A few more headcanons in this. It always bothered me a little how the GZ was handled after 'Prisoners of Love,' just in terms of consistency. I guess that these are my mental justification acrobatics.

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Chapter 15: In the Bark

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"Hey, Danny."

"What, Mikey?"

"You said that humans can manipulate ectoplasm."

Danny looked over his shoulder, to stare flatly at the red-headed boy. "Yeah?"

"So could you become invisible? Or fly?"

"Uh. In especially thick ectoplasm, I guess you could fly." Danny turned away to keep walking. They were trying to go in a straight line, so that they'd be able to eventually come out of the trees. "Not sure what the point would be, though. If you're in the Ghost Zone proper, then there's not much point. In most places you can, um, not sure how to describe this. Gravity is pretty subjective. If you decide that gravity is up, then you'll fall up. Takes practice, though."

"And invisibility?" asked the boy eagerly.

"Not really," said Danny. "You could make yourself transparent to ectoplasmic radiation, but that would be it. Most ghosts can perceive light, so it wouldn't mean much. Also, you wouldn't be able to tell if you had actually done it. I..." He trailed off. "I guess that if you were doing that, you'd be invisible to some ghosts who are invisible. But only some, because a lot of ghosts can finagle it so that they can see in, like, ultraviolet, or infrared, and leave themselves visible in that spectrum."

"That's too bad," said Mikey.

"What, were you hoping for superpowers?" teased Ricky lightly.

"Well, yeah," said Mikey, shrugging. "Weren't you?"

After a while, a familiar scent reached Danny's nose. "I smell apples again," said Danny.

"Really?" said Sam, brightly. "Do you see them."

"Ignore it," said Valerie, darkly, "it's probably a trap."

"A worse trap than starving to death?" asked Ricky.

"It could be. You don't know what these'll do. You heard Mrs Fenton."

Danny sighed. He was hungry, and he knew that the apples wouldn't do anything to him. He was less sure about them being healthy for everyone else. At this point, he was certain this was his lair, but considering that his subconscious thought it appropriate to a) stab his mother, b) drop Ricky and Mikey down a hole, and c) trap Valerie in a tree, he was no longer sure he could trust it with food.

"You know what," said Sam, "I'm going to eat one. Then we can take a half-hour break, and when nothing happens, then the rest of you can go ahead and eat some. Sound good?"

"We do need to find the tree, first," said Danny, scanning the branches around them.

"Are you sure you smell apples?"

"Yep. Might be a little farther on. Come on." Danny walked on, past Sam, to the front of the line. "Yeah, definitely up here."

In another minute, they came across a tight grouping of apple trees. The branches were heavy, bowed down with fat, round apples. They were still a little too far up to easily reach. Sam had to stand on her tip toes to pick one.

"Sam, you really shouldn't-"

Sam gave Valerie a defiant glare, and took a bit of the apple. She froze, and her eyes went wide.

"Sam?" asked Danny, worried that something bad had happened.

She quickly chewed and swallowed her mouthful of apple. "Wow! This apple is great!" she exclaimed, surprised. She took another bite. "Really good!" she said around the second bite.

"So good that you will never again be able to eat mortal food?" asked Mikey.

"No. And why do you sound so excited about that being a possibility?"

"No reason," said Mikey, blushing.

"So..." said Ricky. "We just wait now?"

"Yeah. Figure if it's poisonous, it'll kill me before too long."

Everyone found somewhere to sit while they waited. There were a few attempts at conversation, but everyone was too tired and stressed to be anything like polite and social. Mikey actually nodded off. Ricky, Valerie, and Sam got into some kind of three-way glaring contest. Sam and Ricky had never really liked each other. Even before Tucker had blamed Ricky for throwing up in Sam's lunchbox, they'd had a kind of animosity. Sam disliked Valerie due to a combination of the whole Red Huntress thing, and Valerie's former A-list ties. Valerie disliked Sam because Sam didn't bother to hide her animosity. Danny wasn't entirely sure why Valerie and Ricky were glaring at one another. He wished they wouldn't. It would be so much better if everyone could get along.

(He was so tired. Why was he so tired? He had slept. He had done more on less sleep.)

Danny sighed, and leaned slightly into Sam. He wished that he knew where everyone else was for certain, but this was fine, too. He was sure that they were all fine. Danny closed his eyes. Sam was so warm. It was nice. He could feel her. Tell that she was okay. It gave him a sense of security, of calmness. Danny breathed in deeply. This was nice.

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Sam looked down at Danny, who had fallen asleep with his head on her arm. He still looked awful, in some ways worse than he had before they had run into the wisps. Exhausted, bruised, and, most worryingly, sick. Ever since the accident, Danny hardly ever got sick.

This was all the adult Fentons' fault, Sam decided. If they hadn't built that thing, they'd still be in Amity. Danny would be healthy, at home, in bed. They'd all be at home, in bed. They would have surely beaten Technus by now.

"So you haven't died yet," observed Valerie.

"No, really."

"I guess that those are safe to eat, then," Ricky said, standing.

"Yeah, could you please get me a couple more? I don't want to wake Danny up."

"Fine," said Ricky. "Enjoy having your boyfriend sleeping on you."

"We aren't dating."

"Keep telling yourself that."

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Maddie gave Jazz a boost into a nearby tree. Jazz grabbed a branch, and pulled herself up. She climbed up to the crown of the tree, and looked out and around. She also took a moment to run her fingers over the words carved into the trunk.

"I think I see something," Jazz called (lied) down.

"What do you see, sweetie?"

"Some kind of movement," she said (lied). "Branches moving. Maybe a bit of color. I can't make out much more than that."

"Which way?"

"Downhill," said (lied) Jazz, "but it might not be anything."

"Alright, Miss Fenton, why don't you come down now?"

Jazz slithered down the tree, dropping the last few feet before the ground. They'd been looking for the others for hours. Jazz didn't understand it. She knew why Sam and Danny had left. Danny had been out of his mind, or nearly so. Sam had wanted to help him. What she didn't understand was why Dash, Kwan, Mikey, and Ricky had run off. No, that wasn't quite right. She knew why they had run off. They were scared. It was stupid, but there it was. What she didn't understand was how they had straight up vanished in the little time between the wisps showing up and the wisps leaving.

After calling for them didn't work, and it became apparent that they weren't lying unconscious somewhere nearby, Mr Lancer had made the decision to try to backtrack, regroup with the larger group, and possibly form search parties. However, it evolved that the yarn had, predictably, broken.

So they had come up with idea of getting a better vantage point by having either Jazz or Maddie climb trees (plural, because even in the trees, they could only see so far in the half-light provided by the ghostly moon). Mr Lancer, overweight and nonathletic as he was, had no hope whatsoever of getting up into the trees. Maddie's arm, though healed, was still sore and weak. Therefore, it had fallen to Jazz to do the climbing.

The first couple of times she had gone up had been ordinary. Well, ordinary if you could call climbing trees in a pocket universe created by your younger brother's subconscious ordinary. Honestly, that was a bit weird, even for Jazz. (Being cursed, lost in China [specifically China, don't ask], kidnapped by ghosts, sucked into parallel universes, evil doppelgangers, and time travel were all on Jazz's list of ordinary, for reference.)

When she went up the third tree, however, there had been flowers in the branches. Little, lacy, white things, with long stamens and petals that curved back on themselves. The tree was, or at least, was modeled after, a pine. There should not have been flowers. Furthermore, they only grew from the top few branches, invisible from the ground. They seemed so earnest, though. Jazz couldn't help but compliment them.

The next tree had more. These ones were pale pink, with ruffled, layered, petals. They were a little like carnations, for all that they were growing from an oak. The fifth tree had yet another variety, these being dark teal, with five round petals. The sixth tree had been more ambitious, with large, rose-like toxic green blossoms.

(Jazz was rather forcibly reminded of when she had been ten and Danny had been eight. Their parents been busy with one of their inventions- Jazz couldn't recall which one exactly- and Danny had brought a drawing home from school, one he had been particularly proud of. Maddie and Jack had complemented it, in a kind of off-hand way, but it had been clear to Jazz, and, more importantly, Danny, that they hadn't looked at it. Jazz, feeling sorry for Danny, had given the picture, which had been quite good for an eight-year-old, a great deal more attention than she normally would have. Danny had responded by showering her with pictures for weeks until she snapped at him. She wasn't proud of that, but she had been ten. There were limits.)

The seventh tree was different again. Instead of flowers, there were words carved into the trunk:

'Hi, Jazz!'

For a while, Jazz had been convinced that Danny was nearby and just messing with her invisibly. That kind of harmless (relatively) teasing was just like her brother. However, a couple of trees later, it became clear that she wasn't talking to Danny. Or, at least, she wasn't talking (perhaps communicating was a better term?) to the part of Danny that she normally did.

This part of Danny (Jazz hesitated to call it [him?] Danny's subconscious) seemed to be focused (relatively) on two things- Making sure that Jazz was comfortable (a frequent question carved on the trees was 'Are you OK?'), and directing the group of three. Where he (it?) wanted to direct them was a mystery to Jazz, but even if this wasn't quite Danny, it was still Danny. Jazz was prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt.

This was complicated by the fact that this aspect of Danny seemed to have no grasp of the concept of time. Or sarcasm. Also, that, although it did answer Jazz's question, it often wrote those answers in trees she didn't climb. Additionally, much of the relatively small amount of space that the... entity used to write would often be filled with apologies for things that Danny had done, or supposedly done, to Jazz. Jazz couldn't remember most of them. At least one narrative was preceded by the phrase 'one time I dreamed that-.'

Jazz wasn't ignoring these, exactly. They were important to Danny, otherwise he wouldn't be bothering to write them into the trees. But she had a limited amount of time in each tree, and even as an aspiring psychologist, she had to prioritize. She could talk to Danny about his guilt complex later. Right now, her task was getting their mother (and Mr Lancer) where they needed to be (wherever that was). Or where Danny thought they needed to be.

Arguably, the later was more important. Maddie had hurt Danny. Hurt him badly. Jazz wasn't sure if she would ever be able to comprehend how badly, not without dying herself. A safe environment was a key component of any healing process, and if having Maddie in a particular place would make Danny feel more secure, then Jazz was going to get her there.

Regardless of whether or not that particular place was safe for Maddie. Not that Jazz though that Danny would or had ever harmed either of their parents intentionally, but the incident with the gun (the pieces of which Maddie was still carrying) showed that Danny could potentially do a great deal of damage unintentionally. Jazz surprised herself by not particularly caring. She couldn't imagine anything that Danny would do, intentionally or otherwise, being permanent, and this was, overwhelmingly, Maddie's fault.

Jazz took a deep, calming breath. Getting angry would not help. Correction: getting visibly, physically, angry wouldn't help. On the other hand, Jazz had seen cold, calculating rage be quite effective in these situations. The trick was not to become bitter. Like Vlad. Who was creepy and kind of gross. Jazz sighed. Maybe she should develop an entirely new type of anger.

There were more trees to climb, though. Jazz didn't need a boost for this one. The branches were low enough that she was able to pull herself up without any difficulty.

She was about halfway up, when she noticed words carved into the trunk. Normally, they did not start until Jazz was higher. What really made her stop, though, was what they said.

'I think I'm asleep.'

"What does that mean?" asked Jazz, under her breath. She decided to keep going, but there were more words waiting for her by the next branch.

'I'm not sure. This is weird. It's like I'm everywhere but- Not really? Or I always was? Like I'm dreaming. I don't think I'm going to remember this when I wake up.'

Jazz let out a puff of air. "Okay. So, you're answering my questions like this now. Okay. Where are you, and where are you taking us?"

'I'm with Sam, Valerie, Ricky, and Mikey,' answered the carvings a few feet up. 'I wish that it was just Sam, Ricky, and Mikey, but I couldn't keep Val trapped, and I can't have her just running around shooting at everyone. I don't think I knew that before I fell asleep. I'm trying to get you guys to where Kwan and Dash are, but it's hard because they keep moving like idiots. You are getting close.'

"Aren't you moving around, too?"

Jazz's eyes widened as another line of letters was etched into the bark.

'Yes,' it said, 'but in a line. Not all over the place. Why do people make it so hard for me to help them?'

"I don't know, little brother. Are we going to be seeing you soon?"

'I don't know. Is Mom still mad at me?'

"Jazz?" came a faint cry from below. "Why have you stopped? Are you having trouble?"

"No!" Jazz yelled back. "Just plotting my course!"

"Okay, sweetie, take your time! Be safe!"

"Okay, Mom!"

Jazz looked back at the writing.

'I didn't do anything to the apples, by the way.'

"She still thinks that you're possessed," said Jazz, resuming her climb. Her position was getting uncomfortable.

'Oh,' came the dispirited response. 'I don't think that I'll be able to manage this much longer. Being me, here. I mean, it's- I'm always me but also not? This still isn't quite properly, correctly, entirely me. It is- but it isn't. It's not the right order, I guess. And there are extra things? And missing things? I'm trying.'

"You know this isn't your fault, right, Danny?"

The next bit of writing was uneven. Messier than it had been. 'Isn't it? I had one thing I was supposed to do, one thing, just one thing, keep-' the next few words were illegible, '- but I can't even do that, can I?'

"Danny, this isn't your fault, and we're all fine."

'Amity isn't.'

"Technus can't have done that much damage." Was that the right thing to say? Jazz was pretty sure it wasn't, but what else could she say? "Look, why don't you tell me about... This. This place."

'It's deeper than it looks. It's safe here.'

"That's good." She was at the top of the tree now. "You know the way out, then?"

'Yes.'

"You going to share?"

'I'm going to light up Dash and Kwan.'

"What?" said Jazz, alarmed. Surely he couldn't mean that he was going to shoot at them. But then what-?

Below Jazz, and in the near distance, a number of trees seemed to catch fire. On closer inspection, though, the trees weren't on fire. They were just alight with glowing, orange and red flowers.

'Do you like the flowers?' The letters were a little lazy. Not quite as distinct as before. 'I think I need to sleep now. For real sleep. Goodnight, Jazz.'