A/N: Hey guys! Made another fanart for this fic, check it out on Imgur with the end tag gallery/f8Uicka
"Hey, Star! What's up?"
"I'm here. Um… sooo..."
Star looks up at the large U.F.O.-esque disc adorning the top of Danny's home from the opposite street corner, feeling somewhat concerned about its structural integrity. Of course, she's been here before and it's not like anyone in town was unfamiliar with it, but it's always intimidating to be directly under. Being inside twice in the same week? It felt strange.
"How do you expect me to get into your house? I can't imagine you just leave the door open." She glances down the road and crosses the street, trying to hear Danny's voice around the commotion in the background.
"Right, so- hang on."
Star hears the phone shuffle a little bit, and then Danny's muffled voice along with a few others. Was he with his family?
"What? No, someone else."
"..."
"For the last time, Sam's not my girlfriend and-"
"..."
"No, neither is she! It's for-"
Star chuckles a bit and shakes her head, amused by the conversation and somewhat disappointed she can only hear one half.
"Ugh, it's for a group project, just… I'll be right back."
"..."
"I- do I need to be there for that? Just tell him I want a Pepsi, and then… some cheese curds."
"..."
"Yeah. Yeah, thanks. I'll just be outside."
More shuffling, and then a sigh.
"Sorry about that, we're at some weird train restaurant to eat. You still there?"
Star looks back up at the strange building. "Yeah, I'm here. Your family sounds fun." She smiles into the phone with a hint of jealousy.
"I- yeah, they are. Way more eccentric than any other families, but… I love them. It's hard to not."
Star hums, stopping on the corner directly beside Danny's house. She watches her breath materialize in front of her and swaps her phone to her other hand.
"They're still so embarrassing though… Anyways- if you go over by the fence in the back there should be some loose boards towards the back corner, if you slide them to the left you can get into the backyard. Um, it's kind of a mess back there. Sorry."
"This feels very... not legal, but okay."
Star runs her hand along the fence until she feels some boards give. She props her phone up with her shoulder and digs her nails between the fence, prying the boards to the side enough for her to slip through without snagging her jacket.
"Alright," she sets the boards back into place. "I'm through. Um- oh."
The backyard, to be blunt, is a mess. Ghost-shaped pieces of plywood lean against the exterior of the house, and she can faintly see char marks faded onto the brick. Right across from her there were two large metal bins that looked to contain various glass and metal scrap, and beside her there were several other bins covered in tarps. A stack of sheet metal and a stack of glass leaned against the back fencing, and she could tell the wood was straining under their weight.
"Oh boy. Aren't your parents worried about this all getting wet and stuff? Or snowed on?"
"Well, the sheet metal outside is stainless, and the glass is well, glass. Strong glass. The other bins are scrap, a company takes them away every few weeks. There aren't usually finished inventions or anything that could be damaged out here, those are all inside.
"Anyways," He continues. "tucked behind the top of the doorframe you'll find a magnetic key box stuck there, you might have to get something to stand on, but that'll get you inside."
"Ohh, okay." She looks around the yard and grabs one of the chairs from their patio set. She holds her phone between her teeth and lifts the bulky chair onto the stoop. Standing on the chair, she reaches up onto the doorframe and glides her hand across, bumping into a smooth black box. She pulls it off of the frame.
"You think just leaving a key outside is a good idea?" Inside the box is a key painted with a dab of toxic green nail polish. After taking it she returns the patio chair and the box to their spots.
"Well the only people that would be able to see the box are ones that can fly, and chances are if they can fly they can just phase through the walls."
"Mmm, I guess you're right, but someone could just watch you get it." She fiddles with the lock. "My parents refused to have spare keys hidden anywhere ever. They made my brother sit out in the snow for two hours because he forgot his keys and they were at dinner in the next town over. It's just too unsafe for them."
"Yeah well, I'm not too concerned. People in this town aren't exactly perceptive. Plus, we have our own security system anyways. Lots of guns and alarms and stuff."
Star stops after she unlocks the door. "Um… should I be worried?" She releases the doorknob.
"Nope! I brought down the security system wirelessly earlier. I'll get you on the clearance list though, in case this becomes a regular thing." He pauses. "Unless- I mean… if you ever want to ghost stuff again. It's up to you how involved you want to be."
Star relaxes, smiling into the phone. "I'll let you know if it starts to kill me."
"Preferably before that please."
She laughs and walks inside, glancing around and bracing herself a bit for an alarm, but nothing comes. She shuts and locks the door behind her.
"Okay, so what did you want me to do?" She turns her wrist up to check the time on her watch.
Almost 3:45. Her parents weren't getting home for another hour, but if she could stop at the Nasty Burger to visit Pauly that would be nice.
"Alright, so in the kitchen- where we talked with Vlad? There's a door, that's the basement. Um…"
She hears papers shuffling around before he continues.
"I'm going to send you a photo of something I need you to look for, it shouldn't be that hard to find- I don't think… probably?"
"You sound real sure about that." She reorients herself and looks around, faintly remembering the layout of the home. She walks through the open doorway to the kitchen.
"Okay, I'm gonna send you a photo here, they're blueprints. What you're looking for is the Fenton-Phantom Tracker. Super ironic name, by the way."
Star's phone buzzes and she receives a photo. She turns on speaker and descends the stairs as she opens it.
The drawing made it look like a weird combination of a smartphone and a remote- or maybe just a smartphone attached to a remote. It was oddly long and sported a number of dials and buttons that probably had some meaning to anyone that understood the thing.
"Got it." She flips on the light at the bottom of the stairs and the fluorescents buzz as they flicker to life. The lab looks exactly as Star would expect a lab to look, stainless steel wall paneling and lab tables, white linoleum tiling, a plethora of beakers and complicated machinery that she couldn't possibly guess the purpose of. Different cabinets and glass refrigerators hold rows upon rows of vials containing various brightly colored liquids, a number of them the distinctive toxic green of ectoplasm.
Then, on the rightmost wall, the portal. Well, likely. She's never seen it before, but the large blast doors with black and yellow DANGER paint make it pretty obvious. A red light gleams ominously over it, hopefully just conveying it's locked status. Connected to the portal are various tubes and wires that lead over to the computer systems that probably control it, and a set of meters and dials subtly fluctuate and pulse with ectoplasm and electricity.
On the left side of the room, the impression changes from a medical lab to an engineering lab. Weapons as small as pistols and as large as miniguns adorn the wall, and half-finished machinery scatters the tables and floor. On the same wall the stairs are on, a rack of expensive and dangerous-looking tools hangs. Some sort of large steel vault lies opposite the portal, too. While the tables and shelves are littered with parts and wires, there seems to be a distinct organizational pattern within each workstation, making it seem much more put together than you'd expect. Method to the madness, as they say.
The space in its entirety is huge, looking as if it spans the entire plot and then some. She absentmindedly wonders how much these expansions cost… or if they even got the permits for it.
"Wow, it really looks like a proper lab." She says, not really to anyone in particular.
"Yeah, well… try not to uh, press any buttons or drop anything. I know from experience that some of them can literally kill you." He laughs, but it drops off on a nervous tone.
"Duly noted."
Star takes one last look around the room and then heads over towards the engineering half, scanning the tables and glancing down at the photo to find the right thing.
"So," Star mentions. "I finished the documents Tucker sent me. They were actually pretty interesting, minus all the graphs and charts and stuff. I couldn't follow them very well."
"Oh yeah? Good, good. We've run… a lot of tests over the years- um, all non-invasive and on willing subjects by the way. It was originally Tucker's idea, and then Sam and Jazz helped convince me. Something about 'understanding through science' or… whatever. And also proving that you can get better info by not putting ghosts in cages."
"Well, it makes sense to me. It also probably be used to help ghosts, too. Just like human research." Star carefully lifts up some papers and blueprints during her search, avoiding touching any unfinished parts or tech. "Who wrote it all, anyway?"
"Well, Vlad wrote out most of the graphs and statistics- he's been doing this a lot longer than us. Jazz and Tucker- mostly Jazz- typed it out into plain English."
She checks on the bottom shelves of some of the lab tables. "That's what I kinda guessed. Sam doesn't seem like the… research type."
"No, not really. She helps in other ways though, she's the best with the weapons and the thermos, and then also um… she helps us a lot financially." A pause. "Don't tell her I told you that though."
She chuckles. "Don't worry, lips are sealed. I would have thought that you're the best shot though, I mean you're a walking ectogun."
"You'd think, but I'm used to shooting things out of my hands, not out of a bulky thing like a gun. It just feels so… unnatural."
She can hear Danny shudder over the phone, and she grins. "Fair, I guess, but the thermos? You should be using that thing the most."
"Well- I, at short distance! I don't get target practice with it or anything. Sam can do it at long distance super well, she's had the most practice feeling out its range. I've usually grappled the ghost before I suck them in. That like, divides the experience gained by ten."
Star starts looking through cabinets and in drawers. She's having a hard time believing this tracker is even here.
"Right, excuses, excuses. Sounds like you need more practice then."
Danny mumbles something on the other line, and then waits for a little bit, the sound of Star's rummaging the only thing heard.
"Hey, uh-" Star pauses. "I've started to read that extra packet you gave me. It's- I enjoy it. Like reading a medical textbook, kinda."
"Really?" Danny sounds legitimately surprised by this. "You don't- no, that's good." A pause. "Uh, you haven't taken any notes or anything, right?"
"Oh no, course not. I can see why you and Mr. Masters would want the information destroyed, there's a lot of stuff in there that could get you guys captured or put under suspicion. I'm sure you're not even wanting it to exist." She starts to look through the glass cabinets and drawers on the other side of the room.
Danny doesn't respond for a few seconds, and Star pauses her search, checking her phone to make sure she didn't lose connection.
"Danny-"
"That's… not really why it needs to be destroyed." He interrupts.
She blinks. "It's not?"
"No…" he sighs. "Star, that packet contains a lot of information that a lot of people would want to get their hands on."
"Yeah, to catch you- to know half-ghosts are a thing, right?"
"No, not… not exactly. Vlad and I, we're- we're dangerous people. Ghosts. Dangerous… ghosts. There's a reason I don't use my wail in the city, because it can level blocks. Like you said, we're- I'm… a walking weapon."
Another pause, and Star looks through the cabinet in front of her, the ectoplasm swirling in its vials. Then, the gravity of the situation sinks into her.
"People might… they could-"
"They could create- make the things out of comic books and movies. Super Soldiers- in lack of a less cliche term. It's bigger than Vlad and I. Way bigger."
She looks at the floor, then turns around to see the countless weapons on the wall. "Then why don't you just destroy it? All of it? Keep the knowledge to yourself?"
A sigh. "Vlad brought up a lot of reasons. Something about a bargaining chip for our lives, others lives, having the chance for the right people to reproduce us if the need arises, and then the research itself is just valuable. It's the same reason the government keeps and releases records on their immoral testing, having that information is powerful, even if it's not necessarily good.
"There's also a more- for me at least, a selfish thing. It's um… hard to be one of the only kind of your… species, I guess. Not understanding why and how you work is infuriating, it really is. Keeping stuff like this helps validate that I exist and that I am… alive I guess. Even if it's not the traditional way."
Another pause, and then he laughs. "Sorry, sorry, that's a lot to dump on you all at once. I just… needed to make sure you knew the gravity of the situation."
"No, no, I get it. Definitely get it. And… I can't say I know how you feel about keeping it, because I mean, I can't imagine your situation- But I definitely…" she collects her thoughts, takes a breath.
"I can see how it would be complicated, and I support it. Your decision."
Danny releases a breath he was likely holding and it crackles through the phone. "Thanks, Star. Um… did you- did you find that tracker?"
"Ah, Yeah." She presses her hand to the glass of the cabinet she's looking through. "I think so, but it's in a locked glass cabinet thing."
"Shoot, what type of lock is it?"
"Um, I'm not sure." At least, it wasn't anything that Star could recognize. It was a black and red keypad with both letters and numbers- like the type you'd find on a flip phone. It looked like it also had a fingerprint reader, but she couldn't be sure. Looking at the sides, it had the word 'XISECR' written on it. Probably the brand.
"It's a fancy keypad with I think a fingerprint scanner on it?"
"... does it have the word Fenton on it?" Danny asks.
"No, ha. Some other brand. X-I-S-E-C-R. I've never heard of it."
"Crap. And it's in a glass cabinet? On the portal side?"
"Yeah, the middle one. With a bunch of ectoplasm too."
He groans and Star looks back at the cabinet. It has a few other things in it too, little circuit board things and other bottles of glowing… stuff. It's strange that it's just behind glass though.
"Couldn't someone just bust it? It's glass." She taps at it.
"Yeah well, the glass is phase-proof and blast-proof, probably. And the fact that they actually bought a real security system for it is annoying, Tucker can get by my parents' stuff easy, but this… this might be a problem."
Star checks out the tracker again, it doesn't really look finished completely, a few stray wires still stick out and the face of it looks like it can be lifted off to access the hardware within.
"What's so important about the tracker? Does it track... Phantom?" It seems weird to talk about Danny's other persona as if he's a different person, but she mimics what the rest of the team does anyway.
"Yeah, apparently. I heard my parents talking about it and they said it's super sensitive, I'm worried that they'll be able to track Fenton as well as Phantom. It's not unusual for me to trigger their machines, but if the thing's only meant to track Phantom's ectosignature then it might raise some weirder red flags."
"So you still don't want them to find out?" Star asks, she was sure she remembered him saying the opposite.
"No, I- I do. I really do, but I don't really want them to figure out by catching me and strapping me down to a lab table."
"Well, how else would they find out?"
"I-" He sighs. "Hopefully by figuring out that Phantom's a good pers- um, ghost, first. If Phantom ever gets the chance to talk to them without shooting."
"Well, if anything bad happens at least Sam, Tucker, Jazz and I will have your back. If you need to hide out at my place you're welcome to. We've got a spare room from my brother being gone, and my parents are rarely home."
"Thanks. That's-" another pause. "Actually a really good idea. They'll look at Sam and Tuck's first…" he trails off.
"No problem, it's the least I can do. I enjoy helping you guys, I really do."
"Don't do it just because you feel like you-"
"Danny," she interrupts. "I'm doing it because I choose to. It's helping people, doing good. How could I not? I'm sure you understand that feeling."
He goes silent for a second. "Yeah, you're right. Thanks."
"Like I said, no problem!" She looks back up at the cabinet. "Now, what about this lock?"
"Well, hm, I think you should take a photo of that and send it to Tuck. Take a few. He'll know how to get through it if he can."
"Get through it?"
"Uh, hack it, bypass it. That's his thing, the tech."
Star thinks for a moment. "Actually, that makes sense."
"Doesn't it? Nobody's ever surprised. So! After you do that I'm not sure if there's anything else. I was hoping it wasn't locked away…"
Star finishes snapping her photos and places a hand on her hip. "Well, not much we can do now. I'll send these over and then sign off, unless there's anything else you need?"
"No, that was it, thanks. Oh, and you can keep the key if you want, I'll put another in when I get back. Sam and Tuck have one too, so it only makes sense."
"Are you sure? I can always come back in-"
"No," he insists. "I'd definitely rather have you have one in case of an emergency. FentonWorks is probably the most secure place against ghosts in the country, even if it's got a ghost portal inside of it."
"If you're really that sure then..." Star pulls the key out of her pocket and glides her finger across the green nail polish decorating its head. She couldn't exactly turn down a safe place in the case of a ghost attack, and going through that fence and using a spare really wasn't very secure, in case she was being followed. "I'll head out then, I'll text Tucker as soon as I get home."
"Sure, and thanks again Star, I appreciate it."
"And again, no problem. See ya."
"See ya!"
She hangs up the phone and turns off the lights before ascending the stairs, taking one last quiet look around the ground floor before heading out the front door to the chilly fall air. She pulls up the hood on the hiking jacket Paulina gave her and relocks the door behind her.
As she crosses the street to head back to her car, she wonders if her parents have gotten home early this time.
Maybe they can all go out to eat, too.
Star quietly laughs to herself. She could hope.