AN: Hi, guys and gulls, I'm back with a new chapter for you all!

Previously, we saw that Danny had become a prisoner in Walker's jail since he'd been thrown into the Ghost Zone. Meanwhile, Sam and Co. have been looking for him in the real world, with little luck. This chapter is Danny-centric, following his time in prison. Enjoy~

Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom.

Chapter Nine: Esperanto

Danny had fallen asleep that night with the guard's words still echoing inside his mind. His thoughts felt like a raging bee hive, which he was only barely keeping a lid on. I'm the only one here… repeating it parrot fashion, made it feel like the very opposite of a lifeline, as though he was drowning in the abyss rather than rising from it. He hadn't moved from the spot near the door since he had been left alone with his thoughts. In that cramped spot, with his back resting on the metal door, he remembered that the dream had been different. It was still the same dream, but this time there had been more to it.

It's getting harder to come back from it now…each time that he puts me under, it seems the spell grows stronger. So how long will it be before I am trapped there forever? I ask myself. I dread to find the answer. For now, I am back. The blue glow around my prison has dimmed, so I doubt he has remembered to maintain my sedatives – the way I've been, I bet he didn't need to!

The bolt I'd been toying with last time seems to have gone unnoticed, not that it means much. I had barely managed to loosen it. I just feel too weak. I haven't been able to go ghost since I got here (his cage prevents me from doing so), maybe it's all that unspent ecto-energy that's keeping me going? Never mind that now, I tell myself, I need to get out of here, before… Well, it's best not thinking about that.

Kneeling down, or as far as I'm able to, I can just about reach the bolt. The screw feels icy between fingers that don't seem to work quite as well as I'd have hoped. I can't help but get mad at myself. Of all the luck in the world! There's no way I can rely on anyone else to find me – we've never been here before! So, my fate – my life – is in my own hands. But those hands never used to look so wasted! I can see the edges of bones rippling the skin as I work at my escape. If the screw moved at all, it's hardly worth mentioning.

I could easily give up, I realise, but then, that's what he wants. If I stay asleep, he only gets stronger. The longer I sleep, the weaker I become. But, why? Why come up with this? Of all the dreams to give me…I know he wants me to suffer, but how would he know about that – about what I could have been. That timeline's been altered… but even if it doesn't happen anymore, it's still on my mind; it's still possible. Sam didn't think so though. No one else seemed to give it a further thought, but then, they probably think that's it; it's over and done with. They're probably just trying to reassure me…they always say I need to go easy on myself. With a sigh, I slouch back, leaning on the freezing cold glass, trying to concentrate on staying awake, despite my growing fatigue. Growing fatigue? That can't be good.

I look up to a pair of red eyes and I know what's coming. Nocturne stands before me, an arm outstretched and irradiating the blue energy of his narcotics.

"Wait!" I try to sound authoritative, but I just sound exhausted. "Why him? Why put…Dan in my dream?" I hate to say the name: it's like acknowledging that he could still exist.

"Dan? Ah, the older boy with the ghost powers? I can assure you, he was not part of my original design. However, if your subconscious is willing to punish you further, I am certainly not going to stop it." His eyes narrow in a smug grin.

"Design? You planned all this? The dream – everything?" I try to stifle a yawn, but the sleepwalkers behind him are doing the same. Why is yawning so contagious?

He remains silent, but for his one command, "Now, sleep."

A loud ripping sounded from the other side of his cell, somewhere in the half-lit darkness. It belonged to what looked like a black hole or a tear in reality itself. Through the scratch, hanging in mid-air, Danny could have sworn he saw the inner mechanisms of a giant clock.

The lycanthrope stalked through the wrench in space and time, seemingly disorientated. Yes, it was Wulf, a ghost of the werewolf kind, that had emerged into that dank prison cell in the Ghost Zone. After a quick glance around the room, his eyes locked onto Danny's groggy half-dreaming (or is that half-waking) form, in the gloom by the door.

"Why is it you are here, my friend?" the grizzled looking beast spoke in English, with a perplexed frown upon his, already harsh, features.

"…Wulf?" the boy stirred, "shouldn't you be breaking out of jail?" His attempt at humour washes over the trans-dimensional traveller.

"This is no time for jokes, young halfa. You need to hurry and wake up!" Wulf's voice carries an edge of panicked haste, reverberating around the room and his green eyes dart around the room like emerald beetles.

"Wake up? But I am awake…" Danny shoots him a quizzical look, but even so, something's not right here… "Wulf?"

"Yes?" he grumbles.

"You're not speaking Esperanto." Somehow saying this most obvious of truths aloud, allows the illusion to fade (but not disappear entirely), like a penny dropping through glass, the shards would still remain. "I didn't know you spoke English – it would have made things a lot easier if you'd told me before!"

"I believe you are mistaken, child. I cannot speak anything other than Esperanto."

There is a moment's pause, while both parties puzzle out their confusion. If Wulf says he's speaking Esperanto, then how can I only hear English? Is that even possible?

"Why's that?" Danny asked, stalling for time, as he walked over to the bench on the other side of the room.

"It is the condition upon which I remain here: my purpose. I am but what remains of a failed attempt to unite the world. I am Ludwig Zamenhoff." Wulf looked visibly more relaxed now, but still clearly anxious. What's got him all on edge? Danny couldn't help but wonder.

"The creator of Esperanto…?" He would, any other time, go on to think about the implications of this, but the longer he talks to Wulf, the more his head begins to ache as though from a migraine. Instead he asks; "Why are you here? Not meaning to sound rude or anything, but I can't imagine Walker's prison would be on your list of places to go, Wulf." He motions for Wulf to sit beside him; the more he sees the creature pacing the floor, the more agitated he himself feels.

"Have you not noticed anything amiss in this world, Danny Fenton? Is there nothing that seems strange to you lately?" His tone betrays the surprise, which his stern face would withhold.

"Well, I haven't been able to go ghost for a long time…and, now that you mention it, I do seem to have had an unbelievable amount of bad luck lately – even by my standards!" His laugh has a bitter note to it. Dark humour doesn't suit the boy, Wulf thought to himself.

"It's almost too terrible to be true, is it not?" Wulf hates having to be so careful with what he says, but he has been warned: Danny Fenton has to figure this one out for himself, if all is to go to plan.

"Yeah, like one hell of a nightmare!" Danny jokes, but his off-hand remark draws epiphany to him…What if I had it completely the wrong way round? What if this those dreams I've been having we're of me waking up? That'd explain why they're always so consistent, wouldn't it?

The pain that has been wracking his head for the last half hour suddenly intensifies. The boy rakes his skinny hands through his hair, as if more pressure on his head would reduce the agony he's in. Yet, it is with suffering that all truths are revealed. Images flash behind his creased lids of star gazing and a scream; of an icy cold prison that seemed like a glass coffin; and the one person responsible for it all: Nocturne. Once all the lost moments have returned to him, the pain dies away, as does his own naivety.

"None of this is real…" Danny slowly, hesitantly speaks the truth. "It was all just a trick – just a nightmare." He looks over to Wulf, whose eyes show only pity and sympathy for the child who's been deceived by his own mind. "So what now? Don't people usually wake up, once they know it's a dream? Or am I supposed to be able to control it – I mean, this is my dream, right?"

"I do not know, young one. Have you perhaps heard of something called lucid dreaming?" The werewolf looks up through the bars on the cell's window at the stars, which shine in the Ghost Zone, whether it is night or day.

"…That was in one of Sam's books, I think" he digs deep for those distant memories, "It's where you can control your dreams, right?"

"Indeed." Wulf turns to give him a reassuring smile, with all his teeth in it.

"So is that what'll happen? I'll be able to control it all?"

"It is but one theory." Wulf cannot say anymore; he wasn't told anymore on the subject.

"Then why can't I go ghost?" Danny, all but shouts, after a few minutes of silent concentration on his part.

"Reality is only what we perceive it to be and, from what I have seen, what we believe becomes a lens to our reality." The ghost hopes that it's vague enough to count as a hint, but clear enough for the boy to understand. Wulf hopes the boy recovers. That is his nature, after all, it is what his language was all about – one man's hope.

"So…let me get this straight. You're saying that the reason I can't change is because I've believed it's not possible for too long? Is that what he's done?" Danny asked, snapping Wulf out of his musings.

"Nocturne's spell is a powerful one, because of his nature as The Master of Dreams, Morpheus. We believe it was his plan to make you think yourself utterly defenceless. It is illusion, only. That is all dreams are: imagination animated." The boy catches on quicker than usual…it is a shame we can't always talk so fluidly together, Wulf smiles sadly at this thought.

The halfa gives his traditional war cry: Going Ghost! Perhaps he needs the bravado in these uncertain times.

Looking down at himself, Danny could see the hazmat suit had returned, as had his outer radiance, marking him as one of the dead once again.

"It-It worked!" He smiles triumphantly, flying from the bench over to the mirror above the wash basin. The moment he does, the corners of his mouth drop into a frown once more. "How?" he gasps. "Why is my reflection still Danny Fenton?" He looks over to the sagely wolf.

"I do not know all the answers, friend. Though, if I had to guess, I would say that it is how Nocturne has been maintaining your self-doubts." He says, looking the teen in the eyes, with utmost sincerity.

"So that's how it was then? I could change all along, but didn't realise it? He needed me to think I was powerless so I'd remain under his control…" his brow becomes more lined with deeper furrows. "He is so asking for it!" he growls.

AN: Just in case some of you didn't know, Esperanto means one who hopes, in Zamenhoff's language, Esperanto. Oh, and Morpheus is the name of the Greek god of sleep/dreams, which I thought would be fitting for Nocturne.

What do you guys think? Let me know, 'kay?

Psycho x