A/N: Don't mind the appearance of the Ghostfacers; I've just been watching too much Supernatural lately. And many thanks to anyone who takes the time to review.
The Box Ghost, it turned out, had been effectively dealt with. It had taken a while, considering it was the Box Ghost, but after what had, to judge by the sounds, been more than a few blasts from various bits of equipment, he had eventually been trapped in the Fenton Thermos.
By Jazz.
"That's my little girl!" Jack kept saying. "Takes right after me!"
More likely her mother, Tucker thought. He'd seen Jack's aim. He'd been close to hitting Danny loads of times, but the only one who had ever actually managed to get him was Maddie. Well, and Jazz, but with Jazz, it had never been intentional.
Not that Jack Fenton wasn't smart. Tucker'd seen the inventions FentonWorks turned out, and Danny usually remembered who had come up with what and which ones had been a collaborative effort. And even when whatever it was turned out to have the complete opposite effect of what was desired, the work that went into it all was impressive.
"Has Jazz been practicing, Danny?" Sam asked, eyeing the girl carefully.
Danny shrugged. "Just with the virtual reality helmet, but she does it to keep up her cardio."
"Well, the Box Ghost has nothing on Nocturne," Tucker said. "She was pretty good then, too." He should know; he'd been the one left to fight with her when Danny and Sam had entered Nocturne's dream. "We just don't fight with her often enough to notice."
"Yeah, thankfully," Danny said. "I don't need her nagging me."
"I thought you said she was getting better," Sam said.
"She is," Danny admitted, "but that doesn't mean she's stopped."
"That's the curse of siblings, Danny, m'boy," Tucker said. "That's why Sam and I have it made."
"Yeah, I just have to avoid my parents. At least my grandma's on my side." Sam looked over at the various equipment displays and snorted. "Man, these guys don't know the first thing about ghosts, do they? Your parents look like the only competent ones in the whole building. Us aside, I mean."
"Now that's a scary thought," Danny said. He paused, then amended, "Well, not really, because if these people were any better, I'd probably be in trouble." He shivered suddenly but shrugged it off when his ghost sense didn't go off. "C'mon, maybe if we get out now, we'll be able to avoid getting dragged into anything."
"We could go to the Nasty Burger," Tucker suggested. He checked his PDA, then said, "It's time for my 10:05 feeding, anyway." Besides, he'd gotten the shivers, too. It didn't mean anything, even in Amity Park. The old 'someone walking over your grave' saying was still just a saying, nothing more than a superstition.
Well, usually. But even if this shivering was something weird, Sam hadn't gotten it, so at least it wasn't contagious.
Then again, Tucker thought as Sam shivered, too, maybe it was like yawning. Noticing his eyes on her, Sam asked, "You don't have that prickling feeling, do you, on your neck or your arms?" Evidently, he wasn't the only one who had noticed the shivering trend.
"Oh, great," Danny muttered. "Maybe we won't be leaving so fast, after all." He sighed. "You know, just once, I wish we could go. Or, better yet, I wish all these other guys would just go home. The last thing I need is for anyone else to take up ghost hunting and decide to stake out Amity Park. My luck's bound to run out sometime, and someone good'll pick it up. Someone besides Valerie."
Tucker chuckled. "What, you still have a crush on her?" Danny glared at him, and he relented; it was much more fun to tease him and Sam, anyway, and Sam was already glowering at the suggestion of Danny and Valerie getting back together. She'd be glaring daggers if he moved to the next point and made a crack about the two of them being lovebirds. Not that it would be hard to do; he wanted to do it. But now, unfortunately, wasn't the time.
"Look," Sam said, "I know what you mean, Danny. I wish all these wanna-be ghost hunters would just go home, too, but there isn't anything that we can do about it. You'll just have to lay low."
"You know," said one of the men from the table nearest to them, "maybe we should go home. It's obvious our expertise here is being wasted." He started to pack up all his metal—iron?—rods, which had been lying next to the salt.
Sam cringed. "Sorry." Under her breath, she added, "I didn't mean for them to hear that."
"No, you're not," the other man said frankly as he followed the lead of the first and tugged down the sign proclaiming them to be the Ghostfacers. "You think you're better than us, don't you?"
"Defensive much?" Sam muttered. Louder, she said, "Look, I'm sorry. Just…living in a town that's haunted on a regular basis? You kinda get some practice. It's survival instinct."
"So why are you here, if you think you know it all?" the first man challenged.
"Um…moral support?" She jerked her thumb towards Danny. "He's my friend, and he's a Fenton. He has to be here."
"A Fenton?" the second man repeated. "Why does that make a difference?"
Tucker snorted. "They've only invented half the things you see here."
"Yeah, well, we work with the traditional methods," the first man explained sourly. "Which, obviously, no one else cares about." He finished packing up the rods and then moved onto what looked suspiciously like a sawed off shotgun, complete with shells.
"Wait, traditional methods?" Danny repeated. "Like what? Blood blossoms?"
Tucker shuddered. He wasn't affected by blood blossoms, obviously, but he did not have a pleasant memory of the things. Cursed vegetables. Having to ingest thirty pounds of the things after eating meat all his life? It hadn't gone over as well as it might have.
"Never heard of those," the man said, answering Danny's question. He waved a hand dismissively. "No, we stick with things like iron and rock salt. Not that you'd be interested. You just want us to leave." He glanced around the room. "You, and probably all of them. You guys can all stick with your new technology. We'll stick with what works."
"Some of that new technology works a little too well," Danny muttered. The three of them wandered away from the Ghostfacers, knowing that they had, for some reason, made up their minds to leave and wouldn't be dissuaded. Not that any of them were particularly keen on doing any dissuading. The less time Danny had to spend here, the safer he'd be. And the fewer people around, the sooner he'd be able to get away.
It wasn't long, however, before they realized that the other groups of ghost hunters, who had come specifically to Amity Park for this convention, were also packing up.
"This is, like, extremely boring, dude," one of the Extreme Ghostbreakers whined.
"I'm a girl!" his partner snapped. "But, you're, like, totally right."
Danny's parents weren't taking it too well. "I just don't understand it, Maddie," Jack was saying. "Everyone was thrilled when we were setting up." Maddie frowned, trying to figure out what was going on, and it was all too clear that she agreed with her husband.
Jazz joined Danny, Sam, and Tucker, still clutching the thermos that contained the Box Ghost. "Danny," she asked quietly, "you didn't do something, did you?"
Danny rolled his eyes. "Yeah, Jazz, I'm definitely going to use my ghost powers at a ghost hunters' convention."
"Yeah," Tucker added, "and besides, the only way Danny could've done that was if he'd overshadowed everybody, but none of them seemed to want to leave until Sam said she wished they'd all go home."
"After Danny said it," Sam quickly reminded them as the pieces started falling into place. After all, when it came to wishes, there was only one—
"But it can't be Desiree," Danny said. "My ghost sense hasn't gone off. She can't be close enough to hear you, or me, without me knowing about it."
"Well, maybe not," Jazz said, "but something's definitely up. We're going to be the only ones left here pretty soon." She bit her lip, then handed the thermos to Danny. "Here. You guys take care of this. I'm going to see if I can find anything out."
"Find anything out where?" Sam asked as Jazz dashed away. "This isn't going to be in a book."
"I don't think it's anything I can find, either," Tucker admitted, looking through his PDA. "Dude, we need to figure out what happened the old fashioned way." He grimaced. Even when they'd been caught in the Dark Ages in the Ghost Zone, his technology hadn't failed him. To think that it couldn't help him now, safely at home in Amity Park, was just disappointing.
Danny sighed. "At least," he said, "this got me out of demonstrating all my parents' stuff."
Maddie watched silently as the last of the ghost hunters—the very same ones who had, just this morning, been so enthusiastic about the convention the Fentons were hosting—walked out the door.
She might have understood if people had pulled out once they'd had to move the convention to the Casper High School auditorium. But she couldn't fathom why they'd go through the trouble and expense of coming and then leave within an hour. They'd only just opened the doors to the public, and then…. Then, for some reason, the enthusiasm of her colleagues had died.
She had a feeling that that wasn't just because the air conditioning seemed to have kicked in with more ferocity than was necessary for this time of year. Although….
Maddie pulled off her hood and goggles and looked upwards. The large fans visible on the ceiling confirmed her suspicion. There was no air conditioning, or least none in the auditorium. Ghosts were responsible for this, somehow.
It made sense. Ghosts certainly wouldn't want ghost hunters getting together to exchange ideas on how to better hunt their prey. They might not have emotions as humans did, but they were endowed with a certain degree of cleverness. Granted, that cleverness generally surfaced through their trickery and manipulation of others—Phantom was a prime example, managing to get most of the people in this town convinced that he was good—but some of the smarter ghosts, the ones that had often managed to evade many of the traps she and Jack set for them, would undoubtedly be able to conspire against them if they'd caught wind of what was going on in time.
She'd find out who was behind this. Somehow, she'd find out. She and Jack had put too much work into this to have a ghost ruin their plans. And ruined plans they were; even without any fellow ghost hunters, she would have expected a few curiosity seekers from the streets of Amity Park to turn up. The Fentons were always willing to share their information, and she would have thought at least one person in town would have been the slightest bit curious about how to protect themselves from all the ghosts that plagued their town. But whatever had driven the others out appeared to have kept anyone else from coming in; the only ones left besides her family were Danny's friends, Sam and Tucker.
Beside her, Jack was struggling to get the ghost radar working. It was a portable unit, similar to the one wired into the Assault Vehicle, but which worked for a smaller area. Without a larger power source, they hadn't been able to make it reliable enough to satisfy themselves with the original radius. As it was, however, it was deadly accurate.
The Fenton Finder started beeping immediately, proclaiming a ghost to be nearby. Jack looked up eagerly, but his face fell when he realized in which direction the machine had picked up the ghost. "We still haven't got all the bugs out of it," he said, dismayed. "It's still picking up Danny and his friends."
Maddie glanced at the screen. "Just Danny, from the looks of it." Ever since that lab accident…. She'd feel better if the children actually wore hazmat suits all the time when they were in the lab. It was simple safety protocol, and it might have prevented Danny from picking up so much contamination. It was rather strange that Jazz hadn't picked up as much, but then Danny was the one who was often set to clean up the lab. Jazz had other chores, and she spent her spare time studying while Danny just hung out with his friends. It was good to see him getting along so well, but it would be nice if he tried harder in school. His grades had slipped significantly over the past year.
Jack frowned, mulling over her words, and then brightened. "Unless we did fix it," he suggested, "and one of them is being overshadowed!"
Maddie sighed. "You go check, honey." He wouldn't be happy until he was convinced a ghost wasn't inhabiting one of those poor children, and frankly, she wouldn't be, either, though she knew it was unlikely.
There were too many inventions they hadn't managed to fix, and it was all too likely that all the Fenton Finder was picking up was Danny. If only he'd listened to her and at least worn gloves….
"Oh, sweetie," Maddie whispered, "we'll find a way to get you better, I promise." But she knew how hard it would be to keep that promise. Danny never complained about anything, never displayed anything other than annoyance and, on occasion, nervousness, when their inventions centred on him; she supposed the latter was because he feared they might one time shoot him on impulse, without checking that they were aiming at a ghost, but they'd never do that to their son. But she didn't know if that was the reason for his fear or not, though she had no idea what else it might be, because he never confided in her anymore, either.
He didn't confide in any of them.
As far as she could tell, only his friends knew whatever secrets he might have.
But she could worry about that later. Right now, they needed to find the ghost behind this sabotage. She wished she knew who it was, but wishing, of course, never got anyone anywhere.
Maddie pulled the hood of her blue hazmat suit back up and fitted the goggles into place. Doing was what got things done, not wishing. And right now, she had a job to do. She needed to find the ghost, or ghosts, that had caused this, and she needed to put things right and send those ghosts back to the Ghost Zone where they belonged.
"Ghost directly ahead. You would have to be some sort of moron to not notice the ghost directly ahead," the Fenton Finder proclaimed.
Jack frowned and looked up at Danny, who was smiling nervously. "Oh, sorry, Danny-boy. I thought we had it fixed this time."
"No problem, Dad," Danny said, relaxing his grip on the thermos. "Look, uh, maybe we should just go outside and see if we can find the ghost who did this."
Jack shook his head. "That's what they want us to do, and Jack Fenton's not going to do what a ghost wants him to do. We're staying right here." He wasn't going to be manipulated by ghosts. He had a stronger will than any of those other ghost hunters. Of course, he would have hoped that Danny would have inherited that strong will from him, but obviously, if he was being affected by whatever was affecting all the other ghost hunters, he simply hadn't done enough ghost hunting to develop that stronger will.
Funny that Sam and Tucker weren't showing signs of wanting to leave, but perhaps they hadn't done enough ghost hunting in the first place to be affected. Yes, that had to be it. Whatever ghost was behind this only wanted the ghost hunters out of the building, and Danny's friends weren't ghost hunters.
He should invite them back to the lab. They'd tried to steer clear of it after their first lesson, unless it involved playing video games or looking for Danny or some such thing, but, by golly, they'd been speechless when he'd finished telling them about ghosts that first time. They'd been captivated by what he had to say. It had, quite literally, taken their breath away. He hadn't expected that, actually, but he wasn't going to ignore that sign. Whether they knew it or not, they were destined to take their place among the ranks of ghost hunters.
Besides, they were good friends with Danny, and Danny was a Fenton, and Fentons were ghost hunters. It was practically expected that they learn the ins and outs of the business. Even Jazz had finally given in, and she'd turned out to have quite a talent. He'd tried to get that blue ghost with the Fenton Fisher, but the dratted line had tangled again….
"But, um, if we found the ghost," Danny said, "we might actually be able to beat it."
Sam and Tucker took this as their cue to nod vigorously. "That's right, Mr. F," Tucker added. "We can't catch it if we stay here. It's not going to come to us."
Jack smiled. "That's where you're wrong," he said. Ignoring the astounded 'what?' from the kids, he continued, "I just finished the prototype this morning." He rummaged in his pocket for a moment and then pulled out a device hardly bigger than the Fenton Finder or the Ghost Gabber.
Danny eyed it warily. "What is it?"
Poor kid. He sounded like he didn't even want to know. Surely he hadn't been on the wrong end of that many of their inventions, had he? Sure, the Booo-merang had centred on him instead of any of the real ghosts, though they had yet to figure out why and fix it, since whatever it was was probably the reason the Fenton Finder kept thinking Danny was a ghost, of all things, but Jazz had probably been covered in ectoplasmic gloop more often than Danny, and she wasn't complaining.
Well, she did keep vowing that she was writing everything down in that memoir of hers, but after Maddie had developed that special shampoo so that the gloop came out of hair more easily, she'd seemed to accept it as the job hazard it was.
It didn't matter. Danny'd see the use for his newest invention right away, anyway, and then he'd look a lot more cheerful. "The Ecto-Entrapper!" Jack exclaimed, grinning widely.
"The ecto-whatta?"
"The Ecto-Entrapper."
Sam looked at it doubtfully. "It doesn't look like the ghost catcher."
Jack shook his head. "The Fenton Ghost Catcher is completely different. This little baby here will lure the ghost to us like a fly to honey. It won't be able to help itself. Any ghost within a hundred feet will show its face."
Danny opened his mouth, closed it, then opened it again and asked, "Then what?"
"Then, when the ghost's held in place by the Ecto-Entrapper, we catch it, and we can tear it apart molecule by molecule!"
Danny cringed. "Yeah, um, about that. Have you tried it?"
"Well, no," Jack admitted, "but there's no time like the present." He moved to press the button to start the Ecto-Entrapper, but Tucker caught his arm.
"Hey, Mr. Fenton, can I see that for a minute? I mean, a hundred feet isn't very big for a ghost. The Fenton Finder's got a bigger scope than that, doesn't it? You should be able to get a wider range."
"That's what Maddie said," Jack reported happily. Maybe Danny's friends even had some natural talent when it came to ghost hunting. "But we need to do some test runs before we find out exactly what she can do." He let Tucker take the prototype anyway, though. Kid was a technogeek; even he realized that. Maybe if he could get Tucker interested in inventing ghost hunting weapons, Danny and Jazz might actually consent to go out as a family again. Maddie was big on that quality time stuff, and, well, he just loved ghost hunting.
"How's it work?" Sam asked, leaning over.
Tucker looked at it for a second. "I think it sends out some sort of pulse or something."
Ah, getting the next generation interested in ghost hunting. That's what this was all about. Jack started to explain his newest invention, saying how it reacted with a ghost's ectoplasm and how it would pull the ghosts towards them like magnets attracting metal.
It was sort of like how a Venus fly trap attracted insects, except the device itself acted as an ecto-attractant that drew nearby ectoplasm towards it. It wasn't through sound or smell or anything like that; some of the lesser ghosts, the ones that were hardly anything more than blobs of ectoplasm, wouldn't necessarily react to that. But when he'd first been trying to develop that Ecto-Dejecto to reduce a ghost's powers to the point that it lost all its form, he'd come across a formulation of something that seemed to, well, attract ectoplasm. It had shown more promise of working than the Ecto-Dejecto formulation, so he'd set to work on that first, and now he had something to show for it.
He wasn't really sure how it worked. He just knew that it did.
He didn't need to tell the kids that, though.
Of course, speaking of telling the kids…. When had they snuck off? "Danny?" Jack called. "Sam? Tucker?" No response, and no sign of them. "Danny? Where's the Ecto-Entrapper? Danny?"
Still nothing.
"Jazz!" Jack bellowed. "Have you seen Danny and his friends?"
Jazz, across the room, looked up from her book. "I think they might've gone outside," she called back.
Jack felt a hand on his arm and jumped, but then he heard Maddie's voice. "They'll be fine, Jack."
"They have the Ecto-Entrapper!"
"They aren't going to wreck it, honey," Maddie reminded him.
"But I wanted to try it out."
Maddie sighed. "I'll go find them. Here," she added, rummaging in her pocket for a moment, "have a cookie."
Jack grinned. "Oh, Mads, you always know the best way to cheer me up!" He took a bite, savouring the delicious taste as his wife went off in search of the missing invention. "But I still wish I had it so I could be the one to try it out," he added, swallowing the last of the cookie. "Ah, well, Maddie'll get it back for me." He should really start untangling the Fenton Fisher, anyway.
As Jack started towards the various displays of FentonWorks equipment, however, he tripped over something—and not just his own feet. A closer inspection revealed the Ecto-Entrapper. Jack picked it up. The kids shouldn't have left it lying about, but…. Well, he couldn't pretend that he wasn't happy that he got to be the first one to try it out.
Smiling in anticipation of yet another success, Jack Fenton turned on his latest invention.