Prologue
Fire rained down from the sky, burying the world in ashes and smoke. Danny shielded his face with his battered, filthy arms as the world slowly crumbled.
He hadn't wanted this.
The rumbling beneath the city streets erupted into a roar as great gouts of blue-green flame arced skywards, bathing everything in a harsh, otherworldly glow. He curled farther under a jutting piece of concrete, debris narrowly missing hitting his exposed leg.
He had to do something.
A sickly, green, glowing puddle dripped through the cracks in the pavement and mixed with the ash. Swirls of red twirled lazily through the hazy sheen, originating from the worryingly large chunk of flesh missing from his calf.
It was gonna suck to walk.
But there wasn't much of a choice, now, was there?
Danny got to his feet, swaying slightly, but his eyes were determined.
This was his city. He'd be damned before he'd let it get destroyed.
_1_
The harsh chime of the school bell rang out suddenly, cutting through Danny's fitful nap and jolting him into consciousness. Sam tapped his shoulder gently as she gathered her things and headed for the door.
"Come on, sleepyhead," She smiled, swinging her purple spider backpack around and against her shoulder. Outside, the noise of students talking and slamming lockers rose to a roar as the kids prepared to go home for the day. Danny stretched stiffly, still sore from his most recent ghost fight, and nodded drowsily. Tucker walked past and smacked the back of Danny's head playfully.
"Geez, man, when's the last time you slept? You look awful,he grinned. Mr. Lancer shot a concerned glance in their direction, which the trio pretended not to notice. Tucker's smirk widened. "You almost look half dead."
"Aw, shut up, Tuck," Danny groaned, smiling, as the three pushed out into the chaos of the hallway. The familiar and unwelcome silhouette of Dash Baxter could be seen just down the hall, so the three quickly scurried in the opposite direction. As they rounded the corner towards the exit, Danny glanced back over his shoulder. "Is it just me, or does Dash look uglier than usual? Maybe it's the sleep deprivation, I dunno," Danny mused. Sam snorted.
"We should classify him as a whole new species at this point. There's no way a human being could be that unlikeable," Sam pushed the double doors open wide and glared into the bright, mid afternoon sun. "Ugh. This summer is going to be the death of me. My parents say it's supposed to be record-breakingly hot or something. I'll probably catch fire at this rate."
Tucker shot Sam a questioning glance. "I thought you said Goths simmer? What ever happened to that?" Sam glared at him, snatching his hat before abruptly plopping it on her own head. "Hey!" Tucker shouted, making a grab at it as Sam skipped nimbly away, laughing. Danny smiled, rolling his eyes, as his best friends squabbled.
A sudden chill raced through his being, cancelling out the heat of the sweltering spring day momentarily. Ice crackled through his veins for a split second as he shivered, breath coming out in a plume of cold vapor. Sam and Tucker stopped squabbling immediately as Danny groaned dramatically. They had heard that sound enough times to know that a ghost was nearby.
"I'll get the Fenton Thermos," Tucker sighed, rummaging through his backpack in resignation. "Sam, you wanna be on shooting or Thermos duty? I got the Thermos last time."
"Guys, it's okay," Danny said, waving them off as they began getting their ghost gear assembled. "I can handle this one. Take it easy." His friends exchanged a doubtful glance, and Tucker shrugged.
"You sure you can handle it, Danny? You don't look so good," Sam pushed gently. Danny subtly slid his bruised arm behind his back and waved them off again. It's true he was beat up, but Sam and Tucker had been working their butts off lately helping him with ghost catching, and he felt bad. It was probably just the Box Ghost again, anyways--nothing he couldn't handle.
"I'm fine, guys," Danny breezed, and snatched the Fenton Thermos from Tucker before he could object. "I'll probably catch up with you before you even get home. Besides," Danny gestured at Tucker's hat planted lopsidedly on Sam's head, "you guys were in the middle of some really important business." He laughed as Sam chucked the red beret at him. "Alright, okay," he returned the hat to Tucker after catching it deftly. "Relax. It's not like I'm not gonna die or anything. I'll see you in a few." He winked, waved, and started booking it towards the nearby porta potty.
Sam huffed something under her breath about a hero complex and rolling her eyes before grabbing Tucker's arm and stomping off. Tucker tried frantically to remove her hand from his arm, shouting that Sam was an abusive friend, before the two disappeared around the bend. Danny laughed quietly at their antics.
Danny slammed the porta potty door behind him, letting the familiar rings of energy arc over his body, changing raven hair to white, and blue eyes to an unnaturally luminous green. He stretched, swiftly checking his suit for any wear, before clipping the thermos to his belt and phasing through the roof invisibly. He soared upwards, enjoying the fresh air after a long, stifling day in the school, and scanned the nearby area for the ghost. Where could it be? His ghost sense went off again, making him shiver despite the hot sun.
An ectoblast arced past his ear with a harsh whine, startling him, and Danny instantly switched into defensive, throwing up a shield just as another blast zoomed towards him. Through the wiggly green glow, Danny spotted Skulker floating up to be on his level. His arm was outstretched and a new kind of ectogun smoked faintly on his wrist. Skulker smirked threateningly.
"Hello, whelp," Skulker crooned. His gun clicked and primed itself again with a sickening whirr, glowing a toxic yellow-green. "I hope you like my new toy!" The gun fired and Danny raised another shield, wincing as the powerful blast forced him back a few feet in the sky.
"Not in the mood for this today, Skulker," he growled, firing two quick arcs of green energy at his foe. His bruises twinged painfully, and Skulker noticed his stiffness with a keen eye, letting out a quiet hmph. Skulker dodged the blasts easily, powering up his rockets and flying swiftly towards Danny like a torpedo, catching him by surprise.
"Don't think I'll go easy on you, ghost child!" he crashed into Danny at full speed, holding tight, spiraling them downwards towards the football field. Danny struggled in the iron grasp, green eyes flaming, before firing an ectoblast directly into Skulker's face. He howled, releasing the startled halfa, before Danny abruptly slammed into the ground. With his breath knocked out of him, Danny lay stunned in the dirt, coughing painfully. He fumbled at his belt for the thermos, raising it shakily at the figure clutching his face nearby.
"Looks like you won't need to," Danny muttered, pressing the button with a dirt-stained finger. Skulker turned in shock just as the wide beam of light swept over him, trapping him in the thermos with a howl of rage. Danny capped the thermos with a resounding click, rubbing his face wearily. It hadn't been a long fight at all, but it sure as hell had hurt. He was grateful for his quick healing more than ever before as the sharp pain along his back slowly faded into a dull ache.
As Danny took a breather, the football team jogged out onto the field for practice, noticing with shock the stunned ghost and the large crater he was in. The teens shouted excitedly and pointed towards the faintly smoking hole, running towards him, and Danny yelped, turning invisible to escape his eager fans. It was nice to be appreciated, of course, but there were times that he just needed some space after a fight. The teens crowded in confusion around the seemingly empty crater, disappointed.
Danny rose slowly into the air, reclipping his thermos, before flying leisurely back towards his friends. Ducking momentarily into an alleyway, he changed back swiftly and popped out of the alley behind Tucker and Sam, visible once more, thumping his hands onto their shoulders and whispering "boo!" unexpectedly. Tucker yelped loudly and Sam turned to glare at him witheringly, unimpressed.
"That was fast," she muttered, shrugging Danny's hand off her shoulder as he wormed his way to walk between his friends. "Who was it?"
"Just Skulker, though he has some kind of new gun," Danny rubbed his aching shoulders and winced. Danny remembered the strange yellowish glow the weapon had produced. "It had some pretty funky looking ectoplasm, actually. Almost yellow." Tucker raised his eyebrow curiously, and he and Sam exchanged a questioning glance.
"I dunno if we've seen that color ectoplasm before. Did you notice anything else weird about it?" He asked, pulling out his PDA and looking through his stored ghost information for any clues. He sighed deeply. "I hope this doesn't make our lives harder," he whined, and Danny and Sam had to agree. It was one thing fighting the same ghosts day in, day out, but another thing entirely when they changed things up and caused even more of a problem. At least monotony was predictable, if exhausting.
"It only hit my shield, and it didn't seem to do much, besides pack a pretty powerful punch. I'm sure it's nothing," Danny breezed. "Nothing I can't handle." An unreadable look crossed Sam's face, before she frowned and looked away. Danny didn't seem to notice, but Tucker did, and looked uneasily between the two. It didn't take a genius to see something was bothering Sam lately, but Danny had been too caught up in his ghost fighting to notice. Sometimes Tucker wished Danny could get his head out of his ass enough to see that something he was doing was getting on Sam's nerves, but the guy never did. Tucker shook his head disapprovingly. What would he do with those two? Honestly.
*
Vlad whisked his way softly through the gloom and endless hum of the Ghost Zone. He was on the alert, eyes scanning the impossible landscape around him warily. A heavy metal cylinder was clutched tightly in his fist, reminiscent of a Fenton Thermos but obviously tinkered with, and detailed with fuschia accents rather than green. A small light blinked menacingly above a label that read "occupied," the contents rattling with angry energy.
He slowed suddenly, checking over his shoulders, before darting behind a floating mass of purplish debris near Skulker's lair. A small, plain purple door was wedged into the back of a large stone, which Vlad quickly slithered through. The other side of the portal came out into a large, empty cave that whistled with bitter mountain wind. He closed the now black door behind him firmly, clutching the thermos tightly under one arm. Few knew about his secret entrance to the Ghost Zone, and he intended to keep it that way.
A quick twenty minute flight at top speed, and he was once again home to his mansion hundreds of miles away in Wisconsin. Floating through walls and floors, he arrived in his high-tech lab, settling on the floor with a soft thump of his shoes and a faint whisper of his cape. The black rings of energy swept over his form, returning him to the familiar and intimidating form of Amity Park's mayor, Vlad Masters. A distinctly feline smirk crept across his face as he regarded the humming cylinder in his hands.
"At last..." he sighed, sauntering over to a bulky machine resting halfway in shadow towards the back of his laboratory. With a soft click, he inserted the thermos into a slot towards the front of the machine, and a loud buzzing filled the air as it whirred to life. Long fingers whipped over translucent keys as Vlad inputted instructions and data into the machine. His face creased in concentration and excitement as he worked, and with a triumphant flourish, he hit one final key with a resounding clunk. The buzzing of the machinery grew to a roar as a pod towards the middle of the machine lit up with a deep blue glow, filling with clear, bubbling liquid. A high pitched whine accompanied the formation of a high-powered ectoshield around the pod, glowing green and sending out sparks of other-dimensional energy. A dense greenish fog bubbled up through the liquid, forming into the rough shape of a human form accented with a pair of hateful red orbs that soon twisted into flaming red eyes and a furrowed brow. Slowly, painfully, the long restrained form of Dan Phantom took shape.
"Hello, Daniel... Or should I call you Dan?" Vlad purred, and the form within the pod contorted into a mask of fury, half formed arms beating against the thick, ghostproof glass with enough force to rattle the entire machine. "Feisty, are we?" Vlad hummed pleasantly, but his smirk was feral and devious. "Don't worry, you'll get your freedom soon enough, my boy. There's just something I need from you first." He snapped his fingers sharply and a glitchy holographic form appeared next to him.
"What is it, sweetie?" The Maddie hologram crooned in her echoing, robotic voice, and Vlad's smile softened.
"Be a dear and take some data down from this test subject, darling. I have some business I need to attend to." The hologram smiled emptily and chirped a sugar-coated response, and Vlad sauntered off to another part of the lab to prepare other equipment while his hologram tended to the containment unit. Vlad flicked through the musty pages of an ancient tome that had an ethereal glow to it, searching intently. Soon he found the page he had been seeking, and quickly skimmed the familiar words. Haunting drawings of leering demons and withering ghosts paraded on the page, surrounded by scrawls of nearly intelligible writing, all centering around a blue-clad figure wreathed in flames. Vlad's face contorted into a power-hungry smile that wouldn't be unusual if it appeared on the face of Satan himself. This is what he had been waiting for all along, and Vlad couldn't wait to start.
Those fools wouldn't know what hit them.
*
Danny collapsed into his bed at last, his whole body aching from the beating he had received during his nightly patrol. There had been an absurd amount of ghost activity that night for god knows what reason, and he wanted nothing more than to sleep for the next three days. His spaceship alarm clock read a bleary 3:14 am, and he groaned when he realized he would be lucky to get four hours of sleep that night. Why did superheroing have to be so hard? It was like every ghost in the world was out to get him, and he was sick of it. He rubbed his face with his hands and seriously considered destroying the Ghost Portal if only to give himself a little break while his parents rebuilt it. Although, to really get a break, he'd have to destroy Vlad's, too, and would have to watch for natural portals...
Danny flipped onto his stomach and buried his face in his pillow, groaning. Please, let that be the last of the ghosts for tonight, he thought weakly. I just want to sleep. The exhausted teen sighed, curled up, and drifted off into a fast and heavy slumber. He was lucky for once, and no more ghosts visited Amity Park that night.
A thin tendril of smoke wormed its way up through a crack in the ground, and curled fiendishly among the rubble sitting heavily where cars once drove. Pieces of Amity Park were suspended in midair, levitating like islands in a boiling red sea of clouds and fire. A silhouette, simultaneously familiar and entirely foreign to him, hovered in the distance with a halo of ghostly, cerulean wisps of energy surrounding it. It turned its head towards him, revealing long, elflike ears and a mane of fiery, feathery hair rippling behind it. Hateful crimson eyes pierced through the veil of smoke and made the distance between them seem suddenly all too claustrophobic; he knew without hesitation that he would die if he stayed where he was. He leapt out of the way just as the figure raised a hand, abruptly clenching it into a fist, but he was too slow--he screamed as a chunk of his calf was torn away, revealing the pulsing green flesh and ectoplasm beneath. Things had gone much, much more horribly than anyone had warned him they would. He hissed through his teeth as he fought the pain, attempting to lift into the sky to escape, but unable to as a force like gravity--but fluid and almost like honey surrounding him on all sides--held him down. He glanced furiously around, searching for another escape, and ducked behind a colossal piece of asphalt turned on its side. The swirling, honey-like force dissipated as the silhouette's line of sight was blocked from its target, and he settled into the ash, breathing deeply and trying to stem the bleeding. Calming breaths soon turned to panicked sobs, and he curled around himself as if he could hide from the whole world.
This was all so wrong.
So terribly, unimaginably wrong.