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Who knew turning the sky into a ghost portal would get you into trouble with the government? No, not the human government, he’d been TRYING to piss them off. There wasn’t much they could do, he had an army of ghosts they kept threatening, and they had all of one department armed properly enough for a fight.
No, the issue he had was with the intergalactic governments. The Confederation and the Plumbers (what kind of a name was that?) who didn’t take kindly to him shutting off all entrances and exits to Earth for two weeks. And guess what? Turns out they did have experience with ghosts, and were armed enough for a fight. This resulted in Danny spending the entire two weeks in debate with their leaders on the necessity of this blunt tactic that was halting their operations, as well as organizing troops to keep the ghosts safe that actually did go home. It was...taxing. He managed to finish it up without any extraterrestrial trouble though, and made it home less then a minute after he undid the Phantom Sky to collapse on his bed. Again. Man was being Ghost King exhausting.
So 12 hours of dead to the world (hah!) sleep later, he finally got up to face the consequences. Mainly because it was Sunday when he got home and after all that sleep it was nearly time for school. He didn’t think too many people would figure it out though.
He was wrong.
The first thing he saw upon reaching his first period were the party decorations. The second was Lancer shrugging helplessly. The third was Wes doing his happy dance. He was right! As he grimaced and stepped forward to notice Tucker happily recording, Dash actually picked him up in a bear hug.
“Dude, you are so awesome! I mean you always kind of were, especially the whole saving my life thing, but this is even cooler! But uh, are you dead or what?” He asked curiously, not bothering to put Danny down. And since Danny obviously didn’t have much left to hide here, he phased right through Dash’s arms to land on the floor, popping his back back into place.
“Kinda? I’m a halfa; half dead, half alive. It usually happens when someone gets electrocuted by a ghost portal, It bonds the ectoplasm to our DNA somehow.” He says with a grimace, the memory unpleasant, even now.
The questions came in bulk. Some were easy to answer, like what all his powers were. Kwan even made the species connection between him and Vlad, dragging that story out as a result. Right as he was finishing that tale up though...
“So does that mean your parents are murderers?” The whole room froze and turned towards Paulina, Sam looking murderous. “What? Doesn’t it sound that way to you? They keep making this invention that partially kills the people around them.”
“Not intentionally. It’s manslaughter at the worst, and they never even learn about it til decades or at least years after it happens.” Danny responds a bit numbly, too shocked at the implications. He really didn’t want anyone putting his folks in prison over an accident they’ve all moved past.
“Hey, how about some more snacks! Let’s break out the special punch too!” Kwan shouts, determined to change the subject.
“I swear young man, if that has an alcohol content-“ Mr. Lancer starts, glad for the distraction himself though. The party’s tone was light again after that, even if Paulina was pouting about being partially ignored. When class ended Danny went to his next one, only to be greeted by a similar sight. It seemed the school was determined to make today into a low key celebration for him, and after his stressful month, he was more than happy to participate. His classmates acceptance did help ease his worries some.
This only lasted for a day of course, and come Tuesday classes resumed as normal. With all of his teachers now knowing why he was always busy and exhausted, he got a bit more focus from them. Extra help, a little longer on homework, little things that made his life infinitely easier to manage. It was nice. Mind you, some of his classmates seemed downright scared of him now, the kids who didn’t know him well before kind of skirting around him in the hallways, but he could handle that. The lack of bullies, help from teachers, and of course his three closest friends made like infinitely easier. At school at least.
Then Friday came, and it was back to the Ghost Zone. With Valarie on his side now, he was never scared to leave Amity Park in her capable hands, but it did sometimes worry him. What if something happened? What if the government came down on his hometown when he was out, trying to take all the local ghosts? What if he didn’t get back on time? Valarie couldn’t save them all, even with Sam and Tucker as backup. So even with all the extra power of the ghost king, his paranoia and problems had managed to increase. Great.
Still, he had to come back. Because while they’d managed to pull together crude government structure, and he’d managed to at least temporarily halt the issue with the humans (the U.S. congress was currently still in debate on how to handle this issue), there was plenty to do. While Walker was ensuring the ghosts residing on Earth were still safe (though he does give Danny a mandatory debriefing of the situation) and the ones in the zone content and obeying the laws, Danny had a project of his own to do. It was time to build his lair.
...
...Where the heck do you start on that?! Did he just...pick a random spot? Then what? His obsession was helping people, that didn’t translate into material possessions in a lair very well. Then again, Mr. “will you be my friend?” Managed to build a lair just fine with an emotional obsession, and a similar core, so it couldn’t be that hard, right? Right?