Hello!
While your opinions will definitely be taken into account, I personally think this is my best chapter. Ever. At least the section with Dark Danny, anyway. The writer's block is completely gone, its dark tendrils have freed my mind and I plunged face-first into a deep well of inspiration. It was awesome! I hope you think so, too. Things are definitely picking up now that Dan is revealed. Danny will be majorly stepping up to the plate. I only hope he's prepared. It's a lot for a fifteen year old to handle. But I hope you see from what happens just how much his loved ones respect him. Don't worry if this seems a bit fast, decisive action was called for, and the preparations are going to be extensively covered, so it's not concluding just yet. We still have a ways to go.
Thanks to all reviewers, especially those who provide me with virtual candy. It is delicious. I saved some to give to the first person to get the joke behind the Fentons' alarm code.
Without further adieu, chapter ten!
HiddenAuthor
Chapter 10 – Reassessments
The front door of the Fenton home flew open to blaring ghost alarms. Danny's parents were upstairs inside ten seconds. Despite the serious risk he ran by agitating his parents like that, Danny had to pause for a moment to appreciate just how well prepared they were for an attack. But once their ghost weapons whirred to life and trained on Ember, Danny held a hand up.
"Hold it. She's here for help." Jack and Maddie paused; eyebrows raised, but didn't lower their weapons.
"Come inside and close the door. Sam, go over to the panel in the wall there, and press 44678." Sam rushed over and entered the code. A moment later, the alarm shut down. Jerking her gun, Maddie motioned for Ember to take a seat. After a brief look at Danny, who merely shrugged, she quickly obeyed. "Alright, explain." Danny looked up and met his mother's gaze, changing back into human form.
"What's with the alarms? I'll just trip them every time I show up." Jack frowned.
"We set them up so they wouldn't read your signature. But since you're always fighting ghosts, we thought our house was probably a target, so we beefed up the security." Maddie nodded.
"But that wasn't an explanation." Danny sighed.
"Mom. Remember that carving you found, the one with the creepy eyes?" Maddie paled.
"What about it?" Danny gulped.
"He's back." Maddie stared at her son, confused. Jack just scratched his head and looked between the ghost at his table, to his family and back.
"I don't understand. I thought you fixed that, er, problem." Danny sighed.
"It's more complicated than that. When I fixed it, my actions depended on me meeting him, so now a version of him exists in this time whether I become him or not. I had him contained…somewhere safe, but he's out now. He hurt Ember." The flame-haired ghost stared up. Suddenly the room burst into questions.
"He's still real?"
"What's your mother talking about, Danny?"
"You've met that bozo before?"
"How is this even possible?"
"That thing was you?"
"What's going on?"
"HOLD IT!" Danny shouted, eyes flashing green. The lights flickered momentarily. Taking a deep breath, the ghost boy sat down beside Ember, staring quietly at the floor.
"Alright. I didn't want to explain this yet. You guys are still getting used to the whole ghost thing, and I didn't want to mess that up." Danny opened his mouth again, but Dani phased down through the floor, holding Jazz's hand. They both looked pale.
"Danny, what's going on? We figured mom and dad could handle the alarm, but you're here and," Jazz paused, noticing Ember for the first time, "what's SHE doing here?" Ember sat back, rubbing her head.
"You know, kid, maybe you shouldn't have told these guys. It looked a lot less stressful when it was just you, the nerd, and princess darkness here." She jerked her thumb over her shoulder at Sam, who just glared back. Danny groaned, dropping his head into his hands.
"Okay, from the top. Ember, you've met my parents and Jazz. That other girl is my clo-cousin, Dani. Dani, this is Ember, an evil mind-controlling spirit from another dimension." Dani quirked an eyebrow.
"You mean like Paulina?" Sam grinned despite herself. The ghost girl giggled.
"No, I mean she can control people by singing. Or, she could." Ember hung her head miserably. "She's here under my protection. An evil, twenty five year old version of me is loose in the Ghost Zone destroying stuff. He'll come here eventually, probably to make sure I can't try and stop him later. Right now, I'd guess he's in the Ghost Zone, looking for Vlad. After he's sure Vlad's out of the picture, he'll trash the major ghosts' lairs, assuming he didn't get to them while searching for Vlad. Once they're out of the way, he'll attack the human world. He'll come here first, to remove me as a threat. Then, he'll take down Valerie and Fenton Works, and move on to the Guys in White. After that, he'll pretty much destroy the earth unopposed." Ember was staring at him, mouth gaping.
"Umm, not to rag on you or anything, kid, but he didn't say most of that. He just said he was looking for Vlad. Where'd the rest come from?" Danny shrugged, looking down.
"I've had a lot of time to think about him since I found out. Even if he's evil, he's still basically me. And that's what…that's what I'd do." An awkward silence filled the room. Finally, Jack cleared his throat.
"Er, Danny. This evil ghost…it's you?" Danny shook his head.
"Long story. In one version of reality, I started to turn evil a few months ago. Basically, I ended up destroying everything. The Ghost Zone, the human world, I didn't leave anything standing." Jack paled slightly. Danny gulped and pushed on. "I don't know if it's because I'm part human, or because of genetics, or the portal, or whatever. But the truth is, I'm powerful, dad. You guys haven't seen me destroy anything before, but Sam, Jazz, and Tucker have seen me lose it. They know what I can do, if I want. If I were evil right now, I could destroy this whole city inside an afternoon, and none of you could stop me. And this other version of me has a ten year advantage power-wise." Dani just stared, pale. The others were silent. Finally, Maddie looked up.
"How do we stop him?" Danny sighed.
"I don't know. I only beat him last time because he was using up some of his power to hold you all hostage, and I managed to catch him by surprise. I further weakened him with the Specter Deflector and hit him with the Ghost Gauntlets. I used the Ghostly Wail on him twice, and it was still a near thing. By the time I was done, I was totally drained. I couldn't do it this time. He knows I can use the Wail, and he'll prepare for our weapons. I may not be good at math, but I'm not an idiot, and neither is he. Besides, he picked up all kinds of strategy skills from Vlad." His parents frowned again.
"What?" Jazz put her hand on her brother's shoulder.
"Danny. You did your best to explain quickly. But I think maybe you should just tell them the whole story. All of it." Quietly nodding, Danny motioned for his family to sit down. They complied in equal silence, Maddie's hand draped protectively over her husband's arm.
"I found out something terrible when we went to that college reunion…"
A small, four-legged ghost animal hopped through the green sky from one tree trunk to another. Cautiously, it sniffed the air, and quickly licked out its forked tongue. Its gradually relaxing posture suddenly tensed, fur bristling along its two-foot length, as its ears picked up a small twig snapping one hundred yards to the south. Turning its head rapidly it focused its giant black eyes on the distant bushes. All was still. Still uneasy, the creature loosened its clawed grip on the bark and unfolded a pair of large, gossamer wings. Buzzing as quietly as possible, the strange creature snuck off towards safer pastures. It had flown all of three feet before a bolus flew in and wrapped around it's neck, tearing its head clean off. The severed body and head fell to the ground below, twitching as they dissipated into an ethereal mist.
Skulker, Ghost Zone's greatest hunter, stepped out from the bushes, cursing under his breath. That elusive male had been one of the most acutely perceptive creatures he had ever acquired. If only they weren't so fragile. He had yet to develop hunting gear that was quick enough to catch the flighty things, yet gentle enough not to kill them. It wasn't that he didn't intend to kill them eventually anyway; he merely wanted the luxury of choosing whether or not they died after he caught them. While he relished the new and exciting challenge to both his hunting prowess and engineering skills, his patience was wearing thin. This was the fifth such creature he had inadvertently killed, and none of his new tools had been able to spare the things.
At this point the hunter would usually offer Technus a commission to design an effective new feature for his ecto-suit, but even that was not currently an option. About a week ago, the technology ghost had barred himself in his lair, refusing to come out. Every offer Skulker passed him, no matter how ridiculously priced, was answered with incoherent mumblings about 'hundreds and hundreds of stairs.' Even if Technus weren't on mental holiday, Skulker couldn't actually pay him now. Vlad had done the unthinkable, something he'd never done before; he'd cheated Skulker out of a payment. The hunter had seen neither hide nor hair of the blue creep since the Amity Park fiasco, and he was running incredibly short on money. Musing on his current troubles, his meticulously honed hunting instincts where all that saved Skulker from the blast.
The large metallic ghost jumped to the side before he even heard the explosion. Huge chunks of dirt and rubble flew out from a smoking crater. Looking up with narrowed eyes, the hunter watched furiously as a large, dark figure descended. The lighting behind it, he only had the impression of red eyes and a billowing cape.
"So, Vlad. You've finally shown up. Do you intend to pay me, or was that blast a challenge?" The dark figure chuckled.
"I'm sorry. I think you have me confused with someone else." Green light flared in his fist, casting light upwards on a dark, forbidding face. A white DP insignia blazed across the black outfit. Skulker paused, confused.
"Ghost child? You do not look yourself." The figure laughed coldly.
"Closer, but still not quite there." His hand shot forward, and with a single ecto-blast, destroyed over half of Skulker's suit. The hunter's eyes widened.
"What are you doing?" He asked, gazing down at his masterpiece in horror. The figure smiled slightly.
"I need answers, Skulker. And while I could probably get them from you as you are, the feeling of your real body squirming in my clenched fist sounds much more fun."
Without a second's further hesitation, Skulker destroyed his armor and jumped. He might be confident in his own abilities, but he was no fool. No intelligent hunter this overmatched would stand and fight. He needed to regroup. Falling to the ground, he ran as fast as he could to the nearest emergency tunnel entrance. The network of escape pipes just large enough for his true form riddled the entire complex, all leading back to his main base and spare weapons. If he could just get there…
A gloved hand plucked him into the air mere inches from the nearest tube, kicking madly. Dan chuckled, and tightened his grip. Skulker made a soft, gasping sound, nearly fainting from the pain.
"What do you want?" He asked in a pathetic voice quite unlike anything he'd ever used before. He had lost, badly. And he knew it. Dan grinned down at the pathetic creature and squeezed.
"Talk to me Skulker. You were always close with Vlad; his little errand boy. Where is he?" The hunter gasped, sucking for air.
"N-no one knows. After the fight in Amity Park, he just vanished." Dan shook the small ghost hard. "I swear! I've looked everywhere. He owes me money!" The dark ghost paused thoughtfully.
"Well if you had an interest in it, you probably did your best. And I know you're not stupid enough to lie to me, Skulker." He shook his fist hard, and Skulker nodded desperately. "Perhaps you can help me with my other problem. I need you to tell me if someone who is not bound by the conventional laws of time and existence could bypass a ghost-imposed barrier and invade a haunt." Skulker's eyes widened.
"How should I know?" The hand tightened, but this time, did not relax. He started to turn blue. "I don't know! I've never heard of something like that before! And I've read the Ghost Laws cover to cover; I used to be a council member! Let me go!" He pleaded. Dan rubbed his chin.
"Well, I suppose I'll just have to test it then. But I think I'll work my charm on the Ghost Zone first. I have a few old friends to meet, and word might reach my ear about good old uncle Vlad." He chuckled evilly and looked down. "But first I think I'll play a little hunting game." Dan bent down and dropped a trembling Skulker onto the grassy earth. Bending further, he nearly placed his eyes at ground level and locked gazes with his terrified prey. "Run."
Danny wrapped up his story, leaning back with a sigh. Sam and Jazz had both heard it before, but the others were completely dumbstruck. After even a brief description of Danny's old future, Ember had been so upset her hair went out. Jack was sprawled back on the floor, staring vacantly into space.
"Vlad. Vlad is a ghost. My son is a ghost. Vlad and my son are ghosts. My best friend wants to kill me." Maddie rubbed her husband's back gently, as she shook ever so slightly from the terrible things her son had said.
"All of those people. All of those lives." Briefly her gaze flicked to Danny in his chair. Danny flinched under the gaze. There was pity in it, but under that, there was fear. She was afraid of him. Even if she loved him, she would always be afraid of him. Mutely, Danny floated upstairs and away from those terrible eyes, and collapsed on his bed. After all of the pain, it was funny. He couldn't cry anymore. He just lay there and stared at the wall with an empty expression. Blue mist shot from his mouth, and he felt a cold hand on his shoulder.
"Hey Dipstick." Danny didn't say a word; he just turned away a bit. "Now don't be like that, I'm tryin' to be nice here. It's not exactly my style, but I owe you one. Don't make me work at it, I don't have the patience." Danny chuckled hollowly.
"You don't owe me anything Ember. You told me he got out; I offered a safe place to stay. We're even." Ember sat down on the bed, gazing into the distance.
"Nah, kid. I owe you for not being him. If what you say is true, you'd be him now if you weren't tryin' not to be, and I owe you big for that." Danny remained silent. Ember sighed. "Look. I've seen that expression in humans before, kid. We're ghosts, fear comes with the territory. I'm not sayin' its right; it's just how things are. Even if they like us – heck, even if they love us – they'll always be scared. I mean, the things we can do, I can't blame them. It's scary stuff." Danny mumbled into his pillow. Ember quirked an eyebrow. "What was that, kid?" Danny turned around, green eyes blazing. Ember took an involuntary step back.
"It's not fair! I'm not like you! I'm human! People aren't supposed to be afraid of me!" The panes on the bedroom window cracked, and the light bulb exploded. "What am I, anyway? Even if they love me, once they know what I can do, everyone's scared of me! My friends, my family, ghosts, even I'm scared of me! I don't fit in with humans, even if they all say I still am one, and I don't fit in with ghosts! Vlad's evil and alone, and maybe he deserves it. But Dani and I are good, and still alone!" Danny's voice turned sarcastic, as invisible energy pulsed out through the room, finishing the job on the window and sending shards of glass into the street. "All hail the mighty halfas, freaks of the universe! Not humans, not ghosts, too powerful to be with others, too human to live alone, feared and hated by everything in this dimension and the next! That's all we are! Freaks! Monsters! It's. Not. Fair!" Danny pounded on the bed in frustration, too upset to do anything else. Ember just watched sadly.
"I told ya, kid, fear's part of the deal. I can't make it go away, but try to remember that every ghost out there goes through the same thing. Even if most of us don't like you much for sticking up for the humans, we still know how it feels to have people you care about fear you. It's awful, and it's probably why most of us don't like humans much. I can't tell you it gets better, 'cause I'd be lyin', but I promise it gets easier to live with. Just give it time." Without another word, Ember drifted off into the house, invisible. Danny just lay there, completely drained, and stared at the wall some more. A while later there was a quiet knock on the door. Sam stepped in, frowning slightly.
"You know, for someone who wants to save this town, you don't seem to be working to hard." Danny managed a half smile at the light jibe, and turned to face his girlfriend.
"Are you afraid of me?" Sam's frown deepened, and she joined him, sitting down on the bed.
"I'm afraid of losing you. I'm afraid of you not wanting to be with me anymore. I'm afraid one day you'll stop caring. But I'm not afraid you'll hurt me. I don't think you can. And I believe in you, Danny, despite my fears. I trust you. And your family does, too." Sam reached out and ran a hand through his hair. Finally, a single tear ran down the hybrid's face.
"But what if I can't save you? I'm not ready for this. He's too strong." Sam didn't move.
"I told you. I believe in you. You'll find a way. And not because of your powers. You're a strong person. On the inside. And that's much more important." Danny smiled.
"I love you, Sam." She smiled.
"I love you, too. That's why I'm not afraid." She grinned, and yanked him to his feet. "Now come on. An evil psycho version of you is loose in the Ghost Zone. It's time to get our butts in gear and batten down the hatches." Gripping his wrist, she pulled him back downstairs to the living room. Ember was once again sitting in her old chair, filing her nails. Seeing him enter, she shot him a significant look. Mouthing 'thanks' under his breath, Danny sat down and turned to face his family, plans forming frantically in his mind.
"Okay guys, I don't know how long it'll be before he shows up, but going after him would be pointless. He's too strong. I think we need to take the time we have to prepare and make our stand right here. Even if he tries to destroy the Ghost Zone, ectoplasm can take a major punch, so he won't be able to do too much permanent damage." Danny glanced apologetically at Ember, who just massaged her throat and nodded.
"Ember, I'd like you to recruit any half-decent ghosts you can think of to help. Mom, Dad, I need you guys to convince the mayor to act now. Set up a city ghost defense system. Try to get Valerie's dad in charge. I think he was in charge in the other future, and Amity was still standing, so he must be very good. We'll need Valerie too." Danny coughed nervously. "You two will need to talk to her. Tell her what you think you should, but don't mention my secret unless you think she needs to know. I wanted to tell her myself eventually, but if you have to say something, say it." Jack and Maddie nodded.
"Jazz, I need you to organize any willing locals into a volunteer backup team. You know people and lots of them respect you. Tell them what you have to, but don't cause a panic. You're good at psychology, I trust you to tell them just enough." Jazz smiled, slightly pale. Danny turned towards his girlfriend. "Sam. Get a hold of Tucker and have him remotely shut down Vlad's portal. Blow his house up if you have to, he doesn't have human staff and he's not home. Once its offline, evil me will only have one easy way out. He can make portals on his own, but I don't think he will. It's more entertaining to have a dramatic entrance, and he loves drama. After that, you guys head back here and help mom and dad work on the house defenses." Sam nodded, and ran off, pulling out her cell phone. Maddie looked over at her son and smiled at his logo'd t-shirt.
"I'm really proud of you Danny. You know that, right?" Danny nodded, and smiled slightly.
"You guys should take off. The mayor isn't expecting anything like this, and the sooner you act, the faster things will go. He still isn't sure about me, so he'll probably put up a fight. Call the news, do whatever you have to, but we need that support or we can't win." Jack nodded.
"But what are you going to do?" Danny frowned.
"My powers have settled back down, but I don't really know what I can do now. Before he gets here, I'm going to find out." Nodding, everyone left in the room took off for their personal missions. Dani stayed behind, and looked at Danny, confused.
"What should I do?" Danny looked at her.
"Stay safe. I know you want to help, but I can't risk you melting. I don't want you to die." Dani frowned, and rushed over to her cousin and hugged him tight.
"I worry about you, too, you know." She whispered. "Your family really cares, but you understand me. Without you, I'll be all alone. Promise you won't leave me." Danny smiled sadly down at the terrified girl.
"I promise. Now go find a safe place." He pushed her gently. "Run."
