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Danny was having a goddamn morning, okay? His folks bombarded him with more questions about his ‘physiology’, and followed it up with requests for multiple fancy new interesting experiments to help them learn things themselves, since he didn’t exactly have answers for much of anything. Ah the joys of being newly dead, and apparently everyone just getting to know about that little fact. He hopes that someday, someday soon, his parents will tire of it but ha! not gonna happen. Would the paranoia about hiding it from them be worse than putting up with their excitement? probably, but that ain’t gonna stop him from bitching about his current situation.
Anyways, the real shit part of his day is that the very first thing he did after getting out of the front door of his house, was smashing his toe on one of his mom‘s fancy planters with the cosmic force of the sun collapsing in upon itself. And, AND! it was with his pinky toe specifically; getting a finger denailed hurts less than that shit, he should know since he’s experienced that multiple times. Yay for him. Fuck his half life. Anyways! That fun little trip down the front steps -fuck you mom for buying the cement planters that literally only him and dad could actually pick up and move at all- resulted in him finding out a fun little fact about himself. Namely, that extreme sudden starling, sharp pain results in a surprise Phantom appearance, also known as spontaneously transforming into his ghostly form right on the front steps of his house.
Which was a problem. Because, you know, his folks would want to ask about that ‘reaction to stimuli’ and if it ‘was a ghostly instinctual reaction to unexpected pain’. Meanwhile, if Jazz were around she’d be muttering about how he must associate getting hurt so strongly with his ghostly form that he reverts to it when experiencing notable amounts of pain. So how does Danny deal with that particular problem? By moving very quickly to fly to school very quickly, before his parents notice or have any chance to question him about anything that just happened. Also known as: avoidance, one of his specialties. Hopefully, they’ll just think he doesn’t feel like taking the bus today. Which would actually be a fair assumption, since for once he’d actually like to go to school for a change, and get there on time.
He will not be the one kid to miss out on beach day. No siree. Fuck, that shit hurt though.
And apparently, that shit hurt enough that his body has, for some ungodly reason, decided he was still in too much pain to take human form again. Whoopee. Well whatever, he’s so not missing the beach day because his body feels like doing dumb ghost shit; thank the zone his whole kinda dead issue was a well known to the general public issue.
You can only publicly accidentally transform or accidentally walk through solid objects so many times before no one is writing that shit off as a trick of the eye anymore. And sure, maybe Danny made that worse by messing with people- Dash, messing with Dash. That guy bullied the shit out of him for years, Danny thinks he’s allowed a little payback; said payback being ghostly flavoured notwithstanding. Dash makes him eat underwear, Danny torments him with screaming ectoweinies; fair’s fair.
The one really nice thing, Danny thinks as he limps his happy ass right up next to the bus taking them to whatever beach, is that the whole hero thing he’s trying and mostly succeeding at doing has gotten basically everybody off of his back with the whole bullying and crap. No one gives him shit for being slightly late or rocking the whole spandex and white hair look.
Tuck snorting, “dude, your pasty ass was already going to be blinding everyone, you don’t need to blind them with your hair and glow too”, pointing at the foot that Danny’s not favouring, “and did you seriously hurt yourself already?”.
Danny shrugs exaggeratedly, no point trying to hide slightly embarrassing shit from his friends, “Fenton’s a no go, apparently stubbed toe equals ghost time. So yes, yes I did”.
“Geez, what’d you stub your toe on? A bear trap?”.
Danny finger gunning, “cement planter, full force”, dropping his hands, “was trying to escape my folks and their bajillion horrifically invasive questions”. Tuck just full face cringes at him as they all board the bus. Pretty much everyone, but especially Danny’s best friends, knew about how weird his folks were. He’d gotten more than one talking to about if they were maybe possibly experimenting on him or if he needed a ‘safe place’, awkward.
Sam huffing as they get seated, “I hope you didn’t kill anything your parents might have planted”.
Danny rolling his eyes, Sam and her plants, “I think my foot’s a little more important than some seeds or weeds or whatever, Sam”. Adding on, “and I’m pretty sure there was nothing in it anyways, other than dirt”, at her intensified glaring. Mind you, he doubts the dirt was normal dirt, damn near nothing was ever just normal with them; god it was so embarrassing.
Kwan leaning over the seat, “so man, you decided to be all spooky for a beach, why?”.
Nathan muttering, “the beach better not be a ghost spot, oh god”.
Lindsey huffing, “better question is if he’s got a black and white bathing suit, if he’s going to have a colour scheme then he better well stick to it”, and nods curtly to herself.
Danny sticking his tongue out at her, “you say that like I picked this shit”, rubbing his neck, “but yes, yes I do”. Damn near everyone within earshot laughs at him. Does he like his black and white? Yes, yes he does. Is he making something of a point to stick to ‘his colours’? Also yes. Doesn’t stop that from being just slightly embarrassing. Like being a little kid who’s a little too attached to their favourite colours, so they want everything they own to be in said colours or they’ll throw a fit or something.
Lindsey smirking at him, “do they glow too, spandex boy”.
Kwan shuddering, “please say they’re not also spandex though, my eyes don’t need to see that”. Multiple people shout various versions of “agreed!”. Resulting in Danny raising his middle fingers up to collectively flip everyone off all at once.
“Language, Mr. Fenton”.
Danny rolls his eyes, hard, he has committed a great many fashion crimes but spandex bathing suit was not going to be one of them. He liked his swimming trunks loose thank you very much. He’s not like some people who feel the need to try and highlight stuff to compensate.
Lancer standing up to face everyone, “alright quiet down class, we’re almost there. Remember please actually stay on the beach, yes I’m talking to you Mr. Fenton, Ms. Manson, Mr. Foley, Mr. Todd, Ms. Chanley”, the man sighing, “or at least give a good reason to leave”.
Pretty much everyone responding in unison with annoyed tones, “like ghosts”. It had only been a month and everyone was already tired and apathetic about the towns growing ghost issue and Danny’s propensity to go deal with it. Especially Danny, him enjoying the sloppy spectral fist fights or not. Hey at least he’s improving and usually maybe kinda using the right power when he actually wants to use said power? He’s working on it. And apparently your classmate being a ghost does absolute wonders on desensitizing, or whatever, his entire grade. Probably also helps that Danny’s not remotely scary…
Lancer nodding to himself, “good, now no trying to pants anyone or untie anyone’s tops, Mr. Todd”, and glaring at a few other specific people, “or stealing any wildlife, it’s a wild creature not a potential pet; especially if it’s dead or, Shakespeare forbid, undead. Only Mr. Fenton can take the undead home, please”.
Sam nodding and huffing, “yeah he can return them to their natural habitat, and actually will, unlike some people”.
“A guy mistakes a blob thing for a rock one time!-”.
“Shut up, Todd”.
Lancer laughs faintly but continues on with his little spiel, “remember what’s the most dangerous thing in the water?”.
“The answer is…. Sharks!”.
Mr. Lancer blinks, “I mean…. You’re not wrong, but that’s not the answer I was looking for, Daniel”.
“Damn”.
Mr. Lancer shakes his head, “I’ll amend, what’s the most dangerous thing in Amity Parks waters?”.
“Ghost sharks!”.
Mr. Lancer sighs, “very well, I’ll take it. So that means no swimming too far into the ocean, I may be trained in cpr but I do not want to use it”. Him eyeing Danny, “are ghost sharks a real concern?”.
Danny shrugs nonchalantly, “I mean, ghost octopuses, octopi? octopodes?, are a thing so you do the math”; making the teacher shudder. Honestly? Danny’s pretty sure there’s, like, a ghost version of everything.
Paulina’s hand goes up, “if Phantom does the mouth to mouth can we get a one drowning per trip free pass?”.
“Absolutely not, ms. Sanchez”.
Danny never knows what the hell to do with literally thee most popular and pretty girl in school mildly crushing on him but literally only when he’s all spooky. Tuck says he should shoot his shot, but right now he’s taking way too many shots to be making any on people who aren’t actively literally shooting at him. Not to mention the fact that his body doing weird surprising new ghost stuff is probably not the time to be going around dipping his toes in the dating pool. Goddamnit, his poor pinky toe, how is it still throbbing so much??? Did he actually manage to break his pinky toe?
Now an ocean kind of pool that’s a different matter altogether, grinning as the bus comes to a stop and everyone starts the mad rush to get out and onto the sand. He could totally try and cheat, but knowing his luck he’d get stuck phased halfway through the side of the bus, talk about a perfect opportunity for Dash and Co. to throw fruit at him or something like they’re in the Middle Ages, regardless of them being nicer to him now. Heck, Sam and Tuck would probably do it if the A Listers didn’t. Jerks. Lovable jerks, but still.
People kick around sand and shove each other down into it for a while before making their way off to the changing rooms; most of the girls first as most of them do not want to get their clothes or shoes messed up with sand.
Tuck basically guarding Danny like a bouncer as they get into the men’s. Danny yanking the jump suit off of his fingers, grumbling, “this thing is a bitch to get off”.
“Just phase it off or whatever, dude”.
“Tuck, man, I would if I could. Pretty sure not being able to phase through it is kinda part of its entire point”.
“Shit right, never mind”.
Danny just rolls his eyes to himself as he floats up to get the boots and pants part off easier without hooping around on one foot like an idiot and probably fucking his toe up more; he miraculously doesn’t accidentally fall out of the air onto his ass, please let that be something he’s marginally good at from here on out. Please. Shoving his arm and suit intangibly through the door at Tuck while he pulls hit trunks on; only leaving the stall once he’s rocking his goto swimming tank top. He does not feel like getting mocked for being a skinny twig or a pencil chest, the noodle limb comments are bad enough.
When he gets out Tuck’s just standing there making a face at Danny’s jumpsuit, holding it away from him like the things offended him. Him eyeing Danny, “dude”. Danny just quirks an eyebrow so the guy rolls his eyes, “this thing smells”.
Danny snorting, “smells like death I hope”.
“Oh yeah totally, Danny, just like a rotting corpse”.
Danny blinking, “like, literally? Should I be concerned about that?”, glancing down at himself, “I’m pretty sure I’m not literally rotting”. Oh god what would he do if he was literally rotting? He’s pretty positive he absolutely can not deal with that and if he is then he’s going to ignore that as long as possible to continue not dealing with it. Fuck him entirely.
Tuck shoving the suit in his face, “not literally, you dumbass, it smells like you’ve been fermenting your sweat and blood”.
Danny batting the thing away, “seems fine to me, and don’t we have a beach to enjoy instead of calling me a stinky rat or whatever”. Seriously, it did not smell whatsoever. And why would it? It literally just magically fixed and cleaned itself whenever Danny transformed, heck sometimes it did that without him even having to transform at all. Which is good, ‘cause otherwise the thing would be completely destroyed by now.
“Stinky dead rat man”, Tuck snickers after him as they leave.
Sam putting a hand on her hip, having heard part of Tuck’s comment, “and why are we calling Danny a rat now?”.
“Because his standard dumpster chic is starting to smell how it looks”.
“Hey now my jumpsuit was pulled from the finest trash compactor, the portal did trash compact me real good after all”.
Both of them sigh at him but Sam stuffs the suit in her fancy waterproof bag without bothering to even smell it or inspect it. She absolutely intended to just carry the bag the whole day, why? because they all knew if any of them put Danny’s Phantom jumpsuit in a locker someone was gonna pick the lock and steal it. None of them wanted to play a game of hot potato with Danny’s goddamn jumpsuit; a game good ol’ Lancer would get stuck ending.
Valerie makes a show of scowling at them and covering her eyes in Danny’s direction, “can’t you be bothered to at least try to get a tan before blinding everyone”, huffing, “at least the goth freak keeps the sun off of her skin”.
Sam sticking her nose up in the air, “you know, sun exposure is actually horrible for your complexion”.
Paulina rolling her eyes and sharing a mocking laughing with Valerie, “maybe for you güera, but some of us here have better genes”.
“Looking like a baked bean is not what I’d call good genes”.
Danny absolutely can’t help snorting at that even as the two girls let out offended gasps at the very smug goth.
“Looks like Phantina’s still rocking a shame shirt. You’d think picking fights would put some actual muscle on you, but guess a whimp’s still a whimp”, Dash grumbling a bit under his breath, “even if he’s slightly cooler now”.
The fact that Danny’s gained any cool points with Dash is goddamn weird. He’s not complaining, per-say, but still. Danny turning around at the jock, “you can keep calling me a whimp whenever you decide to try boxing a screaming floating octopus thing fuelled by rage”.
Dash grimacing, “hard pass, Fenton, hard pass”.
Danny doesn’t even get a chance to respond to that beyond smirking before someone dumps a bunch of sand on his head. Him shrinking his head down and going intangible on instinct, “hey!”.
Emily laughing, “hey just trying to make you less blinding, glowstick. And at least you kept your clothes on this time”.
Danny scowls deeply at her, “oh piss off”. Granted Danny’s also glad he kept his clothes on, especially because he’s pretty sure that nothing he’s wearing is phase proof and he definitely doesn’t want to flash his entire class. Damn he absolutely did not think his clothing through at all, did he? Hopefully he’ll remember to ask his folks for phase proof swimming trunks, a new project that’ll save him from both embarrassment and his parents questioning him due to a lack of projects to focus on.
This time when Emily dumps more sand on him he only glares harder at her instead of going intangible; everyone else, Sam and Tuck included, laughing a little and following suit. Danny’s basically just a person sized sand mound by the time they’re done with him.
Danny stays a sand mound for a bit, it’s surprisingly really cooling, before crashing out of the sand like a sand monster at Tuck, making the guy shriek and run away from him. Tucker shouting, “remind me again why I even like this place!”.
Danny laughing as he gives chase, “because of the electromagnetic interference patterns!”.
“Damn you and your good reasoning!”.
Star grimacing, “ew, nerd speak”. Paulina and Valerie nodding in agreement immediately.
Dash huffing, “what’s that crap even mean”.
Sam rolling her eyes as she goes to walk the shore for an possibly good rocks or gems, even a good piece of sea glass she could up-cycle would do, “it means any tech used out here won’t get immediately tagged or tracked by the government. And considering the Fenton’s habit of making insane probably illegal tech and stealing from the government, it makes sense to care, moron”.
“Call me a moron again, Manson, I dare you”.
Sam stops, turns back to the jock, and makes a point to sound out each syllable, “mor-ahn”. Before running as the jock starts off after her, not that he’d actually hit a girl though…
Danny gets distracted from his mild splashing match against Tuck and Chelsea by Todd shouting, “fight me, Phantom punk!”.
Danny glaring at the guy, “dude, the last time I actually took your fake tough guy ass up on that I dislocated your shoulder”.
“It was a clean break and very educational”.
Emily shouts from the shore, “he’s got a point!”.
Danny points at Emily then Todd, “no”, and just floats his sorry ass up into the air and out of Todd’s arm/fist range. Zone did Danny miss the days of this kid only picking fights with the jocks to ‘prove his metal’. Especially since Danny’s pretty positive his natural spectral strength is enough to knock someone’s very human head clean off of their shoulders…
Lancer blows a whistle in their direction, “Mr. Fenton! No unnecessary intentional ghost shenanigans during school hours! Beach day or not!”.
Danny throws his hands up then guestures them down exaggeratedly at Todd, who’s shouting, “yeah! Come down to Todd McFists, my punching bag!”.
Danny then looking at him, confused, “are you on drugs or something, man? Who calls themselves McFists?!”. Todd makes shushing motions so Danny face palms, “oh god, you are, aren’t you”.
Lancer actually chucks something at Danny, obviously not actually trying to hit him but still, “out of the air, Mr. Fenton!”; everyone knew, and took advantage of, Danny’s shoddy self control when startled. Unsurprisingly, his hovering stutters and he promptly face-plants into the water.
Tuck snickering at him, “gravity made you its bitch”.
Danny shaking his hair off and spitting out some water, “shut up, that was totally a controlled descent”.
“Riiiiiiiight, sure it was. It looked liked the ocean punched you”.
“It did punch me!”.
Todd grins, “my turn!”.
Danny throwing up his hands, “no!”.
Star shakes her head, “there is something seriously wrong with that boy”.
Kwan scratching his head, “besides just being dead?”.
Dash scowling at the other jock, “was that a death joke? You are getting way too friendly with the weirdo trio, man”.
“I’m pretty sure everyone is though, yeah?”.
Valerie sighing and nodding at the two boys, “well yeah, duh, I think everyone’s sold on him becoming some kind of town hero if all this ghost weirdness keeps up”, her smirking a little, “I’m sure I could totally do a better job though”.
All the A Listers nodding, Dash muttering, “scary”, to himself. Before eyeing the volley ball net, “whatever, who wants to play?”. The whole group shrugging and moving to the net, while Lancer runs off blowing his whistle and wheeze shouting at Jeese for pantsing someone.
Danny eyes Sam fiddling with what looks like a rusted old chain she found, “you look like you’re mentally writing a dramatic monologue or planning some mild destruction”. She eyes him and flips the chain to be wrapped around her knuckles. “Heh. Or like you’re prepping for a fight club. Why does everyone want to fight me today?”.
“You just happen to be a very bright hittable object, is all”.
Danny shrugging, “I’m not even bothering changing back at this point, kinda a waste”; and his toe is a mostly definitely broken, he so does not need to get mocked for that though…
Tuck trudging over through the weak waves, “and it would have been even less of a waste if you had actually worn your suit, since this would have sorta washed it”.
Danny rolling his eyes, this again, “dude, unnecessary and I’m pretty sure sea water isn’t even close to clean”.
Nathan shaking his head from the sand, “absolutely not, do you know all the microorganism that are in there? The brain eating amoebas? You’re all going to die”.
Danny snaps his head over and smirks immediately, “too late. Been there done that. Ten outta ten would recommend”.
Nathan squeaks, “did you just tell me to die?!?”.
“Yes”.
Lindsey sighs, shouting over her shoulder, “Mr. Lancer! Danny’s telling people to die again!”.
“Mr. Fenton!”.
“I’m dead! I should be allowed to tell people to die!”.
“No!”.
“But I’m so lonely!”.
Todd throws up a hand, “I can totally handle dying. And probably better than his sorry ass”.
Pretty much everyone in earshot shouting, “TODD!”, at the teen. Danny knows the guy won’t do anything stupid at least, he was a tough guy in show only, it was a touch pathetic. So Danny simply smiles evilly, it was probably pretty messed up that him dying made his entire grade drastically more pleasant to be around.
Maybe it was because, on some level, they pitied him, felt bad for the kid who died too young. Or maybe it was simply ‘cause having a super powered super shit in your grade was just plain cool.
As the day starts to wind down most of his class are just chilling on the sand, chatting or reading or digging holes, Danny dug one shaped life a coffin because he's an ass and Lancer banned him from turning the beach into a premade burial site; Sam had been talking about sourcing some bones to bury, so that didn't help his cause in Lancer's eyes.
“I still say you should have just worn your suit”.
Lindsey hums, “that would have meant you’d have less blinding white skin”.
Danny groaning, “this again, man? And ya’ll realize I’m tanner in this form right?”. The going theory is that the portals electricity literally cooked him a little bit, like a little messed up human rotisserie chicken.
“Oh that’s just the contrast with the Snow White hair”.
“It is not! Look at me and tell me I’m not mildly tanned!”, Danny decides to humour everyone by getting up, doing a little twirl, and flopping back down onto the sand.
Paulina eyes Danny, “pale boy, and I still can’t believe you wear spandex, like, actual spandex. Regardless of why and that it’s shapely”. Danny just huffs at that.
While Mikey actually comes to Danny’s defence, “like any good superhero should”, pushing up his glasses, “he’s just missing the cape”.
Star humming, “and I guess that symbol is already super marketable”.
Danny chuckles, waving a hand around, “yeah, I can totally see it getting kinda slapped on everything someday. But I am not adding a cape, I doubt I even can”, and rolls his eyes. Danny makes a mental note to never ever wear a cape, he refuses to be a stereotype. (Time has other plans unfortunately for Danny).
Valerie smirks, “he still needs some mocking. Knock that freak ego down a peg”.
Making Danny stick his tongue out at her, “my clothing is literally also my skin, a second layer of it anyway I think, my ‘outer ectoplasmic layer’ as my folks would say, and I can not change it okay? Gosh”. Or at least he’s pretty sure he can’t, anyways.
Dash rolls his eyes, “nerd speak alert”. Danny just flips him off.
Nathan raises an eyebrow, “what about when you take it off? Like today? You do routinely take it off right? To wash it?”. Tuck snorts very very noticably and mutters, “I goddamn wish”.
Once again, Danny’s never even considered washing his suit, “uh… Nathan? I have never washed that thing. The thought to try has never even crossed my mind before today”. Nathan looks like he’s gonna be sick for a second. Even Todd mutters a quiet, “ew”, and leans away from Danny’s general direction a little. Danny rolls his eyes, “guys, ectoplasm, and ghosts, are anti-bacterial or whatever. Plus my suit and entire body cleans itself when I change. Heals, reforms, reattaches, whatever the fuck. Oh and my suit will just reform on me if I take it off when I transform next”.
Nathan still grumbles that that’s disgusting, pointing at Danny, “I vote we all demand that thing gets washed. If not in a washing machine at least scrub it down with some soap. Just think of the bacteria, the germs”; and shudders.
“Ectoplasm is cleaner than soap. My folks literally clean their pans with it”.
“Wash it”. Damn near everyone in earshot nodding in agreement.
Tuck makes a face, “Danny dude, that’s probably why all the food keeps coming to life and trying to stab you”.
Danny pouts at all of them, guess he’s pointlessly washing his suit? What the fuck. Then being an ass, “do you want it now?”, and makes grabby hands at Sam, who rolls her eyes but does start to actually pull his suit out of her backpack; resulting in multiple people leaning away from her.
“My own dirty laundry is bad enough, I don’t want someone else’s”.
“I’m not your maid”.
“Can I keep it?”.
“I don’t want to touch that! And do you even wear clothing under that?”.
Danny smirks at Nathan, “nope. Not even underwear”. Kwan bursts out laughing. Star grimaces. Lindsey gags. Nathan looks like he’s gonna be sick again. Tuck actually pretends to start trying to flee from Danny, so Danny grabs him and has no intention of letting go. Danny snickering at everyone, “relax, I do actually have on underwear at all times”, eyeing the sighing but glaring Nathan, “which has never been taken off nonetheless washed”. And Nathan gags some more.
Tuck glaring at Danny, “seriously?”.
Though now that Danny’s thinking about it, he thinks his folks have said something about seeing a few ghosts beyond the portal bathing and washing their clothing… is Danny the weird one?
Sam puts her chin on her hand, “have you ever even bathed or showered in this form?”.
“Of course”.
“Oh thank god”.
Danny smirks very meanly, “in ectoplasm that is”, waving a hand around, “another one of Dads weird ideas”. Making everyone groan.
Dash shakes his head, “your parents are crazier than you are freaky, Fenton”.
Valerie scowls, “watch it, I don’t want him to take that as a challenge”.
Danny smirking, “too late”. Was Danny planning on ‘getting weirder’ not really no, but knowing his luck that’s what’s gonna happen.
Mr. Lancer frowns at Danny, “this isn’t an issue of your parents not allowing you to use their machines to wash it? Or perhaps it not being safe to do so, as I would not put it past them to make their washer and dryer anti-ghost”, tilting his head, “could it be that you don’t want to potentially leave it unattended around them to possibly be experimented on? You can’t keep living like that, Daniel”.
Oh god why did Lancer always have to get worried about his home life or make Danny feel things he’s not super comfortable with feeling. And look, Lancer is kinda right with that last bit, Danny absolutely does not trust his parents with his suit unattended. They’ve literally taken hair samples from him in his sleep, so he absolutely wouldn’t put it past them to cut out squares of his suit if they got it off of his body. The only reason they haven’t already cut off a square is because they don’t feel comfortable bringing a pair of anti-ecto scissors that close to his neck. Their priorities were fucked, but they still did prioritize him at least somewhat over getting their samples. It was something at least.
Dash blinks and scratches his head, “oh, uh yeah twerp, hell I’d even let you wash shit my place if needed or whatever”.
“Language, Mr. Baxter”.
Danny blinks harshly at Dash, speaking in a truly offended tone because what the actual fuck, “the fuck did you just say to me”. The sun would freeze over before Danny would ever consider even visiting Dash’s house for anything other than a desperately needed good school grade.
“Mr. Fenton!”.
Lindsey shrugs, “I mean, I think pretty much anyone would let you. You do kind of stop us from getting our shit rocked by dead people”. Lancer only glares at her for that, picking his battles.
Dash stammering, “w-what no, I could, you know, totally deal with some ghosts”. Valerie kicking him one, “more like you’d be dealing with them by cowering behind me actually trying to deal with it”. There are days Valerie actually makes Danny mildly concerned that she might just get ticked off enough with ghost everything and start trying to be a ghost hunter. Sam probably was also concerned about that, more so because Valerie would probably ask her to train her or something; since Tuck would obviously just hit on her the whole time instead of teaching anything. Not that any of them really had much of anything to teach, they’re all kinda just flying by the seat of their pants right now. But hey, at least they knew a bit more than his folks, since they still weren’t super on board with ‘talking’ to ghosts that weren’t Danny… and that could actually speak English.
Danny shaking his head at the A Listers before looking back to Lancer, “I’m fine, totally fine, Mr. Lancer. Though I have absolutely no idea about if their washer is ectophobic or not. I just never thought about washing my freaking magic spooky clothes”.
Tuck points at him, “and I’m telling you that you need to, man”. Danny just throws his hands up in the air while Nathan nods desperately.
Sam smirks, “why don’t we just prove it’s bad Danny”, glaring a little, “it is bad, my bag stinks now”, and the promptly throws Danny’s Phantom suit out of her bag at Nathan who shrieks immediately.
“SAM WHAT THE FUCK!”.
Paulina at least stops his jumpsuit from smacking the terrified Nathan in the face, her whispering practically in awe, “Phantom’s suit”. For the love of everything someone else get that away from her. Danny absolutely lunges across the sand at it, but she scrunches up her face and shoves it at Dash before he gets across; meaning Danny basically just bowls her over. “hey!”, her blushing slightly, “though I could get used to this”.
Danny gets up off of her and scrambles across the sand at Dash, and as Danny had predicted would happen, this starts off a game of jumpsuit hot potato. Dash sneering at him, “this is way too cool to not ruin your day with, Phantwink”.
“I could punt you through an entire barn, Dash. Give it back!”.
Emily looking at Kwan, “why are you holding that like it’s a bomb?”.
“Because it feels like it is, both because Fenton’s kinda feral and ‘cause it’s an actual stink bomb”, and throws it at the girl.
Emily flinching at it, “yep. That’s illegal. I hate it. Wash your shit Phantom ohmygod”, and immediately throws it at literally anyone else randomly; Danny landing ass first in the sand next to her seconds later.
“I hate you people”.
Mikey shouting, “no, not me, I don’t want it!”, but catches it anyways, reflexes be like that, “why is it so freaking cold?”, throwing it away immediately. Apparently no one wanted to hold his suit for more than a few seconds other than Danny.
Okay… maybe he should wash it if it’s apparently that bad. Ugh.
Todd is literally the only person besides Danny and the actual teacher that the teens are all avoiding throwing the suit at, because Todd might actually try to damage it or something. That of course means that Todd’s trying to catch it too, not that he has any more luck than Danny.
Then Valerie balls it up and kicks it straight at Lindsey face, knocking the girl over and making her gag dramatically. Mr. Lancer standing up and snapping, “all right that’s enough of that”; Danny just grumbles and mumbles incoherently from the ground, not bothering to get up because he actually marginally trusts Lancer to not be an ass.
Chelsea muttering, “I’m never touching ghost spandex ever again”; while Lancer picks the jumpsuit up with as few fingers as possible.
Danny huffing, “oh come on it can’t be that bad!”. And getting a chorus of, “it is”, in return.
Kwan clapping Danny on the arm, “your heroic onesie smells like a locker room that lost a war”.
Danny sputtering, “it’s not a onesie!”. Sure maybe the only real difference between a onesie and a FentonWorks hazmat was the material and tightness, but those differences mattered.
Mr. Lancer, holding the suit out at arms length, “ Daniel, I truly mean it, you shouldn’t live like this”.
Danny flops his face down into the sand, whining, “not you too”.
Todd inching closer to the suit, meanly and dramatically ‘wafting’ the suits scent at himself, “it’s giving top notes of gym socks abandoned to their fate. Middle notes of old deodorant fighting bravely and losing. Base notes of something ancient. Something that remembered the dawn of time and chose violence”.
Kwan cringing, “Todd man, why?”.
Todd puffing out his chest and crossing his arms, “perhaps I just have a stronger stomach than the rest of you lot”, and manages to hold the pose for a few more seconds before puking and making everyone shriek and scramble up and away.
Lancer giving a long suffered sigh, “I believe it’s time we return to school and then home”, eye Danny who’s still face planted into sand, “please wash your suit, you do have a… marginally responsible image to uphold”.
“… Only marginally?”.
Dash snorting, “Fenton, you’re face down, ass up in the sand like a baby ‘cause we played keep away”.
Danny groans, “I hate this town so so much”, sticks one hand/arm up and back and makes grabby motions, “gimme”. Lancer shakes his head but relinquishes the stinky spandex, so Danny pushes himself to stand up and holds it to his chest. He likes his suit okay? Probably in ways or to levels or whatever that’s really not humanly normal. Eh not his problem.
…
He’s absolutely getting these people back for this. Danny glances at the suit, then everyone else, then back to the suit, and takes a big long lick across it while making aggressive eye contact with anyone he can. Everyone immediately starts hurling clumps of sand at him, followed by Sam and Tuck both smacking him back into the sand.
Sam actually kicks him one, “get up and take your cursed air freshener home with you, you pain”.
Lancer nodding slightly with a grimace as Danny rights himself once more, “and Daniel?”, continuing once he gets the boys attention, “if I ever ask you if you’ve washed your suit, and you respond with anything other than today, yesterday, or the day before yesterday; I’ll call the authorities”.
Danny quirking an eyebrow, “what if I’ve been really busy?”.
The man leveling him with a hard glare, “busy with what? Avoiding soap?”. Making Danny snort, yes fine Mr. Lancer’s quickly becoming Danny’s favourite teacher.
Most of the class spends the bus ride back to school aggressively or mockingly spraying air fresheners or scented hair sprays or perfumes at him. Danny grumbling, “screw you all and your scent-based vengeance”.
Tuck smirking as he fiddles with his pda, “now if you had just listened to me, though-”, tapping his chin, “-a scent based spray weapon would be super neat”.
Oh geez, Tuck getting a ‘new idea’ was never a good thing. Whelp, too late now, all Danny can do is watch and wait for whatever thing his best friend is going to wind up subjecting him to next. Though if it’s scent based Danny apparently won’t need to worry, since it seems like he’s got a ridiculously tolerant sense of smell and/or a very strong stomach.
And when he gets home, with his friends in tow, he doesn’t really get any kind of say in being dragged to the laundry room to scrub and wash and rewash and rewash again his suit.
His dad having just blinked, scratched his head, and commented, “huh, yeah now that I think about it, I don’t think I’ve ever seen that suit in the wash before”.
Sam and Tuck responding with an in sync, “yeah because it never has been”. Resulting in his mom telling him that in no uncertain terms that was truly disgusting.
But hey, at least he now knew that the washer and dryer were, in fact not anti-ecto. They did do a damn good job of cleaning off ectoplasm stains though, according to his dad at least.
Danny also eventually got to find out what Mr. Lancer really meant by ‘the authorities’ if he forgot about washing his suit. The man goddamn souped him and then handed him off to the janitor for a ‘cleanliness’ lecture… a three hour long cleanliness lecture that featured Danny tied to a chair with what his folks called ‘ectoline’.
Danny kept his goddamn suit goddamn washed marginally consistently from then on. And the janitor got to enjoy harping on a youngster about cleaning every so often.
End.