AN: I pieced this together during slow moments in class and at home. It started as a fic and slowly morphed into a fic-ish description of Danny and his abilities three years after the accident, with the assumption that PP never happened. I'll likely use this as a guidline should I ever write a multichapter fic, and I welcome others to as well, as long as they mention me. As usual CC is very much welcome, though I hope for comments telling me where I did well in addition to where I could improve. As for the one small moment of hinted DxS, which is not my favored pairing and will likely be the limit of anything about the pairing I will ever write, is for Abigail. Thank you. *bows*
It wasn't the first time he found himself restless, restless and up late. The green numerals of his digital alarm clock told him what he already knew, just how late it was as 3:35 changed into 3:36. There had been no ghosts to deal with since lunch, with the Box Ghost inadvertently saving him from the cafeteria slop known as leftover surprise. He should be grateful, both for missing lunch and the lack of ghosts since. He had even gone to bed early back at 9:30 to take advantage of it. Problem was his body had grown used to only getting and functioning on four hours of sleep a night, due to, as usual, the ghost attacks.
The sudden lack of them left him wide awake with him having more than enough sleep to get through the next day and most of the next night with no idea what to do with it. With a sigh he let the white glow of the rings embrace him and ceased to be Danny Fenton and became Danny Phantom. His form turned translucent as he phased through the ceiling first, then the metal monstrosity known as the Opscenter. He wasn't moving very quickly, preferring for the moment to merely float through the obstacles until he viewed the stars over Amity Park. He never got tired of watch the numeriad of brilliant specks that covered the sky over Amity.
One would think that light pollution should have outshone most of them, but even before Amity's growing business sector and increasing number of relatively small skyscrapers there had been a law limiting such light pollution signed into being by a mayor in desperate need of some good publicity long before his family moved here, just prior to his birth.
Whatever the reason behind it, he was thankful for it. It left something he could enjoy on nights like these. His luminescent emerald eyes idly picking up on the familiar sights that dotted the sky, such as the big dipper, Orion, Mars, and Venus. As a half ghost he had found he possessed enhanced abilities, even to human form in some weakened state, that only strengthened as time passed and had grown to enhance things he hadn't noticed until recently, with the chief among them being his senses.
They weren't like "Superman" level senses or anything. But he could hear his mom and dad's voices when they worked on new inventions from his room two floors above with all of the doors closed. He could touch things and pick up on minute details he had never known before. And his sense of taste as well, leading him to do all he could to avoid the cafeteria slop. For scent, is sense of smell had only doubled, but he still knew what was for dinner before even opening the front door.
Finally, there was sight. It was like he could somehow "zoom" with his eyes and it was like looking through a decent pair of binoculars. Something that on clear, restless nights like this one he was very thankful for.
He stopped floating and casually dropped the last few inches onto the Opscenter roof, lying down with his arms crossed behind his head as he stargazed. Now that he thought about it, it was getting close to three years since the accident he thought, idly recognizing stars and planets in the background. He had come a long way since then, and had struggled every step of the way.
The only reason he could think of as to why he had survived those first few chaotic months was the help of his friends, Tucker and Sam. Perhaps, especially Sam. A light blush crossed his cheeks briefly before it faded. He wasn't clueless, though he pretended to be sometimes. He knew how she felt about him; truthfully he shared her feelings, but was too worried about losing the friendship they shared. And so he would continue playing clueless, for now at least.
Eventually he stood, his white hairs ruffling in a slight breeze as a grin crossed his face, the white aura around him brightening for a moment as his legs tensed like a spring right before he jumped. How far the jump might have taken him is unknown as he turned the jump smoothly into a flight and launched himself into the sky. It was, after all, a perfectly beautiful night to fly.
Once he was in the sky his thoughts continued as he easily performed loops. His mind elsewhere as he broke into a climb. He thought back to the early months after the accident, how he had been excited to learn he could fly at just over a hundred miles an hour. He smirked as he dived; taking full advantage of his current top speed of nearly triple of what it had been back then.
But then many things had changed since the early months after the accident. He laughed to himself as he pulled out of the dive at street level, gliding along empty roads. He remembered how he used to turn invisibly or intangible at random, typically at incredibly inconvenient or embarrassing moments. Fortunately for him, things like that had stopped after the first year.
Another laugh escaped him as he remembered the shocked expression on the fruitloop's face as he demonstrated in human form his perfecting the "angry eyes" after Vlad made yet another crack about his dad a few months ago. That was another thing, as his powers increased and grew stronger, some weaker versions of them drifted into his human form; at a fraction of their strength of course.
Other than physical abilities, he could use much weakened ecto and cryo rays, even float a bit though not for long. There were downsides to his powers bleeding into his human form. After the accident his body temperature had dropped to 90 degrees. Now it had slowly decreased to 80 and was holding steady. Fortunately his parents believed it to just be from ecto exposure from standing to close to the portal when it turned on.
He had taken great pains to keep his secret from them so far; he just hoped he would continue to be able to do so. His task was made harder by the tidbits of ectoplasm bleeding into his human bloodstream. He found himself somewhat spooked to discover that the opposite was not true, his ectoplasm as a ghost remained purely ectoplasm.
The half ghost, or perhaps more ghost than he liked to think, pulled up into a hover over Amity Park, his thoughts drifting back to his powers, those which he had alternatively labeled blessing or curse, and how he had improved. He had finally mastered duplication, at least up to four duplicates, and though he had yet, and perhaps would never, learn to teleport like the fruitloop, he had learned something Vlad had yet been able to do, form his own ghost portals. Unfortunately for the moment he could only make them into the ghost zone, not out.
Some five or six months ago he had discovered some slight electrical ability, a manifested remnant of his encounter with Vortex. He turned from where he was and began to fly home. And of course there was the Ghostly Wail. For starters he no longer turned human just from using it. Using it twice quickly was a different matter however. He could focus it if he wanted, so it was no longer as uncontrolled, and he could avoid hitting innocents in a fight.
The teen phased into his room, falling onto his bed, his eyes finally slipping closed for the night. Yes, things were much different than they had been, but still so similar…
