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Dash was having a fantastic day.
He got back two of his tests and an essay that had great grades. Grades that absolutely kept his football scholarship intact.
Sarah Kelley said yes to the date he asked her on for Friday.
And his club, Automotives and Engines, won the first spot for location dibs for the Halloween Haunted House competition.
Sure, the club had to work with at least two others due to the overwhelming number of clubs compared to available campus buildings, but they got first pick.
Which was cool since the club overwhelmingly chose the Rec House. The best building for decorating and making spooky.
The clubs were meeting today to brainstorm and come up with a decisive plan for what they were going to do.
Which is why Dash was no longer having a great day.
The clubs gathered are the Automotives and Engines, Astronomy, and Fashion House.
Which brought one Danny Fenton into the mix.
Who sat on the side watching things unfold as the three heads continued to butt heads with an air of boredom that could shame Paulina.
“We’re getting absolutely nowhere,” James, head of the Fashion House, throws their hands up dramatically. “Let’s just throw it to everyone and then vote.”
“I agree,” Miles huffs, “Fenton!”
Danny blinks, somewhat more focused than before.
“Captain of Spookville, what do you think should be our theme?”
Danny rolls his eyes, sitting up properly, “I think you should give me a limit, how scared do you want everyone to be?”
“Scared but not piss your pants scared.”
He tilts his head, “Abandoned penitentiary, Alcatraz style.”
Miles nods, turning to write it on the chalkboard behind him.
“That’s not scary,” someone from the Fashion House group comments, “Abandoned psych wards are scarier.”
“Sure,” Danny shrugs, “If you want to get roasted for belittling medical malefaction.”
“Last I checked,” Dash says, “We’re brainstorming ideas for a haunted house, not for political correctness.”
“It’s poor taste to ask someone to act as a patient of psychosis when there's countless other options.”
“Stop,” Sean demands, “We’re not going to start a debate so we’re not going to touch it, fair?”
The students murmur an agreement.
“Anyone else?” Sean asks the crowd. “Any other ideas?”
“Ghost King’s Castle,” Dash says.
Miles writes it on the board.
“What’s a ghost king?” a different girl from the Fashion House asks.
“King of ghosts, I think it sounds scary enough,” Dash shrugs.
There’s a murmur of conversation that erupts in the group.
A cold shiver runs down Dash’s spine.
He looks across the room to see Danny staring at him.
Blue eyes shimmering green.
Dash turns away to watch more ideas get added to the board and then a vote knocking out everything but the prison and castle ideas.
“A tie again,” James comments. “Alright this is getting nowhere, who came up with these ideas again?”
Dash and Danny raise their hands.
“Get up here and argue your ideas,” James waves them forward.
Dash joins the trio in the front of the room, crossing his arms as Danny clambers to the front across the tabletops.
Miles grabs Danny by the elbow to pull him to a stop.
“Can you please keep this civil,” he asks, “No funny business?”
Danny glances at Dash, eyes flashing green, “Sorry I can’t make that promise.”
It gets him a whack on the shoulder but Danny does finally join him in the center.
“You can stop with the scary eyes,” Dash says, “You know it lost its effect at graduation after Sam and Val’s fight.”
“What? I can’t help it sometimes,” Danny shrugs, shoving his hands in his pockets.
“Wait, do you two know each other?” Sean asks.
“We were classmates in high school,” Dash says. He sizes Danny up in a mock of consideration. “Maybe I should hang you from the flagpole again, for old times sake?”
“Sure if you want to get shoved into a locker again?” Danny counters with a shit eating grin.
“Children,” Miles steps between them, karate chopping the air, “Can we please focus for 10 minutes? You can go back to pigtail pulling after we come to a decision for a theme.”
Danny rocks on his heels, tension bleeding out of every line of his body.
Dash uncrosses his arms as the room takes a collective breath.
“Why did you say the castle?” Danny asks.
“Thought it sounded cool,” he says, “I remember hearing Phantom mention it in passing and the discussion today made me think of it.”
“Do you know the amount of paperwork that would be needed to have anything resembling the castle?”
“Why would we need paperwork? It's just a castle for ghosts.”
“Dude, do you not remember the Observants?”
“The what?” James cuts in. “What are you two even talking about?”
“You and the loser trio had the weirdest names for all the ghosts, how am I supposed to remember any of them?” Dash says, ignoring James.
“Giant green eyeballs in a robe? Dramatic authoritative little shits? Demanded the entire school pledge allegiance to the new High King?” Danny says.
“Oh those shits,” Dash remembers the group of eyeballs. How the school was locked from the inside and no one could get out until Phantom beat them all to a pulp.
“Why would they care what we do? This isn’t Amity and their king isn’t even here.”
“Because they’re assholes with a control kink.”
“That still doesn’t explain your problem with it,” Dash crosses his arms again. “Why are you being so weird?”
“You’re both being really weird,” James says, turning to the other club presidents, “Are they always this weird?”
“Yes.” “No.” Miles and Sean say at the same time. They frown at each other.
“Because I really do not want more paperwork to deal with,” Danny says, ignoring the presidents.
“Why would you have paperwork?”
“Because they’re assholes with a control kink,” he repeats, sound aggrieved.
“Try again,” Dash arches an eyebrow at him.
Danny huffs, scrubbing a hand through his hair.
Dash forces his shoulders to relax, swallowing the urge to put up more of a fight.
“Seriously, what’s with the eyeballs? Aren’t they just obsessed with their king?”
“They have… a need to be involved and control all things that even remotely relate to the High King and the governance of the Zone to the detriment of literally everyone else. And everything they touch requires paperwork to be filled out and then reviewed by the King which gets in the way of everything.”
“Wait, the King deals with all the paperwork so why do you have to deal with it?” Miles asks.
Danny doesn’t answer, face carefully blank.
Dash frowns at him.
A somewhat horrifying connection solidifying.
“Fenton.”
“Baxter.” Danny’s expression shifts to curiously bemused.
“Who the fuck died and made you king?” he asks.
Danny winces, “You had to fucking go there?”
“Whoa whoa, no need for the language-” James stops abruptly as the temperature of the room plummets.
A cloud of glowing green forms behind Danny.
Growing in size, swirling under its own weight.
From it, three eyeballs in robes float forward to stand between them.
“How dare you show such disrespect-”
The forward most Observant’s echoing voice cuts off as Danny’s heel slams into the top of its head.
“Nobody asked you to step in,” Danny says. “Leave.”
“But your Excellence-” the one closest to Danny turns to him with hands clasped.
“I do not care,” Danny jerks a thumb at the swirling cloud. “I explicitly forbid any of you from traveling outside of Amity.”
“But these mere mortals-”
Danny puts his hand inside his chest and pulls out the thermos, “You have to the count of three before I soup you for the next millennium.”
“You wouldn’t dare!” The first observant says, holding its eyeball from where it’s curled on the floor.
“One.”
The smallest one squeaks, voice a grating garbled radio static, flying back into the cloud without looking back.
“Two.”
The Observant closest to Danny bows deeply before leaving through the cloud.
“This will not go-”
Danny points the thermos at the Observant on the floor. A white beam of light blasts out, sucking the Observant up despite their protesting.
Danny caps it, swiveling on his heel to spin kick the portal. Cutting a line cleanly through causes the cloud to dissipate into nothing, warming up the room to a much more normal temperature.
James' knees give out as Sean’s pants become wet. Several people in the gathering of students whimper or begin to cry.
“Danny, my man,” Miles’ voice shakes in time with his legs. “What the actual fuck.”
“I guess we should scrap the castle idea?” Danny offers, with a shrug.
“No fucking shit, Fenton,” Dash rubs his face with both his hands.
A far more horrifying thought comes unbidden.
“Wait.” Dash’s hands drop from his face.
“How can you be king if you’re not dead?”
“I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that question.”
A small portal opens above the table closest to Danny. A stack of papers a foot high in height fall through, landing with a quiet plop.
The portal disappears silently.
“Great more paperwork.”