Not sure where this came from or if I'm going to continue it. Would love to know what you think!
The whole thing had been Jazz's idea. It was wild, outlandish and the very thought of it made Danny incredibly uncomfortable, but he had to admit that it made sense.
It had been a crazy week, and just thinking about the events had unfolded was exhausting for the halfa. Just seven days before, life was so much simpler and easy to navigate. Now, it was as if the very ground beneath him had shifted and life was unrecognizable.
On Sunday morning, he had woken up to his usual routine of sneaking away to take care of the Box Ghost yet again. He'd returned shortly after, just in time for the Fenton family breakfast. Luckily, this time none of the food had ecto-contamination so he didn't have to fight back against the meal for once.
Sam was out of town for a Manson family reunion in some ritzy location he'd already forgotten the name of, and Tucker was occupied with a group project. That left him with no plans for the day, which was an odd position to be in. He couldn't remember the last time he hadn't been busy, and he couldn't shake the lingering feeling that he should be doing something with the time.
When his dad asked him to help out in the lab for the afternoon, he didn't have a good excuse to get out of it. So he found himself dressed in an unfortunate orange hazmat suit passing tools to his father as worked on the latest invention. An invention that Danny wished he could sabotage, right then and there to save himself the trouble it was sure to cause his ghost half later.
What he hadn't been counting on was the troubles the lab posed for his human half. A bit clumsiness coupled with his father's inability to put sharp objects away had led to an incident where his hand was impaled with a scalpel sitting in the countertop. He'd been so surprised by the pain, his eyes had betrayed his other self and Jack Fenton had noticed.
Now, Jack Fenton was not the brightest man around, but he wasn't a complete fool. His son's accident had been strange on several levels. The boy hadn't made a sound when the sharp object went straight through his hand, not even a grunt of pain. The only sound that clued him into realizing anything had happened at all was the sound of the bottom of the scalpel scraping the lab countertop.
Then there were the eyes. His son's blue eyes were distinctive, so when he met a set of bright green eyes he was startled. His first thought had been fear that his son was being overshadowed. This fear was squashed when he noticed the blood running from Danny's wound. Red and glowing green oozed from the opening in a shocking display. Jack knew that when a human is overshadowed, the chemistry of the body does not change. Something in his gut twisted as he tried to comprehend what this strange wound could mean.
Danny hadn't noticed his father's focus on the blood, instead letting out a belated yelp that sounded almost forced and pulling the tool out of the wound. He made a move to sink but Jack stopped him.
When confronted about the blood, Danny grew visibly nervous. Jack could've sworn there was something akin to guilt in his eyes. It was then that Maddie entered the lab, having returned from her weekly trip to the grocery store. She entered the lab, taking in the scene with confusion.
Jack brought the wound to her attention, while Danny cradled it in his other hand. When Maddie went to pull his hand away, Jack almost fainted. The wound was gone.
Bits of dried and drying blood and ectoplasm coated his hands, but there was no hole or open wound. Jack had personally witnessed Danny remove the scalpel from his hand and could not wrap his head around what this all meant.
There was a period of awkward silence before Danny had looked down at his shoes and admitted he had something to tell his parents. They'd been relieved to hear it, as Danny had grown distant over the past few years. They'd shared many conversations debating his secret could possibly be. It appeared they might finally be getting the answers they sought. They just hoped it wasn't drugs.
He'd sat them down at the living room and asked them to remove all their ecto-weapons. They'd thought it was a ridiculous request, but they'd complied simply to figure out what had driven their son away. Danny had collected all the weapons and dumped them in the room next door. He'd yelled for Jazz to come down from her room.
Jazz was a lot of things, but most of all she protective of her family. Taking in the scene as she entered the room, she hurried to her brothers side.
"Are you going to tell them?" She'd asked.
He'd nodded and Jazz had asked what he wanted her to do. He told her to guard the weapons, so she placed herself firmly in front of the doorway, eyeing her parents warily.
To say Jack and Maddie Fenton were shocked to learn their son walked the line of death and life was understatement. To find out their only son doubled as the massively powerful ghost they'd hunted on multiple occasions was stupefying. Yet they couldn't deny what their eyes had seen as he transformed.
He'd transformed back after a matter of minutes, before approaching them with fear in his eyes. He apologized for not telling them, as they sat their silently absorbing the information. Danny had his mother take his pulse to show how weak his heartbeat was and offered to get the thermometer to show his body temperature level. He was trying to appeal to the scientist in them, to show that it was a condition, not a curse.
He'd looked so desperate, standing there waiting for their judgement. Jazz had screeched at them to say something. It took some time and some prodding, but eventually they regained their words. They had questions. Danny had expected that. He answered to the best of his ability, while retreating from where they sat.
What felt like an eternity later, his father stood and approached him. He crouched in front of his son so that they could look eye to eye and he reassured Danny that he loved him. This seemed to spur Maddie out of her state of shock and she joined him. She pulled Danny into a hesitant hug and echoed Jack's words.
It had been such a relief to feel accepted, it had brought Danny to tears. Seeing this reaction took the revelation to new level for his parents. It finally hit them how difficult this must have been for their son to share, especially considering their role in hunting Danny Phantom. The level of trauma they had inflicted on their own child was striking.
In this moment, the dynamic in the room shifted. They realized how desperately he needed their reassurance and this dismissed finally their fears about his ghost half. Clearly this was still their son, despite everything that had happened in the past few years. They'd took upon themselves to repeat their promises of love to him and spend the rest of the evening with him and Jazz.
Monday came and Jazz took Danny to school. They saw him briefly at dinner and then he'd left to meet Tucker. They avoided the subject of Phantom and ghosts in general entirely in conversation that day. If Danny noticed, he didn't say anything.
The rest of the week passed similarly. His parents made sure to pay him attention while he was home, but they danced around the subject of Phantom. Danny did not go ghost around them, still nervous their attitudes would change.
He had noticed, however, that the 'public enemy number one' flyers had been removed from the lab. When he fought ghosts, he no longer had to worry about his parents shooting at him. The one time they'd come across one of his fights, they'd used the GAV to fire at Technus and actually made their shot count. They'd driven away after, but not before his father had given him a brief nod from driver's seat. He'd given a small wave back, which had elicited an excited wave from his mother.
When Saturday rolled around, Jazz cornered Danny. She was perceptive and insisted that their parents needed to interact with Phantom more. She had noticed that Danny seemed self conscious about turning into his ghost half at home, even though his parents knew his secret.
"Don't think I haven't noticed how Phantom stays a good 50 feet up during fights this week," she'd said. "You don't want them to see your ghost half."
What she had said next had shocked him. "Mom and Dad are really making an effort to show you that they trust you, you should do the same."
It made sense, in a way. He was avoiding a face to face confrontation of Phantom and his parents. He couldn't shake the image from his mind of their faces when he'd transformed. That look haunted him. Yet, they hadn't given him any reason to not to trust them. Maybe they avoided the subject of Phantom because he avoided them.
Jazz's suggestion had been wild. He'd laughed at first, but she'd convinced him eventually.
She left the room and he transformed to his ghost self, before rummaging through his dresser drawers. He found a simple black T-shirt and a pair of dark wash jeans. He changed out of the hazmat suit and into the more casual ensemble before studying his reflection in the mirror.
He had to admit, without the spandex, he looked a lot less ghostly. His white hair looked like a punk fashion statement, and the glow wasn't that noticeable in the direct sunlight.
He grimaced as he eyed his reflection. This was going to be an incredibly awkward dinner, he decided before mustering up the courage to open his bedroom door. The smell of pizza drifted through the house as he made his way to the stairs.
His feet felt like lead as he trudged down the steps. Jazz passed him on the way down, giving him a quick squeeze and encouraging smile before slipping through the kitchen door and out of his line of sight.
"You can do this, Fenton." He whispered to himself. "You've taken on Pariah Dark, this is nothing." So why didn't he feel convinced?
It was now or never.
He entered the kitchen, forcing his face into a nonchalant expression. His father looked up from kitchen table, jerked in surprise and began reaching for a weapon on reflex. Danny tensed, but Jack had already had already relaxed his posture.
Maddie had just taken the pizza out of the oven and placed it on the stove. She turned around to grab plates, and noticed Danny. Her eyes widened but all she said was, "Hi, sweetie."
He smiled and took his place at the table, too tense to lean back in his seat.
Jazz was the one to speak, "Danny is going to be spending a lot of time in his ghost form around you guys so that everyone can get comfortable with it."
The three other members of the Fenton family gave tense nods of acknowledgement.