Monster In the Mirror (Danny Phantom, PG-13/T)
A/N: Certainly a bit of leeway for interpretation here. :) I’d love to hear your theories.
(Was posted on FF Net on Halloween 2009.)
Disclaimer: I don’t own “Danny Phantom” or anything related.
It all began that moment he first looked in the mirror and saw Phantom gaping back at him.
The story was practically legend now, solidified in his mind from tellings and retellings. He had gone into the Fenton Portal, hit the “ON” button-whether by accident or design, even Danny wasn’t sure-and became half-ghost. That’s all there was to it. It was safely distant; the pain was only half-remembered and the subsequent events were a blur.
But that single moment, when he saw his new face for the first time, was still crystal clear in his memory. There was a ghost in that mirror. A ghost. He was dead.
Only half-dead, he decided later. He was only half ghost, so he wasn’t dead, really. By any means, Sam and Tucker didn’t act like he had died that day. No one else noticed that he was different at all. There was no funeral for Danny Fenton. There didn’t need to be-he was still walking around, still going to school and failing his classes and daydreaming and lazing about like any fully human teenager. No one knew about his brush with mortality. There was no problem, according to everyone else.
The problem seemed to be confined to Danny and Danny alone. You see, regardless of whether he was in human or ghost form, he would always see Phantom in the mirror.
The first time it happened was the day after the accident. He had awoken as normal, which meant he had stayed huddled under his covers until the blaring of his alarm clock and the shouting of his sister eventually dragged him into the waking world. Finally rolling out of bed, he shuffled to his dresser and half-heartedly sorted through his clothes, pulling out his favorite t-shirt. He’d just pulled it on over his head when he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror.
His hair was pure white.
Tugging the shirt down so he could see himself fully, he grabbed the mirror and leaned in, peering at his bizarre reflection. His hair was indeed the snowy white of his ghost form, and his skin was just a little bluish and gave off a slight glow. His eyes were an unearthly green-or were they red? He blinked, and they were back to normal. Trick of the light, of course. But there was something about his face that looked different besides all this. It took several seconds of examination for him to latch onto the idea that the face in the mirror was dead. Once he decided it, though, he was absolutely certain. The grim yet earnest expression on his face was that of a corpse.
He had been broken out of his thoughts by pounding at the door and a very colorful threat from his sister. Reluctantly, he had finished dressing and hurried off to school, after pulling down his hair to make sure he was actually in human form. He was. Strange.
He had once tried to bring up the subject with Sam and Tucker. They had been sitting alone at their usual lunch table, talking about idle things like video games and monster movies. Danny had been unusually quiet, though, and Tucker finally asked him, “Hey, dude, what’s up? Usually you’re stoked about the Femalien movies.”
Danny had jumped, startled, then pressed his lips together uncertainly. “Um… guys…?”
“What is it, Danny?” Sam asked.
Danny flinched. “Do I look… dead to you?”
His two best friends had exchanged confused glances.
“Danny, if this is about the,” Sam lowered her voice, “ghost thing…”
“I dunno.” He sighed quietly. “It’s just, every time I look in the mirror-”
“You look fine, Danny,” Tucker reassured him. “No one knows your secret. It’s all good.”
The conversation digressed after that, and Danny soon excused himself and dumped his uneaten lunch in the trash bin.
He had gotten used to it over time. Yeah, it was odd to see himself with white hair and blue skin in the mirror while he was a human, but no one else seemed to see it. It was just an image, just a trick of his imagination or maybe another side-affect to his half-ghost status. There was no need to get worked up over it.
Every once in a while, late at night, Danny would be woken by a nightmare. That in itself wasn’t strange; night terrors were fairly common for Danny. The thing was, though, that he always remembered his nightmares. In contrast, these dreams he could never recall at all. If he tried his hardest, he would get a wisp of a memory-a black cloak, a red eye, that gosh-darn mirror-but then it would be gone.
Once he woke he could never get back to sleep, no matter if he tossed and turned so much that his bed sheets tangled around his body until he was practically mummified. After some time he would pull himself out of bed with a grunt, kicking off the sheets and stumbling to his bathroom for a drink of water.
There was no need to flick the bathroom light on, since his non-existent glow that the mirror reflected gave enough light to see by. He would turn on the faucet with a twist and splash his face, hoping to shock himself out of his sleepy stupor. Invariably, the water was icy cold, and he shuddered briefly before cupping his hands, gulping down the water. Turning off the faucet again, he let his shoulders slump and his hands drop, water streaming down his fingers and leaving little puddles on the tiled floor. He tiredly raised his head to face the mirror again.
In the mirror, he was staring straight ahead. His eyes were lined with weariness and were a strikingly bright red. They were incredibly sad, he thought, unseeing and haunted. His skin was tinted blue and seemed to be radiating coldness, and his hair was drained of all color and life, hanging limply in his eyes. And his hands… The real Danny stumbled backwards, colliding with the wall behind him as he stared at the blood that ran down Phantom’s fingers and made deep red puddles on the ground. Danny stifled a scream and dropped down, running his hands along the floor in search of the blood. All he could ever find was water.
He let out a sob of despair and confusion. He clutched himself, trembling on the ground as he silently cried.
The Phantom that was his reflection cried too.