Yay! Happy Friday, guys! I'm glad this week is over, how about you?

Note for this chapter: Ergotism is a disease you get from a eating ergot-infected grain. Ergot is a fungus.

Amintadefender: Thank you! I'm glad you liked it.

lenasmith106: Pretty much. There's an earlier bit that you could read as him actually finding out, but then explaining it away.

Jeptwin: Thanks! Good to still see you here. :)

Vi-Violence: Thank you for reviewing!

Anne Camp: I guess you mean in respect to the throne? Not anything, really. Ghosts, ghost culture, and ghost law respects relations of choice first and foremost. Danny acknowledges Ellie as his sister. He does not do the same for Dan. Actually, he rejects Dan pretty severely.

fictionaddiction1: Well, I haven't fully fleshed everything out yet, but the main thing the Ghost King does is provide a template for how the Ghost Zone should be. As in, the Ghost King is a fisher king... on the other hand, the Ghost Zone is a fisher kingdom, and... I haven't entirely figured out how I want that to work. Other than that, they're supposed to wrangle the Ancients, the Judges, and the High Council in general. Earlier Ghost Kings took on other responsibilities, duties, rights, etc, but Pariah Dark has been sealed away for long enough that a lot of those have been shuffled out to other people, or just forgotten about. In theory, I guess the Ghost King would also deal with disputes between Realms, diplomacy with the mortal world, making sure laws still make sense, and keep stuff like what happened to Missing Theory from going on... But I'm not sure how much of that would fall on Danny, or how quickly it would happen. I hope this sort of answers your question? Sorry for being so wishy-washy.

DJTimmer: Yeah, they really should tell him, and he's starting to put the pieces together. But can you blame them for not wanting to stress him out even more?

vampireharry the 2: Thank you!

ShadowPillow: Ah! I recognize you as well. I've read a bunch of your stuff. Growing Up is really good, and so is your other HP crossover, Brothers Always :). They're some of the more unique takes on crossovers that I've seen! I'm really glad you like Mortified, and I've probably said this a dozen times in these responses but I'm really glad you liked the Digressed Tower. It was something I really wanted to write, but I was afraid it would get a bad response. It's super nice to hear that people liked it, after all. I hope you continue to enjoy the story!

17: Good to see you again! I can't tell you what's going to happen on that front, because spoilers. But the Rite of Ascension is basically just. Going all the way to the Core. And not getting absorbed by it. So, considering what happened last time he got close to the Core, he isn't there yet. Thank you for your well-wishes, too. I also hope I'll get better soon.

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Chapter 164: Ergotism

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Ergot and Daughters was one of the largest law firms in the Infinite Realms. They had also taken the task of representing many of the human witnesses in the trial of Doctor and Doctor Fenton, as assigned by Libra. Ergot was hoping her daughters could also represent any human witnesses retrieved from the human world, it would be good practice and good exposure, but Libra hadn't made a decision on whether or not to retrieve additional human witnesses.

So, in the meantime, the only clients Ergot and Daughters had were inconveniently missing.

They weren't alone in this. Nettle and Ivy, advocates at arms, had a similar problem, regarding their client, as did Hemlock and Wolfsbane, and the other firms and single advocates who had the misfortune of losing their clients.

Ergot frowned at her papers. She didn't know any of the clients well enough to guess where they might be. In fact a few of them, particularly a Miss Valerie Gray, had been quite resistant about talking to their assigned advocates at all, when they had all been at Libra, before being sent to Elysium.

They still had to look for them. They were their clients, after all. Well, perhaps this would give her daughters some extra experience in investigation.

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The ship was as repaired as it could be, with the supplies the Elysians had had on hand. That didn't mean it was going any faster. In fact, now that they were out of the 'Grinder' and in the safer intervening area between it and Elysium, they were going more slowly. The ship's captain didn't want to push the ship too hard, too fast, and have it fall apart underneath them all.

Jazz was stressed.

She thought that was reasonable. Most of the other students were alternating between pumping her, Sam, and Tucker for information about Danny, making up ever wilder theories about what was going on, and learning various forms of gambling from the sailors and soldiers. Jazz wasn't sure which of those three contributed more to her stress.

She missed Danny. She missed sanity. She missed doing things. If she could fly under her own power, that's what she'd be doing right now, even if it meant leaving all of Danny's classmates.

Apparently, she wasn't as good of a person as Danny.

There was a knock on the door. Jazz looked up. She had wedged herself into a little broom closet, for a moment of privacy. She was tired of being hounded by Dash, and she'd hoped for a little longer to recover her mental stamina.

She sighed, and stood up, brushing sawdust off her clothing, before she opened the door. "Tucker?"

Tucker made a face. "Sorry, I know you just ducked out, but, uh, Sam has a problem."

"Okay," said Jazz. She couldn't imagine what Sam's problem could be. Except- No, that probably wasn't it. They had picked up plenty of those supplies when they were in Elysium. "What's wrong?"

"You'd better see."

"Okay, sure," said Jazz, squeezing out of the cupboard and into the corridor. "Where is she?"

"Uh, she was cleaning up the room we had before," said Tucker, gesturing.

They walked down, to their former room, which had been half-destroyed in the battle back at the Tower. The door was slightly ajar- something that took up a significant fraction of the narrow hallway. Jazz pulled it open, and found that it had been propped open by a furry green tree branch.

The room as a whole was stuffed full of greenery.

"What?" she said, more as a shocked statement than a question.

Sam's answer came faintly from the depths of the foliage. "Help."

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Things had calmed down in Mattingly. Not that there had been any real excitement, just Danny freaking out. It had been a couple days, and while Danny couldn't completely shake his anxiety, the feeling that something was coming, he hadn't had a full-on panic attack for a couple of days.

By Iceclaw's estimation, Danny could start using his powers, and his ghost form again in a few days. Danny had maybe jumped the gun on the powers bit. It wasn't his fault. His powers were reflexive, literally second nature to him. High emotion and emotional fatigue made them harder to control, too.

Today, Ellie, Dora, and the others had embarked on a transparent, but sweet, distraction campaign. They were sitting on a balcony (a relatively new addition to the castle), having lunch and playing with the dogs. Dora had, despite protestations, taken to the dogs after all. Right now, they were playing a kind of game where Ellie would present Danny with a dog to be named, Danny would name the dog, and everyone would (justly) mock his naming abilities, and Danny would defend his choice.

"Here," said Ellie, lifting up a three-headed dog that was easily the same size she was, "he needs a name."

"Spot," said Danny.

"You can't name a three-headed dog 'Spot.' It's undignified," protested Ellie.

"It worked for Hades. Kerberos means 'spotted.'"

"Well, Hades is a nerd."

"It's true," said Pandora.

"Well, I'm also a nerd, so there."

"Glad I'm not a perfect clone, then."

"Hate to break it to you, but clone jokes are nerdy. I don't make the rules."

Ellie looked like she was about to reply, then paused, as if uncertain, or troubled. She looked away. Danny looked at the back of her head. Had he said something wrong? Was the clone comment too harsh? But she had said something harsher, hadn't she?

Spot walked over, and sat down next to Danny, clearly expecting to be petted. Danny obliged.

"How about this... guy?" asked Ellie, turning back and offering up a dog creature with three wagging, fish-like tails and no hind legs.

"Hm," said Danny. "I think I'll call you Greg."

"Oh my gosh, you can't name him Greg."

"Just did."

A sharp crack echoed in the air, interrupting the game.

"Lightning?" asked Danny, uncertainly.

"No," said Pandora. She pointed out over the town of Mattingly. "Look."

Danny followed her finger to a floating guard tower. It was smoking.

Dora shaded her eyes. "Did the cannon powder get set off..?" she wondered out loud, concern lacing her words. "Oh, I shouldn't have approved those cannons! I am going to go see if they are alright."

"No," said Danny, hushed. Then, more loudly, "Wait!" His eyes were locked on something smaller but closer than the unfortunate guard tower. It was black and white and teal and fire, and it was coming straight for them.

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Dan had been excited when he discovered Danny was in the 'Kingdom' of Mattingly. He didn't know why Danny would be there, Dan had never visited the place before the explosion at the Nasty Burger, but it made things so much easier for him.

He'd demolished the pathetic castle and town in his original timeline. They had lacked all but the most basic and medieval technologies, and they had been disorganized, a rabble, really. The prince and the princess had put up quite a fight, with their shape-shifting. But once Dan had discovered the secret to the ability, they had lost quickly. The magic necklaces had added nicely to his power. When he was done with Danny, he would eat them again, and let their power restore his.

But things had changed, apparently. In his timeline, Mattingly had been one of the Time-Locked Lands. Here and now, Mattingly had moved beyond the borders of that area of the Zone. Dan had actually been surprised to spot it all the way out here, while tracking Danny's ectosignature.

Their guards were also much more effective. Dan had intended to sneak into the kingdom, kill Danny, take the necklaces, and retreat until his power was back up to what he was used to, but the guards had the truly terrible idea of challenging him. Dan had plowed straight through the guard tower, and a satisfying explosion had echoed behind him as it crumbled.

The sound would alert Danny that something was wrong, though. Dan doubted that he would run away- it was much, much more likely that he would run towards danger- but Dan didn't want to take any chances. He wanted to get this gruesome, but unavoidable, task over with as soon as possible.

Oh, butter biscuits. That was Pandora. Dodge!

The dragon princess launched herself off of a balcony. There was Danny, sitting nearby, and a girl with white hair. That must be Danielle. He had heard her voice while imprisoned in Long Now. She really did look like Danny. The cheesehead really had gone through with the cloning thing. What a weirdo.

Well, Dan hadn't come to fight Pandora, and he couldn't dodge her spears and lightning forever. He was already tiring, and her attacks were getting closer.

Why wasn't Danny joining the fight? Was he so scared, that he couldn't face Dan?

And what was with all the dogs?

This fight was evolving to be more difficult than expected, but Dan was making use of the terrain. Neither of the women wanted to do damage to the town beneath them.

Dan looked back to where Danny had been. The little coward had fled. Dan frowned, even as he parried the dragon's fire with his own. That was unlike Danny.

Unbidden, the thought crossed his mind: Was something wrong?

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Issitoq was giddy.

He had not hoped for anything quite so fortuitous. With the monster here, he could get rid of both it and the abomination. He could even say to any who happened to see him that the monster had been the main target, and that the abomination had just gotten in the way. Yes. That was perfect. No one would blame him for destroying the monster, even Clockwork would attest to the destruction it had wrought.

He just had to wait for the right time, when both of them were in the same place.

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So, this was what Danny had been having premonitions about. This is what caused him to freak out, and why he was so anxious.

Ellie didn't blame him. She had never met Dan, personally, but she knew him from Danny's memories, and he was bad news. The worst news.

Ellie was scared. Danny was scared. They were both scared, and Danny kept wanting to turn around and fight, even though he was still sick. He was absolutely convinced that Dan would kill Pandora, Dora, and everyone else in Mattingly-

-and he might have been right.

But Ellie couldn't let him kill Pandora, Dora, everyone else in Mattingly, and Danny. So she and Danny were flying through the castle, raising the alarm. Danny had forced himself into ghost form, and was actually keeping up with Ellie pretty well. She had to keep a hold on him, to keep him from running off, but she wasn't having to drag him.

Presently, they were working together to convince a group of maids to flee. The maids were collectively more concerned about their sewing than their continued existence, which was pretty much par for the course for ghosts, so they weren't making a whole lot of progress.

The wall disintegrated.

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Danny was separated from Ellie by flying debris, and the room as a whole was dark and dusty. Danny couldn't see, but he knew Dan was close. Too close.

Fingers brushed over his face. Dan's fingers. He could feel Dan's desperation, his confusion, his need, and he sparked with anger. How dare Dan feel so- so lost? He wanted to kill Danny.

Danny jerked back, went human, and dropped himself sideways through the wall. Dan was just there for him. He would follow.

Pandora caught him, and swept him up against her body. Danny squeaked, surprised.

Dan burst out of the castle wall, causing another spray of stone debris. His red eyes caught on Danny's, and he snarled. Pandora threw a bolt of lightning at Dan, and the evil ghost dodged narrowly.

Dora lunged at Dan from below, and snapped at him, sharp teeth and blue scales flashing. Dan split himself into five. One duplicate allowed himself to be caught, while two others went after Dora's eyes. The remaining two went for Danny and Pandora.

The dogs made their presence known, attacking the two duplicates as a pack. One of the duplicates vanished as Cujo's teeth closed around its leg.

The other was taken out by a crossbow bolt. Mattingly wasn't an empty place, and the soldiers weren't for show.

Dora shook off the other three, and they all disappeared in puffs of ectoplasmic vapor.

So where was Dan?

Danny looked around wildly. He didn't see Dan, and clearly no one else did, either. Dan must be invisible, and more invisible than even powerful ghosts could see.

That was bad, but Dan couldn't stay so deeply invisible for long. Danny knew from experience. It was tiring, just like pushing any other ghost power. Dan had to show himself soon... Danny hoped. The question was, when was he going to show himself, and where?

The answer to the first, was immediately. The answer to the second was, two inches in front of Danny's face.

Dan wrapped his clawed hand around Danny's arm, and Danny felt the unmistakable swirling, spinning, pull of teleportation. When Danny's vision cleared, he was far above Mattingly. The island was thumbnail-sized beneath him.

Beneath him... and Dan.

Danny phased from Dan's hand- But that would only work once. Dan would expect it now, and counter it. He went ghost, core stinging.

Dan threw a bolt of ectoplasm at Danny, and Danny caught it and absorbed it, a trick he'd picked up in fights with Vlad. His core was not pleased with the sudden influx of energy, and pulsed painfully. But it was a move Dan hadn't anticipated, and Danny needed the energy if he was going to put up any kind of fight.

Fire sparked off of Dan's fingers, pale and silver-white. He threw two handfuls of it at Danny, and Danny countered with a slanted shield, the fire glancing off harmlessly.

But Dan had experience, much more than Danny. The fire had been a feint, a way to block Danny's vision, and get closer without Danny retreating.

Too close.

The shield shattered like green glass, and Dan's hand constricted around Danny's throat. Danny tapped his ice powers, hoping to freeze Dan's fingers into fragility, but that was a forlorn hope. Dan simply countered Danny's ice with his fire.

Danny looked down, desperate, to Mattingly. They have to have spotted him and Dan by now. They had to be coming.

(He didn't want to die again.)

But it would take time. Danny didn't think any of them could teleport.

"Why?" demanded Dan.

"Why what?" Danny forced out, voice made small and scratchy by the pressure Dan was putting on his throat.

Dan snarled, and plunged his hand into Danny's chest. Danny couldn't even scream as Dan's hand closed around his core.