Although all ecto-organisms display the ability of flight, density manipulation, and visibility manipulation, it is theorized that the unique abilities ecto-organisms invariably possess relate to their passions in life. If the consciousness of a passionate fisherman were to re-form as an ecto-organism, one could reasonably predict that this being will find itself with the ability to conjure a sea storm or summon ecto-aquatic animals (J. Fenton, M. Fenton).
Not again.
She grabbed her pen and flipped back to the glossary of Goth's Guide to Ghosts. She looked back at the word she'd highlighted: abilities. She crossed off the page number she was just looking at and went to the next. 261.
…have speculated that this crime could only have been committed if the individual had the ability to walk through walls. Top ghost experts have debated this incident for years. Francine Welker of one of the world's top ghost hunting groups, The Groovy Gang, claimed that "there's, like, no way a normal human could've pulled this off. If we had the chance to scan for traces of ecto-matter, this would totally be a closed case" (Welker, 516). Madeline Fenton of the well-known ecto-engineering company FentonWorks also noted…
Sam groaned and kicked her desk chair out in frustration, rolling away from her desk and spinning idly for a moment. Why was it always a Fenton citation? Didn't anyone else have any merit in the ghost community?
She already knew the Fentons didn't know as much as they liked to think they did. Danny told her what they said. They wouldn't even entertain the idea of half-ghosts as a concept.
They said it wouldn't be possible.
She stared up at her bedroom ceiling, tearing her eyes away from her research for a moment. She couldn't help her mind wandering back to that day. The smoke curling off of his body. The screaming. The crying. Those rings surrounding her dead friend as he floated off the ground, his neon blood dripping onto the tile. The light seeming to sear his skin, absorbing the ectoplasmic glow from his body and replacing it with a battered fourteen-year-old human.
Nothing in her life felt more real, more visceral than that day. She knew none of them would ever be the same after what they went through. And his parents wouldn't even accept it as a possibility.
She ran a hand through her thick hair as she huffed in frustration. Sam looked back at her desk – already littered with so many notes and books even though she'd barely gotten home from school. She guessed she hadn't tidied in a week or two. Maybe if she cleaned up her thoughts would feel less chaotic.
Sam wheeled over to the recycling bin she kept on the ground, bringing it over to her desk for easier tidying.
I really should be more organized with these, she thought as she began sifting through her Post-It Notes, placing them one by one into the recycling. Half of these weren't even relevant anymore.
"Cold breath." "Changing forms." "White hair." These things were either solved or non-issues.
She kept a few, sticking them onto her wall. "Danny: Dead or alive?" "Ghost Zone."
"Other ghosts." That one she'd circled multiple times, the pen leaving deep, frustrated indentations in the paper.
God, what she wouldn't give to just talk to another ghost. They'd know how to help Danny, certainly more than his skeptic parents. She hadn't seen another one since the day they all listened to Danny's dad talk in the basement, despite Danny's ghost sense going off a few times during school and their hangouts.
Danny said his parents had it handled, but they would obviously just shoot first and ask questions later. It was clear from their research that they saw ghosts as mindless organisms, like a rabid animal.
Something that either needed to be studied for science or put down.
Beep.
Sam's brow furrowed. That was weird. That didn't sound like her phone. Her eyes flicked to her flip phone which sat on top of a pile of books and notes. The display was dark, yet the beeping continued, slow and muffled.
Sam pocketed her cell phone and pushed aside her printed articles, torn notebook pages, and books, carelessly shoving them onto the floor. The beeping grew louder as she cleared her desk, finally unearthing –
The Fenton Finder prototype.
She picked it up in her hands, the cool metal tingling her fingers. The display was lighting up, a red dot slowly flashing on the interface in time with the beeps.
A ghost.
A blend of guilt and excitement swirled in her chest. She really had meant to give the device back to Jack that day she put it into her backpack – but after their lengthy hangout it had slipped her mind. After she realized she brought it home, well… there was no harm in keeping it around in case a ghost showed up, right?
It was no secret that Jack could be forgetful, and she figured that he just moved onto some other invention. Maybe since this was a prototype, he already had a more advanced version ready to go, and this wasn't missed. Either way, Sam didn't ask and Danny never mentioned it again.
The beeping slowed as the red dot moved closer to the edge of the screen.
"Shit," Sam hissed to herself, tossing the device onto her bed and launching over to her closet to pull a coat off of a hanger before she had a chance to second guess herself. "Now or never."
She yanked the coat on, grabbed her favorite black scarf and wrapped it around her neck, and moved over to her backpack. She picked it up from the foot of her desk and dumping its contents on the ground. Homework fluttered to the carpet, pencils clattered off of each other. She had to be quick. What else did she need? Sam looked out her bedroom window. She was going out in the dark. God, why did it have to get dark so early in the fall?
She grabbed the flashlight she used for late night reading off of her nightstand then Goth's Guide to Ghosts and Ectoplasm in Fiction off of her desk, shoving them all into her bag. Her eyes shot to the Fenton Finder, still beeping. Good.
"Actually, not good," she mumbled, removing her scarf and wrapping the device in it. If her parents heard the constant beeping, they'd have questions. She shoved the cloth bundle toward the bottom of her backpack. The beeping was still audible, only slightly muffled.
Whatever.
It was the best she could do for now.
"She wouldn't be that stupid."
Danny groaned, pacing in his room. "Tucker, I'm like, 100% sure. She was looking for ghosts with that… that thing my dad gave her, I heard the radar thing on the phone, and she said she was at the park, and then the line went completely dead," he rambled, trying to keep his breathing under control.
"So ,what?" Tucker asked, bite in his tone. Danny couldn't tell if he was angry or scared. "Do we gotta go get her?"
"I mean…"
Yes! We absolutely have to go get her! Danny's thoughts screamed.
But even that certainty didn't stop horrible scenarios from leaking in and making him hesitate – what if ghosts were territorial and tried to kill him? What if they knew about his parents and had a personal grudge against the Fentons? He didn't know how to fight – he couldn't fend even a single ghost off, he knew it.
Sam was in trouble – all because he lied and said his parents were taking care of the loose ghosts. That it was no big deal. Of course she wasn't concerned when she went looking for one – he was the one that kept telling her there was nothing to worry about, wasn't he? Yet even knowing all of this, knowing it was his fault, Danny couldn't stop imagining horrible things that could happen to him.
He knew they had to go help. But the fear kept his jaw wired shut.
"Um… dude? If you aren't sure, that means we have to go make sure she's okay. You said she's at the park?" Danny heard Tucker's house keys jingle in the background.
Danny envied Tucker's conviction. He said it like it was the simplest thing in the world. He just wasn't sure if it was brave or stupid. "Y-yeah. No, yeah, you're right. We need to get her."
"I can sneak out my usual way – you got a way to get there?"
Danny looked toward his closed bedroom door. "Jazz is downstairs. She thinks I'm having a fight with Sam. I don't… how can I sneak out? There's no way she'll let me by."
"Just go through the window, man. That's always my move."
Danny shook his head. "I don't have an awning like you do! It's just a straight shot down!"
"Dude, just Peter Pan out of there. Duh." He heard Tucker unlock and slide his window up.
"Yeah… yeah. Okay."
"I'll meet you there, okay? Call me when you're there?"
Danny walked over to the window and looked down. He could do this. "Uh…"
He had practiced this a million times by now. He was getting pretty good at flying. And even if he messed up, the street wasn't that far down. He'd probably just break a leg on the concrete. Or two. Goddamn it.
"Hey, actually, dude, you think you could stay on the line with me? I mean… this ghost business gets pretty freaky, you know. Would probably make me feel better."
Danny paused. Despite himself, a grin snuck onto his face, nervous and shaky. He sent a silent thank you to Tucker. He didn't know how he'd react if he was left here alone. He definitely needed the peer pressure to avoid fully panicking. "Yeah, uh, no problem. What are friends for?"
"Thanks, man."
"Let me just uh… transform, I guess. God, that sounds cheesy," he quipped, turning the speaker on and setting his phone onto his bed. Tucker's contact photo grinned back at him encouragingly. He held an enormous hamburger from a diner a few towns away, one they begged Tucker's mom to drive them to. A shot from this summer. They were both so carefree, so…
Danny shook his head. Don't think about it. Throw yourself a pity party later, Fenton.
"You're right, it is cheesy. It's cause you don't have a superhero call for it yet."
Danny nearly did a double-take. This was not the serious mindset he needed to get in right now. "A what? Tucker, I'm not a… we so don't have time for this."
"Lucky for you, I've been working on one. Seriously, what would you do without me?" Danny heard Tucker jump off of something with a grunt. "You were gonna make your first public appearance without a catchphrase? Criminal."
Danny clenched his fists and dug his nails into his palms, his go to method for distracting himself from the waves of nausea that came with transforming. "Psh, yeah. Right. Criminal." He urged those glowing rings to appear and snake up his body. His stomach churned as his blood cooled and mutated into ectoplasm.
"You aren't ready for this," Tucker said proudly. A dog barked in the distance on the other end of the line. Danny's ears rung as the rings passed over his head.
Danny's head spun as the transformation completed. He slumped forward onto the bed, letting himself lay there for a moment to recover before he reached over and grabbed his, pinching it between his shoulder and ear.
"You're all ready to do something ghostly, right? And you're all geared up to transform – that's when you yell 'I'm going ghost!'"
Danny waited for the dizziness to die down before he stood up to bunch up his blankets. He hoped the lumpy shape looked enough like a sleeping person in case someone came to check on him. "You get that one from She-Wolf?" Danny deadpanned. He stepped back over to his window and slid it open. God, the ground was so far down. "What, does she say 'I'm going wolf' or something?"
Tucker spluttered. "No! Absolutely not! And frankly I resent that. I'm full of original ideas. You need a catchphrase! How else are you gonna get pumped up?"
Danny laughed, a sudden nervous bark that escaped his throat. He gripped his phone. "Yeah. Okay. Screw it, I could use a little pumping up right now."
Danny put one foot on the window ledge.
"I'm going ghost."
He jumped.
A.N. Hi, everyone! Life update for you all: I only have one more class to finish before I can start my Master's degree! Woop woop! I've finished two of my classes in the last few days AND managed to get this chapter written, feeling pretty proud.
For fans of this work — if you're wondering "what's she going to happen after Just Fourteen is done?" Well no worries there, I'm still deep in the Danny Phantom Phandom and have some ideas for future works! Currently, I'm working on a Pink Astronaut fic called What Felt Right, definitely check that out if you're a fan of Paulina like I am. In addition, hazama_d20 on AO3 (who beta-read this chapter, thank you, Haz!) have this idea for an AU that actually makes... season 3 GOOD? I know. Hard to believe. But I hope you'll stick with me as I begin a new lengthy multi-chapter work centered around it in the future!
I hope Sam having the Fenton Finder wasn't too out of left field. She actually stole it the last time she was at Danny's house — if you go back and read, she reaches into her backpack with it and comes out with just a book. It was sneaky, but hopefully not insanely so.
Shout-outs! Thank you to Distant Radiance, Workparty, Dp-Marvel94, and Send Help for Mountain Dew Red for the reviews! So many! In addition, thank you to Shinigami Gojira and lisarussell687 for the favorites.
See you in 2 weeks,
Ani