Simulacrum Chapter 1: The Beginning, a danny phantom fanfic

Author's Note: I needed to get some angst out of my system so I could focus on Time and Time Again! Hope you enjoy. I plan to add at least one more chapter, but it can also stand alone. May decide to keep it as a one shot depending on reviews.

Danny had died, and died, and died again. He'd died in the portal, shaken and horrified at what he'd become and he kept dying over and over, with every aching transformation into Phantom he died. His heart stopped, his breath going still, the only thing that remained close to a semblance of life was the electric pulses through his ghostly body.

The first time he died he was cold, alone, and frightened. He didn't want to be dead. Did anyone want to be dead? He hated the strange hum of the core in his chest instead of a beating heart. He hated the way his vision changed, the way humans looked different. He hated the strange urges that he had now, the ghostly needs that had taken him over. He hated feeling different. He hated being dead.

He was too young, far, far, too young, to be dead.

The humming monstrosity of the portal had stolen his breath from him, stolen his life from him, stolen his future and his sense of self. He had wailed and wept, cursed and pleaded. No one heard him. No one was there to witness his death, to see for the change that had taken root like a parasite in his chest. He was alone, neither alive nor dead, neither human nor ghost. No one knew he was dead, that he'd been replaced, his DNA shredded and reformed, his every cell burned away and returned altered.

He was a shadow of himself, a simulacrum, a phantom. He spent hours crying on the floor of the basement, wishing someone would come for him, help him, reassure him that he wasn't dead or a monster… but he knew better. He knew there would be no one there for him, no reprieve from the creature he'd become. He had curled up in the corner, his tears slowly drying on his cheeks as he waited for his parents to return and kill him again. Even his tears were abnormal, glowing in thick streaks down his cheeks before crystalizing and falling to the floor like snow, evaporating before they hit the ground.

When the rush of life returned, his heart beating a panicked symphony, he still couldn't escape his death, the scar on his hand that marked him as other, the gently smoking hazmat suit a testament to his demise. His body remained cold, his breath frozen in his lungs, the pain of breathing once more causing tears to spring to his eyes while he gently rocked himself back and forth. He tried convincing himself it was a bad dream, he waited for anyone, Sam, Tucker, Jazz or his parents to return, to come find him in the wreckage of his death and reassure him that he was alright… but he wasn't alright. The still humming serenade of his core reminded him of that.

He had died…

And now… he was forever doomed to wander in the boundary between worlds, never truly belonging anywhere, never having someone who understood.

Danny eventually picked himself off the floor, shed his burned jumpsuit, depositing it in the hazardous waste bin before laboring up the stairs to the shower. He stood in a daze under the hot waters, they burned his skin and yet the warmth refused to seep into him as he shivered against the chill of death.

Still no one came.

He walked to his room in a daze before laying on his bed and staring at the familiar glow in the dark star patterns on his ceiling. The remaining daylight had burned away, his parents still did not return, he was alone… he was alone and dead and no one knew. Surely someone would find out what he'd become… they would see the monster lurking over his skin, that they would out him as unnatural. He glanced at the mirror over his dresser, his eyes flashed slightly in the dim light, looking like some nocturnal creature and he shuddered, rolling over and pulling his blankets over him as if that could protect him from the truth.

He wanted to tell someone, to beg for help to try and figure out what had happened to him, to see if it could be undone… but he couldn't make the words come, how do you tell your friends that you're dead. How do you tell your family? How do you tell your parents that you've died? His parents detested the restless dead after all… how would they feel now that Danny, their son, had joined the ranks of those dead. He shuddered as images of his parents slicing into him began to flash before his eyes. He closed his eyes against the nightmares, but they still persisted.

And he was still dead.

His heart still beat, but it was slow and sluggish, like it barely remembered how to function. He had nightmares night after night and often found himself floating above his bed, or having phased through the floor and dropped into the kitchen, screaming as he recalled the portal, or dreaming of his parents discovering his inhumanity. Of course they would want to dissect him… he was no longer their son, just a Phantom… a Simulacrum.

Somehow no one noticed.

How could they not notice?

Yet, in some small ways they did notice. Death echoed around him, he could see it in the way his friends had begun to avoid touching him, in the way his parents looked at him suspiciously when their inventions were triggered by his presence. They knew something was off about him, they could all tell he was wrong. They knew he wasn't human anymore.

Perhaps that's why Dash was so adamant on bullying him. Danny freaked him out, and the only thing Dash could do was hit him for it, shove him into lockers to keep him away from the rest of the school, hide him to keep him from being seen. He didn't blame them, even when he took on the guise of humanity, the cold winds of death whispered around him, he didn't breathe at times, didn't blink enough, sat too still, his skin too cold, his teeth too sharp, eyes too bright.

Danny tried to live. He went through the motions, he ate food (even if it tasted like ash), went to school (while slipping into death to defend his home from the restless dead), did his homework (though the work was always subpar). He pretended to be alive, he had to pretend to be human, for his own sanity if nothing else. His chest ached as his friends slowly drifted away from him, fights and broken promises only adding to the rift that formed when he died. He didn't tell them the truth, how could he?

They couldn't possibly understand… they couldn't possibly forgive him for replacing the real Danny. They began to keep their distance, stopped asking if he was okay, stopped asking if he wanted to hang out, they stopped talking to him and with time… stopped even looking at him. Danny didn't blame them, they were friends with a ghost and didn't know it, of course they wanted to get away, to free themselves from him, from the dead boy.

The restless dead came in droves, obsessions driving them to haunt the living uncaring of the harm they may do. After all, fragile things like mortality matter less after you're dead. Danny kept them at bay, kept the town from harm even at the cost of his own body and sanity. In the form of Phantom the pain could be manageable. He could still be hurt though, which made him wonder if his parents were wrong about ghosts not being able to feel pain or if he was just an outlier since he'd died wrong. Somehow his heart still beat after all… then again the longer time went on, the less pain he felt. Was he becoming more ghostly? Or was he merely getting used to it? Pain as a human began to dull as well, minor cuts and bruises no longer registering, especially when he'd sewn himself up from more severe wounds. Injuries gotten from Dash's relentless bullying barely bothered him, they usually vanished in a few hours.

With all his injuries you'd think someone would have noticed by now that something was up.

Perhaps they did notice, but didn't care.

Perhaps he was more of a ghost than he realized.

His family never noticed the medical supplies that he stole, and never caught him stitching himself up while his insides attempted to escape. They certainly didn't notice the way he'd wince with movement; nor did they comment when he showed up with a large burn on his left arm, unable to be hidden beneath a jacket or long sleeve.

They did notice his grades. They voiced their disappointment in him, yelled at him for being late for curfew, they punished him and grounded him and then eventually they had just stopped caring. Nothing they did fixed the issue anyway… What good would it do in the end after all?

Danny was dead.

He began to wear black.

It was easier to hide the blood stains.

He wore long sleeves and hoodies.

It was easier to hide his wounds and the dark circles under his eyes.

Spectra had tried to kill his sister and somehow he'd ended up to blame for that as well. The anger from his parents as they spoke of Phantom and what happened with Jazz was painful. His self loathing had been exacerbated by the faux therapist as well.

He'd tried to kill himself fully.

He'd sliced deep into his wrists with a stolen scalpel.

He'd rather use it against himself than have his parents use it against him. Not that they truly were his parents the same way he wasn't truly Danny. He didn't care if they would dissect him after he had died, but he didn't want to be "alive" for it.

Slicing his wrists was easier than it should have been. His nerves having dealt with much worse pain in the past, the sharpness slicing through his flesh like butter. The tub ran with red and green as he bled, the hot water of the tub was soon cloudy with blood and ectoplasm. The ectoplasm floated and glowed sickly on the surface rather than mixing with the water. He watched it swirl and form patterns like a gruesome Christmas themed lava lamp. He watched the glow growing stronger the more he bled, blurring and twisting as his eyes drifted shut, he hoped for the last time.

He sank into the fog of death the same way he'd slid beneath the polluted water… only to wake later coated in his own disgusting blood. Angry pink scars on his forearms reminded him of his failed suicide attempt. Yet another reason to wear long sleeves, though the scars were soon hidden among many more, some self inflicted, others from battle, all his fault for dying in that stupid portal. All his fault for replacing the Real Danny.

It had been harder and harder to pretend to be human the more ghosts came along, the more he had to transform, the longer he spent among the dead. Walker's frame job had been the only reason he hadn't gone Phantom full time. Well that and his pathetic human need to eat and sleep. It couldn't be put off without consequences as he'd found out. He wouldn't die completely… no… he was too much of a freak for that… but it wasn't pleasant to starve, and still live as his body tried to eat itself only to be perpetuated by the ectoplasm fueling him.

He discovered this unique torture when Freakshow had come to town, robbing him of his free will, twisting his mind, puppeting his body. He was played with, controlled like a doll, and yet there was no one to save him. He'd vanished for three months, his mind not his own as the demented clown puppeteered him through a new life of crime. The artifact he had muted his thoughts, his obsession, his pain, it had been easy to slip into the fog, easier to be controlled than be himself. He hated that it was easy to let himself slip away, he hated that he enjoyed letting someone else take the reins for a while.

Sometimes he fought, his humanity helping him regain his mind for short periods of time, but he always slipped back under Freakshow's command. Even if he hated being used like this… if his decisions were no longer his own he couldn't agonize over them. His humanity slipped further from his grasp, his human half weakening as he remained a ghost day after day, night after night. His human half died… but was forced to live on inside his ghost.

Sometimes, when his mind was his own, however briefly, he'd stare into the mirror. One month into the circus and even his ghostly form was starting to show side effects of starvation and sleep deprivation. The dark circles under his eyes had become permanent, his cheekbones shone through his skin more than before, his skin was pale and became more and more tinged with green as his ghost half grew stronger to make up for his starving human half.

He looked at his eyes, flickering from red to green as he fought to bring his mind back. If he could just tell Freakshow he needed rest, that he was half human, perhaps the man would be kind enough to let him sleep for a moment. Freakshow appeared behind him, Danny opened his mouth to speak, to beg for sleep, for food, for a moment's rest, and then his eyes fell on the crystal ball and all thoughts faded.

The show continued on, state through state, leaving behind a rash of burglaries. It was by pure chance that they escaped, that Danny could escape. Freakshow had been startled by a heckler throwing things, he'd tripped, the staff had gone flying, it had fallen and upon shattering the spell was broken.

Danny came back to himself halfway across the country on a tightrope in a stupid cloak. He blinked as exhaustion hit him, it took all he had to fly away with the other ghosts, to escape from the tend. He managed to keep his ghost form at the forefront until he found an abandoned building to take shelter in. He collapsed as he transformed back into a human, sinking to the ground and falling into a coma like sleep.

He wasn't sure how long he slept, it could have been days, it could have been years and yet he was exhausted when he woke,. He slowly moved, exhausted and starving. It felt as if his stomach was trying to eat itself and it took a bit of ghost trickery to get something to eat. His hands were too thin, his ribs were showing, he was near skeletal thin, his cheekbones and eye sockets prominent in his face. Despite his rest the dark circles under his eyes remained. He ran his hand through black hair he hadn't seen in months, surprised to find it littered with streaks of white. Was his ghost half bleeding through to his human half? Was he dying or was his ghost half trying to keep his human half from dying? Any other human would be dead after what he'd been through, dead or insane. He closed his eyes after having eaten and fell asleep again.

He wasn't sure how, and perhaps wasn't sure why, but he'd come home, limping up to his door only to be welcomed home with guns pointed at him. His skeletal frame and streaks of white hair had made his parents think he was a ghost, it didn't help that he had accidentally set off the ghost alarm while phasing the door open (he had no idea where his house key was after everything that had happened). It was a few moments of staring down the barrel of a gun before his parents realized it was him. They didn't even ask where he'd been, just lowered their weapons and shook their heads. More disappointment.

Danny wasn't sure if they had even noticed he was gone, they told him to eat more and that was the end of it.

Jazz noticed that he'd been gone… though she blamed him for it, his poor mental health… Did ghosts even have mental health? She saw this as a way of acting out didn't she? Another way he'd failed someone, another reason he was a failure.

Jazz asked him why he'd run away, as if he'd had any choice in the decision. Danny stared at her a long while before deciding it wasn't worth it. What exactly was the point of explaining himself, it would only make things worse in the end. He wasn't truly her brother, he was just a ghost.

He looked back at her for a long time, empty blue eyes meeting her angry teal ones. He stared for a long moment and opened his mouth. For a moment he toyed with the idea of telling her everything, About the portal, about dying, about how the ectoplasmic imprint of her brother now inhabited his dead flesh and ached to be alive. Even knowing he was a poor imitation of the boy the body had belonged to… he wished he was that boy, he wished they would love him, help him, see him… but it was no use.

He shook his head and left her behind, ignoring her protest and closing the bathroom door behind him and shutting her out.

He peeled away grimy clothes, too loose on his frame, he shed the rotting jeans and stained hoodie before stepping into the tub.

He showered.

Unlike the day he died this shower was cold. He started with haunted eyes at the bottom of the tub watching months of dirt and grime run down the drain. He stared blankly as the cold water ran over him until he finally sunk to the floor, silently crying.

He wanted to ask for help, he wanted to reach out to someone, but his face was everywhere, ghostly menace, public enemy number one. If anyone knew they would turn him in, they would be assured that he was evil, they would tear him apart and experiment on him. There was no saving him, not anymore. So he rose from the shower when he couldn't cry any longer and dried himself off, going to bed and sleeping for two days, only leaving his room to get food. His parents didn't force him to go to school, Jazz occasionally poked her head in as if she was going to insist he go, but she never spoke. They couldn't deal with the ghost of Danny Fenton in that room.

Danny closed his eyes… he should go back… even when he no longer saw the point. Was there ever a point in pretending to be human? Yet he still had human needs… and he didn't want to get his parents in trouble even more with his truancy so he eventually attempted to go back to school.

Sam and Tucker might have had questions about where he'd disappeared to, about why he looked half dead… but they never asked, neither did his teachers nor his peers. Dash seemed to be the only one who cared enough to ask ("Where have you been Fenton?"), but had only done so as a prelude to "catching up" on Danny's beatings, having cornered him in the locker room and left him a bleeding mess on the disgusting floor.

Danny closed his eyes, certain Dash had broken his ribs, but as always the cuts, the scars and bruises faded within hours. Perhaps that's why no one ever did anything about it. Then again… perhaps everyone thought he'd deserved it for being such a freak. Perhaps no one ever really noticed since he healed so fast.

Danny sobbed softly, tears rolling down his cheek, stinging the cuts and bruises on his face and lips. He pushed himself up slightly, wincing. The months away from the ghost fights had almost made him forget physical pain. He whimpered as he leaned against the grimy locker room wall, and looked up at the ceiling.

It was true that he was more unnatural… more of a freak since he'd spent so long in his ghost form. Perhaps they were scared that he'd infect them all with his freakiness. He groaned and held his ribs, he didn't dare hope that someone would come help him, by the time anyone would come back to check on him he would have healed. He slowly closed his eyes and focused on his core, drawing the ambient ecto-energy that filled the town into his body, healing himself faster.

He heard a small scuff, his eyes opened a crack, glowing softly green, as Tucker poked his head around the corner. Danny closed his eyes again and groaned, his brow furrowed as he ignored his once best friend. Danny felt Tucker approach, feeling the tang of his emotions coming closer. Danny swallowed, trying to ignore the taste as it was only more evidence of his inhumanity.

"Dash do it?" Tucker asked, worry clear in his voice… and hesitance.

"It's… fine." Danny mumbled. "I don't need your pity."

"Dude…" Tucker said with a small sigh. silence stretched between them before eventually Tucker left.

Of course he'd left… everyone had left.

His parents had stopped talking to him, granted most days they were too caught up in their ghost experiments to care about either him or Jazz, but he suspected that he creeped them out too. He wasn't human enough for them anymore, he wasn't good enough for them anymore. Granted he hadn't been human in a long time.

It hurt… of course it did, but there wasn't anything he could do about it. How could he lament his life falling apart when he was already dead?

His Un-Life went on.

Every day was a battle, particularly when he had to battle something. He dodged his parents, he fought the ghosts, he tried to redeem himself after Freakshow. He stopped the Ghost King and people began to turn back in favor of him… well of Phantom. No one really cared about Danny Fenton anymore. Even Sam and Tucker praised Phantom, though Danny could only hear glimpses of their conversations as he walked through the school halls. The more heroics he accomplished the more the public opinion was swayed, though his parents still seem to hate him.

They had caught Phantom once, delighted glee at the prospect of dissecting him, they had managed to strap him to the table and open him up. They had poked and prodded at his organs, taking their time in undoing him, he was a miraculous scientific specimen.

It had been weeks of hell for Danny, the physical pain was nothing compared to the emotional pain of having your parents dig around in your insides with cold clinical fascination. They'd cut off his hand and marveled at his ability to grow a new one. They'd removed bits and pieces of him, watching with disturbing glee as his body began to reform.

"Why can't I die?" Danny sobbed. "Why are you doing this?" he said with tears in his eyes as his body refused to fail him.

He'd wanted to die so terribly, he wished he could change back into a human and let himself bleed out. He knew that wouldn't work, he'd tried many times to kill himself before after all. He remained a freak of nature that even death wouldn't accept, a singularity on his own, a fixed point of existence. He'd never wanted that, he never wanted to die like this.

The times when the Fentons left him alone (he couldn't think of them as his parents when he was strapped to their dissection table) were no better than when they were there. He lay pinned down with his chest open and exposed, bleeding ectoplasm slowly and sobbing. Thick glowing tears running down the sides of his face and drifting away as snowflakes. He whimpered and cried, his heart heavy as he saw flashes of the Fentons above him, even when he was alone. He tried comforting himself by humming lullabies from his childhood, but they only served to make his core ache more. He felt like perhaps he'd snap under the weight of the emotional pain.

He'd gotten lucky one night, the Fentons had forgotten to close the portal. It was so much easier to absorb the ambient ecto-energy with the blast doors open. He'd mustered enough strength to melt his bonds, the concentrated ectoblast scorching the table before he'd been able to slip free, folding his chest closed and holding it tightly as he slipped from the lab and back to his room.

They had been so disappointed when he escaped. They hadn't noticed their son missing as they cut into phantom. They hadn't noticed their son had to stitch himself up, they never noticed the Y incision on his chest, just like they never noticed the other wounds and scars.

He felt like part of him died that night, a little more of his humanity, of the lingering feeling of Danny Fenton, died on that table.

Time wound on.

Time passed.

Enemies were defeated and citizens were saved one after another… yet his grades suffered, and his parents grew more disappointed. He wasn't even aware he could disappoint them more than he had in the past few years.

Danny stood outside the door to the house staring blankly at the door while wondering what the point was, why should he go back home? There was no one to care for him there, it was dangerous, he was dead and he kept dying over and over again. He could sense movement inside the house and his body ached from the ghost fight he'd been in earlier that day. He felt like there wasn't a part of him that wasn't injured in some way shape or form, despite his best efforts to hide his scars and injuries, there was only so much a hoodie and long sleeve could do. There were scars across his cheek, his lip, his eye, down his neck, those were so much harder to hide.

Danny stared at the door, unable to bring himself to go in, unable to summon the motivation to face down another disappointed look from his parents, concern and disappointment from his sister. He wondered if she'd tried to talk to Sam and Tucker, after all, their presences inside the house were them.

Why were they here?

What was the point?

He stared at the door, dropping his backpack.

Two years of this.

Of lying, of hiding, of running, fighting…

Two years of dying.

Two whole years.

It was amazing that so much time had passed… and yet it seemed like too little time had gone by. How could it only have been two years? How had he managed to go through everything he had in just two years? He felt like he'd aged decades in two years… and yet…

He hadn't aged at all.

It was beginning to bother him… it was beginning to bother others too.

He knew they had noticed, but no one commented on it to his face. They spoke about it in hushed tones behind his back. Theorized living in the house with the ghost portal had stunted his growth, hypothesized that he was actually dead, claimed he'd been replaced by a ghost, even thought that maybe he was a mass hallucination. At least that's what he'd heard in whispers. His sensitive hearing couldn't block out the rumors among his peers. They had noticed his ageless death and they hadn't thought to ask, merely talk behind his back.

He stared at the door.

Was he even really Danny anymore?

That question continued to haunt him. He was a simulacrum of himself, or the poor child who had gone into that portal. Danny Fenton didn't exist anymore, Danny Fenton had died, and his corpse was still around, piloted by his ghost.

What was a ghost anyway?

An ectoplasmic imprint of post-human consciousness… the echo of a person shaping ectoplasm into mockery of sentience. A ghost wasn't the person who they were in life anymore, even if echoes of memories stayed with them, even if some personality shone through.

Danny Fenton was dead.

He was a mockery of a dead boy.

He stared at the door.

He couldn't go on like this, he couldn't be human anymore, he couldn't be a ghost either. He didn't want this. He hadn't wanted this. He had only been curious, and now he was cursed for it. Cursed to live and die in endless cycles, endless fights, endless pain.

He hated the way he had emotions. His parents… no the Fentons, had always said ghosts didn't have emotions, any emotions they had were nothing more than mimicry of what they'd experienced while alive. Anything close to emotion was just echoes of what they'd gone through in life.

Then why did it hurt so much?

Why did he feel sorrow, hatred and self loathing?

Was he so good at mimicking emotions he'd even convinced himself that these echoes were true?

Maybe?

However, his self loathing was new. He was certain he'd never hated himself, nor been so disgusted or horrified by himself before the portal.

No, that wasn't right.

Danny Fenton had never felt those emotions before his death created him.

He stared at the door.

The autumn wind was chilly, and leaves blew down the street. If he were still human he may have shivered, but he wasn't human anymore, he couldn't feel the cold, couldn't feel the warmth, he couldn't feel anything but pain. More and more Jazz talked about depression, about what could be wrong, tried to connect and get him some help, but even she wouldn't look him in the eye or touch him. He tried to remember the last time he'd been touched by someone that wasn't dead, the last time he'd gotten a hug or a kiss on the cheek. When was the last time anyone had even managed to put a hand on his shoulder. The only touches he received these days were violent.

It felt like decades since he'd been hugged.

He looked down at his hands, at the slight tinge of green that crept into his veins instead of blue beneath his skin.

Cold.

Clammy.

Like a corpse.

Then again, he wasn't far off. He was pretty sure it was only ectoplasm that animated his body…

Was it his body?

This body.

He stared at the door.

He wanted to cry, to scream, to wail, to release the sorrow and misery in his chest, to make the world know how cruel it was. He wanted to hurt his parents for not helping, for making a death trap in the basement in the first place. He wanted revenge for his death, for the half life he had to live as the guardian of the boundary. He wanted to hurt his friends for not figuring it out, he'd accidentally phased through things often enough that they should have realized something was wrong.

How had they not noticed before?

It was true he had brushed them off, but… how could they not realize he was dead? What did they think was wrong with him?

Maybe they did know… maybe that's why it had been so easy for everyone to leave him… except Jazz. She didn't know how to give up on someone, even when they were a lost cause.

He stared at the door.

Still the rage festered, the sorrow and grief all consuming. As much as these blind emotions consumed him… he felt numb to it all as well.

Emotions were confusing.

Emotions were dangerous.

He refused to become another malevolent spirit, refused to give in to his darker urges, refused to hurt mortals the way he'd been hurt. He couldn't let that happen, not even once, because if he gave into that urge even for a second… he'd never stop.

He stared at the door.

There was movement inside of the house, talking, his parents could be heard discussing the way he stood and stared at the house, but didn't come inside. Familiar voices met his ears, Sam and Tucker. He'd felt their energy inside, but only now was he picking up on their voices.

"It's drugs. We saw him with a syringe, it explains so much." Sam was saying.

"He injected himself with something in the bathroom, we saw him hiding the needles."

It was the ecto-dejecto.

Skulker had sliced his stomach open…

It wasn't the first time it had happened.

At least his guts had stayed in place this time. It was always a rough day when he was disemboweled.

He stared at the door.

They thought it was drugs, if they thought it was drugs they thought that they could fix him. They must think that his problem was solvable.

They wanted to fix him… save him.

He was past the point of saving. He was already dead.

He saw his family and friends looking out of the window at him from the corner of his eye, could taste the tang of worry and disappointment.

He wondered if he'd ever be able to get the taste of disappointment out of his mouth.

He stared at the door.

The door cracked open and Maddie took a step out, standing on the stoop and folding her arms as she looked at him. It was a mixture of disappointment, pity, and anger, each emotion sharp on his tongue. Danny wasn't sure how she managed that many emotions at once.

When he didn't feel empty he could only feel one thing at a time. Rage. Sorrow. Occasional satisfaction from a fight.

That seemed to be the range of his emotional bandwidth.

"Danny, come inside. We need to talk to you." She said gently, like this wasn't an intervention. Like she wasn't angry that he was 'throwing his life away' or some other such nonsense.

"We know what's been going on with you." she said as he stared at him, as if staring him down would make him admit to anything. It had never worked before, did she think it would work now?

Danny stared at her. He was numb and tired and dead. always dead. He was tired of avoiding her gaze.

He stared back, he didn't blink, he didn't move, he didn't breathe.

"Danny, come on man. We can help." Tucker said as he joined her on the stoop. Worry and fear joining the bouquet of emotions.

Danny had to admit it was good to see his face, his friend was growing into a man while Danny stayed eternally fourteen. A flicker of a smile ghosted across his face before it gave way to bitterness, Tucker got to live, he was happy for him, he was jealous of him.

"You can't help." Danny said, his voice rough with disuse.

He hadn't talked in months, or had it been a year, he wasn't sure. At least his human half hadn't. Phantom provoked enemies to get them to focus on him and away from the humans. Phantom used his ghostly wail to protect them. Phantom reassured citizens that everything was okay.

"Sure we can. We know what happened. Let us help." Sam said joining them outside.

Her hair had gotten longer, her figure filled out, she was turning into a woman, all while he stayed a boy. She was followed by Jazz and then finally Jack. Danny blinked at last, then took a step back to the edge of the sidewalk, feeling cornered, feeling trapped by guilt and pain. Their emotions bitter in his mouth as he took another step back.

"No you don't." He shook his head at them. "I can't be helped."

"Come on son." Jack said gently. "We know. We can fix this, we can get you help."

"It's not drugs." Danny said, he looked up at his assembled family and friends. His voice still gravely, he coughed and cleared his throat.

"Danny… Let us help you, if it's not drugs, tell us what's wrong." Jazz said, breaking in, but Danny cut her off before she could say more.

"I'm dead." He said simply. "I've been dead for two years."

The assembled group went quiet, Jack laughed nervously and shook his head, he was the first to approach.

"You're not dead son, you're here, you're fine." He stepped forward, holding out a hand to Danny, but Danny took another step back.

"I'm dead." Danny said. "You can't change that."

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, turning his face to the sky. It was clear and blue today, it was strange how the colors changed when he turned into a ghost… the colors that began to leak into his vision even when he was "human."

"You can do what you want with me… I know you've always wanted to dissect something like me. I'm tired. I'm tired of fighting, I'm tired of lying, I'm tired of dying over and over and over again, every little death every time I go ghost." Danny said as he slowly tilted his head back down.

The group in front of him looked at him like he was crazy, they probably thought this was a side effect from the drugs. they exchanged looks, this time it was his mom… no Maddie, who stepped forward.

"Let's go inside." Maddie said softly, reaching toward him, but drawing back just before touching him when she saw him flinch. Danny looked at her hand, at how it paused just inches from touching, he wanted to take her hand and hold it. He wished he was Danny Fenton, he wished Danny could have said goodbye… he wished he could have rested in peace instead of whatever this was.

He put a hand over his heart, feeling the achingly slow rhythm and the hum of his ghost beneath.

"The lab is inside… that makes sense." he agreed as he walked toward them, they parted to let him through, he could hear them talking to each other. Wondering if they should wait till he came down off the drugs or not as they followed him inside.

Danny passed the living room (even as his entourage paused confused while he hadn't stopped to sit down) and walked through the kitchen, down to the basement. He strode to the middle of the room, standing there for a moment as he felt them enter the room behind him, cautiously whispering among themselves. They didn't know he could hear everything. His enhanced hearing picking up on all of their theories as he stared at the portal.

The portal.

He had felt so much fear, pain, sorrow, anger and guilt in this basement. He pushed a button and everything changed.

He'd changed.

He'd died….

Danny Fenton had died.

This time he pushed a different button and a dissection table sprung up in the middle of the floor. He ran his hands over a scorch mark near the left hand cuff, it had been replaced since the damage. The assembled group followed him, watching him as he climbed onto the table and sat.

"I won't run away this time." He said as he ran his hand over the scorch mark again. "You finally will get to rip me apart molecule by molecule and see what makes me tick… you were so excited the first time… I doubt this time will be any different." He said. He turned his eyes up to look at his former family and friends. His eyes glowed green like the swirling portal behind him and he tilted his head at them as they collectively took a step back, Maddie was the quickest, her hand drawing a gun before she even realized what she was doing.

Danny smiled, his smile turned to laughter and he threw his head back, laughing and laughing. It wasn't funny, but it was all together hilarious as well. He held his stomach as laughed, the laughter slowly becoming more and more unhinged. The assembled crowd started. Nobody spoke, nobody moved as Danny laughed. It echoed around the basement, filling every corner of the room, until it turned into sobs. He buried his face in his hands, sorrow spilling from his eyes as he curled into himself slightly. Still there was silence instead of comfort, stillness as nobody moved.

"I'm dead… I died two years ago… and none of you even knew." He said, his heart shattered and he traced the Y incision on his chest. "It's time I stop pretending that I'm still alive." He said, hanging his head as the various white strands in the midnight black of his hair caught the light of the portal and glowed softly.

"Danny?" someone asked. Danny couldn't be sure who, but soon there was a hand on his knee, black gloves, small hands, must be his mom… no… Maddie.

"What's left of him… after your Ghost Portal killed me." He said looking at her, his eyes faded back to blue as he met her teal eyes.

"Or… maybe Danny is just dead. You said ghosts… ghosts weren't actually the people they were before." He whispered as he looked past her to the green light cast on the ceiling. How he'd memorized that ceiling when he was held captive here. He rolled his eyes back down at Maddie.

"Just finish what you started." He said. His mood had fluctuated through extremes so quickly; from numbness to sorrow, through rage and despair and back to numbness. Danny sighed and shifted as he pulled off his hoodie, the scars on his neck and face seemed to glow slightly in the light of the portal. Then arduously he began to pull off his shirt, pulling off sleeves, sliding the fabric over his head before fully revealing his scars, but most prominently the angry Y incision that had never quite healed right.

"Danny! What happened?" Sam said running forward, shocked by the abuse his body had gone through. Every part of him had some kind of scar, nothing was spared.

"I died." He reminded her bluntly. She frowned, opening her mouth, but he cut her off, "Don't you listen? Didn't you hear me the first time?" He scoffed, his eyes flashing green again before he shook his head and sighed pulling his knees to his chest, hiding his scars. He held a hand over the buzzing hum of his core.

"I died… my parents tried to vivisect me… or is it dissection… is necropsy more accurate?" He mused to himself before tilting his head back and forth and he considered the accuracy of the different terms. He looked back to the ceiling.

"Let's see… what else… I was the puppet of an evil ringmaster, being controlled against my will… well… as much as I hated it, I do admit… it was almost nice not to be the one in control… to not have to make decisions, to be lost in the fog of brainwashing mind control." He traced the familiar stains on the ceiling.

" I beat an evil tyrant, I died… I keep dying… always dying. I don't… I don't know who I am anymore. Did Danny die? Am I Danny? Who am I? I suppose that doesn't matter now that you know I'm dead… you'll tear me apart anyway. Molecule by molecule…. will I die if that happens? Dying has never worked before but perhaps this time it'll stick." He said with an air of boredom, as if he were discussing the weather.

"Danny…" Jack reached forward and Danny flinched away before going still again, reminding himself that he was letting them take him apart this time. Jack pulled away, exchanging a look with Maddie.

"Danny." Jazz said as she stepped forward, putting a hand on his chest as she pushed aside his knees, feeling the beating heart, it was so slow these days. "Your heart is beating, you're alive."

She must think this is some sort of psychosis, Sam and Tucker certainly did as they whispered about it behind the Fentons.

"Walking corpse syndrome, it must be a side effect of the drugs."

"Do drugs make your eyes glow?"

Danny shook off their whispers, focusing back on Jazz.

"You must be able to tell it doesn't beat enough. Anyone with a heart rate as low as I have should be in a coma… I barely have a heartbeat." Danny sighed. "Right now anyway. I've been dead more and more often these days. My heart doesn't beat when I'm dead and I've been dead more than alive… more ghost than human" He whispered.

"Danny, what are you talking about?" Tucker demanded. They were closing in on him again, Danny sighed and closed his eyes.

Of course they had questions. He hadn't explained this right. He should start at the beginning.

"The portal killed me… but it also reanimated me? I died wrong… I didn't die right and so I can't live right. No… maybe it's more like… Danny turned on the portal and died inside… I'm just the ectoplasmic imprint piloting a body." he looked down at his hands, his thumb tracing over the circular scar on his palm where he'd pressed the button.

"Why do you think that?" Jazz asked. Danny frowned as he looked up at her, he didn't think that, he knew that he had died.

"I don't think… I know I'm dead… that I'm a ghost tied to flesh." Danny shook his head and clenched his hands.

"Danny… you're not making any sense. We are trying to understand but… you don't…" Tucker trailed off and shook his head. "Help us understand."

"Why do you all suddenly care? I've been dead for two years." He said glaring, his eyes glowing green again, rage rising once more.

"Don't act like we haven't cared! We've tried time and time again to get you to tell us what was wrong!" Sam snapped at him. Danny flinched away in guilt, he pulled his knees back to his chest and rested his chin on them, his eyes cooling back to blue as he closed his eyes and let the tears fall.

"What was I supposed to say?" He whispered. "My parents are ghost hunters… I'm a ghost. What was I supposed to do? Perhaps staying and playing human wasn't the right call… but my death opened the portal. My death let the ghosts through. My death made me a monster." He said, the tears were flowing down his cheeks now.

"I didn't want to be a monster… I tried… I tried to stop them… I tried to protect everyone. Yet humans were still hurt… and then Freakshow came to town with his ghostly artifact… Three months I was trapped under his control… three months… my parents never noticed I was gone." He closed his eyes, he felt like his core would break, maybe if it did he would finally die. His face was damp now with tears.

"And of course they would think I was irredeemable now, after stealing for Freakshow, even after all I've done to pay for the crimes I committed under his spell. Saving the town from Pariah Dark, keeping the other restless dead from attacking the city, freeing us from Nocturne, Undergrowth, and Vortex. Over and over… trying to keep humans safe… and yet… the second I let my guard down… they cut me open." He trembled and sobbed, curling tighter into himself.

"Jack! It's remarkable! The ghost has a cellular structure! Look how well it mimics the structures of the living, we've never seen an imprint this strong before." Danny quoted in a high pitched voice made to sound like his mom, "I know Mads, look at this! He actually has a dermis! Look at the bones underneath!" He switched to a deeper voice before swapping back to Maddie. "It's a good thing we developed that ecto-paralytic! It'll keep it nice and still while we study it! What an anomaly! Perhaps it's so deluded in its own mimicry of life that the ectoplasm has actually created a perfect replica of a human body!"

Danny sobbed and put his hands over his head, laughter broke through his sobs and he threw his head back again before looking at the Fentons through glowing tears.

"Please… kill me! Finish what you started!" Danny said. "Finish what you started when you opened my chest, cracked my sternum in half and began to collect samples from my organs. Finish the job and rip me apart to study if my ectoplasm continues to retain its 'memory' even after you've removed everything and destroyed me."

His family and friends stared at him in shock and he laughed again, it turned back into a sobs and he whimpered softly.

"Finish killing me… please… no… don't just kill me, take my core, pulverize it, destroy my soul so I never come back. Powder it, set it on fire and scatter it to the winds. I can't go on like this. I don't even know if I'm real anymore? Am I just an ectoplasmic imprint of the person I used to be piloting my old flesh? Am I just a ghost pretending to be human? Am I just a creepy little boy with creepy powers? I'm a freak! Why would any of you care? Why would anyone care? Why would…" He choked on his words before sobbing again.

The silence in the room stretched on forever as he sobbed and coughed and tried to catch his breath. He hiccuped and whipped his nose on the back of his hand, his eyes hurt, they were puffy and red from crying and he tried to stop, but he'd opened the floodgates, all he could do was rock himself back and forth on the cold examination table and cry.

"I haven't aged." He said softly. "Vlad aged… why did I?" he wiped at his eyes miserably. "I must be dead… just ghost scum piloting my own body… is it even my body? Did Danny die in the portal? Who am I? What am I?" He looked down at his hands and a small glowing star flickered to life above his palm and then petered out.

"My dreams are dead and all I do is cause problems." He whispered. "I'm just a dead child with dead dreams… I'm not even Danny… I'm a simulacrum of him… a Phantom. How-"

He flinched, stopping mid question as Jazz wrapped her arms around him, she was soon followed by Sam and Tucker and then eventually his parents. He froze, shocked still, not even breathing as they held him. Were they trying to restrain him? What would they do with him now that they knew? Would they all take turns rummaging through his organs? He didn't know, he didn't want to know. He closed his eyes, they felt so warm, so full of life, he wanted to believe they were hugging him, he leaned into them, letting himself relax and pretend this was acceptance. If only for a moment, he could pretend they loved him, pretend he was Danny, pretend that they hadn't spent the past two years avoiding him. He could pretend that he was human.

He wasn't surprised when he felt the prick of a needle and his consciousness fading, his body going slack as the ecto-sedative took effect.

She must think this is some sort of psychosis, Sam and Tucker certainly did as they whispered about it behind the Fentons.

"Walking corpse syndrome, it must be a side effect of the drugs."

"Do drugs make your eyes glow?"