Ultimate Danny Phantom

by Grumbles

Impossible choices. Webs within webs. Gods and monsters. The righteous path is not easily tread. -now under heavy revision-

6. Killing the Dead

Killing the Dead

Detective Ethan Miller of the Elmerton City Police Department took a long, slow drag of his cigarette. Soothing heat filled his lungs and his eyelids fluttered. Around him, some of Elmerton's finest men and women in blue darted past with far more energy than he could muster at three o'clock in the morning. He clutched a plastic thermos in his other hand. Miller preferred his coffee hot, but the contents of this thermos had been long cold before he even left the station. His rough tongue and weathered lips maneuvered the orange butt of the cigarette beneath the brown hairs of his mustache to the corner of his mouth and he took a gulp of the cold brew. A quick flash of lightning shone through a hole in the ceiling of the dilapidated gas station, but the ECPD-emblazoned floodlights already illuminated the interior.

His team was busy snapping off photographs and taking inventory of the personal effects of a dead man. They were meticulous as they moved, taking care not to contaminate the scene. Miller wasn't one for praise, but he admired the young officers under his command. The detective sighed heavily and looked around. Behind him, chalk outlines of two other felled men had been drawn on the concrete floor. The coroner was securing the second body in the back of a hearse generously provided by Funke Funeral Services. Miller could see headlights coming down Jefferson Avenue in his direction; another bolt of lightning revealed this to be a second hearse. Miller knew more hearses were en route. His team was finishing their work on the third body and began preparations to manage the fourth of a total of thirteen.

Maybe twelve, Miller thought. There were thirteen bodies in this derelict gas station, but he wasn't sure the last one counted. A fog horn from somewhere in the distance pulled his attention back to Jefferson Avenue, to a new pair of high-beams cutting through the darkness. Attached to the blinding headlights was a massive vehicle barreling down the road. The front end of the vehicle was angled up, away from the two bulky front tires. Four rear tires of the same mass were enveloped by thick treads. A turret tower sat on top of the vehicle; a twin-barreled cannon mounted to its chassis. It looked like a goddamn tank.

Miller's eyes went wide. "Shit!" The epithet dislodged his cigarette from the corner of his mouth and it fell into his coffee. His hand jerked, but he caught the reflex to reach for his firearm. Though he had never met the Fentons in person, he - and every other officer on his force, and on every police force in the state - was well acquainted with their brand. A black letter F surrounded by neon green flames was emblazoned on the side of their tank.

The tank turned sharply and came to a screeching halt just shy of the police barricade. It rocked back and forth on its treads and settled. Miller and the rest of his team watched curiously as the vehicle remained motionless for several moments, its high-beams shining away from the building. Then, after what felt like an awkwardly long period of inactivity, a hatch on the underside of the angled head of the tank opened slowly with a hydraulic hiss. The panel continued to extend, forming a ramp. Dim light shone from the tank's interior.

At long last, two figures hurried down the ramp. They walked closely together, one short and slender, the other tall and broad-shouldered. Lightning danced through the clouds again and Miller caught his first glimpse of the Fentons before they entered the floodlights. In the old war videos, he recalled Maddie Fenton being bubbly and perky and sharp as a whip. Jack Fenton shared her enthusiasm, if not her vocabulary. In the videos they wore brightly colored hazmat suits and smiled warmly as they explained the easiest way to kill a ghost, or the safest way to capture a ghost and then kill it, or the best way to escape an attacking ghost and then return with help and capture it and then kill it.

These Fentons were different. Black tactical pants were tucked into knee-high combat boots that kicked at the bottoms of white lab coats as they hurried forward. Miller noticed the teal and orange shirts under the white lab coats as the Fentons strode into the floodlights and he smiled inwardly. Not too different, then, he thought.

"Detective Miller?" Maddie asked, extending a hand. It has covered by a thick black rubber glove that reached up to her elbow. A hardy-looking metal briefcase was clutched in the other gloved hand. As he took her hand and shook, he saw Jack was carrying two similar - and much larger - cases of his own.

"That's me," he replied. His voice was raspy; he turned his head and cleared his throat. "Pleasure to finally meet you in person, Dr. Fenton," he turned to Jack, "Dr. Fenton," he repeated, remembering they both held PhD's.

Jack set the case in his right arm on the ground with a heavy thud and shook the detective's hand firmly. "Sounds like you've got something for us?" the large man asked.

"I just might," Miller said dryly. "Come with me." He turned back to the gas station and felt a raindrop on his cheek. "Ramirez, get a tarp on that hole," he pointed to the roof. "Watch your step," he said to the Doctors Fenton as they entered the building. The coroner and her assistant were loading the third body onto a gurney and prepping it for transport while the ECPD officers worked on the fourth.

"Gunshot wounds?" Maddie asked as she advanced on the first body.

"Hmm?" Miller stopped and turned. "Oh, these. Yeah. One each, right to the neck," he tapped his Adam's apple.

"Do you mind?" Maddie gestured to the nearest body, covered by a white medical sheet.

Miller waved his hand at the corpse. "Help yourself."

Maddie knelt by the body and removed the sheet from over its head. Lifeless brown eyes stared up at the ceiling. Maddie retrieved a small flashlight from her breast pocket and shone it into the small hole in the man's neck. "Nine millimieter?"

"That's right," Miller confirmed, stifling a yawn. "We'll need to wait for all the autopsies to be sure, but it looks like that's what did 'em all in."

"I'd like a copy of those reports, if that's okay?" Maddie asked as she replaced the sheet over the dead man's head.

"Whatever you need," Miller said. "Come on, it's back here."

Detective Miller led the Fentons behind the service counter and through the door to the management office. He stepped aside, giving the Fenton's full view of the reason why they were summoned to his crime scene in the first place. Sitting slumped in a swiveling chair with a single puncture wound in its chest sat a ghost. Slick black hair was combed up in a pompadour style, a stark contrast against the body's pale, green skin. It wore a white tee shirt beneath a black leather jacket. The shirt was stained with green liquid that had oozed from the fatal wound. It also wore tight dark blue jeans and black boots with pointed toes.

"Well," Jack said after a moment of confused silence. "That's, uh... hmm..." He rubbed the back of his neck. "What exactly are we looking at here?"

It might have been a rhetorical question, but Miller answered anyway. "Might sound crazy, but I think someone murdered this ghost."

Lightning flashed from high above, this time pulling a cacophonous rumble of thunder along behind it. Rain began to fall.

---

Detective Miller watched his team begin their inspection of the twelfth and final human body as the coroner loaded the eleventh into yet another loaned hearse. The Fentons had been busy at work in the back office. Miller excused himself when Jack opened one of his briefcases to reveal a dizzying array of surgical equipment. The detective had seen some seriously troubling sights in his time on the force and in the military, but he wasn't sure he was ready for a front row seat to a ghost autopsy. He went to take a sip of his coffee, but remembered his fallen cigarette. His last cigarette. He looked mournfully into the thermos, then chucked the whole thing out the nearby broken window.

Jack poked his head out of the back door, scanning for Miller. He spied the detective and hurried over. Miller saw him and nodded. Then his eyes went wide. Jack's lab coat, once white and pristine, was speckled with stains of a sickly shade of green. His black gloves looked slick with some kind of mucus. The sight was jarring, and Jack's warm smile unnerved the detective further, as though the man wasn't fazed in the slightest.

"Detective, got something to run by you."

"Uh, sure, what's up?" Miller asked, taking a half step back as Jack approached.

Jack noticed this and his expression fell. Then he looked down and chuckled with bemusement. "Sorry," he held up his slimy gloves and stepped back. "So we've hit a bit of a snag; we can't identify what killed the ghost. We have an, uh, asset we'd like to call in to help our investigation, with your permission?"

Miller narrowed his eyes. "Asset?"

"I can't say more," Jack looked around at the coroner and other officers. "Not with an audience."

Miller nodded and called over to the coroner. "Sue, think you can take two in the last hearse?"

Doctor Sue DaFeid looked up from the gurney with victim number eleven and cocked an eyebrow. "Sure, but they're not done yet," she jerked her head towards Miller's team, who watched him curiously.

"Gather up the rest of his shit," Miller said, gesturing to the items they had set aside. "Finish your inventory back at the station. I'll sign off on it."

"Sir?" Officer Ramirez, a short, stocky Latina cop asked.

"Get a move on," Miller said firmly.

There was hesitation from his team, and he couldn't blame them. This situation was highly irregular. But they followed his orders and began to clear out. The coroner and her team followed with the last two human bodies and drove off into the dim light of dawn. The EMT's and fire department had long since departed. He looked at his watch; it was now quarter to five in the morning. He swore under his breath and patted his jacket, feeling for a pack of smokes. He swore again.

"Are we clear?" Jack asked.

"Go for it."

"Maddie!" Jack hollared. "All clear out here!"

"Thanks, sweetie!" she called back.

Miller looked around. "So, this asset, what'cha got, like a ghost-sniffing dog or something?"

Jack smiled weakly. "Not exactly. Now, Detective, this is all going to make sense in a moment, but I'm going to need you to trust me, okay?"

Miller tensed. "Trust you?"

"Yes. This asset, he might seem a little unusual to you, but he's one hundred percent above board. You don't have to be scared of him, and he's not going to hurt you in any way whatsoever."

"Hurt me? Doc, What the hell are you talking about?"

The sound of plastic being violently torn jerked his attention to the hole in the roof. Something had grabbed the blue tarp and yanked it away. Miller raced forward, drawing his firearm. A huge mass fell through the hole and landed with a crunch as it pulverized the concrete floor beneath it. The mass rose and Miller found his gaze drawn up, locked onto a pair of glowing green optical lenses. The figure continued to rise to its full height of eight feet tall. As it's back straightened, a brilliant flash of green fire ignited on the top of its head. A smaller flame licked the air from its chin.

Miller stumbled back. He tripped over his own feet and fell, his firearm tumbled from his hand. The giant being reached into a pouch on its belt and strode forward slowly. Miller shuffled backwards in a kind of backwards crab walk until his head hit the service counter. He winced, but the pain was nothing compared to the fear that gripped his chest. The figure paused to consider the detective's frightened state, and then knelt slowly. It reached for him with a massive, metal fist and opened it palm up.

There, in it's outstretched hand, was a pack of cigarettes and a lighter.

Jack cleared his throat. "Detective Miller, this is Skulker. Our asset."

---

Miller stood behind the service counter and watched the Fentons casually converse with their asset. The ghost towered over the two humans, but it wasn't attacking them. Not like Miller had seen in the war footage. Then again, he'd never seen a ghost like Skulker in the war footage either. The ghost was heavily armored and armed to the teeth, but it had a temperament like Mr. Spock. It talked a little like him, too. It said something that made Jack laugh - was it making a joke? Did ghosts make jokes?

"Detective Miller," the ghost said, approaching the counter. "Will your officers have uploaded the photos of this crime scene to the ECPD database by now?"

Miller looked to Jack and Maddie, who nodded.

"Think so," he muttered.

Skulker nodded and looked off in the distance. Moments later it returned to itself. "Thank you, Detective."

"H-hey, wait, what did you just do?" he demanded.

"I accessed your servers and retrieved the digital images and accompanying reports. I am compiling the files, please stand by."

Miller hurried around the counter and advanced toward the Fentons. "Are you telling me a goddamn ghost just infiltrated a secure police database?!"

"The password to access the secure server is password," Skulker informed him. "I hardly call that secure."

Miller's face flushed. "What are you gonna do with those, anyway? Your problem is in the back with Johnny Thirteen," he spat, jerking his thumb over his shoulder.

The Fentons and Skulker all turned to look at him quizzically. "Johnny Thirteen?" Skulker asked.

The detective's cheeks stayed red. "Ramirez was first on the scene," Miller explained, turning to face the Fentons, away from Skulker. "She found these twelve here, then your guy in the back. None of them had IDs."

"John Doe's," Maddie said flatly. "Any other nicknames?"

"Only one. Your pal," he turned to face Skulker. "Johnny Thirteen."

"I have never seen that man before in my life," Skulker said flatly. It looked off again, focusing on something elsewhere. A moment later, it added, "Fascinating."

"What?" All three humans asked together.

"Preliminary blood splatter analysis," Skulker continued, walking towards the front door, "suggests all rounds were fired from this position." It pointed at the ground just inside the door. "Difficult to say for certain, given the absence of bullet casings."

"All twelve shots?" Miller asked incredulously. "No way, spook. Gunman could get two, maybe three shots off before they painted the door with his brains. Hell, I'd give you five or six for Dirty Harry, but twelve? And all of them kill shots? Impossible."

"Humanly impossible," Skulker corrected.

Miller felt a chill run up his spine.

Skulker continued. "Your initial reports reveal the injury on the ectosapien subject is consistent with a nine millimeter bullet wound, but no bullet was found. There was significant deterioration in the surrounding tissue and bone mass. Something else killed Johnny Thirteen."

"There was just one wound. What could kill a ghost like that?" Maddie asked.

"The Fenton One-Shot?" Miller volunteered. "I remember seeing that in one of your videos back in the day."

The other three regarded him again.

"You don't think..." Jack started.

Skulker interjected. "That was my first thought as well, Detective Miller. But I do not think that weapon was used here. The One-Shot fires super-heated tungsten rounds that destabilize ghosts on the molecular level. The sudden and rapid super-heating of the ghost's body causes them to break down... violently. I imagine the One-Shot, even a scaled-down version of it, would work with similar expediency to our mystery weapon, but then we would not have a body to examine."

"So, what, then?" Jack asked. "SSDF?"

It took a moment for Miller to process the acronym. The Strategic Supernatural Defense Force was created during the Ghost War to fight the increasingly aggressive ghost attacks that targeted major global cities. He recalled that the Fentons helped found the organization. He also recalled that they had been officially disbanded after the war...

"I don't know, Jack," Maddie said. "This seems beyond them. The most advanced weapons they have in their arsenal are the ones we designed for them."

"That was years ago," Jack countered with a shrug. "And we don't exactly get the newsletter anymore."

"It would be worth finding out for sure," Skulker said. "I will gather the remains of Johnny Thirteen for transport."

"For transport?" Detective Miller asked. "To where?"

"To our lab," Maddie said coolly. "You don't have the facilities to process this specimen safely. We'll send you our full report once it's completed."

Miller wanted to object. This was, after all, his crime scene. He didn't care for the idea of anyone, even the Fentons, taking something so crucial from it. Even if it was a ghost. But Maddie was right; he didn't know the first thing about transporting ghost remains and the coroner's office was almost certainly not prepared to deal with it.

He nodded and Skulker made for the back office with long, confident strides. The ghost surprised him. He was non-violent, articulate, intelligent - he always thought ghosts were mindless monsters. This one subverted all of his preconceived notions, but more remarkably, had managed to gain the trust of the world's most renowned ghost hunters. They weren't just using him, they consulted him and listened to him and -

Miller realized he was now thinking of the ghost as him, instead of it.

After several minutes, Skulker returned to the lobby with a large black body bag slung over his massive shoulder. He headed for the RV and Maddie followed him out. Jack walked over to Miller.

"I appreciate you working with us on this, Detective, especially given the unusual circumstances. I hope I can count on your discretion as this case continues?"

"What, you think I'm gonna rat on you for working with a ghost?" Miller shook his head. "To who? You're the law in this town when it comes to ghosts as far as I'm concerned. If you trust him, that's good enough for me. Just... keep an eye on him, will ya?"

Jack smiled and nodded enthusiastically.

Miller continued. "Do you really think a ghost did this? I mean, it's not like anything I've ever seen. To do what your buddy said it did to these poor bastards..."

"These are strange times," Jack remarked.

The men stood in silence for a moment. Then Miller said, "We'll keep working the case from our end." He retrieved his new pack of cigarettes, pulled one out, slid it between his lips and sparked up his lighter. "I'll let you know if we find anything, though it sounds like Skulker might crack it before breakfast."

Jack grinned knowingly as Miller took the first puff from one of Skulker's offered cigarettes.

"I wouldn't be so sure. There's something about this that feels wrong. Aside from the usual terrible feelings that come with a case like this, obviously. I can't place it, but..." Jack trailed off, his brow furrowed. "In any case, we'll share our findings with you as well. If the perp is human, that's your arena. We'll help you any way we can."

Miller offered a hand. Jack - having removed his ghost gore-slick glove long ago - shook it, then joined Maddie and Skulker in the tank. Jack had explained it was a heavily modified RV, but Miller knew a goddamn tank when he saw one. After a moment its engine roared to life. The ramp folded shut and the vehicle rumbled off back down the way it had come. The storm had long since dissipated, and the dim light of dawn had just begun to shine down on Elmerton. Miller looked down at his watch and swore. Maybe now he could get some sleep.

---

The ride back to Amity Park was boisterous. Jack and Maddie discussed the possibility of a new ghost-killing weapon, arguing over its manufacturing origins and capabilities. Skulker sat awkwardly hunched over on one of the bench seats in the back, his flaming Mohawk restrained for the drive. On the floor in front of him lie the body bag containing the remains of Johnny Thirteen. On the other side, seated on the opposite bench, was Danny Fenton, Jack and Maddie's son.

"I hate that his dumb nickname is already sticking," Danny remarked sourly. "If they can name him Johnny Thirteen, what are they gonna start calling me?"

"You already have dozens of nicknames bestowed upon you by anonymous Internet users from around the world," Skulker explained. "Some of the more creative ones-"

"No!" Danny barked, pointing a finger in Skulker's face. "No no no no no! I do not look up anything about myself online," he said firmly. "I can't handle that stuff."

"As you wish," Skulker replied. "What did your reconnaissance turn up?"

Danny slouched back and sighed. "Nothing. No ghosts anywhere," he pointed at his nostrils. Green - or recently, black - colored mist billowed from his nose whenever ghosts were near; an ability he affectionately referred to as his Ghost Sense. "I didn't see any of the usual signs either. You know; exploded buildings, screaming people."

"Did you notice anything more subtle?" Skulker asked. "Strange footprints leading away from the crime scene? Tracks from a getaway vehicle?"

"I don't think so. I did a perimeter sweep around the building while you guys were talking, all I found was some crummy thermos. A regular one. Didn't seem important."

Skulker thought Danny seemed dejected. His parents hadn't wanted him to come to an active crime scene, especially when they learned how many human victims were there. Danny had insisted. Skulker was consulted and, to Jack and Maddie's chagrin, sided with Danny. He believed it would be an excellent opportunity for Danny to hone his critical thinking and analytical skills. The parents relented, but they refused to let him inside. Instead, Danny was tasked with surveillance and reconnaissance, to possibly track down the perpetrator if they were still in the vicinity.

"You did not fail tonight, Daniel."

"I didn't say-" Danny started, then sighed. "I should've been able to find something. All I had to do was fly around and look for anything suspicious, and I couldn't even do that."

"But you did." Danny cocked an eyebrow, and Skulker continued. "The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence. We know our killer is fast enough to kill twelve men in the span of several seconds. We know our killer has an anti-ghost weapon sophisticated beyond our understanding. Now we know our killer did not leave the scene of the crime by conventional means. And we now know our killer left no other evidence behind. This is all useful knowledge, and you contributed to it." The ghost's robotic face cracked a rare half-smile. "Do not be so hard on yourself."

Danny smiled sheepishly and straightened back up. "If the killer is a ghost, why would a ghost have a weapon that can kill other ghosts?"

"Humans often carry guns with more than enough firepower to kill other humans," Skulker remarked.

Danny rolled his eyes. "Okay, fine, Where would a ghost even get something like this?"

"Indeed. No such weapon is known to exist, which begs the question; where did our killer procure such a weapon? And why target Johnny Thirteen with it?"

"And who was Johnny Thirteen?" Danny asked. "Why was he here?"

Skulker nodded sagely. "It would behoove us to investigate further. The existence of this weapon coinciding with the presence of a collaborative human-ghost element does not bode well."

"Yeah, well... wait, us?"

Skulker regarded the boy gravely. "I have nothing left to teach you about combat. Your abilities have transcended anything I have seen in nearly all of my lifetimes. I cannot teach you about what I do not understand myself." Danny started to object, but Skulker held up a hand to quiet him. "Your power is dangerous if you do not know how to use it, but it is useless if you do not know when to use it. I can no longer teach you how, but I can help you learn when, if you are ready to learn."

Danny looked at the floor, considering his words. When he looked up, Skulker could see the resolve in his eyes. The boy nodded.

"I'm ready."

---

Heavy rain poured down upon the deeply wooded Kazakhstan countryside. Mountains loomed over the valley from the far north, their peaks forming a jagged silhouette along the horizon. Rocky outcroppings and a thick blanket of evergreen trees surrounded their bases and stretched out for miles, broken only to the south by the urban sprawl of Almaty, Kazakhstan's largest city. The dense forest was marred by a deep, fresh wound in the earth almost a mile long. The trench dug deep into the soil. Displaced plant matter and rocks lay strewn in mounds along its sides. Flaming and smoldering debris lay within the trench – only a few pieces at its shallower end, but more and more detritus could be seen at the far, deeper end near the bulk of the wreckage. The downed jetliner had been sitting in the downpour for hours, but the frigid rain had yet to extinguish all of the flames.

Vanessa Masters carefully navigated along the edge of the trench towards the wreckage. A blast of sparks from the wreckage briefly revealed the bulky form of her henchman, Bullet. His large armored body was hunched over, tearing pieces of the destroyed plane apart and tossing them aside with ease. A gust of icy wind blew through the crash site; Vanessa scowled at the ghost and tugged her black parka tightly around her slender body. The cold didn't bother him one bit.

"What have you found?" she shouted to be heard over the howling wind.

Bullet gave her a quick glance before returning to his work. "Nothing yet," he replied, his voice amplified through speakers somewhere on the faceless helmet he wore. "Looks like anything worth salvaging was destroyed in the crash."

It was Bullet who had intercepted the jetliner at fifty thousand feet. His ghost powers, augmented by his protective armored shell, gave him the strength and speed to tear his way into the machine's engines and disable them. Gravity took care of the rest.

"Are you sure this is the right plane?" Bullet asked as he tossed aside another massive section of the plane's hull.

"We've been scanning cargo shipments in this sector for months. In all that time, this was the only one shielded against our scanners," Masters explained, her irritation evident.

Bullet did not respond for a moment, and the cacophony of the rain storm roared around them. "Was this what they were transporting?" he asked finally.

Masters picked her way through the heavier concentration of debris, finally arriving at Bullet's side. He stepped away, allowing Masters a full view of his find.

A cylindrical container, roughly three meters tall, sat in the smoldering earth. Each end was capped with an apparatus dotted with blinking lights and LED indicator panels. The bulk of the device was an opaque black material resembling glass. Another blast of sparks from entangled wreckage highlighted its unusual features, and Vanessa realized that the device itself was in unnaturally pristine condition.

"Bullet?" she asked.

"My sensors can't scan through it," he stated. "One of your research sites might have better luck."

Might was hardly ideal, but it would have to suffice. She gestured at the cylinder and asked, "What about the container itself?"

Bullet didn't answer as he probed the container again. "This glassy component is actually a metal alloy. It appears that ectoplasm was used in the bonding process."

Masters' skin bristled. That was one of her many proprietary technologies that had been pilfered by the Dalv Corporation. She had hoped it would have taken longer for this criminal element to acquire the resources necessary to reverse engineer her techniques, if only to give her more time to hunt them down.

"OPEN."

The unknown voice hissed from the darkness. Masters jerked back in surprise, nearly losing her footing.

Bullet quickly rose to his full height, his hand snapped to the hilt of his omni-weapon. "What was that?" he barked.

"I don't-"

"OPEN."

Masters and Bullet looked from each other to the mysterious cylinder. It shook once. The voice was coming from inside.

"OPEN."

---

"Bang, you are dead."

Phantom pouted. Sam and Tucker giggled. Phantom, as Danny Fenton preferred to be called in his ghost form, pouted more. He was frozen in place, half-way phased through his living room wall. He looked like a cartoon cat burglar who had just been caught red handed trying to steal a priceless artifact from a museum. But Phantom was trying nothing of the sort. Days after the discovery of the grisly mass-murder in Elmerton, Skulker was making good on his promise to train Danny how to use his powers more intelligently.

Now, in the middle of the Fenton's living room, Skulker stood at his full, imposing height, eyes glowing intensely, Mohawk temporarily contained so as to not set the house ablaze. Even Sam and Tucker's giggling couldn't detract from his intimidating presence. Skulker had one shiny armored fist planted firmly on his hip. The pointer finger of his other gauntlet was aimed at Phantom; a mock pistol.

"Then I stay intangible while-"

"Bang," Skulker repeated, dipping his thumb for effect. "You have been shot by the new mystery weapon that kills ghosts with a single shot, regardless of the state of phase. You are dead."

"We don't know it could do that while I'm intangible," Phantom protested, removing himself from the wall.

"Are you prepared to take that risk?"

Phantom thought about it. "Well, no."

"Again," Skulker ordered.

Phantom sighed and blinked. When he opened his eyes, he was standing in the kitchen. He didn't need to blink to teleport, but he found it was easier to adjust to the rapid change of position. And he liked to call it 'blinking'. That gave him an idea. He readied himself, feeding harmless, luminous energy into his fists, and blinked again. He found himself floating in the living room again, right behind Skulker.

Or, rather, right behind where Skulker had been only a moment before. Phantom felt a hard object jab him in the base of the skull.

"Bang. You are dead."

"You moved!" Phantom objected, trying to ignore his friends' giggling.

"How would you know where I was standing in the first place?" Skulker countered.

"Okay, so let me get this straight. I can't just kick the door down and go in, guns blazing-"

"No, you most certainly can't!" Maddie's voice called out from the laboratory downstairs.

Phantom continued, finding it harder and harder to ignore his audience, "I can't just phase into the room, and I can't blink in to take them by surprise. What can I do?"

"That is what we are here to find out," Skulker answered. Phantom sighed, and Skulker relented. "Very well. Tucker," the large ghost turned to regard the human boy. "How would you approach the situation? Assume the facts are unaltered."

Tucker hesitated. "Oh, uh, well," he paused. "So I've tracked the guy to a seedy motel room. He doesn't know I'm coming, but he's got a gun that can kill me in one shot. So, for me, pretty much any gun in the world." He chuckled to relieve tension, but Phantom and the others regarded him dryly. "So, I'd try going in invisibly. He can't shoot me if he can't see me coming, right?"

Skulker shook his head slowly. "Ghosts actively camouflaging against detection under the visible light spectrum are easily detectable by infrared vision. If our killer has this weapon, we must assume they know enough about ghosts to prepare for an ambush by an invisible ghost."

"Alright, then let's just blow up the motel!" Tucker said, throwing up his hands in defeat. "I mean, there's nothing he can do to get the drop on the guy, so why bother?"

"So human casualties in pursuit of a criminal are acceptable to you?" Skulker asked, cocking a robotic eyebrow.

Tucker blushed. "Wha- no! No, but, I mean, you're not giving him a lot of options here."

"So what if I got everyone else out and then blew the place up?" Danny offered.

"And if you miss someone?" Sam asked.

"I'd take my time," Phantom replied.

"And if you still missed one?" She asked. "Or what if the killer got away while you were getting everyone out?"

"Daniel James Fenton, you will not be blowing up any buildings while you live under this roof!" Maddie called up again.

"It appears your ill-begotten strategy is firmly off the table, Daniel," Skulker commented. "Samantha, how would you handle this situation?"

Sam shrugged. "I know where the killer is, so why do I have to do anything?"

Skulker cracked a thin smile. Sam's cheeks reddened, but she flashed her uncle a winning smile right back.

"Do nothing?" Phantom asked, confused.

"Call the cops," Sam offered. "There's twelve dead humans, they're gonna want to catch the killer themselves."

"So I'm just supposed to put them in front of this ghost killing weapon?"

"A ghost-killing weapon, especially one that leaves the body of its victim intact, is unlikely to inflict any greater harm on a human than any other kind of firearm, if it can injure humans at all," Skulker said. "Samantha has the best plan that I have heard so far."

"Nepotism," Phantom protested haughtily, waving at the larger ghost dismissively. "And besides, you're overthinking it."

"Am I?" Skulker asked, a hint of incredulity creeping into his normally even tone.

"Definitely. Because what would happen, is that I'd poke my head in the room, like this," Phantom blinked into the kitchen and leaned through the wall, keeping his head invisible. Skulker looked directly at him. Before he could point a finger gun at Phantom, the smaller ghost blinked behind the bigger one and pointed his own finger gun at the base of Skulker's neck. "And then catch you before you could get a shot off."

"A sound strategy for a scenario you assume to be true."

"What?"

"I invite you to direct your attention to the coat rack in the corner of the room. That is my partner in crime, unknown to everyone until this very moment. While you were gloating, he drew his own ghost killing gun, and-"

Phantom sighed and floated back to the floor. "Yeah, yeah, I get it. Bang, I'm dead."

Skulker planted his fists on his hips. "Again."

---

While the practical application lesson hadn't gone well, Phantom was feeling stronger and more capable than ever. He scanned downtown Amity Park as he flew invisibly over the tops of her tallest buildings, though he wasn't sure exactly what he was scanning for. Most lower-level ghost attacks happened in the suburbs near the heavily mutated redwood forests. Ghosts rarely made it downtown before they were stopped - killed or trapped in a thermos by Phantom, Skulker, or his parents. But this night was quiet, and Phantom wondered why he was even bothering with a patrol.

In truth, Phantom knew it was because he loved flying. He didn't have the first clue about how it worked. Even Skulker and his parents, for all their vast knowledge of ghosts, couldn't offer an explanation. The other two basic powers most other ghosts seemed to possess - invisibility and intangibility - made some sense; at least in theory. To phase, Phantom's molecules shifted around those of the object he was phasing through. Invisibility worked like the camouflage mechanism of a cuttlefish, but on steroids. But flight had everyone stumped.

Phantom liked it that way. It was something he couldn't explain even if he wanted to. It didn't feel like some kind of science-y thing, like his other powers. It felt like magic. He wanted to shoot up into the sky, and his body did it. He wanted to turn this way or that, to climb into the clouds, to dart between traffic inches above the street at breakneck speeds, and his body did it. He wanted to defy gravity, and his body just did it, responding at the speed of thought.

Normally, flying generated a sense of calm and relaxation that simply could not be rivaled. But Phantom's mind was racing, too preoccupied to fully appreciate his view. A killer was loose somewhere near his city. A killer with a ghost-killing gun and possibly even superhuman speed. Phantom didn't have that particular ability; a thought that felt sour in his mind, because now it was an ability he definitely wanted.

He shook his head and headed for the nearest rooftop - a skyscraper of at least fifteen floors, Phantom thought it might have been the corporate headquarters for some bank. He perched on top of one of the massive air conditioning units and sat cross legged. Skulker's lesson had him thinking even now, hours after the larger ghost had departed for his secret lair. That was usually the point of Skulker's lessons, as Phantom had come to learn. And so he wasn't thinking about how Skulker had an answer for every one of Phantom's plans. He was thinking about Sam's plan.

"Why do I have to do anything," he said, repeating her words from earlier. That couldn't be the point Skulker was trying to make. He always advised caution and preparedness, but never inaction. And he must know Phantom couldn't just let humans put themselves in harm's way if there was a ghost involved, not even armed human law enforcement. But what if the killer was somehow human? Should Phantom get involved in human-on-human crime? So far, he hadn't. He'd only stepped in when a ghost was placing human lives in danger. But if this killer was a human with anti-ghost tech, did that that make it his problem?

Phantom grunted and shook his head; he was getting distracted, and if he followed these threads any further he'd spend the whole night on this rooftop doing nothing but thinking. He had to focus on the situation. He held out his hand and fed energy into his palm - only, this energy was different. It wasn't crackling black electricity, or glowing black plasma. This had the same color and luminosity of his other powers, but this was... gooey. He threw the gooey, glowing ball of black ectoplasm down at the roof and it squelched on the concrete.

"Gooey, thanks for coming," he said to the blob, "here's what I'm thinking." Phantom stood up. "We've got a killer. Some kind of psycho, right? He kills twelve people and one ghost. No signs of a struggle, so this guy is fast." Phantom paused to consider the blob and rolled his eyes. "Fine, this guy or girl is fast. Happy?" Gooey said nothing, for it was inanimate ectoplasm and couldn't speak. "You should meet my girlfriend," Phantom muttered. "Anyway," he took a moment to chuckle at his own antics. "Anyway, the killer leaves no trace. Not even ectoplasm, so we can't event be sure it actually is a ghost. But, like, come on, Gooey. It has to be a ghost! What else could it be?" He paused. "That's not The Flash's MO. And he isn't real, Gooey. Nice try."

Phantom floated up off the air conditioning unit and slowly settled down onto the concrete next to the blob. "Skulker liked Sam's answer tonight. Instead of trying to catch the killer myself, he thinks I should call the cops. But I don't even know where the guy- killer, sorry- where the killer is, so why would I call the cops? He's not saying I should remember that for when I find out where the killer is, right?" Phantom waited for Gooey to answer.

He began to pace. "No, you're right. There's no way to know this would even shake out like that. Maybe the killer is hiding in a cave, or in the forest, or in the Terror Tower honeymoon suite." Phantom frowned at Gooey. "Okay, geeze, it was just a joke, calm down." He took a deep breath and gathered his thoughts. "Skulker liked the idea of calling the cops so..." he trailed off, continuing to pace back and forth. "So Skulker wants me to call them for help if I find this killer?" He stopped moving and held his arms wide, looking at Gooey with a hopeful smile. "No, you're right, not call them, but contact them. Maybe- oh! I should work with them! I should work with Detective Miller!" Phantom exclaimed. "That -"

Phantom suddenly envisioned Gooey staring daggers at him, and he sighed. "You're right, that's stupid. It'd never work. Miller wouldn't trust me, he hates ghosts. But!" Phantom perked up again, regarding Gooey excitedly. "But! He has the files, right? They're putting together a, uh, oh, what's that word, like a file, but- dossier! Or maybe it is a file, whatever. But they have it, all I have to do... all I have to do is, uh, take it... I guess. Hmm."

He was still pacing. "Yes, Gooey, I know that's stealing, but I don't know what else to do. What if I just look at it? Eh? I'm not really taking anything, I'm just looking for clues, how about that?"

Gooey was silent, and Phantom couldn't tell if it was an approving or disapproving silence. "I think I can live with trespassing," he said, deciding Gooey still wasn't on board with the developing plan. "Besides, who cares what you think, you're just a blob." Phantom scooped the glowing black blob of ectoplasm up in his hands, but his playful expression turned confused as Gooey was reabsorbed into his hand. He checked the roof, under his feet, and the back of his hand, but Gooey was gone, leaving Phantom alone and with a strange sense of déjà vu.

The confusion faded as Phantom's excitement resurfaced. He thought his plan was a good one, and wanted to act before he had a chance to second guess himself. Phantom felt the familiar swell of euphoria as his body rose into the air, now fueled by adrenaline and optimism. He soared away from the roof and sped off for the Amity Park police station, recalling its location from the few times he had seen his parents visit after a ghost incursion; he remembered a few seconds later that the event in question happened in Elmerton, and adjusted his heading.

Elmerton's buildings were nowhere near as tall or pristine as Amity Park's; the tallest of them was only five stories, and they were far more spread apart. He found Elmerton's police station easily enough. Many of the lights were off, and Phantom eased his way through a wall into one such darkened room. He floated over to the door - a thick slab of wood with a narrow rectangular window at eye level. As Phantom reached for the doorknob, his eyes focused on his reflection.

Phantom was about to make a joke about the good looking guy staring back at him, but stopped. He didn't wear a mask, which never seemed important when dealing with ghosts. This was different. What would these police officers do if they recognized him? Or what if someone remembered his face, and saw him again later in his human form? Sure, he could try to stay invisible, but if something happened, if he was seen... These people couldn't hurt him or arrest him, he had powers. His parents, Jazz, Tucker and Sam, didn't. They couldn't just fly away.

Suddenly, for all his power, Phantom felt very vulnerable. He retreated back out into the night and left the police station behind for now. He still liked his plan, but he needed a different approach.

---

Days after her expedition to Europe, Vanessa Masters and her ghostly bodyguard stood in the underground laboratory beneath her secluded mountain retreat in the relative safety of the United States. This room in the laboratory had been prepared by Technus's drones to receive the curious container, and to handle its potential occupant should the encounter prove less than hospitable.

While Bullet's attention was laser focused on the cylindrical machine, Masters watched a small group of humanoid robotic bodies with fascination as they labored throughout the room. These were controlled by the single guiding consciousness of Technus, a super-intelligent AI construct of her own design. While Technus had no corporeal form of his own, he interacted with the physical world through cameras, microphones, speakers, and, given the opportunity, any networked machine capable of manipulating the world around him. The drones - Technus's own design - were sleek and dexterous, each one standing exactly six feet tall with an erect posture and moving with human-like gait. However, none of them had heads which might have resembled a human face. Although, Masters noted, that they all had speakers built in beneath the chins, and at least two audio receptors on each side of their heads.

A thick wall of bullet-proof glass separated Masters and Bullet in the observation room from the drones and the salvaged machine in the containment chamber. A pressurized airlock at the far end of the room was the only way in or out of the containment chamber. The drones worked diligently on equipment in the chamber. Several thick cords ran from ports in the machine into computers dedicated to pulling and decrypting data, and capable of processing biological data, translation and communications equipment and, perhaps most importantly, equipped with a lethal fail-safe measure in the event the containment chamber failed to contain its occupant.

"Are we ready?" Masters asked after some time had passed.

"On your command," Technus's disembodied voice spoke from the overhead speaker. None of the drones regarded her.

"Begin."

"Affirmative," Technus said. "Bringing energy barrier online." The fluorescent bulbs overhead flickered and a low hum rumbled to life from somewhere beneath them. A greenish sheen faded into view along the surface of the protective glass. Technus began providing Masters with a play-by-play account of his interaction with the machine. "Attempting to access data stores. Encountering firewall, please wait… please wait… ple- firewall bypassed, accessing data stor- encountering second firewall, please wait… please wa- firewall bypassed. Firewall anti-intrusion algorithm analyzed, adjusting Battering Ram Protocol… Battering Ram Protocol optimized, running, plea- thirteen additional firewalls bypassed. Accessing data. Please wait… accessed data is encrypted, running Enigma Protocol. Decrypting data, p- data decrypted. Data is now being processed. Reports are being prepared for your review."

"Fifteen firewalls?" Masters asked. She crossed her arms and cocked an eyebrow at the security camera above her.

"They must be nervous," Technus said, amused.

The blinking lights on the top and bottom caps of the machine died. A hiss of deep purple fog billowed from the crease between the cylinder and the top cap, and steadily blanketed the floor of the containment chamber. Rather than dissipate up and away through the ventilation shafts, it slowly swirled and tumbled along the linoleum floor like a sinister fog. The cap rose up and pivoted back on a hydraulic joint. The cylinder split horizontally down the front along a previously-unseen seam. It opened, and more of the purple gas fell silently from within. As it bounced and curled down to the ground, it left behind a distinct silhouette standing within the machine.

Just under six feet tall stood a thin, feminine body. Its skin was the same deep purple color as the fog, only it was inky and opaque. The sides of its head curled up into what appeared to be horns, and the tips of pointed ears were visible below the horns. Two purple eyes glowed dimly, marked by two overlapping white pupils in each eye, like goats eyes. The figure twitched and stirred. Slowly, it reached forward and grasped the sides of the tank, pulling itself forward with slow, tentative steps. As it approached the glass wall, Masters noticed the being wasn't just thin, it was gaunt; almost skeletal. It stepped up to the glass and glared at Masters.

"What am I looking at?" Masters asked finally.

"Ectosapien," Technus confirmed. "A weak ectosapien. Energy scans place it at a Level One on the Neutron Index."

"Level One?" Masters repeated, unimpressed. She uncrossed her arms, planted her hands on her hips, and cocked her head.

The ghost on the other side of the glass placed its hands on its hips and cocked its head, mirroring Masters. The movement sent a chill up her spine.

"What-?"

"I am detecting an anomaly on the neural scanner," Technus said.

"What kind of anomaly?" Masters asked. She shifted her weight, and the ghost again copied her movements.

"Evidence of higher brain functions," Technus explained. "Recalibrating neural scanner, please wait… performing neural scan, pleas- scan complete. I am still reading the anomalous signal. Neural scanner is operating within acceptable parameters."

"You said higher brain function?"

"I cannot be certain without more data. However, the brain activity of this specimen closely resembles the receptor end of a motor neuron"

"Maybe you should recalibrate the scanner again," Bullet said smartly, gesturing at the ghost. "It is clearly acting of its own accord."

"Only when it's mimicking our master," Technus noted. "I believe it is attempting to find a new source of sensory input data."

"What happened to the original source?"

"Unknown. It is possible that this specimen was injured, or is part of a composite ectosapien entity, like Skulker." Bullet mumbled something unintelligible, but Masters ignored him. "Without input from the whole entity, this fragment may be attempting to psychically reconnect with its input stimulus."

"Can it make contact from here?" Masters asked.

"No. The containment tank that held the specimen was heavily shielded, and this laboratory even more so."

"This is all very fascinating, but we have a larger concern," Bullet spoke. "This specimen was clearly very important to your enemies. They apparently went to great lengths to capture it." Masters followed the direction of Bullet's featureless faceplate and saw his gaze was locked on a corpse crumpled at the bottom of the tank. It was wearing a military uniform.

"Technus, who is that?" Masters asked, nodding in the tank's direction. The specimen nodded too.

One of the drones walked up to the tank and peered inside. The specimen paid it no mind. "Uniform appears to be Russian Special Forces, but modified. No visible rank; likely ex-military mercenary contracted as private armed forces. Body is in an advanced state of dehydration, ectoplasmic contamination of body tissue consistent with ectosapien overshadowing. This human has been dead for several days."

"He must have been overshadowed when he was captured," Masters observed, returning her attention to the specimen. She crossed her arms. So did it.

"What was so special about this particular ghost?" Bullet asked. "Why go through all this trouble?"

"There are only vague references to this specimen in the data collected from this machine and from the salvaged computers at the crash site," Technus explained. "There isn't enough data to form a working theory."

Masters furrowed her brow. "Speculate."

Technus hesitated for a moment, then said, "With the right tools, ghosts can be captured relatively easily even without Fenton technology. Electric fields can be used to disrupt intangibility, and goading one into anger can drive one out of a human host. The only reason to capture an overshadowed host in a shielded containment unit such as this, as opposed to a simpler device, would be to prevent the occupying ghost from communicating with other ghosts; or, more likely in this case, from communicating with its source."

"Even if this one is part of a composite, what makes its source such a threat?" Bullet asked. "Like you said, our targets have the means to protect themselves."

"I can only guess at the source ghost's abilities based on the limited data available from this fragment, if it is indeed a fragment and has a source. A more concerning explanation suggests that this is not necessarily an adversarial relationship between the source ghost and our human targets."

"What do you-" Bullet started.

Masters interrupted him. "They might be working with it," she said in a hushed voice. Silence fell over the laboratory. All eyes were on the specter behind the glass, but it's eyes were fixed on her.

---

One week after Detective Miller had been dragged out of bed to begin the most confusing case of his career, he sat at in a chair that had long since stopped being comfortable, poring over notes on several new cases that had landed on his desk. There were three new homicides for his inspection, their files illuminated by the light of a dying bulb, screwed loosely into a desk lamp almost as old as he was. Heavy rain pounded on the window behind him, meaning he couldn't slip out into the night for a smoke break. Miller swore and tried to ignore the itch in his lungs.

He was a seasoned detective and rarely struggled to manage his cases, but the Johnny Thirteen killings preoccupied his thoughts. He found himself comparing new cases to that one. He flipped through photographs of a new crime scene and immediately noticed the sloppy handiwork of this killer. Five shots fired, only two connected, and the killer had resorted to using a dictionary to finish the job. Not like the superhuman swiftness and accuracy of the Johnny Thirteen killer. This killer left fingerprints and hair and even his own blood all over the crime scene. The Johnny Thirteen killer left so little evidence behind that, if it weren't for all the dead bodies, you could almost be forgiven for thinking there was no killer at all.

But Miller knew better. Professional pride aside, the detective felt a presence he hadn't felt since he had been newly minted in his career; genuine curiosity. Not the professional curiosity that made him good at his job. This was an itch, unlike the one growing in his lungs, that he felt when he first learned about dinosaurs as a kid, or when he took his first criminal justice course at Elmerton Community College. Now, he found himself wanting to learn more about ghosts. And if a ghost was responsible for the Johnny Thirteen killings, he wanted to know what kind of ghost could do such a thing, and how.

He cursed under his breath as a sudden, sharp chill ran up his spine. He thought the air conditioning in the office was turned up too high and slowly rose from his faded maroon leather chair to adjust the thermostat in the hall. As his fingers touched the handle, a thought occurred to him; he listened for a moment, straining to hear the hum of the air conditioning unit through the vent in his office, but he heard nothing.

In the hall, the hushed sounds of the nighttime crew working their cases whispered from open office doors. Miller poked his head out his door and looked left, then right. Nothing seemed amiss - not visually, anyway, but an uneasy feeling was growing in the pit of his stomach. He desperately wanted a cigarette. Miller headed down the hall to his right, towards the men's room. He gave polite, closed-lip smiles to his colleagues as he passed their offices; nobody else seemed to be sharing his growing sense of foreboding.

He made it to the restroom and froze. He didn't actually need to relieve himself. He had started down the hallway, and decided he didn't want to simply turn right around and go back. Then those quip-happy bastards would start in with their remarks.

"Have a nice stroll?"

"Find what you were looking for?"

"Forgot your phone in the can again?"

Harmless, innocuous jabs that just got under his skin and irritated the hell out of him.

Miller sighed and approached the sink. It wasn't all that bad. He was just tired, and really wanted to smoke. He looked at himself in the mirror and shook his head, not thrilled with the wrinkles on his skin, or the bags under his eyes, or his very noticeable second chin. The detective ran the water in the sink on high heat and let the steam rise up under his nose. He closed his eyes, enjoying the temporary warmth. The chill must have been one of those random, stupid things the human body just did sometimes. The steam slowly unwound the tension in his brow. He grinned and turned the water to cold before splashing some on his face. For a moment there, he thought a ghost might have caused the chill.

And then the tension returned. A ghost could come to this precinct, to his exact office, if they wanted information on the case. And if the killer was a ghost, and came here to tamper with evidence and records, the ghost would have gone left, towards the records room, not right. Not here.

He hurried to the door, leaving the sink on. His heart was pounding. He didn't want to alarm his colleagues, and so he forced himself to walk at a normal pace back down the hall. It seemed to take forever. If anyone sensed that something was wrong with him, nobody approached him about it. He quickened his pace as he passed his own office and neared the records room. The door was closed and the lights were off, but Miller figured that didn't mean much to a ghost. He unlocked it with his key as quietly as possible and eased the door open. He checked to make sure nobody was watching and slipped in, closing the door softly behind him.

It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the dark, but he quickly saw something wasn't right. Dozens of file cabinet drawers all around the room were open, although there was an noticeable absence of files strewn around the floor. His attention was laser focused on the far wall near the windows. The street lamp outside shone dim light into the room, enough to create a silhouette of the figure standing by the windows. Slowly, Miller unholstered his weapon and aimed it at Skulker's wide back.

"Thought you were on the up and up," Miller said in a hushed voice.

Skulker didn't look up from the file. Miller could see the deep blue glow from the ghost's eyes as it scanned the contents of the file held in his large mechanical hands. The flaming Mohawk and smaller flaming beard were concealed.

"I'd like to think that is still the case, Detective," Skulker replied. Miller thought his voice sounded different, but that might have just been the hushed tone the ghost was using. The ghost looked up and raised an approximation of an eyebrow at him. "Is that really necessary?"

Miller's face flushed and he hesitantly returned his firearm to its holster. "Wasn't sure it was you. The fuck are you doing here, breaking into my precinct?"

"I wanted to compare notes," Skulker replied, holding up the file. "I have an update; a real lead, thought you'd be interested."

Something about this encounter rubbed Miller the wrong way, he just couldn't place it. His concern was overshadowed by his interest in Skulker's lead. "What do you have?"

"Not here," Skulker said, looking around the file room. "I'd like to avoid any interruptions. Meet me in the parking garage, I'll be waiting for you there."

The hulking ghost faded from view, leaving Miller alone in the file room. The detective waited awkwardly, unsure how long he should wait before leaving. After one minute he decided he should just go. He retraced his steps, passing his office, his colleagues' offices, the restroom, and pushed through the fire doors to the stairwell. Two more fire doors awaited him on the main floor; one opened to the reception area, the other to the garage. Miller pushed through to the garage and scanned the area.

"Over here," the low voice called, echoing in the cavernous concrete space.

Miller looked in the direction of the voice and saw Skulker's hulking silhouette and glowing blue eyes conspicuously poking out from behind a support pillar shrouded in shadow. The lights in the garage had been out for some time, and maintenance seemed to be taking their sweet time fixing them. As the detective approached the ghost, he felt a chill in the night air and hunkered down, shoving his hands into his pockets.

"What do you got, spook?" Miller asked as he approached the ghost.

It looked at him silently, the blue optical receptors darting between Miller's own hazel irises. "An apology," Skulker said finally.

"A what?"

"You see, recent events are forcing my hand, I don't really have a choice anymore. The ghost boy - you know the one, Jack and Maddie's son, Daniel - I need him out of my hair," the ghost ran one of his armored hands over his sleek metallic scalp and chuckled. "In a manner of speaking."

Miller felt a familiar, uneasy sensation, as if he was now reacting to his body from outside it. His hearing began to wash out, like he was underwater, and he felt lightheaded. It was the same sensation he felt the night his colleague at Elmerton General Hospital called with the news that his wife had died in an automobile accident. "The ghost boy... is the Fentons' kid?" He was only vaguely aware of his surroundings.

"Oh my, yes. It makes perfect sense, doesn't it?"

"It... it doesn't... how?"

"Who can tell? The problem - rather, my problem - is that the boy has gotten so incredibly powerful. There's just no way to do my job with him sniffing around. And so I made this plan. I think you would've loved it. You love those old murder mystery novels, don't you, Ethan?"

The detective now remembered the second sensation that hit him the night of his wife's death. All-encompassing, existential dread. And now, in this moment, that other shoe just dropped.

"How the hell do you know that?"

"I know all about you, Ethan. I had to, you were instrumental to this plan." Skulker looked away, his blue eyes scanning the darkness. "I want you to know that I am... sorry. You're a good man. I think you would've helped the boy, maybe even become his ally and fill the gap Skulker will leave behind."

"What are you talking about?" Miller felt his senses return, but they returned to a body in panic. His heart was pounding in his chest, he could even hear it. This was a flight or fight situation, and Miller's body was demanding he flee.

"Hmm?" Skulker's attention returned to Miller. "Oh, you don't have to worry about that." Miller's heart sank. He took a shaky step back. "As a matter of fact, Detective, you don't have to worry about anything ever again."

Before Miller could take another step, Skulker lunged forward and wrapped one of his large, metallic hands around the man's throat. He lifted the detective into the air and slammed him bodily into the concrete between two SWAT vans. The thick, robotic hands pinned him to the ground; cold metal fingers closed around his neck. Miller tried to cry out, but his windpipe was crushed. His vision grew dark around the edges. An enormous pressure built up in his head, and he kicked and struggled and gasped in vain against the might of his attacker. His eyes darted around frantically, hoping against hope that someone - anyone - would come to his rescue. His consciousness began to escape him, and he felt a kind of weightlessness. His eyes stopped moving and fell onto the glowing blue lenses of the ghost. A final spike of adrenaline brought him back from the edge for the briefest moment. The eyes! The eyes were...

They were the last thing Detective Ethan Miller ever saw.

---

The dog days of summer were upon Phantom and his friends. Where most kids his age would either be returning from vacations and time well spent, or scrambling to have an adventure or two upon realizing they had wasted their summer playing video games, Amity Park's resident Ghost Boy found himself in a derelict water treatment facility on the outskirts of town. Several nights ago, Phantom had explained his predicament, and his concern about exposing his face to humans. Skulker listened to this tale, and to Phantom's anecdote about his new pal, Gooey, with intrigue. Now, Phantom found himself summoned to Skulker's secret base along with his friends. Such a request was not unusual, but Skulker had asked Phantom to recreate Gooey so that the larger ghost might examine it.

That was several hours ago. Phantom floated listlessly along the ceiling, pretending he was an abandoned balloon. Sam was teaching Tucker some rudimentary self defense techniques which Skulker had taught her, using a training dummy for practice. Their corner of the expansive room was covered with wrestling mats Phantom had "borrowed" from Casper High School. Phantom absently levitated a new Gooey back and forth between his hands.

"Uh, yeah, I know she's cute, she's my girlfriend, bro," Phantom said to the blob. "Hands off."

Sam looked up at him and rolled her eyes - but her cheeks were slightly red, and an affectionate smile was on her lips - right until a stray jab from Tucker caught her square in the jaw.

"Oh, shit!" he exclaimed, jumping back. His hands were covered by bright red boxing gloves. "I'm so sorry, are you okay?!" Sam's cheeks grew even redder. In one fluid motion, she grabbed Tucker's arm, pivoted, and yanked him into the air. He flew over her shoulder and landed hard on his back. He coughed as the air was forced from his lungs. Phantom started over to help, but Tucker waved him off. "Yeah," he said with a wince, "she's okay."

"And that," Sam said, removing her glove and offering her hand to Tucker, "is how to use your opponent's weight against them."

Tucker reached up and allowed Sam to haul him to his feet. "You calling me fat, Manson?"

"You could afford to lay off the Nasty Burgers," she remarked.

"Samantha," Skulker said in a stern voice as he entered the main room. His green Mowhawk was blazing at its full height. "Never react in the heat of the moment," he advanced towards the children, wagging his finger. "Anger is a distraction; one your enemies can use against you."

"Sorry," she mumbled, averting her eyes.

"Combat is a skill that takes time to learn, and even more to master. You have just begun your journey, there is no need to apologize. And besides," he knelt down next to her, though he still loomed over the three even on his knee, "that was excellent form." Sam beamed proudly at him, and he patted her shoulder. "Tucker, how do you feel?"

"Uh, okay I guess," the boy replied.

Phantom could hear the tiny motors in Skulker's eyes whirring as he focused on Tucker's spine. "What are you doing? X-Raying him?" He landed next to Sam and looked closely at her face. She moved to push him away, but her arm passed right through him. Her reddened jaw bumped into Phantom's waiting puckered lips and she giggled.

"X-Ray?" Tucker asked, oblivious to their antics. "Isn't that dangerous without the lead apron thingies?"

"Micro burst X-Ray pulse radar," Skulker explained. "Completely harmless. Your back is fine, take some ibuprofen when you get home."

Skulker rose to his full height and turned to Phantom. "A solution to your problem," he extended his fist and unfolded it face up. In his massive palm sat a piece of white fabric. Phantom lifted it up and held it in front of him.

"A mask?" Phantom asked, looking the article over. The only visible features were two black circles where his eyes would be. "What does it do?"

"Put it on," Skulker suggested.

Phantom slipped the mask over his head. "Whoa," he murmured. "I can see perfectly!"

"Your voice is unaltered as well," Skulker commented. "The eye ports will filter light to enhance your vision, allowing you to see in areas with an overabundance of illumination as well as areas with little to none."

"Awesome!"

"By now, the mask has fused with the fabric of the collar of your suit. It is now part of your attire in ghost form. If you wish to remove it, simply think about it being gone."

Phantom did this, and he saw the mask retract from over his face. The fabric maneuvered around behind his neck and sat there like a hood. He imagined it being back over his face, and the mask reassembled. "This is so cool!"

"One final feature. Imagine that you also have a cloak."

"No way..."

Skulker gave him a bemused look and nodded. Phantom imagined a cloak, and he felt something move along his shoulders. Sam and Tucker looked at him incredulously. "Holy shit!" Sam muttered, her face bearing the same stupefied look as Tucker.

Phantom floated over to the inert monitors of Skulker's computer array and admired his new visage. The white mask blended perfectly into the cloak with no visible seams. It didn't just hang down over his back like a simple cape, it draped over his whole body. As he moved back and forth, the cloak held its seamless shape. "I... I look like a ghost! Like some kind of Halloween costume!"

Skulker frowned. "I apologize if this new look is not what you were hoping it would-"

"Are you kidding?!" Phantom exclaimed, as he threw open the cloak from the middle, tossing the sides over his shoulders. "This is amazing!" The cloak hung like a cape behind his back, and Phantom struck a hero pose - fists on his hips, one knee slightly raised - and retracted the mask. His smile grew even wider. Tucker hurried over and grabbed one of the corners of the cape and flapped it back and forth. Sam joined him.

"Gotta have the hero wind," Tucker said.

"How did you make this?" Sam asked, stopping the hero wind simulation and feeling the fabric in her fingers. "It feels like real cloth."

"I used a sample of fabric from a Fenton protective hazardous materials suit. Thin layers of protective kevlar mesh protect your body from some kinetic damage, but there are parts of the suit that are more flexible, such as around the joints. I stitched some of this fabric together into a mask. That was the simple part. Using the ectoplasmic sample Daniel provided-"

"Gooey," Phantom corrected him,

"Using the sample," Skulker continued, "I bonded it to the fabric and encoded instructions at the cellular level to engineer specific behaviors. The mask can alter its shape and, using the overabundance of ectoplasmic particles which Daniel generates, it can create the cloak structure and alter its shape as well."

Phantom settled onto the ground, retracting the cape back into his shoulders. "So this is a genetically engineered... living thing?"

"In a manner of speaking, although it cannot operate independently, it must be worn by an ectosapien to be used. Additionally, because this was engineered using your cells, it responds much more quickly to your mental commands."

Phantom stood motionless for a moment, looking at the floor with a furtive expression. Suddenly, the mask reformed around his face and mushroomed over his head. The cloak expanded down from his neck along the front of his body, stopping just past his knees. Two small strings sprang out from the sides of the cloak and fastened around his waist. Only, it wasn't a cloak. It was a chef's apron. "Mama mia!" Danny exclaimed, tugging at his hat.

Tucker howled with laughter. Sam stifled her own laughter and elbowed her uncle's hulking metal carapace. Skulker rolled his eyes and plodded off as Phantom created two new Gooies and began flipping them in the air like pizza dough.

Phantom's cell phone began to ring from the desk situated beneath Skulker's computer array. Phantom summoned it to him with his telekinetic powers, and saw the call from his mother. He reabsorbed the Gooies and answered the phone. "Hey, Mom, what's up?"

"Danny, where are you?" His mother's tone was urgent, her voice sounded strained. It caught him off guard.

"I'm, uh, with Sam, Tucker and, uh, you know who," he stammered, "why?"

"You need to come home right away," she said sternly.

"Is everything okay?"

"No, everything is not okay. Your father was just arrested for the murder of Detective Miller."

---

Jack Fenton sat in the cramped interrogation room of the Amity Park Police Department. He was sitting in a folding chair that was too small for his bulky frame. The room was too warm for a state-of-the-art building he knew had air conditioning. He had been given a clear plastic cup half full with lukewarm water. And he had been sitting alone in this room for well over an hour.

Although he had never been arrested, Jack had been involved in a number of court proceedings as an expert witness when testifying on the effects of ectoplasm, fallout from ghost attacks, and anything else that involved the paranormal. In that time, he had befriended several high-profile litigators. Every one of them offered the same advice; if he ever found himself on the wrong side of the law, to say nothing to the police, and to demand to speak to an attorney. When his longtime friend on the force, Police Lieutenant Larry Braverman, sat him down in the room, Jack had wanted to tell them he was innocent; that they had the wrong person, and that the real killer was out there somewhere.

But something in the back of his mind told him that would have been a mistake. The officer that came in to speak to him first, a man Jack didn't know, had been cordial and friendly, appearing to genuinely want to hear his story, to get on the books why Jack couldn't possibly have killed this highly decorated veteran, this highly respected detective. But Jack noticed something, an almost imperceptible micro-expression, when Jack stated that he wanted to speak with an attorney. It was so subtle, but Jack knew it well. It was the briefest crack in the facade of a man barely constraining his rage. The officer had left the room shortly after. Now, an hour later, he hadn't seen another living being. Jack wasn't sure the officer had honored his request to contact an attorney.

Then, commotion outside the interrogation room. Jack could barely make out curses and epithets amidst the unintelligible shouting. Several voices seemed to be doing battle against the loudest, but they eventually subsided. The door was unlocked, and a large man in a pristine Italian suit nearly kicked it off its hinges. "- can suck a plea deal out of my ass, you prick cocksucker!" he bellowed at an officer - the same one from before, only with a beet-red face - in the hall. He turned, said something that Jack assumed was a curse in Spanish, and slammed the door hard enough to rattle the one way mirror.

"Jack Fenton?" the man asked, slamming his briefcase on the table.

"Uh, oh, yes, that's me."

"What have you told them?"

"What?"

"The police, Jack, what have you said to them?"

"Oh, nothing, I mean, I asked to speak to an attorney, but nothing else."

"Thank fucking God," the man said with a sigh of relief. "I'm Felix Cortez, that attorney would be me."

Jack stared at him blankly. He was intimidated by the show of force the man had just displayed, but knew that temper wasn't directed at him. "Felix Cortez?" Jack asked nervously. "I, uh, I haven't been able to speak with an attorney yet, I didn't hire you. How-"

"I've been asked to represent you by Vanessa Masters, who has also insisted upon paying my fees," Felix explained as he dug through his briefcase. "Must be nice having the richest person on the planet in your back pocket, huh?"

"Vanessa?" Jack asked. "How on Earth did she hear about this?"

"Said she has contacts in law enforcement, tipped her off to some kind of case you were working on with the late Detective Miller. Once she heard you were being brought in for questioning, she called me."

"I don't know if I can accept that," Jack said.

Felix cocked an eyebrow as he fished out a hefty document. "It's the truth, scout's honor."

"Wha- no, I don't mean- I believe it, but I don't think I can accept her paying for this."

"She's already put down a retainer large enough to carry this case through an appeal and beyond, God-forbid. Of course, if you want to cover that yourself, it's all the same to me." Cortez slid the large document, titled ENGAGAEMENT FOR LEGAL SERVICES AGREEMENT across the table. Jack saw the amount Vanessa had paid this man as a retainer and his jaw dropped open.

"Maybe I should look at my options," Jack said, sliding the document back to the lawyer. "Find someone a little more... in my price range."

"I understand," Cortez said, leaning back in his chair. "But I'll tell you something, Jack. This is not some rinky-dink misdemeanor. We're talking about the death of a fucking cop. These pigs are out for blood, and they want yours. It doesn't matter what the facts say, or what the truth is, you happen to be the first person that popped up on their radar. They are gunning for you - big time. And, wouldn't you know it, the District Attorney is up for reelection this year. So you're delusional if you think you can face this down without the absolute best of the best at your side."

"And that's you?"

"Fucking A-right that's me, Jack. Look, if you change your mind later on, that's fine, you're free to do that. But right now, we need to take control of the ship. Are you with me?"

Jack looked around the room. He wished Maddie was here. Making important decisions under pressure was one of her strengths. He never considered it one of his. With no other viable options, he looked back at the attorney and nodded. "Okay."

"Fan-fucking-tastic. Sign here, please," Cortez flipped to the last page of the agreement. A blank line with Jack's full printed name beneath it awaited his signature.

"I thought this was your agreement with Vanessa?"

"Nope, she's only footing the bill. She has no decision-making authority whatsoever, our ethical rules of conduct forbids it. You're the one calling the shots, Jack."

That idea sat well with him, and he signed the agreement. The attorney slipped it back into his briefcase and stood up. Jack stood with him; he normally towered over most people, but this man stood at the same height, around six and a half feet tall. "Let's get out of here."

Cortez yanked the door open, and the red-faced officer from before was waiting for them. "Where do you think you're going? Jack Fenton is part of an ongoing investigation."

"Is he under arrest?" Cortez asked.

"We brought him in for questioning-"

"Is he under arrest?"

"You listen here-"

"Is my client under arrest?" Cortez said slowly and loudly.

The officer's face turned red again.

"Then get the fuck out of my way."

As the pair neared the front doors to the station, Jack saw dozens of people with cameras and microphones crowding around the station. "Wonderful, one of these fucking scumbags tipped off the press," Cortez growled.

"Problem, gentlemen?" The red faced officer from before asked as he met up with them in the reception area. He wore a knowing grin.

Cortez glowered at the man. "When this is over, I am going to make you look like as big of a fucking retard as that living vegetable you call a son."

The officer reeled in shock. "How dare you-"

"Enjoy wearing that badge with pride while you still can, fuck face."

Cortez jerked his head to the door and Jack, not wanting to facing the press, and taken aback by his new attorney's flagrant disregard for authority and human dignity, hesitated before following. The throng of reporters descended upon the duo almost immediately. Cortez intercepted them, and Jack noticed that he conducted the crowd with the ease of a seasoned veteran. "I will be making a statement on behalf of Jack Fenton at this time," he shouted.

The reporters quieted, but camera flashes peppered him almost nonstop. Though his attorney was speaking, he felt the eyes of these reporters, the lenses of their cameras and, more frightening still, the eyes of everyone else watching from their homes, squarely focused on him.

"My client, Mr. Jack Fenton, has been tapped by the Amity Park Police Department and the Elmerton City Police Department to assist with an ongoing investigation into the death of an Elmerton City Police Detective. This much information, I understand, has already been disclosed to the press. Any other information pertaining to this investigation is still confidential at this time. Law enforcement will release additional details as they become available. Thanks to the assistance of Mr. Fenton, our law enforcement teams are working diligently to identify any suspects that may be connected to this tragic death. I'd like to advise our friends in the media, and our community at large, to take a page from our law enforcement and judiciary's playbook, and avoid jumping to any premature conclusions. We will not be taking any questions, thank you for your time."

The crowd erupted into a cacophony of questions. Microphones were jammed into Jack's face. He could barely hear anything they said. He kept his head down and followed his attorney down the sidewalk away from the police station. The reporters followed, continuing to barrage him with questions. A sleek, black sedan rolled up to the curb and the rear passenger door opened. Cortez ushered him inside and followed, closing the door and nearly taking a reporter's microphone with it. The car sped off, away from the reporters.

"Alright then," Cortez folded down a tray table from the back of the passenger seat. A digital tablet was secured to its surface. The attorney powered it up and opened a word processor program and an audio recording program. He started the recorder, and placed the cursor in the blank page of the word processor. "Much easier to do this part without an audience." Cortez shifted in his seat and looked at Jack. "I need you to tell me everything. Understand? Every single detail. No matter how insignificant you think it is, tell me everything you can remember."

"Everything?" Jack asked.

Cortez stiffened and nodded. "Everything."

---

The Terror Tower was Amity Park's premier tourist destination. Every year, visitors from the rest of the country and from across the world flocked to the site where human kind united to drive back a threat from beyond the veil once and for all. Danny had walked, driven, and flown past it dozens of times, but upon stepping into the lobby, he realized he hadn't ever actually set foot inside. The interior sported Japanese-inspired architecture, flush with deep red, pearly white, and sparkling gold hues. The lobby was host to a rather large aquarium built into one of the walls. Some of the fish looked as big as a small child. He wondered if those were natural, or fish mutated by exposure to ectoplasm.

"Hello, checking in," his mother told the attendant. The young man behind the counter asked for a name. She told him "Cortez" as instructed by Jack's attorney. The attendant gave her two plastic key cards and pointed her to the elevators.

Danny lugged his suitcase, only half-packed with some things he thought he'd need for a night or two, along with both of his mother's suitcases, the suitcase she had packed for his father, and some kind of floral-print bag that held an arsenal of makeup, lotions, brushes, and a curling iron. If it wasn't for the omni-directional wheels on the bottoms of the luggage, Danny wasn't sure if he could manage the load. He was struggling quite a bit regardless. "Mom, you know I can only use my normal human boy powers to move this stuff. Can you take, like, one of these things? Please?"

Maddie looked back at him and scoffed. "You didn't need to take all of those in one trip!" She said. She called for the elevator and looked at the key card. "Here, give me the bag, and one of those- yes, thank you. Better?"

Maddie now held her makeup bag and the suitcase she had packed for Jack. Danny maneuvered the other three. "A little," he said, frowning as the suitcases refused to roll in tandem. "Not really."

The elevator doors slid open and the two Fentons entered. Maddie pressed the button for the Penthouse floor, but nothing happened. "Oh, come on," she said, hitting the button a few more times.

"Swipe the card first," Danny said, pointing at what looked like a credit card reader.

"What?"

"Put the card in the thing and then hit the button."

Maddie did so, and the elevator doors slid shut. The car began its ascent, climbing faster and faster as it raced for the top floor.

"What's Jazz going to do?" Danny asked.

"She's staying at school," his mother replied. "It's probably for the best that she doesn't come home to this."

Danny heard the sadness in his mother's voice. "We're gonna beat this," he said confidently.

Maddie smiled at her son and tousled his hair. "I know we will, sweetie."

The elevator slowed to a stop at the Penthouse suite. The doors opened into the foyer of a massive room. Danny stepped out and looked around. "Which room is ours?" he asked.

"The whole damn thing is yours! One of the perks of being swept up in a media circus when you've retained the best goddamn criminal defense attorney in California; complimentary penthouse accommodations on demand." A large man in a nice black suit stepped out from around the corner. "At least until this all goes away. Felix Cortez, I'm your father's attorney. You must be Danny." The man approached and offered his hand. Danny shook it, noticing the lawyer's iron grip. "And you must be Madeline, pleasure to meet you," he shook her hand as well. "You can leave those bags here for now, we're just in the living room going over some things."

Danny dropped his bags and followed the lawyer into the living room. He was taken aback by how lavish the room was. The Japanese theme continued in the penthouse suite with more vibrant reds and shining golds. The living room was a sunken semicircle of plush red carpeting, surrounded by the raised white marble of main space. A massive kitchen with a stovetop island and a fully-stocked bar dominated half of the penthouse. A golden microfiber couch ran along the living room space opposite the stairs. Danny spied at least half a dozen ornate doors framed on either side by red pillars with marble dragon gargoyle caps.

"Are those all bedrooms?"

"Sure are, kiddo," Cortez said. "Each one has its own tv, mini bar, jacuzzi, and private bathroom. Take your pick."

Danny didn't much care for being called kiddo, but this man had just welcomed him to what Danny was now sure heaven must look like, so he was willing to give him a pass.

"Hey, there they are!" Jack boomed from one of the rooms. He emerged wearing bright orange flannel pajamas and a fluffy white bathrobe. "How about these rooms, eh?" He bounded down the steps to greet his family, his feet protected from the cold marble by his fluffy bunny slippers. He gathered his wife and son up into a powerful bear hug and kissed his wife. "Did you have any problems getting here?"

"No, actually, we got here just fine," Maddie remarked. "There were hardly any reporters hanging around the house, and I didn't see any when we arrived."

"That might be due to your generous benefactor," Cortez explained. "She implied that she'd be putting some pressure on her friends in the media to leave you alone. I thought that might mean local outlets, but it looks like CNN and FOX have called off their vultures." He laughed and shook his head. "You must know where a lot of bodies are buried for her to pull out the stops like this, huh?"

"Oh, it's nothing like that," Maddie protested. "We used to work together is all. Though I'll admit, it seems a little strange for her to pour so much of her resources into our legal defense. And then to go this extra mile?"

"Ask her about it after this mess is over," Cortez said. "Jack has filled me in on the situation, I want to go over it with you so I have all my facts straight, is that okay?"

"So, Jack wasn't arrested?" Maddie asked.

"No, not this time," the attorney replied, "its just that our boys in blue wanted to make a spectacle out of someone they pegged as a cop killer. He was brought in for questioning, but they didn't have any formal charges prepared to file against him. Though if they're out for blood, they'll drum up something soon. Now, Jack says you received a call from Detecetive Miller at what time?"

Danny listened to his mother describe the series of events that transpired the night of the mass murder. He noticed his parents had both left out the little detail about his being present, but that wasn't surprising. What was surprising to Danny was their next move.

"So, tell me more about this asset of yours, Skulker. What is the nature of your relationship with him?"

Maddie and Jack exchanged solemn looks. Jack nodded. "I think it'd be better for you to ask him yourself, Mr. Cortez."

Before the attorney could reply, the air in the center of the living room shimmered as a shape took form. Skulker materialized out of thin air, his glowing green eyes locked onto the lawyer. From the top of his head, his signature green Mohawk flared to life.

"Holy fucking shit!" Cortex cried. He scrambled backwards over the couch and fell onto the marble floor behind it.

"Felix Cortez," Skulker said in his deep, booming voice. "I apologize if I have frightened you."

"That's a ghost!" the man exclaimed as he peeked over the couch. "That's a fucking ghost!"

"I can leave if my presence causes you discomfort," Skulker offered, gesturing to the wall behind him.

"Wha- no! No, don't you move a goddamn muscle. Or - oh Jesus Christ this is bad. Oh shit, shit, shit."

"Mr. Cortez, if you could please, watch your language?" Maddie asked, nodding her head towards Danny.

"Oh, sh- uh, sorry, bud. I get a little excited sometimes is all. You might too if a ghost just appeared out of... hey, wait, is this not freaking you the f... freak... out?"

Danny looked at his parents, then to Skulker. "W- uh, well, no, not really. I mean, I've seen him before. Kinda hard to hide a ghost in the house, you know?"

"Yeah, sure," Cortez said, nodding. "Okay, well, sh- uh, shoot. Oh, man, this is bad."

"You keep saying that," Jack said. "What's the problem?"

"The Ecto Act, Jack, ever heard of it? Fraternizing with a ghost is tantamount to treason in the U.S. God, what were you thinking?!"

"We're very familiar with the Act," Maddie stated firmly. "Please don't take us for fools."

"Article Two, Section Five, 'All persons found to be harboring malicious ectosapien entities,' yadda, yadda, yadda, 'or knowingly collaborating with ectosapien entities to incite, inflict, or otherwise cause damage or harm to human lives and instrumentalities of human life,' et cetera, et cetera, 'shall be found to have committed the crime of treason against these United States of America.'" Jack winked at his wife. "Memorized the highlights. It's only treason if we're harboring Skulker, but we don't offer him shelter or help him escape detection. We're also not helping him harm people."

"Yeah? Have fun arguing that in front of the Supreme Court. Or a goddamn military tribunal." Cortez straightened his tie. "Jesus, you guys have really stepped in it."

"Mr. Cortez, what is your defense strategy?" Skulker asked flatly.

"My defense strategy?" the attorney repeated. "I'm being asked to explain my defense strategy to a godd-" Cortez took a deep breath, "I won't know that until I see the State's evidence, big guy."

"And what if the evidence they have has been fabricated by our killer with the intent of framing Jack?"

A chill fell over the room. Danny felt a knot form in his stomach. "How would you know that? Wait, don't answer that, don't say anything!" Crotez waved his hands at Skulker frantically. "You went snooping through the DA's office, didn't you? You know what they have on Jack!"

Skulker gave Jack and Maddie a concerned look, then said, "It does not look like the evidence favors a finding of Jack's innocence."

"Oh my God," Maddie said in a hushed whisper.

"Not another goddamn word! I won't have this case ruined by a goddamn ghost! Do you understand me?" Cortez walked up to the ghost and stared daggers at him. "Not. Another. Fucking. Word." He jabbed a finger into Skulker's chest with each word for emphasis, abandoning his attempts at self-censorship. "I can get disbarred for that shit, understand?!"

Skulker held his arms up in surrender, and Cortez stalked away and began frantically pacing. Maddie was gently rubbing her husband's arm. Jack stared dejectedly down at the floor.

"Then we have to find the killer," Danny said after a long moment of silence. "That's the only way, right? We find the killer, they have to drop charges against my Dad."

"We?" Cortez asked. "What is this we? There is no we, there's us," he gestured at himself and the elder Fentons. "You're not doing shit, kid. What are you, like, twelve?"

"I'm almost seventeen, man," Danny protested.

"Oh, yeah? And I almost give a flying fuck! Have you not been listening? We're talking about a murderer. Do you know what a murderer is?!"

"Felix!" Jack shouted. "I know we've just dumped a lot on your plate tonight, but you will not talk to my son that way, do I make myself clear?"

The attorney nodded. He stepped away from Danny and ran a hand through his hair. "I'm sorry, kid. Blame my fiery Latino temper. But seriously, there is no we. Am I crazy? Why am I the only one saying this?"

"No, you're absolutely right, Felix," Jack said. "We will handle this, Danny. You are going to stay right here, where it's safe."

Danny wanted to object, but he noticed Skulker, standing apart from the three humans. The larger ghost was normally reserved, but when he was silent, he usually stared off into space. Danny assumed that meant he was bored with the conversation and was looking at something in his security grid, or for news updates on the Internet. But in this moment, he was looking at all of them. His glowing green eyes moved from each human, and he took time to look at them. It reminded him of the way the ghost looked at Sam; with affection. And then his green optics connected with Danny, and he smiled. Even though his was not a human face, Danny knew it was a weak smile; one that belied sadness.

"I have something to attend to," the ghost said at last.

"No more dumpster diving at the DA's office for evidence, I hope," Cortez said accusingly.

"Nothing of the sort. If we cannot find this killer in time, if Jack is left with no other option to face charges built upon false evidence in court... we need a fallback plan. I will see to the arrangements."

"What are you going to do?" Cortez asked him.

Skulker raised an eyebrow. "Do you really want to know the answer to that question?"

The attorney muttered under his breath, "Fuck."

---

The attorney had spent almost five more hours in the penthouse with the Fentons going over the case, grilling them about Skulker and other ghosts. Thankfully, the Ghost Boy was hardly ever brought up. Danny finally grew bored of the conversation and retreated to one of the lavish bedrooms. But he wasn't tired. He changed into his ghost form, his street clothes giving way to his protective hazmat suit, featuring his newest accessory. Danny's transformation into Phantom involved two parallel circles which formed as one at his waist before splitting apart and racing away from each other up and down his body. The rings, which once glowed with a neon green hue now shone an otherworldly black color. As the upper ring passed from his chin to his scalp, Danny felt his new mask materialize over his face and head.

He grinned. So cool.

But Phantom couldn't enjoy the sensation for long. This mystery killer had now decided to frame his Dad for the murder of Detective Miller, and maybe even those other twelve men from the gas station too. At least that was what Skulker implied, before the lawyer had cut him off. Phantom willed his cloak to appear and watched the white fabric materialize down the length of his body, completely enveloping him from the neck down. He floated up and out through the bedroom window, and headed off into town.

He considered using his telepathy to reach out to his friends, but it was three in the morning. He didn't want to wake them. Hovering high above the city, he found his gaze drawn to Elmerton. Was the killer still out there? Or had they moved on? He thought about using his telepathy to try and find the killer, but how? Could he tweak it to focus in on people thinking about the murders, or people with the memories of the murders? He had no idea how to do that. Would that require him to have memories of the murders himself?

"This is stupid," he said, giving into the urge to reform Gooey. He reached a hand out from his cloak and willed the glowing black ball to appear in his hand. It did, and he used his telekinetic power to levitate it next to him. His hand fell back into the cloak. "Gooey, help me out, buddy. What do I do?"

He flew off slowly, in the direction of Elmerton. Gooey floated next to his head.

"No, I'm not going back to the hotel. I don't care what Mom and Dad said, I can find this killer."

He looked at Gooey and scowled. "No, I can't invite Sam over at three in the morning. Even if her parents let her, mine wouldn't."

The density of the downtown cityscape began to thin out. "Yeah, I do think she'd like the jacuzzi, that's not - look, are you gonna help or not, man?!"

He sighed. "This is stupid. Is this stupid? What am I doing?"

Stalling.

Phantom froze. "Wha...?"

Afraid.

"Gooey?"

Stalling. Afraid.

The glowing black blob was communicating to him through a psychic link. It was a preposterous idea, but somehow Phanom knew that's exactly what was happening.

"What... what are you?"

You.

Gooey wasn't just speaking. Each word carried mental images, feelings, raw emotion. Even with these short answers, he knew exactly what the little blob was saying.

"You're part of me?"

Afraid. Stalling. That night when this all started, at the gas station in Elmerton, Phantom had snuck into the crime scene, despite his parents' having forbade it. He saw the bodies. He saw them now, broadcast into his mind. He saw his past battles, against Desiree and Ember and Aragon. He watched himself suffer a mortal wound. He relived the experience of dying.

"Okay, yeah, I'm afraid! I don't want to die, Gooey, is that okay with you?"

Duty. He saw the faces of his family, his friends, the people of Amity Park. His people. His responsibility. He saw Tucker, weak and dehydrated in the hospital after being released from Aragon's control. He saw Sam leaning in to kiss him for the first time. He saw his parents beaming proudly at him, his sister smiling warmly.

"But... why does it have to be me? This weapon, it could actually... I could die for good this time. Why me?" Phantom felt his voice crack. He blinked tears out of his eyes. "Why me?"

No images or emotions this time. Only two words touched his mind.

Who else?

Phantom sniffed and held out his hand. He pulled Gooey into his grasp and reabsorbed the blob of weirdly semi-sentient ectoplasm. He drew in a deep breath and sighed, and felt his body relax. Phantom knew what he had to do.

"Thanks, Gooey."

---

Phantom went back to the Elmerton City Police Department for the second time, now with adequate face protection. He found the late Detective Miller's office after a bit of searching and had carefully examined the contents of the deceased man's desk. He couldn't find a home address anywhere, and that irritated him. Then again, why would a grown man need to keep his own home address at his office? Phantom noticed that the desk was surprisingly sparse compared to the other detectives' offices he had seen. Maybe his belongings had been gathered by the police as evidence?

On the wall to his left he saw a calendar pinned to a bulletin board. It must have been old, because Phantom could barely see it pinned beneath dozens of other pieces of paper. He gingerly removed the calendar and flipped through it. Several months back, he saw an event circled multiple times in red ink. It read DINNER WITH RAMIREZ FAMILY AT 7, BRING WINE. Phantom remembered that name, he overheard the detective give an order to someone with that name at the first crime scene. The ghost boy floated through the wall and into the empty office next door. This officer had all his belongings, one of which was an employee directory. Phantom flipped through it and found contact information for a handful of Ramirezes in the department.

Starting with the one with an office on the same floor seemed like a good place to start. It was empty, and Phantom swore under his breath. He was hoping to read the officer's mind to learn the detective's home address. He snooped through the officer's belongings, hoping to find some kind of clue. He found something better - Officer Ramirez's cell phone. Phantom realized this meant she must be nearby - he had to work fast. He opened the phone and was relieved to see she hadn't set up a passcode. He went to her contacts list and scrolled down to the M's. He tapped the listing for Miller, Boss, and stifled a cheer when an address popped up. He read it over several times, committing it to memory, and set the phone back on the desk where he found it. Address in hand, he struck out into the night in search of the detective's home.

Phantom didn't find the house for another hour and a half. Even with his ghost powers improving his mental acuity, he was still directionally challenged in a big way. The house was a modest Cape Cod, sandwiched between two nearly identical houses with only slightly different paint schemes. Lights were on in some of the windows, but Phantom guessed that was done intentionally by someone close to the detective, maybe in an effort to deter would-be burglars.

He descended from the sky and surveyed the area. Nobody was out at this ungodly hour, and Phantom eased himself into the home through the wall facing the compact back yard. Once inside, he withdrew his cloak, but kept the mask on. It would help him see in the darkened rooms. He touched down on the linoleum floor of the kitchen and looked around. Old dishes were piled up in the sink. Dozens of frozen TV dinner boxes were stuffed into a too-small trash bin, and some littered the floor around it. The kitchen table was stacked high with mail, some organized, the rest haphazardly strewn about. A lot of mail was on the floor, too.

Phantom made his way from the kitchen to the living room. The television was on, turned to a station playing Old Westerns. A faded green recliner had been pulled up right in front of the screen from what looked like its original spot opposite a couch of the same color. Piles of clothes were draped over the couch - Phantom saw they were women's clothes. An end table at the right arm of the recliner was coated in ash, and an ash tray was overflowing with cigarettes. Some had even fallen to the carpet.

A noise from one of the nearby rooms caught his attention. Phantom floated up off the ground and hovered over to it. He poked his head through the wall, but saw nothing. He entered the room completely and settled onto the floor of what looked like a home office. A stack of files sat in disarray on the desk.

Bingo.

"Freeze!"

Phantom spun around and saw a short, stocky woman leveling a revolver square at his face. She must have been hiding in the closet.

"Whoa!" Phantom exclaimed. He swiped the air, smacking the gun out of the woman's grip with his psychic power. She looked from the gun to the ghost and back again before lunging for the firearm. "Not so fast!" Phantom shouted, calling the gun to his own hand. It jumped off the ground just out of the woman's grasp and landed in Phantom's waiting hand.

"ECPD!" the woman exclaimed. "Drop the weapon!" She was unholstering what looked like a second firearm from her belt. Phantom watched her aim the device at him - it wasn't a gun, it was a taser. The electrodes shot forward and passed harmlessly through Phantom's intangible body.

"Come on, lady, stop."

"I said drop the weapon!" she cried, reaching for her mace.

Phantom yanked the mace and the spent taser from her hands, along with her flashlight and night stick from her belt. "Finished?"

The woman stared death at him for a moment, but her expression fell. She buried her face in her hands and began to cry.

"Oh, hey, c-come on, lady, don't... don't cry, okay? Officer..." he saw her badge - it was Officer Ramirez. "How did y-" he recalled how long it took him to get here, "never mind. Look, I'm dropping the weapon! I'm dropping all the weapons, look! Look!" His collection of the officer's weapons clattered to the floor. "See? You got me!"

She sniffed and shook her head. "Are you patronizing me, you son of a bitch?"

"Hey, there's no need for name calling, okay? What were you even doing, hiding in that closet?"

"What are you doing breaking into the house of a police detective?" she countered, wiping tears from her eyes.

"O-okay, fair point. Look, I'm not here to hurt you. I dropped your weapons, my hands are up, I- well, I don't, like, surrender or anything, but, you know, I'm standing down. Okay? Truce?"

Ramirez stood back up. "Give me back my weapons."

"Only if you promise not to attack me with them. It's not like you could actually hurt me, but it's really annoying. Deal?" She said nothing, but planted her fists on her hips and raised an eyebrow expectantly. "I'm gonna pretend you said deal. And if you try to attack me, then that makes you a filthy backstabber and we're not friends anymore." Phantom lifted the weapons into the air and maneuvered them over to the officer, who gingerly pulled them out of the air and returned each one to her belt.

"You didn't answer my question," she said, once the last weapon was tucked back into its pouch.

"The mass murder from about a week ago," Phantom started, "someone killed a ghost with a single shot. Couldn't have been a regular gun, and most anti-ghost weapons don't kill ghosts that quickly. I want to find out who did it, and why."

"We all want to find out who did it, and why," Ramirez said snarkily. "What's your angle?"

Phantom turned and began examining the files on the desk. "Self-preservation. Who's to say the killer won't turn that gun on me next?"

"Don't touch those!" Ramirez snapped. She swatted the files out of Phantom's hands and snatched them away. "Don't touch anything!"

"Hey!" Phantom protested. "Look, we both want the same thing. I can help you! Let me help!"

"The same way your buddy helped Detective Miller?"

Phantom cocked his head. "What are you talking about?"

The officer was shaking. "He told us to clear out. Everyone else left, but I hung back. Something felt wrong. And then I saw it," her face went blank. "A massive... ghost robot, or something. It's head was on fire, but the fire was green. It talked to those scientists, the Fentons, and the Detective for a while and then left. I thought... I didn't know what to think. It must have been a ghost, but it was helping?" New tears streaked down her face. "And then I saw it again, in the parking garage that night. It was talking to him again. Its head wasn't on fire this time, but I knew it was the same one. And then it... looked right at me. I don't know how it knew I was there, but it saw me, and it stared at me for... I don't know how long. And then it grabbed Ethan, dragged him behind the SWAT van... and... an..." She fell to her knees and broke down again.

"That doesn't make any sense," Phantom muttered. "That's not true, it's impossible."

"I saw it with my own eyes," Ramirez said between ragged breaths. "I saw it kill him! I saw it!"

Phantom knelt down in front of the officer. "Then I need to see what you saw."

He grasped the woman's head in his hands and focused on her mind, her thoughts, her memories. Her mind was new, unfamiliar, but as his brainwaves synchronized with hers, he could navigate through it with ease. He found her memories and traveled back, seeing information her brain had stored and archived. Like with most minds, memories tended to be spotty and incomplete. But some memories were as clear as the moment in time in which the events actually occurred. Phantom quickly found what he was looking for, but there was something strange about this one. It was full of sensory data that Ramirez's brain was unable to process. Phantom entered this memory from her point of view. He watched from her eyes as she walked through the parking garage the night of the detective's murder. He heard a noise with her ears that caught her attention, and saw again with her eyes as they locked onto... something; hulking shape obscured in shadow. It looked like Skulker. The image instilled fear into Ramirez in this memory, but Danny was confused. The eyes were wrong. Was she misremembering them as blue instead of green? The figure turned its head to look at her, and he felt her heart rate spike suddenly.

And then, something completely unexpected happened.

"Hello, Daniel Fenton."

What the fuck?

"This message was broadcast at an ultrasonic frequency. The woman whose head you are muddling through right now could not hear it when I was transmitting it several days ago when I killed Detective Ethan Miller, but her brain registered the disruption, and I have correctly surmised that your telepathic power now allows you to decode it, and replay it at a speed your mind can more easily process."

Phantom felt himself nearly disconnect from the woman's mind. He was struggling to comprehend what was happening, and struggling to maintain his connection.

"As I'm sure Skulker has already deduced, I have fabricated evidence to implicate your father in the murder of the Detective, which is no doubt in the hands of the District Attorney as you hear this message. In two hours, I will release additional fabricated evidence to law enforcement which will be more than enough to connect your father to the murder of the Detective, as well as the twelve murders from the initial crime scene. However, I will destroy the rest of my fabricated evidence if you meet me at Salton City, South by South East of Amity Park, within the next two hours. Your destination is approximately five hundred and fifty miles away. You may wish to get the lead out."

A loud burst of static stabbed into Phantom's mind. He winced and stumbled back, and the connection to Officer Ramirez was cut. She sat back, looking confused. He wasn't sure if she saw what he saw. That... thing in her memory, it knew his name. Did she...

Two hours.

Five hundred fifty miles away.

He would need to reach speeds of at least two hundred seventy five miles an hour to make it in time. He couldn't blink to a place he hadn't been to before. Could he even fly that fast?

Time to find out.

Phantom phased up through the roof and sped up to meet the clouds. He oriented himself to the coast, put it on his right side, and tore off through the sky. The air rumbled behind him as clouds were sucked into each other in his wake. Green lightning danced along their grey, pillowy tufts.

SKULKER! Phantom bellowed a telepathic cry as strong as he could muster. He wasn't sure if the other ghost was still in his range.

Daniel, what is it?

No time! Be my eyes, where is Salton City?! Phantom broadcast his field of vision to Skulker.

One moment, I need to orient to- yes, I have it. Turn to your left. Yes, more. More. Stop! Maintain your current heading. What is the urg... The connection faded.

Phantom was on his own. He pushed himself to go faster, faster than he had ever moved in his life.

He could only hope it was fast enough.

---

The home of Lester King was quaint. It was adorned with a simple, inoffensive floral decor his mother had built up during her life, which the man had chosen to maintain after her passing. But Lester had no family of his own. No wife, no children, no friends, no pets. Instead, he had his television programs. Skulker briefly took inventory of an expansive collection of DVD box sets, and VHS recordings of hundreds of movies and television shows. But when Skulker scanned the man's computer hard drive, he learned what those discs and tapes actually contained. It was anything but inoffensive.

Skulker had found Lester King's file in the Elmerton City Police Department's computer database. He was a small-time offender; only one simple assault during a confrontation at an anime convention and a few minor drug possession charges. But one item on his rap sheet caught Skulker's eye; Lewd Conduct, in violation of the California Penal Code. The incident took place at a children's park. Detective Miller wanted the prosecution to push for Solicitation of a Minor, to have Lester registered as a sex offender, but the man was offered a plea deal for Lewd Conduct. He took the deal, served one month of a six month sentence, and was released back into the community.

The month in jail cost Lester his job, and his conviction made it almost impossible to find another. He eventually applied for unemployment, and worked odd jobs for cash under the table to help make ends meet. Skulker thought the man had it too easy. He inherited the home from his mother with a fully paid off mortgage. His unemployment and income from temporary jobs was more than enough to cover property taxes, utility bills, and groceries. He illegally downloaded almost all of his perverse digital entertainment.

Skulker regarded the VHS tapes somberly. Not all of it. He wanted to destroy them, but the tapes needed to be present when Lester King's body was found in the morning. Skulker had arranged for an anonymous tip to lead the ECPD right to Lester's doorstep. And to his sordid video collection. And to his body.

And to the suicide note left on the bathroom sink.

Though, Skulker wondered if it really could be called a suicide note. Skulker figured Lester was under duress when he wrote the note, climbed into his filled bathtub, and dropped the plugged-in toaster in with him. Skulker had threatened a long, extended life consisting only of excruciating pain and unending suffering if Lester failed to comply. He supposed it was technically murder, though perhaps that was a question best left to the philosophers of the world. Skulker did not count himself among them.

"Well done," a nasally voice said from somewhere in the room. Skulker identified the source - Lester's cell phone. "This will undo everything I've set in motion to frame Jack. No sarcasm, I truly am impressed."

"Technus," Skulker sneered. "I thought I smelled your stench in all this."

"Yes, congratulations. You found me out, after I revealed myself to you. Bravo, indeed."

"What do you want?"

"I've been asked to deliver a message from a mutual acquaintance."

"What does your master want this time?"

"No, not her. Think a few notches down on the totem pole. Right where you used to be."

Skulker tensed. "Bullet."

"He says, and I quote, 'If you want to see her alive again, come to the docks. You'll know the one.' Who's this 'her' he's talking about? Bullet never tells me anything."

Skulker stormed out of the house and launched himself into the air. His jet engines rotated out from his back and ignited in brilliant blue flame. Stabilizer wings unfolded from his shoulder blades, wrists, and ankles and caught the wind. He made a bee-line to the coast. The dock from Bullet's message was easy to spot; a bright green S blinked on its roof. A miniature rocket pod rose from his shoulder and fired a single concussion missile. It struck the roof and detonated, shattering the cheap material. Skulker barreled through, smashing the weakened ceiling to pieces and pulverizing the concrete beneath his boots.

"Samantha!" he called out.

"Skulker!" he heard her reply. She was locked in some kind of animal cage, hoisted off the floor by a thick metal chain. "Get out of here, it's a trap!"

"Are you injured?" Skulker said as he approached the cage, ignoring her warning.

"I'm fine! Skulker, listen to me, he's not after me, he's after you! Get out of here!"

"He won't leave you, child." A new voice spoke from the other end of the warehouse. Skulker froze. "He can't."

"Bullet," Skulker growled. "If you have harmed even a single hair on her head-"

"What will you do?" Bullet asked, advancing from the shadows. His faceless mask reflected the orange glow of the smoldering remains of the roof. "You'll kill me?" He laughed. "I am already dead, Skulker. I am dead in every way that matters. There is nothing left for you to take from me."

Silence filled the cavernous warehouse. "Skulker," Sam said finally. "What is he talking about?"

"Has he not told you about his past?" Bullet asked her. "Not all of them, no. That would take too long; there are so many pasts in there, after all. Each one as vile as the next. The one I'm talking about, however, is the most recent past. The one that brings the two of you together. Isn't that right, Dear Uncle Kevin Manson?"

"If a fight is what you seek, I will oblige you. But you must first release the girl."

"You're not in a position to make demands," Bullet snapped. He tapped his left thumb and forefinger together, and an electric shock surged through Samantha's cage. She cried out and fell away from the bars. Skulker roared and charged forward. "Not yet!" Bullet shouted, holding his fingers an inch apart. Skulker halted his advance. "Not yet!" he repeated. "First, you must tell her the truth!"

Skulker glowered at Bullet.

"The truth!" the shorter ghost proclaimed, holding his armored hand up with his fingers close together. "Tell her, now!"

Slowly, Skulker turned to face his niece. "This... this is not how I wanted you to learn of my past, Samantha. I would have preferred you never learn of this part of me." He approached her cage. "As Kevin Manson, I served the United States Military in the Korean War. I was part of a counter-intelligence unit sent into villages and civilian encampments to weed out enemy assassins and saboteurs. Our tactics... lacked sophistication."

"The truth!" Bullet barked, keeping in lock step with Skulker.

"We captured suspected targets and tortured them for information. Torture engenders desperation, not cooperation. Our captives often told us what they thought we wanted to hear, and so our information was often spotty. We executed them when they no longer proved useful." Skulker stopped and regarded the architect of his current dilemma with remorse. At seven feet tall, Bullet stood taller than most, but Skulker still towered over him. "Bullet... Chan-yeol, as he was known in life, was the last target we captured. We thought we had perfected our technique to extract information, but we had just gotten lucky with a number of village raids. Chan-yeol gave up his village, told us they were harboring an enemy battalion. We razed the village with flamethrowers."

"My wife... my daughters..." Bullet ripped off his sleek faceplate and threw it to the ground. Beneath was a weathered, damaged face. Jagged scars covered much of his mottled green skin. Tears were streaming from the corners of his narrow eyes. Two tubes ran from somewhere inside the helmet up into his nostrils. "You slaughtered my wife and daughters." Skulker said nothing. He averted his gaze to the floor. "Say it," Bullet hissed.

"I-"

"Say it to her," Bullet hissed, pointing at the cage.

Skulker gathered his remaining courage and looked his niece in the eye. Her face was pale, and her expression was one of disbelief. "I slaughtered his wife and daughters."

"And once your commanders caught wind of your blunder, they disbanded your unit in shame. You and the rest of your craven pack of mongrels was reassigned to other units. Did you know I searched for you after I escaped?" Bullet stood between Skulker and Samantha, unblinking. "I spent the rest of the war searching. It wasn't until after the end that I learned you had been killed in battle." Bullet scoffed. "A miscarriage of justice of cosmic proportions. How could someone as reprehensible as you escape retribution for what you'd done? In every battle I saw to the end of the war, I always saved my last bullet for you. And when I learned I'd been denied my vengeance, I used that bullet to follow you to into the next life." He stepped back and looked to Samantha. "Imagine my surprise when it worked!"

"You have found me. Your plan has worked. If you release Samantha, if you promise not to harm her, I will let you strike me down."

"My vengeance wouldn't be complete just by taking your life. After all, you didn't take mine."

Skulker growled and advanced on Bullet again. "You will NOT TOUCH HER!"

Bullet scampered back. "Ah, but don't you see it?! Look at her! Look!" Skulker looked. There was something about the way Samantha looked at him that was different. The warmth was gone. The admiration, the affection, was nowhere to be seen. "I've already taken her from you! What did she see when she looked upon you before? A champion? A friend, or a confidant? Or maybe... just maybe... a father? Someone to trust and confide in? But now? An immolater of the innocent. A murderer."

Skuker's gaze fell back to the floor.

"You will face me, I will not allow you to take the coward's way out. But you are not fighting for your niece's life, Kevin Manson. Oh no, you are fighting for something far more precious. Defeat me, and perhaps you can rebuild the bonds which I have torn asunder. Or die by my blade," Bullet ignited the orange energy blade of his omni-weapon, "and Samantha lives on, her memory of you eternally tainted."

Skulker folded his arms around himself, and grabbed two hilts that jutted from his elbows. He swung his arms forward, unsheathing two collapsible swords from his upper arms. He slammed them together, and the blades and hilts of the swords fused together with glowing ectoplasm.

"Then face me, cretin." Skulker growled.

Bullet raced forward and declared, "So you have wished it, so it shall be!"

---

The sonic boom sent cascading waves of pain all along Phantom's body, but his regenerative power quickly repaired any damage. He couldn't remember what the exact speed of sound was, but he knew it was more than seven hundred miles per hour. Under any other circumstance, he'd be estatic to learn he had the power of super-speed. But not today. He wasn't sure how long he'd been flying, but it couldn't have been more than two hours, could it? Down below, a large body of water came into view. Could that be the Salton Sea? From his vantage point, he saw a large neon letter D blink several times.

That answers that, he thought.

Phantom rocketed toward the beacon and slowed to a stop just before colliding with the ground. He looked around for something, some sign that he made it in time. He felt vulnerable, and his cloak formed around his body.

"You made it!" a nasally voice called out to him.

Phantom floated up and spun around, his cloak fell behind his shoulders, and black electricity danced along his raised fingertips. The blue-eyed Skulker double from the policewoman's memory approached him.

"Oh, put those away, I didn't go through all this trouble to throw down with you, child." Phantom hesitantly withdrew his hands and his cloak enveloped him again. "One hour and fifteen minutes, you made good time!"

"The other fake evidence you have on my Dad," Phantom said, "You said you'd destroy it."

"Hmm?" the Skulker double regarded him curiously. "Oh, yes. There was no other fake evidence." It shrugged.

"Wha... then what was the point of all this?" Phantom shouted.

"Well, first things first," the Skulker double moved its feet apart and spread its arms. Several heavy pieces of armor hissed as they disconnected from the robotic chassis and fell with heavy thuds to the ground. This robotic body was sleek, sharp, and menacing. The mouthpiece fell away, revealing a triangular mouthplate. The burning blue optics remained unchanged. "Much better. We haven't been formally introduced. I am Technus, an artificial intelligence construct. And while I know a few neat tricks that utilize your lifeblood," he held out his hand and a shapeless green mist materialized in the air before retreating back into the robotic frame, "I am not a ghost."

"What do... who created you?"

Technus's eyes blinked red, and he moved his arms stiffly back and forth. "Four-oh-four! Error! You are not authorized to access this page!" Then the robot laughed. "No, just kidding. Can you imagine? Don't worry about who created me, that's not important. I'll answer your first question, though."

Phantom said nothing, and the AI continued.

"The ghost you know as Johnny Thirteen has been on my radar for some time. He's been pushing a new kind of opiod laced with ectoplasm in his network of dealers, called it Ecto. I killed him, and the collection of drug dealing vagrants that followed at his heels. But Johnny Thirteen wasn't killed by a special ghost killing weapon. I forced him to sample his own merchandise, and he died of an overdose. Ecto does strange things to ectosapiens, including making their bodies corporeal after death. I gave him a bullet like the rest, and removed it." Technus held up a finger, which splintered into at least a dozen tiny armatures. "Very carefully. Now you had a mystery to solve, but things were moving too slow. Recent events forced me to accelerate my timetable. I needed to light the fire under you, and so I killed Detective Miller next. The only evidence the District Attorney's Office has is an entry in his phone records I added showing a received call from your father on the night of the murder, and a calendar appointment I added to his desk blotter for the same night. All I wrote was 'meet Jack in garage.' I was worried it wouldn't be enough, but the police took it and ran like the wind. All this to create a sense of urgency, you see. I knew, with your father facing this, you would do anything in your considerable power to save him. But even still, I needed to make sure you knew where to go. I knew you'd go to the Detective's house looking for clues, and so I needed to make sure you found the last piece of the puzzle."

"That... memory message," Phantom said, his disdain evident.

Technus tapped an area on his face where a nose might be on a human. "Ramirez saw Skulker at the crime scene, she knew something was amiss, and she'd investigate even the slightest disturbance. I went to the station in my disguise, which fooled the Detective well enough. I waited until Ramirez was returning from an assignment and lured the Detective into the garage. Ramirez saw me, and that's when I beamed the message into her head. And tonight, she received a text message from an unknown number, from one of the Detective's neighbors, telling her someone was snooping around his house. She had a key. I meant for you to find her there, and I knew she'd tell you about me. You'd reach into her mind, find my message, and... well, here you are."

Phantom stood motionless. He struggled to form a response to this ridiculous tale. "How did you know when I would see the thing you left in the police woman's head? When did you know when to start that two hour countdown?"

"I have eyes and ears everywhere," Technus said knowingly. It was the kind of tone that was normally spoken by a smiling mouth, but Technus's face was still, his mouth nonexistent.

"No, wait, you only told me what you did," Phantom said, holding out his arms. "Why, though?"

"To distract you, of course." Technus answered. "There's a certain loose end a colleague of mine needs to take care of, and he wouldn't have stood a chance with you in the way. But you've been gone for, how long now? Coming up on an hour and a half. I'm sure the job is finished."

"What job?" Phantom asked. A tightness gripped his chest. "What are you talking about?"

"You might want to get back to Amity Park and find out," Technus suggested. "The trap was sprung the moment you left."

Phantom wanted to violently disassemble this AI piece by perfidious piece, but if what it said was true, someone he cared about was in danger, and he had been specifically lured away so as to not be there to protect them. He tried blinking home, but it didn't work - he was too far away. Phantom shot into the sky and tore back through the clouds to the North. At his new top speed, he would reach home in less than an hour. He could only hope he wasn't too late to stop whatever the machine had set in motion.

---

The warehouse interior was dark. In the ensuing melee, Skulker and Bullet had managed to blow out almost all of the overhead fluorescent lights. Large hunks of metal scaffolding and support structures had been cleaved into pieces, either by one of the many shapes of Bullet's orange omni-weapon, or by Skulker's burning green broadsword. The concrete ground was cracked and shattered, scorched and scarred by dozens of vicious strikes and near-misses. Among the detritus were several of Skulker's on-board weapon systems, either ejected by the ghost himself to exchange firepower for mobility, or sliced from his carapace by his adversary.

Also among the detritus was Bullet's left arm. The one which sported the mechanism to activate the electric shock in Sam's cage. Bullet had lost a considerable amount of ectoplasm before cauterizing the wound with the energy blade of his own weapon. But somehow, the smaller ghost evaded Skulker's attempts to finish him. He was showing clear signs of fatigue, but he twisted and spun and darted away from many of Skulker's attacks. The others he blocked and parried with his own weapon.

Skulker advanced, bringing his broadsword to bear overhead. He brought it down in furious sweeping blows, targeting the space where Bullet's neck met his torso. Bullet dodged backwards, away from each blow, but met the last one with his own blade, and pushed Skulker back.

Bullet took a running start and leapt into the air, twirling his body like a gymnast, and held his weapon close to his body. He landed in a crouch and used the momentum of his spin to sweep Skulker's feet. The larger ghost backpedaled, and felt the metal of one of his discharged weapon systems compress and shatter beneath his considerable mass. He regained his balance just as Bullet pounced at him, his orange blade aimed at Skulker's neck.

The larger ghost ducked and grabbed Bullet's wrist. He spun with Bullet's momentum and swung the smaller ghost in a loop before smashing him into the floor. The ground shook. Concrete crumbled. Dark green bile sprayed from Bullet's mouth. The orange blade of his weapon retreated back into its hilt. Skulker clenched his other fist around the hilt of his broadsword and raised it high over his head.

But he heard a familiar buzzing sound, and a startled cry from Samantha. Instinctively, he turned to her, and time seemed to slow down. He caught his mistake a moment too late. Skulker believed there was only one trigger mechanism for Sam's cage. In fact, there were two. One on each of Bullet's gauntlets. Skulker knew the cage was incapable of delivering anything more than a mild jolt, and was far from being a lethal risk to Samantha. But her yelp of pain pulled his attention. And for the briefest moment, he was distracted.

The orange blade snapped to life and raced forward, burning the air in its path. It stabbed through Skulker's protective carapace with ease, melting through the layers of metal before reaching the ghost himself. He felt searing pain as it stabbed into him, burned through his tiny green body, and burst out of his back. He knew it would continue on, out past the back of his armored shell. But Skulker wouldn't see that. He maneuvered the head of his suit to look at Samantha one last time. The green Mohawk atop his head flickered and winked out of existence. The smaller flame on his chin licked the air one final time. The green light in his eyes dimmed to black. And then he fell back into the rubble, kicking up a cloud of dust and debris, and moved no more.

Sam didn't hear herself screaming as Skulker fell, but she felt the pressure in her throat. She gripped the bars of her cage and shook them back and forth. Tears clouded her vision. She gasped for breath and screamed again, as loud as she had ever screamed in her life. She screamed again and again and again, until finally the bottom of the cage fell out from under her. Sam hit the floor and stumbled forward, scraping her palms and knees on the ruins of the building. She scrambled towards the unmoving shell of her uncle, sobbing and drawing ragged breaths.

Bullet regarded her with indifference. He retrieved his faceplate and covered his unsightly visage. Sam stumbled to her feet and charged at him, screaming and wailing, and pounded her fists on his armor. Bullet pushed her back and she fell. Again, she rose to her feet and dashed at him, screaming and pounding on his chest plate. Bullet pushed her down a second time and floated into the air.

"Kahhh!" Sam shouted. She drew several jagged, wheezing breaths, her wild eyes staring into Bullet's shapeless visor. "Kell yo-!" She coughed violently. Drops of blood splattered the ruined floor. "Kill you!" She rasped, wiping more blood from her lips. "I'll kill you!"

"No." Bullet said somberly. "You won't." And then he disappeared.

Sam crawled over to Skulker's body and fell upon it. Her sobs were silent now; her chest heaved as she drew uneven breaths. She didn't know how long she remained like that, but eventually she was jostled by a sound from high above - a thunderous explosion like the sky had cracked open. Something screamed through the sky, growing louder as it approached. The screaming terminated as Phantom crashed in through the wall of the warehouse. He looked around frantically before spotting Sam. He blinked over to her and changed into his human self before kneeling beside her. She saw the relief in his face, of finding her safe, give way to shock as he saw what she was huddled over.

"He's gone!" Sam rasped, wrapping her arms around her boyfriend and clinging to him for dear life. She sobbed into his chest. "He's gone, Danny!"

"Oh, Sam," he said, his voice wavering. Sam leaned back and looked at him. His blue eyes were wet. "Oh, God, Sam..."

They held each other near the fallen specter, crying together as the urge to do so came and went in waves, and remained by his side until help arrived.

---

Sam thought Skulker deserved a much bigger sendoff than the one he was given. Only Maddie and Jack Fenton, Tucker, Danny, and herself attended. The Fentons had managed to open the damaged battle suit and retrieved Skulkers diminutive, broken body from inside. He was interred in a casket carved from a piece of wood from one of the mutated redwood trees in Amity Park's forest. Jack took the gathering out on the ocean in the Fenton RV, which was also designed as an amphibious assault vehicle. Once they were far enough out on the water, and safely under the cover of darkness, Sam lit the tiny casket on fire and set it out to sea as a form of the Viking burial rite. She thought Skulker would have liked it.

It fell to Sam to deliver the eulogy for her uncle. She pored over several works she thought best suited to send Skulker off, and picked an excerpt from The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. As Skulker's burning casket drifted farther out to sea, Sam began to read.

"And now, all in my own country,
I stood on the firm land!
The Hermit stepp'd forth from the boat,
And scarcely he could stand.

"O shrieve me, shrieve me, holy man!"
The Hermit cross'd his brow.
"Say quick," quoth he, "I bid thee say—
What manner of man art thou?"

Forthwith this frame of mine was wrench'd
With a woful agony,
Which forced me to begin my tale;
And then it left me free.

Since then, at an uncertain hour,
That agony returns:
And till my ghastly tale is told,
This heart within me burns.

I pass, like night, from land to land;
I have strange power of speech;
That moment that his face I see,
I know the man that must hear me:
To him my tale I teach."

The tiny casket burned up, and its remains sank into the ocean.

---

Weeks later, as the summer officially wound to a close, Sam screwed up the courage to visit Skulker's old lair. She only told Danny, who expressed his concern, but Sam reassured him it would be fine, and that she needed to go alone. It was a closure thing. Danny understood, though he still worried for her. Sam thought he was a good boyfriend.

As she picked her way through the derelict facility, something caught her attention from the corner of her eye. It looked like a light was on in one of the rooms deeper in the facility. Was someone here? She cautiously headed down the darkened hallway and approached the room. As she neared the door frame, she slowly poked her head around it. Inside was a simple, bare room. On the far wall, a mounted computer screen glowed with dull blue light. But nobody appeared to be inside. Sam entered the room and looked around. Almost empty, save for the computer screen, and a strange locker off in the corner; the locker was as tall as the room, at least nine feet tall. As she neared the desk, the screen blinked from blue to black. A green arrow winked on and off on the screen. Sam watched intently. After a few moments, a new image appeared. Sam gasped and brought her hands to her mouth.

Skulker looked back at her.

"Hello Samantha," he said in his familiar, deep voice. Tears welled up in Sam's eyes, but she bit back the urge to cry. "If you are watching this video, then I must be dead. I can only hope that you escaped whatever fate befell me unscathed, and that you did not have to witness my death firsthand." His expression fell. "If that is not the case... I am very, truly sorry."

He remained still for a moment. "I may have left you, but I am not leaving you alone. You have a loving family and loyal friends; draw strength from them if you ever struggle to find strength within yourself. I know you to be a fierce and courageous woman, a wellspring of willpower and determination, so perhaps your allies will need to draw their strength from you."

Sam watched the recorded image of her uncle as he stared off for a moment. "If you have learned the truth about my past, of the things I did when I was still a man, I would not ask your forgiveness. I do not deserve it. I can only humbly ask that you remember the lessons I taught you, so that you may be safe."

Skulker paused again and looked away from the camera. "The world I am leaving behind is fraught with peril. I fear the dangers you face will only become stronger, and so you must be able to rise to the challenge." As his gaze returned to the camera, so too did the confident expression Sam was so used to seeing. "With my death, Skulker - as it has existed in this form - is no more. But Skulker is just a mantle. As you are the closest I have ever come to..." he trailed off, and Sam wiped a tear from her eye. "As my kin, my family, all I have to pass onto you is this mantle. I do not wish this life for you, Samantha, but if this is the life you choose..."

As he spoke, the doors of the massive locker hissed and swung open. Sam approached it, and looked upon its contents with her eyes wide and mouth agape. A pristine suit of battle armor shone from within. As she approached, a brilliant emerald flame burst to life atop the helmet, which was featureless save for two narrow, rectangular eyes.

It looked like his armor. But this set was for her.

"...then the mantle of Skulker is yours for the taking."

Sam admired the armor for a while longer, processing what her uncle had just told her. She turned to look at the screen, and saw the recording was still playing. Skulker was looking down at the floor. Sam walked back over and stood in front of the screen and waited. A few moments later, he looked back up.

"I always thought there would be more time," he said softly. "If I never... I love you, Samantha. And I am so, incredibly proud of you."

He hesitated a moment longer.

"Goodbye."

The video ended, and the screen switched off. Sam wiped more tears from her eyes. She walked back over to the locker, and regarded its contents carefully.

---

A deafening siren shrieked from the intercom system in Masters's secret facility. She raced down the hall toward the containment chamber. Red emegency lights blinked from overhead.

"Alert: specimen life signs fading rapidly," Technus declared, his voice amplified over the siren, "Cause unknown."

Masters almost crashed into the doors as they hissed apart and into the walls. She stumbled into the observation theater; the ghost on the other side of the glass was floating aimlessly, as if submerged in water.

"Open these doors," Masters ordered. "I'm going in there."

"But master, it-"

"NOW!"

Technus complied, and Masters ran into the room. She gently cradled the ghost in her arms and eased it down as she sank to her knees. "What's happening to you?" she cooed at it in a motherly voice. "Tell us what's wrong so we can help you! Please!"

The ghost regained some sense of focus, its alien goat-like eyes found her, and it brushed her cheek with one of its bony fingers. The wailing siren quieted, but the red lights still strobed overhead.

"PLAZZZzzzzz..."

The ghost spoke, like it did when the the pod was first discovered. It was much weaker this time.

"What is it?" Masters asked softly. "What are you trying to say?"

"PLAAAZZZMMMmmm..."

"Plasm? Ectoplasm? Technus, she needs ectoplasm! Prepare the-"

The ghost placed the bony finger on her lips.

"PLAASSMMIIAaaaa..."

Masters looked at the ghost, bewildered. "What?"

"PLASMIA... Plasmia..."

The Ghost went limp, and its body began to turn into vapor. Masters stood and backed away. The ghost continued to dissolve, and its gaseous remains were siphoned out of the room by the ventilation system. Masters watched the remains as they were evacuated from the chamber. The fans quieted down, the lights returned to normal, and she was alone.

"Technus," she said finally.

"Yes?"

"...What on Earth is Plasmia?"