Sorry for the wait! I was kidnapped by a pink hippie and forced to do his bidding for a while. That, and I couldn't find a way to end the chapter well. Thanks to Pterodactyl, Darkling Loki, whirlgirl, and purrbaby101 for their vocalized interest, and to everyone else who checked the story out. Keep the reviews coming!
I don't own Danny Phantom, Tomb Raider, Final Fantasy, or Kingdom Hearts.
Chapter 2: Trials and Tribulations
"163 ... 164 ... 165 ... 16 ...6. oof."
Danny Fenton had just let go of the barbell he was benchpressing in a deserted corner of a local workout gym. He let his arms flop to his sides.
"166 times. I can't feel my arms. Can I stop now? We've been doing this all afternoon."
"But we've still got three powers left to test!" complained Tucker, sitting on a rowing machine. Ever since Danny's accident a week before he'd been trying to get his friend to test his powers, because it was "just too cool" to not try them out. Danny had been reluctant since he'd already sworn not to play the hero, but after several suspicious "accidents" he agreed, in the hopes that the testing would result in better control. So far there had been little improvement and Danny was getting discouraged.
"Yeah, Tucker," said Sam, sitting on a set of parallel bars, "give him a break. We can't wear him out too much or his parents are going to be suspicious. Let's go to the arcade or something."
"I don't think I can stand," remarked Danny, stiffly trying to raise his body out of its prone position. Tucker grabbed his arms and pulled him upright. Danny groaned at the pain, but managed to get to his feet from that position. He shifted out of his superform and swayed. Weariness appeared to double when he was normal and he'd overdone it on the weights, after all. Sam and Tucker rushed to his side to keep him from falling.
"That's it, Tucker! From now on I'm in charge of training. You can't keep doing this to him," Sam snapped, worried for her best friend. Tucker knew better than to argue with her in that mood.
"Sorry. Guess we should just take him home, then."
Danny groaned at the thought of the trek across town.
"My home's closer," Sam suggested reluctantly. Danny and Tucker had never been to her house, and she wasn't sure how they'd react to it. Her parents stood for everything she was against and she knew that her choice of friends would not go over well. However, Danny needed to rest before going to his own home, since his father was still finding "superpowers" everywhere and her home was probably the best place to crash for a while. At least she was confident that they would be left alone there.
Once outside, Sam used the arm she'd put around Danny's shoulder for support to steer him in the direction of her house and they began walking. Just before they were about to turn into one of the residential districts, a woman screamed "My purse!" and the trio was knocked aside by an unshaven man. They looked after him, dazed. Danny's jaw set determinedly.
Before Sam and Tucker could react, he'd taken off down the street after the purse-snatcher, but still looking human. The Goth and technogeek took off after him. By the time they caught up to Danny, the boy had the man pinned to the ground and was holding a large purple handbag. He tossed it to Sam.
"Here. Hold this. Tucker, call the cops."
"They're already coming." The other two looked at Tucker blankly. "Hey!" he said, offended, "I can do two things at once, you know."
The thief struggled underneath Danny, and Sam jumped at an arm as it broke free, pressing it to the ground again.
"I can't hold him much longer," Danny said through gritted teeth. "And I can't be here when the police show, either. My dad..."
"Okay." Sam cast her eyes around the area and saw a garden hose lying exposed on someone's lawn. "Let's tie him up, then. Tucker!"
The other boy dragged the hose over and Sam expertly hog-tied the thief while the males held him down. Just as they were finishing they heard the sound of sirens a few streets over and took off, leaving the purse next to the thief. When they'd turned a corner they stopped, gasping for breath.
"Danny ..." panted Sam, "why'd you do that? ... I thought you didn't want to save the world." She glared at him accusingly, though privately she was thrilled that he'd shown such heroism.
"I ... don't," wheezed Danny. "But I think ... smaller stuff ... is okay. I was the only one ..."
"So you're going to go superhero, then?" asked Tucker excitedly.
"Yeah. I guess so."
Sam by this point had gotten her bearings and pointed down the street. "Guys? That's my house up there. We can talk more then."
Sam and Tucker once again slipped their arms under Danny's and began walking.
---
Sam's house hadn't looked all that large from a distance, but it was. In fact, it was practically a mansion, and probably would have been if there hadn't been houses beside it. Sam went up the front steps first to open the door for the guys.
"Dude!" exclaimed Tucker once inside, "this is where you live? Why didn't you tell us?"
"Because I hate this place," Sam replied, heading for the stairs. "Come on. If we're quiet, my parents won't even know we're here."
The three of them climbed up two flights of stairs before reaching the floor that Sam's room was on. Both Danny and Tucker were expecting something that resembled a haunted house, given Sam's gothic demeanour, and were slightly afraid of what her room might hold. Their jaws dropped the moment Sam opened the door.
Apart from the dark colours and closed blinds, it was normal. Sam had hung posters of heavy metal bands on the walls and had a whole table devoted to candles and incense. There were pictures on her dresser of her and her friends and a couple of stuffed animals (a wolf and a cat) on her bed. On the desk were several notebooks and a box of coloured pencils.
"Make yourselves comfortable, guys," said Sam. "You want anything from the kitchen?"
"Sure. What do you have?" asked Danny.
"What do you want?" she replied. Danny and Tucker thought for a moment.
"Chocolate chip cookies."
"Lemonade."
"Ketchup chips."
Sam picked up the phone on her nightstand and told her butler to bring up the food. While they were waiting, the boys kept pestering her to tell them how she could possibly have so much money. Initially she was very cagey about it, since her wealth embarrassed her, but finally she gave in.
"My great-granddad Izzy invented the machine that twirls cellophane around deli-toothpicks," she said, sounding like she wanted to get it out as quickly as possible and stop the questions there.
"Sweet!" said Tucker. "You're the deli-toothpick-cellophane-twirling heiress? Can you afford your own TV?"
Sam picked up a remote from her desk and pressed a button. A portion of the wall across from her bed spun around to reveal a 46" plasma screen. Both boys' eyes widened.
"How 'bout a sound system?"
Sam pressed another button and two giant speaker towers popped out of the floor. Anticipating their next question, she hit a large red dot on the remote and three shelves the length of her room slid out of the wall. Tucker ran over to them and began snatching out their contents.
"Tomb Raider … Final Fantasy … Kingdom Hearts … Sam, you've got every video game on the market here!"
"Yeah," she said smugly, "I know."
"No movies, Sam?" Danny teased.
Sam shook her head. "Not here. They're in the theater in the basement."
At that moment there was a knock on Sam's bedroom door and Sam opened it to reveal a stiff elderly man in a tuxedo holding a covered silver platter. Sam took it from him with a "Thank you, Humphreys", then placed the tray on her desk. She passed out the food and they began talking about the upcoming school year.
After several minutes of idle chatter, Danny fidgeted and turned slightly red.
"Er… Sam? Where's the washroom?"
Sam smirked a little at his discomfort, but replied, "Down the hall to your left, up the landing, third door on the right." Danny recited the directions to himself silently and left the room. Once Sam was sure he'd gone, she grabbed one of the sketchbooks off the desk, opened it to a page, and passed it to Tucker.
"Whadya think?"
Tucker looked at it blankly. "I think you have way too much time on your hands." Open in front of him were detailed sketches of Danny in various outfits, some formfitting, some loose and robe-like, some armoured, and all of them looking like they could have come from a comic book. Tucker flipped through the book as Sam explained.
"I've been sketching these since the accident. I knew it was only a matter of time before he decided to go with the hero thing, and I thought we should be prepared for it."
Tucker stared at her. "You seriously think he's going to agree to playing dress-up with you?"
"No," said Sam, rolling her eyes, "we're going to pick the outfit and force it on him. Now, which one do you think would be best?" The technology whiz realized she was serious about this, and looked at the sketches again.
"Well, we want something light so he can fly easily, and we don't want anything that could get caught and harm him, so we'll have to go with the spandex stuff." He traced his finger thoughtfully around a few of the designs. "He looks horrible in red, and you'll never get him in purple, green's out because he's already got the blasts and eyes, there'll be too much of it if we make him wear it… What about this black one?"
He let his finger stop on a sketch of Danny in a simple black jumpsuit with white highlights. Sam looked at it and nodded.
"He'd look good in black. Now, what about his backup?"
"Backup?" Tucker squeaked.
"Yeah, backup. Every superhero needs a sidekick. And a weapons guy."
"Right," groaned Tucker. "Of course. I call weapons."
"Figured you would. Might be useful for Danny to have two sidekicks though…." Sam got up from the bed and moved over to her closet, where she pulled a piece of folded white fabric out from where she'd hidden it. The cloth stood out even more against the dark tones of her bedroom as she shook it out and stood beside the door.
"Woah, woah, woah." Tucker moved his arms back and forth in front of his chest. "I'm not fighting the bad guys."
"You'll know how to work the tech, Tucker. Shh, I think he's coming back." Sam tensed, and the moment Danny reentered the room she pounced on him and tied part of the fabric around his neck. The dark-haired teen staggered backwards in shock, trying to figure out what Sam had just done to him. He realized what was tied around his neck and glared at the Goth.
"Sam! I am not wearing a bedsheet!" He fumbled with the knot angrily, trying to get it off.
"I just wanted to see what you'd look like in a cape," Sam said innocently. "You know, to see if it would go with your costume." She took the sketchbook from Tucker and showed it to Danny, who stared at it in shock for a moment (Do I even want to know?), then began to back away.
"No way are you getting me in spandex, Sam."
"You need a costume if you're going to do hero stuff. What are people going to think if they see a superhero in Danny Fenton's clothing?"
Danny folded his arms. "Fine, but does it have to be that costume?"
"You'd rather this one?" Sam asked innocently as she flipped the page of the notebook to a sketch of a blue and purple outfit that could have been a genie's. Danny gulped. She meant business.
"All right, spandex it is."
"Good. Now, Tucker's already agreed to build the weapons and we're both going to act as sidekicks…"
By the time Danny was rested enough that his parents wouldn't get suspicious about his activities, they had also decided on a name (The Phantom, because he could walk through walls) and a stylized P logo. Tucker had demanded unlimited access to the Fenton Comic Collection for research purposes and Sam was funding the entire endeavour with her allowance, weapons and all. Danny felt things were maybe moving a bit fast, but Sam was so convincing and Tucker was so eager that Danny found himself getting more and more excited about his new side job. Still, he'd have a few weeks before all the costumes and gadgets were ready, so Danny would have time to get used to the idea.
Let's just hope we can keep this quiet. If anybody finds out ... Dude, I don't even want to go there. He shuddered as he walked in his front door and up to his bedroom, grateful that his parents seemed to be off at FentonComics again.