THE MONDAY AFTER
DISCLAIMER: I don't own Danny Phantom. Butch Hartman does.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Alexander Fleming was the guy who discovered penicillin when he let an experiment get moldy. I'm sure you all knew that, but I thought I'd throw it in. Yes, I know that penicillin and stachybotrys are two completely different types of mold, but quite frankly, mold is mold, in my opinion, and it's all gross. Also, I know it's not a book title (which is what Lancer usually curses with), but I just couldn't think of anything, so I went with it.
PART FOUR: GIVE PEACE A CHANCE
"Finally!" Danny grumbled as the final bell rang, signalling the end of the school day. Gathering up his texbook, pencil and papers, he leapt from his desk and fled out the door. American History was a painfully boring subject anyway, but having it as the last class of the day made was nearly impossible to stay awake. Thankfully he hadn't been caught snoring this time.
He met up with Sam and Tucker in the hall, looking as bedraggled as he felt.
"Man! This day was awful!" Tucker complained.
"Yeah," Sam agreed. "It's like all the teachers conspired to make each class harder than the last, and give us more homework than ever!"
"And, bore us to death!" Danny added. "I'm just glad it's finally over and we can go home!"
The trio turned and made their way down the hallway. As they passed the still-closed door of Mr. Lancer's classroom, Danny paused, regarding the door with a frown.
"What's up?" Tucker asked returning to his friend's side.
"Nothing . . . well, actually I'm wondering if Mr. Lancer is okay," Danny admitted grudgingly. "He looked terrible when Sam and I saw him earlier, and he's been shut up in his classroom all afternoon!"
"You think we should check on him?" Tucker asked.
"Oh, come on, you guys!" Sam glowered, rolling her eyes. "He's fine. He's got a little flu or something is all. Besides, he's a grown-up, he can take care of himself!"
"I guess you're right, Sam," Danny said, and turned away from the door.
The three teens had just made it to the end of the hall when a loud crashing sound caught their attention. Danny, Tucker and Sam raced back to Lancer's classroom and peered through the frosted glass window in the middle of the door. They could just make out a large, dark mass stumbling around inside, bumping into desks and walls as it flailed about.
"Then again," Sam said with a shrug. "Maybe there is something wrong!"
"Cover me! I'm going ghost!"
Sam and Tucker stood close together, effectivly hiding Danny as he transformed from a human teenager to a powerful ghost.
"You two stay here," he ordered. "I'm going in!"
Danny passed slowly through the wooden door and materialized in the classroom. There before him was an otherworldly creature he'd never seen before, several out-of-place and overturned desks, and no sign of Mr. Lancer.
Danny regarded the creature with undisguised disgust. The greenish bits of it glowed; the sludgy black bits dripped off it making wet slapping sounds on the linoleum floor. As he watched, parts of the creature's body bulged out, as though it were trying to grow a new appendage. Or, Danny thought with a shudder, something inside was trying to get out.
Danny approached the creature cautiously. He cleared his throat and the creature turned towards him.
"Uh, hi," he said, trying to sound friendly. "Ummm. Who, or, ah, what are you?"
The creature pondered Danny's question a long moment before answering. "We . . . We do not know. Exactly. We came from our mother, Stachybotrys; she whom The Evil One called mold."
"Mold?" Danny repeated.
The Creature shuddered with rage. "The Evil One killed our mother. Once. Twice. She released us before The Evil One could destroy her again."
Danny's mind raced. Mold? This creature is some kind of . . . mold monster? But, how? And where did it . . . hey! Wait a minute!
Before he could even finish his thought, Danny remembered something that had happened just a couple days earlier. He had just sucked a ghost out of a piece of dancing chalk and into the Fenton Thermos, and returned to the janitor's closet to change back into Danny Fenton and hopefully slip unnoticed into the throngs of students. Suddenly the door burst open, and Danny barely had time to go invisible and press himself up flat against the wall as Mr. Lancer and the school's janitor burst in.
"Alexander Fleming, Mike!" Lancer exclaimed with a snarl. "What do we have to do to get rid of that confounded mold once and for all? It's threatening to destroy my stores of meat! Er, I mean, my important school supplies."
Danny saw the janitor smirk as he reached up for a container on a high shelf.
"Dunno what to tell ya, Mr. Lancer," he said, pulling down a gallon of bleach. "Maybe ya should call a mold expert."
"Yes, I suppose I should," Mr. Lancer agreed huffily.
"Meantime," The janitor continued. "I'll use this here bleach to get off az much of it az I can."
After the two men left, Danny returned to normal, slipped out of the supply closet and headed back to class. He'd completely forgotten about the conversation until now.
"So, lemme get this straight: your mother was some mold . . ."
"Stachybotrys!" The Creature shouted.
"Uh, okay, stackybod . . . stactaba . . . oh, whatever! She was growing . . . down in the basement? Where Lancer hoards all the meat?"
"Yes," the Creature confirmed. "She set us free just before she was destroyed."
"Oh, well, that was nice of her," Danny murmured, then said aloud, "So, what exactly are you doing here?"
"When she freed us, our mother's last words to us were Avenge me, my children! And, we are doing so now."
"Oh, great," Danny glowered. "Looks like this won't be an easy fix after all." Danny sized up his opponent, who suddenly look very unlike any mold he'd ever seen before. "By the way, how did you get so big? And glowy?"
"Our mother ingested a special substance," the Creature said. "It made her, and us, stronger and more powerful than before."
Special substance? Danny's brow furrowed in concentration. Special . . . wait a minute! The fight with the Lunch Lady ghost! We ended up in the basement, and she cut me with that clever! That special substance was blood! Specifically my ghost blood!
The Creature writhed, its stomach undulating again. Danny thought he heard a cry coming from within its bulk.
"Help! Somebody get me out of here!"
"Um, what, or who is in there?" Danny asked.
"The Evil One!" The Creature replied. "He who killed our mother!"
Killed? Oh, no! Lancer!
Danny quickly weighed his options. Sucking the monster into the Fenton Thermos then shooting it into the Ghost Zone was out of the question, as was fighting the monster. Not with Lancer trapped inside; the teacher could be injured.
"But how did you . . . how did he get in there?"
"We worked from the inside out," the Creature said with pride. "Released as tiny spores, we floated into his oral and nasal passages, were absorbed into his body. We flowed with his evil blood, exited through his numerous pores and spread over his skin until we enveloped him completely."
"Oh, gross!" Danny exclaimed. He shook his head to clear his thoughts, and stood up as straight and imposing as possible. He cleared his throat and said in his most authoritative voice: "I order you to release him!"
"We do not take orders from you!" The Creature snarled. "We do only what our mother asked of us: avenge her! And, we shall!"
Danny sighed. He could see no other choice than to battle the monster and try to free Lancer. He only hoped he didn't hurt his teacher in the process.
"I really hate to do this," he said, summoning up a large glowing sphere in the palm of his hand.
"No, Danny! Wait!"
Danny spun around at the sound of Sam's voice. She and Tucker burst through the door and rushed into the room.
"If you fight that thing you might hurt Mr. Lancer!"
"What!" Danny exclaimed. "I told you two to stay . . .oh, never mind!"
"Look, there's got to be a better way to get that thing to release Lancer without hurting him, or it!" Sam insisted.
"I've been talking to it, Sam!" Danny said. "I'm open to suggestions."
"Try reasoning with it," she said despirately.
"Reasoning with it?" Danny repeated incredulously.
"Well, yeah," Sam said. "I mean, it appears to have some sort of intelligence . . ."
"Yeah, well, it only got that way because the mold in the basement got hit with some of my ghost blood."
"Eww!" Sam and Tucker said together.
"Okay," Danny said. "I guess it couldn't hurt to try reasoning with it a little more. After all, I can just beat it up later if talking it out doesn't work."
"Wow, that's the spirit!" Sam said sarcastically.
Danny turned back to the creature trying to find the words to peacefully resolve the situation.
"Okay," he addressed the creature. "I understand where you're coming from. I think. The mold . . . er, the staky stuff Mr. Lancer destroyed in the basement was your mother. And . . . she was just trying to live her life, right?"
The monster's head inclined slightly.
"And, well . . . well . . ." Danny struggled to find the right words. What could he say? It was true Lancer had ordered the mold removed, but what choice did he have? He couldn't just let mold grow in the school! It was dangerous. It damaged stuff. It ruined food. It made people sick.
"That's it!" Danny exclaimed, then addressed the creature again. "Well, the fact is, humans and mold just can't live together."
"What do you mean?" The Creature asked.
"I mean, where you live . . . where you are, our stuff . . . I mean, human stuff gets damaged. Homes are destroyed. Food is ruined. Humans get really sick." He paused to let the information sink in. "You see, Mr. Lancer was just trying to protect the students. He had nothing against your mother. He was . . . obligated to remove her to keep his students safe."
The Creature seemed to be contemplating what Danny had said, and Danny's hopes rose.
Wow! This might actually work! He thought.
Finally, the Creature spoke: "We understand what you have said."
"Cool!" Danny exclaimed. "Then you'll let Mr. Lancer . . ."
"However, we must obey our mother. We must avenge her. We must destroy the Human's Protector, Lancer."
Danny sighed. Turning back to Sam and Tucker he asked, "Well, what do I do now?"
Sam shrugged, and dropped her eyes to her feet. "I guess the time for diplomacy is over."
"Yeah, Danny," Tucker agreed. "You did your best, but if that thing isn't going to release Lancer peacefully, well, I guess you have to take him back by force!"
"Yeah," Danny said disappointed. "I guess so."
Danny turned back to the monster and mentally prepared himself for battle. There were times, he realized suddenly, when he actually enjoyed fighting ghosts. The rush of adrenaline that raced through his body as he fired off ectoplasmic blasts, and dodged return fire. The overwhelming satisfaction he felt when he defeated his foes, and sent them running for their afterlives or sucked them into the Fenton Thermos.
This, however, would not be one of those fights. Danny would take no joy in fighting and (hopefully) defeating this creature, but he no longer had a choice. As Sam had said, the time for diplomacy was over. The time to fight was now.