Home is Where the Heart is
"I'm dreaming of a white Christmas… just like the ones I used to know." The soft song floated through the massive mansion that served as the Manson family homestead. The soft melody echoed through the giant rooms, its mood bolstered by the gently falling snowflakes visible just outside the window. "The sleigh bells, ringing, and-" Suddenly the song was cut off and the sound of a CD player opening could be heard from the living room. There was silence until a moment later the CD tray closed again and the twelve foot speakers built into the living room walls began to blare.
"MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL! NOW YOU ALL GO F*** YOURSELVES! YAAAAAHHHHHHH!" The sound of pounding drums and wailing guitars flooded through the house as Samantha Manson sighed and plopped happily down on her luxuriously thick living room sofa.
"Mm… catchy." Danny shook his head with a chuckle, turning to look back inside from his position near the window.
"Who wants to listen to Christmas music that makes you sleep through the Holidays?" Sam grinned.
"Or Hanukkah, as the case may be." Danny smiled.
"Yeah, well, do you know how hard it is to find good Hanukkah CD's? It's a conspiracy I tell you." Sam grumbled. "Someone needs to make some good Hebrew Death Metal."
"Nobody rocks the Kasbah like they do." Danny smirked, and was rewarded by getting nailed in the face with one of the throw pillows from the sofa. Danny laughed and turned away from her, looking out the window again, as if looking for something in particular. The smile slowly faded from his lips as he watched the snow fall, even the sound of the screeching music behind him fading from his notice. He thought he heard Sam speak, but he didn't quite make out what she was saying.
A moment later however he felt a pair of thin arms wrap around his torso from behind, and could see Sam's worried expression reflected in the window. "You okay, Danny?" Sam asked softly.
"It's been six months since the Ectoranium meteor passed through the Earth…" Danny said softly. "And Danielle hasn't shown herself even once. She has to know what happened, she has to know things have changed… why hasn't she come back?"
"Mmm… I don't know." Sam shook her head. "Maybe she just doesn't want to for some reason. I'm sure when she's ready she'll be here."
"But why isn't she ready? Did I do something to her?" Danny shook his head.
"Of course not, you've done everything for her." Danny felt Sam's lips press against the back of his neck softly. "She's probably just still finding herself or something… honestly, I think you shouldn't worry about it too much. It won't help anything, and you have people right here who want to care for you."
"Of course…" Danny returned her smile over his shoulder, then turned to look out at the snow again. "I just hope she doesn't need someone to look after her…"
Danny stood tall and proud with his chest out, and his hands resting on his hips. His heroic visage stared out over the snow-capped rooftops, as if searching for injustice and reminding criminals and ghosts alike that they had something to fear. The sightless, fixed eyes inside the marble-crafted face stared straight past the pre-teen girl who stood huddled in a nearby alley, standing within the white flurry of powder and blowing on her hands in an effort to thaw them out while she eyed one of the fruit vendors by the side of the road.
She vanished from the side of the road, moments before several apples vanished from some of the carts, and this time Dani didn't make the mistake of becoming visible nearby. She rushed into the nearby alley, floating as fast as her powers could take her so she wouldn't leave tracks in the snow. Nobody would ever miss the fruit, and it wasn't like anybody else would make their way into this back alley bearing gifts.
They only ever brought lies, she thought to herself as she floated through the small maze of alleys, passing a small line of people huddling together under thin, tearing blankets for warmth. A few had successfully started fires along the way, sending a small cloud of black smoke up to meet the falling white powder. Dani had gotten used to the sight, and seeing the people huddled together actually brought a smile to her lips. Seeing that Danny was on top of the world was wonderful… but seeing these people here like this… kept her here.
She landed outside a small shelter made out of scraps of metal covered with cardboard, which effectively kept out the snow. She landed in front of the shelter, only now allowing herself to fade back into visibility before she pushed aside the tattered blanket that served as the shelter's door and stepped inside. She smiled again when she saw a shivering old man leaning against the far wall, with his nose buried in a dusty old hardback book. He always seemed to be reading it, even though he must have finished it twenty times by now.
"Hey Old Man." Dani called to get his attention, setting one of the apples on the small table beside him. "Brought you some grub."
"One of these days I'm gonna learn you some respect, Little Girl." The aged man warned with a cracked smile as one wrinkled old hand snatched the apple up to take a big bite.
Dani hugged her thin jacket tighter around herself, more for his benefit than because she really felt cold. "It sure gets cold fast in these alleys, doesn't it?"
"Yeah, seems to be faster every year." The old man's gnarled, bald head nodded in agreement as he set his book face-down on the table so as to save his page for later. After he'd done that, he turned his deceivingly sharp eyes on her, eyeing her like a hawk.
"You getting perverted on me?" Dani smirked back. "Because you know I have ghost powers. Try it and-"
"What are you doing here?" The old man asked suddenly.
"Wh-what?" Dani blinked.
"We all know where you come from, Little Girl." The man cracked a smile. "We may not have much, but we still have our brains. You're with the ghost boy."
"N-not really." Dani shook her head.
"But you have a place to go." The man told her. "Why not go there and be rid of this place forever?"
"Rid of it? I love it here." Dani smiled. "Good people, good fun, good vibes. Sure it's a little drafty, but hey, it's like home… it's like MY home." Dani looked at him again. "Now why don't you lie down and not break anything, Old Man?" Dani gently put her hands on his shoulders to push him down on the small cot that served as his bed.
"Bah, enough with the Old Man talk, Little Girl." The old man huffed, though he didn't struggle against her. "I'll have you know I was once your age!"
"Really? What were T-Rex's like?" Dani smiled innocently.
"Oh you're gonna get smart, eh? I'll have you know I was a promising young actor at your age, the parents RAVED over my performances."
"I'm sure they did." Dani pulled the thin blanket up the man's body, tucking it in around his shoulders like a mother would her child.
"-And kids today don't know what real discipline is all about…" the old man was still grumbling as he settled down on his cot, his ramblings finally broken by a soft yawn.
"Goodnight, Old Man." Dani leaned down to kiss his cheek softly, leaving him snoozing on the cot as she turned to leave the small shelter, her foot crunching down onto the thick powder on the ground outside.
No sooner had she emerged than a large white sphere slammed into the side of her head, jerking it to one direction, where she remained while several voices gasped in unison behind her.
"Oh you threw it too hard!" A girl's voice shrieked.
"She had it coming!" A boy's voice replied.
"Dani? Are you okay?" A softer girl asked, as she crunched closer through the snow.
Dani didn't respond at first, then suddenly she whirled to see the three children standing behind her. They gasped in unison at the sight of her crooked smile, then their eyes widened when her eyes began to glow frosty blue. The three friends exchanged a glance, then screamed a mixture of fear and laughter as they turned to run, and Dani launched into the sky in hot pursuit.
The remainder of the daylight faded with the laughter of the children echoing through the alleyways. Most people would look down on the alley's inhabitants, but smiles lit up their faces at the sounds that met their ears, and those around them who kept them company even as the snow fell on the flimsy cardboard shelters that they called homes. Some people called them pathetic and sad… but nobody told that to the children.
Danielle Fenton landed in front of her friends, her thick snow boots clomping into the snow as the others laughed wildly against the alley walls. She had a broad, uncontrollable grin on her face as she rested her hands on her hips, panting from her exertions.
"You're the BEST, Dani!" One of the little girls yelled through her giggles.
"Yeah, you throw a mean snowball." The boy shivered and gripped his tattered cloth coat tighter around his shoulders.
Before Dani could respond she heard a high, shrill voice call through the snow, coming from a woman standing in the snowfall nearby. "Come on, children, the sun is going down and the snow is falling harder. You'll catch your deaths if you don't get back to the fires."
"Awww." One of the girls moaned in disappointment, despite the fact that she was indeed shivering.
"You heard the woman." Dani smiled warmly. "Come and find me tomorrow, alright? I'll be happy to take you in a rematch."
"Any time!" The three kids grinned, then waved their goodbyes and whirled to run back toward the softly glowing fires that illuminated the cardboard shelters in the small homeless society. Dani watched them go with her wide smiled firmly planted on her lips, then lifted off from the snow, hovering up toward the sky through the falling white powder.
She landed on the edge of the roof overlooking the alley, hugging her jacket tightly around her torso as she looked up at the powerful pale moon that reflected warmly off of the falling snow. It seemed grim somehow, looking down from up here into the alley and seeing the firelight reflecting off of the walls and the dirty faces of the families down below… to anyone else it would, anyway. Yet the smile never left her face.
The next day was just like the one before it, with the sun hidden behind the low silver clouds overhead that kept sprinkling falling white powder down on the world around them while the people in the alley snuggled together underneath thin rags of blankets for warmth. It was like this every day really, they slept as comfortably as they could in the cold back alley while Danielle herself rested on the top of the building beside them, overlooking the alley like some sleeping guardian angel. It was bitterly cold up here, but she'd found that since her ice-powers had begun to develop a few weeks ago just like Danny's, she wasn't as bothered by the cold as she once had been.
She grumbled and swiped at her nose when she felt something tickling it, feeling a tiny white snowflake brush aside to continue its journey into the alley. With a yawn she sat up fully and brushed some of the gathered white powder off of her body as she climbed to her feet, wiping the sleep out of her eyes with one hand. The people in the alley were still silent and still this early in the morning, getting what rest they could. They would hope for a meal when they awoke, and Dani wanted to give it to them.
She dove from the top of the building, not stopping herself as she plummeted toward the pavement. She went straight down through it, whirling underneath the ground to come back up toward the sky, invisible as she emerged into the middle of the streets, just barely beginning to come to life as people made their way to and from work. She looked around quickly, spotting the fruit vendors she'd hit yesterday nearby trying to sell their wares. She hated taking from the same people too often, they were only trying to make a living after all, so she turned to float further down the street.
She found herself floating outside one of the many Nasty Burgers scattered throughout Amity Park. Floating inside through the front window, she made her way into the back, undetected by those working the registers at the front of the building. She began to gather up those already made burgers she could find, turning them invisible before tugging them into her jacket and turning to seek some more. There were a lot of people in that alley.
She gasped in surprise when a sudden burst of cold swept through her chest, and a waft of blue smoke wafted out from between her lips. She didn't even have time to investigate before she felt a pair of strong hands grip her arms, causing her to squeal and drop the food all over the floor before she was dragged through the Nasty Burger, being yanked out through the wall into the small alley beside the building.
Her back hit the far wall and suddenly she found herself visible once again, with the imposing figure of Danny Phantom hovering in front of her with an angry look on his face. "Danny!? What are you doing!?" Dani demanded.
"What am I doing!?" Danny shouted back. "What about you!? What are you thinking stealing from Nasty Burger? Or anyone for that matter?"
"What I'm thinking is none of your business." Dani replied defensively.
"It becomes my business when you start stealing." Danny insisted. Dani turned to leave, but she was halted by his sudden tight grip on her arm. "Danielle, what is going on here? Why are you doing this?"
"I told you, it's none of your business." Dani glared back at him. "Now let me go."
"Just come back home, Dani, you don't need to steal to eat, you just need to ask."
"No!" Dani yanked her hand away from him and took off into the air, shooting straight up like a bullet as her legs pulled in toward her body, fading into a dangling, ghostly tail. She felt Danny's hand swipe at her, his fingers slipping off of her tail as she darted out into the open air above the buildings and made a sharp turn towards the east, her fists clenched at her sides as she flew as fast as she could.
"Danielle, come back!" Danny shouted from right behind her. "Just stop and listen to me!"
"Make me!" Danielle growled, not slowing down even a little bit. She spun to dart off in another direction, but out of the corner of her eye she spotted a bright green ecto-blast flying straight towards her chest. She spun to try to get out of the way, but it slammed into her shoulder with searing force, sending her spinning through the air as the shock made her lose her flight, plummeting towards a nearby roof.
A squeal erupted from her throat as she slammed into the roof on her back, rolling for several feet before coming to a stop face down, groaning in pain as a sliver of green smoke rose from her burned shoulder. She groaned and pushed herself up on shaking arms.
"Danielle!" Danny landed in front of her.
"You… attacked me." Danielle glared up at him in anger and pain.
"You're not giving me a choice here." Danny raised his arms out to the sides. "I can't just let you steal things. Tell me what's going on! Why won't you come back!? Do you just LIKE being a criminal?"
"N-no! It's not like that!" Dani rose to her feet, nursing her wounded arm. "I can't believe you'd do this to me!"
"I'm sorry, I just-" Danny was cut off by a gasp as his arms shot up, shining green ecto-shields appearing in front of his hands just in time to deflect the stream of powerful ecto-blasts from his young female clone. The blasts deflected into the roof, blowing chunks out of it and sending shards of concrete into the air, but Dani didn't back down, flinging blast after blast in his direction, her eyes glowing green with anger.
"Danielle, stop it!" Danny yelled.
"Get away from me! Get away from me!" Danielle kept flinging her ecto-blasts, though Danny's hands moved rapidly to bat them away before they could do any damage. However fast she threw them, his hands always seemed to be in the way.
Without warning Danny cupped his hands, encasing one of her ecto-blasts in a thick energy shield and whirling with it, spinning down into a crouch. Her next shot flew wide over his head, singing his hair while he brought the blast around inside his shield, then set it loose, sending it hurtling straight back towards her. Dani had no time at all to react before the blast slammed straight into her chest, knocking her back again, slamming into the cold hard roof and skidding toward the building's edge.
She groaned in pain again, raising a hand to her aching chest as Danny moved to stand in front of her, looking at her with a mixed expression of surprise and worry.
"Danielle, please, tell me what's going on." Danny begged her. "If you don't, I'll have no choice. I… I'll have to lock you in the Ghost Zone."
"You wouldn't…" Dani stared up at him in shock, but there was no trace of humor in his eyes. For a moment, the silence as broken only by the gentle wind that brushed the gently falling snow across the land. Finally Dani closed her eyes and shook her head. "Danny… what am I?"
"What do you mean? You're you. Danielle." Danny replied.
"No, I'm you. At least, that's what everyone else sees me as." Dani grunted and pushed herself up slowly to a sitting position, cupping her hands in her lap. Danny knelt down in front of her, listening intently. "Sam, Tucker, Jazz, even Valerie… they're all nice, but I know how they see me. I'm Dani Phantom, like you, but a lesser version of you. And now that you're a big celebrity, that's how everyone would see me. As a copy of you."
"Dani, that's not true…" Danny replied half-heartedly.
"Of course it is, I'm not stupid. As long as I was near you, I would never be known as myself. I would be mini-you, following right behind you. I'd never have a place of my own there, but out here…" Dani grunted and pushed herself up to her feet, turning to walk to the edge of the building. Curiously Danny followed her, and followed her gaze down into the alley, where the small shelters of her community were built, with people talking in low tones and children playing in the falling snow. "Out here, with these people, I have a place. I can help them, and I'll just be ME. I like it here."
"But Danielle, you can't help them by stealing food… even if it's for them, it's still wrong." Danny pointed out.
"Why? It's not like anyone else will ever give them anything." Dani huffed. "I'm like Robin Hood, stealing from the rich and giving to the poor."
"Your definition of 'rich' seems a little loose." Danny smirked.
"It's relative." Dani shrugged. "The point is these people need to eat, they need blankets and jackets to survive the Winter, and nobody else is going to give them to them."
"I get what you're saying, but that doesn't make stealing right. You could start a charity or something…"
"Because people are SO caring and generous." Danielle spat acidly and shook her head. "Danny… please, just leave us alone. Leave ME alone. You're not going to stop me without sending me to the Ghost Zone, because I will not abandon them."
Danny stared at her for a moment, then shook his head. "Fine…" He turned to leave, tucking his hands into the pockets of his ghostly bodysuit.
"R-really?" Danielle blinked in surprise. "Just like that?"
"I'm not gonna fight you, Danielle. Do what you've gotta do…" Without warning Danny took off into the sky, vanishing from sight into ghostly invisibility.
Dani stared after him in shock for several long moments, her eyes fixed on the place where he'd been, until she heard a voice call from down in the alleyway.
"Dani! Come play with us!" A girl giggled from down below.
"Yeah, we'll kick your girly-butt this time!" A boy cackled. Dani turned to look down at them, then allowed herself a soft smile before she leapt down into the alley after the children, who roared like wild animals and let loose with a pre-prepared barrage of snowballs.
Dani didn't have any breakfast or lunch for the people that day, but they didn't really seem to mind. They were very understanding about her inability to get what she'd promised, and in fact they still seemed pleased to see the smiles on the faces of their children, who spent the day trying to ambush her with snowballs, though thanks to her intangibility, she was rarely ever hit. That didn't stop them from trying though, and since they were having so much fun with it, she didn't have the heart to tell them to go away.
The day wore on towards evening, and she could hear her stomach beginning to growl. She might have let Danny talk her out of getting breakfast, but she wasn't going to let all of the people here go all day without eating anything. So in preparation of going out for dinner, she first stopped into the residence of her favorite old man.
"Hey, Old Man." Dani pushed her way into the small cardboard shelter he had made for himself a long time ago. "You in the mood for anything tonight?"
The old man in the back of the shelter looked at her from his mattress, a slight smile spreading across cracked lips. "Well, if it isn't the little girl. You learned some manners, finally?"
"Bite me." Dani said with an innocent smile.
"Bah, you insolent little…" the old man grumbled, though it was a halfhearted grumble belied by a gentle smile.
"So what would you like? Name it, I'll pick up anything for you." Dani walked up to him.
"Actually, I don't think I'm very hungry just now." The smile never left the old man's face.
"What? But you haven't eaten all day." Dani frowned in worry now. "You need to eat to keep your strength up."
"Strength can only last so long, Danielle." One of the old man's hands reached out to touch hers. "I know what you've been doing for us, and… and I can't tell you how much it means to me, and everyone else. Especially those who carry the future."
"I don't understand." Dani shook her head. "Just tell me what you want to eat and I'll get it for you. Anything, anything at all."
"Anything you bring will be fine, Danielle." The old man heaved a sigh, not moving from his thin bed. "I'll make do, just keep giving the people here what they need. I'll be right here, resting." He smiled, snuggling down into his blankets.
"Alright…" Dani was still unsure what he was babbling about, but decided not to press it anymore. "I'll bring you something good." She pecked his cheek and turned to leave, emerging into the alley.
She was surprised to see that the people had all left their shelters, and were gathered around one of the alleyway entrances. She was stunned to see that several already had steaming bowls clutched in hands covered by thick winter mittens. More and more broke away from the crowd, families wandering away from the scene with their food, laughing merrily to one-another as they made their ways back to their shelters.
Dani wandered toward the alleyway entrance as the crowd thinned, revealing Sam Manson standing behind a broad metal serving tray on wheels with several huge pots of stew and several dozen pairs of gloves stacked beside that. At her side was Jazz, handing out the pairs of gloves with a broad smile on her face and a proud glint in her eye.
"I hope they're useful!" Jazz shouted after one of the retreating and well-fed families.
"Sam? Jazz?" Dani walked up to them, struggling to find something to say. "Wh-whaaaa?"
"Hey Danielle. Danny filled us in on what's been going on." Sam dipped the ladle into one of the pots and poured a hot bowl, holding it out to her. "I never knew there was a place like this in Amity Park."
"Me neither. It's so sad." Jazz frowned. "How could something like this go unnoticed for so long?"
"People don't notice things they don't care about…" Dani numbly took the proffered bowl in both hands, then blinked away her shock and narrowed her eyes. "Danny sent you here didn't he? To convince me to come back?"
"What? No!" Sam huffed. "Danny actually told us to stay away from here."
"So what are you doing here?" Dani demanded.
"What does it look like? We're handing out warm food for Christmas." Sam smirked. "And you're welcome, by the way." She spat acidly. She looked ready to continue talking, but Jazz rested a hand on her shoulder to calm her.
"I'm sure after what all happened with Vlad and then exploring the world, you've seen plenty of people who are… less than trustworthy, less than kind." Jazz stepped around the serving tray and stepped up in front of her with a pair of gloves in hand. As she spoke she pulled the bowl out of her hands, replaced here tattered gloves with a fresh pair, and held out the bowl to her again. "And you have every right to be skeptical of humanity after all of that, heck, it's hard for me not to be like that too sometimes. But trust us, Dani, there are good people out there. People who would help you, and everyone here if we could."
Dani stared down at the bowl of soup, then silently took it from her with both hands. "I'm not going to ask you to come back home, I understand why you won't… just ask us if you need anything, okay?"
"I could… use another bowl for a friend." Dani grumbled, feeling suddenly like a tiny ant talking to a pair of angels.
"Coming right up." Sam filled another bowl and handed it to her. Silently, trying not to look at them again, Dani retreated back toward the old man's shelter.
She was almost there when she got up the courage to look back at the two girls with a mumbled "thank you" before she pushed her way through the dangling blankets that made up the old man's door.
"Back so soon?" The old man asked quizzically.
"Turns out I didn't need to go anywhere, tonight." Dani walked up to him, set the bowls aside, and put her arm around his shoulders to help him into a sitting position. "Here you go… this is for you." Dani carefully pulled his small cracked wooden side table over to set his steaming hot bowl on top of it for him before she plopped down on a small fluffy garbage bag nearby.
"Wouldn't you rather spend this holiday with your friends, Little Girl?" The old man asked curiously.
"Nah… I can see them anytime." Dani replied. "Christmas is a time to spend at home, I say." She smiled back up at the old man before lifting her spoon from her bowl to taste the soup. It tasted like crap, but it was warm and chunky enough to be filling. As they said, beggars certainly couldn't be choosers. Everyone had still seemed so grateful for it, and so was she. She had never expected anyone to show up bearing gifts for no reason.
Jazz was right, she had seen plenty of horrible people in her journeys after leaving Danny to see the world, with Vlad being only one of many vile beings in the world. It had begun to seem like nobody on this planet cared, nobody except her and naybe Danny, but she supposed she had just been too harsh. People could be good after all, they could be kind, sometimes it just took something to make them realize that kindness was worth it, even if they didn't get anything in return. If there was ever a time of year to remember this lesson, she supposed, then Christmas was it, and she felt better than she ever had in her life.