Chapter Text
All things considered, it was a peaceful breakfast. It could almost be considered enjoyable, in comparison to other breakfasts. At least nothing at the table was exploding and/or gaining sentience and attempting to eat the humans who’d given it life.
Or maybe Danny just had really low standards. That was probably it, he decided, moving the cereal box to the other side of his bowl so none of the sparks from his mother’s blowtorch would catch the thin cardboard on fire.
“Seriously, Mom? At the table? ” Jazz muttered under her breath, then returned to her book with a disgusted expression.
Danny flicked a Cheerio at her to get her attention. “Jazz, don’t--”
“Don’t what , Danny? I’ll say what I like,” she responded irritably without looking up. “It’s not like they notice, anyways.”
“That’s not what I--” He froze as his spoon fell back in his cereal with a splash. The hand that had been holding in wasn't there .
No. No, no, not here, not now… for the last month, the flare ups had been getting worse as he’d gained more and more ghostly qualities. He’d thought that they were under control, but clearly not.
“What was that?” Jazz asked, looking up. Great, now she decided to put away her book and look at him.
“Nothing! N-nevermind. It's fine,” he lied, quickly hiding his now invisible hand under the table.
“Whatever.” Thankfully, she didn't probe any further, even though Danny could tell she wanted to.
“Okay! Two more days, and it’s done!” Maddie Fenton set down the blowtorch, pulling back the hood on her hazmat suit.
“What did you say? The Fenton Finder is done?” Jack grabbed the device from over her shoulder and held it up dramatically, somehow not getting burned despite the fact that it had been exposed to the flames of a welding torch less than a minute ago. “This baby uses satellites to lead you right to the ghosts!”
“It does what .” The words just slipped out of Danny’s mouth before he could stop them.
His father flipped a switch, and a feminine voice came from the device. “Welcome to the Fenton Finder. A ghost is near. Walk forward.”
Jack walked forward expectantly as the machine beeped, and Danny set down his barely-touched cereal and started for the door as quietly as he could. It wouldn’t detect him, would it? He wasn’t...well, whether he was dead or not was up for debate at this point, but hopefully it wouldn’t--
Oh no. His parents were still following the machine towards him, walking closer until--
“Ghost located. Thank you for using the Fenton Finder,” the traitorous machine announced. Danny gave them his best innocent shrug.
“Guess you guys just need to work out the bugs, huh? Darn. Two more days!” The fake smile fell as he realized how close they actually were to discovering his secret. He’d known that he would need to tell them eventually, he just...wasn't ready. “Actually, before then...I think I need to tell you something.”
“That’s not all you need, Danny.” Jazz stood up, a familiar fire in her eyes. “You need guidance , and parents who can provide it.”
Maddie sighed. “Sweetie, I know what we do doesn't make sense sometimes, but you're only--”
“Sixteen. Biologically!” Jazz argued. “But psychologically, I'm an adult! And I will not allow your insane obsession with ghosts--” she took Danny's arm and pulled him towards her-- “to pollute the mind of this impressionable little child! Come on, Danny, I'll drive you to school.”
“Jazz?” The boy pressed his face against the window, then turned to his sister. “This isn’t the way to school.”
“Come on, Danny, it’s not like I’m kidnapping you to make you miss school or anything,” she said stiffly. “I’m making a detour, and we’re getting breakfast. Figure out what you want, because we’re going to Nasty Burger.”
“You don’t have to--”
“Yes, I do. I'm seriously worried that Mom and Dad aren't doing a good job taking care of you, and it's almost impossible to get a good breakfast with them at the table.” She made a left turn that was a little sharper than necessary, and Danny gripped the seatbelt even tighter.
“Can you maybe--”
“Right, sorry.” She eased up on the gas. “I’m just so mad at them! It’s like they’re not even trying to raise well adjusted children, or raise us at all, so why did they even bother to have kids in the first place!?”
“I don’t know.” He wouldn't exist if his parents had decided not to have kids. The thought was...strange, to say the least. He wasn't entirely certain how to feel about it. “Anyways, thanks.”
“Any time, little brother.” The car came to a red light, and she ruffled his hair with one hand, then her expression grew more serious. “Sorry if I was a little rough this morning.”
“Nah, it's all right,” Danny said instinctively. “You’re pretty cool sometimes, you know that?”
“Hey, we have to stick together, you know?”
“Yeah.” And maybe if you weren't always trying to start something with Mom and Dad instead of letting it go, we wouldn't need to. Danny swallowed, wishing he could push down his selfish thoughts just as easily. How ungrateful was he, to still blame her after all that she'd done to take care of him? “We do, don't we.”
It was probably incredibly unhealthy, but Danny ended up getting a full Nasty Meal for breakfast. He choked a bit on the sheer amount of grease (had the food always been this slimy?) but having a hot meal left a glowing warmth in his throat, and the headache that had been building since yesterday was gone.
I really need to take better care of myself, he reflected. Jazz was right; he hadn't been eating as well as he should have.
Well, at least he could start with lunch today, he resolved.
When the car pulled up, Danny had another moment of what he’d dubbed “ghostly panic” when he tried unlocking the door, only for his hand to pass right through. Fortunately, he managed to use his other hand before Jazz noticed.
Today was going to be a long day.
“I think I should tell them,” Danny said to his friends later that day, as they were headed back from English.
Sam scoffed. “Why? Parents don't listen. And even if they do, they just hear what they want to hear” She stopped and threw her hands up in frustration. “WHY CAN'T THEY ACCEPT ME FOR WHO I AM?!”
Danny stopped as well. “Sam, I hate to-- I mean, I-I'm talking about my… powers, actually?”
Sam had the grace to look embarrassed, and dip her head apologetically before continuing. “Oh, right. Me too.”
“No, I mean, if you want to vent about your parents sometime, I'm always open to listen, I just...no offense, I just think my problems right now are a little bit…”
“Matters of life and death?” Tucker suggested. “Or anywhere in between.”
“Yeah, kind of. My parents want to, um...rip ghosts apart molecule by molecule and study them. I don't know how I'm going to convince them otherwise before they find out.”
“Slowly introduce them to the idea?” Tucker suggested. “That's how my older brother came out as gay to my parents. They weren't exactly thrilled, but they don't really disapprove, either.”
“My parents are clueless, though. With LGBT and ghost stuff.” He sighed, picking at the hem of his shirt. “I just... I wish there was some way for me to just go back to normal.”
“Danny, your powers make you unique,” Sam said, as if this was obvious. “Unique is good! That’s why I’m an ultra recyclo-vegetarian.”
Unique is good. That was Sam’s motto in life, wasn’t it? “Not necessarily,” he pointed out. “Unique can mean different in either a good or bad way, and so far, it's been nothing but bad. Uniqueness in itself doesn't mean anything.”
“Come on, dude, don’t be such a pessimist! I’d kill to have cool ghost powers like you do.”
“Would you die for them?” Tucker flinched at his words, but Danny pressed on. “Yesterday, when I went ‘full ghost,’ I realized that I didn't need to breathe anymore. I took in air to speak, but I was mostly breathing out of habit.”
“You don’t...breathe?” Sam repeated.
“Not when I'm full ghost, I don't. I don’t have a pulse at all then, and when I'm fully human, my pulse is different. It's really faint and slow, like my heart just got lazy. I scraped my knee pretty badly in gym yesterday, but it didn’t bleed, not really. It just oozed a tiny bit of blood, and then this green stuff came out of the cut and dragged the blood back in. After that, it was like it had never happened.”
“Okay, that's...kind of terrifying,” Tucker admitted. “Do you still need to eat?”
“Um…” How to explain that? “It's too early to tell, I think.”
“Well, speaking of food, boys…” Sam turned to them with a gleam in her eyes. “I think you're both in for a surprise!”
“Oh yeah, it's lunch!” Tucker raised his nose to the air, like a bloodhound. “Hm, that's odd. The menu said it was hamburger day, but my meat sense isn't going off like it usually does.”
“That's because we're not having meat today!” the goth declared, while Tucker stared at her as if she’d just announced that she was going to throw fluffy kittens into the Grand Canyon from a helicopter. “The school board finally agreed to try a new cafeteria menu! You know, it took some time, but I finally wore them down.”
“You did what .” Tucker dashed ahead to the cafeteria, poked his head in briefly, and then fell to his knees. “NOOOOOOOOOOOO!”
“Come on, don't be so dramatic,” Sam sighed, tugging him inside and out of the rush of students coming in through the door. Danny followed, apprehensive as to exactly what ultra recyclo-vegetarian actually meant. He knew it was some sort of offshoot of vegetarian, but wasn't exactly sure what that meant.
And apparently, that was grass on bread. Or...growing out of the bread? It was hard to tell, but judging by the disgusted expressions of the students, he was willing to bet it wasn't any good.
“What have I ever done to deserve this?” Tucker moaned once the three of them were in line. “Haven't I been a good friend?”
“Come on, you haven't even tried it,” Sam said, exasperated. “You can't keep depriving yourself of actual nutrients forever.”
“Right, says the girl who isn’t getting enough protein because all she eats is rabbit food,” he retorted, while Danny sighed and tried to block them out. So much for taking better care of himself. Any appetite he may have once had was quashed, but he went through the motions of the lunch line anyways, just to keep up appearances.
“I solved that issue a long time ago, Tucker. My parents even hired nutritionists to make sure I was eating right.”
“Eating right? Sam, this looks like dirt. Actual dirt.” He held up a small paper plate with a brown mound of something on it.
“It's topsoil, and it's good for you,” Sam insisted, putting a plate of the same on her tray. She stalked back to their table amid glares from her schoolmates, all of whom either knew or had guessed that she was responsible for this.
“Dude, she's insane,” Tucker said. “You're closer to Sam than I am; can't you try to convince her?”
“I’ll do my best,” he promised, quickening his stride to catch up to her. She’d already set her tray down and begun eating like this was a completely normal lunch. For her, it probably was.
“Hey.” He took his seat across from her. “Don’t you think this is kind of...extreme?”
“How so?” Sam asked
“It’s a pretty abrupt shift for a lot of people. Tucker, for example. You don't think that eating vegetarian after fourteen years of nothing but meat in his system might have some...unwanted consequences?” Danny ventured. “There’s a reason that people warn against sudden lifestyle changes like that.”
“I didn't think-- you know what? That's the consequences he has to face from only eating meat for fourteen years. The vegetarian lifestyle is way healthier for growing teens, and it's time for a change.”
“Maybe for you, it is, but--” a puff of cold air left his mouth again. “Oh, no.”
“What?” Tucker asked, having caught up with them. “I’ve already given up my meat for the day, how could this day get any worse?”
“Ghost,” Danny said shortly, already on alert. “I don't know if it followed me through the portal, or just got here by chance, but we need to find it. Now .”
“How?” Sam pointed out. “Don't you think it would be suspicious if you just decided to start running around the hallways, looking for a ghost?”
“Not if we had a distraction...” he looked around, thinking. He’d need a pretty major distraction; more on the level of mayhem, to be honest. He’d always been the type to stay under the radar as best he could, but right now, he needed to jam the radar instead. He needed...chaos.
Dash had turned his back to them, along with the other A-listers at his table. Perfect. The popular crowd, for better or worse, was always the epicenter of any trends.
Danny hefted his grassy bread, gauging his toss, before stacking Tucker’s mud pie on top for extra mess and flinging it at the bully’s blonde hair. “FOOD FIGHT!”
“I still can’t believe people are yelling garbage fight now,” Sam grumbled, as the trio were sneaking out the back door of the cafeteria.
“That’s because it is garbage!” Tucker insisted.
“It’s not garbage, it’s healthy! They’re just being stubborn conformists about it.”
Why won’t you ever admit to being wrong? Danny sighed, his breath coming out in a cold mist again. “Let’s just find the ghost, okay? They can’t be far.”
“How close?” Same asked. “It's not like your ghost sense comes with a GPS.”
“How about right there?” Tucker pointed down the hall, to a bright green glow coming from under a door. “Isn't that the entrance to the kitchen? Maybe some sort of hippie ghost possessed the lunch lady and made her dig up a field and feed it to children on birdseed bread!”
“That's ridiculous! The ultra recyclo-vegetarian lifestyle is about sustainability. Digging up an entire field defeats the whole purpose of it.”
“Hey.” Danny beckoned them over, peering through the small window in the door. “I see someone in there.”
Tucker peered over his shoulder. “She looks like my grandmother! Shouldn’t she be haunting a bingo hall or something?”
“I don’t know. She must be here for a reason.” Tucker’s description was partly accurate, but between the hairnet, rubber gloves, and apron, she looked more like an elderly lunch lady. It might explain why she was here.
She was bustling around the kitchen, seeming to search for something. Maybe if Danny helped her find it, she’d go away? It was worth a shot.
“Okay, I’m going to try talking to her,” Danny said to his friends. “Do you want to come with?”
“Sure! Maybe afterwards, we can raid the kitchen for decent food!”
“I’ll always be there to back you up,” Sam said, smiling. “Er, we both will! Tucker and I. Yeah.”
“All right. Stay behind me.” He pushed open the large door, and gestured for them to follow. He winced as it fell shut loudly behind him, but that was as good a way to get the ghost’s attention as any.
“Hello there, children,” she said, turning to the three of them. “Today is hamburger day, but I don’t see the hamburger meat anywhere. Can you help me, perhaps?”
“Actually, we’re not having hamburger today!” Sam said proudly.
“Does that mean that someone changed the menu, dearie?” Something in the air had changed; a chill that went deeper than it should have.
“That was Sam’s idea.” Tucker pointed at the girl. Danny could have facepalmed right then.
The lunch lady floated above them, a fiery halo beginning to surround her. “Oh, changed the menu, have you? You thought you could do better than a tried and true tradition? THIS MENU HAS REMAINED UNCHANGED FOR FIFTY YEARS! YOU INSOLENT HUMANS MUST PAY WITH YOUR LIVES!”
“Welp,” Danny said, shrugging as white rings traveled up and down his body, “Guess I’ll die!”
“Isn’t that kind of... dark?” Tucker said.
“Oh.” Danny’s face fell. “I just-- I figured--”
Whatever explanation he’d been about to make was cut off short as the ghost started flinging plates at him.
Danny dodged the first round on impulse alone, then started catching them, making sure nothing got broken or hit his friends.
“You really like dishing out punishment, huh?” I can’t believe I just made that pun aloud, I can’t believe no one stopped me--
“Of course I do. Kids these days just want everything handed to them on a platter. Especially that one!” She pointed a glowing green finger at Sam.
“If you think you can just assume things about me--”
“Get down!” Danny leaped up just in time to block a second round of plastic plates. “Listen, I don't want to fight you!” he said desperately. “Can we just talk?”
“And why would I do that, dearie?” the elderly ghost asked, halting her bombardment midair. She seemed… genuine. That was something , however disconcerting it was. It was creepy how quickly her moods could shift.
“You wanted to change the menu back, right?” he started. “Because you don’t like the new changes, and you prefer the way it was back when you were...alive, right?”
“Ah, yes, the good old days!” The levitating dishes settled down as gravity took hold, and she laid a hand fondly on the counter. “See, this is an old school. We didn’t always have the fancy new gadgets you kids have today, so we had to make do. It was in the poorer district at the time, and every day, those kids...you could see their ribs sometimes. Most days, we couldn’t afford to give them meat at all. Those poor children. I did the best I could…
“It was back in ‘43 when Congress went and passed a law that would solve everything. At first, the school wasn’t sure what to do with it, but I said, ‘we need to find a new way to make lunch that’s good for these children.’ It took some trial and error, but just before I retired, we settled on a lunch menu that we’ve been using ever since.” Her eyes regained their former intensity, and the ghost glared at Sam. “Until this one decided to ruin everything!”
“She didn’t mean anything bad by it,” Danny said, with a warning glare at the goth. “I understand that you’ve been through a lot, but our culture has changed in fifty years. These days, meat is cheaply available, and the leading cause of death is heart disease. She was trying to reduce that risk by making the school try a new diet for this week.”
“Of course...life goes on, doesn’t it.” The trio watched with bated breath as she picked up a ladle, studying it carefully. “I’ve been dead for so long...one tends to forget these things. It’s sad, but I don’t belong in this world anymore. Not really. Not since I died.”
“But you do have a place where you belong, right?” Danny guessed. “The ghost zone.”
“Ah, yes. I do have...someone very special waiting for me.”
“Maybe you could go back and see that someone, while we could stay here and fix the menu?” the boy suggested.
“I’d like that. Quite a bit, really. Farewell, young halfa!” She frowned. “Dear me, that was rude, wasn’t it? My apologies, I don’t believe there’s a polite name for your kind. Have a lovely day, young man!”
She was gone before he could say anything else.
That night, Danny couldn’t sleep. Most nights when this happened, he’d just call Tucker, who was normally up late playing video games. I’ll sleep when I’m dead, he’d always joked.
It didn’t seem quite so funny now.
Somehow, he found himself going ghost and drifting into the hallway bathroom, trailing his hand absently along the wall.
It passed right through. It shouldn’t have hurt at all, but somehow, it burned .
Don’t think about it, he told himself. You’re fine. It’s just a new way of liv--
No. He wasn’t alive anymore, not really. He hadn’t really been alive since the night of the accident. He wasn’t sure if this was possible. If he was just some sort of freak of nature.
Halfa. When the lunch lady had said that word, she’d instantly looked taken aback at herself, like she'd just cussed in front of a child. Danny could only guess that it was some sort of slur. For...his kind, whatever that meant.
But that implied that there were enough like him that the ghosts, however many of them there were, had a word to use for them. And not only that, but a slang term. And the meaning…
Halfa. Half a human, half a ghost, right? That had to be it.
He reached out a shaking hand to touch the mirror. His “ghost form,” as he’d dubbed it, looked so much like him, except not. His hair was drained of all color, his eyes an unnatural shade of glowing green. Like ectoplasm. He was still wearing the hazmat suit he’d put on to explore the machine, except now, the color scheme was reversed. The fact that it was mostly black now sparked a measure of uneasiness; it reminded him uncomfortably of a funeral.
What's wrong with me?