A/N: I'm sorry this isn't the third story of the Heroic brain and inspiration has taken a sabbatical from the Phandom and I was pulled along for the ride. I've tried to re-kindle my former obsession with Danny Phantom and hopefully this story is a start.

Connection

Anyone who's had a good look at both the town hero and the Fenton's youngest can recognize the similarities. Now the pool of people who've had that good look at both of them is small. Fenton is skittish as the day is long and Phantom is the most elusive ghost we have. Besides most Amity citizens only see Phantom in a streak of black and white or as a tiny figure battling a larger looming ghoul from far above. And Fenton? What kind of creep wants to stalk him? Heck, most of the students in Casper High don't notice him—too busy talking about the latest ghost attack or the movie they just saw with their friends or freaking out about the test they thought was two weeks from now being handed to them. Why bother intently studying the face of someone whose head is buried in their locker half the time? You already need to study for three exams.

But not everyone is so unaware or wrapped up in their own problems. There are people people—kids, teachers, friends and family (even Jack isn't that oblivious)—who have seen Phantom up close and do take a closer look at Fenton. A lot of us do see and some of us have nothing better to do than compare photos, analyze Phantom and Fenton and question. Eh, it's a hobby.

We've all made the connection and we've all got our theories about it.

Paulina's a romantic. She's got this whole background story in her head for Phantom and don't ever make the mistake of asking her or she will gleefully explain The One and Only True Fact of Phantom in vivid detail until your ears fall off.

Curious but not suicidal? Well her hypothesis goes as so: Phantom is a Fenton ancestor. He enlisted young in a war but before he left, he and his sweetheart shared vows to wed when he came back and sealed it with a kiss. Only the sweetheart didn't keep her vow. While he was overseas she betrayed him with another man back home. Wrote him a 'dear John' letter. So poor ancestor Fenton dies heroically and comes back as a ghost but heartbroken, alone forever. He saves people in town despite his shattered heart but all he needs to heal is the love of a good woman. Namely her. Paulina loves her tragic romance stories she does.

Teenage wishful thinking aside, Paulina's not an airhead. She did her research and it turns out there was a Fenton relative, a young man named Daniel Fenton who went off to war in 1941. Enlisted at fifteen. Not more than sixteen years old when he died too. Look between pictures of the two and you'll find an uncanny similarity between the old soldier and the town hero. Especially in the eyes. They both have too-old eyes for their tender years. Our classmate was named after the family's war hero. I'm not willing to take all Paulina says as gospel truth but Daniel Fenton? Danny Phantom? Not too much of a stretch to say Phantom could be a resurrected World War Two hero. Oh yes he could.

Valerie is more vengeful. She thinks Phantom is able to shape-shift. Not like Metamorpho or whatever his name is, but enough to take Fenton's form. The form of the only person, Valerie points out, the Fentons and she both love. The one form three of the town's best ghost hunters would hesitate to shoot. To her the ghost boy uses his appearance as a weapon. It was one more reason for her to break things off with Danny, one more way the ghost tortures her and one more cause for her to hate him. So Valerie hardens her heart, focuses on differences rather than similarities, and hates Phantom with a passion.

Now Mr. Lancer, English teacher down to the bone, has a different idea. Always looking for the story behind anything and he sees a story in this odd similarity between dead and living. He wonders if there isn't some dark part of the past the Fentons are hiding: an affair or a rape back in the early years of their marriage. They and Vlad Masters didn't part on good terms all those years ago and you can see the tension between Masters and Maddie. Lust on his part, loathing on hers. No doubt there's something there, maybe a mistake or worse lead to an aborted baby, one who grew up in the ghost zone to look much like his brother: Danny Fenton. Things like that happen. Our English teacher would know. He was supposed to have an older sister.

The Fentons have their own theories and are predictably deaf to anyone else's—except their daughter's. You might not have heard this theory though. They haven't babbled excitedly about it. They noticed the similarities between their son and their sworn ectoplasmic enemy long ago, nobody's that blind, and they've hypothesized their son is Phantom's actual obsession. They fear for their youngest's life. Fear one day Phantom will want to kidnap Danny…or worse, kill him and replace him. That is why they hunt the town hero down as voraciously as they do and why neither of them will ever admit he could be a good ghost. Admittedly ever since the appearance of Phantom, their son hasn't been looking so good—tired and bruised and distracted. It could be bullying…or some dark truth might dwell in their idea as well.

Other theories are far more benign. Kwan likes to repeat the idea of three other people in the world looking exactly like you at any one time. He himself probably has a couple duplicates somewhere. "It's just Fenton's luck he has a ghost for a double."

The Fenton's neighbors also believes Phantom might be a shapeshifter, but one who hid from the Fentons, masqueraded as their son. Only the Fenton's technology sapped his morphing powers, leaving him stuck forever as a photo-negative Danny. Maddie and Jack viciously deny that rumor, especially the part about any ectoplasmic spook fooling them into thinking it was their son.

Dash always thought Phantom was a shapeshifter too, but takes Fenton's appearance all the time to mess with Fentoad and his crazy family. Everyone knows Danny Fenton is scared shitless of ghosts and deserves getting freaked out by a ghost who looks like him. What could be a better scare? Dash wished he could do something so cool but all he can do is give Fenturd swirlies and stuff.

Jazz has her own scientific theory. She hypothesizes Phantom was the first ghost to come through their portal and Danny happened to be there—something Sam and Tucker point out is true. Phantom came out a blob but upon seeing her younger brother in the family hazmat suit he literally imprinted on Fenton, taking his form.

Don't bother asking Danny what he thinks. Poor kid is always stutters that they look nothing alike. Drowning in De Nile that one. Poor kid's terrified of the spooks though; just a mention of a ghost is enough to scare the piss out of him—why do you think he's always making a beeline to the bathroom? Then again if Fenton actually did become a ghost he'd scare himself to death.

Danny's best friends have different theories. Sam's a big proponent of Phantom being a Fenton ancestor—but one who must haunt his descendants because of their crimes upon ghosts. She denies any similarities between her theory and Paulina's wild fantasy, though they both base their ideas on the same facts. Who knows, maybe it's true.

Tucker on the other hand? He's a troll. One week he says Phantom possessed Fenton and ever since then was stuck with Danny's form. The next week he's all about Phantom being Danny's long-lost secret twin brother who died in the womb before they could both be born. The week after? Who knows what nonsense will come out of his mouth. Maybe something about how Fenton died in the portal and rose as Phantom but still pretends to be alive as Fenton.

But the wildest of our SWAG guesses or the craziest of Tucker's trolling theories can't touch Wes's idea for sheer unbelievability. He thinks Fenton is Phantom. Yes, as in the dead ghost is somehow a living human at the same time. Get him yapping though and he'll tell you all about his weird theory on how ectoplasm can bond with living tissue—never-mind how instantly deadly that would be—to create a true 'living dead' being. News Flash, Phantom is not a zombie. Or he'll tell you all about the time he saw Fenton transform into the ghostly superhero Phantom. Uh, huh, yeah right. If you see someone living turn dead, you need to be calling the coroner. And maybe the police.

Wes can't ever explain exactly how this dichotomy happened though. He tries, remaining completely blind to all the evidence saying something can't be living and dead at the same time. Even Schrodinger's cat has to go one way or another once you look at it. Getting him to see reason is impossible; he's rather attached to his idea. Then again we're all attached to our theories.

My personal idea? Maybe Phantom was a Fenton relative, but born a girl who had always wanted to be a boy and what he couldn't get in life he could in death. The two are very similar but starting to look a little different in build at least. Fenton is a skinny little twerp and Phantom is definitely not these days.

No one's ever asked Phantom about his connection to Fenton though. Maybe we're shy of bringing up what might be a painful subject for the ghost who doesn't owe us anything but saved us over and over again. Or, you know, because no one wants to admit their geekiness. Maybe we want the credit—and the money, there's three hundred dollars riding on who's right—of solving the mystery ourselves. Or just maybe we don't want our precious ideas destroyed by truth; our fun to come to an end; the mystery to come to a conclusion.

Maybe we want to keep guessing.

A/N: When I first got into Danny Phantom I was amazed at the stupidity of Amity's citizens. How could they not get Fenton is Phantom. Heck, Vlad and Dan have teased Danny about how paper-thin his 'disguise' was. Then I thought—it's only obvious if you know halfas are possible. Without that critical piece of information it's not instantly obvious how Danny and Phantom could be the same person. Finally I also realized we, as an audience, are hardly objective with our perspective of the show because we've seen Danny get his powers in the opening theme song and we know halfas exist. The rest of Amity Park believes half-ghosts are impossible if they've even thought of the idea in the first place. But then I thought surely people know there is some connection? They do look very similar.

So this story was born as an attempt to rationalize the 'blindness' of Amity's citizens. They do see a connection between Fenton and Phantom, just not the unbelievable truth.