Author notes:
1)English is my second language. Forgive me for any mistake.
2)I don't own Danny Phantom. The only thing I own here are the plot and the OCs
3)Just one thing: In my story Phantom Planet never happened.
4)I have to give my special thanks to two people for helping me with this story: Truephan and akurate imma (a.k.a Shadow of Light).
The fifteen-year-old Danny Phantom got back at his home at 3:30 a.m., bruised and tired after another fight with Technus. He carried the thermos containing the ghost to the ghost portal located in the basement of his house and flushed him back to the ghost zone.
He turned intangible and flew back to his room. When he arrived two white rings appeared around his waist and moved to opposite directions turning him back to his human self.
He yawned and was ready to collapse on the bed and try to rest for a bit when he saw a few books on his desk. It was his unfinished Math homework. He groaned as he dragged himself to the desk and sat down on a chair. He turned on his table lamp and opened his notebook and tried to solve the problems.
When the sunlight started to warm up his room, he sighed. He was too tired to solve correctly any of the problems, since he didn't get any sleep and probably the teacher would scold him. Again.
He decided to at least take a shower before his sister decided to occupy it. He struggled to keep himself awake and decided to bathe with cold water in order to not fall asleep.
The cold shower did help him a little. After, he wore his baggy blue jeans and before he put on his shirt, he noticed a few more scars on his torso. Technus had made a new model of robot and had decided to add some chainsaws in it. Fortunately, for Danny, the evil ghost liked to gloat about his plans of dominating all technology of the world and the halfa was capable of trapping him off-guard inside of the Fenton Thermos.
He touched one of his new scars located on his belly and flinched. It still hurt a bit. He shivered with the thought of having to sustain such damage in his human form. He wore his usual red and white t-shirt alongside with his red jacket in order to hide the bruises and cuts of his arms and decided to organize his backpack for the school. The fact that it was Friday didn't help him one bit. For Danny it only meant that he would have to fight ghosts without having to worry about skipping a few classes.
Soon, he started to feel the smell of the breakfast that his mom was making. He smiled a bit with at least having something good to start his day. He went downstairs and found his mother alone in the kitchen preparing waffles, bacon and scrambled eggs for her family.
She was already in her blue hazmat suit, however her head wasn't covered. She looked to her son and frowned. He had dark circles under his eyes. It showed her that he didn't get any sleep at all again.
She worried about him and tried to figure it out what were his problems. She tried to talk to him, giving him space and even tried to be subtle about it with no success.
Realizing that his mother was looking at him worriedly he quickly told her: "I've been studying the whole night, mom. I'll be fine."
But she knew he was far from fine. She lost the count of how many times he gave her that excuse. She knew that he was lying and it hurt her. His grades were dropping constantly, not to mention that he fell asleep during classes, and got detentions almost in a daily basis.
She knew he could do better than that. He used to have solid Bs and even eventual As now and then. Now his best grades were C-.
"You know, sweetie, I think you would probably have better results if you rested during the night. You're pushing yourself too hard and you won't learn a thing with you don't have good nights of sleep."
"I know, mom…" Danny said quietly as he sat on a chair next to the table.
Maddie sighed. She knew he wouldn't do such a thing. But she was decided to put an end in it.
"Look, Danny, I don't know what you're going through. I want to help you, but you just don't let me! From now on, I'm going to make random visits to your room during the night and if I find out that you're forcing yourself to study, you'll be grounded. And don't even try fool me. I will know if you are pretending to be asleep and there are many tricks for me to find out the truth." The woman stated looking at her son who just couldn't bring himself to look at his mother in the eyes.
Danny's blood ran cold at her words. He didn't know how to duplicate and now how was he supposed to fight ghosts in the middle of the night? Those questions plagued his mind. The last thing he wanted was that his mother found out that he sometimes left the house to fight ghosts. Besides that, Danny knew that he couldn't focus much on his homework and studies during the night, especially because he spends most of the day trying to protect his town. However, he always managed to do, even if it's just a little, of his homework. He always preferred to deliver something than deliver nothing at all.
'That's just what I needed…more pressure!' The teen thought bitterly as he covered his face with his hands. He couldn't afford his parents to discover that he's something they hunt down. He sure could trick his father, but his mother has always been more attentive and was actually competent when it comes to hunting ghosts.
The fear of rejection made him sick and that called the attention of his mother who stopped preparing the breakfast to put her right hand on her child's left shoulder in order to comfort him. "Danny, your father and I are very concerned with you. We want to help you, but we can't until you tell us what's troubling you, son."
Danny wanted to share his secret. He really did, but he was too scared to do so. Before they could continue, both his father and sister arrived in the kitchen.
"Good morning, family! Oh, Maddie, are you preparing your famous waffles?" said the man named Jack Fenton. He was already in his orange hazmat suit hugging his wife from behind.
"Jack, dear, don't try to butter me up. I'll not mix the waffles with fudge." She said sternly turning to him.
"B-but, Maddie. Everything is better with fudge." whimpered Jack.
Danny couldn't help but to smile at the scene for a few reasons: thanks to his dad, the subject of the conversation was changed and it always amused him to see his mother handle his father's obsession for fudge.
Jazz sat down right on Danny's left and noticed the tired look of her little brother, but decided to talk to him more in private.
Maddie gave another sad look at her son and went back to finish making the breakfast. Jack sat down on the table too and started talking about his modification in the Fenton Ghost Detector which, when completed, could pinpoint all ghosts in a 4 mile radius.
Danny got concerned once again. His wondered when his luck was going to wear off. He has been lucky for a year, because all his parents inventions pointed him as a ghost, but they always thought they were defective, therefore he wasn't discovered.
Maddie served the breakfast on the table and Danny ate quietly the food. He did his best to chew it slowly in order to savor it. 'This will probably be the best thing that will happen to me today.' He thought as he chewed the bacon.
After the breakfast, Maddie tried to talk some more with Danny but he told her that he was going to be late and he didn't want another detention for that. Jazz promptly offered herself to give his brother a ride to the school, which he accepted.
Danny went back upstairs to pick up his backpack and said bye to his parents. Jazz was already waiting for him in her car.
After both of her children left, Maddie went to talk to Jack, who was eating his second plate of waffles, about their son. "Jack, Danny is worrying me so much. He is worrying me and I don't know what to do. I've reduced his curfew to 9 p.m., but he still gets home late, he isn't doing well on school, he's not getting any sleep…Jack, I…don't want to believe he's involved with drugs or something worse…" she said before bursting in tears.
The man quickly got up of the chair and went to comfort his wife. "Maddie, please don't do this. Danny is a teenager. I know you're worried, but we both know he knows better than doing drugs." He paused and gently wiped his wife's tears from hers cheeks. "Let's do like this: When he gets home. Let's confront him. We'll make him sit down and tell us exactly what is bothering him and we'll not let him to get up of the couch before he tells us the truth. How about this?" he finished with a warm smile.
"Oh, Jack…" Maddie said hugging her husband tightly. Jack leaned and returned the affection to his wife.
After a few minutes, Jack spoke: "So…can I have fudge now?"
His wife chuckled. 'He always knows how to cheer me up.' she thought.
In the car, Danny closed his eyes trying to rest a little before arriving at school, but his sister had other plans.
"Another ghost fight in the middle of the night, huh?" she more like affirmed then asked.
"Yes…" mumbled Danny figuring it out he wasn't going to have a few moments of rest.
"They have been appearing a lot, specially during school time and in the middle of the night…" she mused for a moment right before a blue mist came out of Danny's mouth alongside with a chill that spread through his body
"JAZZ, WATCH OUT!" yelled Danny pointing to a missile coming towards them. Jazz managed to dodge it and almost crashed in a lamppost. Fortunately, she managed to break just in time. The missile made a small crater in the road and Danny dreaded with the thought of what could have happened if that had hit Jazz's car. He could have survived due his ghost powers, but she wouldn't. Danny saw red.
He quickly turned into his ghost alter ego and stormed against the familiar ghost who was standing still in the air. "Hello, whelp. Missed me?" said Skulker with a grin.
Danny didn't reply. He didn't want to exchange insults, he didn't want to toy around with the ghost hunter. He just wanted to make him pay to point a gun to his sister.
The ghost boy slammed hard against the ghost hunter sending him flying. However, he quickly recovered himself from the attack and one small canon appeared in each arm of his and blasted at Danny hitting him on the chest.
The young halfa fell hard on the street, but he launched himself again at the ghost in the mechanical suit. Skulker grinned again as he changed the cannons for a pair of rocket launchers which appeared on his shoulders. Each one fired 5 missiles against the boy.
Seeing the incoming attack, Danny growled and tried to destroy all the missiles with his ghost rays against them, but he only destroyed three of them, while two actually hit him and the remaining 5 made holes on the street.
Danny was thrown once again against the street by the explosion and fell in one of the craters in the ground. He was bleeding and the upper part of his jumpsuit was also damaged.
He gritted his teeth and flew again at Skulker who welcomed him by drawing a pair of green blades from his arms. When Danny got really close to Skulker, he unleashed his more powerful attack, the ghostly wail.
The attack at a point blank range completely destroyed the armor of the ghost hunter revealing his small true form. But that wasn't all. The sound attack broke all lamps in the street alongside with all windows of houses and buildings nearby. If Danny had used the attack on the ground he could have demolished them.
Skulker's diminutive form fell on the ground and couldn't focus. His vision was blur and he couldn't hear a thing. Danny flew back to the ground where Skulker was and picked him up and started to squeeze him in his hands making the small ghost yell in pain.
Jazz's ears were still ringing due her brother's sound attack, but she feared more about Danny more than ever. He didn't even bothered to look around to see if there was someone nearby and was going to kill a ghost! She bit her lower lip and quickly looked around in case of any witness, which, fortunately, there was none at the moment. But she knew that the explosion would call attention and she opened her own backpack and took a Fenton Thermos from inside of it. She wasn't sure if ghosts could be killed, but she wasn't going to let her brother become a murderer.
She quickly aimed the thermos at Skulker and, fortunately, she hit the ghost she wanted to capture. The small ghost was dragged to the thermos and Jazz closed it tight.
Danny turned angrily at Jazz showing his teeth in anger. Jazz gasped when Danny turned and his eyes were, for a brief moment, red. She looked scared and that made Danny snap out of his trance.
The halfa looked down in shame and turned invisible and flew his way to the school without saying a word to his sister. "Danny…" Jasmine muttered to herself worried about her brother.
Danny rushed to the school and looked for a place to change back. He went to behind of the Casper High and after looking around for signs of other people, he changed back.
He walked all his way around the school to notice that his backpack was still in Jazz's car. He cursed his own bad luck under his breath and he almost collapsed on the grass he was standing on. His clothes weren't torn like his jumpsuit, however they were starting to get messy with the blood coming from his wounds. He always healed faster in the ghost form, but even healing faster than a normal human, it would take some time. All he could do was at the moment was lean against the wall of his school and slowly sat down. He closed his jacket to prevent other people seeing the blood on his shirt and closed his eyes for a moment.
After a couple of minutes Danny heard a familiar voice calling him. He slowly opened his eyes and saw it was Sam who was calling for him. Tucker was right next to her and the two teenagers went quickly to aid his friend.
"Are you okay, dude?" asked Tucker concerned. Sam was also very preoccupied with her friend.
"I've had better days…"Danny said bitterly as he groaned in pain when he tried to stand up with little success. Sam and Tucker helped him to stand on his own. The goth girl didn't know what to do. It was obvious that her friend needed medical care, but how would they explain how he got such wounds. The doctors would ask him many uncomfortable questions.
Seeing that his friends worried faces, he forced a smile and told them: "Guys, I'm ok now. Honest. I was just hurt a little because of Skulker. It isn't such a big deal."
"Of course it is a big deal, Danny! I don't know what has gotten into those ghosts to attack our town constantly, but you can't handle it all just by yourself. You barely let us help you when a ghost appear. Even when it's just the Box Ghost!" Sam said worried.
"Yes, dude. You've told us they're attacking almost everyday during the night and we can tell you aren't sleeping much." Tucker said.
Danny genuinely smiled that time and in thanks for his friends who looked puzzled at him. "How about this? After school, if there isn't any ghost trying to destroy the town, can we go see the movie 'Bloodbath 4: the ultimate revenge'." Suggested Danny.
"The weirdest thing is that they named Bloodbath 3, as 'the final spill'. It's kinda sad when they try to resurrect a dead franchise. Many people said that the movie didn't stood up for the greatness of the last 3." digressed Tucker.
Realizing that Danny had completely changing the subject, Sam frowned: "No Danny. You aren't going to see any movie today. As soon as the school is over, go to your home and sleep. You seriously need it. If any ghost appears, Tucker, Jazz and I still have some ecto-weapons. We can handle it for you."
Danny was about to protest when his sister arrived at the school and easily spotted her brother next to the school. She rushed to him, carrying both her backpack and Danny's, and asked him what had happened to him. "Danny, it's not like you to be so angry. If I hadn't trapped Skulker into the Thermos, you could've killed him!" She said to her brother looking straight at his eyes.
Tucker and Sam gasped when they heard what Jazz had just said. "It's just…I couldn't hold myself after Skulker's attack, Jazz. He could've hurt you, or worse…" the halfa said not being able to keep looking at her sister's watery eyes. She gave him a hug. Danny flinched in pain, but said nothing.
"Danny, you're worrying me. All of us…Please don't fight like that. I know that if you think properly you can do better in those fights.I know you'll think I'm butting in as usual, but…don't you think you could've just frozen all those missiles?"
Danny slapped his own face realizing that his sister was right. If he had used his ice powers he could have prevented the projectiles from blowing up on him and also prevented all the damage on the street. 'Just great…I've scared the hell out of Jazz and now my city will have to pay for fixing the damage. Vlad is the mayor, but I doubt he would spend his own money to fix my mistakes. He will most likely make another campaign against me blabbering about how I'm the responsible for the raise in the taxes.' Danny thought bitterly.
After releasing Danny from the hug, Jazz gave him back his backpack and told them to go to the class before the bell rang. The four teenagers got into the school, but Jazz kept Danny from entering into it. She asked if he was okay and tried to take a look on his wounds. She would take him to the infirmary if necessary. She would be more than willingly to lie to help her little brother. Danny lied to her saying his wounds were already healed due his ghost powers. Jazz tried to take a look on him, but he just stormed into the school.
The first thing Danny did was getting inside of the boy's bathroom and locked himself inside in it. There was no one inside and the hybrid used that opportunity to open his jacket only to see his shirt with many blood stains. He opened his backpack and took a clean blue t-shirt from it. He took of his jacket and the messy shirt and turned on one of the faucets. He wet the clean parts off his white and red shirt to carefully remove all remains of blood of his torso. It still hurt a little, but he didn't say a thing, because he didn't want to call the attention of anyone else.
When he finished cleaning himself, he folded the dirty shirt and placed it on the bottom of the backpack and dressed the plain blue t-shirt and the red jacket. He unlocked the bathroom and left it.
Tucker, Sam and Jazz thought it was weird of him to lock himself in the bathroom, but decided to not touch in the subject anymore. Unfortunately, for Danny, his best friends had to go the literature class, while the hybrid was stuck with Math as his first class. He said goodbye to his friends and went to his locker.
After preparing himself for the classes, Danny sighed. His first class was with Mr. Smith, the new Math teacher. He was 58 years old, he was tall, lean, all his hair was grayish and his eyes were dark green.
Before Danny entered inside of the class he heard a familiar voice mocking at him: "Hello, Fenturd!"
Danny turned only to face Dash towering at him in an attempt to intimidate him. Danny wasn't in mood to tolerate his bullying, but he didn't want to blow up his secret.
The halfa just said suppressing his anger: "Just throw me in the locker, punch me or whatever you want, Dash. But just get over with it."
Dash couldn't help but to laugh at Danny. "Maybe I'll do all those things and more!" the jock said with a smirk grabbing Danny by the collar of his shirt. But he let go when he saw Mr. Lancer getting near them.
"Is there anything wrong?" The older man asked raising an eyebrow. He knew exactly what was going on. He wanted to punish Dash by giving him detention, however, unless he witnessed Dash's aggression toward the smaller teen or if Danny talked to him about how Dash was bullying him, there was nothing Lancer could do.
Dash faked a smile and told the teacher that there was nothing wrong. "Me and my buddy here were just having some fun, Mr. Lancer." said Dash.
The teacher ordered both teens to get to their seats quickly because it was almost time for classes. When the bald man couldn't be seen anymore, Dash murmured to Danny: "After school, there'll be no teacher to save you, Fentonio!"
Danny closed his eyes tightly in order to hide the fact they turned green with the anger he felt. Both teens got into their respective seats and soon the bell rang signaling that Danny would probably not learn a thing due his tiredness.
As soon as the teacher got into the class. The Math teacher looked at Danny angrily. In the eyes of that teacher, Danny was just a troublesome kid who would just end up being a nobody, because he never pays attention in the classes, made sorry excuses of homework, his best grade in that subject was D and always got detentions after school.
When the class started he ordered the students to deliver the homework on his desk. When Danny put his on the desk, the teacher gave a quick glance at the problems and saw that all his answers were far from being correct. He looked at the teen and said: "I'm not even going waste my breath with you anymore, Mr. Fenton. Go sit down, now."
Danny looked down in defeat and went back to his chair. He couldn't pay much attention on the class and almost fell asleep many times. But he tried his best not to. For once, he couldn't afford to go to detention.
After 2 more classes, Danny was so tired, he didn't feel sleepy anymore. He couldn't exactly explain why he felt like that. When it was lunch break, he was glad he could stay with his friends.
Sam was eating salad, while Tucker put as much meat as possible on his plate. Sam was still an ultra-recyclo vegetarian and Tucker still was an avid carnivore. However, after countless fights they decided to just leave each other be. It was pointless to discuss about what each other should eat, pretty much because they had solid beliefs and none wanted to give up on them.
Danny was particularly happy for that. He didn't have to stop their battles anymore and they could have lunch without many repercussions. Of course sometimes they slipped and made commentaries about each other's plate. Danny himself wasn't very hungry himself and just ate a cheese sandwich.
After lunchtime, the teenagers went back to their classes. Danny was feeling a little better and actually paid attention to Lancer's class. The bald teacher was talking about Crime and Punishment which is a novel written by a Russian author named Fyodor Dostoevsky.
In the middle of the class, he felt his ghost sense went crazy and lots of blue mist came out of his mouth, also the boy shivered in cold. He asked Mr. Lancer if he could go to the bathroom.
The literature teacher frowned, but allowed him. He looked concerned and wondered what was wrong with the boy.
When Danny found himself alone in the halls of the school he turned into Danny Phantom and turned invisible. For reasons beyond his own comprehension, his black and white hazmat suit was again at one piece as if nothing had happened to it earlier that morning. He flew around the school and saw through a window about a dozen of ghostly tigers. They were green with black stripes and had bright yellow eyes.
Danny phased trough the window and when he turned tangible again ready to freeze all ghosts, a hidden ghost tiger jumped from the roof of the Casper High slamming Danny on the ground.
The claws pierced the boy's skin, making the boy yell in pain. Snapping back to reality, the halfa turned intangible and dove into the ground reappearing behind the ghost beast. Danny blasted the tiger which fell unconscious near his fellow felines.
"Hello there, young one." said the unknown ghost before turning visible with a smirk. He had pale blue skin, red eyes and black hair that reached his shoulders. He was tall and muscular and wore brown pants, with no shoes and an open black jacket which seemed to be made of fur. He was holding a brown whip with his right hand.
"And you are?" asked Danny between confusion and anger. He had never seen him before.
"You can call me the Ghost Tamer. I can control all ghost animals. I heard a lot about you and I want to test your strength. Attack my animals!"
The tigers leaped to attack the teen and Danny unleashed ice attack freezing the first five tigers in the front of him. But the others managed to reach the boy who turned intangible, dodging their attacks.
The halfa turned tangible and fired against the tigers with both of his hands, knocking out two more. Another of the stripped felines jumped on him with his jaws opened ready to bit him, when the hybrid shot a powerful ghost ray on it sending it straight to a window. The ghost animal broke it in many pieces and the teen could hear the screams of fright of the students of his school.
He forgot everything else and tried to fly to the room, but he didn't know two things: one that the tiger was unconscious and that the Ghost Tamer was right behind him.
The blue ghost used his whip to attack the boy on his back sending him to the ground and leaving a wound on his back.
"Don't forget about me, ghost brat!" he said with a smirk. Danny was fed up with ghosts trying to kill him and after giving in to his impulse flew at 150 miles per hour against the older ghost.
Too bad Danny's vision was blur and he missed the assault. The ghost teen was still exhausted from the ghostly wail he used on Skulker and didn't have energy for another one. The Ghost Tamer just laughed at his face. "Is that all you can do? You barely are a challenge!"
The Ghost Tamer used his long whip to attack the teen again who wasn't fast enough to turn intangible. The impact threw him on the ground forcing him to turn back to his normal self.
The Ghost Tamer scoffed and used his whip to shatter the ice that was concealing his beasts, then he placed his index finger and his thumb inside of his mouth and whistled, which awoke his unconscious pets and ordered them to leave. Danny only watched as the ghosts fled and he didn't even hear it when the school alarm started to ring.
'What the hell was that? Why didn't he finish me? I'm a magnet for freaks, that's for sure…' Danny thought.
The school was being evacuated and Danny found his cue to leave as well. He was angry, confused, frustrated, hurt and above of all, tired.
The teen struggled to get up and didn't even bothered with his wounds. All he wanted was to rest and he knew he needed it badly.
He focused and transformed again into his Ghost alter ego and flew to his home. He didn't want to face Jazz, Sam or Tucker at that moment. They would try getting him to a doctor and make some bizarre lies to explain his wounds.
The hybrid didn't like the situation he was in not one bit and flew as fast as he could to his house when he was, again, interrupted by another familiar ghost.=
"Rough day, little badger?" teased Plasmius with a smirk as he gave a look at the wounded halfa.
"I'm not in mood for your blabbering today, Plasmius" hissed Danny taking a fighting stance ready to launch himself toward the older hybrid.
Vlad had an amused smile on his face. "If you could actually hurt me, boy, I would consider that a threat."
Danny growled and fired a green ecto-blast against Vlad who simply made a pink shield protecting himself from it.
"I have a proposal for you. How about you go to my house in Wisconsin for a 'vacation'. You should be able to take a break from this madness. Isn't that generous of me?" Vlad said bluntly, making Danny's jaw drop, but he quickly recovered himself.
"Yeah, right. I go to your little trap and you use that time to kill my dad, marry my mom, brainwash me and God knows what with my sister!" He said that firing again at Plasmius who sighed before shielding himself again.
Vlad crossed his arms around his chest and told him with a fake worried face: "You're in a pretty bad shape. You know it. Don't you think that playing hero is costing you a lot?"
"Better this than be your stupid pet, you crazy fruitloop!" snarled Danny back.
"You are too stubborn to see the world as it truly is. Alright, Daniel. Do as you please. But my offer to have you at my side won't last forever. My patience also has a limit! However, I truly hope you see the foolishness of your own acts before it's too late for you." Vlad Plasmius snarled back.
Danny stopped for a moment, but didn't reply. He just told Vlad to leave him and his family alone and stormed back to his house. The boy knew he was no match for the older halfa in his current state. If he were at 100%, maybe he had a good chance of defeating him, but it was impossible being so tired and wounded.
'Excellent. It took a while, but I'm finally starting to break his mind! The pressure and the stress are too much burden for him to handle. It took me a lot convince so many ghosts to continuously attack this place at the most inconvenient hours in order to make Daniel become too stressed and tired to even think! Now, I'll show the boy the life he can have by staying at my side. He'll understand that I'm the only one capable of giving him a future and a true purpose for his life. The world we'll be ours for sure!' Vlad thought with a dark smile as he watched the younger halfa fly back to his home.
End of chapter 1