Part XI

Saturday 11th November

"Well, that felt like a bust," Dani said, dropping into the sofa as the two finally made it back home.

"Not really. Pandora and Dora both said they'd send out people to look for Danny," Jazz said, sitting down in her normal seat adjacent to the sofa. She looked at the map Danny had drawn of the Ghost Zone as she added, "And Clockwork seemed to want to help."

"I hate that ghost," Dani mumbled, shaking her head. She lowered her voice to try and mimic the ghost as she said, "'I'd like to help but the time has to play out without my interference.' What the hell's that supposed to mean?"

"Hey, language," Jazz scolded, knowing enough about the girl to know she hadn't grown up with parents to teacher her things like that. She sat the map on the coffee table and leaned back with a sigh. "Anyway, he's the ghost of time. If he's not supposed to mess with this event, I guess that's good."

"How do you figure that?" Dani raised an eyebrow at the girl.

"If Danny wasn't going to get out of this alright, he'd come and help us," Jazz said, trying to be optimistic.

"Jazz?" Maddie's voice called from the second floor.

"Crud." Dani blinked out of sight just in time to be missed by Maddie walking down the stairs.

"Jazz, there you are," Maddie said, worry pulling on wrinkles Jazz hadn't noticed before. "Where'd you go?"

"Sorry Mom," Jazz smiled weakly at the woman now standing in front of her. "I'd thought of a place Danny and them might be."

"Well?"

Jazz shook her head, looking down at the map on the coffee table. A slight panic appeared in her mind, worried her mother might know what it is, but also worried about what she might have to do.

"I wish we knew something," Maddie admitted, sitting down on the sofa where Dani had been sitting. "Anything. I mean, they've got three kids who everyone knows their parents aren't exactly poor. Why can't they just ask for a ransom and be done with it."

Jazz bit her bottom lip, knowing now was the time. She'd always promised herself that if things got too bad, she'd tell her parents. Two weeks seemed worst then "too bad". "Mom," Jazz sighed, trying to collect herself. "Get Dad, I know something that might help."

Maddie tilted her head, looking Jazz over.

Jazz picked back up the map and looked up at the older woman, pleading, "Please?"

Without a word, Maddie pulled herself back up to her feet and gave Jazz one more look before heading to the stairs.

"Are you crazy!?" Dani's voice hissed before she reappeared standing beside Jazz.

"No, Danny could be in serious trouble," Jazz defended, whipping her head around to look up at the girl. "We need their help and that means they have to know everything about their own son."

"Does that mean…" Dani gulped down her nerves before continuing, "do they have to know about me yet?"

"That's up to you right now," Jazz admitted, wishing the girl would explain herself to even her. "It would be easier if they did."

Dani disappeared as footsteps got closer to the stairs. Jazz's eyes focused on the couple going down the stairs, Jack following close behind his wife and both of them looking broken.

"What's this about, Jazzy-pants?" Jack asked, sitting down on the sofa with Maddie next to him.

"Really, I hope Danny kills me for this," Jazz mumbled, giving a last glance at the map in her hands before laying it back on the coffee table. She looked up at her parents, sitting up, as she asked, "You remember that accident with the portal two years ago?"

"Yes," Maddie nodded, curiosity in her voice as she gave a glance at the piece of paper on the table. She leaned forward and picked it up only to stare in surprise. "Jack, this-"

Jack leaned closer to his wife to look at the paper, surprise on his face. He looked at Jazz and asked, "How do you have a map of the Ghost Zone?"

"And in Danny's handwriting?" Maddie added, looking over the paper at her daughter.

"That accident gave him powers. He stepped inside the portal and turned it on from the inside," Jazz tried, hoping to get away from the map for a moment. "From what I could find from your books, the best guess I have is when he turned it on, the ectoplasm you had put inside it shocked him-"

"That should've killed him!" Maddie exclaimed, lowering the map to her lap.

"There was one case I found, from experiments back in the 30s, that the test subject didn't end up dead," Jazz pointed out. "There wasn't enough I could pull up on what happened to them, but my guess is the ectoplasm formed around Danny's DNA, creating separate genomes with their own nucleotides to support his ghost half."

"His ghost half?" Jack echoed.

"You should know that since he became half ghost, he's gained some enemies," Jazz said, delicately trying to avoid pointing out that they were two of those enemies. "Some that would love him dead or worst, and if Sam and Tucker got in their way, they wouldn't hesitate to grab them too."

"Danny has another face, doesn't he?" Maddie asked, hitting the one point Jazz was hoping to avoid for the time being.

Jazz looked towards the door, wishing Dani would reappear and help her. This wasn't her secret to tell, but for fear of Danny's life she felt like she had no choice.

"The Booomerang, all our technology," Maddie said, putting the pieces together aloud. "They all worked right."

"Mads?" Jack asked, worry on his face as he put an arm around his wife.

"Jazz."

She looked at her mother, worry pulling her face down.

"Danny's Phantom, isn't he?" Maddie asked, her eyes looking straight into Jazz's as her face was frozen unreadable.

Jazz bit her bottom lip before looking down, nodding her head. "I'm sorry we didn't tell you sooner," she tried, unable to look back up at her parents. "He tried a few times, but…it just never happened."

"But what about last Christmas," Jack asked. "What about that thing with the last mayor or any of the other things Phantom's been seen doing. Our Danny wouldn't do that. He shot as us!"

"And you shot at him!" Jazz retorted, looking at her father. "You wanted to take him apart molecule by molecule. Is there any wonder he didn't tell you?"

Jack looked down at his lap, the living room silent a moment before he asked, "Why didn't he tell us when it happened?"

"He almost did, before I even knew," Jazz admitted, calming herself down. "You remember that spell right after the accident that he couldn't keep hold of anything? I think you said something about worrying if the accident messed with his muscular growth."

"That lasted for about a month," Maddie said, nodding her head. "He wanted to tell us then?"

Jazz nodded her head.

"But he's our son," Jack said slowly, his brows unfurling. "We love him no matter if he's human, ghost, or something in between. We're your parents."

"I know," Jazz said, remembering Jack saying something similar on a summer night that no longer existed. "But he's also still a teen. A teenager with the world on his shoulders."

"And you said he had made some enemies?" Maddie asked, looking down at the map still in her hands.

"Yeah," Jazz said, nodding her head. "That's where I was, in the Ghost Zone asking some of his friends if they'd heard anything. Some of them are looking around for him now."

"Then we need to complete those probes," Jack said, taking his arm back from around his wife to stand up. "Maddie, do we still have Phantom's ecto-signature?"

"We should," Maddie said, looking up at the large man.

"And we need to try the Booomerang," Jazz said, mad at herself for not thinking about the stupid contraption until now. "It's always been keyed into Danny since you made it."

"Maybe we'll find him before the end of the week!" Jack said, a large smile on his face as he pumped his fist.