Archive of Our Own ^beta

“Danny,” Sam whispered in exasperation as he sat down, “late again?  You know that one of these days, Lancer isn’t going to look the other way.”

Danny scratched the back of his head.  “Okay, but like, everyone knows that Johnny 13 and Shadow were causing havoc again.  It’s not my fault!”

Tucker snorted lightly on his other side, all three of them now ignoring the lecture on “the Book Thief” in the back of the room.  “Dude, you’d think that someone else would get a handle on these things instead of just leaving it to you all the time.  I mean, come on, you’re graduating soon!  You’ll probably join the rest of us in going off to college!  Someone else should step up to the plate for once.  I mean, don’t get me wrong, you’re cool and all, but…”

Danny shoved him.  “Rude!  Nah, I don’t mind the occasional tussle.  It’s bonding.”

“Wish Johnny would try to bond a little less,” Sam grumbled, and Danny couldn’t help but laugh.  All his rogues were trouble, but none of them were trying to re-kill him by now.  It was just… playing.  He could probably do with a little less bonding, though, yeah.

When the class dismissed, Lancer called out to him, so he lingered in the doorway.

“Graduation is coming up Danny.  You can get an extension on the book report, but,” he held up a finger to cut off Danny’s celebration, “you also have to pass my book club invitation to Ghost Writer.”

Danny sighed, but couldn’t help smiling.  “Yeah, okay.  Next time I stop by the Zone I’ll pass it along.  Still Thursday nights?”

“Of course,” his teacher said jovially, “a consistent schedule leads to consistent attendance!”

Danny waved as he left, heading to lunch.  Sam and Tucker had already grabbed a table, so he plopped his lunch tray beside them and stuck a fork in the mashed potatoes.

Sam looked at Tucker’s mashed potato and barbeque sauce slurry with minor disgust as he dipped his chicken tenders in, eating them with relish.  Danny couldn’t help but laugh.

“Dip your veggie tempura or whatever into it,” the boy insisted, “it’s superior to regular barbeque sauce!”

“You’re disgusting,” she insisted, “Danny, tell him he’s disgusting.”

Danny looked up, deer in the headlights, from where his chicken tender was already in Tucker’s mashed potatoes.  She groaned as the two boys went in for a high five.

“So,” she leaned forward, “word on the street is that Youngblood’s planning to show up for the school career day festival.”

Danny nodded.  “Yeah, I mentioned parents struggling to find babysitters and he must have been around because he went on a rant and then said he’d free all the children from the tyrannical monitoring and have an epic adventure.”

“Translation,” Tucker snickered, “he’s providing free babysitting for the event.”

Danny shrugged.  “I’ll probably have to keep an eye on it and make sure he doesn’t try to recruit more kids for his crew, but I’m sure there’s nothing wrong with kids watching kids.”

They spared a moment of silence for the parents who would get exhausted and cranky kids back after.

The rest of the day passed by like a breeze, Danny effortlessly able to keep up with his classes; now that he was getting enough sleep, school seemed much easier.  It was no longer an uphill battle where he had to fight tooth and nail for every point, harder than any ghost battle he had.  Now, it was enough to challenge him and make him think, but still seemed simple enough that he could actually do it.  The wonders of a good night’s sleep were not to be exaggerated.

Valerie met up with them as they were leaving the building.  “Nasty Burger?”

Danny shrugged.  “I think Jazz might be trying to make pizza tonight.  Fingers crossed it doesn’t come to life and become our new dog or something.”

She snorted and reached out to squeeze his hand.  “Well, you let me know.  And my dad would like me to remind you that my boyfriend has a standing invitation to dinner whenever.”

He beamed and leaned in to give her a kiss on the cheek before they split up.  The weather was great, and it seemed like no time at all before he was home.

His mom called out in greeting from where she and his dad were in the living room.  The TV was blaring with this youtube channel they’d found that showed off viewer submitted ghost videos, and they were constantly running commentary on the “ghosts.”  Surprisingly, even knowing ghosts existed, they called a lot of the videos hoaxes, insisting that it was edited or staged and detailing how it could be done.  It was rare that they got excited about what they thought might be an actual ghost and wrote the location down.

Danny poked his head in just in time to hear “truly chilling,” which had been enthusiastically said by his parents as well.  It was one of the phrases that came up a lot in the videos, and Maddie and Jack liked to guess which ones were coming up and try to say the common phrases along with the creator.

“Danno,” his dad said cheerfully, “we’re just finishing up our video for the day before we go back to work!  We’re hoping to find a doozy!  Come watch with us!”

He laughed.  “Sorry, dad, I have a bit of homework.  Lancer gave me an extension, but I still shouldn’t waste time.”

His parents beamed in pride.  “That’s my boy,” Jack boomed, “keep up the good work, Danno, and you’ll get into any college you want!  NASA would be a fool to not take you by the time you’re through with college!”

Maddie smiled at him gently.  “Take it easy, Danny, I saw that fight with Johnny, the hooligan.  Shadow made you faceplant into that building!”

“Mom,” he laughed, “I phased right through it, I’m fine!”

She huffed.  “Well, you know I worry.  But I’m so proud of you, too.”

He couldn’t help but soften.  “I know, thanks mom.  Is Jazz home yet?”

“Not quite.”

He nodded.  “Tell her to ask if she needs help with dinner.  And you didn’t put any ectoplasm in the fridge while I was at school?”

“We kept our experiments strictly to the basement,” she laughed, “don’t worry, no live prey for dinner tonight.”

He beamed.  “Okay, great!  I’m going to go do homework now, love you!”

Jack looked up from the video.  “We love you too, Danno!  Hah, Maddie, did you see that?  I can almost see the string!”

Danny walked upstairs with a smile on his face.  Could life get any better?

He slept like the dead that night, full of regular old boring pizza.  It had been even better than delivery pizza, and Jazz had smiled so wide when they’d devoured it all.  Apparently it had been better for you than regular pizza, but Danny couldn’t even tell, it was that good.  He was still feeling awesome when he woke up, knowing that it was the weekend.

Sam dragged Danny and Tucker to the park, plopping them down on a bench while she took her camera out.

“Okay,” she said, “photography project and then yes I’ll treat you to lunch.  But until then, you’re my bitches and you have to pose how I tell you.”

It was kind of fun, actually.  Sam hadn’t really wanted to get back into photography after the accident, but Danny had pushed her into it and she seemed way happier now.  When they finally sat down to eat at the Nasty Burger, she showed off some of her shots and he couldn’t help but be impressed.  Even Tucker was oohing and ahhing, including at the ones that didn’t have them in it.

“Wait a minute,” Tucker pointed at the camera when she was showing off a series of nature shots, “wasn’t that when you were telling us to hold that ridiculous cupid pose?!”

She snickered.  “It was for inspiration, it was pivotal to the shot, Tuck.”

The bell on the door chimed and someone walked in.  Danny looked up with a smile before it slowly fell.

“Who are you?”

The person standing in the doorway blinked at him.

Danny slowly stood up.  Alarms were blaring in his head.  “You’re not supposed to be here.  I don’t know you.”

They opened their mouth, but Danny’s presence swelled to fill the diner.  “You’re NOT SUPPOSED TO BE HERE!   GET OUT!”

The person disappeared and everything was frozen for a moment before Danny sat back on the bench.

He breathed out and smiled again.

“Pivotal my ass,” Tucker cried, “you just wanted us to look like idiots!”

“Be grateful I didn’t take pictures,” she chortled, “you both looked so stupid!”

Sam clenched her hand around the lipstick blaster as she heaved for breath.  Nocturn wasn’t giving up or letting up and even the three of them couldn’t make a dent in him.

“I tire of this battle,” he said, sounding bored, and rage welled up within her.  Apparently in Jazz too, as she swung her anti creep stick with a roar.

“Give him back,” she yelled, “or are you too scared he’s going to kick your ass?!”

“Yeah,” Tucker cried, “he beat you once, he can do it again!  No wonder you wanted him out for the count!”

The giant owl faced ghost twisted his head in a mockery of human confusion, horns curling beside his face with a deadly elegance.

“You seem to be under the impression that my Prince’s slumber is unwanted,” he said silkily, “but were you not informed?  He asked for a favor.”

Sam’s blood ran cold.  “What?”

Nocturn laughed, and it sounded like wrapping yourself in the covers so the monsters couldn’t get you.

“Oh yes,” he mused, “I was asked to shelter him in dreams for a while, where no one could find him, until he felt prepared to face the cruel reality once more.  In fact, I was given special instructions to ensure you wouldn’t be able to find him in his dreams of happiness.  No one in the world will be able to!  I ensured it while they slept!”

“You’re lying,” Sam said numbly, “you have to be.  What do you get out of this?  You’re just draining power from him!”

“Oh no,” again that laugh like razor blades in silk, “he has far more power than I could ever want.  But I am of course more than happy to do a favor for my Prince.”

“I thought Danny was King now,” Tucker muttered, “wasn’t that the whole point of him being gone for a few days?”

“Unless,” Jazz said shakily, “he didn’t ever go to the coronation.”

Nocturn laughed at their helplessness.  Sam looked past the ancient ghost to where she could see Danny nestled right in the heart of the ancient’s domain, fast asleep and with a slight smile on his face.  She didn’t think she had seen his face so clear in… she couldn’t remember how long.  For the first time in a long time, he looked peaceful, and the thought gutted her.

“Why didn’t he say anything,” she found herself crying, “we could have helped!”

Nocturn laughed, much sharper than before.  “You?  You living?  When you could not even attend his farce of a coronation for your life?  When both sides of his existence were pulling him apart?  No.  Now begone, and leave my Prince to his eternal rest.”

They were blown out of Nocturn’s domain by a magical wind and sent spinning all the way to the Fentonworks portal, specter speeder and all.  They hung there for a moment, suspended in the ectoplasm, before silently going through the portal.

Where had it all gone wrong?

And would Danny ever want to wake up again?

Tim stumbled to the kitchen and made a beeline for the coffee pot.  Dick made a move to intercept him.

“Woah there,” he chuckled, “I thought you’d be out for another few hours there, Timbo.  You were up for like a week.”

“Ten days,” he muttered to himself, “and not enough, apparently.  Did you know that you can hallucinate eldritch beings when you’re asleep?  Cute boy one second, terrifying creature the next.  Nope, never sleeping again.”

Steph snorted.  “You mean you dreamed?   Tim, that’s what sleeping does.  Also, pretty sure this is telling you to sleep more , not less.  Your dreams would be normal if you slept more.”

Tim shook his head.  “Can’t be it.  Besides, I didn’t know who he was.  All your dream people are supposed to have faces you recognize or no face at all.”

Dick sighed and gave up trying to keep him from the coffee pot while Steph snickered again.

“Okay, so what did he look like?  You said he was cute before he became an eldritch horror, right?”

Tim opened his mouth and paused.  Black hair or white?  Green eyes or blue?  He couldn’t remember.  He couldn’t…

He drooped slightly and stared at his coffee mug in betrayal.  “What have you done to me?”

Dick sighed and wrapped an arm around him, guiding him carefully out of the kitchen.  “Yeah, you weren’t supposed to wake up for another few hours at least.   Back to bed, Red.”

Tim felt the mug being taken from his hands and set on the table.  Steph wasn’t doing a very good job of muffling her giggles.

“Wait,” he muttered as Dick burritoed him in such a way that he couldn’t escape easily (he could still do it.  If he wanted to), “he said… he said I wasn’t supposed to be there.  I don’t even know where I was.  I’d never been there before.”

“Well,” Dick said kindly, patting him on the head with a beaming smile even as Tim’s eyelids drooped, “maybe you can tell him you think he’s cute while you figure it out.  Sleep for a few more hours, Tim, okay?”

Tim would have narrowed his eyes at his brother if he could.  “You just think I’m lonely.”

“Oh, Tim…”

Paradoxically, he felt slightly more awake when he opened his eyes to see that same town that he’d been in before.  He looked left, and there was the Nasty Burger, lighting up the evening with its bright sign.  The three people were no longer inside it.  In fact, no one was.

He walked down the street, semi-aimlessly, and inspected the buildings.  Everything seemed… muted, almost.  There was evidence of humanity, but none to be found.  It was a ghost town.  It was only as he spotted a house with a UFO looking thing on the top that he started to feel like he wasn’t completely alone.

There was a crash a few blocks over and he was instantly more alert.  Was it something innocuous?  Or was it another eldritch horror?

“GIVE ME YOUR PELT, GHOST WHELP!”

“No can do, Skulker,” a younger voice said back, sounding like he was on the verge of laughing, “I’m rather attached to it, you see!”

A giant glowing green robot seemed to pass through a building like it was air, trailed by a glowing green comet that, when it slowed, revealed a boy.  The boy, even.  Tim tucked himself in between buildings and just watched.  It seemed less like a fight and more like wrestling.  He was certain that had any of the attacks hit him, he would be waking up extremely quickly with a headache as he “died” in the dream, but the boy made it look so casual as he iced and blasted and pieces of the mech suit flew off, embedding themselves in the wall.  Tim idly watched them dissolve into nothing, the buildings putting themselves to right when the fighting, glowing teenager wasn’t looking at them.  Soon enough, the mech fell apart to reveal something small and green that got sucked up into a… soup thermos, it looked like.  Tim followed the boy with his eyes as a few people “came out” of the buildings and called to the teen, crying “Danny” or “Phantom.”  They thanked him and sent him on his way, fading back into nothingness, and Tim decided it was probably time to meander in the direction the teen had gone.

His path took him to the lively building labeled “Fentonworks” that had the OSHA violation in the form of the ship thing grafted to the top of the building.  He hesitated for a moment before opening the door.  It was unlocked, just like he’d suspected.

The house was nice, definitely middle class, but it felt homey.  In fact, it felt almost artificially homey, but he could hear people talking a room or two over.  He slipped into the kitchen and made himself a cup of dream coffee.  Gotta love dream coffee.  It tasted like literally nothing but he imagined it was the best thing ever and he felt more awake because of it.  Is that how dreams worked?  Even lucid dreams?  Or was this one special?

“You.”

He blinked and looked up.  “You as well.  Hi.  Is this your dream, or mine?”

The boy (black and blue, Bruce bait if Tim had ever seen it) looked taken aback before his face screwed up in anger.  “What are you talking about,” he bit out, “this is real.”

Tim paused.  “That sounded… defensive.  I’d appreciate it if you didn’t immediately wake me up again, though.  I’m pretty sure my siblings will just drug me again.”

He looked alarmed.  “What?  You were drugged?”

Tim sipped the dream coffee again.  It was giving him sour ideas because he was thinking about it now.  “There’s a possibility it was just decaf coupled with the fact that I hadn’t slept in a long time.  I’m not sure.  It’s not like most sleep drugs actually work on me anymore.  I’m inoculated.”

“Against… drugs,” he said slowly, “I… don’t think that’s how it works.”

“I’m operating at like, 15% capacity right now, cut me some slack.  Anyway, probably your dream.  You’re from the Midwest, right?  You sound like it, and you didn’t think to lock your door.  Midwest behavior.”

The teen (who actually might be slightly older than Tim, he didn’t know) gaped for a second before scowling.  The pressure he could exert was back and Tim held up his free hand in surrender.

“That wasn’t meant to be insulting, geez.  So, you dream about being a superhero?  Can’t relate, seems like a lot of work.”

The boy deflated a bit, but was still scowling.  “I am a hero.  It’s not like anyone else is going to fight ghosts.  Not that I’d trust them to.”

Tim nodded slowly.  “Ghosts like… the glowing green guy in the mech suit?  Huh.”

“Yeah,” he said sarcastically, “good to know you’ve been following me around for a while now.  Who even are you?  How did you get here?”

“Tim.”  He didn’t feel like sharing his whole name with an entity he wasn’t completely sure about.  Some form of dream demon, maybe?  Or not, because… well, he had a few things to look up when he woke up.  “I just appeared here when I went to sleep.  You’re Danny, right?  Or Phantom?”

Danny started a hole into the table, brow furrowed.  “But… no one is supposed to dream this.  I asked specifically…”

Tim nodded slowly.  “So we’re acknowledging this is a dream then, cool.  So some magic or whatever has made our dreams connect, so that when I fall asleep, I join you here.  I have to admit, this is way more entertaining than my usual fever dreams after this long without sleeping.  Crazy coincidence that you were asleep both times, though.  Or, well, it’d only been an hour or so, so I guess you were just still asleep…”

“You don’t get it,” Danny snapped, “you being here is impossible.”

Tim cocked his head.  “So you’ve said.  And yet.”

Danny pushed into his space, eyes flashing bright, toxic green.  “I don’t want you here.  This is my dream and you’re not supposed to be in it.”

Tim swallowed a little, trying to ignore the pounding in his heart when he saw that green and felt Danny’s anger.  His mouth moved without his permission.

“You died, didn’t you?”

His eyes abruptly shot open and he flung his duvet off, letting the cold night air bring some relief to his sweat soaked body.  He fumbled at his bedside table for his phone and pulled it off the charger.  He checked the time.

Four in the afternoon.

For some reason, something about that time felt off to him.  It wasn’t that it was so late; he’d pulled such a long binge without sleep that getting over ten hours was to be expected, so he woke up after a crash whenever he woke up, and everyone knew that.  The date looked fine as well, he had a few notifications that silently stared up at him but nothing more pressing than Steph’s latest slew of memes, so what was it that was bothering him?

His phone went to sleep as he stared at it and he blinked at his very faint reflection in the dark screen.

Ah, that was it.

Depending on where in the midwest he was, Danny was only supposed to be an hour or two behind.

So why was he still asleep?

Bruce was the one to find him in the batcave, squinting at the screen.

“Dinner’s soon,” he said.

Grunt, Tim replied.

Bruce slowly stood next to him, inspecting the screen.  “Amity Park?”

Tim nodded slowly.  “Daniel James Fenton, senior at Casper High.  Eighteen, poor grades and attendance, older sister at Stanford, eccentric scientist parents Madeline and Jackson Fenton with doctorates in ectobiology, or the scientific study of ghosts.  Best friends Samantha Manson and Tucker Foley.”

Bruce nodded slowly.  “And why are you looking up a random teenager on the batcomputer?  Oh, he was the one who found the purpleback gorilla, Damian was telling me about that a few weeks ago.  How lovely.”

“He’s not a random teenager,” Tim grumbled, “he has magic or… something.  I’m dreaming about him.”

Bruce coughed lightly.  “You’re dreaming about a boy?”

“A boy I’ve never met,” Tim flushed at the look, “I’m not- this isn’t a crush or something Bruce, he specifically said I wasn’t supposed to be able to get into his dreams, which implies that he has a mind shield that I can, for some reason, slip past.  He knows it’s a dream, but he tries to pretend it’s real and when I make him mad he forces me awake, and I wake up in a cold sweat, and-”

“Maybe you can ask for advice at dinner,” Bruce cut in, “Dick has had plenty of experiences with…”

Tim raised an eyebrow as he trailed off, seemingly embarrassed.

“I told you,” he said slowly, “it’s not like that!”

He stormed out of the batcave, saving his file of accumulated information and sullenly sitting through dinner.  The only person he acknowledged was Alfred.  He didn’t even kick back when Damian rammed his foot into Tim’s calf.

“I’m going to bed,” he declared at nine o’clock sharp, the earliest he could feasibly rationalize it, “good night.”

Dick looked mildly alarmed.  “Tim, you just slept!  You’ve only been awake for five hours!”

Alfred looked up sharply.  “Master Dick, I think it is quite admirable that Master Tim is attempting to get some semblance of a healthy sleep schedule.”

“No no,” Dick backtracked immediately, “I get that, obviously, awesome, but this seems a little out of character!”

“Tim,” Bruce sighed, but Tim cut him off.

“Thanks, I’m going to get right on that,” he rambled, speedwalking out of the room, “and don’t worry about work, I already did all of that, and I solved like, three of our open cases.  You shouldn't need me for patrol for the next four nights, by which time I’m almost certain I will have resolved the issue.”

He was gone before anyone could offer more protests and shut his door with a sigh.  He’d purposefully drunken no coffee, and he could feel a headache coming on.  He grabbed a glass of water and downed it immediately, rubbing his eyes.  His room was dark with only a lamp on, the blackout curtains doing their work, and he brushed his teeth, changed into pajama pants, and crawled into bed.

He stared up at the ceiling and waited.

And waited.

And waited.

He scowled in irritation, checking his phone.  It was past ten thirty, which meant he’d been laying in bed for an hour and a half doing nothing.  His headache had faded slightly.  He looked up “Ways to Help Me Fall Asleep” and read through three articles before sighing and tossing his phone back on his bedside table.  He flipped his pillow over, curled up, and closed his eyes, forcing himself to breathe slowly as he pictured a giant vat of oatmeal in his head.  He mentally took a spoon and started carving, ever so slowly.

99…

98…

97…

96…

He opened his eyes and flinched, immediately flailing his arms around with a light shriek.

“Oh, you’re back.”

He slowed his movements and tried to crane his head to look at the other boy.  Danny was sitting cross legged, but he rolled his eyes and grabbed onto Tim to reorient him and stop his movement.  There was still a slight rotation, he could tell, but they were now in sync.

Danny released him and he had a moment of panic before he forced himself to settle.  The other boy smirked.

“First time in space?”

“No,” Tim said automatically, “but waking up here, or, well, you know what I mean, was pretty sudden.”

Danny blinked and leaned forward, face wrinkled with confusion.  “You’ve been to space?  You’re like, my age.  And alive.  Unless you’re not real.”

Tim could see the idea was settling in its place as the right one based on the resignation, relief, and… was that disappointment?  He lunged forward.

“No, I’m just weird,” he didn’t know why he wanted Danny to know he was real when there was a possibility that Danny himself wasn’t, “I… took a tour of… the Watchtower?”

Danny blinked back to awareness.  “From the Justice League?  That Watchtower?  Didn’t know they were giving school tours, I would have forced Lancer to sign us up.”

“Something like that,” Tim said quietly.  He didn’t want to tell Danny why he was actually there at least once a month.  Nor did he want to talk about the other planets he’s been to and the aliens he’d met.  They barely knew each other, after all.

“So the fact that we can hear each other and, you know, breathe , means that this is definitely a dream,” Tim said idly, “but what happened, did you get bored of Amity Park?”

Danny blew out a breath, making his white hair that was already waving in the lack of gravity ripple fiercely for a moment before it went back to its lazy pattern.  “I like space.  There’s no people,” he gave Tim a pointed look.

Tim looked around.  They weren’t hovering around Earth’s orbit.  There were little specks that might have been planets instead of stars, since there was one star that looked much closer than the pinpricks, but he could see the entire universe expand around him.  He craned his neck to look at the impressive stretch of stars that was their streak of the Milky Way, making a wide belt that went in a complete circle around them.  He could see the colorful clouds of space dust.

“It’s gorgeous,” he said quietly.

Danny sighed wistfully.  “Yeah.”

Tim tore his gaze away to look at the boy sitting near him, for whatever definition of sitting could exist in zero gravity.  His skin wasn’t as pale looking as it was before, in his kitchen under the fluorescents with his dark hair.  His hair was white and his eyes were green.  He had freckles, which Tim only realized because they were moving, little specks of light like the stars around them.  They twinkled a little, reflecting not the sunlight that barely reached them, but something else.

Tim looked away.

“So… have you been to space, then?”

Danny snorted, jolting out of his wistful reverie.  “Sure.  Ghosts don’t need to breathe.  Figured it might be the only way I could get there.  Couldn’t linger, though.”

“Why don’t you go back, then?  I mean, if you’re a ghost…”

Danny shrugged.  “Too much to do.  No time.”

Tim hesitated for a moment before taking the plunge.  “Because you’re also alive?”

Danny jumped, a hand lunging out to grab Tim’s leg so he didn’t fling himself into space.  His eyes were wide with a kind of animal panic Tim only saw on people who were cornered or on fear gas.  He very purposefully didn’t move, didn’t react, didn’t so much as blink.

Danny opened and closed his mouth a few times before his metaphorical hackles lowered and he heaved out a sigh, suddenly looking very tired.

“Can we just… not talk?”

Tim was endlessly curious and burning with questions.  Looking “Danny” and “Phantom” up had left him with more questions than answers, so many things that just didn’t make sense.  There was a strange information firewall around most of the town, making it look completely normal even to the batcomputer, but one blurry picture of Phantom had been missed that led Tim to believe that maybe the fantastical elements of this dream weren’t that fantastical after all.  Even this, just now, was enough to blow his mind.  Being dead and alive (and Daniel James Fenton was most assuredly alive according to the current records, with Phantom making an appearance as early as four years ago) seemed like an impossibility.

But then again, so did sharing dreams.

He slowly reached for Danny’s hand that hadn’t left his knee where the other boy had grabbed him, and gently held it in his own before looking back at space in silence.  He tried to figure out what section of the sky he was looking at, trying to find a constellation.

He woke up at six thirty two am.

His hand was cold.

Tucker checked his pager.  A ping had gone off and finally made its way through the GIW’s system to his.

He leaned over to Sam.  “Someone was looking up Amity again.”

She kept tapping her pen against the side of her desk, ignoring their teacher while staring the woman down.  “And?  Tourists exist.  Did they get any deeper than surface level?”

Tucker thumbed a few buttons and hummed.  “Gentle probe, it looks like.  Could just be a fast computer and still a civilian.”

She scoffed.  “Well, I’m sure the crazy scared them off.”

He blew out a sigh under his breath.  “Sam, I get that you’re agitated-”

“Danny is still fucking gone,” she hissed, “and it feels like no one has even noticed!”

“Remember,” he grumbled, “that’s a good thing?  Because if his parents figure out he’s missing and put in a police report then shit’s going to get bad really fast.”

The bell rang and they shot out of their seats, shoving blank notebooks into their bags.  Tucker looked back down at his pager to see if he could figure out where the possible-not-a-civilian was from when he ran into someone.

He looked up to see Valerie glaring, heavy bags under her eyes.  “Watch where you’re going,” she grumbled, “ugh, Ghost Boy being gone… is Danny still sick?”

Tucker nodded slowly.

“Not that you care,” Sam snapped, “don’t bother.”

Valerie rolled her eyes.  “Sorry, I’m just so used to seeing you three stooges together that it’s like you’re missing a limb.  Not that he contributed much.”

Tucker lunged out to catch Sam before she could attack the other girl, pulling her to their next class.

“You should have let me punch her,” Sam snarled, “she’s such a bitch!  She still tries to capture Phantom if she sees him!”

“Yeah, well, right now she’s pulling double duty,” Tucker sighed, “so maybe cut her some slack.”

“Danny’s lack of sleep never-” She cut herself off and her face twisted.  They walked in silence to their next class and spent the entire time staring listlessly again.

Tucker checked his PDA.  Their mystery searcher was somewhere on the middle northern east coast, but for some reason he couldn’t get any more accurate.  He hummed and put it away, setting himself a reminder to run it on his computer.

The ghost alarm went off and Sam grunted, checking her phone.  “Ember again.”

They watched dispassionately as the Red Huntress zoomed out of the school to handle the ghost threat, the fourth one in three days.  They were pissed and afraid, but neither Sam nor Tucker had gotten close enough to tell them where Danny was.

Still wrapped up in a dream world with no intention of waking up any time soon.

“You know, my family is starting to get concerned,” Tim remarked.

Danny raised an eyebrow.  “Why?”

“I don't actually sleep this much,” Tim wrinkled his nose, “and usually I drink copious amounts of caffeine to stay up for many days while I work on things.”

“That’s seems,” Danny snickered, “completely unhealthy.  I mean, don’t get me wrong, I practically used to live off of coffee too, but mostly because I couldn’t sleep, not that I simply didn’t.”

Tim scoffed.  “There was nothing simply about it.  I have so much to do that I can’t afford to sleep.  Work, extracurriculars, dealing with family, work again…”

Danny sighed.  “Oof, feel that.  Except I’m living two lives at once.  Or, well, not living one of them.”

Tim snorted.  “Yeah?  I thought the phrase was, “I’ll sleep when I’m dead.”  Are you telling me that’s not right?”

“Hell no, if anything the dead stuff is more work!  Though,” he smiled wryly, “I guess I am getting some sleep now.  Catching up on everything I missed.”

Tim hummed and looked around the school cafeteria.  People looked surprisingly cognizant of stuff, but they all either ignored Tim or acted like he’d been there the entire time.  Danny was back to looking pretty human.  A few seats away were his friends, Sam and Tucker.  They were having an animated conversation about carnivores and herbivores from the Cambrian Era, something that had been talked about in the science class before lunch.  The school almost felt real, but it was too normal and perfect for Tim to buy it, and the classes went by way too fast.

“So… the ghostly cafeteria worker?”

Danny grinned and waved at the glowing old lady.  “Lunch Lady.  First ghost I fought, really doesn’t like it if you mess with her menu.  Mother of Lunch Box.”

As if summoned (and for all Tim knew, she was), a little ghost popped their head out and held up a lunch box.  Lunch Lady smiled widely and plopped lunch inside, sending the kid giggling and off to a table where they ate with relish.

“Cute,” Tim remarked, “so ghosts are just out and about in your town?”

Danny’s expression flickered.  “Sure.  Most of the time they’re causing a little havoc, but not anything I can’t handle.  Fighting is a ghost’s way of bonding.  Besides, you saw, everyone knows I’m Phantom, and they don’t care.  Me and Valerie are the only ones who can deal with them and keep the destruction to a minimum that’s easily fixed.”

Something about his tone made Tim think that wasn’t true.  Oh, sure, it was here , in the dream, but Tim wasn’t a detective for nothing.  There was a very tiny crack in his voice when he’d said that everyone knew and they didn’t care.

“Ugh,” Sam said playfully, letting her voice carry, “any excuse for you to talk about your girlfriend, huh, Danny?”

Danny grinned, stretching his mouth in a way that felt a little plastic.  “I mean, if she knows I'm Phantom, she has no reason to break up with me for flaking or it being too dangerous.  Hell, she’s right there with me helping me send them back to the zone!”

Tim remained silent, even though of the two ghost fights he’d seen (Skulker and Kitty) he hadn’t seen this Valerie person once.  Sure, he usually only lingered in the dreams for a couple hours, but sometimes they could go the entire time without seeing another person, up until Danny seemed to realize how empty places were and populated them without a second thought.

A girl wandered over and plopped beside Danny, leaning her head on his shoulder.  “Ugh, Paulina is being a mega bitch again.  Do you mind if I spend the rest of lunch with you?”

Danny smiled widely again, looking at her with something troubled in his eyes.  “Course, Val.  You can sit with me whenever.”

She smiled at him and pressed a kiss to his cheek before closing her eyes and just leaning against him.  Tim looked over to see Tucker and Sam had been moved back to their seats right next to him.

“So Danny,” Tucker said, “heard back from the colleges yet?  It’s around that time of year.”

Danny’s smile had that plasticky quality to it again.  “Of course!  Caltech said yes, even offered me a scholarship.  It’ll be nice because it’s close to Jazz.”

Tim blinked.  “Who?”

“My sister,” Danny explained, “you might have heard her that time you were in my kitchen for some reason?  She likes experimenting with making fast food but homemade.  Her pizza’s pretty awesome, even if it is healthy.”

Tim frowned.  “But you just said you want to go to California to be close to her.”

Danny froze.  “R-Right, because she’s… in college.  Away.  I knew that.  Of course.”

“I can’t blame her,” Sam snorted, “your parents…”

“Are awesome,” Tucker said cheerfully, “I mean, man, I’m kinda jealous sometimes.  They make fighting ghosts so much easier with all their inventions!”

“Between them and Vlad,” Valerie snorted, “you shouldn’t even have to go ghost all that often.  You can relax and focus on the living world.”

“Yeah, screw Clockwork and the Observants,” Sam snickered, “you have your whole life ahead of you.”

Danny beamed.  “Sure do!”

Tim woke up and scrambled for his phone, opening his notes app.  He scrolled past the list of information he’d already gotten and opened the keyboard.

Vlad, he knew, was Vladimir Masters, an old college friend of his parents’.  Jazz, Jasmine Fenton, currently living in California and attending Stanford.  Clockwork and the Observants, sounded like a name and a title, ghost related.  Caltech, known for having almost a pipeline to NASA since they had the Jet Propulsion Lab.  Valerie, someone new who was either currently dating Danny or had done so previously.

Phantom, which no one apparently knew about in the real world.

He dragged his laptop over and opened the file, scrolling through the information he’d already gathered as hard evidence of stuff.  He clicked on the VPN and went back into the Amity Park internet.  Something about hearing about the inventions had reminded him of the website he’d briefly looked at, so he went and found it again.

Fentonworks, the same name as the building that was Danny’s house.  The website was garish, immediately making him say, “graphic design is my passion” in a deadpan voice, with differing fonts and clashing colors that made it hard to read without getting a headache.  It advertised both research and inventions by Drs. Jack and Maddie Fenton, and the inventions looked like they were mostly weapons that had… was that a toaster?  Had they turned household objects into weapons of ghostly destruction?  He clicked over to the research tab and saw a list of links to published papers, sorted newest to oldest.  The most recent one had “Phantom” in the title, so he clicked it, ignoring the sense of dread this entire website was giving him.

He skimmed the first paragraph of the intro before clicking off and taking a deep breath.

He went back to his notes app and starred “no one knows danny = phantom”.  There was no way.  Not with his parents saying those things about the ghost in question, or ghosts in general.

He dug into the Casper High page to find Valerie Grey.  She’d moved there at the beginning of high school, and according to the yearbooks, didn’t really run in the same circles at all.  There was one picture in their freshman yearbook where she’d been near Danny, but that was it.  Otherwise, she hung out with the named Paulina and their friend group, which hadn’t changed since freshman year.  Danny was only near Sam and Tucker.

His screen flickered and he raised an eyebrow before the command window popped up.

>You’re surprisingly well defended, my good intruder

He hesitated for a moment, pressing a few buttons to ensure his programs were still running, before replying.  This was as far as his hacker had gotten.

< I think you’re the intruder in this case.  Don’t you know it’s rude to hack into someone’s computer?

>Don’t you think it’s worse to go diving into highschool databases?
>talk about creepy

< I’m investigating something in your town

>my town?  Who says it's mine?  I just run the encryption

< the second layer, you mean

>oh, you noticed!
>I suppose you would, tho, with a defense this sweet

< flattery will get you nowhere

>booo
>are you going to tell me what you’re looking for?
>diving in here is dangerous, you know
>you could get the wrong kind of attention

< oh?  From who?

>govt

< ah, the first wall

>no but I’m being serious, they’ll lock you away forever
>if they don’t just kill you

< that’s seven different kinds of illegal

>not for them its not
>loopholes >:(

< ??? how the hell would a loophole mean that a government org can straight up assassinate you for looking into this one town in illinois???

>answer me first
>who are you and why are you looking into amity

< i met someone from there

>and?
>wait, who the hell did you meet and how?

The program he was running in the background went off.  First piece of information extracted.  A username, FriarTuck.  He blinked.

< wait, are you tucker?

>AILDSUHKJ
>WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU

< well that means yes
< is danny just constantly asleep?

His programs beeped at him as the hacker started to break down his firewalls, so he clicked back on the command prompt quickly

< wait, calm down, I’m trying to help!
< I just keep dreaming
< or, no
< I join his dreams, I’m pretty sure
< my name is tim

The hacking attempts stopped.

>...
>wdym you’re in his dreams

< ?
< just that?
< I mean, we’ve both acknowledged at least once that we’re both asleep
< even if sometimes he seems more than happy to just pretend its real after
< but info doesn’t add up

>...like what

< his sister is home
< he has a girlfriend that as far as I can tell isn’t even friends with him
< everyone knows who he is and doesn’t care
< his parents seem fine with ghosts as well

>oh ancients
>please tell me paulina isn't his girlfriend, my mans has GOT to have higher standards than that

< valerie

>marginally better since they did actually date
>wait, back up
>what do you mean everyone knows who he is

< well if you don't know then I’m not going to tell you

>everyone in his dream knows he’s phantom?

< …yeah

>oh danny
>okay we need to do this over phone, can i give you a phone number to call
>since you refuse to give me any of your information
>i'm starting to think you might be oracle, holy shit
>you’re legally obligated to tell me if you’re oracle, i'm a huge fan/rival

< first of all no I'm not
< second of all, no, I’m not

>you infuriate and excite me
> XX-XXX-XXX-XXXX

< why did you add an extension when I already know where you live

>no it’s important, the call won’t go thru undetected otherwise

Tim made sure his phone was masked before typing in the numbers and pressing call.

“Man,” Tucker said as he picked up, “you’re really going whole hog on this anonymity thing, huh?”

“Tucker, now is not the time to make jokes!”

“Yeesh, sorry, sorry!”

“If it makes you feel better Sam,” Tim said mildly, “I might eventually turn it off if I think I can trust you.”

She scoffed.  “Trust us?!   What about trusting you?!  Tell us what you know!”

He rolled his eyes.  “Danny’s asleep.  Or, at least, he’s always dreaming when I sleep, which is at odd hours.  It is very clearly a dream, but he doesn’t seem to want to acknowledge or leave it.”

“Yeah, we know,” Tucker sounded solemn, “look, so… how much do you know about ghosts?  Not from the internet, I mean.”

“I know they fight as bonding, can apparently have children, and that Danny is both living and dead.  Other than that, he doesn’t like it if I bring it up.  I suppose I also know some basic abilities of ghosts.”

Tucker sighed again.  “Okay, so since you’re a random dude, albeit a tech whiz one, this might sound a little wack, but bear with me.  In general, there are two types of ghosts.  People who have died with a lot of emotion or unfinished business around enough ectoplasm, also known as the Dead, and the neverborn, or your naturally forming ghosts that were, well, never born, thus never alive, also sometimes called the Deathless.  Technically a ghost kid that’s formed from two ghosts counts as this too, even if they were “born” by regular standards.  Anyway, in that category is a subcategory of ghosts who have been around so long we call them Ancients.  Ancients usually have a gimmick that basically makes them kind of like gods.  There’s one particular Ancient by the name of Nocturn who calls himself the lord of dreams.  A few years ago, we fought him and kicked his ass, so he couldn’t put us to sleep and trap us in dreams.”

Tim hummed.  “Danny is trapped in a dream by Nocturn, then?  It sounds like you managed to break out of that before, so what’s the issue now?”

The other two were silent for a moment.

“Nocturn said that Danny asked to be put to sleep,” Sam said softly, barely being picked up by the mic, “and tried to make it so that no one could follow him into his dreams to try and convince him to wake up.”

“But clearly that’s not the case,” Tucker said rapidly, “since apparently you can get in!  Care to share with the class how you did it?”

Tim pursed his lips.  “I don’t know.  I hadn’t slept in a while, and then the first time I did, I dreamt I was in Amity.  Walked into a swell place called the Nasty Burger and then got forcefully woken up when Danny didn’t recognize me and freaked out.”

“Hang on,” Sam said suspiciously, “how long is a while?”

“Ten days.”

They were dead silent for a moment.

“Holy shit dude,” Tucker breathed, “you’re insane.  That’d do it, then.  You weren’t ever in Nocturn’s domain when he was setting up the barrier between Danny and everyone else.”

“Which doesn’t help us,” Sam said bitterly, “because we’ve already been kept out.”

“Maybe not, but it does mean we have an inside man!  All we need is for Tim to convince Danny that he wants to wake up, and we’re good!”

“He’s a completely random dude with some hacking skills!  Who knows if he’s going to sell us out to the GIW!”

“Would that be the government body that’s going to find and disappear me?”

There was silence for a moment before Tucker chuckled nervously.  “Maybe?  DON’T look them up, though!”

Tim, already halfway into doing that, raised an eyebrow.  “…Why?”

“Because then you’ll disappear,” he could almost hear Sam’s eye roll, “and then Danny will sleep forever.”

“Hi quick question, so sorry to cut in,” Tucker’s voice was higher pitched for some reason, “when you said your name was Tim, did you mean like, Timothy Drake-Wayne, Tim?”

Tim checked his program.  “Why didn’t I detect your intrusion?”

“Hoooooly shit, okay, that means yes, right?  Man I’m glad I busted out the ghost virus.  Okay, well, suddenly your security makes a lot more sense.  Still sure you’re not Oracle?”

“Wait, Tim Drake?  Socialite rich boy Tim Drake?  That’s who we have to work with?  Ugh! …I mean, I guess he is one of the more tolerable of the brood…”

Tim snorted.  “Thanks, I think you’re tolerable too.  I still hold our gala memories close to my heart.  The New Years one three years ago most of all.”

“Ugh don’t remind me,” her voice sounded a little warmer than it did before, “I don’t want to have to think about those people ever again.”

“What was it you said about Mrs. Hailey?  She had half a swan on her head?”

“That wig was a crime against humanity and I stand by what I said.  Besides, you’re the one who said Mr. Everett was giving birth to a baby hippopotamus.”

“He had a very specific abdominal bulge that just… reminded me of baby hippos.”

“While it's nice that you no longer hate each other,” Tucker cut in, “can we maybe try to make a game plan?  As neglectful as the Fentons are, eventually someone is going to notice that Danny is gone and not actually sick or at one of our houses.  Besides, Red can’t keep up if the ghosts keep getting restless.”

Tim frowned.  “What’s happening in Amity?”  And who was Red, since they weren’t talking about him?

“Ancients, what isn’t, it feels like.  Once word spread in the GZ that Danny was out for the count, his rogues have been popping out of the woodworks to pick fights.  Some of them because they feel like they don’t have any opposition, but some of them because they’re hoping threatening his haunt will bring him back.  Sam and I have given up fighting back unless the GIW are in town or the Fentons get too close, because as annoying as these guys are, Danny would never forgive us if we let them get captured.  Red Huntress is our backup hero, and she tolerates ghosts enough to send them back to the Zone instead of turning them in, so there’s no point in us making ourselves targets.”

“If you don’t want me to look anything up, you do realize you’re going to have to explain things, right?”

Sam sighed.  “Right.  The GIW are the Ghost Investigation Ward, or the Guys in White, since they wear nothing but.  They’re the branch of the government that has sanctions to find and experiment upon or eliminate any ectoplasmic entity, which by their rules technically means most of the town at this point.  They don’t bother with us because they’re calculated the baseline readings for humans, but if it produces, consumes, or consists of ectoplasm, it’s fair game.”

“That definitely violates the Meta Protection Acts,” Tim frowned, “and if just being around ghosts is enough…”

“Or those who’ve died and come back, rare though that is,” Sam said dryly, “but they hate ghosts almost more than the Fentons do, and that’s saying something.  Danny’s safe, but everyone else isn’t.  And if Phantom doesn’t make some kind of appearance, eventually they’re going to run us over and start tearing this place to bits.  I’m not saying he’s the only one stopping them, but he’s a pretty big deterrent.”

“Plus,” Tucker said quietly, “we just want our friend back.  We don’t know what went wrong.”

“…Why doesn’t anyone know about their sanctions?  Surely the Justice League wouldn’t stand for this clear violation of rights.”

They both scoffed. “First of all,” Tucker started, “the Anti-Ecto Acts were buried in between a bunch of other boring and innocuous laws that did very little, so most people missed them entirely.  Second of all, literally when has the Justice League ever bothered with anything related to Amity Park?  Fucking never.  We got pulled into another fucking dimension and never once saw hide nor hair of another hero.  Haven’t you heard, ghosts aren’t real!”

“We’ve tried putting in tips,” Sam grumbled, “but we’ve never heard back.  It’s possible that the GIW was blocking contact, but you’d still think they would have noticed when a city disappeared for a few days.”

Tim opened and closed his mouth a few times.  He’d look into that later.  “Huh.  Well.  So the goal is just to convince Danny to wake up?”

“He can break out of Nocturn’s hold on his own,” Sam confirmed, “he just has to want to.”

“I can't believe Danny got to meet Tim Drake-Wayne before I could,” Tucker groaned, “he doesn’t even know how cool that is!”

“Okay Tuck, cool the fanboy jets.”

“Sam, he’s the youngest CEO ever, and he practically heads WE’s R&D team!”

“I wouldn’t go that far.”

“And he’s talking to me!  On my PDA!”

“On your what.”

“Call back later if you have news,” Sam insisted, “and stop looking things up.  The GIW aren’t amazing at tech, but they’re no slouches either, and the longer you’re pinging our system, the longer you’re pinging theirs.”

They hung up and Tim stared at his phone before carefully exiting out of the Amity sites and scrubbing his presence from that part of the internet before turning off the VPN.

“Those who’ve died and come back to life,” was Sam’s wording.  Ghosts and Danny, yes.

But also half of Tim’s family.

He pulled up messages with Babs.

Hey

So you let someone hack you, huh?
Didn’t look like you tried very hard to keep him out after a while

In my defense he was busy rearranging my world view and adding context to my dreams

Ah yes, the reasons you’ve been sleeping like a normal human, aside from patrols, and avoiding coffee
You know, I was asked to make sure you weren’t bodysnatched because of that one
Danger, will robinson
So?

He asked if i was you actually
Do you recognize the username FriarTuck?

Oh you met the pharaoh!
Why was he hacking you?

Apparently i was looking into things i shouldnt

About your dreams
And the man of them?

Cna you guys stop making that joke
I am genuinely dreaming about an actual real human because he is also asleep
In a way that is not normal

So you got confirmation then

Yeah, he’s been out of commission since before i had my big crash
It’s causing problems because he’s something of a local hero, and practiclaly the only one
Which relates to why I was messaging you

Shoot

I need you to search up, in a way that cannot be detected, the Anti-Ecto Acts and the Ghost Investigation Ward
Apparently if you start digging and they discover you, you get disappeared

Can’t imagine that would happen to one of us
Something to do with ghosts, then?

By their classifications, Jason, Damian, Cass, and maybe even Bruce would be targets

…
Tim these are illegal

*i know*

How the hell did we miss this

Buried laws
You found them fast, though

Ofc
What does this have to do with your dream boy

…w/e
He lives in amity park and he’s sometimes a ghost
No i don't know how that works either
He’s in charge of keeping the other ghosts in check
But now he on purpose went to take an extended nap and is dreaming about a “perfect” world
Sometimes he doesn't even want to acknowledge that its a dream
Things are spiraling on both ends

And the GIW is moving in on his territory?

Yeah
Whole town is at risk

I’ll push this to the JL and work on keeping the GIW out of AP
Why haven’t we heard of this before?

Far as they can tell, either their calls are blocked, or the JL just never responded

Yikes

yeah

Ok
Okay i can handle this
You work on getting your boy up
We’ll keep his town safe

He’s not
Never mind
I’ll do my best
At some point this whole “mainitnaing a sleep schedule” thing is going to obliterate me i just know it

She stopped replying after reacting to that message with a crying laughing face and he huffed, thumbing back to his notes app.  Between that and the file he was building, still open on his laptop, he had several things he needed to add, more pieces of the puzzle he could try to connect.  At this point, his goal wasn’t to figure out who Danny was, or what or where or anything like that.

Now what he needed was the why.

“So tell me about ghosts.”

It was another trip to space when Tim decided he could bring it up again.  It was pretty rare that Danny would decide to forego social interaction, in a dream or no, and Tim would wake up in the endless expanse, but it had happened once more before this one, and Tim had only been doing this for eight days.  He knew that if he pushed too hard on anything, Dnany would just wake him up and he’d lose progress.  Tim couldn’t really afford that.

Danny looked away from the sparkling void (it seemed different every time, but still undeniably space) and raised a single white eyebrow.  “What about them?”

Tim shrugged and “leaned” back, stretching out to look at the sky instead of the other boy.  “Anything.  I don’t know much, after all.  Tell me all the things people get wrong, maybe.”

Danny huffed.  “What don’t they get wrong.  Well, we can feel pain, for one.”

It was said so sarcastically that it took everything in Tim to not ask questions.  After a few moments he untensed, trying to look as lackadaisical as possible.  “Sure.  I mean, you’re physical enough.”

“When I want to be,” he snorted, “but you do know that ghosts can go intangible, right?”

“I think I’ve seen enough to notice that you can also go invisible and launch green energy.  You, in particular, have some ice powers too that others don’t.  Is that your gimmick?  The cold void of space?”

Danny hummed.  “I guess.  I have an ice core, which most ghosts outside of the Far Frozen don’t.”

“There are options?”

He huffed out a laugh.  “Sure.  Not ones you pick, I mean, but you can have so many different ones.  Fire, shadow, plants, water, music, mind…”

“And ice.”

“Obviously and ice , come on Tim, don’t repeat stuff we both already know.”

He snorted.  “Fine.  So a core is a metaphysical concept that gives you a sort of special powerset other than the standard ghost ones that make you more unique?”

Danny sputtered.  “Metaphysical?  Try actually physical!  It’s called a core, it’s the essence of our beings!  It’s… it’s our organs, our brain, our heart.  It’s what drives us.  If we don’t…”

He trailed off and Tim desperately tried to make new constellations while the other boy gathered his thoughts instead of prying for more.  This was hands down the worst part of being a detective.

“Ember’s a really great example,” he said suddenly, loudly, “her obsession, the reason she came back to life, is fame, essentially.  So to keep herself healthy and sane, every time she breaks out she tries to have a concert.  Her music is actually pretty good if you can get past the mind control.  All ghosts have an obsession or two, things that make them tick.  They get more powerful the more they fulfill their obsession, and they can practically live off of it.  Or, well, not live, but you know what I mean.”

“Course.  Lunch Lady’s is keeping the menu the same?”

“Right!  They attack most often when their obsession is either being threatened or on behalf of their obsession.”

Tim blinked.  “Skulker is obsessed with hunting?”

Danny snorted.  “Oh is he ever.  I’m about 98% convinced he was the inspiration for the story, “The Most Dangerous Game” because sheesh, he has the same vibes, you know?”

“Only 98?” Tim snickered under his breath.  “I’ve barely seen the guy and I’m completely convinced.”

Danny laughed, bright and free.  “Yeah.  And that, obsessions, is something most people don’t know about.  I mean, sure, I have to kick all the ghosts back to the zone when they keep causing messes, but it’s not always their fault.  And I’m convinced that none of them actually know how strong regular living people are.  Or how fragile, I mean.  Not great, but that’s why I’m there.”

‘But you’re not,’ was on the tip of Tim’s tongue, but he bit down the urge to say it.  Instead, he tried to pick something more innocent.

“So what’s your obsession, if you don’t mind me asking?  Space?”

He turned to look at Danny after a period of silence and saw that he looked human again.  Something was shattered in his blue eyes, making them look like broken glass, and his smile was brittle and wobbly.  Still, his voice came out clear and cheerful.

“Yeah!  Space!”

The next time Tim saw Danny, he was being slammed into a locker.

“Watch where you’re going, Fenturd,” the football player (based on the jacket and jersey, at least) said meanly, strutting past with a mean laugh, “wouldn’t want anyone getting hurt!”

“So,” Tim drawled, “you dream about… being bullied?”

Danny whirled around.  “Tim!  Ugh, ignore him, that’s Dash.  He’s been pushing me around since like, elementary school.  I’m used to it, it’s normal.”

Tim took a moment to inspect him.  Something about his posture was… off.  Where before, Danny had largely been pretty carefree and relaxed, there was tension there now, something in his slouch.  It was possible that Danny was just acting like he usually did when he was bullied, presumably in real life, but…

“Have you tried reporting it to a teacher?”

Danny scoffed, but grinned.  “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I have a problem with authority.  Besides, he’s a football player, they’re not going to touch him, not for me.  I’m practically a highschool dropout.”

“Who’s going to Caltech?”

His eyes flickered.  “Right!  Lancer helped me get my grades up, and Tucker hacked away the bad record, since it wasn’t my fault anyway.  I just… missed a lot because of ghost attacks.”

Tim hummed.  “Do we have class?”

Danny leapt onto the topic change like a lifeline.  “Nope, lunch time!  Come on, Sam and Tucker will have started without us!”

Tim let himself get dragged along by the hand.  Like always, the hallway seemed to be only a few steps away from the cafeteria, or wherever they needed to go, and it was bustling with activity, including, he spotted, Dash.  Who had gone in the other direction than they had gone.  (He had given up on pointing out small inconsistencies like that, unless it was something Danny said that directly contradicted things, but he couldn’t stop himself from mentally categorizing the holes.)

He let the conversation wash over him, interjecting with basic things when needed.  Danny was basking in the easy camaraderie of the group of four, and the broken edges had been smoothed.

Tim almost hated to ruin it.

“Do you miss them?”

Danny blinked.  “Miss who?”

“Definitely Valerie,” Tucker snickered, “every minute away from her is torture, ain’t that right, Danny?”

Danny blinked before frowning.  “No, I’m okay.  Tim, was that all?  We’re in different circles, I don’t see her much.  It’s not like we’re dating!”

He decided to drop it at how Danny’s mouth had twitched in almost panic.  But he didn’t drop his first question.

“No, I mean, do you miss the real Sam and Tucker?”

The dream versions didn’t respond, but Danny gaped and then swallowed.

“What do you mean,” he whispered, “they’re… they’re just like this.  They’re happy.  Happi er . That’s all I could ever want.”

Tim idly plucked the tongs on his fork.  “But they’re not perfect.”

Danny was starting to get agitated.  “Yes, they are.  They’re just as I remember them.  Perfect recreations.”

“Not true,” Tim said with a slightly mocking smile.  “I mean.  I told Tucker I was Timothy Drake-Wayne.  You were there and everything.  Hell, even Sam would have reacted to that one.”

“What are you talking about?”

His vision was starting to fuzz.  He waved a hand.  “Nah, never mind.  So did you and Valerie break up?”

The static receded and Danny relaxed, letting the plastic smile come back.  “Yeah, amicable split.  College coming up and all.  We’re still friends, though.”

Tim nodded.  “I’m still friends with several of my exes.  One of them is actually dating my sister now.”

Danny’s mouth dropped.  “Are you for real?!”

“To be fair, Cass is definitely the infinitely better pick.”

Danny burst into giggles and Tim’s heart twinged.  It had been two weeks.  This had to stop soon.

“Tell me the worst ghost fight you ever had.”

Danny eyed him speculatively.  They were in his room playing Doomed.  Tim was honestly impressed that Danny remembered enough about the game that he could accurately dream about it (as far as Tim could tell, having never played it before) and yet still lose.

“Why do you want to know?”

Tim shrugged.  “You’ve told me about all the rogues that are now your friends.  But there have to be ones that aren’t, right?  Ones that aren’t Vlad, I mean.”

Danny was still frowning, but was now looking at the game and more thoughtful than anything.

“I guess… there was that one time we were pulled into the Ghost Zone.”

Tim latched onto that like a dying fish to water.  He hadn’t been able to pry that story out of Tucker in their limited interactions, but with Babs and the Justice League working on covertly repealing the anti-ecto acts and cracking down on the GIW, it had been put on the backburner.

“I’m sorry, you got pulled into another dimension?”

Danny laughed mirthlessly.  “Yep.  Whole town.  The old Ghost King, Pariah Dark, got woken from the Coffin of Foreversleep.  He was a tyrant, and with the Ring of Rage and the Crown of Fire, it took everything I had to beat him and stop Amity Park from being a new set of floating islands in the Infinite Realms.”

Tim whistled.  “How’d he get out?  It sounds like if you’re asleep forever… did he just have to want to wake up?”

Danny paused.  “It wasn’t like Nocturn’s powers,” he said slowly, “it was an artifact.  You know, now that I think about it, I bet Nocturn and Clockwork are the ones who made that artifact.  Seems like their style.  But no, Vlad wanted to become king of the Zone, which meant he needed the ring and the crown, which meant he needed to win them from Pariah Dark.  Except Vlad’s a coward and also Pariah was literally the strongest ghost.  I mean, that’s how you become king, you have to beat the previous one to prove you’re stronger. Plus a couple of extra requirements, but eh, you know.”

Tim raised an eyebrow, but didn’t look away from Doomed.  “So how’d you win, if Vlad can still kick your ass sometimes?”

Danny huffed.  “Knew I shouldn’t have told you that.  Uh, I stole one of my parents’ inventions.  It was basically a power suit, an exoskeleton that made me a hundred times stronger.  Nearly wiped me out, but I beat him and sent that sucker back to sleep.”

He hesitated.  “Wait, you… beat the king?  You proved you were stronger?”

Danny froze and his character took a heavy blow.  The sound effect shook him out of it.  “Yeah.  But I have my whole life ahead of me, and besides, Clockwork and the Observants manage well enough.  Clockwork is literally the Ancient of Time, and the Observants are… you know, I’m not sure if they work for him or if it’s the other way ‘round, or what.  But they’re floating eyeballs and they suck major dicks.  They wanted me in ghost prison forever because there was a timeline where I went evil.  Now that I think about it, I think they do work for Clockwork, because he was the one that stopped them from ganking me.  Did have to fight an evil future version of me though.”

“Mood,” he muttered under his breath, jabbing the buttons harshly.  “So you’re not about to take up the crown?”

“Hell no,” Danny said harshly, “they really, really don’t need me.  They say they do, that it’s my duty, that they’re not just giving me busywork, but it feels like, what’s the point?  Everything’s preordained, according to Clockwork.  He knows how things are going to happen, and they’ve lived without a king for millennia when Pariah was taking his perma-nap!  They don’t need me, they just want to ruin my LIFE SOME MORE!”

Tim blinked up at his ceiling.  It was always strange when Danny flickered not to his ghost form, no, that looked normal, but when he swelled and filled with darkness and pinpricks of light and clouds of stardust, all long shadows and teeth and claws of night and glowing bright green eyes that blazed like small suns.  It hadn’t happened often since that first time, but in that moment he looked like something inhuman and powerful that could snuff out Tim’s life like a candle.  It made him believe that the boy could take on what was essentially a god king and win, suit or no.

But most was how in that brief half second before it overwhelmed Tim and woke him up he could see something most curious, floating above what could possibly still be considered Danny’s head.

Flickering in and out of existence, like it couldn’t make up its mind on whether or not it was real, was a crown.

“Welp,” he stood up from the table, “I’m going to bed-”

He was cut off by an alarm pinging all of their phones and he pulled it out with dread.  Bruce looked at his family with a grim face.

“Arkham mass breakout,” he said sternly, “all hands on deck.”

Tim jumped when Alfred appeared at his elbow with a mug.  It took him a moment to place the delicious smell before his heart picked up speed in anticipation, even after almost three weeks.

He took the coffee from the butler and ignored how his heart sank a bit in his chest, swallowing the mouthfuls of the taste he knew so well.  It almost seemed foreign and unwelcome.

Cass met his eyes with a bit of a shrug.

“No sleeping,” she said simply.

He let out a breath.  “Yeah.  No sleeping for a while.  Back to old patterns, huh?”

“Where were you?”

Tim blinked.  He’d just arrived.  They were in the park where sometimes Sam did photography, like she didn’t in the real world.  “I haven’t been sleeping.”

Danny’s glare never faltered.  “Why not?!”

Tim almost said “because I have a life outside of this,” or “because I’ve been neglecting the real world,” or “because there are more important things than you,” but he managed to bite them back.  There was no way that’d be received well.  He pondered for another half of a moment before settling on something that should appeal to Danny’s actual obsession.

“People needed me.”

“I needed you!”

Tim snorted.  He couldn’t help it.  “No you don’t.”

Danny’s scowl got darker, eyes sharper.  “What would you know about what I need?!”

“That’s the point of this, right?”  Tim waved his hand around them.  “This whole dream world of yours.  It’s meant to be everything you could ever want, everything you could ever need.   So why on earth would you need me to be in it?  Me being here is a mistake, remember?”

Danny faltered, glare falling to confusion and… was that fear?  Tim pressed on.

“If you really missed me that bad, you should have just imported the made up one,” he sneered, “they’re just as good, right?  Just as accurate?  You don’t need me.   You can make me at any time.”

“It’s not-”  Danny bit his lip, cutting himself off.

Tim smirked cruelly.  He was so close.  “Not…?  Not the same?  That’s strange.  Weren’t you the one to tell me that everyone was just as you remembered?  Perfect recreations.  The beauty of the dream.  Were you wrong?”

“No!”

“Of course you were,” Tim scoffed, “memory and actual reality differ all the time.  No matter how well you think you know someone, you can never perfectly recreate them, especially not in a dream, and to think you can is delusional.”

“Shut up,” Danny hissed, “you don’t know them.”

“I do,” Tim grinned, “because it turns out, when you start dreaming of someone you’ve never met who seems to always be asleep, you start to look into things!  They’re pretty upset, you know?  Their best friend and town protector has been missing for almost a full month!  People are starting to catch on, Daniel James Fenton!”

“Shut up,” Danny was gritting his teeth, “you’re wrong!  This… this is real!”

“It’s not,” his voice softened and he stepped closer, “and you know it’s not.  If I hadn’t gotten in contact with Sam and Tucker, the GIW would have overrun the town by now.  I wouldn’t have known. You would have nothing to come back to, all because you didn’t want to accept what was already true.”

“And what,” the word fit into a mouth of too sharp teeth jaggedly, “is already true?  That I'm hunted?  A freak?   That I ruin everything I touch?!”

Tim stepped forward and held out a hand.  Danny faltered, collapsing back into himself slightly.  He almost looked normal.

“What are you doing?”  He sounded small.

“Do you want me to be there?”

Ice colored eyes blinked at him, glacier slow.  “Where?”

“When you wake up.”

Danny recoiled from where he had almost grabbed Tim.  “I don’t want to,” his voice was hoarse, “I don’t…”

Tim cocked his head.  “But then how will you convince Sam to try photography again?  How will you see Tucker’s newest app?  How will you go to college?  Graduate highschool?  Tell your parents that you’re king?”

“I’m not.   I didn’t… I didn’t go to the coronation.”

He snorted.  “Tell the crown that.”

He shook his head, not looking up.  “No.  And I… I can’t graduate, I’m failing every class, my attendance is shit, I-”

“Can explain to Lancer,” he nodded, “have Tucker fix the records… Most of what you have here, you can have there, I promise.  And if all else fails, I’ll ship you to Gotham.”

Danny’s eyes were human blue again.  “Gotham?  Why?”

Tim snickered.  “That’s where I live.  Timothy Drake-Wayne?   Come on Danny, don’t repeat stuff we both already know.  Tucker freaked out when he figured it out, and Sam called me one of the more tolerable of the brood, which is an insane compliment from her.  I kind of do want to just show up in Amity, see how long it takes the four of us to destroy things.  I feel like we’re a dangerous combination.”

Danny mouthed, “four of us.”

“But,” Tim took a risk and reached the last few inches to grab Danny’s hand, “that does mean you have to wake up.”

“I don’t know if I can.”

“You, Danny, are partially dead, yes, which means you can do dead people things like apparently become a king they don’t really need.  But,” he smiled, “you’re also alive, and I promise you, life is still worth living.  I don’t care how long it takes for me to prove it.”

Danny hesitated for another moment before swallowing.  “You’re not… busy?  Like recently?”

Tim shook his head.  “I have a secret for you when you wake up.  Promise it’ll blow your mind.  We fixed the issue, though.  Took us five whole days, but we did it.  I’m totally free.  Give me, uh… four hours, if you can tell time in here, and I promise I’ll be right there.”

“You know I’m literally in the Ghost Zone, right?”

“The one place you never had us visit,” he sighed in mock exasperation, “I think I’m due to look around, huh?”

Tim took in his vulnerable expression, the fear and hope at war with each other on the other teenager’s face and took the plunge, wrapping his arms around him.  It felt like… nothing.

“I promise,” he whispered, “I’ll be there when you wake up.”

He rolled out of bed and immediately pinged the family group chat that he was going to Amity Park.  He ignored Dick’s flurry of texts about how little he’d slept, but Tim’s eyebags had never been better.  He packed an overnight bag and grabbed the lunch Alfred handed him for the jet ride over.

Danny sat in the empty void of space.

He didn’t have a way to tell how much time was passing, not really.  He used to measure by when Tim would show up, since the chunks of time in between seemed pretty consistent, but timekeeping devices didn’t work in the dream, it could have been reality if only you’d chosen to stay so he just.  Sat there.  Hoping beyond hope that maybe he’d just… know.  He looked at his painted skies and mindlessly reached up.

He felt the cold metal and the impression of icy flames.  When he pulled his hand down, there was a ring on it.

“I don’t want to be king,” his voice croaked into the emptiness, “I have my whole life ahead of me.”

The void did not respond.

“I’m not going to be good at it.  I… I’m not even all the way dead!  I only beat him with help, that’s not…”

He imagined what Clockwork would say.  “Daniel, you must.  According to our laws, you have won the approval of the Realm itself.  You are to be king.”  What a load of bull.  They didn’t need him.

Other people needed him.

Living people.

He opened his eyes and the colorful clouds of stardust were replaced with green and the deep blue of Nocturn’s domain.  A head poked over and he reflexively smiled back.

“Perfect timing,” Tim said, “we just got here.”

Danny lunged forward and wrapped around Tim.  Even in the Ghost Zone, it felt so warm and real.

“I told you I’d be here,” he whispered in Danny’s ear, “now come on, watch Tucker try to vibrate out of his skin, it’s really funny.”

“He must attend his coronation,” Clockwork said and Danny groaned, burying his face in Tim’s shoulder.

“I disagree,” Tim said cheerfully, “you spent eons without a king, just because you have one now doesn’t mean you can uproot his life.  He’s got stuff to do.  You’re Clockwork, right, Ancient of Time?”

There was silence for a moment.  “Welcome back, Daniel,” the ghost said kindly, “I am gladdened you found what you were searching for.”

Danny couldn’t help but lift his head, seeing the blue light of the flames from the crown bounce off of things.  Tucker and Sam were vibrating, it was pretty funny, and Sam looked ready to murder Clockwork.

“Found what?”

The ghost shifted into his baby form.  “How to live.”  He disappeared as if he was never there and Nocturn was suddenly clucking over them.

“How is it,” he said grumpily at Tim, who seemed pretty nonplussed about this whole thing, “that you slipped past my barriers?”

“Sleep is for the weak.”

Danny snorted.  “More like sleeping four weeks.  Get it?  Because I was asleep for four weeks?”

Sam and Tucker tackled them, making the whole group of four flop back onto the bed with a burst of laughter.

“Come on,” he said, a little breathless, “I have to introduce Tim to Amity Park.  For real this time.”

“Any excuse to hang out with your dream boy,” Sam taunted, “huh?”

“Oh no,” Tim groaned, “not you too.”

Danny couldn’t help but burrow into the pile a bit more.  He could smell things, feel things…

Maybe he had found what he was searching for.