"The Ghostly Wail... it's that moment when you realize that it's all over. There's nothing you can do as you get hammered by a supersonic attack. But being smashed like a tidal wave isn't the worse part, no, the worst part is the moan that echoes as you're being hit. That moan just saps the life right out of you, all the vitality and energy you have. You just feel hopeless, and you are when you hear it. All the pain, all sorts of horrible emotions, it just boils right up and takes over. Does wonders for morale..."
- Private Alexander Jacobs, GIW Light Infantryman and survivor of the Skirmish of Amity Park, giving testimony to experiencing the Ghostly Wail
XXX
Chapter 4
Elmerton Apartments
Twenty three. Twenty three humans dead. But can you really take part in destroying a human? Apparently, she just did. Twenty three of them, in fact. Valerie was lying on her bed, staring at the ceiling, surrounded by her messy array of information on various ghosts (including an old wanted poster for Danny mostly obscured by more recent bulletins), and a small weapon's footlocker where she locked up all her guns when not in use, though it was unlocked at the moment.
"Come on girl, he said himself he was trying to keep it from happening, and you didn't pull the trigger..." Valerie muttered to herself. Destroying ghosts was one thing for her; she was pretty sure that they reformed somewhere in the Ghost Zone anyways. After all, how did you kill something that was already dead? But seeing the Ghostly Wail, seeing Danny kill, had troubled her. Sure, all the medical officials not on the GIW paycheck were saying that the actual causes of death was stuff like a rag dolled tank tread landing on someone's neck, but she was no fool: Danny caused it.
And she had spotted for him, telling him when the GIW had funneled into the attack where the area of effect would be most devastating. Even if the courts ruled that it as self defense or some similar ruling in the inevitable hearing over the whole incident, she still helped kill each and every one of those twenty three soldiers.
How did it escalate that far? She wondered as she thought back to how quietly it had started. A little scuffle outside of Amity Park and her stepping in for... did she dare say friend? The next thing she knew, it had turned into a full scale invasion and finally ended with the ghost equivalent of a nuclear bomb being fired, no matter how toned down it supposedly was. She looked towards the old wanted poster and wondered how much of this could have been avoided had she managed to take him down when the bounty was still good. Before she realized just how much she had been manipulated.
The door opened and she was quick on the uptake, reaching for the weapons footlocker and a pistol was in her hand when she saw it was her father coming in. Exhaling, she let the pistol slip back into its place in the footlocker, but the adrenaline did not fade. "Daddy?" she asked weakly, surprised at how uncertain she sounded.
"Valerie... we have to talk. What happened?" He was not angry, but he was worried. He had let her wait in her room a while, saying something about letting her think things over before talking to her. And somehow, she forgot about him planning on coming in from how disturbing her thoughts were.
"I saw the explosions north of town and went to check it out, make sure it wasn't a ghost attack and all." Valerie explained, hoping that saying it aloud might help put things in perspective. "You remember when I mentioned seeing other sides to ghosts? About two weeks before the whole Disasteroid?"
"Vaguely, yes. I'm guessing the ghost girl was the ghost in question?"
"Yeah. Vlad had hired me to get her, claiming she was trying to assassinate him or something to that effect." He had not used the word assassinate, but in essence that was what he was asking for defense against. "So, I found the girl and caught her, then she claimed to know Danny." Unbidden, Operative Oscar's statement of Danielle being a clone came to mind, but she pushed it down since Danielle briefly filled her in on the gaps before she went with Danny to the Fenton Works building. "So, I used her as bait to get to him and caught him, handed the girl to Vlad, and brought him to the sewers where I had set up a small work area. Once he came around, he started chewing me out about her being a half-ghost, and got me to help him free her before Vlad destroyed her."
"And said something to the effect of you can't take part in destroying a human?" her father said, sitting on the bed next to her and putting a comforting hand on her shoulder.
"Yeah." She blinked, putting herself back on topic before she started trying to figure out how he had guessed that. "Anyways, we freed her and I let Danny go since I figured that maybe ghosts weren't all bad, and when I went back to check in on 'Mayor Masters', I found out he was half ghost, not that I got a solid chance to do anything about it. Fast forward to a couple hours ago: I found Danielle speeding away from the GIW and called Danny, since this was his 'cousin'." She could not help but put bite into the term 'cousin', since she knew now that Danielle was very much not his cousin.
"I take it there's more to this cousin than you've told me? Something to do with Vlad?" Her father's tone was still that same care, and there was no accusation behind it. Damn it, Valerie thought angrily, why isn't he angry? He should be since I just helped kill a bunch of people!
"Yeah." She inhaled, wondering if it was her place to explain. "I'm not sure if it's my place to explain, it's sort of a matter between the two, but I'll leave it that Vlad was hair deep in it."
Whether that satisfied her father or not, he showed no hints and simply nodded along. "Alright, go on. What happened next?"
"Well, we had a bit of a running fight. Danny was trying to get us to disengage the whole time, he was planning on using the GCN to warp himself and Danielle out of there so the GIW would leave Amity Park, but they cut it off by using it as a staging area and we were attacked by advance teams that had moved deep into town, including tanks. After a little more fighting, we took it outside with Danny calling the GIW out to get things out of town so no one got hurt. I thought his plan was to just let loose with his full powered ice and plasma blasts at Graveyard Hill until the GIW were too battered to fight on and retreated, I didn't see the Ghostly Wail coming."
"So that's what it's called? That horrific shriek? I could hear it, faintly, in the lab." He seemed unnerved by the fact that he was able to hear it.
"Yeah." Valerie explained as a shiver shot up her spine as she remembered the horrific, unnatural noise, "some sort of supersonic scream that he's really hesitant about using. He said he was toning it down or something, that if he used full power he would have... have..." Why am I stuttering?! She just could not articulate it.
"Destroyed them all?"
Valerie blinked, surprised at the bluntness. Did he understand that twenty three people were dead? That this was not one of those Real Time Strategy games where it was just pixels going poof and a deadpan 'unit lost' comment from your mission control, this was people dying!
But he was right. She swallowed and nodded, and her father took that as an answer. "You stayed and helped save as many lives as you could."
"But I spotted for him! I told him exactly when the Guys in White were funneling into the attack!" she screamed, surprised at her own intensity as she shot to her feet, knocking past her father's hand. "I sat there and aimed that ghostly nuclear launch! I helped kill those people!"
He rose after her and put both of his hands on her shoulders, looking her square in the eye calmly. "That's the reality of combat, Valerie. People die. Each one of those soldiers knew the risk when they signed up. I knew what I signed up for when I signed up as security, and you being a ghost hunter. I knew you were too young to understand just how stark the reality was, no matter how confident you thought you were. No one, not even the most elite soldier of the military, is ever fully prepared for seeing the full reality when they first see it." He gently lowered her back onto her bed as he continued speaking, the two returning to where they had sat down. "What they have is the training to prepare them for the eventuality. You don't have that, even if you felt you were willing to throw yourself into the fire to protect people."
"What're you saying?" Valerie asked, confused and still trying to understand his point.
"That you have to think on the reality as it is. Death never was some distant theory to wonder about in idle hours, it's a constant reality. You've grown so much, and I'm proud of you. Proud of you for taking a stand and sticking to your beliefs, even if what you did was foolish. Brave, noble, but foolish."
She blushed and hunched her shoulders in an attempt to hide it. Why he was so good at this, she would never know. "So, you want me to think about what I did?"
"Yes." He glanced towards the weapon footlocker and some of the prototype pieces of a new combat suit that she had been fiddling with, his mouth twitching like he was trying to think of how to put something. "I'm grounding you, you need the time to think about this and what you did should by all rights land you in all sorts of trouble. But I'm proud of you for taking a stand."
"Thanks... I think." The grounding did not bother her, as she realized that maybe she did need a break from all the ghost hunting. She certainly needed to sort things out.
"Oh, and Axion called. They aren't canceling your contract even though the GIW isn't happy to see Axion weapons used against them. I do, however, need the combat data from your suit and weapons. They're very curious to see how ecto-weapons match up when used on humans, and..."
"... and not a lot of people are willing to be shot by futuristic guns to see how they work." Valerie finished, completing the bleak humor as she slid across her bed, crouching in front of the footlocker and putting her hands on the sides before hefting it up and putting it on her bed. She was pretty sure she heard a large vehicle screech to a halt outside. "Take what you need from there, I'll upload my tech armor's stuff to the flash drive."
Somehow, putting her mind to a task was helping her. No need to think about the tough questions while working as the black gauntlets formed around her hands and she connected the left one to her computer. She always had the hindsight moment of wondering how intelligent it was to plug armor created by a tech ghost into her computer, but as far as she knew the armor was wholly her own. A knock on the door distracted her and she followed her father in answering, heart pounding as she wondered if it was a GIW assault squad with a warrant...
Her father held a hand up to her and raised a single finger, and she nodded quietly. He looked through the peep hole in the door and opened it without glancing back. To Valerie's surprise, it was the Fentons, who seemed wholly unconcerned, though Mister Fenton was covered in black grease.
"Hey there, Damon, sorry to drop in like this." Jack Fenton said bashfully as his infamous, Massachusetts hailing driving spoke yet again. "We uh... blew a tire right outside the apartment building."
That explains the screech I heard, Valerie thought as the other Fenton explained. "We have the tire, but we were hoping you had a spare jack to help us lift it up."
"No pun intended," the large ghost hunter added, getting a brief smirk from her father.
"Sure thing, Jack." He glanced back, "Valerie, could you go get the jack? It should be in the main closet." The look on his face told her that he was going to fill them in. Well, better they hear it from a friend instead of a GIW sympathizer, Valerie decided as she went back and looked for it.
As she fished around, she could hear shocked reactions from the two Fentons. She was sure the shrill cry of 'what' was Jack. There were some loud reactions, but when she returned minutes later with the device, they were talking quietly.
"So. The Guys in White came to town and attacked one of Danny's friends from the other side, who the GIW were hunting for an unknown reason but not because of wrongdoing?" Jack asked, "Just to be sure."
"Yes, Jack, that's what he said." Maddie added, "But... our boy killed those people?"
"I'm not familiar with the details, but the official stance from the coroners is that it was indirect. Apparently, the power your son used was being watered down significantly, but he would know the details." Her father shrugged. "That's what I know, and I wish I could tell you more. But, you deserved to find out from someone else other than some reporter on a commentary run."
"Thank you." Jack said as he saw her. "Ah, thank you. It shouldn't take too long."
"You're welcome." Valerie said as she passed the heavy device to him. She glanced to her father and he nodded slowly as she noted the clock read nine.
XX
Fenton Works, Amity Park
9:03 PM
"Is... is he going to be alright?" Danielle finally asked quietly, looking at Danny from the kitchen.
"He should be," Jazz answered just as softly, "he just needs time. He's... pretty serious about this kind of thing."
"And he wasn't so freaked when he wasted those other clones?" Danielle retorted quietly as the memories replayed in her head, still confusing her. "There's no dancing around it, he killed them. I killed two of them with him, and one was probably just as aware as I am. What makes this any different?"
Jazz seemed stunned by the question, though whether it was the level of maturity that Danielle was showing or the unfortunate implications of the question was beyond her. She knew that Danny was just defending himself and the first two times, he had no idea what he was fighting and was confused when the clones melted. But it had provoked a response from the older woman. I guess no one's getting out of this happy, Danielle realized. Now why is Danny freaking out still? It was self defense, and he knows it. That should be the end of the story.
"I guess it's the context." Jazz finally answered quietly. "He's had some bad experiences with an evil him running around, and he's very serious about avoiding that happening." She wondered if that was the 'him' they were referring to since Vlad would not make any sense nor elicit that level of fear.
"That, and not knowing they were clones until later?"
"That might have helped. Or having other things to worry about instead of having nothing to do once it was gone. Give him time, he'll swing around when he's needed, but until then he's going to be dealing with the cognitive dissonance of what happened and will be wrestling with how to justify it in a way that satisfies his sense of morality."
She sure seems knowledgeable about this, Danielle mused, wondering if Jazz was looking into... what was it? Spycology? No, that's not it... She wondered if she should have watched more of those educational videos that Vlad had provided to help bring her up to speed in the knowledge department. She had some intrinsically thanks to flash training applied before she became aware, but she was still reliant more on street smarts than book knowledge.
It was about half an hour after nine when the door opened again. Jazz stood up and walked over, leaving Danielle in the kitchen. She stayed where she was, unsure of how to present herself to the two who had brought her own DNA into the world. Fortunately, she was unnoticed as Danny brought his parents up to speed with what had happened, since they were focused on the fight on Graveyard Hill, not the events as a whole. This let her remain hidden in the chair behind the table.
XX
Danny perked up as his parents came in, and almost shifted forms thinking it was a GIW black ops (white ops?) squad making a retaliatory strike before he saw his parents. "Mom, dad?"
"Danny..." his mother said distantly, looking at him. Sam edged away from him, but kept her hand on his as his parents moved closer.
"I'm... sorry." Danny said slowly. "I know. I shouldn't have..."
"Danny, listen," his father said as he locked the door. "We know what happened. Damon told us when we had to stop to replace a tire. We know you were doing everything you could to not do it."
"But I still killed them!" Danny shouted. "It's not alright! I didn't control it enough!" A hand touched his shoulder and he turned to see Jazz standing there.
"Danny," she said quietly, "Listen. No, it's not alright, but we went through this already. You did everything you could. You're worrying about it!"
"She's right, you know." Sam added. "You're worry is what's telling us that you aren't jumping off any slopes." She left the comparison to Dan unsaid; he never told his parents about the whole time travel mess, and he never intended to unless it became necessary. Besides, Dan was locked in Clockwork's Lair anyways.
"Listen Danny," his mother said as she and his father stood in front of him. "These questions can wait. You're tired, and you're in no shape to make any decisions with your state. You need to rest, you need to get some sleep."
"But..." Danny tried to protest, not wanting this to be dismissed out of hand.
"No buts, Daniel," his father cut in. "Your mother's right, it's too late to be solving anything right now. But I have to ask, who was this specter friend of yours? Whatever she did must have annoyed the Guys in White good."
Danny left his father's fan boy attitude over the GIW unsaid. "She didn't do anything... actually, maybe we should let her answer your questions herself..."
XX
Jack frowned as he looked at Danny. He was torn over how to react; his own son, a killer? But on the other hand, how could the Guys in White go so out of control that they were just short of occupying Amity Park just for one ghost? These were the professionals, for fudge's sake! But, the fact that the ghost was in their own house put his nerves on edge in the moment.
"Danielle?" Danny asked, turning towards the kitchen and everyone looked in that direction. Jack's jaw dropped as he saw the little girl come out from where she had been hiding at the kitchen table; she could only be what, twelve years old tops? But, he could not shake a foreboding feeling. Like she looked familiar. The eyes were very familiar, as was the hair color, and the facial composition even with the quiet, almost cowering face she was wearing as she looked like she was trying to be as small as possible. He ruled out one explanation, she was far too old and Danny was far too young for it to be that.
"Jack..." Maddie said in shock, "She looks..."
"There's something else you need to know," she finally said when white rings exactly like those that appeared around Danny when he transformed passed over her. As they passed by her, the cute human girl was replaced with a ghostly girl with the same proportions and size...
And the DP logo on her chest suddenly made everything clear. "She's... she's... she's you?!" Jack shouted, stumbling a step backwards as he tried to make sense of it. "But how?!"
"I'm a clone," Danielle explained quietly, tugging at Jack's heartstrings as she shifted back to her human form. "Vlad Masters made me in one of his schemes. It's... it's a long story, you might want to sit down."
Jack did so, dropping himself down into the armchair. Maddie was sitting on the couch cousin nearest to him, with Sam and Jazz sitting a little further away. Danny and his clone were standing in between them all.
"How does this work? How did this scientific impossibility happen?!" Maddie asked, and Jack had heard that voice before: sheer disbelief at something completely impossible and something completely wrong.
"We don't know," Danny supplied. "All I know is that whatever research Vlad had left, it's gone now."
"Or in GIW hands," Danielle offered, "That's probably how they found out about me."
"True." Danny said, and Jack realized that his son was seizing this objective, whatever it was, to distract him from the troubling thoughts of the recent battle. "So, Vlad was trying to clone me. I told you his old set of goals; kill you, dad; marry you, mom; and adopt me as his son, right?" Jack frowned as he considered where his son was going with this, but Jazz probably already knew given she was looking at them more than her... dare he say little sister? Philosophical questions like this were always beyond him, unreachable to him as ghost related technology was to most others. "Well, by this point I had pretty much convinced him I wasn't going to shift."
"So he started a project in Colorado," Danielle took up, growing in confidence like she had explained this before. "A long story short, while I still thought Vlad was a good man, I was in a scheme to capture Danny and get a DNA sample of him mid-morph, but when Vlad showed he just thought I was expendable and fodder for his schemes, I helped Danny break out."
"That two faced ghost fucking son of a bitch!" Jack roared as it finally clicked in his head, leaping onto his feet with a speed most fat men envied. "That no good, ghast bitten goblin leper kissing, red eyed, Vampire sucking, zombie brained, mummy wrapping, hellborn demon bastard of lies!" No one even stopped his paranormal themed litany of curses when he finally reached the climax, "I TRUSTED THAT MAN! AND HE TURNED AROUND AND ABUSED YOUR DNA, DANNY! HE VIOLATED YOU! HE..." Suddenly tired from the display, he collapsed backwards onto the armchair. "He... he..."
"He acted in a way no friend should have ever thought of," Maddie said, her fury far more tranquil than that Jack had unleashed. "He should count himself lucky that he was in the path of the Disasteroid, because no matter what history, no matter what kind of person he was, he would die for that. And die again and again until he ceased to exist."
Danielle slipped behind Danny and Jack's heart plummeted. Oh no... I... no... He looked at her. "I... I'm sorry, Danielle, I..." He was lost for words. How did he apologize to a clone when he just treated her like she was a violation of her own (Danny's; he had no idea) blood? She must have heard about his 'molecule-by-molecule' rants, that kind of terror. He always wanted his name, his presence, to strike that fear into ghosts. Now... he regretted it. This one time.
XX
In the silence, Danielle stared at the man who had provided half of the original DNA that she was made from, his towering rage towards Vlad, her so-called 'father' and person behind her creation, and feared that she would end up victim of his rage towards whatever familial violation he felt she had broken. Whatever territorial honor she violated by existing, or whatever biologically born called it. Could she really look towards him as a possible friend when such a clear divide was between them? Almost instinctively, she hid herself behind Danny, wondering if she should just turn invisible and leave before she caused any more harm.
The fury from Danny's mother was, in many ways, more terrifying. She was not raging blindly, spewing forth an impressive vocabulary of curses to describe how foul a person could be, but she was in full control. Like a tactician planning how best to defend her kin and friends from attack or plan revenge. Jack would destroy her in pure anger, but Maddie's revenge would be precise, calculated, and merciless.
But... the rage and vitriol was not directed at her, that was clear as she thought about it. They were angry at Vlad, but were they also unsure. The confused, stuttered apology meant that Jack was not pure rage, that he might have... dare she say sympathized with her? Finally, she broke the silence.
"It's... it's alright. I'd probably be angry too."
"No," Jack said, catching Danielle unaware with how sincere he sounded, "I shouldn't have stormed like that. It's not your fault that you were created, born, I don't know what the right word is."
"Still... there's a very important question." Maddie cut in slowly. "What do we do now?"
Danielle knew this was coming, and had an answer. "Well, I came here mainly to talk to Danny. I can't really do more on my own, and I need to know how to use my powers beyond what I already know."
"But?" Jazz asked calmly, no accusation in her voice. "That doesn't really explain everything. Where would you stay?"
"Vlad had a bunch of safe houses," Danielle answered, "The Guys in White have no idea about them, otherwise they'd of stormed into them when I showed up. There's one in Amity Park, fully stocked with survival supplies and unconnected to any of Vlad's other old assets. I could stay there, or head into the Ghost Zone and set up a lair; I'll probably need one someday anyways so why not get one now?"
"I told you Danielle," Danny cut in, "I'm not going to let anyone force you to stay in the Ghost Zone."
"Danny, please," she shot back, appreciating the concern, "This isn't being forced in anymore. This is me choosing."
"Danielle, the Ghost Zone isn't some peaceful river or fluffy clouds, it's very dangerous and many of the inhabitants there have me on their bingo book, and you're close enough for most of them." Danny retorted, looking at her with concern. "Yeah, I have allies there, but how would you get food? Ghost Zone chow is about as dangerous as ignited Nasty Burger sauce if someone eats it. Besides, where would you get a lair in the Ghost Zone?"
"Danny," Sam cut in, "She's half-ghost, I'm pretty sure we can figure something out. We have a lot of sources of information. This isn't going to be jumping in blind."
"I can't believe it, you want her in there?" Danny asked, staring disbelievingly at her.
"You're fine with Frostbite, Wulf, Dora..." Jazz pointed out.
"Yeah, but... they're..."
"Ghosts? Yeah, but so am I." Danielle pointed out. "We're halfas, we're both of worlds."
"She could stay with us." Jack cut in finally, stunning Danielle. He... he wanted her to stay, under his roof?
XX
"Jack?" Maddie asked, shocked at how easily forgiving her husband was. No, Danielle was not at fault for Vlad's sins, but at the same time how could they take responsibility of her? She blinked as she figured out how to put it nicely. "Jack, are you sure? Is there really anything we can do?"
"Sure there is." Jack pointed out. "Besides, you know how Vlad got his powers. It was my fault, being careless with the proto-portal all those years ago. Everything he did is my fault as well because it sprung from that. I owe it to her at least to try and do something to make up for my own failures."
She smiled sadly, there was the man she loved: they shared quite a bit of arrogance and hubris that came with their work, but under it all was loyalty and a genuine desire to do something good, and both for science and for the safety of the world from the paranormal. And there he was, trying to make up for a mistake he knew nothing about for decades.
"How would it work, though?" she finally asked. "You're right, we could help Danielle a lot, but how would it work? I don't think there's even the needed government protocols for adopting someone with Danielle's..." she glanced to the little girl, still wishing she could shake the fact that her eyes were exactly like her little boy's, and got a shrug in return. "Well, for adopting a clone." Jack looked at Danielle, trying to figure out if she was perturbed with the language.
"Look, let's be honest, I am a clone, there's no dancing around it," Danielle explained with a hint of exasperation at everyone's sensitivity in dodging the issue.
"So, cousins doesn't work anymore, huh?" Danny asked.
"No, probably not." Danielle answered. "So... how would this work?"
XX
Jazz watched, amazed that her parents had finally overcome their hatred for ghosts and were able to forgive. That they were willing to shoulder another burden on the house. Of course, with their parenting style...
She finally cut in. "Look, adopting isn't going to be on the table until the current quagmire's been finished. But," she stood and walked towards Danielle and hugged her, catching the little girl by surprise. "Even if you aren't, welcome to the family, Danielle."
Slowly, but surely, their parents came in and joined. Danny smirked towards Sam, "Come on, Sam. You can join it."
The amusement in the goth girl's voice was palpable as she joined, "Little soon, isn't it?" The joke took a moment to resonate, but soon everyone was laughing, and it seemed like the drama and angst of the day was over.
But, Jazz could feel something wet on her shirt and realized that under it all, Danielle was crying. Happy tears, she hoped, but tears none the less and Jazz's mind slowly looked towards the future. A glance to her brother confirmed that the two had similar worries, but they left them unsaid for the moment.
XXX
XXX
XXX
XXX
"Why..." "Murderer..." "Killer..." "Butcher..." "Damned..." "Slayer..." "Villain..."
He raised his hands into an on guard position, trying to find the voices in the thick green mist that he was certain was that of the Ghost Zone.
"Who... who are you?" Danny asked in his ghost form as he looked around. The voices echoed back, an unholy mix of male and female voices of different temperaments, but all that would be recognizable as American.
"Victims..." "Slain..." "Betrayed..." "Slaughtered..." "Massacred..."
He saw a pair of red eyes in the mist and froze, his form colder than his ice core could ever generate on its own. "No, no, no, NO!" he screamed, "No, this can't be happening..."
"Betrayer..." "Falling..." "Killer..." "Murderer..."
The voices would not cease throwing epithets towards him, and in the shadows of the mist he saw figures. Young men and women, happy, vibrant, alive...
"Butcher..." "Executioner..." "War Criminal..." "Why... why us?..."
"Who... who are you?" Danny asked, white armor forming around the young men and women and all their untold stories. "No... no... no... I... I never..."
Suddenly, a ear splitting moan cut through everything and Danny realized he was doing it! No matter how much he tried to stop it, his Ghostly Wail shot into the mist and into the figures, shattering the armor, melting away the skin and flesh of the figures and vaporizing their core mass as they continued hurling epithets towards him even as they fell into puddles of liquid flesh. The wail stopped and all he could see were pale, lifeless bodies of those same figures, lying in the gore of their own wasted bodies, staring with dead, glazed over eyes into the sky.
"Slayer..." "Killer..." "Betrayer..." "Murderer..." "Betrayer..."
"I... I never wanted this," he said as he finally saw that the number of figures was twenty three. Then more bodies appeared as the mist cleared... countless random people that he wished he could put a name and face to. Paulina lay gutted... was she wearing an orange jumpsuit and equipped with ecto weapons? Ricky Marsh, shredded and keeled over as if key organs had been phased out of his body. There was a vaporized puddle of human biomass he somehow knew was Dash. Kwan, older and in a white lab coat and mangled like he was in a car crash. He saw a puddle of green goo, and saw Danielle's face screaming towards him as he looked. Then he saw fire... and in the flames, he saw them. Sam, Tucker, Jazz in the Fenton Peeler armor, his parents... all helpless and looking at him desperately. As was Lancer.
"I suppose out of respect for our past I should let you live..." Danny was drawn towards the source of the voice and realized it was his voice, but far more deeper and baritone than it should have been. He was holding something in his hand and looked at it... no, it couldn't be his hand: it was a black gauntlet, not a white glove! And in it was...
Valerie. Held by her futuristic bandoleer.
"But that's not how I work," he said and threw her away like a discarded rag doll.
He wanted to scream her name, to shoot after her and try to save her, but the mist exploded, blinding him until he appeared in a devastated landscape and finally back in his own body.
"Where..." he looked around the blasted area, decayed clean of all life. The rubble remains of buildings of humanity lay about him as he realized where he was. His future. His work. His actions...
Then he saw the gravestone, the image that haunted him to the day, the sight that had finally told him how critical his responsibilities were...
"Betrayer!" "Killer!" "Murderer!" "Butcher!" "Traitor!"
Suddenly, he was surrounded. Ghosts, all in the shapes of those he had seen dead. Everyone he had ever known in his human life, from his parents to Valerie to her father (missing an arm) to Lancer to Jazz to Tucker to... Sam.
"Massacre!" "Wrath!" "Slaughter!" "Vengeance!" "Justice!" "Revenge!"
"Sam I..." he stuttered as the ghosts grabbed him and began clawing at him. Ripping him apart molecule by molecule. He screamed, long and loud and incoherently, launching upwards...
He blinked, no longer was he in the devastation of his own actions in that dark future. No longer was he the victim of all those he had killed in that time taking their vengeance. He was in his own bedroom, in human form wearing night clothes, in the dark of night...
And standing in front of him was a starry sky, and a certain white mask with purple horns.
"Nocturne!" he snarled, quickly shifting to Phantom formand powering up beams of ice around his hands. "Just like you to walk in on someone's nightmares, huh? I already have enough to deal with without you joining in."
"Calm yourself, Danny Phantom." Nocturne stated as he held a hand up. "I am not here to scheme. I am here to observe."
"Observe what?" He asked hotly, hands still glowing blue as his core continued pumping out cold energy to unleash at a moment's notice. "If I find any of those high tech tiaras..."
"You shall not, for your dreams is all that concerns me." The ghost of sleep turned towards the clock which read 1:07 AM. "You see, young Phantom, your dreams speak to your inner self. They are a gateway to your subconscious."
"So?" Danny asked, having heard this Freudian spiel from Jazz. Why she even has a poster of that dude in her room... he shoved that thought aside. "How is this your business?"
"I am only here to give you knowledge of dreams. They are a gateway to your subconscious. What does it tell you of yourself?"
He stared at the ghost, but he started mulling over what he was discussing. If he wanted to form Sleepwalkers to attack him, all he had to do was order them to and Amity Park would again be alight with ghostly combat. He thought back to the dream, how vivid it was, the epithets being thrown towards him... what did they mean?
"Why are you telling me this?" he finally asked. Nocturne had some angle here, he would not be there out of the goodness of his proverbial heart.
"As you awoke to my presence, and engaged in this dialogue. Or would you rather we do battle, for if you wish conflict, my Sleepwalkers are more than prepared to oblige any bloodlust you still possess."
"No," Danny answered tiredly, "There's been enough violence today. And I won't start any more unless you try something funny, alright?"
Nocturne smiled. "Very well, young Phantom. Now, I must return to the Ghost Zone to ponder what I have learned. Goodbye, and sleep well." To Danny's surprise, Nocturne lowered his head in... was that a gesture of respect? Danny never knew with this guy, he only fought him once and never got a lot besides his shtick being dreams and that he dreamed big. Nocturne faded, and Danny invisibly followed him down until he was sure he entered the Ghost Zone, then returned to his room and shifted back to his human form, wondering just what Nocturne was doing there. He looked at the clock, and tucked himself back into bed. He was in no shape to deal with it, and he drifted back to sleep and dream.
"Hahaha! You are such a child. You 'promised'?"
"Yes... I... PROMISED!"
"I guess... the future... isn't as set in stone as you think it is."
"Clockwork? You saved them?! I... I don't understand..."
"And here we are with you, a fourteen year old child, risking everything to save the people you care about."
XXXX
End Chapter
- One thing that always bugged me about the fact that we have the Christmas episode after TUE is that we never really see Danny dealing with knowing all that. I mean, someone could argue that Danny's start of darkness present since 'Splitting Images' coming to a screeching halt was one of the most significant effects, but I still think a lot of good material that did not even need to be too dark was lost because of how the episodes went. That said, it should not have been a looming shadow over everything; I mean, there's a certain cheerfulness that the show had that gave it its taste. Even TUE, dark as it was, kept comedy coming with Box Lunch, Danny pausing to comment to Lancer about his now-explained periodic absences, Tucker wondering how them dying because Danny cheated on a test was fair. Mind, the whiplash back to serious was pretty fast, but it still kept the offbeat moments of comedy coming.
- I think I had way too much fun with Jack's litany of paranormal themed curses... Now I'm very glad I rated this T, because that is definitely beyond K+ even if some people get the occasional curse in there. That said, I always felt like there was more under Jack Fenton then we see; I mean, we know he can be extremely dangerous when pushed, but there's bound to be more to him than pure arrogance. And he seemed genuinely horrified in 'Phantom Planet' when he realized that he had caused Vlad to become half-ghost and was seriously worried over the ecto-acne in 'Master of All Time'.
- Yes, Jazz does have a poster of Freud in her room. It's really hard to see, but in 'The Fright Before Christmas', during the montage of the Ghost Writer mutating the toys of Amity Park, if you pause when she opens the door to her room you can see it on the right side. Kind of surprised, as his very bleak view of humanity from doing most of his studies on criminals, but hey, who knows?
- For those who did not know, according to Butch Hartman (if I recall correctly of the source, please correct me if I am wrong), had the series gone on further, Danielle would have eventually been adopted into the Fenton family and become a little sister to Danny and Jazz. Given the abrupt ending to the series, we got D-Stabilized to tidy up the story pretty well. That said, I can't grasp it as one of those overnight things; I mean, it's a big step and there's a lot of things that, in my view, need to be done first. Just the culture shock of Danielle being a clone of their own son would take time for the Fentons to figure out.
- Finally; thank you to Deborahpflover, Writerous, chadtaylor020, Sammi, and Amaris the Demon for their reviews. I appreciate it guys, and the feedback helps me know if I'm getting things right or if I need to look at what I'm doing.