Haunt 1.1

"Welcome to your new home," the man said. He was big and burly, nearly reaching six feet tall. White tuxedo and black-tinted glasses made the man look intimidating, though his conversation partner didn't seem to show any fear. The kid across from the man was just barely shorter than the latter, capping out at five-foot-six. A pale hand swiped the key out of the outstretched arm of the agent.

"Thanks," the kid said, pocketing the key. He dragged his hand through his messy black hair, taking in the small house. It was a one-story house, with two bedrooms (with a bathroom for each), a kitchen, a dining room, and a den/foyer. It was just barely more than a glorified-apartment in square-footage.

Not counting the basement, of course.

The kid turned to pin his hard, light blue eyes on the white-wearing man. "Anything else to be aware of, Agent M?"

The man, Agent M, nodded, and pulled out a manilla envelope. He handed it to the teen with a smirk. "You have been enrolled into Winslow High. Due to your innumerable tardies and failed grades, you will have to repeat tenth grade, Daniel."

"Ancients damn it!" 'Daniel' swore. "And I said, call me Danny. If we're gonna be working on an alliance, than call me by the name everyone else does."

"Understood, Danny," the agent said, trying out the name. "Well, you and your sister should settle in. The other agents still have to relocate the other residents, and have them sign the waivers."

The agent made for the door, only to be stopped by Danny's hand on Agent M's shoulder. "And my parents?" he asked. "How are they?"

"Inventors Alpha and Beta are performing wonderfully," the man wearing shades said, with neutral implications. "Some of their more recent work can be used to power civilians' lives for free and can help protect them from capes."

"Capes…" Danny trailed off, hand returning to its body's side; but Agent M still didn't move. "Surprising how Amity Park was so isolated from the rest of the world, isn't it?"

"Yes," Agent M agreed, "but that makes Operation Crypt easier, doesn't it?"

"Yeah. It does," Danny said. "See you around, Agent." He took that as his cue, and the Guy in White left Danny to his own devices.

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"New city, new life, new start," Jazz said. Danny's older sister had a psychology book open and was studying the contents. She was wearing her normal black sweater and blue pants. Her hair was kept out of her face with the blue headband Danny rarely saw her without.

"Jazz, we just got here and the first thing you do is study?" Danny complained. His entire attitude shifted since his meeting with the departed agent. His body stance was relaxed, his eyes had lightened, and a content smile was fixed above his chin, despite the moans and groans.

"Education waits for no man," Jazz said.

"That's time," Danny replied. "Trust me; Clockwork doesn't wait up for anyone."

Jazz huffed and buried herself deeper into her book.

"Well," Danny said, tossing the manilla folder onto the table, "I have to retake sophomore year."

Jazz picked up the manilla folder, wiping her mind clean of the book her major was about beneath her, and read through the his transcripts. "My tardiness and grades finally caught up to me," he said.

Jazz's eyes were narrowed. "Why Winslow?" Jazz asked Danny, without looking up. "I've heard nothing but trouble sleeps in that school."

"Well, they couldn't put me in Arcadia," Danny explained. "Living in a super-sized coat closet, but going to a rich school, with these grades? Not going to happen. And the only other possible school is a Christian school, Immaculata. And I'm so religious…" he trailed off, his point made.

Jazz conceded, "Alright. Just promise me you'll be careful?"

"I promised," Danny said. At that moment, his phone began to buzz. He took it out and saw that his alarm was going off. Group Chat! was buzzing its way across the screen.

"I'm going to talk to Sam and Tuck," Danny said. Jazz had already lowered her head back into her book and was drowning out the world around her. "Uh-huh," she mumbled half-heartedly. Danny ran up to his room, closed the door, and pulled his laptop out of his bag. It was a Portable Fenton Laptop, or PFL. With interdimensional WiFi capabilities, titanium plating, and firewalls created by Tucker Foley himself, it was one of the three best laptops in the world. Guess who had the other two?

As soon as he had flipped open the screen, two other faces appeared on-screen. On the left was an African-American face, yellow sweater and backwards beret. Behind him was the pale yellow color of an unpainted wall in a new home. His glasses reflected lines of code that he was typing away at on his PDA.

On the right side of the screen was a beautiful, black-haired angel (not that he would ever say such out loud) dressed in a gothic outfit. She was reclining on a bed with blindingly pink sheets contrasted against a typical black wall ‒ for her, at least. Her black hair was gathered in a ponytail, and her lips were painted a deep purple. Her face cheered up from a scowl half a second after he opened his laptop.

"Danny!" her voice exclaimed. "It's about time!"

"Yeah, Sam was getting worried about her boyfriend," the black teen teased.

"She's/He's not my girlfriend/boyfriend!" they yelled at the same time. They looked at each other's window and blushed.

"Mm-hm," he said.

"Tucker, I swear to God…" Sam swore under her breath. His techy friend was enjoying being a large distance away from Sam's steel-tipped boots.

"So!" Danny interjected. "Capes!"

And with that, the group chat turned serious. Attention turned to Tucker, who was the online researcher extraordinaire. "So, the first instance of capes ever was back on May 20th, 1982. A golden and naked man appeared over a cruise ship, cured some of the people onboard, and flew off. Over the years he began collecting clothing and becoming a real hero; saving people, stopping the Cold War, and other things. In 1999, he was extinguishing a burning town in Russia when a reporter asked for his name, to which he replied as 'Scion'. After Scion's first appearance, capes began popping up everywhere, and we now live in a world populated by capes.

"How come we never heard any of this in Amity Park?" Danny asked. With so much of this going on, it was a wonder that they never once heard of this.

Tucker shrugged. "Paranormal activity had been around even longer in Amity Park, dating all the way back to the early 1800s. Besides that, the weakness of the barrier between the real world and the Ghost Zone often either disrupted radio/TV waves or sucked them into the Ghost Zone. That's why we broadcasted our own things from within the town. The weakness in the barrier also worked as a weak 'go-away' shield, subconsciously keeping people away from Amity Park. We were literally a ghost town to the rest of the world."

"So, the Ghost Zone basically isolated us from the rest of the world?" Sam asked. "Is that why Pariah Dark was able to easily rip it out of the material world?"

"Probably, Tucker said. "Even if he never did, I suspect something of that nature would've even occurred naturally over the years; maybe in about half a century, even."

"What about the last thing?" Danny asked, voice falling flat. "Endbringers." His voice was practically monotone.

Tucker nodded solemnly, "In the Marun Fields in Iran, on December 13, 1992, a massive monster emerged out of the ground. It was fought and it killed, but it was barely hurt, This entity became known as Behemoth, as one of the three Endbringers."

"Now there's an ominous name," Sam muttered.

Tucker continued, "Leviathan, from the sea, and the Simurgh, from space, joined what is infamously known as the Herokiller later. Though the Endbringers always retreat, they are not always beaten. The most infamous example is Kyushu, an island of Japan. It caused Japan to be reduced from a first-world power to a third-world country overnight."

"Is there any pattern?" Sam asked, attention shifting to her. "There must be a reason for their attacks, right?"

Tucker shrugged. "If there is a pattern, no one has found it before. No one has been able to keep up with an Endbringer…"

"Until me," Danny concluded, taking Tucker's look as his cue. It was true enough. He could fly intangibly through water and had enough stamina and power to keep it up for nearly an hour. No one had a better chance than he did. But that being said...

"Are you willing to try and track an Endbringer, knowing that you could've saved people?" Sam asked, quiet. Danny shook his head. "No," he replied, "but I can save people while staying on the Endbringer's tail."

"Great," Sam said. "Now, just one more thing." She leaned into the camera, eyes narrowed. "Stay out of the superpowered politics, Danny. No need to look for trouble."

"I don't look for trouble," Danny whined.

"Yeah," Tucker agreed, and Danny smiled at the support of his best friend. "Trouble looks for him." Danny frowned, and his other two friends laughed.

"Alright, I have to go," Tucker said. "I'm going to look around my new town. Washington D.C. is an interesting place."

"Try not to hack into any government agencies, Tuck," Danny joked. Tucker raised his hand, showing his fingers crossed. "No promises!" he laughed, and closed out of the chat.

"Well," Sam said, "I'm going to explore my new town, too. See you later, Danny."

"Bye Sam. Enjoy Boston," Danny said, and Sam logged off. He sighed, and closed his modified laptop. He shoved it into his bag and jumped into bed. He turned his head to the side. 9:57, the digital clock read. 'Time for sleep,' Danny thought, and fell into the realm of Nocturne.

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[A/N]: Welcome to the new Deceased, Phans and Wormies! Typical disclaimer, I don't own anything, blah, blah, blah. This takes place just before the start of Worm and after all Danny Phantom series, but, obviously, Phantom Planet never happened, nor the episode where Technus took over the digital world. Not yet, at least. Or will it ever? IDK. And this chapter, like many others, will be and has been beta-ed by the magnificent Mysterymuffin2! Enjoy!

~Slenderbrine