School is starting up pretty soon for me and I thought that as a goign back to school treat I'd update all of my stories in one weekend. I'm sorry if no one's heard from me all summer but I've actaully been planning this the whole time as my gift to everyone who's read my stories. I've been pretty busy with going to a new school and making sure I don't get lost when the term starts, I got to say that High School might not be so bad since my friend phantomlover13 is going with me. Not sure if we'll be in the same classes but one familiar face helps a lot in a whole new world of strangers.
I'm thinking of joining a club or two and maybe doing a sport too for each season so I'll stay in good physical and mental state. Who knows maybe High School will give me some inspiration for my stories I mean Danny is in High and starting Monday so am I.
I can personally say that I'm looking forward to it. Especially since we get vending machines I'm happy! Let's give it up for junk food!
(Insert you choice of cheer here)
Disclaimer: I don't own Danny Phantom; I don't even own my own computer! Apparently we have to share.
Chapter 6
The Mentor
Karma was really starting to get on his nerves lately he thought as he crudely sat on the cold, plastic, orange chair that he had been planted on when he had got back.
He silently cursed the Box Ghost for adding even more trouble to his day that he just wished was over already. This had not been a fun a day to say the least and now he was going to be punished someway by the principal. This wasn't something new but it was an all time new record for him.
Usually on missions like this he'd get a detention around the end of the week never in just half a day. Why did he just act out like that? He'd never been the type to draw attention to him preferring the role as the new kid whose a wall flower and no body ever notices more than once, so what had gotten into him today?
Ever since he had seen this town he had gotten this weird vibe from it, almost like he had been here before somewhere in a memory or dream. But the raven-haired teen had shaken off and just explained it using the ghosts that roamed freely here. Most of them were just bits of memories or spirits who just wanted to stay and look after their loved ones for a little longer until they moved on.
None were a threat to him, the only ones that he was trained to take down were the ones who looked to make trouble. Some were pretty powerful but he always took them down before they could complete their plans for vengeance of conquest over something they couldn't obtain when they were alive.
The ghost that was now licking his wounds in the Ghost Zone was what Phantom considered one of the most annoying ghosts of all time, the Box Ghost, or as he was more helpful for is target practice and a way to relieve stress.
At least it wasn't Skulker or Technus, he admitted reluctantly as he leaned his head against the wall closing his eyes as he waited for him to be called inside the room to be given his punishment.
I really hate the Box Ghost, he growled in frustration. Not only had that little pest made him get in even more trouble for skipping class but also managed to cause a lot of destruction by accident almost blowing his cover and alerting them to the presence of a white haired, green-eyed punk.
Was one day of not having to worry about ghosts too much to ask for?
"Daniel Phantom," called the secretary sticking her head out and reading his name from off a clipboard, without even glancing at him she motioned at him t follow her. Getting up he put on an expressionless mask on and followed in pursuit behind the old woman. "Wait here." she said in a tone that suggested that she was too old for this job.
She pointed towards another plastic chair, this time blue, and without another word she stepped out and closed the door behind her leaving the boy inside and alone with his thoughts for his first night in this boring town. Other than the frequent ghost attacks there was nothing else hear for him to do so the faster this was over with the better. That meant that he would have to run some serious damage control and make sure to stay off the teachers' here radars long enough for him to do his job without a glitch.
The whole wall flower thing might be a bit harder since he had made a scene and had shown off some of his fighting skills to about half the student body. Thinking back now he had to resist the urge to hit himself right then and there for his own stupidity. He should have just let that blonde guy beat him up, a few bruises was nothing compared to what he would have to face if he failed this mission.
What was it about this place that irritated him so much?
The more he thought about it the more agitated he became. It was like the answer was right in front of him yet he couldn't see it.
The door opened once more drawing the boy out of his thoughts as he turned and saw the both the principal and the vice principal followed by a red-head that was a couple of years older than he was. She had a book in her arms and was eyeing him curiously with an analytical look in her look that suggested a high level of intelligence and a keen sense of observation. The way she held herself suggested that she was confident and not easily discouraged from anything with a sense of pride as well.
The Asian woman sitting at the desk pulled out a pair of reading glasses and quietly read over a couple of papers murmuring things to the bald man next to her in his ears so that neither Phantom or the girl sitting next to him could hear them. Danny was seriously tempted to try and probe their minds but reframed from doing so.
He had already convinced them that he was a dangerous rebel there's no need to get them to think that he had any type of freakish powers too.
After a moment of silence Ms. Ishimaya spoke to him, "Now Mr. Phantom..."
Danny remained emotionless and crossed his arms looking the woman straight in the eyes.
"I understand that you may have gotten to a rough start on your first day here and that you might feel a bit confused..."
Danny had to bite his tongue from mouthing off to her, she was treating him like a five year old but the way Mr. Lancer was looking at him told a different story that the worst was about to come soon enough for sure. He had a bad feeling at the pit of his stomach that it had something to do with the red-head who was scribbling down something really fast with intense focus.
"...But I think we may have found the perfect way for you to get accustomed to our policies here so you be able to fit a lot better from now on."
Danny raised an eyebrow, "How?" he asked a bit curious on what they were going to do, this didn't sound like a punishment...
"That's why we've decided to assign you a mentor to stick with during and after school to make sure you have no trouble in the future." Ms. Ishimaya said cheerfully. Mr. Lancer had a small smile on his face that gave the impression that he was enjoying the shocked expression on the teen's face at hearing this piece of information.
"You're giving me a baby-sitter!" he practically yelled out loud standing up from his seat and glaring at the two authority figures in front of him.
The principal was about to say something but lancer beat her to it, "Actually we're giving you a mentor," he said, "Jazz Fenton is one of Casper High's best and brightest and a positive influence to those around her. It's a program where lesser students are assigned an older teen mentor in hope of helping them and giving them someone their own age to communicate with in a more comfortable environment."
"So for the next week or so she'll be constantly watching and observing you," added Ms. Ishimaya to wrap up the matter.
Danny was still lost for words; this has got to be one of the worst punishments in the history of punishments. These people thought that he was troubled? Man they didn't know the half of it, it took a lot of years worth of self-control to stop himself from laughing out loud and saying how stupid their program was to begin with in the first place.
This was going to be a snap...
"Fine," was all that he had to say as he sat back down and regained his old position with his arms crossed and not showing any emotions to anyone. Only this time he was more wary of the girl next to him, "So that's it, I can go."
"Of course,"
Danny rose and left with the red-head following close behind, she stopped to say good-bye to the teachers and shut the door on her way out in hot pursuit of her new 'patient'.
As soon as they had gone out of hearing range Mr. Lancer turned to his boss and looked questionably at her, "Do you really think this is going to work?" he asked frowning a bit, "I mean I don't doubt Ms. Fenton wouldn't do but her very best, but there's something odd about that Phantom kid that I don't like."
"I'm sure it's nothing Lancer," she sighed tiredly. As a principal of a High School that had to deal with ghosts almost daily she had gotten used to having to deal with trouble makers all the time. Phantom wasn't much different from other cases, sooner or later he was bound to break being with Jasmine Fenton for too long. "It's probably just the way his last name sounds that makes him sound so odd,"
"I guess you're right," said the bald man walking to the window where he spotted Phantom being pulled off campus by the wrist by non other than his new mentor. It looked like they were heading towards the Nasty Burger, although he couldn't hear what they were saying, judging from the annoyed look on the boy's face and the cheerful smile on Jazz's face he could only begin to suspect that Jazz was already hard at work.
He turned back to face Ishimaya with a small secretive smile on his face, "...So how much did you bet?" he asked innocently.
"...So I walked up to them and told them directly that using others to prove dominance was nothing but a poor cry for attention and to be looked upon with respect by others in order to ensure their inner feelings that they have importance in this world and are more than equals to those who they consider lesser than them."
It was official that Jazz Fenton was the most talkative person in the world and in the history of man kind. Nothing got her to shut-up and as soon as she finished with one topic she got started with another one making one's head feel dizzy just by the number of big words she seemed to fit in one sentence and still have the entire dictionary to go.
Currently Danny Phantom was trying his best to ditch her so that he could stake out the town and get familiar with the landscape so that he knew where everything was and where he needed to go in case of something bad happening.
No luck so far.
Quietly he started to bang his head against the window next to where he was sitting at a booth at a fast food joint called Nasty Burger. Jazz had dragged him there saying that it would be a greet place to socialize with a lot of kids from school because i was one of the most popular teen hang-outs in town.
All the while Danny had protested saying that he had stuff to do and wasn't hungry but Jazz wouldn't listen to a word that he had to say and kept going. He gotten a burger and a shake in hopes of being able to sneak off but she was three steps ahead of her and tagged along with him to order a small salad.
He knew he should have gone invisible the moment the chance came but he missed it and now he was stuck here with a smart big mouth playing around with his food completely bored out of his mind and ready to kill him just to put himself out of his misery. Too bad there wasn't anything sharp or blunt anywhere to fulfill his wish.
Karma really sucks.
It figures that the first day on his first solo mission ever and he has already screwed up big time and there was without a doubt that the others back home wouldn't hesitate to rub in his face the moment that they heard about it. Why couldn't his life ever be easy and simple? Black and white, no surprises just something standard, get what you came for and leave before someone suspects something's amiss.
But nooooooo there always has to be a down side to things.
I guess the whole 'no deed goes unpunished' really is an understatement, Danny stopped banging his head long enough to shoot a glare at Jazz who had finally stopped talking to take a bite out of her salad, A BIG understatement, he thought
All around kids were stealing glances at him and whispering to their friends; some girls were giving him some really weird looks and giggling together while some boys were looking at him with jealousy in their eyes or fear. Danny just wished he could just turn invisible, he felt as if he was under a spot light inside a display case with hundreds of eyes boring into him.
Was being left alone really that hard to do? Danny thought back to the Fenton girl sitting in front of him and sighed.
Guess so.
"...Are you even listening?"
Danny snapped back to the realm of the living and whipped his attention to te now annoyed looking girl who had he r hands on he hips and looking at him with a disapproving glare that oddly reminded him of a mother scolding their child for some reason. It kind of also creeped him out a bit because he swore that he had seen that look before, it was so familiar...
He shook away those thoughts and gave her the best answer he could manage at the moment with his brain currently rebooting, "Huh?"
"I said are you even listening," she repeated rolling eyes and crossing her arms in front of her chest. "You know I think I even saw you drooling a bit," she added with a mocking grin.
Danny shot her a withering stare that didn't seem to phase her one bit and turned his head so that she wouldn't be able to see him quickly wipe his mouth with the back of his hand to check if there was any drool.
"You know you really need to learn how to pay attention."
"And you need to learn when to stop talking," he shot back.
Jazz looked a bit taken back for a moment but it was gone as fast as it came, she was used to having to deal with kids just like the blue-eyed one in front of her. She was majoring in child psychology and was planning on getting her PHD on the subject when she went to attend college next year.
From the moment she had been told about him she knew was in for a bit of a challenge but nothing she couldn't handle right?
Sighing she said, "You know the rudeness really isn't appreciated."
"And neither is you trying to be a bossy know it all!"
"I'm not a bossy know it all," she growled through clenched teeth. Jazz Fenton was usually a very patient person but this guy was pushing buttons that she didn't even know she had.
"Could have fooled me," he murmured sarcastically.
She could feel her eye start to twitch a bit and resisted the urge to smack him on the back of the head, taking a deep breath she calmed herself down, Ok let's try something else, she thought.
Jazz sighed and put on a more cheery perspective, "Look I'm sorry if I got a little testy but I'm sure that we can find some common ground here."
"And by common ground you mean..."
"...That we should do something together, something that we both like to do. Oh, there's this new section at the museum about analysis on the Egyptian belief on sand incarnations and political data base on the true meaning of he matter of the trade regarding paper!" she squealed excitedly.
"Ohhh, and then later we can go off and read the entire encyclopedia set at the reopening at the library!" he said in fake enthusiasm before he dropped back to his gloomy exterior, "Not. Do you know that you're a spazz?"
That comment threw her threw a loop it was so familiar and brought back an old ache in her heart that she had thought had healed a long time ago.
There had only been one person in her entire life who had been that stubborn and that had ever called her a spazz to her face...
Now she was starting to really doubt there was much she could do with him, she had tried the whole talking non-stop thing and that usually worked. Most kids would have already cracked and spilled their guts out to her but not Phantom. No, he was something different.
He remained as tight lipped as a steel reinforced vault; the only thing she could read off of his face was annoyance and some sort of plan forming in his head to escape her. But she knew all of them, the whole bathroom and 'I need to get some fresh air' routines.
They wouldn't work on her but what she didn't know was that Danny had something a lot different going on in his mind.
It was plain and simple and a sure and safe way to get her and everyone distracted long enough for his to literally disappear from view before anybody knew what had happened.
Danny took a minute took look at his surroundings looking to see if there was anything that he could use to his advantage when he spotted it.
A fire alarm right beside the cash register for quick and easy access in case of a fire.
It was just what he needed in order to make a quick, clean escape.
Aiming carefully he let out a small stream of energy from his finger underneath the table so Jazz wouldn't be able to see.
It hit a metallic surface reflecting off of it in a perfect ninety degree angle and continuing on bouncing off of a compact mirror that a girl named Paullina was using to fix her make-up with, hitting it's target dead on.
The loud siren went off with an ear splitting shriek making everyone jump up in fright before all hell let loose and everyone stampede out of the doors trying to get out from the sprinkles that had gone off soaking everyone.
Several girls were wailing loudly about their hair and their now ruined make-up and clothes.
Employees were rushing to examine any traces of a burn, or scorch mark, while getting everyone to get out as orderly as possible until the fire department got there to put out any fire.
Too bad there wasn't one.
Within a ten mile radius of Amity Park.
With everyone in too much of a near state of panic Danny was able to duck underneath the table and turn invisible in a blink of an eye and silently sneak out the back door.
It may have been strange if someone felt someone else push pass them, but with so much chaos no one seemed to even notice. '
Fools, he thought with irritation.
It was too bad that he couldn't just turn intangible as well but he feared that would leave small traces of ectoplasm. Danny had been informed before he had come here that there were a couple of ghost hunters in this area and he had already taken too many chances so far.
The fire alarm was no problem since it had probably now being destroyed beyond recognition thanks to so many people running over it in their frantic hurry to escape even though there wasn't any real danger. So he wasn't afraid if someone actually found it. They'd probably just take it for a broken piece of plastic from something someone had dropped.
A toy or an electronic device perhaps.
It didn't matter now though.
He reached the back exit and pushed the door open leading him into the place where most of the employees probably liked to hang out around during their breaks between shifts in order to goof off and talk trash about their employer and the local gossip.
It had a dumpster that was practically over flowing with rotten food and half eaten food.
For some reason the teen suspected that the food here was probably thrown away as soon as the first bite was taken. At least... that what was the case with him. His stomach immediately started to protest the cholesterol filled sandwiches that used something that probably was meat at some point...
In this decade.
Looking around he smiled as it was made clear that Jazz Fenton was no where around. Still invisible he took off full sprint to the nearest dark alley careful not to bump into any walking pedestrians to avoid suspicion.
It would look pretty weird if you were suddenly knocked down by an unknown physical object that the human eye is unable to see.
Looking around to make sure no one was around he remained invisible but transformed into his battle-mode before taking off into the sky to get an aerial perspective of the town and more importantly the security measures for his targets.
If he was lucky, everything should stick to the plan and he could be out of this back wash city in no time flat.
I can't believe it!, she thought angrily marching through the crowed hoping to spot Danny somewhere in this. It was amazing how he could just suddenly disappear in a large mass of human bodies without a trace.
He ditched me!
Through clenched teeth she hissed in anger, "When I get my hands on him I'm going to give him a piece of my-"
She stopped dead in her tracks and looked down at the ground her anger fading to be over overcome with a large wave of sadness and guilt. She was scolding this Danny just like she used to do with her little brother Danny.
Why is it that the one person she hates to think about keeps on popping up in her mind and all because this new kid was just like him.
Even as a soon to be graduate with honors in many subjects including the study of the human mind and it's reactions to certain events in one's life, Jazz couldn't understand why all of the sudden old feeling were being aroused by someone who she had only been with for a couple of hours and yet they felt so familiar...
It was a conundrum that was making her brain work over time that someone standing close by could practically hear and see the gears moving and shifting at light speed in order to solve this problem in front of her.
Thinking thoughtfully Jazz looked at the notes she had jolted down about him while they had been in the office and while he had gone to order. Opening her notebook she careful reviewed each one.
It wasn't until someone tapped her on the shoulder that she realized she was standing in the middle of the street.
"Hey kid," said a fire fighter clad in the normal attire required for one in his profession, "Mind clearing out of the way so we can move this truck?"
Jazz turned o see that a fire truck was indeed trying to get through but she was standing in the way.
Blushing she apologized and stepped aside, "Oh, sorry sir I was just thinking."
"Well next do at the library or at home we've got work to do here although I don't see why..." he grumbled stalking off back to the truck and climbing on.
Jazz made her way home as the sun was now starting to set.
Something was strange about Danny Phantom. Looking up at the neon sign that read 'Fenton Works' indicating that she had arrived.
There was a fire of determination in her eyes as she eyed her notebook one last time before stepping inside, "There's something going on here and I'm going to find out what it is whether he likes it or not."
Longer than the last chapter huh? My writers block has finally dissolved into nothingness and now the creative juices are starting up again and so is school. For some reason I can't get over that one tiny little fact. Anyone here already started the semester?