A/N: Credit to FantasticWhovian (on tumblr and the AO3; not sure if they're the same one on this site) for coming up with a title for me; I wrote this ficlet for sweaterblue on tumblr a few years ago and merely had it listed under their prompt, 'being watched', since I couldn't think of a half-decent title. *grins* Blood ahead, but nothing too debilitating. Danny's remarkably resilient, after all. Standard disclaimers apply.

Lancer checked his watch and knocked on the door again. He was on time. In fact, he'd been here early, and now it was quarter past seven. Evidently, Mr. and Mrs. Fenton had forgotten all about the appointment he'd requested.

He didn't make it a habit of going to people's homes. He preferred to keep parent-teacher relationships in the professional environment of the school, but he'd wanted to include Danny in this meeting, and he thought young Mr. Fenton would be more comfortable in his own home. Jack and Maddie were aware of Danny's absences, of course, and of his dismal homework attempts, sliding grades, and tendency to fall asleep in class. What Lancer did not know was how they were addressing the matter, as whatever they were doing clearly wasn't working.

He wasn't sure Danny would give him answers. He'd certainly given the boy plenty of opportunities to do so before, to no avail, and if his parents weren't aware of the root of the problem, he wasn't likely to reveal it to them while Lancer was there. But Lancer at least hoped to start that conversation so that Danny would know he could talk to one of them. That he should talk to one of them.

Lancer tried the doorbell—again, not for the first time—and listened as it rang through what must be an empty house. Even if Jack and Maddie were down in their lab, they would surely have heard the bell going at least once. He had listened to the radio on the drive over and heard of a ghost attack by the Nasty Burger. The Red Huntress had already been on the scene, indiscriminately shooting Phantom and Skulker, but perhaps the Fentons had heard the same report and gone to help.

Ghost fights didn't usually last half an hour, but any number of things could have delayed them.

Lancer sat down on the stoop and rubbed his temples. Maybe it was best to reschedule after all. Danny and Jazz didn't seem to be home, either, and Danny might have gone out with Sam and Tucker even if he had remembered Lancer's requested meeting. But if he rescheduled—

There was a heavy thud from somewhere inside the house, accompanied by a shrill scream and a loud crack, quickly followed by a secondary crash—toppling furniture, maybe? Lancer jumped to his feet, wincing as the movement jarred his back, and tried the door.

Locked.

He knocked again and called, but whoever was inside didn't hear him or couldn't answer. He walked over to peer into the living room window but couldn't see anything amiss. Something surely was, though, so he jogged around to try the back entrance. The back gate wasn't locked, so he let himself in through the fence and walked up the steps to the screen door that led into the kitchen.

His hand froze on the door handle when he saw Danny Phantom inside, sitting between two snapped halves of what had once been the kitchen table.

The young ghost was covered in ectoplasm. A cut on his forehead had bled down the side of his face, staining his skin green, but that surely wasn't what had his face twisting in pain as he bent in on himself, completely oblivious to Lancer's presence. His suit was torn in multiple places, but the worst was a gash that ran from his left shoulder, along his collarbone, and across his torso. It ended partway down his right side, just above his floating ribs, if Lancer had to guess—and he'd tended to enough flesh wounds since the ghost attacks in Amity Park had begun to have a fairly good idea.

It looked like Phantom had gotten on the wrong side of a machete—which, considering he had been fighting Skulker, the Ghost Zone's Greatest Hunter, was a distinct possibility.

Phantom was vainly trying to hold his wound closed, no doubt hoping his body would repair itself more quickly that way, but all he seemed to get for his effort was a dark stain on his gloves.

Lancer was horrified, knowing how bad that wound would be if Phantom weren't a ghost. But why would he have come here, of all places, even if he'd seen the Fenton RV out and about and known the famed ghost hunters weren't home? He had no guarantee that they'd be gone for long and certainly no way of knowing they hadn't set any defences before they'd left.

And that's when Jazz Fenton skidded into the kitchen with an armful of bandages and similar supplies. She was sporting a fair bit of ectoplasm on her clothes herself and had a scratch along one cheek that still leaked red even though the smearing suggested she had attempted to wipe off the worst of it. "I cleaned out our first aid supplies," she said, kneeling in front of Phantom and dropping everything on the floor between them, "but I think you need stitches."

Phantom shook his head. "Just use those butterfly things."

"They're not meant for this type of wound!"

"But they'll work."

"Not well enough. That's too deep, and you know it."

"And you know I heal fast. I've had worse, and you know that, too. It's not like you can see the bone this time."

Even through the screen, Lancer could see Jazz blanch, and he felt a bit unsteady at the idea himself. He'd known Phantom must have gotten badly hurt in fights before—he'd seen the damage left behind, at least—but he also knew the ghost boy was resilient, and to have been cut so badly as to see bone….

But that didn't make sense. He'd attended enough of Jack and Maddie Fenton's lectures to know that ghosts were made of pure ectoplasm. They didn't have bones; they merely had the appearance of bone structure, the appearance of muscle and sinew and everything else beneath that facsimile of skin. The lack of that true rigidity meant that they could stretch themselves and snap back into their usual form with ease.

Lancer watched, not trusting himself to speak and not really daring to interrupt, as Jazz helped the ghost boy peel back his suit from the wound and begin cleaning it. As appearances went, it all looked very realistic. If he imagined for a moment that it was red and not green that covered their hands, that Jazz was tending to Danny Fenton and not Danny Phantom….

Phantom hissed between his teeth, wincing, but Jazz continued to dab on what Lancer assumed was some sort of disinfectant. "Healing powers or no healing powers," she said without looking up, "you'll be better off if we clean this before we try to close it. Are you sure you don't want me to get the needle and thread?"

"Yes. You can't sew something straight if your life depended on it. Even I have a steadier hand than you."

"I can call Sam."

"Are you kidding? She'll kill me if she finds out about this."

"And she won't when she finds out you didn't tell her?"

"I'm not going to tell her. That's the point. And she's been looking forward to this concert with her grandma for ages. I'm not going to ruin that for her just because Skulker showed up."

Lancer's eyebrows shot up. They were talking about Miss Manson. And if Sam was involved in this, then surely Tucker and Danny were, too.

He supposed he shouldn't be too surprised. All four students were defensive of Phantom, though Jazz was often the most vocal in spite of her parents' views. If Jazz had begun secretly helping Phantom, it wouldn't have been long before she got her brother Danny involved, and he doubted even a week would have gone by before Danny's friends had discovered the truth and begun helping, too.

This secret didn't explain everything, but it would explain the occasional absence, the persistent lack of sleep, and the way Danny sometimes favoured an arm or leg for a day or two. There were certainly occasions when the same applied to Sam and Tucker, and even though he didn't teach Jasmine anymore, he didn't doubt that it was true for her as well. It would have to be, if they were all working with Phantom.

But for some reason, Danny appeared to be taking the brunt of it. Perhaps it came down to individual skills. Jazz and Sam were obviously on call for help after the fight, though from Jazz's injury, she was no stranger to combat, and he knew Miss Manson well enough to doubt she'd willingly be left out of a fight for long. Tucker was a technological genius, certainly an asset for fighting ghosts like Technus—and, Lancer suspected, for tweaking the FentonWorks weaponry.

Sam was more athletic than Danny. Lancer knew that, especially after Ms. Tetslaff had filled him in on what had happened leading up to the President's Challenge Fitness Test. But when Danny was awake, he had a quicker reaction time than she—Lancer had seen how well he dodged flying missiles in a cafeteria food fight, sometimes winding up clean while everyone else was covered—and he might have better hand-eye coordination as well. He might be the one who was usually on the front lines of the fight.

Except that didn't make sense, either. Phantom had appeared at the school plenty of times, and Danny was nowhere to be found. But Lancer refused to believe Danny's sister and best friends were involved in something he wasn't. He must be missing something.

"I don't know how long this is going to stay," Jazz was saying as she taped gauze across the wound. "We'll need to keep an eye on this."

Phantom groaned. "We always have to keep an eye on it. And we always have to keep an eye on the Ghost Portal, and on Vlad, and on everyone else. Geez, sometimes I just feel like I'm either always watching people or always being watched."

"Danny Phantom is always going to draw the public eye," Jazz pointed out as she finally sat back. "That's why Amorpho thought you'd be a good one to impersonate."

Phantom rolled his eyes. "Don't remind me. At least he listened to me and hasn't come back. I don't want to deal with that again." He sighed. "Don't psychoanalyze me or anything, but sometimes…. I just get tired."

Jazz carefully laid a hand on his right shoulder. "You're allowed to be tired. You're trying to carry the weight of the world on your shoulders. You need to take a break sometimes."

"The last time I tried that…." Phantom trailed off. "It didn't end well."

Jazz narrowed her eyes. "When did you last try that?"

"Just trust me on that, okay?" He shrugged off her hand and winced. "I don't think this will be completely healed by morning."

"So stop moving it and just go upstairs to bed. I'll cover for you. If I tell Mom and Dad you're sick, they might let you stay home from school tomorrow."

What? None of that made sense. Why would Jazz tell her parents anything about Phantom? How could Phantom have managed to hide a bed in the house of ghost hunters, even with the help of their kids? And what was this talk of school?

But Phantom was shaking his head. "I can't. I've got that algebra test tomorrow, and I can't afford to fail it."

"Mr. Falluca will let you make it up if you missed because you were sick."

"After I've missed so many other classes? Jazz, he's gonna think I'm faking."

"Even with a note?"

"Signed by Mom and Dad? Yeah. You have no idea how many times Sam has forged their signatures. I doubt he trusts their judgement. Besides, if I pretend to be sick, they might think it's a ghost disease and set up the ecto-containment unit again. I'll just do what I always do. It'll be fine."

"Danny, you can't keep doing this. It's not going to be fine. You're sliding. At least let me help more than I am. If you're not going to rest, will you at least let me help you study?"

"Just forget I said anything."

"Danny—"

"You don't need to mother me, Jazz." Phantom tried to get up, cried out in pain, and floated upwards until he could straighten his legs and stand instead. "I appreciate your help. I really do. But I can—" He broke off, and Lancer realized he was staring at the door. He jerked sideways, out of sight, but he heard the ghost boy mutter, "Oh, crud."

"What?" Jazz's voice was instantly wary.

"You remember what I was saying about being watched?"

Lancer knew it was foolish, but he held his breath and pressed himself against the rough brick. He had been watching. He had been eavesdropping. He should have made his presence known, gone in to help Jazz patch up the ghost boy—

But Jasmine had obviously done the same thing multiple times before, and nothing he had heard made sense anyway.

Danny Phantom was a ghost.

He didn't attend school.

Except Lancer knew Falluca had been preparing exams for grades nine and ten. Algebra and trigonometry. He'd been reviewing them during his prep period in the staff room today.

Lancer shut his eyes. No. It still didn't make sense. There had to be some rational explanation. Perhaps Phantom regretted not having a chance to finish his education and elected to invisibly attend classes at Casper High. Perhaps he went to classes with Danny and Tucker and Sam, as they were closer to his age than Jazz, and perhaps he tested himself, made himself do the same homework and take the same tests, so that he could improve himself. So that he could learn.

But that wouldn't explain why he was worried about missing too many classes when he could simply do the same next year. It wouldn't explain his worry over a failing grade.

And it certainly didn't explain why he had referred to Mr. and Mrs. Fenton as Mom and Dad and had often had young Miss Manson forge their signatures for a sick note he shouldn't need.

"Mr. Lancer?"

The incredulous voice was Phantom's, and he opened his eyes to see the young ghost staring up at him. He stood on the step, perhaps still too tired to fly when he didn't need to, though Lancer hadn't heard the door so Phantom must have stepped through the wall. Worry was evident on his face, sharpening his gaze, but it wasn't enough to overwrite the exhaustion carved into every line. Frankly, Lancer was surprised that Phantom's suit had already begun knitting itself back together, though it was easy to see Jazz's handiwork through the tears. It was easy to see the severity of the wounds Jazz had tried to cover, too; even the piece of gauze on Phantom's forehead was already tinged green as if the wound hadn't stopped bleeding. Or rather, seeping ectoplasm.

A moment later, the kitchen door opened and Jazz stepped out, holding the Fenton Peeler. Her eyebrows shot up in surprise. "Mr. Lancer?" she echoed.

And then Phantom's eyes widened. "Oh, crud," he repeated, rising sharply into the air. "I've gotta g—"

"No." Jazz reached out and snagged Phantom's ankle before he was more than a foot above her head. That wouldn't stop him from phasing through her grip, Lancer knew, but Phantom didn't try. "How long were you here, Mr. Lancer?"

How much did you see? That was her real question. How much did you hear? He swallowed. He could explain away more of what he'd seen than what he'd heard, but if he did so, he wouldn't ever be satisfied. He knew the saying about letting sleeping dogs lie, but he was too curious for that. Especially when he had a feeling that the truth might help to explain the real reason behind one of the other problems that was plaguing him.

"Long enough, then," Jazz said grimly when he didn't answer. She released Phantom, and instead of taking off, he floated back down to rejoin them on the step.

"So you heard all of it?" Phantom asked fearfully.

Lancer tried to smile apologetically. "I never meant to—"

"It doesn't matter what you meant," Jazz said sharply. "I never meant to, either. It matters what you do now."

What was he to do? He still wasn't entirely convinced he understood half of what was going on. "I'm afraid—"

"You can't tell them," Phantom said quickly. "Please. I know they'll probably take it okay, but they still…." He shook his head, stopping with a hiss and a wobble that had Jazz put a steadying hand on his shoulder. "There's too much right now, and finding out from you would be even worse." He cast a quick glance at Jazz before adding, "It would just be…bad. Jazz figures they'd blame themselves. She keeps telling me prolonging it won't help, but I'm hoping I'll figure out a way to make things…less bad."

"What Danny's trying to say," Jazz said, "is that he's not mentally prepared to tell them the truth any more than we believe they're mentally prepared to hear it. It will turn their world upside down, Mr. Lancer. If I can at least gather enough information to answer half of the questions I know they'll have, I'll feel more confident when Danny decides to break the news to them."

Danny. She kept calling him Danny. Not Phantom, like she was so careful to at school. He'd first thought that she did so to give the appearance of distance, but the communication between them…. That was undeniable. The amount of information they could confer and discern from a single look; the way Phantom deferred to Jazz now when he had argued with her earlier, knowing exactly how far he could push her; the way they knew each other well enough to pick up on and expand upon partial thoughts….

That kind of interaction took years to build.

Phantom had hardly appeared more than a year ago.

He was staring a riddle in the face and had no idea what to make in answer. Why is a raven like a writing desk? Except this wasn't mere nonsense; the concern on the two faces looking at him was very real, Jazz's seriousness equalled only by Phantom's desperation. What house does one enter blind and come out seeing? A schoolmaster he may be, but even if the answer was as straightforward as that one, he was still blind to it.

This wasn't just concern over how the Fentons would react to their children helping Phantom or even how often Phantom apparently frequented their house. There was far more to it than that. He could see that much. He just couldn't see what must be an obvious connection between it all.

But he could imagine. He could imagine what it would be like if green ectoplasm were red blood, if Phantom were Fenton. And he could imagine a number of reasonable explanations for everything he had seen and heard if he took that as truth. But surely it wasn't possible. The idea itself was ludicrous. The Fentons were ghost hunters.

But they were also inventors.

And once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.

"Danny?" Mr. Lancer asked cautiously. If he imagined those green eyes as blue, the hair black instead of white, and that he wore jeans and a T-shirt instead of the HAZMAT suit—

A HAZMAT suit.

Like the ones the Jack and Maddie Fenton ran around in all the time.

"Brave New World! It's not really you, is it?"

And there was that silent communication between the two again. Jazz nodded, and Phantom sighed, looking resigned. "Promise you won't tell?"

He couldn't promise that. But he could promise not to tell yet. "It sounds like we will have a lot to discuss before anything is said."

Phantom frowned, looked down at his feet for a moment, and then back up at Mr. Lancer. "I don't want to tear apart their world. Or yours."

"I can assure you I already have a better appreciation for Alice than I ever had before."

He still hadn't made the promise, and Phantom knew it, but his shoulders slumped. A bright ring of light sprang up at his waist and split apart, leaving Danny Fenton in their wake. He sagged against his sister. "Then can you at least go easier on me in English?"

"Danny!" Jazz admonished, though whether or not it was because of her brother's request, Lancer wasn't sure. The light appeared again, stealing away Fenton and replacing him with Phantom, and Jazz seemed happier.

Did he heal faster as a ghost? Was she worried about what the damage to his body would be if he kept those injuries while as a human?

Ghost. Human. Was that really what Danny was, or had he become something else entirely? Lancer really did feel like Alice in Wonderland, trapped in a world of nonsensical logic. But this strange world had become the only one Danny could inhabit, and Lancer knew he had merely glimpsed it.

"Maybe I should make something, and we can sit down and discuss this," Jazz offered.

"Around what, our nonexistent kitchen table?"

Jazz groaned. "We'll have to figure out how to explain that. And I haven't even cleaned up the stains on the floor. I'm sorry, Mr. Lancer, but you'll have to excuse me. I need to get that done before Mom and Dad come home."

"Maybe not," he asserted. "Maybe it would be better—"

"We can't tell them!" Danny interrupted. "Not right now. Weren't you even listening?"

"Maybe it would be better," Lancer continued, "if I explained to them that I witnessed Phantom foil an attempt by the ghost Skulker to kidnap their son and that your dining table was the only casualty?" He managed a proper smile for young Mr. Fenton this time. "And I'll treat the story you spin for them as an extra credit assignment and put it toward your grade."

Danny grinned. "I think I can work with that. Thanks."