Author's Note:

My favourite prompt. Multi-chaptering it because why the heck not. Nomii, if you're reading this, I'll submit this story to you along with the total word count once it's finished. No need to tally up the words just yet.

Prompt by Zainymusings / ZombieMerlin / BabyPorcupine_CuteButDEADLY!:

In an effort to keep Danny from failing out of Casper High and becoming Dan, the ghosts band together to tutor Danny in various subjects (Technus in math, Ghostwriter in Language Arts, etc.) Shenanigans ensue.

Doing Math on the River Styx
~ 1 ~

"I, TECHNUS, GHOST MASTER OF ALL THINGS ELECTRONIC AND BEEPING, COMMAND THE GHOST CHILD TO FIND THE VALUE OF X!"

The Ghostwriter looked vacantly at Technus as if his brains were about to leak out of his ears, and for the first time in his life Danny felt as if he might agree. The three of them had been locked away in this library for all of fifteen minutes and they were already getting on each other's nerves, but anything to prevent Danny from turning into the dreaded Dan Phantom was worth it. So here they were.

"You can't just command him to find the value of x, Technus. You actually have to teach," said the Ghostwriter, somehow keeping his patience. "Not everyone has a way with numbers, you know. He can't just magic the answer out of thin air."

Technus stared at him, dumbstruck. "Really? Human children can't do that?"

"Most people can't do that," the Ghostwriter lamented, head within his hands. "Look at him, he's just staring into that piece of paper as if the world itself is coming to an end. That's not the look of someone who has clarity on a topic, Nicolai."

"Fine then, you teach him!"

"Me? Teach math? In what universe? Christ, I'd pass out."

"Will the both of you just shut up?!" Danny finally yelled, his voice shuddering the non-existent library foundations and sending them both silent. "Maybe I can do this! But we're never going to find out if you just keep arguing with each other!"

Both ghosts suddenly realised their position in all of this — namely having gotten out of their chairs in the heat of that mildly passionate debate — and retook their seats quickly in their own embarrassment. "Sorry," muttered the Ghostwriter, quietly. Technus didn't apologise. What a surprise.

"… So, what part of this equation do you not understand?" said Technus, eventually.

"X," said Danny, and Writer let out a smirk from the background. "I mean where are you even supposed to get the x from?"

Technus was feeling confident.

"You start with the first part of the equation, then you do the equation in your head, and then you only have x leftover."

Danny's head hit the desk. "Are you joking? That doesn't make any sense at all!"

"He's right, it doesn't," said the Ghostwriter, matter-of-factly. Technus glared at him. "If it's any consolation, I'd like to use my keyboard to bend reality such that he would learn everything he ever needed to know in an instant, but unfortunately he destroyed it last Christmas."

"Don't remind me," Danny moaned. "I can't take much more of this, I gotta go home."

Technus wasn't having a bar of this. "The value of x is 16! 16!" he yelled, as if that would make his point clearer. "See! Now you can do this type of problem! Now you can find the next value of x!"

Danny stood up from his chair about as calmly as he could manage. "Thanks, but I think I'd rather just learn the normal way from Lancer. I'm—"

"—What about literature?" the Ghostwriter cut in desperately, after watching his afterlife flash before his eyes. "Math might not be your strong point, but there's more than just one subject."

Danny looked at Ghostwriter as if he, too, had as much of a hole in his head as Technus. "Really? And are you gonna be any better at this than the Lord of Electricity over here?"

"I'm legitimately qualified to teach. Unlike the Lord of Electricity over there, as you so aptly put it."

"… What? Seriously?"

"You don't honestly think I made any money writing novels, do you?" asked the writer, looking a bit too wry for Danny's liking. "No one does. I would've starved without a side job."

Technus suddenly stood up. "ACTUALLY HE NEVER PUBLISHED ANY NOVELS, HE—"

A book came out of nowhere and smashed heavily into the back of Technus's head. Danny watched him arc gracefully through the air, face aghast and twisting as he went, before he was gracelessly plastered all over the wooden library floor. The Ghostwriter's brow was raised. "Oh," he said. "How did that ever happen?"

"TELEKINESIS ISN'T FAIR GHOSTWRITER."

"And why not? You're perfectly capable yourself."

"YOU KNOW IT'S ONLY ON TECHNOLOGY! BUT WE'RE STUCK IN THIS PLACE WITH ALL OF YOUR THINGS, YOU—"

A book mysteriously slid off its shelf and landed on straight on top of Technus, striking his head a second time. "Oh, it seems after three decades I'm still having accidents, I'm very sorry about this Nicolai."

"LIKE HELL YOU ARE!" Technus screeched back. Another book struck him. The Ghostwriter grinned in delight.

"Dude, you're enjoying that way too much," said Danny eventually, his eyes wide open. "I thought you didn't like to fight."

"A series of unfortunate events is not a fight," said the Ghostwriter. He was far too happy about this situation, and he showed it with two long rows of very sharp serrated teeth. "Shall we say, it's been a long time coming."

"But can't he… I dunno, kill you or something?"

The ghost shrugged. "I don't know. Can he? Or did he accidentally become part of a pact in which he agreed I wouldn't come to harm, then act like a monumental prat such that I might like to make every book in this god-forsaken library slide off its shelf and hit him? I suppose we'll never know."

… Danny refused to unpack any of that. Technus remained unmoving on the floor as if this might be the best course of action while the Ghostwriter simply stood there, apparently contemplating homicide. This was beyond messed up. But what the heck had he expected when he'd agreed to tutoring sessions in the Ghost Zone?

… Ghostwriter kind of had a point about Technus's math teaching skills, though.

"Now that we have some peace and quiet," said Writer, whose teeth were clenched on each of those final descriptors and whose gaze was also fixed precisely on Technus, "Perhaps you could enlighten me as to what you need to study in English class."

Danny breathed. Maybe they could do this. Maybe it was still possible. "Nineteen Eighty-Four," he said, staring at the sheet of paper in front him, covered in mathematics so poorly executed it was a wonder it didn't shift the fabric of space on its own. He swapped it quickly for his English book. "I got to sort of skim it at home, but ghosts kept attacking during Lancer's lectures."

The ghost sat down again, slowly. "… Orwell? All right… A bit dry, but that's fine. They're after an analysis essay, I'm guessing?"

"Yeah."

"Well," the Ghostwriter began, "Those are reasonably straightforward. All you really have to do is read the question, make something up, and argue it."

Danny's eyes narrowed. "Lancer said we shouldn't make stuff up."

"Funny how in an analysis on fiction, the writing of which is the very act of making stuff up, you're asked not to make anything up at all. No, that's a misconception. What you actually need to do is pretend you're the author and lie."

"Lie?"

"About everything," said the Ghostwriter sagely, tapping his finger on the desk. "You can't know for sure what was in the author's head unless they tell you, which is fine, because it means the English teachers don't know the difference either."

The little cogs and gears inside Danny's brain started to fall into place, but it wasn't a place they'd ever fallen into before. He felt attacked, almost as if stuck in some kind of weird trap, like his fight or flight reflex should be going off. "… That seems pretty suss, why should I even listen to advice like that?"

Ghostwriter seemed almost bored. "You do realise I have a vested interest in not seeing you going insane and killing everyone?"

"Yeah, that seems kind of bad," Technus chimed in from the floor. Writer nodded.

"Even I'm not vindictive enough the jeopardise my own existence."

Danny turned from his paper and looked from one ghost to the other. Were they... suddenly more tired? "… So…" he began, slowly. "Did Clockwork put you both up to this?"

Technus finally managed to peel himself away from the floorboards. "Came knocking on both our doors. Said we had to do something so that That Future didn't happen. It's like, as if you failing classes is tied up in the cosmos to you becoming a mass murderer or something."

Great. Fantastic. Passing his classes was the one thing Danny didn't seem able to do, and that was apparently the tightrope that stopped him from becoming an evil megalomaniac who murders family members and god knows who else. Perfect. Would've been nice if Clockwork could've given him a heads up about that one before his grades started slipping into the D- range. He stared at his empty English book page and groaned.

"God," Danny muttered. "We've gotta make this work…"