Prologue, The Hallway with a Hundred Doors
CLOCKWORK
"Where are you going, Clockwork? Your duty is here, to watch over the time streams…" The ghost turned to them, red eyes glowing with suppressed emotions.
"That may be within my abilities, but that was never my duty," He said slowly, as if talking to a child. "My duty is to my family, as it always had been ever since that day." The ghost frowned, turning his gaze back to a gear that was showing current events within this timestream. "And right now that means finding my son."
The ghost shed the glamour that made him appear to change ages, as well as changing his appearance. The Observants could only stare as the Ghost of Time revealed his true self, before walking out the door.
"How did we not know he looked like, like that? How did we not know he had a son?!" One Observant asked, awakening from his shocked state first.
"He's the Ghost Master of Time." The other responded, rolling his single eye as if it were obvious. "And whoever has messed with his son, well, I feel no pity for them."
DANNY
Danny didn't want to believe it. He didn't want to be seeing what he was seeing. And yet this scene he was staring at now showed up every single time he closed his eyes. He tried not sleeping, it had worked for maybe three or four days (he had lost track of time at some point) but then his grades and his fights started to reflect his sleepless state. And so here he was, dreaming the same nightmare he's had every day the past few years whenever the anniversary of the battle with Dark Dan rolls around. Buildings were in ruins, crumbling, or up in flames. Smoke billowing from fires in those buildings and on the ground. Some people were screaming, but they were far off and Danny knew by now he wouldn't make it in time. All along the street he stood on, and throughout the city of his nightmares, people laid dead on the ground, among them his own human half which was right in front of him.
He couldn't help it, screaming. He thought that by now he wouldn't scream, or cry, or sob relentlessly until his dreamself had no tears left. But he still did, and some part of him was grateful for that. It meant that he was still human, not like him. But it also meant that he was still afraid. Deathly afraid. Not of the being that caused this destruction, Dark Dan, who was him yet not him at the same time. But the idea, the concept that he could be evil, that he could snap, that he could lose everything and everyone he ever loved and cared for. The idea of being completely and utterly alone. And he knew that so long as there were no ghosts around to interrupt this sleep, he would not be waking up from this nightmare until it ended.
DARK DAN
Dark Dan, Dan Plasmius, Dan Phantom, all three described who he is. Yet he didn't care what anyone called him. He was free again, free of that wretched thermos. A contraption that, while normally held to trap ghosts only temporarily, was unpredictable while being housed in the Time Master's lair. But now he was free and Clockwork couldn't see him with that annoying timeline sight of his. Dan didn't know how it worked, not really, but he couldn't care any less.
There was one thing that left him confused though. He no longer felt the want or need to go out and make everyone miserable. He didn't feel like killing anyone or destroying anything. He had, at first, thought it was just because he vented so much of his anger and hate while trapped. But by now, two days later, still in the Ghost Zone, he figured he should've found something to make him angry again. Or something to hate.
But it seems that wouldn't be happening on its own. His younger self could wait. Maybe. Right now he needed to…
What is that?
The thing in question, this far away, looked to be a black and white blotch, or blur, on a tiny island. But he knew of only one person in this time that had these colors. If his younger self was in the Ghost Zone, maybe making his life miserable before killing him wouldn't have to be on hold after all. As he flew closer, a few things became apparent to him.
The blotch was curled in on itself, appearing to be a child much younger than his younger self should be. Then again, his mind provided, Vlad is crazy and his former parents had been ghost hunters. It wasn't too far of a stretch to think that something could've made his younger self physically younger.
Then he caught the thing's scent. Ghost senses were much like a dogs in the fact that their hearing and sense of smell is better than their sight, though they had full range of color and weren't partially color blind. The child reminded him of his younger self, yet there was something different about it.
So forget Vlad and his former parents. This was not his younger self. Dan's eyes narrowed as he thought, flying closer to the girl. He was curious, he'd admit that. It's been a long time since he was curious about something. Yet now this girl who had to be related to his younger self somehow popped up out of nowhere and…
Didn't, in his time, Vlad say he had been working on something? That was years before now, and as far as he knew Vlad wouldn't have stopped, nor would his mansion have blown up. No, this kid couldn't be. Vlad wouldn't go so far as to. And she looked what? Eight? Ten? It was hard to tell, but she couldn't be that thing-Vlad-was-working-on-that-he-never-saw-because-he-blew-up-the-Mansion-and-everything-in-it.
He destroyed everything, including Vlad's cabin in Colorado...She still couldn't be what he was working on though.
The girl looked up, eyes widening as she saw him. Did she know of him, or did he remind her of some other ghost? Why did he even…?
The girl shrieked, eyes (glowing green that he hated) wide, and bolted away from him so fast it took him a few seconds to process it. "Oh no", he growled after he shook his head clear of the ringing in his ears. He would not let her get away and leave his confusion unanswered! He hated his confusion! He hated her because she had made him confused in the first place!
As he shot after the strange look alike little girl; one thought crossed his mind: He'd found something to hate again.