I DON'T OWN DANNY PHANTOM OR MASS EFFECT
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Danny watched as he was surrounded by five strange beings with mucus-like skin and had four eyes each. They all had strange weapons and wore blue armor with white dots surrounded by white circles. The hybrid would have thought them ghosts if it weren't for one thing; his ghost sense failed to go off. He knew that wherever and whenever he was thrown definitely wasn't the ghost zone, meaning if he wanted to, he could simply phase through the ground and away from the things he could only describe as alien. But Danny knew he couldn't do that for two main reasons; one, he didn't know if they were expecting ghosts and he had already learned to NEVER underestimate an opponent. And two, if he left them, he would have to find a different way to find information. Phantom let them lead him down a long hallway then through a door that revealed a stadium-like building. As they approached, Danny saw images of blue strippers with tentacles for hair dancing on the front. "Guys, if you wanted more customers, than holding them at gunpoint is not a sound business plan."
"Shut up and move." One of the alien's pushed his gun into Danny's back. That one act was enough to force the hybrid's instincts to take over. Danny spun around to grab the weapon from the alien that poked him, then swung him and the weapon until releasing both into two different aliens. Phantom followed up with a ghost ray to the face of the alien on the furthermost right. By the time Danny had his powers charged up for another blast, his rational mind took back over and he saw where he was. He withdrew his hand and let the creatures get back to their feet.
"Uh..First show's on me." Danny offered, gloved hands sheepishly rising in the air in surrender. The aliens said nothing in response, only created more distance between them and him and kept weapons steady on his form. 'Way to go, idiot. Now they see you as a threat.' From there, the only sound was the growing volume of music coming from the club. The hybrid had to control the urge to not laugh at the incredulous expressions the patrons wore as they passed through the club. As they were walking, Danny saw several different looking life-forms. Along with the four-eyes, and blue women, the building was also filled with bug-like creatures who's skin looked remarkably like bones. He probably would have noticed the humans, if the gunmen didn't cock their weapons every time he moved his head away from their intended path. They lead him past two flights of stairs to a couch where a blue woman was sitting. Unlike all the other blue women Phantom had seen so far, this one was wearing actual clothes as compared to the stripper garb.
"I must admit, you did something not many can. You surprised me." The blue woman said, playing a holographic video of Danny quickly defeating the gunmen before they could react, only to let himself be captured.
"My pleasure to entertain." Danny said with a mock bow, mostly to keep them off balance. The four-eyed aliens shared looks with each other, ones that obviously said something around the lines of, 'This guy must have a Death Wish.' Meanwhile the female alien just wore a dark smile.
"Do you have any idea who I am?" She asked.
"The only woman here that isn't a stripper?"
"I'm Aria." She told him. Danny knew that probably meant something, but he had to find out what it meant exactly.
"Aria? Aria? Hmm...wait! Now I remember you. You were the one who– Ah, who I'm kidding? Do you own this place?"
"Do I own Omega?" The blue woman turned to stare at the floor from where her perch sat all the way to the front door that Danny entered through. "I AM OMEGA." She signaled one of her henchmen forward. Danny stepped back with eyes widened when a orange holographic gauntlet appeared over the four-eyed alien's wrist, earning a few snickers from the four-eyed aliens and even an amused smile from Aria. "Better question. Who are you?" She asked.
"I'm a species known as human."
Aria laughed in a manner that made the gunmen tense their hold on the weapons and forced Danny to fight the urge to ready a ghost ray. "Since you are one of the few people to surprise me, I'll make you a deal not many get. If you go take care of a certain inconvenience I've been having, I'll let you live."
"And what exactly, is this 'inconvenience'?" Danny asked, not liking nor trusting the tone she used to describe it.
"Take him directly to the drop point." She directed the four-eyed aliens. They lead him to a blue car with another four-eyed alien, also wearing a blue and white suit. Waiting outside the car were three others. There was a dinosaur-like creature and a lizard creature with buggy eyes. Standing between them was a human man in black armor with red streaks traveling up his arms. A N7 stamped on his chest.
"This kid has been assigned to go with you to deal with Archangel." The escorting alien said to the other four-eyed alien.
"Where's his armor? His weapons?" The four-eyed pilot asked.
"Aria sent him."
The eyes of all, save the ghost and escorting alien, widened after hearing the woman's name. "Waiting for you, kid." With no other choice, Danny took the seat. The human turned his attention to the hybrid.
"Why would Aria send someone like you to fight Archangel?"
"If I had to guess, she has no sense of humor." Danny said, "She was also kinda vague. Who's Archangel? And why would she want people after him?"
"Archangel is a vigilante that has been getting in the way of the mercenaries profits." He already knew the Aria chick was bad, but he now knew who was the good guy. And what he had to do. No matter what, Archangel had to be saved. The rest of the trip was pretty quiet, leaving Danny no closer to figuring out where the portal had thrown him. But then again, how does one ask about things others think of as natural?
Before long, the group landed and the lizard, human, dinosaur team had separated from Danny. A part of Phantom wanted to go ahead and use his powers to protect the person from the mercenaries, but he couldn't without exposing himself to the pilot, who appears to have been assigned to make sure he didn't try to run. So he had to use the oldest excuse in his arsenal. "Mind leaving me alone? I seriously have to use the restroom." Danny said, glad he finally got the chance to move. Phantom flew out of the restroom and landed right behind the 'vigilante'.
"You're either Archangel or the unluckiest person I've ever met." Startled by the sudden voice coming from behind him, Archangel rounded to aim his sniper rifle at the ghost teen. By the time the gun fired, Danny had managed to gain the intangible & invisible combo, making the bullet pass through air and crack the wall.
"Show yourself." Archangel yelled, scanning for the mysterious arrival.
"Put the gun down first."
"Why don't you show yourself first?" Deciding that he had nothing to lose, Danny let himself become visible. But he knew better than to release his intangibility or revealing his flight to Archangel. "How did you get past all my defenses?"
"You wouldn't believe me if I told you."
"Try me." Phantom was about to spout some lie about how he was air dropped or something to that effect, but stopped when he saw the mercenaries running across the bridge.
"How about we fight mercenaries now and fight each other later." Danny allowed Archangel to dispatch the mercenaries coming from across the bridge while he invisibly phased through the floor. He landed on the ground and blasted a solitary merc in the face with a weakened ghost ray, instantly knocking him out.
"They're working with Archangel!" Someone yelled. 'How did they see me?' He thought, but than saw the remaining mercenaries point their weapons at the group he rode with. Figuring since Aria and her guards weren't too surprised by his ecto energy, Danny charged his hands and blasted at every mercenary in sight, releasing his invisibility as he did. More were coming from the bridge, too many for Archangel to take on all by himself. In response, Phantom pooled his ectoplasm into his center and pushed it to the surface, resulting in a powerful green wave knocking back all the mercenaries back to the starting point, along with the crates some had been using as cover. Most of the mercenaries were knocked out, but some of them were able to rush to the safety of the far side of the bridge. With no more enemies coming, the halfa phased back to the floor with Archangel. Danny watched as the team he rode with walked through the now unopened door.
"Archangel?" The human asked, obviously the leader of the three. Instead of turning around, the vigilante fired a shot at mercenary that poked his head over the barricade. He then turned to face the the three and removed his helmet, revealing a bony alien with a high-tech targeting eye piece.
"Shepard." He sat down, weapon lowered. "I thought you were dead."
"Garrus? What are you doing here?"
"Just keeping my skills sharp with some target practice."
"OK, will someone please explain what's going on?" Danny revealed himself. All guns were quickly aimed at him, but the human lowered his weapon once he recognized the person.
"You're that kid that blasted away the mercs." The human lowered his gun, which in turn, made the aliens lower theirs.
"First off, I'm 20 years old i.e. Not a kid. Second, What the heck is going on? I thought you were here to kill him."
"We're actually here to recruit him. And after seeing you, I think you would make a good addition to the team."
"A team up? For what?"
"We're fighting the Collectors." The human, Shepard, answered.
"Collectors?"
"They have been abducting human colonies, and they may be working with the Reapers."
Collectors? Reapers? It's been close to two hours and Danny was even more confused then when he first left the ghost zone. The word 'abductions' automatically cemented Danny's assistance, but he couldn't waste his chance to get some answers. "I'm in. On one condition."
"What's that?"
"You answer ALL my questions."
"Agreed."
"There won't be any deals if we don't figure a way out of here. The bridge funnels them, and it would do the same for us." Garrus announced, his scope fixed on the bridge. Suddenly, he had an idea and turned back to the ghost. "You never did answer my question. How did you get in?"
"I..uh...found a small hole in the basement. Too small for any of you." Shepard looked at the bug-eyed lizard, who pulled up a gauntlet exactly like the one Danny had seen while talking to Aria and her thugs.
"I'll give you another chance to answer the question. Either tell the truth or a more convincing lie." Shepard turned back to the hybrid.
"I scaled the wall while invisible." Danny said, adding in what he hoped was an innocent smile. Shepard turned back to the gauntlet user. The creature was pressing buttons wildly, zooming in on the heart of a holographic form that Danny assumed was supposed to be him. "Okay, you got me. I'm a ghost."
"Ghost? As in not living anymore?" Garrus asked.
"Unless you know of a second definition."
"Impossible. A malfunction? No, just calibrated. Are you creating interference? No, no other signs of disturbance. Biotics masking—?" The creature rattled off at speeds Danny was having trouble keeping up with.
"Whoa, whoa. Dude, lay off the caffeine." Danny stopped the alien.
"So you could get all of us out of here?" Shepard asked.
"I can only carry two at a time." That was a lie. Danny had been able to create duplicates of himself for close to three years and, at last count, could make up to 20 or 30 copies. But until he knew who to trust, Danny didn't want to volunteer away too many of his powers. Besides, Garrus has defended himself against the mercenaries long enough for the criminals to unite, a very difficult feat. It's not like he would suddenly be overwhelmed and killed before Danny could return.
"Take Mordin and Grunt. I'll stay back to help Garrus."
Danny chuckled and turned to the fast-talking alien. "Your name's Grunt?"
"You have a problem with MY name?" The dinosaur made an intimidating step to the ghost. Or at least it would have been to someone who hadn't fought and defeated enemies that could eat the Jurassic alien for breakfast. Still, it'd be better to not let them know he's not scared right off the bat.
"Uh, let's get going." Danny grabbed both of their arms and jumped up to pull all three of them through the concrete. He flew them away until he was sure they could escape incase the mercenaries saw them. Once they landed, Grunt held his arms in front of his face and Mordin's eyes somehow widened further than they had already.
"How?" Mordin asked. Before Danny could reiterate his being a ghost, Mordin changed his focus to the gauntlet and started running off possibilities, followed shortly by why those reasons couldn't be it. Deciding that it would be pointless to try convince the alien that ghosts were real, Danny became invisible again to hide his flight back to the warehouse.
"I would have thought invisibility and intangibility would make things go quicker." Garrus said.
"You ever try carrying a dinosaur and a human lizard while two miles underground? Not easy." Danny joked. They were all frozen when they heard a mechanical sound approaching.
"Die Archangel!" A pilot said through intercoms positioned on the exterior, guns aimed through the window. Acting off instinct, Danny threw up his arms to project a force field to protect the remaining group from weapon fire. Bullets burst into the room, only to bounce off the green wall. The hybrid was caught off guard when the pilot launched a missile, sending him against the wall, while also scattering shrapnel. Garrus went down and Shepard approached the downed alien. Danny saw the trouble the two were in and flew through the cockpit, instantly taking over the four-eyed pilot. Now in control of the craft, Danny flew them over an abandoned looking warehouse.
"This thing went out of control and I barely escaped." Danny said through the alien's mouth, before getting an idea. "Archangel's dead." He added before flying them both to view the vehicle crash. He got back to the warehouse in enough time to see Shepard and Garrus getting in a small blue flying car. It took off before Danny could become visible. Deciding to get a better view of where the team was stationed, the ghost followed. Once he saw the small blue flying car board with a large jet of some kind, Danny phased through the larger ship's wall. He stayed invisible until he found Shepard in an elevator. "Is Garrus alright?" The hybrid asked as he let himself become visible.
"He's in the infirmary." Shepard revealed.
"I'm sorry." Danny said, silently wondering how he could have done better.
"Don't worry, Garrus is one tough son of a gun. He'll get up, ready to get back into the field." Danny couldn't be sure, but he thought he could hear some uncertainty in his voice. Before the white-haired man could respond, Shepard changed the subject. "I have some issues to overlook, but come around and I'll answer those questions. In the mean time, feel free to explore the Normandy." The commander said before exiting the elevator on a large room with a orange hologram of the vessel at the center of it. Deciding to accept the offer, Danny phased through the floor and invisibly explored the ship. Eventually rounding to the floor Shepard had stopped on. He found himself in a room with a blue holographic ball and a man sitting in front of some controls. He was about to leave, when he saw they were leaving the dock where the structure was parked. He pushed forward until they were in the night sky. Danny noticed the sky was different than usual, and it only took a few seconds for the hero to realize why.
"Are we in space?" Danny almost yelled, not bothering to hide his excitement. His face pressed against the windshield as he released his invisibility.
"Gah-" the pilot jumped in his chair. After a few seconds, the pilot got over the shock and turned to the holographic image of a sphere, where he said, "Tell the commander I found Phantom."
"Shepard would like to talk to you in the briefing room." A electronic, female voice answered. Seeing the clueless expression on the ghost's face, the pilot explained how to get there. Seeing Danny fly through the wall straight to the designated room, Joker turned to EDI to say, "Bet that saves him a lot of time."
"Wanted to see me?" Danny answered, poking his head from the ceiling. Once he did, he saw Shepard with a red haired woman, Garrus, now featuring a scar that made people want to back off, and most notably, Danny took notice of a black haired woman in a form fitting catsuit.
"You aren't the only one with questions." The black haired woman answered in an English accent.
"Name: Phantom comma Danny. Rank: Superhero. Age: Depends on how you count it." The hybrid answered, purposely to mess with them. The woman's mouth took on a scowl while both Garrus and the red head were hiding their smiles. But Shepard openly laughed at the expression the woman wore.
"You must excuse Miranda. I understand that you want answers, but there are also questions I must ask. First, what're you capable of doing?"
"Oh, so now the standard ghost powers aren't good enough?" The commander dropped the smile.
"There are lives at risk. And full knowledge on what you can do could help save many lives."
"You already saw the standard ghost powers and the ghost ray when recruiting archangel here." Danny jerked his head at the alien to illustrate the base he meant, "But there's also possession aka overshadowing and ice powers." The young hero made sure not to talk about the ghostly wail or his ability to shift between alive and dead.
"You mean like Shepard's cryo ammo?" Miranda asked.
"Not unless he can do this." Danny responded, closing then opening his hands to reveal an ice crystal, which he gave to Miranda. Her eyes widened at seeing the crystal, but she was quick to bring herself back to reality.
"Earlier you identified yourself as a superhero. Why?" The red head asked.
"Because 'person with superpowers who fights super powered villains on a regular basis' takes too long to say, and doesn't look as good on a coffee mug."
"You fight super villains? I bet that means you have some interesting stories." Garrus said.
"You have no idea." The session of question the ghost continued. As the red head, Kelly Chambers as he learned, asked questions, Danny found he recognized the analytical questions were similar to the ones Jazz practiced on him during her Psychology course. He didn't want them to adjust to someone who knew of the science and let them think he was answering without knowing what Chambers was doing.
He wasn't surprised to learn he had traveled over a hundred years, but did find out the names of the species he already met, heard some stories from the original crew's hunt for Saren, and some of the species he has yet to run into. 'An entire woman species? Races of sentient robots? And technological implants? Sounds like Tucker's dreamworld.' The hero thought, the anger of losing everyone reminding him why he was in the ghost zone in the first place. He lost track of Vlad and now he was able to help people, both of which ensured he was stuck onboard for sometime. Phantom made up a lie about ghosts needing places to manifest to cross between the human and ghost realms. The ship's artificial intelligence, EDI, had recommended the port observation deck after seeing his reaction to being in space. The hero flew directly there and was told to rest up for the next mission. After landing in his new room, Danny wasted no time in creating an ice wall to separate him from anyone who might be looking.