Author's Note: Thank you for your continued support. This chapter and the last are for you.
Chapter Thirty-Five
The End
Horrified screams pierced the hazy blackness. Tucker jolted to awareness, arms reaching out, thinking of Sam—keep Sam safe. But it wasn't an icy storm he faced. He scrambled back from the torrent of flames. Through the fire, Tucker saw him—Plasmius—and the maniacal, twisted grin he wore as he blasted the coffin again, and again, and again.
The screams returned. Jazz, with her arm in a makeshift sling, struggling to catch ghosts in the Fenton Thermos. Maddie, blasting all the ghosts coming near her daughter. And Jack, sprinting forward, only to be shoved back by a barricade of enemies. They were surrounded. All fighting. All desperately screaming Vlad's name.
Tucker searched his pockets, the strap across his back, but his weapons were gone, lost in the storm. There was nothing around him but debris—fallen chunks of wall, boards that were once stairs, and broken railing. They would have to do.
He moved, hiding behind the flames, and let out a shrill whistle.
Plasmius lifted his gaze, peering through the fire.
Tucker hurtled a block straight at his nose. He made a dash for the wreckage—taking advantage of the precious seconds Plasmius was stunned from the impact. Searching through the rubble, he found a long, splintered rail and brandished it like a sword.
"Come at me, punk!" he shouted.
Plasmius snarled.
He charged forward. Tucker stared him down, shoulders heaving, waiting, waiting. Last second, he side-stepped, swung hard, and cracked the rail on the back of the ghost's head.
Plasmius grunted, hands pressed against his aching skull. Tucker leapt, rail poised, and thrust the splintered edge at the gaping wound by his shoulder. Plasmius shrieked, splaying his arm, knocking the rail from Tucker's hands and throwing him off his feet.
Wide-eyed, something unnamed bubbling in his gut, Plasmius watched as the boy slowly brought himself to his feet.
"Not so tough—without that crown, huh?" Tucker rasped, a mocking smile on his face as he wiped a line of blood from his chin.
The fire died off without Plasmius to keep it alight. His jaw clenched, seeing the coffin intact, with hardly a mark to show for his effort. And now the boy stood in his path. Without a weapon, but glaring like he had an arsenal.
He was tired of this farce. It was time to put this to an end.
He charged again. Tucker readied himself to dodge, but Plasmius fazed straight through his body, grabbed a latch on the bottom of the coffin, and dragged it out of the building.
Dan cackled with glee seeing Frostbite laid so low—fur shredded, smoking, and looking as haggard as Pariah Dark in his silly little wheelchair. Still, the Far Frozen ruler charged, and still Dan swerved and deflected and caught him behind the back with whipping stings and blows. Yet as fun as it was to watch a once proud ghost topple, he was steadily growing bored.
Across the city, his remaining clone was in the throes of battle with one of Vlad's pet projects. The idiot numbered Ten was faring far worse than Frostbite. Didn't do much to alleviate his growing boredom.
He wanted out. He had better things to do.
So when he saw Plasmius rocketing high into the air with a coffin in tow, he let out a sigh of relief and turned to Frostbite with a smile.
"Game over, friend." Green flame erupted from his fingertips.
Frostbite winced, squared his jaw, and hurled his body forward, a guttural scream in his throat.
Dan dodged the incoming fist, ducked beneath an icy stream, surged up with victory in his eyes, and grabbed Frostbite's neck, squeezing hard. "Goodbye," he hissed, raising an icy palm to the beast's chest.
Frostbite smirked.
Dan frowned.
Glanced down.
Gasped.
Frostbite, with a touch of a finger, had turned the fist on his neck—the one on which the Ring of Rage gleamed—to ice. The sound of his sharp inhale filled the static air around them. Frostbite reared, jaw open wide, Dan's frozen fingers snapping, and dug his teeth into the hand.
It tore with a gruesome shatter.
Frostbite swallowed it whole.
Dan's face twisted. His eyes bulged. He tackled Frostbite, smashed him on the ground, manic with rage, slammed his fist—hit, after hit, after hit, after hit—laden with fire then ice, fire then ice. Frostbite's fur burned, skin mottled. He kept pounding—again, again, again—screaming in unbridled fury, wailing in the face of his un-doer—
Frostbite exhaled. Numb. And welcomed the dark.
Ten blinked.
He rubbed his eyes once. Twice.
Blinked again.
Then surveyed the battered room.
Dan had been right there. About to finish him off. The psycho had trapped him in coils of ecto-energy, torturing him in some sick glee. He'd been screaming his nonexistent lungs out for the longest time. And then poof. Nothing. He'd collapsed, opened bleary eyes, and waited for strikes that didn't come.
Was he being fooled?
Highly unlikely considering his adversary. But he couldn't quite move his legs, so it wasn't like he could defend himself.
He let out a sigh that turned into a groan and closed his eyes again.
Hopefully when he woke, all of this would be long gone and that idiot tazer kid would be shaking him to consciousness with some story of how Danny saved the day.
Ten chuckled.
He could live with that.
Danny approached Fenton Works just as Tucker was bolting out the door to follow Plasmius. He skidded to a stop, mind racing with all the things he wanted to say. Instead, he pointed at the coffin in the air. "Save Vlad!" he shouted, then he opened his arms to catch Sam as Danny darted away, ever the hero.
Wasting no time, Tucker shoved a thermos in Sam's hands and dragged her back into the building. "The Fentons are being attacked. I'll cover you."
"Got it."
"Danny's good? he asked, tugging her across the living room floor.
She blasted a stray ghost, trapping him in the thermos and nodded. "Yeah. He's—good," she stammered, trying and failing to ignore the brief flutter in her chest as she remembered what transpired between them.
Oblivious, Tucker grinned. He knew all he needed to. "Good. Then let's finish this."
She returned the grin and readied the thermos for battle. "No problem."
When Plasmius saw Danny, he smiled.
"How nice of you to show up. You're just in time for the final act." He let the coffin drop, reveling in its rapid descent, giddy with the thought of what it meant for them. The mastermind dead. The accomplices soon to follow. And then he would have his place at Dan's side, ruling the world as he pleased.
When Danny chased after the coffin, Plasmius frowned.
What was the boy doing? He'd agreed with them. He wanted the world to burn. He wanted these people gone.
When Danny caught it, Plasmius snarled.
He knew it. The boy was too soft. The boy was too human.
"You ignorant fool," he hissed. "I'd hoped I was wrong about you."
Danny lifted his head at the words, green eyes flashing ominously, a sneer marring the impassive expression he'd worn since joining them. "Your show's over, Plasmius."
Before he could respond, Danny lifted his hand and struck the ghost out of the sky like he wasn't even worth his time.
Vlad knew the moment he'd ended up in the wrong hands. As if the screams from before weren't enough of a tell. He tried to ignore the bubbling terror in his chest and the way his heart thundered in the small space, but it was nigh impossible considering there was nothing else to distract him from his thoughts.
I'm going to die here, he thought.
In a coffin.
Dead.
How ironic.
How stupid.
Perhaps it hadn't been his brightest idea. But there was little else he could do. If he hadn't been inaccessible, he'd be dead. Hell, he might even be the only person alive right now.
But not for long. He could recognize his own voice. His own movements. The parts of himself that he'd used to revere, that he'd used to think made him better than all others.
It shamed him to know how foolish his ghost self was. How utterly self-absorbed.
But then, that was his personality, just magnified to an obsessive degree.
No wonder Danny Fenton had issues.
Maybe it is better to be one or the other. Maybe a balance of both is simply impossible. But if that were the case, Clockwork wouldn't have bothered meddling.
No. Maybe it was just impossible for him to be both. But Danny, like always, was the exception. Was special.
Well.
Maybe he could live with that.
If he got out of this alive, then yes—a thousand times, yes—he could definitely live with that.
He was beginning to feel light-headed. He thought he heard a voice, but he couldn't be sure. Was he dead already?
Five dots of light appeared before him. Yes, he thought, I'm most certainly dead. The dots grew and lengthened. Soon they looked like fingers. So he latched onto them, thinking, this is it, the way to the afterlife, I won't let this pass me by.
And then he was lifted. He felt a chill blanket his form, then warmth, and then he was gasping in fresh air and staring at the green eyed, white-haired boy he thought he'd never see again.
Danny didn't say anything, just helped steady him and watched him closely with undue concern.
Vlad knew, from the sounds in the air, that things were far from over. And he knew, as soon as he saw his likeness closing in from a distance, what needed to be done to finish this. As he rasped the command in Danny's ear, he saw the boy shiver, fingers twitching. He saw the boy imagining for a moment what would happen if he disobeyed.
But his choice was made in the next second.
Danny nodded. Resolute. Unfeeling. A man.
Vlad watched him go with an ache in his chest, wondering if those boyish eyes would ever return and what he could possibly do to atone for his sins.
Live, he thought. Live to spite me, Danny.
Plasmius heard the wail. Saw the earth trembling from its force. And knew all had not gone as Dan expected. He'd sent clone after clone after clone with Walker's hoard of ghosts, guiding small groups of them to all the facilities building ghost weaponry, destroying them one by one before leading the hoard here. He'd been confidant his strength would hold. What's twenty-plus clones to rings and crowns after all? He'd underestimated the strength human emotion offers, having been apart from it for far too long.
Plasmius wouldn't make that mistake.
He would make the boy despair.
So he charged. Not for Danny, who rose to meet him. But for Fenton Works. For the family battling inside. For the girl holding the boy's heart.
And he razed that building to the ground.
Danny screamed.
The sound of it droned out Dan's wail.
Danny screamed.
The sound of it brought silence.
Plasmius felt a shiver run down his back.
Danny flew into his periphery. The boy's hand darted, crushed his arm and wrenched it sideways to plow his other hand through Plasmius's gut. Slowly, agonizingly, he felt his essence turned to ice. A slow crawl of numbness. A spot of black in his vision. But Plasmius saw the streaks of tears, the shaking snarl, the despair, and still managed to grin.
"Do it!" Vlad bellowed, watching fearfully at the form rising in the air. Dan. Watching. Realization then anger dawning on his face. Vlad saw him readying a powerful blast of energy, aimed right for Danny's head. He couldn't let that happen. This needed to end.
He whistled for Wulf, sent him soaring in Dan's direction. Wulf tackled Dan into a portal, shouted for Dora, who lashed her tail as soon as Dan reappeared.
All the while, Plasmius slowly froze. A strangled laugh on his lips. A look of terrifying exhilaration, and exhilarated terror in his flickering eyes.
Vlad scrambled for a gun. He picked stray ghosts out of the air, protecting Danny as best he could. It would end. It would—
Dan appeared above Danny.
The world stood still.
Danny blinked. Wispy flame licked the air above him. An upward glance showed Dan's mottled, rage-twisted face. Before him, Plasmius choked on ice, his eyes wide and bulging—the last part of him to freeze.
"Why?" he asked the air.
For a moment, there was nothing to answer him. For a moment, he thought he'd died. Then he turned and the Master of Time was there—leaning casually against his staff, smiling benignly as if the world around them wasn't in the throes of anarchy, as if he'd been there all along and found no fault with any of it.
"I like to meddle," he answered and tapped a familiar melody, a far-off memory of warmth, a movie, a cabin, and Sam.
Danny gritted his teeth, shutting his eyes against the torment.
"I thought you could use some help," Clockwork added.
Danny exhaled a slow, shuddering breath, wracked with shivers. "Why now?" he hissed, half a moan. "Why now!" he shouted. "Why not then! Why not—"
Clockwork extended his arm. Danny followed the length of it, its direction, and saw it, saw them—encased in a field of energy, his family, Sam, Tucker, battled, bloody, alive.
He inhaled a slow, shuddering breath and swallowed back as many tears as he possibly could. Still, they slipped past his defenses. Still, he felt more building. He wanted to say thank you. He wanted Clockwork to know he understood. But words eluded him then. Only sobs made themselves known.
Clockwork grinned. "Don't make me do it again," he said, his tone gentler and kind. Knowing it would greatly improve their relationship in the future, he placed a hand on Danny's shoulder. He squeezed reassuringly, then let him go. His eyes narrowed, expression hardening. "Now end this."
He didn't understand.
This wasn't right.
The boy had been there.
Right there.
In front of him. In the reach of his arm. In the way of his blast. In the path of death.
But now he was staring into his own eyes. A long-lost gaze of blazing emerald. Then it was gone. Rocketing downward with a icy Plasmius in tow. Energy built around them, pulsing outward from the boy's form—ethereal, solid, burning cold. Dan pushed against it. Trudged through the growing power. He screamed his frustration, but the sound was swallowed.
Danny roared.
The air shook.
Plasmius shattered.
Dan ceased to be.
...
...
...
The air cleared.
The world was white.
Scattered and strewn across a layer of snow lay the remnants of Walker's army of prisoners. Vlad looked about him in wonder. Snow and ice clung to his limbs, but he felt no chill. One shake of his shoulders and he was free. Yet just to his left, a ghost was frozen solid. And ten feet in front of him. And…everywhere.
Something rustled behind him. He whirled and caught the faintest glimpse of Clockwork's smile before the enigmatic master vanished from sight. In his place rested Dora in human form, Frostbite, Wulf, the Fentons, Sam, Tucker, and—
"Ten," he breathed. He put a hand over his mouth, stifling the laugh that bubbled up in his throat. He'd heard Ten's voice in the coffin, but he hadn't seen him since trying to safely thaw him out. It worked. Everything he planned. It worked.
He spun around, squinting into the white blindness. But Danny didn't appear.
His euphoria rapidly died. He hurried to Sam's side and shook her awake. Blearily, she looked up at him, then gasped at the world she found herself in. "Find him," he ordered, helping her stand. "Danny's out there somewhere."
She hesitated for the briefest moment, eyes flicking to Maddie, to Jack, to Jazz.
Vlad shook his head. "Go now. I'll wake the others," he lied.
So she left.
And he waited for her.
"Danny!" she called, hands around her mouth. "Danny, where are you?" She stumbled over a frozen arm and fell to her hands in the snow. "Danny… Please," she whimpered. "You told me to wait for you. I can't wait forever, you know. I'm not a ghost." Her forced laugh came out as a strangled cry. She fisted her hands—angry with herself, with him—and pushed onward through the white expanse, shouting his name, searching the bodies.
"Danny—!"
Her foot slipped. She tumbled down into a crevice hidden by the snow, scraped her elbow on cracked asphalt, and collided with a body at the bottom. Terrified she'd stumbled upon another ghost with no weapon to her name, she scrambled backward with a scream on her tongue.
Blue eyes blinked up at her.
"Sam—" He opened his arms.
She flew into them and held his trembling form tight. "It's okay," she whispered. "I'm here. I'm here."
Danny lowered his head to her shoulder, clutching her until the shivers ceased, until he was steady, until he was balanced.
Then she hefted him up with one arm round his waist and slowly trekked up out the wreckage of a street he no longer remembered, and away from the crystalline fragments of what used to be a ghost.
They were awake when he arrived, draped across Sam's shoulder, powerless to stand on his own. He collapsed to his knees, even with her steadying arm, and stared listlessly at his tattered hands. Sam settled behind him, a pillar, a warmth. He leaned against her, swallowing hard, waiting for the gasps to turn to shouts.
"Danny…"
He winced, not as ready as he'd thought.
His mother choked on a sob.
"Danny," she said again.
She fell before him, clasped his hands in hers. Tears splashed onto his skin. Wide-eyed, he stared up at her. Sam squeezed his shoulder from behind, a reassuring touch. He choked. Lowered his forehead to their clasped hands.
"Mom…" he forced out. "Mom… I love you."
Maddie burst into tears.
Behind her, Jack scooted forward on his knees. He wrapped his arm around Danny's shoulders, meeting those eyes—the blue, blue eyes of his son. Biting his tongue against the tears, Jack held Danny's head between both of his hands. For a moment, he could only breathe. Seeing only the boy staring back at him. Broken. In pain. "I love you, son," he rasped.
And Danny shattered. He barreled into Jack's chest, hugging him tightly. "I love you. I love you. I'm so sorry—"
Maddie pressed her head against her son's hair.
Jazz rested a hand on his back.
And there they stayed.
...
As the air finally began to cool. As the frozen ghosts around them began disappearing without their notice, though Vlad knew it was Clockwork's doing regardless, there they stayed.
They stayed there until Tucker could bear it no longer. He approached the healing family, met Danny's gaze, collapsed with the rest of them, and joined the hug.
"Don't you dare tell me you love me," he grumbled.
Danny laughed.
Sam rolled her eyes.
Wulf grinned. "Friend!" and caught everyone in one giant hug with Danny at the center.
Dora remained with Frostbite, holding him up so he could see, smiling at the sight unfolding before them. As they dispersed from their hug, Danny saw him lying there and his mild expression fell. The brokenness returned, and with it, a sad acceptance.
Everyone turned to face him, seeing the change when their eyes met. Ruler though he was, heartless he was not. For the briefest of moments, Frostbite reconsidered. Yes, there were things he was required to do. But there were also thing he wanted to do.
As though sensing his thoughts, Danny narrowed his eyes and gave one finite shake of his head.
Frostbite sighed. He would have chosen it regardless. But, knowing the recipient of his choice was willing, made it an easier task to complete.
"You have to come with me," he announced, for the benefit of the others who were unknown to Ghost and Far Frozen law.
Danny clenched and unclenched his fingers. His gaze flickered to his family. To Tucker. Lastly, to Sam, where it remained. He sucked in a breath, parted his lips to speak—
She cut him off by grabbing his hand. "I'll wait for you. I promise."
Danny's answering smile quivered. He lifted his hands to caress the sides of her face. Softly, slowly, he ran his fingers through her hair, then lowered his lips to her forehead, her temple, her cheek, her mouth, where he lingered longest.
Her hand reached for him even as he pulled away.
"Wulf," he murmured, and a portal to the Ghost Zone was opened for them.
Wulf gathered Frostbite in his arms. "Goodbye, friends," he said genially and disappeared with the Far Frozen ruler in tow.
Danny paused before the portal, roved his eyes over the assemblage, burning the image in his memory. "Goodbye," he whispered. He sucked in a breath, whirled, then vanished from sight. Before he lost the will. Before he heard their cries. Before he saw their brokenness. Before his heart rent in two.
It was over.
Finally.
They could live in peace.
Without him.
It was done.