"Zel!" Groovy shouted, trying to turn around on the steep cement steps to catch her but she was too far away and the narrow steps hard to maneuver on. Phyllidia tried to grab Zelda's hand but it whipped past her too fast to seize. The Clew Crew stood to horror as Zelda dropped out of sight down a deep and unforgiving hole.
Danny rocketed past all of them, a hand outstretched to reach the falling girl. He flew down the stairwell going 120 miles and hour. He didn't think about the rapidly approaching cement steps or how he was going to get out of there once - or if - he caught the falling girl. His entire body was focused on getting a hand on Zelda. Or a flailing leg as it whipped past him. Outstretched fingers caught at it and his thumb pressed down in a solid grip. Danny, holding Zelda by the barest of grips disappeared into the wall of the stairwell, a ghost sliding intangible through the solid earth.
There was no light in the earth beyond the Aquarium's foundations, nothing to guide Danny back to the surface. He paused only for a second to gain some idea of which way was up and down. He went what he hoped was "up" and after long moments broke into moonlight and fresh air. He gasped with relief as he saw the trees of Memorial park beyond him and felt Zelda struggling below him. That meant she was alive! He had saved her from certain death. He couldn't believe he had done it.
A flailing hand caught his foot. Zelda had been hanging upside down from Danny's point of view. With a hand on his foot she pulled herself upright before flinging an arm around his neck and holding on suffocatingly tight. "Oh, my god! Oh, my god! Oh, my god!" she said over and over into Danny's ear. He could feel her whole body trembling in shock.
After a moment she paused, too a deep breath and whispered, marvelling, "We flew through rock, the earth. I couldn't see a thing. It was so scary."
"The only way I could catch you in time was to keep going forward. Sorry."
"That means you dematerialIzed me!"
"Yeah."
"Uh - does this mean my clothes were left behind in the Aquarium?"
"No," Danny laughed. "You're dressed. Feeling better?"
"No."
Now that he could see the sky Danny had an idea where they were. He had flown a good block underground. He turned back to the Aquarium, landing outside next to a park bench since he figured Zelda needed a moment to compose herself. As soon as her feet touched the ground and he removed his levitating support she collapsed like an empty sack. He caught her as she fell and carried her over to the bench where they sat down.
She continued clinging to Danny and trembling. She was quiet for a while then confessed "My life flashed before my eyes. Only there was nothing there, just the sight of the steps about to smash into my face. I can't believe I had no life to flash before my eyes. I've wasted my whole life!" she started sobbing softly.
Danny wasn't sure if this constituted progress but assumed that it was. "You know, I don't think people's lives flash before them just before they die," he suggested. "I've always noticed that I'm too busy trying to figure out how to stay alive to worry whether my life had any meaning."
"So this is old hat to you?" she asked.
"It's never old hat.
"Thank you for saving my life," she said then kissed him, on the cheek, the neck, the ear, the forehead and even, more or less, on the lips. She was too busy kissing to aim accurately.
After a moment he pushed her back. "we ought to get back," he said, "I'm sure our friends are beginning to worry about our being away for so long."
"I don't want to go back inside."
"I don't blame you, but I think you're in danger and I can better protect you if you stay close to me."
"I can do that but why do you have to go back inside?"
"Because the Kraken has its lair there. I've got to get the Kraken before more people get hurt."
"But that wasn't a ghost just now. It was an accident with Alphonse."
"Maybe. But whoever was driving your "Clewmobile" was a ghost. It may not be the Kraken. It was an undefined blob of ectoplasm. The Kraken has a very specific shape. Someone is after you. I don't know who or why but I intend to get them as well."
Danny stood up and held out a hand to Zelda. She used it to pull herself off the park bench. For a moment her legs turned rubbery and Danny held her tight again until she could stand up by herself. As he was about to fly her back into the abandoned Aquarium Danny said, "If you kissed Groovy like you did me just now I don't think you'd worry about having to gain his undivided attention."
Sam was climbing up the stairs as Danny and Zelda got back. "There's no bodies down there so he must have caught..." She broke off when she saw Danny materialize in the room with Zelda holding on to him. Sam rushed up the rest of the steps and flung herself on Danny. "Thank god, you're all right," she cried.
"Sorry to make you worry," Danny told her, thinking he could get used to all these ladies hugging on to him.
"I think we all should get back to looking for that treasure," Curtis said after a while. ""We'll never find it tonight unless we get busy looking for it."
"Knock yourselves out," Danny said, "but I came here for the Kraken. I think I know where he's at and it's time to quit farting around and go get him."
"What do you mean? You've known all along!" Sam accused. "You let us waste time here instead of catching that ghost?"
"I'm sorry. It was just kind of fun poking around in all the stuff leftover from when the Aquarium closed. I was pretty sure the Kraken wasn't going anywhere so I figured we had the time. Besides," he looked at Sam with a superior smile on his lips, "I thought you were enjoying yourself poking around, too." Sam scowled as her face grew warm with embarrassment.
"Like, who's this Kraken you're looking for," Groovy asked. He'd held on to Zelda after everyone had hugged her.
"The ghost that's been haunting the Aquarium."
"It has a name? Like, how do you know it's name?" Groovy looked at Danny with a confused expression.
"I asked him the first time we met. - so I could put him in my database," Danny explained.
"You asked him?" Curtis echoed. "Ghosts have names?"
Danny pointed to himself. "Hello, Danny Phantom! Of course ghosts have names. They're just like people, except they don't belong in this universe. "
"But the Kraken, was, like, this big hairy monster. 'Release the kraken' and all that," Groovy protested. "The ghost that attacked Zelda last night wasn't exactly big or hairy. How can that be the Kraken."
"We'll ask him when I catch him, OK? What do I know, maybe he had a very good publicity agent back in ancient Grecian times. Maybe everyone thought he was big and nasty because all they ever heard was his agent saying he was. Maybe he once was big and nasty back when people believed in monsters and when people started not believing in monsters he dwindled away. Like the way Ember McClain needs people to say her name because it gives her power. And when people stop saying her name she becomes weak and powerless."
"I remember Ember McClain," Phyllidia exclaimed. "She was that one-hit wonder everyone was talking about. I wonder what happened to her?"
"I threw her back into the Ghost Zone," Danny said. "She was being a very bad girl."
"Ember McClain was a ghost?"
"Sadly," Danny said with a sigh. "Well, it's been fun, but I've got a ghost to capture." Without another word Danny walked through the wall into the main corridor of the old building.
A thumping on one of the fish tank display cases caused him to look back. Sam's head was in the tank shouting angrily at him. Danny couldn't hear what she was saying through the thick glass. She waved him to come back.
"What are you thinking, leaving me behind with those people!" she demanded when he floated back into the back room.
"It could be dangerous. I didn't want you to get hurt."
"Like the other eighteen million times weren't dangerous! You don't leave me behind!"
The others seemed just as eager to see Danny take down the Kraken so with a sigh he had everyone grab hands and carried them through the wall from the work room into the public concourse.
He led the way to the intersection in the center of the building. He pointed to a corner of the square on the left side. "This is where Zelda was attacked last night. This is also where I was attacked when I visited later last night. I'm pretty sure this is the Kraken's lair. And it's probably where your treasure is, too."
"The treasure!" Curtis exclaimed. How do you know it's there?"
"Of course," Sam muttered. "The Kraken is a kind of sea monster or sea serpent, and what are sea serpents but a kind of dragon, a sea-dragon."
"And dragon's always guard treasures!" Zelda finished for her. "It's all so obvious."
"Assuming that this Kraken-ghost thingy is hold up there," Curtis cautioned. "How are you going to get it out?"
"The usual way. I'll attract its attention."
"What can we do?" Zelda asked. She had been dismayed when Danny had first left without her and now was following him at his elbow. Sam was on the other side of Danny.
"Mostly keep out of the way. Sam has her "goop" gun but I think that's it for weapons."
"I always carry a Fenton Lipstick." Sam added, "when goop just isn't good enough."
With a quick look around to see that everyone was staying back Danny walked up to the tank labeled "Alligator Gar" and tapped on the glass "Come out, come out, where ever you are." he called but no ghost issued forth.
He tried knocking on the glass again.
When nothing happened he tried pounding on the glass wall of the tank but surprisingly the glass was stronger than his best blow.
"Where's a 2 by 4 when you need one," he muttered, thinking of the story of the man who hit a mule over the head with a 2 x 4 'just get its attention.' Around the outer wall just under the tanks was a handrail, to keep people from crowding too close to the fish tanks. Danny grabbed hold a length near the end and yanked on it with all his strength. a six foot length broken off in his hand. He swung it as hard as he could against the glass, which finally shattered in a spray of glass chips, water and mud.
The murky water at the bottom of the tank spilled out on to the floor and spread out. As the water ran out it carried away some of the mud and sand at the bottom of the tank. Lumps started appearing on the floor of the tank. Round and with the occasional sparkle. Danny went to pick up one of the round lumps when with a hiss the blue shirted man-sized ghost leaped out clutching the coin Danny held in his hand. "Mine!" the Kraken hissed.
It tried to rip the glob of material from Danny's hand but Danny closed tight on it and struck at the Crocodile faced ghost with his free hand. "Not yours!" Danny told it.
The Kraken recoiled then leaped on Danny, carrying him to the floor, the glob popped out of Danny's fist and rolled to Curtis's feet. Absent-mindedly, the tall blond bent and picked it up. He looked at the discolored lump then rubbed at it with his fingers.
Danny was wishing he had paid more attention in gym class when the couch was teaching them wrestling. The Kraken had him pinned down and Danny couldn't think of any way to break his hold. They rolled back and forth on the floor but nothing changed on the hold the Kraken had on him.
"Look, gold," Curtis exclaimed, showing the cleaned up lump to Phyllidia.
"It's the treasure!" she squealed. Curtis was about to hold it out to Zelda and Groovy when the Kraken jumped up and with a cry of "Mine" leaped for the coin in Curtis' hand.
"Not so fast!" Danny said, catching hold of the Kraken's alligator-like tail as it slithered over him. He hauled the ghost back and punched it under its throat. The Kraken fell back choking. It piled up against the Aquarium wall, caught its breath after a moment and leaped back at Danny.
The ghost boy ducked under his leap and fired an ectoplasm blast after him. The monster rolled up against the Spirit of Amity park statue and ripped it from the floor. He hurled it at Danny, then leaped for Curtis, still holding the gold coin.
The statue shattered into a dozen pieces scattering like shrapnel along the long, narrow corridors. Sam had to roll out of the way as one piece smashed into the place she had been standing a moment before. Glass and muddy water poured from the shattered tank behind her.
"This is getting to dangerous!" Danny thought and took to the air, streaking like a rocket towards the Kraken. He grabbed it around the waist and hauled it up into the air, through the roof of the old building and out into the skies above Amity Park.
Well away from civilians Danny let the monster go and rammed a couple of stiff punches into its abdomen. It fell back with a grunt then charged at Danny. It bounced off a shield Danny threw up, then was covered in a large glop of ectoplasmic goo. It struggled with that for a moment.
"Why do you harass me?" the ghost demanded. "What have I ever done to you or yours. I seek only to protect that which is mine!"
"You've been harassing a lot of people around this park, people I consider under my protection. You've got to go!" Danny told it.
"I only defend that which is mine."
"You weren't even here two months ago!" Danny snapped. "These people have been here for years. You have no right to be here, or to go around scaring them." He reached behind his back and drew put a Fenton Thermos. "It's time for you to go."
"Never! You'll not steal my treasure, you - you - treasure-stealer."
"It's stolen money. It doesn't belong to you. Besides I'm getting tired of you trying to kill Zelda. She's a nice kid. She doesn't deserve to die."
"I have hurt no one!" the monster protested.
"Tell it to the marines!" Danny said, quoting something he'd heard in a movie once. He flipped open the cap to the thermos and activated its suction power. The Kraken, hovering awkwardly in the air, not at all used to flying, was yanked off its feet (as it were) and drawn towards the small metallic cylinder. "NO! Stop. Treasurer-stealer! Egg-Sucker! Bad person! I have done you no -" The last bit was cut off as the ghost disappeared into the thermos and Danny snapped the lid back into place.
"Well, that's that." Danny gloated, then puzzled as he recalled the monster's complaint that he had harmed no one. But surely dropping a statue on Zelda or driving the Clewmobile around crazily wasn't trying to harm someone what was? Or could there be two ghosts running around the same place? What were the odds of that.
Either way, the best thing to do was get back to the others.
Danny looked around for the Aquarium - they had covered quite a bit of distance fighting - and zoomed back.
He had expected to find the other grouped around the shattered Alligator Gar tank digging out the rest of the lost bank loot. They weren't there. No one was. The walls were covered with patched of "goop" from Sam's ectoplasmic squirt gun. She preferred using "goop" instead of the more lethal blaster weapons because she felt bad for the ghosts, even the nasty ones. Sam was one of the charter members of Danny's sister's "People for the Ethical Treatment of Ectoplasmic Manifestations." Sam was one for letting sleeping ghosts lie.
Danny's look of puzzlement deepened to one of concern when he saw short lines of scorched and bubbled glazed tiles. That would be the Fenton Lipstick Blaster she always carried as back-up, or in case things got too serious for "goop."
"Sam! Tucker! Zelda!" he called out as loudly as he could. His voice echoed off the hard tiles. He waited for an answer. There was a tightness in his throat and suddenly the smugness at having caught the Kraken deserted him. Something had attacked his friends. Not the Kraken, because he had caught it. it was locked away in the Fenton Thermos. But while he was out packing the Kraken away something else had come after his friends. What had it done to them.
He called again and this time Danny hear a faint "here!" in answer.
He tore down the corridor he'd heard her voice. It was only a short distance but Sam's voice had sounded faint. Danny found her sprawled on the floor, leaning against the tile wall and slowly rubbing her head. Her skirt was covered in dirt while her purple tights were a ruin of laddered runs.
"What happened?"
"It took us by surprise. None of us saw it coming."
"What? What did this?"
"Ghost. Just an black blob. Old man's eyes. It grabbed Zelda and scattered the rest of us like toys."
"Are you alright?"
"Do I look alright?" Sam demanded. That relieved Danny more than anything else. If Sam was getting crabby, then she was alright. "Should I call 911?" he asked, just to be sure.
"No. I'll be alright. What about the others?"
"Where are they?"
Sam started to shake her head but stopped with a groan. "I don't know. I was trying to nail the ghost with the "goop" gun. Don't stop him. Tried the blaster and got slammed into the wall. I was shaking off sparks in my head when I heard you calling. "How long as I out?"
"I don't think you were out at all. It only took me a minute to package the Kraken. Where's the others?"
"The ghost went down here with Zelda and I followed but I don't know where the others are."
"Zelda?" Danny had a sinking feeling about this. "Will you be OK here? I've got to find her."
"Just get me my flashlight and lipstick-blaster. They fell that way somewhere."
Danny quickly found the two items than took off back the way he came. He went down one corridor after another before finding Curtis, Phyllidia and Groovy near the intersection of the last corridor. Groovy was spread out on the floor, his face covered in blood. Phyllidia had her purse open and was doling out gauze squares to Curtis who was rolling them up and sticking them in Groovy's nose. The nose looked flattened and was bleeding freely. "You guys OK?" he asked.
"Groovy will never be a "Noble Roman" but other than that we're OK, I guess," Phyllidia explained. She ran a hand around Groovy's head. When he cried out in pain she opened up some more packets of gauze and taped it place with some adhesive. tape.
"Where's Zelda?" Danny demanded.
"Isn't she with your friend, Sarah - no, Sam?"
"No. Any of you see where she went. Sam says she was being held by the ghost that attacked you?"
"Didn't see it," Curtis answered. To Phyllidia he asked, "should we call an ambulance? Groovy doesn't look so good. "
"It's just the blood from the broken nose," Phyllidia told him. "He'll be alright for now. I've got this covered. You - find Zelda!"
Curtis looked up at Danny. "Have you been..."
"I've been every where in here. She'd not here. I don't know who has her or what he wants. I caught the Kraken so it isn't him. It puts everything in doubt.." Danny thought for a moment. "Look, Sam's down that hall. Go get her and bring her to this intersection. I'm going outside to look for Zelda." He was gone before Curtis had time to answer.
Danny phased through the walls of the Aquarium and circled the building looking for the missing girl. "Hey, boychek!" A voice called to him. Danny spun around and found a dark blobby looking ghost hanging a few feet off the ground in the middle of the parking lot, light from a lone operating street light revealed Zelda hanging from a smoky arm. She was held by one wrist and was struggling to get free. The ghost holding her seemed unconcerned by her struggles.
"Let her go!" Danny shouted.
"I intend to," the ghost replied in what sounded like an old man's voice. But instead of dropping the girl, it zoomed straight up into the sky. Danny followed.
The strange ghost stopped when they were close to a mile in the air. The city of Amity park spread out below them in a wide field of twinkling lights of red, white, and yellow. Clouds drifted below them, light on the top by light from the full moon. A stiff breeze tugged at Danny's hair.
He closed in on the ghost who suddenly held the still struggling Zelda out in front of him. "Uh-uh-uha!" It warned. "You don't want me to drop her?"
Danny stopped twenty feet from the other ghost. "Why are you doing this?" he demanded.
"I had a sweet gig till you came along. All the sweet patutties an old man could want. All the laps I ever wanted to sit on, to lean against their boobalas, look up their skirts. It was heaven. And a lot better than the heaven my old woman was always harping on. Well, she can have her heaven, I have mine. Or at least I did till you showed up!"
"What did I do?" Danny asked, perplexed.
"What do you think? You're a ghost. I can hide from them but not from you. You had to go."
"So why did you kidnap Zelda?"
"Oh, her. She has to go, too. She was asking too many questions. I hate to destroy such delectable female pulchritude but she's just too curious. It's nothing personal," this the ghost directed to the girl.
"Nothing personal? You're trying to kill me!" she screamed back at the ghost holding her.
"You hurt her and I won't stop till I've captured her," Danny warned.
"Will you, boychek?" The ghost gloated. "If I drop her you have two choices. You can try to capture me, in which case your girlfriend here falls to her death. Or you can try to catch her, by which time I'll be long gone. And if you do come after me, the next time it'll be the black-haired chick. So just leave me alone."
"You -!" Danny swore. He lunged at the ghost, who laughed and opened his fist. He was surprised when Zelda didn't immediately fall. She had wrestled around and gotten her other hand on the ghost's arm. She was holding on for dear life. With a snigger the ghost made his arm disappear. Zelda plummeted away with a scream.
Danny hesitated for a tenth of a second before diving after the falling girl. With a final laugh the dark blobby ghost disappeared.
All bodies fall to the center of the earth at a speed of thirty-two feet per second per second. Speed piles up second by second until a final velocity of seven miles per second is reached - escape velocity. Bodies falling through an atmosphere face a certain amount of air resistance, though, and as a result, the terminal velocity of a falling human is around 120 miles per hour. Faster if the body is folded into a compact cross-section, slower if the arms and legs are spread out to increase wind resistance. Zelda, flailing wildly was approaching the higher end of terminal velocity.
Danny wasn't falling, he was speeding downward. But it was a downward chase. Every hundred feet he traveled she fell another 60. The ground was dizzily rearing up in front of them. Danny was ten feet from Zelda, then 5 feet, slowly he got within three feet, then two. Slowly his hand inched within reach of hers.
Got her!
His hand settled around her's. He started to pull up, levitating her body as much as he could. But it had a tremendous amount of momentum from falling so far. It took time to slow down.
They crashed into the top of an oak, snapping branches left and right, tearing at their clothes. They hit a large limb with a breath-shaking thump and moments later Danny planted his feet on the ground and brought Zelda around to settle down as well.
She clung to Danny for a moment, then pushed away.
"That's it!" she muttered. "That's it! That's it!" And started walking towards the lights of the street beyond the park.
"Zelda! Where are you going?" Danny called.
"Away! Just away. Don't follow me. I don't want anything to do with you, or them or anybody! If some homicidal ghost wants me to stop asking questions, I'm never going to ask another question in my life!"
"But..." Danny stopped, realizing that Zelda was beyond reasoning with at the moment. He watched her get to the street, then collapse on a park bench. She huddled down like she might be crying. He didn't want to leave her there, alone and friendless but he sensed that at the moment he might not be the person she was hoping would come to her.
He saw that the Aquarium was only a block away and flew back inside. Sam was sitting on the floor closer to the middle of the building watching the rest of the Clew Crew dig through the sand and mud in the Alligator Gar tank for the rest of the missing bank loot. They were as giddy as kids in a candy store.
"I thought they were all about the solving of mysteries?" Danny said.
"Right, and you weren't the least bit excited that your guess where the treasure was, was right?"
"I was after the Kraken - and I got him. Then I went after this other ghost that kidnapped Zelda. Are any of them at all concerned where Zelda might be, or what's happened to her?"
"You didn't bring her back. That does concern me." Sam stretched than started to get up. "That Phyllidia girl said I didn't have a concussion, which seems like good news, even if it's from another teen-ager. So what's become of the fourth Clew Crewer?"
"Having a nervous breakdown, I think. She's sitting on a bench out by the street. I was wondering if you could keep her company for a while?"
"Shouldn't that be the job of her boyfriend?" Sam wondered.
"I'll try to get them out of here, too. Just try to get Zelda to come back to the parking lot, OK. I think I've got this all but wrapped up and I think she'll be a lot happier seeing the ending."
"Leave the psychology stuff to your sister." Sam said as she started walking to the back of the building and the open door there.
Danny watched her go. Before tackling Zelda' erstwhile friends, he unzipped his jumpsuit and pulled out his cellphone. He hit a button and waited for his call to be picked up.
"Do you know what time it is?" A cranky voice answered.
"Love you, too, Jazz," Danny replied. "Look, can you grab the Fenton Peeler and met me in front of the old Aquarium in Memorial Park? Oh, and bring another Thermos? The one I've got is full." He listened for a moment. "If you don't come you wouldn't be able to met my new friends. - Yes, yes, they're interesting. - yes. You could probably get a case study out of them. - I can't diagnosis them over the phone. Come over and meet them. Please. And don't forget the Peeler." After a final pause Danny put his phone away.
"Pretty clever, huh?" he said by way of announcing his presence.
"It looks to be all here," Curtis replied, head still inside the tank scrapping out dirt and coins. Phyllidia had found an old bucket she was piling the coins in as she and Groovy scrapped off the much coating them.
"Groovy, I should have mentioned this before," Danny said, "but Amity park has a pretty strict lease law. You can't let Alphonse here run around unleashed. I'd hate to see him grabbed by Animal Control and taken to the pound. And of course, cops around here are authorized to shoot any dog that they consider a threat."
"Alphonse here would never hurt anyone." Groovy protested, wrapping an arm around the Rottweiler.
"Still, Danny has a point," Curtis said, pulling his head out of the broken aquarium and standing up. "We don't want to get in trouble around here. So maybe you should keep a good hold on him for the time being, until we can find a leash."
"I'm sorry ol' boy," Groovy said, wrapping his hand around the dog's collar. "No body believes what a wonderful boy you are but me."
"Where's Zelda?" Phyllidia asked, noticing that there was no one behind Danny.
"Outside. Sam's keeping her company, but I think you all ought to come out and be with her. The ghost that kidnapped her tried to kill her and I don't think she's taking it well."
"Well..." Curtis hesitated.
"She's a part of your crew isn't she?"
"She did sort of quit."
"But she's still a friend, right?"
"Danny has a point," Phyllidia said. "Friends are more important than treasure!"
"Besides we can come back later and finish gathering it up," Curtis said. Danny looked at him intently, wondering if he , too, was possessed by a ghost. He decided with a shake that it was probably just greed. He finally got them going, reminding Groovy to keep a good hold on the dog. When they finally got around to the front of the abandoned Aquarium they found a red-headed girl leaning against a decrepit Chevy Chevette. She had some kind of loop device around one wrist. Sam and Zelda were no where to be seen.
"This had better be good." Jazz warned Danny.
"Let me get Sam and Zelda, first. Don't worry this will be good."
Sam found the red-head sitting on a bench at the far end of the park. She was silently crying but her whole body was shaking. Sam, an only child, wasn't much used to dealing with extreme emotions in others. A pat on the shoulders and a "there, there," didn't seems like an adequate response. And hugging someone she's met only two hours before seemed a bit uncomfortable.
She sat down on the far end of the bench with a non-committal "Hey."
While waiting for Zelda to respond Sam twiddled with the laddered fabric of her tights.
After a time Zelda sat up a little, rubbed the tears out of her eyes and cleared her nose with a loud snuff. "What do you want?" she asked in an accusing voice.
"Danny didn't think you should be alone."
"I don't need your help."
"Fine. I'm not offering any."
They in silence for a while longer. Zelda searched the pockets of her orange jumpsuit for some tissues, then wiped her running nose on her sleeve.
"I'm surprised he didn't tell you to wear pants, too?" Zelda said after watching Sam play with her ruined tights.
"Oh, this is nothing. I've ruined tights just by going to school.
"Well, I don't need his advice or his help!" Zelda insisted. "I suppose he thinks I'm going to do myself in or something."
"I think if he thought that he'd have come himself. Danny made sure I had a blaster with me so I imagine he wanted me to protect you while he did something else. I think he has things pretty well wrapped up. At least that was my impression.
"He nearly let me get killed."
"He saved your life."
"I can't take it any more!"
":I don't blame you," Sam said. "I mean, I only met you tonight and already there's been three attempts on your life..."
"Four."
"The van, getting knocked down the stairs and just now..." Sam counted.
"And the statute being dropped on my head. That's how I wound up in that pool of mud. But you weren't there at the time."
"Oh. Yeah. Ok, four. Wow, what a night." After a moment Sam added, "Look, I've sorry I called you a bimbo. I was mad at Danny for letting me worry for an hour without calling. I shouldn't have taken it out on you."
"Oh, I thought you were his girlfriend or something."
"Me? Danny's girlfriend? Ha ha ha," Sam's laugh trailed off unconvincingly. "We're just friends, but I guess I do get possessive sometimes."
"Kind of like how Groovy's my boyfriend, except when he's not because all he can see anymore is that darn dog."
"Has he always been like that?"
"Who? Groovy?"
"No, the dog. I've only seen him a little bit tonight but he doesn't act like most normal dogs. I mean I thought he heard him speak and everything. "
"He used to be just a dog but then - it's just weird. He started talking, finding clues, helping us solve mysteries, but mostly hogging all of Groovy's time and attention. I joke that when I look at him now I see the eyes of a 90 year old man looking back at me... But that's just crazy. He's a dog.
"When did he start acting differently?" Danny asked, coming up on them by surprise. He leaned against the back of the park bench and looked at Zelda.
"The first time I recall Alphonse acting strange was the day we went to the nursing home to see Curtis' Uncle Harry. "
"Did he die there?" Danny asked.
"Uncle Harry? Heavens, no! He had just had hip replacement surgery and went into the nursing home for recovery and physical therapy. He's fine. -Though, now that I think about it, someone did die while we were there. At least we saw some ambulance attendants wheeling away a gurney with a covered form on it as we were leaving. ...
"Anyway, the drive from Charity Harbor to Marysville, where the nursing home was, was a bit of a long drive, so Curtis' uncle Harry said we could stay overnight in his house. Driving out there Alphonse seemed unusually active, sniffing everything in the Clewmobile as if he'd never been inside it before, sniffing Phyl's hair - she was sitting up front with Curtis, of course - licking her hand, but mostly trying to climb into my lap. Groovy has never been good about training Alphonse so he would often try to jump on people. But usually after you've pushed him off once or twice he would get the idea and leave you alone. But this night he just wouldn't stop. So I went to the bedroom Phyl and I were sharing to unpack my suitcase. But really to get away from the dog.
"I was kneeling on the floor unpacking the suitcase when out of the blue something cold and wet goosed me in the butt. I screamed bloody hell and scrambled away from whatever had poked me - I was scared shitless because whatever had poked me had poked me under my skirt! I felt violated as well as terrorized.
I turned around and there was Alphonse, sniggering, as much as one could say a dog sniggers. Then it barked. Only it wasn't exactly a bark. It sounded more like "hubba-hubba."
I screamed for Groovy to come and get his dog and explained what had happened. Groovy was like, 'dogs are like that, that's how they show they like you," and I was screaming at him how the dog had deliberating put its nose under my skirt and dogs don't do that.
He would not understand what I was getting at or why I was so mad. Finally I told him to control his dog 'or someone going to get neutered.'
"He whined that that would terrible cruel to Alphonse. I should have told him then that I didn't say it would be the dog that would get neutered! - you always think of the really good lines long after the moment has passed.
"But anyway every since then Alphonse - and Groovy, too - have acted strange. He's always watching Phyl and me, trying to climb on us, watching us get dressed, even go to the bathroom. The dog's a pervert."
"You're right," Sam injected. "I remember when Danny finally got you out of that van and the dog jumped on you, only it was like he make a point of pawing your breasts."
Danny was nodding. "You say you see the eyes of a 90 year old man looking out? You may be right. Come on. Let's wrap this thing up and go home."
He lead them back to the parking lot where Jazz and the others were waiting for them.
"This is my sis - friend, Jazz Fenton," Danny began by way of introduction. "I asked her to come out to help us get to the bottom of what's going on."
"At first I thought Zelda was being attacked by the Kraken but this last time I had the Kraken inside a Fenton Thermos, so there was no way he could have done it. That meant there was a second ghost involved, one that wasn't here before tonight. But it was always disappearing quickly after making an attack. Where was it going that it could disappear that easily and yet still be close enough to find opportunities to attack Zelda. As a ghost myself, I know a few ways of doing that. Which is why I called in Jazz here. Jazz has brought with her a little gizmo called a Fenton Peeler. It's a nasty little gadget that can peel away the layers of a ghost atom by atom. It's especially useful when a ghost has possessed someone. So, Jazz, take it away. Oh, and Groovy, thanks for keeping a good grip on Alphonse - leash law, you know."
Alphonse had gone berserk, snarling, leaping and tearing and trying to bite Groovy's hand. "Alphonse!" the hippie cried out, "what has gotten into you?"
As Danny passed beside Jazz he whispered a word to her.
Jazz Fenton stepped out to get a clear view of the struggling twosome. She was holding a circular device in her hand, like a large letter "D." She pressed a button on its side and the device shivered, and started unfolding. Plates shot out one way to cover her hand and the other way to cover her arm. The plates continued unfolding as they engulfed her head with a helmet with a large, clear faceplate, extended over her other arm and down her body until torso and legs were covered in armor. It had taken perhaps two seconds to completely cover her.
A light on the Peeler switched from green to red and a near invisible beam of energy shot out. It struck the lanky boy and his dog. For an instant they were both frozen in place by the ray's power but then something started happening - to the dog!
The dog started to glow a eerie pale green, then slowly, as if in the presence of a strong wind the glow began to slip off the dog and form onto a cloud behind it. Groovy's hair whipped about in the energy from blue stream but otherwise it had no effect on him.
The dog continued to twist and squirm in the boy's hand but the 'wind' from the Fenton Peeler continued to blow greenish bits from off the dog. Slowly a large dark blobby form coalesced out of the cloud. Angry, old eyes stared out from the blob. Then the blob began to blow away in the continuous fire from the peeler. As the dark cloud faded away all that was left was a short, thin, old man with a pronounced crook to his back. "All right! All right!" the ghost croaked, "you win. Turn off that darn thing. It hurts like heck.!"
Jazz took her finger off the button but kept the Peeler ready.
"Who are you?" Curtis demanded, awe in his voice as the sight of the ghost that had been hidden inside the dog.
"What were you doing to my dog?" Groovy asked. Alphonse, with a shudder, had stopped fighting Groovy's hold on his collar and laid down at his feet, curling up into a ball.
"Why were you trying to kill me?" Zelda said, taking a step toward's the hovering ghost.
"You watched me bath!" Phyllidia wrapped her arms close around her chest.
"Ah, to hell with you all!" the ghost snapped and tried to float away but Jazz called him back, warning, "Don't make me use this again!"
"My name's George Hillard. At least it was when I was alive. I was in that nursing home with that boy's uncle." He waved toward's Curtis. "I died and was drifting off towards that bright light in the sky when I suddenly realized that I was not looking forward to getting my 'heavenly reward.' Spending eternity with my wife would be more like hell, if you know what I mean. I'd spent 50 years with her. That was long enough. So I looked around for some way to stay here and realized - don't ask me where the knowledge came from 'cause I don't know - that if I could find a host body I could stay here as long as I wanted."
"But why my dog?" Groovy complained.
"Because no one would think that a dog could be possessed! Besides it was surrounded like lots of nice, young tail. That always griped my wife - looking at other women. All I ever did was look and she'd act like I was some kind of sex maniac.
"I think she knew you better than you do," Sam quipped, earning her a glare from the elderly ghost.
"Who wouldn't want to hang out with a couple of lovelies like these. Mystery Club, my ass, you just wanted an excuse to hang around these girls. And it would have worked if it hadn't been for you!" He pointed at Zelda.
"What did I do?"
"You kept asking questions. You kept noticing things. Sooner or later you were going to guess that I was overshadowing the dog and then I'd be up the creek without a paddle. As much as I loved sniffing up your butt, you had to go."
"Eeww!" That was Jazz.
"And you saw me chasing after the Kraken you decided to seize the distraction and do it now," Danny supplied. "But you can't blame Zelda for what were, after all, your slip-ups. If you had kept to acting like a dog no one would have suspected. But once you started making the dog do things like talk, point to clues and otherwise act like a person, you gave yourself away. So really it's all your fault."
"Aww, to hell with you."
"If I could send you into that white light I would," Danny began, "but all I can do is send you into the Ghost Zone." He flipped open the Fenton Thermos Jazz had brought with her and hit the intake button. With a swirl of ectoplasmic energy the ghost George Hillard was swept up and hauled into the container.
"And that's that." He announced. "I'm going to dump these two guys into the ghost zone and take a well deserved rest. What about you guys."
"I think my work here is done," Sam said. She looked at Zelda for a moment, then decided against a hug. She wasn't a touchy-feely kind of girl.
Jazz disarmed the Peeler and went over to talk to the Clew Crew.
"Danny?" He had been turning to go when Zelda stopped him.
"I want to thank you for everything."
"That's what I'm here for. So, what are you going to do next?"
"I'm going home."
"Not waiting for your piece of the treasure?"
"Oh, I intended to get my share of whatever reward money we get to finding the money but I've had it with the Clew Crew. It's just too crazy for me. I want to live long enough to regret my mistakes and if I stay with them I won't." After a moment she added, "Would you walk me back to the hotel?"
"Sorry, this is my clue to fade away. I've still got things to do," he held up the Thermoses. "It's been nice meeting you. Good luck with things," and he vanished. He knew he was being rude to just take off like this but if he didn't leave now he might have trouble leaving at all.
Zelda muttered a short, succinct curse and turned towards the hotel lights she could see in the distance.
Danny had just popped a cheesy potato tot into his mouth went Sam dropped into a seat across from him. She tossed a 9 by 12 inch envelope at him. "They gave this to me but I think it's for you," she said. This was about a month later.
"Muuh?" Danny said, hastily swallow his food. Lunch as Casper High was its usual noisy self. Tucker, sitting to Danny's left, leaned over to see what he had.
The envelope was address to "Sam Mansion c/o Casper High School" There was no return address. Inside were two sheets of paper and a photograph. The letters was stapled on top of the photo. He read:
Dear Sam,
I wanted to send this to Danny Phantom but I doubt that he has a mail box, I can't imagine what ghost would be doing with a mail box anyway. But if anyone can get this to Danny I'm sure you're the one.
Thanks for your help last month.
Regards,
Zelda Gaines
Under that letter was another.
Dear Danny,
Thanks again for saving my life. If there is anyway I can help you be sure to ask.
Regards,
Zelda Gaines.
PS - I took your advice about the pants..
Danny had by then forgotten what he had said about pants. Confused he turned this letter over and looked at the photo. There was Zelda alright, wearing pants.
Leather pants.
While sitting on top a small motorcycle.
She was also wearing a leather jacket, gloves and held a shiny new helmet in her hand.
There was an inscription on the photo. "Off to see where the sky meets the land - love, Zelda"
"' Love'? Woowoo," Tucker crooned. "Looks like you found yourself a girlfriend. Where was I when all this happened?"
"Asleep,Tuck, as usual."