Disclaimer: I don't own DP.

Thanks to GhostCore, ShadowYashi, Turtledude83, Crystalmoon39, Above the Winter Moonlight, Invader Johnny, Margot-Eve, Cookieplzandthnx, Yasz1221, Trish, Domination of the World, JoojooBrother, SweetestChick, Brittany, Silverstone007, KraZiiePyrozHavemoreFun, Lilith Jae, Welp, ZoneRobotnik for reviewing last chapter! I really can't thank you enough for sticking with this crazy collection and for continuously showing support and offering thoughts and ideas. You guys make me inspired to write!


Deliverance

Shot 28: Dan's Secret VALentine Plans (Part 6)


D was officially pronounced dead by the practicing doctor, Kwan. Not much could be done for the man who had been shot five times and potentially contaminated with an ectoplasmic-based substance. But the recently-graduated doctor had been greatly confused by D's altered appearance once the body had been sent to his autopsy table.

Kwan cut away the remains of the man's clothes with clinical precision, poking and prodding at the body while he wiped away blood. Upon closer inspection, he realized the bluish-purple bruises were not consistent with bruises at all—they trailed up D's body in places where he'd not sustained injuries. D's eyes had turned a ruby red. One of his canines had elongated into a surprisingly sharp fang.

"What in the world happened to you?" he muttered under his breath as he pulled away, grabbing a needle. D's distorted image made Kwan feel cold and distant. He'd seen the way D had fawned over Valerie and had known that the man genuinely loved her. If Kwan knew nothing else about D, that was enough.

Valerie was still inconsolable, shutting herself away in some unknown location.

Kwan swallowed hard. "I should've come forward with Nathan's psych-evaluation," he admitted to the dead body of D as he drew blood. "I knew he was a high-functioning nut case. I just didn't know what he was capable of."

He pulled the full needle away, noting oddly how the dull blood was still a separated mix of red and green. "But I'll find out what he did to you," Kwan promised. "For you and Valerie."

The young doctor inserted the blood sample into an analysis machine, hoping to identify the root cause of D's odd physical distortions. What had Nathan infected him with? How had it altered D's DNA? But after a few moments, the genetic test returned with the strangest results. The bullets Nathan had shot him with were not the origin of the green blood or physical manifestations.

The genetics analysis detected no substance foreign to the body and instead read, Ghost ENA detected. 100 percent. Running against GHOST data base

Kwan's eyes widened. "Wait, what?" He nearly paused the machine, face in a puzzle but heart unsettled. It was telling him that everything within D was ectoplasmic in nature. That D was a ghost. He stopped the search and retried the analysis, only to receive the same message. "This can't be right."

Was it even possible? That D was really a ghost beneath his incredibly human skin?

Suddenly, the machine pinged, having identified the ENA against the known database of ghosts around the world. The name typed across the screen made Kwan's heart stop. He knew now why D's blood had bled green, why his eyes had gone a distinctive, familiar red, why his hair had streaked with white, why his skin had bruised with a familiar color…

Because he was Dan Phantom.

Kwan gasped. "Oh my god." He pulled away from D, eyes wide. His knees shook as he stared at the dead body, which did not move at all despite Kwan's sudden enlightenment. He could see it now. The similarities. The face, the body's outline…

"Oh my god," he breathed again. He felt entirely frozen—the preserved body of Dan Phantom, the Ravager of Worlds and the murderer of billions, was lying across his autopsy table. Dan Phantom had been inside the shield and inside the resistance using a human appearance. Dan Phantom had fawned over Valerie and seduced her. Dan Phantom had jumped before bullets and saved Valerie.

In the flutter of thoughts and images, Kwan suddenly began to fear for his own safety. The body of Dan Phantom was still unmoving, but that did not mean this wasn't a trap. If D was truly Phantom, it was likely a trap. Maybe that was the plan the entire time: Deceive everyone (especially Valerie), and then make a sacrifice so great that no one would see his attack from the inside….

He pulled out his phone, staring in horror at the body before him. His fingers shook as he dialed a number. A female voice, rough with emotion, snapped back. "What do you want?"

"Val?" he whispered quickly, the hair raising on the back of his neck as he scooted himself into the corner of the room. "I need you get here. Right now."

Her voice sounded odd, as if she'd been crying. "I don't want to see him."

"I'm serious, Val," he said, staring at the body on his table. "You need to get here and battle-suit up. Now. This is an emergency."


In record time, Valerie barreled into Kwan's medical lab, her sleek metal suit covering her body. Her eyes were bloodshot but highly alert. Then she stared at the autopsy table where Phantom's body lay with a sheet half-covering it, and something in her stance broke. "Oh," she said. Agony and disappointment wracked through her. Her eyes began to water. "From your call, I thought—" She looked up at Kwan with great accusation. Words failed her.

Kwan moved forward, desperate for her protection. He ran to her, voice low. "Valerie, we need to contain this body and lock it up tight." His voice was strained and full of stutters. "I know you thought he was your boyfriend—but the tests I ran—he's not human. His genetic readouts match up with Dan Phantom's." He hardly even whispered the name, as if it were cursed or that the sound itself would awaken the monster.

But Valerie did not grow shocked or frightened or confused. Instead, a heavy tiredness came over her. And when she blinked, her eyes began to water all over again. She swallowed back the waves of pain as she retracted her battle suit. "I know."

Kwan paused. "…Wait. What?" Disbelief made him back away from her, and his voice grew stronger, "Valerie, you've had Dan Phantom sleeping in your room. Do you have any idea—"

"—Don't tell anyone," Valerie begged, her voice broken. "Let him die a hero. Please, Kwan. I know this sounds crazy."

He took a horrified step back from her again, suddenly unable to recognize her. "This sounds insane," he corrected. "You knew? I mean, you actually knew?"

"Yes."

"The whole time?"

Valerie nodded, her eyes blurring with tears. "He uploaded a virus to my tech. It blinded the whole resistance and the Shield to him. He threatened me in the beginning to keep quiet, but then—" her breath hitched. "I don't know. He couldn't have planned this." She reached out to Kwan. "Please, don't give me that look."

Kwan flinched away from her, looking betrayed.

Valerie added, voice breaking, "Let me explain."

The man gazed between Dan Phantom's limp body atop the autopsy table and the unguarded Valerie Gray before him. "What is going on?" he said in horrified confusion. "You kissed him and let him sleep in your room. Is this all a trick? Did he blackmail you? Something else?" The sudden thought that Phantom had done something to Valerie made his look of betrayal give way to guilt and anguish. Kwan moved forward, grabbing her hand. "Valerie. What did he do to you?"

Valerie's lips quivered. "Nothing," she breathed. "He didn't do anything."

Kwan raised his free hand and gently planted it against Valerie's forehead. "Did he possess you? What was his plan for being here? Is he going to wake up on my table and kill us all?"

The woman blinked at the rapid-fire questions, her heart growing heavy at the sudden concern Kwan held for her. She gently pulled away from him.

"Phantom…is not good," she said, voice pained. "But sometimes, when I fought him, he said things. Stuff that made me wonder if he wasn't all bad." She inhaled shakily. "And growing up, it was hard to forget, uh, some things about each other."

Kwan maintained an expression similar to ones he gave patients, at least willing to listen to Valerie. "What do you mean?"

Valerie swallowed hard. "He flirted a lot. I tried to ignore it, but he made it damn-near impossible, so it kinda became a tradition. Then he started noticing my problems with Nathan." She turned away. "One day, he implanted a virus in my suit, and he showed up on our doorstep in that disguise of his. Said he was going to help me solve my Nathan problem so I could spend more time fighting him."

The young doctor's eyebrows flew up. "I'm not sure if that's nice or disturbing."

Valerie rolled her eyes, wiping tears from her face. "He started worrying about me dying. He said Nathan was going to kill me. So he posed as an old ex-boyfriend to try and get Nathan to back off, and then everything changed."

Kwan's voice was hesitant. "Why would he do these things? I mean, Val…I've had to patch you up because of him. He wants you—all of us—dead."

She sighed. "It's been years since he tried to kill me. All my injuries, they've been from trying to help out his other victims. The people trapped in buildings and landslides…" Her lips twitched in a sob. "He hasn't wanted me to die for a long time. He could have killed me several times over. There were times I could have destroyed him. We didn't."

The doctor sat back and fell silent. "This is…I mean…." He trailed off, looking back at the limp body of D. "This is a lot to take in." He felt only slightly better about the dead body in the room. "And you let him touch you? Willingly?"

She thought back to the softness of Dan's calloused fingers running down her skin, the desperate need as his tongue slid against hers. She swallowed hard. "Yes." The thought that she would never feel his presence again made her heart squeeze hard and suffocate her lungs. Tears slipped down her eyes again. "He jumped in front of those bullets for me. I held him as he bled out. I keep thinking…this is all a trick."

"Are you sure it isn't?" Kwan asked.

Valerie eyed him, her face red from crying. "I felt his power core stop. I don't know if he can regenerate from that. If there's still a way to help him..." She swallowed hard. "Is there? Something I'm missing?"

Kwan gaped at her, his jaw dropping for a second. "You mean, you actually want him to come back?"

"Yes," she admitted, eyes hardening. "I do."

The doctor seemed to stumble for words, racing for thought. Valerie did not appear possessed but under her own will. "Valerie," he finally said, "saving you doesn't justify his murder of billions of people—or that he would probably go back to murdering more. I can't…" He swallowed hard. "Even if I knew how, I couldn't help you bring him back."

Frustration tore through her. "You don't get it," she argued, voice breaking. "He was changing. I talked him out of killing people. I know he's messed up—but there's so much we could—"

"—Are you listening to yourself?" Kwan asked in disbelief. "He murdered billions of people in cold blood. And you want him running around again?"

Valerie blinked, and tears slipped down her face. "I know it's crazy."

"You realize he's done worse things than any other being on the planet for all time, right?" His voice, usually soft and content, was twisted in fear. "He makes the World Wars look like a tea party. Getting shot five times is probably the least of what he deserves, and I don't say this because I want to hurt you. This is just reality, Val. Whatever he was thinking at the end—"

The Red Huntress squeezed her eyes shut. "—Dammit, I know." She sat down tiredly in one of the free chairs. "I know what he's done. I got the scars to prove it."

Kwan licked his lips, staring at her in deep concern. "Well, what do you think he deserved, then? You think he deserved forgiveness? A happy ending?"

She fell silent. According to law, the intentional and premeditated murder of another human being demanded the death sentence. Amity Park did not have time or resources to mess with such things while under attack from Phantom. If she held Phantom to such a standard, then he deserved to die at the least. He had intentionally murdered five billion humans—children, women, men. Phantom wasn't human, not anymore. She had always thought she'd just destroy him and put him out of his misery, then spend the rest of her life rebuilding a world that did not remember or fear him. Likely, that was what he deserved. Obliterated. Forgotten.

Her lips quivered.

Kwan sat down beside her. His sigh was heavy and old. "Val. We've been friends a long time, and you know I'd do anything for you. But this is bigger than just us."

Frustration overcame Valerie, making tears blur in her eyes again. She probably wouldn't be able to get Kwan on her side—but maybe he could still help her. "Look, I just…I need to understand why he can't come back," she whispered. "If he's still stuck in that body somewhere, or if he's really gone. I want to know where he is. If anyone else finds out about this, then you can say this was all just to make sure the threat was eliminated." Her breath hitched. "Please. I know it's a lot, but I need it."

Kwan pressed his lips together tight. And then, very reluctantly, he nodded. "I know," he said, resigned. "I know."

"I'll owe you one."

"You'll owe me, like, three."


For the next hour, Kwan performed tests. The limp body of Dan Phantom did not move at all beneath that white sheet, and despite the horrific discolorations of his body, the ghost looked almost human. The way that the body never seemed to tense up in death but remained limp and pliable was disturbing. His eyes were half-lidded in frozen sorrow, his white-streaked hair a wild, matted twist in all directions.

Kwan was still haunted by the concept that D was in fact Dan Phantom. That he'd seen this man cradle Valerie, kiss her soundly, and whisper things in her ear that had made the woman blush. It did not make sense that Dan Phantom would clip his own wings and live among the very race he despised to save Valerie (his worst enemy!) from Nathan.

"You were probably going to hurt her," he muttered under his breath as he pushed a button. The wall behind the autopsy table shuttered away, revealing a small and dark tunnel. The table sunk into the x-ray machine, and bright lights scanned over the body. "You were going to use her up until you got bored or she got too old. I don't know why I'm even doing this."

But the body never responded.

Instead, several high-resolution images of the ghost's internal structures lit Kwan's various computers. The images showed Dan Phantom's skeletal structure and multiple views of the fascial tissue. Kwan stared in curiosity, and he tilted his head.

"…Huh." He stared closer at the x-rays, looking at the specific images of the ghost's side. The tissues were disrupted and collapsed in typical entrance-wound formations. But there was something else that had him intrigued.

He pushed the button to stop the x-ray machine, and the table began to roll back out. The disguised ghost's half-lidded eyes stared to the side, still stuck in that resigned, sorrowful configuration. It was beginning to make Kwan uncomfortable. It seemed to be just too human of an expression.

"Valerie's not going to like this," Kwan told the body, biting his lip.

He stared at the body and the horrific wounds. Something about them were hard to look at now—perhaps because he knew they were real. "You really sacrificed yourself for her, huh," Kwan said. He leaned against the wall and crossed his arms. "Did you know? I mean, really?"

The ghost's gaze suggested he hadn't.

Maybe Kwan was reading into it.


Eventually, he called Valerie to his personal office, away from the med lab and the morgue, where he had placed Dan Phantom's body after sewing up the wounds. Valerie was at the office in minutes, looking apprehensive. "What did you find out?" she asked as she shut the door behind her.

Kwan dropped a file of x-rays onto the desk. "Something I've never seen before," he admitted slowly. "His body isn't decaying like a human's or fading out like a ghost's. It's like the tissues are actually frozen, giving him the effect of a stabilized body without any consciousness."

"Can you measure a signature at all? A power core?"

Kwan shook his head. "Nothing." He sighed, rubbing his temples. "I did some x-rays on his body. Whatever Nathan shot him with—it's gone. The entrance wounds and damage paths are there. But there's no evidence of a bullet itself. It's like…it fused with him somehow. I can't even try to remove them from him."

Valerie's tense face fell. "Nothing?" she said dumbly. "You mean—he's stuck like this?"

The man sighed. "He's bled out, and Nathan's bullets are fused inside him in a way that's…not human. So, yes. I'm sorry, Valerie."

She stood there, speechless for a time, just blinking. Something about her looked uncharacteristically vulnerable. "No," she whispered shakily, "we're missing something. Maybe…maybe if we can remove the bullets somehow, he can—!"

"—And how would we do that?" Kwan asked.

"I don't know, but maybe—"

Kwan pulled away from her. "—I'm sorry, Valerie," he said again, voice torn. His words were automatic. "I know this must be hard for you."

"What, crying?" she said, voice breaking. "No, that's easy. Hard was when he was bleeding out on me. And he looked so scared, Kwan, he was trying to reach for me—" She trailed off. Her lips quivered as she tried to hold back her tears. "Where did you put him? I want to see him."

Kwan sighed, running a hand down his face. "The morgue," he said. He pulled a key out of his pocket and pushed it into her hand. "I figured…it'd be a safe place to store him."

"Thanks," she said, voice rough with emotion. The key was warm from Kwan's body heat, but it chilled her. She knew this key well, and its harsh shapes held no warmth in her memories. "I'll be back."

He stared at her for a time, feeling sympathy at the brokenness he saw in her. "Valerie," he stressed, not unkindly. "When we started this, you told me to let him die a hero. Maybe it's time you did the same."

Tears watered in her eyes. "I can't," she whispered. "I don't know how. Nathan was gonna—" Her breath hitched. "He kept telling me I was in d-danger, and I didn't—" She squeezed her eyes shut, and her tears streaked down her face. "Dammit, I didn't listen."


The morgue was a cold and familiar place. She had often identified the bodies of comrades, some of her own friends, on Kwan's steel examination tables. Now the very ghost who had tormented her rested within the encasing against the wall, next to the examination tool counter and Kwan's own chair.

Her boots clicked against the tiles with great unease as she moved forward, pocketing the room's key, and her lips quivered as she ran her fingers down the handwritten tag taped to the side of the storage unit. D, it said, with that day's date and Warning: Ectoplasmic Contamination. Her vision blurred as she pulled out on the handle, and the door gave way, shedding fluorescent light against a white-sheet-covered body. She rolled the table out further.

Surely he wasn't actually dead. Ghosts didn't leave bodies behind like this. But when she pulled back the white sheet, it was his face. His wild and matted hair. His skin permanently bruised between pale white and blue in splotches. His pale lips pulled in that ghastly grimace of pain and fear, and his half-lidded eyes staring in a clouded nothing.

Tears began to escape her eyes as she stared at the body, realizing that this was not a dream—that it was the remains of Danny Fenton—simultaneously the bane of her existence and the only man she'd nearly loved, now so very still.

Her legs grew weak. She sat on the examiner's chair, pressing her lips together hard to keep herself from crying out loud. The silence was deafening—she flinched when the cold compression system kicked on. And then she tried to speak to him. Her voice was rough and hoarse with great pain. "You make no sense," she complained shakily. "You m-make fun of me for not being im-imortal." She wiped her eyes, inhaling uneven breaths. "And then you do this." Her voice cracked. "What the hell, you h-hypocrite?"

She slammed Kwan's notebook to the ground, waiting for Dan's eyes to snap open with a smirk. Nothing happened.

And she began to sob. She felt sick, hiding her face in her hands. Nathan had been planning on killing her and preserving her body—for what she didn't know. The possibilities were too much. But she could still feel Dan's slick blood chilling her, the way he'd weakly collapsed against her, the widening of his eyes as his consciousness faded…

It took her a moment or two to re-center herself, inhaling shaky breaths. She reached out for him as if he were an anchor, and her shaking fingertips ran down his cold temple, brushing back the strands of matted, white and black hair. "Nathan's gonna go away for a long time," she promised shakily. "He won't do anything like this again."

Dan did not respond. Of course.

Valerie gently closed his eyes so that his half-lidded gaze was no more. Then she leaned down and pressed her lips against his cold, unmoving temple. It was more tenderness than Dan Phantom, the Ravager of Worlds, deserved. She knew at some level that her own life was not worth the five billion souls he had snuffed out.

But it was still all she could do to slide the white sheet back over his face and shut his body away in the morgue's storage unit.


Within in the infirmary, Nathan's eyes opened. The world spun with pain and confusion—and where the—?

His neck and chest were on fire, as if all of his nerves were exposed. He sluggishly tried to move. And then something caught at his wrists. His vision and mind sharpened. He realized he was handcuffed to a hospital bed.

For a time, he thought that was particularly odd because he'd never been handcuffed to a bed before. He supposed he'd imagined such things in his fantasies about Valerie, but it was not quite like this—He groaned, squeezing his blue eyes shut. Perhaps D had finally decided to dole out that beating he'd been promising, or maybe it was Dash.

And then he remembered. The all-encompassing rage and the cool, steady decisions. The stealing away of the fusion gun for later use. The preservation of Valerie. And the interference from D.

Nathan's eyes opened as he began to struggle against the handcuffs a little more. His whole body was on fire—Valerie (oh, that beautiful and corrupted woman!) had used some kind of weapon on him after he had tried to shoot. But D… It was as if the man had swooped out of nowhere… He began to remember more and more about his wayward attempts in the basement storage room, and he recalled the incredibly odd image of D's body being transparent as it blurred in front of Valerie, only to revert to full solidity with the hit of the first bullet.

Cold, cold water stormed through him. "G-ghost," he rasped, struggling harder. Valerie had been seduced by some kind of ghost. D had flown and gone intangible. He was a ghost. Likely a powerful one if he were so capable of a convincing human skin.

His beautiful, wayward and virginal Valerie—the target of a despicable being disguised as her ex-boyfriend...!

He didn't know what this meant. But as he was not driving out from the resistance with Valerie's beautifully preserved body in his truck (oh, how he would have cared for her), he knew the information could be valuable leverage. Plan B.

A way to turn the public to his side, unlock his handcuffs, and preserve Valerie. Just the way he wanted.


When Valerie finally convinced herself to return to her room, she found the small cameras and crushed each one beneath her combat boot. The crunch and whine of the small machinery provided little compensation for the well of anger within her. It was not enough. It did not bring back Dan or erase Nathan's room of secrets from years past. So she grabbed onto the bedsheets from the floor in a desperate attempt for something familiar. They smelled more of Dan than they did of her, and for a time, she breathed in his snowstorm scent.

Her hands shook as she wrapped herself up, feeling cold and alone, thinking of the fusion gun—Nathan's psychotic, feverish eyes—and the potential what ifs. What if Nathan had shot her. What if she'd been frozen in time without the dignity to decompose. What he would have done with her body. What Dan would have done when he'd found out.

She stared into the nothing around her. The grief and anger came in waves—crashing over her in a sudden, suffocating disorientation, then tumbling past her. Just when she thought she had pulled herself together, another wave hit. The thought of him brought it on. The color blue.

Perhaps if she did not move, did not breath, did not think...She moved to hide her face in her hands, trying to fight off the pain of tears and the quiver of her lips. "Stop," she whispered at herself and the world. "Just stop."

She shuddered, pressing the palms of her hands to her eyes as she cried, feeling that the world had stolen everything from her once again.

Valerie began to think that it was all her fault. She'd allowed Nathan to get away with things, letting him build up his obsession. If only she had spoken more with her friends about it. If only she'd called police and been more forceful with court appeals for restraining orders. If only she hadn't given him passing attention back in fourth grade—the start of his obsession.

Perhaps the worst thing of all was that no one truly understood. She was the only one in the world who would carry a memory of Dan's face relaxing into a genuine laugh, his eyes lighting up at the sight of food, his vocal approval of human literature. The rest of the universe would celebrate if it knew of his demise. And that somehow made the pain even worse—to know that Dan Phantom had been slowly nurturing a soul, only to get it ripped away.

For her.


By noon, the underbelly of the resistance had been flipped up in the form of one Nathan Green. He'd been given a fairly decent bill of health and had been sent to the onsite jailing facilities. But Nathan had incredible legal backing in the form of the District Attorney—his own uncle, Lester Green.

The man was a portly and large blob of a man, with footfalls like thunder and a wheeze in his breath. He carried a black briefcase with great self-importance. "Nathan," Lester greeted as he entered into the sparse room that was an interrogation room. His voice was a bit higher than his appearance suggested. He ran a ran through his greasy, thinning red hair. "I told you not to contact me, what with the elections."

Something was demonic in Nathan's gaze now. With his bound hands, he scratched at one of the bandages on his neck. The burns itched and hurt a great deal. "You'll want to hear this. I need your help."

The older man gave him a disapproving look. "My help? You've not only disregarded my advice about how to actually win over Valerie, but you attempted to kill her with an advanced weapon and murdered her boyfriend. My seat is up for election in four months. This does not look good for me. I'm only here to tell you I cannot take your case."

Nathan's face twitched at the reminder of his failed plan. "That's what they all want you to believe." Something in his voice was desperate, his mind still racing. "Trust me, uncle, this is all a huge misunderstanding, and it can work in both our favors."

Lester wheezed a bit as he sat upon the chair on the other side of the table. "Enlighten me, then," he said. He cast a file at Nathan, and from out of the manila folder came a few black and white candid photos of a half-dressed Valerie Gray. "The evidence is against you. You look like a crazed, psychopathic stalker right now, and I've half a mind to prosecute you myself so I can maintain the family name."

Nathan stared down at the exposed photos, something overcoming him again—a primal need he barely controlled until he looked up at his uncle again, eyes chaotic. "I've been following her for years, I'll admit." His voice was a rush, a maddened unfurling of his tongue. "I put the cameras in her room. I pulled the trigger. But it was for the good of the resistance and for Valerie herself, I swear."

The District Attorney raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"

"Valerie is a traitor," Nathan declared wildly, scratching at his bandages again. He was spinning wild stories now, the lies and twisted truths coming easier to his tongue. "I've been watching her for odd behavior. My undercover surveillance proves she's been dismantling the resistance from the inside out. I think she's under the control of someone else."

The lawyer blinked. "I've never heard of a guilty plea quite like this one."

"I know," Nathan said quickly, lips twitching up in a mad desperation. "I know—I'm different. I'm the hero. I did what I had to do to save everyone. And Valerie. Uncle, I could make you the greatest lawyer in all of Amity Park if you just listen to me. You'll be a savior."

Lester began toying with his briefcase, unlocking it to pull out pen and paper. "I don't think hundreds of naked pictures of Valerie proves she's a traitor to Amity Park's cause, or that you're a hero. And what about her boyfriend that you shot? You didn't save him from anything."

Nathan laughed. "You don't get it. He was the threat. The puppet master. The ghost."

"…Pardon?"

"Valerie loves a ghost," Nathan declared. "D is a ghost. Is that even his real name? D?"

Lester set down his pen, picking up on the strain of truth in Nathan's words. "You're saying D isn't human? Only humans can live beneath this Shield."

Nathan's jaw set. "I know what I saw. When I tried to shoot Valerie with the fusion bullets, D appeared in front of her, out of nowhere. It wasn't human at all."

"You hit your head, Nathan," Lester said, voice slow. "That's impossible."

His voice shook, his eyes wild. "No!" he said. "It's not—think about it. Valerie is the only one with that much access to the Shield, the outside world, the inner workings of the resistance administration. She could probably get a ghost into Amity Park. I know what I saw, Uncle. D is a ghost. And Valerie is a traitor. Her own father was getting ready to integrate D into the main administration. D was set to take over."

Lester said, mulling over Nathan's story, "A fascinating thought, I suppose."

Nathan looked possessed, his eyes wild with pain. "It's not just a thought," he snapped. "Valerie's been a mole for years. The woman I loved—she was working with ghosts the whole time. Maybe even with Phantom."

"And what in the world would her motive be?" Lester demanded, raising a busy eyebrow. "This is a rather large conspiracy theory, Nate."

"She's in love with him," the younger man said, voice twisting with heartbreak. "All she sees is him. You can't trust her. He's ruined her mind, and he's been working hard to get her to sleep with him to seal some black magic contract. She's losing her ability to resist."

The lawyer fell silent at that, measuring up Nathan's sincere belief that D was a ghost. "Your counter-prosecution depends on your ability to prove D is a ghost."

Nathan nodded, unfazed. "I know. But if I really stopped him, then his body should still be in the morgue. All we'd need is a run on the ENA, and I know you're going to find ENA. He's a ghost." His thin lips twitched with an odd smirk. "When the truth gets out, we'll be heroes. Valerie and her father will be outed from administration—and you'll be the next in line for every major position of authority in Amity Park."

The thought was rather pleasant to Lester, who wanted nothing more if not control and recognition. But he still tapped his fingers against the table. "If you're right, you realize Valerie Gray could potentially face a firing squad for treason. Is that what you want?"

Nathan bit his lip. "Since she defamed me, I think it's only fair that I get to sentence her. If you were the new resistance administrator, you could make that happen. Strip her of her titles and get rid of that battle suit in her blood. Make her work under me." The thought of Valerie stripped or beneath him in any way made his blood surge hot. With time, and with D out of the way, he could wear her mind down again until she no longer resisted him. And then he would still be able to save her, keep her all to himself.

Lester's lips stretched. "I see your angle now."

"We'd all win," Nathan bargained, eyes hard. "Uncle, this is what we've been waiting for."

"Yes, I suppose it is." Lester crossed his arms. "I would gain power—you would have Valerie. At least, in body."

Nathan's blood pumped faster. "That's all I need."


Lester Green, appearing as the distant but well-respected lawyer, visited the attending doctor Kwan and demanded to see D's body in the morgue. "I must review the facts," he declared, "to best understand my client Nathan Green and the situation at hand."

Kwan gave him a tight smile. "You…want to see the body?"

"Yes, I believe that is exactly what I requested."

"It's, uh, a little disturbing."

Lester gave him a bland look. "My boy, I've prosecuted murderers who mutilated and ate women. I think I can handle five shots and physical distortions."

Kwan nervously blushed. "Oh, right. Of course." Lester Green, to the vast public, was a highly respected authority figure. In many ways, the public saw him as the next authority behind the mayor, Valerie's father, and Valerie herself—even if Lester's nephew was something of a disappointment to the family. Kwan fumbled a bit with the key to the morgue, praying that Dan Phantom's body was still there and that Lester would not suspect him of any underhanded wrong-doing.

The old lawyer trailed behind Kwan, wheezing a bit with the exertion it took to walk to the morgue. "What tests have you performed on the body?"

Kwan swallowed hard. "I, uh, did a physical exam. Took some x-rays."

"Very good," the lawyer said as they entered into the room. "And what did you find?"

"Uh, some concerning data around the effects of the bullets? It's not like any other gunshot wound I've seen." Kwan tried to hide the shake in his hands as he pulled out the storage unit labelled D. A covered body was still unmoving within it.

Oh thank god, Kwan thought, pulling the rolling slab out. "Here you go," he told the lawyer respectfully, stepping back.

Lester unceremoniously pulled back the sheet, and then blinked. He stared at the white-streaked hair, the purpling skin. He grabbed a pen from Kwan's table and then raised a pale lip on the dead body. A pearly white fang shined in the fluorescent light above. He opened one of the eyes. Hollow, ruby red.

"…Interesting," Lester said. "This man shows very inhuman traits about him. Tell me," he added without passion, "did Nathan Green's weapon have any mechanism to it that would result in these distortions?"

Kwan stuttered. "Uh, honestly sir—I'm just a doctor. I don't know much about guns. I assumed it infected him somehow."

"I see. I'll have to check in with the Russians who built it to confirm." Lester stood up to his full, hulking height, casting Kwan's pen carelessly back onto the nearby counter. "Can you run a blood sample against our known databases? I'd like to confirm D's identity. For the purpose of normal court proceedings, of course."

Kwan blinked, heart pounding a bit. "Uh, of course."

"Thank you, doctor. Your compliance is greatly appreciated."

"Anytime," Kwan said, pulling the cover back over the ghost's body, trying to hide his own panic. "No problem at all."

But as Lester walked away, a dark look was in the lawyer's eyes. And then his lips stretched in a way that was not unlike Nathan's smirk.

Humans didn't have fangs and red eyes like D did, Lester knew. The potential that Nathan's story was true—it was becoming even more attractive to pursue.

A very good start to his campaign for power.


"Hello, Miss Gray." Lester Green greeted a little later, opening Valerie's office door without so much of a knock. "I'm here to gather information from you about the…recent incident." He peered at her in great suspicion.

Valerie looked up with bleary, bloodshot eyes. She looked disheveled and worn. "It's Commander Gray to you," she snapped.

"Yes, well, I'm sure this is all so very difficult for you."

Her voice was pained. "He was your nephew. I don't want to talk about this. I don't want to see you."

"I hardly know Nathan and am not responsible for his own actions. But that's not important. What is important, Miss Gray—"

"—Commander Gray—"

"—is learning the facts about what happened. If you please."

She gave him a hard look. "I don't want to talk about it right now."

Lester gave her a pleasant, soulless mile. "I understand, but it's imperative I record details before the truth gets…twisted."

For a time, she beheld him as a plague, knowing that he would not go away until she gave him what he wanted. And so with halted words, she repeated her version of the story, carefully blurring past some of the details that would have created suspicion regarding D.

The overweight lawyer appeared to listen attentively for some time, but he noticed when she hesitated and stumbled over herself to create a detail. A lie. By the time she came to the end of the story with her father arriving in the hidden basement room, Lester turned on her suddenly, his visage twisting dark. "And how about D's true identity? Were you aware that you were harboring a disguised fugitive ghost?"

She blinked. "Excuse me?"

"Miss Gray—"

"—Commander Gray," she corrected, eyes narrowing.

"Whatever. If Nathan was attempting to stop a military takeover from the enemy, his actions might prove to be the very salvation of Amity Park. Is that what was really happening—you were allowing D, a ghost, to infiltrate the resistance?"

Valerie's jaw dropped. "Excuse me? Have you—do you have any fucking idea what Nathan has done? Have you seen his damn shrine? All of my emails requesting your help in stopping him from stalking me?"

Lester Green had dark eyes, almost black. They narrowed at her. "I understand that Nathan has infringed on your privacy, which will most certainly result in his prosecution for such. But this is a much minor charge compared to your treason."

"My treason? But he tried to murder me! And he shot D—five times." Her voice broke. "Five times."

The D.A. tilted his head. "And yet you're still here—and D's body is a freakshow testament that he was not a natural human being but in fact a ghost." He threw a file on the table. "I looked over the schematics of the weapon Nathan had designed. Although suitably disturbing in its own right, it could not possibly create the physical transformations as seen in D's dead body. If he's a ghost, Valerie, that begs the question of how he got into our incredibly secure anti-ghost Shield that you built and designed. Which means, if D is found to be a ghost, you will come under investigation for treason." He smiled. "That has the capital punishment attached to it, which you threatened my nephew with. A firing squad."

Her jaw dropped.

The tension between them rose to an unfathomable height, with Lester staring at her in great accusation. "My nephew saw it, Valerie. He saw D use his powers."

She stood up from her chair, planting her hands on her desk hard. "Get out," she snapped, voice low. Her face was tight with fear and anger. "You get out of my office, right now, or so help me, I'll…"

The lawyer began to smile. "You're a good fighter, Valerie, but a terrible liar. And I would not suggest threatening me unless you would like to add to the charges with which my firm will counter-prosecute you. Have a good evening, while you still can." And then he heaved his portly self up from the chair, leaving her to stew in the silence of his accusations.

Valerie let him go without saying anything further, afraid to incriminate herself. It was deafening for a time, Lester's presence like some lingering disease that had infected even the corners in the room.

They know, Valerie realized. It'd only been twelve hours since Nathan had shot Dan, but Lester was smart and Nathan wasn't stupid. Her hand began to shake. She was having a panic attack—a flash back to Dan's body leaning into her as he choked on blood, trails slipping down his lips—

She squeezed her eyes shut, sweat breaking across her temple. And then she slid down against the wall, feeling entirely out of control. Tears streaked down her dark face, and suddenly all she could think of was Dan's long fingers touching her skin as he murmured, "All plots tend to lead deathward."

"Oh my god," she breathed shakily, hyperventilating. "Oh my god."


The morgue was silent as the sun set on the resistance. It was cool, the generators kicking on to preserve the several bodies lying within the large storage container.

But within the storage unit labeled D, an odd glow erupted.

Dan's body suddenly arched off the table, every muscle and tendon tightening as a bright light glowed from his power core—then flickered out. His back slammed down, and the whole storage container shook. The body fell into silence again, the white sheet rumpled over it.

For a time, nothing happened.

Then a green glow seeped from beneath the blanket, and the body arched up again. Several metal clings echoed. When the body fell from its spasm, the storage container shook a bit harder.

The fingers began to twitch beneath the blanket. And then the green glow erupted almost bright white. This time, the eyes opened, the irises dilating wide with the soul of Dan Phantom. For a time, he did nothing but stare at the darkness in oblivion, mind scattered. There was a droning need within him—get up get up get up

Dan disjointedly moved to sit—and he slammed his temple against the low metal ceiling. "Ngh!" He fell back with a groan, stunned as he gasped hard, his red eyes widening. Immediately, they lightened to blue. The purple splotches upon his face disappeared under the natural command of his illusion. His fangs sunk back into smooth, human teeth.

Panic overwhelmed him. The darkness was blinding, and he couldn't see a damn thing—His pale, shaking hand reached out from beneath the white sheet. Metal, he felt, fingers running against rivets. A metal box. The foundations beneath him felt unstable and rolling. If he pushed against the metal sides, the metal beneath him rolled forward, then stopped. His bare feet hit more metal.

Goose-bumps tore down his body. He instinctively kicked at the metal, and it gave way, a doorway opening. Bright, fluorescent light. The light at the end of the tunnel—?

"Mmh," he groaned in complaint, confused and weak. His scattered mind decided that the light had to be better than the metal box, and so he began pushing the rolling table out from the box. Fluorescent light slid up his body until it struck his dilated eyes. He squeezed his eyes shut, but it was too late. The light had cut deep into his retinas, burning them.

A searing pain tore through his vision and spread through the whole of his head. His power core pulsed in his ear, as if it would jump from his chest.

"Ugh," he groaned again, hiding his face in his hands. "The…fuck?"

For a time, he simply lay there in the silence of the fluorescent light, unable to think beyond the nausea and pain within him. He was fairly certain this was what hell felt like. Maybe he'd gone there. And then, as his eyes adjusted, he realized what kind of room it was and why he'd been trapped in a metal box—which was not hell but something similar.

"Morgue," he breathed, his baritone voice a rough gravel. He struggled to sit up on the table, and another metallic ping echoed beneath him. The metal objects rolled in an echo, and he look down in surprise.

He'd popped out four fusion bullets. His own fusion powers had slowly worked against them, instinctively pushing them out as foreign to his body. He looked at his bare side, lips pulling down in horror as his fingers brushed against the torn, puffed skin and unnatural black stitches in neat rows, some disrupted flesh having pulled away at where the bullets had popped out. His fingers began to shake from too much exertion, his ectoplasmic blood circulating more quickly. He felt violated and tender in odd ways, suddenly afraid to touch his now-sluggishly-bleeding side, which made him nauseated to look at.

Then Dan realized his clothes were missing and that his only cover was a white sheet. His face twisted—and in his daze, he clumsily tried to tie it around his waist. His power core felt uneasy—like an upset stomach or heartburn. For a time, he simply held his head and bowed over himself, knowing at some core level that his abilities were still frozen. His mind was scattered.

Then—Valerie.

Everything came back at once with the force of a battering ram. The fear. The image of the bullet racing at Valerie's heart—her tears as she ran shaking fingers down his face, babbling in terror—

His face twisted in great pain and shock, his hands falling away as he sat up. "Valerie," he breathed, her name a caress against his mind. The woman with the dark skin and sharp tongue for whom he felt a sudden, all-encompassing desire to find. To affirm she was still safe.

With a groan, he forced himself off of the table, and he stumbled hard to the tiled floor, jarring his whole body. Fusion bullets coated in dried blood rolled away from him. Nausea and confusion took hold again, and he lay there for a time. Then he pulled himself up, grabbing onto the table, his dark hair blocking his vision. "Valerie," he rasped again. His power core was still flickering from the fusion drain on his system.

And so Dan leaned against the wall, struggling to remain on his hands and knees. He felt quite willing to collapse, but he pushed himself forward, one inch at a time. A phone was on the counter. If he could get to it… Valerie…

He searched his fragmented memory for the number he'd seen on her desk phone. The flicker of numbers barely registered to him, but it was there. His whole body protested his desperate reach for the phone, which was a slick metal gray. His shaky attempt to punch in numbers forced him to retry several times.

By the third attempt, that damnably terse voice crackled back. "This is Commander Gray—what the hell do you want."

For a second, he did not know if he could get his voice to work. "V-Valerie," he rasped, the word an uneven breath of relief. And then his energy ran out, and he slid down against the cabinets. "V—"

The other end went completely silent.

He tried to speak again, but he could only lie there, struggling to recalibrate. He knew only that he needed her.

Then there was a sudden click—she'd hung up. Dan closed his eyes, hoping that Valerie did not think it some kind of cruel joke. He sunk against the floor with failing strength. The sound of the morgue's cooling system kicked in with a hiss, and a minute passed in silence. Perhaps, he thought, he would be left here to bleed out and convulse again. And then a sound—the slamming open of the door—echoed in his ears.

He blearily looked up, and then his haggard face bled in relief. "V-val—"

The woman stood at the doorway, face stricken as her battle suit retracted back into her usual uniform. Her uniform was rumpled, her hair in a wild twist, teal eyes bloodshot. "Dan?" she whispered, heart failing.

He did not know of a sight more pleasing to him than her. His voice was but a shudder as he struggled up to reach for her. "Val—"

Valerie fell to her knees before him, quickly grabbing under his arms to support him, sobbing. "Oh my God. What the hell." Her voice rose high with a breathless hitch. "You're not—I mean—"

He leaned hard against her, barely caring that the white sheet around his waist was slipping or that he was gasping for air, holding onto her with shaking fingers. He gripped her as if she were the only tether to existence.

Her strong hands steadied him as she slipped her fingers behind his neck and at his side, pulling him close. He leaned against her shoulder, closing his exhausted eyes. "Y-you're….h-here," he rasped in pain.

Dan's voice was weak in ways she'd never heard. But the sound of his baritone voice and the feel of his solid body made her cry in joy and pain and hate and anger and—

"You bastard," she whispered shakily, leaning her head against his as she held him tight. Her body was shaking. "That was a d-dirty t-trick. You hear me? Oh my god. It was all a trick."

He felt dizzy and pulled into pieces. "N-no trick," he complained. Her fingers brushed against his mottled and injured side, and he gasped in sudden pain, squeezing his eyes shut. "Ngh," he moaned at her touch over his sluggishly bleeding wounds. He burrowed into her heat and the sound of her pumping heart, fully collapsing against her.

Valerie's sob shook him, her breath hitching her voice as she wrapped her arms tighter around him. "How the hell," she cried, applying pressure on his bleeding side. "How is this possible?"

Dan was too fragmented to explain that his own fusion powers had managed to counteract the bullets. "Powers," he said raggedly.

It was good enough of an explanation for her.

"Then don't leave," Valerie demanded, struggling to breathe in the snowstorm scent that was uniquely Dan. She squeezed her eyes tight, and tears streaked down her face and into his matted hair. "Don't you ever do this again."

He moaned, still feeling a bit ill. "Don't ever h-have…a s-stalker again." He hid his face in her neck and the bundle of her curly hair, which smelled of sand and exotic flowers. Warm things.

"I hate you," she whispered, crying as she hugged him tighter. "Oh my god, I hate you so much."

He said nothing, but his non-beating heart swelled. Valerie's touch and her rough voice was as a balm to him. He wanted nothing more than to remain in her arms. To feel her relief. He shakily wrapped his arms around her middle. "H-hate you. Too."

"I'm never forgiving you," Valerie breathed. "This was a dirty trick, you son of a bitch. Do you have any idea what you put me through? I really thought you were dead." A sob worked its way up in her voice. "That you weren't coming back."

Dan moaned. "No trick," he said again, breathless. "D-didn't—plan…" His side pulsed with a sharp pang, and he flinched in her arms, suddenly feeling nauseated all over again.

Valerie knew he was still bleeding. It took her full strength to pull away. "You're not healing," she breathed, mind racing. She damned herself for not having medical expertise of any kind.

The cold, red blood still occasionally glowed with green as Dan struggled to maintain his illusion. "'m fine," he said unsteadily, swallowing hard at the way his body was trying to circulate ectoplasm to his damaged side. It burned.

"You are not fine," Valerie said adamantly, terrified. Her shaky fingers pressed harder against his side. Her fingers were beginning to coat more steadily with the red blood seeping through the stitches. "This is getting worse—"

Just then, the door creaked open, and a gasped echoed. Valerie craned her neck in fear, only to witness one incredibly shocked Kwan drop several files, paper flying everywhere in a flutter. His face paled to pure white as he looked back at her, frozen.

Dan Phantom. In Valerie's arms. Dan Phantom was awake.

"Kwan!" Her voice was desperate with relief."Kwan, okay, don't panic. Please. He's bleeding out, and I don't know—"

Dan raggedly moaned, "—B-bullet." He could feel it now. The fifth and final bullet was still in his system, ravaging his insides. He felt as if he would vomit. "Fifth. B-bullet…"

Kwan flinched at the sound of the ghost's voice. Then he tentatively approached, looking for all the world as if he were approaching a caged animal. "What the—?" He looked faint. "You were…I put you in the…"

In short order, Valerie helped Dan to stand, throwing one of his arms over her shoulder. The ghost winced as she raised him up. "I have to get him out of here," she said quickly, the tears on her cheeks flashing in the light. "He needs help. Something's still wrong."

Dan looked shaken and pale, his dark hair as straggles down his shoulders. And then he stumbled hard against Valerie, gagging as the pool of blood in his stomach heaved.

The woman flinched as dark blood began to slip from Dan's lips down his neck and chest. "Oh my god," she breathed, stopping suddenly. Panic tightened her face at the thought that he would leave her again. She craned her neck to Kwan. "Please." Her voice broke. "Please."

The doctor stared back in hesitance for a second or two. "You know what he is," he said shakily. "Val…"

"Dammit, I know," she snapped. "He needs help."

The sound of the man choking, the look of betrayal in Valerie's eyes—it made Kwan move forward against his better judgment. "...Come on, then," he said fearfully, grabbing onto Dan's free arm and swinging it over his shoulder. The man's bare arm was cold and trembling. Kwan figured the infamous Dan Phantom was in no condition to kill, and Valerie's pained expression was enough to tip the scales in their favor. "Let's get him back to the med lab before anyone sees this."

Valerie blinked, and tears ran down her face. "Okay."

And so the three limped forward. The disguised ghost gave a ragged inhale and a cough as he leaned his whole weight against Valerie and Kwan. "Ngh," he complained, voice gurgling. "N-no more—s-stalkers…"

"No more dying on me," she snapped right back in fear and relief.

Dan moaned, too tired to even glare.


A/N: So I had more written, but I couldn't finalize it for tonight. If anything seems rushed, I'm sorry! Looks like Valentine will have one more update, and then (with any luck), it will be finished so I can start writing new plot lines again. Fun fact: Lester was actually Nathan's second name in series. I guess he was such a minor character that the creators of the show couldn't even keep his name straight. So I appropriated "Lester" to signify his equally pointless family member. XD

Speaking of Nathan, I kept typing his name as Natan by accident, which reminded me of Satan (which I thought was almost appropriate). And then I was listening to the soundtrack of Repo the Genetic Opera, and the song "Legal Assassin" says the name "Nathan" in creepy whispers, and I startled up because I was certainly not expecting that as I wrote this chapter.

By the way, I'm sorry again for making you all cry or feel depressed last chapter. But what is it about Dan in pain that's so fun to write? Is it just because he's so evil that I think he deserves it, or what?

This collection will probably be moving to an "M" rating shortly due to my paranoia. But, in moving to "M" to be safe, do you want content to remain more on the "high-PG-13" side (what I've been targeting lately), or would you be interested in seeing a few actual "M-level" stories?

Please review with your thoughts, questions, comments, or ideas! Thank you so much!