Chapter 4
Peter was nervous. He had known Phantom for something like a year now, and he had finally decided it was time for Phantom to know who he was. So what if he was worried about it? He knew Phantom, and he knew it wouldn’t change anything. Or so he hoped.
“Peter, you gotta breathe, kid,” Tony ordered, his worried face appearing in front of Peter’s.
Peter obediently took a deep breath. He was at Stark Tower in his lab, where he was supposed to meet Phantom. Phantom had seemed confused by the request, but accepted it easily enough. Really, Peter just knew he would freak out, and he needed someone to help him calm down. So Stark Tower.
“I’m breathing,” Peter huffed.
Tony sighed. “It’s gonna be fine, Pete. Phantom’s a good kid, just because he knows who you are it isn't gonna be a big deal. Has he ever even met you as Peter Parker?”
“I don’t think so? I mean, I’m always wearing the suit when we hang out, and at the meetings we have with him and the Paris Sisters. But I’ve worked with the Paris Sisters. What if they said something?” Peter insisted, knowing he was overthinking this but not able to stop himself.
Tony let out a startled laugh. “I’m sure the Paris Sisters haven’t said anything bad about you, okay? Seriously, Peter, just breathe. He’ll be fine, you’ll be fine, everything will be fine.”
Peter focused on his breathing. Right, everything would be fine. Tony watched him with a mix of worry and amusement, then stepped forward and wrapped Peter in a hug. Peter melted against him, the tension fading away. Tony was right, it would be fine.
“You got this, kid,” Tony insisted.
Peter laughed. “Thanks, Mr. Stark.”
“It’s Tony, kid, you know that,” he huffed.
“Thanks, Tony,” Peter corrected.
After a moment, Tony pulled away, holding onto Peter’s shoulders and looking him in the eyes. He glanced at the clock once.
“You got this. You gonna be okay if I go?” Tony asked.
Peter nodded. “Yeah, I’ll be fine. I’ll let you know how it goes.”
“Attaboy.” Tony clapped Peter on the shoulder, waved, then left in the elevator.
Peter took a deep breath and glanced at the clock. Phantom was nothing if not punctual, and it was one minute until four PM, when they were supposed to meet. Peter fidgeted with the edges of his mask for a moment before pulling his hands away and clasping them in front of him. Sure enough, as soon as the clock struck four, a green portal opened and Phantom drifted out, looking around. He had never been in this lab before as far as Peter knew, by virtue of it being Peter Parker’s lab, not Spiderman’s. As soon as Phantom spotted Peter he smiled and drifted down to stand in front of him.
“Spidey! Cool lab!” he exclaimed, and Peter chuckled.
“Um, yeah, I like it. This is my lab, actually. There’s something I need to tell you,” Peter replied, his voice shaky. Why was he so nervous?
“Course, Spidey. Whatever it is, I’m sure I’ve kept bigger secrets, I get it. Just tell me when you’re ready,” Phantom encouraged.
Peter took a deep breath, relaxing minutely at the words.
“Okay, then. Here we go,” he said.
Then, he reached up and pulled his mask off. Phantom’s face stayed neutral, though his eyes flashed over Peter’s face.
“My name is Peter Parker.”
Phantom blinked once, then twice. Then he laughed.
“Okay, guess we’re revealing secret identities. Nice to finally see your face, Peter Parker,” he said, his face slipping into a smile.
Peter was momentarily shocked. Phantom stepped forward, his hand raising slowly to brush Peter’s hair back from his forehead. Peter smiled, a blush rising to his cheeks. He didn’t know what reaction he had been expecting, but this wasn’t it.
“You’re cute. Especially when you blush,” Phantom decided, running a finger down Peter’s cheek to his chin.
Peter laughed, startled by the comment, and strangely pleased. Phantom thought he was cute? Phantom released a tension Peter hadn’t noticed until it was gone, then withdrew his hand from Peter’s face and stepped back. Peter missed him as soon as he was gone.
“There you are,” Phantom said softly, his eyes alight.
“Here I am,” Peter answered, because it felt like the right thing to say.
“My turn?” Phantom asked after a beat.
Peter’s face scrunched in confusion, and Phantom laughed.
“You know, it’s so much easier knowing what you’re thinking when I can actually see your face. Yeah, I have a secret identity too.”
“Wait, seriously? But you’re a ghost?” Peter asked, mind spinning.
Phantom’s face softened. “We don’t have to do this right now, Peter, if you don’t want to. I know telling secrets can be overwhelming.”
The first thing Peter thought was that he liked the way Phantom said his name, the way it sounded on his lips. The second thing he thought was oh my god Phantom is so sweet and he thinks I’m cute and MJ is gonna mock me for this. The third thing he thought was that he wanted an explanation.
“We...I mean, I’d like to know. Get it all out in the open, you know?”
“Okay. That’s good. This is sort of...well, I swear Tony had a stroke when I told him. Actually, Scarlett told him, without asking, which was fun. But anyway. This is kind of...weird information. But I’d like you to know. Are you ready?” Phantom asked, his face open and earnest in a way Peter had never seen it before. Peter nodded. Phantom took a deep breath.
“I’m only half ghost. Half dead, I guess I should include. I’m also half human. Half alive,” he said.
Peter felt like his world stopped for a moment. Phantom was half alive? All this time, Peter thought he was the one with the big secret, but Phantom, his ghost friend Phantom, was half alive? The room was spinning, then phantom was there, his cold hands on Peter’s shoulders, his green eyes locked on Peter’s.
“Spidey! Hey, Spidey! Breathe! Peter! Peter Parker! You need to breathe!” Phantom yelled, his voice wrought with alarm. Peter let out a startled laugh. Did Phantom need to breathe?
“Peter, breathe!” Phantom insisted, urgently.
It was only then that Peter realized he wasn’t breathing, and black was encroaching on the edges of his vision. He gasped in a shaky breath. His knees felt weak.
“That’s it, Spidey, breathe. In and out,” Phantom coaxed, his grip on Peter’s shoulders loosening.
“Do you want me to call Tony?” Phantom asked, when Peter’s vision had cleared and his head felt stationary again.
“No, no, I’m fine. Just give me a minute. Sorry, you caught me by surprise,” Peter answered, taking deep, even breaths.
“Okay. Okay,” Phantom agreed, taking his hands off Peter’s shoulders and stepping away.
Peter took a few more breaths, then turned to Phantom.
“Okay, so, you’re half alive?” he asked.
“Yes,” Phantom confirmed.
“And half dead?”
“Yes again.”
“Could you...I mean...can you show me?” Peter asked, rubbing the back of his neck.
Phantom smiled. “Yeah. I can.”
Then, a ring of light started in the middle of Phantom’s body and washed over him with a silver glow. Before Peter stood a boy, the same height and stature as Phantom. His hair was black, his eyes blue and anxious, and his skin pale. He wore a faded pair of blue jeans and a white t-shirt with a NASA logo in the middle. He was smiling at Peter, fidgeting with the hem of his shirt, looking bashful.
“I’m Daniel. Daniel Paris. My friends call me Danny,” he said, and his voice was almost the voice Peter was so accustomed to. Phantom’s voice. But it lacked the ghostly half-echo of Phantom’s voice, and as a result it was smoother, a little deeper.
Peter stared for a moment too long. He had been attracted to Phantom from the moment they met, with his otherworldly beauty and his brazen demeanor and his infectious sense of humor. Daniel was Phantom. It was hard to comprehend. Not only did Daniel look different than Phantom, he carried himself differently, too. The brazen confidence and self assurance was gone, replaced by a kid that looked to be about Peter’s age that was nervous and jumpy. Though that could just be the circumstances.
“Nice to finally see your face, Daniel Paris,” Peter said with a smile, echoing Phantom’s words from earlier.
Danny’s face broke into a grin, and he ran a hand through his hair. The he laughed, and his laugh was different when he was human, too. It was sweeter, almost, more...well, human, lacking its usual ghostly echo. Not that Peter didn’t love his laugh either way.
“It is, isn't it?” Danny asked.
“It really is. You’re so...different, when you’re human. You act different, I mean.”
Danny looked down, and for a moment Peter was worried he’d said something offensive. Then, Danny took a deep breath and looked up, head tilted to the side. He looked thoughtful.
“I guess I do, don’t I? When I’m human I’m Daniel Paris, the younger brother of the Paris Sisters, a homeschooled kid considered too smart for my own age. I look over my shoulder at every turn waiting for something to go wrong, someone to be hurt, someone to need saved. For the people I care about to turn on me again. But when I’m Phantom?” Danny chuckled and the light washed over him again. Phantom continued talking. “When I’m Phantom I’m a superhero. I’m mysterious. I’m confident. People admire me. I’m self sufficient, and it’s my job to protect people. I have everything I need. People look up to me, instead of down at me.” He changed back to Danny and took a step forward towards Peter.
“But I’m guessing you feel the same way sometimes?” he asked gently.
Peter nodded slowly. “I mean, of course I do. It’s part of being young and being a superhero,” he agreed.
Danny chuckled and reached up a hand to cup Peter’s cheek.
“It is at that. So, Peter or Spidey?” Danny asked in a light voice, shifting the mood in an instant. Peter chuckled.
“What?” he asked.
“Should I call you Peter or Spidey?” Danny asked, stroking a thumb over Peter’s cheekbone.
Peter tilted his head into the touch, and then he realized something. Danny was warm. Peter frowned.
“You’re warm,” he said, worry clearly in his voice.
Danny chuckled. “Not as warm as a normal human, but yes. My human body temperature ranges from ninety degrees fahrenheit to about ninety five degrees fahrenheit. My ghost half, on the other hand, gets over like sixty degrees fahrenheit and freaks out. But you still haven’t answered my question. Spidey or Peter?”
Peter sighed. “Fine, I guess I can ask you questions about half ghost half human biology later. How about Spidey when I’m wearin the mask and Peter when I’m not? Or is that too confusing?”
Danny hummed in his throat, his hand still on Peter’s cheek. “No, that works. I’ve done much more confusing name things, I promise.”
“What about you? Danny or Phantom? Or Daniel?” Peter asked, his hand migrating to rest on top of Danny’s.
“Huh. Definitely not Daniel. Only Winter and Kendra call me Daniel. Well, and Clockwork, sometimes. I’m Phantom more often than not, in all honesty. It would be nice to be Danny a little more. And I like the way it sounds when you say it. So Danny,” Danny decided.
Peter smiled. He looped his fingers through Danny’s, who still had his hand on Peter’s cheek.
“Danny, then.”
“Wait, you said Mr. Stark knows this already?” Peter asked after a moment.
Danny chuckled. “Yeah, he does. Scarlett told him. She was worried about what would happen if I got hurt and no one knew I was half human. Sometimes when I’m knocked unconscious I change back to human on accident. I’ve been getting better about that, but she has a right to be concerned, I guess.”
“Wait, is Scarlett…?” Peter asked, trailing off.
Danny laughed. “Is Scarlett half ghost half human, too, you mean? Yes, actually. She’s my biological older half sister, actually. We share a mom.”
“Wait wait, explain,” Peter demanded.
“Sure. But do you think we could, like, sit down or something? I do actually get tired of standing when I’m human,” Danny said, eyes twinkling.
Peter looked abashed.
“Oh, um, sure. Come over here,” he invited.
He pulled their interlocked fingers down and led Danny to a nearby couch, where they both sat, still holding hands.
“Thanks. Anyway, about Scarlett and I. Or rather, Kendra and I. This is gonna require kind of a lot of backstory. Is that okay?” Danny asked. At Peter's nod, he continued.
“First of all, we’re both adopted. I was born to Maddie and Jack Fenton. They were ghost hunters, not like Kendra and Winter. They didn’t understand ghosts, they thought they were just soulless monsters they needed to kill. When I was fourteen, they built a portal into the Realms. That’s what it was supposed to be, anyway. It didn’t work. Well, the problem was that they had put an ‘on’ switch on both the inside and the outside. So as soon as I turned it on from the inside, it worked fine. Problem was, I was inside when I turned it on. It electrocuted me. No one has really been able to figure out why it only half killed me, instead of all the way. Scarlett thinks it has something to do with the high concentration of ectoplasm that it took to break open a portal into the Realms. That somehow being half killed is what kept me alive. I don’t really know. So there I was, a half ghost. I was so bad at using my powers at first. I had no control. I accidentally phased myself through things in the middle of school, or shot ecto blasts. It was a mess. I was sort of getting it together.
“Then, I met my parent’s old friend, Vlad Masters. They knew him in college, when they first started working on a prototype portal. Soon I learned that there was an accident with a prototype portal, and it had made him half ghost, too. My parents had no idea. He’s kind of a jerk, but he’s gotten a lot better. Then, I had a whole thing in the Realms where I accidentally got myself thrown in prison for, like, a thousand years. I really had no business being in the Realms without knowing my way around, anyway. Scarlett helped some of my friends rescue me, and we got the hell outta dodge. Then, Scarlett told me she was also half ghost and half human. And she was my mom and Vlad’s biological daughter. My older half sister. We don’t really know the genetics of why she also ended up half ghost, instead of, like, a quarter ghost or something. Genetics, I guess. Anyway, she sort of just adopted me in the way ghost adults do with ghost children. Showed me the ins and outs of the Realms, helped me find my lair, introduced me to other ghosts. Taught me all the laws I needed to know. Basically everything, actually. And she introduced me to her human family, her sister Winter, her parents.
“So what happened next I, uh, don’t really like talking about. So I tend to skim over a lot of stuff. So my parents, the angry ghost hunters, I had never told them I was half ghost. When I was at home I was scared, all the time. I had friends that knew, and my older sister Jazz, too. But when you’re a half ghost that lives with people constantly talking about dissecting ghosts ‘molecule by molecule’, it’s hard not to be scared all the time.” Danny laughed, bitterly. “Well, actually, I was raised as a ghost hunter, too. Once again, not really something I like to talk about. I’ll tell you about it some other time, maybe. Anyways, my parents were basically my biggest rival when I was Phantom. It became harder and harder to keep it secret since I wasn’t going out with them to hunt ghosts as a human anymore, and my opinions on ghosts changed pretty quickly once I became one. They got suspicious. One day, when I was out as Phantom, they managed to actually shoot me down. I fell unconscious and reverted back to human form. I don’t remember much. Scarlett came, when I was hurt. Adult ghosts and their child ghosts have connections, they can be almost telepathic sometimes. So as soon as I got hurt, she knew something was wrong, and she came. As she tells it, my parents were strapping me to a dissection table when she managed to get me out. We fled to the Realms, to my lair, where I could recover. Suffice it to say, my parents were most definitely not my parents anymore, not in any meaningful sense of the word. Scarlett enlisted the help of a very powerful ghost, Desiree, to give me a fresh start. Desiree grants wishes, and she can basically change reality as we know it. So then I was Daniel Paris, and no one knew I was adopted. The Paris family, of course, knew the truth. So do my two best friends, Sam and Tucker, and my older sister Jazz. But anyone else? Unless one of us tells them, they only know me as Daniel Paris, or in ghost form Phantom. Almost none of the ghosts even know that I used to hunt them or fight them, or that I’m half human. My birth parents aren’t even ghost hunters anymore, thanks to Desiree. So I got to start over. Kendra and Winter moved to my hometown, Amity Park, so I could stay close to the friends and family I have left. Technically I’m homeschooled, but the only things we really work on are ghost tech. Still, it’s better than actual school was. So, um, yeah. That’s about it, I think.”
Peter had no idea what to say. He didn’t think anyone would know what to say in this situation, actually. He saw Danny in a whole new light, knowing that much about him. So, Peter did the only thing that felt like it made sense. He turned and pulled Danny into a hug. Danny sunk into the embrace, his head resting on Peter’s shoulder, his eyes closed. He laughed, wetly.
“Hey. It’s okay. Thank you, for telling me,” Peter said, his hand finding Danny’s hair and stroking through it.
It was still so weird to be holding Phantom, no Danny, and have him be almost a normal temperature. His hair was soft and fluffy, sticking up at odd angles.
“Thanks. For listening,” Danny replied, sounding like he was on the verge of tears.
Now it was Peter’s turn to chuckle, his hand still stroking through Danny’s hair in what he hoped was a soothing way.
“Of course. Anytime.”
There didn’t seem to be much to say after that. Neither boy pulled away for a long while. Eventually, the elevator dinged open and Tony Stark stepped out.
“So, I see you both finally came clean,” he stated, taking in the scene.
Danny swiped at his eyes, resisting the urge to flinch back into ghost form instinctively. He pulled away from Peter a little, instead tucking his arm around the other boy’s shoulders. Peter hummed, seemingly happy with this arrangement.
“Yup,” Danny agreed.
“So...do you want dinner?” Tony asked after a moment of silence.
Peter looked from Danny to Tony and back again.
“Wait, but you don’t eat?” he asked Danny.
Danny chuckled. “Not in ghost form, no. Eating in ghost form is not a good idea.” His nose wrinkled. “I did it once and I was sick for, like, a week. Even when I changed back. I’ll sure never make that mistake again.”
“Wait, so you eat in human form?” Peter asked, eyebrows raised.
This whole half ghost half human thing was going to take some getting used to. Danny squeezed the arm he had around Peter’s shoulders.
“I can. I don’t have to, actually, I’ve discovered. I do sometimes, but more often than not I just rely on my ghost half. Old habits die hard, I guess,” he said the last part softly.
“What do you mean?” Tony asked, his eyebrows rising in concern.
Danny shrugged, looking down. “My, um, my birth parents always ‘ghost-proofed’ the food in our house. After I became half ghost I realized that meant anything I ate from home made me really sick. So I just...stopped eating. And that’s when I discovered that my human half doesn’t really care about food as long as my ghost half is healthy.”
Tony and Peter both looked horrified by that explanation. Danny didn’t meet their eyes. After no one said anything for a moment, he chuckled bitterly.
“Granted, these are the same parents that tried to dissect me when they found out I was half ghost, so it shouldn’t be surprising. But anyway, I know you people do actually eat. So you should, you know, do that. I think it’s time for me to head to Long Now. Clockwork’s calling me,” he said, moving to get up.
Peter grabbed his wrist, and Danny turned back to look at him.
“Please stay?” Peter nearly whispered.
Danny sighed, his face conflicted, and tore a hand through his hair. Then, he winced, as if in pain.
“I would, but I really can’t right now. Clockwork’s calling me. I have to go. I’ll come back later tonight, though, when I can. Okay?” he asked, gently.
Peter sighed and nodded, then flew out of his seat and into Danny’s arms. Danny caught him easily and held him tightly for a moment before pulling back, smiling ruefully.
“I’ll see you soon, Peter Parker,” he said. Then, he turned and nodded at Tony. “Tony.”
Then, he opened a portal and he was gone. Peter sighed and turned to Tony. Tony took one look at his face and stepped forward in two quick strides to pull him into a hug.
“I’m guessing he told you everything, huh?” Tony asked.
“Yeah. Yeah, he did,” Peter answered.
Tony just squeezed him tighter for a moment.
“He really will be back, right?” Peter asked in a scared, soft voice.
“Of course he will, Peter. Clockwork probably felt that he was overwhelmed and called him so he’d have time to pull himself together. Danny had a rough childhood, you know, it’s hard for him to talk about. But he’ll be back. I know he will,” Tony answered, sounding so sure that Peter had no room to doubt him.
“Thanks, Mr. Stark.”
“It’s Tony, kid.”