Dan sat on a dusty purple couch, holding his concerned child in his arms. The coffee table was littered with take-out containers and machine parts, and any clean space was covered in machine oil or cola stains. Said stains seemed to have been scrubbed furiously, only to be abandoned once hope of seeing the table beneath was lost.
Jack and Maddie were sitting in front of him, while Jazz shuffled in the kitchen, making tea. The entire situation was suffocating and tense, and Dan could tell the two ghost hunters were beginning to get uncomfortable. Part of him wondered when the last time they had visitors had been. Given the state of the living room, it had to have been a very long time...
Maddie finally broke the silence as she cleared her throat, eyes cautiously watching the man in front of her like he was some kind of monster. He could only assume it was mother's intuition. "So... Dan, was it? What do you know about ghosts?"
The way the woman had said "ghosts" was concerning. There wasn't as much curiosity as there was loathing, and that made the beast within want to growl. But instead he shrugged. "Not much. Being more of a ghost chaser than a hunter, I've never gotten close enough to examine one. I've seen them around though... You don't seem very fond of ghosts."
Jack speaks up, with his eyes unnaturally sharp. "Of course not! Ghosts are horrible creatures that don't deserve to exist!"
Danny's whimper went unnoticed by the Fenton's, but Dan found himself holding the boy just a bit closer while trying to control his paternal instincts. "Why do you hate them so much?"
A tired frown etched its way onto Maddie's face, while her husband fell quiet. She placed a hand on his shoulder, but whether it was more for him or her was hard to tell. "Well, you see... 14 years ago, our son Danny went missing without a trace. We could only assume that a ghost had stolen him."
And then the pieces clicked, and Dan found his mouth had managed to go dry after several years. The intense hatred of ghosts, the devotion to their research, Jazz looking worse for wear, and the lack of a Danny Fenton... He was silently thankful when Jazz sat a cup of tea down on one of the cleaner spots on the coffee table. She then, just as silently, returned to the kitchen.
"What about you?" Maddie asks when the full ghost doesn't speak. "Why are you so interested in ghosts?"
Dan took a drink from the tea Jazz had provided so he could think-hardly noticing that it was still too hot for a sane person to drink. He then sets the cup on the table and breathes a heavy sigh. The ghost could only assume that everything prior to when he stole Danny was the same here, meaning that the ghost hunters should believe what he had to say no problem. Besides, this wouldn't be lying so much as stretching the truth. It would be easier to keep straight that way.
"...I suppose I can tell you then." Dan said, placing a hand in Danny's hair. "You see, we're not from this place. Ghosts have always messed with mine and my son's life, and they're the reason that we're here... We come from another timeline, where a ghost resides-said to be the most powerful ghost in existence. He destroyed our world, but the few survivors that remain tried their best to fight back-I being one of them."
"But while we were preparing our latest plan, he struck. He killed many of us, but he'd sent me and my son here, to what I can only assume is the past. We need to get back and soon, but while we were here I figured we could find some information about ghosts that might help us beat him." And as predicted, Jack was eating the story up like fudge while Maddie stared skeptically.
"You came from the future..." She said, mostly to herself. "Can you prove it?"
Dan's eyebrows scrunched together as he thought about what he could possibly do. Using his powers would get him nowhere, and any information he could provide would make the couple question why he knew so much about them. But then he looked down, and the sight of the young halfa in his arms gave him an idea.
"Well... In my timeline, we set up shop in this building, and in the basement was a lab, and a portal." That really got the attention of the family, as even Jazz peaked out from the kitchen when Dan said this.
"Y-yes, that's right." Maddie said, eyes wide as she watched him. "But we could never get it to turn on. Right now it's just a hole in the wall."
Dan slid Danny off of his lap and stood up. "Well, if you don't mind I could take a look at it. I bet I could get it working."
The two ghost hunters looked at each other, before they nodded and started making their way towards the basement. But rather than follow immediately, Dan approached Jazz-who was looking up at him with a worried and yet analytical look to her eye. She was psychoanalyzing him again... She never changed.
"Jazz, right? Could you come downstairs with us and watch Danny for me? I'd leave him with your parents, but they seem..." Dan trailed off, pleased with the look of understanding he was met with, and made his way downstairs. Danny followed behind him, Jazz doing the same, until they reached the bottom of the stairs.
The basement wasn't very different from the one in their timeline, making it a bit less overbearing to Danny. There were more loose cogs and springs scattered about, and unfinished weapons lining the walls, but otherwise it was the same. And after the halfa processed this fact, he found himself being held up to eye-level with Dan.
"Now Danny, I need you to stay with Jazz right now, okay?" Dan spoke lowly, making sure the two hunters couldn't hear him say the boy's name just yet-one problem at a time.
The small child glanced at the redhead, who was offering a friendly smile and a gentle wave. Something about her was comforting, much more so than the hunters, and so Danny nodded. Leaping back to the ground he ran up to Jazz and held up a small hand to shake. The teen laughed lightly and shook it, carrying on a polite conversation as Dan approached the portal.
It was by far more organized than the one he remembered, but given how much more work seemed to have been put into it that made sense. Wires were parallel to one another, and it felt brighter inside. Granted, the brightness could come from the ability to see in the dark, but that was beside the point. The point was that, if given a couple more years, Dan might not have half-died.
Danny's giggle in the background however killed any further dwelling on that thought. If that hadn't happened, he wouldn't have the boy... And besides, he did kill the cause of that in turn, so everything worked out.
Smile now on his face, Dan reached for the extension cables that powered the portal and pried them apart. He then made his way inside, a quick glance around leading him to the "On" button that still lied on the inner walls of the device. Dan's smile faded to a look of exasperation as he pressed it and made his way back out. Even after all these years, he still couldn't wrap his head around how they did that.
As Dan picks up the cords however, he hears the scrape of sneakers on metal and glances up. He then rolled his eyes, handing one of them to Danny while kneeling in front of him. A bright smile forms on the halfa's face at this, and Dan can't help the small smile on his own as he speaks. "On three."
"One... Two... Three!"
The two connect the plugs, and the portal jumps to life. Whirring fans are heard as ectoplasmic energy bathes the room in an eerie green light. Long shadows are cast from the two ghosts before the portal, while shocked faces stared into the unearthly swirls.
"You... You did it." Maddie took a step forwards, unable to believe her eyes as she fell to her knees in amazement. "You really did it..."
"So, will you help us?" Dan asked, and found his lips curling into an almost shady smirk that went unnoticed amongst the silent celebration as they nodded. "Good. Then we'll come back tomorrow to discuss a plan of action. Until then-"
"Wait." Dan glanced at Maddie, his arms frozen in a held out position-to pick up Danny. "What are your names...?
Dan hesitated, seeing that familiar whirring in the woman's eye. It was the kind of whirring that he'd seen many times-one that meant she suspected there was something off about this situation. What that something was? Only the two specters knew-and Dan hoped to keep it that way.
But then again, this was Jack and Maddie they were talking about. "...Dan. Dan Phantom. And this is my son, Danny."
Maddie's purple orbs moved to the small child, who was now clung to the man and staring at her. She stared back a bit longer, only for any hope to dwindle when no sign of recognition appeared on his face. She simply nodded and turned away, missing the small smile Dan wore at her hidden anguish.
"It was nice meeting you." And a moment later, they stood back on the crater-less streets of Amity Park as Jazz shut the door behind them.
Breathing a sigh of relief, Dan looked up at the sky. He figured it was around noon by now, but couldn't carry the thought along as he was brought back to reality by an insistent yank on his ponytail. "Dad, I'm still hungry! Can we have more of those burgers?"
Dan looked down at the boy, who still had his right hand wrapped around the dark hair, with a smile. "Why don't we try something else? We can go to the mall, find some stuff for the house, and then I'll let you try pizza. I loved it when I was younger."
Danny beamed at those last few words and nodded, as Dan took a turn down an alleyway and placed the boy on his feet. He allowed his disguise to peel away as Danny transformed and flew onto his back, hands gripping the cape as Dan turned them invisible. "Then let's get going."
A/N: Do you guys actually like these author's notes? I don't actually know. Thanks for the added reviews though guys, and props to Acidwing for figuring out where this timeline was before Dan. But you can't blame him-things are kinda stressful for him right now. (Don't you just hate it when you go through a ghost portal with your child and end up in the same dimension as the parents you stole him from?)