Another year, another Phight! Let's see if I can keep word counts a little more reasonable this time, hm? The prompt by EchoGhost (AO3) was this: "Valerie, as the Red Huntress, is chasing Phantom and they end up both accidentally flying through the Fenton Ghost Catcher together. This causes Danny to end up with the hunter suit and Valerie to end up with ghost powers. (Optional: When Val goes ghost she still looks exactly like Phantom.)"
I did go for the optional bit as well but it's kiiiiinda subtle?
"Phantom!" she snarled, tugging on the mental connection between her and her hoverboard, trying to push just a little more speed out of it.
Ahead of her, Phantom's tail inched further and further from her grasp. No matter how hard she pushed, he managed to be just a tad faster than her.
Infuriating is what it was. Sometimes she wished she could show him what it was like.
Not that he would care, of course. Despite his little hero act, Valerie knew that Phantom didn't care about anyone but himself. The only thing a roleswap would do was annoy him. And that was if she followed the common assumption that ghosts could feel emotion at all, which she honestly kind of doubted.
The ghost dove, suddenly, and Valerie growled to herself. Trusting her suit to keep her locked onto the hoverboard, she leaned back, angling herself into a rolling movement to follow Phantom down the alley he'd disappeared into. This was her chance. In a straight flight she couldn't catch Phantom, but in tight maneuvers she stood a chance.
Well, until he remembered he could go intangible, anyway.
Their chase continued through several more alleys, Phantom managing to keep frustratingly far ahead of her—they were too close in speed and maneuverability—until he seemingly disappeared. Or, that had clearly been his plan. At the far end of the alley Valerie entered, she could see him pressed flat against the wall, practically radiating ectoplasmic contamination.
Ha, and he thought his invisibility would save him here. Well, Valerie would let him believe that, if just for a moment longer. She kept flying towards him, not drawing back her speed; Phantom would assume that she was still chasing him down.
And, in a way, she was.
She kept herself turned forward, kept up the pretense that she couldn't see him, until she was within a bodylength of him. And then…
Valerie lunged.
Her board retracted into the soles of her shoes, its engines giving her just that little boost she needed, and she collided with Phantom at full speed. Her arms, covered in the hard plating of her upgraded suit, wrapped around him, fingers digging into his soft ectoplasmic flesh.
Too often he'd gotten away from her, but now, now she knew how to catch him. No injury ever stopped him, but her armor? Her armor was phase-proof. As long as she held onto him, he couldn't get away from her.
With one arm wrapped around Phantom's neck, the other digging for purchase on his upper arm, Valerie went ahead and wrapped her legs around his waist too, making sure he couldn't buck her off. For a moment, she was glad for the fact that it was the middle of the night, if only so no one could see the Red Huntress clinging onto Phantom's back like a monkey.
And then they were falling.
"Val!" Phantom hissed, white-gloved fingers scrabbling over the arm around his throat even as he turned intangible. "Let go!"
"Fat chance, spook!" she snarled back, tightening her hold on him even further as they careened towards the ground. "I've finally got you!"
"Yeah?" he asked, his voice strained, as they closed the last of the distance to the ground— and then kept going.
Shit. Intangibility carried over.
"What was—" was all Phantom managed before they broke through the soil again, and Valerie caught a short glimpse of an underground room clad in shiny metal, before they hit their next obstacle.
Which, in hindsight, was probably the first clue that something was massively wrong. They hit an obstacle. While intangible.
This time, they hit the ground hard, Phantom wheezing out a grunt when she landed on top of him. She deliberated her hold on him for a moment, then rolled off, keeping just one hand wrapped around his upper arm.
Instead, she took a longer moment to look around the room Phantom had dragged them into. And, more importantly, the object they had flown through before they had hit the ground.
Her first impression of the room proved true, as it was, indeed, clad in shiny metal plates. As was the ceiling, and the solid floor they had hit. Most of the floorspace seemed to be taken up by equally metal tables, and it took only a moment for her to place them. Lab tables. They were in an underground lab.
Jerking her eyes back to the object they had phased through, Valerie grimaced. Yep, that looked like Fentonworks tech alright. A huge metal standard, topped off with a ring large enough for her and Phantom to fit through—as they obviously had—which was webbed with ecto-green netting. It must've shut down Phantom's powers when he flew through it.
Great. Just great. Now she was down in the Fentons' lab, forced to either attempt to stealthily break out without anyone noticing her, or let them claim Phantom—because they absolutely wouldn't let her leave with him, and like hell she was giving up her catch to them.
Dammit, her best option was probably to get Phantom to phase them out of the lab again. He probably wanted to be here even less than her. Maybe the shorting out of his powers was just a brief thing.
Mind made up, she turned to confront him. And found herself staring straight into her own helmet.
"Uh," she managed, blinking at the shiny visor she was faced with.
"Yeah," Phantom agreed, his voice oddly distorted by the helmet. And… lacking the usual echo?
Valerie tore her eyes away from the helmet, instead moving them over his chest, down to where she was still holding his upper arm. She hadn't noticed at first—black was black—but he seemed to be wearing her suit, now, instead of his usual jumpsuit.
"What the hell," she managed, and then caught sight of the white gloved hand wrapped around Phantom's upper arm. "What the hell."
"Yeah," Phantom agreed, the helmet tilting like he was cocking his head at her. "I, uh. Didn't think this was something the Ghost Catcher could do."
"The what?" she asked, despite herself, then immediately shook her head. "No, never mind, I don't want to know. What the hell happened, Phantom?"
"You're asking me?" He sounded incredulous, pressing his free hand against his chest. "I'm hurt, Val."
He paused, looking around them in a way that almost seemed meaningful, before turning the visor back to her. "And we should probably leave first, before we talk any of this through."
"What, afraid of getting caught by the Fentons?" she scoffed, even if that had been her plan as well.
The helmet facing her turned down, slowly but meaningfully casting over her body before stopping back on her face. "Sure," Phantom allowed, finally, drawing the word out. "And so should you."
Before she could say anything to that, he pushed himself up, forcing her to get up as well. "Come on, before they realize we're here."
Instead of answering that—how would they know?—she hummed, willing to follow his lead for the moment. She wasn't sure how accurate the rumors were that Phantom regularly broke into the Fentonworks lab, but he did carry their equipment, and it wasn't like she knew any better.
They made their way to the staircase, dodging around the half-finished (or half-broken?) equipment scattered around the lab. There, at the bottom of the stairs, Phantom paused again, turning to look at the hand clamped around his upper arm.
It was so weird to see him dressed in her armored suit. Because it clearly was him, wearing it, the suit shaped to fit him much like his jumpsuit usually would.
She really, really hoped that he was wearing clothes underneath it.
Scratch that. She really hoped she was still wearing underwear underneath the jumpsuit she'd received in trade for her armor.
"Are you going to let go of me?" Phantom asked her, in a low hiss.
She quirked an eyebrow at him. "And let you run away with my suit? No way."
He answered with an odd rolling motion of his helmet, and she got the distinct feeling he'd just rolled his eyes at her. "Fine," he grunted, twisting his arm and sticking out his hand at her. "Let's at least hold hands? That's slightly more convenient while moving around."
Valerie narrowed her eyes at him, but, well. He kind of had a point there. Begrudgingly she slid her hand down his arm, ignoring the way her stomach fluttered at the sight of Phantom's white gloves trailing down her black-and-red armor. He caught her hand when it reached his, twining his fingers with hers. Now neither of them could get away.
Was this some kind of weird power play? Phantom was just odd enough to try it, she thought, then immediately shoved the thought away as not useful.
Phantom kept his helmeted head turned towards her for a moment longer before turning back to the stairs, finally climbing them. Valerie turned her own gaze towards their tangled fingers, then shook her head and followed him up. Something here was wrong, but it could wait until they were away from this place.
The staircase ended in a door, which Phantom opened without hesitation, and which led into… a kitchen?
What the hell, Fentons? Did they really have an unlocked door to their ghost lab in their kitchen?
Phantom's helmeted head turned to the right, and Valerie followed his gaze to a door. The windows next to it had their blinds shut, but it probably led out to the backyard. She stepped towards it, but made it no more than two steps before realizing that Phantom hadn't moved.
He shook his head, then hissed, low, "It'll be locked, this time of night."
Ugh, yeah, probably. She paused to take him in instead, for a brief moment, and realized something she hadn't before: Phantom stood as if he was grounded.
Sure, there had been moments before when Phantom had landed, had walked with his boots on the ground, but he always moved like gravity didn't quite affect him. Like he was just one moment away from floating off.
Not now. This whole time, he'd been moving like gravity pressed down on him, like it would on anyone else.
So that was a no on ghost powers, then. She moved closer to him, dropping her voice in a whisper as well, "And how do you plan on getting out, then? Breaking a window?"
He paused, like he was mulling over his words. "Well…" he finally whispered back, "Danny never locks his window?"
"Danny should also be in his bed," she snarled back, as quiet as she could, "asleep."
"So you'd prefer to break a window and set off the defense systems?" Phantom cocked his head at her, something distinctly challenging about the motion, "Because it'll be your grave, not mine."
"That's because you're already dead, spook." Damn that ghost. How would he even know whether Danny Fenton locked his window or not? "Besides, how do you plan on getting to Danny's room without running into anyone else?"
Phantom visibly stilled at that, like he hadn't considered that.
"Not so easy without ghost powers, huh?"
"I…" He sighed, his shoulders visibly heaving. "No."
Unfortunately, that left them with few options. They could try a window, but that would absolutely cause a stir, and with Phantom wearing her armor, that left her identity completely unprotected. Not to mention whatever security system the Fentons might have, which very well could target her just for wearing Phantom's jumpsuit. The thing was probably seeping with ectoplasmic contamination.
Ugh. She shoved the thought away as something she didn't want to think about, now or ever.
So that left two options. They could try searching the house for some keys, risk getting caught as burglars, and hope that the security system didn't require separate deactivation.
Or they could try Danny's room, upstairs, and hope they could somehow sneak past him—and everyone else asleep in the house—to escape through that window. Curse her for even considering it, but…
"So what are the chances we could get to Danny's room unnoticed?"
Phantom hummed, quietly, then tilted his head like he was listening. "I don't hear footsteps, so the Fentons are probably asleep. Either we didn't set off their alarm, or they forgot to activate it."
"That seems… oddly lucky." She strained her hearing, but couldn't hear anything either. Not that you needed to strain to hear Jack Fenton's footsteps, but Maddie would probably be far quieter—and far more problematic. "How do you plan on getting past Danny?"
"He's probably not even here," Phantom said, something… odd about his voice. Something Valerie couldn't place. "He sneaks out a lot. Why do you think I know about his window?"
"I honestly didn't want to think about it," she admitted dryly, before shaking her head. "Fuck, fine, we'll go for Danny's room. If he's there…" She paused, weighing that. "I know him. We're… We've dated. He's a good kid. I think we can play it off."
Phantom's gaze on her was heavy, but after a long moment he nodded. "If you say so."
"I do say so," she bit back, but it lacked venom. "I assume you know the way, for some godforsaken reason?"
He snorted but nodded, leading her towards the doorway to the left, pulling on the hand he still held. "You don't have to assume the worst of everyone, Val."
"I don't assume the worst of everyone," she snapped back, quietly. "Only of ghosts."
"Oh, yeah, that makes it much better," he agreed airily, before freezing suddenly. Valerie froze as well, straining her ears… still nothing.
It seemed that Phantom agreed, because not a moment later, he started moving again. They were heading towards another set of stairs, these ones—not very surprisingly—much cozier than the ones down in the lab.
For now, she was content to follow Phantom's path, watching him carefully sneak through the Fenton's living room and then up the stairs. It was… odd. She never saw Phantom really walk, like a human, yet he seemed to have no trouble adjusting to it now. Hell, he even stepped carefully, moving around parts of the stairs that threatened to be creaky.
How would a ghost like him know what bits of the stairs tended to be the loudest? What point could that knowledge possibly have, for a ghost that could just float over them entirely?
Once they reached the top of the stairs, Phantom pressed a finger to the front of his helmet—like Valerie needed the clue to be quiet—and then pointed towards one of the doors in the hallway. Danny's room, presumably.
At her sharp nod, Phantom sneaked closer, Valerie right on his heel. They paused in front of the door but, failing to hear any signs of Danny being awake behind it, quickly opened it.
Phantom pulled her inside before she could hesitate, closing the door behind her while she took in the room.
Empty.
Well, not empty. There was plenty of stuff in the room itself, most of it space-related. Not entirely surprising, considering what she knew of Danny, but still.
No, it was empty of life. Danny Fenton wasn't there at all.
"See, no problem," Phantom hissed at her, tugging her over to the window. "He's not even here."
Valerie stopped, forcing Phantom to stop as well, just before he could reach the window. "Are you for fucking real, Phantom?"
"What?" the ghost snapped back, helmet jerking in her direction. He immediately dropped back into a quieter voice. "What did I do now?"
"Danny Fenton is not in his room, and none of the lights in any of the other rooms were on, so he's not in the bathroom either."
"Yeah?" Phantom tilted his helmet. "So?"
"So?" she hissed back, angrily. "So? Where the fuck is he?"
Phantom shrugged, but the motion looked awkward. "How am I supposed to know? He must've snuck out, like he usually does!"
"With his window still closed?" she asked skeptically, raising an eyebrow. "There's something suspicious going on here, Phantom, and I want to know what."
"You're really gonna do this here?" He gestured wildly with his free hand at the room they were in. "Really, Val?"
She grimaced, then shook her head. "Fine. I'm adding it to the list of things we're discussing the moment we're out of this, got it?"
"Yeah, I figured as much." He sighed, then turned to the window, and she let him guide them to it. "We can get out via this window and then fly to some nearby rooftop to talk, if that's alright with you?"
"How do you plan on flying out? I figured your ghost powers were out of the question."
He hummed, grabbing onto the window's handle with his free hand and cautiously opening it, probably wary of it creaking. "Your suit has a hoverboard, doesn't it?"
"You think you can use that?" She scoffed. "Good luck with that."
"Well, worst come to worst you can probably steer it while I try not to overbalance it." He shrugged, leaning out of the now-open window. "Looks like the coast is clear."
Valerie closed the remaining distance to the window, peering outside it while Phantom sat down on its edge, swinging his legs outside. He seemed… oddly cautious not to crush her hand against the windowsill.
"So, uh…" Phantom swung his armored feet meaningfully. "How, exactly, do you summon the hoverboard?"
"You just— Urgh. I don't know, I just do it." She gestured vaguely, biting down the frustration. "I just tell it what to do via my mind, I guess."
Phantom stared straight into her eyes then nodded, suddenly, jerkily. "Alright, I think I can do that."
She made to snap a reply at him, but was cut short by the sound of metal shifting, her hoverboard bursting free from the boots on Phantom's feet. He held it vertical, parallel to the wall, and shifted to the side slightly.
Valerie took the motion for what it was and sat down next to him, letting her own legs dangle outside the window as well—and ignoring the black jumpsuit and white boots she saw from her peripherals. She really was not gonna think about any of this shit until they were away from here.
"So now we just gotta…" Phantom fell quiet, trying to maneuver the hoverboard underneath the window. It took him a few moments before he had pulled it off, parallel to the ground without hitting the wall. "Uh."
Ignoring any protests he might put up, she hooked her shoulder behind Phantom's and shoved him out of the window. The hoverboard caught him—as she had expected it to—and he barely dropped at all. She was even willing to ignore the yelp and the way he'd crushed her hand in the split-second he'd spent falling.
"You good?" she asked, quirking an eyebrow at him.
Phantom grunted, and she jumped out of the window as well, landing neatly on the hoverboard, distinctly missing the clicking sound of her boots connecting to the board.
"Now, I assume— Woah!" Phantom flinched as the hoverboard jerked underneath them, and Valerie found her free hand clutching onto Phantom's upper arm quite against her will. "Okay, no, I think I got it. Val?"
"Just go," she hissed, shifting her feet slightly as she stood behind him.
"Going," he said, voice tight. And, true to his word, the hoverboard lifted, starting to glide forward surprisingly smoothly.
Within moments they were above the roofs of Amity Park, and Phantom relaxed slightly, tension leaking from him. "Okay, I think I got it. It's not so different from ghost flight after all."
She snorted despite herself. "Well, good for you. Put us down somewhere so we can talk this shit through already."
"Bossy," Phantom snarked back, but the hoverboard started dropping before he'd finished the word.
They came to a stop just above an otherwise-unreachable rooftop, the hoverboard almost grazing its surface. "Here's your stop, my lady," Phantom said, waving their still-linked hand.
Valerie rolled her eyes, releasing her grip on his upper arm and stepping off of the hoverboard. A moment later the thing retreated back into the soles of Phantom's boots and he, too, touched down on the ground.
"So, uh… About what happened," Phantom started, shifting his hand and then flinching when he realized it was the one he had linked with Valerie's. "So the Fentons have this thing they call the Fenton Ghost Catcher…"
"The dreamcatcher-looking thing, right." She nodded at him to continue.
"Now, I think they designed it to decontaminate stuff?" He shrugged, awkwardly, and then moved his free hand to rub his neck. "Like, it's supposed to purge ghostly contamination from stuff. I've used it before to pull overshadowing ghosts from their hosts without harming either."
She narrowed her eyes at him. "So what the hell was supposed to happen if just a ghost went through it?"
"I honestly couldn't tell you. But…" Phantom paused for a moment, like he was weighing his words, then marched on. "That's not what happened. We went through it together, and it must've tried to purge the contamination from both of us at once, and somehow stuff got mixed up in the process."
"You're saying my suit was ecto-contamination?" she snarled, ignoring the implication that Phantom had contamination to purge—that he wasn't just 100% pure ghost.
"You did get it from Technus, didn't you?" he pointed out, almost casually. The hand in his neck stilled, fingers hooking into the edge of the helmet. "And, uh. Well…"
And, in one swift motion, Phantom took the helmet off.
"Hi, Valerie," Danny Fenton said, his hair undeniably black and his eyes dull blue in the little light they had on their rooftop.
Valerie felt something in her stop, stutter and skip a beat. Her first thought was that it was her heart, but the feeling was wrong, it was—
She didn't know what it was.
Light flashed, blinding her, and she automatically let go of Phantom's—Danny's—hand to rub in her eyes.
She could hear Danny groan in front of her, could almost imagine the echo that separated his voice from Phantom's. "Why is that so much worse when it's not me!"
Hands still pressed against her eyes, she bit at him, "What the hell, Danny!"
"What?" he snapped back. "What are you blaming me for now?"
Dropping her hands, she glared at him. "What the fuck was that flash of light?!"
He grinned at her, somehow looking both pleased and awkward. "Uh. My equivalent to taking off the suit?"
She blinked at him. Once. Twice. Then dropped her gaze to her hands. No longer dressed in Phantom's suit.
Only now did she realize that her hands had been shaped wrong under the gloves.
Valerie jerked her eyes back to Danny, who once more raised a hand to rub the back of his neck.
"Uh," he muttered. "Surprise?"
Realistically I could've added on a few thousand more words to give these two the conversation they very obviously need but 1) there's only so many revelation fics I can write before I lose track of which conversation goes how and 2) I had no clue how to end the fic after that conversation, so... This ending works fine, I think!