Tumgik
#if Danny knew about Phantom before he died because of those murals or whatever
justwannabecat · 8 months
Text
Time Travel can cause many problems.
One of them, of course, is creating a paradox. If the future changes enough that the traveler never actually goes back in time, then there are several rips in reality.
That’s not the only problem that I’m presenting.
What happens when the traveler doesn’t know that it was them? When they think it’s an entirely separate entity?
What happens when Danny Fenton comes to his parents and says “I think I’m possessed by a ghost thousands of years old”?
320 notes · View notes
Text
From the Beginning Exclusive!
This is an exclusive for the rewritten and soon to be posted Danny Phantom story “From the Beginning.” This is a sneak peak as to what FtB is going to be all about. You can even think of it like a trailer. Not everything is chronological and these paragraphs might not make it into the final copy, but it tells the heart of the story!
From the Beginning’s first chapter will be released on July 6th! Pledge to me on Patreon Buy me a coffee at Ko-Fi
Summary:  Danny Fenton was a simple, sixteen-year-old teenager who loved fast food, video games, and getting a B on surprise pop quizzes. He’s also the half-ghost teenage hero Danny Phantom who defends Amity Park from ghost attacks on a daily basis. Somehow, the ghost attacks make a lot more sense than crushes, friendships, and falling in love with someone he is definitely not supposed to be falling in love with. It was a lot easier to separate Phantom and Fenton before, but now it’s getting a harder the more he learns about himself. Just who was he? The dorky son of scientists who loved the stars or the hero that protected the town. He’s starting to feel like he won’t like the answer. (Iambic Prose) (Prequel to Guardians and Partial Show Rewrite)
“Hello? Anyone here?” Danny shifted outside the massive library, hesitantly knocking on the doors and oh. Okay. That happened, then. Right. Doors swinging open without anyone there. That was his life, wasn’t it? “Great. I’m trapped in a horror movie and it’s not even a good one.”
Pushing his way in, Danny swallowed at the silence and the thousands of books that he could see even from the front doors. “Hey, uh, Ghostwriter dude? Your doors kind of opened and I came here to, um, visit?”
~
“Huh.” Danny crouched down, tilting his head at one of the broken murals. While the other murals at Pariah’s Keep had been beautifully painted across the walls and held strong even now, this one was shattered on the floor. “I wonder what you meant.”
There had been one with ten cloaked figures crowning Pariah as king, but then the next few had shown Pariah’s fall and his subsequent imprisonment. Danny half wondered who had drawn the murals, but he was willing to chalk it up to it being a ghost thing. Reaching a hand out, Danny brushed his fingers against the mural he was currently inspecting.
While there were ten figures, they weren’t the shapeless cloaked figures from the other murals. These ten all had varying sizes and heights, but it was broken in the way that only one figure was separated from the rest. Danny wondered if these were the original Ancients. He never heard much about them, and he was pretty sure ‘the Ancients’ was just the Observants in disguise, but these ghosts definitely didn’t look like Observants.
Shifting his balance, Danny almost tumbled forward before he caught himself, both hands now braced against the cracked mural-
Golden eyes that shone like molten gold and death and hate and loss and pain and how dare they how dare they how dare they when it had been him to bring them all together and if they wanted to suffer than he would show them and he would make them see him he would make sure they never forgot again-
Grunting as he hit the floor on his back, Danny stared up at the ceiling and only absently realized he was gasping for breath and what… What had that been?
~
“Recent? Recent- It’s always been like this! You’ve always been so damn prideful and full of yourself and it’s gotten worse ever since you became ‘Phantom.’ You think you’re above everything!”
“Above- You have no idea what I go through! I’m trying to be ‘in charge’ because I, at least, know about all these damn ghost things-”
“And I don’t?! I’ve been right here this entire time and learning it all the same time as you! I’ve been here the whole time and you don’t even see me! I’m nothing but the tech guy to you!”
“At least you know what you are! I don’t even know if I’m alive anymore some days-!” Danny’s voice died in his throat as he saw the shot that was speeding towards them and while it might  hurt ghosts, this was a shot that could kill humans and no-
~
“The blame seems to lie in both parties this time around, so why not agree to forgive and forget on both sides?”
“Jeez, does everything you say sound like it’s from some kind of Hallmark card?” Laughter bubbling out at the annoyed look he was given, Danny shook his head and forgive and forget, huh? Not bad, but… “Hey, Ghostwriter, what about something else, instead?”
“Oh, please. ‘Something else’ typically means a battle royale and I’m uncertain about you, but I prefer to solve disputes these days by-” Ghostwriter’s mouth closed with a snap, Danny’s grin growing wider as he continued to hold out his hand.
“Hi, there. My name is Danny and I’m a half-ghost idiot with a saving people thing. I hate Christmas, I love my friends, and it’s nice to meet you.” The long silence was worth it when the ghost finally clasped his hand, genuine smile on his face.
“Hello, Danny. My name is Ghostwriter and I’m obsessive over my books and tend to talk to myself outloud. It’s nice to meet you, as well.”
~
“You don’t understand- I wasn’t even a ghost.” Danielle, the little girl that had pretended to be his cousin the last week, looked up at him as if begging him to understand. Danny found it hard to when he was strapped in some machine and doing his best to not panic. “If it wasn’t for Daddy- If it wasn’t for Vlad, then I would still just be a half-formed spirit thing floating around the Ghost Zone. He gave me my life back.”
“That doesn’t mean- That doesn’t mean you just go and do everything he says! You’re your own person, aren’t you?” Please- Please see that this was wrong. “Do you really think this is the right thing to do?”
“No, but… Danny, please. He’s hurting. Daddy loves me, but he’s hurting and I ran away to see if he would care enough to come get me and he did! I didn’t think he’d hurt you, too, but please, you have to help him.”
~
“So, yeah.” Danny took a breath after a rambling apology that had went on for far too long, a little of the weight falling off his shoulders when he saw Elliot’s smile. “I’m… I’m sorry that we got off on the wrong foot. I can kind of jump to conclusions, sometimes, and I didn’t mean to make you feel like you didn’t belong. Trust me. I know how it feels.”
“You could have just said sorry,” Elliot laughed, stepping forward and resting a hand on Danny’s shoulder. “It’s alright. I did kind of push my way between all of you.”
“It’s hard to be a new kid,” Danny shrugged, and, okay… Maybe Elliot could be okay. Maybe everyone was right and he had just been a jealous brat. “Right, so, um, yeah. It’ll- It’ll be nice to have another friend around here.”
“That’s sweet.” Elliot laughed again, grip tightening on Danny’s shoulder for a moment. “I never would have thought that ghosts could pretend to be so kind.”
“Gh… Ghosts.” Danny watched as Elliot’s glasses slipped down and no… No, there was nothing warm in those eyes. “I don’t-”
“It’s okay.” It was the same feeling as when he had stepped into the portal and felt his palm press against a button. A missed step. A wrong move. An unseen threat. A mistake. “The Guys-in-White have been very eager to meet you, Danny Phantom.”
~
“Give her back!” Ice crawled through his veins and Danny knew that each breath he breathed out was filled with crystals of ice and snow. “She’s not yours.”
“Meddlesome child.” Plants with thorns and toxins deadly even to ghosts rose up, Undergrowth at the center of it all with Sam sitting under him. “She will be Queen. This child will carry on the work that has been left unfinished for far too long! After her death is complete, she shall be the one to heal the world.”
“Maybe, but she doesn’t need to die to change things. She never has.” Energy colder than anything he had ever felt poured into his hands, and this. This was why he had first started fighting back. Someone needed to stop the ghosts.
~
“I always wondered, but why do you risk so much to protect your town? Surely you’ve read enough comics to know how poorly life is for a ‘hero.’” Ghostwriter stared at him steadily, curiously, and Danny felt all his lies die in his throat.
“I…” He told everyone it was because he had always dreamed of being a hero. He agreed that he had a ‘saving people’ thing. He swore up and down that if he didn’t do it, then he’d regret that he never got the chance to do something so amazing. None of it… Not all of them were lies, but they weren’t the truth.
“You risk everyone and you don’t have to. I’ve known you for months, almost, but I just can’t understand it.” Ghostwriter was honestly confused and Danny couldn’t help but laugh. Really. Shouldn’t a writer have known before anyone else? “Wha- Danny?”
“No, no, it’s just… It’s simple, isn’t it?” At the look, Danny shook his head. “Bad things… Bad things happen sometimes, right? A lot of times, you can’t do anything about it, and you just help where you can and keep on going. The thing is, though…” Danny swallowed, looking up at Ghostwriter and taking a steady breath.
“When bad things happen and you have the power to stop it and you don’t? Then the bad things happen because of you. If I have these powers and someone gets hurt and I can do something? I’m going to do it. It’s not because I’m playing at being hero, but because I’m doing whatever everyone else has always done. I’m protecting my home.
~
“Danny-” If this Reality Gauntlet thing really worked, which he had just proved it did, then they would never remember this, and that? That was perfect.
“I love your stupid poetry, I love how you mutter under your breath when you have a new idea you want to write about, I love your stupid hair and how you can never completely get it to lay flat you hypocrite, I love how you sometimes go hours without realizing that your coat that you’ve been looking for is on the back of the only couch you ever sit at, I love how you can’t see without those stupid glasses, I love how you have to always have your tea in just the right way or you won’t drink it, and I love, more than anything else, that you saw me.”
Andrew seemed struck completely speechless, Danny giving a hopeless smile. “I always thought it’d be Sam, you know? Maybe Paulina or someone else from school, but then I met you, and… God. It’s like I met you, and I knew- I wasn’t looking to ever fall in love like I did, but then I met you, and oh, man. I lost so bad, Andrew. So I’m going to say it now, just this once.
“I’m in love with you, Andrew Riter. I love you. You’re never going to remember this, but I thought you deserved to know at least just once.”
~
“Oh, I see.” Still crouched and ready for danger, Danny eyed the ghost that was in front of him in the dream he had found himself in now. He didn’t know where Nocturne was, but he was going to be ready for anything. “She must be dreaming…”
“Right, yeah, okay, dream that knows it’s a dream. Great. Is there where the walls start oozing blood?” A laugh escaped the ghost in front of him. It was definitely a ghost Danny had never seen before. The hairstyle alone was something he definitely would have remembered considering it was dreads tied up with beads and chains and, yeah, definitely not something from today’s style. “You should know that I don’t go down without a fight and-”
“Hush, young one.” The ghost walked forward and before Danny could fly away, he was taking a necklace off and pressing it into Danny’s hands. It looked like a dreamcatcher or whatever, only… It was glowing and the thread seemed like ghostly energy rather than thread. It reminded him of Clockwork’s staff, weirdly enough. “When you see Nocturne, gift this to him. He will know what it is.”
“I, uh, yeah. Okay?” This was a very weird dream, but if Danny didn’t have to fight, then, yeah, hey, great. “Do you know where to find him, right now? I’m kind of trying to stop the entire world from entering into a sleep coma.”
“Follow this path until it ends.” Great. Cryptic. Just what he needed. “Young one…” The ghost bit his lip, Danny near jerking back in surprise when his cheek was cupped. “Oh, such young ones. I’m sorry for what you will face.”
~
“That’s that, then, huh?” Danny rubbed at his eyes before looking back to the results of three night’s research. It all said the same thing no matter how many times he reworked the problem. “I’m dying.”
He felt like the words should have torn something apart in him, but all they did was make him tired. He supposed, somehow, that made even more sense.
~
“You know, GW, I have a feeling that we’re going to be great friends.”
“I find that I rather agree with you on that.”
15 notes · View notes