Chapter 15: Fall Back into Place

Sam laid in bed, her eyes shut but still unable to fall asleep. The image of Danny yelling, growing angry with her as the room darkened kept playing in her mind on repeat. Over and over she saw him staring at her with that hateful look in his eyes. It was an awful feeling. She turned again, willing sleep to come. She caught another glimpse of his venomous green eyes and she gave up on sleep entirely, sitting up. She wondered if he was still in the house, or if he had done another disappearing act again. When she used to get in fights with her parents she would always storm out with no idea where she was going, just convinced that she needed to get away.

How did it all go so wrong? The day had started out pleasant enough, all things considered. As pleasant as a day could possibly go while she was trapped in this house, in this town. Her eyes drifted to the box of manga he had left in her room. She sighed and got up, shuffling over to the box and picking one at random. She flipped through it and didn't remember ever reading that series before. She tried to read the first few pages but quickly found that she wasn't processing any of the words or images. She threw it back into the box with disgust.

Sam hadn't felt this awful in a long time. Even encountering those hostile ghosts at the mall and later the school didn't hurt or scare her as much as this. She knew that whatever hold the town had on Danny was out of her control, but she was beginning to worry that it eclipsed his humanity. 'No, no.' She thought. 'That wasn't fair. He saved me. He's been protecting me'. She had to remain hopeful that there was a way out of all this. She couldn't believe that he would still be alive after all this time for no reason. She refused to believe that her coming here and finding him meant nothing.

The best thing to do was let him cool down, come to his senses. She'd just have to avoid him until whatever ghostly hostility he felt towards her faded. He hadn't followed her or anything, so she was certain that he wouldn't hurt her. It still sucked though. Meanwhile, she needed to figure out the significance of what Tucker told her about the other portal. She checked off a list in her mind of what exactly he said: the old portal was smaller, it was just meant as a proto-type, it injured one of the people working on it, it never properly turned on, it didn't work, it broke. Sam wanted to scream in frustration. How did that help her at all? The Amity portal was much larger, did work, and did kill hundreds. The damage was already done, wasn't it?

Tucker also asked her what the portals were meant to do. That part in particular really bugged Sam. She told him that it was a doorway and he said that wasn't the important part. But isn't that the entire point of a portal to anywhere? She supposed that this one also managed to leak large amounts of ecto-energy, hence all the deaths and later the ghosts. But that was clearly never an intended effect of the portal. Tucker had implied that whatever else it did that was so important was part of its designed purpose.

Sam thought back to every interaction she ever had with Jack and Maddie Fenton. They incessantly babbled about ghosts to everyone, especially Jack. But while Sam had always shown the most interest in their work out of her, Tucker, and Danny, she had still been a middle schooler with a short attention span. It didn't help that out of the three of them, Sam easily had the least knowledge about how any of the Fenton tech worked. Tucker was always so skilled with computers and engineering and Danny had much more familiarity with his parent's inventions and ectobiology. She was at a loss. She wished so badly to be able to demand answers from Danny. Part of her was furious with him for hiding this information from her, for still not giving her that final puzzle piece. How could he not want to figure this out?

But that wasn't fair. Sam understood that now. He couldn't say the truth out loud. It would mean accepting that he can leave, something that every ghostly part of himself wouldn't allow. Something the town itself wouldn't let him do without a fight. She just had to have faith that the human part of Danny would be able to overcome this.

Sam stood in a kitchen full of rotting food. The stench filled her nose and made her want to gag. The plates set on the table were chipped and the silverware rusted. The room was also bathed in a green glow, but somehow it all seemed so familiar. She slowly spun in a circle, trying to gauge where she'd seen this kitchen before. She wandered over to the fridge, which still buzzed and whirred as if it was on. Magnets held up old grocery lists and a few photos, but the faces were hopelessly blurred out- completely unrecognizable. She gave up and tried the next room.

It was obviously once a living room, but the couch had been flipped over and debris covered the floor. The ceiling sagged in a sad manner, as if it would cave in at any point. The stench was more bearable here, but the room was coated in dust. Untouched for years at least. Despite that, Sam had the sense that it had once been homey. She could almost imagine the sound of children laughing, chasing each other around while their parents smiled and watched. It bothered her that she couldn't place it.

"Hello dear." A pleasant voice said. Sam turned around to see a shadowy, vague figure standing before her. Its face was just as blurry as those on the fridge. "We haven't see you in years, how have you been?" The voice was warm, nothing in it giving away any malice. And yet some part of Sam felt only wrongness at hearing it speak. She ignored it.

"Oh come on, kiddo. We won't hurt you." Another, larger figure was suddenly behind the first. "We miss having you here. It hasn't been the same since you left."

"What do you want from me?" Sam demanded.

"We want you to stay in town." They answered in unison. "We want you to be friends with our son again." Their voices turned threatening. "You belong here, you know?"

Sam slowly backed up, but her feet felt heavy and unresponsive.

"I think I should go now." She said weakly.

"GO WHERE?" They screamed at her. "GO WHERE? GO WHERE? THERE'S NOWHERE ELSE TO GO."

Sam awoke with a jolt, chest heaving as she gasped for air. She shuddered at the memory of those voices taunting her. She didn't even remember falling asleep, but now she felt very awake. She wasn't eager to experience that disturbing dream again. Her stomach growled, and she sighed in defeat, figuring that she couldn't just hide away in her room forever. She was going to have to leave at some point or another, so might as well hazard a trip to the kitchen.

Rising out of bed, Sam slowly walked to her door. Feeling a bit foolish, she quietly turned the knob and cracked the door open as gently as possible. She stuck her head out and scanned the long, dark hall. The coast was clear. She carefully began to tread down the hall, trying to listen for any sign of Danny. The old floorboards creaked under her feet and she winced. Why was she so nervous? She knew in her heart that Danny would never do anything to hurt her. She supposed that there was an incredibly difficult conversation that needed to be had between them and she was not eager to have it. They both needed some time alone first.

Sam crept down the stairs and hesitated when she caught a glimpse of her grandmother's room around the corner. Well, Danny's room now. The door was still shut. She took several long, quick steps to pass that wing of the house. Perhaps it was just her imagination, but Sam could have sworn that the air seemed to vibrate in that direction. She let out a breath she didn't know she had been holding and finished her walk to the kitchen. She silently cursed the house for being so big, feeling exposed by just walking from one room to another.

She entered the kitchen and immediately rummaged through the pantry, deciding that she didn't feel like bothering to cook anything. Some self-hating part of her noted that she was being cowardly, avoiding making any noise. She scowled and grabbed several protein bars and a bag of chips, deciding that she just happened to be in the mood for junk food and was lazy. No other reason. She turned back around to go to her room and nearly bumped right into Danny.

Sam let out an embarrassing noise in surprise, something that sounded much too similar to "EEK!" She backed away from him and tried not to stare.

Danny's face looked solemn, his eyes rimmed with red. 'Had he been crying?' She thought. She suddenly felt immensely guilty for what she had said to him earlier. He opened his mouth and closed it again, looking pained as he tried to say something.

"Danny..." She started. He shook his head at her.

"No, I need to apologize before you say anything. I shouldn't have lost my temper. That was very wrong of me." He looked wracked with guilt and his eyes were heavily shadowed like he hadn't slept for days.

"It's fine." She said stiffly, surprised to realize that she was mad at him. She just wanted some space and here he was in her face already. He shook his head.

"No, it's really not. I don't have any excuse. I'm sorry if I frightened you." Sam was upset of course, but she understood. She almost felt compelled to tell him that she knew it was his ghostliness that had made him so hostile, but she felt that might come across as offensive.

"Me being a ghost doesn't excuse it either." He said, as if he had read her thoughts. She frowned, was she that easy to read? "Anyway..." He continued, "You were right." He admitted. "I wasn't being fully honest with you and I don't know if I can be about some things." He extended a hand to her and she realized for the first time that he was holding something.

"Here, take it." It was an old, tattered notebook. She took it but looked at him, eyes questioning.

"What is this?" She asked warily. Several pages look loose, jammed haphazardly into the notebook. The spine was in tatters, barely hanging on by a few threads.

"It's one of my parents' notebooks, full of their research notes about ghosts. There's some stuff about the portal too." Her eyes widened, and she looked at him in shock.

"Where did you get this?" She asked. "And why are you giving it to me?" Danny looked uneasy, almost ill.

"It was the only thing I managed to take from Fentonworks the last time I was there. I was being honest when I said I didn't know anything more than what Tucker told you. Hell, I can barely understand anything in that myself. But- "He choked on the words, and frustration filled his face. Sam realized that he was trying to admit the possible significance of the notes. She wondered if he could even physically say the words.

"-I thought maybe you could give it a go." He swallowed painfully. "If you found anything in there that was of interest, well that's all you." His shoulders sagged. "I'm sorry I can't tell you more." He said honestly. He turned to walk away.

"Danny!" She called after him. He stopped but did not turn around. "Thank you." She said. Sam knew that it must be incredibly hard to do this, both because it was the only piece of his family he had left and because it was against his nature to possibly give her the key to ending all of this. His back was rigid, but he finally answered.

"I hope you find what you need to." And with those words he left her alone in the kitchen.

Sam slowly let out a breath, sitting on her old bed with the notebook in hand. Part of her was terrified that she wouldn't find answers in it. She was holding in her hands the last shred of hope that there might be some way for Danny and her to leave Amity together. If this book didn't contain that, she didn't care at all about what other answers about the portal or ghosts she might get. She just wanted to bring her friend home. She opened the book.

Her heart immediately sank at the first page. Dozens of complicated equations were scribbled in barely legible writing all over the page and even squeezed into the margins. She flipped to the second page, then the third, and the fourth. They were all equally meaningless to her. Now she knew why Danny had said he could barely understand anything in it. She should have anticipated this problem anyway, since Jack and Maddy were brilliant mad scientists and math was the one subject she had a poor grasp of. She tried the fifth page and was relieved to finally see words, but they were just as confusing and unfamiliar.

They seemed to be descriptions of ectobiology, with lists of various chemical compounds and electromagnetic readings scribbled all over the page. These were still meaningless to Sam, what good was a bunch of jargon to her? The next page was similar, but with more numerical data and equations. The handwriting changed, now neat and elegant which Sam assumed was Maddie's doing. If the whole notebook was like this, she was screwed. She desperately flipped through page after page, until finally she saw something familiar. It was a diagram of what she assumed was the portal. The illustration matched how Danny had described it to her, though it was in black and white and was very technical. It did not show the glowing green light she had seen in her own dream.

There were some notes jotted at the bottom, mostly measurements and dimensions. But it was the closest thing to what she was looking for so far. She turned the page and saw even more of Maddie's notes on the back.

- Prototype failure occurred due to unidentified ecto-impurities. Fenton Spectral Portal Version 2.0 re-calibrated to ensure ectoplasmic purity with a margin of error of 0.006%

- Ecto-filtrator is larger than prototype to accommodate higher saturation of ectoplasmic particles but consequentially will need to be emptied and replaced more frequently. Conservative estimates indicate a change will be necessary every 8-10 weeks, but routine checks should occur every 6 weeks to be cautious

- A larger portal will require higher voltage. No children in the lab while wires are exposed during construction!

Sam's heart sank at that note. She did not know enough about electricity to understand what kind of voltage something like the portal would have required, but she was certain it must have easily been a fatal amount. She couldn't imagine what Danny must have experienced inside the portal, trapped as it turned on. She knew that the Fentons were intelligent and it was clear from their notes that they had approached their work with caution, but she still couldn't understand why they would have built the portal beneath their own home. Especially following the accident with their colleague, which she noted was not even mentioned anywhere in the notes. It made Sam feel sick to her stomach.

She needed to focus on figuring out the significance of these notes now, though. There was no time to dwell on the Fenton's flaws. The note about the ecto-impurities seemed interesting, giving a reason for why the first portal had failed. Though confusingly, it seemed as if Maddie hadn't considered it to be much of a risk with the new one. A 0.006% chance of failure for the filter seemed incredibly low, but Sam did not know if this estimate was genuinely accurate or something Maddie had gotten wrong. Besides, Tucker had shrugged off the first portal failing. He told her that what the portal actually did was much more important.

Sam reluctantly moved on to the next page, frustrated by more incomprehensible notes. She angrily flipped through dozens of pages, looking for even a hint of English words and not just formulas and scientific jargon. In her anger, she accidently knocked several of the loose papers out and they fell to the floor, scattering.

"Shit." She muttered, crouching down to hastily pick them up. She snatched a few of them up and quickly glanced through them, but they seemed to be even less relevant with diagrams for various equipment and weapons. One looked like a soup thermos, which puzzled Sam. She reached to grab the remaining papers when something caught her eye. She saw what looked like the corner of a polaroid peeking underneath one of the papers. She delicately picked it up and gasped.

It was a picture of a fourteen-year-old Danny standing in front of the completed portal. He wore a jumpsuit similar to the one he had on as a ghost, though the colors were inverted. He was smiling, but looked nervous, like he was afraid of being caught by his parents. His cheeks were still round, not yet sharpened by age. The corner of Tucker's face was in the photo as well, clearly he had been the one to take the photo and hadn't been able to get his whole face in frame. She could see just one bespectacled eye and the corner of his wide smile. The portal was just an empty hole in the wall, still seconds from being turned on. Seconds before Tucker's death. Seconds before Danny would be irreversibly changed. Only hours before Sam would see the wreckage of Amity Park on her T.V.

Sam slowly collapsed to the floor, hugging the photo to her chest. Danny must have put this in the notebook at some point. She wondered if he had gone into the portal with it or if he had discovered it in the wreckage later. It was in shockingly good condition. She wondered how often he had stared at it, his last glimpse of his human self. His last picture of his best friend. There was no way he had forgotten that it was in here. Why did he leave it in here for her to find? Maybe it was an acknowledgement that he was ready to let go of the past. He desperately wanted her to fix this when he couldn't. It was her picture now. It had probably been intended for her when Tucker and Danny took it.

Sam stood up, tucking the photo into her pocket. She carefully slipped the loose papers into the back of the notebook. She thumbed through more pages, her previous frustration morphing into determination. There was something in here that Tucker and Danny both knew was important, vital somehow. She skipped over the pages that contained just numbers, knowing that it had to be in plain writing somewhere. She was getting dangerously close to the end of the book. She passed seven pages in a row of graphs before she found it, only four pages away from the end of the notebook.

Extensive pre-trials indicate a stabilizing factor significantly higher than proto-type. Ecto-entities will be able to manifest physically and interact with non-ectoplasmic entities within an unprecedented range. Ecto shields and anti-spectral weapons have been developed in preparation to capture and study any ecto-entities that may manifest as a result.

There it was. Sam read it three times to make sure she understood what it was saying. Now that it was presented so clearly, the answer seemed so obvious. The portal didn't just allow access to the spectral plane, it also created conditions that allowed for ghosts to exist on the physical plane without destabilizing. The Fentons had anticipated this problem, knowing the cost of their portal was Amity becoming a possible hotspot for ghostly activity. What they hadn't anticipated was an entire town dying at once in range of the portal, creating hundreds of ghosts and binding them to the physical confines of Amity Park.

This was bigger than her or Danny leaving. She understood now why Tucker had cared, why he wanted her to know this. As long as the portal was still running, all the ghosts would remain, and Danny would be bound to Amity just like the rest. But if it were to stop, the ghosts would cease to exist on the physical plane. They would destabilize and probably disappear. Danny would be free to go, the town no longer holding power over him. Possibly, at least. It was just a theory, backed only by the offhand comments of Maddie and Jack's research, which had been wrong before. But it was all that she had. Sam just had to figure out how on earth they were going to shut the portal off.

AN: Once again, thank you to everyone following, favoriting, and reviewing. It means the world to me!