Interestingly enough, Maddie Fenton had been nothing like the man she married. In the luxurious empire that was her prime (which admittedly, she still rode her own coattails) she could be described as an icon. The deep browns of her hair were curled and teased into perfection. Her makeup was astral, and she made an effort to tower the blues and purples of eyeshadow over the dark blacks of a liquid liner. Her lips hid the straight percussion of a white array of teeth, which were only stained by the red of her lipstick when she impulsively bit her lip in thought. The expanse of her wardrobe allocated jackets unreleased and skirts and dresses galore. And her shoes could be described by one word; imported.

Her husband, in what could be examined as his prime, was the equivalent of a ghost chasing stoner. His hair laden with grease and gel from styling and stirring a mullet that rivaled no other. His stubble (which he triumphantly deemed "erotic") droused a chin akin to a shovel, and the rest of him could be described as you would regard any other upperclass college boy who drank almost as much as he jerked off.

In their prime, they were nearly unstoppable, their downfall being condom-less splurge of pseudo luck that came in the back of Jack's low rider after after a autumn festival. Maddie would show the strength of many, and attend her classes with diligence, maintaining a 4.5 in her senior year it university while Jack, in addition with his schoolwork would write an award - winning thesis on the history of paranormal activity, while taking up two jobs at the local mall.

They were having a baby.

In the late reaches of June, in the year 1989, Jazmine Rebecca Fenton was born, with shining eyes and tufts of her mother's copper hair.

Jack Fenton would appeal to a court of the scientific demeanor bravely through the doubt, and acquire a grant for paranormal investigative sciences in the year of Jasmine's fourth birthday and sixth lost baby tooth.

Nobody actually expected them to capture a ghost.

The community was turned upon its head. Religious houses were in a uproar, humane groups protesting for the specimens release, and at a point, a story that Jack and Maddie Fenton had abducted and disfigured a missing high schooler surfaced like a whale in the deep.

That was around when the ghost hunting boom of 1996 spread like wildfire. Jack and Maddie Fenton were awarded the most prestigious award possible, and paranormal investigation became the rage of the streets. Teenager and adults, you'd and old poured out in either support, or protest, and a social schism had formed in the community. Hell, good morning America did a showcase on ghosts, which while it was largely inaccurate, brought even more attention into the community.

That was around the time that Jack and Maddie Fenton decided the christen the sheets of their newly purchased Yew and Oak bed.

And with an ear shattering scream that Jazz heard while she was in the process of making her breakfast of toast and oranges, Maddie announced her second Pregnancy.

He was bald when he was born, but he was gifted with the vocals of a howler monkey. Hell, when he was brought home, the boy howled so much that Amity Park pleaded with them to soundproof their house. At the age of a month and a half, Daniel Thaddeus Fenton had to be moved to the laboratory, which was really just a glorified basement to be kept quiet at all times.

But in the year 1999, the coming pressure of Y2K, people forgot all about the ghosts, and life returned to normal. Jack and Maddie were the parents of a four and eight year old, and had toned down, but still pursued Ghosts like children pursued candy.

That was the reality of the teenaged Danny. His parents traded their opulence for moxie and hunted ghosts left and right, Dissecting and writing papers. And even with ghost hunting in decline, the ladder still brought in money and they lived a pretty wealthy life. It was then, in the freshman year of Danny's high school career, that the boys parents unveiled their newest research project; a gate to the homeworld of the ghosts.

It was greenlit almost immediately.

Danny remembered all too well the big delivery of large twisted metal and boxes upon boxes of screws that were siphoned into the house's basement while Danny loitered on the top of the stairwell, reluctant to help. He remembered from then on, and deep into his summer he would wake up to the sound of a hammer pounding metal, and fall asleep with a twisting of screws into metal. Then in the early autumn of his sophomore year, he came home to a father glowing with triumph, and and a mother brimming with a smile while she prepared a celebratory toast.

Danny remembered it was the first and last time he wanted to taste the strong tang of Brandy brewed in the deep south.

His father moseyed on with his wife, grinning and giggling while Jazz and Danny faked a sense of accomplishment on their parents behalf. It took only a good eleven minutes before Jack Fenton howled that they should see the first test of the Fenton portal.

The basement was as cold as it was sleek, decorated with gadgets and etcetera that lined the harrowing walls and gave them a grim demeanor. At the end of the silver plated suite, was a door that looked akin to the hatch of a submarine. Danny sheepish prodded his way around the laboratory while his father unveiled and unmasked the invention he so fondly (and predictably) dubbed, "The Fenton Portal."

Almost immediately following her husband's speech, Maddie Fenton seized the power cable, and with a grin, she plugged it in.

Almost immediately the machine whirled to life, and the air in the room became as dry as the desert. Maddie and Jack cheered like fans at a sporting event, while Danny shielded his eyes and Jazz reeled back. he remembered it being loud, not like a concert but rather like an eternal ringing in his head. It was like a secretary's office phone had been jammed between the pink of his ears and was ringing off the hook. It was like a fire truck was reeling at him, or the screech of a megaphone resounded from his cerebellum, and the flickering of the lights made it no better, the rapid blinking making it like a epileptic nightmare, right in his own home. And just when it was about to purge Danny into the deep, the harsh rebuttal of sparks and discharge pounded through the room, and the entire basement went black.

It smelled of burnt metal and plastic, and was dark like a closet at midnight. Maddie found a flashlight and with care, approached and examined the remains of the helix box.

Danny remembers his parents shamefully climbing the stairs, Jazz following like a streetcleaner to their disappointment. Danny was still in shock.

To be honest, he didn't quite remember how he managed to convince himself that pulling on the black and white ecto-thermal suit would help, but regardless, he clawed for the zipper and rocked uncomfortably at the stiff soles of the suit under his feet.

Sacking in air he found himself tiptoeing inside the broken ghost portal, while icy blue found the relative tangent of the design intriguing. He was engrossed, his ultimatum drawing near as he patterned down the hall, admiration and empathy for his disappointed parents growing in his gut as he viewed the work that he was done. Absentmindedly, a gloved hand searched for a place to rest as he leaned to ensure balance, and with so, his hand found the still-hot sting of the broken eternal helix box.

He would lie to even remotely imply that it was painless. Even more so as anything under excruciating. He could see his skin crawl. He could see the frigid movements, the hot to cold to hot transformation of having one half of every DNA helix in his body ripped, and replaced with an ectoplasmic substitute ripped straight from the ghost zone. He could feel it in his hair, a splitting feeling that climbed through the boy as he writhed on the floor of the Fenton portal, froth vomit and urine gracing him with the delicacy of of a rusted war hammer.

Argo, Daniel Thaddeus Fenton lie dead on the smoldering remains of a helix box and his own filth, in the inner walls of a gate to a ghost world seemingly pressing down on him like a steamroller.

It was almost as graceful as it was shocking.

X X X

The first thing he noticed was that the suit had inverted colors. Granted, he should be worried about his well being more, but he knew his father would eviscerate him if even a ding was on the suit that his mother had made by hand herself. The next thing he noticed was the blinking of the standby lights of the Ghost Portal. Had the helix box been fixed? Had it just taken a second to warm up? The but plastic and scorch marks on his right hand and on the wall said otherwise.

The third thing was his public hair. Granted, everyone's a little different, but when he pulled down the suit to ventilate himself and change back into his jeans. (The suits were made out of high end polyester that stuck to you like skin) he noticed a pubescent jungle of public hair whiter that fresh snow.

And he soon found out that when you stand naked, in front of a mirror in your basement to make sure you hadn't sprouted a tail, that the mirror could tell no lies. Even the hairs on the back of his thighs were white for Christ sake.

Following that revelation, the erethal glow of poison green eyes scanned him up and down through the mirror. The followup came when he examined himself from his hair down to his toenails in the mirror.

Surprisingly, his heart not beating had caused the least surprise.

It was only when jazz, who had been told to fetch Danny, called his name that the boy snapped into defense mode, and with a wave of white, his eyes were blue, his hair; black and his heart beating came to him like camouflage to a jungle.

Daniel Thaddeus Fenton had died, but only halfway.

The irony of it all.

It would take a good four months of hiding and secrecy for any of the hero business to take hold. He initially bit his thumb at the idea, I mean, who had even ever heard of a ghost boy? but regardless of his denial and Tuckers begging, the appearance of the lunch lady forced him into taking the form of a ghostly demigod, and shut her down.

And with that, Danny Phantom was born.

With so, came a sixth and seventh sense, the sixth being the breath of a ghost, a type of safeguard from the savage and the malicious, and the seventh was a tandem entity, lying deep in his core. The entity was small and asleep, curled in and metaphoric ball deep in the pit of his stomach, where his power lied until he called on it. Danny threw it to the wind, and regarded It as "just another ghost thing. "

And from there, took off two years of tedious ghost hunting. He had met Skulker, a huntsman who was as tactful as he was deadly. He had encountered Desiree, who brought all of your Arabian dreams to a horrid nightmare, he had even become friends with Valerie, a woman with a vendetta toned in shades of gray.

With his powers, he was under the impression that he would be away from the prying eyes of authority. His flight kept him from getting to class late, even when he'd drown the long nights in video games games and movies. His super strength effectively allowed him to embarrass Dash and bench press enough to make the ladies (or so he thought) crazy for him. His ghost vision let him cheat on tests he hadn't studied for, and his intangibility let him reach into his favorite stores at night and hoard off his favorite snacks and treats. The abuse of his powers was fine as long as it it didn't become chronic, right?

Wrong.

They caught him knocked out with a ghastly bruise over the backside of his head, lying in the remnants of ten racks of food, snacks, and cans all cushioning his weight. The irony of it was, that the boy had been underway with the containment of a rampart host, when a rightly timed tentacle clapped back across the boys head, sending him with enough force to not only wreck the store, but also knock him straight into the stores transformer boxes in the back room, giving him a shock so brutal that he reverted back to his human form quicker than lightning.

Danny recalled, the thick accent of a man who sounded like he had a mustache (he did) cursing and carrying on about what the boy had done to the store. Danny raised up and batted his eyes, the hair on his body still on end as he attempted to formulate words. He wanted to explain that he had been thrown in the building, and gussy it up with some tears and pained whines but before he could even breathe out out a pained whine, the cold clack of silver handcuffs met his sore wrists, and he found his chest becoming friends with the cold metal of a squad car.

Jazz said that when Maddie found out, she woke up everyone on the block.

Theoretically, Jack and Maddie Fenton would reprimand their son and like any other child, he would be forced to two months (at the minimal) of grounding, he would have to pitifully apologize to the owner of the shop, and guarantee the payment of the broken glass pane and all the food he ruined, but when Danny woke up, cold and uncomfortable in a rumpled hospital gown, all he got was tears, and "I'm so glad you're okay."

In the beginning, Danny found his voice hitched in his throat. It was dry and hoarse, and his mother's pratting and her deathgrip wasn't helping. Jack Fenton came next, his big hurling man hands coming down on his sore shoulders like a hammer on a nail. Danny yelped and Jack gave a quiet but sheepish grin to his flinching son. Danny pulled the strap of the hospital gown off his shoulder, and felt around until he felt the dryness of scarred skin bunched together with stitches.

"The doctor said that one is going to take a while to heal." Jazz lisped as she adjusted her hair and tucked in behind her ear. Her hands came to cover her brothers, and she moved him away from the stitches. "Don't fiddle with it, if they come out then you'll be in bigger trouble."

His heart sank like a rock in the ocean at the mention of trouble. In his momentary daze of waking up in a hospital bed, he found enough of a distraction in his family to invoke a nice bit of blissful ignorance. But he couldn't hide behind it forever, he supposed. His mother soon would show her claws, and his father's voice would soon come down upon him like snow in the Ozarks, and he'd most likely end up working of the debt from the store damage until he was twenty.

Maddie saw her son's face fall, so she put a consoling hand on his shoulder. "Don't be mistaken, we're very disappointed in you, but it's obviously partly our fault because we hadnt disciplined you properly." She said slowly, taking Danny's hand. Jack slid over to the starboard side of the bed and put his hands on his sides. "I should have been a better father instead of shutting myself up in the lab all the time with the portal and such." Maddie nodded in agreement, and Danny opened his mouth to the interject, but was cut off by his mother. "Hopefully a new setting will help you out, build some character and such!" She giggled at her own words, as the halfa adjusted himself in his seat.

"No, no, it was my fault entirely." he exclaimed with dejection heavily spotting his words. "I did something stupid on impulse, and got scared and hurt when the alarms went off." He lied beneath baited breath. What was he supposed to do? Transform into a ghost in the middle of a hospital and possibly jeopardize his and his families safety? Hell his family had such a vendetta for anything with the slightest amount of ectoplasm in its skin that he couldn't completely trust them with his secret yet. Not to mention the fact that the hospital was alive and breathing with patients patients, doctors, and nurses. They could strap him down and cut him open whenever they felt like it.

He gagged at the thought.

Suddenly a few years of paying to fix the store he wrecked sounded wonderful.

"Look, as soon as I get out this bed and put some real clothes on, I'll go speak to the shop owner and get a job around town to pay for the damages." He said twiddling his thumbs. He looked up and watched his mother twiddle her hair.

"Danny, all that's been taken care of. The damages and the apology, all of that." Maddie said with backing from her husband. "All you really have to do is pack."

"Woah, woah, woah, you paid for the damages and everything?" He asked astounded. He sat up, stressing out his stitches but not caring.

"Well, not really. Vlad was in town and he heard about the whole fiasco, and after some talking, he decided that he would pay for everything." Maddie said lowly. She and Vlad had a history, but she retained some respect for the man, if not sympathy. "he said, he was going to take you "under his wing" and get you back on track." She gave him air quotes for effect, while Danny's astounded face turned to one of concern. He knew Vlad. He knew him well, inside and outside the ghost social ring. Social butterfly and billionaire eccentric by day, harrowing enigma of the ghost zone by night. He had a slight (okay more than slight) obsession with his mother, and vendetta with his father which he learned about while staying at the man's mansion last fall. He'd been very quiet and under them and table since then. Danny didn't like it one bit.

"Seriously? I have to go live with the fruit loop? I'll die!" He said, Jack and Maddie not knowing how literal he was.

"Look Danny," Jack began. "it was either this, or jail, and you and I both know how bad the family would suffer if we had to pay for damages ourselves."

The boy opened his mouth in protest but a steely glare from his parents told him otherwise.

He sighed, realizing how tied his hands were. Less so tied, and more so bound and nailed to the wall.

"When do I leave?"

"As soon as you can walk."