Chapter 10: Flirting With Disaster

My parents worked nonstop on the Fenton Portal into the wee hours of the morning, ignoring me for the most part – but not before they left me a laundry list of rules, foremost of which was 'Don't touch anything!' Fortunately, they decided that the person to keep an eye on my dangerous ghostly self was Jazz.

Of course the cuffs prevented me from doing much of anything. Besides linking my hands together, they prevented me from using my powers. On top of that, the ghost shield kept me from leaving the house – which was fine, really, since I wasn't planning on going anywhere, but it still chafed. Where was I going to run to with ghost cuffs on? I mean, really?

It comforted me only slightly that if things got really bad, I could always escape into the Ghost Zone. It would be a bad idea, but it was possible.

Tucker and Sam stayed over until nearly midnight, and we played a lot of video games. Jazz carried an ecto-gun with her for appearances. "As long as it's not the Fenton Thermos, right, Danny?" Tucker joked.

I laughed weakly, but not being able to do anything about anything was driving me up a wall.

Jazz pulled me aside for a brief conversation while Sam and Tuck took their turn at Blood! Spatter! Gore, our game of choice. "What is it, Jazz?"

"Remember how I said you probably have a psychic connection with Danny?" Jazz asked.

She'd said it in passing, but I remembered. "Yeah?"

"Good. See, based on what Mom and Dad described, I think you're not exactly Danny Phantom … you're more like part of Danny's conciousness, a throwoff manifestation. That's not as terrible as it sounds – it means that you're directly linked to Danny, like if you were having an out-of-body experience."

"That's one way to put it," I cracked.

Jazz smirked. "Look, I don't know how it works exactly, but concentrate. Can you sense Danny?"

I rolled my eyes. "Jazz, this isn't some psycho telepathy show."

"I know, Danny," Jazz sighed, exasperated. "Just try, okay?"

I closed my eyes to humor her, but my thoughts wandered, and I recalled the feeling I'd had when Danny and had first been separated: I had somehow just known that my human half was still alive. That feeling hadn't really gone away. "I can't sense him or whatever, but I know he's alive," I said simply, opening my eyes. "I just … know."

Jazz clapped her hands together excitedly. "Yes, exactly! Exactly what I'm talking about! Do you think you'll know when you're closer or further from him?"

I shrugged. "I dunno, but I guess I'll try," I sighed.

"That's exactly what I hope you'll do," Jazz answered, and then it was my turn to play again.

When Sam and Tucker left, Mom and Dad were still working, and Jazz had fallen asleep on the couch. I sighed and flipped on the TV. "Nothing … Nothing … argh! Bored now!"

Jazz rolled over in her sleep, and I looked down at her. She'd probably saved my … er, life. I smiled slightly. "Thanks, Jazz," I murmured.

"Phantom?"

I looked up, startling back from my sister at the sight of my mom flipping on the living room lights. I suddenly realized what this probably looked like to Mom – me about to hurt my sleeping sister. "I wasn't doing anything," I said defensively before Mom could speak, putting up my hands in surrender.

Mom glanced at the TV, and I followed her every movement warily, sidling away from the couch. But she hadn't pulled out an ecto-gun yet: good sign, right?

"Cartoons?" she asked.

I cleared my throat. "Um, I guess your daughter watches them?"

"Jazz never watches cartoons," Mom answered, which of course I already knew. "Were you …?"

"I got bored," I said warily. What was she doing?

Mom approached the couch (I circled away until my back hit the wall) and sat down near Jazz's feet. "Sit down," she said gently – and when I say gently, I mean she wasn't snapping at me like a wolf. I slid down the wall to sit with my thighs drawn up to my chest, my cuffed hands encircling my knees.

Mom regarded me with open confusion for a moment. "Are you sure you don't want to sit on the loveseat?"

I glanced at said chair, still a good distance from my mom. "I never liked that name for it," I admitted aloud, but didn't move. Why was Mom offering me upholstery seating?

I was startled when Mom smiled slightly. "I'm just taking a short break from the Portal," she explained. "Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?"

My eyebrows shot up. "Um, that depends," I ventured. "Are you going to shoot me if you don't like the answers?"

Mom shook her head. "No, Phantom." She hesitated for a moment. "I … saw something you probably never intended me to see."

I flinched. Had she come up to see Sam and Tucker playing video games with me like we were old friends? Had she seen Jazz joking with me? What had I missed? "Er, what are you talking about?"

Mom was pulling the afghan off the back of the couch and covering Jazz with it. "I came downstairs and saw you juggling."

What was she talking about? It took me a moment to remember the pastime I'd used to distract me from impending doom. "Oh, that … it's just a hobby," I said lamely.

"I see," Mom said. "… may I ask how long it's been since you died?" She fussed with the afghan, not looking at me.

Oh, crud – it was a question I'd never really anticipated anyone asking me, and I didn't want to say 'one year ago' because the coincidence was just too much, probably. "Oh, um, well … I don't really remember," I lied. "I haven't seen my own grave"—that much was true—"but I guess it's been a couple of years?"

"You're very strong for a new ghost," Mom said.

I shrugged. "If you say so. You're the ghost experts."

"You register as a 7.4 on the Theoretical Ectoplasmic Scale."

I smiled wryly. "I've heard that." Namely from the Guys in White.

Mom was silent for a moment. "… You also show a fair amount of human traits – affection, and remorse."

Now we were wandering into slightly dangerous territory, but it didn't really register with me. I felt a flare of annoyance. "Of course I do," I said, trying to not be too snappish. "What do you think ghosts do in their free time? It's not like they wander around the Ghost Zone fighting each other all the time! Geez, one time I caught Technus taking a shower!" I took a deep breath to relax myself. "Ghosts were humans once, too."

"I know. But you don't belong here any more," Mom pointed out.

I was silent. I did belong here, but that was special circumstances for obvious reasons, and for the most part I agreed with my mom. It certainly was no picnic for me when ghosts decided the human world was a good place to visit. "If you say so," I finally mumbled.

Mom looked satisfied, as if she'd won some argument I hadn't known we were having. "Phantom … thank you for helping us find our son. We should have gone to bed hours ago, but …" she trailed off.

"You couldn't sleep," I finished for her. "Yeah, I know. And you're welcome. I … I need Danny here too." Perhaps I'd said too much, I realized, so I backtracked. "I mean, he's your kid, and I don't want to hurt people no matter what you think, and you're not bad people, even if you are trying to tear me apart molecule by molecule … speaking of which, can we please reconsider the whole dissecting me after Danny's back home thing?" Not that it was likely to be a problem, if – when – I found my human half, but it couldn't hurt to ask, right?

Mom gave me a lingering sharp look. "I'll consider it," she said. "On one condition: You must never leave the Ghost Zone again."

I gaped at her. "I can't do that," I protested. "I have to protect Amity Park!"

"The way you protected it when you kidnapped the mayor?" Mom shot back.

"I – that's--! I was framed!" My voice cracked a little. "Why the heck would I want to kidnap the mayor?"

"Why not explain it to me," Mom suggested.

"I can't explain it because I didn't do it!" I shot back, my voice rising in volume.

Jazz mumbled something in her sleep, and began to blink awake. "… Danny …?"

In her half-awake state, Jazz wasn't aware Mom was in the room. "Phantom," I corrected hastily.

"Jazz, sweetie, go to bed," Mom said gently, rubbing Jazz's shoulder.

"Mom?" Jazz's eyes opened fully, and then she glanced back and forth between me and her. "Oh! U-uh, well, shouldn't Phantom get some sleep too? He's got to be tired!"

She was trying to save me from this conversation with our mom, and I decided I was too wounded to be anything but grateful. "Ghosts don't really sleep," I said wearily, "But resting would be nice."

Mom gave me a skeptical look and smiled at Jazz. "Don't worry about the ghost, honey, I'll take care of him."

"Well, treat him nicely, Mom, he's treated everyone else nicely," Jazz answered, standing up and casting me a slightly worried look as she passed by on her way up the stairs.

I shot her a small smile to reassure her. Mom didn't notice, rearranging the afghan. "… well, then, Phantom, would you like to just sleep here on the couch?"

My room and my comfortable bed were right upstairs, but a million miles out of reach. I nodded. "Yeah. Thanks." I stood at the same time as Mom, and I averted my eyes. "As for your offer, Mo-Maddie … I really can't. I'll just risk dissection, I guess."

Mom just watched me as I crossed the room and flopped onto the couch, but all I could think was if I don't find my human half, I'm toast.

&

"And here it is! The Fenton Interdimensional Portal!"

"Wow, that's a remarkably straightforward name," I remarked dryly as my father unveiled their newest invention the next day.

"Of course it is! We don't have to fool ghosts with this one," Dad explained eagerly.

I could think of a lot of things ghosts could do with potential interdimensional mischief-making, but I decided to just hold my tongue.

The Interdimensional Portal was small and round, raised on a platform in the middle of the lab so the Ghost Portal stood ominously silent behind it. A generator sat on the floor underneath it. I wanted to know how it worked, but I was smart enough to not ask. I'd be rewarded with the longest snooze-fest in history, no doubt.

"We haven't activated it yet, but our calculations are perfect," Mom added. "It should work just fine."

"Stand back, everyone!" My dad plugged a couple of electrical outlets, flipped on the generator, and produced a remote control remarkably like the one that had controlled my cage. I cringed back automatically. "Banzai!"

Jazz was right behind me for the moment; I pushed her back gently with my shoulder, out of the line of fire in case the Portal exploded outwards the way my parents' first Ghost Portal had exploded on Vlad. Fortunately, the machine merely sparked a few times, seemed to sputter, and then hummed to life like some kind of bizarre computer screen, a thin layer of what looked like gray smoke obscuring the round portal's entrance.

"It works!" Jazz exclaimed in surprise.

"It works!" Mom and Dad shouted together.

"And I didn't have to do it myself this time," I muttered to Jazz, making her smile.

Mom and Dad hugged each other, then smooched, and I made an 'ew, gross!' face and looked away. Jazz rolled her eyes at me. "Geez, Danny, they're in love."

"Doesn't mean I have to want to see that!"

"We'll get back our son yet," Mom said confidently as they drew apart again. "All right, then, back to business!" She snatched the remote from Dad's hands and approached me.

"This controls which dimension the Portal connects to," she explained, holding out the remote. I glanced at it peripherally, but I doubted I'd be making much personal use of it.

"Okay."

"We had to make the Portal this size to keep it stable," Mom explained. "Most of the closest parallel dimensions are going to be some sort of variations on prior events; we think Danny most likely ended up in one of those. Now … when you travel through the Portal, you'll need this." She snapped a metal bracelet around my forearm, and it blinked warningly. I raised an eyebrow at it.

"That's our homing device! When you've been in a dimension for one hour, we'll pull you back with that device!" Dad boomed.

"Danny can't have gotten far in one day," Mom said, "And hopefully, he's been smart and stayed near where he entered the dimension."

I hoped so, too – or at least that Jazz's psychic connection thing worked. "What if it's the right dimension but you pull me back before I find him?" I asked.

"Then you can tell us and we'll send you back!" Mom answered. She looked back at the Portal, then at Dad. "All right. Jack, are you ready?"

There was the whine of an ecto-rifle being readied by my father. "Ready, Maddie!" He swung the rifle towards me.

Mom pinned me with her gaze. "I'm going to remove the Fenton Specter Disrupters now," she informed me, holding up the key for the cuffs. "Don't—"

"Try anything funny, yeah, yeah, I get it," I interrupted with a sigh. "Let's just do this."

Mom exchanged a look with Dad, who shrugged eloquently. "All right." She unlocked the ghost cuffs.

I stood as still as possible, rubbing my wrists instinctively, then spreading my arms in either direction non-threateningly. Mom and Dad didn't move, ready for me to go berserk and try to kill them or something.

I rolled my eyes, unable to help it, and looked at the Portal. "Well … here goes nothing," I said – and I let my form dissolve, spreading like a directional mist into the Portal.

There was a pulling sensation, and then that of an uncontrollable fall. I would have shouted, but I couldn't change my form back to a solid, human one until the feeling suddenly stopped and I landed hard on my butt in the Fenton lab.

Or … what had been the Fenton lab in my dimension, anyway.

This lab had a huge clown face where the Ghost Portal once stood, and it was silent and dark. I made a face, standing up and dusting my suit off. What had happened here …?

I turned intangible and flew up out of the lab; I had an impression of a silent and unused kitchen before I rose up and into the sky.

The sky was purple. Ghostly faces and clowns and carnival rides decorated every building.

I had the feeling I knew exactly what sort of dimension I was in.

"Freakshow," I growled under my breath. He must still have the Reality Gauntlet in this reality! Which means …

One of two things. Either I had been permanently turned into Jello in this universe and was a stain on the ground at a demented carnival, or Freakshow had let me live to suffer a world where my parents, my sister, my friends, and their parents had all died.

Technically, it wasn't my problem, but it still felt personal. I wanted to find Freakshow and tear him limb from limb, but I took a deep breath instead and closed my eyes. "All right," I said aloud. "Let's find out if Jazz's theory is right."

I thought long and hard about my human half, but there was nothing – nothing except the sensation that he was still out there, somewhere. I opened my eyes again and scowled. "I guess we're doing this the hard way."

Unfortunately, I didn't even get a chance to go looking. I started to swoop down to search the streets of Amity Park when I pulled up short at the sight of a huge, ugly white face with deep-set red eyes that was at least three times as big as my whole body, attached to a ten-story-tall body attached to a hand wearing a glowing gold gauntlet.

"What are you doing away from your booth?" Freakshow demanded of me. "I thought I'd finally broken your spirit!"

The Gauntleted hand came flying up at me.

I did the sensible thing and fled, zigzagging across the sky.

I was too slow or too late or too something, though, because the Form beam that hit me in the back turned me into stone. I began to fall, conscious but unable to scream, kick, or avert disaster, and hit the pavement at terminal velocity.

I broke to pieces.

Tbc

if you'd like a bit of spoiler, you can follow this link to an illustration concept page for the realities that poor Phantom will be traveling to (minus spaces): www. deviantart. com/ deviation/ 41200626/

Thank you again to all my reviewers: Xelena, DP Fan, Amitra, Sasia, Sword on Fire, Pieling, YumeTakato, Shimegami-chan, AnonymousReader13, and Unrealistic. You all rock my socks. D

Reviews are appreciated and adored.