While Danny is off being a hero, he leaves a copy behind to do the mundane things in his place.
Jazz assumed he would tell her eventually. She wasn’t going to rush him. It had been more than two weeks now though, since she’d worked it out, and she needed some answers.
She knew at least that he hadn’t always been like this – even with how oblivious his parents were, they’d surely have noticed an intangible baby. So when did it start? How did it start?
She’d never be able to figure it out on her own, and there’s no way she would involve anyone else. Waiting was the best, and only, option. It was hard, though. Danny’s clone was just so creepy.
It walked like him, talked like him and ate like him, but there was just something so distinctly wrong that it ate away at her insides. It did the same things over and over like a recording. It would go through the routine of putting on pyjamas and brushing it’s teeth, only to get out of bed again in half an hour’s time to try on another set. At meal times, it ate the same mouthful again and again, the mountain of food on the plate never depleting. It’s eyes were cold and dead. It stared right through her.
Every time she saw it, she’d go to the living room and turn on the TV. The local news was on ghost watch 24/7, so sure enough, she’d see her brother, her real brother, soaring through the skies with ectoblasts charged, quipping with the monster of the week.
The illusion must have been purely for her benefit. Their parents would have never noticed if he skipped out of a meal or two, or escaped from his bedroom window at night. There’s no way they’d have made the connection. The knowledge was like a double edged sword – he thought highly enough of her to play the ruse, but not highly enough to trust her. And she’d thought they shared everything.
She and Danny had set off to school together that morning as though it were a completely normal day. It had been, at the time, as normal as any other. Sam and Tucker met them at the corner. She was glad to have met them, not just for Danny’s sake but for her own too. There was no one else in a ten mile radius to walk with.
There was an explosion up ahead and she shrieked, eyes widening. Sam and Tucker exchanged a glance, silently communicating something that Jazz wasn't privy to. Danny sighed.
“You guy’s get to class,” he said, resigned. “I’ve left my German homework in my room. I’ll meet you there.”
“We could wait?” Jazz offered, mostly just to see what he’d say.
“Nah, it’s okay.”
He turned the other way and began to run.
Sam shouted after him. “I’ll save you a seat!”
The weird thing was, though, that Danny was already waiting for them when they got to school. He was leaning on his locker, staring straight ahead through a crowd of people, straight past Dash who was trying to taunt him. It was as though he couldn’t hear them, wouldn’t see them. Like he was asleep with his eyes open.
The first class today was English. Being in the year above, Jazz wasn’t in the habit of sharing a class with her brother. She was doing a poetry reading today though. It was something she’d written herself, that she had actually been quite proud of, but right then she wanted nothing more than to turn around and leave.
She couldn’t bear to look at that impostor.
Tucker guided it toward the classroom with a hand at the crook of it’s elbow. She followed behind them, trying to think instead about what she had to do today. She’d ignored the imposter for weeks, and she could do it again now.
When they got into Lancer’s classroom, she watched as it sat down and got it’s books out of it’s bag. Everyone else was looking to the front of the room, eyes half lidded as though they’d rather be in bed, but Tucker and Sam kept glancing out of the window. As she shuffled the papers in her hand, she knew their minds were turning over the same question she was; would Danny be okay?
The clone was writing something. Pages and pages of notes. It looked up every few minutes, as though listening to her intently, then nodded and began writing again. Danny had told her yesterday how much he’d enjoyed his last English lesson, when they’d analysed his favourite book, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. When she looked closer, it was analysing it all over again. It was playing back Danny’s last English lesson shot for shot, angle by angle.
Mr Lancer cleared his throat. He expected her to start. She closed her eyes, cleared her mind, and began. Her voice shook like an old man's marionette.
“These things I know:
How the living go on living
And how the dead go on living with them
So that in a forest
Even a dead tree casts a shadow
And the leaves fall one by one
And the branches break in the wind
And the bark peels off slowly
And the trunk cracks –”
She stopped, the words caught in her throat like a spider tangled in it’s own web.
The illusion was gone. Danny’s seat was empty. There were no books, no stray papers. Not a hint of disturbance. It was as though it'd never been there at all.
Sam was on her feet in an instant, standing by the window with her hands over her mouth.
Nobody needed to say it. The look on her face was more than enough.
Shot through the heart and you’re to blame, you give love a bad name
For @lumanae Whammymay. Prompt: Danny fucking dies. Hope this follows the prompt well enough I just found the wording sooooo confusing :/ Maybe next time simplify it to Danny gets Fucking Kamikazeed into Oblivion or something to make it more clear to us stupid people.
Phanniemay19 Day 30: Moving On // Whammymay Day 30
Word Count: 2341
Genre: Angst/Tragedy
People love to preach about the individual's ability to change. With the right mindset, anyone can become a better person, anyone can mend their relationships, anyone can heal themselves. But what optimists chose to omit is that not everyone does change. Hell, even if one tries to change themselves, sometimes it just can't be done. Danny was much too aware of that fact. Call him pessimistic or label him as a nihilist, but he'd seen enough of 'humanity' to believe that change was universal. One could say that humanity's greatest judge are those who are disjoint with it; and by all means, Danny was not a human.
He certainly couldn't change. He was a ghost, obsessive by nature, and he was content with that. He'd made peace with that nasty side of himself, the side that would latch onto an idea and wouldn't let it go. The part of him that refused to care for himself, the part of him that was obsessed with selflessness and heroics - his hero complex, as Jazz called it. He knew that sure, in some ways that was a flaw, but he had accepted that and he wasn't going to change himself.
So in short, his ghostliness was what prevented him from changing. However, he saw that same, stubborn refusal to change within humans too. Ordinary people who clung to their own beliefs so, so tightly that they were gone; they could never come back from that, they could never change because those beliefs were a part of them.
He saw it in people like Dash Baxter. As everyone did, he had the potential to change. But as it stood there was likely nothing that would shake him to change. He was always going to view himself as superior to others, even if he lightened up on physically harming them. He was always going to be arrogant, and no amount of effort would change that. It was just his character flaw, everyone had them.
Danny also saw inability to change in Valerie Gray, the once rich girl turned struggling vigilante. Although she had experience much change in her life, there were parts of her that have and would always remain the same. Her unforgiving nature was definitely something he doubted she could overcome. As the wealthy daughter of Damon Gray, she turned her nose up at those her crossed her; no second chances, no room for forgiveness. As the Red Huntress, she was even worse - clinging to her fury, hatred, and spite. It fueled her, and she reveled in those emotions, like an addict. So no, in that respect, Valerie could never change.
But most of all, he saw it in his parents. The two people that Danny looked up to since birth, the two people he could always depend on to be there for him. Gentle touches, warm hugs, and supportive whispers… they were some of the most obstinate people he knew.
Since he was a child, they had been fixed on the notion that all ghosts were vile, emotionless beings. A ghost's only useful purpose is to be examined for scientific progression. To be exhausted for research, no matter how inhumane. By his parents' explanation, humans were good, earnest creatures while ghosts were obsessive, malevolent, and selfish. While Danny could agree that ghosts were obsessive, malevolence was an extreme misconception. Seeing as how he was one, he figured he had enough expertise to make that claim.
His parents' stance on the nature of ghosts was firm, they refused to see ghosts as anything other than foul compositions of protoplasm with a vague impression of consciousness. That was that, and they could never change. At this point, their perception of ghosts was locked in; even if someone could disprove their claims, they wouldn't listen. They were headstrong, rigid.
And when they learned who the ghost boy was… now that had not been fun.
The revelation itself wasn't so bad. Of course, he had been unconscious for most of it so he was biased. For everyone else, that night had been emotionally straining and scandalous. By the time he woke up with a bandage wrapped around the hole in chest, Mom was sobbing empty apologies… "-didn't know it was you. I didn't - n't - mean to shoot-"
He vaguely remembered her shooting him. And to tell the truth, it didn't bother him as much as it should have. She was his Mom for crying out loud and she had shot him! Yet… he regarded it with a numb acceptance. "It's okay, Mom," he assured. His voice cracked, dry from the blood that had dripped down his throat. "I'm fine now."
Still, his parents continued to spout apologies like one of those fountains that they have in fancy parks, marble landmarks that gushed jets of water from the top, spilling into lower tiers. At first, their apologies hit close to home, filling Danny with a sense of satisfaction and impression of acceptance. But as they continued to apologize, their words started to spill into the fountain's bottom tier, losing their genuineness.
They claimed they loved him as he was, but he saw the look in their eyes. They were apologizing to themselves, not to him. Because from their perspective, they had inadvertently allowed their son to become something repulsive, inhuman. They said they loved him, but they were only trying to love his human side, just half of him.
That was only the night of the revelation. From there, things only got worse.
After they got all the frivolous apologies out of the way, tension in his family was at an all time high. Suddenly talking about ghosts at the dinner table was out of the question, so they were stranded in silence. Not even Jazz knew how to navigate their new awkward reality. And using his powers at home? Forget it. They just… didn't address Danny's other side. For a while, Danny fooled himself. He convinced that his parents just weren't ready yet! That they would reach a turning point, that everything would get better, that his parents would loosen up and be more comfortable with his duality.
Danny waited. Waited for them to confront him, waited for them to start talking about hunting ghosts again. He waited for them to decide to change, waited for them to make the first move. Maybe if he had confronted them first he would've realized sooner, realized that they weren't going to change. But he was hopeful - no, that was the wrong word. He had been desperate.
Out of everyone, Jazz was the one who got sick of it first. Of having to redirect conversations, to ignore that Danny was Phantom, to ignore what they were doing to each other. She sat them all down in the living room and gave them all a very winded, verbose lecture about opening up and addressing the situation. Danny watched his parents out of the corner of his eye, watched how they physically cringed when Jazz spoke…
"Danny is a ghost," she declared. "And everyone in this room is guilty of ignoring that. It's not something that's bad, I just feel like we're digging ourselves into a hole by deliberately avoiding to recognize it!"
"It's just hard to adjust to," Mom claimed, holding herself in her arms. "I don't want to offend you, sweetie," she told Danny. "That's why I've been afraid of talking about it."
"I feel that too," Jazz nodded. "But you'll find that the more you talk about it, the fear will go away."
"It's okay if you aren't comfortable with this yet," Danny put his own piece in, "I just… as long as you try to be. I know how you feel about ghosts, but they're really not that bad. It was hard for me to grasp at first too, but after I spent more time around them I became more comfortable with them, and myself."
"We'll keep that in mind," Dad managed.
Afterwards, it was evident that his parents were trying to change. They were trying to shift their perception of ghosts like Danny had suggested, but it wasn't very successful. If anything, Jazz's confrontation brought talk of ghosts back to the dinner table. And with that, returned the conversations about hunting ghosts and tearing them apart molecule by molecule, followed by "but never you, Danno! We'd never hurt you!"
He wasn't entirely sure. If it wasn't for his human half, he doubted they would even try. It was clear that their beliefs were rooted and that no matter how much they tried, they couldn't change. They still stood by the opinion that ghosts were apathetic information banks. And even though they assured him otherwise, promised him that they never expressed interest experimenting on him, he read in between the lines.
No matter how hard they tried, deep down, his parents would never fully accept him. That was a hard, cold fact. It wasn't a fact that Danny liked thinking about, but it was the truth. They were stubborn in their ideology and that would never, ever change. Like Danny, they were incapable of changing.
That was that. And the only thing Danny could do was move on.
His parents would never accept Phantom? Oh well, there's nothing he can do.
Moving on was the solution. Moving on was inevitable.
He still loved them, but he had to let it go. They would never reciprocate that love. Because by all means, Danny was a ghost.
And at some point down the line, he realized that they reached the same conclusion. They stopped trying to assure him that he was different than the other ghosts, stopped pretending.
"I suppose it was always destined to come to this, wasn't it?" he asked, rhetorically.
No one replied. Maybe it was better that way.
He could see his parents shuffling in his peripheral vision, preparing their instruments. He let his head drop onto the table, too tired of this game to put up a fight. He could've evaded them earlier, when they caught him. But he didn't. Because even if he did escape, he'd accepted that his parents were going to have him like this one way or another. If he left home and decided to live around town as Phantom, they'd still find him. Still capture him. And he would be back here, back on this table.
His efforts were fruitless, one way or another. He couldn't change that. This was his final destination, so why drag it out? Was he supposed to value what was left of his life? He'd let it go that his parents would never accept him, but he still loved them. He wouldn't deny them this, after they'd dreamed of it most of their career.
He just hoped it didn't hurt for too long.
"Can you promise me something?" he asked. He didn't expect them to respond - they were being very adamant in ignoring him - but he knew they could hear him. "Tell Jazz that it was a ghost attack," he contrived. "That I was bleeding out and came to you guys for medical attention. Tell her that you couldn't save me, that my injuries were fatal. Tell her… that I loved her, too."
His sister was in college now - she didn't need to know about this. She still had a somewhat good relationship with their parents.
A hand gripped his armand he recoiled at the touch. Mom scoffed at his movement, "Stay still."
"Sorry," he apologized. From what he could see at this angle, she was positioning a large syringe over one of his arteries. He wanted to ask what it was, but to tell the truth he knew it wouldn't matter. It was probably a drug to keep him docile while they tore him apart.
He hissed when she jabbed the needle into him, reflexively pulling against his restraints. After about ten seconds, she pulled it out, and he slumped back against the table. "Sorry, sweetie," she muttered. He wondered if she still considered him her son or if it was an automatic response. "Can you change?"
He wracked his mind, trying to understand her question. It took him a moment to realize that she wanted him to change into ghost form. Well, that made sense. He doubted that they would want to vivisect him while he still looked human. That, and in ghost form all his ectoplasmic functions would be active.
Transforming was easy as moving a limb, a mental command that was just there in his head. It felt weird acknowledging that this was going to be the last time he was ever going to make the change - that he would likely never be in human form again. I've moved on. Don't think too hard.
"Jack, do you have the tube ready?" Mom whirled around, addressing his father.
"Got it," he chirped.
Danny heard the exchanging of hands and then beefy hands clamped down on his shoulders. "Open wide, ghost," Dad spoke. Confused, Danny did as he said, opening his mouth. With a touch as gentle as a tempest, something flexible and plastic was shoved down his throat, scratching against his walls. Until the tube was adjusted, Danny gagged and gagged and gagged-
And then suddenly he could breathe again.
The surgical light switched on and it hovered over him. Its light was intense and unyielding, but Danny thought it was somewhat comforting. A final sunset before he went to bed, his eternal sleep. That sounds comforting.
"Ready when you are, Mads," Jack said. His red goggles glinted behind the lamp.
With his words, Danny started to feel the effects of whatever was in the syringe Mom had injected him with. The world tilted spectacularly for a moment and snapped back into to place. Black spots graced the edge of his vision and he got one last glimpse of a pair of scissors - most likely intended to cut his suit open. Everything was swallowed by the blackness and Danny fell into it, blissfully.
