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It had to be the Box Ghost.
Of all the ghosts that had to be giving her trouble, it had to be the Box Ghost. Her suit had been on the fritz lately. Ever since Technus had hit her with some beam. Or maybe it was before that? Skulker had hit her with a rocket when her suit was supposed to give her a warning but it didn’t.
Funny what your mind goes over when you’re plummeting fifty feet to the ground.
A chime from her helmet and a female voice that sounded a lot like Maddie Fenton rang in her ears, “Impact imminent!”
Oh, thanks. Valerie thought sarcastically. Then everything went black.
When she came to, she lifted her head from the ground. Pain rang throughout her body, ironically, making her sigh in relief. Pain meant she wasn’t dead. She got her weight onto one hand and reached up with her other hand. Skin met metal. She opened her eyes, blinking at the bright light, and realized her helmet was off.
Before she realized she was looking at a pair of red chucks.
Slowly she looked up and realized that she had landed right in front of Danny Fenton.
“Oh… kill me now…” She groaned.
Danny sipped from his cup. Nasty Burger written across the front, perfectly facing her as if it were a product placement. She glanced around and realized thankfully that she hadn’t landed in front of her place of employment. That would have been just perfect.
“You lost… to the Box Ghost…” Danny said slowly.
Valerie slowly got to her feet. “I’m aware.” She looked herself up and down. Nothing seemed to be broken. She looked at Danny and raised an eyebrow. “You’re… uh… you’re taking this well?”
Danny raised an eyebrow, and she felt judged. “Valerie,” he said slowly, like how she talked to people who had head injuries because of the ghost fights, “Your old suit was literally just a fabric mask. No voice changing.”
Valerie took a moment to process that. If that were true then-
Danny continued after she didn’t respond, continuing in that same semi-worried neutral tone. “I’ve known since day one.”
Valerie finally got out. “WHAT?”
Danny was completely unphased. Instead of reacting, Danny just sipped from the cup again. The slurping sound made Valerie flinch. “You lost to the Box Ghost…” A smirk spread out across his lips, like he was laughing at a joke only he knew about, “Valerie… even I don’t run from the Box Ghost.”
Valerie flinched. That was true. Her face began to heat up as a blush began to cross her cheeks.
Danny sighed and started walking away. “Alright, come on.”
“What?”
Danny turned for just a moment and indicated for her to follow him. “I saw your suit going on the fritz from down here, come on, I’m taking a look.”
Valerie hesitated. Danny wasn’t a ghost hunter, he shouldn’t know anything about her suit.
But he was the son of the two foremost ghost experts in the world.
Valerie couldn’t believe it at all. This was ridiculous. Danny, runs at the mere glimpse of a ghost, Fenton was planning on repairing her suit. He shouldn’t even know anything about her suit.
And yet, she followed Danny. Now that she was actually paying attention, she realized she had landed in the park, about halfway between the Nasty Burger and the Fenton household. Fortunately, the park seemed to be completely empty.
That was probably due to the ghost fight she had been involved in a few minutes ago.
And lost.
To the Box Ghost.
God, she was never going to forget this.
Danny led her to a picnic table and sat down. She sat down across from him as he pulled out a screwdriver and a rather beaten-up PDA. “Alright, first things first, your helmet.”
Valerie folded her arms. “It doesn’t come off, it’s part of my suit. It just melts back into the rest of the suit when I need it off.”
Danny shot her an unimpressed look. He leaned over the table and Valerie felt her throat seize up as he got way too close before she felt a pressure on her neck and her helmet popped up around her face. Valerie glanced over before Danny grabbed her chin and made her look in another direction before the helmet opened up around her face, and then Danny lifted it up off her head.
Valerie realized that she had been staring at Danny for way too long. She blinked. “Wait, what? ” she shouted. She ran her fingers along her neck and finding that the suit was still there, except she didn’t have a helmet anymore. Her fingers caught on little bumps that she knew should have been there, and with some careful prodding, she realized that they had been connectors, running wires from her helmet to her suit.
Danny didn’t look up as he poked and prodded at her helmet. “Your suit is based partially on the Fenton Exoskeleton.” His tongue poked out as he ran his fingers over the red lines that traced her helmet. “I mean, most ecto based suits are, ever since my parents made theirs, it started getting adopted by well… everything.”
Valerie blinked. “What.”
It wasn’t even a question. It was a statement. She had to have hit her head harder than she thought.
A hiss made her jump and Danny’s face lit up. “Aha! Got it!” He put the helmet down on the table, and pulled out a… was that an ethernet cable?
Valerie blinked and shook her head. “Wait, wait, back up, why would Axiom’s suit be based on your parent’s suit?”
Danny looked up at her, unimpressed. “Valerie… the suit was made by Technus.”
“Technus!” Valerie shouted. That was ridiculous. “Why would a ghost give me a suit?”
If anything, Danny looked even more unimpressed. “Valerie… the first thing you did when you got this suit was fly up and attack Phantom… one of his enemies?”
Valerie felt her jaw go slack, and Danny plugged the ethernet cable into his PDA. “Oh…” she finally got out after a while. She ran her hands over her wrists, the suit now beginning to feel claustrophobic than comforting. “Should I be worried?”
Danny shook his head. “Nah, I’d be worried about…” He trailed off as his face twisted in disgust. “Oh, god, really?” He muttered before tapping the PDA a couple of times. He pulled out his phone and started dialing. “Hey, Tuck, we still have that Fenton Virus?”
“Fenton Virus?” Valerie repeated. It seemed like every minute she spent sitting here with Danny more questions popped up.
“Awesome! Can you send it to me? Thanks, man!” Danny put the phone on the table and continued tapping away at the PDA.
There were a dozen questions on the tip of her tongue, but the first one that rolled off was, “Does your family preface everything with Fenton?”
Danny didn’t look up from the miniature computer. “It’s a branding thing.” He let out a huff. “Val, have you done any maintenance on this thing?”
Valerie folded her arms over her chest. “I didn’t even know that the helmet could come off!” she defended.
Danny looked up to shoot her the most unamused look she had ever seen on him. “You’re not helping your case here…” He turned the PDA around and held it out to her. “There’s a diagnostic system set up in your suit. Honestly, there’s a lot wrong in there.”
Valerie blinked as she looked at the readings. She didn’t even know what most of these things meant. “What’s MaddieOS?”
Danny groaned. “It’s... “ he sighed. “Look, did Vlad do some work on your suit?”
She scratched at her cheek. Vlad had, but he had also asked her not to tell anyone that he had. Something she was willing to keep, after all, she was only 14. Most adults wouldn’t trust her with what she did if they knew.
“Don’t bother answering, that was rhetorical,” Danny stated. He ran a hand down his face and and continued, “MaddieOS is an operating system that Vlad made. I’m guessing your suit used to run TechOS, which is one made by Technus.”
The PDA dinged, and Danny took it. “Awesome, Tucker sent it.”
“Sent what ?”
“The Fenton Virus,” Danny said as if it should be obvious. “And… there we go. MaddieOS is gone, and now the Fenton Virus is running.” He unplugged his PDA and handed Valerie her helmet. “Here, put this on.”
Valerie slowly put on her helmet and it snapped into place. Danny’s voice echoed in her ears. “Systems online. Doing some clean-up.”
“Did… did you replace the voice in my suit?”
“The voice in there was my moms .” Danny said, his face twisting in disgust again. “Why did you think it was called MaddieOS?”
Valerie mirrored Danny’s grimace behind her helmet. “You said Vlad made that?”
“Yeaaaaahhhh…” Danny drew out as he was tapping away at his PDA.
Valerie really didn’t want to ask the question, but she did anyways. “Why?”
Danny looked up at her and met her eyes through her suit. “He has a thing for my mom.”
“A… thing?”
“A thing.”
“Please tell me you don’t-”
“I do.”
“That’s…”
“Creepy?”
“I was going to say disturbing but creepy works.”
Danny hummed in agreement. He rummaged in his pocket for a moment before taking out some gum. He popped a piece into his mouth, before holding out a piece to Valerie. “Want one?”
Valerie shook her head, “No thanks…”
Danny shrugged. “Suit yourself.” He put the gum down on the table before holding out his hand. “Alright, blaster now.”
Valerie reached for something, but then she realized she had no clue what he was talking about. “Wait, what?”
Danny waved his hand around impatiently. “You know the one you had put in Boxy’s mouth? And it didn’t fire? Suit’s reading that there’s a hiccup in the ignition chamber.”
“Which one?” She asked.
Danny rolled his eyes. Apparently, he was in a sassy mood today. She smirked as she found she could get used to that. Danny grabbed her hand, before pressing down on a point near her elbow and a blaster popped out of her suit. Valerie blinked. “What!”
“The button’s there in case you hurt your arm and still need the gun,” Danny explained.
“Look. it’s not like this thing came with a manual!” Valerie defended herself.
Danny’s voice chimed in. “Opening manual.”
An index appeared on her visor and started scrolling. She blinked as the text passed by her vision.
“No manual, huh?” Danny said with a smirk.
“Oh shut it!” Valerie said. Reaching across the table and smacking Danny in the chest. He put up a token protest, but mostly just laughed at her. The jerk.
Danny took apart the gun, inspecting every piece for a full minute before placing them on the table.“Well, looks like for the most part you’ve been taking care of the weapons at least.” He started putting the weapon back together.
Valerie nodded. “Yeah, my mom was in the army and she taught me a lot about guns and fighting…” She looked down and picked at a knot in the table. “At least… while she was still alive…”
Danny paused in putting the gun back together. “Oh… I’m sorry…”
“It’s okay…” Valerie said, shaking her head. “It was a long time ago… And it’s not like it ever came up when we were dating...”
“Still…” Danny said morosely. Before taking the gum out of his mouth and putting it in the gun.
“What are you-” Valerie didn’t get to finish before Danny fired off a blast off at the ground. Valerie flinched at how loud the blast was. It had to at least have been twice as strong as when she first got it.
Also, instead of a red laser, it was green.
“Much better,” Danny said, flipping the gun around and handing it to her stock first.
“What the…”
Danny held up a red crystal. “So, Vlad used these red crystals cause… I don’t know. He just does.” Danny picked up the gum on the table and popped it into his mouth. “My parents use gum.”
“I think I’m beginning to see why your parents’ inventions blow up all the time…” Valerie looked at the gun in her hand before putting it back into her suit. “You know what, sure, whatever, you’re here fixing my suit, Vlad’s a creep, and you’re fixing my guns with gum. Anything else I should be surprised about right now?”
Danny hummed and looked at his PDA.
“That was not an invitation to throw something else at me!”
Danny didn’t respond at first, going over the readout on his PDA. “Well… good news is, the Fenton Virus is fixing a lot of the issues. The suit is pretty resilient and having a better operating system is fixing several major issues. The suit does have a self-repair system, but you’re running low on fluid in the ecto absorption matrix.”
“The ecto what now?” Valerie asked dryly. “Also, how does a virus fix issues.”
“Ecto absorption matrix,” Danny repeated. He waved a hand about in the air. “Your suit runs on ectoplasm, but it has to get it from somewhere . In this case, it’s the air. Your body does produce some ectoplasm but-”
“What!” Valerie cut off with a shout.
“Everybody does,” Danny said rolling his eyes. “Haven’t you heard about mediums producing the stuff during their trances?”
Valerie shot Danny with a look. “Danny, most of us haven’t grown up in a ghost hunting household.”
“Ah, fair point,” Danny said shrugging it off. “But yeah, ectoplasm can come from humans too. But most humans don’t produce enough ectoplasm to power your suit, so it has to get it from somewhere else. Amity has enough ectoplasm in the air to power your suit, but you’re running low on the fluid powering the ecto absorption matrix.”
He paused and tilted his head before continuing. “As for the virus, it’s the payload that’s really the helpful bit. Tucker could explain it better, but the virus isn’t really the important part. Tucker made several upgrades to the MaddieOS. Vlad won’t notice if and when we replace MaddieOS with FentonOS, that’s what we’re calling it by the way, until one of the other features pop in.”
“What kind of features?” Valerie asked.
Danny smirked, as his dad’s voice popped in her ears. “Blasters are locked and loaded!”
“Oh, God,” Valerie said putting her head in her hands.
Danny got up and walked around the picnic table. He indicated for her to stand up, which she did.
And then Danny got on his knees in front of her.
She was grateful they were alone because the undignified squawk she made when Danny started running his hands over her was something she’d never live down.
“D-Danny?” She began.
“I’m trying to find-Ah! There it is!” There was another hiss, and a large panel that covered her stomach fell away.
Valerie looked down and felt a blush rising as Danny looked at her stomach. “What could possibly be-”
Then Danny shoved his hand up to his elbow into her suit. Valerie tried to get a better look as Danny’s arm disappeared. “What on earth?”
“It’s ecto,” Danny explained, reaching in further, now up to his shoulder into her… suit? She could feel his weight on her suit, but a quarter of Danny’s body should be going through her. He braced himself against her as he rummaged around. “It doesn’t have to obey the laws of space and time.” He looked up at her with a raised eyebrow. “You didn’t realize that your guns and freaking hoverboard don’t fit in your suit normally?”
Valerie worked her jaw for a minute. “I… never thought of it.”
“Apparently,” Danny sassed. She felt something shift in her suit before he pulled back holding a container the size of a pop can. “Got it. Hold on a second.” He said standing and going back to the picnic table.
“Uhh… holding on,” Valerie said, poking at the empty space where her stomach should have been. “Danny, I’m trying to roll with the punches here, but what the actual fuck?”
“Uh… well, have you heard of a bag of holding?”
“No.”
“Tardis?”
“Still no.”
“Mary Poppins’s?”
“Are you talking about her pulling a lamp out of her purse?”
“Yeah, that. There’s extra space in your suit for all the tech.”
The sound of liquid pouring made her look up and she saw Danny pouring the remains of his drink from the Nasty Burger into the container. When Danny turned around and saw her staring he shrugged. “Diet cola is surprisingly good at hanging onto ectoplasm. Like… it’s really good. I don’t understand, neither do my parents. It just works.”
Danny got back down on his knees in front of her and then shoved his arm back into her. “Ah, dang it. I knew this was going to be a pain.”
“What is it?”
Danny pulled his arm out. “It was hard getting it out, it’s going to be harder getting it back in. Let me just…” Danny reached in one more time, pressing his head against her hip as he leaned against her. “It’s just right… there! Got it!” He pulled back and dusted his hands. “You know, might be worth taking some compressed air through there.”
Valerie’s helmet came away so she could pinch the bridge of her nose. “I’d really like to wrap this up so I didn’t have to deal with this weirdness anymore.”
“Fair enough,” Danny said putting the panel back into place. Valerie ran her hands along her stomach. If she hadn’t just seen Danny practically bury himself in her, she never would have known there was that gap.
“Suit running at 80%,” Danny’s voice chimed in her ear. “Internal repairs continuing.”
Danny stood up and dusted off his knees. “Alright, that should fix everything. The blaster isn’t going to misfire like it did up there, the suit is gonna run slightly faster, and the board shouldn’t drop out from under you now that you’re getting a better draw from the ambient ectoplasm.”
Valerie let her suit pull back into… whatever space it came from, maybe she should ask Danny about that. “So… uhh… I guess you know why I broke up with you now…”
Danny blew a bubble with the gum he was chewing. “You mean because you were worried about ghosts attacking the son of the two best ghost hunters in the world?”, he said after it popped.
Valerie folded her arms. “I dunno. I have sixty takedowns, you know.”
Danny titled his head. “How many of those are fully-fledged entities, as compared to you know… blobs?”
Valerie blinked. “Uh… that’s… there are differences?”
“You really did just hop on the board and start blasting, huh?”
Valerie put a hand on her hips and leaned forward. “You’ve gotten sassy, huh.” She smirked. “It’s a good look on you.”
“You look good in black.” Danny countered.
Valerie felt that blush come back, but she smiled. Unlike everything else Danny threw at her in the last hour, this she could handle. “Coffee?”
“Not the Starbucks.”
“Ew no, Poe’s Corner.”
“Lead the way.”
Maybe she owed the Box Ghost a gift basket or something.
Her watch beeped and she looked down at it. The ghost radar, which hadn’t been working for the last couple of days, was warning her of a level 10 ecto entity nearby. She looked up at Danny. “Danny… why is my radar telling me that you’re giving off Phantom’s ectosignature?”