Yo, it's the first of my Ectoberweek 2019 fics! Like the tags say, I'm posting these without editing/beta-reading them, because I'm in a bit of a tight spot, time-wise. I plan on going back and editing them properly in a week or 2, but if you catch any errors, please do tell me!
But, yeah... I may or may not be at 3 out of 7 written right now? As for why I'm participating even though I really don't have the time for it atm, see my Tumblr post (over at darks-ink). Basically the TL;DR is: Ectoberweek is how I (re)started fic writing a year ago! Happy 1 year anniversary to me!

As for this specific fic, yes, there is referenced character death. It involved a character who, in this AU, died some 15 years before canon and went and became a ghost. But the whole 'ghost' thing isn't a widely known fact, so sometimes people will go "oh sorry about _'s death" even though they're not really hung up on it anymore because, well, they just became a ghost? Not really a big deal.

Danny impatiently tugged at the lock on the locker door, cursing under his breath. Why wouldn't the damn thing just unlock? It had seemed to simple when they'd explained it to them!

He was just considering the viability of turning his arm intangible and bypassing the lock entirely when someone cleared their throat behind him.

Startled, Danny jerked back, twisting to look at the person behind him. He looked like an ordinary human being; dark skin, teal eyes, and colorful clothing.

"Uh, hey," the boy said, a little awkwardly. "Why are you messing with my locker?"

Danny blinked at him for a long moment. Then, "Your locker?"

"Yeah?" The boy frowned at him, then gestured at the locker. "See, number 524? That's mine."

"524?" Danny repeated lamely. Then he reached for the locker next to the one he'd been trying to unlock, and twisted the lock in the combination he'd been given. It clicked open easily. "Uh. Oops?"

"Wrong locker?" the boy asked, mirth in his voice but clearly understanding. "It happens to the best of us, man."

"Oh." He shrugged, unsure. He wouldn't know. "I guess. Sorry. I didn't break it, did I?"

"Nah, you're fine." The boy unlocked his locker as well, looking away from Danny to take out some of the books in it. "You're new, right? Do you know where you need to go?"

Danny opened his mouth to reply, but a voice from behind them spoke before he could. "Tuck, don't. You can barely get yourself to class in time."

The boy rolled his eyes, turning to look at the new speaker over his shoulder. "That's not because I'm lost, Sam, but because people keep getting in the way. Not everyone is a walking wrecking ball."

Sam snorted, and Danny closed his locker to look at her as well. Pale skin, black hair, and striking violet eyes. He had to admit that he liked her style, though. Looked like a girl that Ember might appreciate.

"Not my fault you can't keep up, Tuck."

Then she seemed to realize that he was there too, because she grinned at him. "Nice hair."

"Uh." He raised his hands to comb them through his hair, automatically. "Thanks?"

"How'd you get the streaks like that?" she continued, sounding genuinely interested. "It looks really cool, that white in the black."

"It's kinda…" He continued to twist his fingers in his hair, shooting her an uncertain grin, "It's kind of always been like that?"

She gasped, then suddenly stepped forward and grabbed his face. "Man, and your parents let you wear these fangs to school? They must be really cool."

"The coolest," he agreed easily, running his tongue over his pointed canine teeth. "But, um, that's not really- relevant."

"Oh, I see." She let go of him again, nodding to herself. "You're wearing them without their permission!"

"What? No!" He dropped his grin to frown at her instead. "People do that?"

Tuck snorted, but dropped his smile when Sam glared at him. Then she turned back to Danny, huffed, and crossed her arms. "I would if I could get some. My parents suck. Grandma is pretty cool, though."

"Oh." He scratched his cheek, uncertainly. "I've never met my grandparents, to be honest. Jazz said they were pretty nice, but she was like… three years old when she last saw them, so I'm not sure if I trust her on that."

The two other teens shared a glance at that, before Tuck asked, hesitantly, "Jazz? Like, Jazz Fenton?"

"Yeah? Not a lot of kids going by Jazz, right?" Or, well, that's what she'd given as her reason for changing her name. Danny was extraordinary but with a normal name, so Jazz wanted to be the reverse of that.

"Why would Jazz Fenton know your grandparents?" Tuck's eyes were narrowed, like he already suspected the answer, but didn't like it. "Let alone when she was so young."

"We're… siblings?" Danny shrugged loosely, uncertain why this was throwing the other two off so badly. "She's my sister."

"But- But-" Tuck turned and looked at Sam again, like they were having a silent conversation.

"But what?" Danny asked when it looked like they had finished. "Do we really look that different? Mom and Dad always said we had clear family resemblance, but-"

"No, no, that's not it," Sam interrupted. "It's just…" She shot a glance at Tuck again, but turned back before it could devolve into another silent conversation. "We just… didn't know Jazz had a brother."

"Oh. I mean… I guess." He shrugged again. "My parents didn't want me out much, and I guess Jazz wouldn't have talked about it with people she's not friends with."

Tuck opened his mouth to reply, but the sound was drowned out by a loud ringing. Danny flinched, raising his hands to his ears, but the noise stopped before he could finish the motion.

"And there's the bell." Sam shook her head, then shouldered her backpack. "Tucker and I have to get to English. Go find Jazz if you can't find your class, yeah?"

"Uh, yeah, sure." He watched them turn around, then realized what she'd said. "Hey, wait!" He ran after them, quickly catching up. "English? Like, Mr. Lancer's English?"

"Yeah? You too, then?" Tuck asked, turning to look at him without slowing down. "Guess you're in the same class as us. Convenient."

"Uh huh. Mind if I tag along?" He shouldered his backpack properly, pulling his arms through the purple straps. "Since you're going there anyway?"

Tuck snorted, then offered his hand. "Sure man. By the way, I'm Tucker. Tucker Foley."

Danny took his hand, giving it a good shake. "Danny Fenton. Nice to meet you."

Sam seized his hand the moment he let go of Tucker, shaking it as well. "And I'm Sam Manson. Now, since the bell cut us off earlier, what's up with you not being allowed out?"

"Sam," Tucker chastised, "There must've been a good reason, man." Then he nudged Danny, lightly. "Don't mind her. You don't have to tell if you don't want to."

"I don't mind." He raised one hand to the back of his neck, rubbing it uncertainly. "Just, uh, kind of a long story. Might be better to save it until lunch or something."

"Oh, that's a deal." Sam suddenly slung one arm over his shoulder, grinning impishly. "I'll hold you to that, Danny."

He smiled back at her, stamping down the dread that suddenly rose in his stomach.

Why did he feel like he just made a deal with the devil?

"Alright, now tell us," Sam demanded as she tugged him down into a seat. "Why did no one know Jazz had a brother?"

He rolled his eyes, putting down his tray of food. "Can't I eat first? I'm starving."

"You don't want to eat that anyway, man." Tucker sat down next to Sam, looking at his tray of cafeteria food. "The stuff they serve here is barely edible. Best to bring stuff from home if you can."

"I did bring food from home." He reached for his backpack, pulling out the lunch his mom had packed for him. "But I'm gonna eat the cafeteria food too."

"Boys," Sam sighed, shaking her head. "You can't seriously plan on eating so much?"

"Why not?" He peeked into the bag – ooh, weenies – then put it on his tray. Best to start with the regular food. If it really was that bad, he could get rid of the taste with the other food. "It's not that much, is it?"

Tucker made a face. "It is a lot, dude."

"Oh," he said, picking up an apple from the tray. It was a normal amount for him to eat, but he supposed it might not be the same case for full humans. Still, couldn't anybody have bothered to tell him about that? "I didn't realize."

"Man, and I thought I lived a sheltered life." Sam chuckled, but her smile dropped when he raised his apple to take a bite out of it. "Hey, wait, don't-"

He bit down into the apple, his sharp teeth sinking into it with a loud crunch. "Hm?"

"You're not… supposed to eat… with those in," she said, slowly, watching him chew. "That's, uh, bad for your teeth."

Danny swallowed the bite of apple, frowning at her. "With what in?"

"The fangs?" She gestured at the apple, deep gouges in it where his fangs had dug in. "Look at how deep those went! You could've done real damage to your teeth if that apple had been any harder!"

He glanced at the apple, then back at her. She seemed genuinely upset, but he wasn't what to do about it. "Oh. Uh. It's not really… like that."

"Not like what?" she snapped back. "Do you think you're immune to tooth damage just because your hair is super cool?"

"Uh." He blinked at her, caught off-guard by the non-sequitur. "No? But-"

"No buts! And don't take another bite!" she added sharply when he raised the apple again. "We weren't done talking about this, Danny!"

He shrugged, maintained eye contact, then took another bite.

"I really wish you hadn't done that," Tucker muttered, moving further down the bench to distance himself from Sam.

"I don't get it," Danny admitted after he'd swallowed the bite. "It's just an apple."

"The problem," Sam bit at him, "is that you're not supposed to eat hard food while wearing fake fangs!"

"Oh." He nodded. "Is that what the problem was?"

She opened her mouth to snap at him, but he cut her off with a soft smile and said, "They're not fake, so."

As Sam spluttered, Tucker leaned back over, one eyebrow raised. "What do you mean, they're not fake?"

"I mean that they're real?" Danny frowned, eyes darting between the two of them. "Doesn't everybody lose their milk teeth?"

"Yeah," Tucker said slowly, "but we don't grow fangs, dude."

"Oh, I see." He took another bite of his apple, then around it, said, "I guess it must be a ghost thing."

They both blanched, and he realized that he had, once again, misstepped in this conversation.

"A- A ghost thing?" Tucker asked finally, incredulously. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Uh." Danny blinked at them, confused. "It means that I'm part ghost? Duh."

"Don't 'duh' us!" Sam glared at him. "What do you mean, you're part ghost?!"

"Well…" He shifted to lean on the table, semi-casual. "It's kind of in the name, you know? Half-ghost? Pretty obvious."

"You can't be half ghost!" she insisted, arms thrown out. "You can't be part dead!"

"Well, someone should've told me that before I went and managed it, huh?" He shrugged, then took another bite of his apple. The ghosts were all way easier about this.

Though, thinking back, that might also be because they were really big on gossiping. You just had to tell one ghost, and then suddenly everyone knew it.

"Man, you're crazy," Tucker said morosely, shaking his head. "Spent too long at home with your dad. Shame Jazz didn't get him to let you go to school earlier, so you would've realized that all his ghost stuff isn't real."

Danny blinked at him, blankly. "But… ghosts are real?"

Sam shoved Tucker, shooting him a brief glare, before she turned to Danny. "Yeah, don't listen to him. He doesn't believe in anything but cold hard technology."

"And science," Tucker corrected her. "I believe in things science has proven! And ghosts aren't included in that."

"But… they are?" Danny frowned, confused. "My parents have tons of research about it? I can ask Mom to get you one of the basic ones?"

Both Sam and Tucker blanched. Again.

"T-There's no need," Tucker stuttered, holding up his hands. "I mean, it's been forever since she died, right? Those papers must be outdated by now."

"Well, they're working on a new one now." He scratched the back of his head, then shrugged. Whatever. No big deal. "But if you don't want it, that's fine. Just don't tell me science hasn't proven the existence of ghosts, because that's a blatant lie."

"'They'?" Sam repeated apprehensively. "Like, both of them, right now?"

"Uh, yeah? That's kind of what 'they' means." He raised a questioning eyebrow in her direction.

"Well, I guess you're right." She shrugged, eyes lowering to her food for a moment before they snapped back to Danny. "Just… Like a ghost, right? You mean that she's a ghost?"

"Kind of hard to do things when you're just regular dead," Danny said, dryly. "That's sort of why a lot of people become ghosts, after all. Want to continue to do things after you die? Become a ghost."

"So then how did you become half a ghost?" Tucker asked sharply. "Did you half die or something, huh?"

Danny rolled his eyes, swallowing the last bite of his apple. "Nah man, I was born like this. My Mom died like, a year before I was born."

"Ghosts can reproduce?" Sam said, incredulously. "Your parents had you after your mom died?"

"Uh huh." He glanced over the rest of his lunch, shrugged to himself, and then reached for his bag from home. "That's why they kept me at home for so long. They wanted to make sure I would be okay, being half-ghost and all that."

"Man, that's crazy." Tucker shook his head, but didn't try to refute Danny anymore. "I can't imagine- Wait, what's that?!"

"Hm?" Danny looked up from his sandwich, which Tucker was pointing at. He raised it. "This?"

"Yeah!" Tucker swept his hand around, vaguely gesturing at it. "Look at it, it's glowing!"

"Uh. Yes?" Danny lowered it, opening the bread to show the contents. "See, that's the frankenweinies. They're ecto-contaminated hot dogs."

Sam made a face. "No offense to your parents, Danny, but that looks even less edible than the cafeteria food."

"Yeah, I agree with her." Tucker leaned forward, but when Danny moved the sandwich closer to him he flinched away again. "And I say that as the crazy carnivore."

"It's not for human consumption." Danny rolled his eyes, then demonstratively took a bite from the sandwich. Immediately he could feel the ectoplasm feeding into his system, his core humming in contentment. "The ectoplasm is good for my ghost side."

"See, dude, here's a crazy idea for you to consider." Tucker waved a hand as if presenting the concept. "What if the ectoplasm is making you think you're half-ghost? Or, like, the contamination is making you all weird."

Danny shot him a disgruntled look. Was Tucker really still going on about this? "I mean, technically, I've been ecto-contaminated since conception. My body is constructed to be a hybrid between ghost and human. My human side can't survive without the support of my ghost side."

Tucker continued to look unconvinced, eyes narrowed.

"How about this?" Danny swallowed away another bite of his sandwich. "Why don't you come visit my house after school? You can meet my mom and some of the other ghosts, and my parents can tell you all about my weird half-ghost anatomy. And if none of that is convincing because you don't think it's real, well. My dad would love to show you some of his crazy inventions."

The other boy narrowed his eyes even further. "Look dude, no offense, but I'm not really interested in 'ghost fighting' gadgets."

"That's fair." Danny shrugged casually, taking another bite of food and waiting until he'd swallowed it to continue. "But they don't just make weapons, you know. They have this crazy portal to the Ghost Zone – the dimension where ghosts like, for lack of a better word – and a super crazy hovercraft so Dad and Jazz can go there too. And they're working on jetpacks for easier travel, too."

"Oh." Tucker wilted a little, turning a little fidgety. "Well, I… Sam, I bet you want to go see real-life ghosts, huh?"

She snorted. "Just admit you want to see what kind of crazy inventions the Fentons put together, Tuck. Don't drag me into this."

"You're welcome to come too, Sam," Danny offered, smiling at her. "I think that Tucker is too scared to go alone."

"Hey!" The boy in question huffed angrily. "Don't you dare! You're the one inviting me to a literal haunted house, man. Haven't you ever seen a horror movie! The handsome ones always die first!"

"You mean the non-white people." Danny rolled his eyes, but didn't drop the smile. "Besides, you're too late to be the first to die anyway. My mom died years ago, and technically I've been sort-of dead since birth, remember?"

"'Sort of' dead isn't actually dead, dude." But Tucker grinned back, the grim mood broken. "And your mom is the one haunting the house in the first place. That makes her death part of the backstory, not the first death to happen in the movie."

"Eh, fair enough." Danny finished off his sandwich, then stared at the cafeteria food still left on his tray, contemplating it. "But you're bringing Sam, and she actually knows stuff about ghosts, so that makes her a viable first victim too. She'll die just before she can tell you how to stop the enemy."

"But that's rarely the first death." Tucker tugged the tray away from Danny. "Dude, you might be mostly dead, but you really don't want to try that. Besides, lunch is almost over anyway."

Danny stuck out his tongue, but nodded his approval anyway. He supposed Tucker was right. Not enough time to eat it, anyway. "I suppose I'll ask Mom to pack me more lunch tomorrow. But, seriously, you two wanna come along to my house after school?"

"Will your parents be okay with that?" Sam asked, fingers rattling on the table. "Since you weren't allowed to leave it for so long?"

"I mean, Jazz got them to finally send me to school with the intention that I actually interact with living people my age." He shrugged, trying to cover his anxiety over admitting that he was supposed to be here to make friends. "That would involve out-of-school activities, right? And I bet having me safe at home would be preferable over me being out somewhere in the town."

"What, ghost friends not enough for you?" Tucker grinned, then waggled his eyebrows. "Any hot chicks?"

Danny snorted. "You're not even convinced ghosts exist. You really trying to date them, now?"

"Eh, can't hurt to try, right?" Tucker flapped a hand. "And if you could be born half ghost, who says full ghosts can't be born either? It's not weird if they were never alive, right?"

"Debatable," Sam said, dryly. "But I'd love to see you try to woo a ghost several centuries old."

"That reminds me!" Danny leaned forward, poking Sam in the arm. "I gotta introduce you to Ember! I bet you two would get along great."

"Yeah?" Sam quirked an eyebrow at him. "Why, because we're both girls?"

"No?" He leaned back again, confused. "No, why would that matter? I thought you two might get along well because you have similar styles, and that 'rebel' kinda air."

"Oh." Sam blew out a breath, then grinned apologetically. "Yeah, y'know what, why not? Sorry for assuming. People tend to be assholes about that sorta thing."

"Really? Unfortunate." He paused as the bell rung, then pushed himself to his feet to go back to class. "I think Kitty would like you too. She's closer to Jazz' age, but Jazz is a little too 'straight-lace' for her and Johnny."

"You got any cool friendship recommendations for me too?" Tucker asked skeptically as he grabbed his tray. "Or is this a 'cool goth girl' only thing?"

"I mean…" Danny hummed like he was thinking about it. "Sidney is a nerd too. Johnny, Kitty, and Ember are too cool for you… Dora, maybe, but she's not too big on technology…"

Tucker's mouth tightened. Danny laughed, then waved a dismissive hand. "Kidding, dude. Sidney is pretty nice, really, and Johnny and Kitty would love to meet you too, I bet. And Technus, maybe, but he's older and also, like, old. But he's really into tech."

"Hmm, I guess." Tucker shrugged as they entered the school. "Not a lot of nerds tend to stick around as ghosts, huh?"

"I think rebels just tend to die quicker than nerds, to be honest." Danny laughed, following the other two to their next class. "It's usually a more dangerous lifestyle, you know?"

Tucker cracked a grin too. "Fair enough, fair enough."

They fell into silence as they made their way to the classroom. Tucker and Sam dragged him along to the back of the room, where he was tugged into a seat between the two of them.

Then Tucker leaned over, a worried crease to his brow, and whispered, "Are you sure you should've told us all that stuff, though? Wasn't it a secret, or something?"

"Eh." Danny shrugged. "If it was, they probably hadn't counted on it lasting once I got to school. If they're not keeping me a secret, then my circumstances would leak out sooner or later, right?"

He grinned at the two of them. "Besides, how am I supposed to make friends while keeping secrets like that? Not much of a friendship, is it?"

Tucker laughed, and Sam smiled back at him. "You know what, Danny? I think that this might've been the start of a beautiful friendship."

"That sounds… That sounds wonderful, Sam." He smiled wider, softer. "That sounds really great."

I've had the idea for this AU for forever but I never had a story idea to go with it lol. I considered a slightly different take before this one (same AU, but when Danny first got his teeth), but I wanted to write Tucker and Sam meeting Danny for the first time.