The ghost hung in the sky like a limp marionette, invisible strings extending into the atmosphere as it swung. Its aura flickered, green, void-like eyes narrowing. It observed Phantom with a perverse interest, enough to make Danny's stomach twist in anticipation. They'd been fighting for over an hour and Danny had a feeling that this battle had reached its climax. This ghost was especially tricky; he'd learned that the hard way.

The ghost itself wasn't very intimidating. Oh, no. It was just especially average, at least in stature. Stocky, around six feet tallーlike a human, but not. It was a beast, but Danny couldn't make out what kind of beast it was because it was nothing like he'd seen before. It had blue fur around its face, but the rest of its body was slick and scaly like a reptile… not to mention its claws. Those were the worst. They were razor-sharp and curled around its paws like a coilーall seven paws. He'd gotten nicked four times tonight with those claws and he had to say, this guy really needed a manicure.

Its claws… wasn't exactly why he was difficult, though.

It had some kind of collar, a red-and-silver-plated collar that indicated he was one of Vlad's experiments. If Danny had to bet, that collar also had a camera and Vlad was observing how he was treating this challenge. Sick bastard. But… he'd deal with Vlad laterーfor now he had to stop this beast from wreaking havoc. Which was easier said than done, because the collar gave it special abilities. Well, not any abilities. It gave it Danny's abilities.

It took Danny a while to figure out how, but every time the beast scratched him with its claws, it stole one of Danny's powers. The first time Danny was scratched, nothing happened so he didn't think much of it. The ghost lunged, dug its claws into Danny's leg, and retreated for a moment while Danny dealt with the pain. Danny ground his teeth and lured the ghost across town, away from the residential area. And minutes later, the ghost lunged again and struck Danny's chest. Danny staggered backward in the air and clutched his chestーthat hurt like a motherfucker.

He growled and readied an ectoblast, but… Danny's fist refused to ignite.

"Huh?" he shook his hand and pulled at his core, trying to get it to do anything but ectoblasts appeared off the table at the moment. That didn't make any sense! His core was at peak energy, summoning an ectoblast should be child's play!

The beast made a choking noise and Danny spun to face it again. Its face was drawn up smugーlike it knew something Danny didn't. He didn't like that. Then the ghost raised four of its seven fists and chortled. Green energy fizzed around its paws and Danny flinched. It hadn't shown that power before… and now… shit. It could steal Danny's powersーit'd already scratched him twice, who knew what other abilities it'd taken?

The fight continued. It scratched Danny again and again, stealing his intangibility and ice powers. Now all he had left was his wail (unless that was the first power it stole, he hadn't checked), invisibility, flight, and strength. Well, those were his useful powers anywayーhe still didn't have a grip on duplication… which would probably be convenient right now.

The ghost swayed in the air, poised with intent to strike Danny again. Danny was readyーhe wouldn't let it get him this time, he was determined. After all, if he lost another power… well, there wasn't much more it could take without reducing Danny back into human form. Danny subtly pulled his Fenton Thermos off its strap and held the device behind his back, preparing for the beast's next attack.

The beast summoned a shard of ice with little precision, it jetted outwards from one of the beast's paws and fell into the street below. Danny smirkedーit may have taken it's ice powers, but it didn't know how to use them. The beast roared in frustration and stormed forward, angered by its own mishap, forgetting about the other powers it had stolen from Danny. It was ridden with rage and instinct, taking its wrath out on its target.

The ghost flew forward and Danny had just enough time to pull the thermos out from behind his back and aimed. He uncapped the lid and the beast was pulled toward the beacon of lightーit thrashed against the device's magnetism, howling in agony. Before the ghost was completely dissolved into the light, it threw out one of its paws and struck Danny's arm. And then, the world fell upward.

Danny hardly managed to hold onto his thermos as he was ejected from the sky and plummeted toward the ground. He was fallingーAncients, he was falling. Fuck. The beast managed to get in one last strike before it was captured and had taken Danny's flight! And now he was going to crash, he couldn't even go intangible! His mind plunged into panic, this was way too fast. Not good, not good, not goODー

The ground was approaching rapidly. Trees pierced the world above him and suddenly he hit. He heard his impact before he felt itーred hot agony consumed his world and this was it. He was going to die again. This was a fucking stupid end; ghost powers stripped away… knocked out of the sky. Everything hurt so much.

Danny waited to pass out, for the pain to ease; but neither occurred. He was still ultimately conscious for some reason, which sucked. His entire body was sore and if he was human he was sure that he would've ruptured a few organs. He laid on the ground for a few more minutes, waiting to fall into the nether but that release never arrived. It seemed that the world wanted him awake… well, so be it.

He tried moving his feet and they still worked. Then his legs, arms, and head. Everything was sore as fuck but… now the pain was slowly waning. Kudos to his healing factorーhis favorite power that the beast hadn't stolen.

Danny untucked his arms and maneuvered himself into a sitting position. He was somewhere on the outskirts of town, some wooded area. He couldn't fly and he definitely couldn't walk home, so that was a bust. He'd have to call Jazz… which was going to be a pain in the ass. It was nine o'clock and she was probably doing homeworkーthe last thing he wanted was an earful about how he should 'be more careful' and how he 'interrupted her studying'.

Danny groaned in anticipation and focused on transforming human. His phone was in his human's half pocket and he doubted he wanted to stay outdoors in his ghost form anyway. He glowed like a lamp and was already attracting bugs. But when he reached inside himself, he couldn't turn back. He was just… stuck. What the hell…? Oh no.

He knew four out of five of the powers that the beast had stolen, but he still hadn't figured out the first power Vlad's pet stole; his ability to transform. Goddamnit. This fucking sucked. Danny stood up and kicked the ground with his foot, digging his white boots into the dirt. Surely he wouldn't have to walk the entire way home, would he?

Well, he could always try hitchhiking. Although, he doubted that many people would stop for some injured paranormal entity at the side of the road. Everyone knew that was pretty much the beginning of some poorly-written horror movie.

Walking was his only option. If he wanted to make it home before school started in the morning, he'd best start now. Maybe on the walk back he could brainstorm ways to get Vlad back for this.

It didn't take Danny long to assert his bearings. Sam might have something to say about the vices of light pollution but luckily the city cast a strong beacon for Danny to follow. He sauntered through the trees, ignoring the ache in his legs, and kept his lidded eyes focused on the horizon. Falling prey to exhaustion in the woods was the last thing he needed… he just had to place one foot in front of the other for a few more miles. People ran several miles all the time, surely he could walk that distance!

(Okay, but most people don't walk after falling out of the sky.)

(Shhhhhー)

He had to walk home because if he didn't he'd never make Vlad pay for stranding him in the middle of nowhere. Danny deserved that much at least.

He wasn't sure how long he stumbled through the woods, clamping his hands into his wounds and trying not to succumb to the pain. He was a little on the delirious side, so it could have been one hour or five. Maybe it was only ten minutes. Either way, the woods started to thin and Danny found himself standing on the shoulder of a two-lane road.

He'd made it halfway back into civilization, at least.

Or maybe not. A mile marker said that he still had a ten-mile trek back into Amity Park. He was going to be out here for the rest of the night if not well into the afternoon. Maybe he should consider hitchhiking. Even though he was glowing and bleeding out green, perhaps some sucker would take all the red flags for granted.

He made his way down the road, which was considerably easier to follow than the waning tree line. He didn't have to think as much about his destination and just let the pavement guide his feet while his mind took the backseat.

He couldn't even say how long he'd been walking when the bus approached.

For a moment, he wondered if he was dreaming. Why would an Amity Park Transit bus venture outside the city limit? Maybe it was a line that ran between Amity Park and one of her sister cities? Who knew. Danny hadn't even thought about public transportation. All he knew was that there was a bus approaching and it was going back into the city. He needed on.

He stepped out onto the middle of the road. If he was human, this move would be suicide. Luckily, his otherworldly glow caught the driver's eyes and the vehicle came to a hasty stop. Bingo.

Before the driver could regain his wits, Danny circled around to the bus entrance and tapped on the door. He could see the fear in the man's eyes through the glass. Danny tried not to take it personally all things considered.

"Could I have a ride?" he mouthed.

He was met with a blank stare. After a moment or so the man mouthed back, Phantom?

Danny nodded. This guy recognized him, which meant that he was less likely to write him off as some murderous spirit. Though, considering his past publicity that wasn't completely off the books. These days most of Amity Park realized that he was the good guy but there was still a small faction that was inclined to believe his parents' philosophy about ghosts.

Fortunately, the driver leaned forward and pulled the lever to open the door. He was letting Dannyーno, Phantomーonto the bus. He almost laughed in relief. Nowhere else in America would a sane person let a motherfucking dead kid onto a bus… only Amity Park.

"Thank you, sir," he said. "I just need to get back into the city."

The bus driver, a lean middle-aged man with graying hair, stared at him as if he'd grown a second head. "Areーare you bleeding?"

He couldn't tell. His gloves were slick with ectoplasm but he couldn't tell if anything was still secreting from his wounds. Normally his healing factor had kicked in by now but he'd hit the ground pretty hard so it wasn't too far-fetched he was still injured.

"Probably," he shrugged. "I uh, I'll try not to make a mess. I'm sorry."

"Just… just get on."

He didn't have to tell Danny twice. He was pretty sure he was about to keel over at any moment now. Danny used the railing to maneuver himself onto the bus and kept his eyes trained on the floor as he walked down the aisle. There weren't too many passengers considering that it was a Tuesday night, but there were some and that was more than mortifying. Out of the corner of his eye, he counted eight other people. He couldn't decide if eight was a good or bad number. What exactly constituted a bad number?

"Mommy, why is he glowing?"

The girl was promptly hushed and Danny felt his stomach spin. He selected a seat far from the rest of the passengers but that still wasn't far enough. He was only two seats behind a college kid, apparently high off his ass. Out of everyone on the bus, he had no qualms looking Danny straight in the eye and Danny really wished he wouldn't.

"You're so fucking bright, dude."

"Mm-hm," he nodded.

"Not gonna lie, that's pretty freaky. Like those… those fish. The ones that're at the bottom of the ocean… that have to glow to see. You're like that. You're fish…"

Danny didn't know how to respond. He just brushed the comment off and pressed his forehead against the window, idly watching the road fly behind him. It was eerie. There were water droplets on the glass but he couldn't remember the last time it rained.

He turned away from the window and rested his head against the seat in front of him instead. It smelled like sweat but at least it was softer than the glass.

"Mr. Phantom…?" someone tentatively asked. He could make out a figure standing beside his seat but was much too tired to turn his head. Couldn't he just sleep now?

"Do you need uh, bandages?"

"It's just Danny." Mr. Phantom was my Dad, he almost wanted to add. "And I'm fine."

His wound would close soon enough. Some stranger didn't need to waste time nursing to an injury that would be gone by morning. Hell, some stranger didn't need to nurse him at all.

"You're about to pass out," they insisted.

He snorted. "I'm dead."

"Does bleeding out not spell any negative repercussions for you or are you just doing it for fun?"

Damn, they were almost as sarcastic as he was. That didn't mean he was letting them win, though.

"If getting hurt wasn't a hobby for me then would I even be here?"

They thought for a moment. "That's fair."

And then they sat in the seat across from him and Danny didn't have to be a genius to sense that they were staring at him. Actually, they probably weren't the only one. He was naive to think that the other passengers had stopped.

Did he care?

Not particularly. He was a ghost, it was only natural that they gawked at him.

Somewhere near the front of the bus, he picked up on the little girl whispering to her mother again. "Is he an angel? Mommy, he glows like the angel in my cartoon."

"Don't look at him. He's a ghost and you know about ghosts, don't you?"

The girl gasped and no one spoke for another few minutes. The silence of the bus lulled him into an almost-sleep, a state of half-consciousness perpetuated by the dull pain in his limbs.

Inevitably, he was snapped from his daze and Danny wanted nothing more than to sink into his seat forever and cut himself away from the rest of the world. If he still had his intangibility, he might have done just that. But no, the person across from him just had to speak again.

"So why is a ghost on a bus, anyway?"

It was an innocent question. If he saw a ghost boarding a bus he'd probably ask the same question since taking public transportation wasn't something that they did. So, against his better judgment, Danny said the first thing that came to mind: the truth.

"Can't fly. Needed to get home before morning."

"And where is your home?"

"Uh, Amity Park."

"Yeah, but where do you stay?"

He tried shrugging but the motion felt weird with his head pressed against the seat. "Around."

"So why before morning? Do you disappear or something if you don't get home by then?"

Well, considering his frequent truancy that was one way to put it. If he missed another day of school, Mr. Lancer and his parents would make his half-life a living hell.

"Not literally. I just have somewhere to be."

They huffed dubiously. "You don't have a day job do you?"

"Who would hire a ghost?"

"Some ghosts can pass as human. I've seen it."

"Nah. Not me. I can't even get on a bus without causing a scene." Danny lifted his head from the seat and regarded the strangerーa twenty-something black guy with gaudy blue bracesーwith a suave head tilt. "I mean, the glowing's kind of a dead give away."

"Oh my God," the man said. "You're really as bad as they say on the news."

"What? Come on… I don't hurt people."

"No, I mean the puns. That was awful."

He scoffed. "I've never heard them talk about my puns on the news."

"It's usually only on the live broadcasts. Wait, you watch the news?"

"Sometimes? It's good to stay in the loop, I guess."

"That's wild. Ghosts watch the news. Who woulda thought?"

"Not the Fentons, for sure," he muttered.

"Oh yeah, they talk shit about you all the time. I haven't lived here long but I hear they've been wackjobs for years."

Danny's cheeks felt hot. He hated when somebody insulted his family, even though he'd just backhandedly snubbed his parents himself. "They're not… that crazy, but yeah. They hate my ectoplasmic guts so much that they want to put them in jars."

"Honestly, my friends and I were talking the other day and we can't even figure out how they haven't been arrested yet. They have kids, don't they? Growing up with them sounds like a nightmare if you ask me."

Danny growled. "It was fine."

"What?"

Shit. What had he just said? That growing up with the Fentons was fine? Phantom couldn't say that, Phantom wasn't a Fenton kid… Phantom shouldn't know about the Fentons or their children. All he should know is that they're ghost hunters and that they hate ghosts. How could he salvage this? What if this guy figured out his secret because he was a bit loopy from blood loss on some stupid bus? What if this stranger told everyone? He'd be fucked.

"I mean, uh. I think that since they haven't uh, hurt their kids yet that they're probably fine. They hate ghosts but they're not bad people?"

Great going, Danny. That doesn't sound suspicious as hell.

The man gulped. "Um. Your eyes are really bright right now. Are you okay?"

He was panicking. He shouldn't be panicking.

"I'm fine," he assured him, turning away and looking back out the window. The trees had finally thinned and they were passing several residential neighborhoods. How long until the bus stopped?

(How long until everyone would stop staring at him while he broke down?)

Sam always said that nobody noticed him. Or was it Jazz? Whichever. Someone had said that nobody tended to notice anxiety attacks and that he shouldn't let his brain fool him into believing that everyone's watching him. They were wrong. Everyone here was watching him. He was a freak, a ghost, a motherfucking flashlight. He couldn't hide. Even if he turned invisible, they knew where he was sittingーthey'd be able to see his ectoplasm drip onto the seat.

They were watching. Fuck, they were watching.

He dug his gloved fingers into his legs and wished that he wasn't wearing anything around his hands so that he could use his nails to break skin. No, no. Don't do that. You're already injured you fucking dumbass. Idiot. Do you want people to think you're a self-harming ghost? Do you want to think you just protect them because you like being hurt or some sick bullshit? Stop freaking out. Stop freaking out!

The bus turned and Danny felt his breath hitch in his throat. A bus stop. Straight down the street. The driver was slowing down now... was this his stop? Was this the closest stop to FentonWorks?

Fuck it. He needed off, now. He could walk across town if he needed to; he'd walked further than that tonight already.

Half the passengers clamored to stand once the bus came to a full stop. The mother and little girl were the first to exit and Danny felt his stomach knot with guilt. He'd really scared these people just by existing in the same space as them.

"Hey, Phantom," the stranger said. He was still in his seat, eyeing the ghost boy carefully. "It was cool meeting you. Keep looking out for us, okay?"

Danny didn't know how to respond to that. He'd barely talked with the guy, didn't even know his name, and somehow he'd made a good impression on him? Even though he'd practically shut down at the end of their conversation?

"Uh, alright," he managed. He felt bad not saying more but what could he say?

Danny stepped off the bus and cocked his head toward the nearest street sign. He was on 5th Avenue and Cardinalーonly two blocks from FentonWorks. For once, he actually lucked out. He was sure Jazz would kill him when he got back though, assuming she was still awake. No doubt she'd called his phone twenty times by now only to be met with voicemail. Could his phone even take messages while it was suspended in his human form? Weird, he'd never thought about that. He'd figure it out later once Vlad's stupid power-theft wore off.

He hoped that was by morning, otherwise, he would have to find a wig and glasses.