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lexosaurus · 1 year

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Everything Was White: Part 20

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read on: [ao3] [ffn] (please read tags)

Summary: After being accidentally revealed to the public and taken away by the government, Danny deals with the aftermath of his time with the GIW.

****

If Danny thought that Vlad was going to be subtle about picking him up from school, he was sorely mistaken.

“Daniel!” Vlad said, stepping out of the main office and opening his arms for a hug. “Little Badger, it has been so long since I’ve seen you last!”

Behind him, whispers broke out.

“Is that the mayor? Why is he getting Fenton?”

“Don’t you remember? He paid for Danny’s court fees.”

“Do they know each other?”

So embarrassing, Danny internally groaned, pushing himself toward Vlad. Once he got close enough, he paused, giving Vlad just enough time to make a grandiose display of hugging him.

“My favorite nephew!” Vlad’s bony arms poked into his spine.

“Do you mind?” Danny hissed into his ear. “I don’t know if you heard, but I broke my back.”

Vlad pulled back, his eyes narrowing for a brief moment before the mask was back on full display. He stood, laughing joyously. “Oh, but that was ages ago, Little Badger. Come, we have much to do before your outpatient appointment!”

If possible, Danny’s cheeks grew even hotter. He followed Vlad out the doors of the school to see a sleek black car parked along the curb. It was some vintage model—Danny didn’t know or care—but he assumed at a glance that it was worth more than his life.

Vlad oh so graciously opened the passenger door for him, saying something obnoxious as he did so. Danny tuned him out, transferring into the car and folding his arms, refusing to look at the peeking faces in the window who were more than likely whispering their hypotheses to each other.

“No driver today?” Danny asked.

Vlad picked up the wheelchair and glanced around it, clearly lost.

“It doesn’t fold if that’s what you’re wondering,” Danny said, his tone icy. “Just shove it in the back of your car.”

“Of course, Little Badger.” Vlad all but pranced to the trunk of the car. “And no, I sent my driver on a day off today. I wanted to spend some time with you, nephew.”

Danny snorted in derision but let the comment slide. He was willing to play along with Vlad’s tomfoolery if it meant the end goal would be met.

Vlad stowed the wheelchair and hopped into the driver's seat, shutting the door beside him.

And then it was just the two of them. Alone. In Vlad’s car.

“To my house, I presume?” Vlad asked, any semblance of the doting uncle gone from his voice.

Danny breathed out, trying to expel the building tension in his chest. It didn’t work. “Yeah. Your house.”

“So you have wished it, so shall it be.”

“Shut up.”

Vlad turned the car on, and the sound of classical piano filled the tense air between them. He peeled out of the parking lot, and off they went.

It had been so long since it was just the two of them alone together. Danny had almost forgotten how ruthless the awkward silence could be. How unforgiving Vlad’s dark demeanor could be. How much it made him want to snap, to lash out, to punch or hit something.

Or someone.

But he couldn’t do that today. No, today he was here to proctor peace.

Or, a blackmailed version of peace.

But Vlad must have known Danny’s intentions already, right? So then why had he agreed to this? Why had he willingly picked Danny up from school?

You already know why, don’t you, Fentoid? He said it to you. Told you that you were a liability. Reckless, impulsive. That you needed to be under his control.

Except, wasn’t it due to him that you ended up in this situation at all?

“You know…” Danny started, cutting through the dark, internal cloud. “You didn’t have to be so over the top with the stupid uncle stuff.”

Vlad tutted. “My, Daniel, you should know that wasn’t an act.”

“Yeah, it was.” Danny let his head lull back against the seat. “And telling everyone I’m still in outpatient was an asshole move.”

“That one was just for fun.”

“I know. Believe me.”

“But please, as if everyone didn’t already know. You’ve done a perfectly wonderful job of making yourself look unstable enough as it is.”

“I’m sorry, how—how exactly have I done that?” Danny snapped, glaring at the piece of shit halfa before him. “I’ve done everything right since I left the hospital.”

“Daniel, look at your accomplishments since! You only managed to land yourself on suicide watch followed by months of constant supervision! And then confronting a government agent in school? Eyes glowing like a dangerous ghost on the brink of a rampage? But of course, boy, if you say so, then you’re doing wonderful.”

Oh, he was so done with people bringing inpatient up. “Yeah okay, I got tortured by the government, but sure, let’s all blame Danny because he got upset at school one time! Let’s blame Danny because the govern—government fucking stalked him!” Danny bunched his hands into fists and squeezed them at his side. Damn it, he wanted to punch Vlad so fucking bad it wasn’t even funny.

“Yes! Don’t you see, child? The public will blame you!”

Danny’s fists flew up to his hair, and he pulled at his scalp.

“You are in a delicate situation. One slip-up and you can set everyone against you. You’re an anomaly, do you understand? You and I both know that ghosts aren’t inherently dangerous, but do they?”

“My parents are working on it.”

“Yes, right. Your parents. You mean the parents of the half-ghost child that was taken by the government? The parents who were in mourning and were desperate for their child to come home to them? Those parents? The same ones who conveniently went from twenty years of anti-ghost propaganda to now retracting their own publications at the same time their son was taken from them for being part ghost? Those parents?”

Danny shut his eyes, pulling his hair tighter.

“In case you haven’t seen the court case yet, child—and judging by this conversation, I’m inclined to believe that you have not—it wasn’t exactly a blowout. The time, money, and resources, the strings that I personally had to pull to get you out legally were more than enough to put you on some indescribably thin ice.”

The heat in Danny’s body evaporated at once, and ice pooled in his stomach. His hands loosened, then fell from their position on his head, and he looked over at Vlad’s grimacing face with wide eyes.

But why…hang on, was Vlad scared?

Danny’s voice detached from his body. “Who did you overshadow?”

The gentle tapping of Vlad’s finger against the steering wheel was deafening in the silence of the car.

Danny’s voice was more forceful this time. “Vlad, who?”

“Calm yourself, child. Nothing got picked up on camera if that’s what you’re worried about.”

If anything, that made it worse. Danny heard his breathing pick up, his chest grow tight. He felt his fingers shake and any bit of hope exit his body.

Vlad groaned, more than likely feeling Danny’s heightened emotions. “It was a few members of the jury and the defense lawyer on certain occasions. As well as others who had the power to move the case along more quickly. The jury members I selected were either alcoholics, had substance abuse problems, or other personal issues that could cause high amounts of stress. As for the defense lawyer and the others, I only overshadowed them in their offices. No cameras.”

“Am I—did we even win that case?”

Vlad was silent for a moment, and Danny could see him mulling over his response.

“Vlad!” he tried to shout, but it came out more choked than not.

“I couldn’t leave you in there. You’re too valuable to my personal safety. And…regardless of what you believe, in some twisted way, I do think of you as my son.”

“That doesn’t answer the question.”

“You’re young. It’s easy to forget that with how much you flaunt your powers like a peacock. It’s annoying, honestly. But it’s also a reminder that you don’t understand how politics work, especially when a potential weapon that the federal government appears particularly interested in is up for grabs.”

“What are you talking about? Vlad, was…was the government rigging the case?”

“Well, if they tried, they didn’t succeed, did they?” Vlad gave him a sideways glance as they pulled into his driveway. “No thanks to me, anyway.”

Danny’s head was spinning. “But I thought there was a jury?”

“And you think that alone makes a fair trial? Or that cases can’t be delayed for years?” Vlad scoffed. “Please, your innocence is showing. Come, let’s go inside. And I know you don’t care, but I will be leaving you with an elementary-level school project to show off to any potential onlookers, so you better put it to use.”

But as Danny began the process of getting out of the car and planning how the hell he was supposed to get up Vlad’s front steps without his walker (he’d be damned if he asked that asshole for help), he could feel the panic grow, and with it all the different what-if scenarios that came with it.

“You don’t know that no one caught on to you,” Danny said, undoing the brakes on his wheelchair and following Vlad down his front path. “Or that no one will notice anything wrong looking back at the courtroom tapes. Or the person—the people overshadowed won’t…I don’t know, realize they’re missing time or something.”

Vlad climbed the steps of his walkway and stood by his door, frowning down at Danny as he scootched his body up the stairs backward, dragging his wheelchair with him.

“Tch—this is just embarrassing for you.” Vlad ripped both the wheelchair and Danny from the ground and shoved them through his front door.

“Hey, get your hands off me!” Danny growled, begrudgingly settling back down into his wheelchair.

The sight of Packers memorabilia assaulted his view, clashing against the medieval purple interior of Vlad’s home. The mansion was just as massive on the inside as it appeared on the outside, with tall ceilings and plush furniture smattered about. But despite the massive fireplace with its pink ecto-fire and all the tall windows with their heavy drapes, when Danny was inside Vlad’s home, all he felt was cold.

And not the pleasant kind of chill, the ecto-frost that nipped at his fingertips. This kind of cold was different. It was lonely. Foreboding.

“Vlad, I can’t go back…” Danny’s stomach turned. “You have no idea—”

“Frankly, I do have an idea. But really, Daniel, it’s like you’ve forgotten that I have twenty years of experience at having a ghost half. Do you think I’m some infant ball of ectoplasm like you that can’t prevent my eyes from glowing when I want them to? That I didn’t do any test runs before enacting my plan on your case? That I didn’t cover my tracks and make sure every single person had some sort of reason for any time they might not remember? Or fill in any spaces in their memories artificially?” Vlad stalked over to his liquor cabinet and pulled out a bottle of wine. “I know you’re not one to pay attention to the details, but I am.”

“Oh, right, because you so paid attention to—to all the details when you gave Skulker that weapon that revealed me!”

Vlad poured himself a glass, studying the swirling liquid before he sighed. “I admit that my calculations didn’t account for Technus’s interference in Skulker’s equipment. But I assure you, with the severity of the situation, I did not engage in anything I wasn’t sure I could get away with. My many years of underhanded deals and market manipulations were to your benefit. You should be thanking me.”

“I’m not thanking you for fucking up, costing me my life, and then—and then scrambling to undo your mistake.”

“Suit yourself.” Vlad shrugged, taking a sip of his drink. “Either way, you’re out, and I still have my secret intact.”

Danny narrowed his eyes. “Vlad…what exactly do you know?”

“Hmm?” Vlad grinned, setting his glass down on his expensive mahogany table.

“Like, from…” Danny’s heart rate picked up again. “From inside the facility. You know, with…me.”

“I told you already, didn’t I? I have resources.”

“Yes, but—but—” Danny broke off. He didn’t know if the increased pressure in his head was due to frustration, fear, or a mix of both. “What resources are you even talking about? What do you know?”

Vlad took another long sip of his wine, draining half the glass in one gulp. “They had a running game with you after your escape attempt.”

Danny went rigid.

“The game worked in that they would present some small amount of food, usually some packaged food like a granola bar, and they would order you to eat it. And when you couldn’t do it for one reason or another, then they would—”

“Okay!” Danny yelled, cutting Vlad off.

“What?” Vlad smirked. “I thought you would have wanted to hear how it ended.”

“How did you—how do you know? How do you know about that?”

“I thought I told you. Resources.”

Danny had the sudden urge to bash his head against the wall. “What resources? Did you—did you overshadow an…agent or something? Have a guy on the—the inside?”

“Not exactly.”

“Then what? Stop being an asshole and tell me.”

“I have money, Daniel. And money can buy so much. Pictures, videos, documentation. All of it.”

Danny’s fingers twitched, and he didn’t resist the pull when they flew up to his hair again. “So…so who else knows?”

“Other than the gentleman I hired? No one for now. So long as you be a good boy and keep your mouth shut, then you have nothing to worry about. But I warn you,” Vlad said, leaning down to Danny. “One little slip to Maddie and I’ll make sure everyone sees that game you all had so much fun playing in your cell. And you wouldn’t want that, would you?”

Danny sat statue-still, too frozen to speak. He wasn’t even sure if he was breathing. His head fogged, his vision spun, his chest burned, and nausea was creeping up his throat.

But perhaps this was the confirmation Vlad was looking for because he straightened back up, plucked his empty wine glass from the table, and set it in the sink atop the liquor bar. “So, Little Badger, to what do I owe the pleasure of this excursion?”

“Huh?” Danny managed out, trying to force away the incoming panic attack.

“Surely the science project couldn’t just be these little tiffs between us. Not when you made such a big show of calling me. Have you forgotten what ghost powers are? Or did you forget that my entire house is lined with material that throws off ecto-sensors?”

“Um…” Danny shook his head, fighting away the dizziness. He forced his fingers to release their grip on his hair and return to his wheelchair. “Uh—no. No, I just—I, uh—I can’t…go ghost. I can’t use my ghost powers.”

Vlad’s brows shot up. “Still? They never removed the inhibitor device?”

“Wouldn’t you—didn’t you already know this? You bugged our house,” Danny pointed out.

“If you must know, Daniel, I have been away these past few weeks on business and vacation in Europe. And despite what your narcissism may tell you, I don’t spend my entire days watching your parents.”

“Could have fooled me.”

“But looking at your history of emotional outbursts, I understand why your parents have decided to keep your core locked up.”

Danny gritted his teeth, then let a deep breath out.

In, two, three…out, two, three.

“I know. I know how this looks,” Danny said. “How I look. But…but you’re like me. You understand, right? You—you know what this is doing to me? To my ghost half?”

Vlad pursed his lips, giving Danny a hard stare from above.

“I can’t do this anymore. I can’t. Not with—with the government breathing down my neck. I—I—I feel like I’m in danger all the time. I can’t remember the last time that there wasn’t this…this claw in my chest squeezing me. I feel like I’m going crazy all the time and nobody seems to care, nobody gets it. They all just tell me to keep—to keep working hard and…well, one day the chip will come out. But I can’t. I just can’t—I can’t keep improving if—if it’s…I’m being suffocated.”

Vlad sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “You want me to remove it.”

“Yes.”

“Because your parents won’t remove it, your friends won’t help, I’m guessing, and you think that I will.”

“...yes.”

“Then tell me this.” Vlad let his hand drop to his side. “Tell me what exactly you plan on telling your parents once they figure out what you did.”

“They won’t know. I’ve hidden Phantom from them before, I can do it again.”

“Because you were hiding in plain sight, Daniel!” Vlad snapped. “You may have tried some bullshit on everyone else with your promises of staying out of trouble, but I’m a halfa just the same as you! I know that once your core wants something, your adolescent, infant ghost mind will leave you right out in the open acting as a hero once again!”

“I won’t!”

“Don’t lie to me, you will! And your parents know this too! It’s why they’ve kept the chip in your body, isn’t it? Because they know that as soon as a Skulker, a Johnny 13, a Spectra comes into this realm to cause mayhem, you won’t be able to stop yourself from leaping into trouble!”

“Then that’s my fucking problem to deal with!” Danny shouted, glaring up at Vlad with glowing eyes. “If I get caught, then I’ll tell them one of my ghost allies did it for me! It’s not illegal for Phantom to exist anymore, right? Then the only—only issues are my parents, and I’m sorry if you don’t want to go against my mom’s wishes, but you know that if—if this stays in me for too much longer, it’s going to ruin me! It’s—the government is going to ruin me.”

To Danny’s surprise, Vlad’s eyes did not glow in return.

“They’ll take me, you know they will. If—if they were bold enough to rig a trial, then they’ll be bold enough to kidnap me and stage my suicide or something. Which, let’s be honest, that wouldn’t be so fucking hard to convince people of! If I can’t—I can’t defend myself, then you get fucked over too.” Danny let go of the intensity in his glare, letting his aura seep back into his body. “If you really want to keep your secret safe, then give me my core back. Please. I don’t know how much more I can take this.”

“Fine.” Vlad turned and started walking toward his office.

Danny blinked. “Huh?”

“I said fine, we have a deal. Come, I can remove it in the lab.”

“Oh…oh!” Danny hurried after Vlad.

“I really do prefer you this way, unable to walk,” Vlad said, pausing at his office door. He turned back to Danny and remarked, “You know, as much as you like to state otherwise, I have taught you so much. Manipulating my secret? Using your own Obsessive tendencies against me? Very well done, Daniel.”

Danny halted, his heart leaping to his throat.

Vlad chuckled at his reaction. “Oh, but you didn’t think that slipped by me, did you? Please, child, I recognized myself in you instantly. But, you do have a point. The government is unpredictable, and getting you out once was already annoying enough. And even worse, it would be quite inconvenient PR for us if you had another public meltdown because you couldn’t access your core. So in that case, I’d rather see the chip removed.”

Danny followed Vlad into his office where the older halfa shut the door, locked it, and opened the entrance to his lab.

“Uh…” Danny wheeled up to the many tiled stairs, feeling his hands grow clammy on his wheelchair.

“Get off, I’ll carry it down for you,” Vlad instructed, holding his hand out.

“Um, thanks?”

Vlad scoffed. “Please, I’m only doing this because, with your body as disgustingly human as it is, we’ll be here for hours if you try to transport it down the stairs by yourself.”

Danny slid off his wheelchair and onto the carpet, feeling more than a little small under Vlad, who—the asshole halfa that he was—made sure to flair his aura out a bit as he snatched Danny’s wheelchair from next to him.

That dick.

“We’re under a time crunch,” Vlad spoke up as he descended the steps with ease. “The anesthesia will take some time to kick in, so please do come down sometime this century.”

Danny gritted his teeth and began the task of carefully scooting himself down the steps. “What do you mean, anesthesia?”

“I can’t have you squirming around, Little Badger. Not unless you want to go from paraplegic to quadriplegic! Which, if you’d like, I’m more than happy to make that happen.”

“That’s not funny.”

“On the contrary, I think it’s quite humorous.”

“I’m not kidding, Vlad. If—if you do anything—”

Danny heard Vlad dramatically sigh from around the bend. “As if I’d risk Maddie’s love by ruining her only son even further.”

“Will you cut that out? Jesus, you don’t have to be such a villainous asshole all the time. And besides,” Danny said, remembering the Paralympic athlete, “I’ve met paraplegics who are ten times what you’ll ever be. People with legit—legitimate jobs, families who love them—all things that you’ll never have. So shut the fuck up.”

“I’m sorry, was I not about to save your life just now?” Vlad’s tone was light, but the pressure coming off his aura was enough to let Danny know he had struck a nerve. “Keep running your mouth and I’ll pick you up and throw you in the portal. We can see how well you fare in the Zone by yourself with no ghost powers.”

Not for the first time today, Danny wished he had a way to contact Frostbite. At this point, he would even take Skulker over Vlad. Though being defenseless around a ghost that wanted his head as a trophy was probably a bad idea.

“The clock is ticking!” Vlad called out.

“I’m coming!”

Danny slid down the last few steps before pulling himself up and bracing his body against the cold metal wall. It had been a while since he was in Vlad’s lab, and everything looked mostly the same. The test tubes were still carefully lined on their shelves, Vlad’s various machines were stationed around the room, and his pristine portal—much shinier than his parents’ portal—was still nestled into the far wall.

In the middle of the room, Vlad was fiddling with his supplies. Next to him was an empty metal table.

Danny remembered a table like that.

He remembered the last time he was strapped down to it.

The dark chuckle above him. The fingers that ghosted his bare torso, savoring the touch of his skin before they ripped into his body, breaking bones, slicing nerves, and tearing muscles alike.

“Well, hurry up, child.” Vlad carted over a smaller table of tools.

“Uh…” Danny’s eyes were glued to the table. He could feel the thoughts begin to swim in his head, and he wished he had taken another pill today.

“Daniel, don’t be difficult.”

“Huh?” Danny blinked. “Oh. Sorry.”

Stalking over to him, Vlad grabbed Danny’s arm and dragged him over to the table. “Honestly, child, you would be nowhere without me. Of course I can’t just phase the chip out of your body; your mother was actually the one who told me she made it phase-proof. Perhaps she didn’t want you trying anything, hmm?”

Danny couldn’t find it in him to react. He just kept staring at his reflection on the table, slightly warped, clouded, but still him nonetheless.

He wondered how he looked back then. With the Guys in White.

“Take your sweatshirt off and get on the table.”

Danny’s eyes snapped up. “What?”

“The table. Get up on it. And take your top off.”

“Oh…uh…” Danny lifted his sweatshirt off and tossed it aside. He felt naked in even just a T-shirt, and he fumbled with the hem, suddenly facing second thoughts about the chip in the first place.

Other than the doctors and surgeons, no one outside of his family had seen his quilted torso.

“You can leave your T-shirt on.”

Danny tried to not let his shuddering relief be too audible. He gripped the table with his hand, surveying if he even could maneuver his body onto it.

“Must I do everything for you?”

Before Danny could protest, Vlad was heaving him onto the table.

“Jeez.” Danny coughed at the sudden jerk. “A little warning would be nice?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Now, I’m going to give you some anesthesia, and I’ll be able to cut on your previous incision line and pull out the chip.”

“Can’t I stay awake?” He knew he had failed to hide the whining from his voice. “I won’t squirm, I promise.”

Vlad didn’t dignify him with a response, instead pulling out a needle with some liquid inside.

“I—I really will be fine, you know.”

Vlad’s sigh was sharp this time. “Daniel, I’ll only be giving you a local anesthetic. You won’t even fall asleep. Honestly, I would prefer to put you under, but with the time crunch and your terrible acting, I don’t want to be held responsible for any delirious state when your parents pick you up in a few hours. Now lie down.”

“Oh. Okay.” Danny’s breathing slowed. He shifted his body until he was lying on his stomach. The skin on his chest prickled at the pressure, but he ignored it.

“Alright, this will be very quick. You’ll have your ghost powers back after this, but try not to run off.”

Danny grunted in acknowledgment, his throat dry. His stomach flipped over, and he wasn’t sure if it was from nerves or excitement.

After this, he would have his ghost half back. He would be whole again.

“Okay.” He breathed out. “I’m ready.”

“Let’s begin.”

There was a pinch in his neck followed by a wash of cold. Vlad’s fingers prodded around his neck, and another pinch followed.

“It’ll take a few minutes to kick in.”

Danny grunted in acknowledgment. The cold table was incredibly distracting. He forced his eyes forward to remind himself that he was in Vlad’s lab. Not THAT lab, the lab he was taken to every night in his nightmares.

“It’s not too far down in your neck, you know,” Vlad said. “I can actually feel it when I press here.”

“Fascinating.”

Vlad chuckled. “You’re chipped like a little dog, aren’t you?”

Danny hated how he flinched. He hated the immediate, instinctive plummeting in his gut. Hated the way it was so obvious he was in pain when he hissed, “Fuck you.”

“Oh, I do jest.”

“It’s not—not fucking funny.”

He hated how Vlad could just do that. How he had the power to instantly make Danny feel horrible.

Especially since Vlad—it had to be Vlad—had videos of what happened. And he, apparently, still didn’t care.

He had videos, Danny realized all over again. He knew there were security cameras everywhere, but they had recorded it? And saved those recordings?

But why? What purpose could they possibly gain from holding recordings of Operative O tormenting Danny?

Something ugly curled inside him. And he thought that maybe…maybe they had saved it for fun. As something to look back on and laugh.

Because his pain was so amusing, right? That was why Vlad had joked. It had to be.

“Alright.” Vlad bent over his neck. “Can you feel this?”

“No.”

“Excellent.”

Danny didn’t ask what Vlad was doing behind him. He didn’t want the details, he decided. He didn’t care.

But he knew anyway the instant the chip left his body. A frost over his skin, the pulse of his repressed core flashing outward. He was sure, then, that if he had a mirror, his eyes would be glowing.

The ectoplasmic energy rushed around his body, both inside and out. It was beautiful and dazzling and it felt like taking a fresh breath of air after spending months in a polluted city.

“I’m not finished yet, so please contain yourself,” said Vlad.

Danny forced his breathing to slow again, forced his body to calm down. But he couldn’t help the excitement, the sudden spark of adrenaline, and that something else he hadn’t even tried to explain to Sam and Tucker before.

His throat tightened, and he couldn’t help the sudden rush of emotions that threatened to spill. After so so long feeling empty inside, feeling broken, finding the other half of him again was magical.

“You’re such a young ghost,” Vlad muttered. “Only a toddler would flail like this.”

But Danny couldn’t even find it in himself to snap at Vlad. Because this—this—was amazing.

“We’re done,” said Vlad.

Danny’s heart thudded, and despite the increasing burning in his chest, he pushed himself up on the table, swinging his legs over the side.

“Well?” Vlad asked.

Danny pressed his hand to his chest. His scarred skin prickled as normal, but even through his T-shirt, he could feel the chill of his core. His fingers pushed down, and something icy pulsed back.

He exhaled, relaxing into his body. His core hummed in response, sending waves of frost through his veins. He raised his hand and with hardly a thought, it was intangible, then invisible, then covered in a thin layer of ice.

Staring at his hand in awe, he pushed further, watching as the layer of frost crept down his forearm in wispy patterns, stopping at his elbow.

Just like he had commanded it.

He brought his other hand out from his chest and repeated the patterns, watching his fingers become transparent, then invisible, then covered in a sheet of white.

This was it.

He breathed out, and snow dotted the air.

He looked over to Vlad with what he was positive were glowing eyes, but for the first time in so long, they weren’t glowing out of anger or hurt. They were glowing simply because they could.

“Go on, child,” Vlad said, his tone strange. “Let’s see if it worked.”

Danny nodded, hardly believing that this was real this was happening. He shifted, scooting farther to the edge of the table, and then triggered his transformation.

It was amazing, really, what an old reflex it felt like. Snapping his body back into ghost mode was little more than just brushing off the dust from an old light switch and flicking it on.

The rings washed over him in a brilliant display of blue and white, and with it, the pulse of his core grew stronger. Waves of ice rushed over him, radiating out and cooling the room. White hair replaced black, and the black material of his hazmat suit cloaked his skin. His aura blazed out, shimmering and blanketing him with its wispy transparent white.

“Well, well, well. Congratulations, child, it looks like most of you remained intact,” Vlad said.

Most of him…

Danny stole a glance down at his legs, or where his legs should have been. Instead, his ghostly tail was on display.

Maybe he could…

Danny closed his eyes, focusing on the sensation of having legs. He tried to dig into his subconscious to pull them out, but when he opened his eyes, his tail remained.

And then the inevitable fatigue came crashing down on him, and he lost hold of his transformation. The rings appeared once more, and he was returned to his human form.

Lights spotted his vision, and he swayed in his seat. But he couldn’t find it in him to be upset. “I—I’m back. Vlad, I’m back.”

Vlad rushed over, steadying him before he tipped over the edge of the table. “You are indeed.”

“I can’t believe it.” Danny stared at his human hands once again. Ectoplasm buzzed below his skin, and his senses felt so much sharper than before. “I can—I can feel everything. It’s all—wow. It’s there.”

“You’re welcome, Little Badger.”

“Yeah…” Danny’s hands dropped, and he gave what he might consider a genuine smile to Vlad. “Wow, thank you.”

****

Danny stared up at the glow-in-the-dark stars on his ceiling. It was nearly one in the morning, and he was wide awake. Exhausted yet alert at the same time. His chest burned like hot lava, his fingers trembled at his sides, and he felt like screaming and sobbing all at once even though there was nothing to cry about. No reason to lose his cool.

After all, he should be celebrating. His ghost half was finally back. After all this time, he could feel the chilled frost on his fingertips. He could coat his chest in sheets of ice to relieve the pain.

But that wasn’t enough. He was tired, he wanted to sleep. Desperately. More than anything, he just wanted to sleep.

He couldn’t.

He couldn’t sleep.

He hadn’t been able to sleep for the past two nights. His head pounded in his skull, fatigue blistered his eyelids, and his chest burned.

So tired.

But he couldn’t stop. He couldn’t stop replaying the events in his brain. He couldn’t stop seeing the glint of the scalpel as Operative O held it above his head, he couldn’t stop seeing his rib reflecting off the sterile lights, he couldn’t stop seeing the tube as it shoved painfully down his throat, he couldn’t stop seeing the camera in the corner of his cell, the vomit next to his head, the white walls, tiles, his skin, the ectoplasm.

A tear leaked from his eye, and he tried to look up. Focus on the stars.

Another wave of pain hit his chest, and he stifled a groan. His back hurt, joints hurt, everything hurt.

He couldn’t—

Why couldn’t he sleep?

He sat up, sending a wave of nausea down his body. He wanted to stop remembering, go to sleep, stop thinking, stop it. Stop it.

Nights were always the hardest.

Before he knew what he was doing, he had transformed into his ghost half. The sudden wash of cold under his skin felt soothing, and he sighed in relief.

Until the relief was replaced by familiarity. Familiarity from his core that yelled at him to fix this, fix what was hurting, protect his body, don’t let the Guys in White catch you with your guard down…don’t let them catch you weak.

He was weak.

And he couldn’t sleep.

He was outside. The winter air felt remarkable on his face, and he spent a moment letting the soft wind kiss his cheeks, his eyelids, his forehead. He took his gloves off and threaded the air between his fingertips.

It was amazing. So relieving.

But the freedom was short-lived, not before the exhaustion hit him again followed by an angry growl from his core.

He willed his gloves back on his hands and flew high in the sky. Being up in the air after so long awakened an old sensation in his body, one he’d nearly forgotten. And like an old muscle being stretched, it felt stiff, almost uncoordinated at first. He went slow and easy, letting himself regain all the rusty movements until he glided with ease once again.

He didn’t think about where he was going, he just let his muscle memory guide him until instinct told him he had arrived.

He pulled up, hovering over the mansion before him.

Sam’s house, he blearily recognized. He hadn’t been here in months, not since June, but nothing had changed. The grass still looked artificially green—far too green for December—and the tall, perfectly manicured hedges still lined the property.

He wasn’t welcome here. He knew that. He also knew that he wasn’t going to follow that rule. Not to see Sam this time, but for…something else.

Invisible now, he floated through the wall around the house. His chest admonished him, sending jolts of pain all over his torso, but he ignored it just like he ignored the fact that he still wasn’t able to form legs from his ghostly tail yet.

It was fine. He was a ghost. He didn’t need legs.

He barely registered where he was going as he traversed the halls. Invisible, of course. Grandma Ida could be shrewd, despite her old age. Part of Danny had been convinced that many months ago, before his reveal, she had already figured out who—or rather, what—he was.

Danny flew through a door and held his breath. The master bedroom in all its overzealous glory greeted his eyesight. He hardly stayed to take in the wealth, though. Not when the temperature drop could be enough to alert the sleeping Pamela of a ghostly invader in her home.

He darted to the bathroom instead. After all, it dawned on him, this had been his goal all along, hadn’t it?

…yes, it had.

He carefully opened her medicine cabinet and stared at the pharmacy before him. Rows and rows of bottles of every color stared back at him, and Danny made quick work of scanning through the list of names. Advil, Ibuprofen, Dramamine, Vasotec…

And then he stopped.

There it was.

Hydrocodone. Right there. Just waiting for him to take it.

But he couldn’t…

That was stealing, it was wrong. He only knew this was here because Sam had been desperate to give him something to relieve the pain one time—taking this was abusing that trust. He couldn’t do that to her. Not Sam, not after everything she’d done for him.

But it wasn’t like Pam needed this. She was healthy, she was fine. She didn’t have any chronic pain issues that required her to take medications.

And besides, she really owed him after all the bullshit she’d taken to spreading about him to the PTA and conservative media outlets.

Yeah. Fuck her.

Danny snatched the bottle and disappeared through the wall.

****

Thank you once again to @imekitty for carrying the weight of my grammar on her shoulders!

****

previous / next

#danny phantom #fanfiction #phiccs #my writing #everything was white #the chip

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datawyrms · 3 years

Text

Happy DannyMay everyone! i say while dropping this. For day one, Memories. sorta kinda sequel to this Half a Decade Late

He said he’d never hate them. Back when he thought it would only be a matter of time until he found a weakness, a flaw and squirmed free. He always had before. He didn’t like being captured, and he certainly didn’t like getting shoved into cages, but it was always temporary. A terrifying inconvenience. Something he’d shrug off eventually and forget. Lately he was starting to realize he’d forget that he ever considered thinking charitably. Just like all the other things he couldn’t quite remember.

They took everything. His freedom, his limbs, his skin, his voice. So many things he had the misfortune of learning he could recover from with enough time. Really broke the idea that anything about you was special. Did it matter that they ripped him open when the green slime he was made of would eventually cover the hole without even a sign of the pain it caused him? He just stopped caring. Ghosts didn’t feel pain. Maybe if he believed that enough, he wouldn’t need to feel it. Hurt was just a matter of perspective.

He was changing, apparently. The spectral copies of his human organs they stole over and over again stopped being perfect copies. Sloppy. Apparently his body was forgetting what the real ones were like. He didn’t remember the last time he’d been human anyway. That was fine. It was the only real way he could bother them now, being ‘less useful’. Obviously he didn’t need them that badly. He envied some of his fellow prisoners. They were just green inside. Nothing the vultures wanted, nothing for them to mutter and prod at while he struggled uselessly.

He didn’t really know why he still bothered to do that. It never worked. Some impulse. Just better than keeping still. He never really was a human, was he? Humans didn’t treat other humans like this. So he wasn’t one. So why did he ever think he was?

Tie was weird. Maybe having a soul made you act all funny. He’d been tempted to change her name, to no-mask or just face, but the words didn’t feel right, sort of caught on his tongue. Even when he didn’t have one sometimes! Tie just slid off easily. Like he’d said it a lot, or something like it.

So the newbie remained Tie. And Tie was weird. A good kind of weird? She didn’t just tell him to shut up, anyway. Most of them were boring like that. Though not getting shocked into unconsciousness did make the days tend to drag a bit more. She did make his head hurt sometimes, with all the weird reactions Tie made. It always passed though.

He kept playing with the lights up there so they would flicker and crackle, just to check if it was a Tie day. Sure, that got a good amount of shocks when it wasn’t Tie, but they were always grumpy after he’d lost a limb or two. It was almost amusing again. That was the word. Maybe?

“You don’t remember Amity at all?”

Frustration and anger that was directed at him, but also not. Tie was super strange like that. “Why would I?” His response just made her eyes narrow more, but she didn’t do anything to take it out on him. It was hilarious.

“That’s where you’re from.”

“News to me.” Might be a lie, might not. Gun grunts said lots of weird stuff. He shifted position, watching her while upside down didn’t make it easier to tell if humans were lying or not, but did make her scowling funnier. “That’s where you’re from then? Or that other name you keep using.”

“You can’t actually be him. Fuck.” She was rubbing at her forehead, looking away at nothing. “You remember ghost hunters but not Amity Park?”

“Hey! Names are hard, Tie. Isn’t like you know the name of every town you’ve ever been in.”

“No, but I remember the one I lived in most of my life!”

“Good for you! I’d clap but I’m kinda under armed for the task.” Under armed. He snickered as she only rolled her eyes at his joke, but it only made him think of another one. “Isn’t like a ghost lives anywhere.”

“You’re in here for hell knows how long and you can’t get better jokes?!”

Tie’s irritation just made it funnier. “These are gold! Way better than the stuff you guys laugh at.”

“Like what?”

“Oh you know.” The humour of the moment passed as he got back up, wondering if he should give the old ice trick another go. The noises were fun. “Like how the ghost won’t eat, but ghosts don’t breathe either. So the ghost can’t do much to stop ya.” As if Tie didn’t know. She still made the weird pinched expressions though. Why bother? It didn’t really matter if she actually had a soul still. Those ones just quit and then there’d be a new newbie. “Lots of you think that’s reaaaaal funny.” He stuck out his tongue, gagging. “Gross gun grunts.”

“That’s not funny either.”

“Try breaking your funny bone a few times. That’ll fix it. Or was that computers?” He frowned, rubbing his fingers against his chin. Computers. What was it about computers again? Re-re-something? Like with bones when you...did something…

“Phantom!”

That jerked him out of his considerations. “Still not him!” Now that he checked, Tie looked like she’d been trying to get his attention for awhile again. That, or she’d figured out how to teleport closer to his cage. Both were very possible. Probably.

“You didn’t hear a word I said, did you.”

“You were talking?”

“For someone who says he isn’t Phantom, it sure gets your attention fast.”

He shrugged. What did Tie expect? So what if he noticed it? It didn’t mean anything to him, personally. It was like comp-whatevers. “You could say the coats were coming and I’d do the same thing.”

“Doubt it. You remember Jack and Maddie maybe?” Tie hesitated, as if saying something to him actually mattered. “Your parents?”

“I’m a ghost. And possibly a starfish. Since I do the whole regenerating thing.” He’s pretty sure it’s starfish that do that. “I don’t think they’re big on families.” He thought that was pretty amusing, having like. Little voiceless things that cling to rocks as parents. Actually had a bit in common if you thought of his cage as a rock? Tie didn’t agree, based on how he was biting at her lip and clenching her fists. Still no shooting. Still super weird.

“Be a mercy killing at this point…” Tie wasn’t actually speaking to him, but it was interesting. Killing what? One of the other ghosts maybe. “Sam, Tucker? Any of them ring a bell?”

He certainly didn’t have a bell in here. “Sam...and Tucker are names?” He guessed, shuddering a little. Weird names. Made the gooey mess of ectoplasm he was made of wriggle when he said it. Like when he was struggling to digest something, uncomfortable and heavy and just making him want to move when he couldn’t. Though he could this time. Zipping up to the top of his cage helped shake the feeling off, at least. He wasn’t saying those again, no thank you. “You have weird tricks, Tie”

“They’re just names. I didn’t do anything to make you fly up there. I half thought you couldn’t do that anymore.”

Tie did have a bit of a point. When was the last time he’d flown up here? “Think I forgot I could?” He didn’t really move much in general. Not like he had anywhere to go, his cage didn’t really change.

She just looked tired. “This isn’t fixable.”

He wasn’t really paying attention, poking at the edges of his cage with his feet was pretty entertaining. It tingled a bit when he got pushed back, but flipping over in the air was easy. Why didn’t he float more? “Gun grunts don’t fix things, so Idonno why you care.”

Tie wasn’t paying much attention to him either, muttering to herself. “Manson would kill me for doing it. No way she’d believe you’re like this. Let alone the Fentons...”

Well, that was boring. He busied himself with counting how many seconds it took for the shock to stop coursing through him when he touched the walls. Though it was a bit tricky to keep track between tries.

“Skulker? Ember? You at least remember the ghosts, don’t you?”

“Are you just making names up now Tie?” They just sounded silly. The thought of someone named ‘Skulker’...who was also very tiny. Now that’d be funny. Kinda liked that idea actually.

“Probably don’t even remember the guy who put a million on your head…”

“A million whats? Questions? That’s more a you thing, Tie.”

“No, Vlad. The mayor?”

“The what?” Things weren’t funny anymore. He wasn’t cool and passive. That word, there’d been others but he didn’t even care what they’d been. The V had been enough to set his core to a furious pulsating heat of fury. His ice claws clung to the wall even as the buzzing in his skull grew stronger as the field tried to shove him back. “WHERE” He snared, not caring how his throat burned from the partial wail trying to scrabble out of his throat. Tie didn’t matter, nothing mattered and he actually missed his arm since not having it made it harder to keep his grip and snarl at the one backing away from his prison. “WHERE IS HE?” Oh he’d order anyone, and they’d listen or he’d shred them as soon as he got through- but his claws were cracking- green and red staining and corrupting the fine edge he’d honed so often. Why did he care? He didn’t know, didn’t want to know, he just had to act and now, just in case. The chance might slip away and he wouldn’t, they’d pay they’d pay, they’d PAY.

“Danny! Stop hurting yourself, he’s not here!” Tie was blathering, but at least backed away when he shrieked at her. Stupid Tie. Didn’t know anything. “Hell. You don’t even know why you’re mad, do you.”

He kept slamming the ice back in place, even as his arm weakened and started oozing. He didn’t need his legs, he didn’t need arms, he didn’t need anything. Just OUT. NOW. He snarled and snapped at the metal that grabbed his back and slammed him hard to the ground of his cage. It ignored him and the awful warmth that had consumed everything. He never won against it but now he had to keep trying because-because the anger? Because of something. The metal easily ignored the green surging pulses of electricity, just kept pressing down on him until he wasn’t solid enough to struggle, not strong enough to scream at it. The awful stabbing feeling in his core wanted him to act, but he couldn’t even defiantly flick his tail as he grew colder and slipped out of consciousness.

Everything hurt and it wasn’t even Friday. At least. He didn’t think it was? He’d have to ask Tie about it...if Tie showed up again. Something about her gave him a stab of unease. Might have something to do with all the green stains in here. Didn’t remember getting shot though. Strange. Must have done something. Maybe. Didn’t really matter.

#Danny Phantom #Dannymay2021 #dannymay #valerie gray #many terrible implications #i couldn't help it i had more pondering #vals no good day mark 2 #now to endlessly not decide if i should make a compilation on ao3 #or just stick things to the ends of the phic phight stuff i'm doing

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five-rivers · 5 years

Text

Hello! This is a phic phor the phight. The prompts are from @thecommrade and @charcoalhawk.

(Edited: Added a ‘read more,’ like I initially intended to.)

Chapter 1

“Can you be any more awful?” asked Danny, tugging at the collar of the suit his parents had forced him into. Finding loosening it to be a useless, futile endeavor, he instead put his energy into glaring at the person ultimately responsible for his current discomfort.

“Mind the scary-eyes, little badger,” said Vlad Masters, the billionaire tech-mogul mayor of Amity Park who also happened to be Danny's arch-nemesis, as he adjusted his tie and hair in a mirror. “It wouldn't do for the public to think that you were possessed, now would it? Not to mention the reaction of that new accessory of yours.”

If possible, Danny's glare became even less amused. “They wouldn't know possessed if it smacked them in the face.” He fiddled with the white and green 'watch' locked around his wrist. The suit hadn't been the only thing his parents had forced him into. It wasn't as bad as the Specter Deflector, but the Fenton Watch was remarkably unforgiving of even the smallest expression of ghostly power.

Vlad smirked and turned away from the mirror. “Likely not,” he said, smugly.

“You're the worst person ever,” said Danny.

The two of them were currently sitting in a small, but well-appointed, room in Amity Park's town hall. The room was a sort of dressing room, included so that the mayor and city council could get ready for important public appearances in peace, even when they couldn't go home.

Vlad was about to have an 'important' press conference, one where he announced a new 'charitable enterprise.' Really, it was just a new and exciting way for Vlad to make Danny's life difficult with his ludicrous amount of wealth and fame.

“Oh, yes, I'm just terrible for wanting to give you a decent education for free.” Vlad turned, a disgustingly self-assured smile on his face. “Why, anyone would just be horrified.”

Danny pressed his lips together, and clenched his fists. “You just want to make it hard for me to protect Amity Park.”

“Let's be honest, Daniel,” said Vlad. “The only thing you're doing with your hero act is stroking your own ego.”

“And you'd know all about that,” said Danny, bristling. He had to tamp down hard on his natural impulse to wake his core and tap into his ghost powers.

“I never claimed to be perfect,” said Vlad airily, relaxing into a chair. “You, on the other hand, claim to be, what was it? Protecting Amity Park? You're only fooling yourself, Daniel. You haven't protected anyone you haven't put in danger first.”

Danny's eyes flared, and then he yelped with pain as the Fenton Watch zapped him. He hissed through his teeth, and rubbed his wrist. It was ironic. His ghostly mannerisms showed through more strongly when he was forced to suppress the physical aspects of his ghost half.

There was a sharp rap on the door.

“Mr Masters?” said Vlad's secretary (who looked disturbingly similar to Danny's mom). The door eased open with a squeak. “They're ready for you now.”

Vlad rose to his feet smoothly. Danny's scramble was much more ungainly, and Danny had to remind himself not to compare himself to Vlad. Vlad was thirty years older than he was, and a massive jerk. Comparing himself- No, comparing Fenton to Vlad would only result in self-esteem issues. Comparing Phantom to Plasmius was, unfortunately, often necessary.

Ugh. His life was a mess.

“Come along then, Daniel,” said Vlad, cheerfully. “We can't keep our public waiting.”

Danny grumbled under his breath, only every third word was in English. He trailed behind Vlad, lagging as much as he possibly could with the secretary clicking along right behind him. What was her name again? She was a relative newcomer to Amity Park, an import from one of Vlad's businesses, and Danny had yet to figure her out.

They walked out of the town hall's wide double doors, Vlad waving at his oh-so-adoring fans and Danny squinting against the sudden bright sunlight. Danny felt like a goblin, like a little gremlin, like some kind of cave dweller. He wanted nothing so much as to crawl into a dark corner somewhere and haunt it. The space under his bed sounded very nice, right now, or perhaps his closet, or the crawlspace under the stairs. He wanted to sink through the ground, he wanted to disappear.

He forced down the ghost inside him. It wouldn't do to get electrocuted by the stupid watch, or, worse, actually become intangibility and invisible.

They walked to a platform that had been put up in front of the town hall a couple of months ago, so that Vlad could issue his proclamations in style. Danny made an effort, he really did, to look presentable, to look like people would expect him to look, based on the face value of Vlad's announcements. He even waved at his parents, who were in the front row of spectators. He was pretty sure that he was failing to appear even the slightest bit enthusiastic, though.

He sighed, and tried to pay attention to Vlad's speech, now just trying to ignore all the news crews that had come to film the billionaire's 'big announcement.'

“Blah blah blah blah blah,” Vlad was saying. “Big scholarship blah blah blah. Going to make Danny go to a stuck up private boarding school on the other side of the country. Blah blah blah. Opportunities for troubled youth. Blah blah. I'm secretly evil. Blah”

Okay, so Danny wasn't really listening. But who could blame him? He wasn't used to events like this, and he already knew what Vlad was supposed to be saying. He'd repeated it a Danny and his parents often enough.

Danny, unwillingly, let his eyes wander nervously over all the news crews. There were some big names in there, which didn't quell his anxiety at all. The way all their cameras were pointed at him, the lenses flashing in the sunlight, the sleek, tech-adorned bodies gleaming, reminded him uncomfortably of weaponry, specifically anti-ghost weaponry.

He wrenched his eyes away, choosing instead to examine the buildings across the road from the town hall. They were some of the tallest in Amity Park, and, unfortunately, also some of the most boring. Just like Vlad. Ancients, but he liked to hear himself talk.

Danny's eyes caught on a strange shape sticking out from a window on the second floor from the top of the central building. He frowned softly at it, trying to identify it. Was it some kind of flagpole, or..?

His eyes went wide and he threw himself sideways into Vlad.

The moment Daniel impacted Vlad's side, Vlad realized that he should have expected some kind of trouble from the truculent boy. Really, though, what did he plan to accomplish by assaulting Vlad in public, on television? He never thought things through, honestly.

Now Vlad was faced with a choice. Daniel was far too light and, with only human strength available to him, too weak to actually knock Vlad over, so Vlad was in control of the outcome of the situation. He could either play it off as an enthusiastic hug, he was a a juncture in his speech where that reaction might have been expected from Daniel if he wasn't insistent on being so stubbornly ungrateful, or he could take the fall.

He had no time to decide.

Oh, cheesecake, he might as well go along with whatever would cause the most uncertainty and distress in Daniel's life. He was, as the child said, an evil jerk, after all.

As he began his dramatic fall, he heard a sharp crack, and his vision was sprayed with red.

He hit the wood planking of the platform with a thump, and looked down at Daniel, who was covered in red, with annoyance. Had Daniel brought some kind of dye-filled balloon up on stage with him as a poorly advised prank?

But even as that thought finished crossing his mind, he knew that it was false. The brain he was so proud of was putting together the pieces.

Maddie screamed.

#phic phight #danny phantom #phic phight 2019 #my writing #phanfiction #phandom

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funkymbtifiction · 7 years

Text

Danny Phantom: Danny Fenton/Phantom [ESFP]

OFFICIAL TYPING BY: mysterylover123

Extroverted Sensing (Se): Danny mostly lives in the moment, experiences what’s going on around him right now, and takes action when needed. He’s fully engaged in his environment and highly observant. He’s pretty obviously perceiver dominant, reacting to his observations and perceptions first and forming any kind of judgment on them second. He’s quick to jump into the fray and take action to stop a conflict, as every episode involves him in some way running off to proclaim he’s ‘going ghost’ and then jumping out to solve the problem. He’s usually pretty straightforward about solving said problem too, simply taking the clear and visible option to achieve his goals and running with it. He’s normally a bit irresponsible, simply doing what he feels like in the here and now rather than thinking about the potential consequences to his actions (i.e., blowing off his responsibilities like a certain test in Ultimate Enemy).

Introverted Feeling (Fi): Danny is often drowning in his own emotions, fighting desperately against the tide of internal feeling to try and function in the everyday world. He often lets those feelings consume him and acts impulsively on them. In Ultimate Enemy his emotions are so powerful that he opts to remove them entirely, trying to separate himself from his humanity. Many ghosts and enemies use Danny’s inner feelings to their advantage, manipulating him into getting to wrapped up in them to fight (i.e., Skulker pairing up Danny and Valerie to keep him distracted, Ember hypnotizing him into falling for Sam, etc.) He does have a strong and solid enough inner moral code to keep him on the side of good, but often just barely.

Extroverted Thinking (Te): He’s the leader of his friend group and usually in the position of giving commands. He tends to go for the most straightforward solution possible, although sometimes he’s a little slow on the uptake (in What you Want, it takes him 3 days to think up the simple solution of just wishing the genie Desiree to go into the Fenton Thermos, but once he thinks of it he employs it right away.) He can be sharp-tongued and severe in his criticisms of others at times, particularly when enraged.

Introverted Intuition (Ni): Danny’s Ni is fairly well-developed for his age; although he’s frequently impulsive, he displays an ability to connect things to the big picture or the future, and to anticipate what people are going to do. He has the Se/Ni aptitude for manipulating people by seizing the moment; Danny’s Ni comes out the most when he fights with higher Ni user Vlad (ENFJ). He often uses his intuitive knowledge of Vlad to manipulate him into the right position to then defeat him.

Note: Retyped from INTJ. Basic functions but completely in the opposite direction.

#m: esfp #danny phantom #danny fenton #esfp #mbti #c: esfp #character typing

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fountainpenguin · 7 years

Note

So what are your thoughts on Danielle from "Danny Phantom"?

Dani is cute and small and needs to be protected!

She does make me raise my eyebrows, though. I like cloning episodes when clones are magical, but if you establish your clones as being created by genetic science, and then you clone someone who doesn’t come out as a one-day-old baby… Yeah, I don’t buy that. Clones have to be grown as babies. That is the scientific rule.

I love the idea that she’s not a stable clone and she melts every time she uses her powers, though! I love double-edged swords- Hey, I like bittersweet things, remember? I like people suffering to get something they want. Which also means I don’t like it when a character’s drawbacks (ex: melting) are “cured’. Whether or not she was truly cured was left ambiguous, but I wonder…

Dani’s definitely cute and fun (I knew vaguely of her existence and had been anticipating a sassy teenage genderbent Danny, so I was pleasantly surprised to see her so small and innocent, at least).

She’s very interesting from a psychological standpoint. I’m not confirming - and not even sure I’d make this a headcanon - but there’s a possibility she suffers from reactive attachment disorder (inhibited form), which is one of the least-researched disorders in the entire DSM, so don’t hold me too tightly to anything I say. I’m no expert here.

Basically, what this means is that, if we were to proceed with this headcanon, Dani was neglected and/or abused in her childhood (you could easily justify it with canon) and that as a result, she has difficulty forming emotional attachments with others (which again has some basis in canon, since she prefers to run away and live on her own).

Some maladaptive behaviors that often come along with it include gorging on food, impulsivity, and overactivity- all of which she exhibits, though I’m not so mean I’m going to headcanon Dani as abusive to animals or anything like that although Vlad DID get a new cat.

You wouldn’t normally see this disorder in anyone over five, but Dani’s age due to the cloning process is unclear. If you’re curious, here are the diagnosing criteria, summarized after reading through this Wikipedia page on RAD because I’m too lazy to find my abnormal psych professor’s PowerPoint:

Acts inappropriately in social settings

The above does not result solely from developmental delay

Person does not meet the criteria for pervasive development disorder

Disorder shows before five years of age

There’s a history of significant neglect

There’s a lack of a preferred attachment figure

Dani seems to fit these criteria pretty nicely, or so I think.

Like I just said, there’s little to no research of those over the age of five, and since it’s not a disorder I’m particularly familiar with, I’m not sure if that’s the headcanon I’d go with yet. But, I found it interesting and thought I’d share it.

Regardless, Dani seems as though she’ll be difficult for me to work with. To be perfectly honest, she feels a little Sueish to me (mastering the same powers as Danny despite having next to no training, stealing those apples without being caught, having a killer right hook, etc). She has some non-Sueish traits too (presumably), but it’ll take me some time to figure her out.

I would have liked to see more episodes of her, and see her developed over another season or two, because she has potential. She had that awesome scene where she turned on Vlad, and there’s nothing really wrong with her. She’s just not really my type of character.

I just don’t know what to do with her. She doesn’t have much backstory for me to work with (Weird- I love distant parental figures, but… Well, Vlad scores way too low on the parental scale. I like distant parental figures who don’t want to admit they like the children who admire them. Not too keen on those who actively, canonically try to kill them).

If anything, if I were going to make any serious attempt to work with Dani (not counting the possibility of RAD), I’d write an AU where the cloning deal is more realistic and Vlad spends twelve years raising Dani from her childhood. Now that would’ve been awesome. Wouldn’t have worked so well in the show, but it would’ve been awesome.

Maybe I’ll give her a large part in that upcoming wedding ‘fic. Usually I start to like characters more once I actually start writing them, and I haven’t thought much about Dani at all yet. RAD!Dani might be interesting to pursue, but I’m not sure I’d even want to.

So we’ll see if Dani grows on me more later. As usual, I’m not opposed to changing my mind about her, but as of now she and I are at a crossroads.

#Anon #asks #Melting clone daughter #Going Ghost!

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datawyrms · 4 years

Text

Not That Similar

Dannymay day 3: Reflection

“You know, this is the part where Jazz’d be all ‘maybe you should reflect on how you got here’, but with your whole creepy vampire thing you probably don’t even have one-” the younger half ghost broke off their taunt with a yelp, narrowly dodging at hot pink ectoblast. “Maybe anger management classes? Yoga? Knitting? Work with me here!” he kicked off the wall before another blast could connect, turning it into an impromptu propelled punch when Plasmius raised a shield instead of dodging, both hybrids grunting from the collision.

Vlad recovered first, quickly flying backwards to regain his preferred distance. “Must you insist on such juvenile taunts Daniel? Though I suppose being raised by that oaf of a man stunted any attempts of maturing.”

Danny’s eyes flared at the jab at his father, “Says the fruit loop stalker! Get over it and leave my family ALONE!” He launched off three ectoblasts in quick succession, speedy but too predictable to hit the elder hybrid, who blocked them all with an exaggerated yawn.

“You could have been so much more than this if you’d just used your head, Daniel.”

“Oh I’m already way more than you. See, I actually have people who love me. Like my mom. Who totally hates you.”

Any further additions were cut off with Plasmius’ sudden movement, throwing a blast high and grabbing Phantom by the throat when he flew low to dodge it. White gloved hands scrabbled against his black one, green eyes furious. The impulsive panic to free himself stopped him from doing something effective, like shooting Vlad point blank.

“Do not test your luck, boy. Besides, if you believe that, you would have told them your little secret by now. You had been bluffing that day after all.” he spun and flung his captive downwards, grinning at the satisfying sound of the boy’s body cracking asphalt. “Maybe you can be the one reflecting once you peel yourself off the ground, hmm?”

Danny found his feet with a groan, rolling his shoulders as he got back into the air. “Hey, I’m not the one so pathetic they couldn’t wait five seconds to kill my dad. The whole ‘oooh join me’ crud would have worked waaaaay better before attempted murder.”

The admission set Vlad off balance, taking a blast to the chest. It was painful enough to push him backwards a little, but he tried not to show any other signs it had been effective. The second blast from the ground, not originating from the other half breed did provoke a yelp from sheer surprise.

“Tough luck Plasmius! We already caught your minions!” Tucker yelled from the ground, shaking a thermos at the aerial combatants. “We got your back Danny!”

“Actually, I think the road got that but thanks Tuck!” Phantom grinned, any lost confidence returning in seconds. “So much for your ‘rob FentonWorks’ plan, huh?” he paused at the whine of something powering up. “Oooh, Sam brought the bazooka! You've lost, Plasmius. Again.”

The growl Vlad let out was almost feral, but the younger ghost was right. Short of killing Danny’s little entourage, there was no point in continuing this. It did seem like they might have missed his actual motive for distracting Danny from the FentonWorks lab, but he’d need to be in his own lab to check that.

“Being pulled into the ghost zone by a portal in your head might count as payback to all your experiments” Sam warned, tracking Vlad with the heavy silver weapon.

“Oh very well. Perhaps someday you’ll learn to win on your own merits.”

“That’s the thing Vladdie. I don’t have to.”

Danny’s pained yelp as the parting shot connected was some satisfaction as Plasmius vanished. He’d see how the boy changed his tune soon enough.

“I hate that fruit loop.” Danny grumbled, changing back to human before reuniting with his friends.

“Word. Any hints on what he wanted the catcher for?”

“Nope. Just the usual junk. Dude needs a hobby like yesterday.”

“Knowing him, his hobby is trying to beat you up.” Sam added, grinning when the half ghost moaned.

“That totally is his hobby, isn’t it. Urgh.”

Tucker gave his friend a playful pat on the back. “He should change his name to the Fenton Ghost, give the Box Ghost a run for most accurate name.”

“I am totally using that next time.”

“If you do, Tuck’s stitching you up for giving you the idea.”

“It’d be worth it. Can you imagine the look on his face?” Danny dismissed Sam’s frown with a laugh, glancing at his home. “Guess I’ll see you guys tomorrow.”

“Try not to get double grounded this time. My Doomed skills are rusting away without you.”

“Tell that to the ghosts!” his blue eyes looked pleadingly to the sky before he walked up the steps, waving as his friends continued on to their homes.

It took Danny a week to figure out that maybe they’d missed what Plasmius’ intentions had actually been. As that was when he ended up screaming at his own reflection, only managing to fend off the worried Fenton parents with a quick excuse of ‘some big cockroach ghost’ scared him.

The second look didn’t fare much better. He was totally human. Black hair, pale skin, shirt and no hazmat. One problem. Red eyes. Rapidly blinking didn’t set them back to blue either, but he would have taken green at this point. “Jazz, please tell me I’m seeing things.”

His sister had been waiting for the go ahead to ‘meddle’, pushing the bathroom door open at his question, freezing for a moment when she got a good look at him. “Afraid not little brother. Did you get hit with anything weird?”

“Not lately?” he scowled at his reflection, desperately willing the red to go away.

“Well they’re distracted, so you should probably check both looks.” Jazz prompted, noticing how Danny flinched at the suggestion. “It’d be better to make sure nothing else is acting up before you actually need your powers?”

“I hate it when you’re right.” his scowl turned to her, rubbing at his shoulder instead of actually doing anything. “Maybe I can use sunglasses?”

“Danny.” Jazz’s tone of sisterly disapproval was well practiced at this point.

“Okay okay! Sheesh!” Still he hesitated before summoning the rings that switched him between ghost and human, tense as he did so. The lack of reaction from Jazz was probably a good sign? He opened his eye a crack, not wanting to see the reflection. Green eyes looked back. “Well okay then. That’s weird.”

“Your default is weird. Maybe something in the lab is messing with your shapeshifting?” Jazz said, hand on her chin as she pondered.

“Uh, I don’t have shapeshifting powers?”

“Danny you literally do it all the time. You just only do two forms. And the ghost tail thing.” Jazz rolled her eyes.

“I do? Huh,” he changed forms again, wincing as the red eyes returned. “This sucks! Mom and Dad are gonna think I’m possessed!”

“We’ll figure something out, Sam and Tucker probably have backup sunglasses you can borrow if anything happens to these ones. Say you had an eye appointment.”

“Lame excuses are my specialty.” He gave a weak grin, slipping the offered sunglasses on. “All I need is blue skin and then I’m Plasmius’ creepy miniature reflection-” he froze. That was a joke but actually…

“It does seem like a Vlad thing to do, messing with how you look.”

“Creep just wants to harp on the ways we’re the same like that’s gonna make me not hate him.” Danny growled, cracking his knuckles. “You wanna take the Peeler and see how it works on lonely fruitloops?”

“After school Danny. You can’t be late again.”

“I bet Sam and Tuck would skip with me-”

“Danny, it’s just a visual problem. You can wait to fix it.”

The half ghost sighed, but dropped his hands in defeat. “Well if I get caught with red eyes I am totally blaming you.”

“Deal.”

(Also to all of those leaving lovely comments/screaming in the tags I love you all and would respond to them but Tumblr is not exactly great for that. I wasn’t planning on putting these on A03 till I was done >>)

#dannymay2020 #Danny Phantom #vlad plasmius #jazz fenton #my stuff #honestly i was just having fun having characters talk today #so the whole reflection and how they're parallels didn't get explored much #fear me and my wildly inconsistent self

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