IMPORTANT NOTE: Last week I posted two, that's right, two chapters, due to an error on my part (that is, I posted 170 instead of 169, and didn't want to take down 170). If you did not read two chapters last week, you should go back and make sure you read them, before reading this one.

Thank you so much for all of your support.

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Chapter 171: Heroic Deeds

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Danny couldn't bear to watch after Inanna began her glide forward. Not when he knew what would happen.

He couldn't bear to watch, but at the same time, he had to. These people, in his time, their sacrifice, their act, so much more heroic than what he had done and what he was doing, had been all but forgotten. Someone should remember.

What you are doing is plenty heroic. You had no more expectation of survival then they, at the beginning, and you are but a child.

Danny peered out from around the side of the portal's frame, and ducked whenever an ectoblast, fireball, or arrow came his way. He got his fingers singed, and a few strands of his hair. The battle was like a storm, with Inanna as the fiery, star-bright eye. Ectoplasm of ending ghosts streamed away, towards the Core.

Inanna would see that, surely. She wasn't stupid. She would know it for what it was.

… She hadn't, with the lion.

But that was just one ghost.

She may notice, but she will not know what it means. You will lie, and misdirect, and grovel, if you must, and she will be none the wiser. For a time. This is necessary.

But, why?

Watch.

Danny watched.

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There were a lot of Observants. Dan, admittedly hadn't realized how many. In his timeline, he had just collapsed their giant stupid building, and assumed that had taken care of them. According to Nephthys it hadn't.

Dan wasn't so sure he believed her. She didn't have Clockwork's ability to see through time, and she had reason to lie to him. Many reasons. They weren't exactly friends.

He wasn't sure he wanted what she was trying to sell to him, either. Change. Part of him thought it sounded nice, but, really, how much could a thing like him change, anyway? Lethean waters, tinctures of Nepenthe, or no?

Did he want to change?

What had been, it wasn't pleasant, not beyond the detached, intellectual challenge, but it had been... safe was probably the wrong word.

Eyeballs were surprisingly satisfying to pop. Or perhaps not so surprisingly. He despised the Observants. They had killed everyone he cared about. Almost.

(And Dan would have done the rest.)

(And he didn't want to be like that anymore.)

There was an odd shriek behind him, and Dan turned. He had been focusing too hard on this side of Long Now. He flew around the lair, not trusting it enough to go through it, not with Clockwork out of his meddling little mind.

This was, evidently the correct choice, because the scream had been Observants being impaled, skewered, really, with giant, filigree minute and hour hands.

It was... interesting to know that Long Now would fight the Observants.

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Tucker squished a ball of wax between his fingers, and stuffed it into his left ear. It wasn't the best makeshift earplug, but it wasn't the worst, and if Tucker didn't want to be deaf by the time he was sixty, he needed ear protection. At least, that was what his mom always said about concerts.

The thing about Ember? She liked concerts. A lot. They weren't technically the focus of her Obsessions, but they were part of them, and they were how she fulfilled them. A big part.

She was already starting one up on the top deck, happy to have a captive audience. The soldiers, and about half the crew, had come with the students. The rest of the crew was staying with their original ship. They didn't want to leave it behind.

The captain had said something really weird about the ship eventually growing back. Well, Tucker would have thought it was weird, except that... Well, everything. Sometimes Tucker had a hard time shaking a 'normal earthling' perspective.

(Other times, it just fell right off.)

To his right, Sam, looking as bored, set the candle back into its holder, and separated her own glob of wax into two parts. Jazz was interviewing one of Youngblood's thralls near the stern. At least, Tucker thought it was a thrall. Tucker knew there were some actual ghosts in Youngblood's crew, other than Bones, but he wasn't sure which they were. He'd never really hung out with Youngblood. At all. He'd rarely even directly fought Youngblood.

Sam sighed deeply, loudly enough for Tucker to hear.

"Yep," said Tucker, his voice raised. "I know this isn't ideal, but aren't you-?"

"Are you kidding? I'm just relieved to be on a ship with people we can sort of trust. That was my relief sigh, not my annoyance sigh."

"Oh. Okay, yeah, I get it. Yeah. I guess I'm pretty drained, too."

"Yep."

Mr. Lancer dropped down next to Tucker, right on the deck.

"I can't believe everything that's happened," said the teacher. "I keep thinking about it, but nothing makes sense." He leaned back. "It hasn't all caught up with me yet." He sighed. "Will it?"

"I mean, maybe?" said Tucker. "I'm not sure it's all caught up to me yet." He bounced his PDA back and forth between his thumb and fingers. "My battery is dead."

"Weren't you able to charge it with your hands now, or something?" asked Sam.

"I'm trying that. It's possible I might have cooked the batteries. Or I'm just tired. Just... everything catching up to me."

"It really isn't abuse, is it?" asked Mr. Lancer.

"What are you talking about?"

"Daniel, and his parents. It isn't abuse, is it?"

"I mean, Danny never thought of it that way? If anything, I guess it would be neglect." Sam shrugged. "Do you want some wax for your ears?"

"For my..?"

"This is going to get loud. It's already getting loud."

"Oh, sure."

Sam handed Mr. Lancer the candle. "You see, they really didn't ever know. I think that should count for something. Is that really all you wanted to know?"

"Of course not. That's just... That's the most pressing bit." He swallowed. "There are so many ghosts."

"Yep," said Tucker.

"These aren't called the Infinite Realms for nothing."

Mr. Lancer was silent for a moment. "Do you think that Shakespeare is here, somewhere?"

"We met him once," said Tucker.

"You're joking."

"No, no," said Sam, "this was around the end of last year. You made that joke about how if someone brought you a signed copy of one of Shakespeare's plays, you'd give them an A?"

"I suppose. I make that joke with all my sophomores. But Danny did fine, if I recall correctly. He got a B. Didn't he?"

"Oh, yeah. But he was convinced that he was going to fail. He'd had another falling out with Ghostwriter, who tutors him, and he gets, uh. Test anxiety."

"Sure, call it that," said Tucker. "So, one weekend we went on a Shakespeare hunting expedition. We even got him to sign a play. It's under the floor in Danny's room."

"I thought it was in the wall?"

"It isn't in either," interjected Jazz, who had come back from her 'interview' with the skeletal ghost without anyone noticing. "It's on the bookshelf in my room. He gave it to me for my birthday." She shrugged. "I thought it was interesting."

"No, we know about that one, we're talking about the other one. Danny got two, since he thought you might like one."

"Okay," said Tucker. "Anyway, it turns out that Shakespeare is still doing plays over in Logres-Prydain, which is kinda like fantasy Britain. But, cool fantasy Britain."

"Isn't there another one called Albion?" asked Jazz.

"Yeah, but we've never been there, so that's uncool fantasy Britain. There are a few, I think. For really old countries like that, there are sometimes a bunch of different versions hanging out here in the Zone..." He trailed off when he saw how overwhelmed Mr. Lancer looked.

"Thing is," said Sam, taking over, "once we had the thing, we kind of realized how stupid it was. I mean, how were we going to explain that to you?"

"I don't know. I think I might have liked to hear you try."

"Danny will probably give it to you, once we all get back, if it makes you feel better," said Tucker.

Mr. Lancer sat up slightly straighter. "I think it might. How did he manage to, um, get his grades up if they were so bad?"

Jazz rolled her eyes while Sam answered. "Well, first off, they weren't, but secondly, he made up with Ghostwriter."

"Ah," said Mr. Lancer.

"Was there anything else you wanted to ask about?" asked Tucker. "I mean, we can't have the whole," he waved his hands, "thing right now. Not with that about to start," he gestured to the stage on the other side of the boat, which had formed straight from the ethereal mists of the Zone (Ember could do impressive things, sometimes). "But if there's something..."

"I think what he's trying to say, is that you probably weren't looking for an explanation about Danny's academic weirdness," supplied Jazz.

"No," said Mr. Lancer. "Jasmine, I've had some time to think about this trial, with your parents, and I was, well." He paused, looking up at Jazz. "What are you going to do?"

"What do you mean?" asked Jazz.

"It's just that," Mr. Lancer gestured helplessly in the air, "between everything, I think even a human court would find your parents guilty of something." He looked at Sam. "Neglect, at the least. If they had all the facts. It was my understanding that ghosts look on these things even more harshly. I don't know what that means for you or Danny. To Kill a Mockingbird, I don't know what it means for any of us."

Jazz hesitated. "Well, that's sort of complicated, and-"

Ember's concert started. It was, as Tucker had predicted, loud. But, dang, Ember could play.

"- I think that's going to have to wait for later," Jazz shouted at the top of her lungs, hands over her ears. She hadn't put any wax in.

Mr. Lancer nodded in miserable agreement.

Tucker wondered if Ember had this song on an album, and if copies were for sale.

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Danny could feel Inanna coming closer. She smelled of ash, hot metal, and burning ectoplasm.

With the end of the battle, he had stopped watching, and started cowering. If he hadn't already been utterly terrified of Inanna, that would have convinced him to be. Definitively.

He had, however, seen what Lady Ereshkigal had wanted him to see, the reason she had called so many ghosts to their end.

Bilulu and her sons were powerful, very much so, although he hadn't been able to quite tell which powers belonged to which ghost at this distance. They seemed to have multiplication and heat abilities, along with some very strong shields. At least one of them was a strong telekinetic, and focused enough to use the ability in battle. He thought one of them might have raised an illusion. Their steeds were strong and nimble, clever fliers.

The battle was still terribly one sided.

But-

But!

Inanna's breastplate had been damaged, her dress had been torn. Just a little, where the first fastened at the shoulder. Considering the power invested in each artifact, they would repair themselves with time.

But you won't give them that time, will you? the Core purred.

Danny wasn't intending to do so, no.

But Inanna was scary, so he was hiding. She would expect him to hide, anyway. She would expect him to be scared. Wouldn't she?

Danny pressed himself closer to the brick. Inanna rounded the gate.

"Get up," she demanded. Then, in a very slightly less harsh tone, "I will not harm you, for as long as you are loyal, and honest, and you shall be rewarded according to your deeds."

No comfort there. Danny peeled himself away from the gate, and Inanna nodded in approval.

"Take me to the next one."