Submitted by @ectopal: Sam finally asks Danny what he's going to do with himself after noticing that he as a halfa is not actually aging with his friends and family.
Warnings: swearing and mild panic attack. But there's also fluff.
Summary: It's been two years since Danny's accident and he hasn't aged a day. Sam wants to know what he's going to do about his future.
Word count: 2661
Danny was late. Which wasn't so surprising, but he was supposed to meet Sam at the park an hour ago and she hadn't even gotten a single text from him. She wondered what, or who, was holding him up. The Box Ghost? Skulker? Johnny and Kitty? Maybe Ember started an impromptu concert on the other side of town.
The idea made her shake her head and scoff. Yeah, right, as if any of those guys could keep Danny occupied for a whole hour nowadays. Maybe Johnny and Kitty could, but only because they had fallen into the habit of using Danny like a marriage counsellor, and that was just too damn funny.
For Danny to be this late, he was either caught up in something really dangerous or really stupid. Since the city wasn't exploding, or being sucked into the Ghost Zone—for the sixth time—it was probably the latter.
"Sorry I'm late, Sam. Johnny–"
Definitely the latter.
"It's fine," Sam said, cutting Danny off as he swooped into the clearing. Getting caught up dealing with the ghostly couple's relationship issues was better than being shot at by them, or anyone else.
"Still, sorry." Danny settled onto the grass next to her, crossing his legs. He quickly scanned the area, making sure they were alone. Sam had chosen a secluded spot, hidden by a copse of trees on one side and a low stone wall on the other. There were lots of little spots like this hidden all throughout the park, but this one was the best because it rested on top of a small hill. On the other side of the wall sat a pond, so no one could sneak up on them from behind.
Satisfied with the level of privacy, Danny transformed from Phantom back into Fenton. The temperature dropped for a moment as the transformation rings washed over him. Sam was forced to close her eyes against the bright light, blinking away spots when she opened them again.
"So, what'd you want to talk about?" he said. "And why out here?"
Sam looked up at the open sky. Once the sun finished setting, they would have a great view of the stars. Danny always said he felt more relaxed when the stars were out.
"No reason," she said.
Danny shrugged. "Okay. You sounded kind of serious in your text, though."
A stoic "We need to talk," probably wasn't Sam's best choice of words, but it was serious. Worrying her lip, she nodded and turned away from Danny. She reached into her backpack, discarded on the grass next to her, and pulled out a photo album. She had a lot of photo albums dedicated to a lot of different things: family, nature, animals, friends. This album was special. It's purple cover was decorated in glow-in-the-dark ghost stickers. Silly phrases like "Beware!" and "Ghost Zone's Greatest" were written across it.
This album was for Danny's, Sam's, and Tucker's eyes only, and it chronicled their ghost hunting adventures.
"Whoa, I remember making that," Danny said with a grin. He eagerly snatched the album from Sam's hands and flipped the cover open. The very first picture was of all three of them in the Fenton's lab. Sam, being the tallest at the time, held the camera out, Danny in the middle, Tucker squeezing in at the edge of the photo.
"Do you miss being the tallest?" Danny asked teasingly. He flipped through the album to the more recent photos and picked out one of Sam and Tucker lounging on a bench, picking dried ectoplasm out of their hair. Even while sitting, Tucker had a good few inches on Sam. If they had been standing, that gap would have been even bigger.
Sam slapped Danny's hand away and teased right back, "at least I'm not the shortest." She pointed to the next photo over
Another one with all of them together, lying down on the roof of Fenton. None of them were looking at the camera. Jazz had taken the photo without them knowing, peering down at them from the Emergency Ops-Centre.
Tucker, on the right, was focused entirely on his phone, holding it so close that the screen's soft glow lit up his face. Sam lay on her side in the middle, chin propped on her fist, reading a book. On the left, Danny had his arms folded behind his head as a pillow and was just staring up at the sky.
Their heads were all level, but looking at their feet showed they were arranged from tallest, to shorter, to shortest.
Sam remembered that moment. They had been hunting for a ghost that could bypass Danny's ghost sense. Using the advanced sensors in the Ops-Centre, they were waiting to get a ping back that the ghost had been located. It took almost an hour, but the wait wasn't so bad. They needed a nice, calm moment every now and again, when they could just be together in silence.
Two years ago, they probably would have wasted a whole afternoon looking for the ghost themselves. A lot had changed since then. In the grand scheme of things, two years wasn't much, but it was a long time for teenagers. Both Sam and Tucker had grown, shooting up a few inches. Sam's hair was longer. Tucker had a bit of stubble on his chin. Their faces were more defined. Their arms were visibly muscled.
But Danny hadn't changed at all. He was half a foot shorter than Sam. His cheeks still carried a bit of youthful roundness. Despite being the most physically active of all three of them, his arms and legs were the same thin twigs from when he was fourteen years old.
"Hey, have you seen how tall my dad is? I bet I'm gonna have a foot on both of you," Danny said, holding up his hand to show how tall he would be. "Just look at Jazz. She's taller than our mom now! And Mom's not exactly short, either."
"Danny," Sam said softly.
"Don't even get me started on Aunt Alicia."
"Danny!"
He stopped talking. His hand dropped into his lap, fingers curling into a tight fist, and he ducked his head. "Please tell me I at least fooled you a little," he said.
Sam reached over and took the photo album back from him. Removing the picture of them on the roof, she flipped back to the front of the book, holding the photo up against the first one of them all together. Danny looked exactly the same in both.
"Not even a little," she said.
"Damn."
Sam closed the album and set it aside. Scooting closer to Danny, she bumped their knees together, making him look up through his hair. Even that hadn't changed. Sam couldn't remember him getting a single haircut since his accident.
"Danny... what are you going to do?" she asked.
His hopeless expression broke her heart. "I don't know, Sam," he said. He ran his fingers through his hair, hands shaking. He was looking straight ahead, eyes wide and unfocused. "I don't know. I'm not– I haven't changed at all. What does that even mean? Am I not aging? Am I fourteen forever?"
Folding his hands over his head, he hunched forward, fingers digging into the back of his neck. "I don't know."
Sam reached out and touched his hand, trying to comfort him. But the moment she made contact, Danny flinched away, lurching to his feet. The sudden move startled Sam. She stared as Danny paced across the clearing, still holding his head.
"I'm just, I'm stuck, Sam! Everyone's leaving me behind! How can I graduate like this? Or go to college? Or do anything? You're all just going to keep going growing up and I'm going to stay here like, like this!" He gestured to his body. "But you want to know the worst of it? If this is my life now, then... one day, you're all really going to leave me behind."
The implications of what Danny said had the blood draining from Sam's face. She knew it was a possibility, but she hadn't seriously considered. Her, Tucker, Jazz, Danny's parents. Everyone. They were all going to keep aging, and getting older, and one day they would die. One by one, Danny would lose everyone he loves, and he would be left alone.
When Sam asked him here today, she just wanted to ask what his plans were for after high school. How would he deal with college, if he could even go? What would he do about work? What would he do about his parents?
But now he was spiralling into a panic and Sam didn't know what to do. The conversation went wrong so fast it gave her whiplash. She had to get things back under control.
"Danny, hold on," she said, rising to her feet.
He wasn't listening. He just kept pacing and panting.
"You need to take deep breaths, you're going to pass out."
"Don't you get it, Sam? I don't need to fucking breath! It's just a goddamn reflex at this point! Look, watch, see?" Danny pressed his hands against his chest, and he stopped breathing. Thirty seconds passed. Forty. One minute. Two.
They stood there, facing each other, neither one saying anything. Sam kept waiting for Danny's face to turn red. For him to suddenly gasp and suck in a big breath of air, like she did after holding her breath for too long, but he didn't even twitch.
"Danny," Sam said.
"What?" he snapped harshly. He started moving again, chest heaving, hands shaking.
Sam asked the only thing she could think of that would calm him down. "Where's Orion's Belt?"
Danny blinked at her, hands dropping, and repeated, "What?" It was less bitter this time.
"Orion's Belt." She gestured to the stars, which were now out on full display. "Where is it?"
"Um..." Danny's voice was shaky, but when he turned his head to look at the stars, his eyes looked less wild. "It's just above the trees."
He pointed. "There. The, the three stars."
Sam followed his hand, gaze searching the dark sky, and nodded when she found them.
"You can't see his knees right now. But, um, if you look up, just a little. His shoulder is– his shoulders are right there. And you can see the lion he's holding." As soon as Danny moved on to the other stars, Sam was lost, unable to see what he saw. But he kept talking, and she wasn't about to stop him. "Um. Jazz. Jazz told me it was a bow, when I was little, because she didn't know the story. Some people think it's a shield. It could be any of them, I guess. But. I like the lion."
He looked calmer. Still far from relaxed, but less like he was about to collapse. Sam approached him slowly, in case he wanted some space, watching for any sign that she should stop. When she saw none, she reached out and pulled Danny into a hug, pressing his head into her shoulder.
"Sam, have I always been dead?" he asked. His voice was steady, and he didn't sob, but Sam could feel his tears staining her shirt.
"I don't know," she answered honestly. Danny still bled, and he healed, and he ate, and he slept. "I don't think that's something we can know until..."
Until everyone else grew old and died and Danny didn't.
They held the embrace until Danny stopped shaking. He sniffed, rubbed his eyes, and pulled back, chuckling when he saw the dark spot on Sam's shirt.
"I swear, if you got snot on this, I'm gonna take the most embarrassing photo I have of you and plaster it all over the school tomorrow," Sam said. She almost meant it, too. This shirt, a dark grey t-shirt covered in bat-shaped lace, was one of her favourites.
The threat managed to pull a stronger laugh out of Danny. It was watery, but bright, and his lips twitched into a smile as he rubbed his eyes again.
"Are you.... are you okay?" Sam asked.
"No," Danny said. "But, I'm not bad either."
They sat back down, hip-to-hip, shoulder-to-shoulder, and looked up at the stars together. Sam squinted, trying to pick out more constellations, but she didn't have Danny's skill for it. Even after him pointing them out to her time and again, she always forgot where they were. Already, she had lost track of Orion's belt. But that was okay. She liked it better when Danny showed them to her.
"Oh, damn," Sam said, suddenly remembering something from freshman year.
"What?"
"I just realized. It's a good thing I don't have a crush on you anymore, you're way too young for me."
"You had a crush on me?" Danny asked, a mischievous grin spreading across his lips.
Sam blushed. "Oh, shut up. You're my best friend, okay? I thought I like liked you."
Danny tipped his head back and laughed. "Would you believe it if I said I had a crush on you to?"
"No way." Sam gaped at him. "Seriously? Tucker and I always joked that you were clueless because you couldn't tell I like you. Was I clueless too?"
"Tucker knew?" Danny's voice rose to a shriek.
Sam burst out laughing. "Oh my god! That was adorable!" She clutched her stomach and fell over onto her side, shoulders shaking. "I can't– oh my god– please."
Danny scowled down at her, crossing his arms and pouting. It sent her into a whole new fit of laughter, until her lungs ached, and her flushed cheeks felt too hot. Fanning her face, she pushed herself back up and struggled to get her breathing under control.
"Okay. Okay, I'm done. I swear," she said. A final giggle slipped out.
"Asshole," Danny muttered.
"Asshole that you had a crush on," Sam said. "I can't believe I missed my chance to date the Danny Phantom."
"Damn, and I could have dated Casper High's queen goth. Too bad I don't date older women."
Sam snorted. She looked back up to the stars, feeling a sharp pang in her chest. "Sorry you can't be an astronaut, though."
"Hey, maybe they need a scrawny teenager out in space, you never know," Danny said, grinning wryly. He picked at the grass, sprinkling it over Sam's leggings, just like they used to do when they were kids. With Danny's baby face, he still looked like a kid, but Sam knew he had been through so much more than anyone they ever know.
"But I think... I think I'm okay with that," Danny continued after a moment. "I can fly, and I've even been to space before. Without a helmet! How many people can do that? Besides, I'm years ahead of NASA?"
"Oh, yeah? Why's that?" Sam asked, brushing the grass off her knee.
"I've already perfected suspended animation," Danny answered. He wiggled his eyebrows and knocked his foot against hers.
It took Sam a couple seconds to get what he meant, but when she did, she groaned. "That was so bad."
"It was comedy gold."
"I'm ending this friendship."
"You wish. You're stuck with my forever. Everybody is, apparently."
Sam's expression turned somber. "Danny, I hope you know, we'll always be here for you. Even when we're gone. We might not become ghosts, but we love you. We're with you."
Danny looked away. For a second, Sam thought he was going to have another panic attack. But when he looked back at her, he was smiling. It was soft, and sad. If Sam could only use one word to describe it, it would be resigned. It was the smile of someone who knew what the future held for them and would face it head on, even if they weren't ready for it.
"I know," he said.
Danny was right before, Sam thought. It wasn't okay, but it wasn't bad, either.
