Chapter 42
Before school, Danny met with Jazz in the same alleyway near their house. She sat down next to him on the concrete.
"Here's your homework! Sorry I forgot to give it to you!" Jazz said, handing him his backpack.
"Gee, thanks. Can't wait to get started on this," Danny said drily. "What did Mom and Dad say?"
Jazz shrugged. "They bought it."
"Did you write a note?"
"Yes." Jazz grimaced, showing him the note with their mom's forged signature.
"Looks good."
"This is awful! It'll be a relief once you are back to normal. I feel like I have to constantly lie to everyone!"
"It's no picnic for me either," Danny sighed. "Sorry to drag you into this. I kind of don't know what I'd do without you."
"That's actually something I wanted to talk to you about."
"Huh?"
Jazz shifted, getting ready to ask a tough question. "Not to pry, but why don't you just tell them? You know, Sam and Tucker?"
"You? Prying? Unheard of!" He joked.
She crossed her arms and gave him a pointed look.
He shrugged. "I just…don't think they are ready to know."
"Mhm."
"What?"
"Nothing."
Danny groaned.
"It would make things a lot easier for everyone! I mean, they are your best friends and Danny Phantom's allies."
"Right, but…"
"But what?"
Danny frowned. "I mean…well, it's just weird. It's like I have this alter ego. They don't have any idea that Phantom is anyone but Phantom, or that I'm anyone but me…"
"Okay, so you're worried they'll what? Reject you because you lied?"
"Eh, maybe."
"They won't. They're good friends."
"But it's complicated…I mean, Sam—"
"What?"
Danny shrugged, not wanting to finish the thought. It was embarrassing.
"Sam and I kissed," he stammered.
"What?!" She shrieked. "Oh my gosh! That's so cute! I always thought you two would make an adorable couple!"
He cringed.
"Well then all the more reason to tell her."
"But you don't get it."
Jazz furrowed her brows then had a moment of realization. "Wait. Which one of 'you' did she kiss?"
Danny put his face in his hands. "Phantom."
"Oh."
"Yeah. She likes Danny Fenton as a friend."
"I'm sorry," Jazz said. "I mean, there is a strong possibility that she'll realize that she likes both of you. I mean, the real you."
"Or that she'll be completely repulsed that she even had the thought of liking me!"
After checking her watch, Jazz sighed and stood up. "I have to go, but don't think this gets you off the hook! You still need to tell them."
Danny shrugged. "I'll tell them…I just need to find the right time."
Jazz nodded but looked doubtful, before rushing out of the alleyway.
The day dragged on even more slowly than when he went to school. Danny checked the time. 10:30 AM?! How is that even possible? He thought to himself.
He was incognito at a café, working on his homework. He had a hoodie on over his hazmat suit, with the hood and a cap covering his white hair, and sunglasses covering his green eyes. He had gotten some weird looks, but no one had seemed to realize who he was, thankfully. He hoped his ghost aura was not easy to see with the sun streaming into the café.
He knew it was dangerous to be out in public, but after spending an hour on a rooftop, he grew tired of being alone without the natural ambience of the town. Jazz would definitely yell at him if she knew he was this close to anyone.
He answered the last math question of his homework and put his stuff away in his backpack. Looking around cautiously, he got up and left.
As he walked down the sidewalk, his hair stood on end. Before he even thought to move, he instinctually darted left and squatted down. A shot hit the sidewalk to his right. Green smoke billowed up from it.
He turned around. There were two ghost hunters on motorcycles. "Stand down, Phantom! We've got you right where we want you!"
"No way! We saw him first!" Four other ghost hunters with orange T-shirts that read Destination Paranormal came running to the right of him.
Danny waved before sinking through the ground, leaving behind his bad disguise. He popped up further down the sidewalk, becoming invisible and continuing to walk forward.
BEEP BEEP BEEP! He looked down and realized he had stepped on a – wait, is that landmine?
"One more step and you're toast!" One of the Destination Paranormal ghost hunters shouted.
"Is it really safe to have a landmine out here in the middle of the sidewalk?" Danny remarked.
"It's no normal landmine! It only hurts ghosts."
"Well, in that case," he said, going intangible and setting off the ecto-bomb. He was surprised that it did, in fact, throw him backwards, despite him being intangible. "Whoa!" He said, flying up and shaking it off.
When all weapons were aimed at him from the six ghost hunters below, he raised his hands up.
"Look, can we just call it a truce?"
Suddenly, an explosion rang out, and he swiveled around. "Oh no."
It was the police station several blocks away. The ghost hunters stopped and stared at the fire then looked back at him. Before they had a chance to shoot, he jolted into the sky.
When he arrived at the station, he could see the arch over the front of the building was beginning to collapse over two policemen who were limping out. He flew over them and held it so they had enough time to scramble away, before he let it go.
"How many more are in there?" He shouted, throwing his backpack to the ground.
The two disheveled policemen stared at him, astonished he was helping. Wasn't he the perpetrator?
"How many?"
"Five!"
Danny nodded, as he flew inside. The place was covered with dust and rubble, besides the fire and smoke that made it difficult to see. "Oh my God…" He said as he scanned the room. He grabbed a fire extinguisher from the wall and sprayed around the room. "Hello?"
He closed his eyes to use his enhanced hearing. He heard muffled yelling and turned to the source. They were buried under a pile of rubble. He swallowed hard, picking up two pieces of rubble. There were two cops underneath, a man and a woman.
He helped the woman up. She had a cut on her head and a large gash on her leg. He grabbed the man's arm. He was much worse off, barely able to stand. He rushed them both outside to an EMT and went right back in.
"Help! Back here!"
Danny quickly flew into the back. The sheriff was pinned down on the floor by a heavy piece of rubble on top of his arm. He moaned. Danny could tell from the blood that it was really bad.
"Wait," the sheriff said, when Danny was about to lift the rubble from his arm. "There are two prisoners in the jail. You need to get them first. I think the fire is pretty bad back there."
Danny nodded before going to the jail cells in the back. Sure enough, two prisoners were in there, coughing. The fire was bad but hadn't gotten into the cells yet. He flew to them and took them out to an ambulance.
When he got back to the sheriff, he was groaning. As Danny raised the rubble up, he slid his arm out and grabbed it, yelping.
That's when Danny heard something breaking above them. More rubble began to fall, and in a split second, he put his body in between the sheriff, and the rubble which broke on his back.
"Agh!" Danny yelled, as the rubble scraped his skin, and he fell forward.
The sheriff looked astonished, as Danny helped him to his feet. "Phantom, I feel like I should be thanking you. You didn't actually start this fire…or the others, for that matter. Did you?"
Danny breathed a sigh of relief as he shook his head. "No, but I am going to bring down who did."
And with that, Danny brought the sheriff out. When the paparazzi began to crowd them, Danny didn't stay much longer.