"Bye," Jazz half- waved as she slid her key card into her door. The person she was talking to did the same and they both disappeared into their dorms.

She was relieved to see that her roommate was out. It wasn't that she didn't like the other girl, it was just that she needed some privacy right now- it wouldn't do for people to find out she was the sister of a ghost. Not that many people would believe it.

Setting down her books, Jazz flipped open her computer and powered it on, grabbing a private notebook she kept in her locked drawer as it loaded. The notebook was filled with random worried notes and observations about ghost hero Danny Phantom- or, as Jazz called him, her little brother. She sighed as she read over some of the more recent ones. They ranged from the way his voice sometimes warbled when she talked to him over the phone, to her suspicions that Phantom's glow had recently been diminishing.

Reading over her notes she partook in that feeling of guilt all over again. That idea that she shouldn't have left Amity Park, that she shouldn't have left her little brother there to deal with the residents of hell on his own (both those from the Ghost Zone and not). Then she would remember that she was getting lectures from credible scientists, that Danny always had his friends to depend on, and that he would always call her if something was going wrong. This was something she was doing for her own future and that was something anyone deserved.

Her computer made the light bell noise that indicated it was ready to be used, and she quickly went to her most visited website since she started at this school:

She felt like a tweenage glitter emoji every time she typed in that address, especially since the home page included an uncomfortable close up of her little brother covered in glittering heart GIFs. Unfortunately, it was the most dependable site for ghost information, particularly information about Phantom, on the planet.

She clicked on the current events tab and skimmed it, looking for anything that might spell trouble. She was sure her brother would call her if things got too bad, but that wasn't to say he didn't have a bad habit of brushing off life changing traumatizing events, so it was better to try to catch things before it got to that point. She had definitely seen Phantom's lack of energy lately, added to the fact that the site had been inundated with theories of where Phantom has disappeared to, she was very worried. She had dialed his number a few times, but hung up before it connected with reminders not to be too pushy running through her head. She called their parents, so she knew he wasn't really missing or seriously injured. If he was taking a few days off from fighting ghosts, there was no need to make him feel guilty about it.

She slid off her headband, seeing as it was starting to give her a headache, and brushed out the dent it had left in her orange-red hair. As she was doing so a brand new post popped up on the page that immediately earned her attention.

'SooooooooSad :'-( Ghostboy leaving'

Just as her mouse was hovering over it five more appeared.

'OMG Helpz'

'Phantom playin hard to get rarw ;-)'

'Phantom Speech at City Hall'

'Ghost boy angry pics asdfjk'

'Noooooo. Come back! 3'

She frowned and her eyebrows drew closer to each other. Leaving? Speach? Angry? She quickly clicked on the most eloquent looking link while leaning in closer to the screen. The link opened up to a youtube video that started with a screen of a large crowd of people standing in front of what she recognized as Amity City Hall- as the title would suggest.

She tilted her head and moved a long strand of hair behind her ear. She then clicked the volume button up a few times, but no, it wasn't her computer. The crowd was completely silent. The camera jolted upwards and shakily focused on the podium up front. Whoever was taking the video was very far in the back, and all she could make out to tell her this was her brother was his height and a shock of white hair.

His arms were gripping the podium and he was leaning forward. His voice washed above the crowd, but it was distorted greatly by distance and a poor camera microphone. What she could pick out, though, was enough to cause her to start chewing on an errant strand of hair.

"...weight...cruelty… of others…"

"... hatred… unbearable… seeing me around anymore…"

Then he pushed up from the podium to float above the crowds, stopping briefly to look above all their heads at something behind them and then vanishing from the visible spectrum.

Jazz didn't even wait the last few seconds for the video to end before backspacing and clicking a new one, the one calling for help.

This video started much closer to the podium and Jazz could see the tightness to her brother's features, like he was trying to be stoic but knew he wasn't quite succeeding. It also seemed to start closer to the beginning.

"I know there are a lot of rumors about why I've been gone and I'm here to make things clear. I'm tired. I'm tired of the ungratefulness, of the entitlement, you all seem to feel when it comes to your protection from me, and I am done."

The crowd bursts into murmurs and exclamations of disbelief. Jazz fell back in her chair with an audible exhale.

"Oh, Danny."

The camera turned backwards to show the girl holding it, no older than twelve with short frizzy black hair and Eastern features, though Jazz had no way of knowing from exactly where.

"No way he's really leaving, right guys?" She looked up worriedly and Jazz could hear the heavy murmur of the speech continuing. "I mean, he's a real life superhero! And there are, like, real life villains here! He knows we can't survive without him! I mean, he saved my brother's life just last month! What do we do guys?!" The video ended on her looking at something above the camera with wide panicked eyes.

Jazz clicked the first video to find that it was composed entirely of the girl who had taken it talking into the camera about how sad it was that the ghost boy was leaving and how sad his death was.

His death? What? She spit out the hair she had been chewing and wrinkled her nose at the strand. It was a filthy nervous habit that she really had to stop. She shook her head and concentrated back on the site.

The last link contained only a few seconds of video showing Danny flying off.

Finally it was between the uncomfortably named one and the one that claimed to only have pictures. Jazz sighed and clicked the uncomfortably named one.

Jackpot.

This video was from somewhere in the middle of the crowd and seemed to have gotten the speech from the moment Danny appeared at the podium up until the moment where he finished talking about how he had 'died'. Putting it together with what the others had, Jazz was reasonably sure she had the whole picture about what was happening in Amity Park.

What could she do?

She fished her phone out of her purse, quickly unlocking it and opening up her contacts. For a moment her finger hovered over Danny's name, but she reconsidered. He had clearly already made his decision and she didn't want to pressure him if it was for his own mental health or actually well thought out.

On the other hand, what if it was out of spite or desperation? What if this was a case of no longer being interested in things he used to enjoy, because he had enjoyed ghost fighting, to an extent, she knew he had. She bit her lip and scrolled through her contacts. Mom and Dad would be less than no help, so that left Sam and Tucker. Of the two of them, Tucker was more likely to give her an unbiased synopsis but Sam was more likely to honestly tell her who's fault it was and if Jazz needed to come home… Tucker first, then Sam.

Jazz pressed the little green call button and brought the phone to her ear as it rang. With her other hand she scrolled through the Current Events tag some more as more links popped up. She didn't click on any more videos, but found a few short 'articles' (it honestly hurt her educated mind to call them that) that described a bit more about what exactly had happened and how people were feeling about the whole thing. It seemed the adults were mostly ambivalent, if a bit guilty, while the younger generations were genuinely worried about what this meant for their survival against the ghost threat.

The phone went to voicemail. Tucker's phone never went to voicemail.

"Hey, Tucker, it's Jazz. Please call me back as soon as you can. You probably figured this out already, but it's about Danny."

Jazz shuffled over to Sam's number and tried that.

Some articles on the page mentioned the suspicious detail that it was Mayor Masters that had called the conference, yet he seemingly had nothing to say as the people were free to go after Danny's speech. Jazz narrowed her eyes as the ringing stopped and Sam's phone went to voicemail as well. She left a message similar to the one she had left Tucker and put her phone down, going back to the video that had caught the beginning of the speech. This time she concentrated her vision to who was behind the podium.

Sure enough, there was Vlad masters. Jazz scowled. She enlarged the screen and leaned in closer to try to make out his facial expressions.

She was just about sure he was smirking, though maybe that was just because it seemed that was always the expression on his face, when her phone rang.

Tucker.

She scrambled to pick it up and bring it to her ear.

"Tucker, what happened?"

"Jazz…" Tucker sounded tired and said her name like he didn't want to tell her anything.

"Tucker Umair Foley, you tell me what is happening with my brother right now, or so help me I will drive over there and pull it from you myself,"

Tucker gave a strained chuckle before taking a deep breath. "Could you drive over here anyway?"

Jazz blinked in surprise and then immediately stood up to get her suitcase from her closet. It wasn't like Tucker to admit when someone needed to drop everything they were doing to go do something else. He wouldn't ask her to come unless it was last resort.

"Explain," she demanded as she laid the bag on her bed. "I saw what happened at City Hall, but I need context. Why? When? Did Vlad have something to do with it?... He is there, right? It's not a clone or something?"

"No, it's him. I don't know if Vlad… He's been distant lately, it's possible… but let me just tell me what we know. It started… honestly, it started a few months ago, but I didn't notice until a few weeks ago when I asked Sam to meet me at the Nasty Burger to talk about how… down Danny had been lately. It was the middle of the night and we ended our meeting deciding that he was just going through a rough patch. We didn't think he would actually… On the way home Sam came across his phone, abandoned, so we got a nearby traffic camera to tell us what was up… Jazz…

"Tucker, what is it? What happened?" She paused in filling her luggage to adjust the phone closer to her ear.

"He nearly… he hurt himself,"

Jazz froze. She turned and sat roughly onto the bed, now using her hand to press her phone to her head.

"You mean… on purpose? What did he… how?"

"He punched a wall until his knuckles split and then… then he started scratching at himself. It was bad, Jazz. And then he passed out in his ghost form without changing back and his glow completely disappeared,"

"Oh, Tuck,"

"I know,"

"If he passed out why wasn't he with his phone?"

"Ya, that's where things get worse. Maddie found him." Jazz already knew the following story wasn't one she wanted to hear. Tucker had never called her mom 'Maddie' before. It was always 'your mom' or Dr/Mrs. Fenton. He had lost respect for her. He had lost respect for her because of what she did to Danny. Jazz swallowed.

"How bad was it? Did she… Oh God,"

"We don't know, Danny won't tell us. But… from what I understand he tried to be honest about his feelings with her and she manipulated that in some way. Then he said that he was giving up ghost hunting. That he couldn't keep sacrificing himself for people who don't care. He implied that he thinks he's not worth as much as other people,"

Jazz exhaled and stood back up to continue packing.

"I'm leaving in ten minutes. I'll be there in two hours, tops,"

"Alright, but, Jazz… don't try to talk him out of it. Sam already tried and now things are really strained between us all. He shouldn't have to fight if he doesn't want to. It's not his job and it isn't his responsibility!" Tucker's voice increased in volume as he went on until he was yelling with anger.

"Shhh, I know. I just want to talk to him. I promise, it's about his mental health, not Amity Park's,"

"Right, sorry. I'll see you soon, bye." The line went dead.

Jazz took a deep breath. She could feel her eyes getting irritated and she swiped at them until she regained her composure. No need to have more than one Fenton breaking down. She threw in her toiletries and zipped up her suitcase. She could email her professors once she was back in Amity Park and she'd call her roommate on the road.

It was time to visit her baby brother.

A/N: Hey guys, so my doc manager is being really weird. Sometimes it's fine, but most of the time it won't let me create any new documents. It'll just buffer forever when I click submit no matter how I try to upload the document. That's why this is so late and I don't know when I'll be able to update next. I've emailed support more than once, and nada. If anyone has any suggestions I'd love to hear them. In the meantime, I hope you like this chapter. If you did or have any constructive criticism, please review. It'll make all the frustration worth it. :-)