Ghost Stories

Introduction: I have a ton of little drabbles and one shots that I've written, recently and year ago, so I decided to throw them up here in one single story. I'll update the summary with each new chapter I post up. Lots of various pairings will be included, you could even request some if there's any pairings/ideas you want to see. I have a lot with homosexual pairings, but I do have heterosexual pairings in here too. I should warn that there may be things like self harm, abuse, death, angst, and other dark topics.

Overall Disclaimer: Danny Phantom is a product of Nickelodeon. All characters in this story are imaginary.

Pairing: Dash x Danny, hints of possible Valerie x Danielle
Notes: Dash, Danny, and Valerie are 27. Danielle is 25. This was originally written with the theme of "uncontrollable."
Summary: Danny's body is slowly destabilizing, and they have only one hope of saving him.

Destroy Yourself

Danny sat in the bathtub, hugging his legs to his chest. The shaking grew worse than ever, and no matter how much he tried to stop it, it only seemed to get worse. He jumped when he heard the door open.

"I knew you'd be in here." Dash sighed as he sat on the edge of the tub and stared at the shaking man. Taking Danny's hand, he frowned when he felt the gooey substance on it. "This can't go on."

"I'm not going to him," Danny growled, angry that Dash wouldn't give up on that train of thought.

"You refuse to tell your parents," Dash stated as he tried to remain calm. "Masters is the only person capable of helping you."

"I can handle this on my own," Danny growled before a coughing fit seized him, green slime trickling down his chin.

"You have no control over this!" Dash shouted, releasing Danny's hand. "I can't just sit here and watch your body destroy itself."

"Why is this happening to me?" Danny sobbed into his knees.

"I don't know, but maybe Masters can give us some answers." Dash reached into his pocket for his wallet where he kept Vlad's business card.

"What if there's no way to control this or to even stop it?"

Dash stared at Danny, feeling his heart ache at the thought of losing Danny completely. "All the more reason to go and see Masters. We'll never find a way to cure you if we don't try everything." Dash left the room to make the phone call to Vlad while Danny remained in the bathtub, imagining only the worst case scenarios.

Sleeping

Dash stared at the man, who could be in nothing more than a peaceful sleep the way he looked beneath the glass encasing him. In another situation, he may have laughed. It was almost like a fairy tale, and all Danny needed to wake up was a kiss from his prince charming. Dash scoffed at himself, knowing he watched way too many overly sappy romance dramas in his lifetime. But he wished it was that simple. He wished all he had to do was open the containment unit keeping Danny alive and place a kiss upon his lips to wake him.

"I'll save him. I promise." The promise Masters gave him was the only hope he had to cling to at that point. Masters was his only hope to save Danny.

Save Him

"I don't think I can hide much longer," she whispered into the Fenton Phone as she peeked over the sill of the window in the room of the building where she took refuge. He was out there somewhere. Her heart pounded as she slipped down to sit on the floor, leaning back against the wall. "Where are you, Valerie?"

"A few miles out," Valerie answered, her response hard to hear over the static. "I should be there soon. Try to keep out of sight."

"Easier said than done," she muttered and glanced out the window again with her bright green eyes searching the skies and the streets for her foe.

Why? The question circled through her mind. Why after leaving her alone for the past thirteen years was he coming after her again? She stayed away from him, didn't interfere again with any of his plans, yet he found her a few days ago and relentlessly chased after her. She only just barely managed to escape his sight in order to hide out in an abandoned apartment building. What did he want from her now?

She contacted Valerie immediately after he first tracked her down, but the hunter was delayed by distance and random ghosts getting in her way as she flew the several miles to the other town. They kept in contact over the past decade, sometimes joked about getting a place together, though she had a job in this town and Valerie worked several towns over.

Time seemed to move too slowly as she waited for Valerie to arrive, but at least for now, she was safe. He didn't show his face again, but she knew that didn't mean much. He was sly and cunning, and he would be waiting for her to slip up and reveal herself or set a trap or some other way to lure her out into the open again so that he could capture her for whatever dastardly scheme he cooked up now. She didn't know what sort of plan he had in mind, not paying him much attention ever since she escaped him the last time.

"Hello, Danielle."

She screamed when the voice spoke right next to her ear. Scrambling to her feet, she put distance between them, falling into a fighting stance as she glared coldly at the older half ghost. "What do you want, Vlad?" she demanded, spitting out his name like it left a foul taste in her mouth. "And it's Elle now."

Vlad raised his brow in surprise at her. "My dear child, you certainly have done a lot of growing since we last met."

"No thanks to you! And I'm not your child." Elle summoned up energy into her hands and fired the green balls at him.

Vlad wrapped his cape around him, vanishing in a swirl of pink smoke. The energy balls smashed into the wall, leaving black scorching marks. "Let's not do this, Elle." Vlad's hands landed on her shoulders as he appeared behind her. "I don't want to hurt you, and I'd prefer if we didn't fight."

Elle twisted out of his hold, narrowing her eyes up at him. "I'm not helping! Whatever you have planned, count me out. I won't help you hurt Danny!"

"My dear, you're greatly mistaken. I-"

A pink blast crashing through the window cut off his words. Elle ducked in time to miss getting scorched by it, but Vlad wasn't so lucky, receiving the energy beam in the chest. He skidded upon the floor, almost ramming his head into the far wall.

"Don't," Valerie shouted with a quiet fury shaking in her voice, "lay another hand on her."

"Will you kindly stop attacking?" Vlad demanded as he climbed to his feet, rubbing at his pained chest. When he saw the two women still glaring at him, he sighed and raised his hands up in defeat. Black rings appeared around him, and in a heartbeat, he appeared before them as Vlad Masters. "Can we put away our weapons and hold a civilized conversation?"

"Why should we trust you?" Elle demanded, not relaxing her stance as Valerie dropped to the floor, standing at her side.

"Because I'm trying to save Daniel!" Vlad shouted at them, and Elle felt taken aback by the emotion in his voice. She had only heard him like that once before when his perfect clone was destroyed.

"What do you mean save Danny?" Valerie asked, sounding as stunned as Elle felt.

"Did you ever stop to ask yourself why I was so desperate to perfect the clone?" Vlad asked, his dark blue eyes focused on Elle. "Did you ever questioned why I was so desperate to acquire Daniel's mid morph DNA to complete it?"

"I thought you being a sick freak was answer enough." Elle shrugged, not understanding where this line of questioning was going.

"No, Elle, it's because I feared one day Daniel, himself, would destabilize." Vlad's voice shook. "He suffered a stronger shock when he went into the Portal and received his ghost powers. When the accident happened to me, I ended up with ecto acne, in part due to Jack's error with the ecto purifier. But I questioned that after my relapse was cured. Daniel suffered no ill effects after his accident. Why was that? I began to look into it, researched everything I picked up from the surveillance on Valerie's suit. He showed no signs of it yet, but I saw minor instability in his DNA. It may not be as fast moving as when the clones dissolved, but Daniel was becoming destabilized ever since the accident. I was looking for a way to cure him before it was too late."

"You're lying!" Elle shouted, hardly believing that something like that could happen to Danny.

"No, he's not." The voice came from a communications device strapped to Vlad's wrist.

"Is that Dash?" Valerie gaped in shock.

"Yes," Dash answered. "I've been listening to everything since Vlad first found Elle. Danny is in real trouble. Right now, the only thing stopping him from completely dissolving away into nothing is the fact that we have him locked in a stasis chamber. Unless we found out how to stabilize him, he's going to die."

Elle glanced to Valerie. They could both hear the pain in Dash's voice. He was desperate to save Danny, even turning to Vlad for help. "But why come to me?"

"Because you might be the one who can save him."