Vlad Plasmius wasn't sure whether to be happy or angry. They were supposed to have killed each other off. That was the plan. Jazz was the bait for the star-crossed lovers, and Danny would get himself killed trying to rescue her, but preferably not before he got rid of them.
He decided to be angry. True, the artifact was unguarded, but he could have handled Ronan and Julia himself with considerably less of a wait. His whole reason for this little plan was to destroy Danny.
Oh, well. At least the artifact was unguarded.
He strode across the floor of the bay arrogantly as usual. The Heart of Thanatos had been stolen from the Ghost Zone many centuries ago and subsequently lost. Vlad had spent the better part of a year tracking it down only to find that two marids had taken up residence practically on top of it. If they had ever found it…
But they hadn't, and that was all that mattered.
He used his ectoplasmic energy blast to blow a rock to smithereens and reveal the cave beneath it. Inside, just as he had expected, was a chest containing a jet black sphere made of volcanic rock. He was still a bit uncertain as to what it did, exactly, but he had all the time he needed to find out.
It wasn't raining. For the first time in a week, the sky was clear and the air was dry. Granted, he wasn't in Federal Way anymore, but that was a moot point. Danny floated through the sky of Amity Park and vowed to never go near water again. That vow would last until summer vacation at the very latest, but that didn't matter either. Not now, not in the sky.
Jazz seemed to have gotten over Roy; maybe it had just been Julia's influence. Danny was glad; he didn't like Roy. Roy was an idiot. He had told Sam and Tucker about the not-believing-in-ghosts comment. They were still laughing when they parted ways to go home from the mall.
Now, he was out looking for Kat. He had been by the school, her favorite bars, her parking garage…Of course, he finally found her in the cemetery. Of course, he had to actually go look because she only faded into view at a certain distance. Of course, she was leaning against her headstone with her top hat pushed down over her eyes, for all the world as though she was asleep. She pushed the brim up as he approached.
"I saw your mom," he said without preamble.
"Is she still the nitpicky hothead I remember her as?" Kat asked with real interest.
Danny shrugged. "I didn't talk to her for that long. She just told me how you died."
Kat raised an eyebrow and stood in order to sit on top of the stone. "I never died. I told her…she told you, right? I told her I would live forever."
"Kat, you fell into a coma. They pulled the plug. You're dead."
She grinned that Cheshire Cat grin of hers and shook her head slowly. "No, dear. My body fell into a coma because my mind was no longer there to sustain it. My body died when they pulled the plug. I'm still alive."
His confusion was clear on his face, but he had learned not to bother asking Kat questions. She would explain when she was ready. Or maybe she would explain when he was. Either way, she patted him on the head and grinned. "Cheers, Phantom. Cheerio!" And with a tip of her hat, she vanished in a blue smoke.
A/N: Thank you, CSkerries, for catching that. And thank you, everyone, for your reviews. Next one's up tomorrow.