Since this is the last day before my college life starts again and I had nothing to do, I figured this would be a good time to write up another chapter!

Chapter 2 – Negotiations with the Warden

Fenton Headquarters

"Mom? Dad? I'm back home!" Danny called to his parents as he flew through the Fenton Ghost Portal and sealed it behind him. Jack and Maddie Fenton both looked up from whatever experiments they were working on and quickly rushed over to greet their son.

"Danny, m'boy! How did your meeting with Clockwork go?" Jack asked his son eagerly as he hugged him. "Did he teach you something that will make you an even bigger and better Fenton ghost hero than ever before?"

"Not this time, Dad, no," Danny laughed as he shook his head. "It was something else this time around that he needed to talk to me about." He quickly explained how Clockwork had given him his new realm in the Ghost Zone and his plans for turning it into a public location for all to enjoy.

"Danny, that's a really selfless way of sharing your land, and I'm proud of you for coming up for something like that!" Maddie praised when Danny had finished describing his plans. "But…well, I don't know how long this kind of thing will take, but it sounds like it will take a while to make, and some of your enemies could try and attack you while you're busy."

"We could come with Danny and protect him while he makes his home away from home," Jack suggested. "I'll tear apart any ghost who dares to try and hurt by son, molecule by molecule!"

"Jack!" Maddie scolded. "I thought we agreed not to use that kind of language around Danny anymore!"

"Oh, right…" Jack grinned sheepishly. "Sorry, Danny…"

Danny shrugged. "Don't worry about it," he replied nonchalantly, unbothered by his father's choice in language since the context was quite different than it had been in the past. "Though in all honesty, Dad, I think I'll be fine as long as I come prepared."

"Mhm…" Maddie thought for a moment. She believed her son could take care of himself, but there was no way her maternal instincts were going to just let him spend time alone in the Ghost Zone without her and Jack helping him as much as possible first. "You should probably take the Ecto-Skeleton when you go back. It couldn't hurt to have that power boost handy," she suggested.

Jack grinned at Maddie's idea. "Those ghosts are gonna think twice about messing with the great Danny Phantom, Protector of Amity Park, in the highest quality Fenton power armor!" he proclaimed proudly.

"Me? Using the brand new, glitch-free Ecto-Skeleton? With my parents' permission?" Danny shouted excitedly. "Count me in, I'm sure not complaining!"

Maddie laughed. "Glad to see you're so enthusiastic about your new present, Danny," she said before calming down. "But back to business. I was also going to suggest that you try and make an ally out of an enemy or two."

"That's, uh, kinda the whole point of turning my realm into a bar and all those other things I just mentioned," Danny deadpanned.

"Oh, I know that…" his mom explained. "What I'm saying is you should get some ghosts on your side before you try something like this. Your enemies are still your enemies, after all!"

Danny looked questioningly at Maddie. "Do you have any specific ones in mind, mom?"

"If she doesn't, I know just where to look!" Jack declared. "Let's fire up the good ol' Fenton Ghost Database, for all your ghost analyzing needs!"

/

A few minutes later, the three members of the Fenton family were busily scrolling through one of the Fenton lab computers, Maddie and Jack trying to identify ghosts that could be useful as allies for Danny or at least would make things a lot easier if they were no longer enemies.

"Hmmm…" Jack hummed, "here's one. Says here he's one of the most ancient and powerful ghosts in the Zone. How's the Fright Knight sound, eh Danny?"

Danny immediately shook his head fervently. "Oh, no. Ohhhhhhhhhhhh, no. Remember that Ghost King that attacked Amity Park a couple of months back? That was the guy in charge of the invasion. Trust me, dad, trying to negotiate with the Fright Knight is a bad, bad, idea."

Jack grimaced. "No kidding. Okay then, moving on!" He closed out the Fright Knight's file and continued scrolling down the list of names. "No…no…"

"Wait!" Maddie exclaimed, pointing to one of the names at the bottom of the list. "Open up that one!"

Danny read the name on the file. "Walker?"

"Isn't he the warden of some prison or something?" Jack asked.

"Yeah," Danny rolled his eyes. "Enforcer of the rules of the Ghost Zone or something like that. Supposedly he's the guy in charge of "law and order," though half the time he just makes up his own rules to do whatever the heck he wants." Danny smirked, closed his eyes and crossed his arms. "Lucky for me, the ghost elders also gave me exemption from Walker's rules as long as I don't do anything blatantly bad. Oh, it feels good to be the hero!"

"Wait a minute…" Maddie gasped. "That's it! Walker would make a great ally!"

Danny opened his eyes in surprise. "Wait, what?"

"Think about it, Danny!" Maddie explained, her enthusiasm only increasing as she elaborated her plan. "Walker's a pretty important figure in the Ghost Zone, right? You just said it yourself, everyone follows his rules because they don't want to end up in jail! Think about the amount of safety you'd have if you had someone like that backing you up!"

"Son, when it comes to getting things done, there's nothing quite like the iron fist of the law in your corner to give you the boost you need," Jack added. "Maddie, you're a genius!"

Danny was stunned. His parents acted so goofy all the time that he'd completely forgotten that they were actually really intelligent when they needed to be. "There's just a slight problem with that, mom," he held up a finger and pointed it at Walker. "He," he moved to the finger to himself, "and me…we, uh, don't exactly get along. Heck he was the one behind the scheme to make me look like a villain all the way back then. Even though he can't hurt me now, I'm pretty sure he still hates my guts."

"Danny," His dad placed his hand on his son's shoulder. "You were born with the Fenton genius intellect. I'm sure that you'll think of something to get the job done!"

Danny nodded absently, thinking back to all of the times he had had to face off with Walker. As he did so, he realized that he DID know a way he might get on Walker's good side. "Mom? Dad?" he turned to his parents and gave them a calculating grin. "I'm gonna need that new Fenton thermos."

Five Hours Later, Ghost Zone

"I'm hanging around this place a lot more than is probably healthy," Danny thought wryly as he flew towards Walker's Prison. As he did so, he couldn't help but think about Jazz, Sam, and Tucker. He had been tempted to bring them along with him in a Fenton ship, but ultimately decided that it would be best if he went alone. Danny knew that his friends and sister would loyally follow him into Hell itself, but the risk that came with negotiating with Walker was too high for him to call on their help.

The ghost hero frowned as he thought of Sam. They had dated for quite a few months before ultimately splitting up. Danny had thought that Sam would be the perfect girlfriend for him, but he'd soon realized that the relationship just didn't feel right. He'd missed the "best friend" and "battle partner" relationship that he'd had with Sam before they'd dated, and ultimately they decided that the best way to keep their friendship strong was to just bring it back to the way things were.

"Some things just don't work out the way you think they would," Danny mused as Walker's prison came into his line of vision. If everything went according to plan, he wouldn't have Walker breathing down his back while he tried to carry out his plans for his lair.

Walker's Prison

"Sir?"

Walker looked up from the paperwork he had been working on in his office. "What is it, Bullet?"

"It's Phantom, sir. He's in the waiting room of the prison. He says he has some kind of peace offering for you."

Walker snorted in disgust. Phantom might be exempt from his rules thanks to the Elders, but up until now that punk had proven to be nothing but trouble. Still, he hated doing paperwork when the best part of his job was being executioner, executioner, and executioner.

"Whatever this punk's peace offering is," the warden snarled as he got up from his desk, "it better be good."

/

Danny looked up as he heard footsteps coming down the prison corridor. Standing close by were Walker, Bullet, and two of their guards. "Bullet here says you have a peace offering for me, kid," Walker growled. "Whatever your business here is, son, it better be worth my time."

"Oh, it is," the ghost hero promised. "But first, I'm gonna need you to take me to an empty cell." He held out a Fenton Thermos. "You probably don't want me spilling out the contents here."

Walker raised an eyebrow skeptically but gestured for his soldiers to accompany Danny to an empty cell. As soon as one had been opened, Danny opened the thermos and released a frightening-looking ghost monster into the cell. The ghost roared angrily and lunged at the cell entrance, only to be blasted into submission by Walker's soldiers. Danny threw a fist at the criminal's face and sent it flying backward into the cell, before Bullet slammed the cell door shut and locked it up.

"Hey…" one of the soldiers suddenly pointed at the subdued criminal. "Isn't that guy, Nek'Maroth? He was on one of the wanted posters for robbing and destroying ghost lairs.

"Go check!" Walker ordered sharply. One of the soldiers quickly rushed down the hallway towards where Danny assumed the Wanted Posters were located. A few seconds later, the soldier ran back to them, looking excited and breathless.

"That's Nek'Maroth, all right!" the soldier confirmed. He quickly took out a machine and scanned the monster skulking about in the cell. "And the scanners indicate that this isn't a duplicate, it's the real one!"

Walker turned back to Danny, his expression just slightly less hostile than it had been initially. "Well, son, you've just saved us quite a bit of trouble by bringing him in for us," his gaze hardened again. "But not as much trouble as you caused for me in the past, punk! I won't deny you've got the right idea on how to get into my good graces, but I want more than just one criminal in this prison before we start talkin'!"

Danny smirked. "I thought you might say that," he replied nonchalantly. "What makes you think that was the only ghost criminal I caught?"

Before Walker could say anything else, Danny had already walked over to another empty cell and unlocked the thermos again. Another ghost criminal was hurled into the cell by the thermos and promptly beaten down by Bullet and the rest of the prison's guards. The warden could only watch in stunned amazement as Danny filled in a total of fifteen cells with criminals, all listed as extremely dangerous and violent beings from the prison's Wanted list.

Bullet quickly scanned all of the criminals' ecto-signatures to make sure the captives were the real deal. "The boy did it, warden! He caught fifteen criminals straight from the Wanted list by himself, no doubt about it!"

Danny smirked. "My parents upgraded the Fenton thermos so that it can capture more ghosts and more powerful ghosts at once," he explained offhandedly. "They also made it so that it simply evaporates duplicates instead of sucking them in, that's how I was able to tell if the criminals were trying to trick me into capturing a fake."

For several moments, Walker just stood there, completely unable to say a word. Then, suddenly, a grin started to spread across his face. "I never thought I'd say this, son, but maybe you're not quite as much a thorn in my side as I'd originally thought. You sure know how to deal with this lawless scum. Go cross off the captured criminals' wanted posters," he ordered one of the soldiers.

Danny shrugged, "Eh, I just do what I do best."

Walker nodded before suddenly his eyes narrowed. "I got a gut feeling that you aren't doing this just out of the goodness out of your heart, boy. What exactly do you want from me?"

Danny quickly explained how he had gotten his new realm and the plans he had for how he was going to develop it. Walker was about to interrupt him at the mention of a bar but Danny stopped him. "Don't worry, Walker. There's going to be rules, and I'm gonna make sure they're followed."

"And you need me to make sure those rules are enforced, is that right, punk?" Walker inferred.

"Well, I don't need to depend on your help entirely," Danny answered, "but having someone with experience in beating down troublemakers around…well, it certainly wouldn't hurt."

Walker thought for a moment, then nodded. "I'll admit things around the prison can get a bit boring when there's nobody to catch," he decided. "I'll see what I can do. In the meantime, make sure you don't cause me any problems, punk, and you won't get any from me. Deal?"

"Deal!" Danny agreed enthusiastically, shaking the warden's hand. "Thanks again, Walker!"

The prison warden nodded, before remembering something. "By the way, kid, that mangy mutt Wulf got a pardon from Clockwork," he informed him. "He's hanging around Pandora's realm, if you care enough to go find him. I sure as hell don't anymore."

"All right, thanks for the heads-up, Walker!" Danny called back as he flew out of the prison. Walker smirked as he looked back at the criminals trapped in his prison.

"Name's Walker," he introduced himself to his new charges with a sadistic grin. "Know it, fear it, obey it! Today I'll be your judge, executioner, jury, executioner, jailer, and if necessary, your executioner!"

Pandora's Realm

"Hey, Pandora!" Danny shouted as he approached the Acropolis of Athens. "Are you in there?"

The armored ghost elder quickly materialized above her maze, smiling gently as she watched Danny approach. "Hello there, Danny! I trust that Clockwork informed you about your new lair?"

"He sure did!" Danny grinned. "Right now, though, I'm looking for an old friend of mine. Have you seen Wulf around?"

"He's right here!" Pandora reached down into her maze and picked up the Esperanto-speaking wolf ghost. "In fact he's been hoping to see you again for some time."

"Friend!" Wulf rushed forward and locked Danny in a tight embrace. "It is good to see you again!"

"Nice to see you too!" Danny replied in flawed but acceptable Esperanto. "I can't wait to show you my new realm! You can make your home there, if you want, you'll always be welcome!"

"I can't wait!" Wulf replied as Danny said his good-byes and thanks to Pandora. The two of them traveled onward, exchanging talk on how their lives had been going since they'd last seen each other.

"A very nice, large territory!" Wulf commented once the two of them had arrived at Danny's floating island. "Though it looks like there's not much to it right now."

Danny grinned at Wulf. "Not for long, friend. Not for long. Let's get going, Wulf, we have a lot of work to do!"

/

And that's the second chapter! It was actually fairly hard for me to write Jack's dialogue, though I think I did a decent job of keeping him in character. Maddie was a bit easier since from what I gathered from her personality she's the more level-headed and intellectual of the two Fenton parents.

Since Walker can't capture Danny anymore I figured that he'd take what he can get from the ghost hero. If Danny wants to help him capture criminals, why would he say no?

I know that Ember hasn't shown up in the fic yet, but don't worry. She'll be appearing starting the next chapter.