Notes: Yes, a oneshot and a chapter on the same day, no gap in between. Why? Because, combined, "Instinct" and its oneshot collection have over a hundred reviews! I honestly never expected that many reviews, which explains why I wasn't keeping track – I only noticed from glancing at the numbers. Thanks to everyone who's reviewed, put this on their story alerts, and favorited this! ^.^ You fill me with warm fuzzies and inspiration for further making Danny's life difficult and Dan's life way too complicated.
Also, I'm officially back in my internet-accessible dorm room! And I've never been happier to finish a chapter. I spent way more time than I should've on this, but the bit at the end just killed me, for some reason. Oh, but the fun I've been having with writing Dan and the beginning of his awkward pre-teen years makes it worth it.
Let's see, three years is a long time. Things that have happened in the meantime (I might get lynched for these): Sam married Kwan the December after Dan turned ten, Jazz also got married when Dan was nine and is now six months pregnant, Tucker and Aria had a baby boy (Richard) when Dan was eight, and Danny and Valerie... well... *grin* All of the seemingly random pairing up I did will be explained in "The Little Things," by the way! They'll actually be three oneshots titled "Family Secrets" which I'm pretty excited about. :D
Lastly, I wanted to know something from you guys: Do y'all like the oneshots collection on top of this story? I love doing them, since they don't follow a specific continuous plot but they still let me explore random ideas that I get involving these characters and the circumstances... but I was wondering if anyone found it weird or annoying, given that they aren't really part of the current plot line at any given time but still sometimes important to the characters' development or motives in the main story.
Phew! Extra-long author's note DONE, this chapter is long enough as it is!
Disclaimer: Don't own Saw III.
Chapter Ten – Most Devious Plans
Ms. Riley's fourth grade class stood outside of Amity Park Elementary School in varying states of shock, along with the rest of the school. Among them were Dan and Jenna. The girl had her jaw dropped, a scared look on her face, while the boy simply tried to look bored but only succeeded in looking guilty, maybe even paranoid. In front of the building were an array of fire trucks and an ambulance, while a thin trace of black smoke billowed from one of the windows on the second floor.
Behind the fire trucks pulled up one of Vlad's inappropriately conspicuous sports convertibles. The fourth graders' parents had been called to pick their kids up, and since Vlad was the only one of Dan's parents who weren't busy at the moment, he was now striding over to the two fourth graders who stood a bit away from the rest of the group.
"What happened?" Dan's concerned father asked once he'd reached the two kids.
"Dark set the teacher on fire!" Jenna, scared and shaky with shock, blurted out before she could help it. Though it was more like she was confirming the fact to herself rather than answering Vlad for his own benefit.
"Not so loud and no I didn't!" Dan whispered harshly, looking frantically around. Thankfully, neither kids nor adults had heard the girl's outburst.
Vlad's eyes widened, and he leaned down closer before setting a firm hand down on Dan's shoulder. "What was that about setting the teacher on fire?"
Dan looked from his unhappy father to Jenna, who looked on the verge of tears. "It's nothing. She's a liar," he said, a bit too forcefully.
His father was quick to catch on, and he discreetly flashed red eyes at the boy in warning. His father rarely got angry – at least with him – and he was kind of intimidating right now, to say the least. "...It was an accident," he mumbled, looking down at the ground.
Vlad stood stock-still for a moment before standing up to his full height. He put both hands on Dan's shoulders and directed him to a spot further away from any curious onlookers. "How?" he asked in a firm tone. The ten year old avoided his gaze, looking towards the parking lot instead. "Dan, I asked you a question," Vlad said, more forcefully this time.
"...Just a little ectoblast. I was aiming for the desk but I kinda... missed," he confessed, tittering sheepishly and finally looking up at his father.
Vlad's eyes flashed red again, though without his consent this time. "Stay here," he commanded, pursing his lips and looking around until he spotted the ambulance which he rightly assumed currently held Ms. Riley. As he walked away, Dan was left standing all by himself until Jenna came over.
"I'm so sorry, Dark! I didn't mean to tell on you!" she cried.
Dan didn't look at her or respond, instead staring down at his shoes with a resentful and angry gaze.
"Dark -"
"Shut up," he hissed, closing his eyes when he felt them glow red.
Jenna sniffled, whispering, "I'm sorry," one more time before wandering off to her previous spot, aware that the boy wanted to be left alone for now.
Dan crossed his arms and sulked, an anxious knot in his stomach as he watched Vlad talk with the paramedics tending to his teacher. It really had been an accident! She'd given him detention, yet again, just because he'd been hanging out by the fifth grader's field. He'd found an anthill he'd been messing with, how was he supposed to know that he wasn't supposed to go over there?
Yes, he'd been aiming for the desk, giggling to himself all the while, ignoring Jenna's wary and anxious looks. And then James Cahill had thrown yet another paper ball at his head, and the aim from his finger had gone awry. Instead of hitting the desk as he'd intended, it had hit the teacher's apparently highly flammable coat. All he'd seen after that was the abundance of green flames. Of course, she'd screamed, and the kids had screamed, all the while Dan thinking of how much trouble he was probably in as Jenna had pulled him away from the classroom through the noisy fire alarm.
What troubled the boy the most, however, was that he didn't really feel guilty about what he'd done, but rather he felt guilty about not feeling guilty. After all, he constantly got burned by ectoblasts, and he always healed up just fine! Why should he feel guilty... Though some small part of him did know that there was a difference between humans' ability to heal and that of half-ghosts.
And that small part was the one that kept in mind everything his parents always went on about. Wouldn't his mother want him to feel bad about hurting a human? Even his dad was mad at him! Oh, he was always so confused by everything his parents told him! Everything was constantly about good and bad, wrong and right, smart and stupid decisions.
Vlad returned then, cutting off the child's confused inner ramblings. The man was stony-faced, but before he could speak the two half-ghosts heard a familiar voice nearby. They looked up to see Valerie talking to Jenna. She hadn't spotted Vlad yet, but Vlad had spotted her and was glaring heatedly at her turned back.
"Dad, can we go home, now?" Dan said, a troubled frown on his face.
Vlad turned to him and studied his face for a second before nodding stiffly and beginning the walk back to the car. "Your little friend won't tell her?"
The boy looked back at Jenna, who was quick to meet his gaze. She gave him a small sheepish smiled as she waved, and Dan sighed in relief, knowing he was safe for now. "No, she won't tell anyone." Not that he'd really doubted the fact, strangely enough.
Once in the car, Dan opened his mouth to start the conversation with several apologies, but his father held up a hand. He didn't look at the boy, and it was a quiet sign that the man was in no mood to talk just yet.
Dan fidgeted in the seat as they pulled out of the school parking lot and began the apparently dead silent ride back to the rich side of town.
After what seemed like an eternity, Vlad finally broke the silence. "Of all the things you've done, Daniel," the man said quietly, scowling at the road. Dan flinched, knowing that when his father used his full name... well, he never used his full name!
"It's not like I was trying to set her on fire! I was going for the desk!"
"Why were you trying to set anything on fire in the first place?" Vlad finally snapped.
Dan was nonplussed by his tone, however, intent on defending himself this time. "I hate Ms. Riley! She always criticizes how I dress and she'll give me detention for no reason! She even treats me different 'cause my grandparents are ghost hunters!"
"Dan, those are all valid reasons for light-hearted revenge, but not like this! You almost killed her! And what are you going to do if they decide to study the ectoplasmic residue left behind? Well?"
The boy rolled his eyes. "They're humans! They're not going to notice it!"
"The fire started out of nowhere and was green! How can you possibly think there won't be an investigation? If they manage to lock onto your ecto-signature, and consequently all of ours, then where will we be?"
Dan donned a humorous smirk, trying to lighten up the situation. "Dad, it was just -"
"No. You aren't getting out of this so easily this time! I am going to have a talk with your mother and... and... Oh, I don't know what we're going to do with you, Dan, but it will not be pretty."
The boy stopped himself from saying anything else then, instead turning to glare at the dashboard as a thick silence enveloped them once again.
"Hello, Kerry. I want to play a game. Up until now, you have spent your life among the dead, piecing together their final moments. You're good at this because you, like them, are also dead."
"YOU'RE JUST AS MUCH OF A LUNATIC, VLAD!"
Dan sighed and turned up the volume on the television yet again, and was disappointed that it wouldn't go up any higher anymore. He could hear his parents arguing all the way in the locked room across the hall. They'd been at it for over an hour, now!
"You identify more with a cold corpse than you do with a living human. I believe you want to join your true family, indeed your only family, in death."
Neither Vlad nor Danny had bothered to pay any attention to him in the slightest during that time. His dad had ordered him to his room as soon as they'd gotten home, and once Danny had gotten out of work, the fireworks had gone off. He'd never seen his mother so angry or freaked out, and it had honestly frightened him.
But it had all been an accident! He hadn't meant to hurt anyone! Didn't that make it not wrong? He'd simply meant to scare the teacher a bit, that was all! He felt remorseful, sure, but apparently not as much as his parents wanted him to be, and he'd kept putting his foot in his mouth the entire time he was being scolded. Still, their reactions – especially his mother's – were ridiculous. You'd think he was going to go on a psychotic killing spree and take over the world or something, just because of one little near-death accident!
Fortunately for him, as soon as his dad had tried to say something, his mom had been on him with all the verbal lashings that Dan thought were going to be meant for him. They'd started blaming each other for Dan's behavior, going on about bad influences and askew morals, until Dan had gotten fed up and had simply walked out of the room. Nobody had noticed.
...They weren't even fighting about him anymore. They were just bickering among themselves, now. Not that that was anything new.
The fact that he was watching a gory R-rated film in the living room with no one bothering to check up on him was testament to the fact that he was temporarily off the hook. He knew his parents would eventually settle things between them – more or less – but he almost wished they'd do it now, even if it meant he'd get in trouble all over again.
He was so sick of his parents fighting all the time! Most of the time they didn't even fight over anything! It almost made him wish they'd just live in separate places like when he was younger... almost. After all, to a young ghost, it was pretty unfathomable to imagine his parents living apart. He could only do so because he'd been in the situation before, but the idea still caused a certain bout of anxiety to build up inside him.
To top it off, the fighting had intensified just a few months ago. His mom was always away on an array of extracurriculars at the middle school, now. He spent a lot of time away from home – at least more than Dan was accustomed to – and his father seemed to blame it all on Jenna's mom. Dan had to admit that he had noticed something off with Valerie and his mother, but Danny had assured both the other half-ghosts in the household that there was nothing going on. His dad didn't believe his words, but Dan had no reason to doubt them. His mother would never lie to him, after all. And it was still Jenna's mom, so he supposed that he could trust the woman more than any other random lady.
Dan didn't even flinch as the woman on the television screen had her ribs torn apart from her body, her organs spilling out onto the floor. He'd seen worse, after all. And even though the images on the screen didn't faze him, the memories of his nightmares that suddenly came to him did make his stomach churn.
He long ago stopped confiding in anyone most of his dreams and visions. Nobody ever told him anything, and it always seemed to make his mother afraid for reasons he still couldn't fathom. He knew it wasn't normal. He knew he wasn't normal, even for a half-ghost.
Besides Jenna, he didn't have a single friend in school. He was too different! Even after he'd been put in the gifted program at school, there was still a huge gap between him and the other kids, but he'd fit even less if they put him ahead a year or two like the school had wanted to. He felt like he just couldn't fit in with other fourth graders! They liked different things, they played different games, they had different families. Edgar Baxter had even had the gall to get all of his classmates started on calling his mother several unpleasant names after hearing a nasty rumor about Vlad and Danny. Sure, it was closer to the truth than their cover story involving his Aunt Sam, but still! And like always, he couldn't do anything to defend himself or his family because he was stronger than all of them – he'd really hurt them, even without meaning to, as his mother would remind him. And, he supposed, as the incident today was proof of.
And it was like the other kids subconsciously knew there was something off about Dan, from the way they acted around him. It had always been that way, but the older he got, the more his mind seemed to dance circles around the issue. Dan had to admit, he was grateful to have Jenna around, even if she always got them in trouble for talking too much. She was quite smart, she was more or less his conscience (even if he didn't always listen to her), and most importantly of all, she knew about his ghost half.
"WE CAN'T CHANGE THINGS LIKE THIS, DANIEL! That's exactly the kind of attitude that leads to more reckless behavior!"
Dan rolled it eyes. Sure, when he wasn't in trouble, they'd pay so much attention to him that they simply smothered him, never letting him do anything he wanted – not to play in the Ghost Zone without someone breathing down his neck, not to go to Jenna's house without his mom present, not to let him work on certain powers (his mother's specialty), and not even fly over the city by himself. Heck, they wouldn't even let him go to the park across the street by himself! His mother especially was simply overprotective. But when he was in trouble, all they did was argue as if he didn't even exist. When he wasn't in trouble, he seemed to simply be getting suffocated with confusing moral lessons from his mother and dull philosophical debates from his father. They were simply obsessed with wanting him to be a "good person" or getting him to make the "right decisions," with a ridiculous amount of details laying out where the gray areas of life were. He just wanted to be a normal ghost kid like Box Lunch! Why did he always have to worry about every little thing he did? Why did he have to be a perfectionist like his parents? He didn't want to worry about social or moral boundaries!
Dan heard the door across the hall open, before his mother yelled something and the door shut again, the arguing starting anew.
"This is so stupid!" the moody ten year old growled.
Dan turned off the television, his powers accidentally spiking in his rage so that the remote exploded into emerald flames in his hand before there was nothing left behind but ashes and the smell of burned plastic. Dan shrugged at the damage, a mischievous look on his face covering up his previous anger. He suddenly felt very daring, and it showed in his next self-directed words.
"Well, I'm already in tons of trouble. What else can happen if I just... go to the Ghost Zone for a little while?" he said to himself, sinking intangibly through the carpet. He landed nimbly on the second floor, taking a moment to really regain his balance before running for the stairs and taking them three at a time.
He briefly debated flying off to get Jenna, but remembered that she'd been quite shaken up when he last saw her, and Valerie would probably not be too keen on letting her go. Once on the first floor, the boy all but skipped to the middle of the room, phasing through the floor at just the right spot once again.
As soon as he finally found himself in his father's underground lab he morphed into his ghost form, sure that his parents would no longer be able to sense him at this range once he transformed. With a grin, he floated nonchalantly over to the ghost portal's keyboard. Dan frowned for a second, his small gloved hands hovering above the numbers and letters before he finally remembered the password he'd memorized. Of course, his parents didn't know he'd memorized it, and he didn't feel inclined to tell them. He'd been waiting for the moment when he'd have a chance to do this. Or when he'd get the courage to.
Dan typed the long sequence rapidly on the keypad, then quickly moved to press a couple of buttons on the control panel before making a rushed beeline towards the swirling green vortex that was the ghost portal. Seconds later, the metal doors closed behind him.
The Ghost Zone had changed a lot since Danny had first become pregnant. And now that Dan was ten years old, the Ghost Zone was in a state of complete anarchy. There was nothing but chaos at every turn. Especially the Wasteland – the area where most of the ghosts that initially frequented Amity Park resided – had undergone drastic changes.
It was like the ghosts had been busy building their own little cities. There were so many new lairs that Dan's mother had given up on trying to map them out long ago, instead getting Tucker to do digital images of the masses of rocks and approximate locations of doors. Especially considering that the Specter Speeder got jumped every time they dared to take it into the place. Ghosts had a natural violent streak in them, but nothing like the transformation that the specter population had seen in the past couple years. While ghosts liked to leave each other alone and focus on their own obsessions before, with the occasional Danny exception, the ghosts nowadays seemed to have an obsession specifically with destroying and fighting each other. Gone were the days of simple fixations such as boxes and electronics.
The way that the number of ghosts had increased was also very discomforting, especially since the new drones of ghosts were the ones responsible for all the chaos. Ectoplasmic energy seemed to be less and less picky about how it joined together and birthed new spirits, creating new entities left and right as if there was some sort of extreme quota to be fulfilled. Most ghosts wouldn't even look at Danny anymore, because they simply did not know him. The only upside of this was that Dan's grandparents got to do what they loved and got paid to do it. And now with the entrance of Valerie and Danielle into the business, it seemed to have become an entrepreneurial venture of sorts. Though the Fentons and the young huntresses headed the ghost hunting, there were a few other hunters popping up every now and then.
Walker's mysterious absence had, surprisingly enough, taken a toll on the Ghost Zone as well. Bullet simply didn't have the patience or the drive to control the ghosts in the area with arbitrary rules. There was no longer a vigilante force, as Bullet and the rest of the guards simply let most ghosts except for those who were easy to manipulate do what they wanted. Of course, Dan did not know any of this. He only knew that Bullet ran the jail, and that he wasn't very good at it.
It was frightening enough going into the Ghost Zone that Danny would willingly ask Vlad to come along – two half-ghosts were safer than one, after all. Danny was especially irate that Vlad would so often take Dan into the Ghost Zone without his consent, although the child seemed to love the place much more than was probably healthy. He'd be in a simply jubilant mood for days after his trips. Dan had once overheard his mother talking with his Aunt Jazz about how he wasn't sure whether it was better to keep Dan away from the place or let him go.
Now, however, had been a perfect opportunity for Dan to wander in, alone and unsupervised, free to go wherever he pleased as long as he was careful. He'd never tried to sneak into the portal by himself, but today had been such a long day that his ghost side was begging for the release of the Ghost Zone. It always seemed to call to him, but today had been especially strong.
And to heck with his cloak! It wasn't not like he wore it for any reason, or at least it seemed that way to him. He was ten years old! He could take care of himself! His parents were obviously just crazy and overprotective. All he wanted was the freedom the Ghost Zone offered without the suffocating restrictions his parents imposed, including that stupid cloak. Why should he have to hide himself? He was a ghost, too!
As Dan floated further away from the portal, he cautiously surveyed the area – just because he could take care of himself didn't mean that he was stupid enough to not listen to that little voice in the back of his head that warned him to watch his back. He made sure that there were no potentially violent spirits around before making a full-speed dash through the empty green space.
The Wasteland, considered the hybrids' Ghost Zone territory because of the location of Vlad's portal, was always emptier than other areas of the Ghost Zone for some reason. Dan vaguely remembered his parents mentioning that it had once been the center of activity, but thankfully for him he could now roam it much more safely than any other place in the ghostly realm. And today seemed especially quiet, which made Dan feel relieved.
Dan did several spins, shooting a couple of ectoblasts and an eye-ray at nothing in particular while releasing excited whoops of pent-up energy. He knew he had to enjoy his freedom before his parents realized that he existed again.
Spotting a couple of tiny green blob ghosts, he smiled a toothy grin.
"Hey! Bet you guys can't out-fly me!" he called after them, though he doubted they could understand him. Flying as fast as he could towards them, he heard them give matching squeaks of fright as he followed their path and made them run into each other. After a while of chasing them, they finally had the common sense to make themselves invisible. Their ecto-signatures were so small that Dan quickly lost trace of them, but he didn't mind. He simply laughed to himself, feeling revitalized just by being in the Ghost Zone. Here, he could forget Ms. Riley, his parents, and everything else in the world!
I wanna just live here forever, he thought to himself, almost dreamily, before a cluster of floating doors in the distance caught his eye.
Dan excitedly flew over to them, pressing his ear against the purple surface of one before he giggled mischievously and opened the door. A loud roar greeted him, and he quickly went to hide behind another door, trying to hold in his laughter as the angry ghost smashed its... whatever it was, around inside its realm before the door slammed shut on its own accord.
Shamelessly, he grabbed the handle of the door he was hiding behind and repeated the action, hearing the wailing protests of whoever lived there. However, a loud rumbling sound from inside the realm he had just opened startled him enough that he adopted a spectral tail and swiftly flew over to the nearest island which could offer a place to hide.
The boy phased into a set of old buildings that looked like ruins of some sort, wincing as he heard the unmistakable sound of a very angry scream of the ghostly sort. After what seemed like forever, he heard the loudest door-slam he'd ever encountered. He waited just a minute more before vigilantly peeking his head through the wall. Seeing that all was still out in the Ghost Zone once more, he came out and was instantly captivated by the place he had landed on.
"Whoa," he whispered to himself in quiet awe.
He had indeed been correct when he'd thought the old buildings looked like ruins, because that was exactly what they were. They were buildings made of some sort of stone, clearly worn down to the point of crumbling. There had been something on the island, but it had been destroyed, probably by the ghost gangs before they had fled the Wasteland. Dan was enraptured by the scene for reasons he could probably never bring himself to explain. Why did everything look so pretty if it was falling apart like that?
Dan's musings were suddenly interrupted by a strange feeling inside him. Though his ghost sense didn't really work in the Ghost Zone, he was certain that he could feel a familiar ghost nearby. Or more like approaching very rapidly.
He barely managed to duck in time, because a microsecond later he felt a gust from something zooming over his head. Floating upwards, his hunch proved to be completely right as a grinning Box Lunch greeted him.
"Dark! You're in the Ghost Zone!" she exclaimed, flying over to him and hugging him. For once, Dan didn't protest, though he did sneer a bit before prying her off of him. He was in too good of a mood at the moment from his lone venture in the Ghost Zone, and he was feeling rather generous, come to think of it. He might be willing – maybe even a little bit happy to play with Box Lunch. Just for today.
Still, he'd never tell Box Lunch that, so he backed away a little and rolled his eyes before replying, "Of course I'm in the Ghost Zone. Does it look like we're in the Real World to you?"
Even though anyone else, adult and child alike, might have been turned off by the ten year old's tone, Box Lunch didn't mind it one bit and simply continued to smile before she noticed something odd. She looked around curiously before drawing closer and poking his nose. "Hey! Stop touching me!" he protested.
"Where are your mom and dad?" she said, pausing in her inspection of him. "And where's your cloak?"
The half-ghost smirked, his fangs gleaming in the Ghost Zone's eerie lighting, before he pretentiously retorted, "I don't need my parents or my cloak anymore. I can take care of myself just fine, Box Lunch."
Box Lunch beamed. "That means you can come to the Ghost Zone to see me, now!"
Dan snorted. "I didn't come to see you. I came 'cause it's the Ghost Zone! But... I'm in a good mood, so I'll let you play with me – if you're not gonna be annoying, that is."
The girl giggled and nodded frantically. "Come on, Dark! We can go play with the canyon!"
The hybrid child grinned. The infamous Carnivorous Canyon, which was in actuality a live cave with teeth, was a place where he'd only been once, when his father had been distracted enough that Dan had excitedly sneaked off to explore it. Indeed, it wasn't playing at the canyon, it was playing with the canyon. And it wasn't so much playing with it as it was taunting it.
"I'll race you there!" he spoke quickly, and without warning took off to the outskirts of the Wasteland. He could only tell where the outskirts began because it seemed to get significantly darker beyond a certain point.
"Hey! No fair!" he heard Box Lunch yell behind him.
Dan made a sharp right, his aerodynamic ghostly tail letting him reach higher and higher speeds. He could see Klemper's freezer door in the distance, which meant that the canyon was not too far beyond that. Suddenly, the boy's eyes widened when in front of him materialized a giant crate of... tomatoes?
His speed didn't let him brake in time to avoid crashing into the crate. He stood suspended in midair, wiping furiously at his face and trying to get the squashed tomato bits out of his cape. He heard insane giggling as Box Lunch zoomed towards and past him. Her speed was much slower than his yet she was still able to wound his pride, somewhat.
"CHEATER!" he yelled after her, turning intangible to get the tomato goo and random pieces of wood off of him.
"Takes one to know one!" she screamed at him from several feet away.
Dan didn't even have to think about his retaliation. He smiled mischievously before teleporting, disappearing in a puff of green smoke. A second later, he appeared in front of Box Lunch's path. There was clear shock on her face before he ectoblasted her at point-blank range. The girl screamed, and Dan took the opportunity to hurriedly fly towards their pseudo-playground destination.
However, just as he flew past Skulker's Island, he became distracted by the monstrous floating land mass not too far away. Wonderful idea that it was, he decided he might as well stop there first, and so he abruptly turned to change his course and continued at a much calmer pace. Soon enough, though, he felt a sudden tug on his arm.
"Dark, where are you going?" Box Lunch asked urgently, having followed after Dan when she saw him veer in a different direction.
"The prison. Duh," Dan said condescendingly. "Youngblood says they've got a three-headed dog there!"
"But what about the canyon?"
"Have you ever seen a three-headed dog? I'd rather play with one of them than with some dumb canyon."
Box Lunch's interest was piqued, but she still looked troubled. "You're not supposed to go there without permission, though! That's against the rules!"
The half-ghost scoffed. "Rules, schmules. Bullet doesn't ever catch anyone, Box Lunch! Besides," he paused and smirked at her, "we're ghosts. We make our own rules."
And with that, Dan dashed off towards the dark building looming above them. Before he could reach it, however, a strange feeling of foreboding caused him to brake his flight. His pointed ears twitched as his enhanced hearing picked up a strange sound nearby. He suddenly felt nervous, his aura flaring with the feeling as he thought of everything that could be out there. And he was all alone, too!
Daring to look around, he immediately caught sight of what the disturbance was. However, what he saw was nothing like all of the things he'd been imagining in his head.
"A ghost portal?" he asked himself upon laying eyes on it.
Or at least he thought it was a portal. Somehow, it seemed way too bright, and he even had to shield his eyes from its light. It looked almost white from how blinding its glow was. Feeling more intrepid now that he knew it was only a portal, he eyed it curiously and slowly began to approach it.
Dan jumped when he heard Box Lunch yell something behind him, though in his preoccupation with the portal he hadn't caught the words. The urgency in her voice, however, made him turn around – if only out of curiosity.
There was the Ghost Zone's stand-in warden, holding Box Lunch up by the back of her shirt while she struggled in his grip, her eyes, burning a fiery red. Dan immediately felt himself grow angry, gritting his teeth and clenching his fists in anger. Anyone who knew Dan and Box Lunch's relationship might have questioned the boy's ire at seeing the girl in peril, but it made perfect sense to the little half-ghost.
Nobody messes with Phoebe but me!
Dan shot towards the guard as fast as he could, creating an ectoplasmic rope and letting his ghost stinger charge it as soon as it enveloped Bullet. The adult ghost immediately cried out in pain, Box Lunch screaming from shock. "Dark!" she cried.
Bullet, however, did not loosen his hold on the girl. In fact, the surprise attack only seemed to make him angry. Before he could be spotted, Dan teleported to a spot behind the other ghost and wrapped his small hands around his neck. "Let her go!" the child demanded.
Recognizing the voice as that of a child's, Bullet laughed humorlessly. "What is it with you kids thinking it's alright to hang around the prison? Come here!" And as he reached his arm back to grab the boy tightly wound around him, Dan saw a perfect opening for his signature move.
Bullet couldn't hold back an angry, pained yowl as the boy sunk his teeth into his arm as hard as he possibly could. He released the ghost girl, who stood motionless staring at the one-eyed ghost as he flailed around trying to dislodge the ghost from his arm. Suddenly, the girl frowned, her emotions causing her aura to flare.
"LET GO OF HIM!" she screeched, feeling brave enough to jump into the fray. Imitating her half-ghost friend, she sank her not-so-sharp teeth into Bullet's shoulder, her hands holding tightly onto the blue hair that peeked out of his bandana.
"AGH! You damn...!"
Meanwhile, in the chaos that ensued, the three brawling ghosts failed to notice the disappearance of the strange portal, and the entity that emerged from it. They failed to feel the pair of glowing green eyes watching them curiously from a distance, and they failed to see them stare up at the prison after a while before heading straight towards it.
Walker maneuvered himself easily through the jail, invisible in case his presence were to cause unrest. He didn't know what kind of timeline he'd landed himself in, after all. Everything seemed normal enough on the outside, if not a little bit quiet. On the inside, most of the cells were empty, which irked him immensely and made him hope he wasn't the one in charge of the prison in this timeline – it would be downright embarrassing to let his jail get into such a state.
Regardless, the hallways remained the same, the signs pointing to different clusters of cells all reading the same information that they did in his timeline. And so he easily found the way to his office, but to his annoyance he found – not his name on the door, but rather Bullet's. However, it seemed to have been crudely stuck onto the wood. Walker noticed that there was something else underneath the laminated nameplate. Carelessly removing it, he found that underneath Bullet's name was his own, carved just as it had been in his timeline. He briefly thought about the ominous connotations that this had, but that didn't stop him from phasing into the room, dropping his invisibility once inside.
It was just the same as he remembered, minus the papers littered over the desk's surface and the folders sticking out of the filing cabinets in the corner. Yes, this was certainly Bullet's office at the moment, given its disorderly state.
"February 3rd, 2019," he read out loud from the calendar that sat on the desk. Ghosts usually weren't meticulous about keeping track of dates, but it was rather necessary when keeping up with thousand year sentences. The date currently on the calendar told Walker that it was exactly three years from where he'd left off in his timeline. The date was probably irrelevant but he still moved on to the filing cabinet he remembered to be organized by date, just out of curiosity.
The warden flipped through the most recent cases, noticing plenty of familiar names on the cases and some not so familiar ones. Almost every single one read unfinished sentences due to prisoners escaping. Once he got to the files written back in 2016, the cases started getting more numerous. But most peculiar of all was that, once he got to the first couple of months out of the year, he recognized every single one.
"Strange..." he whispered to himself.
His gloved fingers retraced their previous path, stopping on February 4th, 2016. The day's report was less than a page long, though there were several pages outlining plans to fix up the prison. As Walker began reading, he grew more and more mystified at the eerily familiar content.
The prison is in disarray. Plans have been drawn up to repair the damage, but it will be difficult until guards begin to return to their posts. There are zero prisoners on file today. No arrests are to be made; lack of a proper law force prevents efficient order in procedures and will most likely end in the remaining guards being overpowered. The ghosts remaining in the Wasteland have been deemed to possess the rights to defend themselves and their lairs at all costs; There will be no arrests made for rule-breaking for ghosts created in post-human consciousness or through breeding. Any pleads for aid from the Real World will be ignored, and all half-ghosts requesting it will be considered humans for this purpose. Walker has left to seek Dark Phantom. Due to the nature of the Infi-Map, his timely return is debatable. A reform of the prison will take place some time this month. End log.
Walker froze. "...has left to seek Dark Phantom. Due to the nature of the Infi-Map, his timely return is debatable..." he read out loud to himself, going over the two sentences several more times as he attempted to make sense of the situation. The gears in his mind turned, leading him to only logical conclusion that he was still in his own timeline. He had simply jumped three years into the future!
He fingered the Infi-Map in his front pocket, becoming perplexed once again when another thought occurred to him. Dark Phantom, the very reason he had begun this endeavor with the Infi-Map in the first place, had been in his timeline all along? That didn't make any sense! How could the Observants have been so stupid that they didn't notice an all-powerful ghost being...
Wait... but a ghost that powerful had to have been born from two ghost parents! Regardless of recent (or not so recent) events, ghosts born from stray ecto-matter could not possibly be strong enough to reach a power level where they managed to take over two worlds. Not even Pariah had been able to gain control without the help of the Ring of Rage and Crown of Fire, after all.
And on top of everything, this Phantom seemed to follow normal growth patterns for a ghost born from two parents. He had seen it with his own two eyes! And what he'd seen earlier... that had been the Lunch Lady's and the Box Ghost's daughter – Phoebe or whatever her name was – that had been with the younger Phantom. She was barely any older than she'd been when he had jumped into the portal; she seemed just about the same age as Dark Phantom, actually.
Walker's thoughts were cut off by angry mutterings behind him as somebody phased into the office. The mutterings abruptly stopped just as the warden turned around to see a wide-eyed Bullet frozen in place. Walker couldn't help but chuckle and grin at the ghost, holding up the February 4th file. "'His timely return is debatable,' huh?"
He slammed the file down on the desk, circling around the desk and leaning against it nonchalantly as he eyed Bullet like a cat eyeing a canary.
The head officer and newly reinstated warden flew swiftly through the halls, ignoring the surprised glances and welcomes from the guards they passed.
"Honestly, if we would've simply known we'd find him in three years anyways -"
"And have to wait all that time for it? Are you kidding me? There's no way I regret going into that portal, Bullet."
Bullet laughed nervously. "Yeah, but you should have seen – oh, when finally got him off of me and I actually saw him. And then you just popping up out of nowhere! Oh, God, it's been a long day," he said, sighing wearily as the two of them turned a corner.
The two had barely taken any time to talk. Walker had simply gotten to the point and asked him if he'd trapped the kids, which Bullet confirmed. He only bothered to explain enough for Bullet to understand that he was back and they needed to interrogate the Phantom kid to find out more about him, starting with just where he had come from. Even then, their conversation had been cut short when the guards that had been watching over the two children had informed them that the boy had escaped the cell – by turning human.
It explained so much. The power level, the reason why they had never seen him before, and the reason why the Observants couldn't interfere – interfering with Real World matters was both complicated and strictly prohibited unless the situation was dire, after all. The kid was probably the result of another freak accident out in the Real World, just like Plasmius and Danny Phantom.
With an ecstatic grin, Walker had ordered the guards to use their half-ghost weapons and handcuffs. Now that the situation was under control, Walker was more anxious to see this Phantom kid than a five year old would be driving to Disneyland.
After a long and relatively silent walk, Walker and Bullet finally arrived at the cell holding the two children.
It was definitely him, alright. The boy had reverted back to his ghost form, thanks to the collar now around his neck. Walker hadn't managed to get anything that would both suppress half-ghosts' powers and keep their spectral energy high enough to stay in ghost form; it was the reason why they had never tried it on Phantom. This child, however, was obviously still developing – despite what the large scorch marks on the cell walls and ceiling might have implied. He knew it hadn't been the girl because she was currently busy attacking the cell, but her attacks were doing little damage. The boy, however, was occupied with verbally assaulting his officers and being ignored all the while.
"Let me go! You're gonna be sorry! My dad -"
"What was that about your father, now?" Walker interrupted the child's snarling threats, and both kids immediately turned around to see who had spoken.
Dan's instincts went into overdrive as he stared back at the ghost with the piercing green eyes and wicked grin, dressed in matching white from head to toe. He ignored the wariness he suddenly felt from the way the warden was eyeing him and simply bared his teeth, his aura flaring even more. "Let me go, you stupid ghost!" he growled. To his further irritation, all the other ghost did was chuckle.
"Go on, now," the ghost commanded, looking at the guards and Bullet. "All of you! Scram! I'll deal with these two myself."
Walker turned to Dan again, a wolfish grin adorning his face. "You too, Bullet. I've got this," he said without looking at the other ghost. Bullet hesitated before he flew off to stand just outside the door.
Before there was a chance for real silence to fall, Box Lunch spoke up. "Let us go! You can't keep us here! You dumb ghost, you're just – mmf!"
Dan gasped and turned angry eyes to the warden after he successfully silenced his not-quite-friend with an ecto-gag. The boy didn't get a chanced to spew any further threats, however, because Walker approached the cell at a dangerously close proximity before speaking in a smooth voice carrying a certain level of intimidation.
"Now, then. I think we got off on the wrong foot. My name's Walker, and I'm the warden of this here prison. I know who your little friend over there is, so we don't need to talk today. But you and I certainly do. What's your name, boy?"
The boy eyed the older ghost suspiciously, feeling rather vulnerable trapped in this cage with his friend and left alone in the room with this strange spirit. He felt Box Lunch grab onto his cape behind him, but didn't protest as he went over the situation in his head. He knew that calculating look on the alleged warden's face, and it was obvious the ghost didn't have good intentions. The young half-ghost chose to stall with his next words and proceeded with caution.
"I thought Bullet was the warden of the prison," Dan said slowly.
Walker kept that creepy grin on his face the whole time he eyed the two ten year olds. It was very disconcerting, and Dan could almost feel goosebumps build even in his ghost form. "Bullet? Nah, he's only my head officer. I had some business to take care of, so I put him in charge. I trust he's been doing a good job taking care of the prison?"
It was at that point that Box Lunch managed to rip the ecto-gag away from her mouth. "Dark," Box Lunch whispered hurriedly in his ear.
"Shut up!" Dan hissed under his breath, but it was too late.
"Dark? Is that your name?" Walker asked in a pleasant voice, shooting a thicker ecto-gag at the girl to silence her once more. Box Lunch's shriek of rage and distress was muffled, and she could do little but hold onto Dan's cape once more.
Dan glared at the warden, shaking from the desire to hurt the ghost – but it would be useless to try when his attacks would simply bounce around the cell. Meanwhile, all Walker did was smirk as if he'd just uncovered the secret to all life and afterlife.
Jackpot, the warden couldn't help but exclaim in his head.
Walker's chuckles only infuriated the boy further. "What's it to you?" Dan snapped, adopting a defensive stance once again.
The adult ghost's eyes narrowed maliciously. "Now, now. I wouldn't be so disrespectful towards those in authority, if I were you. After all, you're currently in my prison, and even minors can serve sentences here. Even if I were to let you go, I couldn't just let you off without informing somebody to better watch out for you. Can't have you running loose around these parts, can we? Luckily, I know who your parents are, little miss," he drawled, but Box Lunch could nothing but squeak at being addressed. "And I'm sure you have parents too, Dark?"
"That depends. Will my parents know I was here?" he said in a panic while he still attempted to maintain a defiant air. He internally winced, however, when he realized he had more or less given the prison head leverage to use by admitting his parents neither knew where he was nor agreed with him being there.
Of course, Walker gave a triumphant smirk at the boy's words, but not for the reasons that Dan thought. The boy had just not only confirmed that he had parents, but that they probably knew about the existence of the Ghost Zone. That meant that he could most likely be accessed through any portal in Amity Park. But Walker had to keep playing the part. "My lips are sealed as long as yours are not, Dark. But you don't have to tell me anything. I can find out either from your mouth, or from your parents directly when they come claim you whenever they manage to find you. It wouldn't be difficult – you are a ghost, with a connection to your parents whenever you're in trouble... We could always just put you in a situation where your parents will be sure to come by – something that'll make them feel needed."
Dan's eyes widened. He stared down the warden for several long seconds, and came to realize that there was obvious threat in Walker's words. Dan knew that his parents would be able to feel if he was in enough emotional or physical distress, and that they would easily be able to find him with any of the several devices that could lock onto his ecto-signature. And then he'd never be allowed out of his room again – much less into the Ghost Zone! Dan gulped and tried desperately to hide the anxiety in his voice. "Why do you want to know who my parents are?"
"I have to have some way of identifying you. After all, it's part of my job to keep the few real children of the Ghost Zone safe. You probably live around here, after all, right? I don't think your Mom and Dad would like you wandering around," Walker replied, feigning ignorance and still pretending he knew nothing about the boy being half human.
Dan nodded his head slowly, somewhat relieved to hear that Walker had no clue who his parents were – he thought they were full ghosts! "I live out east by the warehouse," he answered, hitting Box Lunch with a tiny blast when he heard her give a muffled hum.
Walker stared at him and smiled maliciously, leaning so close to the bars of the cell that Dan had to consciously keep himself from backing away.
"...You're lying," Walker said after a moment's pause.
Dan glared at him. "How would you know?" he snapped.
"'Cause that's where she lives," he retorted, pointing to Box Lunch who gave a tiny jump before mimicking her friend's fiery glare. "And we don't have records of any other children living anywhere around those parts."
Dan's deer-in-the-headlights look said it all. He'd taken the bait. Of course, Walker didn't know where the kid lived, despite his suspicions of it being Amity Park – there weren't even any records keeping track of where ghosts lived, actually. But the boy had obviously been lying previously, and by the tension he showed and the guilt in his eyes, he probably wasn't supposed to be wandering around these parts anyways.
Dan avoided the ghost's gaze, the anxiety now showing through his posture. But he couldn't just give away who his parents were! He'd get in so much trouble!
"Tell you what," Walker said, attempting to make his voice somewhat gentle once he realized that he was just making the kid more likely to start freaking out and less likely to talk. "How's about we start off with some easier questions?"
Dan eyed him suspiciously, though his unease was now clearly shining through in his red-eyed gaze. Still, the guy wasn't following through on his threats just yet... Maybe he wasn't really a strong ghost? Or perhaps he really did just want to keep him and Box Lunch safe and away from the more dangerous parts of the Ghost Zone? "...What kinds of questions?"
"Say, when were you born? How old are you?"
"September 25th, 2008," the boy said slowly. "I'm... ten."
Walker could see that the child was telling the truth this time around, but what confused him was the boy's date of birth. It was exactly the same as the well-known birthdate of Phantom and Plasmius' spawn. Suddenly, his eyes widened, the gears in his mind turning as everything clicked into place. He felt like he'd been slapped in the face when realization struck him.
"You'll regret not dealing with the problem at its source. It's only a matter of time, you know."
Of course! That's why the Council saw Danny Phantom as a threat! That's why they wanted to eliminate half-ghosts!
Danny Phantom and Vlad Plasmius had spawned the most evil ghost in history.
Were he not a ghost with already pale skin, Walker would've blanched when he realized just who this kid was. There was no other explanation – the kid was half-ghost, for crying out loud! And now that he thought about it, Dark was also the spitting image of Danny Phantom, with Plasmius' influence being painfully obvious as well.
It must be a time paradox, he realized. A time loop of sorts. Dark would probably grow up to be exactly what he'd executed that Christmas Eve. He'd somehow manage to escape into the time-stream at some point and create a world of pure chaos. Then, once back in the past, he'd try to kill Clockwork, get captured by the Observants, and get executed yet again. But he obviously wasn't quite there just yet. If Walker had this foresight, if he could get to the boy while he was still young and impressionable...
"...Hello?" Dan said after seeing Walker blank out, snapping the warden out of his thoughts.
"Your parents wouldn't happen to be half-ghosts, would they?" the older ghost was quick to ask.
Dan's face and silence confirmed the fact when he realized Walker knew who his parents were. Oh, why hadn't he worn his cloak? He looked like his parents, after all! Of course other ghosts could recognize him! He was going to be in so much trouble now...
The boy looked away, feeling the nudges from a nervous Box Lunch and trying to quickly think up a way to approach this. While Walker patiently waited for the boy's answer through the thick silence, Dan decided that a change of tactics was in order. His eyes quickly narrowed. "Yeah, my parents are half-ghosts! They're Danny Phantom and Vlad Plasmius," he said, the defiant confidence returning to his voice. "A-And they're both really powerful, so you better be careful 'cause they can hurt you so bad if you do anything to me! They'll waste you!"
"See, that wasn't so hard now, was it, kid?" Walker said, ignoring the threat and grinning widely, plans bouncing around in his head at a million miles per hour. And Plasmius as the father... Oh, this was just too perfect! "Actually, I do know your parents, you know. They live in Amity Park, isn't that right?"
Dan nodded. "Y-Yeah. But that's our territory, so you better not get near there!"
Walker chuckled. "Of course not. And seeing that you actually cooperated, I don't feel forced to keep you here any longer. I won't tell a word about you two being here," he said in an overly pleasant voice, taking the two kids aback. The gag disappeared from Box Lunch's mouth, and a second later their cell was unlocked. "Now run along! And next time, use the front gate if you really want a tour of the prison," he told them, shoving them away as he phased out of the room and headed towards Bullet like an excited five year old, ignoring the two stunned ten year olds. From the look Bullet saw on his superior's face, he knew something good had just happened, and he knew that a plan was unfolding.
End Notes: Tch, ya see, Dan? This is why your parents don't let you go to the Ghost Zone alone. *shakes head* Anyways, here's where we really jump into the story! Oh, Walker. If only you knew... Actually, the same goes for poor little Dan, hehe.
Oh, and Carnivorous Canyon was a reference to "Infinite Realms." Just a fun fact.