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It's just after math class and Danny's about to go to the cafeteria for lunch, when his ghost sense goes off. He sighs. Is it too much to ask for just one day? Finals are coming.
He turns to Sam and Tucker, saying, "Uhh, guys? You go on ahead without me, this will be real quick."
Sam raises her eyebrows in concern, "Sure Danny, we'll save you a seat." Danny nods and runs to the bathroom. Tucker looks at Sam, "Man, I hope he actually makes it quick. Would be a bummer to miss lunch."
Danny closes the bathroom door. "I'm going ghost!" A flash of white light surrounds him. Immediately, he hears heart wrenching screams. He thinks, Oh no, that's never a good sign .
He runs, turning to the direction of the locker room. It's coming from there!
He readies his thermos, and bursts into the door. There he sees Kwan and Dash, clutching each other, in true best friend fashion, screaming in an off key high pitched tone.
Kwan looks like he's about to cry, and Dash cries, "Oh my God! I can't die, I haven't even signed my death will yet!"
Danny looks around, in confusion. Then he sees it. There, on the wall, is the biggest spider he has seen in his life so far.
One of the spider's legs twitched, and Kwan twitched too. There's a beat. It moves down the wall and he stops breathing. Dash whimpers a little bit.
Danny looks at the two of them, realizing that there is no ghost here, but clearly, the gargantuan spider is the bigger threat at this point in time.
Danny throws an energy ray to the spider. He turns to Kwan, his face ghostly pale, a light sheen of sweat over his forehead. His eyes full of fear as he locked on to the dead spider.
Dash looks over to his friend, "Are you alright? Hey?!" Kwan is trembling, bent on the floor, hands on his knees, his shoulders heaving.
"Hey, Kwan! Breathe!" He almost puts his hands on his shoulders to stop him from shaking, but then Phantom puts a hand on his shoulder and stops him.
"It's okay, I've got this," he comforts him. Danny sits down next to Kwan, making sure he covers the spider with his back, out of Kwan's sight, saying, "Breathe with me. Inhale," he holds his for a few seconds, "Exhale," he releases his breath slowly.
Kwan looks at him like a lifeline, trying to follow his instructions. They do the breathing exercise a few more times, until Kwan's face regains a bit of color.
"I'm going to hold your hand, is that okay?" Danny asked. Kwan nodded once, still trying to catch his breath.
Danny grasped his hand, "Okay, you're okay, it's okay. Tell me three things that you see right now."
Kwan starts to hyperventilate again. Danny squeezes his hand, and guides him through breathing. After a few cycles, he asks again, "What are three things you see right now? Tell me."
Kwan replies, with a shaky voice, "Uhh, the floor?"
"Mh hm, the floor could do with a little more cleaning, the tiles have a rather nice design to them, it would be a shame to not show it off. What else do you see?" Danny says.
"My shoes. My laces are untied."
"Yeah, those are nice red shoes. What else do you see?" Danny squeezed his hand to get his attention.
Kwan looks up from the floor, and looks at Danny's face for the first time, "Uhh, your eyes are very glowy?"
"Yeah, they do that, part of being a ghost, you know?" Kwan blinks, his vision clearing, and looks at Danny Phantom, really looks at him.
No, I don't know that , he thinks, I'm usually busy trying to run away when I see ghosts . He takes a calming breath and stares some more. He realizes Phantom looks exactly like Danny Fenton, if his eyes were blue and non glowy, if his hair is dark instead of white. Aside from the very slight echoing of his voice, he even sounds the same as his classmate.
Danny hands him an orange, "You should eat this. It would make you feel better." He then flies off, with a cheery wave, "See you later!"
Kwan breathes, a little more steady this time, and thinks, if Danny Phantom was alive, he would be about the same and same height and body build as Danny Fenton. His mind blanks. What does this all mean?
Meanwhile, Danny flew about, trying to find the ghost he sensed earlier. Now he's sure there's nothing to worry about, as nothing seems to be broken so far.
Then Danny saw a small boy on the ground. He approached him, minding his distance. Friendly, but not too close in case he attacks.
The young ghost notices him then, "Hello, sir, can you help me find my way home?"
Taken aback, Danny automatically replies, "Uhh, sure! Where do you live?"
"I'm sure it's right this way, but I can't seem to remember. Our house is blue!" The ghost child is, well, young. Danny could feel it in his core, that this little kid is a ghost. Too young to understand.
"Also, mister, I think there's something wrong with my skin. Look," He puts his arm on display. "It's turned into a funny color."
This happens, sometimes, young ghosts not being able to move on. Not because they have to fulfill an obsession, but because they cannot comprehend that they have passed. This is not Danny's first time encountering a case like this.
As someone who tethers on the edge of life and death, Danny is in a perfect position to help.
Ghosts generally have trouble with time. After all, a ghost lives on forever in the afterlife. Most likely, this child ghost has been trying to find his way home for a long long time.
"Don't worry. I'll help you."
After his encounter with Phantom, Kwan spends the next few hours in a stupor. He wasn't feeling fully okay after the killer spider, but as the mind numbing haze of fear clears from his mind, his eyes latched on the ghost hero's face. He helped him through it, no judgement. For that, he is thankful.
But since he was looking at him during the time, Phantom's facial features are practically engraved at the back of his eyeballs. He grips his backpack tighter. Now he's even more sure of his hypothesis.
Kwan could have sworn he remembers that Danny used to have an imaginary friend when they were kids in nursery school. He knows, because he and everybody else made fun of him for it.
But what if? Phantom is Fenton's twin who died from birth but then they grew up together anyway. It's the only theory that made sense.
Maybe that's why only Danny could see him before? Because Fenton is Phantom's connection to the tangible world. Kwan thinks he heard something like that, ghosts needing to have an obsession to tether themselves in this dimension.
He feels shame creep up his neck, silently berating his younger self for mocking Danny's imaginary friend. Not so imaginary, after all.
It could explain Mr. and Mrs. Fenton's infatuation with ghosts. Why they dedicated their works to dissolving ghosts. Perhaps the reason is less maniac, and more desperate. It could be they wanted to give their other son a chance to rest in peace.
There's a special rose bush in the ghost zone, the white rose bush. If the boy has no living relatives left, then a regular headstone is not enough to help him. The ghost child barely has a connection to the earthly realm and with no relatives to remember him, he is losing that barest connection. But at the same time, he probably also does not have a resting place. With no place to rest, he also lacks the connection to the infinite realms. He might fade at this rate.
He needs a stronger connection. To achieve that, the plant could act as a guiding beacon, to help him cross over.
Carefully, Danny tucks away his thermos. The ghost child has too little energy left, so Danny figured keeping him here for a bit would prrevent him from draining his energy even more.
It's not possible for him to just empty his thermos in the portal though. The energy of the zone would be too much for him. He has to cross it himself, willingly.
Ahh but I have to wake up very early tomorrow. This plant only appears at dawn. Danny thinks it's pretty neat. A bit like symbolizing a new beginning. Fitting, for a new afterlife.
Dash is walking to school. Bright and early, so he has time to copy the answers for the math homework he hasn't finished yet.
He was not at all expecting to run into the ghost hero in town. Phantom was walking, like, casually walking down the sidewalk, like it was an actual normal thing for him to do. Why not fly instead? He is holding a potted flowering plant.
Dash walks up to him, casually, as you do, and chats up the local superhero. "What do you have there?"
Danny looks at him, "Oh, it's just a little something for someone special." He has a faraway look in his eyes.
A white rose plant, he observes. He hums, "Yeah, that's understandable. By the way, thanks for your help the other day."
He doesn't wait for an answer as he walks away in the direction of his Casper High.
Danny keeps the ghost plant in his locker. He figured he could plant it after school, so he could have plenty of time to spare. Things might take too long, depending on the situation.
Kwan sees Danny in the afternoon, before the football practice. He is holding a plant, with nice flowers. Who's that for? He wonders.
He wants to take a closer look, to pry a little bit, but he notices Danny was moving slowly. Is he feeling lethargic, perhaps? No. He's too careful with the plant.
Upon closer inspection, he sees the way he hugs the plant close to his chest, like it's something more precious. Sees his eyes, lined with bags, tired and lifeless.
Kwan watches him a bit more. Danny is heading south. That's the direction of the cemetery.
Kwan closes his eyes. It only solidifies his theory.
In the afternoon, Dash sees Danny Fenton taking out a legit to god potted plant from his locker. Dash double takes. Is that a white rose?! He could have sworn that he saw Phantom was holding that very same plant, that very same morning!
~Flashback~
"Oh, it's just a little something for someone special," Phantom says, smiling a little bit.
~End of Flashback~
Dash opens his locker. Stares at it blankly. His face is frozen, but his mind is on fire. He screams in the safety of his brain, Oh my God! Is Phantom in the closet, too??
Danny figures, since the little boy has been drifting for a long time, the bridge to go to the infinite realms is not there anymore.
He plants the small rose bush with care. It should do as a grave marker. He opens his thermos to release the ghost. The ghost boy looks a little bit less transparent now, having recovered a little bit of energy.
"What's your name?" Danny smiles, trying to put him at ease.
"Tommy," he replies. "Will I see everyone there?" He twists his hands together.
"Yes. That's where your home is."
Tommy nods, and Danny knows he understood. "Thank you."
He lights up, and disappears in the brightest yellow light.
Danny stayed a bit, just processing. He's glad Tommy found peace, but it's always sad if they're young. He couldn't have been more than seven years old then.
Kwan and Dash, sit right next to each other on the bench. Both of them barely holding in their epic theory of revelation.
They make eye contact. Kwan takes a deep breath, bracing himself.
"Danny Phantom is Danny Fenton's long dead twin!"
"Danny Phantom is Danny Fenton's secret lover!"
"WHAT?! NO!" They shout as one.
"But he was going to the cemetery!"
"But did you see him actually go there?"
"Well no," he admitted, "But it's the only option that makes sense."
"Well, maybe he was just hungry, Kwan," Dash's eyebrow twitched. "Because that's the general direction of Nasty Burger, too!"
Wes Weston hears shouting across the hall. He peeps through the classroom window, because while high school drama is such a normal thing that happens practically daily, that does not mean he's not interested in the gossip.
Kwan and Dash are talking over each other, hand wildly gesticulating towards the blackboard.
Wes spots the blackboard, full of chalk writing and taped with red yarn all over the place. At the center of it all lies the question, WHO IS DANNY PHANTOM?
He hums. This is interesting. He stays in the corridor for a while to shamelessly eavesdrop.
"You've got it all wrong! He never had a twin!" Dash yells, his palm hitting the teacher's table as if it proves his point more.
Kwan wails, "Yes he does! I've got all the evidence!" He uses both his hands to point at his area of the board.
"There's nothing wrong with loving somebody!"
"I'm not saying there is! It's just that here are the facts!"
Well, there is nothing to be gained here. Wes goes on about his day.
Danny returned to school, feeling accomplished. He gets his things from his locker.
It's dark out, and the lights in the hallway are already turned off. Concluding that no one is around anymore, he transforms into his other form, and flies home.
It's late. Wes opens his locker. After the headache induced by tutoring fellow students, he is so ready to go home. He deserves a nice dinner, at least. He puts on his backpack and sees Danny. That's odd , he thinks. He does not usually stay for afterclass.
A flash of bright light. He blinks. There, exactly where Danny stood, is Danny Phantom. He looked around him and saw the entire hallway was empty. He nods to himself, muttering, "It's too late for this."
Wes stares at his computer, and thinks about his day. Maybe I got it all wrong , he thinks. Hr closes his eyes, remembering the giant blackboard full of red yarn that Kwan and Dash were fighting about earlier. If Danny Fenton is Danny Phantom, then absolutely no one is going to believe me. I could have said the second coming is near and it would be more believable.
Yes. Danny Fenton. Danny Phantom. The names were way too close to each other. Too obvious. It sounds like something his brain, running on way too much caffeine and way less sleep, could mix up. Yep. Total hallucination. He shakes his head, a futile attempt to resurrect his dying brain cells.
There is absolutely no need for Danny Phantom to have a secret identity. Specifically because why would he need a secret identity in the first place? Phantom's dead, Fenton's obviously not.
He shifts in his seat. UNLESS, he thinks. He's only half dead. Is that plausible? He snorts. Nahh can't be real, totally not possible, against the realm of physics. "I need new prescription glasses, must be the stress of the day getting to me," he chuckles.
He looks at his monitor screen again. Either way, I don't trust my memory and I don't care what happens so long as I finish this e s s a y that's due in 5 hours. He reaches for the energy drink on his desk. This thing is not going to write itself.