It was 12:30 in the morning. Danny and Sam, tired of Tucker's pirate movies, had gone upstairs to sleep. Sam took the extra bed in Jazz's room; Danny was in his own room. The nightmare was happening again. He saw Danny Phantom going against Frost's ghost in The Gateway room. Danny Fenton had a sandwich thrown at his head by Dash. Both shattered, colliding with each other and breaking into smaller, sharper pieces. They were all falling towards a giant, open, somewhat familiar hand covered in a black glove. As the pieces fell into it, the hand closed into a fist, apparently unfazed by sharp fragments being caught in its palm. The hand slowly opened again, revealing Danny. He had completely red eyes and Vlad's outfit on, the black parts white and the white parts black. He began to laugh maniacally…and then Danny shot out of bed in a cold sweat.
"What a day," he shook his head, straightening himself out. He decided to head downstairs for a drink of water. Tucker was still in front of the TV, eating popcorn and watching his pirate movies.
"Tucker," Danny sighed, "It's 12:31. Go to sleep."
"Not a chance, man...yeah, alright! Show those pirates!" sighing again, Danny got the water jug out of the fridge. Before he could pour himself a glass, though, blue ectoplasmic smoke drifted out of his mouth.
"Great," he sighed, trying to listen for anything suspicious. He couldn't hear anything over the TV though, "Tucker, will you turn that off!?"
"Huh?" Danny marched over and did it himself, "Hey! What's the big ide..."
"Shhhhhh!" Danny heard something, "Stay here."
---
Jack hadn't looked at the clock since around 8:04, so he had no idea how late it was. He was busy with the latest Fenton gadget.
"Wakeman," he was mumbling, "Comes down on ya like Jackson on New Orleans. Well she hasn't got me out of the Society for Misunderstood Genius Scientists yet, and she'll do that the day that Jack Fenton doesn't believe in ghosts!" he needed all the power in the lab to help charge up this machine, so all the ghosts alarms were off. Consequently, he had no idea that a pirate ghost was coming up from behind.
---
Danny slowly headed down the hall, walking as quietly as possible and listening for any strange ghost sound. He got about three-fourths down the hall before stopping, looking around. There was nothing but eerie silence. Danny suddenly whirled around, changing immediately into ghost form and blasting the spirit behind him with an energy blast.
---
The sound from Danny's blast could be head in the lab.
"What the heck?" Jack then noticed something strange about the room. He looked behind him and saw the ghost, its ghost-dagger raised.
"GHOSTS!" he made a grab for Maddie's small hand-held laser, blasting the ghost in the arm. It's shriek carried across the house, waking up everyone. Outside, ten ghosts, the same ones that had attacked at the mall, had surrounded the house and were flying in through the walls. The panther-ghost was close to the house, leaping off rooftops and making its way over. Far down the street, Velkan was on his way, urging his horse to go faster.
---
"What's going on!?" Jazz shouted as she and Sam came from their room. Maddie was wondering the same thing.
"Jack? Danny?" they saw Jack running up the hall, flapping his arms all over the place and screaming like mad.
"GHOSTS! GHOSTS! GHOOOOOOOOOOOOOSTS!!!" he kept heading down the hall, Maddie running after him and Sam heading downstairs. Jazz suddenly grew nervous; what if they found out about Danny tonight?!
"Dad, for the last time, there is no such thing as a..." she turned around. An old ghost with a scar down his face was grinning at her, showing his hideously decayed teeth. She fainted, falling into the doorway to her room. The ghost left her there, flying after Jack and Maddie.
---
"Danny!" hearing her shouting, Danny and Tucker turned to face Sam, "What's going on!?"
"The ghosts from the mall here. And that means..." he looked around; the panther-ghost was clinging to the ceiling, looking down on them, "Sam, get down!" Sam barely had time before the panther-ghost leapt off the ceiling and was met by one of Danny's energy blasts.
"Get down to the lab and get any ghost weapons you can find," he ordered Sam and Tucker, "And whatever you do, don't let them get the Fenton Thermos!" they ran towards the lab as the panther-ghost got its wind back, now focused solely on Danny. It jumped down on all fours and charged towards him; Danny flew towards it as fast as he could. They collided in mid-air.
---
"Hurry up, Tucker!" Sam was about three feet ahead of him.
"Hey! You try running away from a weird cat-thing after sitting around watching pirate films for five-and-a-half hours!" Sam rolled her eyes, opening the door to the lab and heading in. Five ghosts were already in there, looting the place. They turned their sights on her (and Tucker, as he came in gasping for breath).
"Attack!" one of them shouted, all five flying forward. Sam ducked and rolled to the side, grabbing the Fenton Thermos; Tucker got tackled.
---
Danny had the panther-ghost on the run. He was chasing it down the halls as it ran on all fours. Danny charged up another energy blast and fired it; the panther-ghost just barely dodged it. He had another one ready, but before he could fire it, a ghost phased through the wall and tackled him, knocking them both into his dad's old study. The panther-ghost looked back and stopped; there was no sign of Danny. Smiling, it jumped off a wall and made its way towards the lab.
---
Danny flew out from under his new opponent, turning to face him.
"Skulker?" he said in disbelief. The armoured ghost smiled evilly.
"Ghost-child," he crossed his arms, "We meet again."
"What are you doing here!?" Danny charged up an energy blast in each hand.
"The Order was in The Ghost-Zone the other day, offering a rich reward for mercenaries who agreed to help them on tonight's little crusade. I took the job."
"The Order? What order?"
"So you don't know. Pity. After all, it's you that they're hunting tonight, ghost-boy," he readied his plasma canon, "Now, it's time for you to..." something beeped on his armour, "Oh, why now!?" he read the message on Tucker's planner.
"I have to go to the zoo, observe the gorilla. For the millionth time!" he reluctantly flew off to the zoo. Danny stared up at the ceiling for a minute before heading after the panther-ghost again.
---
Velkan stopped his horse, jumping off and looking up at Danny's house. Judging from the sounds that he could hear, all was going according to plan so far. Now it was time for his move. He pulled a piton gun out of his pocket and fired a rope into the outer wall of the building. He hit a button, which caused the gun to pull up towards the end of the piton, pulling him up towards one of the windows. Jack was heading down the hall towards that window, Maddie covering the other side of the house. Velkan phased through the window, standing in front of Jack.
"Good evening," he nodded, tipping his hat. Jack fired two blasts at him, but he managed to dodge them. From his belt he drew his ghost-pistol, shooting the laser in Jack's hands away and grabbing Jack by the neck with his free hand, "Jack Fenton, is it?"
"The same," Jack squeezed out; for a ghost, this guy sure had a strong grip!
"A ghost-hunter," Velkan nodded, "Both you and your wife. You build these weapons to fight ghosts with and have all sorts of tools designed to send us back to Ghostland."
"You mean The Ghost-Zon..."
"Don't tell me what it is!" Velkan pulled Jack closer to his face, "It seems that you and your wife don't realise the reasons why some of us aren't in there!"
"Well..." Jack was finding it harder and harder to breathe.
"Be thankful that for tonight, at least, you are not who I'm after."
"Who?" Jack was almost completely out of air.
"Your son!"
"Danny? Why?"
"So he hasn't told you," Velkan smirked slightly, "Well, I don't blame him," he released Jack, knocked him out, and headed calmly down the hall.
---
Sam had managed to get three ghosts out of the lab with a laser and trap two more in the Fenton Thermos. She had placed the thermos and as many ghost weapons as she could in a backpack and headed upstairs, Tucker having already headed up to see how many ghosts were left in the house. Placing one laser in her pocket, she followed, meeting Danny on her way upstairs.
"You've got the thermos?" she nodded, "Alright, let's find Tucker."
"He's trying to find out how many ghosts are..." Danny turned around to see why Sam had stopped talking. The ghost he had seen riding the horse earlier that week had grabbed her from behind, holding her mouth shut.
"Danny," he smiled warmly, "We meet at last," he tossed his hat aside. Danny charged towards him. As he did, the ghost knocked Sam away and pulled out his ghost-pistol, grazing Danny in the shoulder.
"Get out of here!" Danny shouted to Sam. She grabbed the backpack, taking one last look at Danny before heading off.
"Who are you people!?" Danny asked.
"I myself am Velkan," he threw his weapon aside, "I won't be needing it," he explained.
"That's what you think," Danny became ghost vapour and flew through the floor. Velkan waited a moment before whirling around, expecting Danny to reappear there. He didn't. Velkan felt something snap into his neck, knocking him forward. Danny landed on the ground, ready to continue, and Velkan got the wind back in him fast. The two began their duel. Danny started to learn the hard way that Velkan wasn't joking when he said that he wouldn't need his weapon.
---
Sam made it up the staircase before being tackled by the panther-ghost, losing the backpack. Knocking it off, she grabbed the laser she had in her pocket and turned to aim it at the panther-ghost. It was nowhere in sight. She felt herself thrown up against the wall as it smacked the laser from her hand and wrapped its fingers around her throat, grinning ear to ear. She looked over and noticed that she could move the laser over to her with her foot. Trying to avoid notice, she began to reach for it, but the panther-ghost apparently had a cat's sight as well as its appearance. It smacked her off to the side, away from the laser or the backpack.
---
Danny crashed against up against a wall, falling down on a small table and breaking it. Velkan was breathing heavily; Danny was a much better fighter than he had predicted. Danny phased through a nearby wall, flying around in an unclear pattern. He was hoping to distract Velkan long enough to get in a good blow; it worked. He kicked him hard in the left arm, throwing him back against a different wall and (accidentally) making him damage a painting.
"Oh no," Danny noticed, "That was Jazz's. She's gonna kill me for that," Velkan slowly picked himself up.
"Good form, Danny," he sighed. He fired a blast on the ground, causing green ectoplasmic smoke to fly up from the floor. Danny didn't see Velkan's chop as it came down on the side of his neck, knocking him out, "Good, but not without flaw."
---
Sam was trying to get back to the backpack, but the panther-ghost proved defiant. She ended up using a different strategy; retreating. As she ran, she came across Jack. His laser was lying on the floor a few feet away from him. Knowing the panther-ghost wasn't far behind, Sam quickly grabbed it, hiding it behind her back. The panther-ghost stopped right in front of her, grinning nastily. Sam gave it a more friendly smile, confusing it. She fired the blast, and once it hit, the panther-ghost became the ordinary ghost who was allergic to cats, vanishing in a flash of light.
---
After Sam had left the lab, the ghosts that were left in the house and the ones she had fought off flew back in, awaiting orders from Velkan. He came down the stairs, gripping his left arm. A large ghost behind him had Danny. At the sight of the captured ghost-child, Velkan's small army let out a cheer.
"We have him," Velkan nodded, "Now, take what we need here, gentlemen, and let's head off to young Danny's school," they picked up some inventions, grabbed a few blueprints, and flew off.
---
"Sam!" Tucker ran up to her, "Found the backpack. You should really be more careful with this stuff."
"Where's Danny!?" Sam seemed concerned.
"Dunno. What's wrong?"
"Something. I don't know what, but something's..." she ran off, not bothering to finish the sentence. Tucker heard her shout "Danny!" a couple times and heard some noises from the lab and some other rooms before running back up, a nervous wreck, "THEY'VE GOT DANNY!"
"How do you know!?"
"We've been best friends our whole lives. We have a psychic connection. I know!" she ran off again.
"Hey! Why don't I have a psychic connection with someone?"