Danny Phantom and all related characters are owned by Butch Hartman and Billionfold Inc.

Do you know what it feels like to fly? I don't mean getting in an airplane and flying. I mean floating through the air on your own, of your own power. Feeling the freedom of the sky: being able to move in any direction without a ground to stop you. Being at peace as you watch people scramble around below you, rushing and rushing and rushing about their daily lives as you float above them: free. There is nothing better than flying.

That's probably why I miss it so much.

Ever since Vlad chained me to this place, I have been unable to fly. My movement is restrained to the length of a heavy, green, ghost-proof chain pounded into the foundation of the portal. Two years of tugging have yet to leave a mark on it. But it has left many marks on me.

My legs have gotten strong from dragging the thing through the house. The constant servitude has callused my hands so that I hardly feel anything anymore. I have been burnt so many times now without realizing it.

But I still hurt inside. I still long to fly.

­­­

"Danny?" I call quietly, straining my entire being in hope of a response.

I want so badly to find him, but at the same time I'm so afraid of what I will find. He's been here for two years now. Two years trapped in the fortress of his arch enemy. I can only hope he's still alive. I have no doubt that he is different, I just hope that my Danny is still in there, under the broken, or comatose, or insane, or evil, or whatever kind of ghost-boy he has become.

"Sam?" asks a voice, so quiet that I fear I'm imagining it, at first. But it calls my name again.

"Danny?" I respond, following the voice through the lab.

"Is it really you?" asks the faint voice, drawing me through another threshold and into a pitch-black enclosure.

"Yes, it's me. Where are you?" I ask, searching the darkness for a sign of life. I can hear his voice now, as clear as day, but the sight of him eludes me.

"I'm right here," Danny responds, a soft green glow illuminating his ghostly body. So pale, so thin, he is sitting against the far wall, his knees pulled up to his chest. His usually-white hair is now so smothered in dirt that it looks closer to its original black. If it weren't for the brilliance of his curious green eyes, I might have thought that his hair was black. There are huge dark circles under his shining eyes, standing out starkly against his dirt-covered, ghostly-pale skin. He looks tired, as though it's been months since he slept last, his whole body sagging in its desperate lean against the wall.

I reach forward, my own hands shaking, and take one of his thin, gloved hands.

"I'm going to get you out of here," I insist. He smiles, though his eyes are pained.

"If only you could," he says, looking down to our joined hands.

"I can and I will," I assure him, freeing my handy lock-picks from my back pocket and waving them reassuringly toward him.

He laughs softly.

"I've tried that a thousand times," he says, watching as I release his hand and begin working on the shackles around his ankles.

"Then you were trying it wrong," I assuring him, focusing intently on the bearings inside the lock. They rattle around encouragingly, but prove a challenge to my three months of lock-picking skills, glossed off of youtube tutorials and do-it-yourself guide books. It takes me a while, but I finally manage to spring the right spring and the shackle clicks open.

Danny looks down, something filling his dull, shiny eyes. I think it must be hope.

I repeat the same process with the other side, smiling when it too pops open.

"I told you," I whisper, pulling him to his feet and dragging him toward the exit. "I'm going to get you out of here."

"So you say," Danny replies, his voice now strange to my ears. "Too bad that's never going to happen."

I whir, finding myself face-to-face with Plasmius.

"What have you—"

"Danny is no longer your concern," Vlad assures me, a grin wide on his face. "There's nothing you can do to save him now."

In honor of Danny Phantom Angst Day. Sorry it's so unpolished (and so short...), but I had no idea such thing as a DP Angst Day existed until this morning. This is just the beginning of a story idea of been playing with. What do you think, should I keep going?

Happy DPA Day!

K.G.