Nothing. There was nothing here. Nothing out of the ordinary, at any rate. Not that Vlad dealt with the ordinary very often anymore, but he knew it when he saw it. Casper High was completely devoid of clues as to the Fentons' disappearance. No signs within, no signs without.

"Oh, fudge buckets," Vlad muttered. This was turning out to be as fruitful as his search for Desiree.

"Oof! I don't know if I'll ever really get used to that."

Vlad spun around to see none other than Daniel's two friends, Sam and Tucker. They were climbing to their feet, scrapping a few pieces of grass off their clothes. He raised his eyebrows; they had not been there five seconds before. "Get used to what, exactly?"

Sam cringed but didn't answer him. "What are you doing here?" she countered, sounding sour as usual.

"Valerie told me young Daniel was missing," Vlad replied easily. No need to mention he knew about the rest of the Fentons; that would only give them an opening for teasing him, and he had had quite enough of all their juvenile pokes and prods into his affairs.

Sam, to his surprise, hit Tucker, who yelped and rubbed his arm. "What was that for?"

"Telling Valerie," Sam ground out. "We might've been able to use her help, but we're sure not going to be using his."

"Oh, please, do talk about me as if I'm not here," Vlad said dryly. When they continued to do so, he cut in again. "I would suggest that you tell me what you know or we might miss our opportunity to get Daniel back."

"We don't need your help," Sam snapped. "You can't help Danny any more than we can."

"And why would you say that?" It wasn't like the girl to admit that neither she nor Tucker were much of a help, either, though he couldn't say he hadn't expected her to balk at the idea of accepting his help.

"Because Danny—" Sam broke off. She glanced at Tucker, then back at Vlad, and he wasn't entirely sure he liked the gleam in her eye. "Maybe you can help," she said slowly.

That couldn't be good. Vlad had hardly expected the girl to change her tune so quickly. "Then tell me what you know."

"Danny can't be helped by his friends," Tucker said, "and I think it's safe to say you qualify as an enemy."

"I beg your pardon?" Where exactly had they gotten the idea that Daniel couldn't be helped by his friends, of all people? That was precisely who could help him; they were the only ones who knew his secret, after all, and had a desire to help the child. And, while he did have his days where he couldn't blame Daniel for considering him an enemy, he really wasn't. He didn't want to destroy him. He wanted to work with him. All right, yes, he'd tried to clone him because he'd refused so often, but the point still stood. If Daniel would just agree to renounce his father and to—

"You're his enemy," Tucker repeated.

Sam was nodding. "You have to find the Box Ghost."

"Oh, not that insufferable—"

"He's the only one who knows anything," Sam interrupted. "He's been there, wherever Danny is. Come on, Vlad. If you want to see Danny again, or his…mom, then you've got to find the Box Ghost."

Vlad ignored Sam's shudder as she mentioned Maddie. He didn't need the approval of children to pine after his college sweetheart. "And why must I be the one to find the Box Ghost?" He couldn't really say he'd ever had a tolerance for that particular ghost.

"Because all the ghosts are scared of Plasmius," Tucker answered. "You're the only one who might get anything out of him. He'd just threaten to throw boxes at us and tell us to beware him and all the cardboard at his disposal."

Vlad crossed his arms. "Very well," he said bitterly, "but at least do me the courtesy of telling me where you two came from. You certainly weren't here earlier."

"Uh…." Tucker glanced at Sam, who reached into her pocket to pull out her phone.

"We don't have time," Sam said. "We need to talk to Valerie. Meet us after you talk to the Box Ghost. You'll know where to find us!" She grabbed Tucker's arm and started pulling him away, dialling the cell phone with her free hand.

Vlad watched them go. It wouldn't do any good to protest, to argue. He did suspect where they'd be gathering, after all. FentonWorks was easily accessible and, no doubt, equipped with anything they might need. He wasn't impressed that he was the one who had been tasked with seeking out the Box Ghost, but Sam and Tucker both brought up good points: the other ghosts were afraid of him, and if he didn't get any information out of that annoyance of a ghost, he might not see Maddie again.

As much as he wasn't impressed with the fact that he was listening to a bunch of insolent teens, he didn't want to risk losing Maddie forever. Losing her to Jack Fenton had been painful enough. Losing her for good…. It didn't bear thinking about.

With a sigh, Vlad stalked back into the school. It was empty, and he wasn't about to let the people of Amity Park know that their mayor was half ghost. Vlad shifted into his ghost form and then set off in search of the Box Ghost.

In times like these, it was best to get the annoyances dealt with quickly and efficiently.

"Meet us at FentonWorks," Sam said when Valerie answered the phone. "Tucker and I found something."

"So did I," Valerie said. "I found Jazz. We're already at FentonWorks."

"You what?"

"I'm with Jazz. Here, I'll pass you over."

There was a bit of shuffling, then, unmistakably, Jazz's voice. "Hello."

"Jazz? Where were you? Where's everyone else? How did you get away?"

"I don't really know. I'll explain when you get here; I don't want to keep repeating myself."

"Jazz is there?" Tucker asked. "How?"

Sam shrugged and waved him off. "Okay. We'll be there in ten." She snapped the phone shut and looked at Tucker. "C'mon. Jazz can tell us what she knows. It's probably not much, but she'll have a few theories. She always does."

"Aren't you going to tell them what Clockwork said?"

"Yeah, but without telling Valerie we got help from a ghost." Sam looked around for a moment, seeking inspiration but not finding it. "We'll come up with some reason that we found it out. We always do."

"Sam said they'll be here in about ten minutes," Jazz said, handing the phone back to Valerie.

Valerie nodded and pocketed the phone. "Sounds good. Have you figured out what you're going to say?"

"Not really," Jazz admitted. "I don't know what I can say beyond relating my experiences. There was no sign of any particular ghost, if it even was a ghost."

Valerie nodded; Jazz had told her this before. "It is a ghost, though. I even know who it is: Desiree, the wishing ghost."

Jazz shot her a surprised look, and Valerie hoped that knowing the ghost by name hadn't blown her cover. Sure, her dad had figured out who she was, when Phantom had unmasked her, but she didn't think anyone else had. True, she hadn't been as careful with Tucker, earlier, but she'd been surprised, and he'd been distracted, and, well, he hadn't commented on it, so hopefully he hadn't caught her slip.

Then again, knowing the ghosts by name was becoming less of a mark for her being a ghost hunter. A bunch of kids in school were trying to learn their names since Paulina had decided that knowing a bit more about ghosts might help her catch Phantom's eye.

Valerie gritted her teeth. Stupid Phantom, fooling all those people…. He was the reason the Fentons were in this mess just as much as she was. If he wasn't so…so…something, then she wouldn't have made the wish, and Desiree wouldn't have been able to twist her words, and then Danny and his parents wouldn't be stuck wherever, and then she wouldn't need to—

"That's what Danny and I thought, too," Jazz said, surprising Valerie. "We didn't run our theory by Mom and Dad. Dad, especially, might've…overreacted." Jazz stared at her hands for a moment, then looked up at Valerie. "But in the time I was there, I realized that things didn't make sense if this was Desiree. From what I understand, she grows more powerful with every wish she grants. She wouldn't gain anything by getting rid of any of the people."

"She didn't. I mean, you came back, right?"

"I know," Jazz said, though she still sounded a bit uncertain, "but it wouldn't make sense for Desiree to just get rid of us and not stick around. I mean, what if we'd wished to go home? Wouldn't that be an easy way to grant wishes? It would've made far more sense for her to move a larger group of people and return them slowly, gaining power each time she granted a wish."

"She would've needed a wish to start with."

"That's what I'm worried about. It means someone doesn't like us."

Valerie winced. "Not exactly. Look, I think I was the one who made the wish. Not against you guys!" she added quickly. "It was something to do with Danny Phantom. I think your family got dragged into it because you're ghost hunters."

Jazz wore a peculiar expression for a moment, but she soon schooled her features. "Our parents are, at any rate. Maybe that's why I got free. Because I'm not."

"Yeah, Danny will probably turn up next."

"No!" Jazz exclaimed. At Valerie's look, she explained, "I mean, Danny's got potential. That's what Mom and Dad say, anyway. I've done a bit of ghost hunting, too, but Danny's better than me."

"He is?" Valerie's eyes widened. "I've never seen him fight." She'd heard rumours at school that Danny had led a group of kids when a bunch of the parents in Amity Park had been kidnapped by a ghost (or had it been ghosts?), but she hadn't actually thought that it was something Danny could've done on his own. From what Jazz was saying, maybe it had been.

"Well, he, uh, doesn't do it much where people can tell that he's the one fighting," Jazz explained. "I don't know how well you know Danny, but he wants to be an astronaut when he's older. He doesn't want this to interfere. And, if Mom and Dad get their way, it will."

Valerie was nodding. "That makes sense," she said, remembering when Danny had told her what he wanted to be when he grew up. She'd been surprised and rather impressed. But she could understand why Danny thought ghost hunting might interfere. If his parents thought he was any good at it, they'd probably be after him to keep at it, and being an astronaut took a lot of work.

She knew Danny wasn't the greatest student in school now, and he'd really have to crack down and hit the books if he wanted the grades so he'd be accepted so he could actually do what he wanted. She knew how much time ghost hunting took; for a while, in the start, her grades had started to slip, until she'd gotten the hang of things and gotten right back to where she was supposed to be. Thankfully, her dad and her teachers had thought it was because she'd ended up moving to Elmerton, and she'd never found reason to correct them.

"What if I'm the only one who wasn't needed?" Jazz finally asked, twisting her hands together in worry. "What if, I don't know, Desiree or whoever it was needs the rest of my family for something? What if they don't make it back?"

"Calm down. I've seen your mom in action, and she's pretty good. And you said Danny's good, and your dad, well, is enthusiastic, so…."

"I'm going to get another piece of fudge," Jazz said, standing abruptly. "I'll be back in a minute."

Valerie sighed as Jazz headed back to the kitchen. They were in the living room now, waiting for Sam and Tucker to show. Valerie checked her watch. They should be here soon.

It was just as well. She wasn't doing a very good job of helping Jazz cope, as far as she could tell, and if Sam and Tucker had any info at all, it might help calm Jazz's nerves. And if not, well, it would at least give her something to do. Valerie figured Jazz worried about as much as her father did.

Valerie didn't have any siblings, so she didn't really know what it was like to worry about a younger brother, but she did know what it was like to worry about her dad. They'd been through some rough times since he'd lost his job because of Phantom, and Valerie had gotten more than one life lesson as they'd worked their way through that experience. So, she could sort of sympathize with Jazz. But she'd never been in a situation where she wasn't sure her dad would survive, and Jazz was clearly thinking the worst.

"Man, I hope Sam and Tucker have good news," Valerie muttered. "We sure need it."

The Box Ghost wasn't cooperating, but perhaps that was because he had yet to notice that he had company. Vlad, as Plasmius, hovered just inside the doorway of the warehouse where he'd found the dratted ghost. He had his arms crossed at the moment, but he had no qualms about blasting the Box Ghost a time or two to get his full attention.

After another ten seconds passed, Vlad's patience ran out, and he shot a ghost ray to incinerate a few of the boxes the Box Ghost had been fawning over.

That got the Box Ghost's attention.

"What?" he bellowed. "Who dares to harm my precious boxes? I am the Box Ghost, and I—" He broke off abruptly as he spotted Plasmius.

"You know where Danny Phantom is," Vlad said simply. "Tell me."

The Box Ghost shook his head. "I do not."

The Box Ghost looked like he was about to continue, so Vlad cut in while he had the chance. "You do," he countered, sending another blast at the ghost for refusing to cooperate. "And I do not appreciate being lied to."

"He's in the other place!" the Box Ghost cried, hovering protectively over the remainder of the boxes.

"And what, pray tell, is this 'other place'? Where is it?"

"It is here," the Box Ghost said, making absolutely no sense whatsoever. Vlad supposed he shouldn't have expected so much; it was, after all, the Box Ghost. "It is all around us. I do not like it there. I will not go back."

Vlad sighed. "How did you get out?"

The Box Ghost shrugged. "I do not know. I was there when the halfa trapped me in his cylindrical container, and when I escaped, I was returned here."

Someone released him, then. Vlad highly doubted the Box Ghost, of all ghosts, would have found a way out of the Fenton Thermos. But that didn't explain anything. "Did Desiree create this 'other place'?"

The Box Ghost shook his head. "It was old magic. If the wishing ghost released it, she does not control it."

Old magic? What nonsense was this? "What are you blathering about?" Vlad snapped. "Desiree's magic is her own."

"Then she is not the one who put the halfa in the other place."

Vlad glowered at the Box Ghost and let his anger show by way of pink flames licking his fingers. "Do you have any useful information," he asked quietly, "or are you simply an annoyance?"

The Box Ghost took the hint, his eyes widening. He darted a quick glance at the boxes behind him, then faced Plasmius again. "There are bridges," he said quickly, "between here and the other place. If you have the right tools, you might be able to build your own."

"Right tools?" Vlad repeated. "What right tools? What are the right tools?"

But the Box Ghost had already fled, taking the boxes with him.

Sam and Tucker got to FentonWorks in good time, and they'd joined Valerie and Jazz in the living room—with the fudge. Tucker had insisted on being able to help himself to said fudge. He'd skipped lunch, and he never skipped lunch. Well, except for the time that it had literally been grass and mud, but seeing as he'd feasted on meat later that day, that didn't really count. And, besides, he'd been doing a lot of running, and that took energy. Fudge wasn't meat, but it was something that he trusted not to be contaminated in the Fenton household, and that stood for something.

Well, actually, it stood for everything. Tucker had learned very early on in his friendship with Danny to decline every time Mr. and Mrs. F offered to let him stay for supper. Cookies and fudge were about the only foods he really trusted here.

After Valerie and Jazz had had their turns, Sam explained what they'd figured out. Valerie looked like she had a ton of questions, so either Jazz or Sam kept interrupting her to make sure she didn't get a chance to ask them. Tucker left them to it, instead helping himself to another piece of fudge. He couldn't think of excuses on an empty stomach. No good ones, anyway.

"Mom and Dad and Danny are the only ones there, as far as I know," Jazz said. She glanced at Valerie, then looked Sam and Tucker squarely in the eyes. "And Danny Phantom. He hasn't left since he showed up. I don't think he can."

Tucker might've been starved for food, but even he could decipher what Jazz meant. Danny was in ghost mode. But if no other ghost was there, he wouldn't have had any reason to go ghost, and he certainly wouldn't have done it otherwise; he'd agreed to play it cool with the whole ghost hunters' convention thing on, and he wasn't stupid. Something else had gone wrong, so Danny had gone ghost, but if he couldn't leave, that had to mean….

Danny couldn't change back? That couldn't be good.

Sam leaned back in her seat and groaned. Evidently, she'd come to the same conclusion.

"I'll bet that spook's enjoying himself," Valerie muttered darkly. "Probably likes seeing people stuck in a situation they don't like."

"He's stuck, too, as far as I can tell," Jazz reminded her, "and you were the one to make a wish."

Sam hadn't taken the news of Val's wish very well, but she'd managed to restrain herself from attacking the other girl. As for Tucker, well, he didn't like Jazz's reminder any more than Sam did, but Valerie's hatred of Danny's ghost half probably wasn't going to change anytime soon. She might call a truce and compromise with him when things got really bad, but she always went back to hunting him.

"Yeah, I guess," Valerie said, relenting. "I hope your family catches him, though."

Jazz sighed. "Believe me, they're going to try." From what she'd told them of the scene she'd left, Danny was probably in a lot of trouble with his parents.

Sam got to her feet and grabbed Tucker's hand. "I need to talk to you," she said, pulling him to his feet. "Jazz, can you come show us what food in the fridge might be safe to eat? I can't really exist on fudge."

"Sure, but I can't guarantee we'll find anything." Jazz got to her feet as well and followed the two of them into the kitchen. She went to the fridge and started rummaging around to keep up pretences, and Sam kept her voice low so that Valerie wouldn't make out what she was saying.

"We should've seen it before, Tuck."

"Seen what?"

"What Clockwork meant. Danny Phantom can't be saved by his friends. Vlad's certainly not his friend, and the Red Huntress still wants him gone. Valerie might be Danny Fenton's friend, but she's not Phantom's."

"And Danny's stuck as Phantom," Jazz added, closing the fridge door and turning to the cupboards. "I don't know if it's related or not, but he can't change back." She shifted around a few containers, paused, and looked back at Sam and Tucker. "But if you guys talked to Clockwork, that would be why the Spectre Speeder's gone and why I had to close the portal." She nodded to herself. "We'll have to get that back, you know. Mom and Dad might not notice once they get back because of everything that's happened, but the minute this is blown over, they'll realize it's missing." She turned back to her task and, after a moment more of rummaging, she pulled out a box of cereal. "I think it might be this or toast."

Sam glanced at the cereal, frowned at the sight of a dull green stain on the front of the box, and sighed, evidently not willing to risk it, even if Jazz figured it was fine. "Never mind. I can live on fudge until the end of the day."

Tucker looked doubtfully at the cereal when Jazz turned to him. "I don't suppose you have any non-contaminated meat?"

"You can be the judge yourself," Jazz said. "It's in the fridge. But, personally, I'd stick with the cereal."

"I'll go get more fudge," Tucker decided, heading back into the living room. Sam and Jazz followed, with Jazz still holding the cereal box. When the doorbell rang, she left the box with them and went to answer the door.

"Jasmine?" The disbelief was evident, and the owner of the voice all too obvious.

"Oh," Jazz said unenthusiastically. "Hi, Vlad. Come in. I'd thought Dad had said you were out of town."

"Thank you," Vlad said, recovering from his shock. "And your father was, no doubt, repeating an assumption of his when I told him I would be unable to show my support for their convention. Now, may I ask how you made it back here?"

"I don't really know," Jazz answered, closing the door and heading back to the living room.

"Did you find anything out?" Valerie asked, scrambling to her feet when Vlad came into the living room.

"Yeah, did you find anything?" Sam said, sounding a good deal more threatening than Valerie had—but then, to Valerie, Vlad wasn't the enemy.

Man, that girl had definitely targeted the wrong halfa. Vlad was way more evil than Danny any day. Well, any day not a day ten years in a future that no longer happens, but still.

Tucker couldn't help but wonder if Val would ever see the truth.

Vlad flicked a few pieces of dust off his suit. "From what I can gather from my sources, the Fentons—minus young Jasmine here, I see—are trapped in another vein of reality."

"Tell us something we don't know," Tucker said.

Vlad frowned at him. "I was told that there are bridges, and it is my assumption that they can be crossed. Perhaps that is why you are back with us," Vlad added, looking at Jazz.

"I guess," Jazz said, "but I hardly moved. I don't actually know if I did move. I was just…shifted back here."

"Nevertheless, you crossed a bridge."

"Yeah, we get that," Sam said. "I'm with Tucker. Tell us something we don't know."

"He is," Valerie said, looking surprised at how much disrespect they were showing Vlad. Oh, what he would give to see her face if she ever found out he was Plasmius….

Sam shook her head. "Tuck and I hadn't gotten to that part yet. It made the least amount of sense, and I was sort of hoping everything you guys said would put it into perspective, but it didn't."

Vlad huffed. "I doubt my little trip to my informant was an entire waste. Did you know that these bridges could be built?"

Silence. Then—

"How?" they all burst out together, the minute Vlad's words had registered in their minds.

Vlad seem to deflate a little, but Tucker figured it was all a show. It usually was, with him. "I'm afraid I don't know. I only know it can be done."

"That doesn't tell us much," Sam muttered.

But, maybe, combined with what Clockwork had said, it did. Danny Phantom couldn't be helped by his friends. And bridges could be built. So maybe he and Sam couldn't build any bridges because there were already bridges there, and those were ones that they couldn't use. They had to build new ones, or rebuild old ones, or something.

The bridges they were dealing with weren't literal. Tucker had figured that one out. But it wasn't entirely figurative, either, if it was supposed to be a connection between the two places. Or two people. Valerie might have a thing against Danny's ghost half, but if she'd fought alongside him before, maybe…. Maybe she could rebuild a bridge she'd burnt before. Maybe she could help get him back.

Tucker wasn't entirely sure how they could do that without telling her, though. He wanted her to cooperate, not rant about how they were being brainwashed by a stupid ghost.

"Let's go down to the lab," Jazz suggested quietly. "If we're going to find anything that can help us here, it'll be down there."

Or maybe those bridges were more on the literal than the figurative side after all. Man, thinking about that made his head hurt. It was almost as bad as doing mental math or trying to come up with an interpretation for some supposed symbolism in one of the books they had to read for Mr. Lancer. He could mention what he was thinking to Sam or Jazz or someone who was better at this sort of thing than he was. He would rather solve a computer problem or hack into someone's system any day.

"But what if we don't find anything?" Valerie asked. "I mean, I hate to say it, but someone has to. What if we don't?"

Sam glanced at Jazz, then Tucker, then Valerie. It figured that she'd ignore Vlad completely. "We will. We have to."

A/N: I'm going to go back to split chapters before anyone gets too annoyed with me for not telling what happens with Danny quickly enough. It's coming. I'll try to make it worth the wait. Thanks to everyone who takes the time to review.