(Master the Orb)
Danny exhaled slowly as the ice built up between his hands. Each new layer glittered in the ghostlight cast by the overhead ambient ectoplasm, embedding complex patterns in the overall piece as new layers built up over it.
"Very good, Great One," rumbled Frostbite behind his shoulder. "Your control has improved immensely."
Danny inhaled equally slowly, examining his work so far but not adding to it quite yet. "I don't know. It looks a little lopsided."
"Mmm, it looks fine to me. Especially for such an early attempt."
Danny sighed, exhaling the ice he had built up with his breath. "So, it is lopsided."
"Consider it practice," said Frostbite, encouragingly. "It takes time to master art of any kind."
"Humans do ice sculpture, too," mumbled Danny. "They get really good, too. I've seen pictures. And videos. They don't even have ice powers." He rubbed his thumb over the surface, smoothing over a slightly rougher patch.
"That may be true," said Frostbite, "but, again, you just started, Great One. You have only had your powers for a little while. Give yourself some support."
Danny shrugged. "I guess it isn't something my life depends on, so I can relax about it." He built up another layer of ice. "This is oddly therapeutic, and I don't say therapeutic lightly. You know Jazz."
"I do indeed," said Frostbite, somewhat ruefully, head half-bowed.
Jazz could be a force of nature, even more so than ice powers.
He held the ice orb up to the light. It caught on the patterns he had placed there. Fractals were the easiest. He was hoping that if he got better, he'd be able to make real sculptures with patterns in them, instead of just orbs.
But, first, he had to master the orb. Just like how when drawing you had to do circles first. Circle. Orb.
Ooorb. Yep.
The controlled application of ice. The evenness of the internal patterns. The solidity, density, and durability.
His orb was… not very orblike, despite what Frostbite said. Frostbite probably thought he was making so flat on purpose.
Yeah. He was terrible at this.
He was having fun, though.
.
.
(Furnace)
"You're taking up glass blowing?" asked Tucker, surprised.
"Yeah? Is there a problem?" asked Danny, reaching over to stop his friend from accidentally drawing a line of orange sharpie across his poster on the themes in Macbeth.
"No!" said Tucker, quickly. "But, like, why? It just seems… unlike you."
"Exactly," said Danny, nodding sharply. "It has absolutely nothing to do with my powers and nothing to do with my family. Plus, I had a coupon."
"For glass blowing?"
"It was a groupon," said Danny. "For making Christmas tree ornaments. I'm going to do it with Jazz."
"But, Danny," said Sam, looking over from where she was working on her own poster about Twelfth Night, "glass blowing, uh, involves a lot of heat."
"Sure?"
"Danny, you have an ice core."
"Ah," said Danny. "Well. I've got to use that groupon. If it doesn't work out, it's only the once, right?"
.
"Oh my gosh," said Danny, wringing sweat out of his t-shirt. "That was awesome!" He giggled to himself and peaked into the annealer again. "So awesome!"
"Uh huh," said Jazz. Her attempts had been… rather less successful than Danny's, partially because she was trying so hard to make them perfect. But she had managed a few little baubles, nonetheless. "I think these'll all be good for the tree. Assuming we get one."
"And it isn't set on fire."
"Oh, yeah, that was a bad year."
He squeaked open the annealer again, only closing it when the instructor lightly scolded him. "They're so terrible and lopsided," said Danny.
"Hey," said Jazz. "Mine are fine."
"I know! I was talking about mine."
"Ah, okay then. I agree."
"You aren't supposed to agree."
"What, you want me to lie? And after you said it first?"
"No," said Danny. "But you could be nicer about it."
"I'm your sister, what do you expect?"
.
.
(Lung Capacity)
Danny let the last note trail off to complete silence. He stared apprehensively at the assembled student body. Curse Mr. Lancer's extra credit talent show assignment. Any minute now, they'd start laughing at him.
What was he thinking? He'd just watched a few YouTube tutorials on breath control, and he thought he could come up here and sing in front of people? He was a moron, and—
Sam and Tucker started cheering wildly, followed rapidly by everyone else in the gym.
Okay. What?
Sam and Tucker, following impulses known only to overexcited teenagers, swarmed up the stage and attacking Danny.
"Why didn't you tell us you could sing like that?" demanded Sam.
"When did you learn?" asked Tucker, doing his level best to noogie Danny. "Why did you learn?"
"I wanted to improve my, you know, wail," muttered Danny, "and all the breath control YouTube videos either had to do with diving or singing, so…" He did a little head wiggle to illustrate his point and also dislodge Tucker.
"I just can't believe you kept this a secret from us," said Sam.
Danny snorted and took a sort of half bow before attempting to leave the stage. "My dudes, I am basically made of secrets."
"Encore!" screamed someone who clearly hated him.
"Oh, no," said Danny, bracing himself against Sam and Tucker who were pushing him back into the middle of the stage. "No encore. I don't do encores."
But now people were chanting. Chanting.
"Come on, Danny," said Tucker. "Just once!"
"Yeah, these are your fifteen minutes of fame!"
"I had those already! Multiple times!"
"That was Poindexter."
"And now it can be you."
Danny reluctantly took the microphone back off the stand.
.
.
(Letterhead)
The ink was thick, almost creamy, and paint-like. It was the ectoplasm mix, which also gave it a rich, rosy glow.
Danny was practicing ghost calligraphy. Well, one particular subset of ghost calligraphy, one which put special emphasis on the color of the letters as well as how they fit together.
It was a totally useless hobby. But it was… not exactly calming. No. He'd gotten way too angry about poorly formed arcs and crooked lines a couple of times. So. Yeah. Not calming. But… meditative. Meditative. And there was something satisfying about seeing the finished product.
Plus, if he framed his better finished work, they made for good presents for weirdo ghosts.
"You misspelled this," drawled Ghost Writer.
"No, I didn't."
"Keuwii only has one kei."
"This is only one kei."
"What's this, then?"
"It's a flourish."
"A flourish."
Danny rolled his eyes. "Everyone's a critic. If you don't want it—"
"I didn't say that."
Danny raised an eyebrow.
Ghost Writer made a show of rolling his eyes. "Very well. Do you have one for my half-brother Randy. Perhaps one that says something along the lines of 'idiot?'"
"I'll see what I can do."
.
.
(Babies on Fire)
"Danny," said Jazz. "What are you doing up at three in the morning with a lighter? And… yarn? Is that yarn?"
"Dad wanted me to learn how to sew," said Danny, "but I don't like needles, not the sharp ones, anyway."
"You get stitches every other week," pointed out Jazz.
"Exactly," said Danny, gesturing with the lighter. "So, I decided to look into, you know, knitting. And I was on knitting websites, and having, you know, a pretty good time with that, but then I found out about the babies."
"The babies."
"The babies," said Danny, seriously. "And the blankets that are on fire. It depends on the yarn, you see. If the yarn is the wrong kind of yarn, if it catches on fire, the blanket can melt onto the baby. It's terrible. Just terrible."
"I kind of think that if the blanket is on fire you have bigger problems," said Jazz. She took a step closer to her obviously insane younger brother. "Are you… testing the yarn?"
"I have to, Jazz. It's for the babies."
"Alright," said Jazz. "You are going to limit it to just the yarn in our house, right?"
"But we don't have any babies."
"Okay, that didn't answer my question, but, like…" She pinched the bridge of her nose. "Since we don't have any babies here, why are you testing the yarn?"
"Because we might have babies here in the future," said Danny. "Or I might knit something and give it to someone as a gift and then they give it to their baby. Oh my gosh, I'd feel so guilty."
"I'd be more worried about the toxic waste in our basement," said Jazz, which was exactly the wrong thing to say to a sleep-deprived half-ghost on the edge of an Obsession-fueled breakdown. Danny vanished in a blur, trailing yarn behind him. Jazz, who had only gotten up for a glass of water, cursed under her breath.
.
.
(Before the Ball)
"I'm so, so sorry, Dora," said Danny, holding back something adjacent to laughter.
Dora laughed, more openly. "It is fine, Sir Phantom. Even now, you are better than my brother."
"Am I really? Your brother? Who was raised to do this?"
"Well," said Dora, letting go and stepping back out of the range of Danny's feet. Which were, evidently, both left feet. "No, I'm afraid, but it is amusing to say, isn't it?" She pressed her fingers to her lips, suppressing more laughter.
"Yeah, it is," admitted Danny.
"In any case, you are far more graceful concerning your mistakes than he ever was. More gallant. A better representative of chivalry altogether." She patted the shoulders of his shirt.
"Thanks," said Danny. "Do you think that I'll be, uh, ready in time for the party?"
"It's more than a party," said Dora. "You're being officially knighted. You'll be a peer of the realm."
"Aha," said Danny. "Yeah. I don't… what? Really? That's a thing?"
"You thought I was joking?"
"No," said Danny, drawing out the word. He had, in fact, thought she was joking and only accepted her offer to teach him how to dance because he thought it sounded like fun and like it might take his mind off his problems. "Of course not. So. Dancing. Important. For first impressions?"
"Everyone already knows you, Phantom," said the knight assigned as Dora's bodyguard. "But dancing is surprisingly useful for swordplay. Which you need all the help you can get at."
"You said I was getting better."
"That doesn't mean you're good."
"Ouch."
.
.
(Time)
"I don't have time for a hobby," complained Danny through the Fenton Phones. "Maybe if the ghosts let up a bit—" He zapped one of said ghosts.
"Danny, are you fighting ghosts right now?"
"Yeah. That's my point."
"Oh my god, get off the phone."
"No way! This is the only time I can call you, what with all of your classes."
"Danny…" said Jazz, clearly exasperated. He took advantage of the lull in the conversation to blast a few more ghosts.
"I'm fine Jazz."
"You are not fine. You are, like, ten thousand miles away from fine. When was the last time you even slept through the night?"
"Eh," said Danny. "Recently?"
"You need to take more time for yourself."
Danny sighed and captured the last ghost. "Maybe catching ghosts is my hobby."
"Catching ghosts is your self-imposed penance for doing something that isn't even your fault. Not a hobby."
"Okay, okay. I'll talk to you on Wednesday, same time."
"Danny, don't—"
He hung up.
"Ugh," said Danny. "I guess I need to find a hobby. Have to find time to find a hobby."
"Perhaps I could be of help."
"Ah!" Danny jolted forward, dropping his phone.
Clockwork gestured with one hand, and the phone dropped back into Danny's hands from above.
"Ohhh my ghost, why are you here?"
"You were just talking about finding time. And now I'm here."
"Good timing, I guess?"
"Only the best," said Clockwork, evenly. "But we were speaking of hobbies. Might I suggest ice sculpture? Your friends in the Far Frozen would be more than happy to teach you..."