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datawyrms · 4 years

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Ectoplasmic Bonds

Dannymay2020 Day 30: Family

“AHA! I have found you, ghost child. You are no match for my peerless intellect!”

This was weird. Not the ranting and dramatic posing in midair, that was just Technus being the weird little boaster he was. The fact he was boasting at a park with no gadgets in sight was the confusing bit. He’d expected the Box ghost or some random animal when his ghost sense rudely interrupted his Saturday, not the tech crazed monologuer.

“I didn’t know we were playing hide and seek!” His hands glowed green, ready to blast the second his foe made a move. “I know a great place you can hide though!”

“Playing? No, we are not playing hide and seek!” the ghost crossed his arms, almost looking insulted. “We are playing BASIC HEALTH EDUCATION, for your feeble mind is clearly LACKING THIS DATA”

“Uh. What.” Danny blinked, eyebrow raising in bafflement. Blasting the ghost would probably be best, but he hadn’t even taken advantage of his blank stare.

Technus shook his head and tisked at him. “Your cousin let us know about your RECKLESS BEHAVIOUR, ghost child! It is a wonder that you haven’t collapsed!”

“My cou-Dani? Wait why would Dani be buddies with you?” the green glow snuffed out, brain struggling to figure out what was going on. Was it April first? Was this a really complicated distraction plot?

The green skinned ghost tisked again. “By being as reckless as you! Young and thinking you are invincible!”

Well that answered approximately nothing at all. Yet the ghost did seem to be serious, he was getting the distinct impression Technus was scolding him. For something. Maybe he was just having a weird dream. “I still have no idea what you’re babbling about.”

“Your education is LACKLUSTER, child! How can you not know you are starving yourself? You are more a ghost baby than a ghost child!”

“Well excuse me for not getting the ‘ghosts for dummies’ book!” he snapped back, wondering if he should go after the ghost for that baby comment.

“Ah, ah, I am not fighting a half starved toothpick! You put those fists down, child and listen to your elders!”

He was totally scolding him, what the heck. “Ghosts don’t eat, what are you even on about?”

Technus put his face in his hands. “The youth of today! So uneducated!” Yet when he looked back up he just seemed more determined. “Fear is all well and good child, but it is no replacement for ectoplasm! The state of your cousin was appalling!” He seemed to notice how Danny tensed at the mention of ‘cousin’ and continued. “She is FINE thanks to our cardboard enthusiast!”

“Well uh. Thanks for helping her out?”

“It was AVOIDABLE! If you were not so reckless in hanging around over here all the time! Do you WANT to start falling apart from lack of ectoplasm? It is distinctly UNGROOVY”

...Was he actually worried about the two half ghosts? Weird. “Errr no, I would not like to do that, thanks.” He had enough nightmares from just seeing it happen to the other clones.

“Then you must stop AVOIDING returning to the ghost zone! You have not come in over a month! Perhaps exhaustion is a thrill to you, but you take it to RIDICULOUS levels! The cousin was quite WORRIED for you, ghost child!”

Dani had managed to set Technus on him for...not going into the ghost zone. What. That was important? “I don’t think I have to-”

“YOU DO! Do you think ectoplasm will rain from the sky for you here? NUH UH. IT DOES NOT.” He seemed larger, looming over the teenager as he pointed at him. “You might have a big battery but it will still RUN OUT. Then no more RECKLESS ghost child!”

Why did he feel so embarrassed? Why was he even letting Technus of all people chew him out? “Okay, okay! I get it!”

“GOOD. Puddles are very BORING nemeses!” He glared at the jumpsuited teenager for a moment longer before vanishing, apparently planning to keep his word on a lack of fighting.

He really, really hoped all this was just a very dumb dream. People had definitely seen the encounter, it was pretty hard to overlook two ghosts yelling in a park in the middle of the day. Mom would probably call it proof that all his fights were staged, or something fun like that. Not that the truth of ‘he came to yell at me because I’m bad at being a ghost’ was much better.

Mom’s pondering at the table in the evening shot any hope square in the chest. “I suppose they do look similar, colour scheme wise. I’m not sure it’s any proof of a familial relation though, there’s no real reason for such relationships”

Jack nodded, scratching at his jaw before adding his thoughts. “Maybe new ghosts cling to older ones at first before separating off to do their own thing? Phantom’s got some electricity powers, doesn’t he?”

“He does, they do share the tendency to never stop talking as well, come to think of it.”

It was very difficult to not respond to that remark. He was not the kind of scenery chewer Technus was! This was going to be a looooong night.

“It’s just strange. They’ve never shown to have a friendly relationship before now. If they wanted to take the town for themselves it’d make more sense to let Phantom stay ill.”

“Even ghosts want to protect the young of their species?” Jack frowned “I didn’t think the spook was actually a young spirit though.”

“True. Technus might only call him a child because of his appearance. Yet it did look like a parent scolding a child, didn’t he complain about the youth?”

“Well if we can nab one of em, we can see if they share or have similar ectoplasmic signatures! It could be an instinctive thing if they’re ‘related’ that way.”

Danny worked to suppress a groan, rubbing at his forehead. Great. Now they thought Technus was his ghost dad. All his dated references were going to be way worse now! He so wasn’t like him! The second his friends found out it was going to be their new favourite joke.

He never did manage to figure out how to track Dani down, instead getting surprised by her with a tackling hello.

“Does this count as a ghost attack?” he asked, smirking as the the ghost snickered at the question.

“I dono, does it? You aren’t fleeing in terror.”

“Maybe I’m just an out of towner that doesn’t believe in ghosts“

Dani shrugged before landing, taking a few glances around before shifting back to her human form. “Then I guess I’m a ghost that doesn’t believe in ghosts either.”

“New outfit?”

“Yup! And it’s all mine,” her grin was infectious as she grabbed the edge of the thick purple hoodie, fiddling with the dark lining that seemed to have a scattering of stars. “I don’t even feel cold in the zone with this on.”

“You know you don’t have to live in the ghost zone, right? Jazz can probably make up some forgotten branch of the family you’re from, or something.”

“What, and join you in tip toeing around ghost hunters that love and hate you at the same time? No way cuz. If I wanted that, I’d be with Vlad.” she paused with a frown. “Well okay, it was fake love but you get it.”

“Too well.” he shrugged, trying to ignore the rush of irritation from his parents being compared to that absolute fruit loop. “What did you drop by for then? Seeing as you sent Technus after me last time. Which I’m still mad about.”

“Oh you know, catch up with Val, enjoy some sunlight. Nothing big.” she rolled her eyes “I didn’t send him after you! I just mentioned to Boxy how you don’t go to the ghost zone much and I guess he spread it around?”

“Well thanks to that people think Technus is my dad!”

“What, he’s not?” she burst out laughing from the other half ghost’s full body shudder, ducking the half hearted snowball thrown her way.

“Oh you think it’s funny now, just wait until they start saying it about you too.”

“Nope, still funny! Besides, I already got a ghost dad.”

“You what.” he stared, but she didn’t seem to be kidding.

“Well after the whole Boxy making sure I didn’t drop dead from lack of ectoplasm thing a lot of ghosts kinda felt bad for me?” the dismissive wave of her hand seemed a bit forced. “Way easier to deal with over there than with humans. They knew I didn’t really have a place that was mine so they let me stick around for awhile.”

“I guess that was nice of them. You sure it isn’t some trick?”

“You worry too much cuz. You really think I wouldn’t have been super suspicious at first? Already did that once!” her glare made him blush, rubbing the back of his neck. Stupid question, of course she’d be careful after Vlad. “Being a clone with no papers is way easier in the ghost zone, so spending most of my time there just makes sense.”

“Yeah, I guess it is,” He couldn’t imagine wanting to live in that green chaotic world, but he actually had a decent amount going for him on this side. Dani...didn’t.

“So yeah, basically got adopted by Nocturn. He helped me figure out the design, it’s reversible.”

“Wait wait NOCTURN? The guy who tried to put everyone to sleep to take over the world? That one?!” he sputtered, only causing his clone to laugh again.

“Yeah? Everyone likes to try and see how powerful they can be sometimes, did you take it personally?”

“Yeah a little! People could have been hurt! And he dumped me on a random rock in the ghost zone! Then tried to kill me!”

“Everyone tries to kill you.”

“Like that makes it better?! He’s a nutcase!”

“Or maybe you’ve only actually met him once? Everyone wants to try messing with Amity Park at one point. It’s just a thing to try, since you never really seriously hurt anyone.”

“Now you make it sound like the ghost attacks are my fault.” he muttered, quickly realizing Dani didn’t care if he wasn’t exactly a fan of the dream ghost.

“Well they’d come anyway because the human world is cool. Some of them are totally only coming to try stealing the town from you though, sorry cuz.” she shrugged again “Oh! Noc’s pretty impressed by your ice attacks by the way, but he’s still pretty sure Frostbite could help with a few things.”

She nicknamed him! “Noted. Uh. Maybe tell him not to do the whole take over the world and kill me thing again?”

“He won’t. One, I consider you family. Two, watching and learning from dreams is more his thing. The take over the world bit was more of a ‘sure why not give it a go’.”

She seemed so relaxed, even while his mind was yelling that she couldn’t be safe around a ghost like that. Yet she was the one who mostly lived in the ghost zone. She probably would know a lot of his foes better than he actually did...though it still rankled. “Well I’m glad you found more family over there. But I’m not inviting him for lunches.”

“You’ll have to be the one to come visit sometime! You have no idea how scared some ghosts are of you, it’s hilarious. They don’t know you’re a total dork.” She perked up when he stopped crossing his arms.

“Hey, that just makes you dork squared ya know.”

“I don’t think that’s how it works.”

“Sure it does. Or not. I’d have to ask Tuck.” he managed to keep smiling, trying not to think too hard about why he’d be considered terrifying to ghosts.

“Or you could ask your daddy” her smirk was vicious as he let out an offended squawk, flinging another snowball after her.

“Don’t even joke about that!”

“Tooooo late! Bye cuz!” her laugh was warm and carefree as she fled from her flustered cousin, vanishing as she darted behind a large bush.

Probably off to go find Valerie now then before headed back home. Still, it was good to know she had a home to go to now. Even if it was with some ghosts he usually had to beat up. Family reunions would be a whole lot messier if she kept that up. Though really, she deserved any kindness she got.

He still wasn’t going to forgive her for the Technus thing though. He was going to need to brush up on dream and sleep puns for proper retaliation.

#dannymay2020 #Danny Phantom #technus #dani phantom #Maddie Fenton #jack fenton #my stuff #brain: ghost adoption #brain also- DANI gets NOT GARBAGE FAM #because srsly she needs some #never have nightmares again with dream control dad #that's probably a plus #HOW IS IT THE30TH

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