Chapter 14 - One Makes a Difference
A/N: Wow...I really got mixed reviews for the last chapter...(I was just reading them). Oh well, I guess that if I decide to take a risk in some certain direction, an author is bound to end up with things like that...
Thanks for the reviews...seriously, they make any author's day worthwhile.
Chapter 14 has arrived!
The ray of light was fading fast from his line of vision, as he screamed out her name from the shadows as he was traveling backwards...
"VALERIE!"
But it was already too late...Danny was falling...falling into another life...
The light of the world had completely disappeared from sight now...he was reaching, grabbing, but there was no use...he had already separated from his body...the one that Valerie had finally came to know...
He was aghast...in her face, he could see the truth that had been placed inside of her...
It was what he had always wanted...but he would never reach it...
Because of the choice he had made...
He never thought that this would never happen...but now it was, and he would never end up living it...
It was all hopeless...this was the decision he had made...
There was no reversing it.
He closed his eyes...he might as well just be surprised from the place he'd end up...it was going to be the Ghost Zone, most likely...he just wanted it to be quick...
However, something was wrong...it seemed that the wind passing by his face suddenly stopped...
...In fact, he was...
...breathing?
He opened his eyes. First, he experienced confusion.
Then as things became clearer, there was even more confusion...
There was a medallion around his neck...
"But that means..."
He frantically searched around...but he didn't see any sign of him until...
"You know what, Danny?" someone said behind him. "Even I don't believe that it was a wise decision on your part..."
Danny turned around, finding himself in front of none other than Clockwork himself, currently in the state of a young boy. Danny could see that he was smiling, but he didn't know whether or not that meant something good...
Either way, it did not matter. Danny was still shocked as switched glances from the medallion to Clockwork. He did not expect that it would be the same ghost that would end up helping him again anytime soon.
"Clockwork..." said Danny, shaking a bit. "I-I don't know what to say..."
Clockwork's appearance changed to an adult as he started to speak. "Yes...a loss for words...it was just as I had expected it to be. Finally, as your last breath comes out, you find something that you have always been trying to find - another person that you can call a friend."
"I didn't know..." said Danny. In fact, he seriously did not know that this was going to happen...whoever thought that Valerie would come to her senses like that?
Because of the differences between them, he usually had that old adage in mind, believing that she'd find out about his secret "over his dead body." But he had never meant for it to be literal.
"Would you mind me asking why you attempted this stunt?" asked Clockwork.
"I thought you knew this was going to happen," said Danny. "Isn't that why you stopped me?"
"Yes, I knew that this was going to happen...though I may know many things, many times I cannot come up with intentions...though I control time, I cannot control thoughts."
"Then you may have realized it by now..." said Danny, letting his voice trail off. "I did this because of Sam and Jazz..."
He turned to face him. "Why?" he asked. "Why did you stop me?"
"I suppose that this question could be answered with a question," said Clockwork. "Why did you decide to jump off?"
Danny was a bit hesitant on telling the truth, but he knew that it couldn't be hidden any longer.
"I couldn't see a future without Sam and Jazz..." he said. "I felt so helpless...I couldn't think of anything else..."
"No future?" asked Clockwork. "I must say, things might be a bit backward in that mind of yours."
"What do you mean?" asked Danny.
"Such a cruel thing, the flow of time..." said Clockwork, answering his question in a different manner. "Like a chain of dominoes, people realize that what they do in the past could greatly alter the future, leading to results unimaginable..."
It was then the Master of Time waved his hand and showed Danny a vision.
The vision was Amity Park...or what was left of it. Danny saw endless fires raging across the town, crying citizens begging some ghosts for mercy, some citizens forced into slavery, and feeble attempts at fighting back. The screams of torment...the endless misery...it was all hard to watch.
He looked around for Fentonworks...it had been reduced to ashes.
And speaking of misery...it was then Danny saw the background. Amity Park was now entirely within the Ghost Zone...it was like they were cut off from the rest of the world.
There was some dark spirit in the background, who watched over them like the town was now under his rule...but he could not see the face. It was completely surrounded by shadow.
"Is this...the future?" asked Danny.
"If things continue going on as they currently are, yes...this is the future." said Clockwork, his form now changing into an old man.
But Danny saw something. "Wait a minute...I know this is the future, but..."
He stopped to take a quick breather. The new information took a great deal of time to sink in before he could finish it.
"...where am I?" he finished. "I know that I may be gone here...but my ghost...it has to be around here somewhere..."
"Something happened to your ghost," said Clockwork. "All I can say is that the results aren't very much to your liking..."
Clockwork frowned, as he shut the vision out. "Some things, Danny, are better left unsaid..."
This statement left Danny in mystery...what did he mean by that? Danny felt exactly like the time that the futuristic Vlad had almost told him about what happened to his human half beforehand...
The idea finally struck him...the dark spirit in the vision...
Was that...?
Clockwork interrupted his thoughts as his form changed once again, back into a young boy. "Your decision to take a dive will eventually result in disaster for the rest of the town...no one else could have filled in your spot."
"But there are many people who could have!" said Danny. "Take Valerie..."
"During a raid of their home, she was captured by ghosts and was neither heard from or seen again..." said Clockwork.
Danny tried again. "I taught Tucker how to fight a bit..."
"Tucker was captured and became a slave...he currently can't do a thing..."
"The rest of the students?" asked Danny. "I taught them all something when Youngblood captured all of the parents for his ghost ship..."
"All of them...captured..." said Clockwork. "They couldn't last.
Now he was becoming fearful...there couldn't be something of this kind of magnitude...there had to be some people that had tried...
And his mind fell on two very likely candidates.
"My parents?" Danny asked, trying to buld up confidence. "Surely they could have done something..."
"Oh, yes...your parents..." said the Master of Time, his outward appearance changing into an adult once again. "Yes...they fought bravely...they set up a small army to try and combat the onslaught of ghosts."
Danny's eyebrows raised, but unfortunately, Clockwork was not finished.
"But they too, I'm sorry to say, met their end after a while, when the ghost shield around their residence shorted out and were prone for easy capture..."
And the final layer of defense shattered his hopes.
He couldn't believe it...even his parents...
Danny could almost feel a tear falling down his face...if he had the ability to cry.
"No one was able to do anything about it?" asked Danny.
"The absence of you leaves a bad vision in the future," said Clockwork. "Yes, your parents could be trained ghost hunters with the greatest equipment, but you are one of a kind."
"What's that?" asked Danny, his head coming up. "One of a kind?"
"Only you..." said Clockwork, his form now an old man. "As a half-ghost, it was only you that could develop strategies to your fights. Take Walker, for example. As a human in the Ghost Zone, you were able to escape easily because you were no longer ghost, but human..."
"That was true," thought Danny.
"One person can make a difference, Danny. The question is, are you willing to accept this fact, or let things continue this way?"
"I don't know..." Danny started to say, but was interrupted.
"I am here not just to change your decision, but to ask that you change it," said Clockwork. "Gaining Valerie as a friend was a change that you wanted, right? And I could pretty much sense without a doubt that you didn't like what I just showed you..."
It was true that he never wanted anyone to be hurt under his expense...committing suicide - after what he saw and heard, there was going to be a lot more damage than to his own self. He started thinking about letting Clockwork return him to his own time...
...but something held him back.
Two things, actually.
"But..." said Danny. "Sam and Jazz...are...they going to..."
"I cannot say," said Clockwork, changing into his boyish form again. "There's only one way that you can find out the answer to the question...and that is for me to send you back."
But this was now a lot harder...Danny felt himself caught by his emotions.
"But I have to know," said Danny. "I can't...if they're going to..."
"If you don't do something Danny, then there isn't going to be a future!" said Clockwork, his voice absolutely firm. "Sometimes, if things reach some certain magnitude, I'm afraid that there are some things that will have to be let go."
This quote was quite surprising to Danny. This was the same ghost that told him that his noble efforts for trying to save the people he cared about were to be rewarded with another chance...not that he would have to let go of them...
Letting go of Sam and Jazz...it seemed like an impossibility, and he closed his eyes.
Especially since there were those hugs...he could never let go of those, notably all those quotes that were still ringing in his head...
But then...there was that future...
Like a game of tug-of-war, he struggled to come up with a decision. In his mind, he was the rope, his body in the middle of the game itself. On one side he was holding onto Sam and Jazz, and on the other side pulled the rest of Amity Park. He was allowing himself to be pulled in their direction, looking at their faces, as if it were to be the last time that he would see them. But then the other side held even more forlorn faces...the ones that would be killed if he decided the other direction. It was only two versus thousands, but it was hard...
Both had legitimate reasons for winning, but once again, he found it impossible to make a choice...every person had some sort of quote that he remembered far back in the past, and had never surfaced until then...it seemed to just be a sea of voices that he could not understand...
But then something that Danny had never expected to happen occurred, however...
Sam, in his visions, spoke one of the quotes that he was suddenly remembering through flashbacks...
"We're just looking out for you, Danny. It doesn't matter what happens to us. If all else fails, you are the one that has to go on...not us..."
After she said that, everything else seemed to be zoning away...soon it was just the two of them...talking with each other no longer through flashback, but through an actual conversation.
"Please, Danny...let go of my hand..."
He seemed to be arguing with her. "But...I can't..."
Sam spoke softly again. "Please...Danny...you cannot let that future happen...just please, my hand, let it go..."
"I can't let you go..." said Danny, trying to strengthen his grip.
"If you hold back, everyone loses..." she said. "Please...let me go..."
"But...I...can't!" He seemed to be trailing off because he almost said the secret he had been keeping...but he could almost feel it coming out into the surface...
And the haunting reality...Sam seemed to know.
"Danny..." she said, "...don't let your feelings get in the way...just...do it..."
He couldn't believe it...those were words that he had not expected...
But though he didn't expect them, it seemed to be some sort of turning point...as he changed glances from his hand to her face...
Danny seemed to be having some sort of breakdown, as his tears fell down his face again. Gradually, his grip on her hand seemed to loosen with every second that passed...as it loosened, he watched her face, watching as her own complexion became saddened, watching their connection come apart. It felt as if he was letting Sam die with every passing.
"Let go...just let it go..."
One would say that it would take all strength to hold onto something, but it was quite the opposite for Danny, as his grip slowly relinquished from Sam's hand. Letting Amity Park win, he watched as Sam's and Jazz's faces slowly drifted away into darkness...his heart seeming to go along with them.
When he opened his eyes again, his vision came out blurry. Touching his face, he could feel specks of water on his cheeks.
So he did have the ability to cry, even if he was a spirit...
But facing Clockwork again, who had now changed form once again to his adulthood, he spoke out his decision, though he could feel some stomach pain as he did so.
"It seems you had a rough time there, said Clockwork, watching him sadly. "Did you make a decision?"
"Yes...take me back," he said. "I can't let that future occur..."
"Are you sure? Remember, once you have a say, there is no turning back..."
Danny could picture Sam and Jazz in his mind once again, but he knew that he couldn't hold back on that...
"Yes," he said. "I'm sure...please...just make it quick..."
The Master of Time smiled, as he pressed a button on his staff. Suddenly, thousands of clocks surrounded them as the dark tunnel slowly melted away, starting to change their surroundings back to Amity Park.
When he could almost make out the sky, Clockwork said one last thing before he disappeared. "And this is where I take my leave, Danny...I promise you...all things will be answered in due time...just remember...even if the odds seem impossible, some things have the uncanny ability to work in that favor...some people deserve a third chance at something, so why can't you?"
The odds? "Wait a minute..." he thought, as things started piecing together like a large jigsaw puzzle. "Odds...Dr. Alan...Sam's and Jazz's surgeries..."
...impossible odds...but...did that mean...?
But before Danny could point it out, it was already too late...Clockwork was already disappearing from sight.
And with a wink, a clock face appeared in front of the Master of Time, and when the hands completed one revolution around him, he was gone.
Before Danny knew it, he was traveling swiftly in another direction...the sudden jerk caused him to scream as he flew backwards, through a realm with clocks running backward...
As soon as it started, however, everything came to a sudden halt, and his world was in total blackness...
Blackness?
Where was he? He tried moving, but for some reason, couldn't.
Something heavy was on top of his chest...it seemed to be focusing on some heartbeat...
And as his surroundings became clearer, he suddenly gained the rest of his senses...as he now realized where he was.
His eyes could barely make out the familiar light that he saw before he had left. His ears picked up the sounds of crying. He could smell the fragrance of some sort of flower bush nearby. He could feel the wet grass against his backside and the drops of water splashing against his face. Some of the water from the rain found its way into his mouth, which tasted pure.
He was alive in Amity Park...back in his body, with Valerie crying atop him.
And that crying slowly dissolved, and then finally stopped, when she realized that his eyes were open...
A/N: The bad news...yes, this is another cliffhanger. But the good news is...I've finally gotten through the hardest part in the story! I have a clear picture in my head now upon how this is going to end, so instead of these long update waits, there will definitely be a difference in the waiting period between chapters.
Send a review, please (or a complaint for putting you through another cliffhanger, LOL). But remember, please, no flames.