.
.
.
Isolation
.
Yesterday had been perfect. Danny had woken up on time, feeling rested. His mother had made pancakes for breakfast. No ghosts attacked. His homework was already done. He had been able to spend a lot of time with his friends and family. The weather during the day had been good, and the night had been ideal for stargazing. It was great. Wonderful.
This morning had also been good, nice and slow and soft. Danny felt more at peace than he had for a long time.
It was with a light heart and a broad smile that he left his house to go meet up with Sam and Tucker in the park. He actually skipped a bit as he walked down the sidewalk.
He caught sight of Sam and Tucker waiting near the park entrance and waved. They waved back. He picked up his pace, breaking into a jog and-
His foot didn't hit the pavement. It fell, and kept falling, and he fell after it, into a green-tinted void. He turned around just in time to see the natural portal close after him.
He groaned, then smiled wryly. Of course, he couldn't have two good days in a row. What was he thinking?
Well, this wasn't the first time a natural portal had decided to eat him, and it probably wouldn't be the last. At least exploring the Ghost Zone was always interesting. His smile perked up a little. Silver linings. Jazz would be proud.
He went ghost and looked around, trying to see if he could spot any familiar landmarks. His smile twisted into disappointment as he realized that there were no landmarks. At all. Just green, as far as his eyes could see.
Alright, maybe this wouldn't be interesting. Great.
All directions being equal... He started flying.
.
Lacking clock, sun, or stars, telling time was just about impossible. Still, Danny felt certain that he had been flying at nearly full speed for hours, and nothing about his surroundings had changed.
He was beginning to become concerned. What if the portal had dumped him into the Ghost Zone's equivalent of outer space? What if he was just getting farther in, farther away from home? What if he was going in circles?
Well, at least he could do something about the last one. He formed an ectoblast in his hand and coated it with ice, making himself a little ghost lantern. It would take days to burn itself out. He'd make one of these every few minutes as a sort of bread crumb trail. Then he'd at least know if he was crossing his own trail.
He let the ghost lantern go and kept flying.
.
Danny thought it might have been a day. Maybe even longer.
The ectoenergy here was plentiful, the ectoplasm thick, more than enough to sustain him, so long as he stayed in ghost form, but he still got tired, still needed sleep. He was beginning to feel like he usually did when he stayed up for more than twenty-four hours, but the utter blandness of his surroundings, the boredom, might have been contributing to that feeling.
Danny didn't know it was possible to be this scared and this bored at the same time. The emptiness of the place was wearing at his mind.
.
Falling asleep floating out in the open was, in Danny's opinion, a bad idea. He made a tiny island and igloo out of ice for himself. It wasn't the most comfortable place he'd ever slept, even after he molded the ice to fit his body, but it honestly wasn't the worst, either.
.
He was no longer sure how long it had been since the portal deposited him in this place, but it felt like forever. Time didn't mean much here.
He was still leaving behind ghost lanterns, but now he was decorating them, just to have something to do other than fly. Starbursts were the main shape he was making, as well as ones with his name on them, just in case.
Just in case what, he wasn't sure. In case someone he knew ran across them, maybe?
That would be nice.
.
Danny had slept three more times since he fell through. There was no change in scenery. He had a new strategy: shouting.
His hope was that someone would hear him and come and investigate. Heck, he would settle for something coming and investigating.
He shouted for help. That he was lost.
He was so lonely.
.
Danny's shouts had turned into names. Not that he really thought that the people he was calling for were listening. It was just something different to do.
He would admit that he carried on conversations with them. And why not? There was no one here to hear him.
Maybe Clockwork could hear him. But Clockwork wasn't answering.
.
The one-sided (and rather annoyed) conversations with Clockwork had turned into begging. A lot of begging. And crying. That, too.
But maybe Clockwork couldn't hear him. What was time, in a place like this?
Nothing.
He didn't bother to make and ice house for himself. He fell asleep floating, weeping, in the void.
(He wanted somebody to save him.)
.
When he woke up, thin strands of something were all over his body. They were like spider silk, and extremely fragile. He brushed them away.
They were the first new thing he had seen in... he didn't know how long. It could have been weeks or months. His sleep schedule was too erratic to do any good. But they unnerved him. It couldn't have been a ghost that made them, he would have felt them come close.
It had to be something from the environment, and it couldn't be healthy.
He resolved to sleep inside from now on.
.
His evil future self had been able to make portals. So why not Danny?
He had no idea what he was doing.
.
This had to be what hell was like. Or at least purgatory. What did he do to deserve this?
.
Danny started talking again. This time, it wasn't to call for help, but simply to remember how to talk. How to carry on a conversation.
He pretended to be talking to Sam, to Tucker, to Jazz, to Jack and Maddie, to Mr. Lancer, even to Dash. His eternal flight took on a daydream-like quality. He imagined conversations with the Lunch Lady and the Box Ghost. He congratulated them on the birth of their child. He had a conversation with Ember about her latest album, he was so excited to hear it...
He started talking to Clockwork again. Clockwork was the only one who could even possibly hear him.
Please, please, he just wanted to go home. He would do anything.
Why was Clockwork doing this? What had Danny done?
What was Danny going to do?
He just wanted to go home.
Please.
.
Danny decided to take the day off. It had been... It had been a long time. He was tired, and a creeping thought in the back of his head mused that, maybe, the reason no one had found him yet was because he wasn't making himself available to be found.
He built himself a house of ice. No. A castle. It was grand and beautiful, the spires tall, the dungeons deep. Fine sculptures and murals lined the walls. The halls were lit by intricate chandeliers.
He lived there for a while, and left it floating as he flew away.
.
'Howling mad' is not as fun as it sounds.
.
Danny turned over the memory of his last day on Earth over and over again in his mind. In retrospect, it was almost too good. It was like a farewell. A last gift. A goodbye.
He held on to it, tightly, anyway. He could go back to that. He could.
It was something to live for.
.
It had been a long time.
.
Danny didn't notice at first when his memories began to blur around the edges. They weren't important ones. Trivial things. Who sat where in math class. Which day of the week it had been when he first fell through. The order of the shops on main street.
But then he started forgetting names. That was unacceptable.
He started his litany again. He would not forget. He refused.
.
He had hope. He did. He had hope. He had hope. He had...
.
He was forgetting. The nothing- it did that. He made himself another house of ice, this one a perfect replica of Fentonworks, except for the colors. He made statues of his friends and family. He made constellations out of ghost lanterns, so that if he laid on the roof it almost seemed like he was looking at the night sky.
They weren't right. None of it was right. He left, quickly.
.
Every time he slept, he woke covered with silk. He no longer cared.
He thought about going human, about how long it would take to starve to death. Could he starve to death, even in human form?
He doubted it. He was going to be trapped here, forever.
A cage without bars or walls... He was sure Mr. Lancer had mentioned a poem or a saying like that once. He should have paid more attention in class.
.
He fantasized about getting hit by the boo-merang. He no longer had any hope of actually being rescued, but it would be nice to know that they had tried. That someone had looked for him. That someone had missed him.
He missed them so much. Even Dash and Vlad.
If he could just see someone, anyone... He'd even take Pariah Dark. He'd take Spectra.
.
Raging against the heavens was almost cathartic.
Almost.
It reminded him that no one was raging back. There was no answer to his insults, to his curses.
It would be a long time until he spoke again.
.
Danny drifted to a halt, slowly. All this time, flying in one direction, and still there was no change in scenery. He looked back over his shoulder. His last two lanterns were just barely in sight. Normally, he'd be making another one.
Normally. He sighed.
Since when had this become normal? How long had he been doing this?
Long enough for all his memories to fade around the edges. Long enough to lose all but the faintest ember of hope.
He tilted his head up- insofar as 'up' had any meaning in this void. He coughed, clearing his throat. "Clockwork," he said, his voice barely above a whisper, hoarse from disuse, "please. Whatever I did to deserve this, I'm- I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, and I'll do anything to make it up, just, please. Please. Let me go home. Just- Even for a minute. Please."
There was no answer. The lantern that formed between Danny's hands was misshapen and small. He let it tumble carelessly from his fingers.
He kept flying.
He did not speak again.
.
The silk that grew while he slept was getting thicker. He suspected, but didn't know, that he was sleeping for longer, too.
.
The lantern he made was huge and beautiful, a beacon that would be visible for miles and miles, even through the gloom and mists of this void. Smaller lanterns, practice runs, orbited it slowly in a mockery of a solar system. This lantern was going to be his last one.
He wasn't going to fly any more after this. He was going to go to sleep and hope that he wouldn't wake up. Not until someone found him.
Into the side of the beacon, he built a little cranny, a dark, secure place, and imbued it with enough purpose to give it the illusion of gravity. Somewhere a ghost wouldn't mind sleeping away the years.
He crawled in with a sigh. As he closed his eyes, he tried to think of his family. If he was lucky, maybe he would dream of them.
.
He woke, briefly, to the sensation of being touched. His eyes sprang open, a wild hope blooming in his chest.
It died almost immediately.
The thing brushing against him wasn't a loving hand or a curious ghost. It was that odd, silky residue. The strands were thicker than he had seen before, and if he had any willpower left after all this time, he would have wondered if he could have woven it into something. He'd tried before, with thinner strands, but had been unsuccessful. There had been many things he had done to stave off the boredom.
As it was, he simply went to sleep again.
.
Nightmares were better than being awake. Nightmares held the chance that he'd see people again, even if they were fake. Even so, that particular nightmare, seeing his friends and family die like that, was enough to jostle him awake.
Instead of green, the color that greeted his tired eyes was a dull, soft, silver. He shifted, trying to get a better look at it. Whatever it was, it was too close to his face for his eyes to easily focus on it.
Oh, it was the silk. Apparently, it had grown enough to cocoon him.
Alright, then.
His friends, his family, and his teacher... What was his teacher's name again...?
.
Wakefulness again. His brain buzzed with fatigue and confusion. He felt weak. Perhaps the long time he had spent in ghost form was finally catching up to him.
Whatever 'ghost form' meant. Was there another?
Green light, more than could be accounted for by his eyes, reflected off the walls of his cocoon. His eyes moved slowly, looking for the source. He found it in ectoplasm dripping off his body. No, from his body. He was melting, destabilizing, his ectoplasm pooling at the bottom of the cocoon.
Oh, well. Whatever. He had the vague impression that someone he once knew would have scolded him for the attitude, but he couldn't quite recall who.
Speaking of which, hadn't he known someone who destabilized? He couldn't remember.
There had been other people, once. He knew that. It would have been nice, to see them one last time. Or the other thing. The other thing he liked. What were they? Right. The stars. It would have been nice to see the stars. He had made some stars before, out in the void, but he couldn't see them from here.
Gooey eyelids slipped closed over his eyes.
.
It wasn't fair, that he should still exist enough to wake up as a puddle of ectoplasm. He didn't stay awake long.
.
There were sounds. He forced his eyes open. Eyes. He had eyes again. His hands came up to touch them. Hands. A body. He had a body again.
Again?
What had he had before? He didn't remember. He didn't remember anything.
Where was he? It was small and grey. He touched a silky wall. What was that sound? It was rhythmic and regular, like a heartbeat. What was a heartbeat? He put a hand over his chest. Should he have a heartbeat?
His hands... They were as dark as night. He could see stars in them, nebulae. They seemed to blend with the fabric of his sleeves, which continued the pattern. Was that normal?
On contemplation, he decided that he wanted the sound. He wanted to go to it. He rolled over in his cocoon, trying to determine where the sound was coming from. Was it bigger than before? Before what?
Here. He knocked against the side of the cocoon before digging into it with his claws. Layers upon layers of silk fell away as he tore at the side of the cocoon. He kept having to stop, to rest. He was sure he had been sleeping for a long time, but even this little bit of work felt like a marathon.
Finally, he pierced the surface. The sound became clearer. A beam of light from outside fell through the hole. He redoubled his efforts, pushing and pulling and clawing. A tear large enough for him to slip through opened up, and he sprawled out of the cocoon onto a hard surface.
A pair of hands- Not his!- picked him up and set him on his feet. A person, a man, half-floated, half-knelt in front of him. He wore a long purple robe, his skin was blue, and his eyes were red. As he watched, the man's form warped, becoming older. Behind the man floated other people.
They weren't outside. They were in a... a room. That was the word. A room.
The sound was coming from all over in the room and also from the man.
"Greetings to you, youngest of Ancients, Master of Space," said the man, gravely, his voice deep. "We congratulate you on your completion of your trial, your becoming, and welcome you to our council."
None of these words made sense. He tilted his head in confusion.
"I am Clockwork, Master of Time, eldest of Ancients."
Clockwork. He knew that name. He knew-
He took two small steps forward, closing the distance between himself and Clockwork, and fell against the older ghost.
.
Clockwork stayed crouching and held the small ghost that had once been Daniel Fenton until he went limp in his arms. With a small sigh, he straightened, adjusting his grip on the child, who shifted unconsciously.
"I must admit," said Pandora, drifting forward, "I had not expected his appearance to change so much. And yet... so little." She teased a strand of silver-green hair away from the little ghost's head. "He looks younger. Is he still half human?"
Clockwork nodded. "It will take time and care before that part of him can heal, however." His lips twisted as he looked down at the child curled against his chest.
"You did the right thing," said Pandora, voice pitched low. "Had he been anywhere else when he started coming into his power, the Observants would have found him and destroyed him."
Clockwork did not acknowledge the statement. He turned towards the other Ancients, who drifted closer, curious. It had been a long time since their family had welcomed a new member, and never a child.
"What shall we call him?" asked Nocturne, Master of Dreams, subtly comparing his stars to the child's.
"I think," said Clockwork, "that he will like 'Cosmic.'"
.
.
.
The concept for 'Cosmic' came from agent-jaselin on tumblr. They and I were talking about how Danny might become an Ancient, and it spiraled into this.