"Hey guys!" Tucker ran out of his house as he saw his two best friends approaching from the window. "Are you as excited as I am for today?"
"Are you kidding, Tuck?" Danny was surprised, "Since when is going back to school a good thing?"
"Danny, Danny, Danny" Tucker shook his head pityingly, "since I became Mayor and since everyone knows my best friend is Danny Phantom of course! How are the babes going to resist this smokin' piece of work now?" He grinned broadly at Danny who grinned back. Sam groaned.
"You have got to be kidding me." She rolled her eyes. "Why would you even want to be with a girl who only liked you for something like that?"
"Sam, leave me to my romantic worries and I'll leave you to yours," Tucker smirked mischievously, "you're the one who's going to be fighting off hoards of girls who'll all want to kill you for taking the Phantom off the market!"
"Like I'd let that happen!" Danny interjected.
"You may not have a choice, whelp." Danny, Sam, and Tucker all whipped around to face the booming voice.
"Skulker." Danny addressed the bounty hunter as he quickly went ghost. "What are you doing here?"
"I told you that I'd never stop hunting you." Skulker's bright green eyes flashed. "And you've finally shown a weakness."
"A weakness?" Danny scoffed. "You're wrong. I've been training – I'm stronger than ever!"
"You've developed a hole in your armor, ghost child." Skulker grinned and swung up a gun inhumanly fast. Danny instinctively dived away as the net shot towards him.
"HA!" Danny cried, "Missed me! You should work on your aim, Hunter."
"I wasn't aiming at you, whelp." Said Skulker as he flew down and collected his net, which held a struggling Sam. "You forgot to protect your heart!"
"SAM!" Fury clouded Danny's vision and balls of ectoplasmic energy came unbidden to his hands. "You have TEN SECONDS to let her go or I'll blast you out of the universe, Skulker!"
"Don't be rash, now." Skulker aimed a menacing looking weapon at Sam even as he locked eyes with Danny. "You wouldn't want my finger to slip and vaporize your little girlfriend, now would you?"
Danny shook with rage. "I'd destroy you in three seconds if you did."
"But she'd still be gone wouldn't she?" Skulker let the weight of his statement sink in for a moment, watched the horror and fear set in on Danny. Then he tossed something at Danny's feet. "I'm reasonable, Daniel. I'm willing to accept a trade."
"A trade?" Danny picked up the object, which appeared to be glowing green handcuffs.
"You for her." Skulker's eyes were glued on the halfa and triumph played across his robotic face. "Those handcuffs will short out your ghost powers. Put them on and I'll let her go. You've avoided my capture long enough, come take your place in a cage in my zoo."
"Don't do it, Danny!" Tucker shouted "He's bluffing!"
Danny took a deep shuddering breath. "I…I can't take that risk, Tucker." He slowly opened the handcuffs, squared his shoulders and looked up at Skulker. "All right, Skulker. It's a dea-"
"-DANNY!" He locked eyes with Sam for just an instant before she swung her arm, fell through the net and plummeted towards the ground.
Danny didn't even need to think. His body reacted, and in a flash he was hurtling towards Sam far faster than he had ever moved before. Before the handcuffs he had dropped hit the floor, Danny's arms wrapped around Sam and stopped her fall.
"Nice catch, Danny, thanks." She said a little shakily, as he flew her over to Tucker and gently set her down.
"You two stay safe." Danny ordered, his attention fixed on "Skulker!" Danny relished the look of terror that was plastered across the bounty hunter's face. "You don't have your insurance now! Do you want to guess how this turns out?"
"Uhhhhh…" Skulker glanced around desperately for a route of escape, but before he could even take a step, Danny blasted him with an ectoplasmic ghost ray so powerful that Skulker's cyber suit was reduced to dust.
"My suit!" Skulker the tiny ghost blob shrieked. Before he could utter another word, however, Danny threw an intense blast of cold that froze the little creature solid. Finally, with a deep breath, Danny let loose a terrifying ghost wail. It slammed into the ice sculpture and sent it flying beyond the horizon.
"Holy…" Tucker managed as he and Sam rushed over to Danny, who was breathing heavily and beginning to calm down. "Dude, that was incredible!" Danny gave him a small smile, but quickly turned with concern towards his girlfriend.
"Sam, are you okay? Did he hurt you? How did you manage to get out of that!"
"I'm fine. Really." She assured him. "He was so focused on you, he wasn't even watching what I was doing. Luckily my grandmother gave me this for my birthday." She held up a small Swiss army knife. "It's got a tiny knife in it, and I was able to saw through the net. I guess he didn't want to waste an ecto-net on a human; it was just made of rope!"
"But weren't you scared that…? I mean, when you fell I-"
"I knew you'd catch me." She reached out and touched Danny's face tenderly. He covered her hand with his own.
"But what if I hadn't made it?"
"I knew you would, and you did."
"You couldn't have known, Sam! You could have been killed. Do you know what that would have done to me?" He gazed at her intently, trying to impress his point.
"Oh, so I should just have let you walk right into Skulker's zoo?" She pulled away in irritation. "Do you know what that would have done to me? You know I'm not some damsel in distress, Danny. Give me some credit!" She looked at Danny, and softened at the pain in his eyes. She went back to him and grasped his hand. "And I did know you'd catch me. I trust you. You've never let me down."
"Yet." Danny amended. "What if I will, Sam?"
"You won't." She said simply and with the conviction that Danny loved her for. "And Danny…" she hesitated, a slight blush coloring her cheeks, "…what you were going to do for me back there. I mean… … thanks."
"Sam, I-"
"Hey guys…?" Tucker interrupted. "Not to break up your lovefest or anything, but if we don't run now, we're going to be seriously late for the first day of school."
Danny glanced at his watch. "Oh man. Well, I can cut down our travel time at least!" With that, he grabbed Sam and Tucker's hands and took off in the direction of Casper High.
