Hello, Friday.

Asilla: Danny can't sleep forever, but Clockwork can try.

Jeptwin: According to wikipedia, Issitoq is a floating eyeball deity that punishes taboos in Inuit mythology. In retrospect, I probably shouldn't have had the one character with an obviously indigenous name be the bad guy... but it was just so perfect... Hopefully I'll be able to change that soon, though.

lenasmith106: Yeah, the only problem is that they took way too long to do that. XD

ObsidianBlackCat: I asked for your username so I could talk to you... and then... I didn't do that... (I'm so sorry!) This week- This week for sure.

TricksterBoy: Thank you! I'm glad you're enjoying the story. Make sure you sleep, though.

17: I love their dynamic, honestly. Tiny chaos + large chaos.

DarkFoxKit: I'm sort of of torn on redemption for Issitoq. On one hand, I like it when people get along, but on the other, I like having a villain who is just, well, bad, if that makes sense?

Jamalymal: Thank you for reading! I'm glad you're enjoying this.

.

.

.

Chapter 193: Vines and Binds

.

Danny woke up with a gasp, his heart thundering in his chest. He'd just had a nightmare, he was sure of it, but he couldn't remember anything about it, except that it had been about Amity Park. He shuddered.

The GIW had taken over Amity Park. The damage they could do, the people they could hurt… The people they had already hurt… Many of the people of Amity Park were ghosts. The GIW would hunt them, catch them, torture them, all because Danny wasn't there to protect them.

Ancients, they were probably in his house.

In his house. In his room. In his walls. Oh, Ancients.

There were people who would be defenseless. Utterly defenseless.

He was shaking, practically vibrating.

Clockwork shifted against him, and made a soft noise, clearly still asleep. Danny squirmed, and tried to escape, phasing out of Clockwork's arms. He got a few feet away, only to wind up back in Clockwork's arms.

What?

Oh.

Oh, no.

He phased out again, and once again found himself back where he started. He moaned. Clockwork was doing this. Like this, Danny wouldn't be able to get out and help Amity Park. He wouldn't be able to protect them. He started shaking again.

It had been so long since he was home. He wanted to go back. He needed to go back, to help.

(He missed Amity Park.)

It hurt.

(What was wrong with him?)

Clockwork mumbled something. Danny frowned, and looked up, frustrated.

"Grandfather," he said, quietly, not wanting wake Clockwork. Clockwork needed his sleep. "I need to go. Please." He tried phasing out one more time and rolled off the bed. Alright, this looked like it was working this time, so far.

-And he was back. Time ticked on, nice and evenly.

It seemed like he was stuck.

.

.

.

Memento lived in the Floating Forest, a great, messy, three-dimensional rainforest that benefited from the Monsoon Wind that blew off the waters of the Drowned Quarter. It served as home for snakes that were also flowering vines, and two-pointed stepped pyramids that moored themselves to the surrounding foliage with golden chains. Two rivers poured out of it, one directly into the Drowned Quarter, and the other, the Lethe, out the other side, clumps of red flowers blooming in the spray.

In his timeline, Dan hadn't even tried to conquer the place. He had just set it on fire. It burned just as well as the rainforests on Earth. Better, even. After that, all he had to take care of were ash, pyramids, and slag.

He was not looking forward to being in there. It looked dark, wet, and terrible.

"Do you know where in there she is?" asked Dan, a little skeptically.

"At the spring of the Lethe," said Nephthys.

"Which is where, exactly?"

"At the end of the river."

"And where in the forest is that? You don't know, do you?"

"We'll just have to follow the river."

"The river full of water that will make us forget everything if we touch it?"

"Yes. Did you turn into an idiot between the future and now? Or were you already stupid?"

"If I turned into an idiot, it's because of whatever the hell you did in Long Now."

Nephthys waved her hand. "You asked for that."

"Don't remind me."

"If you really don't want to remember, you can take a little swim." She mimed a dog paddle, which really looked odd in her current outfit, robes and veils.

"Ha ha, very funny." He scowled at the forest. "That place is huge. Does she live in one of those pyramids, or what?"

"They aren't really pyramids. They're more like," she held her thumbs and forefingers together to form a diamond, "octahedrons. Let's not waste any more time." She flew forward. Dan cursed under his breath and accelerated to keep up. "It isn't like the river stays in one place, anyway. Like all things, it changes."

"You just forgot," accused Dan.

"Same difference, on the shores of the Lethe."

Dan rolled his eyes. Shadows and glow from the foliage started to fall across his face. The trees lay against one another like jackstraws and knotted ropes. Leaves, branches, and roots stuck out in every direction without rhyme or reason without gravity to tell them where to properly grow.

Oh, and the vines were moving, as expected, leopard-spotted snakes slithering, their flowers waving, flexing slightly, eating the occasional hummingbird.

.

.

.

Ellie sulked. She hadn't found Danny among the Observants' prisoners. She had wanted to. She had wanted to find him so, so, badly. But, no, it was just Undergrowth, Vortex, and a handful of others who were so obviously insane that Ellie could practically taste it on the air.

She kicked a bit of debris that might have once been something expensive and magical across the floor. It made a clattering sound just audible over the noise of normal calm, collected, even staid, legal professionals tearing the Panopticon apart.

In a few hours, there wouldn't be anything left of it but the prison. If that. Ellie hoped someone responsible would come take care of it. She hated the idea of prisons, but she had to admit that the likes of Vortex and Undergrowth had to be contained, somehow. The Observants wouldn't do it. All of them had fled by now, even the stubbornest and stupidest ones.

She heard a muffled cheer from another room. Someone had found the treasure room, apparently. Ghosts could be just as greedy for gold as humans, Ellie had discovered, though that greed was always tempered by Obsession.

She sighed again, sagging down against the wall.

Greedy for gold, and power, and other things besides. Stupid Observants, messing up everything even worse than it already was. Danny had more than enough to deal with. Danny didn't even know everything he had to deal with, yet.

Danny didn't know he was going to be a king. King, and of an entire dimension. King of All Ghosts. Ancients, it was so big. Ellie hadn't processed it yet.

A woman poked her head into the room, red hair falling over her shoulder. "Oh, hello. I don't suppose you mind if I join you?" She smiled. "It's getting to be a bit much out there."

"No, go ahead," said Ellie.

The woman floated into the room, and lightly set down on the floor.

"So," said Ellie. "Who are you?"

"Ivy, of Ivy and Nettle, advocates at arms. We're representing Miss Fenton, so you are likely to see me again." Her smile was nervous.

"You're representing Jazz?"

"Yes. Nettle and I are."

"Have you heard from her, recently?" asked Ellie. If she couldn't find Danny, she could at least hear news about her fully-living sibling.

"Just a few days ago, before I left Libra." She brushed back her hair. "She's quite well."

"That's good," said Ellie.

"It's all rather," Ivy flicked her hand, "remarkable, isn't it? In a bad way. The Observants doing all those horrible things to your brother. I'm so glad he's safe with Lord Clockwork."

Ellie coughed on her most recent breath. "What? How do you know?"

"Miss Fenton and his other classmates came with the news. Specifically, Miss Manson, I believe?" She said the last as more of a question than anything else.

"But she was sure?"

"She convinced most people. When I left, we were waiting on Lord Clockwork's advocate to return with news. She had left before we had the news."

"Right. Cool. How did she get it? Sam, I mean. How did she know about Danny?"

Ivy fidgeted. "Her liminality is developing. I believe she has manifested some kind of clairvoyance? I'm afraid I don't have the details. I was mostly focused on making sure Miss Fenton would be satisfied with her representation in the matter of the trial. Then I was diverted here." She smiled again. "It is a bit overwhelming, though, isn't it? All this change? But so exciting! So many opportunities. Maybe our firm will get more business after this." She sighed, happily. "I would love to have regular cases."

"Sure. I hope that works out for you."

Ivy smiled. "Thank you."

Ellie slid down the wall a little more. Danny was safe with Clockwork. She'd have to ask Pandora if they could go to Long Now. Or go that way on her own. It wasn't like she didn't know the way.

It had been a while since she had seen Clockwork. A few weeks, at this point. Or had it been that long? Time moved strangely here, sometimes. It had been a while since he had told her to go check out the Digressed Tower.

She ran a hand through her hair. Danny was alright. He wasn't lost in the distant past, or on another planet, or in some hellish corner of the Ghost Zone.

Cool.

.

.

.

Vlad reclined on the sofa in the office of his advocate.

"The argument you have outlined is a very good one," said Foxglove. "But I do have to warn you that we may not have the chance to give it during the main part of the trial, where we would bring the argument against the Fentons- Jack Fenton, I should say." He spread his hand out on the table. "Many of my colleagues have been enchanted by the idea of a human-style trial. I am unsure if I can dissuade them of the notion. You know how certain people are with poetry."

Vlad twitched. But he had been in business for long enough to control his displeasure. It wasn't as if it were Foxglove's fault, after all.

"But, surely, the trial won't end without some segment dedicated to determining who has custody of the children, according to our laws, regardless of what the humans decide on their end."

"Yes, that's one of the current points of contention. Some are enamored of the idea of a sort of family court epilogue, after the Fenton's are convicted and sentenced. I am not saying we can't use elements of your argument, but there likely won't be a setting to put forward the entire thing."

"I understand. Are we done for today?"

"I believe so," said Foxglove. "I think we have a very good chance of assigning you custody of Daniel, at least."

"Excellent. Now, I have other business to take care of." He floated out of his seat and brushed imaginary dust off his suit. "I will be seeing you soon."

"Of course," said Foxglove. "I look forward to it."

Vlad flew back to his portal and collapsed on one of his rolling office chairs. What a headache. And now to deal with the GIW. The GIW, who were behaving more and more like lunatics by the day.

First the curfews, and now arresting random people… Madness. He shook his head in disapproval. They should have expected the fighting in the streets. They should have expected that the citizens would go underground.

He poured himself a glass of wine and walked to a computer screen showing a live picture of the situation in Amity Park. Which was bad.

Vlad probably would have been arrested, if he hadn't made himself scarce and put a human shield around his Amity Park property. He sipped his wine and checked his watch. He had time, before his interview with the networks.

There were benefits to being a famous and reclusive billionaire. One of those was having the ear of the media whenever he wanted.

He sneered as a GIW truck rumbled across the screen. The idiots probably thought he was still in Amity Park. Admittedly, he had nurtured that misconception by routing phone calls through that mansion and employing a handful of ghosts and humans to play with the lights and move around in it, but still. Even Daniel and his little friends would have noticed the discrepancies. Jack would have noticed he was gone. Honestly.

.

.

.

Wes sat up, groaning. He stopped immediately when he realized he wasn't in the forest or his group's pre-arranged meeting place.

Actually, the surroundings were suspiciously white.

Had he been caught?

"Hey, kid, calm down, will you?"

Wes yelped and jumped back. He had been caught. He recognized that guy, he was one of the GIW agents that had been stationed here for years. Was he O? K? Did it really matter? Because this was not an okay situation. Okay. OK. Oh, jeez, he was making puns like Fenton did. Crap. He was screwed.

"You're Wes Weston, right?" asked the agent.

"No," squeaked Wes. "I'm, uh, I'm not even from this town."

The man sighed and took off his sunglasses. Wes stared. He wasn't sure he'd ever seen one of these guys without sunglasses, and it made the proportions of his blocky face look beyond weird. The overhead light shone off his bald head.

"You are Wes Weston," he said, as Wes scooted away from him, back to the wall. "I have a proposal for you."

Pft. What kind of proposal could this guy possibly give him? Sell out your family, friends, and whatever ghosts you're working with and maybe we won't kill you or ship you off to an internment camp? Fat chance Wes would agree to anything like that.

But if that's what this guy wanted, why was Wes on a bed and not in a cell? Or at least handcuffed? On second glance, this place looked more like a hotel room than a holding cell, or a hospital. A disused hotel room at that. All of the flat surfaces were dulled with dust.

"We," said the agent, "that is, I and my partner, want to help you."

"Help?" asked Wes, skeptical. "How?"

"We'll be a Fentonworks in a few days," he said. "To help with a new shipment. We know you're in charge of this 'resistance,' or whatever you call yourselves."

Wow. Wes would not say he was in charge of anything at all. He wasn't riding the tiger so much as being mauled.

… Also, they didn't call themselves anything at all, come to think of it.

"We want you to attack on that day."

"What?"

"We want you to attack. We can disable the perimeter alarms, cause a distraction, whatever, but you have to stop this. What the scientists were going to do to the people on that transport…" The man looked faintly ill. "It's one thing when it's ghosts, but humans? And some of the things they're doing to the ghosts, even, it's- But that's not the real problem." He shuddered. "We overheard… They're planning on decontaminating the town. With all the citizens in it."