Chapter CV

"This is amazing!"

"Whoa, whoa! We- we're flying! We're FLYING!"

Danny struggled to maintain his focus as his body ascended through the air and he felt a strange sensation in his chest. His heart, which normally sat still and unmoving in ghost mode, was vigorously pounding

"Ok Danny, you don't want to overdo it on the first try. You just got these powers yesterday and we don't know how high you can actually go."

A slow, steady breath was pulled in through the ghost boy's mouth. His slightly shaking body relaxed somewhat and he continued rising, although his pace had slowed. He was now hovering twenty feet up off the roof of Samantha Manson's house. Had Danny been awake, he would have smiled at the memory that was playing before his dreaming eyes. But as it happened, the reverie of his first flight was cut short as his dream took a different route.

An earthquake of an impossible magnitude shook the earth with unrivaled strength. The very sky vibrated, as if trembling with fear. Danny watched the entire town crumble as the quake tore every building apart from their foundations. Even nature itself was wrought with destruction. Trees and rocks fell into fissures with the remains of the once great civilizations that had conquered the planet.

Danny heard an inhuman cackle echo up from the gaping chasm that had opened beneath him. He dared to look down into the wound in the earth and felt his limbs go numb. Two red eyes stared back up at him. Danny knew those eyes. He knew the face that appeared shortly thereafter. Plasmius opened her mouth wide and roared an absolutely evil laugh. It was then Danny realized he had dropped Samantha from his arms in his moment of shock. He watched helplessly as her body tumbled into the vampire woman's open mouth.

"Danny!" Plasmius' voice thundered.

He couldn't respond. He wanted so desperately to save Sam, but he knew it was already too late.

"Danny!" Plasmius called out again, this time the voice was closer, louder, more pronounced.

The teen wanted nothing more than to silence that voice, but he couldn't move; he couldn't even speak.

"Son!"

"Don't you EVER call me that!" Danny spat, finally finding his voice.

"Son, wake up!"

Danny's eyes snapped open to the sight of a dimly lit first class section of the plane's passenger cabin. A red flashing light was blinking from overheadand a siren was obnoxiously blaring at him from somewhere overhead. He sluggishly turned to his side to see the panicky, terrified face of his father staring at him.

"Danny! Thank God you're awake!" Jack exclaimed with relief.

"Dad, what's going . . ." The teenager's eyes widened in anxiety. "Where'd everybody go?"

"If I had to guess, there never was anyone else here." Jack's large fist unfolded in front of Danny's face revealing a strange circular object. "Hologram projector," he explained, "I found a whole bunch of them all over the plane."

"So everyone was a hologram? That doesn't make any sense!"

"I'm working on it," Jack mumbled. "I'm also working on how to get us out of here before we die in a horrible explosion of painful fire and superheated plane parts."

Well the secret identity was nice while it lasted, Danny thought. "Dad, I think I might-"

"Danny, look! Parachutes!" Jack hollered.

Danny leaned out into the aisle and raised an eyebrow at the image of his father lugging two huge packages from the cockpit. The fact that his father had quickly sprinted from his seat to the cockpit surprised him, but the parachutes his father held piqued his interest just a smidgen more. Probably due in no small part to the his name being printed on one of them. Jack wasted no time in strapping the parachute to Danny's back.

"Uh, Dad?"

"No time to talk now, Danny, we've gotta get out of here!"

"Well it's just that this was obviously a trap."

"Gee, you think?"

Danny scowled at his father's sarcasm. "Then do you really think it's such a good idea to use gear specifically designated for us?"

Jack paused securing his own parachute and rubbed his chin. "That's a good point . . ."

"So? We take them or not?"

"We're either going to die in an explosion, die when the parachutes don't deploy, or we live when they work. Since I'm not a big fan of dying in explosions, we're gonna try the 'chutes."

Jack bounded over to the emergency exit and kicked it open after he had unsealed it. The man took a deep breath and leapt out into the cloudy sky without another word. Danny sighed and followed along behind him. Freefalling through the sky didn't affect Danny nearly as much as it would affect any other fourteen year old, but there was something about not using his powers that made the leap all the more significant.The wind whipped at his face, sending his hair into a tizzy as he descended through the sky. He wasn't quite heavy enough to catch up with his father, which turned out to be a blessing when his father's parachute deployed. DALV CO. was imprinted on the fabric. Danny scowled and used his ghost powers to safely maneuver far enough away from his father to deploy his own parachute.

"Well how do you like that?" Jack shouted over to his son. "There's a cabin! Can you see it, Danny?"

It took several seconds of squinting his eyes in different positions, but eventually the speck at the end of Danny's field of vision became more of an architecturally influenced speck. He could tell it was a house of some sort; or at least he thought he could tell.

"Looks like today's our lucky day!" Jack proclaimed.

"Something tells me luck had nothing to do with it," Danny mumbled.

A gentle breeze drifted over the buildings of Amity Park. Flocks of birds used the draft to glide in formation to the next tree or power line or parking lot. Litter was picked up for but a moment before being set back down. A plastic bag was caught up in the invisible force and carried to the top of a home. Striking like lightning, a clawed metallic fist materialized out of thin air and snatched the bag from its course. Skulker tried to charge his fist with ectoplasm in order to destroy the bag for blocking his surveillance, but to his disappointment, not even a faint green glow appeared around his fist. With a sigh, the robot released the bag and allowed it to carry on its journey.

Turning his head to his left, Skulker took in the sight of his personal attack hounds. The three dogs were fearsome beasts capable of dealing out more damage than any of Plasmius' mutations. The spirits that sat at his heels were those of the first domesticated prehistoric canines. It appeared that such animals back then were much, much bigger than their descendants. One of the hounds could easily take down a fully grown grizzly bear. That being said, Skulker had considered only bringing along one of his loyal attack dogs, but his curiosity got the better of him; Skulker wanted to see them work as a team.

Skulker leaned forward, his single eye gleaming as he watched an unexpected guest walk up to the front door of his target's residence. The young Samantha Manson, the mate of the ghost child, had decided to pay the Fenton women a visit.If Skulker had a mouth, he would have grinned. Three hounds to stalk and prey upon three defenseless females; the timing could not have been more perfect. Skulker turned to his hounds and emitted a low whine. The canines each selected a target, telepathically communicating with one another and with Skulker as they each chose an individual female. Another whine of a different pitch came from Skulker's audio communicator and the hounds became invisible, setting off to stalk their prey.

"To the hunt!"

"Well that wasn't very fun," Danny mumbled after his slow descent had ended. His parachute had carried him a considerable distance away from his father and the teen now found himself dangling from a rocky outcropping just beside a waterfall."Maybe it would've been easier to just go ghost."

NO! You could have revealed yourself to your father!

Unlikely, but it could have happened.

Guys, relax. The important thing is that I didn't have to. Now all I have to do is phase out of this stupid parachute and I can go find my Dad.

That might not be possible.

Why?

The fabric of this parachute has been coated with an anti-ghost resin. You will not be able to escape it through ghostly means.

So what do you suggest?

STRUGGLE AGAINST THIS INFERNAL DEVICE UNTIL IT YEILDS UNDER YOUR POWER!

OR he can remain where he is and wait for his father to arrive and free him. The view is unarguably pleasant.

He is a TARGET out here in the wilderness!

A target to what? Regular animals can't hurt me.

You know that this is not a simple plane crash. We are nowhere near Cape Canaveral, Florida. This is Colorado. The father/son trip was a ploy used by the Dalv Corporation to lure you and your father here.

But why?

Plasmius hired the Dalv Corporation to install that new security system in Casper High. It is the same one that Technus infiltrated, which resulted in the birth of your second illegitimate son.

There is an undeniable connection between the two. She is likely waiting for you.

Why would she go through all the trouble to draw me out here?

The unwelcome feeling of the others' recession was what Danny received for an answer. "Oh, thanks a lot guys. I really appreciate it. This is that whole 'teach me independence' bull crap isn't it? Well I'll remind you that if I die because of you, you die too!"

"Why would you die because of me? I'm your father! I'd never do anything to get you killed!" Jack shouted down to his son.

Danny gasped and looked up with a winning smile. "Dad! How'd you find me?"

"I saw your parachute," the large man explained as he began to pull Danny up to the ledge. "And your blathering gave you away too."

"You, uh, heard?"

"Just noises. I don't like to eavesdrop on my family's private conversations with themselves."

Danny rolled his eyes and set his feet down on the ground as his father finally pulled him up off the edge of the cliff. His father cut the parachute's tangled straps with a hunting knife that had been stashed away somewhere in his jumpsuit.

"Danny, there's something you should know . . . other than the fact that our plane was sabotaged and we're stranded out here in the wilderness. We're nowhere near Florida. In fact, I'd say we're still in the north."

"Yeah, like Colorado," Danny said absently. He loudly cleared his throat after seeing the strange look his father was giving him. "Or, you know, somewhere . . . else."

Jack sent his son a suspicious look."Right. Well we better get going."

"Going where, that cabin? Are you sure it was really a cabin?" Danny stated.

"My eyes never lies," Jack said with a grin. "We didn't have the best view. Our plane was too low while we were flying through the mountains. If we can reach the top of that ridge," he pointed a gloved finger to the top of the nearest mountain, "we should have a better chance to get our bearings and maybe find out if what we saw was actually a cabin."

"That's gonna be a long hike," Danny began, "maybe we should make camp; you know, start tomorrow."

Jack's expression turned from jovially anxious to dead serious. "No."

"No?" Danny repeated.

"No. There's something off about this place."

Danny looked from one side to the other. "What is it? What's wrong?"

"Listen."

With a sigh, Danny closed his eyes and focused on the sounds of the forest; the singing of the birds, the buzzing of the bees, the chirping, squawking, hissing, rustling sound that was Mother Nature. But Danny's eyes widened in started realization. There were none of those noises. No living creature dared to sound its call. Only the gentle mountainous breeze occasionally wafted through the trees, as though searching for the fauna that once frolicked amongst the leaves and branches. The waterfall roared in defiance of the absence of life, sounding the calls of every creature at once.

"There's nothing here," Danny whispered.

"Exactly." Jack said in an equally low tone.

"So what does that mean?"

"I've only been in a situation like this twice before. Once was when I forgot your mother's birthday last year . . ." Jack rubbed the back of his neck. "The other time was when I was exploring the wilds in Siberia. There had been rumors of a strange creature committing grisly murders, so they called your mother and me in to investigate. It turned out to be a ghost lizard."

"That's it?"

Jack narrowed his eyes. "A twenty-five foot long bearded dragon that breathed fire."

"Oh."

"Would've been nice to have the Fenton Thermos back then, but we-" Jack's reminiscing was cut short by a spine-tingling shriek.

Danny looked from the direction of the all-too-familiar wail to his father. "Time to move?"

"Time to move."

"So Mom," Jazz sat on the lab table next to her mother's invention, "what are we gonna do while Danny and Dad are gone?"

"I thought you could help me with the new neural interface I've been working on for the ecto-suit," Maddie replied. "I would've been working on it earlier, but you know your father; once he finishes something he never wants to change it."

"I'm glad you finally have a chance to work on something you made instead of just fixing Dad's inventions," Jazz commented as she hopped off the table and began examining the ecto-suit.

"Um, Mrs. Fenton? Jazz? Are you down there?" Sam's voice called out from upstairs.

"What'cha need, Sam?" Jazz shouted back.

"I think I left my purse down here," Sam said as she descended the stairwell. "Well actually, I don't even think I had it with me the last time I was over here, but I'd rather make sure before I ask my parents if they've seen it. My mom freaks out whenever I lose my purse."

Jazz looked from Sam to the large pile of equipment that sat on one of the wall-mounted counters. "Dad decided to clean up before he left for the trip. If your purse was down here, it's probably underneath all this." Jazz grabbed a battery pack for the Fenton Foamer, but sent the whole mountain of gear tumbling to the ground. One of the devices bounced off the floor and slammed into a panel on the wall. One by one, the lights in the lab went out, followed by every other electrical device. The three women were plunged into darkness with only the ambient green light of the ghost portal to light their way.

"I know I'm going to sound like Dad when I say this, but that was definitely not my fault," Jazz spoke up.

"It wasn't an accident either," Maddie replied coolly. The mother ran over to the damaged control panel and pressed a button. A red light winked on, and a row of emergency lights blinked on from the corners of the room. Mrs. Fenton hit another button and the floor beneath her lit up in a circular pattern. "Op Center, online," Maddie commanded. The lights flickered for a moment, but stabilized and the woman sighed with relief. "Girls, get over here." Sam and Jazz gathered around the older woman as she continued to punch commands into the tiny panel. "This is an experimental elevator system I've been working on. Jack always wanted to use it to catapult exploding cannonballs into the sky, but I think I found a more practical use for it."

"How's an elevator going to get the power back on?" Sam asked with a hint of sarcasm.

"If this works, I should be able to access the emergency back-up power," Maddie replied, not detecting the cynicism in the Goth girl's tone. "Three to the Op Center," she commanded the panel.

After several seconds of nothing happening, Sam shifted her weight from one foot to the other and cleared her throat obnoxiously loud. "Hmm. So, like, is it supposed to not work?"

Jazz elbowed Sam in the ribs. "Maybe it's because the power is-"

Suddenly, the three females were vacuumed up into a hole that opened in the ceiling. The current of air carried them from the basement through the first and second floors of the houseand into the super-modern Op Center. Sam stumbled from the "elevator" and nearly fell to the floor. Her hand reached out and grabbed onto a knob and helped to steady her. Sam's awkward position - frozen in a falling over state – was illuminated with the rest of the Op Center as the emergency lights blinked on.

"Well whaddya know," Sam mumbled as she righted herself. "It really does work."

"I'll try to see why the power's out," Maddie said. She sat down in a computer chair and pushed herself over to a console, allowing the chair's momentum to slide her over. "Well that's odd," the woman commented as her fingers glided over the computer's buttons. "Everything looks fine." Maddie noted the confused looks on the girls' faces. "The Op Center has a monitor system that keeps tabs on the whole house," she explained. "If something is wrong, the computer would notify me."

"Well something's obviously wrong, otherwise we'd have electricity," Sam said. "Maybe the computer's broken."

"Well your attitude sure isn't helping things along," Jazz hissed.

"Either Sam is right," Maddie continued to examine the console, "or something else cut the power; something the computer can't detect."

Sam rolled her eyes. "Really? What possibly could have done it?"

"A computer virus," Maddie replied.

Jazz smirked at Sam's uncomfortable silence. "Oh . . . I mean, I was gonna say 'ghost', but you know. Computer virus sounds right too."

Sam growled and moved over to the window to avoid Jazz's smirk. Jazz, silently leaned over her mother's shoulder, pointing to a line of text on the screen as Sam rolled her eyes, looking out the window. All up and down the street, power flickered on and off. One street light about a block away flashed a few times like a lightning bug before flaring, bits of glass falling to the street. Sam took a few steps towards the window, watching the scene in fascination. She turned around to tell the Fentons to look, but she felt something. Her hand came up to the back of her neck just as a tingly feeling spread from the base of her neck to the back of her head. She looked over her shoulder – there was nothing there, but Sam wasn't so easily convinced.

Maddie peered at the computer screen, ignoring her daughter's unhelpful comments and Sam's small sigh of exasperation. There, on the screen, were some strange dots. They flickered in the house, appearing and disappearing on the old ghost radar. Three dots, moving slowly through the rooms on the lower level. She blinked, sitting up a little straighter, her eyes narrowed behind her goggles. "Ghosts."

Two houses away, Skulker dialed a button on his visor and zoomed in on the Op Center. Inside, he could see the two younger females standing and looking around, the older one sitting before a computer. All of them looked worried – as they should. Anticipation swelled in Skulker's chest as he let out a small, high-pitched whine. Inside the house, his three hounds reacted instantly, turning from their search of the basement and beginning to stalk up the steps towards the Op Center.

To Be Continued

A/N: So you're all like "oh mai gawd, u died!" Well I didn't. Work is terrible. Avoid employment as long as you can. I hope you like this chapter. Super special thanks to Cordria for beta-ing it.

Thanks to all my reviewers, especially General Razgriz, inukagome15, Vorago Atrox, darkbunny92, Perspective, darkness over day, MissMeliss4251, Akemi Clevek, Shining Zephyr, alienphantom, and CyberArcRotarr.

By the way, go see The Dark Knight. Seriously, it's one of the greatest movies ever created.

SAY GOODBYE TO THE UNIVERSE, MAXIMALS! - Megatron.