"Run."

Danny sped down the abandoned street, his body convulsing slightly as it flickered between ghost and human form, his legs were getting tired, but this was no time to complain.

"Just run." Sam's voice whispered again from somewhere deep inside the catacombs of his mind.

Ok, Sam, let's run.

The only things he could hear were his short, sharp breaths, his rucksack clunking and the clattering of his heavy feet against the damp pavement, they echoed menacingly between the tall buildings in a way that sounded as if unseen people were applauding him. It was twilight – or at least it seemed that way, were there even days anymore? Was there even time?

Danny felt a cold chill and his wheezing breath appeared in front of his face, despite it being a warm day. They were near, unseen. Were they chasing him? Or were they waiting for him in the ever-growing darkness.

"Keep running. You can't die"

He wished so hard that he could fly, but his sporadic transformations made that impossible – every time he jumped into the air to fly, he would get a few meters then spasm as his body unwillingly turned human, sending him crashing to the ground. It was a good thing that puberty as a half ghost child had made his human body unnaturally stronger than most or he might have broken a few bones during these attempts. Still though, his body would be crushed like a coke can under the force of the beings chasing him now.

Where was he? Ok. Next to Amity Park, a left here and down the next str- "Arrgh" Danny yelled as something ripped though is right arm.

"Stop being cowards!" he screamed through short breaths, "Become visible and fight me like a true person!" Green and red blood oozed from is upper arm.

"We are not like people, we are not like you," replied a low, rasping voice from somewhere behind him – or were they in front of him? The persistent echoes off the buildings made pin-pointing the location of the voice impossible, and the ghost knew that. "Stop trying to fight us, we have already won."

"Keep running."

Danny dashed down the roads he knew so well – now hardly recognisable.

Just a few more streets…and then what? How was he going to get through the protective ghost shields with him becoming a ghost every few seconds? Danny couldn't think about this now.

A new voice echoed around him, one he recognised all too well – Skulker. "There is no point in running, Halfa, we've been easily keeping up with you this whole time. We have you completely surrounded. Although it has been fun to watch you squirm, it's time to end this."

They had been playing with him.

Suddenly, as if a veil had been lifted, they appeared.

Well, they had always been there, but now Danny could see them. Fifty or so 20ft tall faceless ghosts appeared in an unbroken circle around him. In front of him stood Skulker himself, his usually very tall armoured suit looked small compared to Walker's guards.

Skulker laughed at the pitiful boy, standing, painting as he flicked helplessly between human and ghost form. "I see the gas bomb has affected you in a very interesting way."

Danny gritted his teeth and his eyes flashed bright green. He clenched his fist and raised it as it turned from bare skinned to a glowing white glove, a small ball of green light formed around his hand and flew pathetically to the ground in front of Skulker's feet.

This time all the ghosts joined in laughing.

"My only regret is that I haven't used this gas on you sooner, Danny Phantom. I could have killed you so long ago." Skulker sneered.

"Why kill me now anyway?" Danny snarled, "It's not like I can bring all the people you killed back to life. My parents, my classmates….Sam." His voice cracked at the end which angered him, he didn't want to give this animal the joy if knowing he was in pain.

"Don't try to fool me. I know what's in that backpack – food, which means you know where there are humans still alive. And it seems they are relying on you to stay that way."

Danny had nothing. He thought about arguing that it was all for him, but he knew that Skulker wasn't going to listen. Besides, even if it were unnecessary to kill the ghost boy, Skulker would anyway. Most ghosts would. There had been prise money for his head for the last 5 years.

"I wonder what will happen when you die, Phantom. You could just become a regular ghost – easily defeatable, or would you just disappear?" Skulker loaded his largest and most powerful gun. "I am just dying to find out."

He steadily raised the weapon and walked forward until the snout was hovering right in front of Danny's chest – his core.

The boy shut his eyes. This was it. After all his efforts, all his sacrifices, he was about to get blown apart by a ghost who he was once able to control with Tucker's PDA.

"Don't let him see you cry, Danny. Don't give him the satisfaction." Danny opened his eyes and searched for the source of the voice. Sam Manson stood just to the right of Skulker, although he knew she wasn't really there, he had come to welcome the frequent hallucinations he'd been having of her. They had been coming to him ever since she…left.

His eyes welled with tears, but he bit his lip and stood up as straight as he could, reluctantly tearing his eyes from Sam's large deep purple ones, he looked straight into Skulker's glowing green ones.

"You know what? I'm dying to find out too." He said with dry sarcasm.

Skulker even chuckled as he powered up the gun, Danny watched the green light of the ray grow stronger as a high-pitched sound came from the gun, and the static that emanated from it made his hair stand on end.

This is it, then.

"Goodbye, ghost child." Skulker barely whispered

And then it came, a voice that was everywhere and nowhere, it was right inside everyone's minds, as if it were a conjured up memory of a voice, but too loud and too clear. It was a voice that Danny had heard before.

It echoed through their very beings, their past, present and future – but it was the only voice that didn't echo off the buildings.

"TIME-OUT."