Danny feels a bit tired and a little sarcastic. After fighting (and getting severely beaten by) Vortex, gaining weather powers from the fight, and then somehow beating Vortex with said weather powers (that went away at some point, thankfully) with the help of Tucker's mood helmet, (to send Vortex back to the Observants from whom he had somehow escaped from, nice one, Plasmius) you would think he would get a bit of a break.
But no, now Danny is at school in the middle of the night fighting the Lunch Lady ghost (lamenting the lunch menu change, again), when all he'd wanted was to get his forgotten History book.
Except there's no one there but Danny, which does have it's advantages, he must admit; no students or teachers nearby to get hurt during the fight, for one. But the disadvantage is that DANNY is the sole target of the lunch lady's fury, and he's not operating on enough sleep to fight effectively. Plus the fact that he has no back up to speak of makes not getting stabbed by a bunch of sentient kitchen knives that much harder. He finally dredges up enough brain capacity to trick the kitchen knives into snapping themselves in half on the granite floors.
Ha! Not so sharp now, are you?
He decides to save that pun for a later date, because he's not sure he could say it right at the moment with his limited brain functions. But those knives must really not have been that smart, to get tricked so easily.
Maybe they were sleep deprived too?
His thoughts are half hysterical from tiredness as he turns tangible again and floats rightside up to face the lunch lady. The school kitchen is a wreck, Danny notes, plates shattered, the lunch line food containers- what're those called, again?- are dented from Danny being thrown on top of them, silverware scattered and broken, the walls dented.
"Would you like a cookie?" The Lunch Lady asks sweetly, a green ghost cookie proffered to him in her yellow gloved hand.
Danny knows not to be put off his guard by this, though. Berating himself for getting distracted, he settles into a battle-ready stance (float?) and replies, "Uh, no thank you? I mean, it's a bit late at night for sweets, my mom would probably get mad if she heard." He shrugs apologetically and tries for a smile, because maybe, just maybe, this time she won't blow up in his face.
The lunch lady's body language changes from friendly to hostile, her white apron and pink plaid lunch lady attire getting ruffled in a ghostly wind that starts gravitating toward her as she says, "No? fine! Then face my meaty fist, and my ovenly wrath of DOOM!"
Ovenly?
Danny's eyes dart to the back, where the meat is kept. On cue, a huge assortment of frozen meat flies toward her and stick onto her body like armour. Danny tiredly watches as more and more meat piles onto itself, forming the massive meat monster and adding to it's bulk, until it can barely fit and has to hunch down or break the ceiling.
Wait, Ovenly, like, an oven?
Danny's sleepy brain finally muddles through the wording of earlier. He should be shouting out some sort of lunch related pun right about now, something smart and witty that makes him feel less afraid, (or tired) but Danny is distracted by the sudden dread curdling in his stomach, because on top of one of the ovens, one of the ovens levitating and spitting fire and heating up at an alarming rate, sits a Nasty Burger bag, filled with a god-awful amount of Nasty Sauce that Tucker had asked him to pick up, the guy hoards the stuff to put on food at home and- Oh god.
The smell of burning plastic fills the air, the ovens are turning molten red from the heat they're putting out, they aren't supposed to do that. Images of his mom, dad, sister, and Tucker and Sam tied to the Nasty Sauce boiler in the Nasty Burger assault Danny's consciousness, and the thought-
Get out of there!
Finally enters his head when he remembers that explosion, sees it dancing across his vision, so vivid as to almost be real. It rattles around in his head as Danny flees, going through the walls with intangibility, pouring on the speed, welcome adrenaline coursing through his system for the first time of the night.
Fear will do that to you, Danny thinks, heart beating fast as the halls he's speeding through become brighter when his eyes dilate and he phases through the front door of the school- and collides with Mr. Lancer, who must have just been leaving.
He doesn't pause, just keeps going with Mr. Lancer in his arms, flying full speed through the air. But Danny doesn't think it's fast enough, they're only about 8 feet from the door (by Danny's math, which is pretty bad) when he hears the explosion, and then the shockwave hits, heat and force hitting Danny's back and knocking him out of the sky.
The next thing Danny hears are his ears ringing, and he registers that they're on the ground when he next hears, "Chronicles of Narnia!" from Mr. Lancer, very nearby, maybe, it's hard to tell with everything muffled and ringing. Danny opens his eyes, (when did he close them?) and sees that the school, a lot more than 8 feet away now by Danny's poor math, has been torn apart and blown to flaming smithereens by the shockwave and pressure buildup from the vapor explosion caused by the Nasty Sauce.
Danny, wondering why they aren't dead, realises the position he's in, on his back with his hands up, a shimmering green ectoplasm shield surrounding them.
I must have put it up by instinct. That really intensive secret training with just Sam has really paid off. He muses, watching the wreckage of Casper High burn and crumble some more. After making sure the explosion is over, Danny puts down the shield and stands up, groaning, feeling every cut and scrape from the fight in the kitchen, and the burn on his back and the singes in his hair from the explosion.
But if I spend a few hours as Phantom, they'll heal up quick enough. I should maybe be worried about Mr. Lancer..
He looks down at Mr. Lancer, who was still sitting and staring at the school, swearing his weird swears in increasing vehemence.
"Uhm, excuse me, sir, are you alright?" Danny Phantom asks, putting on his 'Danny Phantom voice' as Tucker liked to call it, ("It's not just a voice Tucker, it's a persona!") for the first time that night, having had the tiredness knocked out of him. Literally. At the lessening befuddlement in Mr. Lancer's face as he looked toward him, Phantom continued, "You're not hurt, right?"
Lancer blinked, and then seemed to take stock of himself and his immediate surroundings again, because he answered, "No, your shield seemed to have protected us at just the right time," he replies, but then goes to stand up, and winces when he puts weight on his left foot.
"A bit of a rough landing, though." He admits, and wow, Phantom can actually hear him over the ringing in his ears.
"Yeah, sorry abou-" Danny Phantom stops when his battered ears pick up the sound of rubble and stone shifting. They turn back towards the school, and see the lunch lady ghost, still a meat monster, albeit looking a lot bigger and more charred than the last time he saw her, emerging from the rubble of the ruined school. Danny groans.
"Oh, great." Mr Lancer swallows, looking between Phantom and the lunch lady, who was now drifting towards them. "Yeah, I'm just gonna go alert the principal. We need to...decide what to do now that.." with a weak gesture toward the school, a shake of the head and a muttered swear of, "Moby Dick.." Mr Lancer starts limping in the direction of the parking lot, though Danny doubted that there will be much of one left.
And yeah, Danny doesn't even want to imagine the repercussions of the school blowing up from a ghost attack, other than hoping this means no school at all. (I probably won't be that lucky.) Danny Phantom thinks as he fires a couple ecto blasts in the meat monster's direction.
Walking back from her mission to get a stupid autograph, Blow is feeling detached and logical.
When it comes to killing, Blow has become good at lessening her emotions and tamping them down to a manageable level. All she has to do is rationalize and focus on the facts.
The detached feeling is also helpful. The mission hadn't been that bad, really. Getting an autograph signed was embarrassing at the least, but the Stage 4 demon did help get her on Seren's good side. The person the demon was possessing had been beyond saving, as it is with Stage 4. After killing the demon, which used to be a person, it left Blow feeling slightly out of herself and displaced from her body, as well as this need to put things into logical terms.
There was no helping him. I had to kill him, to save Seren and all the people nearby. You can't save possessed people that are that far gone.
To pass the time while trudging through the nighttime forest, near some school by now if Blow hasn't diverged from her planned route to get back to Opion under the tree cover, (honestly, all the attention the Black Magician gets just makes her nervous, she hates crowds) Blow goes over the stages of demonic possession as she walks.
Stage 1: Has been recently possessed, may be noted by the glowing of the eyes at the first few hours of demonic possession. Recovery still possible.
Stage 2: The demon has now been in possession for one day, and has started to corrupt or eat the possessed's soul. Demonic power will materialize in the body, the possessed may begin to attack people. Recovery still possible.
Stage 3: The demon has been in the body for two days. Body distortion has begun, and the demon will attack humans if it has not already. Recovery unlikely.
Stage 4: Demon has been present three days. Body transformation has begun, the soul of the possessed is corrupted beyond help or devoured. Recovery is impossible, kill on site.
With each stage, Blow felt more in control, the detached feeling slowly dissipating until she felt aware and in control of her body again.
I wonder what that feeling was.
Blow stops suddenly, and scans the forestry around her, her sharp eyes and ears picking up normal normal nighttime sounds and no enemies lurking in the undergrowth that she could see, and her night vision is good, with just enough of the moon peeking out through the tree branches to cast everything in a silvery light. She doesn't feel watched, exactly, just the feeling that she wasn't alone.
Blow is prevented from searching the area more thoroughly by the sight of a body flying through the air past her line of sight, landing in a roll with a yell. Blow reaches for her magic, her mana forming her black and dark blue blade with familiarity as her electric blue eyes scan for more enemies.
A snake-tailed monster bursts through the trees, nearly as big as a five floor mansion and its large abdominal muscles holding it upright, arms pushing trees aside easily. Glowing red eyes and a mouth filled with jagged teeth glare out of a large head that swings around clumsily.
Blow reaches out with her magic, fearing another stage 4, but instead senses that it's a...ghost? - wait, that's a ghost? That? - Gaining a new respect for ghost hunters, Blow turned toward said ghost hunter to check on them, to find them..floating. And glowing, which wouldn't be all that unusual if said ghost hunter had an awakened form, but this looked...different.
Not just the white hair or the green eyes were glowing, his whole body was. (which was really ruining Blow's night vision.)
Glowing, like a ghost, Blow observed, as the white haired kid flew toward the huge ghost with a determined expression on his face, firing green ecto blasts from his hands with the ease of long practice.
Okay, not just 'like' a ghost, then, Blow concluded calmly, because while magicians can gain a couple of ghost-like abilities upon awakening, such as invisibility or intangibility, firing ecto blasts from your hands instead of a gun is something only ghosts can do.
But why are they fighting each other?
In Blow's limited experience, ghosts only attack people, not fight other ghosts. The ecto blasts blow big chunks of.. charred meat, Blow smells, off of the other ghost. The larger meat ghost makes a grab for the smaller humanoid, but he slides through the air, around and past the grabbing hand, and blasts off the whole arm. Which falls to the ground, and breaks apart into smaller bits of meat.
But as white hair goes to fly out of reach, the blackened meat on the forest floor swirls around to reform into an arm and snags him out of the air. After it reattaches to the main body, the meat ghost looks down on the smaller humanoid and bears it's teeth in an uneven grin. The hand holding the other ghost starts to squeeze.
Hearing the young ghost's cry of pain, Blow makes a decision. She dashes up to the ghost monster and slashes, precise strokes that slice up the arm holding the smaller ghost into ribbons with a wet, meaty sound. The arm falls apart, and Blow catches the falling green-eyed ghost as he falls.
Holding the cold body tightly in her arms, Blow retreats to what she estimates as a safe distance away and sets the ghost boy (because with a closer inspection he looks to be close to her real age) down gently.
"Are you alright?" Blow asks, as if this were just another person she had saved from a demon.
The ghost boy looks up from poking the general area where his ribs would be if he had them, green eyes glowing eerily in the moonlight, and says, "Y'vet. H rfer x jlv rxqalh khrl, vlq H'nn sm oxaq rk x fvoqll exaql."
The ghost boy grimaces, either from pain, or realizing his mistake and says, "Er, I mean, yeah. I'll be fine-"
"In a couple of hours, you said?" Blow interrupts, because she's watching the meat monster, as it's previously carved up arm reforms, more slowly than before, and she formulates a plan for taking it down.
"Can you still fight?" She asks, because even without the supposedly real and broken ribs, the ghost boy is covered with half-healed cuts, his black and white jumpsuit torn and dirty. (And Blow's not going to be picky with allies at the moment.)
"Y'vet. Er, yes, I can," the ghost boy assures her, looking past her standing form at the incoming meat ghost. "The problem is that with all that meat covering her like armour, I can't catch her with this." The ghost gestures to something on his hip, but Blow is a bit busy grabbing him by the arm and dodging out of the way of the huge meaty fist that swung down to crush them against the ground to look properly, the ground shaking and forming into a crater with the force of the blow.
"You can leave that to me." Blow says with a confident smile, darting out her hand to touch the meat arm, the planned spell passing her lips. [Elgira Koraliithe Xlaquiine!] And with a burst of power that ran all the way through the meat ghost's constructed body, the charred meat ghost fell apart, losing shape, the meat cascading to the ground like a solid black and meaty smelling waterfall.
And then there was nothing left except for a glowing, floating green skinned, pink plaid and apron-wearing lunch lady, who was lifting her arms and waving them about, trying, and failing, (Blow noted with was satisfied smirk) to wear and control the horribly charred meat again.
The ghost boy, floating up in the air above the Lunch Lady, pointed a long cylindrical object at her (What? Is that a thermos?) and remarked, "Ryiie Vxqk, Voqlkxybr'l yojb." And the thermos shot out a sphere of white revolving light, which captured the ghost and sucked it into the thermos.
And then Blow blinked, because 'Sorry Lady, Lunchtime's over.'? (Did he just make a pun?) as the ghost boy floated down to her level, capping the thermos.
He looked over toward her and commented, "Nice, uh, spell was it? What did it do? I'm not all that familiar with magic, so," he continued, gesturing towards the thermos in his hand, which, now that Blow got a good look at it, was not magic, as she'd initially assumed, but technology, something that she 'isn't all that familiar with.'
Deciding that an exchange of information was in order, Blow replies, "I'll tell you, if you tell me how that ghost-capturing device works, and.." Blow hesitates, "And your name." because she can't just keep calling him 'ghost boy'.
The green eyes blink, and then suddenly look more guarded, as if he's just now realized something. But he replies, "I'm not sure how the Fenton Thermos works exactly, I didn't invent it, a family of ghost hunters did." A tense shrug. "But I prime it up, and then it shoots out the suction ray that captures the ghosts."
The ghost boy hesitates again, then says, "And my name...it's, uh, Danny. Danny Phantom."
And the ghost boy, Danny Phantom, tenses up as if preparing for an attack, settling into a slight battle ready stance. Deciding to ignore this strange behavior for now, she holds out a hand and says, " Blow, Opion's Magician."
Phantom looks at her hand like it's a poisonous scorpion that tried to sting him. Blow raises an eyebrow.
"Is there a problem?" Phantom, looking uncertain now as well as guarded, cautiously shakes her hand once, his fingers ice cold, and then lets go quickly, as if fearing some sort of infectious disease. (Which might not be too far off the mark, but still.)
"Er, I guess not?" Looking a little more at ease, now that nothing has stung/infected him, no doubt, and a little sheepish, Phantom rubs the back of his neck and admits, "I was...expecting you to attack me after you heard my name."
At Blow's look, eyebrows now both raised, he clarifies, "Some...certain magicains are after me. Since you're a magician I figured.."
Blow's confusion clears quickly after that remark, her face smoothing as she says, "Oh, right, I did hear that the Tower started going after more ghosts after allying with the Guys In White." At Phantom's alarmed look, Blow reassured, "Don't worry, though. I work for Opion, not the Tower, and anyway, I eliminate demons, not ghosts. And," Blow adds, the subject of the tower making her want to growl with distaste, "I have no reason to capture you, not when you just protected people from that ghost."
Phantom relaxed, looking a little reassured by that last sentence, and that's when Blow remembered that most ghost hunters, if not all, capture and destroy (or study, Ugh) ghosts for no reason other than them existing. "As for the spell," Blow continues, because she still needs to finish her end of the deal, even not knowing how a ghost would react to this information, "It was a mild ghost protection spell that magicians use, cast on people or objects, that cuts off the ghost's influence on the person or object."
As Phantom looks confused, glancing at the fallen meat, then back at Blow, Blow simplifies, "As an example, say a person gets overshadowed, if you place a spell on that person's body, the ghost won't be able to control it anymore."
The ghost will still be trapped inside the body, though. You would need to push the ghost out after that, Blow silently adds, not sure how Phantom would take the rest of that scenario. At Phantom's slow nod of understanding, and seeing none of the offense or aversion she would have expected on his face, she decides to ask another question, seeing as how he's acted so human so far.
"So, do you hunt ghosts often?" That and the fact that he's a ghost using a ghost hunting weapon to capture other ghosts invented by ghost hunters are facts that seem a little odd to her, and deserving of questioning.
Phantom sighs and rubs his face tiredly, (Is he tired? Ghosts can be tired?) still floating slightly off the ground. "Y'vet. All the time." He sighs again and says, "I should really get home, though."
He looks up at her, and before she can ask 'what home?', (like ghosts don't have homes! they must go somewhere when not scaring people!) his green eyes are widening as he looks her over for the first time, and stutters out, "Y-you should probably go home, too!"
Then Phantom turns and, without any prior warning, flies off the way he came.
(Rude. But then, I guess I can't blame him for getting nervous.) Blow looks down at herself, sighing at the blue blood, with hints of red, that is lightly splattered on the front of her black clothing like paint. Smelling the sickly sweet odor of demon's blood, Blow muses that it almost masks the metallic smell of the red, human blood mixed in.
Blow sighs again, and starts walking, her only company the images of the swirling demonic power from that night ripping into everything around it.
When his alarm clock goes off at 6:20 am, Danny is sorely tempted to blast it to bits and go back to sleep. Danny had finally gotten home at 4:12 am, having had to stop by a store and procure some bandages (he wasn't carrying any money) so that when his ribs healed they wouldn't heal crooked.
After reaching inside his own chest with intangibility to set the ribs back in place, (an experience Danny isn't eager to relive) and wrapping them in bandages so they'll stay that way, and the long, painful flight home after that, he'd barely managed to transform back to human and get his binder off before collapsing in bed.
After a while Danny reluctantly gets up and turns off his screaming alarm. Checking his ribs and deciding that they were mostly healed, Danny unwraps the bandages and pulls on the binder, ribs still a bit sore.
Changing into clean clothes and brushing his hair, Danny starts to head downstairs when he remembers: school! The school got blown up last night! I got up for nothing..
But, Danny realizes with a groan as he's about to climb back into bed, Danny Fenton wouldn't know about that yet. Danny put his binder back on with a sigh, the hope of snoring the morning away benched. For now. Snagging his phone, Danny sends a quick text to Sam and Tucker:
DF: so unfair. the school gets blown up last night and i still have to get up for it.
SM: Blown up? Danny r u ok?
TF: woah, rly? u ok, dude? does this mean I can go back to sleep now?
Danny chuckles sleepily while reassuring Sam and Tucker at the same time as he heads downstairs.
DF: yeah, i'm fine, i got out in time. i'll tell you guys the details later.
Dani is already at the breakfast table when he walks into the kitchen, eating a bowl of sugary cereal. Danny used to like the stuff when he was younger, but now he can't see the appeal.
Danielle, looking up from her cereal, swallows loudly and says, "Hey, brother. You sleep good?"
Danny, sitting down next to his sister, (it still feels weird calling her that.) sets his arms down on the table, and his head in his arms, issuing a long groan in reply. It makes Dani laugh, which is what matters.
"Rough night?" Dani asks, her face looking sympathetic through Danny's bangs. "You know…" Dani begins, as if not sure what to say. She glowers down at her cereal bowl, takes another bite, and then says, "You can tell me anything. You know that, right? I'm your twin sister, I can take it! Whatever it is!"
Danny, feeling too tired for this conversation, mumbles, "Are you sure?" in her general direction.
"Of course I'm-" Dani retorts, but Danny looks up at her and interrupts.
"No, Dani, are you really sure? Because I'm.. I'm just trying to protect you." And myself, from my own guilty emotions, Danny's thoughts supply.
Danielle, looking less sure than before, hesitates before saying, "I'm sure. I need to know. Whatever it is you're hiding from me, I can feel that it's important, as important as those certain abilities that you think I haven't noticed." Dani says, smirking as her brother's mouth drops open from shock.
"What, you think just because sometimes you looked a little different that I wouldn't recognize my own twin? Flying through the sky like a-" as their mother Maddie Fenton walks in, Dani substitutes 'ghost' for 'airplane' in her sentence and stuffs another spoonful of cereal in her mouth. A closed cellphone is in her hand, presumably from just getting off the phone when their mother announces, "I just got a call from the principal, school's out today, kids. Apparently the school got blown up in a ghost attack."
A yell from downstairs in the lab from Jack Fenton, proclaiming, "Yeah! And we're going out and investigating! Would you kiddos like to come along?" Danny gave a quick 'no' and trod purposefully up stairs to his room to get some more sleep. It's not like he's running from Danielle or anything.
Danny dreams of screams, pain in his chest, and melting ectoplasm.
The sound of the alarm he set so he could go meet Sam and Tucker jerking him awake with the urgent thought of DANI!
His pounding heart and sudden paranoia making him search the room for the GIW, Danny reassures himself with, Dani's fine, she's fine now, I made her fine, she's living with us now, has been living with us from the beginning for everyone but me, Sam and Tuck.
'Danny? Are you okay?' Danielle queries inside his head.
'I'm fine, Danielle, just a bad dream.' he replies, marveling that out of all the things he's had to adjust to over the past year, twin telepathy was one of the easier ones.
When his heartbeat was slow and steady, and after reassuring Dani again, Danny got up to go meet Sam and Tucker.
"You met a magician in the woods behind the school and fought beside her, not against her?" Tucker get's out, looking up from his burger to stare at Danny, a mystified expression on his face. "Didn't she know that the Tower's after you?" Tuck queries confusedly.
"Actually, no, not until I told her." Danny replies. At Tuckers and Sam's horrified expressions- well, Sam's was more of a 'what were you thinking?' expression- Danny raises his hands in placation, half-eaten Nasty burger still in hand, and says, "I know, I know, but even then, she didn't seem to care. She said she works for Opion and that she has no reason to capture me."
At Tucker's and Sam's skeptical expressions, Danny says, "Yeah, right? Seems too good to be true. A magician that won't attack me on sight!"
Which all magicians had, until now. Explaining that he was a good ghost never works, for ghost hunters or low-ranking magicians.
Thinking of the demon's blood he'd seen on her that had spooked him so much (Nice one, Danny) Danny remarks, "And I think she was a pretty high-rank magician, too. Don't magicians have to be rank 2 or higher to be qualified to fight demons?"
Tucker swallows his bite and replies, "Yeah, according to the sparse info on magicians available online. But what makes you think she's high-ranking?" Tucker asks.
"Had she killed a demon earlier that night?" Sam asks, ice in her voice, stabbing at her caesar salad with a dark look.
Danny winces. "Yes. That's initially why I left so quickly."
At Sam's increasingly dark glare and violent actions toward her food, Danny protested, "But think about it, Sam! Demons aren't like ghosts, they don't just terrorize people, they kill them! If ghosts started killing people, what would you want me to do? Just send them back to the ghost zone like before? That works for ghosts, but only because they aren't killing people when they come back!"
After considering things from that angle, Danny had felt horrible for running away like that, judging her without even thinking about the personal consequences of killing demons while they were inside human skin because you had to, to protect people.
Would I do the same, in her shoes? Would I have to kill people regularly? Would I be able to?
Sam's fist slams against the park table that they're eating off of, and she says heatedly, eyes blazing, "I know! But there has to be another way! Something, just not, that! When they kill demons, they're killing people too! We've been over this before!" And into her salad, quieter, "I know."
And there stands the controversy of killing a demon while inside a person's body. From people actively against it, to people that say it has to be done, to those that are for killing demons more than needed, and almost none of them wanting to do it themselves. How being first rate is both a gift and a curse, a gift because you can get more money and recognition that way, and a curse, because only first rate magicians ever kill a person that can't be saved.
"So, what's her name, and what's she look like?" Tuck asked, breaking the tense silence as he starts on his fries.
Danny, taking a few more bites before answering, asked, "Why?"
Tucker snorts, and digs out his PDA. "So I can look her up, of course. If she's rank 2, there must be something about her online."
At his expectant look, Danny sighs and accedes. "Okay, so she was taller than me, short black hair and blue eyes, wearing all black. She said her name was Blow."
Tucker looked up from his PDA to goggle at Danny. "You're joking."
At Danny's blank look, Tuck exclaimed, "You just described the famous Black Magician of Opion that everyone is talking about and wants to meet! Tell me you're joking."
At Danny's confused shake of the head, Tucker groaned and said, "How could you not know? Are you as oblivious as your parents now? She literally has her own fan site! How could you have missed something like that?"
Danny, feeling offended and not knowing quite the source of his offence, said, "In my defence, I live in a family of scientists, Tucker. I'm not sure what mom would do if she found me on the magician forum sites again."
The first time, she had scolded him severely on the ethics of killing demons, the second time, she banned the computer for a week. And the third, well, let's just say that he never mentioned magic or magicians to his parents after that incident. He'd rather not cause another fight. And that had been years ago.
"I'm pretty out of the loop when it comes to anything magical." Danny simplifies.
"Right," Sam says, nodding, including herself in the conversation again, "That whole conflict between magicians and scientists."
Yeah, Danny thinks. 'That whole conflict' being the ongoing war between scientists and magicians to prove which was superior; science or magic. It never comes to blows or fights in the street, but so far, magic seems to be winning. With technology only permitted in specific 'technology zones', though magic zones can still get cellphones at the least, and with the Tower pretty much running the government at this point, and ghost hunters being disrespected left and right in favor of magicians. (The oddballs being the GIW, allying with the Tower)
Danny looks up from his fries and thoughts, hearing the ping of Tucker's PDA go off as he scrolls through the new notification.
Then Tucker is spitting out his mouthful of Cola, Sam exclaims, "Hey, my salad!" as a new dressing is added to it via Tucker's mouth.
Tucker, eyes not leaving his PDA, says, " Uh, guys, you should see this."
"Just spit it out already, Tuck!" Sam snaps irritably.
"Too late for that." Danny says, gesturing towards her newly spat upon salad with a grin, because he just had to.
Tucker turns the screen toward Sam, explaining, "I just now got this notification from the school."
Sam reads the screen, and then, "Shit," she swears unexpectedly.
Danny's about to ask what's wrong when Tucker turns the PDA screen toward him. And Danny reads:
Casper High students will start temporary attendance to Helios, school of magic, starting Monday.
"Fuck." Danny agrees. Danny's parents are not going to be happy about this.
Blow, crouched near the back entrance of the Opion building, reads the sign again with annoyance. 'If you are not a thief or an animal, please use the front entrance!' (That guy...what's he trying to do, he knows I hate crowds!) Blow looks down at herself, still spattered in blue and red blood.
There was no where to stop to clean up where I wouldn't be recognized. Blow laments.
Reading the sign yet again, Blow smirks as a certain loophole comes to mind.
I guess he still tries not to think of me in that way.
Blow pauses as something in the depths of her mind stirs, groans, and settles again. Her smirk growing, Blow reaches out and breaks the locks on the door with magic, locks mundane and magical breaking under the force of the magic. Blow enters Opion through the back entrance.
If he mentions it, I'll say.. that.
Walking up to the front of Master's desk, Blow slaps a piece of paper on top of it and says, "Here's your autograph."
Master, picking up the autograph, exclaims, "Wow! You actually got it! And I heard Seren was bad-tempered, too. Smells nice." Master sniffs the piece of paper.
Looking at Blow's blood-covered appearance, familiar worry lines appearing on Master's face, he asks, "Ah. Did you run into trouble on your way back?"
"How do you think I got that autograph? She wasn't bad-tempered at all after I saved her from that demon." Smirking in amusement, Blow points, "There's demon's blood on that."
"Ah." Master says, moving the autograph away from his face with a sheepish expression, embarrassed at having been enjoying the smell of demon's blood.
Blow sympathizes (while still finding it amusing). If an inexperienced magician or regular person comes in contact with a demon's blood, they will be enraptured by the smell, and become easy prey for the injured demon. Blow had felt the pull of demon's blood enough times to ignore it, but if you're caught off guard or don't know what it is..
"By the way. How long are you going to stay in that form? Rood?" Master asks.
Blow replies, "Well, thanks to you and these stupid missions I have plenty of Mana."
Readying herself, Blow says, "Your name is [Blow], awakening remove."
Feeling the familiar surge of power those words provoke, black and dark blue magic susurrates around Blow, black hair fading into pale blonde, electric blue eyes ceasing to glow and tone changing into a stormy blue color, height shrinking by 16cms until Blow was gone, leaving Rood in her place.
Looking down at himself, Rood hunches up uncomfortably.
Master clears his throat and says gently, "Rood, how about you give your report after cleaning up a bit? It can wait."
Looking up and meeting Master's understanding gaze, Rood nods gratefully and departs from Master's office.
He stops by his room, which is disguised as a utility closet that only he and Master have the keys to. He hops into the shower for a quick wash, watching the demon's blood (how did it get in his hair?) swirl down the drain with a detached feeling.
Out of the shower, Rood puts on his binder with relief, and over it and his boxers and grey undershirt, with a black tee over top and light brown pants.
Back in Master's office and feeling much more comfortable, Rood demands, "Now give me a proper mission!" leaning over Master's desk.
Master, giving Rood a beautific smile that had Rood imagining flowers appearing around his face, said, "But Rood! Delivering Macy's heart-stopping love letter and finding Darcy's lost puppy and so many more are waiting for you!"
He reaches under his desk, and places a large stack of mission requests down on the desk with a thump, no doubt filled with requests like walking dogs, rescuing a kitten from a tree, and searching for a missing earring, all of which Rood had actually done.
"NO!" Rood says, knocking the ridiculous papers off the desk, where they scattered and fluttered to the ground in a jumble.
"I refuse. I'm tired of doing missions that don't mean anything. Give me a serious mission! Please." He added, hoping this might persuade him, feeling a headache coming on wearily.
Master sighs. "Okay, I'll think about it. First give your mission report, please. How'd it go?"
At the very end of Rood reporting on his encounter with Danny Phantom, (Rood usually goes over his missions with Master before writing the official report) Master makes an exclamation of recognition. "Hold on, I think I have a file here." Master gets up from his desk and shuffles around in one of the file shelves in the room, pulling out a thick file folder with a triumphant, "Ah, ha!" and slapping it down on the desk.
"Here, Danny Phantom." Opening the folder, he starts reading the papers there with intensity.
Curious, Rood sidles up to the desk and spots a manilla folder. Snatching it before Master can notice, Rood opens it and reaches inside, feeling smooth square surfaces under his hands. He pulls one out, and sees it's a photograph.
The photo features a creature built out of technology, being punched by Phantom.
Must be a ghost, Rood thinks, upending the folder onto the desk. There were a lot of photographs, taken from a bunch of different devices, each featuring Phantom.
Phantom fighting and capturing ghosts, Phantom flying through the air, Phantom getting shot at by ghost hunters.
Rood, looking up from the photos, meets Master's eye.
"Apparently he's a fellow celebrity." Master tilts his head toward the photos.
"Lots of people either love the ghost, saying he's a hero, or hate him for being a ghost and wants to capture him. Including the GIW, who have a lot more pull now that they've allied with the Tower. I'm not surprised he didn't stick around."
Rood nods to himself as Master gathers up all of the photos and puts them neatly back into the manilla folder. Putting the file back in it's original spot, Master walks over to start picking up the papers that Rood had knocked over earlier.
"Rood, there is this one mission that is pretty important." Master admits.
"Really?" Rood says, waiting impatiently for more information.
Master looks up from gathering up the scattered papers, and gestures toward them, a silent, 'help me clean up your mess, would you?' in his gesture.
Stifling a sigh, Rood walks over to the fallen papers and bends down, and starts to help pick them up.
"Now, this mission, it's going to be at an auction house, and they're going to be auctioning a certain magical item that's going to attract some unsavory characters." He continues, satisfied with Rood's cooperation.
"Magical object? What is it?" Rood queries, crab-stepping closer to Master to grab more papers when there are no more in his immediate area.
"It's called Freakshow's Shard. It's a-"
"What?" Rood exclaims, head jerking up, forehead hitting Master in the chin, cutting off the rest of what Master was going to say and making Rood see bright lights as his forehead gives a sharp jab of pain.
Rood leans back on his hands, groaning as his head gives a throb of pain, the looming headache making an appearance.
"Rood? Are you okay?!" Rood hears, having closed his eyes before. A gentle hand pushes back his bangs to prod at his forehead worriedly.
After the third well-meaning-yet-annoying poke and the third corresponding throb of pain, this time accompanied by the flash of-something, some image- that Rood immediately forgot afterward, but had him tearing up where the headache hadn't, Rood opens his eyes and pushes the hand away, blinking back the moisture, saying, "Fine, I'm fine! But what was that about Freakshow?"
Master, sitting on the floor next to Rood, retracts his hand, index finger still extended with a weird expression on his face that Rood can't interpret.
"Remember how his crystal ball shattered?" At Rood's nod, remembering the report about the man who controlled ghosts with a crystal ball and ran a circus that was shut down after it was discovered that he was the one making the ghosts steal jewels and money, Master goes on, "Well apparently one of the shards from the crystal ball still retains power. Some genius put it on a chain and sold it as a magic necklace to the auctioneer." Master says bitterly, and Roods mood sours at the thought of that power in somebody's hands.
Standing up and moving away from Rood, papers forgotten on the floor, Master says, turned away from Rood, "Get it? You need to get in there. You know what to do when you get there?" Master queries, looking back at Rood, still on the floor.
"Yes, Master, I think I get what you mean." Rood says, an image of Ms. Ren, scratched up and bloodied from a struggle with a dozen glowing green ghost tattoos entering his mind.
Master smiles sadly, and they share a look of mutual agreement.
Months ago…
Iod Ravus was eating alone in the park, minding his own business, when a strange girl with black hair and yellow eyes, wearing a weird hat with horns attached to it, sat down next to him.
Iod kept chewing, waiting for her to say something, but she just kept looking at him with a piercing stare. After a few minutes of this, the girl sighed and said, "Nothing?"
Iod, thinking this a weird way to start a conversation, asked, "Nothing, what?"
The girl sighed again and said, cryptically, "You're not remembering anything?"
Iod shook his head, confused. "What? have we met before or something?" The girl looked at him, and Iod got the feeling that she was looking through him as well as at him. It made him uneasy.
"Okay," The girl said, reaching up and taking off her hat, "What about now?"
Iod goggled, food forgotten, because there weren't horns attached to her hat, but attached to her head. Something twitched in the depths of his subconscious, but Iod squashed it before it could rear its head.
At Iod's increasingly confused look, the girl said, "Strange. With Garmode all it took was to meet and we recognized each other and remembered. With Elzeble, one look at my horns had him running so fast he ran out in the middle of the road and got hit by a car. The subsequent change made him remember… perhaps that is what you need?" The horned girl looked at him speculatively.
Iod, getting nervous, stood up and said, "You know, I don't think I'm very hungry anymore." And started power-walking away, scared and not knowing why.
"Stop. You cannot run." And now she sounded pissed off. Some force knocked him off his feet, and Iod was rolling in the grass, to stop by two pairs of shoes.
One pair belonged to a horned girl, and the other to a man in a purple suit and a tattoo near his eye.
The girl said, "Elzeble, we will have to use drastic measures. I cannot understand why they have to be so difficult."
Iod's eyes focused, and he registered two palms held toward him, crackling with yellow and purplish power, before there is a blast of pain in his chest and through his stomach. Iod screamed, and then a cold sensation rushed through him, light blue light enveloped and swirled around his body, images, conversations, memories flashed through his mind as the world shrank around him.
I remember now, Iod thinks.
I'm not a human at all. I never was.
I am… a demon!
Pushing away his false human memories, Iod-Diorook lifts his head and roars, wings flaring out and kicking up a strong wind. He looks down at the two small beings on the ground in front of his front claws, -Rubymonter and Elzeble- and says, "Nice greeting, Rubymonter."
He really means the opposite of what he just said, because that hurt, dammit, but ever since Diorook was very young, he had learned not to show weakness in front of other demons.
Rubymonter looks up at him and says, "Oh, so you remember. Yes, injuring you enough for you to transform seemed the quickest avenue for getting you to remember."
Diorook cocks his head, wings folding back against his body as he asks, "And how did I forget?" Seriously, how did he forget his real life as a demon?
"I am unaware of the specifics, something to do with how we bonded with our human hosts made us all get amnesia and live out lives as human children." Ruby dismisses it calmly with a shrug.
"But, now we can start."