Disclaimer: Danny Phantom is property of Butch Hartman and Nickelodeon.
Chapter 11: Things become solid
Danny floated near the Void, he felt the pull of the zone trying to dissuade him away from it. He looked down at the clear dragmarks leading away from the Void. Like someone had clawed their way out. He followed them to a small cluster of rocks. He began to consider his options when a throat was nervously cleared right next to him. He turned to the pirate who'd led him to the area where they'd found the drag marks. Danny smiled comfortingly to the nervous ghost.
He pulled out the ghost detector his parents had created but Tucker had perfected. The screen showed three ghostly signatures within a 500 foot radius, which made sense since no ghost in their right mind wanted to be this close to the Void. Danny knew one signature was his and the other was the pirate's, so that meant they had a new way of identifying, locating, and possibly even touching the invisible ghost.
Danny turned to the pirate, "Thank you for leading me here, you may leave."
For his credit the pirate hesitated, "My king, I cannot leave you here to be tempted by the Void."
Danny clapped a hand onto the pirate's shoulder, "You are a good man, and if you ever leave your pirate crew know that a place on my guard will be open for you, however you need not worry. The zone anchors me in a way that helps resist the steady call of the Void. You do not have this protection, go."
The pirate hesitated again and Danny was considerably impressed considering how close to the Void they were, then the pirate turned and left.
Danny turned and stared into the darkness of the Void, he could have sworn he'd heard something. He shook his head, the heir was the only ghost that could possibly have survived for such a long period of time in the zone. A normal ghost lasted maybe a few days, and Danny knew their hadn't been any recent 'deaths' in the ghost community.
He pressed the compressed Fenton phones in his ears, "Hey Tucker, I think I found something, but I need those ghost goggles you made."
Tucker replied quickly, "On the way Danny."
When Tucker arrived, Danny put on the goggles and found his theory was correct. With the technology Tucker had developed seeing a ghost from the Void was laughably easy.
Danny frowned at the little stuffed teddy bear, but shrugged it off many ghost children had items that turned intangible with them it made sense this toy would be intangible after being in the Void.
"Okay Tucker do you have your compressed ghost suit? If I'm right, I won't be able to touch the ghost child, but your suit shouldn't have that problem."
Tucker nodded and pressed the inside of his wrist. With the help of Valerie's father, Tucker had designed a suit that could be compressed into a small adhesive bead on a point of the skin. He usually hid it with heavy wristbands, but he'd felt no need to do such in the zone.
Danny watched as the suit spread across his skin at a ridiculous speed. When he was completely suited up, Tucker pulled the visor down over his eyes and activated the googles. He saw the child lying sprawled on the ground. As Tucker watched, the child started sinking further into the rocks. He couldn't be older than seven. His little face was marred with a frown, and his clothes were patchwork at best. Tucker picked him gently up. Making sure to grab the admittedly creepy bear the child had sprawled next to him. Danny looked around, wondering what had attacked the child when he was trying to make his way out of the Void. There wasn't anything in sight though. Only the child and his stuffed bear, and the idea that bear could attack anyone was ridiculous.
"Danny? I'm ready."
Danny snapped out of his thoughts and nodded to Tucker, "Let's go, the sooner we can get this kid to Frostbite and Clockworth, the better."
They took off and Danny shivered, hating the way this place made him feel.
It made him feel like he was powerless.
When Danny and Tucker got back to the castle, the planning meeting was still in process. The allies weren't yelling, in fact they were talking in calm tones, but there was a tension in the room that suggested that they all wanted to yell at one another. They were just too mature. Danny was pleased to see his older-self sitting in a corner helping Dani with her homework. Sam was pinching her nose and attempting to manage an oncoming migraine. Danny walked behind her and gave her a soft kiss hello.
"We found the heir. He is invisible and it's likely that until we can reverse the effect the Void had on him, Tucker and Valerie in their suites will be the only ones who will be able to touch him."
Sam nodded and raised a hand to stop all conversation. Everyone immediately obeyed.
"The legends were true," she said simple, then she stood and followed Danny into the medical room of the castle.
Frostbite and Clockwork hurried to follow. Tucker had just attempted to lay down the heir only to realize it wouldn't work. He looked helplessly at the four new people in the room.
Sam assessed the situation, "Alright, how long do you think you can hold you arms like that?"
Tucker looked down, "Not long, my arms are already shaking from the strain, but I recently made a mode for my suit that allows it to follow basic commands without me inside it."
Sam nodded, "Okay, while you do that I'll get Valerie and the supply of ghost metal we have. Danny have Dora bring in her best blacksmiths and get them started on a metal covering for the bed, after they're finished with that have them start on about a dozen of those ghost goggles, Valerie will supervise. Frostbite, may we borrow a few ghosts?"
"Of course my Queen."
"Good, Tucker you'll supervise as they mine for more ghost stone, then Ember can heat it to metal and we can start working on medical equipment for treatment. Danny give Clockwork your goggles, he can sit here and comfort the child if he wakes up."
Danny nodded and passed the goggles over.
"Alright everyone knows what to do then? Good, let's go then, we have so much to do and plenty of time to get it done."
*Linebreak*
Jazz leaned back from the ancient books she was studying. Some of them were historical text, a few were fables, and in all honestly she couldn't tell what a few were. She yawned and removed her glasses to rub her eyes. Years of constant studying in poor lighting had affected her vision to the point of making reading glasses a necessity. She noticed a warm plate of lasagna and a cup of coffee waiting for her, just out of her work area. She smiled. Her loves knew she had a tendency to get so caught up in her work, she only cared about work. She didn't eat, sleep, or move until she had found a solution. Fortunately, she had gotten better, but it was nice to know one of them had taken the time to bring her dinner. She stood up and stretched, wincing at the bones that popped.
She moved toward the table where the food was and picked up the plate. She noticed a note sitting under it.
Take a break please love, we still haven't started on the medical equipment and Sam said you didn't have to start work until you had the necessary equipment relax please. ~ Love Valerie.
Jazz picked up the fork and took a small bite. She hummed at the taste. She was maybe halfway through when she felt a pair of arms snake around her waist. She leaned back into Ember. She recognized the hands that should have been an eerie cold, but that were instead covered with an artificial warmth.
"Hey, babe, did my slave driver of a brother and sister-in-law finally give you a break."
Ember just signed in reply. She was pretty sure the only reason she got a break was because Danny had sensed she was low on power. While her body was constantly absorbing and translating ectoplasm into energy while in the zone, she had been working herself hard to ensure the safety of her princess, who would soon be her niece. At this point her body barely had enough energy to produce the artificial warm that covered her skin and the flames that made up her hair.
Jazz set down her plate, using one hand to sympathetically pat Ember's head and the other to reach back and lean Ember's head toward the back of her own.
"Was it that bad."
Ember grumbled something that sounded vaguely like, worse, before she went limp against Jazz's back. She wasn't sleeping, as she couldn't, but at that moment she felt tired enough to fall asleep.
She had learned enough science in the books in Jazz's room, she tended to read whenever they all sleep over at the Fenton's house, to know that the tiredness was an allusion, just her body warning her she was at her limits. Still, she wished she could just close her eyes and dream.
Jazz maneuvered them into the armchair she had been avoiding. It was comfortable, but she had only just stood up. She ended up sitting sideways with Ember clinging to her like a baby koala-bear. This was how Valerie found them.
Valerie had gotten permission from Sam to leave supervising to someone else and get some rest. Actually, it had seemed more like an order. Unlike the blacksmiths, sleep was necessary if she was going to function the next day. Jazz and Ember both shifted to make room for their third on the chair. Valerie curled up with her girls and tried not to fall asleep.
She failed, and Jazz, satisfied that her loves were safe and beside her, followed not long after. Ember gave a contented hum as she felt the loves of her afterlife fall limp. Their relationship hadn't always been so perfect, in fact, when Jazz and her had found their third piece in Valerie, they had considered breaking up and pursuing her separately. When they had settled on a pologamous relationship, things just seemed to get worse. There were a lot of hurt feelings and arguments that appeared from a lack of communication, and at one point Valerie had actually left them. They had both been so busy fighting with one another and trying to protect her from their arguments that in the end they had led her to believe they didn't want her to be a part of their relationship.
Danny and Sam had sat them all down and taught them the lesson that they'd needed to learn after a few decades together. Communication and trust were the foundations of a relationship. They talked it out, and Jazz and Ember admitted to themselves that a lot of stupid arguements had come from a refusal to communicate. It had broken the two to find out that because of their admittedly stupid arguements with one another, they had lost any trust Valerie had put into the relationship. It took a while, but eventually after weeks of doting on Valerie, being on their best behavior, and proving they were committed to the relationship this time, Valerie gave them one date to prove this time would be different, and it was.
Ember slipped out of her mates arms, and lifted each, one by one, to take them to bed.
*Linebreak*
Danny watched over Frostbite's ghosts that made up the miners, watching to ensure they didn't have an accident. He had come from patrol to replace a tired Tucker. Ghost zone stone was special. In its normal stone form, a ghost could phase through it, but they might feel a lingering pain. It was a well guarded secret that once it was heated to a certain degree, it turned into a metal ghost couldn't phase through. The worst part was: it had to be heated to an exact degree to change, any lower and it remained the same, any higher and it turned into a very beautiful, but useless gemlike material.
Which is why Ember, with her precise control over her powers, was the only one who could heat the stone. Ember would have to rest often though. Danny thought back to the scuffed up boy in the medical room who they were still waiting to wake up. They had to help him. Not just because he was the hair, but because he was a ghost, and that made him special to Danny. He felt warmth flood through the bond that he had with Sam, that he was beginning to share with Dani, and he smiled. He would help the heir and save his daughter. They had five months and they would not fail, they could not.
Danny clenched his fist and thought of the coffin locked in a sealed room made out of ghost metal. This needed to work.