This idea was inspired by ispacey's Grey Ghost Week prompt "dark v light," although there is no romance to be seen— just them trying to kill each other and some mentions of their past canonical relationship, as far as it went.

Title from Imagine Dragon's I'm So Sorry.

Waste of Precious Breath

March 25, 2016

Danny flipped around mid-air just in time to see Valerie charging up another cannon blast. The gun barrel glowed for just a moment before another beam of pure energy was hurtling toward him. A moment's instinctual intangibility was all that saved him.

But he was running out of places to hide in a space this open, and he couldn't risk taking a fight with this level of property damage back into the middle of Amity Park.

So dodging Valerie's shots to save his skin until he could think of a better plan it was. Story of his life.

It was becoming harder to keep up with her movements, though. He was getting tired and was nursing old injuries from his fight that morning that he hadn't had time to treat properly before she'd shown up and caught him by surprise.

That was the problem with his ghost sense—it only told him about ghostly threats. Not the human bullies or hunters after his hide.

This was starting to get really old, honestly. The chases, the banter. Getting shot at on a weekly basis by the girl he still kind of wished he was dating…

But her misplaced desire for revenge had only gotten stronger with each failed attempt, firing her up to train harder and track him down more relentlessly for rematches that were getting harder and harder to get out of.

Both of them were getting better at the whole fighting thing, thanks to the insane amount of opportunities they had to practice while defending the town. While Danny had his hands full fighting off any number of ghosts, however, Valerie didn't seem very interested in going after anyone but him.

Which kinda didn't seem fair.

She was improving with each passing week and now she was almost scary good whenever Danny wasn't at one hundred percent. Which… was practically always these days.

Valerie's tracker beeped to indicate that it had locked onto its target and then Danny was swerving to avoid another blast. Which turned out to be several tracker balls full of exploding ectoplasm instead.

He tried to maneuver between the clustered projectiles but the shift in tactics meant that he was caught in the middle by the last two. The impact was harder than he expected and sent him hurling to the ground.

Both balls burst to cover his shoulder and calf with more green goop than it seemed possible for them to hold. The slime kept expanding and falling and oozed into the ground beneath him. To his surprise, the goo was sticky and had begun to solidify, holding him to the ground. He tugged upward to free himself but didn't manage to until he'd dislodged an entire chunk of grass along with his shoulder.

Not a second too soon, because Valerie was hot on his heels, swinging a sharp blade in an arc that landed next to his head instead of on it only because he jerked away with a help at the last second. Before she could follow up to move, Danny rolled over into her, knocking her off balance enough that the blade flew a few feet away.

In the previous moments it took for Valerie to retrieve her weapon and activate a gun turret in the pack slung across her back, Danny had turned invisible— not that it would help him when she could just track his ecto-signature whether or not she could see him—and shot off.

If he could get far enough away from her to transform in some place where she wouldn't be surprised to see Fenton when she turned the corner guns blazing, he might be able to get away. Right now, that was all he wanted to do—just get out of there to live another day.

Because Valerie was as serious as he'd ever seen her and that knife had been aimed straight at his head and, despite their violent encounters, he hadn't ever expected something so intentionally deadly. And he really wasn't in the mood to get killed today.

He sped off through the air and Valerie snarled behind him, gathering up her weapons and pushing off the ground on her hover board to track the tiny red dot speeding away on her wrist monitor.

Danny flew as fast as his wounds and the sticky clumps of dirt would allow. He headed straight for the town, hoping to gain some ground by flying through buildings that Valerie had to skirt around.

He zig-zagged with a curse when he heard another mechanical whine behind him. He risked a glance back to see if she was serious, but as soon as he caught sight of her face he realized that she wasn't going to hesitate firing at an invisible target.

Pulling up, Danny swooped over to the left just before she was about to pull the trigger. The wind drowned out any curses of her own, but at least she'd managed to pull up before shooting a building that hadn't ever done anything to her. Danny considered that a win, but his face hardened as he realized that she really wasn't playing around today. The sooner he got off her radar, the better.

He could get through a building, transform into Fenton… throw her on a wild goose chase and…

Another shot caught his foot and sent him spinning into the alleyway beneath him where he crashed back into visibility.

"Now I've got you," she snarled, bringing her gun around again and recharging a blast.

Danny split himself around the point of impact, wincing when she growled in frustration and pulled out a pocket blaster so she wouldn't have to deal with the recharge period.

This was just getting ridiculous.

She wasn't going to stop until he somehow made her.

But if he waited too long, he wouldn't be in a position to stop her at all.

His brain raced frantically to keep up with what was happening, what he could do, but he was running out of time.

He put up his hands to fire at the same time she did.

Danny grunted when the small beat hit him directly in the chest, knocking him back against the brick wall. His head cracked on impact and he groaned as he tried to stagger back up into a defensive stance, but then sagged in relief when he saw that his own attack had been effective.

Valerie was lying against the corner, heaving, her fisted hands spasming. The circuitry around her chest was smoking and sparking and her guns were out of reach but she was definitely still alive. Glaring at him like he was evil incarnate, though.

But he was still breathing and that was what mattered.

Rolling over with a harsh cough, Danny pushed himself up onto unsteady arms, wincing when his glove left a streak of bright green across the ground beneath him. He spared a moment to look up and cringed when he locked eyes with Valerie staring at him like she'd never hated anything more in her life.

As he began moving, Valerie started scrabbling against the pavement, straining to reach for a gun but unable to reach either of the pieces lying just a few feet away. An attempt to reach over was aborted as soon as the strain cracked skin beneath her burnt suit.

She drew back with a hiss, clutching at her arm.

"Stop," Danny said wearily. "Why can't you just stop?"

Valerie shook her head viciously. "Not going to stop," she panted. "I'm never going to stop, you scum," she vowed. "You ruined everything and it's all your fault and I'm not going to stop as long as I can come after you," she said before breaking into a cough.

Danny's eyes narrowed.

"You don't like it?" Valerie spat. "Then end it. Right here, right now. I'm down," she sneered. "And you've got a built in death ray. Come on, do it," she taunted.

"Do it."

Danny stared at her as she tried to goad him into action.

She wasn't even scared, she was just… angry. Seething. Full of hatred because she hated him and wanted nothing more than to see him dead. Failing that, apparently, the next best thing was for him to kill her while she was down.

"Do it," she snarled. "End this."

Danny wondered how they ever could have ended up here. Valerie breaking both of their hearts to protect his human half as she tracked down his ghostly alter ego every week…

She'd been trying to catch him for years. Ever since Cujo had destroyed most of her worldly possessions she'd begun this vendetta against him, searching him out and blasting him again and again and again.

She's never going to stop and he knows it. Realizes it for the first time. Valerie's never going to stop fighting him.

She's going to keep coming, keep shooting up everything in her path to get to him. To destroy the ghost that ruined her life and her dad's life and destroyed any chance she ever had of being a regular teenager and having a normal relationship with her old friends or with Danny Fenton.

Valerie is driven and dedicated to eradicating this one evil from the world and he'd applaud her if only it wasn't him and he wasn't actually evil and this was all just a huge misunderstanding. But she didn't know that, didn't listen when he tried to explain that not everything was his fault.

And this was never going to stop. Not until one of them was dead.

They'd worked together when forced, when circumstances made it impossible for either of them to survive without the other's help. But when the world wasn't ending, she went right back to trying to take her revenge.

Valerie's skills continued improving at alarming rates and one of these days he wasn't going to be able to just walk away from one of their encounters.

He drags a hand across his side and winces. He was already really hurt and Valerie would follow up with that advantage tomorrow or the day after.

She kept on butting in when he was actually fighting a real bad guy who was probably trying to take over the town. Every time she interrupted to gang up with his enemy of the day, she was endangering the lives of the citizens of Amity Park.

It put everyone at risk when she tried to take out the one effective defender of the town.

Valerie was trying to kill him.

This was self defence.

But how long would he be able to keep this up? With her and the ghosts and his parents and his teachers and the bullies at school and Vlad all coming after him on a near-daily basis?

Not when she actually wanted to wipe him off the face of the earth.

This was self defence.

It was him or her.

And she was asking for him to end it.

Something flipped in his brain.

All of the arguments fell away and now he prepared to do the unthinkable.

"Okay," he said.

Danny staggered up to one knee and braced himself against the brick wall before raising a hand.

Valier glared fiery daggers at him but he expected no less.

There was no surprise in her gaze. This was exactly what she expected the evil ghost to do.

"I'm not evil," he said, trying to explain one last time.

"Yeah right," she sneered, spitting blood on the ground beside her. "Enough stalling. Can you do this or not?"

His hand blazed with green energy.

"I'm really sorry, Valerie," he said, voice cracking.

She blinked in surprise.

"But I don't want to die."

He released the blast and her entire world was enveloped in light and heat and pain and white and black and blue and green and she couldn't breathe and her last thought was

Danny.

"End this."

"Fine," he hissed, raising a hand. He blasted outward, pinning her to the brick wall with ectoplasmic goop just like the kind she'd shot at him minutes before.

She didn't look like she would be moving any time soon, but he'd learned a long time ago not to underestimate her resourcefulness or Vlad's technology.

Her fingers were twitching for the gun just beyond her reach but it would surprise him if she didn't have any more blades or blasters hidden away in her suit just waiting to be activated at a touch.

She screamed in frustration when she realized how helpless she was, trapped like this and unable to reach her weapons.

"You coward," she spat.

Danny panted raggedly against the wall, trying to get his bearing for a few moments, letting her struggle uselessly against her ghostly bonds and use up some of her angry energy as he blinked to see straight again.

It was never supposed to get like this. They could be rivals but they were never supposed to reach a point where she was about to finish him off or thought that he was about to kill her slowly.

Valerie was seething, panicking, trying to lash out with anything she had left.

"Fine," he said again. "You want me to end this? I'll end it," he panted, "but just… calm down for a second, okay?"

"Yeah right, you son of a—" she said, trying to work a hand free of the glowing goop.

Sighing, Danny blasted some more goo to cover all of her fingers. It would disappear as soon as he was gone but until then, she wouldn't be pulling any tricks.

The sound that came out of her throat once she realized how trapped she was tore at him and spurred him into action.

Danny pushed up away from the wall and put his hands out placatingly as he took a step forward. "It's okay," he said. "It's okay, Valerie, I'm not going to hurt you."

She struggled in place, not caring about the burns on her arm that cracked open to trickle blood. He grimaced.

"Yeah right you're not going to hurt me," she parroted in badly disguised fear. "When have you ever not—"

He transformed.

The dirt fell off of him and the blood began to flow red and hot and sticky at his side. He put a hand on the wound to stop the bleeding and another on the wall to steady himself.

Valerie was staring at him with wide eyes, unable to form words, but shaking her head in denial.

"There," he said, heavily, as he lowered himself to the ground. "I finished it."

"No," she breathed.

"It's me, Valerie," he said. "Okay? It's always been me."

He swallowed heavily before continuing. "I'm the one who ruined your life," he admitted. "And there's no taking that back or fixing it even though I've tried. But I started this and now I'm ending it right here. This has gone on way too long," he said.

"We're not enemies. This needs to stop. So here," he spread out bloody hands. "This is me. This is what I am. You still wanna kill me? Fine," he said, breathing raggedly. "But I'm gonna put my life on the line here and bet that you care about me. As a human being. And that you aren't gonna kill me. But if you want to… fine. I understand. You know where I live."

He pushed himself to his knees and started to get up on badly shaking legs. "But I want this over, Val," he panted. "I want it to be over."

He stumbled to the edge of the alleyway, then turned back to look at her one last time before vanishing and flying away.

As soon as he was out of range, the bonds holding Valerie to the wall dissolved and she fell down on her knees, catching herself on the grimy pavement beneath her.

Tears rolled off her nose into the gravel as she screamed after him, "Phantom!"