Yeah, so Issitoq has strayed somewhat from the path if sanity. Yup. But are y'all really that surprised? But he hasn't gone completely off the rails. He's only going to release Dan if all other methods of getting rid of Danny fail. The last chapter was more about having Dan available to release.
My problem now is that I can't decide if I want to do a redemption kind of thing for Dan, or a Danny beats him up thing. Both plots have their plus sides and I'm torn.
.
.
.
Chapter 113:
.
"So, we are not here because we are hiding from Issitoq?" asked Phantom, feeling a weight lifting off his chest.
"Who?" asked Dash.
"That's the, what did you call him, the judge?" said a shorter blonde, a girl. Hannah?
"Yes. But to clarify, we are just here because we managed to get lost in Missing Theory?"
"Yeah," said 'Ellie.' She was apparently his sister-by-theft. Which was Plasmius's fault, of course. Phantom didn't know whether he should be thrilled, disturbed, or both. Both, probably. He had always wanted a real family. Pandora, Frostbite and the others were great, but he had always felt like there was something missing.
"That's a relief." He sighed, and ran his hand through his hair. "Are any of the rest of you noticing any significant changes, or am I the only one to change so much?"
The humans shook their heads. Plasmius stayed impassive.
"I think Valerie here had her other arm broken," said Ellie.
"Her arm-? Oh, dear. We should get that in a sling," said Phantom, only now noticing the girl's injury. He pulled a length of cloth from within an inner pocket, and shook it out. "I have some first-aid things with me. Not all of them are for humans, of course-"
"Why?" asked Valerie, sharply.
"Why we should get your arm in a sling? So you do not strain it unnecessarily?"
"Why do you have first-aid things that aren't for humans? You're human, right?"
"Yes," said Phantom, slowly, frowning slightly. It seemed like this was going to be an exercise in traversing a verbal minefield. He hoped that he wouldn't do any lasting damage to his 'normal' self while navigating it. If he was reading the situation correctly, it would appear as if none of these people knew of Phantom's, or, should he say, 'Fenton's,' unique condition. "But most people I know are ghosts, so..." Phantom shrugged, his shoulders brushing the bell that hung off the end of one of his braids.
"Why are you like this, anyway?" asked the redhead with glasses.
"Like what?" said Phantom, racking his mind for this person's name.
"So different. This was just supposed to swap the direction you turned one time, right?"
"I couldn't say. I suppose that one of my choices was more important than it first seemed."
The redhead looked him up and down. "If most of the people you know are ghosts, does that mean you live here in this... universe?"
"In Missing Theory?" The idea surprised a laugh out of Phantom.
"No, in the Ghost Zone," said the boy. Mikey. His name was Mikey.
Phantom hesitated. "Yes. Don't you?"
"No."
Phantom blinked. That was interesting, and unexpected. "Not even in someone's lair?"
"Is that where you live?"
"Yes," said Phantom. No need to mention that it was his.
"How did you get here?" asked Ricky.
"I don't know," said Phantom. This line of questioning was beginning to make him uncomfortable. "I cannot remember living anywhere else." He rubbed the back of his neck. "Here, it hardly matters. My history clearly does not align with the real one. But we should treat any wounds that you have. They may disappear as soon as we leave, but if they do not... At least, you should clean them, so that you don't pick up an infection."
"Clean them with what?" asked Valerie, irritably. "Where? I don't think that there's a bathroom here."
"Oh, you'd be surprised," said Phantom. "But, please, let me look at your arm first."
"Fine," said Valerie.
.
.
.
Issitoq turned the cylinder over and over in his hands. This was a last resort, one he hoped he would not have to sink to. He hoped that the fools he and his subordinates were currently collecting would be enough to finally, finally, destroy Phantom. If not, he would release this monster, and show the Council of Ancients what they had voted for, force them to pick someone reasonable.
Or, if that didn't work, force the other members of the High Council to depose the Ancients, to set up a new, more orderly, method of choosing a king.
Or, and this really was a final resort, create an opening to end the Ancients. Yes, and that option grew more appealing every day, every hour, but, still, Issitoq hesitated. It was against his nature to move against tradition, but here he was. Some things were necessary.
.
.
.
Dan knew the instant that he had been taken from Long Now. He even knew who had done it. In the future that never was, he had destroyed the Observants quite thoroughly, and it would be a lie to say that the thought of doing it again didn't bring a small touch of joy to his fiery core.
But only the thought. Dan knew that his long imprisonment, coupled with the... irrelevance of his Obsessions, his inability to fulfill them, had left him weak. It would be good if he could escape the Observants, let alone take them in a fight.
Part of Dan wondered if he really wanted to escape. Yes, he wanted to continue to exist, he wanted to be victorious, powerful, feared! But he was tired. Emotions had been distant for him ever since he had been removed (like a tumor, like garbage) from his weak, sniveling, human half, but in the darkness of the thermos they were often all he had. That, and eavesdropping on the old man.
Well, it didn't seem as if the eyeballs were going to let him out any time soon, so he didn't have to decide right away. He could wait, and... observe the situation, as it was.
.
.
.
"Do you really think that he's Phantom?" asked Sarah, watching Danny patch up Valerie out of the corner of her eye. They had settled on an unoccupied set of couches.
"Well, yeah, it makes sense, doesn't it?" said Hannah. "I mean, what else could explain him?"
"He has basically been the Casper High cryptid for a while," said Mia, scowling. The scowl was not due to her mood, although that wasn't great, either, but because she still hadn't managed to replace her glasses, and squinting was the only was she could see.
"That's different," said Sarah. "We can't just say that he's a ghost, or whatever, because he knows when ghost attacks are going to happen and moves quietly and shows up in weird spots and is really agile when you surprise him and... Uh. Look, we don't even know for sure that that guy is really Mayor Masters."
"It's definitely him," said Hannah. "It's the only thing that makes sense."
"You thought that he was a vampire," pointed out Sarah.
"No, I thought that he was an immortal mutant psychic."
"What's the difference?"
"A vampire is way too obvious, and has, you know, supernatural weaknesses. Have you ever seen a mutant be repelled by a cross?"
"No, but I've never seen the mayor in a church, either," said Sarah, crossing her arms.
Hannah frowned. "Maybe he is a vampire... No! That's not what we should be talking about."
"I don't know," said Mia. "Danny's not going to attack us, but, I mean, I could be wrong, with, you know, not being able to see and all, but isn't that the Wisconsin Ghost? The one that shows up right before the town gets royally screwed?"
"Shoot, you're right," said Hannah. "How did I not see that before?"
Sarah groaned.
"Right, right, back on topic, is Danny Phantom?"
"He's nice enough," said Mia. "He's been... weirdly competent, too."
"We haven't really seen Phantom, either," added Hannah. "Then there's that he lives in the Ghost Zone in this reality. How could he do that, if he's not a ghost?"
"... The Fentons have a ghost portal in their basement, don't they?" said Sarah.
"Yeah," said Mia. "Putting all the Fentons together, isn't it way weirder that Danny hasn't fallen into the Ghost Zone yet?"
Hannah glared. "Whose side are you on?"
"I'm not on any side," said Mia. "I'm just tired of not knowing what's going on."
"Okay, what about the amnesia thing?" tried Hannah.
"Well, I'm pretty sure the Lethe got mentioned, earlier?" said Sarah, voice tilting up at the end of the sentence, turning it into a question. "I'm pretty sure that's the river in Greek mythology that wipes your memory. He could have fallen into that."
"Ghosts probably have other ways of giving people amnesia, too," added Mia. "I mean, you don't remember what happens while you're overshadowed, right?"
"True," said Sarah.
"But him being Phantom explains everything."
"Not really," said Mia. "Remember what started this mess? That gun, what it was supposed to do? No matter how weird Danny is, or how weird... Ellie is, they're still alive, right?"
.
.
.
Star nervously fiddled with the edge of her sweater. For some reason, her friends, Mikey, Ricky, and the twins, had closed ranks without her. She licked her lips, which were more than a little chapped from the cold air of the Ghost Zone.
They usually waited for her, made room for her. They knew that she was, well, not assertive. Had she done something to offend them? Danny wasn't available, either. Usually he was at least good for a chat about physics, or whatever, even if they weren't very close.
"Star, what are you doing?"
Star's head snapped around so fast she almost gave herself whiplash. Was that Paulina talking to her? What did she want?
"Uh..."
"Stop staring at the nerds and get over here," said Tiffanie, one of the other A-listers. She was Dash's girlfriend, if Star remembered correctly. She had a hard time following all the A-list dramas.
Star's eyes flicked from Tiffanie, to Paulina, to Dash, to Dale, to Kwan (whom she might have had a crush on). Could it be that she was an A-lister in most other universes? Could her life change that much just from turning right instead of left, or vice-versa, once? It was nothing next to what had happened to Danny, but still. Wow. Yikes.
This could be her chance to be popular. But... If this wasn't how things really were, if she wasn't part of the so-called nerd-herd, then... Would she not remember what she knew, what she knew, deeply, entirely, genuinely, once she left this place, this floor? The idea disturbed her, though not quite as much as the idea that her friends didn't know her anymore. She glanced at them. Had, possibly, never known her.
She walked over to the A-listers. This could be fun, while it lasted, if she was unpopular, and if she was an A-lister, then she shouldn't screw up her reputation by... hanging out with her friends. Wow, she hadn't even been an A-lister for five minutes and she was already acting like a trash person. Whatever, this was for blackmail purposes.
.
.
.
Mr Lancer sighed. This never got any easier. Ever. He had known about Daniel's... extracurricular activities for about a year now, ever since he caught the young man transforming in an empty classroom. It was as if every time he turned around, things got weirder and weirder.
He had thought that the weirdness had peaked when Daniel showed up on his doorstep, dressed in Elizabethan clothes, arms wrapped around a signed First Folio. But then the actress ghost had shown up, and the two of them had begged him to put her in the school play, and, well... Things had never stopped escalating.
.
.
.
"I'm kind of surprised that you aren't hanging off of Valerie again," said Nathan into a lull in the conversation.
"Who?" said Lester.
"Valerie."
His twin stared blankly at him.
"Valerie Grey?"
"Why would I be hanging off of her?" asked Lester, wrinkling his nose.
"You know, I ask myself the same question all the time."
"Can you be serious for once, Lester?" said Mikey, pushing his glasses up.
"I am."
.
.
.
Phantom snorted.
"What?" said Valerie, voice tight.
"Nothing, I just heard something funny."
