I did pretty well, getting this chapter written, despite the fact that my week's been really rough. Homework, gang wars, family, hospitals, et cetera. But somehow my writing's quickest when my life is roughest. Go figure.
This chapter is pretty fast paced so it was hard to keep it flowing how I wanted, but we're doing suspense in English lately so it's helping But something pretty creepy is revealed here. It was creepy to me, just writing it. But over all, I'm satisfied. Angry Danny is so fun to write.
Thanks to reviewers: Dreamer for lyf, Fey Phantom, Digital Dreamer, sleep warrior, Snapcat, azngirlchibi, Frimmy. bluejolteon, and xheartkreuzx.
Tactics
"So what were you guys doing back there other than faking out, huh?"
"We were just talking," Danny growled, crossing his arms and glaring at Tucker as they walked down the street to his friend's house. It was probably safer than his home at the given moment. Sam had separated from them not long ago to walk the much less convenient path to her house. The chances of it not being because of their spat were slim to none. "And it's not 'faking out', okay? It's called 'fake out-make out'." At this, Tucker smirked triumphantly, succeeding in agitating Danny even more. This was getting old fast. "Why are you looking at me like that?"
"No reason," he said, smiling angelically. He hopped on the balls of his feet as he walked.
"Tucker…"
"Or, no reason meaning that you already know, oh half-ghost ladies' man," he replied. Thinking on his words, Tucker frowned. "Alright, how the heck is it that you're the ladies' man of our dynamic duo? I'm the comic relief, aren't I? Man it's always the weird one in the group!"
This time, Danny couldn't help but laugh at his reaction. "I'm not the ladies' man, Tuck," he said. "You just happen to not be it, either."
Tucker seemed to think over this before nodding. "Yeah, I guess so. If you were the romantic one Sam would be your-"
"I swear, one more word about me liking Sam and I'll lodge your PDA in your stomach."
Nervously, Tucker looked from his pocket where his PDA was to Danny's hands. "You… you can do that, can't you?" Danny nodded, the smile of victory plastered on his face now. "Okay. I believe you. You don't like Sam." His shoulders relaxed and he faced forward again just as Tucker said, "So what were you talking about then? All cracks aside, Sam seemed pretty miffed with you."
Memories of their earlier discussion slash argument raided his mind again. "Valerie" he lied. He had his answer prepared long ago. "Just the usual gripe about trust, danger, et cetera et cetera."
"Figures," Tucker mumbled. "It's not that she doesn't have a point or anything, you know." Danny felt bad again for lying to one of his close friends, but if Sam had reacted so badly, he didn't want to bother Tucker with it. He could only hope Sam had the same idea of not telling him.
"Hold on, dude, my phone's ringing." He reached into his pocket and took out a cell phone, flipping it open. "It's Sam," he sang.
"Let me see it," Danny said, holding his hand open. To Tucker's look he said, "Is that your stomach ringing?" Two milliseconds later the phone was to his ear. "Hey, Sam."
"Danny!" came the distressed but quiet voice of Sam. "Cyrus is striking downtown, you can't miss it. There's a bunch of screaming and cars being thrown around!"
Half of his internal organs jumped up into his chest. "What! What's he doing?"
"What's who doing?" asked Tucker, eyebrows raised.
Danny clutched his cell phone to his ear, listening intently as Sam checked on whatever the ghost was doing. Over his shoulder, Tucker was bobbing up and down on his feet to try and hear her, as well. "Oh my God, Danny, this is bad. You have to get…" Dreaded silence met his ears as Sam's voice faded into a thin whisper then disappeared completely.
Red flags went up in his mind. "Sam?" Danny asked slowly, apprehension rising in his stomach. After a few seconds, the silence was replaced by an even worse sound: the clang of the phone hitting the ground, and then the static. "Sam!"
He shut the phone and thrust it back into the hands of Tucker, who almost dropped it in surprise. "What happened?" he asked eagerly. Danny ignored his question and grabbed his wrist. After looking around their surroundings quickly, he ducked behind a car, friend in tow, and focused on becoming Phantom. When he finished changing, the two became invisible and Danny flew into the air. Tucker struggled with grappling to his arm as they gained altitude, yelling into his ear. "What the heck is going on, man?"
Danny blinked and stopped in midair. He felt Tucker jerk forward and heard him yelp in fear. Usually his friends were used to flight but he must have been focused and finding out what happened. "Sorry," he apologized, shaking his head to clear his thoughts. His mind was full of images of Cyrus, downtown, and whatever was happening to the people there and Sam.
"It's cool, man," Tucker said. He forced calm into his voice, but the wavering betrayed him. "Just take a second to breathe and chill out your nerves. Now, tell me what on earth is wrong with Sam!"
Danny took a deep breath and tried to collect what all he gathered from the phone call. "I… I don't know," he admitted. "Cyrus is downtown, doing something really bad to the people there. Sam was about to tell me exactly what when her voice just started to break off, like she wasn't listening anymore. Then I guess she dropped the phone."
Tucker groaned deeply. That was never a comforting sound coming from him, Danny noticed immediately. "What?" he asked. "What was that for?"
"Those Nasty Burgers are coming back on me, what do you think it means?" Tucker cried sarcastically.
"Tucker," he growled.
"Yeah, yeah, I know, not a time for jokes," Tucker sighed. "Anyway, you remember that freaky-deaky, supernatural thing the ghost did to her last night, right?"
Danny gulped just thinking about that. Her face seemed so vacant, so empty… and she wouldn't react to anything they said to her until she snapped out of it. Sam had stopped listening to him on the cell phone, he thought with sudden realization. "You don't think?"
"Yeah, I do," said Tucker. "So do you know exactly where she is?"
"She cut off before she told me; I just know it's downtown." This answer seemed to bring him back to reality. "Oh, duh, why aren't we flying there?"
"I don't know! You're the pilot!" Danny sighed exasperatedly and felt his legs disappear as he headed in the direction of downtown, heading first for the route that Sam took when she walked home from the Nasty Burger. If what Tucker had suggested was what had happened to her this time, he couldn't wait to get his hands on that ghost for everything he'd already done to him and his friends. Valerie's arm, Sam's whatever it was, Danny and the… well, the list was long enough to kick some militant ghost butt.
"One hundred and twelve miles per! One hundred and twelve miles per!" Tucker yelped, clinging to Danny's torso with one arm, undoubtedly keeping tight hold of his beret with the other. Danny felt him slipping down to his nonexistent legs. He slowed a little as they neared the tall business buildings of downtown Amity Park.
Below him Danny saw the streets suspiciously clear of any signs of life other than the few cars speeding down the road in the opposite direction. All were good, familiar signs of ghost activity in proximity. However, he couldn't see any real signs that any ghosts had attacked. Nothing seemed out of place yet.
Not like that fact made either of them feel any better.
"Ugh, where are they?" Danny asked, pausing over the business center to search for the ghost fiend. He let go of their invisibility. The first thing he saw was Tucker's head bent back to look behind them.
"There!"
Danny turned around and gasped to find the scene of chaos below them. Just as Sam had said, there were a number of overturned cars, toppled traffic lights, and smoke rising from one of the busiest streets of the city. The only difference from her limited report was that there were no people screaming. In fact, Danny couldn't see any people at all.
Not knowing where Sam was at was even more troubling than if he knew she was down there. "There isn't anybody here," he commented, lowering down to the abandoned street. The only sounds were that of small, crackling fires and the wind blowing newspapers down the road. It was hard not to imagine a scene from a suspense movie with the tension around him.
"I don't know about you," Tucker said, "but I don't like this at all. Do you have the thermos?"
Danny instinctively reached behind him for the loop in his belt he would carry the thermos in, but his fingers only grazed the air. He cursed under his breath. "Sam has it with her."
"I like this even less now," Tucker said, pressing his back against Danny's and looking around. "Where do you think they could be?"
"No idea. That's what's bothering me." The longer they waited on the street, the deeper Danny's need to face Cyrus grew. If he were human enough, his face would be flushed with his frustration. Why wouldn't he show himself so he could finish their fight?
Danny shut his eyes tightly and willed his angers away. Cyrus was getting to him… he had to focus.
"What are you doing? Get out of here, Tucker," Danny said, nudging Tucker towards an alleyway. "There's nothing you can do." Suddenly, he gasped and exhaled, his ghost sense coloring it blue.
Both boys jerked their heads to the left to see a swirl of black robes appear, taking the shape of a familiar body. A hollow laugh escaped from the folds before the head of Cyrus appeared. He crossed his arms and looked at the two teenagers with a smug expression. "And what makes you think that there's anything you can do, human?"
Danny groaned impatiently and pushed Tucker away, clenching his fists. Ignoring the cry of protest from him and the mocking jibe from the ghost, he demanded, "What have you done here, Rogaine Man?"
"Young people in these times simply don't show proper respect to their superiors," Cyrus mused, pursing his lips thoughtfully. "Always with the sarcasm, never serious about anything they are."
"Well, this usually seriously hurts everything," Danny said, lifting from the ground and torpedoing toward the ghost with a fist glowing with a ghost ray pulled back to make contact-
He gagged as his airway was constricted tightly and he was stopped in the midst of his momentum. His hands reached up to his neck and he felt the cold grip of Cyrus's hands.
"Hmm. That was rather easy," Cyrus noted to himself. With one arm-movement, he flung Danny away from him and towards a brick building. Danny closed his eyes and focused on going intangible. When he came out around the other side, his ran his fingers over his sore neck. Something about how Cyrus had stopped him felt strange…
Pushing the thought from his mind for now, he went through the building again, this time remaining invisible until the last possible second. He reappeared inches from Cyrus, and this time he was finally able to make contact. The ghost was pushed into the building opposite them. Rubble rained down from where he was.
"I'll ask you again," he said while he was disoriented. "Where is my friend?"
As the dust settled around his body, Cyrus smiled a sinister grin. "Why don't you learn for yourself?"
"Well, even though that would be awfully convenient," Danny said, crossing his arms, "I haven't gotten to that point yet."
"Perhaps you should consider learning a bit more about your enemies before attacking them, human," he replied airily. Something prickled the back of Danny's neck as Cyrus gave him an all-knowing stare.
Look behind you, idiot, his eyes seemed to say.
"Danny!" Tucker yelled from below him. He turned behind him to find Tucker in the alley he'd pushed him into, only instead of being on the ground, he was on the fire escape and pointing into the shadows. At first he couldn't see what it was that Tucker was indicating, but finally something emerged from the darkness. He held his breath in, a cat ready to pounce whatever it was that would attack.
How surprised was he when he saw a little boy, maybe seven years old, walk slowly out to the street, staring up at him with calm, innocent eyes. There was dirt smudged on his face and a rip in his brown pants. Danny looked curiously from the child, to Tucker climbing the rest of the way to the rooftop, to Cyrus who was looking on with mild interest. He wasn't making a move, excusing Danny from having to.
He turned back to the boy and knelt down to face him. The boy's eyes were wide and glassy looking. "Are you okay, kid?" he asked, reaching a hand out to wipe some dust from his dirty clothes.
The boy's hand flew up and caught Danny's gloved wrist, holding it in place easily. Nothing but his arm had even twitched. Something wasn't right with the way the boy frowned up at him. Danny smiled and laughed nervously, pulling his hand away slowly. "What's up, huh?"
A hard metal object whammed into Danny's head, causing him to stumble. He winced and saw a can lying at his feet. "Danny! Look! Up! Already!" Tucker yelled from the rooftop.
Danny craned his neck up and saw Tucker pointing back into the alley. "Not at me, genius, that way!"
Turning back to the space behind the boy, Danny jumped back, eyes wide. "What the hell?" he cried, lifting up off of the ground and staring.
A small crowd of fifteen people, twenty at the most, had appeared out of nowhere at the entrance of the corridor. Some wore business suits, others wore jogging suits, and he saw a few other children in the midst. All of the people were staring up quietly at him, and to be perfectly honest, it was giving him deeper creeps than most other things had, and he was presently fighting a ghost with veins popping out of his head.
"What... What is this, Cyrus?" Danny asked loudly, voice shaking slightly.
Cyrus closed his eyes tightly, as though concentrating intently. "You wanted to know where your human girl was, right, half-breed?" he said, opening his eyes slowly and lifting an arm, pointed at the crowd. Danny saw this and believed him to be ready to lash out. He pointed a pair of glowing fists at him when, once again, Tucker's voice broke all other thoughts in his mind.
"Sam?"
He jerked back and scanned the street at Tucker's outburst. There, in the street, stood Sam, separate from the small group of people. She was looking up just as silently as the rest, except only her wide eyes were laid on Cyrus's form. The scene was immediately recognizable, imprinted yet again on his memory. Whatever he'd done last night, he had done it again. He had done it to all of them. Only this time, Sam was under its full control. Their empty, lonely gazes chilled him to the core.
"Your companion has a strong determination," Cyrus commented, as though he were analyzing something in a school assignment. "She is even sometimes able to-"
Sam stumbled forward, almost tripping and landing on her knees. One of her hands raised slowly to her face, as though another hand was trying to pull it back down. Her fingernails dug into her cheek and she made a sound like a wounded animal, deep from within her.
"Ah, see, that is a perfect example." Cyrus extended his fingers again and Sam's arms fell again. She crumbled to the ground, unmoving except for the small, harsh movements of her chest.
Time seemed to stop, and he briefly wondered if it had. No. She wasn't dead. His best friend was not dying, not again.
Before Danny even realized what he was doing, he found himself fading into invisibility and flying around Cyrus, coming up on his other side, and blasting his arm away from the people. A few of them also fell to the ground, some muttering incoherently, others simply becoming useless masses much as Sam had.
"Tell me what you're doing to these innocent people now, or else!" Danny yelled.
Cyrus laughed in amusement. He shook the arm Danny had hit to ease the slight pain. "Or else," he said. "Trust me, human, unlike you I know what my opponent is capable of. Or else is not incredibly threatening to me."
"I have a new 'or else' I don't think you know much about yet." The idea of using the ghostly wail swam through his mind, growing more and more appealing with each snide word that escaped the ghost's mouth. He was pretty sure that he hadn't even used that power since defeating his evil self, and seeing as how none of that actually happened, there was no possible way Cyrus could know about it.
"No," yelled Tucker. He ran across the street and settled next to Sam, grabbing her wrist and pressing down on her wrist to feel a pulse. "Danny, not now! There are people coming, look!"
Sure enough, Danny looked down the street to see a succession of vans speeding down the street, led by an unfortunately familiar vehicle: the Fenton Ghost Assault Vehicle. His parents, news reporters, and who knew what other idiots would intrude on a ghost attack, were heading straight for him. Danny didn't know exactly what Cyrus had done to the people here, but he knew more regular people weren't going to help him out.
Danny moaned and threw a round of ghost rays at the bases of a few streetlamps and traffic lights, adding to the obstacles in their paths. The news vans weren't able to avoid them, but the RV drove over them like a military tank.
And, if he wasn't mistaken, Danny thought he saw a red figure flying to the scene as well. The inconveniences were starting to give him a throbbing headache.
He didn't have time to fight Cyrus. "Get these people out of here as quickly as you can," Danny ordered his friend, who was trying to lift Sam from the ground. "The kids first, then the rest."
"What about Sam?" Tucker asked, nodding at the limb body in his arms.
"Kids first," he repeated. He turned his back on the battle and flew out to meet the series of vans parking at the edge of the scene. The first two people to run out were his parents, Maddie carrying two handheld ecto-guns and Jack shouldering some huge dangerous looking weapon that's function he couldn't remember.
Maddie raised her guns at Danny. He leaned back and held his hands up in a friendly manner, but she didn't take notice. "Stand aside, ghost," she hissed, "before we have to take you down as well."
She asked him to move? That slightly surprised him. Apparently, his parent's had the same view on him as Valerie did: Danny Phantom was both ally and enemy. The enemy part he still didn't like, though.
"Hey," Jack said, lowering his weapon slightly. "Isn't that Tucker and Sam over there?"
Maddie followed Jack's line of vision. Danny turned his head back, as well. The situation behind them had changed again. Most of the people were back on their feet again, and Cyrus had his hand outstretched again. Tucker was dragging the little boy and a nine-year-old girl behind him to the sidelines, trying to support a half-awake Sam on his other arm.
"Oh, move!" Maddie cried, running forward with Jack next to her.
"No, stop!" Danny yelled. He didn't know what was happening, or if anything would happen to them as well. They shouldn't be going down there! He held a hand out to stop them, but suddenly, fingers grabbed his arm and he was being dragged higher into the air.
The person heaved him up and turned him around to face her. Once Danny stopped feeling dizzy, he was able to focus on Valerie's masked face. "What is going on, Phantom?" she said forcibly, raising him by some loose fabric around his neck into the air above her.
Breath came to him with a struggle, his collar wrapping around his air passage. "I don't know!" he choked, squirming around before remembering he had ghost powers. He phased through her hands and settled his feet on the space on the hover board in front of her.
"Yes, you do." Valerie pulled a bulky weapon from her backpack, unfolding it by its hinges and locking the pieces in place. "You've been here longer, you've seen what he's been doing. Even if you don't know everything, you know something. Now, spill, ghost."
"Alright," he said. "Cyrus, the ghost we fought last night, made a huge mess down there. I don't know how but the people who were in the area… I think he did something to them. They're like… zombies, or something." Zombies. Living dead. A terrible taste filled his mouth.
Through her mask he heard her curse under her breath. "The ugly bald one? And Dad still has my new artillery…" Valerie grunted and pushed him off of her board. It wasn't as though he would've fallen, but he was now ticked off at her, too. He didn't need anyone else being rude to him, but she had the right idea. She was flying down to join in the battlefield.
He followed after her, righting himself and scanning the scene for any sign of Cyrus. The only real fighting taking place anymore was human against human. He saw his parents throw down their guns and try to restrain the slow-moving people who were trying to lash out at them. Above them, Tucker had managed to drag three unwilling bodies away, and he was now trying to snap them out of it.
Valerie appeared next to him. "He's not here," she commented.
"No, he's here," he replied. "I can feel it…"
His ghost sense activated.
Valerie screamed, being thrown away from his side by an invisible force. As she tumbled through the air, her board flying off somewhere else, Cyrus appeared with his hand outstretched to her. She screamed again, only a different sound. Instead of surprise, she was in pain. Suspended in the air, her board soaring back toward her, her body stopped twitching and she floated still. The ghost grinned in satisfaction.
"I almost pity how much of a disadvantage you are at with me," he said to Danny. "But I'm not here just to teach you. If you won't accept a teacher, you must learn from experience."
"Stop it!" Danny yelled, staring at Valerie. Her face was masked but he could envision the absence of self it would have he it were revealed. Cyrus only laughed in reply and faded away, reappearing high above him. His fists aimed upward, ready to strike, when he felt something hit him in his stomach and throw him off course.
The air blew out of him. His suit was covered in the red substance he'd seen used last night. Valerie's canon was aimed at him and smoking.
"I'm not the one to stop right now," Cyrus said. "She is. Stop her, human."
Valerie fired at him again, this time with a glowing ectoplasm based goo. This time, he learned his lesson and split himself at the waist. Going intangible didn't work against ectoplasm, but this did.
From behind him, he heard someone call his name. He chanced a look and saw Tucker leaning over the edge of the building behind him, Fenton Thermos in hand. Behind him, he saw Sam, awake, holding two alert children back from the fight. A wave of cold water rushed over him. If they had awakened, had the other humans come back to their senses as well? "Take it," Tucker said, tossing it up to Danny.
What good was the thermos going to do against a human, Danny thought. Right as his fingers grazed the cylinder, he was pushed down toward the ground as a purple net wrapped around him. He fell and landed on the ground, his head forced to look straight up, as it grew tight around him.
The underside of Valerie's hover board closed in on him. The muzzle of a small gun appeared over the front side as Valerie aimed below her at Danny's useless form. He tried to become intangible, but he couldn't phase through the material. He should have guessed; other than some features, it was the same net future Val had used.
Past the side of the board, he saw Cyrus. He looked down at him, shaking his head. "So easily defeated, and by a human as well. Of course, she did have help," he said. "We'll finish this another day." The robes billowed around him until her disappeared completely.
What the hell was up with this guy? Every time Danny asked that question, it was never answered, and he felt himself getting repetitive.
"Argh!" Valerie groaned and the board tipped downward, about to plunge straight into him…
Cliffhangers are so, so fun to write. I apologize, but they simply are! Again, though this among some of the longer chapter's I've ever written, it seems too short. I feel I paced this too fast and I tried to even it out in a few places, but the rest are supposed to seem fast-paced. And doesn't Danny know not to trust the little kids? Sigh. Gosh, I love writing Cyrus. The action is in the beginning here, the research comes later, the opposite of CAI. Well, this is a long note, so I think I'll end it. Review! Theorize, I love it when you theorize…
See you in the afterlife,
Saramis Kismet