Danny tripped over a root and went sprawling. He frantically scrambled forward for a ways before he got his feet back under him and started running again. Behind him, in "hot" pursuit, were three giggling little girls on fire. Inferna, as he recalled, or would later, when he was no longer trying to avoid becoming a char mark on the ground.

They had first appeared as normal children in Puritan attire, each carrying a small doll of some kind. They had smiled and offered to help, then burst into flames and came after him. Apparently, their idea of "help" was to cleanse his soul by incinerating him. He had managed to dispatch them with little difficulty and started to walk past. Then the little piles of ash they left behind upon their deaths had sprung into burning life once again. Three times, he had managed to defeat them, and three times they rose from the ashes. Now, he was just running.

He groaned inwardly as he saw a little guardhouse ahead with a tall closed gate stretched across the road. He would never be able to climb it before they caught up to him, and based on injuries he'd already sustained in the previous battles, he knew he wouldn't survive if they did. He looked around and decided to simply turn at the gate and take off into the woods. Maybe he would find a pond or river or something that would take care of the problem.

Electricity crackled across the gate as Danny got closer. He cried out and threw up his shield as lighting arced out, but it went past him to reduce the creatures to ash. Then it reached out again and blasted the ash into dust. Danny stood where he was; when they didn't come back to life again, he let out his breath and turned to see the gate opening.

Just beyond it was a large man in a prison uniform. Blue electricity arced across his badly charred body. His hair was an indeterminate dark color, and his eyes were smoking holes in his head. He gave off a smell of electrified meat and burning hair that made Danny want to gag.

"You gotta blast the ashes, kid," the man said with a rough voice. He seemed friendly enough.

"Uh…thanks," Danny responded. "Who are you? And why help me?"

"Name's Horace," he answered. He started to hold out his hand and seemed to think better of it. "Haight enjoys Silver's little games, but I'm not a sadistic bastard."

Danny brightened slightly. "So, you'll help me beat her?"

For some reason, Horace found that to be very funny. After a few moments laughter, he wiped a non-existent tear from a non-existent eye and shook his head. "Ah, man. Thanks, kid. I haven't laughed like that ages. Beat Silver…" He chuckled for a bit.

"But you just said…" He trailed off miserably.

"Listen, kid. You ain't the first to come here, and you ain't gonna be the last. No one beats Silver."

The revelation that the Fentons were not the first people on the island in five years was not lost on Danny, but he stowed it away to think about later. Instead, he drew himself to his full height, which was still about two feet shorter than Horace, and announced, "Well, I will! I'm not going to stand by and let her play games with my family's lives!"

Horace scoffed and shrugged. "Well, whatever. I ain't gonna try and talk you out of it. You'd be better just saving your own hide, but it's your funeral. Head through the lighthouse basement and follow the cave system around. Be careful, kid. Haight likes to hang out down there"

"Thanks," Danny said, bemused, as Horace disappeared in a flash of blue lightning. Well, at least he had something resembling an ally in this world gone insane. The lighthouse was easily visible above the trees, even in the darkness. Although it didn't work anymore, there was some kind of light up there. Hoping to see actual people and hoping his hope wasn't in vain, the boy broke into a jog.

He destroyed another Inferna at the base of the lighthouse and looked up. There was definitely light up there, and he thought he saw a person. It was just a silhouette, but it was moving. He grinned and, when the lighthouse proved locked, blasted down the door. Inside looked like it might have been an office at one time; a rotting ladder led up into the tower. Climbing it was rather treacherous, and when Danny reached the top, what was left of it crumbled to the ground. Fortunately, it wasn't that far to jump.

A metal staircase wound up the tower; Danny took the steps two at a time. At the top, he paused momentarily next to the mechanism that had once controlled the light. Judging by the broken knife blades surrounding it, slayers had been up here at some point. He shrugged and stepped through the broken door.

The light came from a lantern hanging on a nearby peg. Pacing a few steps in either direction and back again was the same girl Danny had seen at the docks. "They left me here," she was muttering. "They left me alone."

"Excuse me," Danny said quietly. He took a step forward, and the feeling of time slowing down hit him again.

The girl turned to face him, and he was able to see a few details he had missed. The chains she wore were a rusted red, and they weren't just draped around her. Shackles graced her throat, wrists, and ankles, and length of chain hung limply from each one. "He made me stay here," she hissed angrily. "He wouldn't let me go. Now, I'm all alone."

Then the moment was gone, as was the girl. Danny had dealt with some of scariest ghosts the Ghost Zone had to offer, but something about this place trumped every one of them. His heart pounding, he started to run straight back down the steps, but he managed to regain control of his legs before he got too far. Horace had said there were caves below; the lantern might come in handy. He snatched it off the peg and went back down.

It was oddly fortunate that he should find a lit lantern on top of an abandoned lighthouse after five years. And then there was the tree at the chasm that just happened to fall across the gap. Was someone actually trying to help him here? Could it be the girl in white? She did drop Clem's notebook when she vanished the first time. Maybe she was a ghost. Maybe she was trying to do what she could to help him beat Silver without drawing attention to herself. That would make two ghosts that were afraid of her, which didn't bode well for the Fenton family's continued health.

Danny jumped the ten feet or so from the bottom of the tower to the office and walked around a corner to jump through the door to the cellar. It was darker than he realized it would be, and he was beyond glad he had brought the lantern. He took a few steps forward and realized he could hear the sound of something hissing, like air escaping from something, or…

"So…you made it this far," Haight said. Danny couldn't see him yet, so he walked forward slowly. From what he could see of the next room, there were pipes everywhere. It seemed to be a boiler room of some kind. "There used to be steam in these pipes," Haight informed he boy. "Now…there's only me…"

There was a noise, the sound of metal striking metal at a high speed, followed by a squealing sound. Green gas began to filter through the lantern light as it crept into the boiler room from various vents and pipes. The metal pop sounded again, and some kind of knob hit Danny hard in the arm. It was probably used to shut off the steam once, but it wouldn't help him now. As a half ghost, he could survive without oxygen for longer than any normal human, but he still needed it. He ran across the floor and jumped down a trap door into a cave system. The air was blessedly clear for about thirty seconds.

"Really, now," Haight taunted. "…You didn't think it was that easy, did you…?" No, he really didn't. Still, one could hope. Rather than answer, the boy started running. "You can't escape me, you know…There's a cave-in ahead."

Danny almost stopped; his falter caused him to trip, but he managed to recover. Haight was lying; he had to be. Danny refused to come all this way just to be stopped now. The gas was already all around him. If he turned back, he'd never make it alive.

"Yes…" Haight whispered. "Keep running…It makes the game so much more…interesting…"

Danny ground his teeth as he was forced to slide to a stop. He threw his fists against the rocks as though he could move them by sheer force of will. He was just about to give up and fall into despair at having failed when he noticed a single silver eye peek out from between the rocks. It was impossible, of course; there was no room for the strange girl in there. Yet there she was, staring.

"…Do you know what hate is, Danny?" Haight asked as he manifested. "We all know it here…You must hate something by now. Is it me…?" He seemed to take pleasure in the thought.

Danny shook his head, though in denial of the situation, not the comment. He backed against the rocks and glared angrily. He wanted to retort, but he needed to save his breath for as long as possible. Then, something reached out and grabbed his arm. He gasped, but before he could try to pull away, a handful of burrowers took that moment to dig below the rock and knock in down.

It wasn't luck; the strange girl was trying to help. He clambered across the fallen barricade and resumed his escape, but he was running out of time.

"…You think you have a guardian angel?" Haight asked mockingly. "Old memories can't save you from me…not for long…"

Danny burst into open air and not a moment too soon. He dropped to his hands and knees, coughing and hacking. Finally, he took a shuddering breath and looked back. "…We'll meet again, Danny…" the apparition sneered. "They all fight me…but I always win…in the end..." His laughter echoed eerily as he dispersed into nothing. Danny collapsed the rest of the way onto the ground to rest for a while.

A rattling noise startled him and sent stumbling to his feet just as Dr. Killjoy appeared a few feet away. His projector was sitting on a rock next to the cave mouth. "No rest for the wicked, my boy!"

"What do you want?" Danny grumbled as he plopped back onto the ground.

"Now, is that any way to greet your doctor?" Killjoy admonished. "I'm only trying to help."

"Why don't you go help someone who needs it? Like that Haight guy."

"Ah, yes! Hermes is rather an ongoing case of mine. He's very resistant to my attentions and, alas, there are many places on Carnate that I cannot reach. But! Enough about me; this session is about you! You remind me of a former patient of mine, a very violent man. Solved all his problems through force, you see, and I positively shudder to find you falling prey to that same condition."

Fire exploded along the outer rim of the small canyon Danny was in, completely blocking all means of escape. He jumped to his feet and started blasting as four giggling Inferna burst out of the flames. Killjoy was still ranting happily about this and that; Danny didn't pay any attention. He slipped between two of the girls as they charged past, and was rewarded with painfully burning scrapes across his chest and back.

The other two girls stopped and jumped into the air. Danny destroyed one, but the other succeeded in exploding; he barely got his shield up to defend against the worst of it. One of the creatures rushed straight towards him; he destroyed it, then jumped out of the way as the two that remained started throwing fireballs. He returned fire and succeeded in reducing one to ash before the other rushed him. He dodged as best he could while he finished off the pile of ash and finally turned his attention to the remaining Inferna.

Bruised and burned, he destroyed it and turned to Killjoy, who had disappeared. At some point, one of the Inferna's attacks must have hit the projector; it lay in melted ruins. Danny smirked and turned to figure out how to get out of this flaming mess. There was no water, nothing he could use to put it out. He could see the land beyond, so the wall couldn't be very thick. He sighed miserably and, bracing himself, jumped through to hit the ground rolling. At least the flames didn't latch onto him as a ghost.

Well, he'd been nearly suffocated and incinerated, he was falling over tired, and he was in pain. It was about time for Silver to start taunting him again, wasn't it? He sat down on a fallen log to watch some slayers battle some mainliners.

Natural born killers, aren't they?

"What do you want?"

To congratulate you on a job well done. No one has ever won my game before.

Danny jerked upright in disbelieving shock. "I won?"

Yes. Step forward and claim your reward.

Smiling brightly, his family stepped from the foliage a little ways down the path. Behind them, the last mainliner finished off the last slayer and went off to investigate something interesting. Had Danny still been paying attention, that might have tipped him off.

He shrugged off his exhaustion to run forward into his mother's open arms. He was about two feet away when an image of the Inferna flashed across his mind, and the image of his family smiling happily was replaced by one of them crying in pain as they were consumed by flames. It was gone as quickly, leaving the boy to collapse to the ground, sobbing.

You didn't really think it would be so easy did you? Silver asked snidely. Her very audible laughter echoed off the canyon walls, and Danny jumped to his feet, enraged. She was here.

"Where are you?" he yelled. "Come out here and fight me!"

But the game's not over yet, niño! You'll see me in the end.

A flash of movement caught his attention, and he started blasting, but to no avail. A sharp pain in his arm distracted him enough to realize that something had been attacking him while he was otherwise occupied. There were three syringes sticking out of his arm; he yanked them out and turned on the mainliner. The poor thing didn't stand a chance.

As Danny glared at the fuming smear on the ground where the creature had been standing, Haight spoke again. "Yes!" he exclaimed, laughing. "You see…? We're the same…you and I…"

"I'm nothing like you!" Danny argued heatedly to the vanishing green haze. Inwardly, however, he was very shaken up. He knew that he had destroyed the creature, but he didn't actually remember doing it. He had been so angry, he hadn't even thought. Was Haight right about him?

He had promised his family he would never turn evil. But what if he couldn't help it? What if he was already evil? He glanced around furtively and resumed his journey in considerably darker spirits.

A/N: Eh heh...Yeah, the convenient little notebook...I'll confess.That does exist in the game, but I brought it in like that so I wouldn't have to spend the entire story calling them "sword things" and "gun mosters".