The next chapter is here, Enjoy!

I went back and rewrote this chapter. Rewrites for future chapters are coming soon.

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Danny Phantom:(

Waking up in the morning knowing you have to go to school is pure torture. –unknown

My body jolted up with a start. I frantically looked around at my surroundings, disoriented by the change of scenery. The metal walls and artificial light had been replaced with my NASA poster and sunlight streaming through my bedroom window. The memory of condensation running down the glass walls as my body seemed to burn from the inside out ran through my mind, but the cold sweat that drenched my pajamas made it seem like just a nightmare. But it had felt so real. I shakily got up from my bed, and tried to process the events of last night. Had it just been a dream? My parched throat and shaky body seemed to suggest otherwise.

"Get up Danny, you'll be late for…wow, you look horrible." Jazz had appeared in my doorway, but gave me a double-take as she took in my appearance.

"I just had a bad dream, that's all," I replied, before Jazz could say anything else. I mentally face palmed as I realized this would just cause her to worry more.

"You know, if you want to talk about your dream we can. It could mean something…," Jazz continued, going on and on about my health. She has read way too many psychology books.

I finally managed to slip past Jazz and head to the kitchen. I filled a glass with water and shakily brought it to my lips as soon as it was filled to the brim. I savored the coolness as the liquid soothed my parched throat, and once the steady stream of water abated, I quickly refilled the glass. Despite my desire for more, I refrained from drinking another cup when I heard Jazz descending the stairs. After her suspicion about my nightmare, she would find it odd that I was drinking so much water. I'm sure she would give me a lecture about some psychological finding that she managed to uncover from the depths of the internet about the aftereffects of nightmares or something. Although, the fact that I had to hide my thirst seemed to point to the fact that something might really be wrong. I may not know if last night was real, but it sure felt like it. My throat still burned, and the house seemed to be unnaturally hot this morning.

"Danny, you need to hurry up, you're going to make us late!" Jazz was peeking her head over the top of the refrigerator door. Her mission to prevent me from being late to school two days in a row seemed to have interrupted her futile search for edible food, as well as my thought process.

"Geez, no need to worry, I'm just going to take a quick shower and then I'll be ready." I sent an eye roll her way. "Just chill for a second."

She gave me an annoyed glance before looking at the refrigerator dejectedly and slamming the door shut. "Just hurry up."

I ran up the stairs and grabbed my usual outfit before heading to the bathroom and starting the shower. I turned the handle all the way to the left before rethinking that decision and angled it towards the blue side. The cool water felt amazing as it soothed my burning skin. This was not normal. I've had nightmares before, but this was something entirely different and possibly ghostly. Before I could think more about it, I heard Jazz yell something unintelligible through the door. That was my cue to hurry. I reluctantly shut the water off and toweled myself off as quickly as I could. When I ran down the stairs, I could see the Jazz had already started the car and was tapping her fingers impatiently on the steering wheel. Well, we can't all be morning people like her, especially when ghost fights seemed to follow me like the plague at all hours of the night.

Nothing exciting happened once I got to school, except for me having to make up a few missed tests from yesterday (not that taking tests is, in any way, exciting). At lunch I talked with Sam and Tuck, but didn't let on that anything was worrying me. I wasn't even sure what happened, so I had my doubts about telling them before I could come up with a sensible explanation. If it happened again, they would be the first to know, but until then I didn't want them to worry.

Besides Mr. Lancer being exceptionally happy that I was on time for class, nothing out of the ordinary happened. Despite my lack of tardiness, my lack of attention made some of Lancer's happiness diminish, but the events of last night were all I could think about. The more I went over it in my head, the more I knew that it really happened. As the class ended, I came to a conclusion. The question wasn't if it happened, it was why it happened.

Sam and Tuck where waiting for me in the hall, but I gave them a weak excuse about catching up on schoolwork before I went straight home to search for answers. When I arrived at the house I dropped my backpack on the floor and made it as far as the lab door before some unseen force knocked me down. I placed my hand on the back of my head where it had collided with the hardwood floor. I looked up, squinting my eyes in pain, and saw a six foot wall of orange rubber staring back at me.

"Sorry Danny, you can't come down right now, your mother is very busy with an invention. She even kicked me out! Well, see you Danny, I'm going to get some fudge."

That figures. My search for answers began with a possible concussion and a bruised tailbone. I peered through the doorway to the basement, but I couldn't see anything from the top of the stairs. I couldn't just waltz down the stairs to see if there actually was a containment unit taking up one of the corners, especially with my Dad guarding the door. For all I know, my mom could be working on some horrible invention that she would use on me later. It didn't look like I was going to get any answers today.

As I was picking myself up off the floor, the doorbell rang. Seeing as my dad was busy stuffing his face with fudge, and my mom didn't appear to be coming up from the lab anytime soon, it looked like I was the only one willing to answer the door. I opened the door and caught sight of silver hair and a black suit, and I tried to slam the door closed, but the newcomer must have sensed my annoyance and slammed his hand against the door before I could pull it back any further. The now fully open door gave me a full view of Vlad's mischievous grin. I groaned internally, before steeling myself for the upcoming conversation.

"Daniel, how nice to see you!" Vlad said with fake cheerfulness. "There's no need to rush this wonderful visit."

"V-MAN!" my dad shouted as he came up behind me, fudge covering the outside of his mouth.

"Jack…" Vlad trailed off, his smile fading," I just came here to invite you over to my house for the four day weekend Daniel and Jasmine have off school."

I had completely forgotten about that. I could barely keep track of what day of the week it was, much less worry about school that I probably would have missed half of anyway. Today was only Wednesday, but that means I could catch up on sleep and maybe attempt to complete my pile of missing homework during the days off. This would normally be a happy occasion, but if I have to go to Vlad's mansion, I'd rather just suffer through school instead. What's he doing following my school calendar so closely anyway. This definitely feels like the start of one of his evil schemes. But then again, everything he does seems evil.

"So, where is Maddie?" Vlad asked. Well, he got right to the point, I should have known that he was here for her.

"She's in the lab working on something and will need to stay here for a few days, so I guess it's just you, me, and the kids!" Dad said excitedly. He was as oblivious as ever.

Vlad looked less than thrilled to hear that, but he couldn't take back the offer now, although that would have been preferable in my opinion. But my dad wouldn't have listened anyway. "Well, I'll be up in my room, while you talk about the trip," I said, attempting to get as far away from Vlad as I could. As I entered the room, I couldn't help but look longingly at the soft, silky sheets and cozy comforter that covered my bed. I closed my blinds and pulled my curtains closed, trying to achieve maximum darkness. The afternoon sunlight still managed to seep through a few cracks, but my room could still be considered somewhat dark. Vlad's a problem for a less sleep-deprived Danny. As soon as I hit my pillow, my eyelids closed and my restless night caught up to me. I was asleep within seconds.

I woke up as an uncomfortable orange glow permeated my eyelids. When I opened my eyes, bright lights caused my pupils to constrict painfully. I tried to move my arms, but I felt metal pressing against my wrists. My legs seemed to weigh my body down. As my eyes adjusted to the light, I looked down and saw that I was hanging from the wall of the containment unit, my wrists held by chains. I tried to phase through them, but nothing happened. After a few minutes of struggling, a hole opened up in one of the glass sides of the containment unit, and my mom walked through.

"Lucky for you, the device I designed to keep you here will only works for a limited time. I plan to fix that soon, but in the meantime I want some answers." Her face was expressionless.

I watched as she slipped her hand behind her back. She looked as if she was taking something out of her back pocket. To my dismay, she produced what looked like a remote, with an extremely obvious red button in the middle.

"What a cliché," I groaned.

"Interesting, you must still have memories from being a human. That will come in handy."

Ugh, me and my big mouth. I would say it's going to get me in trouble, but it's too late for that.

"First question, why do you fight your own kind?" she asked.

"Oh, we're starting already? I forgot to bring notecards." That is so not what I meant to say. Or maybe it was. It depends on what the red button does.

"Cut the crap, Phantom. I don't have time for your foolish games. The stakes are high this time."

"The way I see it, this works in my favor. Didn't you say you were on a time limit?" Her eyes flashed with anger, and I could see her finger hover over the button. Again, wrong thing to say. It wouldn't hurt to answer one little, harmless question, would it? The look Mom gave me convinced me. "So I can protect the people of this town." I said it with as much conviction as I could muster. But she had heard this defense before, has seen it discussed on the local news. She looked down at the red button for a moment and put her finger on it, but didn't push it. She didn't like my answer, but she decided to go onto the next question, instead of dwelling on it.

"How long have you been a ghost?" she asked.

"A little longer than a year."

"How did you die?"

I didn't know if I wanted to tell her that or not. If I say electrocution, she might start connecting the dots back to my human half when I turned on the ghost portal. Before I had a chance to decide what to say, her hand tensed around the remote and her finger had pushed the red button down. A few moments later, electricity was conducted through the chains that held me to the wall. I felt pain course through my body, starting at my hands and travelling through my body. My fingernails dug into my palm as I clenched my fists. In my mind, I was replaying the night I turned on the portal. This was the same pain, but to a lesser extent. It felt like hot knives digging into every part of me. I couldn't escape the pain. I started screaming at one point, and my mom apparently thought I had had enough. I let my head hang down after it stopped, my mind replaying the scene over and over again. My own mom electrocuted me. Right at that moment, the thought crossed my mind about revealing who I really was so she wouldn't torture me anymore. I quickly decided I wouldn't, who knows how she would react if I told her. She didn't exactly seem sane right now.

She asked another question, but all I could hear was my head pounding and blood rushing through my ears. All I could do was think about getting out of here. I frantically looked around to find a way to escape, but everything seemed like it was going in slow motion. Mom headed towards the opening in the glass, and each footstep felt like an eternity. After a disorienting few minutes – or hours, it was hard to tell – I blacked out, exhausted by the painful and sleepless night, or afternoon, or whatever the hell time it was.

I woke up to the same disorienting scene as the morning before. But this time I knew with a dreadful certainty that this was very real. And very wrong. My throat was sore from screaming, there was a metallic taste in my mouth, and there was dried blood on my hands where my fingernails had pierced my skin. It was all from the electrocution. I felt numb all over. On top of all that, I had to go to drag myself out of bed and attempt to survive school today.

When I got there, I arrived in a daze. As I was walking towards the entrance, I spotted Sam and Tucker. I started to head over to them to tell them what happened when I heard a voice behind me call out.

"Hello, Daniel." I cringed. Daniel, that's never a good sign. I turned around to see Vlad walking toward me with smug grin on his face.

Thank you to everyone who is taking their time to read this! I hoped you like the chapter. In these kind of fanfics I know electrocution is used a lot, but I needed to add it in for some events in later chapters. The next chapter will be up in a few days.