Hey. This is the Tuesday chapter. I'm posting this a little early. It has a giant cliffhanger, though, just warning you. Also, more GIW violence.
I really enjoy reading your reviews! Your feedback helps my writing.
Still haven't worked out the trial. The request for possible ghost opinions still stands!
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Chapter 72: Too Close
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"So you're saying," said Maddie, her voice slightly raised, "that his Obsession is making him do this? That it's alright, because it's his Obsession?" Despite how fast they were going, there was little wind. "That anything would be fine, just because it's his Obsession?"
"No, Mom," said Jazz. "We've been over this. You're getting hung up on the Obsession thing. It doesn't replace a persons morality. It just adds an extra dimension. Actually, not even that. It's- If you wound up becoming a ghost, you'd probably be Obsessed with ghost hunting, like you already are. You wouldn't kill someone over ghost hunting, would you?"
"No," said Maddie.
"There are probably a lot of things that you wouldn't do. It's the same for ghosts. An Obsession isn't something that you'd do anything for, it's something that you want to keep existing for. Something you'd live for. I've read some papers, there are some good research organizations here, don't laugh, I'm serious, and they mostly agree on that. Some of them focus more on the regret angle- Anyway. It isn't something that's controlling him. His Obsession isn't even remotely sinister. It isn't something you should be worried about, especially not now. Please, let it drop. Careful! Watch out for the door!"
Maddie angled down sharply to avoid the floating object. Then she caught sight of Sam and Tucker diving into a swirling green whirlpool. "That's the shortcut?"
"Looks like it! Hold on tight!"
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Ellie stood by awkwardly as the four women spoke to one another in rapid-fire Ancient Greek. Then, three of them broke off, flying away at high speed.
"Okay," said Adrestia. "We've got to do this fast, kid."
"My name is Ellie."
"Right. You've heard of Libra?"
"Yeah?"
"Okay. So, you should go to Libra. That's probably the best thing you can do for your cousin, right now. Then-"
The wisp interrupted, singing urgently.
"What? This is his? Why didn't you say so in the first place? Sheesh." Adrestia strode up to the door, and rapped smartly on it.
The door swung open immediately, revealing someone who looked identical to Danny, but who definitely wasn't him. "Oh, good. Ellie," he looked relieved.
"Who are you?" she asked, taking a step back.
"I'm Mirage. I'm a shadow." He looked up, at Adrestia. "They've got a bomb of some kind. They're heavily armed. They're headed to the core. Danny's gone after them, along with five humans. He's injured pretty severely, but that was the only option we had. Ellie, you can't go."
"Why?"
"Because if you go, and Danny fades, you're the only one keeping this lair intact, and there are a few hundred people in here."
"What, seriously?" asked Adrestia. Then she shook her head. "Never mind. I have to go."
"Please," said Mirage. "Save him."
Adrestia made a face and no promises before withdrawing, and following the other three women.
"Okay," said Ellie. "I want an explanation."
"Right," said Mirage. "That will take a while."
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Danny came out of the portal, his skin tingling with the sensation of high energy ectoplasm. This wasn't good. His core was too damaged to deal with all the energy he was taking in. He could feel himself shedding energy as fast as he took it in, leaking through the cracks. He could feel it eroding him. But he needed it. He didn't have the strength to fight otherwise. He sped closer to the core, glowing green mist swirling off the surfaces of the speeder.
It was hard to see far under these conditions. Danny shut down the motor and let momentum carry the vehicle forward. He could hear better this way, without the growl of the motor. He could feel better this way, without the disruption in ambient spectral 'noise.' (Which really wasn't sound at all.)
He could hear the song of the Core like this, curling around his own core and brain, but not, quite, touching either of them. He could hear the portal behind him, so different from the music of his own portal.
(None of it was song. None of it was sound. He sometimes saw it. Sometimes it was ice on his skin, or shed heat, or a smell. His human brain did not always know how to interpret the signals it got from his core, even with his 'ghost brain' acting as a go-between.)
He drifted, or, more accurately, dropped, directing 'down' towards the Core. He knew that he couldn't get too close, that most ghosts that did dissolved, broken down, stripped of their ectoplasm until they were nothing more than their core, and were absorbed into the Core. Only a ghost with rock-solid sense of self, massive self-confidence, could dare the Core and survive.
Then he heard it. Engines. Many of them. One much larger, deeper, than the others. That was it. That was them. Briefly, Danny restarted the glider, reorienting it so that it felt towards the GIW group. Towards Inanna. Towards Danny's probable death. Then he shut them down again. The quieter he was, the less likely they were to notice his approach. He'd never show up on their ghost-detectors. There was too much ambient ectoenergy. His own would be entirely masked, impossible to differentiate from the background.
Danny bit his lip. He could see them. He didn't like what he was going to do. He couldn't say that he preferred a fair fight, exactly. When the safety and happiness of his friends were threatened, he'd use every trick available. However there were... Rules. Equivalencies. Levels. The force he spent was equal to the force he received. He was always careful not to go to far, when he was fighting ghosts weaker than himself. When he fought humans, like his parents, Valerie, and the GIW, he never struck them.
Except for what he had done a few hours before.
Except for what he was about to do.
The thing was, there was reciprocation, with the ghosts. Most of them, anyway. Not the jerks, like Undergrowth and Vortex, but most of them. These people, though, these humans... Really, it was difficult to even call them people. They were going to destroy everyone and everything. It didn't matter why. It didn't matter if it was out of some kind of fanatic hate, or loyalty, or if it was for a cause, for money, or anything else, really. The fact that they were here meant that nothing short of death could stop them. It meant that any ghost that they had encountered between here and wherever they had come in had been ended, reduced to nothing.
Danny couldn't afford to give them anything even approaching a fair fight.
He raised the rifle (stolen from the GIW and so lethal) to his shoulder, sighting along the barrel. Doing this in free fall would be unpleasant. He almost wished that he had a bigger weapon. He licked his lips, and lowered the gun. Too far. He couldn't trust his vision at this distance, nor could he trust his aim. Perhaps he could... Ah. There. Yes. The glider was equipped with a 'real-world' object detector. (The name made him roll his eyes. As if the Infinite Realms were somehow fictional.)
He flicked it on. There were guidance systems. This could be a distraction. He toggled on the motor, too, and jumped away, altering his course, falling towards the Core and around it, orbiting, simulating gravity with his mind. Then he stopped, anchoring himself. He was between them and the Core, now, with the glider coming up behind them.
He waited, waited, waited, until they were distracted by the glider's arrival, then he raised his rifle and fired. Once, twice, three times, and then the knew that he was here. They were shooting back now, and, gosh, some of those were big. He dropped out of position, dodging a massive blast by a hair.
He was doing this as a human. He didn't dare do it as Phantom. He didn't want to be shredded to nothing, and with the way he had been treating himself lately, how he had been injured, how his core had been shaken, he didn't want to risk it. Not yet.
Two of his shots had hit. Only one had been immediately fatal, but from the way the other was convulsing, it looked like the ectoplasm, ectoenergy, and whatever else was here, because there was definitely something else, were enough to give humans problems, and that piercing their protective suits would be sufficient. Good.
(Beyond the immediate issue, the need to save the world, Danny worried that the others hadn't put their stolen suits on properly. Would their small measure of liminality help them?)
Danny swung around, up and down, back and forth, trying to keep his path unpredictable. Most of his shots were going wide, and the GIW were still advancing. He needed to push them back. He needed to get rid of that bomb, he needed to get rid of that long, white-painted cylinder. He needed to reduce the number of deadly projectiles coming his way.
He needed to be closer.
He fell towards the GIW agents, shooting all the time, stabilizing himself with tiny bursts of flight and telekinesis, willing himself to stay properly aimed, deflecting shots with shield-fragments. He couldn't spare the focus to do more.
Then he was among the agents. The rifle quickly became ineffective in the close quarters. He couldn't get it around fast enough. Several of the agents withdrew, backing away so that they could take advantage of the rifles' long range. Danny didn't let them have a clear target. Friendly fire was his friend in this situation.
He made a small, razor-sharp knife of ghost ice. Constructs weren't working well, here. It was the Core. Its will was stronger than his. His was nothing, compared to it. A candle to sunlight. A candle that would be overwhelmed and fade away.
Ghost ice wasn't like normal ice. Danny could manipulate both. However, only ghost ice could be formed into an edge no wider than a single atom, and harder and more durable than steel.
There was almost no resistance as he sliced through their thick protective suits and skin. It was almost as if he were intangible.
With his other hand, he directed his shields, deflecting the shots he couldn't dodge. Every so often he switched to telekinesis, pushing the agents off balance, striking buttons on their gliders and sending them haphazardly in all directions.
He wasn't able to dodge or block every shot, every strike. They grazed him with an electrified net, once, and he fell, back to the Core, unable to resist its presence. A bullet went through his leg. His core was cracking. Whenever he got too far from the other agents, the more distant ones took shots at him. One of them had some kind of rocket launcher.
Danny was fighting tooth and nail, and there was as much exhilaration in it as there was desperation. It was adrenaline, yes, but also the fulfillment of his Obsession. He hated it. He would have preferred nearly any other ways to deal with his Obsession to this. He hated people being in danger, and now everybody was. He hated hurting people. It grated painfully against his morals. Yet here he was, killing people. Doing this terrible thing. Committing this sin.
What they were doing was worse. He had to keep reminding himself of that.
Still, he was being pushed back, loosing ground to the agents. Closer and closer to the Core. Almost too close.
A bullet tore through his arm, and he hissed, dropping. That hurt. That burned. Poison. For ghosts. Danny was not, entirely, a ghost. He was living, so he'd live.
"What are you?" demanded one of the agents, a tall man, with the Greek letter beta written on his shoulder.
Danny brought himself to a halt, and reversed direction. That was what this fight was missing. Witty banter. He snarled. Not his best work, no. "If you are Inanna," he said, "then I am Neti!"
He didn't see the missile until it was too late. It didn't quite hit him, but it blew him backwards, closer to the Core. He struggled to stabilize himself, to work out which direction would take him away from the Core, to do so much as see clearly, to hear above the tinnitus afflicting his ears. He could feel the ectoplasm around him thicken, thoughts and feelings not his own wrapping around him, lovingly. He was too clo-
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