Once Jack was done with it, the shed was much less of a mess. That was one thing.
Not that it was completely organized, but he'd be digging through it again next week anyway for their road trip, so in a way, it made sense to do the real clean up when they got back. That was the only reason he hadn't done it already.
Or gotten Danny to do it.
But it was noticeably better, and it was important to count the small victories. Especially when the situation inside the house was... Well.
No sooner had he came in the back door than Jazz had come sprinting out of the basement, slamming the door open so hard it bounced shut behind her, and completely ignoring his attempt at a greeting. He could shrug that off though, both his kids did tend to spend a lot of time sprinting around the house. He was proud that they took the initiative to get where they were going, that was important in life. When he was their age, he'd been a very effective walker. When Jack Fenton started walking to class, Jack Fenton walked to class.
It was how he'd known Maddie was the one for him. During their undergrad, she had the most beautiful, efficient walk he'd ever seen in a woman. As soon as he caught up, he asked her out, and she'd said no. When he clarified that he meant on a date, she said yes, and they'd been inseparable ever since.
Jazz and Danny would be alright, in other words. They'd go far in life. Literally!
...What was he doing?
Right, lunch.
He'd gotten halfway through making a reuben when the door to the lab crashed open again and Maddie came charging out, less efficiently than usual; she was lugging around their reel to reel tape recorder, and for a "portable" machine that thing had to weigh 30 pounds. But she looked more upset than carting around aging consumer electronics would normally make her.
Jack set the spoon back in the sauerkraut jar. "Everything ok down there, Mads?"
"No!" She set down the tape machine with a dull thud and made a furious strangling motion with her hands before regaining control of herself. "Phantom," and she was back to saying the ghost kid's name like he'd broken her favorite microscope, or forced her to pay for parking. "Will not stop looking at me!"
"Looking at you? Looking at you how?"
"Looking at me like he's terrified of me!" To illustrate what she meant, she made a very violent ripping motion with one hand, before putting her hands on her hips and stalking across the kitchen. "I can't concentrate on transcribing this tape when he's looking up at me like he's expecting me to shoot him any second!"
He couldn't help but chuckle a bit. She glowered at him as he went back to reuben assembly. "You're a force of nature, baby. Can't blame him for noticing."
"I've been bending over backward to be kind to that monstrosity! I even offered to let it continue associating with humans! What on earth do I have to do to put it at ease so we can just..."
The sentence fizzles out as he dropped a final slice of marbled rye on the pile and transferred it to a waiting pan. He glanced back at her when it started to sizzle. "You're not talking again. Just what?"
She threw up her hands and sank into a chair at the table. "Just finish this charade, where we pretend that 'good ghosts' exist and placate our children until it becomes obvious to them that we were right all along."
"Is that so?"
"There's only one way this ends."
"With us running Phantom out of town?"
"He's the one threatening us, Jack, it's hardly 'running out of town'."
He took a chair opposite her at the table. Her gaze had drifted back toward the lab door, but she looked his way as he sat down. Her expression dropped further when she saw how he was looking back at her.
"You can't be serious."
"I'm real serious, Mads. We said we were going to go at this thing and shake it down no matter what came out of it. I'm still shaking."
She stood up fast enough to send the chair skidding backward a few inches. "This isn't theoretical, Jack. We are not in a research ethics seminar. We are adults, and there is a ghost in our basement threatening our home and our family. When you're ready to rejoin me in our life's work, I will be upstairs transcribing this audio. And your sandwich is burning."
He spun around in his seat to see wisps of smoke coming out of the pan. With a curse, he got up and attempted to flip the reuben, but it was beyond salvaging.
Maddie had left the room and taken the tape recorder with her. He flipped the burner off and scraped the mess into the garbage, leaving the pan in the sink.
Well, that made two members of his family that were avoiding him, and Jazz hadn't been in any hurry to stop and chat either.
But he was down, not out. You can lose a battle and still win the war. And he knew just where to start the advance.
Jack opened the door to the lab and descended the stairs. He still had no idea what the ghost kid's boundaries were, but maybe if he could extend an olive branch, that would be enough to get back on speaking terms. And the truth was, despite his being a ghost and all, Jack was honestly a little worried to hear he was looking terrified down there.
He'd meant what he said. Maddie could be a formidable woman. But if Phantom was just floating there doing nothing to deserve it, he didn't want the ghost to feel afraid for his afterlife. Not when it wasn't necessary, anyway. And besides...
Well, besides that, there was something about how Phantom talked to him that made him want to trust the ghost. He'd done it once before, when they were pinned down by the Wisconsin Ghost, and that call had saved the day.
And now, Phantom had shown both him and Mads a lot of vulnerability where they'd expected hostility, and it didn't seem like he thought they'd use any of it against him. That was the most confusing part, it was like he already trusted them more than he had a reason to. You don't show your belly when you expect a bayonet.
And so when he stopped on the landing and saw Phantom sitting curled up in a corner of his containment unit, Jack wanted to make it right. No bayonets.
"Phantom?"
The ghost looked over at him, pivoting his head from its resting position on his knees, but didn't get up either. There was no way he hadn't heard Jack coming down the stairs, not with that supernatural hearing; was he waiting to see how Jack wanted to play this?
"You doing ok down here?"
"Peachy, thanks for asking."
He should have expected sarcasm by now. Still sounded weird coming from a ghost.
"Any chance you want to help me with something?"
Phantom's head shot up, eyes wide. "You don't mean...?" Those glowing green eyes darted to the dissection table and back to him.
Probably shoulda been more specific. "No, nothing like that! We're just talking, remember?" That didn't seem to relax the ghost too much, so Jack took the almost unprecedented step of unclipping his utility belt. The weapons and equipment hanging off it jangled as he descended the last few steps. They made a heavy clunk when he set it down on a far-away counter.
It was the most disarmed he'd felt in months. Literally, he wore that belt into the shower.
The ghost kid took notice, too. He finally loosened up a little bit while Jack made his way over to the lab bench where he and Mads usually did their interviewing.
"You... Aren't you going to want to have a gun handy?"
"Nope. Like I said, just talking."
His eyes flicked to the empty spot on the lab bench. "You don't have the tape recorder," he noted.
"We don't need to record everything, do we? Besides, I don't really have any questions for you."
Well, the ghost kid sure wasn't worried anymore. He mostly just looked confused. "Then why do you want to talk?"
"I dunno. It's been interesting talking to you, I think anyway. What about you?"
"Definitely interesting. I, um... Jack, about last time, I didn't mean—"
Jack waved it off. "Water over the bridge. It was early to be pouncing on you with big questions. My wife and son are the same way, not morning people by a long shot. Guess you probably know that about Danny."
Phantom clammed right up. Should he have let him finish the apology? Was that a ghost thing? There was a bit of an awkward silence where they just looked at each other before it became real clear Jack was gonna have to be the first one to talk.
"So what do you think?"
"...sorry, about what?"
"About you helping me out."
"Um... With what?"
"With this." Jack pulled open one of the drawers on the lab bench. Phantom winced until he saw the black and white checkered board.
"Oh, chess? I don't really think I'm qualified. If there's one thing I've learned, it's that I'm no Gary Kasparov."
"You and me both. Do you know checkers?"
"Sure, it's just easier chess, right?"
Typical reaction for the uninitiated, but Jack could work with that. "It's not easier, it's a whole different game. If you can't do chess, maybe this'll click better for you. That's how it was with me."
"I guess. So um... Am I playing from in here?"
Jack looked at the containment unit. Solid glass with a phase-proof field around it. That'd make things pretty difficult, actually. That was easily fixed though; he hopped off the stool and made his way to the door on the side. Phantom clambered to his feet, looking confused.
"Can I trust you not to fly away?"
Phantom nodded.
"Ok then." He opened the door.
"...just like that?" Phantom asked.
"Just like that," he replied, grinning.
He stepped aside, letting Phantom walk out into the lab. He stood just outside the door, eyes darting around at the racks full of ghost hunting equipment, probably feeling a little overwhelmed.
Jack made his way back to the bench, pulling up a stool for Phantom and patting it. The ghost finally made his way over and took a seat. Jack sat opposite and started setting up the red pieces. When Phantom made no motion to do so, he set up the black pieces too.
"Black starts."
Phantom tentatively reached out a gloved hand and moved a piece. "So uh... How's this helping?"
Jack countered his opening move with his own. "There's a tournament coming up in Toledo." Phantom captured his piece. Jack captured his right back. "Gotta get some practice in if I'm gonna go toe to toe with the pros."
They traded back and forth for a while. Phantom played an aggressive game, greedily taking pieces, leaving himself exposed in the process. He left a flank open and Jack captured 3 of his pieces in one move, prompting a frown. "Dang. Didn't see that."
"Don't worry about it, you're doing good for a rookie. I've probably got a decade of practice on you. Wanna try again?"
Phantom looked up at him over the board. Jack could just about see the wheels turning behind his eyes, and the ghost kid nodded. "Sure. I think I know what to do now."
He didn't. Phantom lost the next game spectacularly.
"Don't worry about the sides too much ghost kid, you want to control the center of the board if you can."
"That's what I was... Ok."
Phantom started the next round with a center piece. "They call that move 'Old Faithful'." Jack moved a piece in from the side, leaving the center a little more open than he normally would. "So you've played chess before, have you?"
"Yeah, badly." Phantom forced out a chuckle while he moved a piece up behind his opener. "One of the ghosts I fight, he thinks everything is a chess game."
"Sounds like an old buddy of mine. Always trying to think five moves ahead, right?"
Phantom looked at him kind of funny, just for a second, then stared hard at the board. "Yeah, something like that. In my defense, he hasn't really won yet, but it feels like he's always got the upper hand."
"Want some advice?"
"'Control the center'?"
"Don't play his game. That buddy of mine, he could whip me at any normal game of chess we played, but when it came to speed chess it was easy to throw him off balance. When you're up against a planner, just try and hit 'em before they can think things through. That's their Achilles' tendon."
Jack thought he caught a hint of a smile on Phantom's face. ...although it might've been because he captured a few of Jack's pieces, right down the center. "Thanks for the advice, I might try that. Oh, uh, king me."
"Sure." Jack placed a captured piece on Phantom's newly minted king, then made a devastating move of his own. "King me."
Phantom did so.
The board was a scattered mess, but most of the pieces were out of the way now. It could go just about anywhere from here. Jack stroked his chin, thinking. "Hmm. Not sure about this one. How about we call it a draw? I want to show you some more openings anyway."
He held a hand across the board. Phantom shook it with a smile.
Community Exposure Files
File Number: Fenton-157
Ghost reference(s): AP01, AKA "Phantom"
Human(s) affected: Jasmine Fenton
Date: 2005-08-09
Time: ~12:00 pm
Casualties: 0
Notes: Ghost AP01 "Phantom" recorded in conversation with Jasmine Fenton. Both participants were unaware of any audio recording in progress for the first 5 minutes, 3 seconds. Phantom clearly distraught upon realizing the conversation was being recorded. The complexity of the recording equipment was noted as the primary reason why the recording survived the encounter, despite both participants' desire for its erasure.
This audio recording acts as our first definitive proof of long-term contact between Phantom and Jasmine Fenton. The two appear to be very familiar with each other. From their description of their first meeting (referencing ecto-entities AP08 aka "Spectra" and AP08b aka "Bertrand"), they have likely been consistently in contact for over 9 months.
There is little sign that Jasmine withholds any information from Phantom. When prompted, she freely disclosed her insecurities regarding her academic performance and future career prospects to Phantom. Phantom seemed highly interested in hearing other weaknesses directly from Jasmine herself in the future. She believes this to be a two-way relationship, as a pair of humans might confide in each other.
It is also clear that Jasmine Fenton has been aiding Phantom in evading Fentonworks ghost tracking activity and research. This goes some way to explaining certain equipment disappearances and malfunctions. However, it is highly unlikely Jasmine is acting alone.
Recommendations: Question Jasmine Fenton about her involvement in subverting Fentonworks activities on behalf of the entity AP01. Question Daniel Fenton about his possible involvement in the same.
Maddie was seething in the emergency operations center.
The interviews she and Jack had recorded on the tape earlier that morning were much what she had expected. But particularly after how short her interview had been, she had been right to think the tape looked a little low.
She had to listen to the extra audio five times. Once in utter disbelief, a few more in anger and confusion, and finally one last time to actually take the notes.
If Jazz hadn't triggered the recording mechanism, they might have never found out the depth of their children's involvement with Phantom.
They (Maddie) had certainly expected it went deeper than they had been able to prove, but this was beyond the pale. Finding out that your child had been actively working against you, aiding a dangerous ecto-entity... That was worse than they could have ever anticipated. Some form of mind control might have been at play here. Surely that was the only explanation, wasn't it? What on earth else could have so divorced Jazz from her senses?
There was also the possible manner of Danny's involvement, but that would have to wait.
Maddie checked her watch. It was hardly 5 o'clock now. Based on what Jack had said he probably wouldn't be home until curfew at 11. Optimistically.
In the meantime, she couldn't ignore what she did know. And looking over to the equipment rack, she knew just where to start.
She held it behind her back when she knocked on her daughter's door, her expression cool and detached. No sense betraying quite how upset she was if Phantom was able to either access Jazz's memories or even see through her eyes via possession.
Jazz didn't look surprised to see her there. Mostly just worried. "Hi, mom."
"Afternoon sweetie. Can we talk?" She tried to smile, but not too much. Disappointed, but still happy to be talking, that was the balance to strike.
The expression had to be perfect, because Jazz was analyzing her. When she was invested in a conversation, her daughter's eyes rarely stopped moving. They darted back and forth over faces taking in every nuance, watching for the tiniest twitches of emotion. It was reassuring to see that now. Perhaps Jazz was fully in control of her faculties.
Eventually, she replied. "Sure thing mom." But she didn't walk back from the doorframe.
Maddie frowned before she could stop herself. This would be easier inside the room where there was more space. "I'm here about—"
"Danny Phantom, yeah. I figured."
"Jazz—"
"He isn't evil, mom."
She couldn't afford to get angry. She settled for 'exasperated'. "It's a ghost, sweetie, they have no concept of human morality. And right now, I need to know how much it's been influencing you and your brother to suit its needs."
Jazz crossed her arms across her chest. "How can we have a productive conversation when you don't trust what I say?"
"Like this." She braced her left hand on Jazz's shoulder before she could pull away, and flung the specter deflector around her waist with the other. She had the two ends clicked neatly together before Jazz had a chance to react, although she did pull back and stumble into the room.
"Mom! What is this thing supposed to do?"
Maddie followed her in. "It's the Fenton Specter Deflector. It weakens ghosts, including any influence they may have over your mind. It's the only way—"
"That you can trust your children? Well fine, allow me to reiterate. Danny Phantom isn't evil. He wants to help our town. And yes, Danny and I help him do that, and yes, sometimes that means ignoring what you and dad have to say about ghosts. But you've never given us much choice."
She looked angry, but she didn't make any motion to remove the belt. Nor did it appear that it was currently... Doing anything. Had she really been unaffected the whole time? Was that honestly what she thought?
...she must have betrayed too much in her expression because Jazz actually scoffed. "Is it so impossible to believe that there may be one thing you've been wrong about? There's a sentient being in your basement, locked up, and he's terrified. It's the kind of thing that would scar a human for life. If you care about protecting people from Phantom, I would suggest starting with how you and dad are treating him."
Jazz sat back at her desk, her back to the door. But this conversation was far from over. "Jasmine, you are grounded. We can discuss the particulars later, once it becomes clear exactly how much damage you've done." Maddie paused until her daughter at least looked at her. It came in the form of a deep exhale and a glance over the shoulder before she returned to whatever homework she was doing. "There is also the matter of your brother. You need to tell me exactly what his involvement with Phantom is, right now."
She waited expectantly. To her daughter's credit, she held out a remarkably long time before finally turned to face her again.
Jazz looked... Surprisingly somber.
"That's between you, Danny, and Phantom. He's not in danger, so it's not my story to tell."
Maddie didn't want to give her daughter the last word, but she also didn't want to create the appearance of needing the last word. She simply closed the door behind her and resolved to wait as long as it took for her son to come home. They had a lot to talk about.
But 11 o'clock came and went. Danny never came home.
Author's Note: I really enjoy Jack giving fatherly advice to Phantom without realizing it's his actual kid.
Cut from this chapter: Way too much information about Marion Tinsley.