Maddie woke to the smell of pizza.

Without opening her eyes she yawned luxuriously, wondering at the scent. If there was pizza, it meant that somebody's day had been exceptionally bad. The tradition reached back to college, when any time that their experiments failed miserably or more funds were cut, the only way to cheer the two boys up had been with pizza. One Maddie and Jack were raising a family, the tradition had been added upon with brown creaming soda (Jazz's contribution) and ice-cream cake (this one had been Danny's idea).

Wondering whose life had been met with catastrophe, Maddie opened her eyes and sat up. In an unfamiliar bed. In a plain, white room. With a freezing chunk sending bolts of pain through her chest.

Crying out, the woman lurched forwards, pressing hands against the space where her heart should be. As the pain dulled back to an aching throb, she waited for the familiar beat of an organ that was no longer there.

Phantom poked his head through the open door, brow creased in that inexplicable worry. "Are you okay?" Her withering glare had the halfa looking at his toes. "Sor-ry, it's a standard question," he muttered.

That tone pressed against Maddie's mind like a leaden weight. Everything about this kid screamed harmless-if-slightly-obnoxious teenager, and the more the woman stared, the less she could see in terms of a dangerous creature from beyond the grave. If the kid ditched the hazmat and somehow managed to stop glowing, he'd fit right in at the local high school.

Phantom sighed when Maddie didn't speak. "Look, while you were asleep, I went and got some dinner. Do you think you can walk?"

Her body screamed no, but her mind quailed at the thought of showing even the slightest weakness against this particular person. "I can handle it," Maddie insisted, swinging her feet over the edge of the bed and trying to hold back a grimace.

The ghost was by her side in a flash of light, and Maddie jerked away from him at the unexpected teleportation. "I said I can handle it," she said in her best 'listen to me because I'm the mum' voice. True to her hypothesis, the teen pulled back slightly. His hands fluttered though the air as though unsure before their movements settled, folding casually across his chest.

"The dining room's just across the hall," he supplied as she took her first step.

The pain ripped through Maddie's chest in a jolt, but she refrained from letting her discomfort show. Instead, she concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other. Maddie was dimly aware that the spectral teen was following right behind her, but to her relief he didn't make contact.

Upon entering the room across the hall, the woman collapsed into the nearest chair, breathing in shallow gasps. She could have sworn that Phantom muttered something about her usual stubbornness, but through the haze of pain Maddie couldn't be entirely certain.

The huntress waited until her breathing slowed back to normal, fully aware of the boy nervously standing beside her. Once her breaths were completely under control and the throbbing diminished, Maddie opened her eyes, looked at the table, and froze.

Pizza, brown creaming soda, and an ice cream cake.

"Won't it melt?" Maddie blurted, her mouth spewing the first thought to cross her stunned mind.

Phantom lifted his hand in response and wriggled gloved fingers, grinning mischievously as ice crystals formed in the air around his fingernails. "I wouldn't worry about that," he responded.

Somehow, this kid knew the inner workings of the Fenton family. Maddie dimly registered that his suit was no longer covered in her blood as she struggled to comprehend how this impossible creature knew such an important family tradition of hers.

"Are you one of Danny's school friends?" she breathed.

Phantom stiffened. "Um, I-I know Danny, if that's what you're asking." He seemed to not know where to put his hands – rubbing the back of his neck, folding and unfolding lanky arms, running gloved fingers through a mess of white hair – and his eyes looked everywhere except the huntress' face. "Why d'you ask?"

Maddie gestured to the food. "You know our bad day tradition."

"Oh, that." The kid let out a laugh that was a little more boisterous than necessary. "Yeah, Danny told everyone in the class about that when we were sharing family values and talking about different cultures and things we hold on to and stuff like that. I went to get food when you fell asleep, and remembered that he'd said you guys have this stuff when you have a bad day, so I thought you'd like to have it now because becoming a halfa was certainly one of the worst days I've ever had."

He was babbling. Maybe Maddie could use that to her advantage. "So, you're in my son's class?" she asked, trying to keep her tone nonchalant.

He finally met her gaze. "Maybe."

"Stop trying to be mysterious," Maddie told him, "you just make yourself look stupid."

"But a virtually unique creature such as myself should be mysterious," Phantom countered, puffing out his chest somewhat childishly.

How did she even end up having this conversation?

Turning her focus to the table, Maddie smirked. "I think you got a tad much," she commented, gesturing to the four large pizza boxes.

"Well, I usually eat three," he muttered, sitting in the chair next to her. Maddie tensed at the proximity, but if Phantom noticed, he made no comment.

"How can you eat that much? There's not enough space in your stomach!"

Phantom flushed, his cheeks turning light green. "Um, most of it gets turned straight into spectral energy and stored as ectoplasm. Only the last couple of slices actually feed my human body."

"So you do have a human form."

"I thought that we'd already established that," the teen grumbled, reaching for a slice of pizza and foregoing his plate entirely.

"Well?"

"Well what?"

"What's your human form?"

Phantom choked on his mouthful, hunching over the table and coughing violently. After a few seconds Maddie started to thump him on the back, and it took a couple more breaths before his fit subsided. "Please," Phantom rasped, "don't ask me that."

Maddie was instantly furious. How dare he? This creature had dragged her into the Ghost Zone and to his lair. He expected her to trust him enough to stay there while ectoplasm slowly tainted her entire body, and to blindly eat and drink whatever was offered. For all they knew, this new heart could be turning Maddie into a hybrid! How dare he even think that he had a right to keep such information to himself?!

"Phantom," the woman ground out, struggling to keep her voice level, "please be reasonable here. I'm trying to trust you, but you have to give me something to go on."

The halfa went very still, his fingers curling tightly around the edge of the table. "I saved your life," he responded in a whisper. "I brought you to my only safe haven, even though all you've ever done is hunt me. Isn't that enough?"

Something within Maddie told her to stop, that the boy was right, but she couldn't keep her mouth shut. "All you've ever done is terrorise the town!"

"I fight off the real threat!" He was on the verge of shouting now. "I keep everyone in Amity Park as safe as I can!"

"Why?! Why do you care? For all we know, you're just having fun with your ghostly buddies!"

He stood so forcefully that the chair clattered to the floor. "I give a damn because it's my fault that the portal started working in the first place!"

As Phantom's words registered in Maddie's stunned brain, a look of horror crossed his face. He took a step back, eyes darting to the door as if he was debating whether he could make it before someone shot him.

"Wait-"

He was gone as soon as she opened her mouth.

Maddie leaned back in her chair, fingers pressed against her lips. Her eyes began to burn, and the huntress felt like she was going to scream.

Phantom fought the ghosts because he thought that it was his fault.

Guilt slammed into her like a bulldozer, and the first tear spilled down the woman's cheek. Phantom was just a kid, but he obviously dedicated his life to doing what he thought was right. He had a human form, and since Maddie had seen him fighting at all hours of the day, his human life would surely suffer from the constant call of duty.

The kid dedicated himself to protecting the citizens of Amity Park from something that he felt responsible for. Technically, he was doing Maddie's job. Visions flashed through her mind of the suddenly frail-looking body being thrown against buildings, shot, burned… More tears followed, and Maddie sobbed into her hands as she finally realised that all the kid had ever done was try to keep her safe, and she had hunted him relentlessly for it.

As Maddie continued to cry, melted ice cream dripped of the edge of the table, pooling in a sticky mess on the floor.