Help (a Danny Phantom story)

Prolouge

"Danny? Daaaaannnnnyyy?" Sam sighed and cupped her hands over her mouth, "DANNY!"

The boy jolted awake, looking disoriented as he yelled and fell out of his seat. The class laughed as he rubbed his head and sat back down. Mr Lancer sighed and glared pointedly at Danny, an expression of 'what am I going to do with this child' washing over his aging face. He returned to his lecture, and Sam turned to Danny once more.

"Dude, that's the third time today you've fallen asleep."

"And the tenth time this week," Tucker included, "what's up with you?"

Danny yawned and muttered, "I'm fine guys, just tired."

Sam and Tucker wanted to call on his bullshit, but the bell rang and students were flooding out of the building. Danny dragged himself slightly behind his friends as they walked home. Sam and Tucker kept looking back at their friend, worried looks glossing over their faces. Danny hung his head and gained an interest in the ground. They wanted to ask, but the look on his face told them to wait. The three entered the Fenton household and settled in Danny's room, which was getting progressively messier.

"Ok dude, talk." Tucker spoke suddenly, gesturing around the room. "You don't look good, you're falling asleep all the time, and I've never seen your room this trashed for this long."

"There's just been a ton of ghosts lately and I keep putting it off to clean my room, I'm fine I swear Tuck." Danny reassured his friend, but it did little to sway him. Sam shared in his worry for their friend, but Danny wouldn't open up. They dropped the subject and moved on to working on homework. As the day slowly faded away, they worked and talked and joked around as they normally would. But something was eating away at Danny, he felt so much more tired than he should be, but he pushed through it and laughed with his friends.

A shout sounded through the house, and the trio went to investigate. Down in the lab, Jack and Maddie were hunched over a new invention that looked vaguely like an electric chair. They high-fived as the last touch was finished.

"What on earth is that?" Sam asked, she was used to the Fentons strange inventions, but this one took the cake.

"It's the Fenton Investigator," Jack said proudly, "it can be used to interrogate ghosts by entering their mind!" He seemed genuinely gleeful about it, and the trio couldn't dissuade him despite their looks of judgement. Maddie went on to explain the science, but the trio had back out of the lab before they could get trapped into that conversation.

"I swear they're getting weirder," Danny said regarding the invention, to which Sam and Tucker agreed. They hung out a bit more before the sun was setting and they said their goodbyes. As Danny went back towards his room, he ran into Jazz, accidentally knocking over her stack of books and papers.

"Ugh Danny! Watch where you're going, will you? It took me hours to get this done and you messed up all the papers!" She ranted as she gathered up her stuff. Danny bent down to help but Jazz swatted his hands away. He got the message and left her alone and walked back to his room. Tucker was right, the place was a mess, but the thought of cleaning it all took any energy Danny had out of him. He just opted to go to bed, clothes and all, and let the sudden exhaustion take over.