Still haven't figured out my clue that I gave you at the end of the intro? Well the answer was Scotland. Simply reading this stories summary on my main page would have given away the answer.
So putting the clues together you can see that the legend of this mythological creature means it is based in Scotland. Now my next clue will have you go back to read the stories summary on my main page again. It sayd that Danny and Tucker are out fishing. This is the next clue: this creature lives in water. Think you can figure it out now? If not then continue reading, because the answer will be revealed at the very end of this part of the story. Enjoy.
The scene opens in the halls of Casper High just as students are rushing to get to their first classes of the day. Dash and Kwan are seen wailing on Mickey by giving him a wedgie before shoving him in a locker. They both laugh and walk away, not noticing Danny, Sam and Tucker standing nearby.
"At least he's not wailing on you anymore," Tucker said to Danny as a way to lighten the tension between them.
"Yah but he should be messing with people as big as he is," Sam informed him before Danny could respond. She turned towards the locker Mickey was stuffed in and pressed her ear to the cold metal as she turned the knob.
"Dash is a moron that is all bark and no bite," Danny added to the conversation as he leaned against the locker next to the one Sam was trying to open and folded his arms. "At least with people he finds intimidating."
"That's why he's stopped messing around with you," Sam informed him; pulling her ear away from the locker so she could look at them. "He's also stopped messing with Tucker and Paulina's stopped messing with me because we're your best friends," she added before she went back to trying to open the locker. "After Danny revealed his ghost half to the world the people who used to bully us have left us alone because they know that Danny is a threat."
A click is heard before Sam pulled on the locker's handle and the door swung open. Mickey fell out of the locker and tumbled to the floor, losing his glasses in the process. After finding them and placing them back on his face he stood up and patted himself down. "Thanks Sam," he thanked her in his nasally voice.
"No problem," Sam responded with a smile. "Now hurry up and get your stuff together; class will be starting any second now," she informed him.
"Actually he's still got a few minutes," Tucker spoke up drawing their attention directly to him. He was fiddling around with his PDA. "I've hacked into the school's timing schedule and reprogrammed the clocks to be five minutes slow; this way we can get to class before the bell rings."
"Nice thinking," Danny said before Mickey took off down the hall in a sprint.
He rounded a corner moments before a crash is heard before a kid with a high pitched voice is heard screaming, "OWW! My Leg!"
Sam slammed the locker shut before she bent down to the floor and picked up a couple of notebooks. She handed one to Danny and kept one for herself. They held each other's hands as they walked down the hall to their first class of the day.
Their first class was English with Mr. Lancer; for some reason he seemed to be their teacher for a lot of their classes, not only for their grade, but also for the freshman and the sophomores. He must have had a clone or something because there was no possible way for him to be teaching at least a half dozen courses at once.
"So I heard you and Danielle had your hands full last night with the Box Ghost?" Sam asked him as they continued to walk down the hall hand in hand.
"Yah what's the deal with that?" Tucker asked, butting in with a question of his own. "I thought he was a push over?"
"Well it would seem he's learned a new power that he's deemed 'The Box Bomb'," Danny informed them. "Let's just say that he's been upgraded from an annoyance to a minor threat."
"I never would have thought that possible," Tucker said in slight shock. "How'd you beat him?"
"Well we never actually did," Danny said shyly as he rubbed the back of his head nervously. "After I tackled him into the middle school's storage basement he buried us in boxes and made his escape. He ruined Danielle's night because she was supposed to kiss some guy she likes in the play. Now she's seeking revenge and she doesn't want any help from us so I'm just sitting back."
"Besides, she needs to redeem herself after he beat her back in January," Sam reminded them. What she said was in fact correct; the last time Danielle went head to head with the Box Ghost she lost when he threw boxes filled with acidic residue at her.
"Well don't remind her," Danny warned them. "She's still fuming and she plans to use full power to take him down."
"Ouch, talk about Over Kill," Tucker said with his eyes wide and practically bulging out of his head.
"So I heard rumors that Lancer's got a new project for everyone to work on," Sam said to change the subject.
"I guess we'll just have to find out the old fashion way what it is," Tucker sighed.
"By going to class and staying awake long enough to hear the assignment," Danny finished what Tucker was saying with a sigh of his own.
They entered the bustling classroom and just missed being hit by a fleet of paper airplanes. Students were yelling across the room back and forth to each other. Boys were flirting with the girls, geeks and nerds were trying to get their things together and slackers were trying to fall asleep despite the excessive noise.
The three friends took their seats off to one side of the room just as Mr. Lancer walked into the room. The balding man had been on a diet so his beer gut had started to recede. He carried his usual briefcase at his side and set it on his desk before he turned his attention to the bustling classroom.
"Alright everyone," he said in a clam voice. Nobody seemed to hear him so he spoke louder. "Everyone calm down and pay attention." Still nobody except those that were actually paying attention could hear him. At this time he snapped. "Will everyone sit down!" he yelled at the class.
A sudden hush came over the room and all the students whom hadn't been sitting rushed to their seats like scared dogs with their tails between their legs. Everyone seemed more scared of him than usual. Normally nobody paid him much attention, but he was more strict on the upper classmen so they had to be more cautious around him.
"Good, now that I have your attention I can begin to inform you all on your next project," Mr. Lancer informed them. He began to stroll across the front of the class at a meager pace. "We will be starting up a pen pal program that you will all be expected to participate in."
"Pen pal?" Danny questioned. "That's like writing emails and letters to other kids in other schools right?" he asked with quite a bit of curiosity, although he was afraid that the answer to his question wouldn't be something he'd enjoy.
"That is correct Daniel," Mr. Lancer said in a pleased tone. "The students you will be communicating with could be from different states or even from different countries," he said in a darker tone, and with a wicked smile no less.
"They had better know English," Tucker pouted as he crossed his arms. "Because I'm not learning another language just so I can write letters back and forth to someone I'm only going to be in contact with for a few days."
"Will you stop being such a big baby," Sam scolded him. "You already know how to speak in fluent Esperanto and you're a techno geek," she reminded him. "You can just use your PDA to translate what they say if they speak a different language."
"Well I guess that is true," Tucker conferred as he rubbed his chin and looked at his PDA in his other hand.
"Besides I like the idea of getting to know someone from a different part of the country, or even from a third world country," Sam added with a little more enthusiasm.
"Only you would like this project," Danny whispered to her so no one else could hear him.
"You will ALL be expected to participate in this program," Mr. Lancer spoke up, taking over control of the class room discussion once more. "No matter what language your assigned pen pal speaks," he growled at Tucker who sank into his seat as if it could hide him.
"What happens if we refuse to participate?" Dash asked after raising his hand into the air.
"A very good question Mr. Baxter," Mr. Lancer said with an evil grin. "You will all be happy to know that your grades won't be penalized." The entire class broke out into an excited uproar before Mr. Lancer spoke back up. "Instead you will be forced to participate in our Foreign Exchange Program in which you will be sent to live with your pen pal for a week," he informed them. A sudden hush over came the classroom. "Principal Ishiyama has given a forewarning; anyone who refuses to participate or disturbs the process of the pen pal program will have their parents notified and they will be placed on a plane at their expense the next day."
"I don't think we've ever had a project that was so strict," Danny exclaimed to his two friends.
"You will all be paired into groups so after we get to the computer lab I will give you the email addresses of your pen pals," he informed the class as he continued to stroll around the classroom.
A little while later the class had gathered into the school's computer lab. A rather large room; computers were set up along the walls of the room. More computers were stationed on tables that made up three rows running the length of the room. Altogether there were probably over fifty computers in there alone.
Only a few computers were being used though because the class of just over twenty students had been split up into groups. Our favorite three teens were lucky enough to have been paired up with each other.
Being the techno geek of the three, Tucker worked the keyboard while Sam worked on the details of the project.
"Ok, so we've been assigned to communicate with a girl named Sophia who lives in Scotland," Sam informed the two boys as she read off a sheet of paper Mr. Lancer had given them. "According to this info sheet she is also a junior in high school and she speaks fluent English because her mother was born and raised in Great Britain, but she still has a very thick Scottish accent." She looked up half expecting a response from the other two but instead what she got was Danny cheering on Tucker as he played a space shooting game in which he maneuvered a space ship and shot alien ships to increase his score. "Are you two even listening to me!" she half yelled at them.
The answer to her question; was no. They weren't paying her or the project any attention, potentially threatening their grade point averages in the process.
"Alright, I've gotten to the mother ship," Tucker said to Danny as he used the directional arrows on the keyboard to aim, the space button to fire individual energy attacks and the enter button to fire rapid successions of energy attacks.
"I've never gotten this far into Crash Nebula before," Danny told him as Tucker pushed buttons rapidly. "You've nearly beaten the game."
Before Tucker could beat the game a shadow overtook them. They turned around and smiled nervously up at Mr. Lancer who had his arms crossed and he was glaring down at them in anger. He reached out and pressed the escape button on the keyboard, effectively closing the game. "The two of you are on very thin ice," he warned them before he walked away.
"Do the two of you want us to fail this project?" Sam scolded them in a low whisper.
"Hey, you had things under control," Tucker responded in a low whisper of his own. "We figured we'd just take a break."
"A break from what!" Sam whispered in a scolding manner. "We haven't even started yet; besides, this is a group effort. We all get the same grade and if you fail then I fail, and I'm not about to let you two drag me down."
She shoved him out of the way and accessed the internet before typing in commands to go to an email sight.
"She's got a point," Danny finally said with a sigh. "We've got to get to work, otherwise we could be sent off to Scotland for a week."
"You really believe they'd send us to Scotland?" Tucker asked skeptically, and with a raised eyebrow.
"I don't really know, but I certainly don't want to find out," Danny responded as he pulled his chair up to Sam who was typing furiously on the computer. Tucker sighed in defeat before he too pulled his chair up to Sam's other side.
While they and the rest of the class were busy the view changed so that everything changed to a different shade of red. Black indication lines formed a cross in the center of the view that served as a cross hair for some type of weapon.
"Hmm, the ghost child is communicating with others elsewhere through the glass box?" a dark and sinister voice said to itself quietly. "Perhaps it is just a school project, or maybe he is gathering forces to aid in his own protection." The source of the voice lowered its arm, the red sight going with it because it was attached to his wrist.
His physical appearance was that of a large robotic hunter with a flaming green Mohawk. His boots and gauntlets glowed with a blue light and his belt had a glowing green S on the front. Skulker was hunting Danny from a distance; he didn't want to get too close because he now knew just what Danny was hiding and what he was truly capable of.
He knew Danny was hiding his full power within his ghost form; he could increase his power nearly 1,000 fold making him an unstoppable force, a rare catch indeed for what was already a rare breed of ghost and human.
"In either case it is safe to say he doesn't know I'm here," Skulker said with an evil grin. He was floating invisibly in the corner of the computer lab up by the ceiling. "With the new stealth mode of my suit not even his ghost sense can pick up my location; as long as I stay invisible," he added with a groan.
He re-lifted his arm and looked through the device attached to his wrist which looked like a pair of binoculars. Through the view of red, Danny, Sam and Tucker are seen before the view changed into a thermal image.
He zoomed in on Danny who appeared to be producing much more heat than his two friends. His central body core appeared to be white, giving off enough heat to produce a healthy aurora around his entire body.
"His power is incredible," he said in a low gasp. "He seems to be even stronger than when he killed his clone, and it's only been a few months. If I'm going to capture the ghost child I'm going to need to stay cautious and keep my distance until the timing is right."
Then just as fast as he had looked through the binoculars; Sam and Tucker stood and walked across the room to the printer while Danny stayed behind, looking at the online profile of a girl named Sophia from Scotland.
"Perfect, the other two have left him by himself and he has his back turned," Skulker spoke with glee. "It's not going to get any better than this and he could still be major threat. I need to strike while the fight is turned in my favor."
In a bored state of mind, Danny pushed the arrow down button on the keyboard as he read over Sophia's profile. Apparently her father mysteriously disappeared while out fishing on a lake the family lived on ten years previous.
With no other students in the immediate area, Skulker became visible behind Danny with his arm raised; a weapon protruding from his wrist and aimed directly at the back of his head.
With Skulker now visible his stealth mode was no longer operational allowing Danny to pick up on his presence. A wisp of cold blue air escaped from his mouth. Acting as if he didn't notice it Danny continued to examine the computer screen, or at least he was pretending to. He glanced to his right as if he could see what was behind him.
He heard the low hum of a weapon charging from behind him. He gulped nervously as a bead of sweat rolled down the center of his forehead, between his eyes and dripped off the tip of his nose before landing with a splatter on the computer's mouse.
That seemed to be the starting gun. All in one quick motion he swung around and grabbed the barrel of the gun and moved it to the side so by the time Skulker had realized what happened he had fired and missed Danny. The ecto-blast exploded on contact with the computer Danny had been using. The resulting smoke from the explosion set off the fire alarm and the sprinkler system was activated.
By now everyone in the room, or better yet everyone in the school thanks to the fire alarm, was aware of the current ghost threat. "Everybody run for your lives!" Mr. Lancer screamed. He was the first to run out of the room with dozens of students' right behind him. Sam, Tucker and Danny were the only ones left.
"We've got to help him!" Tucker yelled to Sam. His hands were full with stacks of printed off paper so he couldn't react quite like the others.
"We will but we need to get our gear!" Sam yelled at him. She grabbed his arm and pulled him along with her as they sprinted out of the classroom. Tucker dropped the papers as they fled causing them to be scattered all across the room. "Follow me to my locker!"
"I'm not following you; you're dragging me!" Tucker yelled at her fearfully.
Danny grabbed further down the barrel of the gun with his other hand. He charged them with ecto-plasmic energy before he turned his entire body, lifting Skulker off the ground before slamming him into the computer monitor next to the one he had been working on before it was blown up.
"Why are you here Skulker?" Danny asked him in a scolding tone. "Hunting me once again perhaps?" he asked with a mocking grin. "After all, you know just how rare we half breeds are. We are a rare catch indeed for the avid hunter."
"Well it would seem that you've answered your own question," Skulker said with a grin. "After all I am the hunter and you are the prey. Now if you'll kindly hold still for just a moment," he requested as his gun began to hum. A bright blue glow could be seen coming from within the barrel of the gun.
Just as he pulled the trigger Danny jumped out of the way. Like Vlad did when he revealed his true identity to the world; Danny back flipped into the air before he started hovering in his human form.
His signature blue ring of light appeared around his waist transforming him into his super powered ghost form. Skulker wasted no time in aiming his gun at him and fired off another round to which Danny dodged easily. His waist stretched out and became slightly transparent as a series of ecto-plasmic blasts passed right through him and exploded on the ceiling.
After forming his waist back to normal he proceeded to make a glass-like energy barrier and deflected yet another barrage of energy attacks. When the blasts ceased; he grabbed the edge of the energy shield and flung it at Skulker. It spun rapidly through the air like the blade of a loose buzz saw.
"Waa!" Skulker gasped before the rapidly spinning energy barrier struck the weapon attached to his wrist. It cut right through it before it continued on, chopping off the tip of his shoulder plate. It then exploded when it hit the wall, blowing a massive hole into the side of the school.
The sound of Skulker coughing is heard through the smoke and debris before he waved his hand through the smoke, clearing enough of it away so he could see clearly. A look of confusion was spread across his face. His eyes were wide and his mouth hung open as he searched for his prey.
Danny was hovering in the air in front of him with his arms folded and a mocking smile spread across his face. "I've trimmed up your armor a little bit," he informed the ghost hunter. "You like it?" he asked mockingly.
A look of anger spread across Skulker's face. He barred his teeth and growled at being made a fool of. He retaliated by grabbing the destroyed remains of a computer monitor and chucked it at Danny, whom caught it in one hand with ease like a baseball.
"Really?" he asked as he held up the computer monitor. "A computer? I didn't think you'd sink to trying to take over Technus' ghostly obsession," he figured with a roll of his eyes.
"I can't take over another ghost's obsession," Skulker said with a cocked eyebrow. "It goes against all bi-laws."
"I was making witty banter dude," Danny said with a sigh of disappointment.
"Huh! Ohh…ugh…this is awkward," Skulker said foolishly.
"Then allow me to remedy the situation," Danny yelled with furiosity. His legs morphed into a ghostly tail; he put his arms out in front of himself and he charged at Skulker at over one hundred miles per hour.
Skulker growled angrily and pulled his hand back into a fist before he lunged forwards and landed a hard fist right into the side of Danny's mouth, sending him careening across the room and into a table with a few unbroken computer monitors.
Skulker then proceeded to shoot another ecto-blast at him. His gun was gone thanks to Danny, so he resorted to blasting an attack with his hands.
Danny saw the attack coming and reacted by grabbing the printer from its stand next to him. The energy attack blasted off the cover lid with ease but the glass beneath was enough to deflect the blast away. It struck yet another table of computers, destroying them all.
Danny threw the printer away before he narrowly dodged a punishing blow from the ghost hunter; sending his fist into the wall and burying it the concrete and steel frame. He flew up into the air and landed back on the floor as Skulker removed his fist from the wall.
Skulker then jumped at Danny and proceeded to land another punishing blow, but he missed when Danny preformed an ecto-skid by emitting energy from the soles of his feet and sliding backwards. This was one of the only energy prone techniques he was capable of producing with his feet.
After coming to a stop; Danny charged for Skulker once more. Skulker pulled his fist from the shattered floor tiles before he launched himself for Danny once more, his fist blazing with energy.
Danny infused his own hands with glowing green ecto-plasmic energy before he caught Skulker's fist. He struggled to hold off the blow and managed to throw Skulker aside and into the wall, breaking a few more computers that were lined up alongside of it.
"It's time to end this," Danny said as he reached for his belt and grabbed for the Fenton Thermos that was attached there but found that it had been unknowingly crushed in the fighting. "Ohh," he sighed in disbelief. "Not again," he complained.
He chucked the crushed thermos over his shoulder and looked up to see Skulker stumbling to his feet.
"Well…there is more than one way to send you back to the Ghost Zone," Danny said to himself before he put his hands out in front of himself and started to form a swirling disk of ecto-plasm. He forced out all of his energy until the vertical disk was about five feet in diameter, but once again the strain was too much and he was forced to let go. The portal closed up and there was no trace left behind.
"Ha! Not enough power to open a portal to send me back to the Ghost Zone," Skulker speculated with laughter. He stood back up to his fullest and removed a string of wire that was dangling from his shoulder. "Now allow me-" he said with a smirk as he raised his hand and pointed it at Danny who was breathing heavily to catch his breath.
Another weapon was produced from his wrist and hummed to life. Danny was too weak to dodge when an anti-ghost net was launched at him. It wrapped around him and shrank in size until he was forced into the fetal position by the net tightening around him.
"Yah!" Danny screamed as the net squeezed down on him, forcing his knees into his chest. He opened his eyes and they shown with a bright green fury. He went intangible but found that he couldn't phase through the net. A look of confusion spread across his face before he tensed up and thrust his arms and legs outwards, but found that the net wouldn't break or rip. He couldn't escape. The tension of the net forced him back into the fetal position.
"There's no use in trying to break free ghost child," Skulker mocked him as he lowered his arm. "This net has been strengthened to withstand external and internal forces. It would take someone beyond your abilities to break free."
He walked up to the ghost hero and reached out to grab the net. Just as his fingers were wrapping around the netting a blast of energy came out of nowhere and struck him in the chest, shoving him away from Danny and into the last table of computers that hadn't been destroyed.
Danny looked up to see Sam and Tucker standing in the doorway; Sam with an anti-ghost pistol in her hands, was letting off smoke from the shot she had just fired. "Whoa! Nice shot!" Tucker yelled with excitement.
"Common!" Sam half yelled as she ran towards Danny. She dropped the weapon and kneeled down next to Danny; she grabbed the netting and pulled on it but to no avail. "I can't; it's too strong. We can't break it Danny," she confessed to him sadly.
"Yah, I already knew that," Danny said skeptically with a bored look in his eyes. "I can't break out in my current state, so I guess I'll just have to turn up the heat," he said with a burning fury in his eyes.
Skulker stood and growled before his shoulder armor opened on its own and produced a pair of energy reading binoculars. "Huh?" he questioned before he looked through them. He cocked an eyebrow as he examined Danny.
Sam and Tucker were backing away from him as sparks began to surge around the netting. Danny appeared to be struggling to break free once again. Confused; Skulker pushed a button on the side of the binoculars, changing the red shaded image to infrared.
Skulker examined the image more closely and discovered that he was letting off far more heat than usual; particularly his head. His ghostly glow had thickened and his hair had turned into flames.
Off to the corner of the image a series of numbers was rapidly increasing. First one thousand, two thousand, three thousand and so on. By this point he was starting to become fearful. Danny was increasing his power to unprecedented levels.
"It's like what happened over the summer all over again," Skulker said with a touch of dread hidden in his voice. When the power reading hit six thousand he removed the device and it disappeared within his armor. "He's becoming much too dangerous to take head on; I must bide my time and attack at a later time. Until our next meeting ghost child; so long." And with his parting words he became invisible and disappeared from sight, allowing his stealth mode to keep him hidden from Danny's senses.
The net that had entrapped Danny became set in flames before it was finally ripped apart. "ARGH!" Danny roared as he stretched out his arms and legs and emitted a bright flash of white ecto-plasmic energy from his entire body.
What little remnants of burnt net remained fell around his feet as he touched down on the floor. The heat he was emitting from his body was enough to melt the floor tiles. His thickened ghostly glow was moving about as if he were on fire.
"Darn it!" Danny yelled with fury. "He got away…another one of my enemies got away from me." His anger caused his ghostly glow to burn with greater intensity. Sam and Tucker had to back away from him because it was getting too hot for them.
"Danny, will you let it off?" Sam requested. "You're getting so hot headed right now you're making my skin simmer."
Danny realized that getting mad over Skulker's escape wouldn't help in any way. He took a deep breath and then sighed with relief as he powered down. His hair turned back to normal and his ghostly glow stopped moving about like flames. Blue rings of light appeared around his waist, transforming him back into his human form.
It was at this point that he took the time to look around and take in the damage toll that had built up in the fighting. Every single computer in the lab had been destroyed and a gaping hole had been blown into the wall.
The fire alarm and the sprinkler system had been deactivated and it was very likely that everyone in the school had become aware of the ghost attack by this point.
"All the technology, destroyed," Tucker whispered. "It's gone…all gone," he said as he fell to his knees and started crying into his hands.
"There must be over $100,000 worth of damages in here," Sam calculated simply by looking around the room. "So I wonder how much trouble we'll all be in for this?" she wondered out loud.
"Well I was defending us from a ghost attack from Skulker so hopefully they'll be lenient on us," Danny hoped.
Dramatic music plays as three American passports and three plane tickets are slammed onto a desk. "Congratulations, the three of you have just earned two way tickets to Scotland for the rest of the week," Mr. Lancer growled as he scowled at the three teens.
"WHAT!" Sam screamed, she was more stunned than anything else. "How is that fair!" she yelled with anger in her voice this time.
Mr. Lancer didn't respond; he just growled as he stepped away from the desk. Principal Ishiyama sat behind the desk in her seat with her fingers folded together. She seemed to be at a loss of words.
"I was fighting Skulker," Danny said to Mr. Lancer as his excuse. "It wasn't my fault he attacked while my back was turned in the computer lab. I was defending myself; you all know that."
This time Principal Ishiyama spoke. "Yes Danny, we are all quite aware that you were only looking out for everyone else's safety, but that is not why you are being sent away for a week," she explained; never having unfolded her fingers.
"Well then why?" Tucker asked out of curiosity.
"It better not be because we disturbed the pen pal program in process?" Sam warned. "Because it's not our fault Skulker attacked while we were in the computer lab," she reminded them.
"No Samantha, that is not why we are sending you to Scotland," Mr. Lancer responded with a sigh. "It's because of the damages to the computer lab," he informed them.
"Well there's always the chance of minor destruction when one of my enemies attacks," Danny responded quickly. "I mean, even the box ghost-" he started to say before Mr. Lancer cut him off.
"The box ghost didn't cause $100,000 worth of damages to the school's only computer lab," Mr. Lancer yelled angrily. "I wouldn't necessarily consider that 'MINOR' destruction," he informed the teens in a softer tone.
"Hey Sam's guess on $100,000 was spot on," Tucker said to Danny, nudging him with his elbow. His attempt to lighten the mode of the room wasn't taken lightly.
"We've never been punished like this before for causing damages to the school," Danny complained, stepping away from Tucker.
"You've never caused this much damage to the school before," Mr. Lancer responded calmly.
"I've caused millions of dollars worth of damage to the town before," Danny added. "Danielle and I both have."
"We all have," Tucker added, pointing his finger into the air.
Sam growled at him before lightly punching him in the stomach. "What they mean to say is that despite all of the damage we've caused to this town, we've never gotten into too much trouble because our activities have always been for the good of others, not for personal gain. You punishing us for something such as this just doesn't seem right considering all that we've done for this school."
"Let alone the town," Danny added.
"To heck with the town," Tucker half yelled. "You've saved the entire planet at least three times!" he yelled whilst throwing his arms into the air.
"I'm sorry you three," Principal Ishiyama apologized. "But those are our final words," she finished. She held up the three passports and three tickets so the teens could take them. After a few seconds they reluctantly took them.
"I guess spending a week with Sophia in Scotland isn't so bad," Sam finally said as she looked over her documents. She looked up at Danny and Tucker who were giving her skeptical looks. "Well I figure we could use this as a great learning experience," she answered their unspoken question. "I mean, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity to learn about a foreign culture from within."
"If she's starting to like the idea of being shipped off to Scotland then I'd bet money that we're not," Tucker whispered to Danny as the three of them walked out of the principal's office and walked by Dash, Kwan, Paulina and Star who were all sitting on a bench outside the office. The four of them had all been paired together for the project.
"I can't believe we're being sent to Northern Canada," Dash complained.
"I don't even know where Northern Canada is," Kwan complained with a bit of fear in his voice and a worried look on his face. "I don't wanna live like an Eskimo, and I don't even know how they live there," he complained.
"Ohh, my skin is going to chap so much in the frigid temperatures," Paulina complained.
"Why couldn't Danny have left at least ONE computer intact," Star complained. "At least then we'd be able to complete our project without having to be shipped off to another country," she wept into her hands before her three friends joined her. They wrapped their arms around each other and began crying as the scene fades away.
The airport was rather busy the next day; Sam, Danny and Tucker waited in a long line of people to get on a plane destined for Inverness, a well populated city in Northern Scotland. There they would meet up with Sophia who would take them to her home in Whitebridge, a small town at the south-eastern end of a nearby lake.
The three teens slowly moved through the line with their tickets in hand. Sam and Danny were holding hands and Tucker was wearing earphones and listening to something on his PDA. "Oh man, who ever knew learning to speak Scottish was so difficult," he complained as he took off his ear phones.
"The Scottish people speak mainly English dude," Danny informed him with a chuckle. Sam covered her mouth and giggled. She coughed and looked away whistling to retain her Gothic nature.
"It's actually referred to as Highland English," Sam corrected him.
"English!" Tucker half yelled. "Then what the heck am I listening to!" he asked as he pressed a button on his PDA and a small cartridge disk popped out of the side. He examined it closely and read, "Learning the Scottish language made E-Z for Dummies." He turned it over where it read, 'Hughes' joke shop'. He growled angrily before he tossed the fake language cartridge over his shoulder.
The plastic cartridge bounced off the floor before coming to a stop at a man's feet. He bent down and picked it up before looking up to see Danny and Sam laughing at a pouting Tucker. He was about to call out to the teens when Skulker; invisible of course; phased into his body from behind.
Danny stopped laughing for a moment so a wisp of cold blue air escaped from his mouth. It was a slightly darker blue than usual but none of them noticed the slight color change. He started looking around nervously.
"Danny, what's wrong?" Sam asked him worryingly.
"There's a ghost around here somewhere," he informed his friends. "It's probably Skulker overshadowing somebody so that I can't find him," he figured.
"Well he's not gunna attack with this many people around," Tucker reminded them. "When it comes to human crowds he's nothing more than a coward," he added with a grin.
The man Skulker had overshadowed looked down at the plastic cartridge in his hand before he wrapped his fingers around it and crushed it with a loud crunch. "The ghost child was able to sense my presence when I overshadowed this weakling human," he said. His voice was Skulker's, but it also echoed with the man's original voice so when he spoke they could both be heard simultaneously. "As long as I remain within this body he won't be able to find me," he added with a sinister grin. "But he can't stay hidden from me no matter where he runs off to."
He chuckled evilly to himself as he watched the three teens hand their tickets to the stewardess at the gate.
Slowly the room darkened and colors shifted as the scene melted to out in the middle of the ocean in front of the sun as it began to rise against the yellowish-orange colored sky. The plane passed in front of the sun and flew from right to left. (Meh, I couldn't think of a better transition)
The plane touched down later that day at around noon. They landed in a Scottish city named Inverness; (Its airport isn't directly connected to American Airlines, but in the story it is); somewhere in the Northern Highlands. They stepped off the plane and were instantly at a loss for where to go. The directional signs were in a different language.
"I thought you said they spoke mostly English?" Tucker asked the other two angrily as he lowered his eye brows.
"Well they do, but a portion of their language evolved from a German Dialect," Sam informed him. "These signs are probably in German," she figured as she scratched her chin in thought.
"Germany is like, what, one thousand miles from here?" Danny asked as they were forced to walk away from the gate.
"Don't get me started," Sam warned him, pointing a shaky finger in his face before she looked behind him to a girl that was running up to them. She had long, red, shoulder length hair; a green beret, a purple sweater and a green and red skirt; or as the Scots call them, kilts.
"Och mah god! Yoo're Danny Fenton!" the girl yelled excitedly in a thick Scottish accent as she ran up to them and skidded to a stop. "An' ye main Sam an' Tucker?" she asked the other two.
The three teens sent strange looks at each other before they smiled nervously while Danny replied. "Yah, that's us," he said with a smile. "And you would be-?" he asked out of curiosity.
"Sophia Weaither…yoo're pen mucker?" she answered him, only confusing him further.
"What in the world is a mucker?" Tucker asked with a cocked eyebrow. "Is that her profession or something?"
"'Mucker' is the Scottish term for 'pal'," Sam informed him in a scolding tone. "This is Sophia, our pen pal," she added.
"Oh," Danny and Tucker said in unison before they looked at each other and laughed nervously.
"However did you find us?" Sam asked the girl as they shook hands.
"Weel, Ah didne recognize th' tois ay ye, but Ah recognized th' famoos Danny Fenton, aka, Danny Phantom. Fa wooldnae ken th' world's hero?" she said in her thick accent.
Sam's lips moved to one side of her face and she blinked multiple times before she smiled nervously as a drop of sweat rolled down the side of her face.
Luckily, Tucker was using his PDA to translate due to them not being able to fully understand her accent. He looked around as hundreds of people walked around them. "Well it doesn't look like very many other people even notice we're here, let alone that Danny is the world's hero," he commented after having read the translation off his PDA.
"Well we're stuck here for the rest of the week so perhaps you can show us where we can pick up our luggage?" he asked her as a suggestion.
"Ay coorse, th' terminal is thes way," she said as she led them through the throngs of people moving about, trying to get to their own flights in time.
A short time later, the small group had left the airport terminal and were making their way out of town in Sophia's little green car. The trip was quite quiet…sort of; Sophia and Sam conversed in the front seat while Danny and Tucker sat quietly in the back seat, watching the terrain move by. Neither said a word until something caught Danny's attention.
He perked up, catching Tucker's attention in the process. "What's up dude?" he asked his half ghost friend.
"That," Danny said as he pointed out the window at the ruins of a castle close to the water's edge. They were driving on the opposite side of the road so no cars could obstruct their view. "I've never seen a castle before."
"Well what about Pariah's keep?" Sam asked him. "And Queen Dora's castle in the previous dark realm of the ghost zone?"
This caused Danny some frustration. "I meant castles in the real world," he growled.
"Vlad also had a castle dude," Tucker reminded him. "That's in the real world."
"Vlad's castle was also a modern day castle," Danny snapped. He interrupted Sam before she could say anything; "and I know there are modern day castles, I was talking about castle ruins like this," he finished.
"Thes is Urquhart castle; it has bin aroond fur hundreds ay years," Sophia informed them. She never once took her eyes off the road; she apparently had seen it enough to not be overwhelmed by its glory. "It has bin haem tae mony powerful fowk in its time. It was also th' secht ay puckle battles. The-day it is a historical secht open tae visitors."
Tucker seemed quite confused and looked at his PDA for a translation. He read silently, 'It has been home to many powerful people in its time. It was also the sight of great battles. Today it is a historical sight open to visitors.'
He looked up from his PDA just as Sam spoke. "We'll have to go back and visit it sometime," she suggested. Apparently she understood Sophia's accent quite well. They had been talking this whole time so perhaps she was getting used to it.
"Yah, we'll have to come back sometime," Danny agreed with Sam as he looked out the window. He watched the castle's ruins disappear into the distance with interest. Something inside of him told him he'd be seeing it again soon enough.
A short time later the small town of Whitebridge could be seen in the distance. Sophia told them about her home town; it was situated right on the lake deemed Loch ness. Whitebridge had a population of less than one hundred all spread out over roughly five miles. It was a very small town.
"Most ay th' permanent population is either fairmers ur gameskeepers. Others commute tae Inverness fur wark," Sophia told them as they passed by a small sign that welcomed them to the cozy little town. "Mah fowk is a wee crew ay fisherman. Uir catch is th' towns only export," she added.
"So you and your family are the only fishermen in the entire town?" Sam asked her out of interest. "You guys must be rich; well considering where you live," she added.
"Nae pure, we only make wee catches an' we only seel tae lae ay th' toon," Sophia informed her.
"Oh so considering the town's small population you probably don't make a very big profit," Sam guessed.
"Och aye, we ur th' only fishermen in toon sae at leest we dornt hae onie competition," Sophia confirmed Sam's thoughts. "Sae Ah guess ye coods say we ur rich in uir ain sense."
Sam and Sophia laughed amongst themselves while Danny and Tucker pouted in the back seat. "Why do girls have to talk so much?" Danny asked quietly so only Tucker could hear him.
"Don't ask me dude; she's your girlfriend," Tucker reminded him, wanting to stay away from the subject not wanting to risk getting hurt by Sam if she ever found out what they were just discussing.
The car pulled to a stop and Sophia and Sam were the first ones out. "Haur we ur," Sophia said as she waved her hand out in front of her. "Mah family's loch side haem."
Danny and Tucker got out of the car and looked with awe at the sight before them. Sophia's home was right on the lake. It was a three story building made of stone colored with white paint which was chipping in multiple places exposing the gray rock beneath. Patches of gray spotted the entire structure, revealing that it hadn't been painted in quite some time. The house was ancient, but it was kept up to date in other ways.
The roof was covered in bright red shingles; not a single one faded or missing. A tall stone chimney poked out through the top of the roof; smoke was coming from it so someone had lit a fire in the fireplace. The bright red window shutters were opened to reveal green curtains covering the inside of the windows.
The grass was well kept; cut regularly and watered enough to keep its lush green texture. A stone walkway swerved from the cul-de-sac shaped driveway to a tall closed stone archway that served as the front door. The walkway itself was lined with larger stones along its entire length on either side. Late summer flowers sprouted in random places along the edges, giving color to the lawn other than green and gray.
A large Willow tree stood off in the side lawn; a tire swing hanging from a thick branch about ten feet off the ground. 2x4's were nailed to the trunk of the tree to serve as a make-shift ladder to get to the branch so the rope tied to it could be kept in good condition for anyone swinging on the tire below.
By the lake shore two fishing boats sat tied to the piers that jutted out into the water. It was a clear nearly windless day so the boats remained stationary in the wave-less water. The two boats had large white sails that fluttered with what little wind there was moving above the surface of the water. One boat was turned to the side so all could be seen was the bow of the ship and a small portion of its starboard anchor. The other fishing vessel was turned enough to show its name, 'The Merry-Weather'.
"Thes hoose has bin in mah fowk fur ower thee hunder years," Sophia informed the other three teens whose mouths were all hanging open in astonishment. "It's nae th' most luxurioos place, but Ah caa it haem."
"Not the most luxurious!" Tucker half yelled. "This place is amazing! Not even Vlad's place compares to this."
"Your home makes my mortal enemies castle look like a rundown wooden shack," Danny added his compliment.
"Thenk ye," Sophia said, her face flushing beat red. She folded her hands behind her back and looked down, giving the impersonation of an innocent little girl.
A few hours passed and the Sun was lower in the sky as evening dawned on them, not a single cloud obscured the view. A flock of geese flew overhead in 'V' formation before the view descended to Sophia's home. The view was from out in the center of the lake and showed the stone building sitting just off the shoreline.
Danny was lying out in the grass staring up into the sky while Tucker sat nearby while he kicked a rock around with one of his feet out of boredom.
Above them on a stone patio sat Sam and Sophia in wicker chairs with a wicker table situated between them. They both turned when an older woman dressed as a maid came out of a sliding glass doorway and approached them with a tea pot and cups on a silver platter.
"Sam, thes is uir maid, Gladys," Sophia introduced Sam to the woman as she set the platter on the table. "She's mute sae cannae spick, but she serves th' best cuppae tea in th' entire toon," she added as she picked up one of the tea cups and took a sip. "Mmm, delicioos, thenk ye huir uv a much Gladys," she said with a smile and a nod. Gladys nodded in return before she turned and disappeared back into the house.
"Umm, not to offend but I don't drink tea," Sam said apologetically. "My parents drink it all the time and I don't get along with them too well."
"Ye shoods gie it a try," Sophia suggested. "Thes brain ay tea is illegal in America sae it is a safe bit yer parents hae ne'er drenk it afair." She took yet another sip and smiled with delight.
"Well…I guess," Sam pondered. She lifted the small glass cup and took a long sip before lowering it to the table. She paused for a moment before her eyes widened. A close up of her eyes shows them dilating. She was suddenly overcome with a sudden shaking motion. She became jittery and was unable to stop herself from spilling tea out of her cup. "Whoa! Now I know why it's illegal," Sam half stuttered, thankfully her voice remained normal despite her jittery state.
Back down below Danny had had enough of his boredom. "That does it, I need to do something productive," he complained.
"Well if you figure out something to do let me know," Tucker said without looking up from the rock he was kicking around. "Because we're stuck here for the rest of the week with nothing else to do."
Danny stood and examined his surroundings a bit more carefully. He looked down at the pier and saw a very small wooden motor boat tied to it. He thought to himself for a moment before a thought came to mind. "Hey Sophia," he called to the girl.
"Och aye?" she asked, looking up from assisting Sam with her unstable jittering.
"You think Tuck and I can take that little ol' thing out for a spin?" he asked her as he pointed his thumb over his shoulder at the little wooden boat. "We'll be careful with it," he added in a sweet tone.
"Ah dunnae kin," Sophia responded nervously. "Th' loch is huir uv a radge an' Ah wooldnae want ye tois gettin' hurt," she cautioned them; although her accent had him confused.
"Riiiiight," Danny said with a slow groan. "Well you don't have anything to worry about," Danny informed her. "I'm the world's ghost hero Danny Phantom," he said proudly as he pounded his chest with a fist. "And you know what that means?" he said with a cocked eye brow towards his techno savvy friend.
Tucker jumped to his feet with a large grin on his face. Danny swiped his arm across the screen and pulled it back to reveal a cyclone of air swirling around them. As the air dies down it reveals Danny and Tucker magically changed into green overall fishing waders over their normal cloths and tan fishing hats. They held fully deployed Fenton Fishers in their hands; the glowing blue strings neatly wound around the spools.
"FISHING EXPEDITION!" they both yelled at the top of their lungs in unison.
"Where did you guys get that fishing gear?" Sam asked them scoldingly. "And how did you get it on so fast?" she asked with raised eyebrows.
"Who cares?" Tucker asked, paying no attention to her questions. "Race yah," Tucker challenged his fishing partner.
"You are on," Danny responded with a chuckle before they both sped off in a cloud of smoke and dust. The trail went straight towards the motor boat before it suddenly took off across the surface of the water and speeding out of sight.
By now Sam had settled down and was starting to get used to her tea and wasn't as jittery. "Aww, don't worry about them," she comforted her new friend. "I'm sure whatever is out there that scares you so much, Danny has faced off against things ten times worse." She promptly took another sip of tea.
"Nae," Sophia responded. Her normal sweet and quiet tone having disappeared leaving behind something that sounded darker and much angrier. "He hasnae," she said in a low growl. She looked up at Sam with fire in her eyes.
"There's something going on here that you haven't told us about," Sam said in a stern voice, only guessing at what could be making Sophia so furious.
Sophia looked away as tears started to form in her eyes. "Ah tint mah faither ten years ago tae a monstroos beest 'at li'es in th' loch," she growled. "Ah fear 'at yer friends ur in mortal danger," she confessed. Sam's mouth opened in a gasp and her eyes widened in fear as she dropped her tea cup; shattering it when it hit the stone floor. They both looked out towards the lake as dark clouds filled the sky out of nowhere.
Several hours previously in Amity Park the sun was low in the morning sky; it was just coming over the horizon. They were about seven hours behind the others in Scotland so their day was just getting started. Everything was quieter than usual; the town's streets were completely deserted.
Becky, Nicole and Steven wore what appeared to be bullet proof vests with the Fenton Symbol on one of the pouches. They held anti-ghost pistols and moved through the streets slowly and carefully as they kept an eye out for their target.
"They're around here somewhere," Steven whispered to the two girls.
"If she finds him before we do, who knows how much destruction there could be," Nicole whispered.
"So we can only hope that we find him first and capture him?" Becky asked them in a whisper.
"Correct," Nicole answered her. "We've only got a few hours before we have to get to school, so we've got to defuse the situation quickly."
Suddenly a large explosion broke through the silence, shaking half the town before most people were even awake.
The Box Ghost suddenly phased through the middle of the street. "YAAAAH!" he screamed with fear as he flew by the three younger teens. They were all stunned and proceeded to give chase, but when the ground started shaking once again; Nicole extended out her arms and stopped the other two.
It was too late for them to interfere. If they jumped in now they would only be getting in the way because she knew the one giving chase didn't want them helping.
Cracks formed in the roadway and extended away from a manhole. Streaks of white light shone through the cracks and the holes in the manhole cover. The light got brighter and brighter until things started to get too hot for the manhole cover. It started to get red hot and melt; dipping down into the hole before a massive explosion blew the street into pieces.
From the resulting crater in the ground, Dani appeared above the street in her ghost form. Her hair was on fire, her eyes were gray and her ghostly glow was thickened; she was angered to the point that her ghostly glow was moving about as if her entire body was on fire.
White ecto-plasmic energy erupted from her feet; rocketing her down the street at supersonic speeds. She flew by her friends moments before a rush of wind and a sonic boom hit them. She was long gone down the street by the time they realized what had hit them.
"Common, we've got to follow them!" Steven yelled as he got to his feet and gave chase to the super charged halfa.
Becky and Nicole started to give chase as well but noticed that the pavement of the street was partially melted right down the center yellow lines. They glanced at each other nervously as they ran on either side of the melted pavement.
Further down the street the Box Ghost fled as fast as he could. He turned his head and saw Dani coming up behind him quickly. He dipped down and phased through the ground just as Dani caught up with him.
She was moving too quickly to catch him. He phased through the ground just as she swiped her hand to grab him. She missed and continued going. Her missed swipe caused her to spin and slash at a light pole.
She landed on the ground and growled as she looked around for him. She failed to notice the light pole crashing down; the light smashed into her head and shattered.
The sudden pain caused her to reach for her head and double over in agony as the pole rolled onto its side next to her. "He is going to pay for that!" she growled angrily.
Her friends ran up to her out of breath. They had run all out to keep up with her. "Dani, you've got to calm down," Becky huffed. "You're so angry you're melting the town with your rage."
"I AM CALM!" she snapped at them. Her pupils had disappeared and her eyes were solid white. One of her eyes was even twitching. Her flaming hair burned with more intensity and her ghostly glow intensified with it.
From a distance her ghostly glow was a few feet thick in some places. Her anger was pushing her flaming hair several feet into the air above her. She seemed like a ferocious threat that nobody wanted to mess with. She growled angrily before she took off into the sky like a rocket and disappeared from sight, leaving her shocked and horrified friends behind.
"Of all the girls I decide to date, I've gotta pick the one that gets angry over the smallest thing," Steven sighed.
"And pushes her powers beyond their normal limits when she's angry," Nicole added.
"Even if that is the case…" Becky said to grab the other's attention. She was looking down at the pavement. "She's never had pyrotechnic powers before," she said nervously.
The other two looked down at what she was looking at and found that they were looking at a circular section of payment had been melted where Dani had once been standing. In the middle of the circle were impressions of the soles of her phantom boots. Her body temperature had increased to the point that she was melting everything around her; in this case it was the pavement.
Out in the middle of the lake Danny and Tucker sat in the wooden motorboat with their fishing lines cast out into the water. The bobbers moved with the waves as they gently rocked the boat.
The sky above them was no longer clear and sunny, but it wasn't stormy either. The sky was a simple shade of gray and everything was gloomy.
Danny and Tucker were just far enough out so they could barely see Sophia's home sitting on the coast a few hundred yards away.
Back on land an invisible figure watched them from the roof of a famer's house. The farmer himself was outside tending to his small crop, yet didn't notice the figure sitting on his roof. The invisible form was that of Skulker as he looked through a pair of binoculars and spied on Danny and Tucker closely.
"This seems oddly familiar," Skulker whispered to himself so the farmer wouldn't hear him, unfortunately his invisible form didn't fool a cat as it purred and rubbed itself against his invisible leg. He cocked an eyebrow and looked down at the cat before picking it up by the skin on the back of its neck with two fingers.
"Meow," it purred before Skulker tossed the cat aside; but the feline was determined and laid down on the roof next to him; curling up into a ball and falling asleep.
"When you're too busy trying to pull in your catch is when I will strike," Skulker said with an evil grin as he watched the two boys through his binoculars.
Danny was busy trying to put a worm on his fishing hook while Tucker was laid back on his seat snoring as his line sat out in the water. Falling asleep wouldn't normally catch him anything, but that was about to change.
His bobber moved a bit before it went beneath the surface. "Hey Tuck, you got a fish," Danny said as he nudged his friend. Tucker woke up with a snort just as the bobber came back to the surface.
"Are you sure?" Tucker asked before the bobber was suddenly pulled beneath the surface with a 'Blop'. The line on his fishing poles spool started unwinding rapidly.
"Positive," Danny answered.
Tucker grabbed his fishing pole and held it firmly as he desperately tried to reel his catch in. "Whoa! This is a big one!" Tucker grunted through gritted teeth as he fought with the apparently massive fish on his line.
By now Danny had set his pole down and he was leaning over the side of the boat to see if he could spot the fish. A sudden splash caught his attention and he looked up to see a large tail tin going back beneath the surface of the lake. "This definitely isn't your ordinary fish," he said nervously. "Be careful there Tuck, you don't want the line to break," he warned him.
"Danny this line was created by your dad," Tucker reminded him with a smirk on his face. "He coated it with an ecto-plasmic resin that ghosts can't break. We got nothing to worry about."
He was forced to eat his words when the line suddenly snapped. Tucker fell back into his seat as the fishing line disappeared beneath the surface. "Well I guess the fish isn't a ghost," Danny said with a scowl.
"Right, my bad," Tucker groaned. He got back up and they both looked over the edge of the boat. "Well that stinks," he growled. "That could have been a record catch."
While they were busy looking into the water from one side of the boat something started to disturb the water on the other side. A giant bulge began to form behind them as a very large dorsal fin began to protrude from the water.
Skulker noticed the disturbance in the water. He cocked a noticeable eyebrow from behind the binoculars. The feline napping next to him awoke suddenly and dove beneath a chimney stack. It poked its head out and appeared to be shivering in fear. "Huh?" Skulker asked himself as he pulled away from the binoculars and looked up into the sky as a shadow overtook him.
The farmer that was working his crop looked up when he realized the shadow wasn't from a cloud. His eyes widened with fear and he started to back away slowly before he disappeared into his house silently.
Out in the lake large water droplets started to fall onto the two teenage boys. "Did it suddenly get really dark out?" Tucker asked about the concerned shadow that was now covering them. Neither of them had the sense to look up as something started growling.
Their faces contorted and their eyes bulged before they slowly turned around and looked up into a pair of bright red eyes looking down at them.
Protruding from the water was the head and neck of a massive serpent-like creature. A spiky dorsal fin started at the top of its head and went down its neck before disappearing into the water with the rest of its body. It was covered with greenish-gray scales and had long skin like whiskers hanging from the side of its mouth. It had hundreds of razor sharp teeth and a triple forked tongue.
It roared with a deafening screech into the air, promptly causing Danny and Tucker to cover their ears and cringe from the beasts roar. It looked back down at the boys and hissed at them; showing off all of its teeth as saliva dripped from them.
"Danny, what was the name of this lake again?" Tucker squeaked.
"Loch…Ness," Danny answered with a nervous gulp between words.
The monstrous serpent roared with a deafening screech once again as it dove straight for the boys with its mouth open. It promptly swallowed the scene before everything goes into a black out.
Alright, there you have it. If you still can't figure it out then you need brain surgery. The Loch Ness Monster, how's that for a cliffhanger ending to send this story into a commercial break? When we come back, Danny and Tucker will have to make a hasty escape. What plans will Skulker have for them and the giant serpent that is even more legendary than the rare halfa? Come back and read the second and last part of this story for more dramatic fight scenes and the conclusion to the story.