Chapter Text
"Tch, smart. You've gotten a lot stronger now haven't you."
"More than you know." Dan smirked, eyeing Danny up and down again, a hand perched on his hip as he smirked. "Mhh, you really have grown up. I'm curious to see what else you can do. How many of my powers you've developed."
"They aren't your powers. Nothing is yours. You exist out of time. My family is my family, not yours. And my friends are mine. What used to be your past never happened, and it never will." the teen spoke harshly, scrutiny in his voice as his eyes glowered at the ghost before him.
"And I will never be you."
Dan only chuckled, his smile never leaving, unnerving Danny— though he would never show it. As he watched the man approach him slowly, his body moved defensively as he backed away just as slow. He almost jumped ten feet in the air when his back hit the kitchen counter on the other side, looking behind him for just a moment and immediately regretting it.
Dan's hands were quick to slam onto the flat surface, trapping the half-ghost. Of course he could /try/ to turn intangible, but the likelihood of Dan stopping him was way too great for him to try something like that.
"Never? Why? Because you promised them? Awwwh, how sweet." he patronised, going to prod the halfa's cheek, Danny moving his face away in defiance. "You must remember that your ghost half is still malevolent, correct?" he mused.
Danny shifted uncomfortably, wanting to squirm as far away as he possibly could from the ghost. Still, that wasn't exactly very far while being trapped. But he'd managed to fly his family to a safe place before he gained the power back from his clones, and that was the important thing.
Dan looked at him, seemingly waiting for an answer before continuing. "Okay, you obviously don't get it. Let me put it this way. Do you think Vlad was always so evil? You probably don't notice it now, but your ghost half has a very big influence on you. Eventually, you'll start doing things you wouldn't normally do, get angry more easily. Haven't you ever wondered why your temper is so much worse in your ghost form." he said this slowly, as if Danny needed the whole thing spelled out for him.
But it already infuriated him to hear the words that came out of Dan's mouth. "What. Do you think I really don't know that? Last time you saw me I just started getting the hang of my powers. I may be bad in school, you and I both know that painfully too well, but I'm not an idiot." he snapped, looking away when he mentioned school. Cheating on the CAT was the whole reason that Dan existed. Danny thought he was so dumb, he was desperate to get out from under his sister's shadow. But now it seemed like she was living in his now that he was outed as the town's superhero.
Irony at it's best.
"I hear Phantom talking to me. Coaxing me to do things I wouldn't usually do. The worst part is, is that he sounds way too much like you sound now. But I won't give in. I haven't given in yet." he admitted, but his voice was still strong. Despite that, Dan still thought it to be the voice of a rebelling teenager.
"Boohoo, mister superhero won't back down. Let's just see how well that goes after a few more years. I don't even have to do anything. Just kick back and watch you slowly turn into what you're meant to be. Sure, it'll take a little longer. But my point is, is that I'm still inevitable."
Danny was tired of this. He didn't want to feel trapped anymore, he didn't want to feel threatened. "Stop patronising me."
"Ooh, scary. An angry teenager is glaring at me."
"What did I just say?"
"It doesn't matter what you say, Daniel. You can't do anything to me. You and I both know I'll trump you no matter what you do. It's why you keep babbling like this. You're nervous, scared, so you're trying to stall by talking." He retorted, moving closer to Danny and making the teen press painfully into the corner of the counter. "You seem to forget that I've been through what you've been through. I still remember how I used to react to things. How you cope with things. And don't spout off with how 'I'm not you' because even if I'm not, I used to be."
By this point, Danny could hardly breath without his chest pressing against Phantom's, jaw tightly clenched and eyes glowing an icy blue rather than their usual sky colour, or even their ghostly toxic green. He didn't feel... Right being so close to Dan. It unnerved him. "Why are you here. Just to mess with me? Hardly seems like it's worth your time when you could be destroying my city by now."
The full ghost nodded with a chuckle. "True, true. But messing with you gets the reaction I enjoy. Fear is nice, but defiance is a challenge." his face moved close to Danny's ear, grinning when the boy's body froze up. "I want to destroy you from the inside out." he whispered, feeling him shiver, heaving out a slight sigh of relief when the full-ghost finally moved away to give him some personal space.
"I'll see you later, Danny. Maybe we can actually have a real fight next time. I had fun watching you get mad like that." he muttered, suddenly transporting.
Immediately the halfa dropped, curling up and clutching his hair. His eyes were wide, his breath quick and gasping.
He couldn't believe that this was happening again.
...
Danny retrieved his family the moment he calmed down enough, getting an earful from not only his parents, but his sister as well.
The teen just sat silently, eyes on the floor as they lectured him on using his possession powers on them and not letting them help. He bit his tongue to keep from exploding, but the icy words finally crawled up his throat, eyes glowing as he looked up at them.
"I'm so very sorry that I don't want the people I care about dead because I was too reckless and I didn't get them to safety before the psychotic ghost could kill them. I'm sorry I tried to make sure that my parents and sister were away from the crossfire between me and the single most dangerous ghost to not only you, but the only ghost that I can't truly defeat. Why do I even bother to help humans if they don't even appreciate what i—" he exploded, his voice catching in his throat when he realised what he had just uttered.
His now human fingers laced through his hair, pulling at it slightly as shallow breaths left him. "No.. Sorry, I'm.. I'm a human. I.. I'm sorry for yelling. I know you were worried..." he choked out, all three of the Fenton's looking at him with wide eyes.
"Danny, are you—"
"I'm fine. It's just him getting into my head. I guess only he would know how to do it.." He interrupted before his sister could speak another word.
"Then if you're really okay, you should start by telling us what just happened. Who was that, why did that thing call us mom and dad." Maddie huffed, wanting to gain answers as quickly as possible. If this enemy /was/ too powerful for Danny, she wanted to know everything about him asap.
"Mom, it's not that simple.."
"Make it simple."
Danny shuffled awkwardly, not sure how to put it. "I haven't even fully explained it too Jazz all the way I don't think I can be able to—"
"Danny!"
"Okay, okay.. Uhm, that was my future.. Self." he started, averting his gaze before going to continue. He didn't want to give them a chance to comment. "See, when I took the CAT's I was suppose to cheat on it, but if I did that, it would have caused all of you and my friends to die.. And I would have went to Vlad being there would be no one else that could understand me. Then I would have become so depressed and would have asked Vlad to separate my human and ghost half.. Then my malevolent ghost half would have ripped Vlad's ghost half out and taken it over.. Making him. Dan Phantom.." he said, the long-winded story keeping his family silent.
"You said.. Would have.. That means—"
"Yeah, it's not going to happen. A time ghost named Clockwork helped me to prevent that from happening and saved you guys, but... I still can't shake that. It's something that kinda drives me. The moment I saw him here, I knew I couldn't let him anywhere near you. He knows more than anyone else in the world how important you guys are, and how easy I could turn into him if you were gone."
Maddie took a puzzled face. "But, how is he here if you changed the future?"
"Don't worry, my future is fine. I managed to defeat him once, but when I captured him and gave him to Clockwork, he was taken out of all the timelines. So no matter what, he can't be stopped." he assured, still looking slightly awkward as his eyes shifted around a bit. "I hate that I don't know where he went, but he's just so much more powerful. He's got like, twenty years of experience plus ten more harbouring the two ghost cores and utilising them."
His mom pulled him into an embrace, gently petting his hair as he clung to her a bit too hard for a sixteen year old boy to do when hugging his mom.
"Oh, honey. The fact that you've had to fight every enemy to keep us and the city safe, including yourself just shows how much of a hero you truly are." she mumbled quietly, in a soothing voice only a mother could muster.
And while she did that, red eyes glowered at the scene from just far enough to not trigger the teen's ghost sense. Stealth wasn't exactly Dan's strong suit, being he was used to getting his was by unstoppable power and brute force along with strategic plots to lead him to victory. Sneaking around was the last thing he'd needed in his future. But that was only a memory now, just like his old parents and friends.
But that thought brought more anger into his soul.
Ghost's were fuelled by emotions, it was ridiculous to think that he had none. Emotions and compassion were two different things, and Dan was definitely one to tell that difference.
The pain and anger still lingered after the split, how could it not. He had lost everything in one fell swoop— his family, his friends. He tore out his humanity, and all that was left was anger, hate, arrogance. It was the thing that kept him running, along with the malevolent thoughts that never stopped. This was no excuse of course, he was still evil, but Plasmius was a huge influence in that factor.
He leaned back with a sigh, closing his eyes and hovering invisibly over FentonWorks. There was some sort of... Weird feeling when he got close to the halfa, a feeling he was sure wasn't his. It frustrated him to see Danny the way he was. By the time Dan was sixteen, he had managed to kill hundreds, had all of Amity park shaking in their boots at the sight of him, and Valerie hiding out, trying to update her armour enough to defeat him— a valiant, though futile attempt.
Still, Phantom couldn't help but admire how his future self had improved /without/ Plasmius' power to aid him. He'd managed to gain power after power and seemingly get closer to his full potential faster than anyone could imagine. It was almost scary how quickly the kid developed. Dan was sure that their meeting helped him improve like that. He always was better at learning by watching someone else do it. That's why it had taken Dan so long to master his ghostly wail.
Being pulled out of his thoughts, the ghost watched Danny's parents burst out of his house, him following behind. He couldn't hear what exactly what they were saying, but they were certainly arguing.
"Mom, I'm telling you, you can't help me with this. It's my fight!"
"Danny, I'm not going to leave you alone on this."
"But the one thing he wants most in the world is for me to be destroyed, and that means mentally. You.. You and my friends are what holds me together.."
"But—"
"Stop it Jazz. You guys need to leave /now/. Even if he follows you, he won't lose track of me and he can't be in two places at once forever. That would take too much energy from his core and leave him weaker than usual. I have a feeling he doesn't want to risk that after our last battle."
Maddie smiled and she kissed his forehead. That sight burned in Dan despite his literal lack of compassion for that family at all. "When did you learn so much about ghosts like this. You continue make me so proud." she sighed, hugging him tightly before she followed Jack, who was walking out with three suitcases over to the RV. After some goodbyes, the Fenton's left their son alone to FentonWorks.
And that was a great thing for Dan, who didn't even bother to follow them. He was after Danny now, he didn't need the teen's parents anymore.
He would get his revenge, one way or another.