Hello, guess what, I'm not dead! I'm still here! Physically, at least, I don't know about mentally. Sanity is a waste of time. Anyway, I'm sorry for not updating in…(attempts to count how long its been since my last update and runs out of fingers) well, it's been a while. And I'm sorry for that. I just needed a good, healthy dose of Danny Phantom. And Skittles.

Lucky for me I got both very recently so have no fear! (Well, maybe fear the inevitable OOC-ness) And I'd also like to apologize for the crap that's been going on in the last couple of chapters.

Thirteen: Learning the Hard Way

Vlad located Phantom in a locked, walk in closet in which hung series of broken or abandoned anti-ghost weaponry. The ghost boy shrieked when he saw Plasmius phase through the wall and immediately brought up his fists, feeding glowing ectoplasm into them. Vlad rolled his glowing red eyes and crossed his arms over his chest. Phantom didn't buy it. He charged Plasmius with a feral battle cry and swung his fist at the older man's face. Plasmius easily caught the ghost half's wrist, twisted his arm behind his back, and grabbed a fistful of shocking white hair. Phantom swore loudly.

"Now really, Phantom, is that sort of language necessary? My nerves are already raw and I really don't want you to make me do something I'll regret." Vlad turned intangible, causing Phantom to do so as well, and dropped through the floor, "We really can't have you running off."

Why don't I just hand-cuff you and Daniel together? No, of course, they'd try strangling each other. What am I thinking? All of these thoughts were in a rather sarcastic tone of voice.

"You got detention!?" Jazz almost crashed into the car in front of her as she started pulling out of the school parking lot, "Are you stupid!?"

"Are you?" Dan hissed back, Danny's blue eyes glinting red for a few seconds, "Don't antagonize me, Jasmine, I'm not really in the mood." He sunk down as far as the seatbelt would let him, "I…I think I almost killed Lancer again…"

It was the horrid regret that rang in his voice that made Jazz glance at him. But his features were blank, "What do you mean by "again?""

"The first time, in my timeline," His voice was monotone and he starred unblinkingly out the windshield, "Clockwork's the only one who knows what really happened. It's…different than what happened here, whatever Danny or those blasted Observers say."

"What happened?" Jazz asked softly, keeping her eyes on the road as she headed for the Mayor's mansion.

"Well…a ghost had attacked Mr. Lancer in the park on his way home. This was just before the CAT so he was carrying the answers with him and I was out on patrol…it was such a minor little, stupid ectoplasmic goo-ball I didn't think twice about it. Gave me more trouble than it was worth, though." He sighed, "It exploded when I shot a charged ecto-beam at it and I went flying through Lancer's briefcase. With all the ectoplasmic residue all over me…the CAT answers…" He trailed off, looking a little upset but more angry than anything else, "I cheated on the test. Lancer found out and called me, you, and our parents to the Nasty Burger for a talk. I'd gotten Sam and Tucker to come along too even though they were both angry at me for cheating." He shuddered to a halt, clamming up, his eyes completely red now and the black hair swirling upwards in a wind that Jazz did not feel.

"Dan…what happened. You can tell me. I swear I won't tell anyone else."

"Some stupid ghost punk had thought it would be funny to stir up some trouble right then. I freaked when I saw it coming; it was big, and ugly, and…it had fire powers." He sagged lower in his seat, "I changed right in front of everybody and started fighting it. It was…intense. I…I got…set on fire and…fell right into that stupid, stupid batch of Nasty Burger sauce…!" He clenched his fists tightly, black claws sprouting from his finger tips and cutting deep into his skin. Glowing green blood slid down his wrists, "I…I thought for the longest time that I was the one who killed them. But now I know the truth." His form blurred and stretched and Dan Phantom was sitting beside her, looking ready to kill, "It was the world. It's full of idiots! It's their fault everyone died! It's they're fault that ghost attacked me! It's they're fault I'm like this!"

Silence. Dan continued seething all the way to the mansion. Jazz remained silent.

The first thing Clockwork noticed when he entered the room was Danny tied to a chair by pulsing, pink ectoplasmic ropes. He looked very upset. And very angry.

"I'm not a sideshow freak, Clockwork! Mind getting me out of these things?" The boy snarled as the Time Ghost walked over for a closer look, his staff propped on one shoulder like the victory pose of a character in a video game. Danny struggled against the ectoplasmic and then gasped in pain.

"Danny?" Clockwork's brow furrowed. Had Plasmius set the bindings so that if one struggled they would tighten?

The boy gritted his teeth and threw his head back against the back of the chair, his breathing getting heavier. Beads of sweat formed on his face and tickled down his neck. Suddenly, he yanked himself forward, as much as he could bound to a chair, and screamed like someone was stabbing him with a hot poker.

Clockwork realized that Danny's DNA was breaking down once again.

As Plasmius regained tangibility on the second floor of his manor, Phantom suddenly convulsed in his grip. The ghost writhed around, gasping for air like someone was strangling him, and kicked out, catching Plasmius in the gut. The older man dropped him to the floor where Phantom curled into a ball, groaning in agony.

A bloodcurdling screech of torture suddenly rang from the first floor and made Plasmius shiver as he reverted into his human form. The same scream was echoed by Phantom who was now laying flat out on his back, digging his fingers into the carpet and screaming as loud as he possibly could, arching away from the floor. Vlad took a step backwards.

Phantom's ectoplasm structure started to blur. It shook, fading around the edges, and little green wisps of ectoplasmic smoke floated away into the air, dissipating, never to be seen again.

Vlad looked around in horror for help but found nothing but an empty hallway.

Phantom was, by all reasonable means, dying.

As Jazz and Dan stepped out of the car and began their walk towards the mansion, Dan suddenly froze, turning his head towards one of the second floor windows. Jazz stopped beside him and looked up, confused.

"It's…Fenton and Phantom…" Dan hissed, "They're…screaming…"

Jazz ran for the mansion. Dan crossed his arms over his broad chest and sat down on the gravel at the side of the car, facing towards the mansion. He knew that Clockwork would call him momentarily, he knew that Jazz would be in a panic, he knew that Vlad would be angry beyond belief, and he knew that Fenton and Phantom would be screaming like there was no tomorrow. It was chaos.

But it wasn't a chaos that Dan enjoyed. He'd just spilled his guts to Jazz, told her everything, something he'd never said to anyone. The time paradox created by him going (coming?) to the past (present?) had stopped Danny from becoming evil even though Dan had tried his hardest to keep the future the same.

"Things are they way they were meant to be…!" Dan snarled, mocking Clockwork, "If things were the way they were supposed to be, I wouldn't be here! And Danny would still be Phantom! And everyone would just live happily the freaking ever after!"

These last words were shouted at the top of his voice and a couple handfuls of pebbles went scattering across the drive, driven there by the trace of ghostly wail that had entered Dan's voice in his anger.

"Happily ever after…" The ghost growled, drawing his knees up to his chin, his red eyes narrowing, "What a bunch of bull."

Jazz burst into the room just as Danny let loose another earsplitting scream, thrashing in his bonds. Clockwork's fingers were so tight around his staff that he looked as though he was going to snap it in half.

Vlad suddenly dropped through the ceiling, carrying a screeching, thrashing Phantom in his arms. His usually calm, turquoise eyes were rimmed in white and flooded with terror. He looked from Clockwork to Jazz and then to Danny. The pink, ectoplasmic bindings holding the boy to the chair vanished in a wisp of smoke and Danny fell to the floor with a cry of pain, holding his right arm close to his chest, tears running down his face.

Phantom was in no better condition. The pain was too much for his ectoplasm to handle and it was shaking him to the core. Plasmius looked over at Clockwork but the Ghost of Time had his own red eyes closed and wasn't looking at anyone.

"DANNY!" Jazz, sobbing, threw herself on her little brother and wrapped her arms around him, holding him close to her chest as he continued to scream and cry. The skin on his left arm bubbled and cracked, splitting in some places so that little trickles of blood leaked down his arm. Blisters and burn-like marks erupted all the way down from his shoulder to his fingertips. With a final, shuddering gasp, both Fenton and Phantom lay still, breathing deeply and slightly unevenly but obviously out cold from the torture.

Vlad could only stare, opened mouthed, at the unconscious ghost in his arms.

"Dan." Clockwork whispered, his voice barely audible over Jazz's sobbing, and the future Danny appeared in a swirl of cold wind, face expressionless, "Take Phantom and Fenton up to their room." The Time Ghost opened his eyes ever so slightly, his gaze trained solely on the carpet, "And take Jazz as well. She can bandage them both up."

Dan snorted but did as he was told, taking Phantom from Plasmius and, after a bit of tugging, managed to get Fenton away from Jazz. The girl followed Dan from the room, wiping the still coming tears from her eyes.

Clockwork allowed his red eyes to slide across the carpet and train upon Vlad's face. The expression he saw there was, in all honesty, not what he expected. The millionaire was deathly pale, fear, doubt, pain, and sadness boiling in his eyes, conflicting, his arms hanging loosely at his sides.

"Not what you thought?" The Time Ghost said in a low voice and Vlad shook his head wordlessly, starring fixedly at the door, "It's hard to watch. It'll be even harder near the end. Phantom will die before Danny does, you know that, you saw for yourself his ectoplasmic structure breaking. I can't do this alone, Vlad. I may be the Master of Time but I'm not a genius. I can only see the future…not solve it."

Vlad suddenly collapsed onto a nearby couch, burying his face into his hands, shoulders shaking.

"I was doing this for Maddie. I was doing this to keep Maddie happy! I wanted her to see that I could do something right!" Vlad's voice was muffled through his fingers but Clockwork remained silent, listening, "But now, I see this and…" The man swore, "I don't know what to think! I want to help Daniel more than ever." Misty blue-green eyes came into view as Vlad leaned back against the back of the couch, "I don't know where my head is Clockwork, I really don't."

"I do."

"Of course you do, you know everything!"

"Don't snap at me, Plasmius. I know what you want. You want to help Danny, you want to keep Maddie happy. I can tell you how." Vlad looked up expectantly as Clockwork leaned in closer, "Let them be, Vlad 'Plasmius' Masters. Let Danny, Maddie, Jack, and Jazz live in peace. Don't be a rival, be friend. Help Danny instead of hindering him, aid Jack and Maddie in their experiments instead of stealing them. You can still love Maddie, there's nothing wrong with that, but do not try to steal her." Clockwork stepped back, "That's my only advice Vlad. But for the moment, we need to get Fenton and Phantom back together again." And he swept out the door without another word.

Vlad watched him go, feeling at odds with himself. Too many things were happening too fast. He forced himself to focus on the business at hand.

Danny Fenton and Danny Phantom could not longer be two separate entities.

Okay, I know that was a short chapter and I'm sorry for that too but I'm building stuff up for the next one. While I was writing this, there was a part of me that wanted to make Vlad start crying but that would have been so out of character I think I'd puke. I opted instead for him being completely overwhelmed by the whole situation. Hey, he may be a millionaire halfa but he's still part human and everyone gets pressured when there's a lot of stuff going on around them.

So, I will see you in the next chapter but until then…toodles!