One more chapter until chapter 20!
Chapter 19: The Coming Storm
Clockwork was locked in a small, inescapable cage in his own castle. Karma was the one to trap him.
"Karma, this has to stop! You could destroy the human world before the rift destroys it! You just let those ant ghosts through, and there was nothing coincidental about that!"
Karma kept looking through the time window, which can only see the present time because of the rift. "You seem to forget that I can create coincidences. I made the ant queen just happen to hear the plan. Maybe she overheard a conversation from a couple of Tyzax's soldiers. Maybe she decided that it could be a good idea to get to the human world. Anything can be a coincidence, you just need to think of it that way."
"You're using a child in your plan to save the world, just to spite me! I know Danny Phantom is under my protection, but that doesn't mean you can use his daughter out of spite!"
"She chose to save the world! She chose to hide her powers! It was her own decision!"
Clockwork just got angrier. "How much was that her own choice? You told her that she was the only one that could save the world! A lie right there. You manipulated her subconscious, made her choose to give up information which could have got her to the goal immediately!"
Karma smiled. "Don't worry, the ant ghosts landed in Antarctica. They won't get to human civilization any time soon. All the major cities have ghost shields anyways. I'll try to get a portal to suck up Heather to the Far Frozen, ok? Maybe he'll have some vital information..."
"You're walking on thin ice, Karma. You're lucky I'm locked in here, or else I would-"
"You would what?" Karma interrupted. "I trapped you, the self-proclaimed most powerful ghost of all time, in that cage, with my bare, pure-energy hands. You can't do anything."
Clockwork said nothing. He didn't want to admit it, but Karma was right. He was powerless, and he would continue to be until the rift was sealed. He couldn't tell Danny or Heather anything about what they needed to do... but at least Karma was going to get to the end goal eventually, even if it took months. There was no other power that could help.
Tuesday morning, the day after the laptop and ant ghost invasion incidents
The sun was shining, the birds were singing, and Heather was sleeping. In fact, she was sleeping right through her alarm.
The alarm automatically turned off after ten minutes, though. And it wasn't until thirty minutes after that when she was woken up.
Knock! Knock! Knock!"Heather, school starts in ten minutes!"
Heather finally woke up from her mom's yelling. She finally felt well-rested, after fourteen hours of sleep. She was finally in a good mood.
Then, she looked at the clock.
8:20 A.M.
She really did have ten minutes.
She put on some new clothes, ran downstairs, grabbed a piece of toast, and ran outside, eating toast with one hand and putting on her jacket with another. She ran towards the school, but she knew she couldn't make it in time. She still ran.
But then she remembered. She could fly! So, while still running, she looked around to make sure she was alone, then morphed to her ghost form. She leaped into the air and flew. She flew over houses, skipping the longer walk through neighborhoods and crosswalks.
In less than two minutes, Heather got to school. She flew straight at the wall of her first class at very high speed. She went intangible, then once she was through the wall, went human. Luckily, it was a large art room with tables instead of desks, so when she crashed into a table she only nudged it.
The teacher ran over to see what the big clunk was.
"Am I late?" Heather asked.
Mrs. Lena was speechless. She looked at the wall, then at the nudged and slightly dented table, and Heather. "Uhh, the five minute bell hasn't even rung yet. How did you... What did you..." She was speechless.
"Hey, best not worry about it." Heather pulled the table to its original spot, and set up the chairs that were knocked over back to their original position. She walked to the far back corner seat, which was her seat, and sat down.
The five minute bell, which was the bell meaning school starts in five minutes, rang. and the rest of her day went well. For the most part.
Besides the three hundred individually-wrapped cookies Heather completely forgot she had and had to hide, one other thing went wrong.
Heather, Alex, and Ray were at the high school after school ended, selling the cookies, like they originally planned to do the day before. They were doing well, and many of the cookies were sold. They had a lot left, but the first bagful was almost gone.
When you have ghost powers, you should never expect a peaceful moment, because when you think everything is fine, you'll see a ghost portal in the distance.
That ghost portal in the distance was spotted by Heather. Of course, the trio went to the portal to investigate. It was quite high in the sky, but luckily, it was right above a secluded alley behind the high school.
Heather went ghost and flew up to it, then stuck her hand near and almost touched it, but didn't. "Ok, boys. Shall we enter? I say we have about thirty seconds before it closes."
Alex, who was kind of fascinated by the ghost zone, voted yes.
Ray was a bit more skeptical of it, but also voted yes.
Heather picked up the boys and flew them into the portal with her.
The first thing they noticed was the cold air. It was absolutely freezing, when the rest of the ghost zone usually felt like a mildly chilly late autumn day. Heather looked down, and the coldness was justified.
A huge island, covered in ice mountains, was below them. They flew close, investigating the island.
Out of nowhere, a glowing net trapped the trio and dragged them to a valley in the mountains.
The trio struggled, but they couldn't break free. Heather caught a glance at a monster holding the net they were contained in. It looked like a yeti dressed in a white army-like uniform, and it was examining it's catch.
Heather didn't know why, but for some reason the monster freed them from the net.
"Are you related to Danny Phantom?" The monster asked. He didn't sound angry. He was clearly curious.
"Uh, yeah, I'm actually his daughter."
The beast smiled in excitement. "My name is Avalanche. You must come with me to see Frostbite immediately!" He ran off through the valley.
"Wait, where are we? Who's Frostbite?" Asked Ray.
Avalanche was already out of earshot. Alex shrugged and went running after him, and Heather and Ray followed.
They soon got to a city in a huge clearing in the center of the mountain range. The houses were made out of blue stone, with windows made of ice. It was a small city, with no large buildings other than a huge castle in the center of the city. They ran through a few blocks of houses, then stopped at a street corner.
Avalanche took a device that looked similar to a smartphone out of his shirt pocket and texted someone. A few minutes later, a silver, hovering van came to a stop at the corner.
"Come in, you guys!" Avalanche prompted.
"Don't they always tell you not to get in a stranger's van?" Alex said, only half-joking.
Heather looked into the van, seeing the driver wearing the same uniform as Avalanche and a passenger with a similar uniform but in a navy blue. "Well, they look legit. We got nothing better to do." She hopped in, and so did Alex and Ray.
The inside of the van had the driver's and passenger's seat facing forward like an average van back on Earth, but the seats behind them were against the walls, facing the van's center. There was another yeti sitting next to Avalanche, and the trio sat across from them. The door closed automatically and the van started moving. The yeti in the blue uniform tossed three thick blankets into the back seats, and the trio wrapped themselves with them. They were nice and warm, as if they were fresh out of the dryer.
The second yeti introduced himself. "I am Commander Iceclaw. You've already met Lieutenant Avalanche. Welcome to the Far Frozen. You are just what we need right now. We are taking you to the Castle of Artifacts, where Lord Frostbite will brief you on a very important matter."
"Does it involve the rift and stuff? Because if this is about stopping that it would be very helpful," Ray mentioned.
Iceclaw gave a quick nod. "We know of a possible way to stop it. It's dangerous, but we know you can do it. Once we get to the castle, we'll tell you all about it."
I hope you enjoyed! Things are about to go down...
