Usually, Danny left ghosts that weren't causing trouble alone. Sure, being a ghost was a crime and all, but it was one he was guilty of, too, and he wasn't a cop. He was a superhero. Plus, he had enough headaches, including the very literal one caused by lack of sleep (thanks, Skulker) and finals stress (thanks, Lancer), without adding to them by making extra enemies.

Unfortunately, the beginning of his superhero career had been full of dumb mistakes like that, so his reputation among ghosts was "combative and territorial." Him showing up as Phantom could cause a fight by itself.

Which meant that he was at a bit of a loss regarding ghosts that seemed to need help.

Today's ghost in distress was a shepherdess. She was tall, verging into giant, with the exaggerated proportions some ghosts seemed to favor. Her dress was checkered pink, with a frilly, lacy ruff on the bottom, a pink vest, and an equally pink and lacy bonnet tied in a bow at her chin. She held a long shepherd's crook in her hand, which, itself, had a bow on it. Behind her trailed two enormous, white, fluffy sheep, each with a matching pink bow and a cheerfully ringing bell around their necks. Except for their ghostly glow and the massive, curling, silvery-black horns all three of them were sporting, they could have stepped out of a children's storybook.

At the moment, the ghost wasn't doing anything threatening, only flying to and fro as if looking for something, her sheep trailing after her, but from the flashes of her face Danny could see past her bonnet and horns, she was becoming increasingly anxious. Danny had a bad feeling that even if he didn't show up as Phantom, there would soon be a problem.

He sent a quick text to Sam and Tucker, telling them he'd be late for their study session, and approached cautiously. He didn't know how she'd react to a human talking to her, although she seemed to be ignoring all the bystanders filming her with their phones.

"Excuse me, Miss? Ma'am? Do you need help?"

The ghost turned to him. Her eyes were glowing gold, with a large, bar-shaped pupil, and full of unshed tears.

"One of my sheep has gone missing, and I can't find her! Have you seen her?"

Danny swallowed back a Little Bo Peep joke and shook his head. "No, but I can help you look."

"You will? Oh, you precious little lamb! Thank you, thank you!"

She leaned down and cupped Danny's face with her huge hands. Her thumbs rubbed circles into his temples, the fabric of her white gloves whispering pleasantly over his skin, and he surprised himself by momentarily leaning into her touch. He pulled back, startled.

"Where," he said, before having to pause, pushing against a headache that felt all the worse for the moment of relief. "Where did you last see her?"

"I was walking along this road," she said. "I was trying to find the bakery, you see. But when I got there, I looked back, and- and she was gone!"

The ghost started crying. Danny patted her elbow comfortingly.

"It's okay. I'm sure we'll find her. She's about the same size as these two, right?" A Glowing ghost sheep that stood five feet tall at the shoulder would be hard to miss.

The ghost nodded. "A-and she had h-her little bow, and her- her bell. I tie them on ev-every morning."

"Okay," said Danny, "good job." He turned to glare at some of the cell phone people. "Maybe you guys could help, instead of just staring?"

"You can't expect us to deal with ghosts!" protested one of them.

"Then get out of here! You're being rude."

"Do you really think you can find her? People are always try-trying to steal my poor sheep. The horns, you see… I can't give them to just anyone."

"She can't have gone far, right? It's only been a few minutes."

The ghost nodded tearfully and a few salty droplets landed on Danny's skin.

"Then she'll be nearby," said Danny, optimistically. He hoped he wouldn't have to fight some other ghost over a sheep. "Why don't you fly up to check the roofs, and I'll look in the alleys, okay?"

"Alright," she said. "Thank you so much, lamb."

She floated up, her sheep following her. Danny started walking down the street, peering into alleys and down crossroads as he went. Some of the pungent ones made him gag. His headache must be getting bad if smells like this were setting him off.

It couldn't have been more than ten minutes before he found a patch of bright, fluffy whiteness where it shouldn't have been. The sheep. Eating someone's old pizza box. He'd thought only goats that did that.

"Hey!" he shouted up at the sky. "I found her!"

The shepherdess was there so fast Danny wondered if she had teleported.

"Oh, you naughty little thing!" she cooed at the sheep. She picked the sheep up, lifting it over her head. The sheep seemed unconcerned at this development. "You gave me such a fright! And now you're filthy." She put the sheep down, but wrapped an extra length of ribbon around its neck and tied the other end to her staff.

Danny watched her fuss over the sheep and felt his head throb. Yep. Headache was definitely getting worse.

"Now, you, wonderful little lamb." The shepherdess was looming over him again, his face back in her hands.

Had she gotten bigger? She felt bigger, but that might just be the confines of the alley. Her large thumbs circled his temples and forehead, exerting a gentle pressure. He let her continue as she spoke, only listening with half an ear. She was showering him with compliments, in a tone not entirely unlike the one she used for her wayward sheep, if more positive.

"How can I repay you?"

The question brought him back to reality. "You don't have to. I'm happy to help." And he was. He could feel his core humming behind his headache, basking in praise for a job well done. "But there are ghost hunters in town. You might want to go home."

"Oh, I think I would be going home now, regardless. I'm going to have to give these naughty little ones a bath. But I do thank you for the warning. You really are a helpful little lamb, aren't you?"

She leaned down and planted a kiss on the center of Danny's forehead. A sharp zing of pain went through his head, and the edges of his vision began to pulse. The ghost pulled back, letting go. Danny felt tears gather in his eyes at the sudden pain.

"I know," she said. She plucked a small bow from inside her pocket. A grape-sized bell hung from the knot. "If you ever need my help, untie this, and it will lead you to me."

"Thanks," he said, voice rather strangled.

She gave him a smile and patted him on the head again, this time carding fingers through his hair. Then she lifted from the ground, her sheep following her.

Danny rubbed his eyes. That had gone better than expected. What had he been doing again?

Study session. Sam's house. Right.

He made it there, somehow, and texted her so she could let him in without him knocking and possibly drawing the ire of her parents.

Sam opened the door, and hung there, her gaze rapidly filling with concern. "You look awful," she said. "What happened?"

"Thanks," said Danny, quietly, unwilling to raise his voice much above a whisper. "I've got a headache."

Sam's face twisted in sympathy. "Are you sure you want to do this today?"

"Test is on Monday," Danny pointed out.

"Right," said Sam. "Come on in." They snuck from the brightly-lit entryway to the blessedly dimmer, cooler basement.

"Hey!" greeted Tucker. "Got your text. Why were you late?"

"Helping a ghost."

Tucker's eyebrows went up. "Really?"

"Lost her sheep."

"You were helping the ghost of Little Bo Peep?"

"More or less." Danny sat down on one of the beanbags and squinted at what Tucker was holding. "Flashcards?"

"We thought it was a good place to start. Want to make it interesting?"

"Tucker, we are not gambling on flashcards."

Danny leaned back, listening to his friends idly bicker. His head throbbed, pressure intense behind his eyes, and he couldn't help but groan.

"You okay, man?"

"I–" Danny's breath hitched as the pain went white and piercing. Then, even through the pain, or perhaps because of the pain, the pressure inside his head eased deliciously. He crooned as a sort of solid pulse ran from his brain to his core.

"Oh my gosh! Danny, where are you bleeding?"

Bleeding? Danny blinked, his vision slowly returning. There was something warm and wet on his face.

Before he could respond, he was seized by the combined pain and relief again. When it cleared, he could feel another pressure, this one on the outside of his head and much more comfortable. It reminded him of the shepherdess's touch.

"Danny?" said Sam, her voice wavering.

"Are you okay?" asked Danny, with a minimum of slurring. He seemed to still be sprawled out on the beanbag. Sam and Tucker were both hovering over him, faces worried. There were flecks and smears of blood on their faces and clothes.

"You're the one who randomly started bleeding from their head," said Tucker. There was a green tinge to his skin. "We should be asking you that."

"Oh," said Danny.

"I've been putting pressure on it," said Sam. "But I'm going to take it off now, okay? So we can see what, um, what might have caused it."

Danny almost nodded reflexively, but the way his head throbbed and his stomach heaved at the thought warned him off. "Okay," he said.

Sam peeled something off his forehead. It came away with the sticky, tacky feeling of cloth soaked in something that wasn't water. Some of the sensation of good, outside pressure disappeared with it, and he keened in displeasure. But some, thankfully, stayed.

Tucker swallowed heavily and covered his mouth. "Oh, jeez," he said. "Danny. Dude."

"What?" asked Danny.

"You, uh. You've got horns."

"What?"

"Horns," said Sam, a little more clearly than Tucker. "Like on a goat or something."

Danny reached up to his face, fingers gingerly questing over his eyebrows, then to the sides. He hit tender, sore, flesh, and then… Then something hard, protruding from it. Something curved and ridged with a sweetly sharp tip.

Horns.

Danny had horns.

Danny, in human form, had horns.

"Like a sheep," he said. "Not a goat."

.

They managed to get Danny into the basement bathroom. The Mansons had built it with a full bath and shower, for some reason, even though there wasn't even a guest room down here, and Sam used the shower wand to wash the blood off Danny's face while Tucker helped stabilize him on the edge of the tub.

It was oddly pleasant. He wished they'd put pressure on his head again. He'd tried it himself, reaching up to push, but it wasn't the same.

"So, you think it was the shepherd lady?"

"I mean," said Danny, trying to stay focused on the conversation despite how the pressure inside his skull was building again, begging to be let out, "that makes sense, right?"

"It doesn't seem like a coincidence," said Sam. "Did your headache start when you talked to her?"

"No, already had it." He shut his eyes. The bathroom lights were unbearably bright. He wanted to lie down and go to sleep.

"Well–"

Danny was hit with another wave of pain, but this time he rode it, holding on to his awareness of his surroundings by the tips of his fingers. Again, the pressure eased into something bearable, and blood ran down Danny's face.

Sam swore. "They got bigger," she said.

"Yeah," said Tucker, "what was that, twenty minutes?"

"About," said Sam. "Why?"

"If they're going to keep growing, we should keep track of how fast," said Tucker.

"Don't want them to keep growing," mumbled Danny.

"We know," said Sam, soothingly, "we're going to try to stop it, don't worry." She dabbed at his forehead with a washcloth, and he leaned into the touch, seeking contact and pressure.

"Mirror?" he asked.

"There might be one in the drawer. Tucker?"

Tucker got up, and Danny shivered. He wanted Tucker back by him. Wanted to lean on him.

"Here," said Tucker, rejoining Danny. Danny mumbled and leaned on him. "Yeah, yeah, I know, you always get touchy feely when you feel bad." He rubbed Danny's back, up and down. "Got your mirror."

It was small and ringed with a floral pattern that indicated Mrs. Manson had picked it out, but it was more than sufficient to find the inch-long silver-white-black horns on either side of Danny's forehead. He raised a hand to touch one, fingers first whispering over the thorn-sharp tip, then proding around the red and tender base.

"Yeah," said Danny. "Definitely the shepherdess. Her horns looked just like this, but bigger."

"Crap," said Tucker. "You don't think you're turning into a sheep?"

"How could he possibly know that?"

"I don't know, but it seems like a relevant question, doesn't it? I don't want my best friend to be mutton!"

Sam sighed. "This is why I'm vegetarian."

"Because a ghost might polymorph your best friend?" asked Danny.

"Does his hair look fluffier to you? Sam, touch it."

"It looks wet and full of bits of blood," said Sam. "You touch it."

"Come on, I don't touch his hair often enough to tell."

"And you think I do?"

"Yeah?"

"Guys," said Danny. "She left me something." He pulled the bow out of his pocket. "Said this would lead me to her if I needed her help."

"Okay," said Sam. "Do you trust that? She did do this to you, after all."

"Still need to find her," said Danny. "Figure out what it was she did."

"Do you think she's still on this side?"

"Told her to go home," said Danny. "It's been a while."

"We'll need the Speeder," said Sam.

"I'll be the distraction!" said Tucker, making Danny wince at the volume. "Sorry, dude."

.

Danny borrowed a beanie from Sam to hide his horns. The shape of them was still visible underneath, but unless someone already knew what it was, they wouldn't be able to tell.

The horns grew more on their way to Fentonworks, no less painful than before, each period of growth preceded by that awful build of pressure.

"I think I've ruined your hat."

"Yeah," said Sam. "I don't really care about that." Her phone buzzed. She looked at it briefly. "Tucker says your parents are out, now, let's go."

Sam led him, stumbling, to Fentonworks. Getting into the Speeder was a bit of a blur. Sam got into the driver's seat, with Danny laid out in the back.

"So," said Tucker, climbing in after them. "Anything else happen?"

"Think they got longer." Danny pulled off the beanie.

"They did. Yikes," said Tucker. He made a note on his PDA. "That's… fast."

"Mmm," said Danny. He closed his eyes and ran his fingers up over the horns. Another half inch, maybe? They felt solid. Heavy.

"What does it feel like when they grow like that?" asked Tucker.

"You know how when you've got a bad headache and you just want to break your skull open to let it out?"

"Yeah," said Tucker, his tone one of morbid fascination.

"Feels like how you'd imagine breaking your skull open would feel."

"Oh. Ow."

"You said you had something that would show us how to find this ghost?" asked Sam.

"Yeah."

"You want to use it?"

"Okay," said Danny. "Okay, yeah." He took the little bow out of his pocket. "Here we go." He pinched the end of the ribbon between his fingers and pulled. The ribbon swirled in the air, lengthening, the bell growing larger. One end looped around Danny's neck, tying itself into a bow there. The other end stretched away, out the Speeder door and into the portal.

"Holy crap," said Sam. "That's not ominous. I'm starting forward. Tell me if it decides to strangle you or anything."

"Are you sure you're not turning into a sheep?"

"No, I'm not, Tucker. This came with the same guidebook as being half ghost."

"No need to snap," said Tucker. He very deliberately put his hands on his knees.

"... You can check my hair if you want."

"Cool," said Tucker, eagerly reaching forward to gently rub Danny's head. "It is pretty fluffy." He pulled his hand back.

"Mmm no," said Danny. "Keep going."

"Huh?"

"Felt good."

"Really?"

"Yeah, like a head massage."

"Are you sure?"

"Tucker, my head is killing me. I'll do any–" He moaned as the horns grew larger, thickening and curving backward, some quirk of proprioception telling him where they were. It didn't hurt quite as much as before, the pressure relief the larger part of the sensation.

"Eep!" said Tucker, snatching back his hand. "They're growing really fast. You know, one of my cousins did 4H with goats, and she said that they cut off the horns, so they wouldn't hurt people… Or grow back into the goat's skull."

"That is exactly the image I needed, Tuck, thanks."

"It's a legitimate concern!"

The inside pressure started to come back, and Danny actually found himself wishing his horns would grow, so that it would stop for just a second. The outside pressure they exerted right now was faint, but maybe it would grow as they got bigger and heavier?

An ectoblast splashed against the windshield, followed shortly after by a missile. The Speeder spun wildly, making Danny's vision white out.

"Skulker!" yelled Sam, when she got the Speeder back under control. She slammed the auto-fire button.

Danny knew that wouldn't be enough. He hauled himself to his feet and went ghost. The light of his transformation made him waver, but, blessedly, his horns grew, easing the pain. He threw open the door and flew out.

It evolved that ghost fighting was very difficult when every sound made your head ring like a bell and every movement made your vision sparkle. Still, Danny thought he did a passable job until the net.

And the tranquilizer dart.

.

When Danny woke up, he still had his skin attached, which wasn't a given when dealing with Skulker. Blearily, he surveyed his surroundings. He was in a cage, and not a big one. Surprisingly, the ribbon was still around his neck. Outside, he could see numerous other cages, some filled, some empty - Skulker's menagerie.

Skulker himself was sitting at a table, attacking the long end of the ribbon with a pair of large scissors that emerged from a slot in his suit. He had what looked like the remains of a lunch there (Danny decided not to think too hard about the logistics of that) and a large keyring.

Sam and Tucker were nowhere to be seen. Hopefully, they had gotten away.

"So," said Danny, hoarsely. "You change your mind on the whole skinning me thing?"

"Not until those horns stop growing," said Skulker.

"Why? What do they do?" Something the shepherdess had said about people stealing her sheep tickled at his memory. What made these horns so valuable?

Skulker scoffed. "What can't they do?" he asked. "Shape one into an instrument, and it's a weapon of perfect sonic destruction, or a call for aid that can reach across time itself. Grind them into a powder, and they're a medicine that will heal all ills and ensure peaceful sleep. Put a morsel of food or drop of drink in one, and it becomes an endless cornucopia." He turned away from his attempts to cut the ribbon. "Which is why they'll make such a great trophy."

A digital tweedle sounded from Skulker's arm. He looked down at the glowing display. "What! No! No! I refuse to check out that book agai–" Skulker's rockets activated, shooting him up through the ceiling.

Tucker's work. So, at least he was okay. Now, Danny just had to take advantage of it.

The keys. One of them probably fit the lock on this cage. Danny just had to get them. For a human, they'd be thoroughly out of reach.

But Danny wasn't human.

Danny's telekinesis was trash. He never used it in battle. The number of ghosts he'd used it in front of could be counted on with one hand. It was still telekinesis.

He stretched his hand through the bars of the cage, and reached for the keys. He focused. Hard. Harder. A green glow formed around his hand and the keys, and then–

His headache spiked, and was immediately soothed by his growing horns. Still, he'd lost his concentration. The keys had moved only an inch.

This was going to be slow going.

Bit by little bit, Danny got the keys off the table and pulled them across the floor. The swell and ebb of his headache as he drew on his telekinesis made him feel dizzy, disoriented, and the way his horns curved solidly around the back of his skull, close enough to feel on his hair, was oddly grounding, but not in a way that helped him focus on anything but them. The bases of the horns were huge, now, pushing back into his hairline, almost touching his eyebrows. They were heavy, and made him one to rest his head on something. Someone's lap, maybe.

When the keys were close enough, Danny took off one of his boots and used it to pull them the rest of the way to the cage. He fumbled through them, trying each one against the lock until it finally clicked open and he was able to crawl out.

He stumbled to the other occupied cages, letting the other captives out one by one. Sometimes, he got a whisper of thanks. More often, he got a swipe of claws or teeth. More importantly, the freed animals and prisoners were loud, making all sorts of calls and wrecking Skulker's lair. Danny's headache built to blackout levels again, and the next thing he knew he was floating in the Ghost Zone, far away from any island.

He breathed deeply, and felt his horns just barely brush against the corners of his jaw. The bell at his neck jingled. Had he heard it do that before?

Sam and Tucker… He had to find them. But a pretty, frilly, pink ribbon stretched out in front of him, into the green. He wanted to follow it. It wanted him to follow it. His head hurt so much it was hard to think.

He started to drift in the direction of the ribbon, then stopped. No… The ribbon… The ribbon was from the shepherdess. The shepherdess who caused this. The shepherdess who… who had given him the horns which were helping him with his headache. The nice shepherdess, who had rubbed his head and said he was helpful. Who had given him the ribbon and the bell. Why shouldn't he go to her?

But Sam and Tucker, they were out here, weren't they? He stopped again, trying to think. It was hard when every thought brought with it such terrible pain. Pain eased by the equally distracting relief and pleasure of his growing horns.

What had they been doing? They had been in the Speeder together, Tucker had been rubbing Danny's head, and then… They got lost? Separated? Something to do with Skulker. Before that, they had been… Going to see the shepherdess together.

So, Danny should go to the shepherdess. If they were all going to the same spot, they would meet up there.

There was something wrong with that thought.

Right. He stopped flying forward. The bell jingled again, insistently. Sam and Tucker didn't know how to find the shepherdess. They had been following the ribbon together. Plus, the Speeder might have been wrecked. Danny didn't remember.

He was a bad friend.

He reached for the weird little part inside himself that never seemed to get lost in the Ghost Zone, and bullied it into retracing his steps.

By the time he spotted the Speeder, damaged, but still functional, puttering towards him, the bell at his neck was ringing constantly, unbearably, even when he put his hand on it. The horns had grown up along his cheeks, looping back to almost touch their bases, taking out a fair chunk of his peripheral vision, a little like horse blinders.

He flew into the Speeder, crying, and hugged first Sam, then Tucker. Their voices, concerned, washed over him, soothingly, but didn't register as words.

"Can you rub my head?" Danny asked. "Please?"

"... Sure, man."

.

"I think I see them."

Danny looked up to see what Sam might be talking about, and saw, against the green, a little pink dot followed by three little white dots. As they came closer, Danny could make out more detail. Including the way that the other end of his ribbon was tied firmly to the shepherdess's staff.

"Yeah," he said. "That's her."

The shepherdess flew up to the Speeder door and knocked. Sam and Tucker exchanged a glance, and both of them checked their weapons before nodding. Sam hit the automatic door release button.

"I'm sorry it took me so long to find you," said the shepherdess, peeking in. She was a bit too large to entirely fit through the door. "I was almost home when the ribbon reached me, and I couldn't hear the bell– Oh, heavens." Her hand flew to her mouth.

"So," said Tucker, tightly. "You can see we have a problem."

"Oh, dear. Oh, dear." Her hand fluttered. "You are the one who helped me today!"

"Mhm," said Danny.

"I'm terribly sorry. I didn't mean for this to happen. If I had known you were liminal, I would never have risked it! Even then…"

"Risked what?" asked Sam.

"I noticed the poor dear had a headache, and I thought I could soothe it a little," said the shepherdess. "If I had known he was liminal… It's the conditions of the horns, you see. One must be a ghost who eats, for the power of cornucopia, who sleeps, for the power of medicine, and has a sound based power, for the power of instruments. How do you feel, little lamb?"

Danny felt Sam and Tucker tense. "Bad," he said. "Hurts."

"How do we stop it?" asked Sam. "How do we get rid of them?"

"You can't, I'm afraid. Even if you cut them off, they will grow back. But it's the headache that fuels them, the first time. They will stop when it runs out."

Mixed feelings swirled inside Danny. He liked his horns. They were… nice. Solid. But there was a reason he shouldn't have them. He knew it. But there was so much pressure in his head that there really wasn't room for other thoughts.

"I will take full responsibility, of course," continued the shepherdess, "and I will make sure you two make it back home."

"Wait, hold up, what do you mean, us two?" said Tucker.

"The little lamb will be staying with me, of course. The lengths some people will go to for the powers of the horns are horrible."

"So you are trying to turn him into a sheep."

"Only the horns are inside my power. I only mean that I would welcome him into my home and protect him."

"Uh, no," said Sam. "Danny's going to stay with us. He can protect himself."

The shepherdess looked at Danny's sprawled form dubiously.

"When he isn't in pain because of something you did," clarified Sam. "We're not letting you kidnap him so you can take 'responsibility.' Either help him here or let him go."

Something ugly flashed across the shepherdess's features. "There is one thing I can do. Come here, little lamb."

Danny crawled to the door, evading Tucker's hands with intangibility. The shepherdess reached in and took hold of Danny's horns. She tilted his head first one way, then the other. It was easy for Danny to be compliant, the horns acting as a kind of lever for his head.

He felt his horns twist and lengthen under her touch, pain out of his head and into them. It felt good.

Then she stopped, and Danny could think again. His thoughts were clear, if beaten, and he startled backwards. His head felt incredibly heavy, and he reached up to feel curled horns that were at least as big as those on the shepherdess's sheep. They blocked off the sides of his vision, giving his field of view a tunneled, focused effect.

"Danny," said Sam, "are you okay?"

Sound was different, too. Just a tiny bit muffled.

"Yeah," he said, weakly. "I'm okay. It- It doesn't hurt anymore."

"I wish you would let me do more than that," said the shepherdess. She untied her end of Danny's ribbon from her staff, and it shrunk back into the tiny bow it had been before dropping into Danny's hands. "But you know how to find me if you change your mind, or if the hunters become too much for you. I would love to welcome you as one of my lambs." She paused, then said to Tucker, "Not a literal lamb. Until then…" She bowed away from the Speeder, and began flying away.

"Great," said Sam, "now what?"

Danny gingerly touched his horns. They still didn't feel bad. They felt, bizarrely, too natural.

"Now we go to the Far Frozen and get a second opinion," said Danny. "If, uh. That's okay with you guys? How long have we been here, anyway?"

"Long enough that we're probably going to miss the test. And be grounded forever," said Tucker. "But you can't exactly go home like that. What would you even say?"

"That a ghost did it."

.

"Danny! Sam! Tucker! What happened to you?" The voices of their parents (and Danny's sister) overlapped in near-harmony.

Danny, Sam, and Tucker looked at each other, then said all together, "A ghost did it."