Bonjour, mes chers! So terribly sorry about the wait but I hope you can forgive me as I give to you 21k words and as well a rather well put together smut scene, if I do say so myself.

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Chapter Twenty

::

"Oh, yes, the groaning. I know, I know, it's a terrible and cliche assignment." Andrew wasn't very happy about the assignment himself, but at least he kept his visible disappointment to a minimum. "'Write about what you're thankful for'. Unfortunately for you all this class does have some mandatory curriculum and assignments, this being one of them."

Letting his powers take over writing on the board, Andrew gathered up the papers and started handing them to students in the front row to pass back. "This assignment does have merits, however. It's a good way to put our thoughts in order and to reflect on the things we're truly grateful for in life. Family, friends, or even just the fact you're still here, still learning and growing." Right, the distant looks meant he was getting a bit too philosophical. He'd save it for if he ever taught college classes one day.

"Since this assignment is so open-ended I'm only giving you a word count goal of five hundred, due right before Thanksgiving break. Anything goes as long as you list at least one thing you're thankful for, and why you're thankful for it. Any writing format and narrative counts, so if you want to write it as a conversation between yourself and another person or character, that's acceptable. I will be grading on grammar for this one, as well, since midterms are coming up soon. Please use a spellchecker, even if it's just right-clicking on the red lines under the words."

Letting the marker fall back into his hand, Andrew capped the lid on the marker and looked to his classroom, making sure they all at least looked like they had a vague idea of what was going on. "That's it for today. You're free to escape."

As usual, the students flocked to the door in droves, Andrew trying not to visibly roll his eyes at the predictability of teenagers. At least no one was stopping by his desk to try and 'confess' to him. Honestly, the fact he was a ghost and near their parents' age mentally did nothing at all to dissuade them. He blamed all the 'immortal love stories' that were published these days.

Now that he thought about it, the lack of confessions probably had to do with Danny's little 'jealous' act of glaring whenever another student tried to flirt with him. Although Andrew wasn't quite sure if the behavior was entirely part of his act.

Pausing from where he had started to clean the board, Andrew glanced over his shoulder with narrowed eyes. "I swear if you're trying to do more 'training'-"

"You have to keep in shape somehow," Randy faded back into view, hovering over the floor with a wide grin. "Just because we no longer work for the Sect doesn't mean we can neglect our training."

"Training for what?" Andrew tossed an eraser to Randy, trying not to smile as the man immediately went to work at helping him tidy up the classroom. "For you and your jobs, yes. Me? I'm a teacher, in case you've forgotten."

"Exactly! You need the training more than anyone, considering the hell those little demons put you through daily." It probably would have been easier to scoff if Andrew wasn't working so hard on not laughing. "Even Danny keeps up with his training."

"'Hero' training is very different from assassin training, I'll have you know." Far as he was concerned, Randy and Danny could release their pent up sexual tension all they wanted, but Andrew was staying far away from the mess that would bring.

"You'd be surprised." Speaking of pent up sexual tension… Andrew glanced behind him, Randy's face barely an inch away from his own from where he was so tightly pressed against his back. "Just one little training session?"

Sparring with the two of them before being pinned to the ground, a body pressed tightly against his and panting for breath with sweat and tension and a pounding core- Aha. No. That was- No. Well… "I thought White Fang was supposed to be done tempting the sinners."

"Now whoever said that." Randy's voice was a near purr, lips brushing against the tip of his ear and oh, that should feel nowhere near as good as it did. He might have been the one to say that they didn't need to put a label on what they were, but there were times where Randy was so good at running him around in circles and he just wanted to know. "'What I'm thankful for', though, really? Isn't that a bit cliche? Even for you?"

"It's not like I have the ability to reject all school-" Pausing, Andrew shot Randy as nasty a look as he could manage. "And just what, Randall, do you mean by 'even for me'."

"Mon petit frère chéri." Their native tongue came out in a soft croon, Randy slipping around so easily to cup his cheek and stare down at him. And this… This was it. This was the moment everything changed. Andrew could feel it with the sharp crackle of tension in the air, the beating of both their cores, Randy's soft gaze trained on him and him alone, and a body that was moving closer… Closer… "Have you read your books?"

"Remind me why I haven't killed you, yet?" Slumping, Andrew didn't bother to fight against the hold as Randy pulled him in for a hug. "Yes, yes, I love you too." A little too much, it felt like. "Now help me get ready for my next class."

"But that's so much effort, and, really, Andy, I have work of my own I need to be doing. I just got this job offer-"

"Danny will be here for lunch."

"I'll get the broom."

::

"My, my, you have been busy, darling. A run in with the Guys-in-White, a game you've got the school wrapped up in, and now playing with the feelings of the only people in your life who have ever felt close to you. Such productivity!"

The halls were empty, Danny noted. That was good, since he could feel his power thrumming under his skin, buzzing and building like something about to explode. It was only the thought of giving her the satisfaction that kept Danny from changing and charging ahead. "Spectra. It's been so long I thought I got lucky and you finally pissed off the wrong person."

"Oh, no, don't worry about me, dear." Spectra gave a smile that was all teeth, human disguise fading to reveal twisting shadows of malice. "I know my limits." The jab was clear, and Danny wished it didn't pick at him like it did.

"Then you should know pissing me off like this isn't going to help you in the long run. I only have so much patience, Spectra." Because he had at least admitted that much to himself. He may have been a hero, but that didn't mean he saw the good in everyone. Not when they didn't deserve it.

"You really are becoming like him, aren't you," Spectra cooed, hand reaching closer. Danny had the ghost pressed against the lockers before he even knew what he was doing, hands filled with blazing energy. "So quick to resort to violence. The similarities are uncanny."

"Andy isn't anything like that anymore." He could feel the growl rumbling through him, a tone of voice that wasn't truly his. Wasn't human. A voice like that could never belong to someone human. "He's not the Priest!"

"I wasn't talking about the little Priest you're so enamoured with, Danny dear," Spectra laughed, sharp nails of her own digging into Danny's arm, drawing blood easily. Danny did his best to not flinch, only glaring and pushing her further into the lockers. "I'm talking about that little future of yours you try so hard to hide."

Amity Park burning and destroyed and everyone dead and red and green and they bled bled beld and there was so much death and destruction and he couldn't breathe but it was him it was him at the center of it all and there was no one left there was just rage and hate and malice and don't you get it don't you get it

"You don't get it, do you? I'm still here. I still exist. That means you still turn into me."

"You're already so much like him," Spectra laughed, and for a moment Danny saw nothing but red. "Did you really think you could escape your future that easily, Danny? Your fate? After all, there's a reason you feel so comfortable around killers."

Danny was throwing Spectra across the hall before launching himself after her, not able to pinpoint the moment he changed to Phantom and only aware of the rage that was consuming him. "Don't you dare- Don't you dare compare that monster to them! Don't you dare compare him to me!" He wasn't Dan. He wasn't. He was never going to become him he would sooner die-

"The solution is simple, Danny." Spectra's voice curled around him like smoke, obscuring everything else. "You know it as well as I do." Would sooner die… "There's only one way to make sure that future never comes to pass." If he stopped everything now, he would never change. Never grow any different. If he were to stop aging, stop living…

"Danny?" Eyes wide, Danny shot his gaze over to… To Randy. What was Randy doing there? "Are you alright? Did you just fight someone?" Was he- Oh. Spectra was gone.

"Ye… Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine. And I wouldn't call it a fight- You didn't feel any ghost signatures?" Because Randy was better at that than Danny sometimes, and he was the one with the ghost sense.

"I felt something off, but not any specific ghosts." Letting himself switch back to his human form, Danny blinked as he felt hands cup his cheeks, blue eyes staring into his own. "There's darkness around you." Before Danny could even question that, Randy was shaking his head. "Come on, Andy's waiting for us. It's time for lunch."

"Yeah." He hadn't felt Spectra. How had he not felt Spectra? Had she even been there. His arm wasn't bleeding anymore, but that could just be from where he had changed to his ghost form and then back. "What are you doing here, anyways?"

"Bothering Andy." Faking a smile, Danny followed after Randy down the halls, eyes straying to where he had last seen Spectra. He… He couldn't have imagined that whole thing, right? Stress could cause him problems, sure, but hallucinating? And something like that? There… There was just no way.

Right?

::

"I'm worried about Danny." Blinking up at Randy, it took a moment for Andrew to register the concern in the older's voice. As soon as he did, he was swiveling his chair around and giving Randy his undivided attention.

"Whatever happened at the school?" There hadn't been much. Some strange ghostly energy, but there had been no other signatures besides Danny's. Randy had only mentioned something about darkness before distracting the two of them with talk all throughout lunch.

"It's wrong." Randy was pacing across the floor of the work room they were in, nervously tapping out a rhythm against the guns holstered at his side. Not a good sign. Vidya seemed to notice as well, an uneasy snippet of a song swirling around Andrew's head. "There's- There's this darkness clinging to him."

"You said that before, but I'm not quite sure I understand what you mean, grand frère." It was true that Randy had always been the empathic sort, but sometimes it seemed as if he could feel the emotions of others… A latent ghost power, perhaps. "Depression?"

"Darker. That was there, yeah, no doubt. Anxiety, too. But this was… This was darker. Heavier. I don't know how to explain it, Andy, I just know something is wrong with him. Or something's bothering him more than ever before."

"Any idea what it could be?" Their relationship - the three of them - would understandably cause a bit of stress and confusion, but this? What Randy was describing? Andrew could think of nothing in Danny's life that could cause as many problems as was being alluded to. "It doesn't seem to be anything in school."

"It's not us, before you suggest it. The only time he seems calm anymore is when he's curled up with me or you." Randy's pacing slowed for a moment, blue eyes swirling with the white of his powers. This really was getting to him. "Enemies? Plasmius and him may have called things even, but there's still others. Spectra, Guys-in-White, even the Observants."

"It's not the Observants, Clockwork would have told us even if Danny didn't. The truce has been working wonderfully for months now. I doubt that it's any average ghost. The Guys-in-White have been quiet. Or at least, I haven't seen them around the school." A few drive-bys, certainly, but nothing that could be credited as outright watching them.

"Spectra?" That… It was easy to tell that Randy's uncomfortable look was mirrored by his own. "He's been having problems with her for years."

"The more recent ones have cropped up in the last few months. He won't tell me much of the fights, if they're even that much, but he has admitted that her words have gotten to him."

"Spectra's words always hit her mark," Randy muttered, collapsing onto a couch with a groan. Rolling his eyes, Andrew absently turned and saved his work before getting up and moving to sit beside him. "That darkness has been there since I met him, but after dealing with Spectra one time, it seemed so much… It seemed heavier. Like a piece of her shadow had crossed into his."

"She's a leech," Andrew shook his head, comfortingly tousling Randy's hair. "She takes, not gives."

"But does she infect?" Silent for a while, Andrew watched as Randy finally sighed, eyes settling down into their usual blue. "Keep an eye on him and any behavior that's out of the ordinary."

"As if you needed to say so," Andrew flicked Randy on the ear, laughing at the betrayed look he was given. "Danny's resilient, if nothing else. I'm happy to protect him and keep him safe, but he's stronger than both of us combined on some days. He'll be okay."

"I hope so." Andrew did, too. Spectra was a leech, but she was a threat, as well. There usually wasn't much worry when it was only brief contact for short amounts of time, but with Danny being exposed in his fights to her… Ones that were becoming more frequent, as well.

Andrew couldn't help but think that Spectra was playing a game only she knew about. A game that she was winning.