Author: loosedefense
Title: Weak
Pairing: Danny/Dash
Disclaimer: Danny Phantom is the property of Butch Hartman and Nickelodeon. This story implies nothing about the characters nor does the plot of the story have any effect on the show itself. This story is pure fiction and fantasy.
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"Are you just going to lie there all day, Fenton?"
"Yeah, that sounds nice. Thanks."
Dash drew his lips into a thin line. It was Monday afternoon, and he was on the seat he normally sat on when he came over. Danny had been sulking in school the whole day, not saying a word and keeping his head down; refusing to look at his friends, whom Dash had seen throwing concerned looks at him all day; and afterward, Danny had allowed Kwan and he to come in with nary a greeting, had drooped down on the couch, and hadn't moved since.
Dash shared a look with Kwan. The Asian had looked more worried, but then again, he had never seen Danny close off first-hand before. Dash was only surprised that the boy hadn't locked himself up in his room this time.
It was time for Dash to put his support skills to the test.
"Look, Fen—Danny," he said in his most sensitive voice, "this is what I'm here for. I can tell you're down, and you should talk to me about it instead of keeping it bottled inside." Saying this line always made him wonder if psychologists actually talked to their patients like this. What a bunch of crock.
Danny, however, seemed to be in the mood to complain, so it was to Dash's surprise – and chagrin – that he began to open up.
"Well, let's see," he started, "I found out that I've missed my chance with Sam, probably my only chance to be happy, I haven't given a single thought about what I'm going to do after high school, I've blown my options apart, my only true friends are leaving at the end of summer, and I'm just going to be … here. Just here." He brought his arm up to lie over his eyes.
"Don't be ridiculous, Fenton," Dash snapped. "This can't have been the first time you realized you're a loser; it's the whole reason we're stuck together in the first place."
Kwan stared at Dash as though he couldn't believe what an idiot he was. "You are really bad at this."
Danny looked at Dash when he heard Kwan's statement, lowering his arm a little so that a little bit of one eye was revealed. "It's true. You are."
"Why are we even talking about me?" Dash gave Kwan a look one would reserve for a traitor. "Fenton's the one with the crisis here."
Danny closed his arm over his eye again and let out a moan.
Dash exhaled sharply. Weakling.
"Fine. Fine. You're not a loser, okay?" he didn't bother to sound like he meant it.
"Thanks, Dash. My life is all better now."
"Oh, come on, Fenton, what do you want from me?" Dash hated how childish he sounded.
Danny peeked out at him again from under his arm. "How about doing your job that you claim to be so competent at?"
Dash gave him the evil eye.
"So, Dash," Danny said sweetly, getting far too much pleasure out of the jock being the one ganged up on for once, "aren't you going to come over here and play doctor?"
Kwan grinned. Dash's cheeks flared.
"Just tell me what's wrong, Fenton."
"My psychiatrist has no bedside manner for one," Danny replied complacently, propping himself up with his arm.
Dash raised his eyes heavenward. Kwan snapped his fingers once.
"Chop, chop!" he said cheerfully, one hand having run through his hair and resting at the nape of his neck.
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"What if I just stopped caring?" Danny questioned softly.
He lay on his side, one arm underneath the side of his face, twirling a long stick he had found in the water. Hunched behind him was Tucker, looking lazily on. After another half-hour with Dash and Kwan, he had decided that he had had enough, and left the house. "Do whatever you want," he had told them, closing the front door behind him. He had then called Tucker to meet him in the park, and together they had made their way to the pond where they were sitting now.
Tucker didn't reply, but Danny didn't mind. He was in a weird mood, he knew. But maybe this was how one was supposed to act when one's heart got broken. His heart didn't feel broken, but maybe it wasn't supposed to feel like that.
In any case, he liked this feeling. He hadn't analyzed it much, because analyzing was a waste of time and energy. He wished that that was his mantra. Thinking was irrelevant. He had never been allowed to think so before because he had always been thinking about how to evade the next punch, the next blast, and the next detention.
"I should break my heart more often," he said in the same soft tone which gave him the feeling that only he could hear the words.
Danny could see reflections of the clouds and the sky, looking at the water, and he felt a sense of discomfort disturbing the serene scene by spinning the stick. He spied some kids playing with remote-controlled boats, and hoped that they wouldn't come to where he was. If the ripples he was creating on his own were starting to bother him, he couldn't imagine what the ripples from the boats would cause him to feel.
'Why doesn't this pond have ducks?' he wondered briefly.
"So I'm guessing last night with Sam didn't go well."
"I don't want to talk," Danny said. His voice was muffled by the fabric of his shirt pressing against his lips when he drew his arm closer.
Tucker fell silent, but Danny could feel his eyes boring into him.
"She's leaving," he informed. "For Princeton." He didn't know why he said it; he had just told Tucker that he wasn't interested in talking, and especially not about that, but feeling his friend's eyes on him, waiting to be included in what had happened, the words had come out of Danny's mouth, and now felt like a barrage about to be set loose.
"I can't believe I never thought about it," he went on. "I never imagined Sam not being a part of my life any longer. I didn't think she would leave this soon, you know? God," he rolled on to his back, tossing the stick elsewhere and not noticing the resulting cry of "Oh my God, Junior! Junior!", "how did this ever creep up on me?"
"I don't know, Danny," Tucker pulled his legs closer to his body, wrapping his arms around them and resting his head on his knees. "It's just something we never talked about."
"Well, we should have talked about it!" Danny said vehemently.
Silence descended upon them again, although the tranquility that had been present earlier was no longer there. Danny sensed that there was something Tucker wanted to tell him, but wasn't sure how to. One look at his face confirmed it. "What?" he asked.
"Danny, you know I'm leaving too right?" Tucker rushed out, grateful that he hadn't had to bring it up with his own opening. Danny met him with a blank look. 'Oh, this is not going to go well.'
The raven-haired boy didn't say anything, only blinked once.
"What?" he finally managed.
Tucker looked down. "Um, yeah. I've been applying to a bunch of places. I don't know if I'm going to be in Amity Park for much longer." He took the time to look up at Danny and quickly added, "But I'll be here to help you fight whenever I can."
"No," Danny sighed, rubbing his eye. "That's okay, Tuck. I knew this was coming."
"You did?"
"Yeah," Danny replied. "I mean, Sam's leaving, why shouldn't you?"
"You can leave too," Tucker said tentatively.
"No," Danny sat up, shaking his head. "This place has only gotten worse since the Ghost Portal was created, and now that it has, I don't think there's any real way to seal it. My place is here."
Tucker nodded. He had already known this, of course. He had just thought it wouldn't hurt to push the idea. Danny had given a lot to protect the city, but to stay here all his life was not an issue the three of them had felt comfortable discussing.
Danny took a deep breath, taking in his surroundings. "I never really enjoyed the park before," he said absent-mindedly. Tucker wasn't sure if that had been directed to him. "The benches were always too stiff, and I was always too worried about rain." He paused. "This is nice."
"It is nice," Tucker agreed. The three of them – heck, any one of them – didn't usually have time to enjoy being down in the park. Especially on a Monday afternoon. Tucker supposed that he ought to start on his homework, but Danny had called and asked him to come, and Tucker hadn't wanted to refuse after what he had expected to be a bad confrontation between Sam and him.
Plus he had wanted to hear all the details.
And now he found himself thoroughly enjoying having a lazy day; no homework (not right now anyway); no ghost-fighting; no jocks hanging around his best friend. He reached down to cup the PDA in his pocket protectively. There were some things a boy had to have with him at all times, after all.
He was suddenly struck with a paranoid feeling. "You're still going to hang out with Sam, right?" he practically screamed. Danny jumped, looking shocked by the sudden outburst.
"Yeah," he replied when he had collected himself. "Yeah, why wouldn't I?"
"No reason," Tucker said, calming down. "Just asking."
Danny eyed him. Tucker flashed a sheepish grin.
They were quiet again for a few more moments. Tucker looked back up to ask Danny something, but the words died on his lips when he saw the creature sneaking up on them. Danny had his back turned to it and hadn't noticed anything. In fact, he was twirling a small blade of grass around with his finger. "Danny!" Tucker exclaimed.
"What?" Danny looked at him, frowning. Tucker pointed.
Turning around, Danny's eyes widened, catching sight of the ghost.
"Aw, crud," it said, forgoing all attempts at being stealthy and lunging at them. Danny quickly grabbed Tucker's hand and turned them both intangible. When it had passed through, they returned to their regular tangible forms again.
"Bullet!" Danny was confused. He had not anticipated an attack from the former militant. "Does Walker know you're here?" Though Danny and Walker were constantly at odds with one another, they had left each other alone in recent times, knowing that they both basically wanted the same thing: order in the Ghost Zone. Danny had taken it as an unspoken agreement between them that whenever ghosts appeared on his turf he would deal with them, and once they were returned to the Ghost Zone it would be Walker to keep them in check; ghost appearances had largely decreased in recent years in Amity Park anyway, what with them being afraid of Danny, and – he assumed – with Walker locking up every being that broke one of his rules.
"Of course he doesn't know," Bullet scoffed. The ghost was Walker's second-in-command, and as far as Danny knew, had never dared to disobey the warden. "It won't matter soon enough though, once I take care of business."
"Let me guess," Danny drew himself into a fighting stance, already transforming into his alter-ego. He gave himself a mental kick in the head for not thinking to check that nobody was watching, but then again, that's what Tucker was for; "you're here for Vlad's spirit."
"Smart boy," Bullet breathed. "Not that I expect you to, but give it to me and I shall let you walk away unscathed."
Danny took a moment to mock-consider. "You're right," he said, "you shouldn't have expected me to." With that, he rushed to the ghost, but Bullet was ready for him, reaching out grabbing the ghost boy by the throat. Danny let out a strangled sound.
"Pathetic," Bullet sneered. "How you managed to survive this long is beyond me. There must be more incompetent annoyances running through my world than I thought." With a flick of his wrist, he managed to fling Danny back into a tree.
"I really need to take up bodybuilding," he groaned. His back ached from the hit, but he ignored that and made his way to the ghost once again.
Tucker watched in horror as Bullet easily took Danny's arm, twisting it in a way that rendered his friend useless. "You are hardly even a challenge," he breathed, leaning close to Danny's face. "Come, boy, give up to me," he extended a small combat knife, "and I will make this a more pleasant affair."
"You know," Danny grunted, struggling to get out of Bullet's grip, "I may not have the brawn—" he went suddenly still, "but you know what makes up for that, don't you?" His hand turned intangible, escaping the vice grip easily, Bullet changing forms along with it, and then reforming as soon as the connection had been broken between them. Danny took this opportunity to land a firm punch straight to the purple ghost's face while Bullet hadn't realized what happened. Bullet stumbled back, clutching his nose.
Danny smirked. "It's a natural progression; the bigger you are, the dumber you get. At least, that's what TV's taught me anyway. And jocks. Thermos." He directed the last line to Tucker, who rushed to get it out of his bag.
Unfortunately, Bullet had managed to recover in the time Danny spent gloating, and soared towards the hero, knocking him back into the tree again, and without pause going in for a few more strikes. Tucker watched, frozen, and Bullet reached out for the thermos. Realizing what he meant to do, Tucker quickly drew his hand back. Bullet growled, but had no time to go after the human, for Danny had taken the momentary reprieve to kick the ghost out of his way.
Danny's gloved hand glowed green with the beginnings of an ectoplasmic blast, which he let loose on his adversary. "Give me the thermos!" he ordered. "Now!"
Tucker hastily tossed it to him, and with another blast to keep him down, Danny uncapped it and aimed the light at Bullet.
"That was close," Danny let out the breath he didn't realize he had been holding in.
"I'll say," Tucker commented. "For a second there I thought you had a challenge."
"Ha ha," Danny smirked. He lost all traces of amusement, however, when he examined the thermos.
"What?" Tucker asked, worried that it was broken or something.
"Bullet is Walker's main man," Danny mused.
Tucker shrugged. "Yeah, so?"
"So," Danny stressed, "Walker and I don't get in each other's way. Why would Bullet come after me?"
Tucker shrugged. He didn't really see where Danny was going with this. Aside from the few conflicts his friend had had with that psychotic warden, they did keep out of each other's way, but a ghost was a ghost. So what if one decided to attack, no matter how close he was to Walker?
"Bullet said that it wouldn't matter what Walker knew or didn't knew once he had gotten Vlad's ghost from me," Danny was beginning to put the pieces together. "Ember said that she wanted it because it would give her heightened power."
"A ghost's gotta have power," Tucker reasoned.
"True," Danny allowed. "But since Vlad gave me his half, all the attackers have been focused on is getting it for their own use. Why are they so desperate for it? Just because it's a quick fix?"
"The more power they have, the higher their status right?" Tucker said. "Not to mention you've kicked their butts so many times before that they're probably hoping this will give them an edge."
"Even Bullet?" Danny challenged. "He's never had it out for me before, not really. Why start now?"
Tucker shrugged. "What do you figure?"
"I've got a hunch," Danny told him. "I'm not sure how right I am though."
"What is it?" Tucker leaned forward. Danny looked around, and once he was sure no one was around, transformed back to his regular self.
"An uprising," he held the thermos up, gripping it firmly with his fingers. "It would explain why they want Vlad's soul so bad."
"You think … what, there's gonna be a civil war or something?"
"Maybe," Danny said uncertainly. "Maybe a revolt against Walker? A lot of ghosts hate him, and maybe the reason we haven't seen any around lately is because he has them all locked up."
"So what are you going to do?"
"I'm going to bring Bullet back to him," Danny decided. "And tell him what I think. He's not going to be happy with what his first man did. I'll ask him what he knows; maybe he can clue me in."
"Well, be subtle," Tucker warned. "If you're wrong, you'd just have Walker locking up everyone up for mutiny or something."
"Are you kidding?" Danny grinned. "I am the king of subtlety. Now, come on, I'll fly us back home."
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When they walked into the house, Dash was on the phone, but abruptly slammed it down when he caught sight of the two of them. "Thank God!" he fumed. "Where the hell were you?"
"Out," Danny said coolly, closing the door behind Tucker, who was staring agape at the two of them speaking so freely and the fact that Dash seemed to have gotten so comfortable in the house.
"Shut that mouth, Foley," Dash turned his attention to the techno-geek. "You're gonna attract flies." He focused back on Danny. "Where's Kwan?"
"How should I know?" Danny said. "He's your friend."
"He went out to look for you," Dash said. "In fact, he went after you only a minute after you left. How could you have missed each other?"
"I guess we did," Danny shrugged, not very concerned. "Tucker and I are going down to the lab. Don't follow us."
"Whatever, Fenton," Dash grumbled, going back to the phone and calling Kwan's cell again.
Downstairs, Tucker asked, "What do I do if Dash comes down and sees you're not here?"
"Stall him," Danny said. "Get him out of the room, because I don't know when I'll be coming back."
"What if you get in trouble?"
Danny thought of a solution. "If I'm not back in fifteen minutes, come find me," he said.
"Better make it ten," Tucker advised. "I don't know if I'd be able to hold Dash off for fifteen minutes."
"Fine," Danny agreed. Opening the lock his father had installed upon the portal with his thumbprint, he took the thermos with him and made his way in.
Entering the Ghost Zone always left Danny a little disoriented. The feeling of the floor from the other side completely cut off on this side had him adjusting to floating about, and the sudden onslaught of green and doors took getting used to.
Once he had caught his bearings, he made his way to the prison located deep within the Zone. Occasionally, a random ghost would come about here and there, but avoid Danny. There had been one that seemed to recognize him and made its way towards him, no doubt hoping to get Vlad's soul, but a couple of blasts had deterred it.
Finally, he found what he had been looking for: the prison was guarded by outer walls that made it look more of a fortress than anything else, and it hung in limbo just like all the doors did. Making sure he had a firm grip on the smooth brick, Danny changed into his human self and quickly drifted through the walls and into the prison.
'How do I find Walker?' he wondered, looking around the area, but it turned out that he didn't need to.
"Danny Phantom," he heard the warden's gravelly voice behind him. Danny turned around, setting his eyes on the stern, almost skeletal face of the Ghost Zone's self-elected law enforcer, dressed in his typical white garb. "What brings you here?"
"I came here to return something to you," Danny said in a forceful tone. "One of your men attacked me a few minutes ago in my world."
"Impossible," Walker rebuked. "I authorized no such action. My men know not to go after you unless it is on my orders."
"Oh yeah? Tell that to him." Danny pressed the release button and uncapped the thermos, which promptly shoved Bullet out of it, causing him to drop on to his hands and knees before the warden.
Walker's face tightened as he gazed upon his right hand man. "Bullet," he declared.
"Walker – I—"
"When did this happen?" Walker looked back at Danny, ignoring his charge's pitiful pleas.
"About a half hour ago." Danny was gazing down at Bullet's form, his eyes flashing in anger. "How do you explain that?"
Walker dropped his eyes down to Bullet once again, who hung his head in shame. "I cannot. I had thought all my men were loyal to me and the pacts that I hold. Rest assured, this one will be dealt with."
Danny met Walker's eyes, hoping that he could silently convey that he wished to speak to him in private. Walker apparently understood, because addressing the ghost between them once more, he said, "Bullet, get out of sight now. Wait for me in my office. And I expect you know better than to run from this place."
Bullet wordlessly got up and shuffled out of the room. Danny's eyes watched him go, and when the door closed, he turned back to Walker. "He was after Vlad's soul," he informed.
Walker showed no reaction, only waited for him to continue.
"This past few weeks, I've been attacked by three ghosts, Bullet included – all of them wanted the spirit."
"Vlad's soul; you mean to tell me that he has given up his ghost powers?" Walker questioned.
"You—you didn't know?" Danny was caught off-guard.
"Being warden of this place does not leave me time to pick news from the grapevine." Walker told him. "I lock up the law-breakers, not listen to their gossip."
"Yeah, well, I think you should listen to this one," Danny cautioned. "Three ghosts in a row all seeking for extra power. I think there may be an uprising or something ahead. And I want you to keep me informed."
"All of them no doubt looking to tip the scale in their favor," Walker dismissed. "Still, you haven't survived this long not relying on instincts. Why should I bother about what the ghosts wish to do in their time on Earth? It is in their nature, and I cannot deny the urge to fight. It is up to you on how they are dealt with on your soil."
"Because if there's an uprising, it's going to happen here in the Ghost Zone," Danny informed him. "You're about the only person in this place I can actually trust … somewhat. I need you to keep me informed; our little truce depends on it, and I'm sure you know by now that I'm not someone you want to mess with." To highlight his point, Danny stuck his hand right through Walker's body, reminding the ghost that no harm could befall him in the Ghost Zone while in his human form.
When he pulled out, Walker rubbed his broad chin thoughtfully. "Very well," he decided. "I will make Bullet tell me everything he knows." A sadistic smile crossed his face, and, invincible or not, Danny was glad that he would not be on the receiving end of whatever the white ghost had planned.
"An uprising," Walked mused, a hint of glee in his voice, pushing past Danny to go through the door Bullet had just gone through. "Think of the law-breakers that will have."
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Author's Note: This chapter was shorter than the recent ones, because I'm tired and had to get through writer's block for this. I hope you enjoyed it anyway.
Thanks for all the reviews in the previous chapter, I hope to hear from more of you guys. :)
Nonasuki-chan: There are plenty of really amazing Danny/Dash fics out there; I'm sure you've already come across them, but in case you haven't let me whore out evolutionaryspider's "Grim Reaper Boogie", KimuraSato's "Romance in Black", and a whole bunch of other series that I'm too tired to think of right now. :p They're all excellent. You can find the two I mentioned in my Favorite Stories section.
I have an announcement: in a certain chapter, I said that I had a trilogy, a sequel, and a spinoff (if possible) planned for this series; after much consideration, I have decided that Part 2 and Part 3 of the trilogy – which are close to each other in terms of timeline – will be combined into one, and the sequel will be the new Part 3. It all falls a little neater that way.
Hope to hear some feedback:D