Author's Note: The 365 Project is an experimental project to write and post at least one short every day for the next year, not including my semi-regular bi-weekly updates. Whether or not that goal can be reached, we'll see... This is The 365 Project, 12 January.

Disclaimer: Danny Phantom and related characters and situations are the creations of Bruce Hartman, used without permission or intent to profit.

Written as a teaser for an upcoming story project I've been working on...

"Burning Out Of Control"
'Flint and Tinder'
By J.T. Magnus, 'Turbo'

"You know what?" a twenty-seven year old Danny Fenton sighed into the phone as he paced in the living room area of his apartment in Amity Park, New Jersey, "Let's just do this, Sam - let's quit while we're still talking to each other. I'll pack up your stuff and have it waiting for you. Yeah, I'm sure. Look, you can do whatever you want, Sam, but count me out. Yeah, goodbye."

As he hung up the phone and tossed the handset onto the couch, Danny felt lighter than he had in almost twelve years, than since he had became decidedly not-normal due to becoming the world's - as he would find out later - second halfa. It was a good feeling, Danny decided, looking around the apartment.

"I have got to get an interior decorator or something," he remarked with a shake of his head, noting that the apartment just felt way too Sam and not enough Danny despite the fact that it was supposed to be his apartment. It was like a giant example of all the compromises he'd made for his friend-turned-girlfriend over the years since they had gotten together. Those compromises he could deal with, but what she was wanting now was going too far for him. He might be definitely not-normal, but that didn't mean he didn't want a life that was at least somewhat-normal. He was Danny Fenton, just because he could become 'Danny Phantom' to deal with ghosts that were getting out of control didn't mean that was who he thought of himself as...

But Sam's latest idea in her on-going series of crusades for health and the environment and social justice had been for Danny to use the fact that Danny Phantom was famous to speak out in support of some of her pet causes. That idea just went way too far for Danny to agree to, but Sam kept bringing it up every time she could. That day's phone call that had went from staying in touch while Sam was out of town, that they loved and missed each other, to Sam again trying to insist that she could get more done if someone famous like 'Danny Phantom' was seen supporting her had been the final straw for him, leading to his declaration of ending their relationship.

Strangely, despite them being together for so long, it made Danny feel good.

"This is irony for you," Danny Phantom remarked to the person next to him roughly three months later as they fought against dozens of angry ghosts.

"Shut up, Dipstick!" Ember snapped back, "How was I supposed to know that old concert hall was haunted by an entire jazz orchestra?"

Phantom looked at her askance, "What about the sign in the lobby that talks about how they died in a fire here and when the place was rebuilt they just stayed?"

"Oh, like every place that claims to be haunted really is?" Ember countered sarcastically.

"Look out!" Phantom cried out, lunging at Ember and knocking them both down as a trumpet player blew notes that weren't at all sweet since they caused waves of energy to come from his horn and blast the wall directly behind where Ember had been floating, showering the two 'younger' ghosts with rubble.

Ember glared at Phantom, "Get off me, Dipstick."

"Sorry," Phantom floated away from her sheepishly as Ember righted herself and turned her glare on the trumpeteer.

"And you... Get with the times!" Ember shouted before she hammered out a solo that left the trumpteer and half the horn section reeling.

Danny Fenton laid on his couch, absent-mindly strumming his partner's guitar as she sat cross-legged on the floor next to the couch, writing music as she hummed out what Danny thought sounded like something by Kick Axe.

"How long have we been doing this?" Ember asked suddenly.

Danny stopped strumming and looked over at the clock on the wall, "About an hour or so, I guess, why?"

"No, Dipstick," Ember reached back and smacked Danny's head, ignoring his yelp of pain as she continued, "I meant how long have we been hanging out together."

"Six months, something like that," Danny answered.

"Six months and we haven't tried to kill each other or anything," Ember leant back against the couch, "Can't hardly believe it."

Laying the guitar on the back of the couch, Danny shrugged, "For a rock star, you're not really that destructive... so as long as you're not trying to brainwash anyone, we're good as far as I'm concerned."

Danny Fenton had a special plan on how to spend his twenty-eighth birthday, and it involved his partner and semi-official girlfriend and their relationship becoming very official. Opening the jewelry box in his hand, Danny chuckled to himself as he looked at the necklace inside; a swarvoski crystal heart with a black musical note 'floating' in it, with a band of gold trim along the outside of the heart. Rings were just too-normal for his somewhat-normal life, this was better.

"Whatcha looking at, Dipstick?" Ember asked from behind him, leaning over the back of the couch and lookng over his shoulder.

"Aaah!" Danny yelped in surprise, tumbling forward off the couch and into the floor, "Don't do that! You almost scared me to death..."

Ember rolled her eyes, "We're already ghosts, Dipstick, we can't be 'scared to death'. Anyway, 'happy birthday' and all that..."

Then she noticed that the open jewelry box had fallen out of Danny's hand onto the seat of the couch when she had surprised him, "What's this, huh?"

Reaching over the back of the couch, Ember picked up the box and looked at the contents, "Nice necklace, Dipstick, but I'm not sure it's your style."

"It's for you," Danny informed her.

"Thanks," Ember replied, "But I thought it was supposed to be your birthday, baby-pop."

Since she already had the necklace in her hands, Danny decided to throw caution - and his plan - to the wind, "Marry me."

This time, it was Ember's turn to drop the necklace in surprise.

As her fiance lay battered on the floor of Clockwork's tower, Ember took her guitar by the neck and swung it like an axe towards the doppelganger's face, only for them to catch it with their bare hand despite the massive charge of ecto-energy she had poured into it.

"You screamed so prettily last time I ripped out your vocal cords," the doppelganger said in a frighteningly casual voice as he reached out with his other hand and grabbed Ember's neck, "Play it again for me."

"Keep your damned hands off her," Danny swore, then he Wailed, causing his doppelganger to release Ember and clutch his ears just before the sound of Danny's Ghostly Wail shattered all the clocks and hourglasses in the tower, unleashing a storm of energy...