Danny looked over at his friends as the building before him smoked. Around them teens looked forlorn and shocked all at the same time, the place that they had claimed as a hangout. It was a haven for the teens, away from home where parents demanded too much work and from school which claimed too much from them as well. Before him stood Lancer, though the human male couldn't know it was him as he was in his Phantom form, he was still worried. He took a step back as to blend in the crowd as the teacher turned to look at the spot he had been moments before. As it struck the people around him that they could have been in that blast, hurt or killed by the explosion that had claimed most of the building, Danny officially blended into the crowd and disappeared, Sam and Tucker also attempting to leave...attempting being the key word as Lancer turned on them.
"What the hell was that?!" Tucker stuffed the half eaten burger he had been munching on fully into his mouth, while Sam just stood there with a blank look on her face. "I saw that ghost boy here a moment ago! He did this!" Sam opened her mouth to rebut his claims only to be cut off as another ghost came flying by at that moment scaring the teacher off with a single scream. Sam didn't recognize the small, child-like ghost, but she was sure that Danny would have defeated it. So why was it flying away? She turned to see where it had gone only to find that she and Tucker were alone, the masses having run off from the now gone ghost. She threw a glare at Tucker for abandoning her before looking around for their friend.
At that moment said friend appeared from behind the Nasty Burger, his body intact and clean. The pair headed over to him questionably, both inquiring as to who the small ghost had been and what had happened in the now destroyed Nasty Burger.
"That was Lunchbox, the daughter of the Box Ghost and the Lunch Lady..." he faded off with a shudder at the thought of the pair of ghosts who had spawned somehow to make that child. She had obviously been their spawn though, with her awkward manner and food fetish that her mother had.
"Yikes," the pair said in unison.
"I was thinking more like ew, but anyway I found this stuck to my back," the halfa said pulling out a manila envelope, the contents hidden though the trio of teens knew what it was when they turned it around. It was the answer guide to the CAT's, the on that had been in the briefcase that Lancer still had cuffed to his arm. "Hello great future!" the halfa cried sounding mildly relieved as he held the envelope close.
"Danny, you wouldn't even be thinking what I think you are thinking...are you?" The halfa looked at Tucker as if he had just asked the most obvious question. "I don't think that is a wise idea."
"I have to agree with Tucker on this one," Sam stated, folding her arms. "I'm not your conscious or anything, but that is bad news." The halfa looked at his close girl friend, his eyes flashing green as he thought about what she said and why he felt he was entitled to the answers in his hands. He decided against saying anything and instead just crammed the envelope into his bag before heading off, Sam and Tucker following shortly.
Sam walked over to the Nasty Burger, well, the ruins of the fast food restaurant. A day before had found the small building under fire when a ghost, that none of them had seen before, had appeared and had attacked Danny. Looking at the building and remembering all the fun and not-so-fun times the Goth had had in there with her two friends brought a smile and a slight frown. The sun was high in the sky at this point and Sam yearned to find some shade from the heat, but for some reason she felt an urge to enter the building, to see what the place looked like on the inside...the ruin that had happened during a fight.
It was a Goth thing, seeing the ruin and despair of others. Moving toward the building the hair on the back of her neck raised up as a chill came over her. Looking around her she rubbed at the goosebumps that had broken out on her arms.
"Strange," she muttered before turning back to the building. Creeping toward it she failed to notice the sound of footsteps behind her or the shadow that moved slowly toward her. It was so strange, and so scary that the day before any of them could have been dead. Burned to death or blown up by whatever had attacked Danny in that building. She opened the door to the former fast food place, her hand sliding off of the door as she moved further into the building. Overhead the skies darkened as the sun faded and the moon rose.
"What are you doing here?" came a voice from behind her and the Goth turned to find a white haired male, a man that looked familiar. "This isn't exactly a place that is safe for you, Sam." Her brow rose in confusion at the fact that he knew her name and she couldn't seem to place him.
"Who are you and how do you know my name?" Then it struck her that the male before her had skin that only a ghost could have. "Y-You're a ghost!" He nodded.
"So I am not going to be dying because I did something as reckless as step into a building that has just about been demolished," he stated taking a step toward her as a meter in the distance moved further into the yellow and closer toward the red where a black skull resided. "You shouldn't be in here." Amethyst eyes narrowed at the intruder and she shook her head.
"I don't have to listen to you."
"Sam, you should listen to me because if you don't then you will die." Sam took a step back as a feeling of fear overcame her. Something in his green eyes told her he wasn't lying about that, but at the same time she felt that this man before her wouldn't hurt her.
"Is that a threat?" she managed to ask instead.
"No, it is the future." At that moment the sound of a car pulling up was heard, Sam looking at the door as the male before her disappeared. "You all need to leave." Those were his last words and with a blink of her amethyst orbs she headed for the door to see who had pulled up to the destroyed Nasty Burger.
"Glad that you could make it," Lancer stated, his back to the Goth as a few people got out of a familiar van.
"What is going on here?" came Maddie's voice from the other side of the headlights that highlighted the downed sign of the fast food enterprise. "Why did you call us here, Mr. Lancer?" The heavy set teacher pulled out a paper, Danny's test paper, and walked toward the parents of Danny, the halfa walking out from behind his mother.
"We talked about in school today about passing the S.A.T's and how your life can go one of two ways," the balding male stated. "They could go really well or you could end up here." He gestured to the building that Sam was walking out from at that moment. "Your son...he will be ending up here since he cheated on the test today!" It was at that moment that the halfa behind them found all eyes on him, but instead of looking confused or even guilty he just began to chuckle.
"What is going on here?" Sam whispered to herself. It was in that moment that a beeping interrupted the silent night air, the sound coming from behind her, from the building that was now feeling a little more heated. Sam turned around just in time to see the meter that was blaring the warning as the arrow hit the little skull on it. "Oh no!" she cried turning to her best friend, her teacher, the Fenton parental unit, and Jazz who had just came upon the scene. "RUN!" she managed to scream as she took one step from the building only to find her foot caught on some debris. With a whimper she fell, her body hitting the ground hard, her head landing with a loud 'thunk' as the building began to shake.
It was as if the whole world had stopped and in that moment, as time stood still for all involved Lancer rushed away, Jazz heading for the building with Danny in tow, the halfa changing in that moment as he attempted to rush toward Sam, only his parents decided that neither of them would make it as Jack took both teens in his arms and rushed away.
It's the moment of truth, and the moment to lie,
The moment to live and the moment to die,
The moment to fight, the moment to fight
To fight, to fight, to fight!
"NO SAM!" the halfa cried as something in him tore, his heart stopping in that moment as the other person in him came out, his older form running toward the downed Goth as she groaned, awakening just moments before what would be her death. In the moments that followed his parents saw Danny change, transforming into the ghost teen that had saved others, who had concealed his identity for the safe of his family and for his friends...and for himself as his parents' jaws dropped in unison. He phased through his father's arms, but he wasn't fast enough as the other male jumped over her, the building exploding in that moment. Danny was blown back with his family, the air filling with smoke and debris that struck cars that were parked nearby.
It's the moment of truth, and the moment to lie,
All Danny could see in his mind's eye was the Goth, his Goth, being covered...protected by Dan, the man who had tried to kill them and the one who had been so helpful in making him cheat, though he had been thinking about doing it. He could see that man saving Sam, doing what the halfa had been unable to do because he had allowed himself to be weak, to consider taking the easy way out.
The moment to live and the moment to die,
He sat up, the smoke still too thick to see through, but he wasn't going to let that stop him as he rushed back into the danger, his only thought on saving Sam, of protecting her from both the harm his other half had attempted to do back in his timeline and the building that was still falling apart even after the initial blast. When he made it to where the Goth and Dan had been he found that neither was there, the place bare of human or ghost life.
"Sam!" he cried out worryingly. "Answer me!" His thoughts were one of negativity, not thinking that even for a moment that Dan would have saved the raven haired beauty except to use her against him. When he moved further into the smoke he heard a sound, a cough, that came from the left of him. Turning he rushed out of the smoke to find Sam sitting against a car that had been spared any damaged from the blast. Next to her was the other halfa, his hand on the skull of the Goth where it seemed she had taken a hit. There was blood oozing down her pale forehead, but other than that and some dirt and dust she seemed fine.
"Danny?!" she cried out, her eyes full of relief at the sight of her friend. It was at that moment that Dan turned to the younger male. Danny saw that Dan had taken most of the hit, his green blood coming off his face and his clothing torn from the hit.
It's the moment of truth
"Get away from her!" the halfa shouted and miraculously enough the older male took a step back and disappeared leaving Sam sitting there alone. Rushing over to her he was quick to check her out, to make sure there was no other damage done to her besides what the building had done to her. She opened her mouth to say something and found that she felt a little light headed, the smoke from the building making her cough again as her vision blurred. "Sam? Sam!" The halfa quickly checked her pulse to find that it was still steady and breathing a sigh of relief pulled her into his arms before heading back to where his family was...remembering that they now all knew who he was.
"Unhand her!" came his father's voice and Danny was confused to find that his parents were scowling at him as if they had seen a...ghost.
"Uh...okay." Laying the Goth on the ground before him he rushed off, his parents rushing to grab the Goth while watching to make sure that he had indeed disappeared. "What ha-" With a ooph he looked up to find that he had run into Dan, the other male glowering down at him before looking over his shoulder at the family that was taking Sam back to the van as several cops and ambulances rushed onto the scene with Mr. Lancer coming out of one of the cop cars. "What are you doing back?! I told you t-"
"I came back to make sure everything was okay...with our identity..." This shut the halfa up as he looked down at his family.
"You did that?" The other male shook his head before disappearing again leaving Danny to look down at his family in confusion. If Dan hadn't done it then who had? And why? Heading back down he reverted back to his human form, forgetting why he had even took flight instead of doing this to begin with. Maybe it had been because he had been so thrown off by his parents' reaction to him that he hadn't known what to do, but running off he intercepted them loading Sam into one of the ambulances.
"Excuse me, kid," one of the emt's stated moving to cut off his path toward the now fully awake Goth.
"Danny?" the female inquired. "What happened?" Dark brows raised in confusion he was allowed past.
"You don't remember the blast?"
"I remember the blast, Danny..." she paused. "I just don't remember how I survived the blast. I was going into the building and then I heard Lancer outside." She continued on with her story and Danny noticed that right away she didn't remember seeing the other ghostly male at all. It was like he had been wiped from her memory.
"You don't remember what happened after the first blast, Sam? The one where Box Lunch tried to take me out?" Sam shook her head.
"I remember that you had the results from the test, and going back to your house and the battle with that really weird ghost that was part Skulker and part Technus...but after that I don't remember much." That was weird, but Danny supposed that maybe Sam just couldn't remember the bad that had happened to her.
"Don't worry, Sam. I am just glad that you are okay." The Goth nodded and with a smile the pair hugged, never realizing that something had happened...something that only Danny would remember.