Eyes | After a ghost encounter, Danny discovers that he can't see clearly during class, and now has to find someone who can solve this problem.
A/N: So it's my first time doing the DannyMay event and I'm pretty excited! I guess the good thing about staying home during online school is that I have more time to write and draw :') Anyways, here's something I enjoyed writing!
~~~
Danny groggily rubbed his eyes, forcing himself not to fall asleep in Mr. Lancer's class; he would surely kill him if he did! The boy looked over to his two best friends who also seemed to be bored out of their minds and not paying attention to the lesson being taught, but then again, Mr. Lancer's lessons were always filled with boredom and unnecessary work. Even the nerds thought so, and they were the ones who always asked for extra homework in his other classes!
"He freaking needs to sound more enthusiastic in class if he wants people to pay attention to him," the half-ghost mumbled to himself as he heard his female friend chuckle, and luckily, the teacher hadn't noticed. Mr. Lancer was too busy eyeing the jocks who secretly exchanged paper balls at each other and thought his class was a football stadium.
"Hey dude," Tucker whispered to his friend. "You think you could help me with this game?" he asked.
"Sorry pal, you're on your own," Danny whispered back before yawning quietly. "Plus, I need to catch up on some beauty sleep."
The technogeek rolled his eyes but didn't comment further and went back on his PDA. Meanwhile, Danny took this as a chance to take a short, well-deserved nap.
The timing was perfect; he sat in the back row, and Mr. Lancer was too focused on teaching and watching over the misbehaving jocks to pay attention to everyone else.
The boy leaned into his chair and gently placed his head on his desk. He used his purple backpack as a pillow and the heavy book they had been reading for literature as a guard. He also knew his two friends would wake him up if Mr. Lancer grew suspicious.
Or not.
"Mr. Fenton!" the teacher's voice boomed, waking the poor boy from his slumber as he frantically pushed his backpack away.
"Yes, Mr. Lancer, sir!" he squeaked, finally opening the book to the correct page as the bald man in the front of the classroom eyed him with a suspecting look on his face.
"Would you like to read what's on the board for us?" he asked, crossing his arms as Danny hesitantly nodded. He really didn't want to read to anyone, let alone the whole class. But what choice did he have right now? It was either that or get sent to detention. And he doubted his parents would like receiving another call that their son was sleeping in class.
The boy stared blankly at the board and was taken aback at first. He rubbed his eyes and couldn't believe that he couldn't see; anything! Everything was blurry and miswritten, and he tried squinting his eyes to read at least what the first two sentences said. But for some reason, he couldn't read the scribbled words.
Danny got up, hoping to see better while Mr. Lancer raised a questioning eyebrow. 'Well, that's new,' he thought. He was sure that Danny could read and see well since he'd called on him multiple times in the past when the boy wasn't paying attention. Yet, he couldn't do it now. The struggle on his face was all the proof he needed. But whatever the problem was, he wasn't having any of it.
"Maybe you should sit in the front," the teacher suggested, walking over to the vacant seat right in front of his desk. Danny tried to mask his horrified face by nervously smiling.
"Thanks, Mr. Lancer, but I'm-"
"Oh, but I insist," and at that, Danny knew he couldn't say or do anything to change his mind. He reluctantly packed his supplies and walked over to the desk in front of the class, taking a seat.
But Mr. Lancer wasn't finished with him yet, "Can you read it now?"
Although the hybrid could now see the positive difference between his back seat and here, he still had trouble making out the words in the blackboard, rubbing his eyes gently again in case there had been something stuck or he was still sleepy. But alas, the sentence up front looked like nothing more than scribbles by a preschooler.
Mr. Lancer sighed but didn't bother asking the boy to read again for the remainder of the class, and so he chose someone else. For the rest of the period, it consisted of the students giving him weird looks and him focusing on nothing else but his sudden poor eyesight.
'Shit, shit, shit! Why can't I see?!' Danny was panicking mentally, looking back and forth at the blackboard, hoping that it was all a dream. He waited, wondering if it was only temporary but so far, there seemed to be no improvement.
He was sure that there wasn't a problem with his eyes yesterday because he remembered answering one of the chemical formulas on the board with ease. It had to be something recent, and he knew he had a lot of thinking to do after class.
"Mr. Fenton, I'd like to have a word with you," the English teacher said after the bell had rung, causing the teen to freeze and hesitantly turn back around.
"We'll wait for you outside," Sam said as Danny nodded, too nervous to care. Mr. Lancer would surely demand an explanation from him, and he knew he wouldn't be able to answer him honestly because he himself didn't know what was going on! Is it even possible to lose your eyesight completely overnight?
When everybody had finally left the classroom, Danny was quick to speak.
"Mr. Lancer, I didn't mean to-"
"I understand Danny, you do not need to tell me," the teacher interrupted calmly as the boy looked at him, confused.
"Your eyesight. It looks to me that you can't see clearly anymore, the words are blurry, right?" he asked as Danny nodded. "I strongly recommend you see an eye doctor as soon as possible to fix that issue. You are dismissed."
The teen stood there stunned, staring at his English teacher in disbelief. No detention, no comments, not even a remark! This was the first time Mr. Lancer had asked to see him and not say anything negative, well, not anything negative he could fix. But as he processed the information he was given, he was beginning to believe that his teacher was right.
He nodded and walked away, about to head out of the door when Mr. Lancer spoke up again.
"Oh, and Mr. Fenton?" he said. "Make sure you also get some sleep, I don't want to see you taking a nap in my class again."
Danny nodded again and without further comment, left the room, embarrassed that his teacher had caught him sleeping. He was sure he had tricked him into thinking he was awake the whole time!
"But I guess that isn't something new," he muttered dryly, watching his two friends hurry after him after he had left the classroom. The trio exited the school, as it was the end of the day, and Danny began recounting to his friends what had happened knowing they would ask about it.
"Wait, so does that mean that you'll be wearing glasses too?" Tucker grinned at the prospect of having his best friend also wear glasses.
"I don't know... I have no idea how my eyes just suddenly... changed. Like, they weren't like this before, hell they were perfect yesterday! And just today, I couldn't see a single word! You guys also look a bit blurry to me, even up close! I just don't get it-" Danny ranted but suddenly froze, recalling something important. His two friends also stopped walking, looking at their friend expectantly.
~Flashback Time~
"Don't you think it's a bit too late at night to be starting a fight?" Danny joked, handling another blast thrown at him.
"It's never too late to use technology, ghost child," Technus cackled, releasing the alive devices to attack Danny and then grinned. "I'm aware that you're also guilty of it."
The half-ghost frowned, knowing he was talking about his gaming. He had been playing Doomed with Tucker when the technology ghost had shown up to interrupt them. And it had been over an hour ago.
"At least my video games haven't affected anyone. You on the other hand..." he retorted, successfully managing to blow up the mainstream connecting the wires. Technus growled, now using his full ghost powers to fight back his enemy.
"What? Can you not take control of your technology anymore?" Phantom teased, flying closer to the weird-looking device. He didn't know much about technology like his best friend, and he knew he couldn't ask him about it because he was likely asleep by now. But he was sure that the red wire in the middle had something to do with turning the system off...
Technus saw what the boy was about to do and yelled "No! Don't unplug it!" But unfortunately, he was too late. The hybrid had already removed the wire from the plug and before he could comprehend what was happening, sparks erupted from the device as Danny shrieked, instantly pushing himself away from it.
"Agh!"
Danny closed his eyes, feeling them burn from the impact. The bright light and the tiny electric sparks managed to get into his eyes, and he could feel pain whenever he blinked too much. However, he couldn't let Technus get away so with the Fenton thermos in hand, he managed to suck him in while he was preoccupied complaining about his destroyed tech.
'Well, that hurt,' Danny thought to himself, finally opening his eyes only to be met with blurriness at first, but nothing too serious. He didn't think anything of it and only checked on the mirror a few times to see if it required immediate attention. But it didn't, so he completely forgot about it the next day.
~End Flashback~
"So let me get this straight. You end up blowing up a device because you didn't know how to operate it, and then screw up your eyes?" Sam restated, angry at her friend for not only keeping this from her but not getting any help afterwards.
"Why didn't you just shoot the device using one of your ecto balls from afar?" Tucker asked with an annoyed look although he was worried too.
"Don't you think I already did?" Danny said, bothered by the fact that his friends thought he was dumb. "It wouldn't break, so I just decided to go up close and maybe try to unplug it..."
"Well, that was a stupid idea! You could've seriously gotten hurt or worse-" Sam cut herself off and sighed, knowing she was overreacting. But she couldn't help that her friend had to suffer the consequences alone because they hadn't shown up to help him!
And Danny noticed that and smiled softly. "Hey, it's fine. I'll just go visit the eye doctor and-" before he could continue, he heard a sudden crash from behind him and his ghost sense went off.
The trio groaned, knowing it was not the right time for a ghost to show up and disrupt the city, but when was it ever a good time?
"Whelp! I was looking all over for you, you're late!" Skulker yelled as he threw an ecto bomb, not giving his prey enough time to comment back. However, Danny was prepared and quickly brought up his hands to form a shield to protect himself and his friends. He quickly transformed to Phantom after finding the street empty, and flew up to the ghost.
"I'm flattered, but can we please reschedule?" The boy countered not wasting time by blasting the ghost with a few tricks of his own.
"Why? I think now is a perfect time! Now enough talking and more screaming!" Skulker smirked as he threw more ecto bombs at the boy, trying to blow him up. But unfortunately for him, Danny avoided all of them and grinned.
"Well you see, I kinda have an appointment to attend to and..." Danny shrieked, shielding his eyes from the sudden flashing bright lights of the building beside them. He felt himself slowly get dizzy and eventually flew himself back to the ground.
Skulker was confused by the sudden behaviour of his prey, as he hadn't done anything else to him to provoke such a pain. The boy already blocked all his attacks! But he knew that whatever it was, his eyes were the one getting the end of the stick, considering how the boy was blocking them.
And when he flew closer to him, he gasped when he saw his prey's eyes glow into a green-yellow. From experience, he knew that either meant he was sick, or something else was wrong.
"What happened to your eyes?" he asked, merely out of curiosity as Danny weakly smirked.
"Why? Are you worried about me?" he asked as the mechanical ghost rolled his eyes.
"Hardly. But I want my prey to be in perfect condition when I hunt him. I cannot attack you in this current state. It'll ruin my reputation so for my sake and yours, I'll come back some other time," Skulker said, ready to fly back to the ghost zone when Danny stopped him.
"Wait! I can't go to the eye doctor like this!" Danny exclaimed as soon as he transformed back to human, staring at a nearby window only to freak out at his appearance; his eyes were still glowing green, and yellow! "What should I do? This sounds like a ghost thing, I'm sure you'd know!"
"Do I look like a doctor to you?" Skulker sarcastically replied but then sighed, looking thoughtful. "But I know about this ghost doctor located somewhere in the ghost zone... Ah yes! Her lair's the island between mine and Klemper's, she'll have a talking door when you first spot it. Now go get that fixed, I want to hunt you already!"
Before Danny could ask any more questions, the hunter had already left, looking for another prey to hunt in the meantime while his favourite one got treated.
The boy rolled his eyes but quickly told his friends about what he'd discovered, and they decided to take a short trip to the ghost zone.
~~~
"Tell me again, how did this happen to you?" the doctor asked, inspecting Phantom's eyes closely while his friends watched warily.
The trio had been reluctant about entering the new ghost's lair. After all, he wasn't the most liked person in the ghost zone and he was nervous that she'd blast him as soon as he stepped foot in the place.
And he was right, somewhat. The doctor had frowned upon spotting the trio, pinching her lips in distaste. The ghost was aware of who Phantom was and what he did to her kind, and she was even wary of having him right in her lair. What would the other ghosts say when they find out she'd helped the halfa?
However, she was unaware of the fact that the trio felt the same way, and were quite nervous about visiting her because of Danny's reputation. If they weren't so desperate to find a cure for the boy's eyes, they wouldn't have taken another step at the creepy place, especially Tucker. He was fearful of visiting anything hospital-like. Not only was this an eerie-looking clinic accompanied by a scary doctor, but it was in the ghost zone. And the doctor was a ghost too.
"You bet that if I wasn't worried about leaving you with this crazy ghost, I wouldn't have come here in the first place," Tucker whispered, completely ignoring the fact that the doctor could hear him from miles away as she rolled her eyes.
The poor technogeek was nervously looking around the office every now and then, his hand hadn't stopped shaking since they'd come here. Danny wished he could comfort him like what Sam was doing to the both of them, but he had been feeling fidgety, for a different reason of course.
Danny looked at his friends apologetically. If it weren't for his stupid actions, they wouldn't be stuck here with someone who could kill him. But his two best friends came either way, even if it meant possibly getting hurt. And he wasn't going to allow it.
He was unsure if the female doctor would help him or hurt him. It was hard to tell with the poker face she had on, instead surveying him up and down. And that did make him quite uncomfortable. But he also completely forgot she had posed a question until she coughed loudly, snapping him out of his daze.
"Uh, I... I think I was electrocuted..." he finally replied awkwardly, turning his head away. However, she didn't let him keep his head low for long and forced his chin up to flash light on his eyes, causing him to flinch.
"Hm, sure looks like it," she said, turning his head sideways as she frowned. "You don't have to be nervous, I get that hospitals can be a scary place. Or," she raised an eyebrow. "You're somehow afraid of me which confuses me. I'm a doctor, I treat pain, not cause it."
Danny didn't know what to say so he just let her do her thing, trying not to tense up. But Sam, on the other hand, had plenty to say.
"That's kinda hard to believe, don't ya think? You wouldn't stop glaring at us the minute we showed up, and it looked like you were ready to tear us apart."
The woman grinned like a Cheshire cat, causing the trio to inwardly shiver. The look really didn't suit her, and it didn't help that she had glowing red eyes.
However, they didn't know that she was simply amused by their behaviour towards her. They acted like a bunch of... teens. And they reminded her of her son.
"Touche," she commented, scribbling something onto her notepad. "You can relax though. As long as you don't touch my stuff and act like obedient kids, I won't give you a hard time." She smirked. "And I'll give you all lollipops."
Danny rolled his eyes at her comment but felt at ease, beginning to realize that the doctor was only doing her job and that she couldn't be blamed for acting hostile towards him. After all, many of the ghosts here didn't have nice comments to say about him, and news travelled quickly.
Before the hybrid could ask any more questions, the doctor started to form something in her hands using ectoplasm and... white dust? He jumped in surprise and his two best friends looked at the woman weirdly. But she ignored them and just continued focusing her energy in her hands until it formed... glasses.
The boy was confused when she handed the object to him, the faint glow disappearing and turning to a plain black colour.
"It looks like a pair of normal glasses," she explained, pointing to her creation. "But it has ghostly pores that work to make you see again, and help return your vision. I would go into further detail and explain to you how the process works and all but I have a date in an hour and I doubt you'd be interested in hearing a lecture you'd half understand."
Danny stared at her amazed, hesitantly putting the glasses on. However, the amazement of how kindly the doctor was treating him doubled, and his eyes adjusted to the lenses. Everything was bright at first, and he had to blink a few times too, but then his vision suddenly became clearer and he could even see the faint pimple on his friend's chin.
"Woah..." Danny said in astonishment, looking around the room as if it was his first time seeing. He was stunned at how effective, and quick, the device worked. And after he took them off to compare, he already felt a slight difference in his eyes, and the previous pain he felt every time he blinked had decreased.
"Worked like a charm," the ghost crossed her arms, wearing a proud grin as the boy smiled brightly at her.
"It worked! This thing is so cool, I've seen nothing like it!" he laughed. "Wow, my vision is even better than it had been ever before."
After musing with the glasses for a while, the boy finally turned to face the doctor. "Thank you for this, I really appreciate it, a lot," he sincerely said as she nodded, smiling back. If she were to be honest, she would say that she liked to see the boy relaxed and smile at her. And she was proud of herself for treating a hybrid, she'd never treated a different species than her own before.
"You're probably used to this by how quickly you managed to form these, but it's still so cool..." Danny continued and, in an instant, the doctor's expression changed and she became cold.
"Yeah, many come from fights and I treat them," she replied bitterly, confusing the boy. However, Sam quickly caught on and glared at the woman.
"I'm guessing the fights have nothing to do with Danny, right?" the goth snapped. "You act like your people are never wrong but they continue to terrorize us and cause harm-"
"Doesn't make violence a better choice. You guys claim to protect your town but then blame it on the ghosts when you cause damage to it because of your fights," the doctor could feel her anger rising and eyes flickering so she quickly calmed down, back to wearing a poker face. "You can't blame us for everything that happens in your world, y'know...."
"I'm sorry that you feel that way. It must be hard treating patients in much worse condition than I am. But I fight because I'm forced to, and I try to limit the number of injuries done to the ghosts by trapping them in a container and releasing them here," Danny said with a sad smile, getting up from the examination table to leave.
The doctor just sighed and nodded, grabbing a sticky note and scribbling some words onto it. She handed the note to the boy who looked at her in confusion.
"A reminder. Even if you feel better after wearing the glasses for a few days, I suggest you continue to wear them for two weeks or else your vision will get worse. Also, wear them at all times and only take them off when you go to sleep," she clarified as the boy nodded and smiled gratefully.
"I see. How much will it cost?" he asked, hoping it wasn't expensive. He didn't have much money in his wallet and he knew glasses were quite pricey. And these weren't any glasses, they also contained medicine that was crafted specifically for him.
The doctor tilted her head. "What?"
"Uh, the price for the glasses?" Danny said again and before he could understand what was happening, the woman burst into fits of laughter. The trio stared at her action and just looked at each other, unsure what to say. Even Tucker, who had been quiet for a while, forgot about his surroundings and just stared and rolled his eyes. 'I knew she was crazy,' he muttered.
"Ah, I'm sorry, I forgot how amusing you humans can be at times," she chuckled. "We don't do money here."
"Wait, what... So then, how do I pay? Are there specific ghost coins or is it soul related?" Danny rambled on causing the ghost to grin.
"No silly, you don't pay here. It's what you guys call it; free. Being a doctor is not only my job but a hobby," and obsession, she mentally added. "I love helping people, it's what keeps me as, well, a ghost. I know my son used to like it when I used to treat patients here," she sadly smiled. Danny wanted to ask her what happened to her kid but refrained from doing so. His friends also shared the exact thoughts together as they exchanged looks.
Danny changed the topic by smiling. "You didn't need to help me, but you did. And that says a lot since I'm infamous around here," he nervously scratched his neck and added, "I'm sure your son would be proud."
The woman's face brightened as she smiled at the boy in front of her, and for the first time, Danny noticed the dimples on her face.
"Thank you," she said as Danny nodded and put on his glasses, looking around again in content.
"Thank you for the glasses," he said and suddenly got an idea. "Hey, since I can't pay you with money, I can do something else instead."
Phantom focused all his ice energy in his hands, confirming what he was going to make. The doctor watched in awe along with his friends as the teen started crafting using his ice powers, something she'd never seen before. The icicles gracefully swirled around what seemed to be a frame, and when Danny finished, he handed the product over to her.
"This is a picture frame, you can put a picture of your son in it," he explained and then grinned. "And don't worry, the ice won't melt."
"Wow, I really don't know what to say," the doctor stared at the elegant piece handed to her before carefully placing it on her desk, afraid of breaking it. "You're one of the most unique patients I've had in a while."
"And you are one of the strangest doctors I've ever had," the hybrid joked.
"I'm a ghost. I doubt you've visited a doctor that wasn't a human before," she dryly answered.
"Yeah, well, I'm a halfa so unless you've treated Plasmius before, which I doubt you have, I'm the first," he said with a smirk.
"Get out of here before I start to question why I have three annoying teens in my lair."
~~~
A/N: Should I do a sequel to this where Danny goes to school in glasses?