This is my fanart for I Don't Know If You'll Believe Me
Danny never told his friend about another creature besides the ghosts that he can see after the lab accident. Maybe because he didn't want his friends to mock him, maybe he didn't want them to think he lost his mind, or maybe he didn't want them to fret unnecessarily; be it for their own sake or for his. They already lose half of their mind with all of those naughty ghosts, running amock the town (and don't forget about the Box Ghost. That total menace!). And if he told them that there exists something, something that was invisible to normal human eyes, crawling around almost in every nook and cranny? They'll live their life shrouded in anxiousness, always looking on their back yet found nothing because they couldn't see. Didn't have the same eyes as Danny.
At least, with ghosts, they can just shot ecto-beam at them.
The creature itself was not bad. They were just like the ghosts—some of them were nice and some of them were bad—they were just permanently invisible to the naked eyes. He first realized this fact when they were done with the usual patrol, Danny saw three small creature with wings huddled around the pavement. He was ready to suck them inside the thermos, as their guard was lowered, but held back at the very last second when Tucker ran past them. And what he means past them was, through them. The same thing happen when Danny used his invisibility power to go through the wall or a throng of people. And the dark-skin friend of his didn't react—besides shuddered for a few seconds—didn't even comment on their appearance and just strike a conversation with Danny like nothing was wrong.
That night he ushered his friend to go home without him, said that he dropped his phone somewhere. Tucker almost went crazy at the mere thought of him losing the tech. Sam just smacked him and pushed him away. She shouted at Danny not to stay out too late because Mr. Lancer wants to discuss new materials for the CAT test in the next week.
When they were finally gone, Danny turned to see that the tiny creatures with wings were looking at him, curiosity shone on their black eyes, "what are you?" he remembered he said that, eyes narrowed but posture still relax. He didn't want to incur some unknown creatures wrath, not without knowing them first, "my friend couldn't see you. There are no ghosts that couldn't be seen by a human."
Well, except Youngblood. But his ability was preserved just for an adult. Or a teenager that acted like an adult; like his sister. A teenager like Sam, Tucker, and Danny could see him just fine.
"Oohh...a ghost! He can see us!" The first one screeched happily, voice echoed like a bell; melodic, yet kind of disturbing at the same time.
"A ghost? Really? I smell a human scent from him thought" the second one tilted her head.
Danny froze.
"Maybe he's the halfa the ghosts were talking about?" the third one answered her friend question. She flew around Danny's figure, he unconsciously tensed, "Our kind is called Pixies. We're a Youkai!"
"Youkai?"
"Uh huh," the second Pixie nodded, "Ghosts live in the ghost zone. We also have our own place, but we like to stay in the human world."
"It's fun here!" the first Pixie twirled, she giggled, "it was so fun the see humans do their thing. And it was also fun to see you fight with the ghosts. Or when the Ghost Hunter hunted you but fail! Fun!"
At least someone having a blast from my misery, Danny bitterly thought.
"But why my friends couldn't see you?" he asked the important question.
"Don't know," the third Pixie answered, "in the past, they could see us just fine. Yet we haven't found a single one nowadays. Maybe it was like a bloodline? It becomes less purer as the generation goes by?"
That was understandable.
"What about you, halfa?" the second swayed, "it looked like you never met one of Us, not before today. So what makes you finally be able to see us?"
"Maybe the same reason I'm a halfa?" his answered sounded like another question to his own ear. But that means, he mussed, the Fruitloop can see them too? He hoped not. It'll be a disaster if he used an army of invisible creatures to wreck the town. And the civilian inside it will think that Danny goes crazy, fighting nothing but the air (that was what happen when he first fought Youngblood). And speaking about an army...
"Are there any bad Youkai?" Danny threw another question, hands folded in front of his chest, "you three haven't attacked me yet, and I sure don't want you to attack me. You know I can easily catch you and dump you into the Ghost Zone, even if it was not your world."
"No, no, no, Pixie will never hurt people!" the first shrieked, she shook his head vigorously, "we're a nice Pixie!"
"Do some harmless prank, sure," the second continue, "but hurting people? Nope."
"But yes. Some of the Youkai are bad. Just like ghosts," the third finished, "They tend to attack if the human can see us, just like you. So, I recommend you not to carelessly speak with them. Not if you don't want your status as a halfa to be discovered by other humans. You're lucky we're a good Youkai."
"Noted."
His phone let out a loud ring, it startled him. His alarm went off, that means it was nearing his curfew. He needed to go back now or his parents going to ground him, again. He waved at the trio Pixies, "it was nice talking to you. Bye."
"Bye! Do come see us sometimes, halfa!" as he flew towards his apartment of a home, he vaguely heard the first one spoke, "he's fun! I wanna see him again!"
And after that night, he finally saw what exactly a Youkai was. Their quantity was less than the Ghosts. The reason why he never saw them before was that they tend to linger in the darkness. And for those who do not, they took a form of a person and mingled around the human. Fortunately, his ghost power work on them just fine. Although instead of a white fog coming out from his mouth, his power identified them with a teal color. His power was really handy, he hummed, as he avoided talking with 'himself' in public several times just because he thought that person was a normal human.
(And now that he thought about it, there were several times when his breath was teal. But he thought it was just another ghosts because whenever he got one, a ghost came to attack at the very same time. And the only ghosts who love to attack every day was—surprise, surprise—the Box Ghost. Danny really need to find a way to permanently lock him inside the Ghost zone)
He also found out that the Fruitloop couldn't see Them. As when they have another battle, Danny saw a Youkai that looked like a bird but has several eyes on its head, flying near Plasmius, he didn't react. Didn't even bat an eyelash. At least someone heard his pray and this nuisance will never put another burden on his shoulder. His presence was a hassle on another level already. Plasmius with an army of the Youkai will give him a headache.
Yet again, he didn't tell his friends. Some of the Youkai are just as bad as the evil ghosts. At the second day of that week, he eventually found the aggressive one. It looked like an Eagle Ray. And when their eyes met, the Youkai—Forneus, he found out later from the history book—growled. Without saying 'hi' or 'a good day today', it attacked, let out a crackle of energy from its tail. Danny had the reflex to avoid, though the shop across the street didn't. The people around started to scream, thinking that it was the electric pole acted up or worse, a ghost attack. Danny immediately ran to the alleyway, changed into Phantom, turned invisible and tackled the Youkai to another part of the town, preferably a field as not to cause unnecessary collateral damage.
Because of that, the Youkai started to notice him too. He didn't mind the nice one. They only wanted to talk to him (like the Pixies), asked for his help to search for something or tracking other Youkai. But the mean one, they were just like ghosts. They started hunting him; some of them just for fun (like the box ghost), some of them really had the intent to kill (like Skulker). It annoyed Danny, to have to be worried about the second attack, coming from the different angle. It tired him to the point he couldn't change into his ghost form.
When a villain—an honest to God villain—came attacking their town.
The villain was a man wearing a Rhino costume, his primary attack was his fist and headbutting everything that came too close to his personal space. He didn't catch his name, Danny was too exhausted to think straight, too caught off with a fact that the building he rammed his head into crumbled like a paper, rained on the innocent civilian, on the unsuspecting kid playing a ball and was too scared to move. Yet because of his hero-complex, he forced his legs to move, to save that kid, to switch their position, anything! Just move, move, move—
Pushed the kid away to the waiting parent, screaming at them to go away, he can handle this and find a place to hide! Just go—
Danny let out a scream.
He saved the kid. He did it. But the falling rubbled now cluttered on top of him, caught his arm and pulling it out of its socket.
"Goddangit!" he wanted to swear so bad, he did. Though even in this pinch, his sister talking about manner echoed inside his head. He tugged on his hand. Nihil. He tried to make his hand invisible. But the exhaustion caught up. And his flickering hand just made the situation worse, the rock planted deep inside his skin, almost cracking his bone if he didn't turn it visible at the right moment.
Shot, the villain noticed him. What was he saying? He'll use him as a hostage and will kill him if the bank didn't start to pack up those big bulk of money? Sam and Tucker were shouting his name, cursing that the ghost weapon didn't work on a normal human. Wait, what? Why are you coming over, Sam? No! You're going to get killed! This is not a ghost you're fighting about, this is a villain! Stay away, stay away stay awa—
BOOM
The villain was shot by a laser beam and thrown onto the far street.
"Man, villain these days. At least wear a cool outfit. A rhino, really?!" a robotic voice echoed through his hearing as the rubble on his hand was being lifted, the halfa snapped his attention to the source of the voice, "sorry I'm late, kid. United State is not New York nearest neighbor. I don't know why he was so far away from home, that guy caused a looot of trouble for me last week. How did he escape? Maybe I gotta fund the jail after this."
It was, Danny gapped, the one who saved him was—
IRON MAN?!
"Danny, you okay?!" Sam and Tucker approached him the moment the Villain was far from reach. The Iron Man was facing the Rhino already. And it didn't take long for the man to succeed in tiring the Villain out so the anti-riot could capture him off-guard.
So, that's how a Hero work.
Awesome.
"Hey, Kid. You okay there?" the Iron Man landed near them, opening his faceplate and showed them the Tony Stark's charming smile. He saw how Danny cradled his right arm and grimaced, "at least that's a clean dislocated shoulder there, bud. You gotta check it to the hospital."
(OH WAOW, THE IRON MAN IS TALKING TO ME OH MY GOD—)
Danny shook his head to woke himself from his stupor and grasped his hand, "don't worry. I had worse," and before Tony could stop him, he put the dislocated shoulder back to its socket with one yank; he flinched at the sudden spike of hurt.
"You got guts, kid. That should not be an injury teenager like you could just shrug it off," they winced, recognizing his mistake too late (it was usual for him to get injured when he patrolled around the town. And that injuries included bruises and a dislocated shoulder. The worse thing Danny ever got was a large gash by the hand of the samurai ghost and broken pipe pierced near his kidney (that was another story he didn't want to ever recall. Especially with how scared his friends was, thinking that he was dying and I'm sorry, I didn't want to make you worry I'm sorry). So yes, Danny had worse before). The man looked like he wanted to say something. But seeing the media started to come around the corner, he cut the chase short and said instead, "one of you bring your phone with you?"
"Ah, I am sir!" Tucker, after glaring at Danny for being a selfish, reckless hero he was, fished out his PDA. Tony's eyes sparkled at the sight.
"Ooh, fancy thing you have there, kid. I wanna talk to you about that but our time is short," Tony recited his number phone as Tucker typed it and called Tony for him to save his, "I'll call you sometimes. Gotta get away from the media first. As much as I like attention, I'm not very presentable right now. I don't have my coffee yet!" Tony turned the faceplate down, "So yeah, see you around!" before he blasted off to the sky, ignoring the cry of the reporters.
Sam pulled the boys away from the commotion, pretty sure they'll shift their attention to them with an excuse of 'you're a victim saved by Iron Man, how do you feel about it?'. Well, Danny felt it was—
"AWESOME!"
"OH MY GOD, OH MY GOD, OH MY GOD! I HAVE TONY STARK'S PHONE NUMBER! CAN I CALL HIM? CAN I ASK HIM ABOUT HIS AWESOME TECH AND HOW DID HE GET THAT IDEA TO BUILD THE SUIT IN THE FIRST PLACE?'
"TUCKER, YOU HAVE TO GIVE ME HIS PHONE NUMBER! YOU HAVE TO!"
"DON'T WORRY, DUDE! I'M TOTALLY GONNA GIVE YOU, BUT I'LL BE THE ONE WHO SPEAKS TO HIM FIRST!"
"...boys."
Two days after that, it was Sunday. The long-awaiting call from their superhero finally came. He said he wanted them to meet but at a place where nobody could see them; Tony didn't want any media caught a whiff of him because he wanted to ask something private. Danny suggested they met at the hill at the very far, outside of town. It was one of the places he loved to visit to lay around and stared at the clear sky besides his family Ops Center.
And here they were, sitting on the grass, fidgeting and trying to reign their fanboying inside while Sam could only sigh. Tony himself tried not to chuckle at their vibrating body but to no avail. Tucker had been idolizing him from the very first time he saw how beautiful Stark tech was. While Danny looked up to him the first time he announced to the whole world he's the Iron Man, because it was the same time he first got his power and was having a difficulty trying to be the Hero himself. Watching Iron Man gave him a lot of pointer to that. He also loves his tech, though not as much as Tucker, because his family tech center around the Ghosts weapon; he was more of an astornomy guy anyway.
"So, as you all know, I'm Tony Stark," he begins, "what's yours?"
"Sam Manson."
"Tucker Foley, sir!"
"D-Danny Fenton."
"Fenton?" the billionaire tilted his head, "oh, you're the Ghost Hunter's kid?" Danny groaned, hiding his head behind his hand in embarrassment, "hey, it's not a bad job. The ghost loved to flock around this town, I don't know why. Cuz I haven't seen one in New York but your town is very famous for it."
Maybe because the Ghost portal is in our basement? That was why they only appeared here? Danny thought then said, "yeah, but they have bad aim."
"Can't disagree with you on that," Tony chuckled.
"So...why are you calling us here, Mr. Tony?" Sam asked, shifted their conversation back to the real reason.
"Before that, you sure your arm is okay, kid?" Danny nodded. Tony shrugged, "okay then if you say so. I want to ask Danny-boy here something."
"Me? What do you want to ask ab—"
Danny promptly cut his word short when the freezing breath came out from his mouth. He tried to hide it, although it was too late as his friends went rigid, hands hovering over their Fenton Wrist Rays and Lipstick Blaster. While Tony looked confused since the weather was not freezing enough for a breath to fogged up.
"Danny?"
But Danny ignored her when he saw the air behind Tony started to shimmer, warped and distorted. Before a...being appeared without a sound. She is a skeleton, covered by a black garb and was smiling at him knowingly. His friend didn't see her, even though she was basically right in front of them—
A Youkai then.
She didn't seem to want to attack so Danny shook his head and whispered, "Nah, false alarm guys."
Still, Tony heard him anyway, "false alarm for what?"
"Oh, uh...for the ghost." Danny nearly stuttered, "my parents wanted me to have a way to detect if a ghost came near us, so...yeah."
Tony hummed, "I don't think it was a false alarm though."
"Huh?"
"Come on, kid. I know who you are," he grinned, ignoring how the teenagers in front of him started to tense a little more, "Just change the color coordination and voila. You got the result. I don't know why people never realized, it was obvious. Well...one is alive and the other is dead, so I understand why they still couldn't connect the dot, not like Sailor Moon. Gosh, I'm still questioning the logic of that cartoon. You can totally see it from her pigtails! But maybe because I'm just a genius~"
"So, what are you going to do now?" Sam tone turned vicious. Even Tucker, the one who fanboyed all over him, shifted his body, tried to shield Danny's form from the curious stare of Tony and was ready to attack at moment notice, "are you going to call Guys in White for this? A Government? You want to run an experiment on him?"
Danny breath hitched.
"What?! No! Why would I wanna do that?" Tony denied vehemently, waving his hands with exaggeration, "I was actually impressed. For a teenager to become a hero for an entire town, that was so noble of you," his gaze turned serious, "though seriously, kid. Take care of yourself, okay? You said it before that you had worse. My armor protected me and I still got injured sometimes. You didn't wear anything besides a jumpsuit! Yeah, as a ghost you have a fast healing factor—I saw your fights on youtube, by the way—but if you didn't start looking out for yourself more, you gonna get killed someday!"
"Pot meet kettle"
Danny almost laughed at the skeleton comment—her voice sounded like a thousand of being reverberated throughout the air, it shuddered him—but barely held back and nodded. His friends started to relax too.
"Is...that what you wanted to talk about, Tony sir?" Tucker hesitantly asked, "you just wanted to scold Danny? I think you need to scold him more."
"Hey!"
"You deserved it though."
"Sam! I thought you're on my side?!"
"Ah, well that too. But the thing that I wanna ask is..." Tony slowly moved his hand, his index finger pointed towards the waving skeleton and smirked, "you can see her, right?"
.
Silent.
"Huh?", "What?", "Her?"
"That's why I said it was not a false alarm." Tony smugly said, "I saw how the Ghost boy detected his enemy, the fog is white. But yours just now is teal" (he's so perceptive. I mean, he was an ex-weapon designer, you need to be able to notice small detail, Danny sweatdropped, no wonder he saw through my secret so easily), "I never saw that color before. So I guessed that was because your power can also detect the Youkai. And looks like I was right~"
"Youkai?" Sam glance at Danny, who fidgeted, "what is he talking about, Danny?"
"You didn't tell them?" the brunette was surprised, "well...I didn't tell my friends when I was dying from Palladium Poisoning too, so..."
"I-I don't want to alarm you guys..." Danny started. Tony nodded in understanding.
"Dude, you worry us enough with that second persona of yours!" Tucker said, "I don't think anything going to surprise us anymore!"
"well, I know that. But you can't see them," he continued, "there's another creature besides ghost that live with us; they called themselves Youkai. Maybe I can see them because of my power, I just never met them before because their population in our town are less than the ghosts. They're not bad, they just wanted to talk to me sometimes. You don't have to worry"
"You sure about that kid?" Tony interjected, "no evil Youkai had attacked you before?"
Danny hesitation was an answer enough.
"Is that why you're so tired two days ago?!" the Goth girl nearly shrieked, "not just because of ghosts, but also these Youkais?! We can help you, you know!"
"Are ghost weapons even work on them?!"
"Actually, you can punch them easily with your own fist. No need for fancy weapons. As long as you know where to look," Tony informed, "Takashi-chan did that before and the Youkai was defeated just like that. Maybe cuz his spiritual power is high for a human..."
Spiritual power? Danny wanted to scoff but his Ghost power could be called as one, so he didn't, "but they still can't see them though. I can't always keep giving them instruction in the middle of battle. I mean...can you guys even see the skeleton on Tony's shoulder?"
They squinted their eyes.
"That's easy. Use this," Tony offered them something. It's a glasses, with weird symbols and an eye in the middle of the circle carved onto the glass. Japanese? "I tried to create a more compact gadget from it. Surprisingly, it worked just fine. The flashlight was good for talking to Them, but because you two need it for combat, the glasses are easier to use. You need your hand to wield your weapons anyway. Put it on."
They did and instantly gasped in shock. Danny was confused, "What?"
"There's a skeleton over there! Since when?" Tucker stammered, gaping at the sudden appearance (to him) of a being on Tony's shoulder, pulling his glasses up and down to ensure himself he was not just seeing things. The skeleton waved, Tucker hesitantly waved back, "if it was not because I couldn't see her before, I swear she is just another ghosts."
"That's what I thought," Danny was surprised a mere glasses could make the Youkai visible to normal humans. Maybe it was because of that symbol on it?
"The ghosts in this town are kind of weird," the Genius said, "I met a few ghosts before on my trip to Japan. But they were also as invisible as the Youkai."
"Maybe because they were doused with enough concentration of ectoplasm?" Tucker guessed, "the Ghosts in this town are glowing green like a neon lamp."
"Y-You're the Mistress of Death?!" Sam, after a moment of silent, finally shouted, shocked voice caught their attention back. Her face was full of awe and almost admiration, "she's the leader of all Spirit, guys! And-and ghosts too, I think? She's a Shinigami!"
How could you be so happy to see a death reaper?! Danny and Tucker simultaneously exclaimed.
"Wait," the halfa said, "then, does that mean...Tony...are you—"
"Naaw, don't worry. She's here not to reap anyone soul," he chuckled, "she is just hanging around because she was so impressed I cheated death twice, she stalked me for a year. She was also the reason I can see the Youkai now~"
"I need to be here when Tony finally dies a horrible death."
"Stop scaring the kids with that twisted love of yours."
"How did you create this tech, though Tony sir?" the dark-skin teen, as a Technogeek, asked the important question, "I mean, this is a breakthrough! You can sell it for a hefty price! But it'll only add paranoia to others. On second thought...I don't think you should mass produce this."
"'course not. Takashi-chan's friend gave me the mean to create this. I couldn't sell something that is not mine. See that symbol there?" Tony pointed, "I asked her permission to create more just for you two~"
"For us?" Sam asked, "why?"
"To help Danny-boy here," the brunette sing-song, "You're just like Takashi-chan, you know. Running straight into danger and leaving your friends behind," ("Hello again, kettle"), "with this, you can support him whenever some mean Youkais decided they want to pull a prank on Danny."
The halfa was speechless. He watched as his friends turned their head around, trying to spot other Youkai and shouted in amazement when they found one. He turned his attention back to the smug Tony. The Iron Man. A national Hero. Helped a normal (not so normal though) teenager like him. Help him to take care of his friends more thoroughly. He was too amazed to say anything, yet Tony understood his gaze anyway and grinned back.
"As a fellow hero, it was a right thing to do to help each other, right?"
OMAKE
"Danny Fenton-Phantom." He stared at the approaching Mistress, looking away from watching Tucker and Tony went into a tech debate while Sam listened with amusement. He gave a small nod at the apparition, "Tony called you and your friends here so he could help in making your adventure easier if you still want to be the Hero of Amity Town. But the reason I asked Tony to located you specifically was because I need to warn you about something."
"There'll be a big disaster in the future. Big enough to rival the disaster of the Ghost King. Big enough to destroy the balance of life and death" Danny tensed. That...that was bad, right? "it's up to you to stop it."
"D-Do you mean I have to get stronger or something?" he asked, voice barely above a whisper.
The Mistress shook her head, "the thing that you need to do to prevent it is—
"You must not let the easiest route tempt you."
"H-Huh?"
The Mistress wanly smiled and floated back, claiming her spot back and said that it was time to go back home or Pepper is going to go crazy. Tony cheekily waved and said to call him more often because a friend that could (finally, for Sam and Tucker) See and a technogeek need to stay in touch. Before he instantly vanished, shocking them enough to make Tucker tumbled onto the ground.
Danny couldn't bring himself to laugh at his friend misfortune. Still too caught off guard by the warning the Leader of all Dead Spirit delivered to him.
;;;
He failed. He failed he failed he failed—
He should've listened to Death's advice. He should've listened! But no! Just because he saw the shortcut right in front of his face, he took it. He took it and now his friends are in danger. His family is in danger. His teacher is in danger. Because he was greedy. Because he was too cocky.
He run. Run, run run—trying to change into his ghost form yet failed—run, goddangit, legs, run faster—
—"As a fellow hero, it was a right thing to do to help each other, right?"—
I'm not a Hero, Mr. Tony. Never A Hero. A Hero saves everyone. A hero saves their precious people. A hero—
And the tank exploded.
—a Hero never let his people die!
I failed. I failed I failed I failed I FAILED—
"STOP THE TIME!"
"You like the kid, Clockwork." The Mistress giggled as he watched Danny tackle hugged his friends from one of the monitors inside the Ghost of Time lair, "like him enough to defy the Observants."
"Well...aren't you the same?" Clockwork, in the form of an old man, answered. A smile carved on his wrinkle complexion, "you like that Genius Human enough to give him hints here and there and stir him away from the intended Fate."
She hummed, "Let us agree that we are just a very worried parent."
"Indeed~"