Meanwhile, in Wisconsin…
Vlad was hard at work in the kitchen preparing a meal for his beloved new family. At long last, he had everything he ever wanted and he couldn't have been happier. He was cooking Maddie's favorite meal to show her just how much it meant to him having her be his queen. Let it never be said that he was a worse husband than that idiot Jack…
He had just walked over to check the oven, when a hand grabbed his ankle and phased him through the floor and into his secret lab below. He quickly changed into his ghost form, his hand igniting with spectral magenta energy, ready to attack his foe. He relaxed as Skulker stepped out of the shadows.
"Skulker? What is the meaning of this!" he hissed.
"I came to deliver my report. I almost eliminated the whelp, when a human stepped in to save her."
"So you're telling me a human was able to beat you? Honestly, when you told me you were the Ghost Zone's greatest hunter, I assumed you hadn't gotten that title by default!"
"I just thought you should know that that human was your adopted son!"
"Daniel? That's impossible! He couldn't possibly…"
Vlad trailed off, mentally examining this new development. There's no possible way this timeline's Daniel could have possibly have been in Amity Park to save the ghost girl, which meant…
"Clockwork! That meddlesome time spirit must have restored Danny's memories of our original timeline and sent him to Amity Park to aid that Manson girl!"
"What are you talking about," Skulker asked, having no idea what this "timeline" nonsense his employer was going on about was even all about. "I don't see why you're so upset. He's just one human child. He's just one human child
"Never mind, you big oaf! Just get back to Amity Park and await further instructions."
Skulker scowled, not liking being ordered around like an underling one little bit. Nevertheless, he did as he was told and flew off to Amity Park.
"I can't believe this!" an extremely frustrated Plasmius ranted. "I go through all this hard work to get everything just the way I wanted it, and he still finds a way to mess everything up! He's more like his idiot father than he realizes!"
He floated over to his main work desk and punched a button on the underside to activate the communicator.
"Walker! I need you to go to Amity Park and detain a rule-breaker…"
"Fine. What rules has he broken?"
"All of them…" Vlad replied, smiling.
Back in Amity Park…
Sam and Danny stood before Fenton Works, the only untouched building in Amity Park. All the others had been badly damaged, but his family home stood strong. Of course, the glowing green ghost shield around it probably had something to do with that.
"Come on, he's in here!" Sam exclaimed. She grabbed Danny by the hand and dragged him inside.
Inside the building, it was clear the place had faced some serious neglect. There was garbage and clothes everywhere, furniture had been thrown about, and there were green stains all over the walls. Whoever was living here clearly wasn't big on housekeeping.
They descended into the basement, into his parents' old lab. It was pitch black down there. The only source of light was a series of monitors set up on a desk in the far corner. They cast a dull blue light, which was just enough for Danny to make out the outline of a chair and someone sitting in it in front of the desk.
"Hey Danny, long time no see, dude."
The lights suddenly turned on and the chair swiveled around. Danny gasped at what he saw.
It was Tucker… or rather what was left of him! His body was now almost completely mechanical. Only his face still looked human. However, even that wasn't fully untouched. The upper righthand corner of his face was now completely robotic too, leaving him with one glowing red mechanical eye. A series of wires connected his robotic body to the futuristic, hovering mechanical chair.
"Tucker…What happened to you?" Danny asked in complete shock.
"Sam and I were cornered by Walker and his goons. There was a big fight and Sam was able to drive them back, but I took a hit from one of Walker's energy blasts. My body was damaged beyond repair so I had to be transferred into this mechanical body. Now I don't need to eat, to sleep… I don't hate this form, really. I don't mind looking like something out of Cyber Zombies, but not being able to eat meat… that's just cruel and unusual punishment!"
"Tucker, I'm so sorry. I—"
"It's not your fault, dude. You weren't there. There's nothing you could have done. Besides, I got some sweet powers out of the deal. I can now control any piece of technology in a twenty-mile radius! I mean, I have to kick Technus out of it first, but he's not the brightest bulb on the porch so that's not too difficult. I've always wanted to be closer to technology and I can't be any closer now, can I?"
"But if I had been here, maybe I could have…"
"What's done is done. What's important know is that you get Clockwork's medallion and undo it!"
"Wait? How did you know about that?"
"I have each of the safehouses monitored in case of emergencies. I heard everything you told Sam. The good news is, I can help you. If I can get close enough to that castle, I can shut down the security. The bad news is, the place is bound to be crawling with guards, not to mention Plasmius himself! As tough as Sam is, she's not strong enough to take them all on by herself."
"I hate to admit it, but he's right! I'm not strong enough to take them all on by myself. I only got these powers a few months ago. I'm still learning. I don't know how to use them all."
"That's ok," Danny reassured her. "I do. Come on, I'm going to teach you two years' worth of training in two hours!"
The following scenes play out as part of a montage sequence….
First up was the power of duplication.
"OK. This one's a little tricky. It took me a while to learn it, but Vlad's a master at this, so its really important you get this right!"
Sam attempted to split herself in two, but succeed only in splitting her head in two.
"Did it work?" both heads asked in unison.
"Well…" a slightly creeped out Danny gestured towards her heads.
Both heads turned to face one another and screamed when they saw each other.
Next up was conjuring a ghost shield.
"Conjuring an energy field around you can temporarily deflect your enemies' attacks. Go ahead, show me what you can do!"
With a little effort, Sam was able to conjure an orb of glowing energy around herself.
"Awesome job, Sam!" he congratulated her. "Now let's see how well it holds up."
He took one of the ghost weapons off the wall and fired a blast at the shield. The orb went flying backwards, crashed into the wall, ricocheted off, crashed into the floor, and bounced off that as well. Sam, in her protective bubble, began bouncing around the room like an out of control bouncy ball. During one of her bounces, she struck the side of Tucker's hovering chair, sending him flying.
"Well that's just great," he muttered. "The world's first half-ghost pinball!"
Next, they tried cryokinesis.
"This power I only got recently, but it's come in pretty handy. With it, you can freeze your foes in their tracks!"
Sam blew a cold blast of freezing ghostly energy. "Hey guys, how did I…do?"
She looked over to see Danny and Tucker frozen in a block of ice. Danny's hand was raised in a thumbs up position.
They moved on to the ghostly wail.
"Alright. This is the strongest of our abilities. It can take down anyone and wipe an entire army at once. But it sucks out all of our energy and strength, so it should only be used as a last resort!"
Sam attempted a ghostly wail, but it only managed to minorly rattle some of the equipment on the walls. Tucker gasped in surprise when a glass of water next to him on the desk exploded. The water splashed onto some nearby devices, causing them to short circuit.
"Nooooo!" he cried in despair. "My technology!"
Danny's face collided with the palm of his hand and he shook his head. "Oh great. If we encounter the Glass Ghost while we're there, we'll win for sure!"
So, they decided to try duplication again…
This time Sam was able to conjure three duplicates. Unfortunately, they all seemed to have come out…wrong. One was all crinkly and bent out of proportion like a cubist painting. One seemed to have developed a bad case of ecto-acne and appeared to be melting. The other appeared to have inflated like a balloon, and looked like it weighed 900 pounds like a sumo wrestler. Sumo Sam, unable to walk because of her immense weight, began rolling around on the floor like a bowling ball, ultimately knocking over Tucker.
"Aaaaaand… we're back to pinball."
They tried each ability a few more times, with Sam improving after each iteration. After about four or five tries, she seemed to have gotten it!
End of montage…
Danny and Sam were sitting on the roof of the op center looking at the stars.
"You know, no matter how many times I look up at the night sky, it gets more beautiful every time I see it," Danny commented. "Just like you."
Sam blushed and looked away.
"You know, ever since I got these powers, I haven't had time to stop and appreciate the beauty of nature anymore. I used to spend all my time trying to protect it, but now…"
"You never did tell me what it was like. When you first got your powers, I mean."
"At first? It was fantastic! More than that, it was exhilarating. For the first time in my life, I felt like I was really making a difference in the world, you know?"
"Yeah. I think I know exactly what you mean."
"Anyway, it all seemed so much more fun back then. Fighting ghosts, getting the occasional payback on Paulina, sneaking away from my parents and their ridiculous rules…"
She trailed off, becoming very quiet. She looked down at the ground, a sad expression on her face.
"Sam, what is it? What's wrong?"
"You know how my parent were so proper and how much they hated anything 'abnormal'? Well, they didn't take kindly to Vlad's takeover. They didn't care for the idea that a ghost was in charge, and that he brought more ghosts with him! They adamantly spoke out against him. One day, they held a big rally of concerned parents to protest against all the ghosts. Tucker's parents were there too."
"So, what happened?" Danny asked, not liking where he thought this was heading.
"Walker and his police force arrived to break up the protest. They arrested everyone in attendance and hauled them away. I haven't seen my parents since. I don't know where they are, what happened to them, or if they're even still alive. I think that's the worst part…not knowing. At least if I knew they were gone I could grieve and move on. But instead I'm stuck in some cruel purgatory between the hope that they're still out there and the fear that they're not. It's funny, I spent my whole life fighting them and now… I just miss them so much."
She buried her face in her hands and was silent.
Danny put a hand on her shoulder reassuringly. "Sam, look at me." He pulled her head towards him so he could look her in the eye. "I will fix this. I promise. We will fix this. Together."
She forced a smile and looked down. For the first time, she noticed that her hand had closed around his. She leaned in closer and he did the same…
Boom!
They were both jolted to attention as a massive explosion shook the building. A massive bolt of energy had struck the side of the ghost shield. Suddenly another bolt hit the shield, then another, and another. The looked down to see Walker standing with over fifty police ghosts in behind him.
"Attention Daniel Fenton," he shouted up at them. "You've broken the rules and the time has come to pay the consequences! You, Samantha Manson, and Tucker Foley have all been charged with conspiring against King Plasmius. Surrender peacefully and we will be lenient in your sentencing."
With that, each of the ghosts below began to fire off blasts at the shield. With each blast, Danny could see it getting weaker. Small cracks were already beginning to form in its sides.
"That shield won't hold them long. Come on, let's go!" Sam cried.
Together, they ran back into the building and down to the lab. Tucker was hard at work, desperately trying to activate the defenses but to no avail.
"The shield is almost down," he reported. "They'll be in here any minute!"
"Then you have to teleport us out of here!" Sam ordered.
They all heard a large crash, indicating that the shield had finally broken. The ghosts were in the building.
"I've never brought people with me before. I don't know if I can!"
"Well whatever you're planning on doing, can you do it quickly?" Danny pleaded. "We have to get out of here!"
"Oh, you're not going anywhere, punk."
They all turned to see Walker and at least twenty police ghosts. Over a dozen more floated in through the walls, surrounding them on all sides.
"You broke the rules, son. Now you and I have a problem."
"Stand back, Danny," Tucker instructed him. "This is about to get messy!"
He pressed a button on the arm of his mechanical chair and several panels opened on the walls. Large cannons emerged from each crevasse and began firing large globs of green goop, trapping several of the police ghosts. Walker's forces scrambled, desperately trying to evade the slimy projectiles.
A group of them with large riot shields surrounded and moved in on Sam. Wasting no time, she split herself into four duplicates. Each one let off any icy blast, freezing the S.W.A.T. ghosts in solid ice.
Danny ran to a nearby wall with mounted ghost-hunting equipment and began scanning it for something he could use. "Let's see… Spector deflector? No… The booo-merang? No… What's this thing? A ghost speed gun? Why do we even have that?!"
Meanwhile, Sam was finding herself under fire by a dozen of Walker's goons. She immediately cast a shield up around herself but knew it wouldn't last long. Learning from her training session, she backed up into the wall and was launched into the air. The glowing bubble began ricocheting off of everything it touched and began bouncing around the room uncontrollably, knocking around ghostly police officers in the process.
"Yes! Fenton Wrist Rays," Danny exclaimed in excitement, strapping the weapons to his wrists.
At the same time, a very fed-up Walker fired a blast of magenta energy at Sam's shield, causing it to pop. She crashed to the ground, dazed and weakened. He used one hand to close around her neck, pinning her to the ground, and raised the other into a glowing fist, preparing to strike.
"I've had enough of this! I'm sending you up the river."
At that exact moment, Danny blasted him with his wrist rays, sending the corrupt warden flying. Meanwhile, mini-turrets emerged from secret compartments in Tucker's chair and he began blasting back the ghost troopers with rapid-fire green bolts.
But it was no use. More and more ghosts poured in and the ones that had been trapped were quickly breaking themselves free. They were surrounded and vastly outnumbered.
"Stand behind me, guys!" Sam instructed. "I'm going to try that wail thing!"
But before she got the chance, a small black cube with green circuitry landed at her feet. Suddenly, the cube expanded, trapping Sam inside, leaving only her head and neck visible. The cube glowed green, forcing her back into her human form.
Finally making himself visible, Skulker hovered over the cube. "At last, ghost child, I have you!"
"Sam!" Danny yelled. He ran over to help her but Walker struck him with a burst of green light, binding his hands and feet in glowing green energy cuffs.
"Tucker, get out of here! Teleport yourself away while you still can!" Sam yelled.
"But I—"
"NOW!"
With a sigh, he reluctantly pressed a button on the arm of his chair. A glowing yellow portal opened in front of him. He was pulled through it and the portal closed behind him.
"You just let him get away!" a frustrated Skulker growled at Walker.
"It doesn't matter. These two were the ones he really wanted anyways."
Walker walked over to his two prisoners and knelt down to look at them at eye level.
"Daniel Fenton. Samantha Manson," he grinned. "You're under arrest…"
End of Episode 1…