A/N: Yes! I finally have Reality Trip in my possession and some friends are coming by in a few hours to watch it with me and pig out on sugary things! (We'll miss you, mrit, but Akoya and Epyon, you'd better be there! I bought stuff for s'mores. :D) I am so looking forward to it. I had to watch like twenty episodes of Fairly Oddparents last night to stop myself from putting on Reality Trip and watching it alone, heh heh. Was really too tired to write, but managed to finish off this chapter, which I'd had in the works for a few days. And still isn't as long as I'd have preferred it to be.

Thanks to conan98002, Annabelle Carter, shadow929, silvermoonphantom, luv2bamom, Lt. Commander Richie, dPhantoMfreak, Alucard Hemlock, AkoyaMizuno, Emunah, Jenna Dax, Phantom of a Rose, Jimmy the Gothic Egg, SilverstarsEbonyskies, starfruit-22, Leppers, passing4insane, dArkliTe-sPirit, animeobsessed3191, Anomaly25 (and thank you so much for your comments on Icebreaker! I'll write a proper review reply later), Soni, dragonbonez, Crossover Fiend (ah, we're not quite full circle yet, stay tuned!), mrit, L-ange-Sans-Ailes, Anne Camp aka Obi-quiet, and HAlFa34 for their reviews last chapter! I realized after the first alert came in, that I should probably be barricading myself inside, preparing for the "You killed Danny! T.T" mob. Yeek.

Fortunately, most people seemed to be too much in shock to actually make threats. :D

Estrelas

Chapter 25

by Shimegami-chan

Danny swept Sam up into his arms and they took to the air, slowly, the scene outside the hedges and gate coming into view. The Specter Speeder was long gone, and though both Penelope and Tucker's cars remained, the firefighters, policemen and medical units had made a beeline for the destroyed guest house, unaware of the solid evidence the two vehicles could provide them with.

"I have to get rid of the cars," Danny said, sighing. "Before anybody figures out who owns them."

"How?" Sam wondered.

"I'll bring them to Tucker's kid's place. I hope that's where he took Jazz, at least. As long as I take them one at a time, I can make them go invisible until I get onto a main road, I think."

"...You can drive?"

He just glared at her.

Sam frowned. "Okay...I guess I'll go inside and face the music, maybe I can do something to keep the suspicion off of us. Or at least find out what they saw." She pointed at the window she'd used to sneak out of the house. "That's my room, there."

Danny nodded assent and flew through the wall into the room she'd indicated, setting Sam gently on her feet on the black rug. He accepted the Thermos from her and turned to go, and she reached to catch his arm, but her fingers slid right through him. "Danny--"

"Yeah?"

"You'll come back for me, right?" Sam couldn't quite explain why she was so afraid he'd just disappear if he didn't come right back. She supposed it was only her overactive imagination. Why shouldn't he come back? Hadn't Spectra confirmed it - he liked her, maybe even loved her?

If that was true, Sam wanted him to know that she wanted to see him again.

And maybe Danny had been wondering the same. His face broke into a shy smile, and he nodded wordlessly before disappearing back through the wall. Sam watched him go before running to the window, but already he was invisible, and she drew back, preparing herself for the chaos she was sure to find downstairs. She removed her skirt, tank top, boots and leggings and brought them into her bathroom, throwing them into the tub and running hot water to wash away as much of the green foam as possible, then used a wet facecloth to wipe it away from her face, neck, arms and legs. A quick shampoo in the sink took care of the gunk in her hair, which had been hardening like glue.

Throwing on a fresh shirt, purple skirt, arm and leg warmers and her boots, Sam wrung the water out of the clothes in the bathtub and stuffed them at the bottom of the laundry pile, praying that once she'd been caught and taken in, nobody would find the items and use them as proof of her involvement in the ghost fight. She pulled her hair into a loose ponytail and took a final look around the room. It was time to check out the scene downstairs, and if she couldn't return to her room, everything that could be used against her would be hidden already, and Danny would track her down before things got too bad. She hoped.

Unlocking the door, Sam peered down one end of the hall and then the other, taking a deep breath as she smoothed her hair back one last time. She left the door slightly ajar and stepped into the hallway, wincing inwardly at the loud clunking of her boots on the hardwood floor.

The hallway ended at the top of a large staircase that opened into the foyer, and Sam was unsurprised to see that both the butler and one of the maids were peering through the windows on either side of the front door. What was unexpected was the reaction when the maid - a pretty girl barely older than Sam herself - became conscious of the sound of Sam's approach and turned around excitedly to greet her. "Miss Manson! There's quite a commotion going on out there, just look!"

The butler, Gar, added, "It seems as though the guest house just caught fire. We heard a terrible sound, and when I looked out to check, it had practically fallen apart. Jeanne called the fire department, but I suspect there's no saving it now."

Sam waited for them to continue, to say "And we saw you out there fighting a monster!" but the accusation didn't come. Instead Jeanne simply moved out of Sam's way so the girl could clearly see the firefighters hosing down the remains of the house. Mouth dry, Sam managed to stutter, "Where are my parents?"

"They've just gone out to have a look at it," Gar replied. "You seemed to be asleep when we knocked, so we thought it best to leave you be."

"Oh, of course." Relief flooded through Sam - maybe they hadn't been seen after all. The area where the fight had taken place was easily viewable from many of the mansion's windows, but just barely out of sight from the front door area, thanks to the foliage. Once again Sam found herself mentally thanking the landscaper for his excellent placement of trees.

Of course, nothing's ever that easy, surely they'll somehow trace the destruction of the house back to Penelope...

But how?

Ghosts don't leave fingerprints. Ecto-blasts don't leave...well, what cop OUTSIDE of Amity Park is going to say "this is obviously the work of a ghost"? Without proof, they've got nothing. And while my parents are going to jump to the conclusion that it had something to do with Danny, why would anyone else? Nobody's going to believe them.

And then there's the matter of Danny's body...will they ever know who, exactly, died in there?

Sam turned away from the window. "Jeanne, I'm going out shortly, and I don't know how long I'll be. Please let my parents know, okay?"

"Certainly, Miss Manson."

"Thanks." Sam gave both maid and butler a short wave and jogged back up the stairs and up to her room. She shut the door behind her, scanning for any sign of Danny, and finding none, sat down at her desk, opening up a notebook to a blank page.

Dear Mom and Dad,

I may be gone for a while, and

I'm sorry we can't seem to come

to an understanding.

Please don't worry about me.

I love you both.

-Sam

Satisfied with the simplicity of the letter - just enough information for her parents to grasp the situation, but not enough to help them or anyone else find her - she stuffed it in an envelope, wrote "Mom and Dad" on the front, and turned it over inconspicuously on the desk. When they realized she wasn't coming back, they'd find it quickly enough.

Sam then set about packing a few items to take with her; dumping the contents of her spider backpack onto her bed, she found that there were only a few things she thought she'd really need. First was the book, of course, and alongside it as many changes of clothes as she could fit. She threw the wet items she'd worn to the fight into a shopping bag and stuffed them in alongside her purse, then slid the clasp shut with a final click. Finished.

Sam was thus sitting on her bed, wearing the backpack, when Danny returned from dropping off the cars. "Hey there. How'd it go...?"

"They didn't see anything," Sam confirmed. "So let's just get out of here before they start wondering why Penelope didn't show, okay?"

"Uh...about that, Sam." Danny's expression was unreadable. "You know and I know that I can't take you with me. Not after...everything that's happened."

"Danny Fenton." Her voice was cold as steel. She reached for his hand, and the ghost boy wisely became solid and allowed her to touch him. "Do you think, for some reason, that 'everything that's happened' is going to make me give up on you?"

He looked confused for a brief moment, and then shook his head slowly. "I guess not, but circumstances have changed. I'm back like...this..." he gestured at himself with his free hand, "and on our way out of Amity we were still hearing news broadcasts that every hunter in town was after me. I can't go back there, at least not yet. And where I'm going, I really shouldn't take you."

"Where?" she asked curiously.

"Uh." Danny rubbed the back of his neck, looking embarrassed. "I was actually thinking about going into the Ghost Zone, you know, maybe setting up a place for myself in case I needed to stay. I need to talk to someone in there as soon as I can."

"Then I'll come with you," Sam said determinedly.

Danny shook his head. "You can't, I just sent Jazz back to Amity Park in the Specter Speeder. I was going to fly there."

"Why can't I fly with you?"

"You'd actually want to?" He smiled wryly. "I got the feeling that you didn't like intangibility much. And the Ghost Zone is pretty dangerous - they don't much like humans or Earthly items coming in there."

"I don't, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't do it if I had to. I'm already a crack shot with that Thermos thing of yours, I can take care of myself."

Danny laughed, and the tension between them broke abruptly. "You really aren't going to take no for an answer, are you?"

"Sorry, no."

"Okay." He tried to look serious, but the smile was still tugging at the corners of his mouth. "I guess you can come with me, as long as you agree to a few things."

Sam grinned. "Let's hear them."

"One, you let your parents know that you're leaving. I'm not going to be blamed for kidnapping you."

"Done. I handled that while I was waiting for you." She thumbed in the direction of the door. "Obviously, I wasn't letting you go off alone."

"Typical," he said, good-naturedly. "Two, when I go to see Vlad, I have to talk to him alone about something important. Please don't ask any questions about it. If things work out positively, I'll tell you."

"Done."

Danny exhaled loudly. "And that's it. Are you ready?"

"Ready as I'll ever be." Sam glanced one last time over her shoulder at the desk, the letter, the door. She'd be back eventually...probably.

The flight back to Amity Park was a short one, and Sam and Danny exchanged few words during it, ostensibly because Sam seemed to be enjoying the view. In truth, she wasn't entirely certain what to say. The scene with Spectra, though they had come away victorious, had put a dark new spin on everything. She hesitated to even ask how Jazz and Tucker were doing, not wanting to bring up anything Danny didn't want to talk about yet.

Danny himself looked extremely conflicted. Sam had snuck glances at his face throughout their journey to the Ghost Zone, and he'd been distracted, deep in thought and often frowning. It was so much harder to pretend that nothing had changed between them when he was so obviously torn. And why shouldn't he be? Sam had shut her eyes tightly, and only opened them once she was confident she wouldn't just break down.

"This is it," Danny said once they'd reached the Ghost Portal beneath Jazz's apartment. Sam wanted to ask why they were using Jazz's portal instead of the one beneath the former FentonWorks, but held back, conscious of the way they entered the house intangibly from the back, diving through the floor of the porch. It seemed he didn't want to talk to Jazz any more than Sam did, so if they could avoid an encounter with anyone, even an invisible one, she'd be happier.

The basement was lit only by Danny's ghostly glow, casting eerie shadows into the corners. He flipped a switch that flooded the spacious room with light, bringing to her attention a huge metal door outlined in an octagonal frame. She stared at it, and then at the huge electronic system alongside it. "And you say your parents built one of these in the sixties?"

"Sure," Danny shrugged, wiping dust off the console with a rag. "Keep in mind that Mom and Dad were geniuses. Except for when it came to common sense, in Dad's case. Because of what they did, they had a lot of technology available to them that wasn't publicly common or sometimes even known about. Kind of helped that the government wanted to keep the ghosts in as confined an area as possible, so my parents' projects were always well-funded."

That's a big change from the state of the city now, when most people don't even want to admit the ghosts exist, Sam thought sourly. Like her father had.

Danny continued, oblivious to Sam's inner monologue. "This is the Ghost Portal Jazz and I built while I was living with her. It's pretty much the same as the one my parents made, right down to the Fenton genetic lock. We keep that turned off most of the time though, in case of emergency.

Like now, Sam thought as Danny threw the switch to allow them entrance. The portal yawned open, teeming with bright green energy that seemed almost alive, drifting counter clockwise into itself. It looked as though it was some kind of alien creation, not something that had been designed and put together by an elderly female psychologist and her teenage brother.

Danny held out his hand. "I hope you're not wearing anything electronic. Stay close to me, don't let go unless I tell you to, and don't make eye contact with any ghost you might see. Clear?"

"Crystal." Sam deposited her backpack on the floor outside the portal. Instead of carrying her bridal-style, as he had before, Danny wrapped one arm around her waist and rose slightly into the air, extending his floating abilities to her merely with his touch. Sam took a deep breath and nodded.

He flew forward into the gate with her in tow, smiling slightly at the awed gasp that escaped Sam's throat. The Ghost Zone was always an impressive sight at first glance (providing you hadn't already been attacked by something) and for Sam, whose love of the bizarre often had to be concealed from those around her, it was especially breathtaking. Her eyes sought to take in all of it at once while still obeying Danny's instructions. The phantom just grinned and took them further into the netherworld, thumbing the portal shut behind them via a remote control. "Vlad's place isn't far away from this portal. Actually, we were there earlier this afternoon, me and Jazz and Valerie, when your parents were kidnapping you."

Sam tore her attention away from the swirling landscape. "Valerie too?"

"Long story." Danny sighed. "I ran into Val right after I left your place and I ended up telling her my secret. She didn't believe me. That's what got me...ah...well, I didn't have a chance to tell you about that."

"She took away your ghost half," Sam supplied. "Tucker told me."

"Oh." He winced. Probably because, Sam realized, he felt bad about getting her hopes up. She tried to think of something noncommittal to reply with, but Danny continued before she could find the right words. "At least we're on good terms now. Val seemed to genuinely want to fix the problem, once she realized that I was who I said I was."

"Problem?" Sam echoed.

Danny winced again. "Well, at the time, we were worried about who was going to take care of Spectra and Bertrand if I couldn't go ghost. I thought that maybe Vlad would know how to reverse the effects of the weapon, because he knows about that kind of stuff, and..." he trailed off, frowning.

Sam could tell by the look on her companion's face that there was something he wasn't telling her, and he was speaking slowly enough that she was sure he was giving each phrase careful thought before it left his mouth. She had an inkling of what the issue was, too, and decided to come right out and ask before he had the chance to try and "protect" her by obscuring the truth further. 'That's really the reason why you wanted to be a half-ghost again?"

"What?" Danny slowed in mid-flight, his face carefully impassive. He was much better at concealing his emotions when he was a ghost than when he was human, she noticed. It probably had something to do with his body reacting faster than he could really think about how he should react to something; it'd probably make him a poker king if he were so inclined, but at that point it was becoming a huge inconvenience to Sam. For all she knew, each of his expressions were carefully chosen to match whatever story he wished to present.

Sam's face was clearly betraying her, no matter how much she tried to conceal her thoughts. "Spectra said something back there that made me start to wonder. She said she could feel you regretting something. Did you...not want to be fully human after all?"

Danny sighed and Sam got the feeling she'd asked the right question. "Please don't take anything that witch says at face value. Yeah, I was regretting something, a lot of things actually. She was kind of right. I was upset about losing my ghost half, and I know I really should have just been thankful. At the time." There was something strange in his voice; a rushed, confused quality . Sam realized that Danny probably didn't know what he wanted or thought anymore. But again he continued before she could speak, hurrying, as though he'd been the one to do wrong. "I barely even remember a time when I didn't have these powers. When Danny Phantom wasn't me. What am I supposed to think when they're suddenly taken away, even when I'd been wishing for so long to be normal again? I just wanted to be able to grow old the normal way, like Jazz and Tucker. I wanted to not have to hide from anyone. I hadn't really counted on having to give up my ghost powers to get that, I suppose." He avoided her gaze. "Sam...I know you were probably happy when you found out I was fully human again. I'm sorry."

"Oh no, Danny," Sam cried, her eyes widening in astonishment. "Don't tell me you're feeling guilty about that!"

"Shouldn't I be?" he murmured.

"No," she replied firmly. "I understand exactly what you're saying and I respect that. Your ghost side is a part of who you are...you can't be expected to give up on it just like that. Don't make your decisions based on me, because I want you to be happy. Even now...even now, I'm glad to have you. You're still Danny, whether you're ghost, or human, or halfa."

And then, his face assumed an expression she wasn't quite sure how to interpret. It looked as though it started as a smile, then changed to a frown, then got caught in-between, brow furrowed and teeth gritted. Sam blinked twice, confused. "Uh...Danny?"

His eyes cleared and the strange look vanished as quickly as inexplicably as it had appeared. "Well...I'm glad you think so. I really didn't think anyone was going to understand why I'd be upset about something that seemed like such a good deal."

"Yeah..." She couldn't explain it, but something in Sam had also felt the loss of Danny Phantom, and mourned for him when she thought him gone. It probably had to do with the way they'd met, and the qualities that didn't quite carry over to his human self, like the luminescent green eyes, the slight echo to his voice, and the lightness in his step. Even the chill of his ethereal body, that crept across her torso now like a silk scarf, she knew that she would miss.

The problem was, now Sam was experiencing the loss of Danny Fenton instead, and that didn't feel very good either.

-to be continued…