I'm playing with other people's stuff for fun, not for profit, so if you recognise something; then it probably belongs to whoever owns the works I'm playing with, which in this case is whoever owns Danny Phantom. Danny Phantom belongs to Butch Hartman or Nickelodeon Animation Studios or something; not sure exactly who beyond that it is not me.

Tucker gets jealous of Danny's powers. Danny notices. They have a talk.

Set somewhere between 1 and 2 weeks after the Portal Accident.

"Tucker." Danny said seriously looking his friend straight in the eyes. "You are my best friend. That you don't have powers, I don't care. You are my best friend and nothing can change that. You don't need Ghost Powers. You're great just the way you are."

Something dark twisted Tucker's features momentarily, "Yeah? Sam doesn't seem to think so."

"I don't care what Sam thinks." Something fierce flickered over Danny's face. "You are my best-friend. Not Sam's and she's my friend but we've had each other's backs for years and I won't give that up if she thinks your worth less than me because you're not half-dead. You see me as Danny, your best friend no matter what. You don't expect me to act differently because of my powers."

His voice softened with a certain sorrow, "You're the only one I can trust not to see me differently because I suddenly have freaky ghost powers."

Tucker scoffed softly, "Oh, yeah? Sam seems pretty happy about your 'freaky ghost powers'."

"Exactly," Danny sighed, "I'm half-ghost, half-dead and Sam? She looks at me and tells me I'm unique that I should be proud. She's already planning how I can use my powers to help her Environment campaigns while at the same time telling us off any time we so much as suggest I use my powers for myself. She's expecting me to fall in line with her ideas of helping the world and she can't even remember that she was hit by the Portal too."

He draw in a ragged breath and blinked away tears of frustration, "Sam looks at me and thinks I should use my powers to 'help' others. She looks at me and sees something new and interesting that she can use. She doesn't seriously care about how I feel about this."

Tucker seemed to deflate slightly as he looked at Danny but Danny wasn't done. "Sam thinks my powers are great. She doesn't think about the fact that I can never tell my parents for fear that they'll hate me. That I have to hide so I don't become a freak show or a lab experiment. I can never risk telling my parents because they don't think that ghosts can be anything but evil. I can never let them find out because I'm scared they love their work more them they love me. I can't ever have them know because even if they love me they will just try to cure me."

"If anyone ever finds out their going to think that I'm evil or a weapon or something better then humanity or just a freak." Danny looked at Tucker with a certain defeated in his eyes. "Even if you turn out to have powers just like me…at least you can hope that if your parents knew they would be proud."

He sat down next to Tucker. "And if you don't have powers, well you have your whole life a head of you. You're great, fantastic with technology. You can stand tall in front of the world and show them what you can do and you can do it in full confidence of yourself. Tucker," his breath hitched, "I'm fourteen and I'm half-dead. I can never become an NAS astronaut or marry and have kids. We don't even know if I will grow up or if I will trapped as a teenager, a freak halfway between two worlds and my parents will find out and look at me with disgust."

He lent against Tucker's shoulder as they sat there, "You're my best friend and I need you Tucker." the words were almost a whisper, "Please, don't leave me."

A look of fierce determination filled Tucker's eyes as he set his shoulders and clasped Danny on the shoulder. "Danny, look at me." Tucker sounded grim and stubborn but there was a conviction Danny could feel in his mind as he looked into his friend's green tinted eyes. "I won't leave you. Not now, not ever, I swear. You're my best friend since for ever and for as long I you've got my back I've got yours." As he continued to on Danny could feel his mind opening and connecting to his power as a pale glow light him up. "No matter what Danny, you are not alone in this."

"Tucker…" Danny whispered and there was a gratitude that he couldn't express in words but he could feel his mind press against Tucker and knew that Tucker could feel just how much this meant to him. Tucker looked back at him with that fierce loyalty and caring, no not just caring but love and Danny let that feeling mingle with his own awe and thankfulness and love-loyalty-trust.

After a couple of moments they retreated back to their own minds and shifted awkwardly. Danny gave a snort and broke the tension, "Well, Tuck, it seems that all the fuss over me being the only one with powers was over nothing."

"What?" Tucker asked with a confused frown before he actually looked at the hand on Danny's shoulder. Instead of bare skin there was a black glove and he gapped as he looked over at the only mirror in Danny's room and saw a white haired, faintly glowing figure looking back.

Danny shook his head, "It seems that you've got powers too, they just took longer to activate."