I don't own DP.
Thank you for the reviews! They're nice to read :) Hellbreaker, I noticed that part of the episode too... it's a bit sad, honestly, how easily Maddie – genius inventor extraordinaire, Maddie – missed something as simple as that. How can people be so blind?
...Don't answer that.
Anyway, here's the next chapter! NOTE: Spoiler warning for Infinite Realms!
The day passed mostly uneventfully. The Box Ghost showed up twice, once halfway through biology and once during lunch, but the ghost was so easy to defeat that Danny didn't even miss much biology. When final period came around, he was in a very good mood; he'd actually understood most of the material and had high hopes for the homework now tucked in his locker.
He met Sam and Tucker in front of the classroom, exchanging glances with them as Tucker pushed the door open to enter. They all hastened to the back of the classroom, eager to remain as far out of the limelight as possible. Don't want to be too front-and-center when we start laughing, Danny thought amusedly. If the theories were as silly as he remembered, they'd probably be doing a lot of that.
Sam seemed to echo the sentiment. "Remember to keep from laughing out loud!" she reminded them, a faintly humorous note in her voice.
"No worries." Tucker pretended to cough. "Mr and Mrs Fenton, I have whooping cough, that's why it sounds like I'm laughing... don't mind my terrible timing..."
The other two laughed. Sam slid into her seat and propped her elbows on the desk. "I'm not sure whooping cough is the right excuse there... does it really make you sound like you're laughing?"
"Dunno. The name sounds good, though... and do you have a better idea?"
"Not really."
Danny grinned and leaned back in his chair. He'd gotten the desk in the corner of the classroom, as near to the door as he could get and still be in the back row. Sam sat immediately in front of him, and Tucker on his left. Their classmates filed into the room and settled around them, sitting in groups with their respective friends. Dash and Kwan sat near the front, along with Paulina and Star; Mikey and Nathan were a bit further back, and Valerie seated herself dead center in the front row. Figures she'd be especially interested in this class...
They sat up straighter as Maddie and Jack entered the room with all the energy born of excitement. "Good afternoon, class!" Jack exclaimed breezily.
"Hello," Maddie said simply.
Most of the class was sitting back, eyes half-narrowed. Everyone knew the Fentons were crackpots... even if they'd been proved right about the existence of ghosts. Only a few – Valerie, Paulina – looked especially eager. Paulina was all but bouncing up and down, holding up a small picture of Phantom (Sam scowled) to her face.
As the class commenced, the great majority of students were talking and passing notes; but as it went on, the atmosphere changed. More and more people turned to the front as Danny's parents pulled out various theories and weapons. "This," Jack boomed, pulling out a lipstick, "is a very handy little weapon."
It also looked absolutely ridiculous in the big man's hand. A tiny little green lipstick... Dash sniggered. "What's it do... horrify the ghosts away with its girliness?"
"No," Maddie interjected. "It shoots a beam." She took the lipstick out of Jack's hand and shot it at a target she'd brought along for demonstration purposes.
Dash very nearly jumped out of his skin at the resulting explosion, much larger than would seem possible to come from the tiny object. "O...oh."
Danny grinned.
"This weapon," Maddie continued, "is especially useful to carry in the purse as an undercover weapon... if you're ever out shopping, or otherwise caught without a weapon, you can simply pull out your lipstick and shoot the ghost while it's unaware that you have a weapon. Quite a handy feature."
"What about if you don't use lipstick?" drawled Dash, exchanging conspiratorial looks with Kwan.
Jack whipped out a pencil. "The Jack-O'Nine Tails is a man's best friend for those pesky attacks at inconvenient times! Just point"- he pointed it at the target - "shoot" - he pressed the button - "and presto, instant ghost tangle!"
"Or self tangle," Kwan snickered. Jack, with his usual bad aim, hadn't pointed the pencil properly... the grasping arms all draped over Jack's head and shoulders, his face a comically dismayed centerpiece.
"Moving on," Jack grumbled, somewhat hastily, untangling himself. He moved to the desk again and pulled out a folder, opening it almost reverently. "I am about to show you the very first proof the Fenton Family ever had of the existence of ghosts. The triumph of our ancestors."
Silence. Paulina scowled, flicking her hair back. "You haven't said anything about Phantom yet," she observed petulantly.
Jack ignored her. "In the late sixteen-hundreds, my esteemed ancestor of the time, Jon Fenton, lived in Salem. The witch trials were going on."
Danny's eyes widened, then narrowed, and he exchanged glances with Tucker. Sam turned around to look at him, wide-eyed. This can not be what I think it is...
"One day during practices, when the local witch-burners were practicing their record set-up time, a strange girl appeared. She was dressed in odd, dark clothing that was outrageous for the time... it left her arms and midriff bare, and showed off her legs. This undoubtedly exhibited her allegiance to the Devil."
Sam's face turned pink, and she faced front, dropping her head into her arms. Danny groaned quietly, nearly as embarrassed. It is... how on earth am I gonna get them to realize we were time traveling and didn't belong in that time...
"She ran forward, yelling, trying to tell the villagers to 'get a life'. It is unknown to this day what she meant by that; perhaps she wanted them to kill someone." Jack looked very serious. Tucker choked and hid his sudden laughter in the crook of his elbow.
"Remind me to stay invisible the next time we go time traveling," Danny murmured to Sam, who tried valiantly to hide her amusement at his words.
"Fifteen minutes of history," she observed. "A paradox."
Tucker's head was buried in his arms, shoulders shaking. He looked up at the other two, and there were tears of laughter in his eyes as he struggled to control his amusement. "I... a ha ha! I wonder if you STARTED your parents' obsession, Danny?"
Danny threw up his arms slightly in exasperated despair. It would be true, wouldn't it?
"As she finished her satanic command, she stepped forth onto the Fenton Anti-Witch Net, the precursor to modern ghost weapons, and was trapped above the town, struggling. The villagers, angry and horrified at the presence of the witch in their midst, dragged her forth and tied her to a post in the middle of town, ready to be burned." Jack hadn't noticed a thing.
Dash let forth an exaggerated yawn. Maddie silenced him with a look. "Patience. The ghostly part's getting here. In fact, it has to do with Phantom."
The whole class sat up straight, minus a certain trio. Valerie and Paulina leaned forward, radically different expressions on their faces. Silence fell. Danny hid an embarrassed sigh. I'm really glad they don't know it was me.
"They were about to burn the girl, but suddenly, from nowhere, a creature flew to her rescue. It was in the form of a boy, glowing with an eerie light, with deathly white hair and poisonous green eyes." Maddie took up the story, giving them all a significant look. "It had on strange, form-fitting black clothing with points of white to draw the eyes... very unusual for the time, just like the girl."
"Phantom," Valerie growled. "Devil."
"But... like, weren't the witches later proved to be innocent?" Paulina piped up. "Phantom was just saving people, same as always!"
The ghost hunters all seemed to turn suddenly hard of hearing, but the trio had to smile. Thanks, Paulina.
Danny realized something and pulled out a piece of paper and a pencil hurriedly. Wonder why they didn't remember the insignia and make it a symbol of all things terrible and ghostly? he wrote. Quickly he duplicated the message, crumpling the papers up small and tossing them carefully to Tucker and Sam.
Both read the message quickly and turned amused looks on him before writing responses. Sam's arrived first. Perhaps they didn't see it? He was going pretty fast and even when the flowers were burning him he was curled up enough it might not have been seen. She made sure no one was named, just in case their notes were intercepted. At least the 'going too fast' and 'flowers burning him' parts could be explained away with an overactive imagination.
Danny shrugged at her and mouthed 'Maybe.' It made sense, though it was sort of funny.
Tucker threw over a note as well. It got lost to history?
Somehow I doubt that, honestly, Danny thought with a sigh, what with the Fenton family's obsession... they even remember my eye color... but it was as good a theory as any. He tilted his head in a half-shrug.
Meanwhile, Jack had gone on. "The pale specter flew forward, intending to save his dark mistress from her doom. My honorable ancestor was on the scene, and sprang to stop it."
It. Niiice, Dad.
Dark mistress? Sam wanted to die. Her face felt like a fireball.
"He ringed the pyre in Blood Blossoms, a kind of flower that holds a deadly poison to ghosts. It's perfectly safe for humans, in fact it has good snack value. The only way to shut off the flower's effect is to eat it!" Jack stated happily.
Tucker shuddered at the memory.
Maddie was pulling out a bag from behind the desk. She finished the story as she wrestled with it, shuffling around inside with her hand. "The ghost hit the shield the blossoms created and bounced back. A brave, unnamed man stepped forward and threw the ghost inside the ring, and it thrashed around, screaming as though it knew it were being destroyed..." Gasps sounded from the class. "But before it could be eradicated, a strange boy with dark skin and a shiny metal object in his hand ran from beyond the circle of villagers and ate all the flowers. Freed, the ghost sprang upwards, seized both witch and boy, and flew away. Now that we know witches aren't real, we now believe that he was controlling the two for some unknown reason." Several people cheered, Paulina among them, while Valerie folded her arms and scowled.
Danny made a mock-scary face at Tucker and they both laughed silently.
Maddie began making rounds of the desks, placing something on each desk. "And thus the Fenton Family Occupation was born," she concluded merrily. "Phantom is a ghost that is at least 300 years old, and may have a grudge against the Fenton family for our near-destruction if him back in Salem. This is probably why he showed up here, after being in Salem 300 years ago." As she finished speaking, she approached Sam's desk. Danny couldn't help but roll his eyes.
Sam leaned forward, trying to see what Maddie was doing, and whipped around to look at Danny, face going pale. 'Blood Blossoms,' she mouthed, horrified.
Danny's face went white, and Tucker's eyes widened. Oh no.
The innocent-looking little red blossoms were placed on the desks in front of them. One blossom to each desk. He pushed himself back as far as he could in his seat, already feeling the tendrils of poisonous energy brushing at his skin, tingling and burning like a spray of liquid nitrogen. How can I get out of this? Dimly, he was aware of his dad drawing something on the board... a diagram of a Blood Blossom. Apparently they were trying to illustrate what, exactly, made the flowers so dangerous to ghosts... hey, the specter deflector and ghost shield were based off blood blossom properties? He hadn't known that... strange, the things you pick up in dire situations...
Try as he might to keep from agitating the flower, the proximity of his ectoplasmic side triggered the flower's defense mechanism. The red energy released itself, going on to trigger the other flowers scattered through the room. Slowly, the classroom began to fill with a pale red light, leaving a bloody cast over the scene. Danny's hands clenched his seat, body going rigid, jaw locking, as pain ripped through his body.
Sam snatched the flower off his desk, swallowing it in one gulp and following it with her own. Tucker threw his at her in great haste, and she finished it off too. They both stared at Danny, pale-faced, hoping that would help... but just like in Salem, the other flowers didn't stop. What could they do?
As if that wasn't enough, Maddie chose that moment to be observant. "Sam, I know we said they're edible, but they're critically endangered now: we don't want them to go extinct! Don't eat any more of them, please."
Sam whipped around to stare at her, face white and terrified, like a trapped animal. Maddie frowned.
Danny's body was trembling, curling up now. His muscles were contracting out of his control, and he fell against his desk, shaking violently. Maddie finally noticed. "Danny!"
The whole classroom turned to look, and eyes widened. Both Fenton parents hurried to Danny's desk. "Danny! What's wrong?"
He couldn't answer. If he tried, he'd scream... and if that wouldn't be a giveaway, he didn't know what would. Stubbornly, he bit his lip, and tasted blood. The class gathered round him, abandoning their desks.
Sam rocketed to her feet and set at top speed to each desk, snatching the blossoms and gulping them down. Tucker helped her gather them, though with a look he conveyed his unwillingness to actually eat them. Before long, all the flowers were gone, and Danny finally relaxed, sighing in incredible relief. The deadly energy faded, and the red cast to the room vanished.
The class stared in confusion for a long moment, but then Star looked around. "Hey, goth-girl ate all the flowers!" she exclaimed. "They're all gone!"
Maddie furrowed her brow, seeing the inevitable connection between Danny's strange episode and the Blood Blossoms. "Why did the flowers affect you, Danny?" she whispered, slowly, in something like horror. Jack was silent beside her, and the class stood round as the boy rolled to his feet, waiting.
The trio exchanged fearful glances. This wasn't good.
Wasn't good at all.
All satanic Doom and Gloom pieces are just things I relate to the Salem Witch Trials and in no way reflect my own beliefs :P Also, Tucker's appearance would have been very odd to them back then, I think... both in clothing and in the fact that slavery was still very much a problem back then. I daresay he would have garnered quite a bit of attention.
I didn't put much of their theories into the chapter... it was getting long already, and I didn't want to get too in-depth into the whole thing. If you prefer, I can add one-shots in a separate story at some point to explain the views I take in the Danny Phantom universe (and use in all my stories in the fandom), in contrast to what the Fenton parents claim.
This chapter seems somehow... cumbersome. I'm not sure how to change that. Help? :S