Time passed as it always did, mindless of whatever struggle you were going through. Dan spent the weeks following the electro-thermal bounty hunter incident and the subsequent false quarantine, in full ghost mode, haunting the places wherever he felt the most safe. This included Make-out Point, the magical thirteenth floor of Babylon Towers where he had bumped into more than one of his supernatural acquaintances (including Douxie & Zoe), and the mothership. Mother had dogged his steps for the first few days after he had shyly returned, slipping in through the back door and hunkering down inside one of her many vent shafts. He had enjoyed the feeling of her engine purring in time with his core and more often than not, fell asleep to the atmosphere created because of it.
The few times he had haunted the thirteenth floor of Babylon Towers, he had either crashed on George's couch or spent the hours playing with familiars like Archie, or even helped out with Ms Yav's tutoring students. But he was more of a hinderance than a help in that aspect; in fact the wrinkled changeling often found herself chasing after her students & the halfa through the hallways, much to the children's delight and her chagrin. And now Dan was back in the throes of the Tarrons' lives and their various adventures around Arcadia. Like the trollhunters and the wizards, these Akiridion siblings seemed to draw trouble to them like a magnet…it was that the town itself? Dan could believe that the little town of Arcadia held some sort of beacon that brought all to it, it was one of the reasons he had ended up there afterall. It had just felt right.
Currently, Dan found himself staring slack-jawed and wide-eyed up at a large section of meteorite which had fallen from the sky mere hours ago and nearly struck Krel, Eli & Toby down in the street where they had been filming Toby's film. Now those same boys were gathered pale and shaken in the mothership as they stared up at the piece of space rock which had nearly squashed them into pancakes.
"…This meteorite is debris from a category 20 meteor shower originating from the Oxiom Galaxy, some 500 light-keltons away" Mother explained as she scanned the rock hovering above them.
"What? How did it get here?" Krel exclaimed as a screen popped up showing the meteorite's trajectory and subsequent countdown. The halfa's mouth had run dry as he was reminded of the last time he had faced down such a phenomenon and he had to wonder what were the odds that something like this would happen again.
"This is the best dolly ever!" Toby gushed from behind them, where he sat in one of the hover chairs and continued to record what was going on. "Uh, guys? Hey, what is that thing? I-Is that red thingy moving towards that green thingy?…Um, is that green thingy us?"
"An asteroid the size of Arcadia is set to make landfall in Arcadia in approximately 24 horvaths" Mother continued.
"Wait" Krel mused, "If a rock that size lands here, then…"
"…The whole town would be destroyed!" Aja ended.
"Along with the entire Western Seaboard" Zadra added, hands on hips.
"Wait—the entire Western Seaboard?!" Eli panicked as Toby shoved the recording camera into his face to capture his reaction.
"Oh please! This is nothing!" Toby laughed off. "Danny Phantom can just take out the flying space pebble like he did last time, right?"
"Last time?" Krel turned, brows furrowed, towards the halfa who stood off to the side with clammy hands shoved into his pockets and heavy tongue lolling in his mouth.
"Yeah! Yeah! Years ago, when Danny was a superhero, he and all the ghosts came together with the world and they built this huge metal-satellite-tower-spike-thing that ran around the world so they could turn the entire planet intangible! I don't remember it, but it was awesome in the comics!"
"Th—that—that was a different—that was completely different" Dan swallowed harshly around the lump in his throat as he shook his head against the expectant eyes.
"How?" Aja asked.
"Well for one" Dan licked his lips, "We had much more time to prepare"
"Yeah, but that one was like thrice this one's size!" Toby argued. "And the last one only affected ghosts and stuff! This one'll be no sweat!"
"No sweat?" Dan chuckled in disbelief before he turned to the fanboy. "Do you even know how much energy it takes to turn an entire planet and everything in it, on it & around it, intangible? The last time this happened, I had at least 40% of my human half, but now? If I do that again, it could kill my human half. For good"
"So that's a 'no' on the superhero comeback…?"
"What about this spaceship?" Eli asked as he slapped Toby's camera out of his face. "Doesn't she have something that can help?"
"Our V-Strykers routinely eliminated asteroids whenever they entered Akiridion airspace. Mother, activate your deep-space laser technology" Zadra suggested.
"That was destroyed during our escape from Akiridion-5" Mother replied.
"Then activate your mid-space laser technology" Krel retorted.
"Destroyed when we crashed on Earth"
"How about your near-space laser tech?" Aja tried, hoping that at least they had something like that still intact and operable.
"That would be Luug" The pup in question farted happily and rolled over, begging Toby for a belly rub whilst said cameraman complained about how the alien canine was such a diva who couldn't—or wouldn't—perform on command.
"Little brother" Aja turned to her sibling who stood at the controls.
"Hm?" Krel hummed, sparing a glance over his shoulder as he ran through various calculation, both in his head and on the screen.
"You need to build a deep-space laser and you need to build it fast!"
"Such a device would require technology that doesn't exist on this planet, and even with Daniel's assistance, it's still—"
"—Communication systems have been compromised" Mother interjected as the screens glitched several times before Kubritz appeared on the screen.
"Mother! End transmission, now!" Vex commanded as the woman who had been the bane of their most recent problems appeared before them.
"Please don't!" Kubritz pleaded, looking more concerned than Dan had ever seen the woman. "We—we need your help"
"After what you put us through?" Aja retorted incredulously. "Why would we ever help you?"
"Because, I wouldn't be calling unless you were humanity's best, last and I fear, only hope." It was almost funny how pained she looked in asking for assistance, particularly from them. Dan knew that the colonel was only buttering them up, but annoyingly, it seemed to be working. Not the puppy-dog eyes though, they just looked weird on such a usually stern face.
"Say we agreed, what would you have to offer us?"
"…Free-range of the alien technologies we have gathered over the years. Would that work?"
"I s'pose it'll have to do" Krel sighed.
"For the good of Arcadia" Aja finally agreed to her terms.
"For the good of the world" Kubritz pettily replied. "And what about you ghost boy? Can we count on help from your kind?"
"Unlikely" Dan denied nonchalantly, "The last one was made of ecto-ranium, which made a good incentive for the others to help out. Since this one is decidedly not, help'll be dismal at best"
"Meet me at the canal as soon as possible"
CLICK
"So…" Toby drawled, "What's the plan?"
"Ooh, ooh!" Eli suddenly perked up, nearly toppling from his chair as some thought clicked. "If Dan can't turn the whole planet intangible, then what about just the asteroid?"
"Huh?" Dan blinked dumbly at the bespectacled boy, a little annoyed that he didn't think of that himself.
"Yeah! Yeah!" Toby quickly jumped on board. "He could ride the whole thing through the planet and—bonus!—it wouldn't kill you!"
"…Yeah, that could work. I mean, I'd need something to help me get there quick enough, but it should be doable; an asteroid's a lot smaller than the planet, afterall. Krel?"
"I've got some ideas that could work…"
Evening had fallen by the time they were all gathered together at the canals. The commander and the two royals stood center stage in the middle of the canals whilst Zadra, Toby, Eli and Dan remained up on the bridge. The halfa and the Akiridion may have painted an imposing picture, but Eli and Toby left a lot to be desired even with the glowing war hammer and shiny ninja stars. "Varvatos Vex finds this plan most foolhardy" Complained Vex as he narrowed his eyes against the bright lights of the military car that parked not a few meters in front of them.
"That makes two of us" Aja agreed.
"Make that three" Krel added. "But we're out of good options here, and if the colonel has the resources we need then she may be our best bad choice"
"Not another step!" Aja called to the approaching woman and her lackey, Sergeant Costas. "Our team won't hesitate to turn you into flexel!"
"Oh snap! She said 'flexel' yo!" Toby sang as the head of his hammer knocked Eli off of his feet, and in turn, sent a ninja star flying towards Costas' thigh.
"Ah!" He hopped up and down in pain; especially when Kubritz simply plucked the weapon from his thigh without a flinch.
"You've brought backup, I see. Smart, but so have I" Kubritz smirked as she snapped her fingers, ordering the hazmats to emerge from the dark. "We have a code five—"
"—The asteroid, we are aware" Aja interjected. "What are your leaders doing about it?"
"We've been trying to draw up a plan to intercept it, but we fear the level of engineering required is beyond our current capabilities"
"Area 49B has the most advanced alien technological resources this planet has to offer" Costas continued where Kubritz left off. "But unfortunately…"
"…You don't know how to use them" Krel continued, easily picking up on their conundrum. "And that's where we come in"
"So you see, neither of us can solve this problem without the other" Kubritz purred.
"We have terms" Stated Aja.
"First, you will clear the base of any non-essential personnel and allow the king-in-waiting to bring his own team" Vex stated the terms.
"Second, as soon as this mission is over we go our separate ways" Aja went next. "And you leave us alone, for good"
"Fine, then we have a—" Kubritz began.
"—Ahem!" Toby coughed, catching the attention of those below as he texted his & Eli's own terms. "Eh, DJ Kleb!"
"And finally, my team will require 16, no, 60—?! Sixty cases of Nougat Nummies?!" Krel read out before spinning on his heel to stare incredulously up at the sheepish humans.
"Brain food!" Toby excused, sheepishly. "You'll thank us later!"
"We agree to your terms" Kubritz sighed as she strode forth and held out her hand to shake on the deal. "Now, do we have a deal?"
"After you make the most sacred of human oaths" Aja retorted, holding out her pinky finger to the confused colonel.
"…We have ourselves a deal" Kubritz complied, hooking her finger with the Akiridion's and sealing the deal.
The ride to 49B was tense and spent squashed between hazmats & each other. Dan couldn't be more glad to be half ghost than in that moment because Aja, Krel, Vex, Toby & Eli looked like sardines squashed into a tin can especially with the circlet of hazmats. Dan grinned unabashedly at their sour expressions as a wayward elbow swung through his belly and hit the person on the other side of him. They all looked like they were done with the world already, particularly as Aja bent down to try and have a not-so-private conversation with her boyfriend.
"Heh-hey-yo! It's the Palchuck!" Steve's voicemail rattled throughout the truck and Krel rolled his eyes at the blonde's cocky voice.
"It's Aja—" The queen-in-waiting whispered into the phone.
"—Don't worry about me, I'm just doing something—"
"—Take out the trash!" Steve's mother sounded faint in the background.
"I'm on the phone!" Steve retorted in kind, making Aja wince at the volume. "Anyway, just wait for the—"
BEEP!
"Ugh" Aja rolled her eyes at his antics. "Steve this is serious! We need to talk immediately! Call me"
"Trouble in paradise?" Eli waggled his brows suggestively before the truck took a sudden turn and he crashed into Vex's side with a grunt. A few more violent twists and turns later and they had arrived at Area 49B. Honestly, as soon as Dan stepped foot on the tarmac, he couldn't wait to leave.
"Whoa!" Toby & Eli gushed as they skipped from the vehicle, heads swivelling like schwarma on a stick. Behind them, the three Akiridions stuck close together and Dan felt his shoulders hunch up around his ears with each step. They couldn't wait to leave.
"Welcome to Area 49B" Costas greeted the boys.
"YES!" Eli cheered, "I knew it! I knew this place was real!"
"Awesome-sauce!" Toby sang.
"If you two tell anyone you came here, that asteroid's gonna be the least of your problems! Got it!" Lackey warned sternly.
"Oh yeah, hear ya Cap', loud and clear!" Toby saluted the man as he retreated with a roll of his eyes, before mischievous chuckles fell from his lips as he bent to retrieve his camera from his bag.
"Toby!" Eli scolded him.
"What? Think about the production value! Y'know…if we survive"
Before Dan knew what was going on, they were all hustled towards an abandoned warehouse that had been prepared for their arrival. A small diagram had been set up with a glossy moon, Earth and a crumb of that meteorite that had hit the town square. "…We have a rocket on standby" Costas giddily explained as he gestured with a toy rocket from the Earth, pass the moon to the could certainly tell that he was having fun playing with the rocket. "Roger that. Engage boosters! Ready to land a team on the asteroid…They can drill a nuclear bomb directly into its surface and—"
"—What are you? Twelve?" Dan snorted, cutting off the sergeant's explanation.
"Hey! Quiet in the cheap seats!" A hazmat called.
"What? Are you telling me that you weren't involved with the incident with the ecto-ranium asteroid twelve years ago? That'd be a first"
"Why you—"
"—Stop, stop, stop! Please stop!" Krel interjected as he bought up a hologram of the Earth and the incoming meteorite. "You're embarrassing your entire species! At this current speed an asteroid of this magnitude, can only be disintegrated by a deep-space thermo-radiant pulse laser"
"You think you can build that?" Kubritz asked sceptically.
"Please" Krel scoffed. "Does a larvox defecate in the Kygons?"
"…"
"Yes, the answer is yes. But that's not the issue; even if we do use the deep-space laser, there's still some complications involved"
"What kind of complications?"
"Dangerous ones. But don't worry, we've got an alternative" Krel clapped Dan's shoulder, jostling the halfa only slightly.
"How is that an alternative?"
"Let's just say I've had some practise" Dan smile sardonically as he crossed his arms.
