Disclaimer: "Danny Phantom" and associated characters and situations are the property of Nickelodeon and are used for entertainment purposes without permission or intent to profit.
-o0O0o-
"Friends and Friends"
By J.T. Magnus, 'Turbo'
-o0O0o-
If anyone thought of who Danny Fenton's best friends were, they'd usually decide it was Tucker Foley and Sam Mason, but that wasn't always the truth. There were times when Danny considered them his best friends, and then there was Johnny 13 and Kitty. The relationship between the three of them was complicated - Johnny had dated Danny's sister, but he'd done it to try and steal her body for Kitty to use; Danny had dated Kitty, but only because she'd been possessing the girl he had a crush on at the time; and during one of the times that Kitty and Johnny had been on the outs, Danny had been the one Johnny'd turned to for help in winning her back. Through all of this, the three of them had developed a unique bond. Danny wasn't sure he'd ever admit it to anyone, but there were times when he considered himself closer to Kitty and Johnny than he was to Sam and Tucker. Of course, there were also times when he took inordinate enjoyment in stuffing them in a Fenton Thermos and sending them back to the Ghost Zone, but that was just one of those things that happened when friends pissed each other off. It was only fair considering that Kitty banished him and Johnny to another dimension when they pissed her off and a couple times Danny had found himself in Johnny's Shadow's pocket realm if the biker was mad at him. It never meant they weren't still friends. When they disagreed, they disagreed, some times it meant they needed time apart and some times it meant they were going to have a fight, but it never meant that their friendship was over...
Unlike a certain ongoing feud between Carnivore/Omnivorism and Ultra-Recyclovegetarianism that had resulted in more than a few rounds of 'this friendship is over' before something ended up causing those involved to patch things up and be friends again until next time. After the third or fourth time, it had gotten old; after the tenth or twelve, it was silly; now, however, he had lost count and honestly sometimes wished that they'd just decide to let things stay ended and be done with it. Especially considering how they always tried to pull him into the middle of it; neither of them seemed to care that he didn't agree with either of them on the subject. Because of his 'unique' - except for Vlad, unfortunately - physiology, Danny actually used up more carbohydrates and ectoplasmic energy than any pure human or pure ghost would; the transition between forms alone the equivilent of an ecto-blast that could punch through a wall or playing a non-stop quarter of a basketball game in terms of using up his body's fuels. On the other hand, it also meant that he didn't get as much energy back from absorbing ectoplasm in the Ghost Zone or eating a combo at Nasty Burger, so he had to absorb and eat more than others - he didn't really have the time or energy to spare to care if he was eating a double-meat-double-cheese Nasty Burger with extra onions or a salad with fresh lettuce, cheese, ranch dressing and all the works, he just needed the food and plenty of it, just like sometimes he just needed to be in the Ghost Zone soaking up the ambient ecto-energy for his other half.
If he tried to hang out at the Nasty Burger, sooner or later, he would end up caught in the middle of a disagreement about meat. It happened almost every time. Strangely enough, however, in the Ghost Zone, where most of his enemies were, he could go to Kitty and Johnny's place and stay there until he had all the ecto-energy he needed and they'd let him and let him be. He still wasn't entirely sure what that said about his two sets of friends. He wasn't even sure that he wanted to know what it said. He knew, however, that having two sets of friends had one strong bonus to it; whenever he couldn't stand one set and needed to get away from them for a while, there was always the others to hang around.
