By the time Sam reached Danny's house, Tucker was already there. "House is empty," he reported as she came up to him. "I already looked."
Sam just nodded; she hadn't expected anything else.
"I've got Danny's map of the Ghost Zone," Tucker continued, pulling it out, "and I think our best bet would be to talk to Frostbite."
"Do we have time to make it to the Far Frozen?" Sam asked uncertainly. "We could just head over to see Dora and start there. She's closer, and then we might be able to split up and cover more ground if she's willing to take on a passenger."
"I don't think we should split up. I mean, if Walker gets a hold of either of us, we might be in a bit more trouble, and judging by what Valerie and Danny went through that one time, Skulker's probably not above taking prisoners to try to lure Danny to him for a good hunt, either. And, face it; from what we've seen of the Ghost Zone, Danny has more enemies than friends. They've all got to be in trouble to put that aside and help him."
"We don't know that they aren't."
"No, but they won't believe us otherwise. And, anyway, I've worked out a schedule." Tucker's ever-faithful PDA was shoved under her nose then. "If we don't take a wrong turn and we're running at top speed, we should be at the Far Frozen within the hour. Then we talk to Frostbite, see if he's heard anything—"
"He's in the Far Frozen," Sam said bluntly. "He won't have heard anything."
Tucker shrugged. "Maybe not. But he might let us use the Infi-Map to find Danny."
"Because it takes us where we want to go," Sam said, smiling for the first time since this mess had begun. "And it would be able to find him."
"See? Sometimes I can be the smart—awk!" Sam grabbed Tucker's arm and jerked him inside before he could finish his sentence. He hardly had time to slam the door before she dragged him down to Danny's parents' lab. They didn't have any time to lose.
"You navigate," Sam called over her shoulder as she released Tucker and sprinted for the Spectre Speeder. "I'm driving." She waited impatiently while Tucker finished keying in the override code to access the Fenton Portal and took off the moment he climbed inside the Spectre Speeder.
"You know," Tucker said as he pulled himself off the floor and into the seat, "Danny's going to kill us if a whole bunch of ghosts come through while we're gone."
Sam shrugged. "We've done it before, and he's captured a whole bunch before. It's nothing new. We don't have school tomorrow, anyway. Besides," she added, finally sparing Tucker a proper look, "you said you told Valerie what was going on, right? She can handle them. It's time she did us a favour, anyway. Now, where do I turn?"
"Just give me a sec. I'm calibrating my PDA to the map so I can track our route electronically, and—"
"Just tell me if it's right or left at Skulker's island. I don't remember."
"Right. It's left at Walker's prison."
"I thought that was the way to Dora's," Sam said. "Let me see that." Throwing the Spectre Speeder onto autopilot, she leaned over to look at the map. "Yes, see? I'm right. That's a castle you're leading us to, not an iceberg. And, anyway, then it'd be faster just to go straight."
"Then we go around the swirling vortex here," Tucker said as he pointed to it. "Hang a left at Skulker's."
"That's a thumbprint," Sam reminded him. She sighed. "Man, didn't Danny ever update this?"
"He said he was going to draw a new one."
"And yet you grabbed the old one. I'm asking for directions."
"From what, an ectopus?" Tucker raised his eyebrows. "C'mon. Danny's found it on his own before. We can, too."
"You just don't want to ask for directions," Sam grumbled.
"I'm running our coordinates against the map. It'll be fine. Just head straight past Skulker's, then we'll turn after."
"When you admit that you don't know where we're going?"
"Just trust me, okay?"
Sam was quiet for a moment. "Yeah. I trust you." She trusted both Danny and Tucker with her life. It was just hard not to be…to think about what might've….
"I've got the electronic version of the map I've been making, anyway," Tucker continued. "Danny's map was just a guide, until I reset the scale, which should be done…right about now."
Sam smacked him. "Straight on past Skulker's, then?" She didn't bother hiding the relief in her voice—or her frustration with Tucker. He knew this wasn't funny, and trying to make light of things wasn't helping.
"I'll tell you when to turn," Tucker confirmed.
Valerie used the emergency window entrance to Vlad's study. Technically, she wasn't supposed to unless he called her, but it was the fastest route. Once she was safely inside, she powered down her jet sled and dropped to the floor. "Mr. Masters?" she called uncertainly. She'd thought he would be in here.
She left for the hallway. "Mr. Masters?" Surely he was—
"Valerie, what are you doing here?"
Valerie jumped and spun around. Vlad stood there, looking as impressive as ever. Where he'd come from, she hadn't a clue. "Mr. Masters, forgive me, but I thought I should tell you. I thought you might be able to help."
"To help with what?" he asked, sounding…not interested, but at least polite.
"It's Danny. He—"
"Ah, yes, young Daniel. What is he up to now?"
"He's gone. Him and his whole family. Tucker told me; all the Fentons have disappeared, and no one knows where they've gone."
"What?" There was no trace of amusement in Vlad's voice now, no more thought that Danny had just been playing a joke, that she might be overreacting. "Maddie's gone?" Seeming to catch himself, he added, "Maddie and her dear family are gone? Disappeared?"
Valerie nodded. "Tucker told me. He and Sam can't get a hold of Danny, and they can't find him. They're still looking. But Mr. and Mrs. Fenton and Jazz are gone, too, and Sam and Tucker figure it has something to do with ghosts." She shifted on her feet for a moment. "I tracked down the Box Ghost, but he didn't know anything and he didn't stick around, and I was too busy to chase him. Then I found Desiree, and I tried to get her into a thermos, but it didn't work."
"Didn't work?" Vlad repeated, sounding doubtful.
Valerie shrugged. "I don't know what happened. She was there, and then she wasn't, but she's not in the thermos, either. I brought it in case you wanted to look at it or something, but the thing is, I think Desiree knows something."
"And what makes you say that, my dear girl?"
"Something she said to me when we were fighting. I mean, it's the result of a wish. She admitted that. She admitted that she granted a wish—my wish—but I didn't wish for this to happen to the Fentons. It didn't even have anything to do with them. I just…. It was early, and I was annoyed, I guess, and no one else was around, so I wasn't really watching my words, and I was talking to myself, and I kind of…wished for something."
"Wished for what?" Considering this was Amity Park, Vlad's voice was appropriately wary—Valerie really should've known better—but, intentional or not, there was an undertone in his words of so this is your fault that made her want to squirm.
"It had nothing to do with the Fentons," Valerie repeated hurriedly. "I just, I mean, it was about Danny Phantom, that's all. He's the reason I'm a ghost hunter. Well, him, and you, since you gave me the stuff, but…." Valerie trailed off, trying to read Vlad's face.
Vlad's lips were set in a thin line. It wasn't anger—well, not anger directed at her, anyway, or at least, she didn't think it was—but she couldn't quite tell what he was thinking. "Thank you. I'm going to make a few calls. I don't know if I can help you, exactly, but I have known the Fentons for a long time, and I haven't forgotten our college days together. I might be able to turn up something to help. In the meantime, I suggest that you keep an eye out for anything…noteworthy."
Valerie shifted on her feet for a moment. "Did you want to check the thermos?"
Vlad sighed. "I'll have it looked at, I suppose, but I doubt it is a malfunction. You may leave it in my study when you go."
"Yes, Mr. Masters. Thank you." Valerie quickly retraced her steps and went back into the study. After leaving the thermos behind on the desk, she activated her jet sled again and shot out the window. Vlad would help, somehow. She had faith in him. Besides, he was good friends with the Fentons, so it wasn't like he was just doing her a favour. He'd want them back, too.
She wasn't sure why anyone would think she'd ever want them gone. She and Danny, and even Sam and Tucker, were friends now, sort of. True, she wasn't dating Tucker or Danny—or anyone else, for that matter—but she'd had a lot of stuff on her plate, and she still did. But when she had been dating them—well, when she'd been dating Danny, at least—she'd learned about him, more than she'd known before, and she kind of…. Okay. So she still kind of liked him. Yeah, she knew he and Sam were going to get together sometime, but until then, well….
Forget 'until then'. There might never be an 'until then' unless she and Sam and Tucker could find the Fentons now. Besides, she was still busy. That hadn't changed any. And Danny still didn't know that she was the Red Huntress, so she couldn't really explain anything, but….
She didn't have time for this.
None of that mattered, anyway. She was only worrying about the past because she was too afraid to worry about the present and because she didn't really want to think about the nastier things that the future might bring. But none of that was helping. Danny and his family were in trouble, and she had to help save them. And she would. She was.
"Don't worry, guys," Valerie whispered to the wind as she crouched down on her sled and increased her speed. "We're going to find you, wherever you are. We'll get you back."
Maddie looked up just in time to see Jazz walk through the doors. "Oh, Jazz, honey, did you get Danny home all right?"
"Yes, but, um, there's somethi—"
"Did you take his temperature like I asked? And make sure he'll stay in bed?"
"Yes, he's curled up with a book—"
"A book?" Maddie interrupted, frowning. "That doesn't sound like Danny."
"Oh, uh, it was about space," Jazz added hurriedly. "You know, more stuff to prepare him to be an astronaut. But, Mom, there's something wrong."
"Something wrong?" Jack interrupted, looking up from the Ecto-Entrapper. He was fiddling with it again, sure he could enhance its signal. Maddie had thought it best to just leave him to it until someone showed up.
Jazz nodded, biting her lip. "We can't find anyone else. I mean, we didn't see anyone. The streets are empty, and Danny phoned Sam and Tucker to tell them that he was sick and going home, but he couldn't get a hold of either of them. I just…. I've got a bad feeling."
"It's the ghosts," Jack proclaimed. "They've done something to everyone. We'll find out what's behind this and rip it apart molecule by molecule!"
"Jack, dear, don't jump to conclusions," Maddie reprimanded gently. "Jazz, just because you didn't see anyone and Danny can't get in touch with his friends, it doesn't mean anything's happened."
"We swung by Sam's on the way. Danny insisted. He wanted to tell at least one of them where he was. But no one was home, and you know that Mr. and Mrs. Manson—"
"Oh, yes, I know them, all right," Maddie interrupted. She still wasn't impressed with them, exactly. They didn't care for jumpsuits, and they'd once filed a restraining order against Danny, for goodness's sakes. As if her son was the reason for Sam's actions. The poor girl was simply trying to rebel because of the way her parents stifled her. Not like her; she and Jack made sure to encourage their children's interests, showing them the latest inventions, keeping them up-to-date on the latest ghostly happenings….
"But I really think this has something to do with ghosts," Jazz insisted. "I mean, the entire town is gone, except for us."
"You don't know that, sweetheart. You just walked home with Danny to put him to bed."
"Unless she saw something," Jack countered. "Did you see anything? Any of the signs of ghosts we've taught you?"
"Well, no, but the lack of a sign is surely as much an indicator as a sign itself, right? Ghosts must be behind this."
"I'm not entirely sure what you said," Jack admitted, "but I believe you. Come on, Jazzy-pants! Let's go hunt ghosts."
"Jack," Maddie said, crossing her arms, "what about the convention? We can't just leave it." Jack looked disappointed for a moment, and Maddie relented. "Oh, all right. You and Jazz can go look for signs of ghostly activity, and I'll stay here in case anyone turns up. But if you find anything, you be sure to call me, all right?" She smiled. "I've learned the value of a cell phone now, and I've got mine with me. I don't want to miss out on the fun."
The smile on Maddie's face faded once her husband and daughter were out of sight, and she pushed back the hood of her hazmat suit with a sigh.
She hadn't wanted Jack to be right.
He'd said ghosts were the reason the convention was such a failure, but…. While she'd known it was a possibility, one she'd initially been convinced of herself, when she'd had time to think it over, she really hadn't thought the ghosts would take the route of action they had. The ghosts, she'd assumed, would simply try to destroy the place, and then they could be dealt with accordingly. Instead, they'd shown a kind of cunning she hadn't expected from them.
They'd somehow managed to isolate her family.
Jazz had said that everyone else had disappeared, but Maddie wasn't so sure. With the kind of power that would take, Jazz shouldn't have missed the signs. She should have been certain. Granted, even if they were the ones who had disappeared, as Maddie was beginning to suspect, they ought to have noticed something, too.
Maddie picked up an ectogun from the display table and made her way outside, trying to see if anything was noticeably different. She'd been out earlier, just briefly, to see if Danny and his friends had sneaked outside as Jazz had suspected. Then, things had been fine. There'd been cars passing, the chatter of birds, a dog barking in the distance—usual things, usual signs of life. But now….
It was quiet now.
The streets were empty, and the world was silent. Well, silent except for the telltale rumble of the Assault Vehicle, but that only signalled the presence of Jack and Jazz.
And yet, if a ghost were behind this, why had they not detected its presence? They had enough of their inventions with them that something should have alerted them that a ghost was nearby.
"Except Jack turned most of those off," Maddie remembered, "because they still react to Danny. He didn't want to excite anyone over false readings."
She shouldn't have forgotten that. She'd gotten complacent. But it was too late to worry about that now, too late to think that perhaps she should have let Danny stay home. He'd told her he hadn't slept well, and then to find out that he was ill, well— She couldn't deny that he needed the rest. He was safe at home for the time being.
Right now, she had to try to find out what had happened. She wouldn't stray too far—she'd said she wouldn't, just in case Jazz had been mistaken—but the school might hold some sign of what had happened, perhaps even give a clue as to which ghost was behind this.
Providing it was a ghost they had fought before. With a more complex, more calculated attack like this, she wasn't so sure it would be. And when she and Jack had gone up against stronger ghosts in the past, they'd had help—from the Red Huntress and, whether she liked to admit it or not, Phantom. That particular piece of ectoplasm gave her mixed feelings. As much as Jazz—and even Danny, when he paid attention—tried to insist that that ghost didn't have an ulterior motive, Maddie doubted he was as noble as he tried to appear to be.
He was a ghost. Ghosts were evil. It was as simple as that.
And the ghost that was behind this, whichever one it was, would pay. She wasn't sure what it had done. Amity Park hadn't been pulled into the Ghost Zone again—the sky was a clear blue, the sun directly overhead—and the fact that they could leave the school meant that it wasn't just Casper High that was affected. The ghost's power had, in all likelihood, been specifically directed at them.
Unless…unless this was just a guise. This could very easily be a trick. Perhaps none of this was any more real than a dream. A powerful enough ghost could fabricate this little piece of reality and drop them into it. It would explain the lack of life forms. She hardly expected that keeping plants in their role was as difficult as organizing the actions of birds or watching over all the interactions of people or anything like that.
Of course, for all she knew, there was a ghost out there that could script her life, write out what was going to happen and when and watch it unfold, and was doing this for mere entertainment.
She didn't know. She couldn't know, and she wasn't the one who had set out to find any information. The most she could do was go around the school with the Fenton Finder, try to strengthen Jack's Ecto-Entrapper, or go home and look after Danny.
He must be worried about his friends, and she rather doubted her son would stay put and stay at home in bed, even if he was sick. If she'd known, she would've told Jazz to stay with him. Danny didn't always think before he acted, and to know that he might be out on his own, with a ghost after them….
Maddie reached into her pocket and pulled out her cell phone. It had been Danny who'd finally convinced her to get one, after that DALV fiasco when they'd ended up stranded with Vlad in one of his hunting lodges. He'd been so disgusted that she hadn't had something he considered so essential, and by the end of the night, she had seen the value of the thing in an emergency, which is why she'd finally relented and bought one.
Biting her lip, Maddie dialled her home phone number and waited for her son to pick up. She knew he would, if only because he thought it might be one of his friends trying to call him. He wasn't so heavy a sleeper that he'd miss it altogether, even if he was ill.
But the phone, to Maddie's dismay, just kept ringing.
As far as Danny could tell, Amity Park was empty. There wasn't a car on the streets or a person on the sidewalk or any sign of life in any of the buildings he'd passed through. He'd seen a lot of weird things in his life, but somehow seeing a normally-bustling city dead in the middle of the day without any signs of an imminent ghost attack was right up there with the existence of half ghosts and the fact that the people of the Far Frozen called him the Great One when almost every other ghost seemed out for his head. Or his pelt, in Skulker's case.
He'd already started back towards the school when he caught sight of the Fenton Family Ghost Assault Vehicle barrelling down the streets below him. He cringed and took off in another direction, trying to get out of range of its ghost radar. The last thing he needed was for his parents to blame this on him.
Though, judging by the path he'd seen the Assault Vehicle taking, it had been his dad who'd been driving. Even with empty streets, he still found obstacles to swerve around.
So, Jazz had definitely told their parents, but they might've split up. Someone was bound to be back at the school. He hoped it would be Jazz, but he had a feeling she'd be saddled with their dad. If she'd said she suspected a ghost was behind anything, Jack wouldn't miss the opportunity to take his daughter with him to show her a few more tricks of the trade.
That meant that his mom was probably back at the school.
Danny slowed to a stop and hovered for a moment, thinking. He really didn't want to go back to Casper High as Danny Phantom and run into Maddie. If he was going to get blasted at by one of his parents, he'd be a lot safer near his dad. And there was a slim chance that Jack and Jazz had noticed something Danny hadn't. He had taken an aerial route, after all. But before he went back, he should really….
Danny drifted down to the sidewalk and ducked out of view, more out of habit than anything else. (Could he call it a habit if he still sometimes forgot to check for witnesses in the heat of the moment? It was a lot easier to remember when it was quieter like this.)
Closing his eyes, Danny searched for that familiar warmth inside him that held his human half. It was there, he could feel it, but he couldn't…. He couldn't grab it.
He couldn't change back.
He was stuck as Danny Phantom.
The one time he was right and Jazz was wrong, it had to be something like this—something that was undeniably really, really bad for him.
He couldn't even gloat about it and watch Jazz tear her hair out because she'd gotten something wrong. She wouldn't; she'd be too worried about him. Because he was trapped in his ghost form, which meant his parents would end up hunting him because he couldn't very well hide from them for very long when it looked like they were the only ones left in the city. That, in turn, was because of something else that had gone wrong that they would probably blame on him when they found him—just before they strapped him to a table and started experimenting, before they ripped him apart piece by piece, molecule by molecule.
"Aw, crud."
A/N: Step 2: Make sure Danny's stuck in ghost mode. Check. Step 3: Isolation. In progress. Isn't that a cheerful prospect? Thanks to everyone who's following this story, and an extra thank you to everyone who takes the time to review.