A/N: Another thirteen-day hiatus. But - alas! I actually have a decent excuse this time. First, I went to New York City for seven days, then, because said trip meant getting about an hour of sleep a night and traipsing all over Manhattan with only an incredibly soggy (I kid you not) Subway sandwhich in my stomach, I got sick. I'm still sick. But there's little I can do about it, so last night I just sucked it up and finished this.

Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or any characters or plots associated, that honor belongs to Viacom, Nickelodeon, and Butch Hartman; nor am I making any money of of this.

Chapter Ten

"You're wanted on level five."

I stopped and stared at Lewis. I suddenly had a vague recollection of the very first time I met Toby. He'd been heading to the fifth floor at the time. Is that where he goes? I wondered.

"You're wanted on level five," Lewis repeated. "Now."

I blinked, coming out of my thoughts. "Why?" I asked. Lewis glared at me and pushed me out the door.

"No one else asks that, you know," Lewis said. "Just come on." I moved over to walk beside him and followed, now in a state of mute curiosity.

He stopped next to the elevator, pushed the 'up' button, and shoved me on. I managed to press the 'five' button before he could do it for me. He scowled slightly and stared at me until the elevator doors were securely closed.

"Glad he's gone." I didn't jump. It was Toby's voice, after all, and I was quite used to him appearing out of nowhere. "I never liked Lewis."

"You know him?" I asked the general elevator.

"Of course I know him," Toby said. "He was under Lupé until he asked for a transfer."

I didn't want to know why he'd wanted a transfer. I really didn't.

"What's on level five, anyway?"

Toby became visible, and I noted that his face didn't look much better than it did the day before. "Picture yourself on a boat on a river with tangerine trees and marmalade skies."

I sighed, irritated. "Stop ripping off Beatles lyrics and tell me what the heck is going on."

Toby just grinned. "Roll up for the magical mystery tour," he said, without a hint of sheepishness, and I sighed. He was being as useless as ever, and I obviously wasn't going to get any more out of him than usual.

The elevator pulled to a stop, and the doors opened. Toby stepped in front of me before I could catch a decent look and strode easily out. I followed, almost skittishly, behind him. It was a long hallway, possibly an office complex.

"What is this place?" I whispered.

Toby said, perfectly loudly, "Level five. Administration and . . . marketing."

"Then why are we here?" I asked, slightly louder than before. Toby didn't answer, but I still got the feeling he was smiling. I felt the urge to slap him.

How could he be so nonchalant about everything? Everything - the prospect of being bought up by some rich idiot, the idea that he wasn't human, everything. It was completely infuriating. And on top of that, he wouldn't tell me anything at all.

"Here we are," he said cheerfully, stopping in front of a seemingly random door. "Mrs. Garner's office."

He led me in. This Mrs. Garner's office was sleek, yet old-fashioned - most of the furniture was obviously antique, but everything was placed in very efficient places.

Toby gestured for me to sit down in a wooden chair, and he sat down in one right next to it. "Mrs. Garner and Emma will be here soon."

"Who's Emma?" I asked, settling for the question he was most likely to answer.

"Our fellow non-complacent." Then he sighed happily. "And the most beautiful person ever to be born."

"Our . . ."

"Fellow non-complacent," he repeated, but didn't elaborate. I resigned myself to fidgeting in my seat.

A couple of minutes later, the door opened, and I turned around to see who it was. "We're here," an older woman, presumably Mrs. Garner, said, stepping through the door. "Emma, get in here."

Mrs. Garner walked all the way into her office, and sat down in front of her desk. I was so busy watching her that I didn't notice Emma shuffle through the door and take a seat next to Toby.

"I just want you two to know - oh. You're here."

I blinked, and nodded.

"Danny, right?" I nodded again. "All right, then. You ought to've said something, kid." She paused. "Anyway, I want you two to know that your work with Mr. Masters was highly successful, even if he has yet to make any sort of decision, he's still informed us that he is definitely looking to buy."

Like so man things recently, it honestly took me a minute to process that. Then . . . "What?"

Toby and Mrs. Garner ignored me, but Emma leaned back in her seat to look at me. I glanced over, and instantly recognized her. She was the blue-haired, turquoise-eyed girl from the whole incident with Mrs. Kilpear. She stared for a minute, then brought up her hand in a 'shhh' motion.

". . . so you'll be spending the week with Maxine Roberta and her husband," Mrs. Garner finished. "And, Emma, you can stop staring at Danny. He's no more a freak than you."

"Yes, Mom," Emma said quietly, repositioning herself again. My thoughts were so strictly VladVladVladVladVlad that the 'Mom' bit didn't quite sink in.

Mrs. Garner recollected herself, and peered at us. "The Robertas are ideal candidates for our little marketing program. Both have watched the city they were raised in fall to shambles thanks to a mob of freaks. They're likely very prejudiced, but no so much as to want you all dead, since they themselves have had no casualties. And they're very, very rich."

"So is this a standard step-in, suck-up operation?" Toby asked, cocking his head to one side.

Mrs. Garner smiled, and not altogether pleasantly. "Probably. And don't let the intern screw it up. It's not everyday such a perfect opportunity shows up."

"All right then," Toby said, standing up. Then he gestured for the door. "Emma, Danny? After you."

I stood up numbly, following Emma out the door. Toby drifted out behind us. After Mrs. Garner's door was shut and we were somewhat down the hall. "I guess you'll be needing the 411, eh?" he asked.

Emma glanced at me again. "Mom really won't be happy if you screw this up."

I snapped out of my Vlad-induced stupor to stare at Emma. "That was your mom?"

"Yeah," she said. I didn't question further. Besides, I was too busy trying to push Vlad out of my mind (while still getting the information I needed) to worry about her family life.

"Right," Toby said, cutting in. "The basics of the advertising job: the three of us go off and spend a week with some rich old bat, or some rich family, or some rich couple, or just some generally rich people and try to convince them that forced domestic servitude is a good idea, via much self-depredating, sanctimonious justification of the practice, and, above all, sycophancy." He paused. "Usually they're good about picking good people to advertise to, but I remember one particularly nasty time in which we tried to present a pitch to a rather enthusiastic civil rights activist . . ."

Emma snorted. "That was pretty bad. Hallelujah for mem-mod."

"Mem-mod?" I questioned.

"Short for memory modification," Toby explained.

Given that this new tidbit of information did not surprise me in the slightest (my standards for 'strange' had increased astronomically in the past year, and in the past couple of months), I simply went on to my next question. "And how, exactly, do we convince them to let us stay with them for a full week?"

Emma shrugged. "Don't ask me. That bit's taken care of by the time we get there."

Raising an eyebrow, I looked at her. "Speaking of which . . . how exactly do we get there?"

"Van, if it's close, copter or plane if it's not. No idea where these people live, so I don't know about this particular trip."

"Ah," I said. "So the entire point of this job is nudging the quality of our own lives down the drain?"

"Of course," Toby said, smirking slightly. "We're the ones who refused to be affected by the complacency compound, so, in turn, we refused that last ounce of personal dignity. On top of that you two got some nice side effects, but, ah . . ." He started giggling slightly as Emma rammed him in the arm.

"Shut up, Toby," she said, almost playfully. I blinked, and decided to ignore the implications of this, before stopping dead in my tracks.

"The what?"

Emma and Toby stopped, as well, and exchanged meaningful 'poor, poor, naïve fool' looks before sighing in unison. "Are you that thick?" Emma asked. "You didn't notice that everyone here, I don't know, doesn't seem to give a rat's ass about their lives being ruined?"

"Em, language," Toby chastised.

"I did notice that. I'm not freaking blind, you know."

"Well, there's something keeping them in line, Dan. The wiser of us call it the complacency compound, 'cause it's official name is just about longer than anyone can say in a single breath without dying of oxygen depravation." Toby wrapped his arm around my shoulder. "But don't worry. All it did to you and Emmalina-aquamarine over there is permanently scar your chances of finding a sane significant other." Emma flushed horribly.

My head swimming with the several sudden explanations I'd been given within the span of about forty seconds, I started walking again, Toby following. "We'd better get going," I said numbly, evening out some of the kinks in my current perception of the world.