The house stood dark and daunting before him. It had been over a week since he had last set foot inside of it. Most of that time had been spent at the hospital for what they claimed was observation, but Danny knew better. They had put him on suicide watch. No one knew what he might do since his family and two best friends had been killed right before his eyes. The last two days had been spent sleeping on Valerie's couch. She had offered to make this first trip back to his empty house with him, but he had refused. He had wanted to do it on his own. Now that he was standing in front of it though, he severely wished he had taken her up on that offer.

'Too late now,' he thought as he swallowed the nervous lump in his throat and slowly ascended the stairs. His black hair blow into his eyes and reminded him of all the times his mom had brushed it away from his face as a child, and the tears he had fought so hard against, welled up once more, sliding down his cheeks in fat lumps.

Damn it! Why had he kept those answers? If only he hadn't been so stupid... If only Lancer hadn't decided he had cheated and called his parents to meet at The Nasty Burger... If only... Danny shock his head to try to regain some control. He wiped the tears away. They did no good now. It was simply better to try not to think of such things as "if onlys." Gingerly he reached out and turned the door handle. Sure enough it turned and creaked open. Jazz must have left the house in a bigger hurry then he originally thought.

Steeling himself against a new wave of tears, Danny entered the darkened abode of his now deceased parents. He took a deep breath, letting it out slowly as if he expected something to come of it. When nothing happened, he breathed a slight sigh of relief at the realization that no ghosts were currently in residence. They were the last things he needed to deal with right now. He had come home for a reason and he couldn't afford to be distracted by needless battles with entities he no longer had any interest in dealing with.

There was only one ghost he ever wanted to fight again, and that was the ghost that had killed the people closest to him. Unfortunately, Danny knew it wouldn't be so easy. He didn't even know who the ghost was. Everything around him had fallen apart so suddenly that he hadn't exactly been up to trying to track him down yet either.

Heck, Danny hadn't even been able to bring himself to talk to either Tucker or Sam's parents about what had happened. He was positive that Sam's parent's most likely blamed him too, and the idea of facing Tuck's parents just sent waves of nausea through him.

Thus it was that Valerie had been the only person he had talked to and he hadn't even told her everything. She had no idea why Lancer, Sam, Tucker and his family had been there. It was enough that she knew it was them. She had been there as they had carted the bodies out of the wreckage. Apparently the human body is tough enough to survive an explosion at close range enough to remain identifiable. Of course it helps when those bodies had been blown to pieces, with large chunks, like say a head, landing 50 yards or more away. He shivered at the memory.

Somehow the knowledge that Valerie had been there to see them carried away eased Danny's mind somewhat. If anything, it meant that he was not the only person that had been totally mortified and scarred by what had happened. Someone else had been traumatized too. Although he had to admit to himself that Valerie did a much better job of hiding it. He wondered if she was doing that for him and then cursed himself mentally for having such a selfish thought. Of course Valerie would have her own reasons for not wanting to show her feelings. He had heard her up late tossing and turning in her sleep, as he sat up unable to think or feel. He could only guess that she was reliving the grotesque scene that had played out before her own eyes.

Sleep no longer came easily to Danny. His own dreams were nightmares filled with the screams of loved ones and a dark looming figure of a ghost, flying away and laughing viciously all the damage that had been wrought. What Danny failed to understand, even now, was why he had been spared. The ghost had had the perfect chance to kill him, but instead had merely smiled at him with an evil grin that the teen-ager couldn't quite push out of his head. In fact, it had gotten to Danny so much, that it was the only aspect of the ghost that he could remember clearly.

Danny turned to the wall and flicked the light switch into the on position in the slight hope that it would make the house seem warmer and fuller then it did in the dark. All it did though, was emphasize the emptiness, so he quickly turned the light back off and headed back upstairs. He ignored the signs of a family life interrupted; projects that had been left unfinished, Jack Fenton action toys and figures that littered the living room coffee table and some new ghost catching invention that had still been in the testing phase, but now lay forgotten on the couch.

He knew why he was here, and it had nothing to do with those small things. It was to pack his meager belongings and leave again. This time permanently. Sure, the utilities were all on now, but that wouldn't last for long, with no one to pay the bills. Seeing as it was highly unlikely that anyone would be willing to hire a fifteen-year-old that hadn't finished high school and was on the verge of becoming unhinged, he couldn't exactly afford to stay.

Valerie's dad had been kind enough to offer Danny the couch in their tiny apartment. It wasn't much, but it would do for now, until Danny could figure something else out. He wasn't keen on the idea of going to live with his aunt, and he had no where else to turn to at the moment. Making his way upstairs out of sheer force of habit, Danny paused momentarily outside of Jazz's room.

It was killing him. He knew why his parents had been at the Nasty Burger, as well as why Lancer had been there, but why Jazz? Or Sam and Tucker even? Why had they been there? Danny opened the door and stared in. Her computer sat on her desk, a composite screen saver of Stanford/Harvard and Yale still running across the screen. The desk overflowed with the books and worksheets she had been using to study for the C.A.T's. His heart beat fast against is chest as for he thought about Jazz sitting there and how she would have yelled at him to get out and stop bugging her. It was too much and Danny quickly left, going straight to his room. He pulled a few suitcases and bags from his closet and began throwing his clothes into them haphazardly. He suddenly wanted to be as far away from this place.

When he was done, he grabbed the luggage and hurried back down the stairs. His foot the edge of the rug, tripping the fifteen-year-old and causing him to flip head over heels down the steep stairs. As he began to fall instinct took over and for the first time since before the incident that Danny turned into a ghost. His body fell almost gracefully through the floor and down to the lab below. Stopping in mid-air he stared at the Fenton Portal before him. Green eyes turning back to blue, Danny solidified as he touched the ground. He wasn't sure how much time he spent staring at the now lifeless portal before him, the luggage that had been in hand mere seconds before now lay forgotten on the floor beside him.

All the emotions he had been feeling in the last week finally boiled over into a sense of pure rage. This thing, this machine was to blame. It had caused all of this. From the first moment he had stepped into it, his life had been plagued by ghosts of one sort or another. It had been fun at first, but that was before anyone had died. That was before he had witnessed that ghost murdering his family. The memory of it flashed through his head yet again, the dark, hulking figure, that hideous smile and something else that he couldn't quite put his finger on. That something began to nag at the back of his mind, but he ignored it as his rage reached its peek.

Without so much as another thought, Danny overturned one of his father's work benches. He picked up inventions, one after another and throw them around the room. Screaming in agony he ran up to the Fenton Ghost Portal and began to hammer on it with his bare hands until they began to bleed.

"Give them back!" he screamed at the large door. "Give them back to me! Give... them... back..." Hot tears streaked down his face. Danny no longer had the energy to stop them, and instead slide to the floor in a stupor.

"Danny?" came a shaky voice from behind him. He turned to see Valerie standing at the bottom of the stairs, her hands clutched in front of her chest and her eyes brimming with unshed tears. "I... I got worried, so I thought I should come by and see how you were doing..."

"Their gone," he breathed as he turned away from her. "Their gone and they won't come back."

Valerie ran up to Danny to try to comfort him. "I'm sorry, Danny. It will get better, I know it will! You just have to give it time."

"Time?" he asked incredulously as he pushed Valerie away. "What do you know about it? Have you ever had a ghost take away everything that was important to you?"

Danny saw the hurt look in Valerie's eyes and suddenly remembered that she had. He was the reason Valerie and her parents lived in such a small, cramped apartment. He had managed, albeit by accident, to take away everything that had mattered to Valerie at one time by destroying her father's security business. When it came down to it, wasn't Valerie just another victim of Danny's ghost hunting obsession?

Part of Danny wanted to apologize to her for the remark, to say he hadn't meant it. The other part wouldn't hear of it though. What did he care that her family lived in a small run-down apartment. At least she still had her family with her. He had nothing. No family, no home, no friends.

"It was Danny Phantom," Valerie spit out under her breath as she turned her head to try to hide her own tears from Danny. "This is all his fault."

"What are you going on about now?" Danny snapped. He was starting to get confused and that was making him even angrier than he already was.

Valerie looked a bit worried that he had heard her.

"Nothing," she replied, shaking her head. "It was nothing, really."

"Valerie...," Danny warned as he stood up, clenching his bloodied and broken fists by his side and gritting his teeth. He could almost taste the fear that emanated from Valerie. He could see that she was struggling with the thought of telling him, or letting him continue yelling at her. Finally, she looked up at him and sighed in defeat.

"I wasn't suppose to tell you in case you got it into your head to do something stupid. What with your parents having been ghost hunters and all."

"What weren't you suppose to tell me?"

"Danny, you have to understand. No one knows better then I do about wanting to get revenge against ghosts, but you can have to promise not to do anything stupid."

"What weren't you suppose to tell me?" Danny repeated slowly, as he tried to reign in his temper. It was taking all of his energy to not blast a hole in the wall out of sheer frustration and anger.

Valerie looked like she was about to say something else and stopped. Bowing her head she gave in.

"They know who killed your family Danny. Who killed Sam and Tucker and even Lancer."

Danny suddenly felt numb again. If they knew which ghost had done this, then he could go after it, couldn't he? The ghost that had been haunting what little dreams he had. He could fight it and destroy it, just has it had destroyed the people he loved. Maybe then he could stop feeling so guilty and finally put this whole nightmare behind him. Eyes narrowed he looked back at Valerie once again.

"Who?" It was the only word that would come out of his mouth.

"Danny Phantom," was the reply.