Chapter 9
Danny looked back at the map Craig had given him, following the highlighter that had been drawn over the roads. He was flying over the old downtown area, looking for a baseball diamond Craig had pointed out that was almost across the street from the old castle.
Danny dropped to his feet on the sidewalk on the road north of the baseball field's parking lot, finding the house he was looking for directly across the street. He started folding up the map, making new cresses to get it back to its original size, and checked the street before crossing. He shoved the map in his pocket and looked at the old houses around him, worried who might see him. A lady with her dog on a leash stood under a tree to his left as he followed the sidewalk back to the old brick house, staring at him. He gave a polite wave, forcing a smile, as he reached for the iron gate to let himself in the front yard.
Turning away from the stunned lady, Danny closed the gate behind himself and walked up the steps to the front door. He was surprised the exterior of the house showed no signs the residences within were ghost hunters. He pulled the Fenton Thermos from his pocket before wrapping his knuckles against the dark wood door. As he waited for a response, he looked up at the overhand above him, a part of him wondering how old the building was. It sounded like it was a historic landmark, which might be why the Norton's didn't have anything on the outside, he realized. He poked at the sensor still hidden just under his hair absentmindedly before forcing his hand away, knowing Sandra would be mad at him if he messed up more of her sensors.
The door opened, revealing an older man in a lab coat with a mustache and beard that were turning a dark gray. A device was held in his hands, two antennae pointing towards Danny as lights pulsated at him. The older man looked at Danny and then down at the device in his hands, his bushy eyebrows raised in surprised. He looked back at Danny before calling out, "Jackie, he came right to the door!"
"Dr. Norton said he was going to call you," Danny said, being cautious of any weaponry that might appear. "I'm Da-"
"You're Danny Phantom, we know who you are," Kevin Norton interrupted. "How are you stable so far from your haunt?"
"I've been to Colorado and Wisconsin, too," Danny said, noticing a lady dressed in a leather fridge vest over a flowery dress that went to the floor coming up behind the old man. "I just need to get to your ghost portal so I can drop this off."
"You caught that rainbow fiend?" Jackie Norton asked, pushing her skinny form past her husband so she stood on the stoop in front of Danny. She looked at the device in his hands only to ask, "Is that Fenton tech?"
"Yes." Danny took a cautionary step backwards, away from the gray curly haired woman as he put a second hand on the thermos. Trying to keep himself polite he said, "I'm sorry, I just want to put this ghost back in his world and get back to Dr. Norton." A strong worry pulled at his mind from these two ghost hunters. He felt like he had just walked up to a lion's den, being a juice piece of meat holding an easier piece of meat and asking to see their storage of meat in the far back of their cave. He realized he had spent too much time around Tucker with coming up with the analogy.
Kevin gave another look at the device in his hands before taking a step back. He looked back at Danny and said, "This is the Norton Novicator, it'll let me know if you activate any of your powers and will incapacitate you the instant you do."
"Ghost hunters and their weird device names," Danny mumbled with a smile at Kevin. He turned to Jackie and nodded his head towards the inside. "Lead the way, Mrs. Norton."
Jackie gave him a glance before walking passed her husband. Danny looked at the old man and the device in his hands, brushing his side against the door frame to squeeze past. Following the woman into the dog run of the house, Danny looked around with surprise to see what looked like the remains of fire damage along the walls.
"Was there a fire recently?" Danny asked, following the woman who hadn't left the seventies into a room only to stop in the doorway in surprise at finding their lab above ground.
"Yeah, in '99," Jackie informed. "Almost wiped out all of our research."
"Forward, Phantom," Kevin ordered, still behind him.
Danny gave a glance over his shoulder, biting his tongue as he stepped up to a strangely square door in the wall. "Is this your portal?" Danny asked, stopping a few feet from the plain metal door.
"Yes it is," Jackie said with a wide smile. She turned to a control panel built into the wall beside the closed portal as she added, "This morning we were running a basic test, just making sure everything was still operational. We've been trying to create a portal into your world for most of our careers."
"How those idiot Fenton's figured it out before us, I'll never know," Kevin retorted.
Danny kept his eyes on the door, holding in the defense to his family he wanted to blurt out.
"But the ghost slipped through our defenses and flew south," Kevin informed, continuing without noticing Danny's discomfort. "We called Craig, but didn't know he was working with you. Makes sense though, that my brother would get called in to work with you before the Fenton's."
Danny bit his tongue, worried he was going to bite it off as he physically held himself back from telling them all the truth as he held tight to the thermos in his hands.
"Here we go, shoot him back in there," Jackie said as air released from the door.
To Danny's surprise, the metal door broke apart in a swirl pattern, twisting to reveal a small circle in the center of Ghost Zone green. The metal stopped moving as Jackie turned around and said, "There you go, Ghost-boy."
Danny gave her a look, having expected to step through the portal and at least drop the ghost off like he had done before his parents worked out the Fenton Flusher. He looked back at the hole that looked to be just bigger than the thermos before uncapping the device in his hands. Putting the mouth of the thermos to the hole, he flicked the switch to release and pushed the button. He gave it the same amount of time the Fenton Flusher would take before releasing the button and pulling the device free of the hole.
Jackie turned back to the panel and pressed a button, causing a low beep to alert the portal door closing.
Danny watched in amazement as the metal twisted close before looking once again like a single sheet. Remembering his mother's curiosity, he swallowed his Fenton pride and forced on a smile as he capped the Fenton Thermos. Turning to Jackie he said, "Wow, Mrs. Norton. Your portal looks super cool. How does it work?" Internally he cringed, thinking back to those acting classes Jazz had suggested.
"Better than the Fenton's," Kevin retorted, stepping around Danny so he was beside him. He kept the Norton Novicator pointed at Danny with a scowl pulling on his face.
"Well, the door is tungsten sprayed with our own ghost proofing spray," Jackie explained, throwing a look at her husband. Turning back to Danny she continued, "We used an idea from origami, called the transforming ninja star, for the unique look of the door. But the best part is how we activated it. You wouldn't happen to know how the Fenton's activated theirs, would you?"
Danny shook his head, keeping the thermos in his hands as he blatantly lied to them. He knew exactly how it had been activated. He did it.
"The most popular belief is just ectoplasm charged in the right manner," Kevin said. "Instead we focused on limestone."
"Limestone?" Danny echoed, vaguely remembering something with it being a conductor for ghosts but that was so long ago he couldn't remember it all that well.
"Our portal is lined with limestone," Jackie continued. "With the right mix of limestone, electricity, and water we finally struck a portal!"
"Fascinating," Danny forced out. "But I really should be getting back. Dr. Norton's expecting me."
"What you're doing with Craig still baffles me," Kevin admitted. "But that ghost escaping was our fault and I'll be dammed if our town turns into your Amity Park."
Danny eyed the man, registering the jab was towards himself as well as his family, before saying, "I'll let myself out." He was about to start floating, planning to fly through the roof, only to stop before activating the power and looking at the device Kevin was still pointing at him. Giving it and the man holding it a glare, he instead turned on the ball of his foot and walked out of the room. Retracing his steps, he walked up the dog run and pulled open the door, leaving it opened as he jumped into the air and quickly flew upwards. He gave a glance behind himself and looked at the doorway to see the couple watching him. Rolling his eyes at the two, he pocketed the Fenton Thermos and pulled back out the map to find his way back to the Glenn Research Center.
The End