Hello again, except for the slight change to the ending and the odd spell-check, Moss Royal gets credit for this chapter. But after this, it's all me!
Thanks to MoonrockBlink1772, for reviewing Chapter One. I'm happy to see that you enjoyed (what soon will be my) work.
And if you want some more good reads, might I advise WingsOfMorphius' new fic, 'Father of My Son' or imekitty's 'The Luckiest Girl in the World.'
Disclaimer: Butch owns DP; Gerry Conway and Al Milgrom created this chapter's villain. Mrs. Calvin and Brucey are Moss Royal's creations; I have his permission to use them.
"Valuing life is not weakness and disregarding it is not strength."
-Mirage from 'The Incredibles'
Danny ate his cereal very slowly the next morning, glad that it was a Saturday as his body was still aching and he hadn't gotten much sleep due to worrying about Captain Boomerang. He hadn't even noticed that he'd put orange juice into his Raisin Bran until it was too late.
"Ugh, gross! That's just...not bad, really," he reviewed, taking a few more spoonfuls.
"Just when I thought you couldn't get any weirder," muttered Jazz through her morning coffee and blueberry muffin.
"Humor me, Jazz. The last few days have been really rough. Although I guess I should be grateful that no ghost has bothered me besides Technus."
"Morning, kids!" Jack greeted in his usual, chipper, goofy manner.
"Morning, Dad. Morning, Mom," Jazz replied as Maddie entered the room in a much less ecstatic mood than her husband.
"How's it going with that Hanson crook?" asked Danny, glad he could get somewhat valuable info without arousing suspicion.
"Ugh, lousy," mumbled Maddie, "not a word or a rogue blink from him."
"But on the plus side, the police finally let us take out that punk's weapon for analysis," mentioned Jack.
"I thought the partner grabbed both of them when he ran off," said Danny.
"No, sweetie, he just got away with his and a good share of the money."
"And just take a looky at this, kids!" Jack cried excitedly, pulling out Hanson's ecto-gun, and holding it before them.
"Looks like an ordinary ecto-gun," rated Danny, "if you call that ordinary."
"Yeah, but look harder," Jack said, turning the gun so they could see the underside of it. A few inches ahead of the trigger lay a small, black doodad.
"A switch?" Danny and Jazz asked in unison.
"Mm-hmm, and would ya look at what it does!" Jack flipped the switch, causing the gun to emit a low buzzing sound, and the top of the gun opened up. The ecto-ammo disappeared into the gun and was replaced by a different type of ammo that slid into its slot perfectly. "BAZAII!" Jack fired the gun at his empty chair and a thin bluish-red beam fried a small, but clear hole through it.
"Jack!" "Dad!" came both Maddie and Jazz's voices.
"Hey, wait a minute," said Danny, looking over at the hole. "That wasn't an ecto-blast."
"That's right, son! It's a laser gun now; intended for people, instead of ghosts! It's two guns in one! HA HA!"
"But where did they get those things? We don't even have that sort of technology," observed Danny.
"That, Danny, is what we're trying to find out," stated Jack.
"After all, average thieves don't know how to make this sort of thing, so whoever they're working for must be pretty voiced on the subject," Maddie assumed.
"Oh boy," muttered Danny.
"All right, enough about the criminal workings," said Jazz, not wanting her little brother getting too worked up about evil scientists. "Let's see what's on TV."
Unfortunately, Jazz's intentions were snuffed out as Tiffany Snow came on with a new crime having just taken place.
"It seems that ghosts truly have become the least of our worries as Amity Park has recently become a hot spot for criminal activity. The works of Rob Hanson and his accomplice robbing Amity Bank this past Wednesday, and the so far unknown assailant and arson of the 24K Jewelry Store seem to have foreshadowed another attack. But was this attacker ghost or human? Lance Thunder has more."
The camera changed to Lance, standing beside a very terrified looking, elderly woman wearing a towel around her shivering body and a hot water bottle over her head. Danny instantly recognized her as the poor woman with the dog that Hanson had almost run over in the big chase.
"Tiffany. I'm here with Mrs. Calvin, the unfortunate victim of what appears to be the newest breed of criminal in our town. Mrs. Calvin, would you be able to tell us what happened?"
"Y-yes," she chattered, appearing to be on the verge of tears. "I-I was taking my little dog, B-Brucey, for our m-morning walk. I was g-going to pick up s-some more dog food f-for him. We had just crossed the street that c-connected t-to the grocery store, when-when she came-came out of n-nowhere. She walked up t-to us, with this hideous, h-horrible grin on her f-face. She d-didn't say anything; she just-just raised her hand t-to us, and the next thing I-I know...the-there's ice! Ice everywhere! M-my feet were frozen t-to the sp-pot. And Brucey, h-he ran up to that-that monster, and s-started barking at her t-to go away and leave us alone! And s-she-she j-just laughed at him and then she-she..."
The tears Mrs. Calvin had been holding back broke lose and she just cried out and wept in pain. She didn't need to finish the sentence, though; the camera showed it. And every Fenton, as did many other viewers, I'm sure, gasped at what they saw.
Brucey, the small, loyal dog that just wanted to protect its mistress, was frozen solid in jagged ice. Lifeless and paused in the moment of barking at its foe.
"Mrs. Bruce?" asked Lance. "I have no idea how hard this must be, but if you could describe this villain to the people at home..."
"O-of course," she pressed on through sniffles and shivers. "I'll never f-forget her face, as l-long as I live, n-never. Her skin was p-pale, deathly p-pale; her hair was a d-dark blue a-and short and w-was m-matted down right against her-her head. S-she wore blue gloves and b-boots and some sort of swimsuit or j-jumpsuit or s-something that ended just below her sh-sh-shoulders with w-white ice m-markings around the ch-chest. Sh-she was smallish, t-too. Not tiny, but st-still s-s-small. But h-her eyes-her eyes! The pupils a-and irises were completely bla-black, no c-colour or an-anything! And the rest o-of it, where the whites o-of the eyes are sup-supposed to be, they-they were all b-blue! She couldn't be human! She's some sort of d-demon! No person could ever kill my-" Mrs. Calvin stopped again as her sobs interrupted her and she turned her back to the camera.
"A demon to be sure," agreed Lance. "Police, firemen and even other concerned citizens are hunting for this force-freezing monster, intent on making her pay for this atrocity. And in an earlier conversation with Mrs. Calvin, she was asked several questions to determine this woman's 'living position'. Although she displayed powerful blasts of ice, and certain physical characteristics, there was no other evidence to confirm her state. Now two questions lie before us? Is this creature human? And where will she strike next? This...is Lance Thunder."
Just like a few days before, the rest of the news became pointless, tuned-out racket as the Fenton family shook their heads in sympathy and pain.
"That poor woman," whispered Maddie, looking not far away from crying herself. "She must be so scared..."
"Come on, Maddie," Jack ordered, rising from his chair.
"Come on where?"
"We're goin' out there to find that frozen freak, and bring her to justice! Ghost or no ghost, I'll be damned if we're just gonna sit here while something like that walks the streets!"
"Good idea, Jack," she said, smiling warmly at him. "Kids, if you see that...thing, hide down in the lab and call us at the Fenton GAV. We're headin' out!" She and Jack both pulled their jumpsuit hoods over their faces and headed off to grab whatever Fenton gear they could use.
"I can't believe anyone could do something like that, ghost or not," mumbled Jazz.
"Jazz, if anyone asks, I'm up in my room," Danny said, running for the stairs.
"What? Danny, no! It's too dangerous!" Jazz knew all too well what her brother planned to do.
"Yeah, it is. But if this thing's a ghost, then it's my responsibility. And even if it isn't a ghost, I still have to stop it. Besides, I've faced ice wielding bad guys before."
"Yes, but that was a miserable, pajama-wearing ghost who wanted friends. This is some jumpsuited psychopath who from the sound of it, just wants to hurt things."
"And that's why I'm going." And before Jazz could say anything else, he phased through the ceiling. Looking over his town, he concentrated on the ectoplasm surging through his body, and two familiar white halos appeared and completed his transformation. "I've got some hunting to do."
Jazz watched him fly off through the nearest window, and then rushed down to the lab. She opened the Weapons' Vault, grabbed the Fenton Foamer and one of her Mom's blue hazmat suits and rushed out the door after Danny.
'You said that as if you actually believed I wouldn't follow you,' she scoffed to herself.
"Come on, where are you?" Danny asked in exasperation. He'd been searching for more than an hour and hadn't found anything. "People like that don't just up and disappear...Well, if she's a ghost she can, I guess."
He was about to head back and check another part of town when he was hit from behind by a mountainous pillar of ice, knocking him flat on the sidewalk below. He slowly raised his head to find the woman that perfectly matched Mrs. Calvin's description. The hair, the eyes, the clothes all fit. And she was standing on a rising path of ice that she was making with her hands.
He waited for the chill and the well known, blue breath to float out from his mouth, but there was nothing aside the slight chill from the ice that had hit him.
"So you're not a ghost," he confirmed.
"Sorry, Dan doll, but I'm a hundred percent alive, 'least on the outside, anyway." She blasted more ice from her hands to finish a path to the ground in front of Danny.
"Then what are you? And- wait, you know me, too?" Thinking back to Captain Boomerang's initial reaction to him.
"Kinda hard not to notice a ghost boy hero when just about every other ghost in this town is evil and destructive, now is it? And as to your first question, that depends on your standing. Some call me a mutant or a gifted individual; some say I'm a weather bender or an ice queen, but most: most just call me a freak."
"I wonder why," he said sarcastically, rising to face her. "You're not exactly popular around here, lady."
"Why, because I fragged some old bat's precious mutt?"
"Yes, that's it," he replied, trying to keep his control. "You sound beat up about it."
"Death is death, Dan doll; doesn't matter who does it." Sick of talking, she shot an ice blast at Danny.
He went intangible to evade it, but when he felt a strange sensation in his feet, he looked down and saw that his feet were freezing to the sidewalk while he was still intangible. "Dah!" He fired a ghost ray at his feet to break the ice and became tangible again. He glared at the woman, who had stopped freezing at him and was just smirking unemotionally at his reaction.
"How did you do that? It should've gone right through me!"
"You should listen more closely, doll. Like I said, death is death, so therefore, life is life. Human or ghost; solid or otherwise, I can freeze it. You're just the same as any other person to me." She fired another blast at him; this time he dodged it and took to the air. He fired a ghost ray at her which she just canceled out with her ice.
"I'm Killer Frost, Dan doll, and I'm the last thing you're gonna see!"
She created a new ice path and blasted it up to Danny so she was level with him, and fired another blast. Danny expanded his midsection to leave a huge hole for the blast to go through, and then sped off further over town with Killer Frost hot, though not literally, on his heels; firing ice blast after ice blast after him. As he zigged and zagged to avoid them, he had to reluctantly commend Frost for her skill. She was able to keep firing blasts while simultaneously making more ice for her walkway (or slideway, in this case) and keeping her balance. And as he weaved from different blasts, he noticed that they were drastically upsetting life below them, big surprise.
The fact that people had stopped what they were doing to watch them was one thing, and stray blasts from Frost were hitting everything from mailboxes to Volkswagens.
"I've gotta find a way to stop her quick," he thought aloud, when an idea came to him. Without warning, he flew down below where Frost had already made an ice path and blasted at it, causing it to crumble, so the path Frost was on fell. Thinking quickly, she jumped off her current ice support and fired another ice blast to create a pillar for her to land on.
As she regained her balance, she locked her eyes on to Danny just before he punched her square in the nose. The force knocked her off her pillar and sent her plummeting to the street below. Using all the speed he could muster, Danny flew down under her and caught her, and brought the two down to earth.
"I think that's enough," stated Danny sternly.
"Really? I don't!" Taking advantage of his favor, she blasted Danny in the face, freezing almost all of his head.
"Oh, great," he muttered in a muffled tone, and fired a ghost ray at his own head to shatter the ice. He looked back to Killer Frost, who was just smiling and shaking her head in mock disappointment.
"You really think you can stop me, don't you? Sorry, but you can't. 'Cause unlike you, I can keep this up forever, and when you tire out, you and every other living thing in this town'll be in a frozen tomb!"
"Why?"
"Death makes me happy. Why's never been a question."
"Sorry you feel that way. Then I've got no other choice." Flying right at her, he went intangible, planning to overshadow her, but when he met her body, he just bounced right off her and fell backwards.
"What was that?"
"Insurance, in case you tried that possession trick. My suit emits a low-level radiation that'll keep you from any...intimate contact with me. And now-" Before she could finish, they both heard a small buzzing and the next thing they knew, Frost was covered in ecto-goo.
"Yuck! What is this crud!" she yelled, trying to get it out of her face. Danny looked to his left and saw a thin figure in a blue hazmat dash away down the street.
"Jazz," he muttered. "Have to thank her later, but right now-"
He raised back to his feet, charged a ghost ray into his hand and punched Frost in the nose again; the force of the blow causing her to lose her balance and fall back in an unconscious mess. Danny was so relieved that it was over that he didn't even hear the bystanders cheering him. He looked around and saw at least thirty people were there, chanting his name in unison.
"PHAN-TOM! PHAN-TOM! PHAN-TOM!"
The cheers were soon blocked out though when police cars and the Fenton GAV pulled up. Jack and Maddie were out instantaneously and surveyed the scene. Well, Maddie did anyway...
"GHOST!" roared Jack, pulling out the Fenton Bazooka and taking aim.
"Hey, wait!" a voice cried, and a teenage boy about Jazz's age stepped up. "He just saved our butts! He stopped that psycho ice witch!"
"Yeah, he's a hero!" another voice cried, and the crowd broke back out into their cheers.
Danny couldn't help but smile with pride as he flew off. His people were cheering him on; Killer Frost was being arrested and nobody had gotten hurt in the fight. But there was still one more thing he needed to do...
Mrs. Calvin sat on her couch, drinking a small cup of tea. She looked to the cushion to her right, where her little Brucey used to sit and lick gingerly at her hands for no particular reason. She missed that little guy. She'd gotten calls all day from everyone to the mayor to people on their way to work who wanted to say how sorry they were for her lost. It touched her; really, it did, but it didn't really fill the emptiness inside her or put out the fear that had been started by that monstrous woman.
"Mrs. Calvin?" a youthful voice asked. She nearly spilled her tea as the voice had come out of the blue. She looked up to see a young man floating before her, with a strange black suit and glowing green eyes.
"Who are you? How d-did you get in here?" she asked, moving further into the couch.
"It's all right; I'm not gonna hurt you. I just wanted to let you know that we caught her."
"What?"
"The woman who attacked you, Killer Frost; she's been stopped and she's going to jail. You're safe now. Just wanted to let you know so you'd be sure," he said and floated towards the window.
"Oh, one more thing: If she ever escapes from prison, I'll be there to stop her, I promise."
The old woman just stared at him in response. He smiled grimly and then phased through the window. She looked after him as he glided over the city. Small tears fell from her eyes and she gently smiled.
"Thank you..."
A familiar Aussie gentleman sat in his warehouse lair, pondering over his recent brush with the Ghost Boy. He knew the kid had survived, that was a given, and although a bit wet behind the ears, he posed a decent challenge for the Captain. Maybe even more of a challenge than his legendary Central City opponent.
Hell, why not take a stab at him? With a little initiative, this punk could do things that'd put the Fastest Man Alive to shame; that was certainly a better use of his time than a wise-cracking speedster. Now...he had to start planning; he could kill the kid himself...but what fun was there in that!
"You've never been a selfish one, George," he complimented himself. "Why not split the fun?"
But who to call? Mardon and Dillon were both pushing up daisies in outer space; served 'em right for trusting nutcases like Luthor and Grodd. Snart was still in jail and Scudder had…gone to pieces after the last run-in with their arch-foe.
He could call Jesse, but no, he wasn't about to put his good faith in a crook who needed pills every six hours just to think straight. Besides, in his right mind or not, Jesse was about as weak as a supervillain could get.
The Captain needed someone who not only shared his 'interests', but was at least mildly competent; skilled in whatever trade he or she had gone into.
That was when ol' Boomer got the perfect guy in mind. He didn't travel in his circles; hell, the two of them didn't even share the same postal code, but he'd seen some of this guy's work and hey, if he could cause problems for the Man of Steel, then why not the Teen of Ectoplasm?
He slid his chair into his desk and reached for the phone, immediately dialing up a Metropolis area code. The phone rang twice before it was answered.
"Hello, who, may I ask, is calling?" asked an eerily calm, rather unnerving voice.
"Winslow, you l'il tinkerer! Have I got a deal for you!"
If you're a DC Comics fan, then you might know who 'Winslow' is, if not then you'll just have to wait. But I will fill you in on Captain Boomerang's aforementioned, rejected partner options:
Mark Mardon-Weather Wizard
Roscoe Dillon-The Top
Leonard Snart-Captain Cold
Sam Scudder-Mirror Master
and James Jesse-The Trickster
If you have any requests for a DC Comics villain to appear (including Teen Titans, Justice League, etc.) send it with a review. I'd relish posting some evil favourites!