Viral Attack - II - Dot Com Bust-Out

Danny Fenton was sprawled on the top edge of a small ridge over-looking a largish square building dominating a small island floating deep within the ghost zone. Sam and Tucker were beside him. He was squinting through a small rectangular box with the inevitable word "Fenton" stenciled on its side. Danny was fiddling with a number of knobs that projected from the side. After a moment, with a snarl, he cast it to the ground.

"Can't see a think through the Fentonoculars."

"Try these," Sam offered, handing him a large pair of binoculars. A Swiss name was discretely embossed on it.

Danny put them to his eyes, adjusted the focus and gasped when the image snapped into perfect focus. It seemed as it he was hovering scant feet above Warden Walker's ghost prison. Uniformed guards floated along the walkway on the top of the prison walls. Watchtowers built into each of the four corners of the wall were manned with more ghosts, armed with some kind of heavy blaster weapon. Inside the walls were a large exercise field filled with a small number of shackled ghosts (so they wouldn't try to fly away) and a larger number of guards, each armed with a glowing truncheon. Walker didn't trust anyone, especially ghosts he had seized and incarcerated in his prison. As far as Danny could tell, since there was no government, laws, or overarching authority in the ghost zone. Walker's prison existed by his fiat, and his prisoners were as much kidnap victims as spectral miscreants.

After watching the guards patrol for a few minutes Danny sighed and handed the glasses back to Sam. "He's got overlapping patrols everywhere, Danny explained. "There's no way I can sneak in over the top."

"What if we take the Specter Speeder," Tucker suggested. "We could drive through the walls, grab Technus and be out of there before Walker knew what hit him." It was a curious property of the Ghost Zone that things from the material world could pass through walls and such as easily as ghostly things could in the material world.

"We don't know where Technus is being held," Danny replied., "It's a bit hard to do a 'smash and grab' when we don't know where to grab."

Danny rolled on his back, pausing a moment to look at Sam. He was having trouble dealing with how she was dressed.

Instead of her usual dark skirt and tights Sam was wearing a pair of baggy camo pants printed in overlapping splotches of purple, grey and white. Her top was a tight sleeveless men's Tee, also printed in purple, gray and white splotches and her long, black hair was tucked up in a baseball cap of the same design. Her usual black boots stood out in sharp contrast to the rest of her outfit. When he can gone to pick her up in the park that morning he had walked right past her at first.

"Danny!" she had called indignantly.

"Sam?"

"What?"

"You look....different."

"What, I can't change my clothes once in a while?"

"No, no, it's not that. It's just...so different."

"You don't like it?" Sam got up and started towards the patch of dense foliage Danny used for changing into Danny Phantom.

"It's so...bright," Danny lamely offered, following Sam into the concealing brush. "I thought Goths likely only dark things."

"Well.... purple is dark, and it has gray, too. Gray is very Goth because it's neither one or the other, you know. It's a conflicted color."

"Color has conflicts?"

"I am thinking of staining some of the fabric black; tone down some of the whiteness." She turned around to face Danny. "But I can't believe you didn't recognize me. Am I that predictable in what I wear? Or don't you look beyond the clothes people wear and look at them in the face?"

That was a bad question to ask in a tight T-shirt, Danny hastily moved his eyes to hers.

"I was thinking about how we're going to get in to talk to Technus," he mumbled, transforming into Danny Phantom. He took her hand, made them both invisible and flew off to the FentonWorks.

***

Danny slide down the slope a bit before standing up and walking the rest of the way down to the Specter Speeder. He didn't want to risk the chance that the guards on the prison wall might see them. The other two got up and followed.

Danny was sitting at a tiny breakfast table in the back of the speeder, doodling on a pad a paper when they arrived. Sam could see where he had sketched in a view of the prison with its watchtowers and walkways. Danny wasn't a good artist but she could figure out what he was getting at. She slip into a chair beside him, Tucker took the one opposite. Danny started adding an image of the Specter Speeder hurtling towards a large wooden castle-like gate. After an awkward moment Tucker suggested, "We could dress up like a couple of guards and pretend we're delivering you to the prison. That would get you in at least."

"That only works in movies because it's funny." Sam argued.

"Neither of you could pass for ghosts. You're too...substantial." Danny said without looking up. He was adding speed lines to his picture. After a moment he threw down his pencil and leaned back in his chair. He closed his eyes in thought.

"Tuck's idea might work," he said, finally.

"Dressing up like guards?" Sam asked in disbelieve.

"No, the smash and grab. Only not with the Speeder." He leaned forwards. "Danny Phantom can't walk through walls here in the Ghost Zone, but Danny Fenton can. So I'm going fly around to an unobserved part of the prison wall, change into my normal self and just walk in."

"What are we supposed to do in all this?" Tucked asked. Sam just scowled disagreeably.

"Nothing. Once I get in I'll sneak around, passing through walls as needed until I find Technus, have a little talk with him and get back out. If I'm not out in two hours..."

"One hour." Sam insisted.

"...OK, one hour, then you come in with the Speeder and get me. I'll have on a pair of Fenton Phones so you can track me."

"Woohoo!" Tucker shouted.

"What makes you think you can do all this without running into Walker. No only does he have it for you for various past reasons, but I'm sure that sneaking into his prison is a violation."

"You got a better idea?"

"No. But I don't think this is a good one either. Danny, is this something worth risking your life about?"

Danny glanced at Sam but couldn't meet her eyes. "I don't want a million spam Technuses running around the world."

"I'm sure we can stop them without breaking into Walker's prison."

"Sam, I gotta do this. I've got to know where these viruses are coming from."

"Girl, you are not giving Danny enough credit for what he can do."

"Tucker, don't ever called me 'girl' again." Sam snapped.

"But you are!"

"And you're a boy but I never calll you that. It's demeaning. I don't want to hear it again."

Tucker looked at Danny for support but found his friend as confused as he was. "But that's how my people speak."

"'Your people?' You mean other geeks?" Danny laughed.

"Other ghost fighters?" Sam added. "Sorry, I get a little touchy on the 'girl' thing. Like I'm not supposed to have ideas or opinions and have to defer to 'The Man' all the time."

"Well, T'Keisha likes it when I call her 'girl'."

"Does she, really?" Sam asked, quietly

"Heck, I don't know."

"You guys can work out your issues while I'm gone. I want to get this over with while I still have my nerve up." Danny got up and walked out of the speeder. As he passed through the door, a bright ring of light sprang up around his middle and raised to either end of his body, changing him from Danny Fenton into the ghostly Danny Phantom.

* * *

Danny flew low and away from the ridge overlooking Walker's prison. When he reached the edge of the small floating island they had landed on he swooped down and under. Different regions of the Ghost Zone were different. Some zones were all doors leading to other places or dimensions, others were filled with never-ending fog and some parts had floating islands. The islands were like icebergs floating in some existential sea. While the islands possessed gravity the region they floated in didn't. The islands drifted but only slightly and not as if they were in any kind of stream or current. Plants, trees, grasses grew on the islands. Sometimes animals lived there, too, but there was no sun and at the best of times the Ghost Zone was dingy. How the plants could grow there was just another mystery of the Ghost Zone. As Danny had noticed about his own ghost powers, they didn't seem to "come" from anywhere, they were just there.

Soon Danny had sailed past the deepest root of his island and the larger shadow of Walker's island came into view. He was sufficient below the plane of the surface of Walker's island that the walls of the prison could not be seen. Meaning, that the guards on the walls couldn't see him, either. Danny carefully looked around to be sure that the ghost warden hadn't done something as sensible as an aerial patrol covering the underside of his island. As far as he could tell the way was clear.

He jetted out into the void between the two islands. The trip was longer than he had expected, the way across vaster than it had appeared. But soon he found himself near the root of Walker's island. He swung around for a moment looking for the island he had left. He spotted it by a glint of light coming off the ridge running along the top. Sam's super-powerful binoculars, Maybe? Had they given themselves away earlier when they had peered at the prison with those powerful lenses? Was Walker already waiting for him to attempt a break in?

Danny remembered seeing a clump of bushes off to one side of the prison, near the edge of the island. That seemed the safest cover for coming over the edge of the island and landing on its surface. Or was the bushes too convenient? Had Walker planted them there to lure escapees into a trap? Danny couldn't be sure but the doubts, the self-questioning was beginning to wear on his nerves.

He found the bushes where he thought they would be. Not as close to the wall as he would like, but close enough. He stared into them intently for a time before moving, but could not find anything resembling surveillance equipment.

Danny scrambled over the edge of the floating island and scurried into the shelter of the bushes. He worked his way to the front and squinted at the ghosts patrolling along the top of the prison. When he judged they were least likely to see him he sprinted towards the wall, pressing himself tight against it when he got there.

His heart was pounding in his chest like it would explode any minute. His mouth was dry, his breath short and hot. Taking a deep breath, Danny reached in and turned himself inside out. Rather than the black suited Danny Phantom, tousle-haired Danny Fenton leaned against the wall, in blue jeans and white Tee shirt.

Slowly he pushed against the wall and sank into it.

The wall was thicker than he expected. He had to take a long step before his head surfaced on the other side. He seemed to be in an disused storeroom. Dusty boxes and discarded furniture were scattered about the floor. Danny breathed a sigh of relief. So far so good.

He eased his head through the door and saw a hallway that joined another hallway maybe thirty feet beyond. He walked through the door into the hallway and quietly made his way to the end. The hall here was better lit. Open cells ran along the length of the hall. Apparently this was a disused portion of the prison. Danny was surprised that Walker hadn't just kept hauling prisoners in until the whole jail was filled.

Danny stepped into the brighter hallway and went down along it until he came to another intersection. He paused to listen for sounds before putting his head around the corner. He was about to move on when he heard a voice on the other side. Two voices. Coming his way.

"...rry the Rat is saying that Johnny 13 is planning an escape for tomorrow night or maybe the day after."

"Someone must be helping him," Walker replied. "We'll let him go and see who he flushes out. If it's one of my guards, they'll regret the day they ever decided to get bent."

The voices were nearly on him. To avoid detection Danny melted into the wall and fell out into an occupied prison cell. He spun around in alarm as a familiar voice purred, "Aren't you a sight for sore eyes. Say it, big boy, Say my name..."

"Ember?"

"Oh-h-h-h-h-h." the sound burbled from her mouth like the groan of a junkie weeks without a hit.

"Again. Say it again."

Danny saw her laying on a narrow cot hanging from the wall. The ghost musician was dressed in ugly prison orange, though she had found some way to personalize her outfit. It seemed to fit tightly about her bosom and waist, emphasizing a lush figure, the envy of any woman rock star. Her hair still floated in a glorious mane of white but the curlicue tattoo around her eyes looked tired and faded.. She looked tired and faded.

"What are you doing here?" he asked.

"I could ask you the same, kid," she replied. "Don't make me beg, say my name."

"I will if you will tell me where I can find Technus."

"Why do you want that old blowhard when you can have me?" Ember oozed upright, swinging her legs over the side of her cot. She arched her back like a cat, stretching her uniform even more. A broad smile crossed her face but it looked cold, hungry.

"I gotta find out why he's sending spam email to my friends."

"Who needs friends when you can have me," she whispered in a husky voice.

"I like my friends. They remain my friends whether or not I say their names."

"But can they take you to Rock and Roll Heaven? Can they set your soul afire? Can they write a song that will have millions chanting your name? I can. I can do all that for you Danny Fenton, if you just say me name."

"So what do they call you around here that you're so desperate to have someone say your name?"

"To those pigs I'm inmate #647938. Who wants to be remembered by such an ugly name? Not me, not Ember McLain, the greatest rocker of all time!"

"I thought that was Elvis..."

"Don't toy with me boy! Say my name."

"Where can I find Technus?"

The ghost sighed and lay back on her cot.

"And you'll say my name if I tell you?"

"Yes. I promise."

"They keep him somewhere in the dungeons. I've never been down there so I can't help you more."

"How do I get to the dungeons?"

"My name..."

"Ember, how do I find the dungeon?"

"Oohhh. Aahh." She sighed again. Suddenly she sat up, bright eyed, energized. "Take me with you," she said, "and I'll show you the way."

Danny considered the offer. "Just tell me how to find the dungeon. I'll say your name again if you'll do that."

"Take me along."

"This is a jail break in, not a break out," Danny said firmly.

"Then why should I help you?"

"You know why, Em--"

The ghost looked expectantly at Danny waiting for him to finishing saying her name. But he let the syllable fade into the air.

"Don't leave me like this?"

"The longer I stay here the more likely that Walker will catch me. If you won't help me, I'll be on my way."

Danny turned and started to walk into the wall. He was about half way through when he heard her call, "wait."

Danny turned and found the ghost musician halfway across her cell, her hands were knotted, desperate.

He waited.

"Ok, turn left when you leave my cell, follow along the hall. It circles the whole prison. About half way around there will be signs for Cell Block H. There's a corridor there leading to an inner circle of cells. The corridor ends at some stairs leading down to the lower levels. The dungeons are down there somewhere. That's all I know. There are guards patrolling the hall outside but they don't come around too often."

"Thanks, Ember McLain."

The ghost sighed again. More powerfully than she had before.

"Thanks, kid. You don't know how good that feels. Hey, how about a kiss before you go. A little thank you for all your help?"

Ember was drifting close to Danny, her lips pursed to a kiss. She looked incredibly desirable, sensual. Danny didn't get kissed by beautiful women very often, and though Ember was a ghost, well, she was every bit a woman ghost. He was starting to lean in towards her for the kiss when he remembered that she was a ghost and ghosts have the power to possess people, and right now he was a people.

"Maybe next time," Danny hurriedly said, ducking into the wall, avoiding Ember's grasping arms.

Out in the hall, Danny leaned back against the door to Ember's cell and shuddered. He wasn't sure just what he had escaped but from the cursing coming from her cell he was pretty sure he had just escaped from something bad.

***

Danny turned left as instructed and followed his way around the hall of cells. There were occasional crossways cutting from the outer ring of cells to the exercise yard in the center of the prison. A couple times Danny heard guards coming and melted into the wall to hide. One time he found himself in an unused cell, the other time the cell contained some vague, but very large shape snoring loud and wetly on the bunk. Danny nervously waited until the guards had passed then walking back through the wall with a breath of relief.

The intersections between the circular halls and the radial ones were all marked, Danny soon realized. He had started at Cell Block B and quickly passed through Cell Blocks C, D and E. Nearly Cell Block H he realized that there was more activity there. Guards passing on the crossways, a steady buzz of muted conversation. Finally he reached the third ring of prison cells. The radial hall he was in ended at a large, wooden door with heavy iron hinges. Through the door he could glimpse rough hewed stones, angling down to form a wide stairs.

Waiting carefully for the hall to clear of guards, Danny sprinted across the way and into the stairs. He clattered down the stairs, the hard stones echoing every step in alarming volume. He reached the bottom of the stairs and found himself in a small chamber. Two halls lead off from there. One was lit by electric lights hanging from wires stapled to the ceiling. The other was dimmer, with a few flaming torching offering the only light available. Danny turned that way.

Technus was the master of all things technical or mechanical so he couldn't be held in the average cell in Walker's prison. Those doors were locked and unlocked by switches run from a control room. Technology that Technus would exploit. The only place that could hold him was in some technology free cell, someplace without, for example, electric lights.

The hall went on a lot longer than Danny had expected. There were a number of cell along the way. These cells did not have locks. Heavy wooden bars dropped into brackets on either side of the door, locking it into place. There was no technology here for Technus to exploit. This was the one part of the prison that could contain Technus and his particular powers.

Danny had to stop at each cell and listen for sounds of occupation, sometimes sticking his head in to see who was there. When he finally reached Technus' cell there was no doubt that the cell was occupied and who was in it. Technus never stopped talking. Danny walked through the door, catching Technus by surprise in mid-tirade.

"What!" the ghost squawked in his high-pitched, irritating voice, then in a more normal voice, "are you doing here, child?"

"I've come to see you about an E-mail."

"What E-mail? As you can see I have neither the means nor the opportunity to make use of such glorious technology."

"It was an E-mail sent two days ago, supposedly from my friend Tucker's computer to a friend of his. It contained a virus. a ghost virus..."

"A ghost virus?" Technus echoed. "Interesting. How does one turn a ghost into a virus?"

"I was hoping you would know."

"I, Technus, am master of all things technological and mechanical, but this I have not heard of before. Tell me, child, about this E-mail virus."

Danny was puzzled. "You don't know anything about this? But it was you who came out of the virus to attack our friend."

"And I tell you, child, I, Technus, have been here all this time, forced to lick my wounds and brood on the failure of my plans."

"What about Boucou Buxcs? Ever heard of him? Made plans with him, perhaps?"

"Technus works alone, child, surely you know that by now."

Danny scowled and tried to think of another line of attack. "Have you ever heard of someone going around calling themselves Technus 0.7?"

"I, Technus, am the one and only master of technology! No one would bare to steal my name!"

"And the 0.7 thing?" Danny prodded.

"Technus has always been whole and complete. There has never been a fractional version of me."

"No clones, duplicates, spin-offs, copies or emulation?"

"Never!" Technus raged for a moment.

"Well, something weird is going on because yesterday I battled a ghost in the mortal world who looked like you, only like a crudely rendered version of your earlier self. It called itself Technus 0.7. Acted and talked like you. And seemed to materialize out of an E-mail sent to our friend from someone signing themselves as Boucou Buxcs. None of any of this sounds at all familiar to you?" Danny watched Technus' reaction. The ghost had stopped its endless swirling about his prison cell and listened to Danny's story with rapt attention.

"I, Technus, will destroy them. No one. I repeat, no one, steals the look and attribute of me. No one ever! Free me from this accursed cell, mortal child and I will hunt them down to the ends of space and time and destroy them. No one makes a mockery of Technus!"

Danny hadn't considered the idea of working with Technus so the offer came as a shock. The ghost seemed earnestly confused and outraged. But would it really be wise to let him out? Technus was a dangerous ghost, and wily. Maybe he would find Boucou Bucxs or maybe he would just turn on Danny.

Before Danny could make up his mind the cell door slammed open and a familiar voice barked, "No one is escaping from my prison." Danny spun about to see Walker and a dozen of his goons standing in the hall, glowing truncheons in their hands.

Danny turned and ran, grabbing Technus as he passed. Together they passed through the cell wall into another cell and through that into another. A dragon like creature lunged at them only to be drawn up short by a chain around its leg.

Danny angled back to where he believed the hall would be, passed through another wall and found himself in the dim hall, near the stairs. Technus was dragging behind him like a balloon on a short string, squawking every time they passed through another wall. Danny pounded up the stairs, burst through a crowd of disorganized guards and headed for the doors to the exercise compound in the center of the prison. Walker's voice could be heard not far behind yelling instructions to his guards.

A gun blast shattered the stone wall near Danny's head, showering him with hot bits of rock. He ducked and tried to run faster but he was rapidly running out of breath. He ran through the first set of doors to the outside just as another blast passed over his head. He wasn't sure whether a charge from Walker's gun would pass through him the same as he could pass through walls because he was a moral in the Ghost Zone but he didn't want to find out.

A second set of doors, heavy barred, was swinging close as Danny passed. A third set were already close. Habit must have caused the guards to close the doors to stop an escaping prisoner, forgetting that Danny wasn't stopped by doors or walls. They were slowing Walker, though, and that was a good thing.

As he emerged from the last door into the exercise yard Danny switched from mortal to ghost, launching himself into the air almost before the twin bands of light had finished twisted his body through the fourth dimension. He dropped his grip on Technus and yelled, "Come on."

And ran right into a squad of goons.

Danny had forgotten about the many guards stationed in the exercise yard to prevent ghosts from trying to escape. He just knew he had to get aloft and away as fast as possible, back to the Specter Speeder and safety. He was wrestled to the ground. Guards gripped his wrists, trying to twist them behind his back where cuffs could be attached. Danny knew if that ever happened he would never get out of Walker's prison.

Technus was already down, with a number of guards pummeling him unmercifully with their stun truncheons. Wrapping his hands in boiling gobs of ectoplasm Danny was able to keep the guards from completely immobilizing him. A pair of shiny black boots planted themselves in front of him. "Boy, you are in a mess of trouble," Walker growled, "breaking and entering, conspiracy to liberate a dutifully incarcerated miscreant, resisting arrest. It's going to be a long time before you will ever leave here."

"You haven't caught me yet," Danny snapped. He stopped struggling for an instant, and when the guards loosened their grip on him, switched back to mortal form, slipping into the ground, swam through the ectoplasmic substance away from the guards before breaking free, again as a ghost, streaking into the sky.

"Damn you!" Walker shouted. He drew his gun and took aim at Danny retreating form. The range was small. Danny's back filled the sights. Walker smiled with cruel humor as he squeezed the trigger.

A ball of fire exploded over Danny. He gasped in pain, He staggered in the sky for a moment, unable to concentrate. He fought through the pain, tried to stay focused on escaping. If he could reach the Speeder he would be safe. It was just a short distance away on the next floating island. It could out-fly any ghost. All he had to do was stay focused, keep flying and not get shot again....

Walker laughed and aimed the gun again. "I've got you this time, Ghost Boy. No body escaped from Walker." He pulled the trigger again.

Nothing happened.

"What the --!" He turned to see Technus laughing.

"I am Technus, master of things mechanical and I say the child goes free!"

Walker growled. He pointed the gun at Technus and pulled the trigger but it remained jammed. He shoved the useless gun back in its holster. "Get him out of here!" he shouted to the guards. "Put him in the hotbox! Let's see him laugh after sweating in there for a month. And scramble the cycle patrol! Get that boy!"

Danny streaked through the ether, trying to ignore the pain in his side. The island floated up ahead. As he crested the top he could see the tubular shaped Specter Speeder, it's outside door open and welcoming. Home. Home and freedom. Danny drove towards it.