#two sentence

With a slow, deliberate motion, Danny peeled the suit away from his body. His eyes, glowing a harsh ectoplasmic green, locked onto the mirror.

At first, he saw that he had unusual pale skin, the white hair that had replaced his once-dark locks, and the faint glow that always seemed to cling to him in his ghost form. But as the suit fell away completely, his reflection twisted. Shifted.

His skin… no, it wasn’t skin anymore.

Danny’s breath—or the shallow imitation of it—caught in his throat. His face, his chest, his arms, his entire body, charred and burned, was revealed. Blackened skin, cracked and mottled like the surface of scorched earth, stretched over his bones. Green ectoplasm pulsed through the cracks, like veins of molten fire running just beneath his surface. His fingers twitched, and the motion caused flakes of charred flesh to crumble from his hands, only to be replaced by more seeping ectoplasm.

Oh God.

His eyes widened, horror seizing him as he stumbled back, hitting the bathroom wall. His reflection followed, the sickening reality of what he’d become staring back at him. This wasn’t just a ghost form. This wasn’t just some new transformation.

This was him — his real body.

“What… what the hell…” Danny whispered, though his voice cracked, barely audible. He reached a shaking hand toward his face, his fingers brushing against the charred remains of his cheek. The sensation was numb, like touching something distant, not really his own skin. His heart, that dull thrumming echo of a heartbeat, sped up, each pulse a painful reminder of the accident in the ghost portal.

Memories flooded back in fragmented flashes. The screams, the burning sensation, the searing light that had enveloped him when the portal had torn open and ripped through his body. He had never really seen what he looked like after the accident — he’d never wanted to. He had convinced himself that his ghost form was just another side of him, a reflection of his powers, of the energy that had saved him from the brink of death.

But he hadn’t been saved.

He had died.

The boy who had entered that portal was dead, reduced to ash and embers. What stood before him now was something else entirely—something that only wore Danny Fenton’s face when the hazmat suit was on. But beneath it, there was nothing human left.

Just this… charred, hollow corpse.

Danny’s legs gave out beneath him, and he slid to the floor, his back pressed against the cold tile wall. He clenched his eyes shut, trying to block out the sight of his twisted reflection, but he couldn’t unsee it. The truth had sunk in, deep into his core.

He was no longer the boy who lived. He was the boy who had died. Everything since that accident, everything he had tried to hold onto—his family, his friends, his life—had been a lie. Phantom wasn’t just a mask or a persona. It was all that remained.

He let out a shaky breath, or at least tried to. It caught in his throat, more of a rasp than anything else. What would his parents say if they saw him like this? If they knew the truth of what had happened to their son? Would they even recognize him as Danny, or would they see him as just another ghost — just another monster to be hunted and destroyed?

He pressed his hand to his chest, feeling the unnatural smoothness of his charred skin, the faint vibration of ectoplasm flowing beneath it like blood. It was a grotesque mockery of life. He wasn’t healing, wasn’t recovering from this. This was him now. This was all he had left.

Tears pricked at his eyes, but even they were tinged green, drops of ectoplasm that burned as they rolled down his cheeks. He looked up at his reflection once more, his glowing eyes locking with the hollow, scorched thing staring back at him.

And for the first time since the accident, Danny Phantom understood just how much he had truly lost.

He wasn’t prepared to take off the mask — not now, not ever. Because the mask, the suit, the human skin he hid behind, was all that kept him tethered to the life he so desperately wanted to return to.

But the truth had always been waiting beneath. A truth as blackened and charred as the body he now inhabited.

And the classes taught at Casper made him and Ron uncomfortable, and Hermione was always bordering on arguing about the content. Harry didn’t struggle as much. He hadn’t grown up believing blood magic and necromancy were evil like Ron, and he hadn’t delved into studying all things about British magical history like Hermione.

But of course, Harry’s life was never simple.

“Is that your sister?” Harry asked, pointing to a girl who looked about two years younger than Danny, although they looked like they could be twins. They were at lunch and Harry was trying not to think too hard about what was in the food. He definitely preferred Hogwarts meals. He had seen the girl before and been curious. 

“Ellie? No. She’s my clone sister.”

“What?” Hermione asked, dropping her spoon.

“Oh yeah. There’s this creep that wants to kill my dad, marry my mom, and take me as his son. Since we kept refusing he tried to clone me.” Danny smiled at his…sister. She waved at them, coming over.

“Hey, I’m Ellie. You guys are the visitors from the weird magic school, right?” she plopped down on the seat next to Danny, reaching over to steal one of his fries.

“And you’re a clone?” Hermione said, her eyes flickering between Danny and Ellie.

“Yup.” she said, stealing another fry from Danny. 

“What’s a clone?” Ron asked, his brow furrowing in confusion.

Hermione stared at him. 

“Well, you see,” Ellie started, and Danny snorted, “when a Fruitloop is so obsessed with having another woman’s son as his own, he takes some of his DNA, and makes a baby, that he then grows with magic till they’re about the right age, then he tells them that they’re meant to replace the original, but they’re too smart and decide they’d rather be the original’s sister, and they both beat up the Fruitloop.”

Harry stared at her incredulously. Beside him he could see Ron gaping, and Hermione opening and closing his mouth.

Across from them Danny rolled his eyes while Tucker and Sam laughed.

“That’s not quite how it happened.” Danny said. “But basically yeah.”

“You have a Dark Lord?” Hermione finally managed to say.

“He wishes he was a Dark Lord.” Danny said, chuckling.

“What even is a Dark Lord anywary.” Sam said, rolling her eyes. “Is it just someone who does magic you don’t agree with? What is it that makes someone a Dark Lord, and who gets to decide?”

“Sam,” Tucker interrupted, “let’s not get philosophical again.”

She huffed and crossed her arms but fell quiet.

“Besides, Vlad’s a Fruitloop, not a Dark Lord.” Danny said, rolling his eyes.

Hermione looked like she wanted to argue about the Dark Lord thing, but Ron elbowed her in the side. She glared at him, but picked up her spoon and angrily started eating again.

Harry decided to redirect the conversation. “So, why don’t you have Defense Against the Dark Arts?”

“What’s really considered dark?” Sam started, but Tucker spoke up quickly.

“I think we cover the same basic concepts when it comes to spellcrafting. And there’s classes on the different magical races–”

“The people you classify as creatures.” Sam interrupted, glaring.

Tucker continued as if she hadn’t spoken, which was probably for the best. “and their history and traditions. But that’s more of a social class. It’s still a required gen ed so we can be more aware of each other.”

“Really?” Hermione asked, sounding interested. “I wish they taught that at Hogwarts.”

Sam opened her mouth, probably to make another controversial comment, But Danny spoke over her.

“You can probably buy the textbooks to take back with you when you leave at the end of the semester.”

Harry relaxed, glad that it didn’t look like they’d be getting into another debate.