A/N Hey guys! This is something I wrote while I was stuck on another project. It also lets you know I'm not dead and am continuing my writing. I know that you all want another chapter for Inside to the Out but I unfortunately have lost my notes for the next 3 chapters… on top of a recently fixed laptop. Heh heh please don't kill me! It will be done I just don't know when right now so I thought this might help! I recently caught my nephew watching Danny Phantom on Netflix and got interested in it again. This is based in a universe I've been working on for a longer project so the OCs might not make sense but if you want the background just PM me and I'll send it to you.
It had been a fairly slow day on the ghost attack front, just the Box Ghost and Technus so far. My patrol circuit had taken me over near the school and I considered dropping in to lighten Danny's day a little, until I saw said boy's nine-year-old daughter Danielle sneaking into the school. I sighed as I altered my flight path to intercept her, I really didn't want to stop her from seeing her mom and dad but she knew that the school was off limits during class time. I caught up to her outside the English classroom.
"Dani…" I kept my voice soft as I placed my hand on her shoulder. She still jumped even though I was trying not to scare her. "Dani, you know that we have to wait for them to finish school sweetie." Tears started pooling in her eyes.
"But I really wanna see them… there were these guys in white suites and they started shooting at me while I was practicing my powers and they got really close and they said they wanted me for experiments and…" Dani noticed that I had stopped listening as soon as I heard the Guys in White had tried to capture her. "Uncle Rob? Are you ok?" I was shaking from trying to hold my anger in, it wouldn't be right to let it out in a school… or where Dani could see the results. I pulled it together enough to answer Dani.
"I'm fine Danielle. Did you see your Aunt Callie on your way here?"
"Uh-huh! She was near the Nasty Burger, she didn't look busy." I quickly thought over possible plans of action in my head, trying to find the one with the best outcome. All of that went down the drain as the roof exploded downwards. The GiW roped in through the hole they made, they didn't wait before firing a net at Dani. My temper flared and my fire core with it, I melted the net before it got within ten metres of us. Students started coming out into the corridor to see what was going on, I noticed that Carrie poked her head out of the English room before running off to find somewhere to change, Danny followed suit.
In seconds Carrie Angel and Danny Phantom were stood behind me holding Danielle close, tense and ready to defend their daughter. The lead GiW agent shifted.
"Give it up Phantom! We've got the school surrounded! You'll never get away!" It was only after the agent started speaking that I recognised him; Agent K, the GiW's lead field agent. I turned to Danny.
"Let me handle this." He looked at me concerned; he knew that I had bad blood with the GiW but he didn't know why.
"You sure you can handle it?" He asked. I gave him a cocky smile that he couldn't see under my mask, but he knew it was there.
"I can handle this… the question should be can they handle me?" Amazingly the GiW hadn't moved this whole time, well that was fine by me… I had a show to put on. "Hey there K. Remember me?" the last time I had seen K I had been wearing the same type of mask I was now, but I had been in human form.
"I don't make it a point to remember ectoplasmic slime balls like you!" Spat K, which was good: it was exactly what I hoped he'd say.
"Well that's a shame…" My smile was evident in my voice. "You once made it a point to know me, always tried to get me to show my face…" I drew out the silence before I dropped this particular bombshell. "You even gave me a tour of GiW HQ before…" Sure enough the other agents snapped their heads around to look at K; some of the students looked confused at why a GiW agent would give a tour to a ghost. Danny suddenly made the connection to the news report and whipped his head between Agent K and me looking horrified.
"Oh really?" Sneered K. "And when did I do that?"
"23rd of February 1998." I could see the start of comprehension on some of the other agents faces, some of the kids remembered that something big had happened that day.
"Yeah right! The only reason that I would take a ghost to HQ would be to submit it for experiments!" I laughed at his one track mind.
"Yeah that probably is true! And you were there to greet me. But I'll admit your right on one thing; Omega hasn't been to GiW HQ." You could hear the 'I told you so' building, but I didn't let him voice it. "But Theta did." There… I said it. You could watch horrified realisation wash over everyone there, from hardened GiW agent to high school student. I took a step forward and swapped my casual black and white clothes for a replica of my broken armour. There were puncture marks all over it, the most serious were the four parallel marks that showed where some ghost lizard had shoved its claws through my back and out through the other side; I made it so that light shone through the holes.
I heard gasps from all over the place as they took in the state of my armour; some even had to run off to the toilet to be sick, and surprise, surprise… Paulina passed out and fell to the floor, eight others joined her. The GiW agents lowered the weapons that they had been pointing at me, a few even looked like they wanted to run off. They could all see one of my eyes through a broken section of my mask; my gaze was harder than stone and colder than ice, the gash that ran down my face over the eye only enhanced the effect.
Carrie covered Dani's eyes and turned her head away. Danny stood and started to approach me only to think better of it and hover between me and his girlfriend and daughter. I turned my head to the side to look him in the face.
"It would be better if you got her out of here… this is something she doesn't need to see." By now I was so close to losing control that my newly awakened electro core started acting up, sending arcs of electricity running over the surface of my body. Danny nodded at me and turned to Carrie.
"Get her out of here, I'll stay and help if needed." Carrie looked at him, trying to tell him that it was too dangerous with her eyes. But it was Dani that caused the biggest stir…
"Daddy no! Stay with me!" Up until now Dani had remained an unknown; sometimes seen in our company but never on her own, she had kept people guessing what her relationship was to us, no longer. The GiW looked shocked that a ghost could be a parent, the students looked just as surprised but probably for different reasons. Danny ignored all this and knelt down in front of Dani.
"Dani… honey… I don't want you to get hurt… I need you to go with your mother right now ok? I'll come see you when my shift's done, ok?" Dani was now sniffling but agreed anyway. I smiled at the scene, but didn't turn to face them so that Dani didn't have nightmares of me like this. "Ok, I'll see you later. Love you kiddo." With that he kissed her forehead and Carrie picked her up ready to take off.
"I'll bring you some candy when I get back from Ember's if you can manage to send your Auntie Callie over here, think you can do that for me fluff ball?" I got in before they took off, as usual Dani's mood brightened like a firework at the mention of ghost candy. She nodded so fast her head blurred. "Alright, I'll be there in a couple of hours, but you only get one today!" I warned while laughing.
"Aww only one? But Uncle Ro…" Wined Dani. We still couldn't get her to call me Omega in front of the public, so we decided that Ro was good enough and left it there.
"No buts! You already bounce off the walls with one!" I shut her down. I noticed that the GiW were trying to sneak off while I was distracted. My anger peaked and the charge that had built on me discharged into the floor in front of them. "I'm sorry gents… but were you going somewhere?" Carrie took the hint and got out of there. The students backed off as well after seeing me throw lightning from my hand. "You don't get to go anywhere…" My voice had regained its icy quality that had vanished while I was talking to Dani. I made sure I had everyone's attention.
"I think that we should let these good people know what happened on that day… don't you?" lightning ripped out from my body, striking lockers, light fittings and door handles.
"Omega… Omega calm down! You're gonna hurt the humans!" Danny tried to break through the walls that were raising themselves around my consciousness. The observers in the corridor found their eyes drawn to my waist where a black flickering light was manifesting. Danny saw it too and started panicking. "Omega! You're about to let Shade out! Calm down!"
But I wasn't listening; I was actually calling Shade, willing him to the surface. I could feel him manifesting in my head. I stopped resisting, I let go and just told him: "Make them scream." I could feel him reply with: "That is the least I will do…" the malicious smirk that slipped onto my face clued in Danny that I wasn't fighting him; he started screaming for everyone to get as far away as they could.
The GiW realised that there was danger and brought their ecto-guns back up. It proved to be the worst thing they could do; it provided the trigger to release Shade:
The black rings formed at my waist and parted; one up to my head one down to my feet. The ruined armour vanished, replaced by a pristine copy that was so dark it seemed to absorb the light around it. My eyes behind the now whole mask changed from gold to black, my usually snow white hair developed streaks of my normal jet black. When I walked forward I left a footprint of negative energy on the floor.
Danny was about to launch himself at me but was interrupted by Callie arriving through the roof.
"Oh thank god! Callie you've got to help me here! Shade's got loose and we've got to help Omega get back in control!" Callie took one look at me and at who I was walking towards.
"Yeah… I'll help." Danny heaved a sigh of relief, only to be blasted sideways into some lockers. He hauled himself out in time to see the black rings finish changing Callie Phantom into Wraith. "I'll help wring their necks!" I turned to take in her dark form, I held out my hand.
"Shall we dance, partner of my heart?" she took my hand with a smile.
"We shall dark one." Wings of black ectoplasm emerged from our shoulder blades; we looked like angels of death. One of the brave GiW agents fired off a blue bolt of ectoplasm; it hit me in the chest and I just absorbed it. I moaned at the rush of energy.
Wraith let out a dark laugh. "Naughty naughty… it's not nice to shoot people with guns." I vanished my mask and smiled evilly.
"But then there is a saying… treat others how you want to be treated." I gathered an energy charge in my free hand and held it there while my threat sunk in. Once I thought I'd left it long enough I let it go. I kept it as a beam that connected my hand the GiW agent's chest, once it had connected I viciously yanked the polarity from one end of the spectrum to the other.
The GiW agent screamed in agony as the rapidly cycling beam of energy tore his atoms away from each other. It seemed like he was un-knitting from the point of contact outwards, leaving just and undulating mass of darkness behind. The other GiW agents watched in shocked horror as I dissolved their comrade into a shadow. When I was done an exact shadow replica stood in his place waiting for orders.
"Agent J?" breathed one of the other agents. I laughed internally.
"Agent J?" I called to get my new minions attention. He snapped his head up to look at me. "… sic 'em!" a feral grin spread across the shadows face and he lunged into the huddled mass of GiW agents and began to tear them apart… limb… by… limb.
While this was happening I pulled Wraith in for a kiss against the background of carnage. Danny had watched all this horrified from the hole Wraith had blasted him into earlier. The show of affection backed by the slaughter proved too much; he let himself go and retreated deep in his psyche. Kane took the opportunity to surge to the fore. Wraith and Shade broke apart to witness the release of their leader in crime.
"So… we're free at last! Now all we need is to release the others and our work can truly begin!" Wraith and I sank down onto one knee to show him our willingness to serve and do his will.
"And so the darkness will rise!" we all intoned.