Chapter three:

The three sat quietly under the branches of a great oak. Auslynn had seen to their injuries, which were admittedly mild in comparison to the magnitude of that last fight, and they were prepared for the return of those white jets.

Danny was determined to win. His eyes were fixed on the bright summer sky, watching for any sign of the GIW return. He was worried about the possibility of their capture and death, but he would save his friends or die trying. That would save Amity Park from a ghastly apocalypse, at least… right?

Auslynn had her doubts. Neither Danny nor Vlad had experienced this sort of situation before, a no-win scenario. But she had… Of course she had, why else would she be a ghost? Her war experience told her to continue urging the frenetic teen to retreat, but she had given up on that. He was a stubborn kid.

Vlad was numb, put simply. For the past three months, he had been struggling to survive on a planet composed of war-crazy natives. He had barely been able to get away with his life, and now this. It was inconceivable, the series of events that insisted on leading to his destruction. He knew that they had absolutely no chance of survival… But oddly, he really didn't care. It was Danielle he found himself fretting over. There was no way of telling what those savage feds could be doing to her. It was insane.

Suddenly the ground started to shake vigorously, rousing the dreary trio. The hybrids shifted quickly into their ghost form, glancing around in confusion. "What's going on?" Danny murmured.

"That…" Auslynn pointed to the forest as trees began to fall. Three massive tanks appeared out of the woods, GIW soldiers pouring out from around them.

"Tanks?" Danny growled. "Really?"

"Well, this complicates things…" Vlad murmured.

Steranz appeared from the crowd, his glasses lowered to the end of his nose to reveal murky gray eyes. "I'll give you another chance, Phantom." He said softly. "Give yourself up."

"Give me my friends, scum ball." Danny hissed back. Steranz sighed and turned back towards the army.

"Don't worry about them; I'll be sure they die quickly." He chuckled, starting back to the tanks. Danny growled, his eyes glowing with anger, and shot a beam of energy at the GIW. It knocked him forwards a couple inches, but couldn't penetrate that suit of his.

Steranz laughed, continuing onward until he disappeared into the cluster of troops. As soon as he was out of sight, the soldiers began to advance.

"Sooo… What do we do now?" Auslynn murmured.

"Take out those tanks," Vlad replied quietly. "If they're not shielded." Danny nodded and fired a ball of ectoplasm at the closest one, which was absorbed by an invisible force-field.

"What else?" He sighed. But there was no time to answer, as the missiles fired.

These were short ranged, taking off with a thundering noise and cutting through the air towards the ghosts. They had only a fraction of a second to react, in which the trio erected a spherical ecto-shield around them, and then the explosives activated. The paralysis wave materialized upon ignition, but harmlessly bounced off the dome.

"We need to get out of here." Auslynn murmured, watching as the ground force started to fire their guns.

"No. We're fighting." Danny shook his head.

"Man, you're stubborn." She sighed. "Fine. But it still is and always will be a foolish idea."

The three simultaneously ceased the shield, opening themselves to fire. Danny immediately fired a wide blast of ecto-energy, taking out the frontline. Auslynn shot a couple of ceiling fan blades at the second wave, as Vlad shot concentrated blasts of pink ectoplasm. Their combined force took out a couple rows of troops, but there was scant hope for an overall victory.

Suddenly the tanks halted with a screech. The whole mass held still for a moment or two before hover craft emerged from the roofs of the tanks. They began to fire a continuous blast of plasma bolts, riddling the ground with burns.

"Run!" Danny shouted, turning and sprinting in the other direction. Auslynn and Vlad quietly followed him to a group of saplings, where they cowered from the blasts.

"Alright, now what?" Auslynn hissed.

"I don't know…" Danny sighed.

"You said you had an ability that could take their forces out?" Vlad asked.

"Yeah. But only if you two are willing to finish them off, I'll be completely wiped out afterwards." Danny explained.

"Sure. Just take out those tanks." Auslynn nodded.

Danny sighed and got to his feet. His stomach clenched at the thought of what he was about to do. His ghostly wail could destroy near anything, but it was so painful to create, and it had been quite awhile since he used it last. But he shrugged off all feelings of haste when he remembered Dani. No amount of pain he could ever feel would be worth her dying for.

The GIW continued to inch closer as Danny brought himself into the proper footing. With a large breath, he forced his ghostly wail into life.

The green waves of ecto-energy threw the tanks –along with the various soldiers- tumbling across the clearing. Danny wanted to cease and collapse, but he knew that the GIW weren't done yet. The tanks fired more missiles, despite their current situation. The bombs exploded early and Danny was unable to stop them, finally allowing himself to fall back. The waves of blue energy overtook him, and ensured that he would stay down.

Vlad erected another ecto shield around him and Auslynn, watching the waves as they bounced off harmlessly. "Well then…" Auslynn mumbled. "I guess it's our turn." She waited for the shield to disperse before jumping to her feet and running towards the fallen tanks. Vlad hesitated a moment, but soon flew after her.

Two GIW soldiers had managed to get up, and were getting their weapons ready. Engaging them was inevitable as they started firing erratically. "I take right, you take left?" Auslynn shrugged, turning to Vlad.

"Sure." He nodded.

Sam fought against the man's hold as she was forced to walk down the dark hallway. Beside her, Tucker whined incoherently. Dani trudged behind them, restraints on her wrists and ankles.

"Where are you taking us?" Sam growled.

"To see Steranz." An icy-green eyed GIW said quietly.

"That blonde guy?"

"Yes."

"Why. Why did you take us?" Sam grumbled. "We're humans."

"You were assisting the ghosts."

"I'm hungry…" Tucker moaned.

"As soon as we clear you, I promise your needs will be tended to." The man sighed as they came to a large door. He typed a code onto a silver keypad and the door slid open with an electric hiss.

The three were forced into the room and the door sealed shut behind them. Tucker collapsed into a heap, grumbling, as Sam and Dani sat beside him. "Is he okay?" Dani asked softly.

"Yes. He does this frequently." Sam nodded. "Are you?"

"Yeah. How are we getting out of here alive?" Her green eyes betrayed the fear inside her.

"Danny will get us. He… He has to."

"What if he can't?"

"Then we do whatever it takes to survive. No matter what." Sam murmured. "We HAVE to live. Okay?"

"Okay."

"Hello." A voice appeared from the other side of the room. Sam and Dani looked up to see Steranz standing there, hands crossed neatly behind him. "I just need a little information."

"You're not getting it!" Sam hissed. "Let us go!"

Steranz glared blankly at her, smiling. "I could always shoot you on the spot."

Sam jumped. She hadn't expected him to be so violent. "Uh…" She scrounged her mind for something to say, "Well, wouldn't that get blood all over your sparkling white floor?"

"I suppose. Maybe a lethal injection?"

"Why?! What could that possibly achieve?!" Dani growled. "We never did anything to you!"

"Trust me; I don't want to do this." Steranz said quietly. "But by law, every ghost is to be eliminated. And in order to do that, I need to know how to defeat your friend. He's causing a lot of trouble in our organization."

"You're not getting anything from us." Tucker joined in the resistance. "You think we'll just tell you everything if you ask politely?"

"Well, it was worth a try." Steranz shrugged. He stood and tugged a silver pistol from a hidden holster. "And by the way, Manson, I'm not a clean freak like the others." He pressed the cold barrel of the gun against her forehead and waited for a moment before asking, "Now, how do we kill Danny Phantom?"

Auslynn took out her soldier with a group of ceiling fans, pinning him to the ground. With a bolt of blue ectoplasm she knocked him out cold. "Danny?" She asked, turning to the hybrid.

"I- I'm okay…" He managed to say.

"Alright." She nodded. "Vlad?" She murmured, glancing around. "Where is he?" She spotted him on the edge of the clearing, caught under the fire of the GIW's assault rifle. Auslynn sighed and sprinted towards him, charging an ectoplasmic blast in her palms. She was almost within range when another GIW caught her off guard with a plasma grenade and sent her flying into the ground.

Vlad erected shield after shield, unsure how to deal with this resilient gunman. The soldier was quick to dodge any blast and the gun seemed to have an endless supply of bullets. This was going to be complicated. And then, out of nowhere, a loud crack rang out across the clearing and everything went black.

Auslynn jumped when she heard the noise, turning to see a tree fall abruptly on the ghost beneath it. By the shredded stump of the great oak, she could see yet another GIW with a dark grey plasma cannon in his hand. "Shoot." She sighed, finishing off her current opponent. She was about to confront the others when Danny ran past her, firing green blasts of energy.

"Just get that tree off of fruit loop, will you?" He ordered blankly. Auslynn sighed and ran over to the mess of leaves and wood. She tried desperately to move it, but it was too heavy for her. Instead she pressed her hands against the wood and shot ectoplasm through the trunk. It exploded into a storm of splinters and ecto-energy, leaving cuts all over the both of them.

"Well… Perhaps I could have done that more efficiently." Auslynn sighed as she prodded Vlad, now in his human form, with her finger.

He woke abruptly, gasping for air. After a moment or two of labored breathing, he groaned and rolled onto his side, coughing up dark blood. "Are you alright?" Auslynn asked quietly. He nodded, but gave no verbal response. "Liar." She chuckled nervously.

"Where… Where's Daniel?" He coughed hoarsely. Auslynn looked up and saw the hybrid approaching. He looked tired and a gash ran along his forearm.

"Everyone okay?" He asked, kneeling beside them.

"He won't tell me." Auslynn shrugged. "But I'm fine. Now, I'm going to bed."

"What?" Danny murmured. He hadn't realized that the sun had set and the sky was growing darker with every second. He watched her plop down on her side, using her jacket as a blanket. "Okay then…" Danny sighed. He lay back on the ground, forcing all thought away from him until sleep overtook him.

Danny woke to Auslynn shaking his shoulder. "Whaaat?" He asked lazily, swatting her hand away.

"Danny…" She looked panicked.

"What is it?" He groaned, sitting up.

"We need to get back to Amity Park, as soon as possible." She answered darkly.

"You know we can't, but why the rush?"

"Well… I woke up earlier and I noticed that Vlad was breathing weird. So, my doctor's instincts told me to seek it out. Nearly half of his ribcage has been crushed. He could have a punctured a lung." She explained quickly.

"Wait, wait, wait. What?" Danny mumbled. "Aren't you a doctor? Can't you… do something from here?"

"Um… Well… I could… But I really don't want to." She watched Danny get up and stretch.

"We can't go back to Amity. The Feds must have the place surrounded by now. You need to just do what you can."

"… Okay." She sighed, turning to the form beside her. "…Danny, I can't…" She whined. "I'm really bad at on-site work."

"Weren't you a field nurse in the war?"

"No. Not at all. I was a soldier. I decided to study to be a doctor when I became a ghost." Auslynn admitted softly. "I've never had to anything like this away from a sterile and well-stocked environment."

Danny was about to reply when a shot of energy whipped past his head. "Seriously?" He hissed. "Worst. Timing. EVER."

He turned to the approaching group of soldiers, throwing various ecto rays. Auslynn joined him, summoning ceiling fan blades with a sharp flick of her hand. The GIW continued onward, despite the ghost's efforts. "Umm… Danny, I don't think we're making it out of this one." Auslynn murmured solemnly.

"Don't you say that…" Danny growled, but he knew she was right. They were all tired and hurt, too weak to go through another vigorous fight. He felt his shoulder combust into a smoldering wound as a GIW got a lucky shot. He couldn't hold on any longer… The feds had won.

"Do you see any other options?" Auslynn sighed. "At least we can see where they took your friends."

"What, have you suddenly turned into a coward?" Danny growled. Auslynn looked over at him, looking tired.

"Sometimes cowardice is the only reasonable choice."

"Reasonable? Since when has ANY of this ever been reasonable?" Danny shouted angrily, his eyes glowing neon. "I've fought giant evil snakes and traveled through time; I've overthrown a king and turned the planet intangible! My life is never reasonable, and it always comes out for the better. But we have to fight to the finish."

"Until what finish, Danny? 'Til We're all dead? We can never win this, Danny! You can give up and have a chance to save the others or you can fight and be blown to bits." She growled, dodging a blast. "This isn't a game. There's no room for screw-ups. We have to do the right thing the first time, or everything is lost." Danny was silent, staring quietly at the ghost.

"Well, it was nice knowing you." Auslynn shrugged. She charged forwards, shooting ceiling fans and balls of ectoplasm.

Danny took a deep breath and ran after Auslynn. He wouldn't go down without a fight. He had barely shot down five of them when he heard Auslynn shriek. He turned to see her fall, a large burn across her stomach.

Suddenly Danny felt a jolt of pain in his leg and he tripped, falling on his face. There was nothing more that they could do… The GIW were ten feet away, guns hissing with energy. Danny sighed and let himself lay still, watching as their defeat approached.

And then the impossible happened.