Chapter Text
Well...shit.
This was bad.
This was really, really bad.
As much as Danny stood in his dorm trying to change back into a human, he couldn’t.
Shit.
It was a weapon from Skulker that had hit him. One that had been—as loudly declared by Skulker himself—a gift from Vlad. The mechanical ghost had caught Danny by surprise, landing a lucky shot on his back. But aside from some minor stinging, the weapon didn’t seem to actually do anything, which if Skulker’s despondent expression was anything to go by, was a surprise to them both.
As a result, Danny wrote it off as just a faulty weapon. But he should have known better.
Yeah, he really should have known better.
Because it wasn’t until they completed their normal song and dance of Danny capturing Skulker in the thermos and then flying off to his room did Danny realize what was wrong.
He couldn’t change back.
He mentally poked around his chest, probing for that internal warmth, but all he felt was the coolness of his core.
Stupid Vlad and his stupid tech.
He grabbed his phone off his desk. Class was starting soon, and he had no idea how long this weapon’s powers would last. A few minutes? Hours? Days? With Vlad and his sadistic sense of humor, anything was possible.
“Oh crap, oh crap.” Danny’s head fell into his hands, panic striking through his body. He couldn’t miss class today, there was a quiz at the beginning of the lecture. And of all classes, it had to be chemistry.
He needed to calm down. To think this through. Technically, everyone already knew he was Phantom. True, his revelation was a somewhat...recent development. He hadn’t known that there was a reporter hiding out in the alley that he’d transformed in, and of course his senior year of high school had turned into a complete media circus that had been so bad, he nearly ended up finishing out the year in online school rather than at Casper high.
But now he was just a regular freshman at college. His classmates had seen Fenton, and the public had seen Phantom, but Danny still worked hard to keep those identities separate. Fenton was never seen fighting ghosts, and Phantom was never seen at school.
Except now.
His phone screen lit up. A text from a peer asking him if he was ready for class.
Shit, shit.
Danny was so screwed.
“It’s not a big deal,” he tried to reason with himself. “Everyone knows you're Phantom already. So what if they see you in class as a ghost? They’ve already seen you on TV, it’s not a big deal. It’s not.”
But it was.
Phantom was a ghost. He was dead. He had super powers, he flew and shot laser beams from his hands. His eyes glowed—hell, even his freckles glowed.
While Fenton was...a student. A normal, average student.
Well, not entirely average enough. The school had suspiciously not sent him a housing form, instead choosing to send him an email stating that they had already selected a solo dorm in the freshmen building for him.
And then when he’d arrived on his first day, there were phones constantly flipped in his direction when people thought he wasn’t looking. Shy glances his way. Nervous voices whispering around him.
On his first day of class, people didn’t approach him. They seemed nervous, as if they didn’t know how to act around him.
Of course, it hadn’t been all bad. It took some warming up, a few instances of Danny inserting himself into study groups and a few weeks of him hanging out in the common room getting to know people before anyone seemed to realize that Danny was just...Danny. Just a regular, lost freshman student.
And from that point, it had been good. Really good.
But none of them had met Phantom yet. Not in a casual setting, at least. Maybe they’d seen him flying through the air, but none of his new peers had ever interacted with Phantom.
Not like this.
There was a pounding on his door, followed by a deep voice shouting, “Hey! We gotta go!”
Danny jumped in the air, startled. He glanced out the window and for a moment he debated flying away hiding out on a roof until the weapon wore off.
But then he remembered the quiz, and his brain came crashing back to reality.
“Uh…” He forced his feet to touch down to the floor. “It’s unlocked.”
The door swung open to reveal Carter, a lanky Asian boy that lived on Danny’s floor. The duo bonded one night over a seemingly impossible problem set assignment, and from then on out they’d shared an unspoken agreement to tag team this chemistry course.
Behind him stood Star, someone who Danny would never have guessed in a million years would join the ranks of the STEM department. However, Star quickly proved herself after scoring the highest grade in the curve on their first exam.
The two teens took one look at Danny and froze, jaws hanging open. For a few agonizing moments, no one said anything. They just stood there staring across the room as if Danny was a drug-induced art display.
Star recovered first. “Um...Phantom? Fenton? What…?”
“I—I can’t,” Danny stuttered, wringing his wrists. “I can’t change. Back. I can’t turn human.”
Carter’s jaw snapped shut. “What the fuck?”
Danny huffed, breaking eye contact with the two. “Listen, okay, Skulker was hunting me and he had this new tech from V—Plasmius, and he landed a lucky shot. I was distracted, okay? He went invisible, which he literally never does, and I’m still not used to this new environment and I was distracted and he got me. Except then what I didn’t realize was that the weapon was designed to short out my transformation ability, and I know it’s because that asshole incel old man designed it that way on purpose, and he probably is at home in his chair laughing his ass off at the fact that I can’t—I can’t change back.”
He caught a breath, his head whipping up to the two bewildered teens still standing by his doorway. At some point during the rant, his feet had left the ground again. “I can’t change back. I’m stuck. I don’t even know how long! Oh my god, this is a disaster. I’m so dead.”
“Uh…” Carter blinked. “I mean...it’s not so bad? You don’t...look...I mean, I’m sure it’ll be fine?”
“Are ghosts even allowed in the classroom?” Danny pulled at his hair with his fingers. “Oh Ancients, this is so bad.”
“It’s fine,” Star said suddenly, snapping herself out of her stupor. She strode into the dorm, opening Danny’s bureau and rifling through the wrinkled clothes like she owned them.
“Uh, what are you doing? Star?”
She pulled out a hoodie and some jeans. “Well? We have a quiz in fifteen minutes, and you’re in a hazmat suit.”
Danny looked down. “Oh my god.” He pulled at the suit. “Shit, shit, shit. This is so weird.”
Something hit his face, blinding him. He pulled off the offending fabric to reveal a smug Star standing in front of him with her arms crossed. “Hurry up, ghost boy. I don’t wanna be late.”
It only took a little more prompting and words of encouragement to get Danny into the human clothes and out the door. And now that he’d changed, Danny could almost ignore the fact that he was still obviously not human. He could ignore the glowing, the white bangs in the corner of his vision, or the way his voice had a slight echo when he spoke.
But as soon as they stepped out of the stairwell and into the lobby of their building, Danny was once again reminded that he was still very obviously a ghost.
All eyes were on him.
He must have stopped moving, because Star’s hand was on his back, propelling him forward towards the people. He walked as if he were in a trance, desperately trying to ignore all the faces and phones pointed his way.
And then beams of sunlight hit his face and he knew he was outside.
Which meant everyone on the street could see him.
Him. Danny Phantom. A glowing ghost. Wearing an APU hoodie and jeans.
As if sensing his panic, Carter threw him a thumbs up. “You can hardly even notice! Honestly, I didn’t even know your gloves could be removed. I figured they were just like attached to your skin or something.”
“Uh…” Danny surveyed his hands. In his distraction, he’d completely forgotten about the Lichtenberg figure that started from his left palm.
He drew his hoodie over his hands. It was fine, he could just hide it. Ignore anyone who asked.
“No, they’re just...I don’t control what my clothes look like as Phantom. But they’re just clothes.”
They walked further down the road, ignoring all the whispers of “Hey, is that Phantom?” “No way!” “Look, it’s Phantom in a hoodie!”
He knew he’d be all over the news by that evening. All thanks to Vlad.
A flash of anger overtook him, and he jammed his hand into his pocket, bringing out his cell. He unlocked the phone and opened a new message to a ‘Fruitloop.’
‘Go to hell.’
Carter peered over his shoulder. “Who’s that?”
His phone buzzed, and Danny nearly blasted his phone into a wall at the response.
‘I’m quite sure I don’t know what you mean, Little Badger.’
He took a deep breath, counted to five, and then stuffed the phone back into his pocket. “Just the clown that did this to me.”
Carter’s eyes bugged out of his skull. “Wait, ghosts can text each other?”
“Some can,” Danny answered stiffly.
“Some? Like which ones?”
“Never mind that,” Star cut in. “Are you guys ready for the quiz today? I feel so unprepared for the structural question.”
Danny had never been so relieved for someone to bring up classes.
“Didn’t you do well on the p-set though?” Carter asked.
“But that doesn’t mean anything. I still feel super shaky on the electron configurations.”
“You’ll be fine, Star,” Danny reassured her. “I, on the other hand, am totally gonna fail.”
“Nah, we got through the last assignment together!” Carter said.
“Yeah but…” Danny rubbed a hand on his chest over his core. It felt alien to not be able to feel any warmth whatsoever next to his core. “Stoichiometry’s still gonna murder me. I’m no good at math.”
“Aren’t you studying astrophysics?”
“That’s different math.”
“Whatever you say,” Star said sarcastically.
The trio reached the STEM building, and Danny could see curious faces peering at him through the window.
Ancients, he felt like he was a zoo animal.
He took a deep breath, opened the door, and entered the building. Only to be immediately assaulted with emotions of panic and confusion and stress.
Ah, nothing like a group of students before a test.
Emotions were one of his least favorite powers as a ghost. Thankfully, like the rest of his powers, his ability to sense and taste emotions were muted in human form. But stuck as a ghost, that just meant he had no way to block the onslaught of anxiety surrounding him.
And he was likely just making it worse. What, with him standing in the middle of the hallway as a ghost.
“Phantom?” a student’s confused voice sounded from behind him.
“What is he—”
But Danny ignored the voices and stepped forward, deeper into the hallway. He kept his head down, relying on his muscle memory to guide him around the building.
It was small blessings that the people around him seemed too confused to approach.
“Stairwell or elevator?” Star asked from behind him.
“Doesn’t matter.”
“Stairs,” Danny said immediately. Like hell he was going to be trapped in an elevator as Phantom.
“Sounds good.”
They moved up the stairs, ignoring the double takes and whispers as he walked by.
Ancients, this was awful. This was terrible.
Vlad could go fuck himself for making Danny go through this. The bastard. Danny could only imagine how he looked right now, watching the internet flooding with photos and images of Phantom in real time. He was probably twirling his wine glass between his fingertips with one hand and stroking his stupid cat with his other hand, chuckling in that dark, smug way that he did like some B-list comic-book villain.
That asshole.
A hand grabbed his arm, and on instinct Danny nearly phased away, whipping around with an ectoblast at the ready.
But thankfully, his self control was just good enough for him to not nearly take out whoever was behind him. Which had been Star, who was now staring at him with a mix of bewilderment and concern.
“We’re here?” she said, motioning forward.
Danny looked over to see a crowd of students standing in front of a locked door, all either openly staring at him or politely pretending not to.
Shit.
He was so screwed.
Danny moved closer to the wall, hoping to use the other students as a shield. Unfortunately, he wasn’t counting on them immediately moving to give him a large bandwidth of space.
This was just like the first day of class, when everyone realized the half-ghost kid was in their lecture. And how nobody would stand near him, no one would talk to him.
But everyone would stare at him.
He anxiously tugged the sleeves of his oversized hoodie over his hand and grabbed his notebook, desperately looking for any excuse to ignore the sea of eyes piercing through him.
Fortunately, that seemed to do the trick. As if a magic spell was broken, everyone else snapped out of their trance and redirected their attention to their notebooks and textbooks as well.
“See? It’s not so bad,” Star muttered next to him. “Nobody cares. There’s a quiz.”
“Yeah,” Danny breathed. “Okay.”
Several agonizing minutes passed before the door clicked open and a line of exhausted and stressed looking students filed out of the room.
“It’s go time,” Star said.
“Shit,” Carter said.
Danny had to agree.
His heart was pounding as he entered the lecture hall. He tried to convince himself it was due to the quiz, but he knew he was lying.
Would his professor kick him out? Would he be written up? Would they fail him?
Calm down, he tried to tell himself. It’s okay. Calm down. Nobody cares, nobody cares…
The air around him was dropping in temperature, and a few students around him shivered, glancing his way.
Get a grip.
“You good?” Carter lightly touched his shoulder.
Danny attempted to offer him a reassuring smile. “Just nervous for the quiz.”
Carter didn’t look convinced, but thankfully followed the bro code and went along with it anyway. “Oh yeah, don’t even get me started. On one hand, the TF told me that it’s only five questions so it should go by quick. But on the other hand, it’s only five questions. So that’s pretty much a guaranteed D.”
“Or a guaranteed A if you studied,” Star said in a singsong voice.
“Oh, shut up.”
Danny tried to shake off some of the nerves as he found his usual seat towards the front of the lecture hall. He glanced up, but his professors and TF’s were in a deep discussion, their backs turned to the students.
So they hadn’t seen him yet.
Danny didn’t know if that was for the better or worse.
More and more students filed into the classroom, and Danny noticed how nobody sat near him. Well, no one aside from Star and Carter.
He put his head down, trying to read the absolute mess that was his notes. But his eyes wouldn’t focus on the paper and even though he didn’t need to breathe, he felt like he couldn’t get enough air.
Was it just him, or was the room colder than usual?
Calm down. It’s okay. It’s—
“Phan—Danny? Danny Fenton?”
The room went silent.
Danny meekly picked his head up to see the face of his extremely confused old professor.
“I don’t suppose ectoplasm has any special properties of electron orbital configuration, does it?” asked Professor Biggins.
Nervous giggles echoed around the classroom, and Danny could feel the burning stares more prominently than ever before.
He opened his mouth, but his throat refused to cooperate. His mouth was dry, his tongue was frozen in place. But despite the embarrassing frost that was beginning to creep around his hoodie, his face burned with ectoplasm.
Star gave him a worrying look before coming to his aid. “He can’t transform back, professor.”
Professor Biggins leaned back, blinking in astonishment. “Can’t transform back?”
Mutters broke out around the classroom.
“Another ghost shorted out his powers earlier today and now he temporarily can’t transform back to a human.”
“Huh.” The professor ran a hand through his thin white hair. “Well, I have to say this is a first for me. Can you—are you okay for the quiz, Danny?”
“Yeah.” Danny nodded slowly, his voice returning to him. “It—I’m good. Yeah.”
“You sure? Tell me, what group of elements are categorized as having p orbitals?”
“Um…” Danny’s eyes darted down to his notes. “Groups thirteen to...eighteen?”
“Except? Which element’s the exception to this?” he pressed.
“Helium, right?”
Professor Biggins surveyed him for a moment more before crossing his arms and nodding approvingly. “Yeah, you’re all right.” He turned and strode over to the chalkboard. “Alright, class! Notebooks off the desk, only pencils and calculators. The TF’s are going to pass out the quiz to start right now. You’ll all have fifteen minutes, and then we’re going to get right back into our continuation on molecular structure configurations. Remember, your lab this week is on configurations, so you want to make sure this stuff is crystal clear before Wednesday. I highly recommend taking advantage of office hours tomorrow if you’re confused at all after today.”
The room was filled with the shuffling of paper as everyone stuffed their notebooks into the bags. Carter tossed a stack of quizzes on his desk, to which Danny took one and then continued the chain of passing them down. Before he knew it, all the students in the room seemed to have gotten over the glowing teen seated in the front of the room in favor of the intimidating sheet of paper flipped over before them.
“Okay, everyone ready?”
Danny nodded, staring his paper down. Phantom or not, he was ready for this.
“And begin!”
---
“So you really can’t transform back?” Sam asked from the phone screen.
“Nope,” Danny said, popping the ‘p.’
Tucker bursted out laughing.
“It’s not funny!” Sam scolded. “He could have seriously been hurt!”
“Oh man!” Tucker dramatically wiped his eyes. “Are you kidding? That’s hilarious.”
Danny rolled his eyes and shifted his phone to his other hand. He was sitting on the grass by the river that bordered their school Facetiming his two childhood friends who’d spread out across the country to their respective schools. Although the trio typically saved their Facetime sessions to the weekend, social media worked fast. And when Danny had woken up the next morning still stuck as Phantom, that was enough for Sam to demand an emergency Team Phantom meeting after classes that day.
“Shut up, this is serious! Danny, did you get a hold of Vlad?”
“Yeah.” Danny glanced up at a couple that was walking by, staring at him mouths agape. “He said it should wear off in a few days and told me to enjoy the attention. Cocky asshole.”
“He’s such a dick,” Sam growled.
It made his heart sing to hear her say that, but he didn’t need to let her know.
“Dude, have you seen reddit today?” Tucker cut in. “This is amazing. The meme templates, Danny. Oh man, this is about to be a great month of internet culture.”
“Already?”
“Here, let me—” He broke off, his voice devolving into maniacal snickers. “Hang on!”
Soon enough, an image popped up in their group chat of Phantom, dressed in his human outfit, looking abundantly stressed as he poured over a notebook and textbook over his desk. He recognized it from his physics class that morning.
Of course it was from a morning class.
The caption over the image read, “When you’re dead but remembered you have homework to do.”
Danny snorted. “Okay, very funny. How many reddit awards has this gotten you?”
“Oh, too many to count! Thank you for asking.”
“You guys are ridiculous,” Sam groaned.
“You’re just jealous that my memes are funnier than yours.”
“And you’re just making up for the fact that I kicked your ass in Doomed last weekend.”
“You always kick my ass in Doomed. Danny, tell her that she’s trying to deflect from the fact that she’s jealous of my internet fame.”
“Oh yeah? Well Danny, you can tell Tucker that Reddit points are worthless.”
Tucker gave a dramatic gasp, putting his hand over his heart. “Well I never!”
“Alright, alright!” Danny waved them off. “You’re both funny. Do you feel better now?”
“I think I can live with that!” Tucker said.
Sam’s mood sobered. “But seriously, Danny. Are you really just going to go to class all week as Phantom?”
“I mean, what choice do I have?” he said. “I can’t exactly skip a week of classes. And you know, it’s not like I’m using any of my powers in class. I’m just...you know. Half the students show up to morning lectures in their pajamas. So what if I’m glowing a little bit?”
“Touché,” Tucker agreed.
“Besides, I have lab tomorrow.” Danny glanced over at the time. “Ugh, speaking of. I have to go to my study group for the pre-lab assignment. Talk to you guys this weekend?”
“Okay, yeah. I should get back to homework. Text us as soon as you can transform back, okay?” Sam said.
“I will.”
Tucker waved him off. “Thanks for the memes, Phantom!”
Danny rolled his eyes again and casually flipped his best friend off, though he was unable to hide the grin on his face. “Oh, fuck off.”
“Bye! Stay safe!”
“See you!”
Danny clicked out of Facetime and surveyed the field around him. Groups of students huddled together, some doing homework and others just enjoying each other’s company and the fresh air. Some people glanced his way, and he could still feel a mixture of confusion and concern in the air from those around him, but Danny was miraculously able to shrug those people off.
Well, maybe he was still a bit self-conscious. But hey, it was college. Weirder things have happened.
Probably.