Soul collection, Dan had come to find, was a full-time job; one that paid no mind to time of day or state of dress. That night he'd tried to ignore his Ghost Sense to the best of his abilities in the hopes of catching a few more winks of sleep, but alas, the dead waited for no one. The interior of Amity had all but frosted over by that point and Cujo was not pleased. So dressed in a moth-bitten oversized t-shirt with his Danny Phantom logo printed on the front (Tucker had started selling them as a side-business as Dan's fame increased) and a pair of Jazz's old Sailor Moon—"Shut up! They're comfy!"—pyjama pants that were worn and torn from so much use; he found himself in the most oddest of places.
It was unlike anything he'd ever encountered within Arcadia, even stranger than the poltergeist possessed house he, Zoe (a pink-haired Hedge Witch) and Douxie had exorcised when they'd first met; but that was a story for another day. Large cavernous walls that were engraved with various runes that he never hoped to decipher lined the walls—both inside and out—that sapped at his powers like a ravenous mosquito in summer. Beyond these walls, lay a room encased in rot and dust with a faint crackle of magic flittering throughout the cracks and crannies of the place. Remnants of old relics lay atop old benches and moth-eaten books remained open from where they had been left for the spiders to enshroud in their sticky webs.
But that wasn't the oddest thing of all. No, that came in the form of a trick step that he'd quite literally stumbled into. One moment he was standing in a room that personified death and the next, life had been breathed back into it with a warm & golden glow. The once monstrous cobwebs were gone, not a spec of dust to be found and the old relics were shiny & new. Jumping off of the stone step brought Dan back into the realm of death and he couldn't help but wonder at the magic that had been used to do such a feat, even as he played with it."It's like jumping between the Zones!" Dan laughed as he childishly played with the step. "Ghost. Mortal. Ghost. Mortal. Ghost"
Soon enough, an achy kind of exhaustion pulled at his limbs and he wondered if he'd slept wrong or something. It didn't take long for an achy tiredness to set in, pushing him away from the step and further into the room in the search for whichever soul had brought him here. "Man, Sam and Tuck would be having a field day right 'bout now" Dan smiled as his gaze ran from the tattered gothic tapestry on the wall to the rusty hilt of a sword, to piles upon piles of dusty old tomes clustered together like skyscrapers. That was until the rosy red petal floating before him, gave him pause.
It hadn't been much of an issue when he'd first arrived, pushing passed the barrier created by the runes on the outside that slowly drained his powers and at first, Dan had just assumed that the aches and exhaustion he felt came from the runes planted about the place. A preemptive measure to ward off unwanted visitors and thieves who sought out the treasure trove in years passed; like a medieval security system. One that would go away eventually if he just shoved the feeling into a box in the back of his mind.
Or so he thought. A single red petal had landed in his hand; blood red in colour and burning at his skin like a thousand white hot fire pokers. His hand spasmed at the pain, letting the petal float gently to the ground at his feet where it lay amongst the dust, as he retraced the petal's trail up to the ceiling above him. "Oh" Dan squeaked, wide eyes alighting on the red flowers that sat snugly in the crannies of the stalactites. He'd never seen so many blood blossoms in one place before.
And just like that, the box in his mind sprung open and the agonising pain flooded back to the forefront of his mind, flooding his senses despite the runes that filtered their potency throughout the cavern. Dan's hands threaded into his bed hair as he collapsed to the floor in a pile of moaning, groaning and thrashing limbs. The Fenton Thermos clattered to the floor with a thunderous clang that echoed throughout the chamber, but that was naught but white noise as he became overwhelmed by the sensation of such pain.
His only saving grace was that the blood blossoms were far enough away and hidden beneath with enough magic runes that they didn't all kill him at once; instead they only tortured him. Heavily rolling over, Dan coughed wetly, hacking up blood and ectoplasm that sprayed out across the cobblestone floors before he flopped back to the cold stone with a pained groan. The force of the cough had rattled him only piling onto the all-encompassing pain he felt. A single thought floated to mind as he lost his grip on reality, relinquishing his hold to the pain.
I am really going to die this time?
Well, they had done it. They had finally done it. Jim, Claire & Toby had come out to their parents and gotten their blessing for the latest mission (although Jim knew he'd be going with or without it). Standing before their guardians had been nerve-wracking as hell with his mother covered in paint, Nana Domzalski with cookies in hand and a rather confused Mr & Mrs Nuñez sitting on their couch. The air had been thick with tension and the four worst words had been uttered: "We need to talk"
Their school bags had been raided, accusations had been thrown—mostly at him—shaky excuses had been cast, guilt flowed like an unending river and to top it all off, Blinky had appeared at the worst possible time with his brother in tow. His situation awareness really was awful. The thing with Dictatious had to be pushed aside however as his mother had cornered him in the basement and guilt-tripped him into spilling his guts. It had been a heart-felt moment nonetheless.
In fact, the three of them had eventually spilled their guts to all their disbelieving parents. It had been a scenario filled with shock, awe and more accusations. Of course, that was when the goblins attacked and then Claire had another Morgana vision, this time involving his amulet, Merlin & Angor Rot; which had led them to where they were now, traipsing through the underbelly of Arcadia. Jim couldn't help but feel relieved that they hadn't stuck around to see the full fallout of their parents' comprehension of their activities from the last few months. Even if they treated their send-off like it was their first day of school. Why would they even need extra underwear?
"…Wingman!" Toby gasped, pulling Jim from his thoughts as the group hurried over to where their friend lay suspended in a stasis trap.
"No! Stop!" Blinky surged forward and yanked Toby back before he could even reach the cage. "It's a trap!"
"Ah! A stasis trap! That's—!"
"—The work of Angor Rot! And he's upgraded it!"
"Um, those are Dwärkstones! If we deactivate the stasis chamber, this whole place is gonna blow!" Claire identified the floating green crystals. Jim swallowed audibly at the reminder; the stones were already glowing a mean green which meant that if any of them so much as grazed one of those stones then they'd all be blown to kingdom come.
"Aaarrrggh, my friend, they've used you to bait & kill us!" Blinky cried.
"We gotta get him outta there!" Toby whined over Aaarrrggh's grunts and groans.
"No…Wingman…" Aaarrrggh strained out through gritted teeth. "You…leave"
"No! We're not giving up!"
"Ah!" Jim breathed a high-pitched gasp as another rat ran over his foot and disappeared down through a crack in the floor. It gave him an idea as he fervently ignored his cheeks flushing with embarrassment. "Guys, I've got an idea"
"What?"
"Okay" Jim swung around so that he was facing his friends with Aaarrrggh at his back. "Here's what we do: Toby drops the hammer and we drop into the room below"
"The war hammer's power and weight might be enough to override the stasis trap" Blinky nodded. "Or it'll fail, Toby will disintegrate into nothingness and we'll die with the ensuing explosion"
"Cool beans" Toby agreed wholeheartedly with a face full of determination.
"But even if it works, what if we drop into something worse?" Claire worried.
"Than this?" Jim retorted, gesturing around them. "I'll take my chances. Tobes, are you ready?"
"Ready to possibly kill us all and die in horrible failure? Yeah!" Toby replied, hefting his hammer as Jim interlocked his hands and readied to throw his best friend over his shoulder. "FOR AAARRRGGH!"
Toby charged towards Jim like a furious bull, hefting the uncannily lightweight weapon over his shoulder as he was flung high up into the air. Jim watched with bated breath and heart thundering in his chest as Toby cleared the top of the stasis trap with a war cry, before he swung the head of the hammer down towards the cobblestones beneath Aaarrrggh's feet. Time seemed to slow as the cage vanished and Toby—blathering to himself—dropped into his friend's arms, as the dimmed Dwärkstones clattered to the floor like forgotten coins and the floor gave way.
"Is everyone all right?" Jim coughed, waving away the dust clouds as Aaarrrggh stepped back from where he had shielded them upon their awkward landing in the room below.
"Wingman!" Toby smiled as he pulled the mossy troll in for a hug under the glow of Daylight, the others following suit not long after.
"What…is this place?" Blinky mused as he eventually pulled away.
"Smells…old" Aaarrrggh sniffed as he leant out over the edge of the path to find a tattered old gyre sitting at the bottom of the cavern.
"Remarkable! An ancient gyre!"
"Why would there be a gyre hidden down here?" Jim wondered as they all clambered aboard.
"Huh, it doesn't even have any controls!" Blinky's hands roved over the front panel where a small circular indent lay embedded in the stone. "Master Jim, your amulet!"
Despite Claire's persistence that he'd need to smash the amulet to pieces in order to retrieve Merlin's staff, Jim had been hoping against hope that there was another way around it. But it didn't look like that was going to work; the indent was much too small for the whole amulet to fit, no matter which way he tried to insert it.
"It won't fit" Blinky despaired.
"No, but the blue stone inside will" Jim sighed. "Claire, it's what you saw in your visions. If I break the amulet, it'll lead us to Merlin's tomb"
"Master Jim" Blinky started as Jim placed the amulet down on a rock off to the side and hefted War Hammer, turning back to face the music. "Are you sure you want to do this? The amulet is your sacred charge!"
"I know"
"If you destroy the amulet, it is forever—"
"—Forever and ever! I get it!" Jim snapped before recollecting himself.
"Just making certain" Blinky reassured the boy, hand on his shoulder.
"Thank you" Jim sighed, sparing a glance at the others. "If we wanna catch up with Gunmar and Angor Rot, we have to find the tomb"
"And the staff" Claire joined him at his other side.
"For the glory of Merlin"
Staring down at the innocent blue amulet before him, he wasn't sure how he felt. He knew he had to sacrifice it in order to find Merlin's tomb, but a twinge of doubt pricked traitorously in the back of his mind. Surely there's another way? Can we not find another way? No. This had to be done, it had to. Swallowing the seed of bitterness that clogged his throat, Jim hefted War Hammer and swung down, hard.
"No turning back now" Jim morosely gathered the fragments of the amulet and made his way back to the gyre where he found the stone now fit perfectly inside the indent and ignited its engine. "Whoa! The map! Claire, you were right!"
"If this is fate" Toby worried as large sparks zapped around them. "I really hope we're not destined to die!"
"Only one way to find ou—AAAAHHHHHH!" Claire screamed and they were off.
"Hate gyre!" Aaarrrggh whined as Toby regurgitated his lunch. Disembarking from the mechanical death trap once it had reached the end of the track, they then continued up the path hidden behind a large misty waterfall.
"Whoa, a hidden entrance!" Jim grinned, brushing his damp locks out of his face.
"Yeah, but to where?" Claire mused.
"Gunmar must've come through here too…"
"Ah!" Toby suddenly yelped as War Hammer collapsed in on itself, folding back down into its more compact form. "Why no War Hammer magic?"
"No magics here" Blinky supplied helpfully as he read out the runes written on the stone wall above them. "It appears this hallowed tomb is warded against sorcery"
"Nngh! Ugh! My Shadow Staff doesn't work either!" Claire complained after trying her own hand at summoning her weapon before she wandered over to the scratched walls. "Jim, these claw marks look fresh"
"Hmm" Blinky hummed, coming to examine them as well. "Yes, yes, as if…a struggle"
"Huh? Draal!" Aaarrrggh hummed as he picked up the large broken chain that Toby had tripped over.
"Draal is free?" Blinky demanded.
"If there's no magic here, maybe Gunmar's hold on him wore off?" Jim suggested hopefully. "Then we're not just here for the staff, we can save Draal too!"
With that thought in mind, they moved further inland where they soon came across the inside of Merlin's tomb or at least the large anti-chamber filled with rot and decay. Cobwebs hung from anything & everything and Jim gagged on the stench that he was practically able to taste as he wandered over to the dead end at the other end of the room. There lay a large smooth slab of wall with a skylight far above that lay framed in red flowers. "No way we can climb that" Jim despaired.
"There must be some sort of apparatus we can use" Blinky replied from his right. "A ladder, perhaps?"
"Hurk—ka! What is this?" Toby gagged from somewhere behind him. "The tomb for Merlin's extra junk?"
Smiling to himself at Toby's comments, Jim moved over to an old workbench where various tools and rusty weapons lay. Even with all the Trollish that Blinky had crammed into his head, there was no way that he'd ever be able to decipher what was written in the moth-bitten tomes. Claire might, though, she seemed to have picked up a knack for that. On the mantel above that lay an old sword whose hilt alone was bigger than his head, easily dwarfing Daylight. In fact, he wondered, is it a prototype for Daylight? There's so many similarities!
Jim's thoughts were soon cut off however when the room was suddenly awash in a golden glow and a warm breeze wafted through the cavern that definitely hadn't been there before. "Whoa! Ah—buba—ah—wha—?" Toby blathered as they spun on their heels trying to take in the sudden change in scenery. At the new movement, the room returned to what it was before.
"Wha—what was that?!" Claire demanded.
"Ha! By Gorgus!" Blinky gasped in eureka. "Tobias! Press that stone again!"
"Er…" Toby warily stepped onto a trick step which gave way beneath his weight and turned the room back into the golden one. "Wha—awesome sauce! This feels super weird!"
"Wait" Claire peered closely at a painting above the roaring fireplace. "This switch…makes everything new"
"Or it's somehow jumping to the past" Jim replied as he turned to run his hand over the blade he had been ogling at earlier. Only now, it was shiny and new instead of broken and rusty. "That's crazy though, right?"
"You're onto something, Master Jim" Blinky excitedly refuted, "We do seem somehow flung into the past. Or at least the room has! Why, by the wear patterns on the rocks, I'd say this is…hundreds of years ago!"
"Ooh! Olden times. Today. Olden times. Today. Olden times—" Toby played with the step, flipping back and forth between the two eras with much enthusiasm.
"—Tobias" Blinky scolded, but was ignored.
"—Today. Olden times. Today—"
"—Tobias!"
"Sorry!" Toby eventually apologised, dropping the sack he had been holding onto the step so that he could further explore the room from the past.
Standing abreast from Blinky, Jim tried his best to think of a way to get out of the room so that they could beat Gunmar to Merlin's tomb and make it out alive. Maybe. Hopefully. Unfortunately, aside from having Aaarrrggh fling them up towards the rafters, he hadn't been able to come up with anything. Especially now that they were down all magical weapons and the amulet had been destroyed. He clenched his fist tight around the shards of metal tucked into his pockets.
"See—AAAAHHH!" Claire screamed, pulling Jim from his thoughts as she backpedalled from where she had bent to inspect the contents of the sack Toby had dropped to the ground. Vaulting over the small outcropping at his feet, Jim went to pull Daylight from its sheath only to remember too late that he no longer had it.
"Claire!" Toby joined him at his side, holding War Hammer's sheath as he too forgot about the no-magics-rule within the cavern. "Claire! Are you okay? What is it?"
"I—I—I thought I saw…" Claire stammered, trailing off as her eyes remained glued to a spot shrouded in darkness, beyond one of the larger stone tables in the corner of the room. One hand remained clenched around the seed she had plucked from the sack whilst the other quickly crossed herself with shaky hands.
"Claire?" Jim pushed. "What is—?"
"…Nngh…k-ka…ka…" A pitiful moan followed by a series of weak bone-rattling coughs sounded from the shadows, cutting him off, and making the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. Jim flinched at the sound of something wet splattering against the stone and he shook out his tense arms, as if doing so would rid them of the goosebumps littering his flesh. Aaarrrggh, who had rushed over alongside Blinky to help fight against whatever foe lay hidden in the shadows, crept forward with cautious steps and nose twitching.
He kinda looks like a dog. Jim mused as Aaarrrggh was led by his nose into the dark corner after whatever it was that had caught his attention. "Wingman…?" Toby called out after the hulking troll as he too became enshrouded in shadows. There was no reply for a moment, save for the sound of something being dragged across the ground, and another tense moment before Aaarrrggh returned, this time cradling something to him. Moving out into in the middle of the room, Jim was soon confronted by a sight he had expected to see.
"Danny!" Toby gasped, quickly shoving War Hammer's sheath into his pocket as he hurried over to the elder teen's side with panic in his eyes. Claire was not far behind, although she appeared shaken by the boy's limp appearance. Not that Jim could blame her. From what he could see peeking out from beneath Aaarrrggh's chest fur, the ghost boy wore dirty and worn pink pyjama pants with an oversized t-shirt that was splattered with green and red splotches (matching the substance on his lips) that worried him. The only sign that he was still alive was the tiny rise and fall of his chest combined with the weak coughs which seemed to rattle him.
He may not have totally gotten along with Dan Masters, mostly because there just something about the ex-superhero that rubbed him the wrong way. Jim couldn't quite put a finger on what it was and maybe that was the problem—he was supposed to be the Trollhunter, protector of Arcadia, and here was this anomaly that he still wasn't sure if he was friend or foe. Of what he'd seen of Dan, the teen mostly kept to himself but wielded these outrageous powers that belonged inside some kind of horror film. He wanted to give Dan the benefit of the doubt, but he was a bloody ghost boy, for God's sake! How terrifying was that? Who knew what it would take to make him flip and kill them all like he tried to do when hopped up on gravesand?
"…What's he doing here?" Toby bit at his lip as he watched Claire peel back his shirt to check for any serious wounds.
"I don't know" Claire murmured, brows furrowed as she tried to find the source of the bleeding.
"By Deya's Grace!" Blinky gasped, as a smattering of highlighted scars and rash-like burns peeked out from beneath the t-shirt in Claire's grasp. Jim sucked in a breath as he joined the others, worry replacing the wariness.
"Dios mío…" Claire breathed when her eyes alighted upon a particularly large scar that ran the length of his torso. "Is that…?"
"He looks like a frog" Jim blinked in shock at the Y-shaped cut that was intercepted by the fresh scar courtesy of Strickler's knife. Toby was right, he'd clearly been through so much if this was what remained behind. "Like those ones we dissected in biology"
"…I think I'm gonna be sick"
Whatever Jim was going to say became stuck in his throat when Dan's eyes blearily peeled open and rolled over towards him. Pain swam in those emerald orbs alongside confusion and relief. Why is he relieved to see us? What's he even doing here? Why's he in so much pain? There's nothing really here that can do that, right? It's just books and dust and cobwebs and flowers! Jim puzzled, brows furrowed in thought. Claire and Toby continued to fuss over the senior in Aaarrrggh's grip like a pair of headless chickens. Without their magical weapons, the three were just ordinary teens, as hard as it was to admit.
"Ah!" Aaarrrggh gasped, pulling Jim from his thoughts in time to see Dan become illuminated in an eery green glow. The troll dropped the senior as if he'd been zapped, but instead of collapsing to the floor like Jim thought he would, Dan remained levitating in the air above a triangular portal (like the ones Dan was forever pulling them away from). If Jim peered closer he would've seen a series of runes that encircled the circumference in spinning circles.
"Hear these words, hear my cry, spirit from the other side" Childish tones floated in through the portal and only added to the mystery.
"Wha—what's going on?!" Toby panicked. "You said magic doesn't work here!"
"How are we s'posed to know?!" Claire retorted, gripping tight to the Shadow Staff's sheath.
"It would appear that someone is performing a séance" Blinky informed them. "It's an old human tradition dating back centuries. Trolls have no need of such a ritual, of course, what with the—"
"—Blinky!"
"Apologies"
"Come to me, I summon thee, cross now the Great Divide!" Several green chunky chains surged upwards from the portal and ensnared Dan in them, wrapping him up tight. Jim could only watch dumbfounded as the limp senior was suddenly yanked downwards into the triangle and onto whatever laid beyond.
The green portal then zipped shut behind him, leaving nothing behind as if he'd never been there to begin. That was if Dan's bloodied thermos didn't remain idle at his feet. Jim bent to pick up the device, marvelling at the heaviness of it before turning back to his traumatised friends and concentrated on the task at hand, making note to return this whole…thing at a later date. Now time to find Merlin's tomb.
