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noxposting · 4 months

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Truce time!

Hi @noxposting :v you got me as your secret gift giver. You get fic this year, because art and I look at one another with wary stares until the other backs down. Hopefully you enjoy it? I tried to add bits of multiple prompts but :v crypid danny going to a coffee shop won out. mostly. heh. On Ao3

Barista. Not exactly the pinnacle of anyone’s career, heck, many would call it a low point. Not Valerie though. She knew the real pits of food based service, thanks. It didn’t even involve food! That hideous mascot outfit reeked worse than a dumpster on a warm summer evening on a GOOD day; and anyone that saw you managed to treat you WORSE than that! Which was probably the whole point, when you got ‘promoted’ to cash or the grill you’d actually feel grateful. Seeing your face sure didn’t stop everyone from being the worst human they can be, but enough were too cowardly to be as rotten when the threat of spitting in their food was right there.

It didn’t help with the looks about someone ‘young’ working at a burger place so ‘soon’, and the next time someone asked if she should be in school on a Saturday was getting a special side seasoning of knuckles. If she didn’t need the money, she wouldn’t be working!

So yeah, in short? Getting hired at a coffee shop was a major step up from the Nasty Burger. Like, who calls a place Nasty Burger? She might not be the biggest fan of coffee either, but at least she wasn’t reeking of grease and having weird sauce explosion nightmares anymore. (The training videos about the Nasty sauce were ridiculous, there was no way you could legally keep something that explosive and give it to people to eat, why so graphic?)

Sure, fewer people from school dropped by here, but that was sort of a plus too. Even if it wasn’t as embarrassing to be seen working once free of mascot duty, it still didn’t feel great to watch how everyone else in class got to have fun while she worked for peanuts. Having some easy ways to slack off and chat a bit on slower days was nice though. Usually only bored old ladies wanted to chat here, and not about anything remotely interesting.

Sam Manson was the only person she’d recognized today, but she didn’t really count. Valerie didn’t know what the goth girl’s deal was, but she always acted like she was trying to ‘steal’ her friend. Which yeah okay, she did date Danny for a bit, but it’s not like Sam even tried to date him first! Having more friends or romantic interests wasn’t going to kill the guy, seriously. In her opinion, Sam was way more likely to hurt Danny than she was. Maybe Sam should look at herself instead of getting all weirdo over-protective. Whatever. At least she didn’t make the same old person joke every single customer thought she never heard before. Paid, got enough sugar for her drink to reasonably be considered a soft drink, and left her alone. Easy.

Valerie got back to cleaning up her work area, there wasn’t more for her to accomplish just staring at the sitting area. The bell at the door would let her know if she had to turn around.

Which it did, twenty minutes later. It wasn’t Sam leaving, but some new guy wanting an order. Normal. Except Sam wasn’t sitting alone anymore. When had Danny got here? It wasn’t with Sam- she saw her come in alone. At the same time as new customer guy? Only if he could teleport. Pretty sure the Fentons didn’t have a magic teleporter invented yet, or there’d be way more weird ghost hunter home invasions.

She wasn’t staring. She wasn’t. Took an order, made it, put the cash in the register all without staring at the weirdness of a suddenly appearing ex. Totally.

Danny didn’t even do coffee! Why would he be here? You’d think someone so constantly tired would at least try coffee for the caffeine kick- but he acted like she suggested he stick his tongue in a blender when she asked if that’s what he kept in his thermos one day. Kind of a weird overreaction, but that was just Danny. It was kind of cute in a way, like he needed big reactions to get noticed at all. Considering his family though… she could get it.

If there weren’t more customers coming she might have gone over and asked if he wanted anything. Even if Manson would have been catty about it. She wasn’t scary, just loud.

Mostly people going to join the first guy who ordered. Friends meeting up, probably. Did it matter? No, but thinking about it gave her something to do as her feet got sore and staring while cleaning got boring.

Nosy friends. Sam wasn’t happy, judging by the death glares. Like she wasn’t ever loud with Danny or Tucker. Sheesh.

“Hey Val, can I get a water?”

She blinked once, twice. Danny had not gotten to the counter that fast. Without even making a sound against the slick tile floor. Yet there he was, shy half grin on his face, rubbing the back of his neck like he was asking for a big favour.

“Sure, but it’s gotta be in the dinky little cup. That alright?” It was a dumb policy, but that was jobs for you. What was he going to do with a coffee cup full of cold water, make ‘illegal tea’? Who cares?

“Totally. Thanks.” Danny’s grin grew, almost a bit too much for a guy getting a baby cup of tap water.

It was weird. The hairs on the back of her neck shouldn’t be acting up from Danny just being a bit of a goof over water. She forced the stupid feeling down as she handed over the drink and shook her brain back to reality. “No problem. Nasty Burger closed or something?”

“Nah. Tuck’s just grounded and Sam wanted to go somewhere that didn’t reek of cooking animals,” he said, adding playful air quotes to reek before taking the cup. “Those guys don’t seem like they’re locals, what do you think?”

“Listen, after like two hours you all look the same.” Valerie answered with an eye roll, earning another laugh from the boy. “I don’t think I’ve seen them here before though, no.”

“Elmerton, maybe?”

“Maybe? I don’t get paid enough to pay that much attention to them.” Valerie rubbed her forehead before looking at Danny again. Somehow he’d gotten even worse at making conversation! Who cares about some slightly noisy table group?

“We’d find out pretty quick if there was a ghost attack.”

Danny was joking, obviously, but it didn’t keep her from leaning over to hiss “Don’t you dare speak bad luck into my day, Fenton” under her breath.

“Okay, okay! I’m totally not doing that,” he held up his hands in mock surrender, but the easy smile stayed in place.

Sometimes she really wanted to strangle the stick of a boy. Ghosts weren’t funny! He knew that! Some were pathetic, but still not funny. “Good.”

Danny gave a little wave, nearly spilling the thimbleful of water that could fit in the sad little cup as he headed back to the looming thunderstorm that was Sam.

Maybe she was glaring as much as the goth was, she kept feeling the need to blink or rub at her eyes, but they didn’t feel dry. Weird. Her suit would warn her of any real danger from spectral pests, but she could do without randomly feeling really off for no reason.

Oh! She was just feeling weird because it wasn’t so loud anymore. That was all. The uncomfortable chill and too long shadows were just in her head. The noisy group kept looking around and fidgeting in their seats instead of just loudly saying everything and everything. Sam was comfortable enough, even if it looked like the light on her side of the room had died, leaving her and Danny lurking in shadows that kept creeping closer and closer to the other group- not literally.

She shook her head. She needed a break. Pushing back into the employee’s only section would give her a moment to drink some water and wake up before she started seeing things.

–

“Pushing it a bit? She totally almost caught you.”

“But she didn’t.” Danny pushed Sam’s comment away as he slid out of his seat. “Besides, I thought you wanted me to get ‘em to shut up a bit.”

“I did. You’re just being extra,” Sam rolled her eyes, watching the now quite cowed group of out-of-towners.

Danny gave a loose shrug, shoulders weirdly out of tune with the movement that should be all about them. “I’m hungry! No one local ever gets scared of easy stuff anymore,” his arm twitched as he spoke, a faint green twisting and twining through his skin. It seemed to thread through skin and muscle, pulsing and pulling bits from beneath before sliding back into smooth skin again, a secret no one was meant to really see.

Sam pointedly avoided looking at that arm. She didn’t try to tell him to be more careful again either.

Danny’s grin slid a bit too far to be comfortable on a human face before he moved closer to the group that kept looking for the door. “Hey. Did any of you guys see the light switch? It’s kind of dark here.”

It was dark in here. On a bright sunny day, with all the windows open. It shouldn’t be- but ghosts hardly cared about what ‘shouldn’t’ be. He wanted it to be dark- and his powers obliged. Eagerly, even. Happy, delighting that instead of squabbling and fighting with another ghost he was going to do what they were meant to do. Scare the daylights out of the living. Grab the feeling and emotion and life his own chest forgot how to feel some days. More and more often, lately.

“No? I-I didn’t really see anything.” The first person tried to answer back, failing to match Danny’s easy smile, leaning further back in his chair as Danny leaned forward, a tilt to his head.

“Really? Darn. Maybe one of you can help me out?”

It was funny. He was totally still ‘Danny Fenton’ right now, asking a very casual question in an easy way but everyone lurched back as if he asked to rip out their teeth. “I totally get it if you can’t though. I just have bad luck with switches.”

He reached out, arm twitching again in an awful, too loose way. Like he’d popped it out of his arm socket but it kept slowly reaching towards his target as it twisted and seemed to burn. Neon green scarring burst out from his fingertips and spread as he got closer and closer and flared into a painful glow as they screamed and tried to back away from him.

His friends didn’t do much better, scrambling away and abandoning their friend to the ‘terrifying thing’ casually just walking after him.

“What are you! Get back!”

Danny ignored the panicked pleading, only grinning as the others found the door to be locked. “Huh? I’m just a guy asking you for help?”

“No you aren’t! You-you-you’re some monster!”

His eyes flashed green as he put his twisted, burning, scarring arm to his chest. “A monster? Really?” The green scarring spread like the electricity that first caused it- the damage throwing his whole body into a sickly painful looking glow. “Is that what you see?”

His target tripped as he tried to escape, tangled in his own legs and shaking too much to really gain any ground even as Danny didn’t move above walking speed. “If I’m such a monster, how about you tell me how it feels?”

The shriek was enough to hurt his ears for a second as he reached forward and grabbed the unfortunate human, the rolling green transferred over for only seconds before it leapt back to Danny, slowly fading back under his skin and taking all the horrific damage with it.

The doors had unlocked, letting all the others escape as he rocked on his heels, waiting for the one who’d passed out from sheer terror to get back up. It wasn’t as if he ACTUALLY felt how awful that day was. It was a fraction, a hint of his own memory. Not fatal. Just absolutely terrifying.

“And Sam calls me dramatic.” Danny muttered, nudging them again with his foot before joining Sam back at the table. He could just say the others pranked him and left him if Valerie was annoyed at the unconscious person on the floor.

After all, it wasn’t as if any ghost was here. She’d know about an ‘attack’. He’d just gotten his own kind of snack.

#Omg I love this 😭#Sorry it took so long to get to it #Phandom truce 2023

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noxposting · 4 months

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Another year, another @phandomholidaytruce ✨

Merry crisler @datawyrms ! Hope you like it!! It's also on AO3 with an extra chapter

Something's Wrong with Danny Fenton

The realization that something was seriously wrong was like falling asleep; slowly, and then all at once.

There had been no catalyst, no trigger to speak of.

Miss Jones had been sick and, this late into the school year, they hadn't bothered to provide a replacement. Most of the class hadn't even bothered showing up anyway; with finals so close, they were either asleep of studying.

Cal would have done the same, was it not for the absolute chaos at home. The twins were off school for the summer already, and they made sure to make their presence known to every single resident of the house. Usually starting at 6am. Cal didn't feel like he got to choose whether to stay home or not.

This is how he found himself here, sitting in a mostly empty classroom, gaze unfocused as he soaked in the rare moments of quiet. In front of him lay an opened biology book, as he lied to himself that he was going to use this time to revise ahead of exams. Instead, the sketch of a duck wearing sunglasses was guiltily staring at him from the page margins.

His gaze had wandered to the window, towards the school-yard of Casper High. Today was a rather rare sunny day; it was early summer, but even during the heart of the hottest season there was a never-ending, persistent chill that seemed to choke the entirety of Amity Park.

Cal, of course, knew exactly where it was coming from.

It was a little bit difficult to live around here and not know about the ghosts.

He pushed his glasses up his nose nervously. He didn't have any particular strong feelings about ghosts, really. He had gotten used to them, in a way. But, truth be told, he was not a fan of the spine-chilling coldness that seeped through everything in their presence and lingered after they were gone. The way the town seemed never to be able to escape this coldness anymore bothered him, but there was not much to do other than suck it up.

Which was why rare days like today were a pleasant, welcome surprise to the locals. He could see his classmates lounging around in the grass outside, soaking up the sunlight like starving sunflowers, and it brought a warm feeling in his chest. Cal was always more of a people watcher, standing in the side and absorbing situations rather than getting involved.

He tried to ignore the tense feeling in his spine that made the hair at the back of his neck stand.

Also, he was studying. He looked down at his book and a second duck that had joined the first and was silently judging him, this time wearing a dapper top hat and a little bow-tie.

There was no haunting chill in this classroom. Right. He didn't want to go out and miss the time to relax.

His let his gaze passively wander around the room. There were only four others in there with him, all in different states of mental non-existence. Eleanor and Sally-Anne were sat opposite each other, heads close over the desk as they gossiped, their whispers providing a subtle background noise through the quiet room. Jonathan (the one with the glasses, not the one in the football team) was focused on the book in front of him and Danny, at the back of the class, looked to have fully dissociated, eyes glazed over. Now wasn't that relatable.

Cal sighed. Suddenly the chair felt a bit stiff, his shoulders a bit tense, so he pulled his arms behind his back in a big stretch. He couldn't help the groan that left his lips as he felt his joints pop. Grabbing the back of his chair, he twisted around -first the right side, then the left- to relieve the tension.

The tension, as if to spite him, stayed.

He got up, cringing at the scraping sound his chair made as it slid back, and he could see on the edge of his vision that his movement had caught the attention of the two girls. When he didn't say anything, they returned to their conversation.

Cal went around his desk towards the window and looked outside, once again marveling at the sunshine and trying to ignore the goosebumps travelling down his arms. He did briefly debate the merits of joining the rest of the glass out in the grass once more, but the peace of the quiet classroom was too tempting for his foggy brain. Still, he didn't feel like sitting in a chair for the next forty minutes. Looking around, he spotted a few unattended markers on the teacher's desk, and paused, a thought forming in his mind.

His fingers were itching with misplaced adrenaline, and he figured what the hell.

Pointedly not allowing any awkward embarrassment to brew, he approached the desk, grabbed the black and green markers and approached the blank class whiteboard.

Cal had always liked to draw. His mom said it's because his hands can't sit still (but she liked it, really, especially when he made her custom-made mother's day cards every year). The twins had no opinion about it, until his sister got her first celebrity crush and begged him to draw the poor guy with cat ears.

No ducks with accessories this time.

She later posted it online with a humble brag about how she had 'finished it really quickly, what do you guys think' but, considering she had barely hit double digits in age, Cal had let it pass.

The validation of elementary kids was not in his radar, exactly.

He never followed any particular theme -his illustrations were usually random, without much thought. He liked letting his mind and hand take him wherever, and that often led to either randomness or, as was often the case for his bigger, more planned illustrations, a lot of inspiration from his environment.

Was it a surprise that he had produced so many drawings of ghosts?

As Cal was suddenly, once again, very aware of the subtle chill (not quite a presence, but it existed and it came from somewhere), he figured that one more addition to his ghost collection wouldn't make any difference.

Even if he wasn't used to drawing on a whiteboard, he still felt the long, controlled strokes of the marker come naturally. His preferred style was either completely colorless (which had absolutely nothing to do with his tendency to draw during class, thank you very much) or with minimal color; he knew how to manage negative space to his liking.

He had to admit, the subject he had chosen was pretty perfect for the whiteboard; all high contrast black and whites.

Getting lost in the process was easy for Cal; applying long strokes across the board and thick filling to the black outfit allowed time and tension to pass him by, almost. The hair would be tricky; making sure the black marker was used faintly enough to translate the light, luminous color was a mission, and Cal was nothing if not a perfectionist when it came to his work. All aspects to a drawing needed to come together for a good result, after all.

But for this, the most important part was the eyes.

Cal tightened his grip around the green marker. There could be only one color on this drawing, and it had to be the eyes. Sadly, a green whiteboard marker would never be quite the toxic green that he would have liked, but it was the principle that counted.

As he placed the last detail on the hair, fade enough to be as close to the bright white of the real thing, he uncapped the green marker. There was a sense of gravitas in the movement, the start of the final step to this work.

Or maybe Cal was just pretentious about it, who's to say.

"Wow, Cal, you're so good!"

The sudden voice made Cal jump and, even worse, almost draw a green line straight through the board and the almost finished drawing. He turned around to realize that everyone in the room was staring at him.

Maybe he should've thought this would happen, but he felt the heat on his cheeks rise nonetheless.

It was Sally-Anne who had spoken, turned around on her seat where she was facing Eleanor. Both were smiling. A few desks ahead, Jonathan had abandoned his reading and instead was looking at Cal with interest, head resting on his hand.

Cal avoided all their eyes, fidgeting with the green marker instead "Um, thanks. Just a hobby, no big deal."

Sally-Anne raised her eyebrows. "Are you joking? This is amazing! It's like, the best Phantom art I've ever seen!"

Cal blushed even harder. "You're exaggerating, but thanks."

Eleanor gasped "Oh my God, no one better erase this! Quick, I need a picture!" she swiftly pulled out her phone and paused. "Hey Cal, can you like, put a signature somewhere on that? I need to take a pic."

Cal breathed out, muttering 'no problem' and obliged.

A stutter sound came from Eleanor's phone "Awesome! I'll send it to you if you want!"

Cal refused and Eleanor shrugged, sending it to Sally-Anne instead.

Soon everyone went back to what they were previously doing and Cal was happy to be ignored. Walking over to the teacher's desk to put the markers back (and maybe look for an eraser, if Eleanor and Sally-Anne didn't kill him first), he was suddenly aware of that ever-present yet so distant chill and his head snapped up towards the room.

At that moment, he locked eyes with Danny Fenton, and Cal froze.

It was impossible to pinpoint what was wrong exactly, which made things worse. Danny Fenton looked as he usually did; tired, bruised, head resting against his hand and unruly hair falling in his face. Yet there was something just wrong. His pallor was pale, unnervingly so, the bluing bruise against his cheek and graze on his lip contrasting dramatically against his skin. But his gaze was so sharp that Cal was sure that Danny could see right though his skin and into his brain.

It happened slowly, and then all at once.

Worst of all, Cal now knew where that ever so familiar chill came from, and he was almost shocked he didn't recognize it before. The aura of the dead was practically oozing off Danny Fenton.

Time felt like it was slowing down as Cal was locked in by those eyes, a shade of blue so cold it was painful and, for the first time, Cal realized that he was seeing Danny Fenton.

Cal wasn't sure how long he was trapped under that gaze. It felt like eons, but it couldn't have been more than seconds. As he felt his brain melt under the realization that something was frighteningly wrong with one of the people he knew, something happened that shocked him out of his spiraling.

Danny smiled. The faintest, most tired lift of lips, yet it was enough to transform the aura of wrong and that trapping stare, like deciding to let free an animal that was going to become dinner.

Just like that, with a movement so simple, the chill was passive again. Cal smiled back.

Feeling like he was floating, Cal went back to his desk. He took a seat as the bell rang and his classmates soon started filtering in, all of them taking a moment to show various levels of awe towards his drawing.

Throughout it all, Cal kept his head tilted and one eye, watching Danny's reaction. To anyone else, he looked like he had just woken up from a nap, groggy and unfocused. But Cal now knew better. He had realized the wrongness, and knew there was more hidden behind these icy eyes.

He didn't know what, he didn't know how. He didn't know when it had started, or why, but there was one thing Cal was sure of.

There was something very wrong with Danny Fenton.