Before I begin, I want to thank Horselvr and Leppers Zeldafan for those two reviews. I was giving serious thought to putting this story on hiatus since I wasn't getting any reviews, but those two reviews for last chapter motivated me to keep going, so thank you for those. Please keep the reviews coming!
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The two Bhyspawn stared down at Danny, gnashing their teeth together and pinching their claws. He didn't want to hurt either one of them, especially since they were really his friends Sam and Tucker.
"Easy does it there, guys," Danny said, slowly backing away but not turning his head. "I'm your friend Danny, remember? Your best friend? In the whole world?"
The two Bhyspawn didn't seem to be affected by Danny's words at all. The continued approaching him more and more, looking more vicious every passing second.
"Guys, I know it's tempting, but you gotta snap outta this!" he yelled, trying to be as clear to the two monsters as possible. "I know that if you just try to remember the good times we've had together, you can snap out of that form and return to your regular selves! I know you can do it! I believe in both of you!"
One of the Bhyspawn picked Danny up and slammed him on to the ground. He staggered up and looked at the two Bhyspawn, now looking a bit more savage and vicious himself. "Well, that always works in the movies," he grunted.
"Danny!" yelled the masked person behind him. "Don't let your guard down!"
"Shouldn't we fly away or something?" Danny asked. "Bhyspawn can't fly."
Danny immediately started floating in the air and even blew a raspberry at the two Bhyspawn. Instantly, the two monsters sprouted wings and started floating in the air. Danny's face dropped.
"Oh, that's right. They can fly, can't they? How else could they have gotten into my hotel room a few nights ago?"
The two Bhyspawn roared loudly at him and started swiping at him. Danny had to move out of the way very fast, because if he let his guard down at all, he'd get sliced into bite-size strips by the Bhyspawn.
"All right, let's finish this, you guys," Danny said after he flew a safe enough distance away. He hated to do it, but he fired a blast of energy at both of the Bhyspawn. They seemed to be especially hurt by the blasts and were knocked onto the ground.
He stared at them with sad eyes. He hated the fact he had just to hurt his two best (check that-his only) friends in the entire world, but it was either hurt them or get killed by them.
"So, that's how much you care about them?" asked a voice from behind Danny.
This time, Danny didn't even gasp nor do anything like that. Instead, he just groaned and turned around. "Why won't you just go away? Why do you keep popping up and causing me trouble?"
In case you didn't guess, it was Skyler. He was floating in the air with his arms crossed and giving Danny a nasty smirk. "Putting yourself before your friends. I thought you were supposed to be the good guy?"
"We can go without the mind games!" Danny yelled, finally turning around and looking Skyler straight in the eye. "I may be the good guy here, but that doesn't mean I'm not going to do what I have to do to beat Bhyrun and to make sure you never hurt anyone else or turn anyone else into a Bhyspawn!"
"Oh, and you know the one way to do it?" Skyler said.
"You bet I do!" Danny threatened.
"Very well, then," Skyler said. "So, you've finally realized that killing me is the only way you can beat me? Come on, give me your best shot!"
Skyler spread his arms and legs out in mid air, making himself look like a human starfish. Danny's eyes opened wide and his teeth started grinding together.
"You're just begging for it," Danny said with a mixed expression on his face; it was part-worried, part-angry, and part-not knowing what to do. Skyler was actually encouraging Danny to blast him. Apparently, Skyler didn't think Danny would have it in him to actually try to hurt and kill someone.
"Danny, you have to forget your kindness!" the masked man shouted up to Danny as the two adversaries were staring at each other. "You have to beat Skyler now, whether you want to or not!"
Danny continued passing looks down at the masked man and Skyler. The masked man was giving Danny an I-hope-he-does-what-I-want-him-to look, while Skyler was looking very cocky and sure of himself. He really didn't think Danny had the guts to actually go and kill a person.
Danny continued staring at both of him, but after a while, he even started shaking and sweating. This was possibly the hardest decision of his life: deciding to end someone's life or not.
Finally, Danny just burst. He fired a ray of ectoplasma at Skyler with such speed and velocity that Skyler was thrown backwards and stopped floating. He started falling towards the ground below and landed face-first on it. He stayed there and didn't move.
Danny gasped, taking in everything he just did. He looked at Skyler's motionless body on the ground, and thought he just did the one thing he thought he would never do: actually kill someone.
Danny slowly floated onto the ground with a shocked face. He looked at the masked man, who also seemed to be pretty shocked at Danny actually going through with it. Without even stopping for one second, he continued to slowly trot towards Skyler as he lay on the ground. When he was less than half a foot away, Danny got down on one knee and continued looking at his foe.
Out of the blue, Skyler launched up into the air and looked back, staring at Danny and the masked man with a face of complete shock and horror on it. Without saying another word, he flew off, presumably going as fast as he could.
The masked man walked over to Danny and stared off with him as they both watched Skyler run away.
"You know," Danny started, "when I thought I killed him, I was pretty upset with myself. But now that I know he isn't dead, I'm pretty upset about it. Why can't that guy just go to a mental institute or something and not have to make me take any more of his grief?"
"Calm down, Danny," the masked man said coolly. "Skyler now knows how powerful you are now. He won't come looking for trouble."
"That's good," Danny said, now sounding like he was out of breath.
"Actually, no it's not," the masked person said. "Now that Skyler knows that you aren't afraid to teach him a thing or two, he's not going to come looking for you now. That means if you're going to weaken Bhyrun's power, you're going to have to go looking for him now."
"Aw, man!" Danny groaned. "That's just great. I have absolutely no clue where he is. How am I supposed to find him if I don't even know where to start looking?"
"Why don't you go to the place where he got arrested?" the masked man suggested. "You know, at his science lab?"
"You know, that actually makes sense," Danny thought. "I mean, where else could he go without someone finding him? All right, let's head there now."
"Hold it!" the masked man said. "It's still light out. Skyler would be able to easily see us and send his entire fleet of Bhyspawn out to stop us. We're going to have to wait until it's dark out so Skyler will have a harder time detecting us."
"All right," Danny agreed.
So that's exactly what they did. The two of them waited until nightfall, and when it was too dark out to see much. Danny still had the address of Skyler's lab engraved in his mind from when his dad took him out to try to destroy the cloud about a day into their vacation.
In no time, Danny and the masked figure were standing outside the lab, crouching below a window. They looked in and saw that there were Bhyspawn patrolling all of the halls and doors. There was no way they could both get in without getting mangled.
"How are we going to get in?" Danny asked. "Even if one of us goes in as a distraction, that will only leave one person to deal with Skyler. Besides, security might be too tight even for that method."
"Well, we can't go and ask people to help us break into a science lab," the masked person said. "Wouldn't you be pretty terrified if some masked figure with a sword and a teenaged ghost asked them for help breaking into a mad scientist's lab with nasty looking creatures guarding every corner?"
"I know, I know," Danny admitted. "But that doesn't leave us a lot of options. There's no possible way then we could break into that lab and have us both make it out alive."
The two of them slumped on the grass outside Skyler's lab, disappointed that after figuring out where Skyler was hiding and that they would finish him once and for all, they couldn't even break into his lab.
After a long silence, something triggered in Danny's mind. The masked man looked at him with interest and saw Danny's face. Just by looking at his face, the masked figure could clearly see that several thoughts were pulsing through Danny's head and that he had hope the thoughts would work. His eyes gave the impression that they were formulating a plan to solve world hunger, and after a few seconds of thinking and planning things out, Danny's eyes lit up.
"Hey!" Danny yelled to the masked man. "I got an idea! I know how we can break into Skyler's lab, confuse the Bhyspawn and to even throw Skyler for a loop!"