The next morning, Sam went over to Fenton Works and knocked at the door. She was greeted by none other than Danny, just the person she wanted to see.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, a trace of anger still in his voice. She noticed he was still in his ghost form.

"I wanted to see you," she answered truthfully, ignoring his tone.

"Yeah? Well you're the last person I want to see," he retorted. Before he could close the door, however, Sam stuck her foot in.

"Please, Danny. I just want to talk."

"My name is Phantom now, and what's there to talk about? You said plenty when you turned your back on me."

Sam flinched again; he had to rub it in, didn't he? Not that she could exactly blame him, she probably would have been way more of a jerk if it had been he who turned his back on her when she needed him most. Still, she had to at least try. After seven years, she needed to know what happened to her friend.

"Please, Phantom," she pleaded, stressing the new name, "It's been seven years. I want to know what's happened to you."

"It's none of your business," he continued, trying to close the door, but Sam wasn't about to give up that easily. Besides, she had an excuse.

"I'm staying here for a week," she said smugly. Danny gave her a horror-struck look, but before he could utter a word of protest, she went on, "I have permission from my parents and yours. You can't kick me out, Danny. This isn't your house anymore."

She felt she was going a little too far, but it was still storming (a storm had kicked up the night before, as Jazz predicted) and she doubted that Danny and his gang were about to go anywhere in this weather. Hopefully the storm would last a week, so she could learn about Danny and what's happened all these years.

Danny eyed her angrily, outraged that his parents had allowed her to come, but had no choice but to let her in. After being greeted by the Fentons, Sam sat down on the couch, while Danny sat on a chair backwards, facing the goth girl. She sighed.

"So Danny, what happened?"

"I already told you, it's none of your business."

"Come on Danny, I haven't seen you in seven years, and I'm probably not ever going to see you after that. Can I at least have a good memory of you?"

Danny scowled, but Sam was feeling adventurous today, and dared to ask, "Why are you here in the first place?"

"I didn't want to come back, that's for sure," Danny muttered. Sam wanted to say something, but bit her tongue. She had gotten Danny to start talking, and didn't want to blow it. "Alright, you wanna know what happened? Are you that pathetically desperate?" Sam had an urge to glare at him, but instead nodded her head.

"Fine, if it'll get you off my back. Here's a basic summary of my life. After you guys abandoned me, I went to the ghost zone. I found a small island to live on for a while, but what do know, Skulker happened to live there too. He trapped me in and killed my human half, but I managed to escape before he could destroy my ghost half too. So you see, now I'm a full ghost."

That would explain why he was in ghost mode.

"After I escaped him, I wandered around for days, searching for a place to stay. Eventually, the lack of sleep, food, and water gained up on me, and the next thing I knew, I woke up in Ember's place. She took me in out of pity, but soon enough it turned to love. She changed, Sam. I had gained my strength back long ago, but I didn't need to go anywhere since I knew where I belonged: with Ember. I asked her to marry me, she accepted, and now look where we are. She's seven months pregnant, and we're very happy together. But then a new evil came to the Ghost Zone, called himself King Karsh or something like that. Well, all the ghosts really freaked out when they heard he was coming, from what I've heard, he's very dangerous and will not hesitate to kill anyone. We heard he was coming our way, so we made a run for it. I wanted to fight, of course, but I couldn't with Ember pregnant, and I wasn't going to send her out by herself, so we ran together. We picked up Johnny and Kitty--they're cool, and they've changed too, in fact, they never really were evil, just wild--along with Youngblood, who they pretty much adopted since Kitty can't get pregnant. And so that's basically how we became Team Independence."

Sam nodded, following the whole story with intense interest. Danny continued,

"Every place we stop, we clean up the ghosts and ask for somewhere to spend the night in return. It's been like this non-stop for nearly two months now. I think all of this is taking a toll on Ember, though," he admitted, his voice now changed to that of concern. "She's really exhausted. She has terrible morning sickness that can sometimes last all day, and she's just worn out. Your appetite is supposed to increase when you're pregnant, right? Well, it's the opposite for her, her appetite has decreased. And all this worry and stress...she's just really sick and tired. But," he smiled lovingly at the Ember-image in his mind, "She's the most wonderful woman I have ever met, and I feel really blessed to call her my wife."

Sam's eyes watered at this.

"Danny," she began quietly, sniffing, "I need to tell you this. I never imagined it to be this way, but...I've always loved you!"

With this, she burst out crying. Danny looked wearily at her. His face showed no remorse.

"Sam," he said, once she had calmed considerably, "I...I have a wife now. We're expecting a baby. I love Ember, and I'm never going to leave her. Sam, you're...you're too late."

You're too late. Sam burst out sobbing again at the realization of this, but what did she expect, really? That Danny would stay single forever? No, of course he'd get a wife, of course he'd forget about her! Danny seemed generally unaffected by her tears, however, and continued his story as if nothing was happening.

"Our next stop was Amity Park. I didn't want to come here, as you'd expect, but we had a job to do, and we needed a place to spend the night since we'd been driving for three days straight. And so, here we are, there's your story, happy?"

Without even waiting for an answer, he got up and left for upstairs, probably to go see Ember. Leaving Sam to her tears, she cried her heart out as the realization gripped her. She had lost the only person she ever loved. It was too late.