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Beep beep beep beeeeeeeep.
Valerie stared at the device in the Guy in White's hand as it went off, the little blinking light on top flashing wildly.
Another agent dropped a heavy hand on her shoulder.
"You need to come with us."
Valerie stared at him, as the students all around stared at her.
"What?" She didn't understand, why her? She wasn't a ghost, why was it responding to her?
"You're under arrest for suspicion of harbouring a ghost fugitive." The agent pulled out a pair of high tech looking manacles. "We're taking you in for questioning and decontamination."
Valerie smacked his hand off her shoulder and took several frantic steps back.
"I'm not harbouring anything! Your stupid scanner's busted or something."
"Yeah," Nathan spoke up somewhere from the line of students behind her. "She hates ghosts, she wouldn't be helping them."
There was a murmur of agreement among the crowd of teenagers gathered in the school's gym.
"Anyone with high ectoplasmic readings is to be taken in for questioning." The agent grabbed at her again. "No exceptions."
His hand barely brushed her shoulder when she gripped onto his forearm and twisted until his elbow popped. He cried out in pain and dropped to his knees.
The students went nuts.
People cheered and screamed, hooting and hollering in excitement as Valerie let the agent go and stood back.
The organised lines of students were now a crowd surrounding Valerie, cheering her on. She held her ground as more agents approached.
"You're not taking me anywhere," she said through gritted teeth. "I don't care how many arms I have to break."
True to her word she lashed out at the agents surrounding her, kicking one in the knee and sending him to the ground before swiftly turning on her heel and planting her foot in another man's sternum with a loud CRACK.
Dash and Kwan were jumping up and down, clutching at each other in excitement as Valerie took down another agent.
"GO VAL GO! GO VAL GO!"
The chant picked up and soon enough half the student body were cheering her name.
Mr Lancer struggled through the packed crowd.
"'THE LAST CONTINENT', PEOPLE, THIS IS A SCHOOL ASSEMBLY! NOT A MOSH PIT!"
He stumbled his way to the nearest Guy in White and grabbed him by the lapels.
"This has gone far enough! A mandatory assembly is one thing, but physically attacking my students-"
"Your student is physically attacking my men."
Another agent skidded across the floor past their feet.
"She is clearly dangerous and obviously enhanced by some kind of ghostly contamination. For everyone's safety she must be contained."
Lancer watched as the man pulled an ecto-gun from his jacket and pointed it at the girl.
"No! You can't-" But before he could finish his sentence, someone else had stood directly in front of the barrel.
A concentrated ball of ectoplasm slammed itself into Danny Fenton's chest and sent him flying backwards, almost crashing into Valerie.
There were more screams than cheers now, those who witnessed the gun go off began backing away from the agent in terror.
"He shot someone!"
"He shot Danny!"
"Fenton's been shot? Fenton's been shot!"
"Is he okay?!"
The circle around Valerie widened as the students fearfully retreated from the scuffle. Danny stood bent over clutching his chest, Valarie grabbed at him desperately.
"Danny?? Danny are you okay?? Tell me you're okay!"
The agent with the gun looked down at the scanner on his wrist, it was beeping twice as fast as the other agent's device was minutes ago.
"The two of you huh," he murmured. "Guess you're both coming with me."
Valerie tightened her grip on Danny's arm.
"I'm fine Val," he grunted. "Run, hide in the crowd, I'll keep him busy."
No, absolutely not.
When the sound of the gun discharging a second time reached her ears, Valerie didn't even think before shoving Danny to the ground and taking the blast directly.
Everyone screamed, and then there was an eerie silence as Valerie stood tall, unharmed. Her iconic red armour's breastplate clinging to her form.
Danny looked up at her from the ground, eyes wide in shock.
"Val, you-"
"No time for that," she said as she bent down beside him. "We need to get out of here."
"We?" Danny's question cut off with a strangled squeak as Valerie scooped him up bridal style, the rest of her armour slid seamlessly over her skin, her helmet closing over her head.
"Hold on tight."
Danny did as he was told as Valerie turned around. Shielding him with her body, she took another blast to the shoulder from the agent.
The students all screamed in amazement and shock and fear and confusion as her board constructed itself below her feet, and Valerie shot off toward the ceiling. A laser blasted out from the front of the board and smashed through one of the gym's large skylights, she and Danny followed quickly after.
She clung to him tightly as they approached the roof of her apartment complex, she set down as gently as possible before letting Danny go.
He stood steady, seemingly unshaken by the unexpected ride.
"Valerie," he whispered. "You-"
"I'm sorry." She pulled away from him, not meeting his eyes as her helmet retracted. "I should have told you, I'm sorry."
Tears slipped down her cheeks, it was over. Everyone knew her secret now, Danny knew she'd been lying to him, he knew it was her fault he'd been attacked that time with Technus, he knew-
"I knew."
She looked up sharply, confusion clouding her expression.
"You... knew?" She stared at him with wide eyes. "For how long?"
"...A while," he whispered, almost bashfully. "I'm sorry. You wouldn't have had to reveal your identity like that if you weren't trying to protect me. I didn't think I just..."
Valerie couldn't speak. He knew, all this time he knew, and he didn't hate her.
"You're not mad at me? For lying to you?" she asked in a fragile voice.
"Of course not," he said, his voice gentle, his eyes sad.
"I don't understand how this even happened." Valerie sat on the ground by the building's rust stained air vents, gripping her head in her hands. "Why did their scanners work on me? I'm not a ghost. Was it the suit? Did it pick up the suit? But... why would it pick up my ghost hunting equipment and not their own?"
Danny sat down slowly beside her.
"When was the last time you were sick?" he asked. "Cold, flu, stomach bug, anything?"
Valerie looked up at him quizzically.
"What does that have to do with-"
"About a year right?" he answered for her. "And minor injuries, bruises, cuts, blemishes, you've had none of those either, right? And big injuries, ghost fighting injuries, they heal quickly? Too quickly?"
She stared at him, alarmed and confused.
"How did you-"
"And you probably haven't felt cold in a long time, even when everyone else is. Sometimes you only put on a coat just to get people to stop asking if you're cold. You can hear things other people can't hear, like the electricity buzzing in the walls, and night time isn't as dark as it used to be, and-"
"Stop it!" Valerie hugged at her legs tightly. "You're freaking me out!"
"It's true right?" he stared at her, his blue eyes burning, intense. "Tell me I'm wrong."
She...
She couldn't.
"What's wrong with me?" she asked, her voice warbled barely above a whisper. "Am I sick? Am I really contaminated like they said?"
"...Yeah, you are," Danny answered quietly.
"Oh god." Valerie hung her head low as sobs began to tear their way out of her throat. "Am I dying? Oh god, how am I gonna tell my dad? How am I gonna..."
"No! No, not... not exactly. It's... it's complicated." Danny grimaced, wringing his hands anxiously. "Look, the Guys in White are trying to keep this under wraps but, everyone in town is ecto-contaminated. Everyone. My parents have to recalibrate their sensors every few months to accommodate the changes. For most people there aren't any real noticeable effects, but for people who've spent more time in ectoplasm rich environments... like the Ghost Zone... or constantly wearing ghost enhanced nano-tech armour..." Danny trailed off.
Valerie looked down at her arms, the red steel of her armour shining in the afternoon sun. Her stomach churned.
"So I have to take off the armour if I want to get better?" she asked. "If I want to be normal again?"
"Val..." Danny gently placed his hand over her gloved one. "This isn't something you can undo."
"But the Guys in White said they can decontaminate people, maybe I could ask your parents to-"
"Val, you're contamination is molecular," Danny stressed, his hand clutching hers tight. "It's too late. Your body becomes reliant on the ectoplasm, even if they could decontaminate to that level, your cells would start to die... you would die."
Valerie looked at their linked hands, tears threatening to flow again, she blinked them back angrily.
"If I can't go back to normal, then if I take off the armour can I at least stop it from getting worse?"
"The armour is the main contaminant so, yeah. You could-"
Valerie didn't wait for Danny to finish talking before attempting to yank at her gloves. They didn't move. She pulled at the breastplate, looking for seams she could dig her fingers into to no avail.
She retracted her armour completely until just the gloves remained, and then tried pulling at them again, they still didn't move.
"Why won't you come OFF?" she grunted, her movements becoming more desperate.
She tried forming it in small chunks on her forearm, but still they wouldn't budge, like they were glued to her skin.
"Get off! Get off get off get off!!"
"Val." Danny reached out to her as she thrashed and tore at herself. "Val listen, calm down."
"No! No I will NOT calm down!" Valerie snapped, clawing at her breastplate. "I can't just keep letting this stupid armour infect me! What if I end up more ghost than human? Could I even still call myself alive after that?!"
"I do."
His words were so soft, not even a whisper, but she heard it.
"You... oh."
Of course, of course.
"It's already happened to you," she whispered, it was her turn to clutch his hand. "That's how you know... what it's like."
They both held tightly to one another, one hand icy cold, the other enclosed in steel.
"How bad is it?" Valerie asked, her voice almost caught in her throat.
"It's... not bad really." He shrugged. "Honestly, it's kind of amazing."
He met Valerie's quizzical stare with a gentle one.
"Val, think about it. We can't get sick, we can't be hurt by mortal means, we're stronger, tougher, we're almost indestructible." His eyes shone unnaturally bright. "What's so wrong with that?"
"It's... Danny it's unnatural." Valerie pulled her hand away from his. "I mean it's a contamination, a... a sickness. We're mutating."
She stood up, wrapping her arms around herself.
"I don't want this Danny, I don't want any of this, I just want to be normal."
"If you wanted to be normal you wouldn't have become a vigilante ghost hunter." Danny stood up and placed a hand on her shoulder. "You don't want to be normal, you want to be human, and you still are. You still will be, you're just a bit of something else too."
It was in that moment that something occurred to Valerie, a memory of a little girl, part ghost, part human, made from Phantom's DNA.
She thought the kid had been made that way on purpose, as some sick experiment, but what if she wasn't, what if Phantom...
Valerie looked Danny in the face, really looked.
"She had black hair and blue eyes," she whispered to herself, eyes widening. "No, no, you can't be. You can't be."
Danny didn't act confused, or surprised, he didn't ask her what she was talking about, he only looked at her with sadness in his eyes. The way he'd looked at her when they first landed, he knew this would happen, he had been waiting for this.
"NO!" Valerie turned and walked across the roof a few paces, she couldn't look at him. "No it's not, it's not you, it can't be you."
Danny sighed.
"Valerie-"
"YOU RUINED MY LIFE!" She rounded on him, screaming with tears in her eyes. "AND THEN YOU LET ME JUST... HOW COULD YOU?!"
"How could I?" A defiant edge lined his voice. "How could you? You blamed me for something I didn't do, something I actually tried to stop. I didn't make that ghost dog attack your family, it was an Axiom guard dog that was slaughtered as a puppy when they brought in the new security system. All it wanted was the chew toy it hid in the kennels."
Valerie reeled back as if she'd been slapped.
"Why didn't you just tell me that?" she asked in a hard tone.
"Because you wouldn't listen," Danny hissed.
"No, why didn't you tell me as you?"
"Because what if you didn't listen to this me either? What if I spilled my identity to you and you used that against me?" Danny stared at her intensely. "Even when we worked together you would always make it clear by the end that we were still enemies. I didn't need that kind of bullshit in my human life."
Valerie tried to argue, she tried but found her words lacking.
"You don't get how significant this secret is Val, for me specifically." The heat in Danny's voice wavered. "I can't just trust anyone with this, if my parents found out..."
Valerie's mouth felt dry.
"Even after we dated, you still didn't trust me?" She couldn't help but feel hurt. "I loved you, I only left you to protect you."
"I don't think you understand what it's like to be on the other end of your hatred. You hate so strongly Val." Danny's voice cracked in pain. "I just couldn't tell if that hate would win out against your love, and I couldn't afford to take that gamble."
"You're taking it now," Valerie said. "You knew where this conversation would go, but you started it anyway, what changed?"
"You, you changed," Danny said quietly. "I know how hard it is to go through this alone, I couldn't let that happen to you. You had to know you weren't alone."
"Like you were alone?" Valerie asked.
"...I was so scared, for the longest time, that one day I wouldn't be able to turn back." Danny's voice trembled. "I wouldn't wish that on anyone."
Valerie warred with herself for a moment, before something finally broke and she wrapped her friend in a tight hug, her suit fully retracting back into her body.
"This is so messed up," she murmured through tears.
"Yeah," Danny agreed.
They held each other close, neither wanting to be the one to end the moment.
But eventually the moment had to end.
Valerie was the one who finally pulled away.
"What are we gonna do about the Guys in White?" she asked. "They know about me, and one of them knew there was something about you that wasn't right."
"I'll be fine, I can hide my signature when I'm not using my powers, he probably caught me for a second when my energy spiked after he shot me, but if anyone tries again they won't find anything higher than regular atmospheric levels," said Danny. "But you... that's definitely going to be a little more complicated."
Valerie groaned, leaning against the air vents and dropping her head into her hands.
"I really messed up."
Danny leaned against the vent beside her.
"This is my fault, I should have known you'd risk yourself to protect me. I was an idiot, I'm sorry." He placed a hand on her shoulder. "But I promise you Val, I will not let them hurt you."
Valerie laughed.
"Danny, I just threw seven Guys in White across a room, breaking at least 13 bones between them. They aren't going to hurt me." Her voice soured slightly. "They're just going to make things very very difficult."