The wires along Valerie's thermos lit up as she aimed it at the ghost in front of her. Her face stretched into a grin. "I've been waiting a long time for this, Ghost." Phantom swallowed hard, his face scrunched up in preparation for the blast. Then she flipped off the cap and pressed the button on the side of her thermos. But before she could react, Phantom's eyes snapped open and he leapt towards her, pinning her to the wall by her throat. Her shot went wide, the thermos clattering to the ground as her hands instinctively shot to the fingers around her neck. Her vision started clouding at the edges, and her chest heaved as she struggled to breathe.

Black bolts of electricity arced along Phantom's body. He cocked his head to one side, grinning. "Looks like you were a bit too slow this time, Val." The bloody glow of his eyes stained her vision, and she clawed uselessly at her throat again. A forked tongue flicked into view, probing his canines experimentally. Hadn't they been shorter before?

Phantom's grip around her throat tightened as his tongue flicked back into his mouth. He laughed humorlessly. "Well. That's new." He leaned closer to her, and her arms fell to her sides. "You know, you used to be so much fun. But now? You're just a wet blanket." His face contorted into a snarl, exposing thin white fangs. "And I despise wet blankets." Green flames appeared across his fingers, burning her throat as he tightened his grip around her neck even further. "Goodbye, Valerie."

And then the world went black.

"We're gonna have to ask her for help."

Sam shot bolt upright in the passenger seat and glared at Jazz. "Are you insane? That psycho?"

Jazz kept her eyes on the road. "Look, I know it's not ideal. But Mom and Dad don't have a second Specter Speeder, and since the one in the Ghost Zone was destroyed…"

Sam groaned and sank back into her seat, scowling darkly at the road ahead. "Yeah, I know. But Valerie? There's gotta be a better option."

"We don't have time to think of a better one," Jazz snapped back. "How long have they already spent in the Ghost Zone without the Speeder? One hour? Two? They won't last much longer if we don't get them out of there."

"Yeah, but —" Sam's phone ringing cut her off. She flipped it open, trying to keep her voice light, and failing miserably. "Courtney. Is everything okay?"

The voice on the other end sounded near panic. "I… I don't really know. A doctor just shoved me out of the room, but I think the kid's gone into cardiac arrest. Again."

Sam's shoulder's tensed, and she put Courtney on speakerphone. "Are you sure?"

"No," Courtney snapped. "I'm not sure, I just called you for the heck of it." Then she took a deep breath, and her voice calmed somewhat. "What do I do?"

"There's nothing to do." Jazz said, her voice strained. "Just… stay there, okay? And let us know if there's any change. We'll try to find Danny."

Courtney started to protest, but Sam flipped her phone shut. "Bye, Courtney," she said. Jazz glanced over at her, and Sam sighed. "Fine. We'll do it your way." Then she spotted the thick column of smoke, and her eyes went wide. "Wait. Isn't that near Valerie's apartment?" She whispered.

A glance towards Jazz did nothing to reassure her. The other girl's mouth had drawn itself into a tight line, and a sudden jump in the car's speed showed she'd just floored the accelerator. Sam squeezed her eyes shut. Please don't let it be Danny. Please.

But as Jazz pulled into the apartment complex, Sam's heart fell down into her stomach. Huge swaths of wall was missing, and large green flames danced along the edges of each crater. She leapt out of the car, not bothering to shut the door behind her as she started sprinting towards the burning building. The thump of a car door closing told her that Jazz was right behind her. Please don't be Danny.

And then something hit her in the back and she was lying face down on the asphalt. Sam immediately tried to lift her head back off the ground, but she only succeeded in scraping the bridge of her nose on the road. She clenched her jaw, straining her eyes as she glanced to her left, then suppressed a loud yell in her throat as she caught sight of her left wrist. Mansons did not panic. They figured out what was going on, and then they figured out how to fix it. However different she was from her parents, they had that much in common.

But the fact remained that there was a glowing blob of ectoplasm binding her hands to the road. Why did this feel so familiar?

She pushed the feeling aside. What did she have? A pair of immobilized limbs. A thermos just out of reach. But maybe if Jazz was still free…

A clawed hand tapping her on the shoulder startled her out of her thoughts. A voice whispered into her ear, silky smooth as poisoned honey. "Hello, Sam."

Sam's eyes went wide, and her brain froze. Distantly, she could hear Jazz yelling something, but she didn't pay attention. She knew that voice. Where did she remember it from? She closed her eyes, and an image danced across her brain, unbidden.

Bound and gagged in glowing green ectoplasm, a tall figure looming over her. Blood red eyes, flickering flames along his skull. Her eyes shot open, her heart stopping in her throat. No, it's not real. But the memories kept coming.

Mrs. Fenton, training a gun on a ghost that looked so familiar, "What have you done with our boy?"

And the ghost laughing at her, cruel and merciless in his madness. "I am your boy."

The huge bang. The feeling of the flames rushing toward her, bound, helpless, unmoving. Wanting to scream through the glowing gag, to get up and run far away, even as she knew it was too late.

"What kind of parents are you anyway? The world's leading ghost experts, and you couldn't even figure out your own son was half-ghost!"

The world on fire. The smell of burning sauce, so torturously real in the back of her throat, signaling how close the end actually was.

Leering at her, red eyes glowing murderously as his head flickered. "But me? My future? I'm inevitable."

How Jazz's eyes widened in fear as the thermometer on the vat of sauce flickered closer to the danger zone. The way Tucker yelped just once through his gag as the flames shot past them, how the whole world froze for a split second as she realized he was dead.

How the piece of shrapnel felt as it shot through her stomach, coming out the other side and embedding itself in the wall behind her.

And then waking up in Lancer's classroom, like nothing had ever happened. Like nothing was wrong. Like she hadn't just died.

But right now, Sam remembered it all.

Her breath shortened to tight gasps through her nose, she was sure she could still smell the Nasty Sauce burning. And the boy with silky smooth voice smiled into her ear — No, it couldn't be him, not the flaming hair over insanity personified. Not his red, red eyes. Not him, anyone but him — "Remember me?"

Sam took a shaky breath and let it out slowly. "Hello, Danny."

Her mind raced as the boy laughed, his poison honey voice loud in her ear, sending shivers down her spine. She could get out of this alive.

She always had before.

A/N: What? Another chapter in under a three week period? No way!

At least, I'm pretty sure it's been less than a three weeks this time. I've been procrastinating big time, though, so it's hard to be sure. It's really weird. At first, I started doing this while I was putting off homework. Now I'm just putting off everything and sketching ghosts in my notebook instead.

Master procrastinator at work here, guys. Do not do as I have done, or else you'll end up trying to build a catapult in three days. Which is not fun.