Danny was used to seeing injured individuals. Heck, he was injured more often than he could keep track of. Right now there were a few raw burns rubbing at the inside of his suit that stung like hell, but that's small. Manageable. Normal.
He's seen ghosts that were injured almost to the point of non-existence, ectoplasm flowing from their bodies as smoothly as water. Ectoplasm flowing from him as freely as water. That's normal too, in this business. Ectoplasm was… weird. It was green, viscous, had a citrusy-toxic smell that was both pleasant and not at the same time. It took Danny a long time to finally grasp it as the life-blood of his ghost kind, and even now he doesn't have what he would think would be the proper reaction to it. It felt… fake. It was easy to think that it was a cheap Halloween trick. It didn't really make him uncomfortable.
But real blood, human, red, coppery blood… he had an instinctual drive to get away when he saw it. Terror pierced through his heart like a well-sharpened spear. You can't imagine it's fake, the texture is too real, the red hues changing based on their length of stay on their chosen surface. And then… the smell. Coppery, thick, overwhelming. And lastly, the way it soaks into anything and everything, forever leaving an imprint of the trauma sustained there.
Danny was used to ectoplasm. He wasn't used to blood.
So when he entered that bathroom expecting the worst, he somehow got more than he expected, and froze. Unsure of what a 16 year old kid with mild experience bandaging burns, cuts and the odd broken bone could possibly due in this scenario. So he hovered there, perfectly still, unbreathing, eyes wide, glowing, waiting.
Then, a twitch, a breath, pulled him out of the endless void that was his mind and brought him back to reality. He was the hero, the hope. He was the only one that could do anything right now. It's as per usual, really. So just do what you should. He was thinking like that a lot recently.
Danny bends down to touch Star's shoulder. She's lying face down, wearing a towel, a pool of sticky red beneath her. He doesn't touch it, feet hovering centimeters away. He's afraid to.
"Star? Star!" he gently shakes her, tries to get a response, some movement, anything.
There- a whisper, just barely audible. A plea, help.
"I'm here, I'm here. We're gonna get you somewhere safe."
His hands hover over her form, unaware of where the injuries are worst and where should be safe touch her. (His mind supplies nowhere, leave her and get out, but his obsession disgustingly pushes that thought away) He spreads his intangibility over her and gently lifts her off of the ground and into his arms, refastening the towel around her torso. He sees the source of the red oozing from her body- deep gashes in her stomach, and one long gouge all the way from her left eyebrow to her chin, down her entire face. Star shivers once she's settled in his arms.
Danny looks around and creates a low-level duplicate to pick up her red, sticky phone and a blanket from her room. (His breathing is shaky.) As the copy does that, he also radios Sam and Tucker.
"Guys, meet me at Sam's house. I'm bringing her. She's hurt, bad."
Sam has the best medkit out of all of them, although that probably won't mean much with… this extent of injuries.
"Got it, we're going but… wouldn't it be better to bring her to a hospital?"
Danny shakes his head despite nobody being there to see him. "No, it's- I don't know if they can fix this. I think… I think I can do better. Just meet me there." His duplicate drapes the blanket over Star and then takes a glance at himself- and trembles. The white symbol on Danny's chest, his gloves, and his boots are all completely stained in blood- but that doesn't even compare to how much is covering Star.
He has to hurry.
Danny dissipates the clone and shoots off through the ceiling, flying as fast as he possibly can without jostling his rider around too much. Her body shivers intermittently.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry- we're almost there. I'll- I've got you."
"Dan-ny?" She barely opens her eyes and looks into his, her face is pale and covered in dried blood, making her look dead and sickly. He hopes it won't be permanent.
"Yeah, I got you Star, don't worry. You're… I- You'll be fine. I promise."
"Wh… where…?"
"Someplace safe, someplace safe. We'll take care of your injuries and you'll sleep for a little, but everything'll be fine."
As Danny approaches the Manson residence he notices Sam and Tucker's mopeds speeding down the street. He flies through the window and gently places Star down on the plush carpeting.
Sorry Sam, gonna have to get another deep clean.
He arranges her to lie completely straight and then carefully peels the now soaked blanket off of her, revealing the once-white towel that's now a deep, dark red. He heads to Sam's closet and pulls out two black towels and replaces the white one with those, tossing the ruined one in the pile with the blanket. He parts the two towels at her waist to reveal the wounds and looks them over closely.
He can see a faint glimmering iridescence within them, like how you can see oil making rainbows in street puddles. Ectoplasm. Trace amounts, but enough to do damage.
Sam and Tucker burst into the room.
They both freeze, the same way Danny did upon seeing the scene himself. Sam's the first one to snap out of it, heading to her closet and digging in the back to pull out a huge box, a medkit. Tucker closes the door behind him and stands pressed against it for a few more seconds, turning completely pale. Danny averts his eyes from him.
"Sorry."
Tucker seems to somewhat come back to his senses and shakes his head. "No dude, it's fine. Well- it's not fine but…" He kneels next to Star on the ground and starts looking her over. "I'm fine. What happened?" Sam comes over and starts pressing against the wounds with bandages. Star groans.
"I'm not sure. I went to her house and found her face down in the bathroom… in a pool of blood."
"Danny, I don't know if we can do anything about this. She probably needs a- a blood transfusion and stitches. Stopping the bleeding… I can do that, but…"
Tucker pulls out his phone and starts taking notes, assessing her damage. Danny responds.
"Sam, I just need you to bandage everything up, keep it tightly closed. Can't bring her to a hospital, there are traces of ectoplasm in her wounds. I'm going to overshadow her and see what I can do. Tuck, I'm going to send a duplicate with you to Star's house to get you inside. Grab her some clothes and anything else you think she might need. The attack happened in the bathroom attached to her bedroom, so it's a mess in there."
Tucker nods and stands. Danny splits a duplicate off to send with him, and then diverts his attention to Sam, helping her out with the bandages. They quietly work in tandem with Danny's intangibility to get the bandages securely wrapped around her waist. Sam cleans off the cut on her face, which is bleeding a decent amount but it's hardly deep, so they neglect that one for now. Danny gently rubs his thumb across the bruises on her throat (clearly in the form of handprints) and knits his brows together.
Who… what could have done this? Why? Because she spoke to me?
He glances at Sam.
Is this going to happen to everyone I care about?
When everything is all bandaged up, Danny leans forward and lays his hand across Star's forehead. He can barely feel any heat coming from her, and her breathing is weak and hoarse.
"Alright, Sam? I'm going to overshadow her. Keep cleaning her off and replacing bandages when you need to, I'll see what I can do. Let me know when the duplicate comes back."
Sam nods, and Danny takes one last look at her as he dives into Star's mind.
TTTTTTTTTTTTTT
Meanwhile, Tucker and the duplicate phase through the front door of Star's home. He drops Tucker into the entryway and lands next to him. He briefly searches through Star's jacket to pull out her house keys and tosses them to Tucker.
"C'mon, her bedroom is upstairs." Danny walks towards the stairwell.
"Woah, I kinda figured she was well-off based on the fact that she's part of the A-List, but this house is huge."
Danny nods. "Yeah, I didn't get to take a look when I first got here, but it is pretty big, isn't it?"
They climb the stairs, and Danny holds a ball of energy in his hand to light the way. The shadows around them dip and move with the pulsing of the energy, and the eeriness of it-
A light flips on. Danny takes a breath and looks towards Tucker...
who seems to have a lightswitch. He raises an eyebrow at Danny.
"Ah, yeah… heh." He rubs the back of his neck and steps into the now lit hallway. He points at the door with a star on it sitting at one end.
"Is nobody home?" Tucker asks, walking down the hall while peering into other dark rooms.
"No, not as far as I can tell. Either someone's going to get a… scary surprise when they come home or- I guess nothing will happen." They enter Star's room and look around, Danny quickly shutting the door to the bathroom before Tucker can get a look at it.
"Can you contact Jazz and let her know what happened when we get back? This is probably something she would want to hear about."
Tucker nods. "Sure. Let's grab her stuff and get back fast." He goes to the walk-in closet to collect some of her things, but Danny stops at her bed, noticing something out of place.
He picks up the framed picture of Star and her family and looks up to see a bare nail embedded into the drywall. He turns the photo over, examines it, and then hangs it back up in its place above her bed. He starts to walk away, but turns around and glances at the image one last time, and then heads to the bathroom to grab a few more things- as well as get an estimation of how hard it would be to clean.
After a few minutes, Danny and Tucker emerge from their respective rooms with a change of clothes, a hairbrush, a makeup bag, some pajamas, a toothbrush, a phone charger, a laptop, and a pillow. Tucker crams as much as he can fit into his bag and holds the pillow under one arm.
"Hey, I noticed that photo- the big one over her headboard, was down on her bed for some reason. I put it back, but… it seemed weird."
Tucker glances at the photo as he shoulders his backpack. "Maybe it got knocked down in the struggle? Or Star could have pulled it off earlier."
Danny looks at the photo once more before floating up to Tucker and grabbing his hand.
"I don't know… just thought I should mention it. C'mon, I gotta combine again- let's go."
Tucker nods, and they float through the ceiling and fly back.
TTTTTTTTTTTTTT
Star wasn't feeling great. Sometime during the time that Autumn attacked her she lost consciousness- but not easily. She fought valiantly to stay awake, fearing that the next time she closed her eyes she wouldn't open them again, but she was already so tired, so out of breath. Everything hurt, everything was blurry, dizzy, foggy, dark.
She remembers that Autumn was talking the entire time, but she couldn't figure out what. It almost seemed like she was talking to herself, but not? She'd have to really go over her memory after this to figure out what she said.
If she got the chance.
She woke up at some point and realised that her attacker was gone. Everything was fuzzy and bright, almost dreamlike. She brought her hand up to her face to rub her eyes only to cringe at a stinging sensation. It came back covered in blood, but then again, everywhere was covered in blood. And… did she hear music?
Right, her phone. It was still playing on the sink.
Wait, phone… she should probably call for help, right?
Right.
She tries to get up but realizes that it's impossible to stand right now. Not even impossible in the hypothetical sense, literally impossible. She does her best to try to flip onto her belly and move over to the counter, which she does do successfully, but uses most of her strength. If she could just reach up…
Aha, there.
She taps on the edge of the phone and pulls it down. It clatters onto the tile floor and Star collapses back down, panting. The world spins more than it already was somehow and- oh shoot, maybe being on her stomach wasn't the best idea. She felt more warmness seeping through her towel.
She opens the phone and- ugh, she was getting the screen all gross.
Focus Star, focus. Your life is on the line.
(Was she in shock?)
She pulls up her dial screen and starts to type 9-1-1, but hesitates.
I want you to call me if anything weird happens, okay? I'll put you under a priority contact, so only call me if it's important.
She instead goes to contacts and browses her favorites to find Danny's number, and rings.
The ringing feels a million times longer than anything she's ever waited for, and she can feel herself slipping away right as she relaxes her hand.
"Hello? Star?"
Danny- help, please. The words don't come out, and she falls again into blackness.
After that, Star remembers Danny, hears him calling out to her. She figures she's dreaming (or dead) but she responds anyway, in the faint hope that it is real.
"Can you- help?" She slurs the her sentence horribly and curses herself.
"I'm here, I'm here. We're gonna get you somewhere safe."
His voice echos, and she's still pretty sure she's in a dream. She can't feel much, but she knows she's cold, and almost feels like she's floating. She closes her eyes at the pleasant feeling, and drifts back to sleep to Danny's voice.
She wakes up and she's cold again. Really cold. She opens her eyes to see the night sky, and Danny's face again, but… wait.
Did he have white hair?
"Dan-ny?"
Is that really you? Where am I?
"Yeah, I got you Star, don't worry. You're… I- You'll be fine. I promise."
She still feels that weightless feeling and rolls her head to the side to take in her surroundings, and- dang. She knows she's probably delirious but…
Since when could Danny fly?
She looks out over the cityscape and watches the lights twinkle down below. It's beautiful and peaceful, calming, relaxing.
And then they start to descend.
Oh, I wanted to look for a little longer.
Time seems to skip again and Star comes back to reality in pain. Her stomach throbs, like someone's pushing down on it and-
Oh, someone is pushing down on it. Actually, if she cracks open her eyes she can see that there are a few people hovering around her. Star groans at the pain, but at least she's warm again. She closes her eyes, it's too much work to keep them open.
(She hates the cold.)
She hears Danny's voice for a while, and someone else's, and then a cold hand touches her forehead. Despite her previous protests to the cold, this feels soothing on her throbbing headache. She tries to focus on the words being spoken to understand more about what's going on. Is she in a hospital?
"Alright, I'm going to overshadow her. Keep cleaning her off and replacing bandages when you need to, I'll see what I can do."
Wait, overshadow?
Her entire body feels tingly for a second and Star suddenly thinks back to the last time she was overshadowed, and it was not a pleasant experience. She prepares herself for the cold, gross feeling of being pushed out of your own mind, but it never came. Instead she felt… comfortable, like the feeling you get when you're sitting quietly in a room with someone, not exchanging words yet simply enjoying each other's company.
Well, until they spoke.
Star?
She hesitates a moment, not sure what she should say. Think?
… Danny?
He pauses himself. Heh, uh… if I told you it's not… would you believe me?
If she could raise her eyebrow in her mind, she would.
No. Then again, I'm still a little delirious, as far as I can tell. Is this a dream?
No, you're- This isn't a dream. You're… pretty badly hurt.
Is it… am I… She struggles to find the words.
You'll be fine, uh- probably.
I- g… Danny. Probably?
I mean, uh, shoot. I think so. Sorry, it's hard to focus while doing a bunch of things at once.
Star pauses and waits. She figures it's probably useless to try to 'think quietly', so she just asks her questions out loud.
Danny, how are you doing this? There's something you haven't told me yet, isn't there?
He hesitates, a series of words rattling through her (their?) heads like rain on a tin roof, and then, silence.
Yeah. A lot. I… probably owe you the truth, after this.
Star does the mental equivalent of sighing.
Alright, first, tell me how you're doing this.
Doing… this?
Yeah, overshadowing me.
I- you- didn't you see me?
Star thinks back to today's prior events, but couldn't remember much about Danny's blurry form except for the fact that he had white hair…
And was… flying.
There you go.
Hey! Don't- are you eavesdropping on my thoughts?
They were about me, weren't they? And also, I can't really choose to not listen, it's like trying to ignore your own thoughts, it doesn't work. At all. Try masking them with different-
Well, stop it. She interrupts. Anyways, are you… are you telling me that you're Phantom?
Danny feels a bit hurt by the tone of voice she uses. Hey, I resent that! Of course I'm Phantom! What, is it like, unbelievable or something?
Star could feel Danny's frustration through her own mind, and was getting frustrated herself.
But- you're just Danny Fenton, you're just supposed to be- She pauses. Oh that's a nasty trick with the names, Danny. Real clever.
Her mind-voice drips with sarcasm. Jeez, it's like some sort of echo-chamber-feedback-loop going on in here. Great. Star takes a moment to pause and come back to her senses. Danny grumbles a little bit, but otherwise calms down as well.
Okay. You're Phantom, that's cool, that's good, like, whatever. But… how?
Danny snickers a little bit, and Star gets an instant visual of him rubbing the back of his neck.
Uh… heh. Turns out, if you die by a surge of electrified ectoenergy, your ghost becomes bonded to your, um, human cells. Somehow.
Star's entire thought processes stop upon hearing the word 'die'. Wait, so you're telling me you're-
Star, I'm a ghost. I thought that was kind of obvious? Like, the most obvious part.
Star pinches the bridge of her nose. (Hey, it was getting easier to visualize things now.)
Alright, I don't know how to deal with this information, so we're gonna shelve that for now.
You're telling me.
Anyways,She stresses, irritation again rearing its ugly head, how are you overshadowing me right now? I know you're doing it, but it feels immensely different from other times I've been possessed. It feels… instead of feeling like there's ice locked around my heart, it feels like a cool breeze, or a hug. It's nice.
Well, that's because I'm not fully overshadowing you, just your body. I'm letting your mind do whatever it wants. Usually when people get overshadowed the ghost just retains full control since it's uh… easier, and less distracting that way. They suppress the other's mind. Um, by the way, sorry about not asking first, but I'm doing it to heal you.
Star shakes her head. No Danny, don't worry about it. You've- this saved my life, didn't it?
Danny hesitates. Star feels guilt and sorrow radiate off of him in waves.
You wouldn't be in this situation if it weren't for my carelessness. I'm sorry, Star. I'll do what I can to fix it.
Danny, don't go blaming this all on you. She, Autumn, she warned me. I'm the one that went and searched for you. If you're going to blame anyone, blame me, or even better, her.
Danny seems to contemplate this for a moment before sighing.
Right. You're right, 100%. Well, on that last bit. It's not your fault. After you're healed up we'll figure out the ghost who's really behind this and take them out.
So it is a ghost? Is Autumn like you, or…?
Danny laughs harshly. Ha. Not likely. She's probably being overshadowed or controlled, or got replaced, corrupted, something like that. What I want to know is how long she's been able to fly under my radar, and what she wants with me or you.
Then… what are you going to do?
Well, first- get you better. Right now my ghost core is basically think- believing that um, your cells are mine, and that means it's healing them at an accelerated rate. I debated taking you to an actual hospital, but I figured that would create a whole host of problems that I don't think you or I are interested in dealing with right now. That and… your situation was pretty bad. I couldn't- wasn't sure if they could save you. I knew I… well. I knew I had a better chance. Turns out I was right, anyway. You've got an ectoplasmic infection that my core is eating away. They uh, probably couldn't deal with that with meds. Even in Amity.
Star goes over the words Danny said for a little bit, a few questions popping up in her mind. She ignores most of them… except for one.
So I did almost… die. If I hadn't called Danny, I for sure would be… Autumn intended to kill me, for real, hadn't she?
Danny stayed quiet, letting her work through her emotions on her own. He felt each and every one of them, the fear, sadness, guilt, anxiety, the existential crisis of near-death, all of them fully, but he understood, and felt as if she needed to think it out alone. The only thing he did was curl his core closer around her heart, reassuring her that someone was there and that she was safe now.
After a while, Star speaks up. Sorry, Danny. I kinda got lost in thought.
No, no, this is your mind, you- I'm technically the invader right now. He chuckles. In any case, I can tell that you're drowsy, so why don't you just go to sleep for awhile? It's been… an eventful day. For both of us. Getting some rest will do a lot of good.
Star sighs, she was feeling herself struggle to not drift off just now. She's been unconscious on and off occasionally, but she assumes that's not a very good substitute for real sleep.
Yeah, I'm… pretty tired. She laughs. Thanks, Danny. I'll… see you in the morning I guess? Will you still be here when I wake up?
Maybe, maybe not. It depends on how much I can heal you tonight. I'll let you know as soon as you wake up if I'm still here or not. Oh- do we need to let your parents or someone know you're gone? There was nobody at your house when I got there, but I don't know.
Danny doesn't receive a response, and assumes that Star already dozed off. He recedes from her mind and quietly opens Star's eyes, looking into Sam's.
"Hey." Star's (Danny's?) voice comes out extremely hoarse and cracked, and he goes into a dry coughing fit.
"Hey. D- uh, Phantom?"
He tries to nod, but the pain in his neck causes him to cringe.
"Ouch freaking everything hurts, yeah, it's me. And she knows, so don't worry about that."
"How much?"
"Everything, pretty much. If not, I'll tell her."
"Okay, I kinda figured… weirdly enough, I couldn't tell if it was you or her. Star's eyes are green too, you know." She reaches into the medkit and pulls out a few things.
"Yeah, um… can you get me some water? And a straw?"
Sam affixes the last bandage she was changing and stands up.
"Sure, I just got a text from Tucker that said he was on his way back, just so you know."
"Thanks."
Sam leaves the room, and Danny takes a moment to asses the damage. He closes his eyes and focuses on the pooling of ectoplasmic energy in Star's body.
Injuries to the face, back of the head, neck, waist, thighs, and left ankle. The most severe are definitely the waist, neck, and head in that order. She might also be concussed.
He sighs, which turns into a wheeze, and thinks to himself.
Sorry Star, I'm going to have to dig a little deeper.
He again closes his eyes, and delves into her memories.
TTTTTTTTTTTT
"Danny… Danny?"
"Hmmm?"
Sam and Tucker walk into the room, followed by his duplicate. Duplicate-Danny speaks instead of Star-Danny.
(Man, this is getting confusing, isn't it?)
"I'm checking her memories for more info about what exactly happened." Danny sits down. "I'm almost finished, give me a second."
Sam and Tucker also take a seat, the former resuming her position by Star's side and the latter taking the bed. Tucker starts to pull out all of Star's things from his backpack, and Sam hands him Star's (now cleaned) phone. He takes it and plugs it in.
"Think you can find her phone passcode too? I'll see if we should contact her parents and let them know she's gone." He fiddles with it and checks the battery, ensuring there's no damage.
Danny pauses for a moment and thinks.
"4826."
"Thanks." Tucker taps on her phone for a while and lies down. Sam gets back to cleaning things up and tossing out bandages, and they kind of just sit in silence for a bit. There's tension, but not as much as you'd expect.
Then, Star-Danny opens his eyes, and the duplicate poofs.
"Oh man, that feels so much better."
"Hey dude, are things going alright with Star? I texted Jazz, she'll probably be here in a half an hour." Tucker sits up and puts down the phones he was using.
"Thanks, and yeah, she's uh, stable now. Sleeping though. I've figured out what needs to heal first, and I think I'll be able to walk and stuff by tomorrow. I might need to stay with her for longer than that though, probably. I'm still pretty drained from the fight with Ember."
"Have you figured out what happened?" Sam asks.
Danny nods and blinks a few times. "Yeah, for the most part. Do you know who Autumn is? I think she's in your English class with Lancer."
Sam looks at Danny inquisitively. "Yeah… she's… I wouldn't call her a friend really, or even an acquaintance. I see her at the Skulk n' Lurk and at poetry slams every once in awhile. Why?"
Danny sighs. "Well, I think she's being possessed… maybe. Or corrupted, um… I'm not exactly sure. There is something weird up with her."
Sam runs her hand through her hair. "Well… do we confront her? Try to get the ghost out? Sic your parents on her?"
Danny chews on his lip. "I'm not sure. I'm gonna be out of commission for a while, so I think moving um, forward we'll probably try to get Star some Fenton tech to defend herself and do more investigation while I res- rec… recuperate." His words begin to slur, but he struggles through it. "Don't wanna confront her just yet, not while- not like this." Danny coughs a few times after this, and Sam brings a water bottle to his lips. He takes a long drink and clears his throat.
"Better?"
"Mhm, much."
Danny was starting to get woozy, something that commonly happens after sustaining serious injuries. He mumbles to Sam and Tucker.
"Let Jazz know what happened, I'm- I can barely keep m'eyes open anymore."
"Sure man, what should we do about the bathroom?" Tucker moves over next to Danny and takes a seat on the floor.
"Mmm? Ask Jazz, she's smart. Ya got keys now." He lifts his forearm and weakly gestures towards… something, and his eyes flutter close. Sam and Tucker look at him fondly, and then laugh.
Now that they know things are going to be mostly alright, they felt they could finally breathe again.