"Where's the whelpette, child?"
"That's not something you need to know," growled Danny. "Now, get out of my house."
"I may be after the girl, but I'm not opposed to adding a few more specimens to my collection. Your pelt will look quite nice on my wall, as will that of the little ghost hunter girl." With that, several missiles extended out of the ghost's shoulders and he drew an additional gun, this one aimed at Valerie. The appearance of additional weapons seemed to shock the Fenton parents back into action. Maddie grabbed the pistol she had recently set-down and Jack lofted the bazooka still in his hands.
"No one messes with my family, you spook!" He cried out as the bazooka let out a blast that missed the ghost by a foot, leaving a large scorch mark on the back wall.
Valerie rolled her eyes. That's how he survived then. His parents have terrible aim.
Skulker roared as another blast knocked out half his missiles.
"Ha, take that Ghost X!" shouted Maddie.
Scratch that. His Dad may have terrible aim, but his mom doesn't.
Tucker looked up from the PDA he had once again started fiddling with. "Ghost X? Have you been reading Jazz's files?" he asked.
There wasn't time for a response as 'Ghost X' fired a round of missiles at the group, causing them to scatter and duck under various lab tables. Valerie's hiding spot was close enough to the weapons collection that she snatched the first one she saw. She would have changed into her suit at the first sight of the ghost, but with the elder Fentons around, that option was out of the question. Instead, she aimed and pulled what she hoped was a trigger on the Fenton ectoblaster. Not as good as her own weapons, but an ectogun was an ectogun and it would do.
Except it didn't seem to be doing much at all. After Maddie's initial hit, Skulker had activated some sort of shield around his metallic exterior. Every blast, rather than harming the ghost, was now being adsorbed by the suit. Thus the barrage of blasts Valerie and the others were firing were not deterring the ghost in the least. In fact he seemed amused by their attempts as he continued firing his own weapons, causing the group to constantly dodge, dip, dive, duck, and dodge as if they were playing a professional sport on The Ocho.
Valerie panted as she took cover behind an overturned table. They had only been fighting the ghost for a few minutes and already she felt like it had been hours. How on earth was she supposed to beat this guy without weapons?
The answer came in the form of a black and white blur hurdling through the lab, landing a punch right in the ghost's gut, causing him to let out an oof and drop one of his blasters. "You wanna mess with me? Well here I am you big jerk. Leave them out of it."
"Phantom!" bellowed the grown ghost hunters together.
"Don't shoot!" rang out three teenage voices. Valerie whirled around. Danny, Sam, and Tucker had jumped in front of Maddie and Jack, effectively blocking their view of the now two ghosts. But if Danny was with Sam and Tucker, then...
Scanning…
New ectosignature detected. Classification: Ghost. Level: Unknown.
"Dani!" shrieked Val, as she ran towards the ghost girl who was presently giving Skulker an obviously painful beating. Valerie was a few feet away when her foot collided with something round, causing her to lose her balance fall to the ground. She quickly snatched the offending device, fully prepared to toss it through a window for daring to trip her up. But her anger turned into devious glee when she realized what the contraption was. Still lying on the ground, Valerie managed to wrench the cap off the cylinder.
"Danielle, get out the way!" The girl turned towards Valerie, confused about why she was being called away from her attack until she saw the device in Val's hand. Dani barely escaped the beam of blue light now emitting from the cylinder. Skulker was not so lucky, his whole body and associated armory stretching as it was unceremoniously sucked into the Fenton thermos. Valerie capped the lid of the thermos and collapsed back down to the ground.
Scanning…
Level six ectosignature no longer detected.
"Argh, stupid device," mumbled Danny as he hit the red button on the Ecto-Exposer to shut it down.
The sudden stillness in the lab was jarring after the noise and chaos of battle just moments before. Valerie could hear her fellow fighters breathing heavily as they recovered. The calm was broken when two weapons were heard charging up, followed by a little "eep!"
"Mom, Dad, no!" shouted Danny, rushing to stand between the charged weapons and the cringing ghost girl.
"Danny, sweetie, out of the way. We've got a ghost to catch."
"No! She just saved our lives, in case you didn't notice!"
"Yes, but honey, she's still a ghost."
"Yeah, but not really. Mom, you can't shoot her!"
"Sweetie…"
Mrs. Fenton was abruptly cut off when two rings of light swept over Danielle, changing her from ghost to human.
"Oh. Oh my god!" Maddie dropped her weapon and brushed past her son to catch the girl that was having trouble standing since her transformation.
"Careful Mads, the little ghost might just be pretending."
"Da-ad, she's not. I promise."
"Jack, she's breathing… and she has a pulse," answered Maddie, her voice wavering as she placed two fingers on Dani's wrist. "I...I think she's human." She settled into a sitting position, with Danielle on her lap and began absently stroking her now black hair.
"How is that possible Mads?"
Danny cleared his throat, causing everyone to turn and gaze at him. He let out a slight chuckle and rubbed the back of his neck.
"Danny?" asked Maddie, confusion clearly on her face, "what do you know about this girl?"
"She's, a, uh, well, she's a halfa."
"A what-a?" asked Jack.
"A halfa. She's half-human and half-ghost. She can go back and forth between her two forms at will. She's got all the powers of a ghost, but she's still fully alive, just like you."
At Jack's skeptical look, Valerie chimed in, "he's right. Dani's a human and a ghost. And she's not dangerous at all."
Maddie looked down at the girl in her arms, her expression softening. "How is this possible? What about her parents?"
"Well, we were hoping you could help us out with that part," said Sam, nodding to Danny to continue. "Sam's right. We want to do some genetic testing and mom, I know you have the equipment."
"Hmm, yes, well that would be useful." Maddie's eyes lit up and she glanced at her husband. "Think of the fascinating features that must be in her DNA! We'll need to get several samples though, maybe a cheek swab and a hair sample, and of course a blood sample. Jack, grab a needle from the med kit, would you?" At the mention of needles, Dani jerked fully awake and wriggled out Maddie's grasp to cower by a nearby cabinet.
"Mom, you're scaring her!"
"Huh? Oh sweetheart, it won't hurt at all I promise! And we won't run any tests you don't want us too, okay?" She smiled reassuringly at Danielle, who still looked a bit nervous. "Jack and I can get a little enthusiastic when it comes to our research."
"A little?" scoffed Tucker. Maddie chose to ignore the quip. She stood up and began clearing off one of the lab tables while Jack went to retrieve the medical supplies.
Sam nudged Danny, encouraging him to speak up. "Ow. Uh, mom, can, uh, can we also compare her DNA to, uh, to mine?" Maddie gave him an inquisitive look, "Why on earth would we need to do that, honey?"
"Well, I think she's my cl, uh, my, cousin?" Maddie's eyes darted between Dani and Danny. "Hmm, you do look incredibly alike." She shrugged. "But you know your Aunt Alicia doesn't have any children, and your father is an only child. I only had one cousin growing up, but he was ten years older than me and his two kids graduated college already. All blonde too, if I remember their Christmas card picture from last year..."
"Mom?"
"...I'm not sure about second cousins on your dad's side, although it could be possible, let me go check the Christmas card pile, there might be something..."
"Mom!"
"Hmm?"
"She's not really, arghh, I know she's not really my cousin." Maddie just gave him with a puzzled look.
"Alright young man, out with it. Who is this poor girl, really, and why do you need to compare her DNA to yours?"
Danny was suddenly very interested in his shoes. "She's my, well I thought she was my clone."
"Danny, I don't know who told you that, but cloning doesn't -"
"Doesn't work like that, yeah, so I've been told. Still, I think we share some DNA." Maddie just looked at him expectantly. "It's not just the black hair and blue eyes that are the same." He took a deep breath. "It's the ghost powers."
AN. Yes, I'm evil and enjoy leaving you with cliff hangers. The big reveal is coming, I promise! Also, how'd I do on the fight scene? I much prefer writing exposition to action, but since the latter is more exciting, I'm trying to give you both. Good? Bad? Suggestions? Thanks for the reviews and support, y'all are awesome! (Also, extra kudos to whoever reviews first with a reference to my not so subtle movie reference)