A/N: Okay, so I know there are quite a few longer paragraphs in this one and less dialogue. I don't usually do this, but please don't skip them because for the most part, they're important for story comprehension.

Thank you for those who reviewed the last chapter :D That was my first real 'action-inclusive' chapter, so a big thank you to everyone who left a comment. I hope to hear you guys' thoughts on this one…

Anyways, this is a long one, so enjoy!

Chapter 10: EctoCaves

"Daniel, wake up," I heard a vague command, the words blending into my dreams. The tree in my dream was telling me to wake up…

"Daniel!" the order was repeated, louder this time, causing me to jerk to reality. The soft watercolours of my pleasant dreams washed away as my eyelids fluttered open. Getting up, I rubbed my mouth, embarrassedly removing dribble from it. Since when did I drool anyways?

I heard a chuckle coming from Vlad. Turning to face him, I saw that he was watching me as I wiped away residue saliva from my face. "What?" I snapped, angry that he'd woken me from my happy dreams, most of which were about Sam telling me she loved me.

"No need to bite my head off," Vlad said lightly, rolling his eyes at my overreaction.

I sighed, trying to steady my emotions. I was probably just riled up because I'd been cooped up in this RV for hours. I always got impatient hen I was forced to stay in one spot for too long; that was one of the reasons I hated road trips so much. Looking out the window to distract me from my irritation, I realized that we were driving on an elevated surface, something like a plateau. Further on, the plateau raised in altitude, forming some sort of a mountain. I noticed we had stopped on the levelled ground, and Vlad was holding the key to the car in his hand.

"What's going on?"

"EctoCaves," the man responded, pointing ahead. I looked out, noticing that the mountain sheltered several small, black openings.

"We're going in there?" I asked apprehensively, hoping the answer was no.

"Precisely," Vlad said. He seemed slightly less tense now; It was like he was no longer afraid that the Observants would find us. That made me kind of suspicious, but I let the feeling go. "Pick up anything you'll need because we're leaving the RV out here, and we may not be back for a few days."

With a tired sigh, I pulled the Fenton Thermos out of my duffle bag, slinging it around my shoulders. As I watched Vlad slip the map in his pocket, a thought came to me. Was this worth it? Was I really ready to risk my life in order to find an itsy bitsy stone? I shook the thought out of my head.

I couldn't think like that. I was the superhero- I had to do this. My thoughts instead drifted to my duties once the stone would be retrieved. I knew I had to get it away from Vlad, but how? Should I confront him about it now? Maybe if I explained to him that we needed to destroy the stone in order for it not to reek havoc on the entire Ghost Realm, he would give it to me without a fight? I almost laughed out loud at this thought. If I told him he'd probably waste me on the spot so he could have the stone to himself.

I felt kind of bad for him- he had no idea that this stone would be his downfall. He really thought he was going to use it for good and leave it at that. I momentarily wondered if he was going to fight me when I flew off with the stone. Another stupid question, I know. Vlad may care for me, but I don't think he'd look too kindly on my betraying him, so to speak.

I decided I would just grab the stone and make a run for it. Stupid plan, I know, but what else could I do? I didn't even know here the gem was going to be. I also realized that I had no idea how to get to the Realm of the Far Frozen from here.

Pushing the though aside, I grabbed my cell phone from my bag and slid it in my back pocket, deciding I'd worry about the problem later.

I followed Vlad out of the parked Specter Speeder, closing the door behind me. As I turned to face the older hybrid, I caught a glance of his sarcastic expression. I frowned.

"What?"

He gave a sigh before drawling out, "Despite the fact that we're deep in the uncharted territory of the Ghost Zone, you needn't to go ghost for this mission." I could almost feel the irony dripping from his tone.

Rolling of my eyes, I transformed into my ghost persona. Then, quietly, I followed the hybrid into the dark, eerie caves, venturing into the most dangerous operation I'd ever been on.

We'd been flying for hours. At least that's what it felt like anyways. It had probably only been thirty minutes or something, but it felt a lot longer to me. I was sweating from the heat of the caverns and my limbs were tired from flying. We'd reached the caves, and Vlad was definitely taking his time figuring out which one we were supposed to enter. Glancing back and forth between the map and the plethora of cave entrances before him, he was trying to pick out the one that corresponded to the entrance on his map. I have no idea how, seeing as they all looked the same to me.

"This one," he said suddenly, his voice filled with confidence and self-assurance. Pointing to a rather small entrance, he motioned for me to follow him inside. I flew behind him until we reached the inside of the small cave. It was pitch black and every breath I took seemed to echo against its stony walls. Lighting our hands with ecto-energy for light, Vlad and I ventured further into the depths of the grotto. According to him, the EctoCaves were all interconnected, and the stone was to be found in one of the caves in the heart of the mountain.

When he'd explained this to me, I'd envisioned a twenty-minute walk through a couple of mountainous halls, leading to the gem at the end. Apparently, I had been wrong.

These caves may've been narrow and small, but what they lacked in width, they made up for in length. This cave alone was six hundred kilometres in length. Vlad had brought along some shelter-building material in a backpack, saying that we'd need to camp out in certain areas when it got too tiring or too dark. I had half a mind to ask him if we could camp out right now because honestly, I didn't see how it could get any darker than it already was.

We continued through the caves. Shining my hands towards the ceiling, I was disgusted to see numerous bats hanging from the cave top. With a shudder, I brought my light source back in front of me.

"How long till we get to put up shelter?" I asked Vlad, who was floating in front of me. I had to admit, it looked pretty funny seeing someone as sophisticated and well-learned as Vlad flying around with a backpack slung on his shoulder.

"Not yet, Daniel," he replied patiently.

The rest of our walk rather uneventful, save for bumping into a few bats here and there. There were so many turns that I wondered how Vlad knew which ones to take. I waved the thought away, deciding that as long as he knew what he was doing, I didn't care if he led us down into a pit of snakes. Finally, almost three tiring hours later, we stopped. Which was good, because I didn't know how much longer I could hold the ecto energy in my hands.

As my I let my light source flicker away, Vlad and I landed on the ground. He pulled a tent out of the backpack, which I decided must be roomier than it looked. Passing it to me, he ordered me to go set it up, which was stupid, because I'd never set up a tent in my entire life. Just as I was about to walk away to try to set up the shelter, I noticed Vlad was pulling something large out of his bag. I stared at him in disbelief as he pulled two or three logs out of the bag, as well as some matches.

Noticing my expression, he explained, "It's a specially designed bag. It can hold up to a ton's worth of material. Think of it as your very own Mary Poppins-style satchel."

Shaking my head in incredulity, I set to work on the tent. I put up the pole that was meant to hold it up and hammered in the stakes. It looked pretty decent once it was finished.

I turned to see what Vlad was doing- he'd already managed to start a fire, and was pulling some packaged food out of his never-ending bag.

Only then did I realize how hungry I really was. Save for a bit of popcorn, I hadn't eaten in almost three days.

"What are we eating?" I asked Vlad as he speared the cylindrical-shaped food. Upon closer examination, I realized that he was putting a hot dog in the fire. Rubbing my hands together, I grabbed a stick off the floor and speared my own hot dog, letting it cook in the flames. We sat around the fire, our faces illuminated by the blazing light.

As soon as my food had cooked, I brought it to my salivating mouth. I blew on it lightly before diving in and taking a huge bite.

Almost the moment I'd taken off the chunk, I spat it back out.

Disgusted, I brought my hands to my mouth, wiping away any remains of the revolting taste. "What is this?" I demanded, looking at Vlad in disgust.

"Tofu dogs. Much healthier than those hot dogs you children eat," he informed me, suppressing a laugh at my sickened expression.

No longer hungry, I threw the stick to the ground. "Don't you have something, you know, edible?" I asked.

He rolled his eyes. "No Daniel. Just eat your food."

"If you can call it that," I muttered before letting out a sigh. I hope the Ghost Realm realizes what I'm going through for them. "You know what," I decided suddenly, "I think I'll just turn in early."

Vlad shrugged. "Suit yourself. The sleeping bags should be next to the tent." I nodded and picked the blue one, dragging it into the tent with me. I unrolled it and shuffled my way in. I closed the zipper once I had entered the sleeping bag, and put my hands behind my head, hoping to relax a bit before I went to sleep. Seeing as I'd just napped about four hours ago, it was a bit early for me to be going back to sleep, but I was exhausted from all the flying and from generating that light for hours on end.

Staring up at the tent, I let my mind wander. The light from the fire outside illuminated the shelter just enough to create a soothing, warm effect in my sleeping area, giving me the perfect atmosphere to think. As the embers crackled up and around the fire, I let my thoughts drift to my plan from earlier.

To grab the Stone and then make a run for it? Maybe that wasn't the best way to go about safeguarding the most important object in the Ghost Zone.

I would have to outsmart Vlad somehow. The only question was, how? After all, I had no advantage in this situation. I didn't know exactly where the Stone was, nor the obstacles I'd have to overcome in order to reach it. Not to mention that outsmarting Vlad was next-to-impossible. I guess maybe I was going to have to stick with my 'take it and run for your life' plan after all. I'd make my way back to the RV and drive to Frostbite in the Realm of the Far Frozen. Then, after the destruction of the stone by the Ice-Dwellers, I'd make my way back home…

As my less-than-intricate plan unfolded in my head, I realized there just was one tiny flaw. I couldn't make my way home, because I wasn't going to have one anymore. There's no way Vlad would accept me back into his mansion, right? And technically, I wasn't allowed to live on my own…

Maybe I was overreacting. I mean sure, Vlad would be mad at first, but once I explained to him that the destruction of the stone was mandatory, if only for the protection of the Zone, he'd understand. Right?

Well, if not, I could always go live with Tucker or something. And if that didn't work out…well, maybe the Ice-Dwellers would accept me.

As I pondered the thought of having to live the rest of my life in a frozen wasteland, I realized the fire outside had dimmed considerably since earlier. There were some sounds of shuffling outside the tent, and a few moments later, I saw Vlad dragging a red sleeping bag into the tent.

"What are you doing?" I asked stupidly.

Vlad stared at me dumbly for a moment before replying, "I'm setting up my sleeping bag."

Oh no…

I almost slapped myself on the forehead. Two sleeping bags. Two hybrids. One tent. Duh. How could I have not realized that I was going to have to sleep next to Vlad?

With a nervous chuckle, I shifted my sleeping bag as close as possible to the other end of the tent before deciding that maybe I should just go outside. "Uh, I could just sleep out there…" I began, making to get up from my sleeping bag.

"Daniel, don't be stupid," Vlad said shortly, pushing me back down. "We're sleeping in separate bags. There's no reason to feel awkward." He unrolled the sleeping bag next to mine as if this were the most normal thing in the world.

"Are you sure? Because I could always…"

Vlad gave an abrupt sigh as he zipped the sleeping bag around him. "Daniel, relax will you? Just try and get some sleep," he ordered.

Slowly, I eased back into my sleeping bag. I uncomfortably pushed myself away from the wall I'd previously tried to stick myself against. Even though I wanted to keep as much distance as possible between me and Vlad, I it was extremely difficult to sleep while crammed against a tent wall.

The fire outside had flickered to its last few flames and the light slowly died away.

"It's a shame we can't see the stars."

Confused, I looked at Vlad, who was staring up at the tent the way I'd been earlier. "What are you talking about?"

"The stars, Daniel," he repeated as if I was a complete idiot. "The big dipper is a particularly beautiful sight tonight."

I creased my eyebrows. "But we're in a cave."

"Yes Daniel. We're in a cave. Hence the not being able to see the stars."

I rolled my eyes at the sarcastic reply. Then, a thought hit me.

"Wait," I began, propping my elbow against the floor and leaning on my forearm to face Vlad, "You can see constellations in the Ghost Zone?"

"Of course," Vlad answered. "And it's quite a sight, barely rivalled by those in the human world.

"That sounds really cool."

"Yes, it is," Vlad responded vaguely.

I kind of got the impression that Vlad wanted to say something else, but he remained silent as I lay back down against the floor. Several moments of silence passed between us as each of us floated in our own pool of thoughts. Suddenly, a thought hit me.

"Hey Vlad, are there any enemies in this cave? You know anything to look out for- like those Mirajians?""

I though I saw a smug look on the hybrid's face, but I waved it off as a trick of the light, or rather, lack thereof. "Well, it's said that once you've neared the stone, you need to be careful of the ghouls that protect it. Those things are ten times worse than the Mirajians."

I shuddered at the thought.

"But it's nothing we need to worry about; we're still miles away from there." There was more silence before Vlad continued, "You should probably get some sleep before tomorrow- we have a big day ahead of us."

"Yeah," I nodded in agreement. "Goodnight Vlad."

As the hybrid returned my goodnight wish, I turned in my sleeping bag to get comfortable. Then, closing my eyes, I let myself drift away into the land of dreams.