TEN
Danny appeared outside his room where he was told the president was waiting. The president's body guards were waiting outside the door. In place of the sign that said "Danny's Room" was the seal of the President of the United States. Danny cleared his throat.
The man on the left turned his head. "What do you want?" Danny rolled his eyes. The man slipped his glasses down his nose. "Oh, my apologies, Mr. Phantom." He pushed his glasses back up his nose and opened the door.
Danny smiled and floated inside. "I like this celebrity stuff." The guard shut the door behind him.
At Danny's desk, where his computer was, a humongous chair sat. "Um...Mr. President, sir?" Danny floated a little towards the chair, then stopped. Something wasn't quite right.
"Daniel, my boy..." a voice came from the chair. Something about the way that was said reminded Danny of someone...but his most recent concussion kept him from placing his finger on whom. A hand motioned for Danny to sit down. "Please, have a seat." Danny did as he was told.
Danny glanced at his usually open window (now closed). "So...you're the president...that's pretty cool..." Well, he had TRIED to start a conversation.
The chair moved a bit. "Daniel...Mr. Fenton, there's something I've been meaning to ask you..." Danny waited.
All of the sudden, the chair swiveled around. "Will you and your mother join me now?" The president's unusually red eyes glared at Danny.
Danny tensed up, ready for action. "Plasmius! WHAT, no, strike that, WHY do you think either of us will join YOU?!? She knows you're half ghost!"
The president...Vlad sighed. He stood up and walked over to where Danny was sitting on his bed. At the foot of the bed, Vlad walked out of the president's body, letting him fall onto the bed. Danny floated up above Vlad's head. "Shall we finish this conversation elsewhere?" Danny asked, mocking Vlad's way of speaking.
Vlad grinned. "Yes, we shall."
"Then follow me." Danny phased through the floor and down into the basement; Vlad followed.
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"...and I'm just saying that we should"- Maddie looked up. "Oh, Danny! You're back! Did you have a nice chat with the president?"
Danny shrugged. "For the most part." He looked up. "But look who it turned out to be..."
Vlad phased through the ceiling, hands glowing, ready for a fight. "Okay, Daniel! Let's..." He stopped when he noticed the group staring at him. Eyes wide, Vlad gave a meek wave and a small 'hello' to follow.
Maddie gasped. "Vlad?! Vlad...Masters?!" She started to walk towards him but stopped. "I...I can't believe it..."
"Maddie! I just...I mean, it wasn't my fault!" Vlad told her. "I...never wanted this to happen at all...it...just did."
There was a long silence which was soon broken. "Get out." Maddie crossed her arms.
"What?!?" Vlad didn't know what to say.
"You heard me. Get out. Never come back. If you ever come within 50 feet of this family, I will have you arrested."
Vlad frowned but his mood quickly changed. "Very well." He changed back to his lonely, human self and went to the stairs. Before he left, Vlad commented, "This isn't the last you will see of me. I will be back...probably sooner than you'd expect." And with that, he was gone.
"Wow...that guy has issues..." Jazz stood up. She walked over to her parents. "I'm gonna go...get something...like-elsewhere..." Jazz walked up the lab stairs.
Maddie nodded. "Yeah...we've got dinner to cook..." She grabbed Jack. "Come on, honey." They too left.
Valerie stood in the basement gawking after she'd learned that she'd been working for a ghost...in a way. Then she, too, left, without saying a word.
Left in the basement alone, Tucker, Sam, Dani, and Danny had to make the next decision - what to do next?
Danny took a seat on the make-shift bed. "Well...now that THAT'S over..." he started. But he didn't finish. Instead, Danny buried his face in his hands. A few seconds later, his shoulders started shaking.
Sam glanced at Tucker who shrugged. She stood up and walked over to Danny. Setting a hand carefully on his shoulder, she asked softly, "Danny, what's wrong?"
Danny sniffed. A muffled muttering could be heard.
Tucker pulled out his PDA. "Dude, we can't help you if we can't hear you..."
Slowly removing his hands from his face, Danny whispered, "It's not fair. It's just not fair..."
Sam rubbed his shoulders. "Danny, life isn't fair"-
Suddenly filled with anger, Danny pushed Sam away. "I know life isn't fair!" He reached down to his leg and pulled the cast off (with his ghost powers, of course), throwing it across the room. The glowing white words lost their shimmer. "But I'm going to make it fair!"
Sam quickly got up and joined Tucker, watching Danny in horror.
Danny painfully stood up, grabbing for anything that would keep him from collapsing. Nothing was there to support him, so he adjusted to the searing pain, barely. Danny gasped. Turning to Sam and Tucker, his voice barely above a whisper, he said, "I never asked to be half ghost, it just happened. I never wanted it, I never even considered it, it just suddenly happened."
Danny's hair shadowed his green eyes. "Because I never asked for this, I was never able to prevent something like this from happening. I want to go through my teen years without the burden of fighting ghosts, or dealing with the Guys in White, or any of that! I want to be u normal /u ! I want to freak out about a zit, not some ghost that's trying to hunt me down and 'hang my pelt above his fireplace.'" He pulled his arms around himself in a self-hug.
The room suddenly got colder and ice formed under the small groups' feet. Sam's feet slipped out from under her and she fell onto her hands and knees. "Danny, calm down! You're going to do something that you're going to regret! Your powers make you different - that's what I like about you!"
Danny glared at Sam. "Calm down?! Calm DOWN?!? u WHY /u should I calm down?! HOW should I calm down?! I don't care if I have something that makes me different, I don't want to be different, I want to be normal! I don't want to worry about a secret identity day-in and day-out!"
The room temperature was now a cool 7 degrees Fahrenheit. Cold winds blew from all directions, ice and snow in these slight breezes.
"All I want is to be a normal guy that doesn't have to carry the weight of the world upon my shoulders!" The winds stopped. "And I know just how I'm going to do it..." He suddenly disappeared.
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The only thing the three friends failed to notice was Dani turning on the web-cam. She had recorded the entire...speech.
The entire U.S. had seen what Danny REALLY thought of his powers. From upstairs, the Fenton family watched, as did the Guys in White, Valerie Gray, Vlad Masters, and everyone else in the U.S. In the Ghost Zone, huge TV-like portals popped up everywhere. All the ghosts stopped to watch the halfa express his feelings. Everyone knew what Danny really thought, but only the ghosts knew what he was going to do...
Vlad danced around the small motel room gleefully-like a small child on Christmas day. He clapped his hands together. "Oh, this is just TOO wonderful!" Vlad pressed a button on a TV remote he was holding and watched the television screen.
'"Calm down?! WHY should I calm down?! HOW should I calm down?!..."' The young halfa's face was shadowed by anger.
Vlad sat down in an overstuffed chair. "Thanks to his teenage emotions, this will work out even better than before!" He pulled a cell phone out of his jacket pocket.
As he waited for the person of the number he dialed to pick up, Vlad quietly talked to himself. "Now that he's going to get rid of his ghost powers I can work this out even better than before! I just have to wait for him to get rid of them, however he's going to, and then the rest of my plan will fall into place! I can manipulate"-
The person on the other end picked up. "Hello?" a cold and sinister voice asked.
"Ah, yes, Doctor...Whatever-your-name-is, I will no longer be needing your assistance." 'This is easy,' Vlad thought.
There was no answer. Finally, "Well, I was planning to quit anyway, so I guess this all just works out, eh?"
Before Vlad could answer, the other end went dead. "Hello? Hello?" Vlad pressed the redial button.
"We're sorry, but the number you are trying to call seems to be disconnected. Please hang up and try again," an automated woman's voice told Vlad.
Vlad sighed and put down the phone. "Ach, whatever. One less person I have to pay." He stood up and morphed to his ghost form. "As for now, I have business to attend to."