InsaneJournal

Apprentice of the Sixth Age 5/12
Title: Apprentice of the Sixth Age
Chapter Title: Training
Rated: NC17 (chapter rating hard R)
Pairings: Danny/Lancer
Fandom: Danny Phantom
Danny Phantom belongs to Nickelodeon and its associates. The Call of Cthulhu role playing game belongs to Chaosium Inc.
Notes from the last four chapters.

-----

This is the second novel of the Apprentice Arc.

Writing of this novel began in May 2006. The novel was finished in March 2007. It spawned a third installment, a short story which was began in March 2007 and is nearing completion. It has been edited for grammar repeatedly.

The Apprentice story arc grapples with a multitude of themes that a great many people may not be comfortable with, including but not restricted to Insanity, Slash, Het, Pedophilia, Drug Use, Polyamoury, and Master/Servant Relations.

-----

Danny swooped out of the ghost portal and cringed as alarms screamed from every direction. He heard his dad’s voice from upstairs.

“Maddie! Come quick! The most concentrated ghost presence I’ve ever heard of is in the lab right now!” A stampede of footsteps pounded down the stairs.

Danny sighed and flew off through the building and into the afternoon sun.

He fancied he could hear his parent’s screams of lost glory.

-----

Danny landed in front of a windowless building with an unmarked door. He phased through the door to a dank, smoky room. A large, muscled man in an ill-fitting suit grabbed him from behind.

“Where do ya think yer goin’?” snarled a masculine voice.

Danny sighed and went intangible. He stepped out of the man’s grip and turned to smile at him.

“G-ghost!” the bouncer gasped.

Danny patted him on the head and strode through the beaded curtain into the main room.

This room was smoky and shadowed, much like the entryway. A large group of people, all teachers, was gathered around a stage where some poor sap was making a fool of himself on a karaoke machine. Small intimate tables formed a maze around the stage; most were populated by singles or pairs discussing students, drinking, laughing, and in general unwinding from the week. A bar stood in the far corner, the bartender laughing and joking as he served drinks.

The poor sap on stage stepped down and a number of teachers started calling for one person to stake the stage.

“C’mon, Lyonell.” “Lyonell!” “Get up there, Lancer.” “Riff Raff!”

Danny went invisible as Lancer sullenly allowed himself to be shoved up on the stage. He overshadowed the karaoke machine and selected a song.

“Just because none of you lot can sing doesn’t mean I have to,” Lancer shouted to the crowd. The music started. Lancer started to sing, confused. This wasn’t the song he’d chosen.

I’m all dressed up with nowhere to go, Walkin’ with a dead man over my shoulder. I’m all dressed up with nowhere to go, Walkin’ with a dead man over my shoulder.

Although Oingo Boingo was never that bad. He started to sway to the chaotic trumpets.

I wait for an invitation to arrive, Goin’ to a party where no one’s still alive. Waitin’ for an invitation to arrive, Goin’ to a party where no one’s still alive.

But why this particular song? He swore this was the creepiest song they’d ever done.

“I was struck by lightning, walkin’ down the street,” Lancer sang. “I was hit by something last night in my sleep. It’s a dead man’s party. Who could ask for more? Everybody’s coming, leave your body at the door. Leave your body and soul at the door!”

Danny left the karaoke machine and materialized at the table closest to front center stage. He grinned and waved coquettishly.

Lancer thanked the gods for chaotic trumpets and leaned over the edge of the stage. “What are you doing here?” he shouted over the music.

Danny leaned up and kissed him. Lancer sighed into Danny’s lips and tongue. He pulled abruptly away and started singing again, a mischievous glint shining in his eyes. “All dressed up and nowhere to go, walkin’ with a dead man, oh, with a dead man. Ooo, waiting’ for an invitation to arrive, ooo, walkin’ with a dead man, dead man, a dead man. I’m in my best suit and my tie with a shiny silver dollar on either eye. I hear the chauffer comin’ to my door, he says there’s room for maybe just one more. I was struck by lightning, walkin’ down the street. I was hit by something last night in my sleep. It’s a dead man’s party. Who could ask for more? Everybody’s coming, leave your body at the door. Leave your body and soul at the door!”

Lancer tipped the microphone down playfully and Danny crooned the bridge, badly. “Don’t run away, it’s only me. Don’t be afraid of what you can’t see. Don’t run away, it’s only me. Don’t be afraid of what you can’t see.”

The bouncer, Frank, threw aside the beaded curtain. “I knew I heard that ghost in here!” he shouted, pointing at Danny. The vast majority of the room turned to stare.

Lancer ticked under Danny’s jaw and kissed him.

Frank’s jaw dropped.

“The ghost’s with me, Frank,” Lancer called out.

Frank gaped in an excellent imitation of a fish before skulking off behind the beaded curtain.

Lancer didn’t even bother finishing the song. He stepped down from the stage and pushed his way through the staring teachers to the table Danny’d appropriated. “Hi,” he said, the stares making him nervous.

Danny wrapped his arms around him and tucked his head under his chin. “Hi yourself. Miss me?”

Lancer laid his head on Danny’s and wrapped his arms around the ghost. “You were only gone a day. How long was it for you?”

“I don’t know,” Danny said. “Maybe a couple of months. I never did see the moon so I’m not really sure.”

“What on earth is going on here?!” demanded a voice in front of them. Mr. Wilson, the head of the school board, stood there, martini in hand. He glared daggers at Lancer before noticing Danny and taking a frightened and disgusted step back. “What the hell?”

Danny and Lancer separated. Lancer cleared his throat. “Robert, this is my lover, Danny Phantom. Danny, this is the head of the school board, Robert Wilson.”

Danny held out a black-gloved hand. “A pleasure to make your acquaintance,” Danny said, layering on the apprentice’s charm. Wilson reached out tentatively and shook his hand quickly before drawing away just as quickly.

“You’re dating a ghost,” Wilson said, stating the obvious. “The ghost boy. How old is he?”

“Umm,” Lancer began, not knowing what to say.

“Five thousand eighty-three years, give or take,” Danny supplied. “Why? Is there a problem?”

Wilson’s jaw dropped. He downed his martini in one gulp and skulked off through the crowd.

A tall, thin man sidled up next to Lancer. “I never pegged you for a necrophile,” he said, wrapped an arm around the older man’s shoulders.

“Hey!” Danny complained. “Do I look like a corpse to you?”

“Hello, William,” Lancer sighed. “You’re not a corpse, Daniel. You’re much too… lively.”

Danny blushed.

Lancer excused himself from William’s grasp and tried to make his way from within the crowd. His colleagues gathered around him and Danny, closing in. Lancer gave a pleading look to someone near the karaoke machine.

A tall, thin blonde woman took to the stage. “Hello, everybody!” she shouted in a voice that sounded like the screams of a Siamese cat. The Titanic theme played behind her as she started shrieking out Celine Dion.

The crowd dispersed, hands to their ears. Lancer gave her a grateful look and let Danny drag him off to a corner table.

“What are you doing here?!” Lancer demanded in a whisper.

Danny held up the Necronomicon. “I need you to watch over something. I can’t keep it at my place, it sets off too many alarms.”

“It’s a...”

“It’s a book,” Danny supplied. “A ghost book.”

“How do you make a ghost book?” Lancer asked.

Danny cringed as he took an airless breath. He’d wanted to shield Lyonell from this. “To make a ghost book you take all the copies and burn them,” he said sadly. “Burn them all. Many times the ashes were then scattered but it’s not necessary. The Catholic Church gathered together every copy of this book in [year] and burned them. In the end, they created a ghost book.”

Lancer’s expression fell and the light in his eyes died. “I’m headed out, Pete!” he called to the bartender.

The bartender waved, not even looking up from his handiwork.

They left.

Lancer got in his car. Danny hovered around the driver side window. “Maybe you shouldn’t be driving,” Danny mentioned.

Lancer gave him a depressed look. “I wouldn’t have pegged you as one who’d care if I died in a car crash.”

Danny shuddered. “It’s not that. I’m worried you might survive.”

Lancer threw open the car door and got out.

“What did I say?” Danny asked. “What’s wrong?”

“What’s wrong?!” Lancer demanded. He looked like he needed to scream but reigned himself in. He grabbed Danny’s wrist and drew him off the sidewalk into an alley next to the bar. “God damn it, Danny.” He pulled Danny in for a quick, deep kiss then shoved him away.

“What the hell?” Danny exclaimed.

“I--I can’t do this, Danny. You’ve done so much to stay with me, to make me okay with everything and it… it just makes me feel all the more inadequate.”

Tears sprang up in Danny’s eyes. “I thought you were okay with this!”

“I was!” Lancer shouted. He winced at the echo and lowered his voice back to a hissing whisper. “I was. And then something else happened to make it not okay and I learned to live with it. Then something else happened and again and again and… I can’t keep up, Danny. You need someone who can keep up with the weirdness, some ghost.”

He’s breaking up with me! “No, Lyonell, please, I love you…” Tears began falling, tears tinged with deep red. He tried to gather Lancer in his arms.

Lancer squirmed away. “Even this, this is too much! You’re crying tears of blood, Danny! How am I supposed to be okay with this, with any of this, when every instinct I have is screaming at me to run away?!”

“Because we love each other and that should be enough,” Danny said firmly. “You won’t always be alive and then what? You won’t always have those instincts, Lyonell. On the other hand, I’ve loved you for thousands of years! What are we going to do, wait for each other?!”

“That’s an idea,” Lancer whispered.

Danny’s face fell. His shoulders slumped and his head dropped. With three words he’d been reduced to a powerless shell, a facsimile of his former self. “Fine,” he whispered. “I’ll go. I’ll go and ne’er darken thy living soul again.”

“Danny,” Lancer said hesitantly, his words finally catching up to him. “I didn’t mean--”

Danny turned to him, a sad frightful spectre. “Aye, Lyonell, you did.” He flew away without even a goodbye.

Lancer staggered in shock to his car and drove away.

-----

Lancer barely made it to his house in one piece. He stumbled in and grabbed the bottle of bourbon off the top of the fridge. He poured himself a large glass full and stared at the nearly empty bottle. With a scream of rage he sent the bottle flying into a wall. He slid down the side of the fridge to sit on the floor. He stared dumbly at the shattered glass on the floor only a few paces away.

He knew one way to fix this.

He crawled forward and picked up a particularly large shard. He pressed his thumb against the sharp edge. He stared fascinated at the blood dripping from the cut he made.

Yes, this is the perfect way to fix this.

It’s the only way.

He brought the shard to his wrist and pressed in.

-----

In the Ghost Zone, Clockwork bolted upright. Something was very wrong, he could feel it. He grabbed a weapon and with great effort he transported to the living realm and stopped time.

Or at least he tried to.

Time slowed but it wouldn’t stop for him; he was too weak. And then he saw the scene. So this is Lyonell, he thought.

Lancer was lying in a puddle of blood on the kitchen floor. His eyes were dim and his breathing was labored but he was still alive, still conscious. He gazed up at the cloaked ghost above him. He took in the cloak, the red eyes, the scythe… He felt… relieved. Death had come for him.

“Oh, no, Lyonell, you’re not going to die today,” Clockwork scolded. “My Daniel needs you in your living form just a few years longer. TECHNUS!!”

Technus appeared. “What’s wrong, Clo--” The scene dawned on him. “I see. So what do you need me for?”

Clockwork pointed at Lancer on the floor. “Fix it!”

Technus glanced from Clockwork to Lancer then back at Clockwork. He sighed and floated away.

“Get back here!” Clockwork screamed. “I command you to fix it!”

Technus came back with a cordless telephone. He read the sticker “in case of emergency call 911” and pressed those numbers.

“Yes, I’m at the home of, where the hell are we? Anyway, we’re at the home of Mr. Lancer, the high school teacher. He’s been slicing through his wrists with a piece of glass and there’s a lot of blood. He’s still alive. Could you send someone over to fix it? Thank you.” Technus dropped the phone, not bothering to hit the ‘off’ button. “There, someone’s on their way to fix it.”

“Why can’t you just fix it?” Clockwork demanded. “I’d rather not get the living involved in this.”

“I’m the ghost master of technology! The living aren’t technology, they just make it. I can’t fix living people. You could stop time, prevent this, you know.”

Clockwork lowered his head in shame. “Not anymore. It’s taking all my effort to keep time slowed and even then it is only Lyonell that I’ve slowed. I don’t have time for this, Technus! My time’s almost up then Daniel’s time will come.”

“You mean he’s…” Technus gaped. “But Daniel’s so fond of you! How do you think he’ll feel when he learns he has to kill you to take your place? And how do ghosts die again?”

“Daniel’s not going to know.” Clockwork glared down at Lancer. “Is he?!”

Half a minute passed before Lancer slowly shook his head.

“Good.”

“Daniel’s going to hate us all after he’s taken over,” Technus reminded.

“Not if I have anything to say about it.” A pounding knock sounded on the door. Technus waved his hand and the door opened. Two paramedics rushed in and stopped when they saw Clockwork hovering over Lancer’s barely conscious body.

Clockwork dropped the time-field around Lancer and pointed to him. “Fix it!” he commanded.

The two paramedics shrugged and proceeded to save Lancer’s life.

-----

Danny flew away from the bar. He needed to talk with someone, someone who wouldn’t judge. Someone who wasn’t three hundred miles away at school until next Thursday.

He knew Sam was the better choice but he didn’t know if she’d be able to keep her disappointment under control. Dash was out because although he trusted Father Dagon explicitly, Dash didn’t know about the ghost thing.

He found himself outside Tucker’s window. He knocked.

“Hey, Danny!” Tucker said. “You’re not a vampire, you don’t need my permission! Get in here before someone sees you!”

Danny phased through the glass and sat slumped on the bed. He set the book next to him.

“What’s wrong, Man? You look like somebody just exorcised your cat!”

Danny sighed. “Tucker, I need to talk to someone. And I need you to keep quiet about it.”

“You got it, Dude.”

Danny looked up from his slump. “I’m seeing someone.”

“Well you don’t look too happy about it,” Tucker pointed out.

“We just had a fight. A big one. About me being a ghost and how it affected our relationship. I think we broke up.”

“Whoa! You told her?! It’s not someone popular, is it?”

Danny shook his head. “No, they’re older. And I trust them. This wasn’t a high school crush, Tuck. I expect them to be more intelligent that shouting my secret identity to the rooftops. Besides, you heard the whole apprentice thing, right? As much as it would hurt, I don’t even need to be here. I could just go to the Ghost Zone and lay low for, say, six years.”

“Wait, wait, back up. How serious was this relationship?”

“Very.”

Tucker paced a circle around his floor. “Serious enough to give up your eternity for?”

“Tucker, look at me. This new look here, I got this by spending over five thousand years in the Ghost Zone then sent back here a day after I’d left. And every day I was stuck there I couldn’t stop thinking about him. I love him, Tuck.”

Danny’s choice of pronoun hit Tucker in the brain. “‘Him’? It’s a guy? You’re gay?”

Danny slumped again. “Yes.”

Tucker gave Danny a look. “You haven’t been hitting on me, have you?”

“No.”

Tucker’s look faded to one of confusion. “That’s odd then. I could have sworn someone keeps trying to hit on me but doesn’t know how to start. You sure that’s not you? Because I am hot; I totally wouldn’t blame you.”

“It’s not you, Tucker!” Danny snarled.

“Okay! Okay! Sorry!” Tucker slumped over on the bed to join his depressed friend. “So you gonna start dating again?”

Danny shook his head. “Last resort is I’m gonna wait until he dies then ambush him.”

“That might be a while.”

Danny gave Tucker an amused look. “Five thousand years! One human lifetime, not that long.”

Tucker shuddered. “Way to creep a guy out.”

“Sorry.”

They sat in silence for a few minutes. An uneasy feeling passed through Danny’s subconscious but he ignored it.

“Speaking of creeping a guy out,” Danny said suddenly, “I’ve got this ghost book here that I can’t take home. Do you think you might hold onto it?”

“How do you make a ghost book?”

“You burn it and all its copies.”

Tucker paused for a moment before a hopeful look dawned on his face. “You mean the libraries at Alexandria are still around in the Ghost Zone somewhere?”

“The Lore Master keeps the scrolls in his library. He’s very protective of them. So, yes, they’re around.”

“Sweet!!”

-----

That night Danny pushed open the front door of his parent’s house to see them standing in the living room, glowering at him. “You were expecting me,” he said.

Maddie began it. “Where were you last night?! You went down to the lab, suddenly you disappear, and only now you show up?! The school called. Apparently you weren’t there either! We tried calling the police but they weren’t going to do anything until you’d been gone 48 hours. Do you know what can happen in 48 hours?! Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t ground you for a month, Young Man!”

“Your mother’s right, Son,” Jack began, sounding much saner than his wife. “You shouldn’t go running off like that. What if something happened? What if a ghost attacked? And how did you disappear in the lab? You didn’t go into the Ghost Zone, did you? Do you have any idea how dangerous it is in there?”

Danny saw where this was going and tried to head around them upstairs.

“Don’t you turn your back on me, Daniel Fenton!” Maddie scolded. “You’re grounded until New Years, do you hear me?!” She tried to grab him as he passed.

Her hand went right through him. She jumped back, a look of calculating fear in her eyes.

Danny turned around to face them. His eyes glowed red. “I hear you, Mother. I just don’t understand why you think you can hold me here.”

“Where’s our son?!” Jack demanded. “What have you done to him?!”

“I am your son, Dad.”

Jack gaped and took a few steps back. He bumped into Maddie.

Danny thought for a moment. If what Clockwork had said was true… He started off toward the lab.

“Where are you going?” Jack shouted. “Get back here! Where’s our son?!”

Danny walked down into the lab and stood next to the ghost portal. He waited for his parent’s curiosity to get the better of them and bring them down here.

“Mom, Dad, I am your son. I died two years ago in this very room. I’ve been a ghost ever since, more importantly I’ve been a ghost capable of evading your detection ever since. You want proof? I’ll give you proof. I’ll show you what’s left of your son!” He swooped to the consol that controlled the portal.

“What are you doing?!” Maddie demanded.

“I’m turning it off,” Danny said.

“You can’t!” Jack shouted. “It’ll take hours to turn it back on!”

The glowing green of the Ghost Zone overtook them as Danny opened the portal doors. The event horizon flickered twice and died. The doors tried to close but they slowed and stalled halfway. Smoke from a short somewhere obscured the interior of the portal.

Danny shoved the portal doors open and fanned away the smoke.

Maddie gasped and tears sprang to her eyes. Jack’s jaw dropped as he stared, speechless.

Beside the slightly glowing ghost who wore their son’s visage laid a body. Perfectly preserved in the anti-life field, it wore a white radiation suit, black gloves, and black boots.

Jack let go of Maddie and tentatively reached for it. He lifted it out. It was dry, almost brittle. It was very light. It was very dead.

It was the body of their son.

Jack laid the body on a lab bench and stroked its hair lovingly. “How did it happen?” he whispered.

Danny floated next to him. “The ghost portal produces an anti-life field. It was very quick.”

“Did it hurt?”

Danny shook his head. “No.”

“Why did you stay?”

Danny shrugged. “I didn’t want to believe it. I wanted to live my life and forget about it. That’s how I was able to avoid you detecting me. The machines always saw me for what I was and alarms have been screaming constantly. My denial was just so strong that you never noticed them. Eventually I turned the alarms off. You’re not mad, are you?”

“Mad?!” Maddie asked. “You killed our son, you usurped his life, you prevented us from finding out and you wonder if we’re mad?!”

“Now, Maddie,” Jack started, “listen to yourself!”

“I am not letting that monster back into my life!” She dove for the weapons locker and pulled out something nasty.

“Danny, run!” Jack shouted. “Your mother and I are going to have a little talk.”

Danny left as Jack tackled Maddie and tried to wrestle the weapon from her hands.

-----

Danny flew around town looking for a place to rest. Tucker couldn’t take him in, Sam and Dash were on a date, and he wasn’t even going to consider Kwan. He wondered if Lyonell was still mad at him. He decided to check.

When he got there the house was quiet, empty. He stuck his head through the door. “Hello?” he called. “Lyonell?” He walked through and stood in the empty living room. “Lyonell? I came to see if you were all right.”

“He’s not,” murmured a voice from behind.

Danny spun around. “Technus, don’t scare me like that.” He paused. “What do you mean he’s not all right?!”

“I’ll let him explain,” Technus said. “He’s at the hospital.”

Danny flew off as fast as his thoughts could carry him.

-----

Lancer lay in that twisted world between dreaming and awake where nothing seemed real. William appeared, looking worried. He morphed into Death’s disappointed visage. He became Robert then Dash. It seemed his entire class sat in the room around his bed then they all turned into snakes and flicked their forked tongues at him. The snakes all merged into one, which reared up and turned into Daniel.

“What did you do to yourself?” Daniel asked.

He tried to answer but he kept floating away.

“This is all my fault. I should never have asked you to take in that book. Oh, Lyonell, I’m so sorry. I drove you to this. Can you ever forgive me?”

Poor Daniel. I was only trying to do for him what he’d done for me.

Daniel dragged his foot along the ground. “I should probably go now. The nurses don’t know I’m here.”

No, please, don’t go. Don’t leave me alone! Please stay…

“But really, what can they do if they find me? Kick me out? Call my parents? I told them today, that I’m a ghost. They hadn’t known. My dad seemed not to hate me but I don’t think my mom and I can ever be in the same room again. Well, not without her trying to kill me.”

I’m so sorry. I’m sorry I couldn’t be there for you, I’m sorry I let my instincts get the better of me, even after all you’ve done for us. I’m sorry I was too human.

Daniel held back a sob. “Scootch over.” He lay down next to Lancer.

I’ll never leave you again, Daniel. I promise.

“This was the stupidest Friday ever,” Daniel mumbled. He grabbed one of Lancer’s arms and pulled it over him in a parody of an embrace. He fell asleep.

I love you, Daniel.

Lancer fell into a dreamless sleep.

End