I Couldn't Give What It Cost Me

I Couldn't Give What It Cost Me

AO3 link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/58929406

Who would have thought following Casper High’s lab safety protocols would leave him in the same place as if he followed his parents’, just infinitely more spooky looking?

Hell, Danny had even pulled out the worn piece of paper from their first class, the one that listed all the PPE needed to deal with a high school level of science and beyond! Sure, the tidbits about the different levels of HAZMAT suits were probably just fun facts, but his parents never fought him or Jazz on wearing their HAZMAT suits in the lab, nevermind the gas masks and goggles. If his parents’ research had any chance of radiation or burning them, he was wearing the PPE.

Sam and Tucker complained about the stiff suits, brightly coloured and stiff, all too large as they were back ups for Danny’s mom and dad. When Danny had pulled out his own, he was on some level happy that his white one was nearly the proper size, if still too large. It was always better safe than sorry in his parents’ lab, one too many chemical burns from unknown substances proved that.

“Y’know Danny, we could totally take these and trick or treat in them, they’re just creepy enough that we can pass as Pestilence, a horsemen of the apocalypse,” Sam said, voice muffled as she adjusted her mask.

“Oh, for sure, just after we explain why Pestilence is wearing a bright orange HAZMAT suit,” Danny pulled on his gas mask, breathing slowly as he got used to the odd, wheezing sound. He looked around the lab, huffing, “man, dad must’ve updated my suit without telling me. I think he added a welding shield on it, I can’t see anything.”

“Oh, don’t worry Danny, it makes you look spookier, especially with the white suit!” Sam smiled, though Danny couldn’t see it. “How about you keep your mask off till we get to the portal, then put it on when we get the picture?”

“Wait, we’re getting a picture?”

It was pointless to argue, so after getting to the portal and showing the waste of space off, and after a lot of directing, both Sam and Tucker annoyed at the small steps Danny took inside the portal, he was ready. He didn’t go too far into the tunnel, he kept mostly in the middle, he even smiled for Sam’s picture, decked out in his full suit, completely safe.

It wasn’t enough.

There was an unexpected jolt of electricity, sparks falling from the top of the tunnel that was the portal, and well, Danny couldn’t really see anything, so the sudden light was a surprise. It started him, and no one really ever talked about how hard it was to move gracefully in a full HAZMAT suit, especially one that was a size or two too big. He stumbled back, and wires that littered the floor tripped him. Danny’s hand fell against the wall as he tried to catch himself, tried to not fall onto the floor and embarrass himself, he couldn’t see the bright buttons that said ON and OFF, inside of the portal.

It was just pain after that.

Pain that flooded him so completely, overwhelming every sense until all he knew as pain. Bright, shocking, both burning and freezing, it was overwhelming all his senses, but it wouldn’t stop.

Sam and Tucker said it was a haunting sight when he stepped out of the portal.

Neither told him of how long they stood frozen, just listening to their friend’s death throes.

Being Phantom was easy. It was easier than it should have been.

He struggled yes, he phased through silverware when he was, alive, breathing, human, he wasn’t allowed anywhere near the beakers in chemistry anymore, his parents’ machines all homed in on him when he stepped through the front door. That was all part of his new, life, unlife, death? Not death. Scrodinger’s cat, a box unopened, was he dead or alive?

Fighting ghosts was easy, fun even.

Danny, Phantom, got pummeled often. He threw shitty punches and was hit with thousands of pounds worth of force back, he struggled with his powers, new ones appearing everyday. The Lunch Lady was hard, at first. Skulker, Technus, Plasmius, Box Ghost, Spectra, Ghostwriter, all of them. They were all hard to beat, at first. They all treated Danny, Phantom, like he was an adult, that he should be able to withstand them, should be able to survive their attacks, and he proved that he could. It was the first time in years that it felt like he could try his best, and that he could, and would, succeed. The ghosts pouring through his parents’ portal saw Danny, saw Phantom, and sometimes, it seemed like they were expecting his best too. They saw something more than a Fenton Freak, a boy who dreamed of the starts that were always going to stay out of reach.

People feared him, but they saw him.

They saw his ghostly form, the pitch black HAZMAT suit that he wore to death, the gas mask covering his face completely, the hood that covered his hair. Phantom looked like a harbinger of doom, a horseman of the apocalypse, something solely and completely otherworldly.

The threats got bigger and bigger, the stakes climbing as Danny, as Phantom, was the only person, the only thing, standing between the ghosts of the realm his parents opened, and the small town of Amity Park. As the GIW showed up, as mom and dad became more and more obsessed with Phantom, everything pouring and spilling on top of one another.

Something was bound to break.

Of course they captured him.

Of course they let him go.

Of course, they left the mask on until they had already cut him open, until after they had removed his organs, taken samples of his skin, broken bones and stole them.

Maybe they wanted to save his brain for last.

Maybe they thought if they touched his brain, he would dissolve like the others before him.

The Fentons never did understand cores.

Maybe, the fear in their eyes was more for what they had done than what they had seen under Danny’s mask.

He wouldn’t know, he never looked.

He didn’t want to see what death left under his mask.

Sam, Tucker, Jazz, they all knew. They respected his death enough to not describe it to him.

Maybe what laid underneath would be what sent him over the edge.

Mom and Dad, Maddie and Jack, the Fentons, they let him go, somehow. They helped him hide his trail from the GIW, somehow, and with help from Sam and Tuck, he made it to Gotham. From there it was up to him, with the equipment his parents, the Fentons, shoved into a duffle bag, and cash that Sam had been saving for him. It had to be enough to make a new life.

Now, Danny just had to deal with the ghosts and nightmares.

It was mostly wishful thinking that he could put Phantom in the past.

It was mostly wishful thinking that Gotham was going to be fine with its knights of the night.

It was mostly wishful thinking that he wouldn’t have to deal with the Bats.

A mysterious new meta who seemed to only target ghosts? That same mysterious new meta suddenly, without provocation, killing a new rogue?

What can Danny, what can Phantom, say. He really, really, hated Freakshow. That tended to happen when you mind control someone, especially when you made that person kidnap a Robin and threaten to have him walk a tightrope, one that was bound to break if it was anything like last time.

Danny was struggling. He knew, logically, that he should just go with the Bats, to explain why he did what he did, they were probably used to people blaming mind control for their actions, they had to know when someone wasn’t lying.

Right?

Danny couldn’t take the risk. Couldn’t chance them leading the GIW right to him while his guard was down. They were already sniffing around Gotham, he just.

He couldn’t.

Danny watched in horror as Batman’s gas mask was cracked, as the Dark Knight threw the person off, only in appearances trying to walk off the powerful punch.

Danny knew better.

He could tell Batman was holding his breath as he felt along his utility belt for something, anything, to filter the fear gas that was being pumped onto the street.

He knew he would find nothing.

If you asked Danny afterwards, he didn’t know why he went ghost, why he walked up to Batman, the very person Danny had been dodging for months now, and removed the ghostly gas mask from his face. He tried not to look at Batman’s face when he shoved it over his cowl, unsure how the fear gas will work on him.

Was it best used as an aerosol, breathed in and absorbed through the lungs? It had to work through mucous channels, maybe just less effectively through the eyes and mouth? It didn’t matter, Danny was dead, alive, Scrodinger’s cat, he could stop his breathing for minutes on end but eventually he had to take a breath, and that mattered less if the gas worked through mucus channels.

“Take it, don’t argue,” Danny said, surprised at how, normal, his voice sounded. He hadn’t thought about how he never really spoke when his mask was off, how it betrayed how young he was. Only just under fifteen, so close to his anniversary.

He couldn’t see any part of Batman’s face, the upper half covered further by the cowl and the visor on his gas mask, the lower now covered by the gas mask’s main components.

“Do you know if the gas works through mucous channels?” He asked, trying to maintain eye contact with the older man, unsure if he is even succeeding. Batman has never been known to be chatty, but this is concerning, not even a grunt in response.

“How old are you?” His voice was muffled by the gas mask, maybe it was a good thing, Danny was pretty positive that Batman wasn’t putting on the deeper voice he usually did.

“Doesn’t matter, I’m dead, not dead. Ughhh, think of Scrodinger’s cat, both dead and alive till you open up the box,” he never wanted to open the box, if he is completely honest, “Keep the gas mask on, don’t know how long it took me to get it to stop being in welding mode and don’t want to know,” keep talking, distract, “does fear gas work through mucous membranes? Do I have to keep my mouth shut, eyes closed?”

It was pointless, somehow, he broke Batman. Danny could hear the Scarecrow laughing somewhere in the distance, people screaming in fear, people fighting against things only they could see and understand.

Danny froze as he caught sight of white suits, teal and orange HAZMATs, through the crowd.

He took a deep breath.

Phantom had already lived his worst nightmare.