Disclaimer: I don't own Danny Phantom.

The only way to describe Danny's morning was hectic. After getting a very frantic text from Tucker exclaiming that he finally had a lead on a possible sighting for Desiree, the galfa decided the best course of action would be to leave as soon as possible before the wishing ghost disappeared again. Sadly, with Desiree being spotted across the country, he knew that this was going to be a long trip and had to plan accordingly.

This mean he had to ditch school...and a date with Sam. It was obvious which one was worse.. It took a lot of begging and pleading to get the goth off his case about why he was suddenly cancelling on her. Still, it was better than bringing her with him. Sure he was fine with letting her in on some of his ghostly escapades, especially since she already proved herself, if in another timeline, but he didn't want to bring her in any more than she was needed. After all, he couldn't allow her to get hurt. Tucker getting hurt was okay, but Sam was Sam and that made it completely different. Some people might say he was a jerk and maybe even a little sexist for thinking that way; he liked to think of it as protective.

Eventually though everything was sorted out and he finally appeared in front of Tucker's house. With a slight smirk he was half tempted to just faze into Tucker's room and freak the boy out, but he knew Tucker's might not be fully clothed. He did NOT want that awkward conversation.

The halfa decided to walk up the steps instead and gave the door a good knock before it swung open.

"Hello, Danny," greeted Tucker's father, a thin man with graying hair and a pair of glasses that looked similar to Tucker's.

"Hello, Mr. Foley," Danny replied. "Is Tucker awake? He wanted me to meet him at his place so we can walk to school."

"Oh, okay. Tucker is awake and should be up in his room if you'd like to see him." The father opened the door a little further for Danny to enter and pointed to the staircase at the end of the hall. Just go up the stairs and his room is the first door on your right."

"Thanks, Mr. Foley!" Danny said before walking down the hall.

Every time Danny entered Tucker's room he was always surprised by how dark it was. Besides the bright white glow that came from both the technogeek's computer and PDA, which was always at his lap or within reaching distance, the room was fairly dark. It never made much sense too because Tucker did have many lights to illuminate his room, he just never used him. Maybe that was why he and Sam had to sleep in the attic whenever they slept over?

Said technogeek paid no mind when Danny knocked on his door, or when he shouted at him yo open up for that matter.. The only thing that got his attention the light the entered the room when Danny opened the door. "How's it going, Tuck?" He asked the teen who was currently typing something on his computer and paying the intrusion very little mind besides straining his eyes.

"Desiree, um, seems to be, um, moving," he answered with his attentio glued to the screen.

Danny looked around the room and noticed how the room wasn't as dark as it usually was. The lights were still off, but there was a lot of light coming through Tucker's window that it more than lit up the room. This also let him see the heap of clothes sitting next to Tucker's unkept bed and the various items scattered across the floor. The halfa walked over to the clothes heap and sniffed at one of the shirts before visibly recoiling. "Okay, definitely dirty," he quietly muttered to himself. "Tuck, how long have you been at this?"

"I don't know," the boy answered. "What time is it?"

Sighing, Danny looked at the screen that captured so much of Tucker's attention but was unable to make heads or tales of it. There was a map of what he presumed was New York. That he could tell. Along with that though were several other screens that just confused him. "I think you're starting to obsess over this." he stated.

Tucker finally spared Danny a glance, if only for a second. "Don't you want to find Desiree as fast as possible? Why does it matter if we can get you home sooner?" At first Tucker's voice sounded neutral, but Danny could sense a darker tone hidden in his question.

"Obsessing is never good, Tuck. It can lead you to do bad things. Maybe not now, or even later, eventually though it will catch up to you. Just look at Plasmius."

"Who?" Tucker asked, still not fully paying attention. "Oh yeah, him." he said with a wave of his hand. "Let's just get to Desiree and worry about everything else later."

A small frown formed on Danny's face. "Fine," he was about to leave at that when a sudden question popped up into his mind. "Uh, you wouldn't happen to be doing this because you regret setting Desiree free, would you?"

"No!" Tucker quickly shouted before catching himself. "I mean, she shouldn't be able to cause any harm with her powers."

Danny looked down at Tucker's trembling hands but decided to not pursue the topic. No point in riling his friend up any more than he had to. "Okay. And, Tuck," he walked up and placed a hand on Tucker's shoulder, "thanks for stopping me before I went to far with her. I don't even want to know what I would've done if I went through with it."

You would be exactly where you are now! His conscious answered. Danny didn't even acknowledge it though as it didn't matter. Not to Tucker at least. He'd tell him about Spectra later. Right now the technogeek didn't need to know.

"Oh, don't worry about it, Danny," Tucker said trying to hold down his embarrassment. That didn't stop the smile from showing on his face. "So how are we going to get there anyway?"

"Well I was planning on just overshadowing you and-"

"No!" shouted Tucker before taking a few steps back and wrapping his arms around himself in a show of theatrics. "I don't want you inside my body! There are some places that you should consider private! Besides, you may need me and my PDA if Desiree leaves the city before we get there."

Danny took a step forward with a mischievous glint in his now glowing green eyes. "Are you sure, Tuck? It would be real easy."

"Get away from me!"

Another step forward. "Why, Tuck? It will be really quick and painless. You won't even know what I'm doing until I'm already done," He said, his smile growing creepier.

"Don't you think your joke's going a little far, dude?" Tucker said, making sure to keep his distance from is friend.

The two rings formed around Danny's waist and Tucker knew all hope was lost.

"A can't believe you would trick me like that!" Tucker shouted as Danny carried him across the sky in his ghost form. "It really wasn't cool dude!"

Danny rolled his eyes for what must've been the umpteenth time. "I already said I was sorry, Tuck. Besides, it's not like I actually overshadowed you or anything."

"Maybe I should keep a Fenton thermos in my room," Tucker muttered, "You would then get to see how the other side lives."

"Ghost's don't live," Danny shot back. "Also, I've already been trapped inside that thing. You don't seem to remember your first time using the thermos."

Tuck felt the heat rushing to his head as he thought about the memory.

"Do you want me to give you a hint?"

"No, no, you don't have to!" The technogeek shouted as he tried to close Danny's mouth.

A smirk reached the halfa's face as he stretched out his hands so Tucker couldn't reach him. "I seem to remember the first time you uncapped the thermos the energy that escaped forced you to fall on your butt and the beam that shot out ended up catching me in it. Took you two hours to get me out."

Averting his gaze, Tucker responded, "Actually it was four."

Danny blinked for a couple of seconds. "Oh, without Sam it must've taken you longer."

"Desiree seems to be on the outskirts of New York City. I think she's about to leave to go somewhere else." Tucker replied, changing the topic.

"New York has a big enough population to keep Desiree content with her wish granting, doesn't it? Why would she need to leave...unless..." Danny paused in mid air, ignoring Tucker's protests. "Tuck, what is Desiree's obsession?"

"It's granting wishes, duh," he quickly answered in a matter of fact tone.

"That would make sense at a glance, but she didn't seem to want to grant all those wishes at Paulina's party because of an obsession of hers. No, she wanted to do it for the power. She did keep talking about the power she would gain from all the wish granting."

Tucker thought about it for a second. "You think her obsession might be power and not wish granting? That would be a basic obsession most ghosts seem to possess in some form."

"I-I really don't know. Wouldn't there be more efficient ways to gain power than granting other people's wishes? I mean, as soon as she is defeated her wishes go away and her power drops."

"Well, while not the quickest way, it might be the safest. She looks like a genie so people expect her to grant wishes. When she does she would immediately gain power from that wish and disappear before the person who wanted the wish watches it go wrong." Tucker answered, a little distracted with something nagging him at the back of his mind. He just couldn't put his finger on it. Did he forget something at his house? No. Was it something Desiree told him before? Probably not. Maybe it was just Danny? Why did his mind feel like it had to do with Desiree then?

Tucker grew more and more nervous with each passing thought. "Do you think you can pick up the pace a little? We have no time to lose! He frantically said, all the while staring at the blinking red dot on his PDA.

Danny shot towards New York once again, this time going as fast as he could at the expense of his energy reserves. "Hey, Tuck, you made sure to bring a thermos, right?"

Tucker felt the condensed metal contraption in his pocket and nodded. "Yeah, why?"

Danny's eyes were hardened with determination. "When you made the wish to Desiree, did you ever specify what qualified as good or bad? If her moral compass was skewed, could she perceive something that a normal person would consider bad to be good; like reanimation of the dead for instance? It's technically considered to be a taboo, but to her..." The halfa wasted no time with a response, instead choosing to quicken his flight even further until they reached the wishing ghost.

A couple hours later the boys finally reached their destination inside the big apple and continued to follow the coordinates on Tucker's PDA until they arrived at a small park near the edge of the city. "If we continue down this path we should run into the fountain that's at the center of this park. That's probably where Desiree is as most people like to toss a coin in the fountain to make a wish. You know, this park kind of reminds me of the one back at Amity." Tucker said as he looked at the browning trees that littered it. "I mean, the sky isn't as clear as the one back home and you can still see some of the taller buildings of New York, but it's still nice."

"I'm more worried about Desiree at the moment," the halfa responded.

Tucker reached for the back of his neck once more and began rubbing it, a nervous tick that Danny recognized himself doing fairly frequently. "No matter what Desiree did, it's not your fault. If anything went wrong, it's because of her."

"The wish I made was mine alone. I tried to make it foolproof but left a gaping hole in there for Desiree to exploit if she finds out. Of course it's my fault."

"Tuck," the halfa began with a sigh, "You can either continue to blame yourself, or actually fix the problem at hand. What shall it be? If you want I can just do this by myself and you can wait here."

Tucker glanced up at Danny before his eyes hardened with a determination that would've made even Danny's ghost self proud. "No, I told you I would handle her by myself. Can't have you accidentally killing her, can we?"

"Oh, you remember that," the halfa sheepishly responded. "Well I was angry when I said that."

"Right, just let me do the talking." Tucker was about to walk away when Danny grabbed his hand.

"I'll only let you do this is if you give me the thermos."

The question was already forming in Tucker's mind before Danny's firm grip and serious gaze forced him to shut up and hand over the thermos.

The halfa grabbed it and quickly stashed it in his pocket, all the while saying, "Sorry, Tuck, but this is better with me if things get serious. Now, since you're doing the talking, what's the plan?"

Tucker raised an eyebrow. "There's supposed to be a plan? I was just going to ask her for the info."

"Great," Danny groaned, visibly face palming. "Just a little note. Always have a plan before you do something."

"Like you do during one of your ghost fights?" Tucker retorted.

A half glare was sent his was from Danny. "I'll just remain invisible and ready to act."

With their plan formed, Danny turned invisible and silently followed Tucker until they neared the fountain. They were both immediately put on alert when they felt the supernatural chill that only a ghost could give.

"So you have wished it, so it shall be!" Declared the young genie ghost as she floated over a quivering businessman next to the fountain.

"There she is," muttered under his breath before walking over to just behind Desiree. She still hadn't seemed to notice him as she was too preoccupied with her wish. That was a good thing too as her wasn't expecting her to be this...enormous. She was definitely at least twice the size of her normal form and grew even larger with her new wish. Tucker did little to hide the suprise and even slight fear on his face.

After taking a small gulp and calming his nerves. Tucker stood firm and shouted, "Desiree, I need to ask you something!"

This seemed to catch her attention as she turned away from the man and faced Tucker with a bored expression. "Oh, it's just you," she said, "for a second I was actually worried."

Slightly taken aback by the genie's boldness, Tucker began to lose some of his previously gained resolve. "I-I need to ask you about Clockwork. Where is he?"

"So that's why you're here." Desiree glanced towards the empty space of her side without saying anything.

Normally Tucker wouldn't have cared at such a motion, but he had a feeling that she just glanced at Danny and knew he was there with them.

"It makes sense that your little friend would want to return to his timeline, dimension, whatever, like I even care. I'm more curious as to why you're helping him. You know what the end result will be. You're only working towards the eventual separation of both of you. Sometimes I just don't understand humans.

"We're friends!" Tucker answered. "We help each other. It doesn't matter what the outcome will be."

If it was possible, Tucker would've thought that Desiree looked even more bored with his answer.

"Right," she replied, beginning to stare at her own hand as she flicked her index finger for amusement. "I won't bring up the if your friends jump off the bridge situation at the risk of sounding too cliché. Wait, I just did. If the outcome brings loneliness or suffering, then it is not a favorable outcome for you."

"I didn't come to talk about this!" Tucker said with a scowl on his face. "Just tell me what you know and I'll be off."

Desiree answered in a huff, "Clockwork's supposed to be in some big clock tower just off of the Far Frozen, past Waller's prison." Noticing the technogeek's blank expression, she sighed. "I'm not drawing you a map, kid. The clock tower's supposed to be easy to find if you look in the right area. Of course that's because it's guarded by one of the most powerful ghost's in the zone. For most, the place's a death wish."

Tucker gave a small nod amd began to walk away. "Thanks for the information."

"Hold on." Desiree interrupted, looking back at the blank spot on the air. "I still want to talk to you, ghost boy. "

"Desiree." Danny greeted, never letting up the ectoball in his hands.

If it was meant to scare her, it didn't worm. She continued to look at the boy with the same lack of interest that she showed throughout her talk with Tucker. "I see you still want to go back. Why is that?" For once Desiree let some interest actually show on her face.

"Why else? It's where I belong."

"Even though your life is better here?" She asked. "Let's face it, the impact that your wish has caused will always exist. It's already warped some of your beliefs, your attitudes, even the basic fundamentals of who you are. If you return, you'll return changed."

"My friends and family would still accept me, just like they have here."

Desiree nodded. "True, but of course this time was different. I heard that Spectra has vanished from the Ghost Zone. Her little sidekick, what was his name, Bertrand, was even running around exclaiming that you did it. Funny how rumors spread.

The aura around Danny grew dark and dense, almost evil if Desiree thought about it. "What's your point?" He spat out. "If I go back, Spectra will still be alive."

"Not the one here," she responded. "You'll still be a murderer no matter what you do. That is, if you consider killing a ghost even murder."

"Stop it!" Danny grounded out, firing the ecto ball into the fountain and blowing it up into hundreds of shards. "Stop trying to get into my head!"

Desiree just shook her head. "Right now your life is just about perfect, isn't it? Well, perfect for you. It can never really get any better. You have your dream girl, everyone accepts you, and ghost attacks are far less frequent. Admit it or not, but because you killed Spectra, most ghosts are far less willing to enter the portal now. Luckily, because she wasn't much of a fighter, this hasn't attracted the attention of the more powerful ghosts either. This is a golden time for you. So why go back?"

Danny started violently shaking, grabbing his head as if it were in pain. It almost looked like he was having a mental breakdown. "I-It's my home! I have to go back! This isn't where I belong!"

A smirk formed on Desiree's face, though she did the best to hide it. "Well then, ghost child, I leave you to your thoughts."

"Wait!" Danny calmed down slightly and looked up at Desiree, still shaking. "Why do you want me to stay here so badly?"

"I don't," she answered, letting her smirk show. "I just love watching you squirm. It give me...entertainment."

With thatishe disappeared and left the shaking boy to his own devices.

Reviews:

Blueriderguest: Thanks for the support once again. Desiree's never been that great if a villain to me (Though I've used her in two of my stories so there must be something there). I should actually consider using the Guys in White in one of my stories because they have always interested me.