Edit: that moment when you call Casper High Amity Park High a few times, sorry! Should be all fixed now :)
"Man, this is really not the way I wanted my day to go," Danny yelled while wildly clinging to a ghost he'd never seen before. This ghost had some weird obsession with airplanes, as he insisted on riding in a black and green fighter plane. Danny, however, refused to let go of the ghost, afraid that if he did, he'd never be able to catch up to him again.
"Let go, ghost child! I simply have a delivery to make, then back to the ghost zone for me!" the ghost yelled over the wind in a raspy voice.
"Well, if you're not going to slow down, then it looks like I'll just have to wing it!" Danny smirked, particularly proud of that pun. He somehow managed to grasp the Fenton Thermos in one hand while holding onto the arm of the fighter pilot ghost with his other hand, but struggled with getting the lid off. "Just- Come- OFF!" he growled.
"Time's up, ghost child!" the fighter pilot ghost said, pressing a small round black disk to the halfa's chest. It began beeping, a small green light flickering on and off every few seconds.
"What the- get this thing off of me!" yelled Danny, dropping the Fenton Thermos and scratching at the disk in an unsuccessful attempt to get it off. "It won't come off!"
"You refused to just let me make my delivery in peace, ghost child, so now you pay the price!" the ghost shook Danny's scrawny fingers off of his arm, leaving Danny floating midair and slightly disoriented.
He looked down at his chest while the green flashes of light and the beeps grew more constant. He tugged at the fabric of his hazmat suit, only to find that it was indestructible as ever. Danny grunted a few times in exasperation, trying frantically to tug the weapon off of him. Finally, the consecutive beeps turned into a single long beep, the green light ceasing to flicker anymore. Danny, looked around frantically, trying to find an idea, but coming up short of any.
With a large flash of toxic green light, Danny's body flexed in pain. A throaty yell escaped his throat as he felt himself falling through the air towards the ground, his consciousness slipping slowly away.
Dash had been the last one on the field for the fourth time that week. Something about his football game had been slacking lately, and he just couldn't figure it out. Instead of talking to the coach and trying to troubleshoot, Dash decided that it would be a better idea to just practice a little more and take it like a man.
'Take it like a man, you wimp!' the words repeated themselves over and over again, like rubbing salt in an open wound. 'You're a disappointment to this family.' Dash pushed himself harder. 'You'll never amount to anything.' Ran a little faster. 'All you're worth is football, and that'll only last another three years.' Dash sprinted the remaining few yards until he crossed the finish line on the track just outside of the school. He stopped, sweat dripping from his face.
Checking the stopwatch, he saw that instead of cutting back a few seconds, he'd gained nearly five whole seconds on the 500 meter. "Damn it, Dash, what the hell's wrong with you? All you're good for is sports, and you're getting worse at even that!"
He grabbed his water bottle, running a hand through his damp blonde hair and heading back to the boys locker room. Suddenly, a few hundred feet above him, a green flash of light and a large 'boom' shook the sky, causing the distraught athlete to look up at the sky. A black, white, silver and green collection of flames rocketed straight towards Casper High, crashing through the roof.
Dash dropped his water bottle, sprinting towards the building while a million possibilities ran through his head, none of them good. He threw open the boy's locker room door, watching as a cloud of green and black smoke poured out. After a few seconds, the smoke cleared, and Dash ran into the locker room, jumping over benches like hurtles to get to what the smoke was coming from.
He stopped in his tracks, hearing a groan from the person in the middle of the smoke. Dash held his breath, questioning if he may have imagined it. Another small groan followed by a wheezing cough signaled that there was, in fact, someone in there. He ran into the plume of smoke after taking a deep breath, shocked at what he saw.
Surrounded by a crater of rubble was none other than Dash's ex-punching bag. Danny Fenton.
"Oh jeez, Fenton- Phantom, you don't look so hot- I don't mean hot, you're not hot or anything- well I mean, oh . . . " Dash's rambles were the first thing Danny heard as he regained consciousness.
"Dash, calm down," Danny groaned, his eyes barely open. The school's resident jock looked down at Danny in shock.
"You're alive- er, half alive!"
"Help me up?" Danny asked. He was determined to find that fighter pilot ghost.
"Um, yeah, sure," Dash was there in an instant, throwing Danny's arm over his shoulder and helping him to his feet. They hobbled out of the plume of smoke, and as Danny took a deep breath of clean air, he managed to support himself without Dash's help. Two bright blue rings formed around the teen hero's waist, moving apart until he was completely in his ghostly form.
"Thank's for the help, Dash, now I've gotta go," Danny began to float slightly off the ground, only to wince as he felt a sharp pain in his side.
"Fenton, oh jeez!" Dash yelped while Danny fell forward into the jock's chest. The blue rings formed around his waist once again, turning the hero back into a human. "I don't think you're in the condition to be going anywhere."
"Yeah, I guess . . . " Danny mumbled. Dash gently set him on one of the benches in between a row of lockers so that Danny was laying down.
"Here, let me go grab a first aid kit," Dash spoke quickly, running to grab one of the many first aid kits kept in the boys locker room.
After Danny's secret ghost hunting and superhero work had been unearthed when he saved the planet from that meteor, Casper High made sure to keep first aid supplied with ectoplasmic and human supplies ready at all times. That way when Danny stumbled back into class after a run in with a ghost, he didn't have to pretend he wasn't injured and wait until he got home to fix up his wounds.
"Here we go," Dash ran back, a first aid kit in hand. He pulled up Danny's usually white but now bloodied t-shirt, revealing a four inch gash across his side. Dash pulled a rubbing alcohol wipe from the kit, running it over the gash while Danny winced.
"That stings," Danny hissed.
"Uh, yeah, duh," Dash said harshly before biting his lip apologetically, not daring to look the ghost boy in the eyes. "Sorry. Still getting used to . . . ya know . . . "
Danny bit his lip while Dash rubbed a bit of an ectoplasm salve Danny's parents had whipped up in the lap after discovering his secret. Dash topped the wound off with a strip of gauze, sealing it with a bit of medical tape.
"Good as new," Dash gingerly recovered Danny's midriff with the now rust-colored t-shirt.
"Thanks, Dash," Danny managed to sit up next to Dash, holding his side. Due to the lack of injuries to his chest, Danny came to the conclusion that the disk that ghost had put on him was just a stun bomb, not an actual explosive. The nasty gash across his side was probably from his nearly three story fall.
"No problem," Dash sighed, running his hand over his buzzcut. For some reason,he seemed more reserved than usual, almost self conscious.
"Hey, Dash, I know I probably shouldn't be asking this, but what's the matter?" Danny finally worked up the nerve to ask.
Dash looked over at Danny hesitantly before looking straight ahead and beginning to speak softly. "I just feel guilty for all those times I beat ya up, that's all. I mean, with all those ghosts beating ya to a pulp already and such."
His response shocked Danny, to say the least. He'd known Dash Baxter to be a self centered, arrogant jerk who didn't care about anyone but himself. Seeing such a high level of emotion and sincerity both made Danny uncomfortable and strangely intrigued at the same time.
"Um, weird question, but why?" Danny asked. "I mean, before you knew about . . . you know, you pretty much would beat me up. Nobody else, just me. Why?"
"Well . . . I just . . . " Dash sighed, resting his head in his hands. He looked to sad and pathetic, Danny almost felt sorry for him.
"Dash, you can tell me, I won't tell anyone else. We can keep it between just the two of us."
"Ok," Dash said after a but of hesitation. He lifted his head from his hands, glancing at Danny before looking straight ahead again and beginning to speak. "I just . . . don't really know how else to . . . ya see, my dad. He does all kinds of things to me. He beats me up and tells me it's because he loves me. He calls me a loser and tells me that it's because he wants me to grow up stronger."
Danny's mouth hung sightly open. He had expect any answer besides that one. "So, you . . . "
"Yeah, Fenton. Always have, always will. I . . . I like ya a lot. I care about you, and I just don't know how to say it. Words don't- they don't- they just don't work for me. It's like my mind turns to putty when I'm around you and I just can't help but punch you. It's the only way I was ever taught to say that . . . that . . . " Dash turned slowly towards Danny, looking right at him. Danny looked into Dash's electric blue eyes, and everything seemed to move in slow motion.
Dash slowly put his hands on either side of the ghost boy's face, and Danny was surprised by how warm they were. Dash leaned in until they were just a few centimeters apart. "I love you, Danny." The two bridged the gap between them, pressing their lips to one another's. Danny's stomach did a summersault, his eyes closing for just half a second.
No, Danny thought, shaking his head and pulling away. "Dash, I," Danny took a few deep breaths, his usually completely steady heart beating faster and faster. "I have a girlfriend. I- I love her, I can't just . . . "
Dash looked down at his hands, getting the memo. "Ok. I got it."
Danny felt his heart twist. What have I done? He threw an arm around Dash's shoulder, wincing slightly from the pain in his side, but ignoring it. "Hey, we can still be friends, ok? And- and I swear, nobody'll hear about this. What happens in the locker room stays in the locker room, ok?"
Dash looked up at Danny, analyzing his face for a few moments before smiling sadly and nodding. "Ok, yeah."