This chapter has been way too long in the works, and honestly, I had a bit of trouble getting it started when I started up writing again. I knew what I wanted to do, and this chapter was meant to just be one of those hilarious "filler" episodes that break up the main storyline a bit so things don't get too dark, which made it a little more difficult to figure out. I hope the others that I have throughout this story don't trip me up as much as this one did...
Okay, I actually kinda used a bit of my family in this story, mainly just the main setting. However, Uncle Ron, Aunt Darla, and Cousin Carl do somewhat resemble a few of my relatives. The rest... pure Danny's family and meant for hilarity!
And now on to the chapter, I gift you 7738 words!
I do not own Danny Phantom :'(
Episode 59: Christmas Fright
The goth and techno-geek stood back and watched as the dark-haired boy lugged his suitcase out to the outrageous green-and-white vehicle, tossing it in with unceremonious carelessness. As if planned, an alley cat yowled in unison with its heavy thud as the trashcan it was sitting on was apparently knocked over, the mangy thing running out of the back alley and down the street before disappearing around a corner. "Cheer up, Danny," Jack Fenton cheered boisterously, patting his son on the back none-too-gently. "In just about ten hours you'll be able to chat away with your cousin Darisa, just like last time." Based on how he shuddered, which went unnoticed by the orange-jumpsuited man, that wasn't a good thing.
Once the eccentric man was out of earshot, AKA back in the house to try and find something else ghost related that he could sneak passed his wife into the RV, the aforementioned wife walked over and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Now, Danny, I know you don't particularly want to go out of town on your winter vacation, but it's only for a couple days," she said, a kind smile on her face. For once she wasn't wearing the blue hazmat suit to match her husband, but instead was dressed in a normal long-sleeve shirt and jeans. "You know how close your father is with your family, so just try to make the best of it until we get back." There was an underlying message to her words, displayed by the slight grimace she gave as she stared off in thought, but it was only present for a split second before she quickly covered it back up. "Now, I should be getting back inside before Jack manages to stow away the Fenton Foamer or some other contraption," and with that she was ascending the few steps to their home.
Now left outside with just his two friends, he rushed over to them and almost fell to his knees as he pleaded, "Are you two sure there isn't some life or death event coming up in the next day or two that I have to stay back and attend with you guys?"
"Sorry, Danny, but after last year I don't think your dad is going to buy my excuse again," Tucker stated, recalling how he had faked sick only to have the Fentons come back early and find the two sitting in the living room playing video games. "And sorry man, but I'm not tagging along this time." He didn't even want to remember that event…
Sam just shrugged before placing her hands on her hips. "That's karma for you," she replied, voice that mix of amusement and apathy. "I tried to get you guys to help me out of my thanksgiving family reunion and no one would help me. I don't know exactly what a house full of Fentons is like, but Tucker promised to fill me in on it after you leave. It can't be worse than my sunshiney family…"
By that point the front door opened again and the other three members of his family came out, the largest one grabbing him under the arm and dragging him away from his friends. "Okay, everybody in the RV so we can head on out to Ron's place," he hollered, jumping in the driver's seat.
As the Fenton Family Assault Vehicle sped off down the road, Danny and Jazz both stared out the back window, forlorn expressions adorning their faces.
As if the long car ride in the Fenton Family Assault Vehicle to the dreaded Fenton Family Reunion wasn't bad enough, the three were tormented by the horrible screech of Jack Fenton's road trip sing-alongs. He was currently halfway through "She'll be coming 'round the mountain" and hollering for everyone to join in. This, of course, while on a windy road on a narrow cliff twisting around a mountain, which led to his distractedness nearly driving them right off the edge on one or two occasions. The children in the backseat were hanging on for dear life.
"Danny, I know you only have your learner's permit, but do you think you could possess Dad? Just until we get off this road," she whispered so quietly he needed his ghost-enhanced hearing to pick it up.
"Just two problems with that," he replied in almost equally hushed tones. "One, won't Mom ask where I am? And two, I have no clue where we are going!"
"What are you two whispering about?" Maddie asked, turning around in her seat to look at them.
Before Danny could start to shout 'nothing!' which would have inevitably drawn more attention to their conversation, Jazz replied, "The psychological impact of interacting with people who should be in a mental institution outside of a professional establishment."
The older woman chuckled a little at her daughter's comment before turning back to the road and saying, "Jasmine, you know as well as I do that your father's family is not crazy. They are all professionals in their own unique fields."
"Yeah, the same could be said about us," Danny mumbled, clutching his armrests for dear life as the Fenton RV nearly laid forty degrees to the right as his dad rounded a particularly sharp corner. He was willing and ready to use is ghost powers to save their lives, but only if he absolutely had to. Which was looking more and more likely the farther along they got.
"What was that, Danny?" Maddie asked, sounding quite content and not a bit worried about her husband's driving. But then again, it was sometimes scarier to ride with her at the wheel.
"Just asking how much longer till we get there," he lied, although he was a bit curious. The sooner they arrived the sooner they would leave.
Chuckling again, she replied, "Don't you remember, silly? We're almost there. Just have to take this road here."
Where she pointed to ahead of them was just a cliff, or at least looked like a cliff. Danny drew in a sharp breath as Jazz attempted not to scream, the Assault Vehicle drawing ever closer to the edge. Mentally preparing himself for the explanation that would surely following revealing his powers, he was quite surprised to find that they truly weren't sailing through the air to their deaths at that moment, but that there really was a road over that seemingly steep drop off. Of course, the speed at which Jack was driving did make the RV fly through the air a short ways, and his control over the vehicle appeared to waver when they initially touched down, but he stayed on the narrow dirt path and before too long was coasting to a stop in the sea of cars surrounding the quaint, two-story house. "We're here!" Jack called, having been completely oblivious to everything that had transpired the entire trip there, aside from his road trip sing-a-longs. "Danny, hurry up and grab the Fenton Extractor so I can show it to my brothers! I-I mean, the Completely Ordinary Vacuum Cleaner so I can show it to my brothers," he corrected at the glare he received from his wife.
A gentle hand landing on his shoulder, Danny looked up into his mother's purple eyes. Handing him the glassware she was carrying, she started, "Go ahead and take the sweet potatoes inside, and I'll handle your father's ferreted ghost hunting equipment." The last few words were said with a measured amount of venom and aimed at the large man currently scratching the back of his neck nervously. Deciding it would be better to deal with his father's insane family than his mother's wrath, Danny thankfully grabbed the dish and hurried to the house, Jazz scurrying right behind him with the pumpkin pie.
"Dad's in the doghouse?" Danny asked quietly to lighten the mood, taking the three stairs up to the porch in one step and rushing across the wood deck to the door.
"I think the doghouse Dad is in is in the doghouse," Jazz replied, hurrying through the portal once her brother had it open. "She told him no less than eleven times to not bring the ghost hunting equipment." Taking just a second to look back at him parents before slipping inside, he had to agree with his sister. One of his mother's sternest looks was directed at the much larger Jack Fenton, a single finger waving dangerously in front of his face. The man's expression was downcast and shameful, although whether it was because he was feeling guilty for disobeying her or ashamed that he got caught disobeying her Danny couldn't tell. And didn't want to dwell on. He had enough problems ahead of him without worrying about the one behind him. Besides, it's not like she was going to kill him or anything. Probably…
The door opened up into a spacious room, a chair, couch, and coffee table to his left, small landing and stairs leading to the second floor on his right, and a large entertainment center directly in front of him. A large, gas fireplace stood on the left wall halfway across the room, decorations piled on its top and a warm fire blazing behind the thin glass, with another couch on the other side of it, positioned in front of the sixty-inch TV. A hallway jutted out directly across from the stove, to which Danny took, deftly dodging one of his uncles as the man exited it carrying what sounded like a very angry cat carrier. Yeah, whatever was in that Danny did not want to know.
"There you are Danny," a female voice said as he entered the large kitchen. The woman was rather tall with a slightly country accent, but it didn't deter from her sweet voice. Currently, she was leaning over the counter and carving up the ham, one of the last few pieces of dinner that needed to be prepared aside from whatever the rest of the family was bringing. Jazz had already made this stop, as was seen by the pie tossed among the rest of the desserts on the right counter, next to the gigantic fridge, and he could only guess she was now in the room to his back, stealing all of the crab dip lick she usually did.
"Hello Aunt Darla," he greeted as he made his way to her left, sitting the sweet potatoes down amongst the rest of the main course such as the turkey and green beans. "Spoons still in the same drawer?" At her nod he made his way over the drawer and retrieved a large spoon to sit on the foil lid over his mother's famous (among their family, at least) sweet potatoes. "Is that a new stove?" he asked offhandedly as he went to leave, stopping in the hallway long enough to hear her reply.
"Yeah, it's part of the remodel we're doing for the kitchen," she replied, then dove back into cutting up the ham.
Passing through the arcway behind him, Danny entered the large dining room. It was located on the right corner of the house, on the other side of the landing leading upstairs, and out the front windows he could see his father still being chewed out. And sure enough, Jazz was attacking Aunt Darla's famous (among their family, at least) crab dip. "Hey, save some for me!" he complained, rushing over and playfully pushing her out of his way so she had a harder time reaching more crackers. She shoved him back after he grabbed a couple Ritz crackers of crab dip, to which he responded by phasing his hand through her torso to grab some more.
"Hey, no fair Danny," she complained, watching his pull the cracker back through her before eating it.
"All it fair when it comes to Aunt Darla's crab dip," he replied around the food in his mouth, smiling.
His mirth was short lived, though, when he heard the front door open. If he hadn't known any better he'd have sworn Santa's reindeer had just come in through the front door, with the loud clacking on the hardwood floor at the entrance and the melodious tink!ling echoing against the walls. But, he did know better, and so without even looking up he knew the first sound came from the steel heels of the girls boots and the singing jingle bells were from the multitude of belts and chains adorning her clothing. Cousin Darisa had arrived.
"Darisa, honey, why don't you go bring the apple pie in to your Aunt Darla?" the man behind her asked kindly, a small smile touching his features. He was dressed well in a black suit, and out of all the Fenton relatives the only one that would be classified as normal. Uncle Rory was an accountant at a fortune 500 company.
"Ugh! How many times do I have to tell you, mortal, my name is Carmilla, and you will address me as such," the seventeen-year-old girl spat, glaring at her father as if she was royalty and he was a peasant, which, in her mind, was true. One of the reasons Danny did not like his cousin was the fact that she believed she was the reincarnation of the vampire empress, Carmilla. The other reason… "Daniel! Take care of this degrading task for me!" she yelled across the room, having spotted him when she came in.
The other reason was her repeated attempts to boss him around as if he was some slave. "Do it yourself," he shot back, reaching around, instead of through this time, his sister to grab a couple more Ritz crackers and piling more crab dip on them.
She seemed completely stunned by his refusal, having gotten used to him grudgingly following her orders. For almost a minute the black-haired girl, dyed, Danny noted since her natural hair color was a light brown, just stood in the entryway, staring across the room at him as if he'd just grown two heads. Or turned invisible or something, which he had done neither so it was definitely from shock. "What did you say?" she asked after a moment, voice losing a hint of its authoritarian edge.
Sighing as he shoved the last cracker in his mouth, Danny walked along the table to the landing, and as he placed a hand on the railing to go upstairs he reiterated, "I said, 'do it yourself,' as in 'no, I will not do it for you.'" He then continued on his way.
The upstairs was a lot less spacious than the downstairs. There was a bathroom immediately in front of him at the top of the stairs, and the master bedroom to his left. Down the hallway to his right were two more bedrooms, one on the left and right of the hall, Danny going the through the door on his left. Three chairs sat against one wall, an entertainment stand and large bookshelf lined with games against the other, a gentleman in his mid-early forties seated in the center chair. "Hello Ron," Danny said, taking the chair closest to the door. "What cha playing now?"
The man looked up from the screen to smile at the teen. "Hey Danny," Ron replied, "Fallout 4." On the TV a man in a big metal suit half-fell, half-rocket propelled himself across a large gap in a dilapidated bridge and landed on the other side.
"Eh? So what are you doing now?" the half-ghost inquired, watching the character come up to another large gap. "I bet you can make that."
"We'll see," he chuckled, his metal man running with stomping footfalls towards the edge before jumping and activating his rockets. The tin suit flew several feet in the air before the fuel ran out and it started to fall, barely hitting the edge and preventing him from falling to the ground below. "So, what I'm doing, is really just exploring and gathering resources, and fighting guys when I come across them. I already finished the main storyline, but there are a lot of side quests and such to complete."
Danny understood enough about the game to know that meant it would be a lot of just running around with random intervals of shooting things and picking flowers, but he liked watching his uncle play. It definitely beat anything else the rest of his dad's side of the family would do. Maybe it was because he wasn't actually related to Ron that he got along with him so well. Whatever the reason, it was about a hundred times better than being downstairs.
A light knock on the door drew the attention of the two occupants of the room. Leaning against the doorframe was the one person Danny wanted to avoid more than anyone, although now that he actually took the time to look at her outfit he couldn't help but think that Sam might actually get along with his creepy cousin. She wore about a small amount of black eye liner, hair mused in a kind of punk-goth mess and a blue stone in the side of her nose. The choker around her neck had five chains spiraling out from it, hooked through various loops in her top. The dark material hung loosely on her slim frame, sleeves changing from solid material to mesh as the shoulders that completely encased her hands. The bottom of her shirt was too long to be classified as normal, and while the front had a regular straight edge the back extended another foot and half in twin coat tails. More chains adorned its sides, either crisscrossing across her front or looping loosely from the back of her shoulder to the front, and a couple more crisscrossed the back of her black jeans, hanging down to just below the back of her knees. To finish the ensemble, she wore black, fingerless gloves and her signature steel-heeled high heel boots.
"Hello Darisa," Ron said, quickly pausing his game and sitting the controller in his lap. "Did you need something?" Danny expected her give some smart retort about how she was Carmilla, the queen of the vampires, but to his surprise she did not.
"Aunt Darla said to come down and get something to eat," she said, actually sounding quite normal.
"Ooh, food," he cheered almost comically, muttering a quick thank you as he slipped passed the teenager. She then strolled over to the seat he had been sitting in and flopped down a lot more unceremoniously than an empress would.
"Here I half-expected you to bite him," Danny jested, although he couldn't keep all the bile out of his words. What did she want now?
The girl chuckled slightly, something that actually sounded genuine, sweet. "Come on, you don't think I actually believe that, right?" she asked, her peaceful demeanor almost making him forget that this girl had made his family reunions hell for the last four years; almost. She giggled again when she saw his glare. "Getting lessons from Aunt Maddie, are you?" she continued, looking ahead at the screen and taking up the controller Ron had left on the side table. Getting into the settings, she started changing the colors of his pip boy. "Should I make it pink, or black?" Again, Danny just glared at her. "Look, my dad likes to pride himself on being the only normal member his family, so it's nice to take him down a notch or two at times."
"And always bossing me around…?" Danny asked.
"You let me, so it was kind of fun," she replied, settling on turning it black so when Ron came back and tried to use it he'd see nothing. "I knew you'd eventually get tired of it and tell me to stop, but until then it really helped with my commanding character. I just didn't like my dad trying to push his normalcy on me, trying to make me dress in a 'proper and dignified manner,' as he liked to call it. He didn't like the style I chose, so as he pushed I pushed back. I mean, it's not like you believe all that ghost stuff your parents spout, right?"
It was so strange, seeing her actually act human, that he almost missed her question, and his continued silence made her raise an eyebrow curiously. "Of course I don't," he replied, hoping she wouldn't catch on to his nervousness at the topic. Technically he wasn't lying, though. Belief indicates the room for doubt, and he knew ghosts existed, so no chance to doubt that. She just smirked as he stood.
"Well, I don't see the harm in enjoying something make-believe. Just don't tell my dad, 'kay?" she conceded as he reached the door. Pausing momentarily, he gave her a slight nod before continuing down the hall. So maybe she wasn't one-hundred-percent pure evil.
Scurrying down the stairs, he stopped at the landing to stare at the curious cat carrier nestled against the side table at the hinged edge of the door. Part of him wanted to crouch down and see what creature it contained, but another, more rational part reminded him that anything his Uncle Jim had in his possession could not be good. Or friendly. As if on cue, the… thing… started growling viciously and rattling its cage, sharp-sounding claws scratching at the metal grate before two glowing red eyes peered at him through the slots in the hard plastic. Yeah, he was definitely not looking in at that thing.
Hurrying in the other direction, snatching up another crab dip cracker in the process, he made his way to the kitchen and the food. It wasn't really until he could smell all the various dishes that he realized just how hungry he was; guess worrying about his dad's driving took more energy than he thought. And speaking of the big man, he could be seen moping about halfway through the line, no doubt from the thorough scolding he'd received from his wife. Lazily scooping up a large helping of mashed potatoes, Danny almost laughed at just how disinterested his dad seemed about food, something that rarely, if ever, happened.
Making his way through the line, piling sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce, olives, and turkey on his plate, Danny found he had to make his way upstairs through the living room, what with the dining room now filled with all his little cousins that were honestly still too young and rambunctious for his liking. When having to choose between walking through them and by the very possibly evil cat carrier, he'd choose the cat carrier. As he was slipping into the hallway he could heard one of those cousins ask Aunt Darla what she did for a living, to which he already knew her reply. He had asked her that almost ten years ago, and her answer never changed. "I'm a super secret top government spy in disguise as a housewife," she said all mysterious-like. It was a tale she liked to spin, and it entertained the younger kids. Of course, Danny was too old to believe that, but the way she'd say it almost made it sound believable, even to him.
"What's your super secret code name?" one of the little girls, Kate or Mary, Danny could never remember which, asked.
"Hmm…" Aunt Darla hummed, looking up and to the left as if trying to come up with one. "How about Agent W."
"But Jimmy brought his work with him," his father complained as he entered the living room, the large man taking up over half of the couch.
"I don't care if Uncle Jim brought that crazed raccoon in with him, you are not getting the Fenton Extractor," Maddie scolded, purple eyes narrowing.
"Actually, my patient is a koala," the man replied evenly, one finger held up in a physical representation of making a point. "And he is a very sweet koala who just happens to be picking up on his madam's inner turmoil and is acting out." It was only then that Danny realized the man's face and arms were covered in long scratches, no doubt from his 'very sweet patient.'
"And how do you know that?" another of his uncles asked, a man almost as large as Jack except he was all muscle, not fat.
"He told me of course, Fred," the much slimmer Jim replied matter-of-factly as he pointed in the direction of the carrier. Again, the angry mammal snarled and jarred its cage.
"Yeah, like that's true," Fred laughed, holding his belly. "What are you now, a Koala Whisper?"
"Maybe I am!" Jim shot back, jumping to his feet. "And even if I wasn't, it's a lot more real than the fake monsters you chase after!"
"Sasquatch is not fake!" Fred yelled.
"Ghosts are not fake!" Jack chorused, jumping into a conversation that he actually had no part in, thinking his brother's comment was directed at him as well. The other two seemed to ignore him, though.
"Shh, you guys," a fourth man cut in, stepping between the two. He was built a lot sturdier than Jim was, but not near as much as the taller Fred. "Don't let them hear us fighting. That's what they want," he half-whispered, eyes darting between the two and the TV.
"Frank, what are you going on about?" Fred asked, earning him another 'shhhh' from Frank at his voice being too loud.
"It's the TV, it's one of them," he replied quietly. "Machines, robots. They're taking us over little my little, making us dependent and discordant. Once we are divided they will attack and take over. Don't let them see us fight!" He said that last sentence with volume and vigor.
"Okay, Frank, I think it's time you sit down a little," Jim tried to reason, placing a hand on his shoulder.
And that was the main reason Danny did not like coming to his family reunions; crazy relatives. Between the total technophobe, 'nature journalist' hunting down sasquatch, and now a 'koala whisper,' it made his dad look normal.
Skirting passed the very obviously enraged Koala, Danny made his way back upstairs while managing to ignore the rest of his uncles' frantic rants. And none-too-surprising, both his Uncle Ron and Cousin Carl were already hiding out upstairs when he got there. "My dad going off on his whole 'technology is evil' rant again?" the boy asked as he slipped in, looking up from his 3DS to take in his slightly older cousin. Carl was a year younger than Danny, and one of only two people (potentially three, he reminded himself, since Darisa seems to actually be a lot nicer than he used to think) Danny could really stand here. Whereas his dad was paranoid of all things mechanical, Carl was fascinated by them, and actually really good at working on them. This, along with the fact that he liked to grow his hair out and dye it odd colors, were much to his father's ire. Currently he had his bangs dyed blue, the rest of his blonde hair tied back in a ponytail at the base of his skull.
"I think you can probably hear him well enough from here to know the answer," Danny replied, "but yeah. Man, it must be hard to work on your latest project with him around. How's the virtual reality helmet going?"
"I just leave an old computer monitor out in front of my door as a deterrent and he usually leaves me alone," Carl replied, sitting his game down in his lap. "And it's going as well as it can. Gotta earn the money for the parts myself, and some of the pieces are in the hundreds of dollars, so it takes a while. I should have it finished by next Christmas, though, and you can try it then."
The three lapsed into silence again, Danny barely looking up from Ron's game when Darisa glided into the room and sat down on the floor with her own plate to watch as well. And for a few fleeting moments, he was actually enjoying his visit to his family. But all good things have to end…
A wisp of blue smoke escaped his mouth, and he almost outwardly groaned. Of course, something had to come up. Standing drew Darisa's attention, the girl asking curiously, "Where're you going?"
"Bathroom," was the automatic reply. And sure enough he did go to the bathroom, closing and locking the door from the inside before slamming a fist into his open palm to start his transformation. Everywhere the white rings passed altered, his white-and-red t-shirt and blue jeans changing into a black-and-white jumpsuit with an emblazoned DP on the chest. Black hair turned to snowy-white and blue eyes to blazing green, expression somewhere between resigned and determined. Whoever had decided to crash the good moment he was having at this chaotic event was going to regret ever coming.
Turning both invisible and intangible, Danny phased down through the floor, finding himself in the downstairs closet. He could still hear Uncles Jim, Fred, and Frank arguing in the living room, with his dad jumping in at random times, but that was not his current concern. His ghost sense went off, which meant he had a ghost to find.
"I don't think I recognize you," Aunt Darla said from the kitchen, and as Danny phased through the closet door into the hallway he couldn't help but cringe. Purple flames blazed off the back of the black and grey suit of armor, billowing behind it like a cloak, green bladed sword sheathed at its side. "I'm afraid I'm not familiar with what character you're playing. Want some turkey?"
"For the last time, no, I would not like some Turkey," the Fright Knight growled in frustration, reaching for his sword. If Danny didn't do something soon Aunt Darla was going to experience her worst nightmare. "Now, where in this infernal place is the—"
"Fright Knight, what are you doing here?" Danny asked, arms folded over his chest and disapproving scowl on his face.
"—Danny Phantom," he finished his previous sentence, green eyes narrowing as he grinned maniacally beneath his helmet. "Why, I was just looking for you."
"Isn't there some truce about not attacking on Christmas?" Danny retorted, glancing from one of his more nefarious enemies to his aunt in an attempt to give her the hint to slip away. She just shrugged her shoulders and went back to whatever she had been doing, washing some dishes, it seemed. Apparently she thought this was some kind of cosplay or something, which to someone outside of Amity Park he guessed it did kind of seem like.
"Christmas was two days ago," the knight replied, expression changing to something almost innocent.
"This is still a Christmas celebration, so shouldn't it still count?" the half-ghost inquired, sighing in frustration at the other's sudden change in behavior.
"Well, the truce only really counts on Christmas day, so it should be okay," he answered, eyes still big, round circles in that almost creepy-like naivety.
Groaning and hanging his head for a second, Danny's next question was, "What are you even doing here, Fright Knight?" Really, it would be better to just get this over with, but the only times the Fright Knight came after his was being he was on someone's orders, and if Pariah Dark got out then—
"I was bored," came the reply, cutting off his train of thought.
Did he seriously just hear that right? "You were bore—" he started, snapping his head up just in time to see the attack.
The loud thud drew Darisa's attention, the girl having been standing outside the bathroom door asking her cousin what was taking him so long. Taking the stairs in two steps, half because she jumped down them and half because she started that jump by tripping, she put her hands on the wall in front of her to stop her momentum. Turning in the direction she had heard the noise from, her green eyes fell upon the white-haired teenager, sitting against the gas stove where he had been thrown just a moment before. He had one eye closed as he rubbed the stinging pain out of the back of his head, mumbling to himself that he 'should have seen that coming.'
"Ghost boy!" Jack yelled at that point, having gotten over his momentary shock at his 'nemesis's sudden appearance.
The Fright Knight chose that exact moment to throw his sword at the boy as well, white-clad hands slapping together to catch the blade just an inch from his chest. "Hey, you're gonna break something!" Danny shot at him, completely ignoring his dad's outburst.
"Isn't that normal?" came the oblivious reply, the ancient ghost calling his sword back to his hand and out of the teenager's. "I don't think I've ever seen one of your fights end without something getting damaged."
Groaning as he pushed himself to his feet, Danny realized that there was no point in trying to explain it to the Halloween ghost. This wasn't Amity Park, where people had gotten quite accustomed to ghost attack damage and where it was considered stupid to not have Ghost Insurance. This wasn't the place where his dad might jump into the fight and make everything ten times worse but people understood because they were the resident ghost experts and they had few others to rely on. And this wasn't some random business that he knew was already well prepared for a ghost-fueled rampage. This was his aunt's home, and outside of the one place where the excuse 'a ghost destroyed my house' was plausible.
"Can't we take this outside at least?" he asked, brushing off the seat of his pants.
"Nope," the Fright Knight replied, launching another attack at the young hero.
The sword was again caught between his hands, preventing the Halloween spirit from slashing through him or the expensive fireplace behind him. The next slash went over his head, taking several of the decorations with it and raining them down on Uncle Jim and Fred's heads. So, he was obviously not going to make this easy on him, but maybe Danny could prevent anything major from being destroyed.
"Let me hit you!" his opponent growled as he weaved around a strong uppercut, legs dissolving into a ghostly tail. His next attack was a ball of purplish ecto-energy, which the boy hastily dodged only to wince a second later as he heard it hit whatever was behind him. Looking back over his shoulder he saw he smoldering hole in the center of the now cracked TV.
"That… is going to hurt," he grimaced.
"So is this," the Fright Knight grinned, balled fist connecting with jaw, sending him flying back through the opposite wall.
"See, I told you ghosts were real!" Jack announced boisterously as Danny was thrown through the wall, his intangibility the only thing keeping him from making a decent sized hole in the wood and plaster.
"It's not very convincing," Rory drolled from where he was sitting in one of the chairs on the other side of the stove. "I'll admit that Carl's holoprojections are getting better, but of course the smaller one would disappear once it reached the boundary of the room. And this other one…? Is he supposed to be come kind of comic book villain? Really, a flame cape? And what's the bright green sword? He's about as scary as Chihuahua."
"You dare to mock me, mortal?" the ghost bellowed, raising his sword above his head. It was right at that time that a slightly disoriented Danny phased his head back through the wall.
"Oooh, I'm so scared," Rory mocked, chuckling slightly. The next instant he was cut by the Fright Knight's blade and the world around him went black. Sighing, he was about to spout some course remark when a person came in to his field of vision. "Darisa?" he asked curiously, only able to see the back of his daughter's head and the long, black cape she wore.
"No, Daddy, I'm Carmilla," Nightmare Darisa purred, turning to look at him. Her eyes glowed red and she had a set of long canines in her mouth.
Rory's next reaction was to scream like a little girl and run, the cackling vampire right on his heels.
Everyone else stared at the spot Uncle Rory stood a minute ago, mostly in awe. He really needed to wrap this up quickly before anyone else got sucked into the Fright Knight's dimension. Of course, as he reached behind his back to grab the Fenton Thermos that is when he remembered that he didn't actually bring one with him. Not only would his mom have noticed and thought his dad had used him to sneak it on, but he had been counting on the ghost truce and the sheer distance between him and Amity Park to prevent him from needing it.
Uncle Fred screamed next, having recovered from the initial shock of his brother's disappearance first. Granted, he had initially thought it was all incredibly fake as well, but it was hard to refute the empty space missing about two-hundred pounds of pompous know-it-all.
"Oh, for the love of…" the medieval ghost started, raising his sword again. "Will you just be quiet?"
His blow was deflected by the smaller ghost slamming into him, driving him back and into the wall just to Darisa's side. She quickly side-stepped up the stairs and out of the way as the green blade landed right where she was standing a second before, and cringed as much as Danny did when the blade went flying back the other way and cut the cat carrier in two and sent the front half spinning across the carpet at the gathered relatives.
"Eat hot Fenton Bazooka, Ghost Boy!" Jack yelled, leveling the weapon at the two.
"Not now, fighting!" Danny shouted back, grunting as his armored opponent pinned him to the floor. In retaliation, he brought both feet up and kicked him squarely in the chest, sending the knight back through the wall and jumping to his feet. The barrel of the large gun followed his every move, though.
"Jaaaack," Maddie started, tapping her foot irritably on the floor. "Where did you get the Fenton Bazooka from?"
"Uhhhmmm…" the big man stalled, taking his eyes off the half-ghost for a second as he tried to think of some excuse to give his wife. "Not telling…?" he more so asked that replied.
"And just where do you think you're firing that?" she berated, hands on her hips. "If you try using that here you'll likely blow the entire house up. Give it here."
"But Maddie," Jack tried, shoulders drooping when her only response was to move her fingers in a non-verbal command to give her the weapon. He was halfway through handing it over when the contents of the cat carrier moved. Red eyes glaring out into the open space, Uncle Jim's furry companion leapt free of its cage, landing directly on Jack's face. It's vicious snarls were matched only by Jack's screams, Jim jumping up immediately to try and disengage the angry koala.
"I told you he picks up on his mistress' distress!" Jim scolded. "He must have understood Maddie's ire as well and gone after you! He really is normally quite sweet."
Content that they could handle anything else going in the house, Danny quickly followed his enemy outside. "Alright, pumpkin, pumpkin," he mumbled to himself, watching the Fright Knight pick himself up out of the dirt. "Wait, it's December! There are no more pumpkins!" he yelled, both hands on his head has he just remembered that small little fact. "But if I don't lock him back away in a pumpkin then how am I supposed to fix everything he's cut?"
A ghostly laugh reaching his ears, Danny turned to face the ghost. "The answer is you can't," the Fright Knight replied, blasting him with another ball of ghost energy. He flew through the wall, the table, another wall, and finally stopped when his back hit the counter, right next to where Aunt Darla was still washing the dishes. For some reason, it appeared she hadn't left once to go see what all the commotion in the living room was about.
"Ah, are you two still playing?" she asked sweetly. "Just came back for dessert?"
A lightbulb clicking in his head, Danny shouted, "That's it!" and scooted along the counter towards the fridge.
"Ah, back where we started," the Fright Knight laughed, watching the boy clutch at his chest where it was still steaming from his ecto-blast. "I think it's time we end this," he stated, lifting his sword above his head. Danny glanced up at him, one eye closed and wincing at the movement.
As his sword was coming down, angled directly at the half-ghost's head, Danny smirked and said, "I couldn't agree more," and moved off to the side. The green blade continued its downward path, cutting through the empty air before the tip landed right in the middle of one of the pie plates on the counter. And suddenly he could not let go of the sword's hilt.
"What is…?" he questioned, feeling himself being drawn in to… something.
"That would be pumpkin pie," Danny grinned, taking one more step to the side the Fright Knight was quickly drawn back into his prison. "I figured if a plastic pumpkin filled with candy worked then maybe that would too." A green energy burst from the now-sword-impaled-pumpkin, sweeping over the house and repairing the damage the ghost had caused. Uncle Rory reappeared in the exact same spot he had vanished from, albeit a little paler and winded from the experience, the large hole in the middle of the TV vanished and the episode of The Bachelor that had previously been playing resumed, and the cat carrier mended itself, although its inhabitant was still in its keeper's arms.
"We got you now, Ghost Boy!" Jack yelled, bursting into the kitchen. He had scratches covering his face now, which did nothing to hide his confusion as the only person he was his sister Darla. "Not here… He must be outside, Maddie!" he yelled, rushing through the dining room and out the front door, his Bazooka wielding wife in tow.
Danny sighed from his hiding place in the upstairs bathroom, the sworded pumpkin behind the shower curtain. He almost didn't get out of there in time to avoid his parents.
"Are you done in there yet?" Darisa asked, knocking on the door again.
Jumping, he quickly stuttered, "A-almost!" turning on the sink for good measure. Now he just had to get the pumpkin back without his parents noticing, and unfortunately it was a little too far away for him to fly there and back before his folks left. Maybe Jazz would have a bright idea. Pulling the shower curtain over a little more and turning off the sink, he unlocked and opened the door, his cousin quickly ambushing him about the fun he'd just missed.
While he had been skeptical at first, Jazz's idea of saying the weird pumpkin was a gift from Uncle Ron seemed to have worked, for while his mom did raise an eyebrow at the 'present' she said nothing else about it, and so as they were filling up the RV the next morning he was able to ferret it away where hopefully neither of them would ever think about it again. After all, as soon as he got back home he was throwing the thing away in the ghost zone.
"See you later Danny," Ron said, giving him a quick hug before doing the same with Jazz. Also, luckily, no one had asked Uncle Ron himself about the weird pumpkin, because that would mean Danny would have to try to find a way to possess a relative to make the story fit, something he didn't really like to do anymore. Sure, he'd used a couple times on his parents to handle things at his school, but he preferred to not have to.
Walking up to him as he was about to hop in the Fenton Family Assault Vehicle, Darisa tapped him on the shoulder to get his attention. Jack and Maddier were still back saying their farewells to his family, and Jazz was trying to make sure Uncle Rory wasn't going to be permanently scarred from his experience with the Fright Knight, so it was just the two of them. "I had fun," she said, giving him a very kind smile.
"Surprisingly, so did I," Danny replied, and it was surprising because he actually meant it. Despite the brief interruption in the middle, it really hadn't been so bad.
Leaning forward to give him a hug, Darisa whispered mischievously in his ear, "Sooo… you don't believe in ghosts?"
Danny froze, mind working to quickly come up with something to counter the knowing tone in her voice as she backed up a step and showed him the picture she'd taken of Danny Phantom on her phone. Laughing softly, she continued, "I don't know what that one did to my dad, but he seems absolutely terrified of my now, so if you ever see him—either of them—again, thank 'em for me?"
"Uh… yeah," Danny managed, somehow, watching as she pranced back to the porch.
He was still frozen there a minute later when Jazz came back out, saying something about Rory's mental state that he didn't hear. "Danny, are you okay?" she asked a moment later, noticing that he wasn't paying attention.
"Huh? Oh, yeah," he replied quickly, snapping out of his shock. He honestly wasn't sure if she was 'calling his bluff' on his belief of ghosts or telling him she knew he was Danny Phantom. Although to be entirely honest, it seemed like the latter.
Clambering into the front seat, Jack barely made sure everyone was buckled in before whipping the vehicle around and roaring down the road. "Who wants to sing songs?!" he shouted, not even waiting for a reply before bellowing out, "Shhhhhhhheee'll be coming 'round the mountain when she comes!"
Both children in the back seat placed their hands over their ears. "Just ten more hours of this," Danny stated, starting their countdown.
"Just ten more hours…" Jazz sighed.
So, my family always has a second Christmas with my dad's side the weekend after Christmas. It worked perfectly, because when I first came up with this episode I had actually forgotten about the Christmas truce, so it was a perfect way to get around it.
I don't if this will lead to any more chapters involving Jack's side of the family, but I tried to set it up so that if I wanted I could easily pull either Carl or Darisa back into the picture for an episode or two. But, for now, this is the only time you'll see them. Who knows, maybe in a few months I'll come up with even more episodes (oh god...) for this story, and they might be in one of those. I could also see them easily appearing in one or more of the sequels to this story, once I finish with CoDP. Until next time!
As always, reviews are luffed and appreciated :)
