Chapter Sixteen

A/N: We're also going back a little bit in time for this chapter (specifically picking up with Tucker's POV starting a few minutes after Danny left).

CW: Emetophobia, dehumanization, mentions of abuse

Tucker wasn't usually so lucky. He earned the awful nickname "Bad Luck Tuck" for a reason.

But of everyone in his house, he was the one currently awake right now, alive and okay, while his parents and Sam lay unconscious, and Danny . . . His mind struggled to think about Danny. Things were so much easier when they thought he was possessed, not maybe dead or half-dead or whatever the heck he actually was. In the span of five minutes, Danny went from his friend who could have friendly chats with ghosts and had one or two odd but relatively minor abilities, to a who-knew-what shooting ecto blasts, turning invisible and intangible and creating shields. He knew literally nothing about Danny anymore, his friend a perfect and terrifying stranger.

Shaken as he was, Tucker tried to do as Danny instructed when he left to go fight the ghosts. He didn't have any ecto weapons, but he did have the specter deflector still and so he put it on, wondering if it would hurt Danny, but it was the only defense he had and hopefully Danny would understand. The specter deflector probably wouldn't do much. Tucker seriously doubted it could stop those things if they attacked or used that weird power on him, but it was better than nothing.

He checked Sam's pulse again despite being able to see her chest slowly rise and fall. She wore a small smile, her eyes twitching as if dreaming, but like his parents she would not wake up. What if this didn't get better? What if they all remained asleep forever because of what the ghost did to them?

Pulling out his phone, he quickly dialed 9-1-1, and felt a twinge of fear as it rang endlessly and no one answered. "Fentons, then," he decided, talking to himself in an effort to try to keep his panic under control. Danny wouldn't answer, of course, too busy fighting ghosts, even though he was a ghost? Maybe? He couldn't think about it, not right now. It was too much for him to handle with everything else happening. Tucker needed to focus. Who else could he call for help? Jazz, maybe? He pulled up her contact and dialed, the call connecting within seconds as she answered.

"Hello?"

Oh thank goodness. "Jazz, it's Tucker. There are some ghosts that came to my house and they did something to my parents and Sam. I don't know what it is and no one's picking up at 9-1-1. I didn't even think they were allowed to not pick up the phone when you called 9-1-1!"

"They might have been attacked too," said Jazz, sounding impossibly calm even as Tucker felt himself spiraling. "They're all over town. As far as we can tell, all they're doing is putting people to sleep, but we haven't been able to wake anyone up and Mom and I are hiding under the ghost shield right now while Dad is out looking for Danny. Any chance he's still with you?"

"No, he left a while ago," he said uneasily, trying not to break out into insane giggles. Oh, god. Danny. How could he even begin to tell Jazz and the others about Danny when he still didn't understand even half of it? How could he tell them that Danny might actually be dead and a ghost and not one of them noticed? "I think his phone wasn't charged, though."

"Ugh, of course it wasn't. I really wish he'd remember how much people worry about him sometimes," she said. "He still keeps trying to do everything by himself. But at least Phantom and Valerie are out there right now, too. Mom's trying to help them track down the ghost doing all of this."

"Phantom's back?" He should have been happy about that, but instead he felt a weird sort of queasiness thinking about the ghost. There was something he was missing, wasn't there? Something obvious about Phantom and Danny, but he wasn't sure what.

"Apparently. I think it's a good thing. Mom is, well, let's say a little wary about Phantom given how long he's been gone," she said. "But I might be able to have Dad come pick you up, at least, and get you under the ghost shield if you want."

"I've got a specter deflector," said Tucker. He remained unconvinced that it would do anything, but there was no way he was going to get in that GAV while Jack Fenton was behind the wheel. "And your Dad's driving is way scarier than taking a nap if the ghosts do get me." Hopefully. Probably. Either way, he heard Jazz laugh quietly on the phone. "Call me when you get an update, okay?"

"Of course. And if you see Danny–"

"-I'll call you, Jazz. Promise. Stay safe."

"You, too."

Running downstairs, he checked on his parents again, confirming they were still breathing, and he tried unsuccessfully to shift them both to a more comfortable position on the couch before hurrying back upstairs to his room. Sam's mouth was still moving silently in her sleep as he sat down at his computer. There were dozens of stories about what the news was calling the "sleepwalkers," including one unfortunate video of poor Lance Thunder being accosted as he gave an update on the weather. His social media apps were mostly devoid of updates. A handful of kids from school were talking about it. There was a likely worthless video from Paulina on TikTok, and what was probably an even worse video from Wes Weston. Sometimes Tucker found Wes's weird conspiracy videos kind of funny, but right now as he glanced at his sleeping friend he found he was in no mood.

And then came the scream.

He felt it before he heard it. A violent shiver ran through him, so intense and jarring he almost vomited all over his keyboard, and then it echoed through Amity Park, a nightmarish wail that made the ground quake. Sam's eyes snapped open and she sat up, shoving her hands over her ears as tears leaked from her eyes, and Tucker could feel himself crying, too, as he gritted his teeth and wished it would end. The scream was full of pain and grief and rage, and his chest ached and his stomach churned, and just when he thought he couldn't take it anymore the screaming and shaking stopped.

The echo of it in his own mind remained, though, making him shiver.

"Sam?" His voice croaked, the word barely making it out as he wiped the tears away on his sleeve. "You okay?"

"Not really," she said, shaking violently, and he grabbed a blanket and threw it around her shoulders. "What the hell was that?"

"Don't know." There was a loud thumping on the stairs, and a moment later his Mom opened the door, looking similarly startled and unsettled.

"You kids okay?" Tucker nodded. "Thank goodness. Did you hear that, too?"

"Yeah. It's some kind of ghost attack," said Tucker. "There's stuff all over the news about it. You and everyone else fell asleep because of some creepy ghost. I–I thought–"

"-shhh, it's okay, honey," she said, throwing her arms around him, and although he might normally be a bit embarrassed to get a hug from his Mom in front of Sam, right now he didn't care. He leaned into it, letting her comfort him for a minute, impossibly glad that she and Dad and Sam were okay and weren't going to be stuck in some ghost induced coma forever. "Your father and I are going to check and make sure nothing was damaged. Do you kids need anything?"

"I don't think so," said Sam. "I feel kind of sick from whatever that was. I'm not super feeling in the mood for ice cream anymore."

"Okay. If you change your mind or if you want a ride home, let us know, and–" She paused, taking in his room again. "Wasn't Danny here, too?"

"Uh, yeah, but he left like a minute before everything went weird. I'm sure he's fine, Mom," lied Tucker as he nearly pushed her out the door. He hated this. He knew Danny wasn't fine, nothing was fine, not after what he saw.

"You sure?" Ughhh. Of course she could tell he was lying, too. How did Danny do this so convincingly for so long? Then again, maybe he didn't. It wasn't as if Tucker and Sam and everyone else hadn't noticed there was something horribly wrong with him since his accident. They just hadn't noticed how wrong. They hadn't done enough, they hadn't–they should have–He pushed the thoughts down, trying not to spiral again.

"Yup. Totally sure. I'll, um, text him again, though. Just in case."

"You do that," she said, and his Mom left, shutting the door behind her, and Tucker let out a long, shaky breath.

"We were asleep?" asked Sam.

"Yeah. Some ghosts came inside while you were downstairs," he explained. How the hell could he explain what happened then?

"Did Danny get it to leave?"

"Uh, yeah, he did. He decided to go after them. But Sam, it wasn't like he just talked to them or whatever like the last time and–" He stopped as a small popping sound suddenly interrupted him, and for the second time that night, a ghost appeared in his house.

Kneeling on his bed was the strangest ghost Tucker ever saw. Humanoid in shape, its white hair danced across its head like flames, and it seemed not so much made of flesh but of the night sky itself, more of a strange sort of void in the shape of a person than actual, present being with thousands of tiny stars traveling through it. Flames and smoke danced over its skin, and its clawed hands clutched Tucker's blankets. With a jolt he realized he saw this once before, with Phantom when the ghost's glove was destroyed, and as Tucker studied it further he saw the strange, silvery green fern-like pattern sprawling up from his left arm and across its chest, stopping abruptly around his heart.

"Phantom?" he asked as Sam sat frozen, her eyes wide.

"No! It's not–I'm not–I swear I'm still me. Please don't scream," the ghost begged as its voice echoed, and as it looked up its green eyes locked with Tucker's own. For the first time he saw the thermos clutched under one arm, and much to his surprise, the ghost was trembling, inexplicably terrified of him and Sam.

And although Tucker didn't understand it, he wasn't scared of what should have been an absolutely horrifying monster on his bed. Something about the ghost was immediately, intensely familiar despite its seeming insistence that it wasn't Phantom.

But it was Sam who figured it out first despite not having a clue what happened earlier. "Danny?"

He flinched, and although physically this ghost had little in common with his best friend beyond his size and the shape of his form, the moment Sam said it Tucker knew she was right with a certainty he only felt once or twice in his life. He expected or maybe hoped for a denial, a deflection, something . . . but it didn't come.

"It is you, isn't it? It sounds like you and feels like you, somehow, but what happened?" she whispered.

"I don't know what to do with this," he sputtered, holding out the thermos to them, stubbornly refusing to answer their questions again, and Tucker doubted he could get a more solid confirmation that this was Danny than that. "I can't–they can't see me this way, but he can't just be released back into the Ghost Zone. He's too dangerous."

"Are you–are you dead?" asked Tucker for the second time that night, his voice tight. He didn't care about the ghost or the thermos or whatever right now, no matter how awful that ghost attack was, but this–this wasn't like when Danny left and still looked human. Was this what he meant before about being able to be a ghost or something? Or was he–had something–Tucker didn't want him to be dead. He didn't. But as he looked at Danny, he had a hard time believing he could be anything but.

Before Danny could answer, Tucker felt his phone buzz in his hand, and glancing down at the screen he let out a soft curse. "Shit. It's Jazz."

"She–my parents–they have to get the thermos and figure out a way to contain Nocturn until I can–until I'm not–," stuttered Danny, and the mention of his parents hit Tucker like a train as he and Sam exchanged an uneasy look. What the hell were they supposed to do? Why didn't Danny go to them instead? Why didn't Danny at least deny being dead this time, like he had earlier? "Please. I–please don't let this be for nothing."

Oh no. He did not like the sound of that. "Can I–should I tell her that you're–" he gestured uncertainly at him, unable to form the words a second time as the weight of what it meant truly began to hit him.

"N-no. Just the thermos. Please."

Although he didn't want to lie to Jazz, Tucker also didn't want to be the one to tell her that Danny was dead, probably fully dead, especially not over the phone, and that thought sent a dagger through him as he realized there was no doubt that whatever line Danny was toeing before, he firmly crossed it tonight. Answering the call, he took a deep breath, hoping his voice wouldn't quaver as he spoke. "Hey, Jazz. You okay?"

"We're fine! It seems like people woke up after that awful screaming," she said, and Danny flinched again. Ah. Well, at least he knew the source now, but if Danny made a sound like that as he died . . . What the hell happened to him? The scream was awful, so full of pain and anguish and grief that realizing Danny made that sound made him physically sick. How badly had they failed him for Danny to sound like that? "Everyone okay?"

"My parents and Sam are all awake, and, um . . . Phantom dropped off the thermos with the ghost in it. He needs your parents to come by and get it. I guess he had to be somewhere. Or something?" Tucker winced. That shouldn't have been a question, but there was no way he could explain it was Danny and not Phantom that defeated the ghost, no matter how much the creepy, inky void and stars thing kept reminding him of Phantom. Maybe all the times Phantom overshadowed Danny, regardless of how innocuous Danny claimed it was, left their mark. "He said the ghost is super dangerous, though. He suggested not putting it back into the ghost zone yet."

"Danny won't like that, I bet," said Jazz, and Tucker's hands shook so badly he almost dropped his phone.

"Haha, yeah, probably not," he squeaked. "But, uh, you said your Dad was driving around, right? Maybe he can come get the thermos?"

"Sure. I'll let him know." She was silent for a moment, and Tucker felt his stomach drop. She noticed, didn't she, that he was a gibbering train wreck. Jazz was always too sharp. "Are you sure everything is okay, Tucker? You sound kind of freaked out."

"A ghost just put half the town to sleep, a freaky ghost scream made me want to throw up, and now I have a thermos with the aforementioned super dangerous ghost inside it," he sputtered rapidly. "Of course I'm freaked out, Jazz."

"Fair enough," she said. "Any word from my brother yet? I know you said his battery was dead, but I was hoping he would have gotten in touch with someone by now."

"Not yet," he lied, the words feeling heavy on his tongue as the word 'dead' made his mind start spinning again. "I'm–I'm sure we'll find him soon." He couldn't bring himself to promise that Danny would be okay. Not when he knew the truth. "Keep us posted if he comes home?"

"Always. And Dad texted he'll be there in ten minutes or so, depending on the roads. I guess there's a lot of accidents."

"At least he didn't cause them." The joke was weak, but given the moment, it was the best he could bring himself to do as he stared at the ghost of his dead friend trembling while he kneeled on his bed.

"Small miracles," said Jazz."Try to breathe, Tucker. Whatever it was, at least it's over now."

"Right, Jazz. You're right. It's totally over. I'll, um, talk to you soon. Bye." He slammed the end call button on his screen with his thumb, silently wishing none of this had happened.

"Thanks," whispered Danny, his voice echoing. Little by little he was looking less like some nightmarish creature from the void and more like a person. The strange flames and smoke were smaller, the inky shadows clinging to his skin receding, and as things shifted it was increasingly clear that this was Danny.

"You know, as soon as you told us about what you were doing and being a liminal, Danny, I was pretty sure it was going to get you killed," said Sam, and Tucker could see tears starting to form despite Sam's best efforts to hold them back. "I just didn't think you'd prove me right so quickly."

"What happened?" asked Tucker. Although he was in no rush to experience a death echo again, he felt like he owed it to Danny to hear the truth, even if it hurt. A part of him felt numb, still detached from what was happening, but he could feel his grief building like a tidal wave that would soon overwhelm him. "That was you screaming, wasn't it?"

"Yeah, but I can't–right now–" Danny shook his head, gritting his eerily white, pointed teeth. "I need help."

Sam and Tucker shared a look. "With the thermos? Your Dad's on it, he'll be here–"

"-no," he snapped, and Tucker felt the temperature in the room plummet for a moment. "Sorry. I don't feel right. It's all–everything's just wrong."

"I kind of think being a ghost wouldn't be the same as when you were alive," said Sam carefully, her fingers gripping her skirt so tightly her knuckles were white. Neither of them had any experience with a new ghost, and with how much Danny pulled away from them and hid from them, they didn't really know Danny that well anymore, either. Something based on just an echo of him, some snapshot of his consciousness as he died, wasn't a place Tucker thought he could reach.

"No, the ghost thing, I get, it's always different, but this," he said as he gestured at himself. "And I can't change or –it's there, I can feel it there, but I can't reach it. I need help."

Little of that made sense to Tucker, despite knowing Danny mentioned being a ghost sometimes before he left, and although he wanted to ask questions to try to understand, he knew that wasn't what Danny wanted or needed right now. "Okay, just breathe, or, well, don't breathe, I guess? Whatever. But tell us what we can do."

"Talk about something normal. Something human. Please."

"I got tickets to the Dumpty Humpty concert next month," said Sam after a moment's thought. "Three of them, so you could come." Her voice cracked, but she smiled through it anyway.

"Seriously? The new lineup sucks," he whispered, still shaking. He clearly hadn't thought it through, what it meant. But that didn't matter. He wanted some kind of reminder of his humanity, of being a person, and they would try to give it to him as best they could. Tucker didn't understand how it would help, but if there was anything he could do for Danny at that moment, he was going to do it.

"No way! They've taken the original spirit of the group and brought it to the next level. Like, Jeffrey is a way better guitarist than Alan ever was," argued Tucker. His voice barely trembled, but this felt like something easy to talk about. Something safe. And at least this was the truth. "Pure skill alone, dude, the new lineup wins."

"It's all technical, though," argued Danny, the shadows fading faster from his arms and revealing his ordinary looking, if literally glowing, skin beneath, and maybe this was what he meant. Maybe that monstrous ghost wasn't what Danny wanted to be, or maybe, somehow, this would help him move on to wherever he needed to go. "There's no heart anymore. The music sounds like something a robot would make."

"You say that like that's a bad thing," said Tucker. "I'd be first in line to hear a group of robots."

"Ugh, not me," said Sam. "But I think they've definitely got some heart in the new lineup, Danny. It just took them a bit to find their sound. Have you listened to the new album yet?"

"No."

"I've got it downloaded, hang on," offered Tucker, spinning to his computer, and he skipped to his favorite track as Sam reached out to hold Danny's hand, squeezing it firmly as if trying to convince herself that somehow, maybe, Danny could stop being a ghost if she just refused to let him go. For a few minutes the three of them listened in silence, the singer's words echoing in his small room. "This part's cool, listen." He turned it up a little so they could hear the guitar solo.

"Bet I could play that," said Danny. "I've been taking lessons from Ember."

"In your dreams, space boy," said Sam, and Danny flinched hard. For a moment Tucker worried about him, wondering if they accidentally triggered some part of his obsession or reminded him of whatever hurt him, but the shadows kept receding as Sam held onto him and they chatted. The faint, glowing fern-like pattern on his arm remained, but the part across his chest was obscured by a dark t-shirt with what looked like an inverted NASA logo. His teeth and face had mostly returned to normal, the only evidence of something ghostly the faint glow around his skin and his still intense, glowing green eyes and white hair that seemed to wave in an invisible breeze. "Even Ember's lessons can't get you that far, and Jeffrey is a better guitarist than Ember by like a hundred miles."

"Don't let Ember hear you say that," he said. "Although you're probably right."

Tucker stood up, then, and carefully removed his specter deflector before sitting down beside Danny, too. "Don't want you to get zapped. Seems like it would hurt." Danny gave him a half-smile.

"Thanks. I'm not in a rush to get electrocuted again." Again. Tucker's stomach plummeted as he considered what Danny meant, not sure if it was just his portal accident or something else, but before he could ask, Danny's eyes widened and he looked at Sam. "You're going to need to let go of my hand. I don't actually know if this can hurt you."

Sam let go reluctantly, clearly not wanting to risk Danny disappearing on them. As if they could stop him if he really wanted to go or needed to go. They knew so little about ghosts, somehow, despite the last couple of years of seemingly endless ghost attacks. Tucker wished he knew more, if only so he could help Danny. "If what hurts?"

Suddenly there was a brilliant flash of light as a circle appeared around Danny's waist. For a brief second, Tucker wondered if this meant he was moving on or getting pulled into the Ghost Zone but then the rings traveled over Danny, and within seconds he appeared to be back to normal. The glow was gone, his hair and eyes were their usual and thankfully very human colors, and the weird glowing pattern on his arm vanished (or maybe the hoodie just hid it - Tucker wasn't totally sure). Danny drew in a sharp breath as the song changed to the next track on the new album, his breath a little wheezy as he put one hand on his chest over his heart, feeling it beat for a moment.

"Oh thank goodness," he breathed, tears in his now very blue, very normal eyes. "Like, seriously, thanks. I know I owe you both the longest explanation ever, but I just–I thought I was going to be stuck like that forever."

"You're not dead?" Tucker reached out, grabbing Danny's left wrist. His skin was clammy and ice cold, but he could feel Danny's sluggish pulse under his fingers.

"Not anymore than usual." He pulled his arm back, quickly wiping away the tears. "I've never been stuck like that before, in that way. I knew I wasn't like completely dead or anything, since I could still feel that warmth there next to my core, but I couldn't grab onto it. I thought I might've gone too far, for a minute." He shook his head. "I'm sorry. I know I'm not making a lot of sense. I'm still just kind of freaked out."

"Join the club," said Sam as she held up her hand, showing how much it shook. "Five minutes ago I thought you were dead, and now? You could've, like, opened up with the 'Oh, hey, guys, I'm not dead, it's fine. I can be a totally normal human or a totally freaky ghost whenever.'"

"I wasn't sure I could be," said Danny as he stared at the thermos. "That ghost, Nocturn . . . I thought I lost myself, stopping him. I think if you two hadn't been here, then I don't know if I could've come back from that without you. I don't know, honestly, if I should keep apologizing or thanking you."

"You could do both," suggested Tucker. "But I think I'd rather get some kind of explanation. I'm kind of worried I'm hallucinating at this point or having like, the worst nightmare ever."

"It's not a nightmare. Not, like, most of the time," said Danny with a shudder as he closed his eyes for a moment and continued to feel his heart beat steadily beneath his hand. Letting out another slow breath, Tucker heard him count softly for a moment before breathing once more and opening his eyes again. "Sorry. Just needed a minute."

"It's okay, just . . . yeah. Explanations, if you can."

Danny nodded. "Right. Okay. Um . . . so when I said that there's a range with what liminals are like when we talked a few weeks ago, that wasn't an exaggeration. Most are kind of what my parents think. They're people who had some near-death experience near a portal or weak spot between Earth and the Ghost Zone, got exposed to some ectoplasmic energy, and suffer from permanent ecto contamination. That contamination is what makes them different, I think. They've got a range of abilities and stuff, but most can't do more than talk to ghosts in their own language, feel where ghosts or portals might be, whatever."

"My accident was more extreme," he continued. "You kind of experienced it a little, then. I don't want to make you go through another death echo, but, uh, I was in the largest known portal between our world and the Ghost Zone. The amount of energy, of ectoplasm–" He stopped as the temperature in the room began to drop, and for a half-second Tucker swore he could see the portal in the wall of his room before it vanished. "Sorry. It's hard to think about without starting to panic. I really, really don't recommend the whole almost but not quite dying thing."

"I don't remember a lot of what happened after. I woke up in the hospital and my memory was kind of patchy, but the first moment I realized something was wrong was when my arm went invisible and intangible," he said, and Tucker almost fell off the bed when Danny held up an arm and made it disappear and reappear to demonstrate.

"Jeez, dude, warn a guy," he hissed as Sam paled. He was not used to seeing his friend do this, despite it being maybe the least terrifying thing he witnessed Danny do all night. He knew he shouldn't react to it so much, especially from the hurt look on Danny's face, but at this point Tucker was barely keeping it together.

"Right. Sorry. I just–" He stopped, shaking his head. "Right. I don't really know how I managed to hide it while I was in the hospital. It kept happening at random, I couldn't control it. Everyone just thought I was clumsy or stupid or anxious because my stupid IV kept coming out and it just–it sucked. And at first, like, I thought about telling my parents or my sister, because it was super freaky and I was scared I might be dead, and then they started to talk about the portal and what they planned to do to the ghosts and I–"

He broke off, his fingers gripping the thermos tightly as he forced himself to breathe. "I thought about telling both of you, too. I figured it was weird and creepy, but you've both been my friends for a long time. I thought that if anyone could accept it, maybe you two could, and at least then I might not get stuck dealing with all of this alone."

"But then it got worse. I started waking up in the basement in front of the portal," he said. "And the third time it happened, I wasn't–I wasn't me anymore. I wasn't human."

"You were a ghost." It wasn't a question, not really, but Danny nodded anyway.

"Yeah. I was a ghost, wearing the same exact thing I died in when I stepped into the portal that day," he said. "It was a blessing, really, since my parents heard the alarm go off in the lab and when they got there, thanks to the suit, they didn't recognize me. I managed to stumble through the portal before they could catch me or shoot me. Turns out my Dad's a pretty bad shot. But my Mom–" His voice cracked, and Tucker saw he was crying again. "Crud. Sorry. I don't mean to–I just–"

"-you can cry, Danny, it's fine," said Sam. "If you gotta let it out, let it out. I can't imagine what it's like for your own parents to try and hurt you. I mean, my parents suck, they don't understand me at all, and sometimes what they do feels like torture, but it's not even kind of the same thing as someone you love pointing a weapon at you."

"Yeah, I don't recommend it," he said with a dark, strained chuckle. "It hurts even when they miss."

Tucker shared a worried look with Sam. "Danny . . . you don't have to go home, if you don't want to. My parents would be happy to let you crash here for like ever."

"I've got like five extra rooms in my house, too, if you wanted to stay in one," added Sam. "My parents wouldn't even know you were there."

"It's not their fault," he said. "They don't know the truth. I can't be mad at them for it, not when they don't even realize it's me."

"You're allowed to be mad at them, Danny," said Sam, but he simply shook his head. Sighing, she reached out her hand again, grabbing Danny's own and squeezing it tightly. "Look, have you thought about telling them the truth? Do you think they'd still try to hurt you if they knew what you were?"

"If you asked me that question a year ago . . . I don't know. I want to believe they wouldn't hurt me, but it's hard, seeing what I've seen and knowing the kinds of experiments they've done and tried to do," said Danny. "But now? They're at least open to the idea that ghosts aren't inherently all monsters. I've thought about telling them everything dozens of times, but in my head, it still goes wrong, even though I know they're starting to rethink all of their theories and stuff. I still don't think I'm ready yet, but it's–it's okay. It's been like this for ages now. I'll be fine."

Tucker remained unconvinced. He never thought of the Fentons as a threat - they clearly loved their kids dearly, and after Danny's accident they took dozens of additional safety precautions to try to ensure something like that would never happen again - but having having seen them shoot at ghosts without any hesitation and knowing what Danny looked like as a ghost now made him less certain than he wanted to be that they would welcome their somewhat eldritch looking son with open arms.

"Danny, you're not fine," argued Sam. "I–"

"-I'm not going to fight about this," he interrupted, and Tucker shivered as the room grew colder. "Please. I appreciate that you both care and that you're worried. I get it. I do. But I'll be okay."

"Saying you'll be okay just doesn't land the way it used to, Danny. Not when you've been saying it for over a year despite clearly not being okay and when only ten minutes ago you were a ghostly wreck sitting on my bed," said Tucker.

"Sorry," he apologized, again, and Tucker wanted to choke him for it. He was mad at his friend and Danny definitely owed him and Sam about a million apologies, but not for this. And Tucker and Sam probably owed him about a dozen apologies, too. For not realizing it sooner. For not being good enough friends for Danny to feel like he could trust them with this. For literally everything. But it felt like a waste of time to go in circles with it.

"How often do you go all ghostly like that?" said Sam. She clearly wanted to argue with Danny more about his parents, but they both knew it was pointless, their friend too stubborn. They weren't going to drop it, though. He needed to tell his family before he got hurt, and if Danny refused, then he and Sam might need to figure out a way to do it for him.

"Uh, like that specifically? That was kind of a first. I don't usually take off my Hazmat suit," he said. "More because of terror about what was underneath it than, like, because I can't, although I'm pretty sure there's a fused zipper or something."

It clicked for Tucker, then. The connection between them, that felt so painfully obvious now he wanted to smack himself in the forehead. "Wait. I was right, then, when you first showed up here? You're Phantom."

"Yeah. Fenton, Phantom. Get it?" He smiled at the lame play on words, his fingers picking at his bed spread when they didn't laugh. "I thought it was clever, I guess."

"So, like, wait. You're all about ghost rights and stuff but then you spend every other minute hunting them down? Do they know it's you?" said Sam.

"No. Well, most of them don't," he said as he stared down at the thermos. "There's at least one who figured it out, mostly because he haunts the school, but I thought it was just him. Part of what scares me about the ghost tonight, Nocturn, was that he knew exactly who and what I was even though I'd never met him before, and if he knew, then there might be others out there, too, that know the truth. The ghosts generally hate liminals. They tolerate us, at best, but I've heard some nasty slurs from more than a few ghosts about others. And some of them . . . pretty much all of the ghosts despise Phantom. They see him–well, me–as a traitor. A lot of them would love to see me locked away in a thermos or Walker's jail or some other hole where I can't bother them ever again."

"If they learned the truth, it would undermine everything I've been trying to do as Fenton," he said, and Tucker's insides squirmed. He did not love the way that Danny separated himself, made a distinction between who he was as a ghost and who he was as a human. Jazz would probably say it was a coping mechanism. Tucker worried it would break him. "The ghosts really are more than my parents think, and because of what I am, I can understand them in ways nobody else ever will. I want to give them a chance to be better. I hate stuffing them in a thermos. I know how much it sucks inside that thing. The thought of leaving Nocturn in here makes me want to throw up, but I'm also terrified of the damage he could do if he escapes. He–this was the worst fight I've ever been in, and I've been in some really, really ugly ones."

"Danny, you–" he began, but there was a loud knock on the door that made Tucker nearly jump out of his skin.

"Hey, Tucker? Danny's father is here. He said something about a thermos?" his Mom said as she opened the door, and then she blinked as she took in the three of them sitting on his bed. "Oh, Danny. You are still here. I thought you left."

"Uhh, nope, I couldn't make it very far," he said with an uneasy shrug. "And I'm kind of sneaky, so you might not have seen me come in a few minutes ago. But Tucker texted me and let me know my Dad was on his way, so I figured I would get a ride home with him. The ghost attack tonight has me kind of freaked out."

"You're not alone," said Mom with a smile. "And I'm pretty sure I slept through most of it until that awful screaming sound."

"Yeah, me, too," lied Danny as he rubbed the back of his neck. Tucker felt a little nauseous, then, as he watched just how easily Danny told one lie after another. Although Tucker had been caught up in everything that was happening, it was a jarring reminder of just how much Danny hid everything from everyone, including him and Sam, for so long. How much he would continue to hide from everyone. And the nagging little question of just how deep this rabbit hole went worried Tucker. He understood, at least, why Danny hadn't told them everything. It still stung, but putting himself in Danny's place, knowing how quickly Tucker and Sam and everyone else in Amity Park turned against the ghosts, knowing that he was the very creature his parents had spent a lifetime instilling an intense fear and hatred of within him . . . In so many ways, he understood why Danny felt like he had no choice but to lie.

And while Danny lying to them upset Tucker, he worried how much worse hiding everything must have hurt Danny. How much it had to sting to believe that there was no one in his life that he could trust or confide in or really be himself with.

"Can you tell my Dad I'll be down in a minute?" asked Danny.

"Of course, hon," she said as she retreated down the stairs.

"I know there's still a lot of stuff I haven't told you and that you've still probably got like a million questions," said Danny, "but I really should go. And I get you–if you don't want anything to do with me. Really. I–I get it."

"I'm not going to lie, Danny," said Sam. "I'm super fucking freaked out right now, and I'm pretty angry that even after everything a few weeks ago, you were still keeping something this big from us and lying again. I knew you said you were keeping more stuff from everyone, that there were other things you had to tell us, but I never imagined it would be something this big." She let out a long breath, her fingers tightly gripping the bedspread still. "But I also get why you did. This is just–it's so much, and it's terrifying to think that you might not be fully alive and to even start considering what your parents could've done to you or still might do to you and . . . I'm sorry, Danny. I don't know exactly what I'm trying to say or what to think or even feel. I just . . . I might need a couple of days to think about it, to think about all of this. Is that okay?"

"Whatever you need," he said, even as he looked crushed, and Tucker felt a flash of irritation with Sam, even as he understood her, too. This was a lot.

He turned to go when Tucker stopped him, grabbing his hand. "Look, I–I don't get it, much, but–I'm–you're my best friend. Still are. And I'll be here for you no matter what," said Tucker, wishing his voice didn't waver so much as he spoke. It felt so insufficient after everything they learned, but he didn't know what else to do or say. "And I'm sorry that we didn't–that we didn't figure this out sooner. That you didn't feel like you could trust us."

But it was enough, maybe, since Danny brightened a little at that, digging his shoe into the carpet as he mulled it over. "I . . . thanks, Tuck. But it wasn't about the two of you, not really. I just–I was scared, I guess. I get that this is–that it's probably too much. And I won't be mad if you change your mind. I get it. The only–if you do, just please don't tell anyone the truth. There are more people than my parents that would be excited to turn me into a lab rat if they knew."

"Who the hell would believe this, anyway?" said Sam, throwing up her hands.

"Wes would. Have you seen that guy's conspiracy theory videos? They're completely nuts," said Tucker as he forced a smile. "But you should get going. And, um, seriously. The offer stands, no matter what. If you need a place, my door is open." Even if he couldn't get right with this, he wouldn't let Danny get hurt if there was a way for him to stop it. He wanted to help him, to try to make up for it all somehow, even if he doubted he ever really could.

"Thanks," Danny said as he left, leaving the two of them alone.

"So . . . that was a thing, huh?" said Tucker eventually as he shifted uneasily on the bed.

"Understatement of the year," said Sam. "I hate this, Tucker. I want to be mad–I feel mad–but this? After seeing him all ghostly like that and everything? I get why he was too scared to tell us. I think I'm going to have nightmares about it for weeks."

"I thought you liked dark and creepy."

"That wasn't just dark and creepy, it was Cthulu like. Madness inducing," she said, shaking her head. "It's not the same as thinking that there's a strange kind of beauty in skulls, Tuck. That mouth full of teeth, the claws, the creepy shadow void thing and stuff. All of it was terrifying, even though it somehow didn't feel that way because it's him and I just–I hate it. I hate being so judgy and doing exactly what he was scared we would do since it feels like it justifies him not telling us and all of the lies even though it shouldn't. I hate thinking of him as a monster. But I can't help it, right now. It took everything in me not to scream."

"Most of the time he just looks like a dork in a Hazmat suit, though," said Tucker. His reaction to Danny hadn't been quite so visceral - to him, there had been a strange kind of beauty and familiarity to it. "Way less horrifying. And I don't think Danny would blame you for being freaked out. He seemed pretty unsettled by it, too. In the fight with him as Phantom a few weeks ago he mentioned he never looked beneath the suit before. I got a glimpse, then, of what was under there, and it was kind of scary, but I think him being actually dead is way more horrifying."

Sam sighed. "I know it is, I just . . . I can't really help how I feel. I'm trying. I want to try to find a way to accept this, to accept everything about it and to not be super pissed about all the lying he's done, because I get that this isn't, like nothing, that what he's going through has been way worse than a few lies and what we've gone through, but we're also–we're supposed to be his friends and I just–I hate this, Tucker. I don't know what to do or how to accept all of this."

"I don't think Danny expects you to right away, Sam. Seriously, you're being too hard on yourself," said Tucker. "This is, like, a lot. Way more than I ever could have guessed, and I still feel like we've barely even scratched the surface here."

"I know, I know, I just . . . I need time, I guess." She shivered, rubbing the goosebumps on her arms as she stared down at their notebooks from earlier. "Think they'll cancel school tomorrow?"

"Not a chance."

A/N: Thanks for all the comments, kudos, etc! I can say pretty definitively right now that the next chapter will probably go up a week late. It's my partner's birthday next week and I'm also stuck doing overtime for a bit at work. But hopefully it'll go up around the tenth or so.