Long ago since the last time I updated he he he...-hides-

Weekend

Valerie was awestruck. Train her? Why? He had said just a few days ago that she was going to be able to find out how to use the suit. And, surprisingly, she actually had!

"TRAIN me? How are you planning to do that?" Valerie finally managed to say, even though she still wasn't sure what was so important for him to be doing all these things for her.

"Well, you could learn how to use your energy well. You don't want to die, do you? AND… I'm quite sure you would like to play around with it. Plus, I can teach you incredible things, things that might be beyond your comprehension at the moment," Vlad said, finishing with a smile on his face. Valerie always thought she knew it all and was always right, but at the same time, she was so ignorant about what surrounded her and what the truth of what was really going on was.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Masters, but I know what I'm doing, and I want to make sure you know that I work alone," the girl said seriously, somehow rude for the old millionaire. This enraged him, but before he could say anything to Valerie, she shot up into the sky, and, leaving a faint red line behind her, she disappeared.

BEEP BEEP BEEP!!!

"ARRGHHHH!!!" Danny yelled in annoyance at his clock, making a lot of effort not to destroy it. He pushed the off button with all of his strength (which wasn't much since he was still awakening to a new day), and woke up from his bed. He didn't hear his mother, who was at the moment passing outside his room. She was going to make sure he was already up, and she discovered it in quite a way. But it was normal for her by now to hear her son arguing with his hated clock.

The memory of the clock made her shudder; she didn't want to remember the previous day's events, since it made her feel that she was going nuts. Then another thought hit her. Hadn't Danny's clock sounded different?? (A/N: If you look back to chapter 3 "The Gas", you will find out that the last alarm clock did a "Ring" sound, and not "Beep") And why hadn't she heard it for the other past two days? She could have sworn that she had seen Jazz waking him up those days. Maybe she wasn't crazy, and the clock that was currently in Danny's room was the new one. But…that couldn't make sense! How in the world did that clock get there if he was out buying it? Also, her son told her that he didn't say anything about buying a clock!

"Mom?" a voice asked. This caused Maddie to jump and turn around, then finding the source of the voice, Danny. She realized that she had been standing there for some time, thinking. "Are you okay?" he asked her. Calming herself down, Maddie smiled at him.

"Yes, sweetie, I was just…thinking? Ummm, do you want pancakes for breakfast?" she asked quickly, trying to change the topic.

"Uh? Oh yeah, sure, Mom," Danny answered, taken aback by the sudden topic change. Hurriedly, he headed to the bathroom.

Meanwhile, Maddie went back to the kitchen, ready to cook breakfast and ready to try and convince herself that she hadn't become crazy.

It was the last day of school before the weekend, last class, last hour, and yet, it was the most slow and painful one. Sam glanced at the clock anxiously; it wasn't that bad, really, because this year, fortunately, they had the opportunity to have art as the last class before the weekend. She actually liked it because it was a way to let out all the stress accumulated throughout a whole week.

They were all finishing their paintings that they had already started on Monday, and Sam couldn't care more about it; she spent the last ten minutes thinking about what she would do for the weekend. And then, finally, the bell rang, announcing the end of school leading up to the weekend. She heard some happy yells take off around the room, and everybody went flying out from the boring art class.

"Come on, Sam!" she heard Tucker scream over the loud voices of the hyper teenagers. She smiled, and started walking behind her two best friends.

After walking out of school and dropping Tucker of at his house, the two remaining members of the trio started walking towards Sam's house. Since everything went silent when they left Tucker, Sam decided to make some conversation.

"So, Danny, do you have anything planned for today?" she asked, feeling a bit awkward about it.

"No. Well, actually, I was going to suggest going to the Nasty Burger, as always. And then maybe to go bowling!" Danny replied.

"Yeah that would be cool. Hopefully, we won't find Dash in there. He's still angry about what happened last time in P.E."

Danny laughed at this and said, "You don't know how right you are. I hope luck is on our side this time, if that ever happens."

Sam laughed too and replied, "Yeah, you're not what we can consider a 'lucky man'. That's good for me because it means I can beat you at bowling today."

"Riiiiight, just because you won every game for three months in a row, doesn't mean you'll win today!"

"Keep dreaming… So tomorrow we're going to make Tucker get some company. After that, do you want to go watch a movie with me?" Sam asked with embarrassment. It wasn't a date, so why was she so nervous about it?

"Like a date?" This made both of them blush. "I mean, in friendly terms!! It would be cool, yeah."

"Great, so…see you at six, and call Tucker to tell him the plans for today," Sam said after finally reaching her house. They said goodbye, and Sam entered her home with a big grin on her face. Why was she so happy? She and Danny were only friends, and even though Danny did mention it, it wasn't still a date. It was just two friends who where going to hang out and see a movie. Nothing less, nothing more.

Vlad was in a huge office, sitting in a big red-wheeled armchair in front of a desk. His laptop was shut off at his right, and in front of him was a pair of folders labeled "Experiment 10638" in red at the top. Behind him was a big painting of an old castle in the night. It looked so real, you could get scared just staring at it. In front of the desk were two wooden chairs. The walls were painted with a peach color, and in front of a large centered window with white curtains was a white couch with a small desk. In front of it was where a vase of flowers was placed in the middle. Centered at the top of the room was a gold and silver chandelier.

Skulker phased through a door that was placed in the middle of the wall in front of Vlad, and the ghost hunter, remaining invisible said, "I'm here." The halfa stood up from his chair and walked toward the window. Closing the white curtains in an abrupt movement, he turned around, facing the room again.

"You can show yourself now," Vlad said, and Skulker regained visibility. The millionaire sat in his chair again, and made a hand motion indicating that the ghost could sit in one of the chairs in front of him.

"You called me, Sir?" Skulker asked, feeling a bit awkward sitting instead of floating like he was used to doing.

"Yes," Vlad replied. He sighed and turned around in his chair, looking at the painting. Skulker turned to look at it too, and shuddered at the unusual sight of the dark castle with the full moon shinning over it, making him feel inferior. "I'd like for you to do me a favor… I want you to transmit a message of my own into the whole ghost zone. It will benefit all of you, and me especially, so I want it to be clear. Can you do that?"

"Well yes, sir, but, I'm not a messenger, I'm a hunter and--" He was cut of by Vlad's hand which had been raised up, and could be seen from behind the large armchair. Vlad turned around, and folded his arms on the desk, leaning forward a bit.

"I will ask you again," Vlad said more seriously, "Can you do that?"

"Yes sir. I can. I will," replied Skulker hastily, which was quickly becoming nervous. But to his relief, Vlad smiled at him. He picked up the two folders in front of him, and underneath them was a paper. The halfa took it and gave it to Skulker, who received the paper somehow still nervous.

"Very well, you are dismissed," Vlad said at last, and Skulker disappeared reluctantly in front of his eyes.

Danny was sitting on his bed, having just finished talking with Tucker. He stood up, and also taking his wallet with him, went downstairs. Danny found his sister reading a book in the living room. Noticing that her brother was ready to leave, she stopped her reading, glancing at Danny.

"Where are you going, Dan?" she asked.

"To the Nasty Burger with Sam and Tuck, and then to the movies, why?" he replied speedily.

"Don't you think you're forgetting something?" Jazz asked, causing her brother to roll his eyes. "You know what I told you about going out without a Thermos and a Fenton Phone." This made Danny sigh, and he muttered an "OK" under his breath as he went back to his room, and took his Thermos and one of the Fenton Phones.

Danny went back downstairs and said goodbye to Jazz, heading out toward the Nasty Burger. After walking for a couple of minutes, he finally reached his destination, where he saw Tucker waving at him in one the tables positioned almost at the end of the restaurant. So he ran up there to meet his friend.

"Hey Tuck, where's Sam?" Danny asked, sitting down.

"On her way here. So what's up, Danny, anything new?" Tucker asked, trying to make some conversation.

"Not at all dude, oh look, there's Sam," said Danny, who waved at Sam, so she made her way towards her friends.

"Hey guys!" Sam said as she sat down. "Guess what movie is in theaters...The Long Cry 2!" she said excitedly.

The trio started talking happily, until Tucker got a sight of Valerie, and he changed the theme of their conversation.

"Hey, dude, there's Val, are you going to talk with her or what?" Tucker asked.

"I don't know guys, I don't think it's safe anymore," Danny replied, much to Sam's relief.

"Finally you're coming to your senses, Danny!" She took a sip of her drink, and then added, "She still wants to kill your other half."

"I know, Sam, but after trying so hard to make peace with her, I dunno, I think I should at least talk to her," he said, taking away Sam's relief, and causing her to frown.

"Yeah, maybe we should call her and tell her about your secret!" Tucker said giggling. But instead of laughing, Sam and Danny just stared at him. "Geez, sorry for trying to have some fun!"

"Tucker, this isn't funny. Well, maybe it is to you, but that's because you don't have anyone that wants to TEAR YOU APART!!" Danny said a little too loudly at the end, drawing Valerie's attention. And after spotting Danny, she started to make her way towards the three friends. However, Danny didn't notice, and continued talking, "I mean, I can't understand why Valerie hates Phantom so much." With this said, Tucker and Sam's faces became pale, and Danny wondered for one second what was going on with them, until his doubts where answered by a single voice.

"Yeah, I wonder why," Valerie said with a tone of hatred. Danny turned to look at her, but Valerie just shot him a last glance and then angrily walked away.

Finally a new chappie :P sorry for the long wait nnU stupid 1 week writer's block, and my sister that was spending vacations in our house and decided to take power of the computer for a whole month.

I can't believe that I actually achieved to keep Vlad in character; normally I always screw up his dialogue, and I'm considering on re-writing all of them after I'm done with this.

I can't wait to write the next chapter, I have waited so much, and planned so much this moment of the fic, I think I'm going to update pretty fast :D You guys are going to like it, I'm sure of that :P (or maybe not o.o!)

Thanks a lot for reading, and PLEASE review, I love them, and they inspire me! I hope you guys enjoyed this chp, 'till the next one ;)

-Bluename

Posted: July 29, 2007

Chapter corrected by Sophie --hugs her--.