What was happening to him?
Danny groaned and curled in on himself in his bed, shivering even though he felt hot all over. The entire day long he had felt off, as if he was getting sick. But this wasn't normal, that much he knew. At school he hadn't been able to control his ghost powers. His hand had disappeared into the walls and according to Tucker throughout the day parts of him had turned invisible for a few moments. It was like he was back at the beginning when he had first gotten his powers. Why couldn't he control them properly?
Another wave of nausea hit him and he went to his bathroom, not wanting to accidentally make a mess in his bed. He tried to breathe evenly and will himself not to throw up. Could this get any worse? He was in pain, didn't know why, his powers were out of control, making it difficult to hide them and he had no idea when this was going to stop. Great, just great.
"You okay?" Tucker asked him the next day at school and Danny nodded. "Yeah, just didn't get much sleep last night." I was busy trying not to pass out from pain, he thought grimly. The random pains had vanished at one point, thank God, and he had been able to get some sleep, although it hadn't been much. Hopefully that was the end of it. He seriously didn't want to go through that again.
Tucker didn't look convinced. "What was wrong yesterday? You had some serious luck that no one noticed that your arm was missing in the hallway. I thought you had your powers under control?" he asked, sounding worried.
"I can control them. It's been a year. I…just, I don't know. Just had a bad day I guess," Danny replied dismissively, not wanting to talk about it. "So, we didn't have any English homework, did we?"
Sam grabbed his arm and dragged him away from the other students at lunch. "Hey, what are you doing?" Danny asked, rubbing his arm when his best female friend let it go.
"Danny, what the hell?" Sam looked at him and Danny didn't know whether she sounded more annoyed or worried. Judging from her expression it was more likely that she was annoyed.
"If you keep this up somebody will notice. You froze your whole lunch tray!" Sam told him, pointing to their table where Tucker was pretending nothing was wrong and tried to warm the tray up with his hands' body heat.
"Oh." Danny hadn't even noticed. He rubbed the back of his neck and sheepishly looked at her. "Uhm, woops?" He received a glare in return.
"That's all you have to say about that? Danny," she then sighed, "look, Tucker and I are a bit worried. Yesterday it was the same thing. Is there something wrong?"
Oh definitely, Danny just didn't know what exactly. "I don't know. I've been feeling a bit under the weather. It's nothing. I'll try to be more careful from now on," he told her reassuringly and smiled at her, hoping she would leave it at that. It looked like she wanted to continue the conversation, but the bell rang, effectively cutting her off.
"I better get to class," he said and walked away. Great, now his friends were worried. He suddenly felt a stab of pain and rubbed his stomach, stifling a groan. He hoped things would return to normal soon.
He couldn't take this anymore. There had to be a reason that this was happening.
Danny couldn't stand the pain any longer, the heat, and the nausea. Something was wrong, it was like- he couldn't explain it properly. He felt like something was missing. He needed something, but what?
He stood up, trying to ignore the pain in his stomach, and left his room, walking downstairs and to the basement. This had to do something with his ghost side, that was the only explanation he could come up with. When he was normally sick it didn't affect his ghost powers. Maybe he could find an explanation in the Ghost Zone.
Now determined to find the solution to his problem he transformed, gasping when another wave of pain went through his body. "What's happening?" he asked himself and winced, wrapping his arms around himself. It was somehow worse now. This only strengthened his belief that this was because of his ghost side. He looked at the portal and noticed that the Ecto Filtrator needed to be changed. Right. He vaguely remembered his dad reminding him. Deciding that he definitely didn't want the house to be destroyed he took a new filter and exchanged the two.
And then something changed. Danny didn't know why, but he couldn't look away from the Ecto Filtrator. The concentrated Ectoplasm within looked so…good.
Danny suddenly realised what this feeling was, he knew what was missing. He felt hungry, no, he was starving. He just hadn't realised it because it felt different from his normal hunger. This was much worse.
Almost automatically he opened the Ecto Filtrator and the smell of ectoplasm was nearly overwhelming. Danny knew that normally people thought it didn't smell all that great, he normally was pretty neutral about it, but in this moment he thought that he had never smelled anything this good before. It smelled delicious.
And before he knew it he was drinking it. He couldn't drink fast enough, actually. He wanted it all, needed it all. The gooey substance tasted amazing and Danny quickly drank it all, every last drop.
When he was finished he felt much better, the pain gone and he smiled, before he realised what had just happened. He had drunken ectoplasm, concentrated ectoplasm. He let the now empty Ecto Filtrator drop to the ground and stared at it. What was going on?
Danny felt like that hadn't been him a moment ago. He would never drink that stuff voluntarily. Never. Why had he done this? He felt disgusted and shivered, not knowing why this had happened. He physically felt better, the pain was gone, but mentally? Oh boy. He couldn't come to terms with what had just occurred. He should forget all about it. It was useless trying to figure this all out now.
Still somewhat dazed from the entire experience he put the old Ecto Filtrator away and changed back into his human form. He quietly went upstairs and back into his bedroom. Sleep will fix it all, he thought to himself, I should forget this all. He quickly fell asleep, exhausted from the tiring night, the thought of the utter satisfaction he had felt when he drank the ectoplasm never quite leaving his mind.