Hi there! This chapter goes over what was going through Valerie's perspective. Hopefully this will answer some of your previous questions about why Valerie trusted Spectra and what's going on.

This ends in a different spot than the last chapter. It's still kinda a cliffhanger though.

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Chapter 98: Red Redux

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Valerie didn't quite register anything as wrong until Penelope blasted Mia away from Danny with a ray of green energy and fell on the semiconscious boy like a hyena on fresh meat. Then Penelope burst into a mass of black flame and Bertrand- the other ghost- got in on the act, turning into a giant cat. Almost everyone was frozen in shock, but Valerie had two years of ghost hunting under her belt. Even though she was surprised, she acted. She called on her suit and started shooting.

Then Danny had to pull yet another outrageous and impossible thing out of thin air. Literally. That knife. How did he do that? Some other freakish benefit of liminality?

Then he turned, looking straight at Valerie and shouted, "Look out!"

Look out for- Since when had the boat been on fire?! Why was the boat on fire?!

Valerie leaped back, keeping up her rate of fire. All of her blasts were deflected by the fiery ghost's shield. She couldn't figure out why. Her blaster had worked on the whale!

"Oh, what an optimistic little thing," cooed Penelope. "You still think that they'll listen to you! They picked a complete stranger over you. Do you know what they were arguing about? Whether or not you had tricked them into bowing to Pandora when you and your little friends didn't. Isn't that just lovely?"

Valerie cringed internally at the reminder. There was more truth in that statement than she would like to admit. That was what Dash and Dale had been complaining about when Penelope had dropped in through the skylight. They had chosen Penelope's story over Danny's... And Danny's stories at least had some corroborating evidence. Penelope's had just been the one Valerie wanted to be true.

"And don't you little toys try to get away. This is your fault, you know, for believing me in the first place. I mean, really, I came in through a sky light, I told you nothing about myself, I gave you nothing, and I still had you wrapped around my finger in minutes. How much do you hate this little brat, here?"

Valerie swore. Her father would be deeply disappointed that she knew such words, but she couldn't help herself. How dare that ghost-!

Then her gun cut out. Apparently it hadn't had enough time to recharge. Either that, or it was still messed up from all the nonsense in Phantom's lair. It didn't really matter right now. None of her other weapons would respond to her. Penelope flicked out of view, then reappeared only inches from Valerie's face.

The ghost that had been Bertrand slammed Danny down on the deck, and Penelope raked her claws down across Valerie's body. Valerie cursed again. It hadn't hurt, but it made her suit spark and tear.

"None of that, either," said Penelope, her voice sickeningly sweet. The ghost had a hold of Valerie's arm, and she wrenched it hard, before flinging Valerie backwards, through a wall of flame. She rolled until she bumped up against Dash, and suddenly realized that she and the rest of her classmates were trapped. "Goodness, but you are incompetent. I suppose that I can't blame you too much, though. Hanging out with that... Thing... would make it hard for anyone to tell the difference between a human and a ghost, and of course he lets you overestimate your abilities by taking it easy on you." She sighed. "I was told to kill you all. But..." she trailed off, playfully. "Let's play a game, shall we? I've always liked your human game shows. Survivor, in particular."

"Spectra, you- Ah!"

Valerie couldn't quite make out Danny beyond the great green bulk of Bertrand and the dancing black flames, but she could hear his pain, and she sucked in air between her teeth.
"Oh, you aren't doing so well, are you? But that's what core damage does, I'm afraid. Now, where was I? Oh, yes. Let's play a few rounds of Survivor. You get to vote on who dies first. Isn't that fun?"

Core damage? They had been talking about the core of the Ghost Zone back in Phantom's lair. Had it done something to Danny?

"Don't do it!" shouted Danny.
"Well, you could do that. Then I'll just kill all of you. Now rules, rules... Oh, yes. You can't pick this lovely little brat." Penelope bent down, out of view. "I want to make him watch. Save him for last. So who's going to die first?"

Silence. Valerie hadn't the first clue how to get out of this, and it sounded like none of the others did, either.
Then, Spectra gasped. "I almost forgot the most important part!" she said gleefully. "Bertrand, make sure he can see this!"

Danny was dragged up by Bertrand, his head caught in a lock as the shapeshifter turned into a strongman. He looked terrified.
"Who shall it be, who shall it be?" asked Penelope, morphing back to a young, human-looking form and prancing across the deck, flames flickering in her steps. "The annoying compulsive liar?" she asked, pointing at Elliot. "The dead weight who always has to be coddled?" she jabbed a finger at Mia, who was still lying on the ground. "The school bully?" she leered at Dash. "There are so many choices!"
"Don't-"

"Oh, shut up! Who will it be?"

Valerie was trying to summon a blaster to her hand. It wasn't working very well so far. The tears in her suit were sparkling, and bits of it were growing hot.

"Do I really have to show you that I'm serious? Hm? Well. Let's start with you, Valerie, dear." She reached into the circle of fire to pull Valerie out by her injured arm. "You wouldn't survive this, anyway. Danny-boy here is the only one who likes you, isn't that right?" That was, again, more true than Valerie would like to admit. Star was the only other one who still hung out with her, and even then, not always. "You were thrown out of your little friend group years ago, and no one else would take you in. You were a bit of a bully, too, weren't you? Even to sweet little Danny."

Untrue-!

Finally, finally, Valerie got a blaster into her hand.

Then it felt like the bottom dropped out of the world. Valerie fell to the deck, then looked around frantically, trying to find the source of the problem. The tiller had snapped off. There were snapping, splintering, creaking, crackling sounds coming from all sides, and the wind howled loud in Valerie's ears, even drowning out her classmates screams. The boat was still on fire. Valerie narrowly avoided falling into the flames.

Once she had recovered herself, she managed to find Danny. He was standing up on one foot, swaying back and forth, smiling weakly. His eyes flickered green and blue, like a dying light bulb. Occasionally, a green spark would leap from his skin, and the air around him seemed... uncertain. Wavery. But that might have just been the work of the fire and all the heat it was producing.

Was this liminality? Was this one of those powers that Mikey was so keen on? If so, it was a lot more than Danny had initially made out.

Danny was talking. He was saying something.

The fires flared, reaching inwards to to lick at Valerie. She heard Kwan scream, and Hannah, and then others, and she was glad that her suit protected her from the majority of the heat.

Then the fires disappeared in a wash of cold.

Danny eyes were a glowing an impossible ice blue. Then he crumpled, the winds falling with him.

Valerie struggled to her feet, trying not to jostle her arm. Penelope was still here. Where had Bertrand gone? Where was her blaster?

Then Dash rushed past her with an oar. What the heck was he doing?

There was a sharp crack as Dash brought the oar down on 'Penelope's' head. The top half of the oar broke off, and Dash was left staring, open mouthed, as the ghost whirled, and growled at him.

Valerie was sure that Dash was dead. She was absolutely certain that he was going to die. There was murder written on the ghost's face and, suddenly, Valerie remembered-

Penelope Spectra. The former school psychologist, who Danny and Jazz had said had been a ghost, an evil, shape-shifting ghost who existed to make people feel terrible. A ghost who tried to murder Jazz. A ghost that had given the whole school depression for weeks.

Danny lunged at Spectra's knees. The ghost stumbled, missing Dash, who only fell over, but then whirled, and threw a bright green bolt at the back of Danny's head. Danny slammed into the ground and fell still.

A blaster came into Valerie's hands. It was her very largest. It really should be called a bazooka. Parts of her suit were hot, parts of it were burning. She brought the crosshairs up to bear on Spectra and pulled the trigger. A massive fuchsia flare erupted from the mouth of the enormous gun and engulfed Spectra. When Valerie blinked the shadow of the lights out of her eyes, Spectra was nowhere to be seen. All that was left of her was something that looked like a glowing, crystalline, ember. Valerie walked up to it, and punted it off the ship, and into the swirling, rocky gloom below.

"Oh my god," breathed Dash. "What the hell. Why didn't you do that earlier?"

"Couldn't," said Valerie, kneeling next to Danny. She deactivated her suit, revealing circuitry-shaped burn marks on her arms and clothing. She put her hand in front of Danny's mouth. He was still breathing, good. So now... Recovery position. That's right. But what about... "Mia? Is Mia okay?"

"I'm fine," said Mia, voice wavering. "I'm, um, I'm fine. I don't know how..."

"Anyone else hurt? Is Lancer waking up yet?"

"We've got some burns over here!" called Mikey.

"Oh my god," whimpered Paulina.

Valerie swore. She didn't have anything that would work for burns. Heck, she didn't have anything, period. Hopefully there wasn't anything too serious. "Try not to touch the burns," she said, "and pull any clothing that got burnt out of them." Valerie turned back to Danny. Now she just had to lift him up, put his hand-

Danny's eyes snapped open, and darted up to Valerie's face. Then he jumped back, trying to get to his feet, crying out and falling when his ankle collapsed under his weight.

"Danny, are you..." Valerie trailed off when she saw the look in his eyes. He was afraid of her. He was afraid of her, and not without reason. She had shot him. She had- She had caused this.

But then Danny's eyes flicked off of her, up, towards the sky, to the rocks and other islands passing by. "Oh no," said Danny, looking even more scared. He turned towards the bow of the ship. "Oh no."

Valerie followed his gaze.

Directly in in the path of the boat was a large island.

"Oh," said Valerie. She whirled to look at the tiller. Broken. Completely broken. "Oh, jeez." Could she summon her board? A quick attempt showed that the answer was no. Well, she wouldn't have been able to ferry everyone off the boat in time, anyway. So what-?

"We have to-" Danny tried to get up, and fell again. "Gotta turn the- gotta turn the boat we- Heck. No tiller. We- Um. Then we-" His eyes flickered green. "No. Not working. That's not working. We..."

"We're going to die, aren't we?" asked Rebecca. "All of this, all of this nonsense, and we're going to die."

"Wh- No."

"We'll figure this out," said Valerie, without much hope in her voice.

"Yeah," said Danny. "Yeah we- We can." He looked back up towards the approaching island. "We can do this. We-" He looked back at the class. "Remember what I said about how we can manipulate ectoplasm? Remember that? Willpower, and stuff, you know? This is kind of a fly or die situation here. I- We can do that. We can make the boat turn or- No, that won't work. Boats are- they're too defined. They- The wind? No, atmospheric ectoplasm will be too thin for you guys to grab on to effectively. I... The island. That's the first kind of thing Sam and Tucker did, right? Yeah. We can- Look, everybody! We can survive this, you just, you just all have to believe that that, there, it's like a cloud. It's like, made of pillows."

"What the hell are you talking about?" asked Elliot.

"Just work with me here!" said Danny. He had given up on standing, and was just holding his injured leg out at an awkward angle.

Valerie looked up at the island. "What do we need to do?" she asked.

"Just- Just focus. Just believe. Believe that it will be a soft landing. Yeah. Yeah."

The island was approaching, coming ever closer.

"Yeah," said Valerie.