A/N: First, thank you to everyone who's taken the time to review or seen fit to favourite this story (already! I hope I can live up to your expectations!). Second, when I say 'auditorium', I'm thinking of the room in Public Enemies that had removable chairs (but still a stage), though most other episodes with that room with the stage seem to have permanent chairs. Do forgive me, or, better yet, tell me what room I'm actually thinking of so I can change it.
Earlier that day….
"Danny, sweetie, you have to get up. We've got a big day ahead of us."
Danny groaned and tried to bury his head in his pillow, but his mother was already pulling the sheet away from him and tugging on his precious pillow. He didn't want to get up. He'd just gotten to bed half an hour ago. Not that she knew that; neither of his parents knew of his nightly—and, all too often, daily—activities. Only his sister Jazz knew, along with his friends Sam and Tucker.
They were the only three people he trusted with his secret, anyway. Technically they weren't the only ones who knew it—he'd made enough enemies over the past year and a half that a whole lot of people knew it. Not that all of those people could be defined as people, exactly, considering most of them were ghosts—or at least half ghosts, like Vlad.
And like him, ever since that lab accident.
His life probably would be a lot easier if his parents weren't inventors and avid ghost hunters, if they had never invented the Fenton Ghost Portal in the first place, or if Sam hadn't convinced him to check it out, but his life would certainly be a lot more dull. Besides, after Sam's wish that one time, he knew he didn't really regret any of it. And, as Danny Phantom, he could defend Amity Park. His parents wouldn't be able to hold off all the ghosts on their own.
Not that they were the only ghost hunters in town. There was also the Red Huntress, who was actually his classmate, Valerie Gray. Of course, she, like his parents, was also set on destroying his ghost persona on the basis that he was a ghost and all ghosts were evil, but he'd long since realized that some things probably wouldn't change, even if he wanted them to.
Still. He'd gotten two hours of sleep, maybe two and a half in total. The last thing he wanted was to be dragged along to a ghost hunters' convention, for crying out loud. Okay, so everyone else there would be amateurs compared to his parents, and he had no intentions of going ghost unless a ghost did show up, and it would have to be a pretty stu—
No, scratch that. With the types of ghosts that invaded Amity Park on a regular basis, one probably would show up today.
Great. That would be just what he needed. Maybe he'd get lucky, and it would just be the Box Ghost or something, and his parents could take care of it. Except he hardly ever was lucky, and if it looked like he was lucky, something big and distinctly unlucky for him usually followed what had started out as a spell of good luck.
"Do I have to go?" Danny muttered into the mattress.
"Oh, honey, why wouldn't you want to go?"
Danny turned his head and blinked up at his mother. Lying and saying he was sick probably wasn't a good idea. The last thing he needed was a trip to the doctor's office on top of everything else. His body temperature hadn't been normal since the accident, something he figured was not only because he was half ghost but because, as a ghost, he had an ice core. And while his parents—mercifully—attributed that change to a side effect of the accident, writing it off because he didn't appear to have any harmful effects even if his body temperature was a few degrees below normal, he always seemed to have to tell the story whenever he went for a check-up and someone new was there, and he just didn't want to take that risk.
Besides, his mom wouldn't waste a second before shoving a thermometer in his mouth and doing her own check-up first, and if his dad got involved….
"I didn't sleep well last night," Danny admitted. It was the truth. It wasn't the whole truth, but it was the truth. That counted for something, right?
Maddie pulled her son up and into a hug. "Was it bad dreams, sweetie?"
Thankfully, no. Nocturne had so not been involved. "Um, no. I just couldn't fall asleep." He pulled away and looked at his mother. "So can I just stay home? Please?"
"It's only for a few hours," Maddie said. "Your father was hoping you and Jazz could help us demonstrate some of our inventions."
Oh, great. Another reason to try to get out of this. "But I—"
"Danny-boy!" Right on cue, Jack stuck his head into Danny's room. "Why aren't you up and dressed yet? We need to go and set up for the First Annual Fenton Ghost Hunters' Convention!"
"First annual—?" Danny repeated, staring at his dad. Man, he should've paid more attention when they were talking about this instead of tuning it out. This was a rather nasty surprise. "This is going to be an annual thing?" An annual ghost hunters' convention? Hosted by his parents? He was going to be dragged to this every year until he went away to college?
Aw, crud. The day just kept getting better and better.
"That's what we're hoping, honey," his mom explained. "We'll be able to exchange information with fellow ghost hunters and educate the public of Amity Park."
Danny decided against pointing out that the last time 'world renowned' ghost hunters had shown up in Amity Park, it would've been more of a lesson to the public on what not to do than what to do.
"Just get dressed, Danny," his mother said, ruffling his hair with one hand. "It'll be fun."
Yeah. Fun. He'd have a riot. He'd probably set off some sort of sensor just walking through the door….
Sighing, Danny resisted the urge to flop back into bed the minute his parents left his room, closing the door behind them. Instead, he pulled off his pyjamas and replaced them with his usual jeans-and-T-shirt combo. He might not be able to get out of going, but he could at least be comfortable. Sorta. As comfortable as he could get surrounded by ghost hunters who would be after him if they got even the slightest inkling of who and what he was.
He glanced at the mirror above his dresser. Bleary blue eyes stared back at him, half-hidden behind his black hair. Danny pushed it away, but it flopped right back down. Oh, well. His mother was more likely to attack him with the Fenton Foamer than with a comb, anyway. Actually, his sister was more likely to suck him into the Fenton Thermos again…. To her credit, though, her aim had gotten much better. She hadn't done that for a while now, and the last time had just been an honest mistake. Or, at least, that's what she'd claimed.
At least the number of inventions that worked on him when he was in his human form was limited. The Spectre Deflector, the Booo-merang, the Ghost Gabber—things like that. He didn't need to worry about being sucked into the Fenton Thermos or the Fenton Weasel when he wasn't Danny Phantom.
Danny headed downstairs, but he'd hardly taken two steps into the kitchen before his father appeared, burdened with an assortment of ghost hunting gear. "Here, Danny," he said, dropping the mess into his son's arms. "Hold this for me, would you? I need to go get the Ghost Gloves!"
"Um, yeah, sure, Dad," Danny said, trying to shift things so he could actually see where he was going.
"I'll take it, Danny." Jazz. "I've had a piece of toast already. I'd recommend that for you, too. I know you don't like toast, but the milk's gone funny." And, miracle of miracles, Jazz put down her latest psychology book and took all the ghost catching gadgets from him—without managing to tangle the Fenton Fisher in her long red hair.
"Thanks, Jazz," Danny said. He trusted his sister, at least when it came to the quality of food in their household, but he checked the milk, anyway, picking up the carton from the counter and opening it to peek inside. He really didn't want toast, but he didn't want dry cereal, either.
The milk gave off a faint green glow.
He sighed and threw it in the trash. He was skipping breakfast. Again.
"Danny, are you ready?" Maddie stuck her head into the kitchen. "We need to get going."
"Yeah," Danny said. He followed his mother out to the RV—or, as his father called it, the Fenton Family Ghost Assault Vehicle—and froze as she opened the passenger door. "Hold on, Dad's not driving, is he?"
"We're running late," came the reply.
Dad was driving, then. Danny climbed inside and buckled up immediately, and not a moment too soon. His father was off, weaving his way through traffic and breaking who knew how many laws to get there. The convention, Danny remembered, had been scheduled to be held in the town hall, but last week's fight against Skulker had left a bit too much damage behind. At least if it had been Desiree, he might've remembered to wish some of the damage away before sucking her into the thermos, but with his track record, he probably wouldn't have.
As it stood, though, he was being taken to school on a Saturday, since the backup location had been the auditorium of Casper High.
Danny obediently carried in everything his father gave him, but he was more concerned with figuring out who else was here. The Guys in White hadn't turned up yet, though he had no doubt they would at some point, if only to try to rip off his parents' inventions. The Extreme Ghostbreakers had shown up again, as had the Groovy Gang and Scaredy Cat. Somehow, he still doubted they'd pose much of a threat for him—or any ghost, for that matter. There was another group there, too, the Ghostfacers, but from the looks of them, they hadn't seen a lot of ghosts, either.
So, all he had to do was wait for Sam and Tucker to show up, and then they could sneak out and get as far away from here as possible. Well, they could at least head to Sam's to watch some movies. Tucker was still raving about the home theatre her family had in the basement, and he'd found out about it over a year ago. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that Sam's family had access to all the new technology that Tucker was always drooling over.
Then again, maybe they could play the latest version of Doomed. Danny had a feeling Sam still hadn't told them all the cheat codes she knew; she beat him and Tucker every time they played against each other, even when he and Tucker tried to gang up against her. Heck, she'd even managed to beat him the first time they'd all played it together, and he'd actually gone into the game and used his ghost powers.
He still hadn't lived that one down.
Okay, maybe he shouldn't suggest Doomed, but still. Sam and Tucker were good friends. If he couldn't sneak off, for whatever reason, they'd stick with him and cover for him if something went wrong. He didn't want something to go wrong, but considering what tended to happen when he was around, chances are something would. It was pretty much Murphy's Law at its finest.
"It's too bad Vladdy couldn't be here for this," Jack commented as he started setting up the gadgets Danny had brought. "He would've loved this."
Oh, yes. Vlad Masters would have so loved this, especially if his ghost persona, Vlad Plasmius, was detected by the same sensors that kept picking Danny up. Idly wondering what excuse Vlad had used to get out of town—especially since, last time, Vlad had been the one to set all the ghost hunters after Phantom in the first place by setting a million dollar prize on his head—Danny asked, "Why can't he be here? He's the mayor. He should be, shouldn't he?"
"Well, you know Vlad," Jack said. "He's got more things on his plate than just being the best mayor in our town's history" —Danny had to bite back a retort to that one, but his dad literally only knew half the story— "and he told me he had previous engagements elsewhere that he just couldn't break. All those things with VladCo, I expect. It's hard work being a billionaire."
"Right." Danny carefully put the last thing he'd been carrying, the Fenton Bazooka, onto the table. "I'm going to go see if I can find Sam and Tucker, okay?" The convention wasn't open to the public yet but would be soon enough. If Sam and Tucker were here already, they might be able to sneak off before they got enlisted to help everyone else finish setting up.
"Just be sure to be back in time to test out some of our equipment," was Jack's cheerful reply.
Danny made a mental note to drag his feet as long as possible, mumbled an agreement to his father, and took off. He had a horrible feeling that 'testing' some of the equipment involved not just demonstrating it and showcasing, say, how the Fenton Peeler was supposed to work, but actually getting caught in the line of fire. The nets, for instance, which were specially lined to encase ghosts (at least so they couldn't phase through it) worked just as well on humans. Even Jazz had been caught in those a time or two.
To Danny's immense relief, he spotted Sam and Tucker on the school grounds. Tucker, who had evidently been watching and cataloguing on his PDA the various technologies he spotted being brought in, let out a low whistle as Danny approached. "Man, you'd better be careful," he warned his friend. "Some of that stuff might actually work on you. Something beyond your parents' stuff."
Danny glanced over his shoulder to see a large container labelled SALT being hauled into the building.
"Some of the other things, I mean," Tucker amended, following Danny's gaze.
"Oh, come on, he has no intention of giving anyone any opportunity to see for sure. Right, Danny?" Sam asked.
Before Danny could respond, however, a familiar chill crept over him and his ghost sense went off, his cold breath fogging in the warm air. "Aw, crud," he muttered, looking around to see who the culprit was. "What are the chances that these guys can handle it?"
"Well, unless they've really improved…." Sam trailed off. The Fentons were the only reputable ghost hunters that had shown up. The Guys in White would have been the only other ones to even remotely pose a threat, but they were still conspicuous by their absence. For all Danny knew, they were using decoy ghosts in hopes of drawing out more powerful ones—like him. It wouldn't have been the first time.
Then, finally, a flicker of good luck came his way, and a familiar cry reached Danny's ears. "I am the Box Ghost!"
Danny and his friends snickered as the ghost in question continued ranting about corrugated cardboard boxes of doom, of being master of all things box-like and square. "I think," Tucker said, voicing all their thoughts, "that even they might be able to handle this one."
"Stupid job," Valerie muttered as she headed towards the Nasty Burger. She didn't really hate her job; on the contrary, she had actually begun to enjoy it. Just a little bit. She wasn't the mascot anymore, at least, and even when she had been, Danny had….
All right. Fine. She'd admit it. She still sorta liked him. Not liked liked. After all, everyone knew he and Sam were going to wake up and get together sometime. She'd even caught them making out a while ago, though they both still vehemently denied all implications that they were already together. But Danny was a good friend, and she appreciated that.
Unfortunately, he and Sam and Tucker still stood up for the ghost boy, and they'd never seen eye-to-eye when it came to him. Danny Phantom was the reason she'd needed a job in the first place. He was the reason she was a ghost hunter. He'd lost her father his job. He'd lost her her social life.
Granted, she at least knew now that her 'friends' hadn't actually been friends; they wouldn't have deserted her the minute that had happened if that had been the case. But it had taken a while to adjust to being a social outcast instead of a popular kid, and she still hadn't quite gotten the hang of things, but perhaps that was because she had poured so much of her life into ghost hunting.
When she'd heard about the ghost hunters' convention the Fentons were hosting, she'd wanted to go. Just to…look around. Get a feel for things. See where her technology—well, the technology she'd been given—fit in with everyone else's. Maybe pick up a few tips or some new tricks to try when she ran into Phantom again.
She was hunting ghosts because of Phantom, yes. She still wanted her revenge on him. Not as strongly as she once had, admittedly, but that wasn't the point. Point was, he was the reason she'd picked up this hobby, but it was just as much his fault that she couldn't enjoy it. She had to work. Because her family needed the money, because he'd lost her father his job. True, he'd gotten it back, but that wasn't the point, either.
No one would take her shift. Who wanted to, on a Saturday morning? She'd drawn the short straw. Normally, she wouldn't have minded, but this was the Saturday of the ghost hunters' convention, and she was missing it. By the time she got off work, it would nearly be over, and she'd have missed all the good stuff like the demonstrations.
"Sometimes I just wish," she groused, "that Phantom would end up in a situation where he's forced to show his true colours. Then, people would see him for who he really is." He'd been Public Enemy Number One for a while, and people were still saying he was a hero. Okay, fine, he'd done a few good things. She could give him that. But she, for one, wasn't convinced he'd changed his tune. Isn't that what ghosts wanted you to think? "I mean," she continued, still grumbling to herself, "with all the ghost hunters in town, you'd think someone would catch him. I get that he's acting good and all, but I'd love to see him stuck on his own and getting what's coming to him." She snorted. "Not that I'd get to see it even if it did happen."
Valerie sent a longing glance in the direction of the school. If only…. But it didn't matter. What did her dad always say to her when she was in one of these moods? If wishes were horses, beggars would ride. She had to focus now. She couldn't afford to daydream. She had a job to do, and with no ghost in sight, she had no reason not to do it.
Heaving a sigh, Valerie went inside.
What she failed to notice, however, was the faint beeping coming from her bag. It was, in fact, coming from the very device that she had buried in it this morning, tightly wrapped in a ball of non-work clothes to keep it from her dad's sight. He'd almost caught her with it earlier, when he'd stuck his head in the doorway to ask if she was ready to go, and he didn't exactly approve of her ghost hunting. It was dangerous, and he didn't want his little girl doing such dangerous things.
But wishing itself could be a very dangerous thing, and Valerie had done just that. She'd also had the misfortune to do it in the presence of a particular ghost, the very one whose presence the device in her bag had tried to warn her about. After all, this was Amity Park. Wishes in Amity Park had come true before, and not always with the most desirable consequences.
Desiree, the wishing ghost, swirled into human sight and grinned as she swelled with power. She'd been delighted to make her latest escape from the Ghost Zone and equally delighted to realize that no one in the Fenton family was home. That had given her free rein to wander wherever she liked, seeking out people who might not be watching their words. Humans were particularly bad with that; ghosts, or at least the ghosts who knew her, were quite careful. They were well aware of how terrible a wish could turn out, especially if she'd been tricked into granting one she didn't like.
However, she didn't mind granting this particular wish. Quite aside from the fact that she grew more powerful with every wish she granted, she wasn't too impressed with Danny Phantom, either. The halfa had caught her in his confounded Fenton Thermos numerous times. And the wording of this wish had been suitably vague enough to allow her to have quite a bit of fun with this. She could get some of her own revenge on the ghost child with the granting of this particular wish.
There were many different ways that it could come out. She hesitated, examining her options for a moment—a luxury she so rarely had these days when she showed her face in Amity Park, what with the fact that the halfa was usually coming at her with ectoblasts by now. But he was busy right now, too busy to notice her drawing on a bit of magic and granting a wish.
It wasn't strictly ghostly magic she used for this one. Those wishes were predictable. They were amusing, and they served their purpose, but they were rather boring, really. Not to mention that they always turned out with a distinct taint, a twist that wasn't exactly the same as her own, and it wasn't a particular twist she enjoyed. On more than one occasion in the past, Danny Phantom had proven his ability to exploit those twists. He'd been able to overcome them.
Desiree had been trapped in a bottle for countless human years, and she'd hardly been out of it before he'd sucked her into that dratted Fenton Thermos. It had become her new prison. True, it probably hadn't been for very long—he'd released her into the Ghost Zone soon enough, judging by what she'd heard upon her release—but every single time she came back, he managed to trap her again. She never had a chance to have any fun, never had a chance to do what she wanted to do before she was caught again.
It was beyond time that he knew what it felt like.
That, however, hadn't been the human's wish.
Unfortunately.
But even if Desiree couldn't grant her own wish, she could throw something at Phantom that he wouldn't be expecting. A certain type of magic existed in the human world, the sort that had taken what had been left of her as a human and helped her to become a wishing ghost. When she'd first become aware of it again after her long spell of imprisonment, when she'd first felt a trace of it tickle her senses, she'd searched for some. It was rare, and tricky, and it hid well, but her diligence had paid off. She'd managed to draw some wild magic to her, right here, to Amity Park.
It was barely a pinch, hardly anything next to her own brand of ghostly magic, but it would do the trick. It would weave its way through her spell. She wouldn't be able to predict it, true; she wouldn't even be able to properly control it once she released it. But it would, without a doubt, provide her with a bit of amusement at the halfa's expense.
Desiree selected the scenario that best fit into the parameters of the human's wish and her own particular desired outcome while being the most likely to keep the wild magic in check. She did not want to give it an inch more free rein that she had to. She'd heard whispers, rumours of what had happened to others who had dared to try….
But she was different from the others. She was a wishing ghost. Compared to her, they hadn't been anything more than performers calling themselves magicians. They had been skilled in the art of illusion, of deception. She had spent her afterlife dealing with magic.
The power crackled in her hands. "So you have wished it," she intoned, "so shall it be." And, laughing, Desiree released her power, letting it seep through town and find its way to the unfortunate halfa.