Title: The Caretaker, the Pharaoh and the Reaper

Summary: Excommunicated agent of Death, Danny Phantom, is bored. His solution? Venture into the human realm with his two ghost pals; the spirit of the exalted Pharaoh Duulaman, and the enchanting daughter of Undergrowth, Samantha. Their destination? Casper High. When trouble making is all that's on the agenda, it's time for the newly crowned A-listers to usher in a new age of chaos…

Notes: Duulaman is Tucker.

'I can't believe she fired me,' Danny pouted, idly turning his scythe over in his hands. The tool glinted merrily in the permanently hazed glow of the Zone, quietly mocking him for his earlier spectacular fail.

'In all fairness, Danny, You were crap at your job,' countered Sam a little tactlessly.

But she wasn't wrong; Danny was just that, a slacker. Since day one, he'd cut corners, totalled jobs, bent the rules to breaking point and beyond. There were the times he'd been late, topped only by the times he'd been early, and every time in between when he'd been brash, cold or downright scary. The real mystery, if Danny was being completely honest, was why he hadn't been sacked sooner.

'Eh, so maybe I took a few souls before their time. Big deal.' He shrugged nonchalantly. 'I had a quota to fill and I didn't want to be stuck ferrying souls to the afterlife for the rest of my existence.'

It was true. Whenever he wasn't causing trouble, he started to feel like one of Duulaman's brainless drones populating the Pharaoh's Realm[1]. They were quasi-ghosts; creatures that appeared sentient, but in reality were no more than incorporeal dolls, moulded from an echo of another ghost's memory; an ectoplasmic shell. Drones weren't created to think for themselves and they had no free will, simply following blueprints drawn up by their maker to fill their empty heads.

That was why Danny screwed up as often as he did —to prove he was in control. To prove he wasn't like every other reaper under Death's management.

And now he wasn't. As of today, he was officially the first reaper in history to get the sack. Yay.

Danny twirled his scythe between dexterous fingers again. Sam glowered and her breath hitched as the blade skimmed the crimson petals of one of her precious roses. Without warning, she lunged forward with a surge of vines, snaking around the boy's limbs and pinning both of his arms to his sides.

'Do that again, I dare you.' Her eyes flashed a brighter shade of luminous green in warning.

Danny gulped and nodded. The vines slunk back into the mud and he rubbed the thorn prints dotting his porcelain skin. 'No, ma'am,' he said, more impressed than intimidated.

Danny would always be the first to admit that Sam was a badass. For starters, her lair, a sprawling haven of lush greenery and exotic plants, was so much cooler than his —a bleak little room in the dullest sector of the Ghost Zone was all his position had afforded him. That was why he spent most of his free time in the Garden hanging out with Sam.

Not to mention the raven-haired nature spirit was the most beautiful girl Danny had ever seen. But that was between him and his tight-lipped canine confidant, Cujo.

'If you hated your job so much, why aren't you out celebrating, Danny?' she asked, turning back to her plants and petting an animate venus fly-trap under its sepal.

'I'm bo-ored, Sam,' he whined over-dramatically, floating upside down and stretching out his arms like an exasperated starfish.

Unlike most ghosts, Danny didn't have an obsession —he was a Reaper; an acolyte of Death herself. Now that he was out of the job, he was a Free Spirit at last, but the eternal monotony had him feeling more like a Lost Soul.

'What do you want me to do about it?' she asked distractedly, rejuvenating a wilting bush with her ecto-energy. Its droopy leaves perked up and sharp thorns appeared along its velvety stem.

Danny floated closer to the ghostly gardener. 'What do you say to visiting Earth with me? I'm dying for a vacation.' The pun was whispered huskily into her ear, his eyes flickered to her lilac lips—

—Sam's head snapped up. 'You want to go haunting with me?' she asked, a jade blush dusting her soft cheeks.

Danny had drifted backwards, choosing to hover at a safer distance and rubbed the back of his neck, fixing his gaze to a large knot decorating a nearby trunk that was suddenly very fascinating. 'Yeah, the three of us are gonna have so much fun,' he forced himself to say, inwardly face-palming.

'Three of us?' she questioned, a subtle hint of disappointment etched into her words.

'You know Duulaman has been talking about going for a while now. I can't remember the last time that guy left the Ghost Zone,' said Danny, chuckling lightly.

The Pharaoh's realm was one of the largest and most elaborately designed sectors in the whole dimension. That was why he rarely ventured outside of his home, let alone beyond the limits of the Ghost Zone. But Duulaman had found himself in the grip of boredom too, and travelling to a different plane of existence promised excitement and adventure… as well as the chance to wreak some serious havoc for the humans living there.

'Right, of course… yeah,' mumbled Sam, despondency evident in her tone.

If he didn't know any better, Danny would've thought Sam had wanted to go haunting with him alone. The ghost boy shook his head. As if Sam, protégé of the venerable Undergrowth, would ever fall for a washed-up hench-ghost like himself. That's why he'd invited the D-man, so she wouldn't get the wrong idea. Not that he didn't want to go alone, just that Danny knew she would never want to be anything more than friends.

'So... you coming or what?' he asked, masking his insecurity behind a devilish grin and extended a silver-gloved hand.

She returned his wicked smirk with one of her own. 'Someone's gotta keep you out of trouble,' she said as she entwined her fingers with his.

'...Or help me get into it,' he riposted with a wink.

Swinging his scythe down in an arc, Danny drew a fine seam of glowing green light on the muted green canvas of the GZ. The dimensional tear grew into a huge gash, spiralling into a lime vortex of ectoplasm: a ghost portal. Natural portals were hard to come by, but reapers, beings who periodically passed between realities, had the ability to create temporal gateways, and —in spite of his recent expulsion— the ghost boy had retained this skill.

She laughed at his more apt sentiment. 'So tell me, Phantom… where on Earth are we going?'

Vice-principal Lancer looked down at his new students with blinkered optimism.

In the first seat sat a young woman with shoulder-length black hair, full lashes and winged eyeliner framing brilliantly green eyes. She sat primly, staring fondly at the baby succulent placed next to his sticky-tape dispenser. The neglected plant looked better than it had since first leaving the garden centre, its shoots seemingly growing towards the goth girl, its fronds extending as if reaching out for her. Well, that's unusual…

Next to her sat another teen with dark skin and shorn black hair. Daylight turned his lenses into an opaque screen, but when he tilted his head, Lancer saw a flash of crimson irises. The purple and gold striped beanie sat on his head like an ornate headpiece, and the subtle inclination of his chin demanded cool respect. He was studying Lancer's desktop monitor with a great deal of interest as if he had never seen anything like the hunk-of-junk machine whirring asthmatically in the centre of the desk.

Next to him was another boy, roughly the same age, with obviously bleached white hair and vibrant green contacts. His black hoodie was flipped upwards, casting his features in partial shadow. Where the silver zipper had separated, Lancer could see the glint of a chain disappearing beneath his collar and the faint outline of a pendant under the fabric of his white shirt. His… unique look was in violation of several school regulations, but despite his attempts to stand out or appear mysterious, he wore a vacant expression that hinted of little substance to his character.

Still, Lancer practised what he preached and never was one to judge a book by it's cover.

Principal Ishiyama had entered alongside his soon-to-be newest students, introducing them as Samantha Manson —but everyone calls me Sam— Tucker Foley —that would be your excellency, the Great and Powerful Tucker Foley— (Lancer wasn't entirely sure how serious he had been about adopting the title, but assumed it was an inside joke between the trio that he didn't understand), and Daniel Grimm. The teen had furrowed his brow in laboured concentration, offering a weak 'hello' and a sloppy wave.

'That is all… Now educate them or something, I don't know.' Ishiyama shrugged, her tone was loose and informal, as well as gruffer than usual as if her voice was not her own. She leant against his desk with a bored expression, regarding her manicure tiredly… Were her eyes always that piercing shade of green? I could've sworn—

'See ya,' she dismissed herself abruptly, totally and uncharacteristically unprofessional.

Perhaps she hasn't yet had her morning coffee? Lancer wondered silently.

He watched as the Principal turned to leave, shooting the new girl a sneaky, almost conspiratorial wink before walking head-first into the door with a jarring slam.

'Owch…' she grumbled sourly, rubbing her forehead and glaring at the offending entryway as if it had caused personal insult, or perhaps slandered her mother.

Tucker laughed at her expense and Sam face-palmed. A scowling Ishiyama hesitantly found the door handle, remembering to swing it open before trying to pass through this time. She did not attempt to reprimand the cheeky students. Ishiyama wasn't overly strict, but Lancer hadn't thought she was that lenient either.

'…Damn doors,' she muttered darkly under her breath on her way out.

The slam of the door seemed to jolt the second boy, (Danny, was it?), back to the present and an alert brightness flooded his features. It might've been encouraging if his smile hadn't been laced with mischief. Instead, it was thoroughly chilling.

Lancer shuffled some papers on his desk and addressed his new students. 'It's most unusual to have three students join at once,' he remarked. 'What brings you kids to Amity?' he asked, raising a brow.

Amity Park was your standard sleepy town in the middle of nowhere; the kind of place people went to be forgotten. The only exceptional thing about the place was how exceptionally ordinary it was. Nothing ever happened here. The only draw to Amity was the neighbouring city, where a lot of his students' parents found work, and Lancer would put money on these kids having similar circumstances.

'We're tourists,' said Danny flatly. 'Casper High being the first stop on our whirlwind tour of paranormal hotspots.'

Sarcasm. This young man seemed to be conforming to every troubled teen cliché in the book. He clicked his tongue in disapproval.

'Our… guardian lost his job and we all felt like a change of pace, so we moved here… last week.' The way Sam tacked on each detail seemed a little suspicious. 'He was… a delivery man. But he was really unprofessional.'

'Yeah, he was in charge of some really precious… parcels. He shook them up too much and never made his delivery slots,' Tucker cheerfully chimed in.

Danny glared at the two other kids, a sour look on his face. 'Guys, in m—his defence, being a delivery man wasn't his true calling.'

'That's funny considering that was what he was literally made for,' said Tucker. Lancer didn't have to understand the context to know the boy was speaking disparagingly about their guardian's former occupation.

Danny had risen out of his seat. 'Just because he was made for it, shouldn't mean that's all he can ever hope to be,' he bit out.

'Yeah, Duu—de,' said Sam, sounding as if she had changed direction mid-word. 'He can be whatever he wants to be.' She grabbed hold of Danny's forearm, quelling his temper. At length, he sat down, still seething.

While Danny's impromptu speech was oddly profound and inspirational, Lancer felt as though there was some hidden subtext that had been completely lost on him. But realising he had no hope of deciphering it, he set aside his questions for the meantime.

Mr Lancer looked down at the forms sitting on his desk. Apparently, the trio were the adopted children of Mr Gar Dian and Ms Kair Tayker, and —as they had told him earlier— had recently moved into 917 Maple Street.

Mr Lancer hadn't known that tumble-down old place was for sale, or even habitable for that matter. It was falling apart, neglected and smelled funky. All qualities that made it perfect for hosting the school annual haunted house party, but not ones that made for a comfortable home. Maybe it had been renovated since last Halloween, Lancer wasn't sure. But why anyone would want to live there was even more of a mystery.

Rumour had it that 917 Maple Street was haunted.

Not that Mr Lancer subscribed to the occult and spooky, but that place gave even him serious chills. He opted not to comment on their new address.

'Here are your timetables,' he handed each of them a sheet of paper with their names printed at the top but yanked them out of reach to issue a terse warning. 'Do not lose them. I don't have time to reprint them just because you're too careless. A lost schedule is not a valid excuse to be late to class.'

When they nodded, he let the teens take the timetables and silently compare. They didn't have all their classes together, but English class —his class— was one which sat all three kids together. Oh, joy. Lancer was not looking forward to fourth period when he'd have to deal with three wild cards all at once. He knew and expected it to be a test of his patience. A challenge Mr Lancer could really do without.

At least he had a little help in the form of one Jasmine Fenton. She had been enlisted to show the new students around, and —fingers crossed— keep them out of trouble. It was a big ask, but if anyone was up to the challenge, it would be Miss Fenton. She was an outstanding student, with perfect grades and an incredible work ethic. Not to mention she had a lot of experience in dealing with… eccentric characters. Her parents were professional ghost hunters after all. Well, technically they were inventors, but there was generally some sort of ghost hunting application attached to each invention.

As an only child, she had her work cut out in keeping the Fentons out of trouble. Though their wacky antics often made the local headlines despite her valiant efforts.

He called her inside but left her to make her own introduction. 'Hi, I'm Jazz.' She waved and smiled welcomingly. 'How are you three finding Amity so far?'

'Different,' said Tucker. 'I don't remember there being so many people.'

'You've been here before?' Jazz asked conversationally.

'I came a few years ago when they brought over Hotep,' he replied. Danny lifted an eyebrow as if this was news to him. 'What? I missed my staff. But there's no way I was going to wake up that jerk just to get it back,' he added quietly to the other boy.

'Hotep RA? The mummy?' questioned Jazz, familiar with the Egyptian exhibit. 'But he's been a permanent fixture at Amity Park Museum for at least fifty years.'

'Wow, time flies,' replied Tucker, mildly surprised.

Sam elbowed the boy sharply in the ribs. 'He's joking! Aren't you Tuck?" she said between gritted teeth.

'Right,' he wheezed, shooting her a heated glare. 'A joke. Because as you can clearly see, I'm only sixteen,' he swept his hands demonstratively over his torso with an awkward rigidity. 'And there is no way I could have been there fifty years ago. Because I'd have to be immortal, or something equally as ridiculous.' He spoke stiffly and paused as if daring someone to contradict him, laughing a liar's laugh.

Danny and Sam face-palmed.

'Uh-huh,' said Jazz. 'Right, so…' she cleared her throat. 'Let me show you guys to class.'

She led the new students from the room, shooting Mr Lancer a concerned glance on her way out. Miss Fenton would be fine… probably. It was the rest of the student body that he ought to be worried about…

[1] I feel like ghosts created by other ghosts, or ghost minions would be different and less sentient than regular ghosts, a bit like Nocturne's Sleepwalkers.

A/N: Thanks for reading the first instalment of The Caretaker, the Pharaoh and the Reaper. It was a one-shot that got really out of hand. At first, I just wanted to do a little piece about the evil trio causing trouble at Casper High, but now each chapter is going to be from a different person's perspective. In this AU, Jazz and Danny aren't related and they're the same age. This is because I wanted Danny to be older, but I still wanted Jazz to feature in the story as I have big plans for a Jazz chapter. *Cackles evilly*

If you have any suggestions for things you would like to see in this story, please leave a review, and as always, concrit is very welcome :) Whose perspective would you like to see next?