Author's Notes: Okay guys again please do not skip this chapter! I am trying really hard to make this sound as less as a repeat as possible.

With that said please enjoy, and tell me what you think.

Yours Truly, RoxieDivine

(Back With Clockwork…)

Clockwork raises his staff yet again, (Man he does that a lot!) and time skips forward once more.

It is now the next morning, the day before the life changing test, and there was much work to be done. His eyes shifted to the Observants just to his left. They were strangely quiet, no doubt trying to figure out what he was planning. 'Let them wonder.' He thought. 'I have more important things to worry about.' He reminded himself as the rift before him showed Danny and his friends walking down the halls of their school.

It was important for him to focus, now that he had made a crucial change to the original design anything could happen. His one change had already started a butterfly effect of changes all around them, and if he missed one crucial detail, no matter how small all his efforts could be lost, and then he'd have to start this mess all over again.

And Clockwork really hated repeating himself!

So he forced himself to ignore the Observants and focus on the boy, and the world around him.

(Back with Danny…)

His future,

He knew it was not something to be messing around with, no it was something to be taken seriously. And he was being serious however, convincing Tucker and Sam was not proving to be an easy feat. Then again nothing in his life was easy. Ever since he got these powers he had been struggling to float above the surface of his enormous ocean of problems. And now his future was at stake and all because ghost hunting left him with no time to study!

Why shouldn't he get a little bonus for helping save the world?

Just a little leverage to help things go his way wasn't so bad right?

Oh who was he kidding? This was his future he was messing around with!

Danny Fenton bit his lip warily as he, and his two friends walked down the halls of Casper High. 'Maybe their right.' He thought to himself. 'I can't cheat my way through the rest of my life.' Still the temptation to do so was overpowering, especially when he already had the answers in his hands.

'Besides the test is tomorrow.' He reasoned with his guilt. 'And with all my Ghost fighting I've had not time to study for the CAT!'

"So, are you going to return the test answers or not?" Sam finally asked. She didn't want to come off as naggy, but the silence had been killing her, that and she really thought Danny would make the right call.

"I will! I will." Danny assured her. "I'm just...waiting for the right moment." He reasoned.

"Like, maybe, after the test?" Tucker joked, knowingly.

Both Sam, and Danny frowns at him.

Tucker scoffed as they pass by the teacher's lounge "Yeah, you're right. You're not thinking about cheating on a test that you're convinced will determine your future."

The door to the teacher's lounge opens, and Mr. Lancer looks after them quizzically. Had he heard them right? Where they really talking about cheating? Shutting the door again, he goes to the sofa and sets the briefcase down on the coffee table. He pulls out a key and unlocks the briefcase, and gasps upon finding it empty.

Tucker Foley's words suddenly plagued his mind. "You're not thinking about cheating on a test that you're convinced will determine your future."

Mr. Lancer shook his head, unsure. 'No, Daniel maybe a slacker, but he would never…or would he?'

'It's best to be sure.' Mr. Lancer thought, as he uncuffed himself from the now empty briefcase. 'But how? I mean I could accuse him, but what if I'm wrong and someone else stole the answers? This is his future were talking about!'

'I Know!' he suddenly had it! 'I'll get his sister to confirm it for me.' He steps out of the teacher's lounge, and sets out to find Jazz Fenton.

Luckily for him the Brainiac wasn't far.

Mr. Lancer turns the corner down the hall to see several Casper High girls looking angry as Jazz as she talked away about her successful future. "So, it's a choice between Harvard, Yale, and Stanford, and I can't make up my mind!"

The girls all turn and walk away, obviously jealous of her success, and Jazz's smile drops. "So...see you after school?" She asked hopefully.

No answer.

Jazz frowned.

Mr. Lancer takes this moment to make his approach, walking up to Jazz he says. "Ms. Fenton, may I speak with you after school?"

Jazz looks alarmed, but nods her agreement just as the bell to head to first period rings around them loudly. "I better get to class." She stuttered, and hurried off.

'What was that all about?' She wondered. She wasn't sure, but something told her it was bad, really bad!

And it was, it was the worst thing she could possibly imagine.

Clockwork raises his staff once more, and time skips forward again.

The scene in the present day rift shifts to Fenton Works at night. In Danny's room, the trio are sitting in a circle on the floor; around Clockwork's medallion. Tucker connects a pair of wires from it to his PDA, and begins to try and fiddle with it.

However Clockwork is not worried, the tech is far to advance for him to hack into with that primitive device.

"I can't seem to hack into it." Tucker soon said, confirming the ghost's suspicions. "It's really hi-tech."

"Yeah, like it's from the future or something." Sam pointed out, hinting at the truth without realizing it.

Danny gets up smiling nervously. "Well, speaking of the future, I think it's time I started preparing for mine." He says picks up his backpack, and pulling out the sealed answer sheet.

"You mean cheat." Sam pointed out.

"I didn't say cheat." Danny said defensively.

"You didn't say not cheat." Tucker pointed out the obvious.

Danny face-palms "Guys, come on. I'd love to have spent the last month studying, but I was fighting ghosts! Besides, if you two think this test is so meaningless why do you even care if I cheat? Why shouldn't I open this up and study the answers, huh?" He asked holding up the answer packet.

Sam and Tucker look at each other nervously, and Clockwork prepares for the moment that he has chosen to be the time for his next big change.

"No answer?" Danny asked placing the answer sheet back down on his dresser. "Well that's all the answer I need." He said confidently, though he still looks down at the packet hesitating slightly.

"Aren't you going to say something?" Tucker asked Sam hopefully.

"I'm his friend, not his mom." Sam said giving Danny a dirty look. "He wants to cheat, he can cheat."

"That's it!" Clockwork declared before saying. "Time Out!"

Everything freezes once more as the father of time appears by the frozen Danny. He snaps his fingers and an unconscious Skulktech appears. Clockwork wastes no time, placing a time medallion around his neck.

"What?" A screen with Technus' face asked in a confused manner.

"You are back in time." Clockwork answered them. "I am Clockwork, and my employers want you to kill this child." He gestured to Danny.

"The Ghost boy?" Skulker asked. "You want us to destroy him here where he is weak."

"With our futuristic strength that he could never hope to defeat in his premature state?" Technus asked slyly. "But that sounds so unfair."

"Yeah for him." Skulker scoffed.

"So you'll do it then?" Clockwork asked.

"With pleasure." The two ghost spoke as one.

Clockwork smiled. "Perfect." He mused, before shouting. "Time In!" He then vanishes in a swirling ball of light as time moves forward once more.

Danny's eyes narrowed, turning ghostly green with anger. "It's not cheating, it's studying!" And with those final words he rips off the seal!

Suddenly Danny freezes as his ghost sense goes off. "Seriously a ghost now!" he complains, before stuffing the now unsealed answer sheet back in his book bag.

Sam and Tucker sigh in relief, only to stop as they notice Danny is watching.

"I mean...Oh no, a ghost." Sam exclaimed sarcastically.

"You see this is a perfect example." Danny said as he changed into his ghost form. "I'd like to have time to study, but they never give me a break!" He then turns to confront the ghost only to be given yet another shock.

It's another new ghost with a gearshift medallion around its neck. The ghost is a combination of Skulker and Technus, with Skulker's head in the typical head spot and Technus' face embedded on a screen in the middle of the chest.

Danny goes ghost and leaps at the ghost, who easily backhands him into the wall. He slides to the floor and glares up. "Who are you supposed to be?" he growled.

"I am Skulktech 9.9, the future Ghost World's greatest hunter!" The former Skulker exclaimed.

"With its greatest techno-villain as his operating system!" Technus added.

"Skulker and Technus together?" Danny asked, bewildered.

"Okay is that an EW, or a yikes?" Tucker asked fearfully.

Several claw-ended arms spring out of Skulktech.

"Definitely a yikes." Danny admitted as the new duo move in for the kill.

Danny barely misses getting slammed by a cluster of arms. Then going intangible, he snags Tucker and Sam and flies them out of the room, then returns through the door.

Skulktech knocks him around for a bit, then grabs him by the neck and holds him up. "Say goodbye, Ghost Child!" he says. They lift a claw arm, which begins to spin like a scale saw. Suddenly their gauntlet starts beeping the tune to Reveille. "Someone's hacked into the system. Again?! I thought we fixed that!"

"We did!" Technus assured him. "We must have accidentally synced up with somebody else's PDA!"

Skulktech goes intangible against his will, and their jets fire off. Dropping Danny, they take off through the ceiling.

The door opens and Tucker and Sam come in.

"Wow." Tuck said, looking disappointed. "I can still hack into his operating system with my handheld computer. I don't know whether that's exciting or depressing."

Danny leaps to his feet, and going intangible, he flies up through the ceiling. "Come on, follow me!" he shouts.

Tucker, and Sam frown in annoyance

"We'll walk." Tucker said defeated.

(Back with Jazz…)

Danny flies after Skulktech across the evening sky. Below, at Casper High, Jazz and Mr. Lancer are talking.

"So you're saying Danny stole the C.A.T. test answers? But how?" Jazz asked.

"I don't know." Mr. Lancer admits holding up the empty briefcase. "Unless your brother suddenly gained the ability to turn invisible and reach through solid objects?"

Jazz cringing, Danny did have ghost powers, and was completely capable of such a feat, but this fact did not make her opinion waver. She knows her brother is secretly a hero saving them all from ghostly terrors, and is still determined to defend her brother. "But Mr. Lancer, you still have no proof Danny took the test answers."

Mr. Lancer signed, but agreed all the same. "Fair enough. He has up until the test to return the answers. But if he cheats, I won't just fail him. I'll destroy his future."

Jazz bit her lip, hoping and praying to her lucky stars that she was right about Danny being innocent. 'It can't be him.' She thought. 'He's the good guy.'

Still even good guys make mistakes.

'But not Danny!' Jazz argued with herself. 'And I'm going to prove it!' And with that final thought she march off in the direction of home; determined to prove it!

(Back in the air, Danny is still chasing Skulktech…)

"What are you waiting for?" Skulker asked, as they flew around out of control. "Activate the Purple back Gorilla Override!"

"Don't tell me how to do my job!" Technus snapped.

Danny zaps them with an ectoblast, and they fall from the sky to crash into the ruin of the Nasty Burger right beside the heating element which shows the meter inching higher.

They imminently get back up, and attack the boy with their own new technique

"Activating Phantom Palm Pummeler!" Technus stated. Their hand opens, sending out a blueish-white ray that catches Danny and knocks him off course, smoking. It hits him again and he reverts to human form. He falls a short way before going back to ghost form.

Danny's eyes widen as he realizes the truth. "You're shorting out my powers?!"

"Indeed." Skulker confirmed his suspicions "Pummeler might not work on you in the future, but we had a feeling it would work on you here."

"The Future?" Danny asked, obviously confused.

Technus laughed. "Oh, I love it. You're much less powerful than that other Phantom we have to deal with!" He exclaimed hitting him with a third blast turning him human once more.

"What are you two talking aboooou Aaah!" He exclaims, falling, only to catch himself one-handed on a flagpole. Danny looks up, shocked "Wow. That flagpole thing works? I thought for sure it would-" He gasped as the pole snaps "breeaaaak!" He shouts falling and bounces off an awning into a pile of trash bags. "Guess I don't have a future as an Olympic gymnast." He realized out loud.

An arm snakes through the pile and grabs him around the middle, zapping him.

Danny screams and it slams him to the ground.

"You don't have a future, period!" Skulker hissed. "Not anymore!"

"I wouldn't bet on that." Tucker said, cutting in as he ran his override program on his PDA. A red laser hits Skulktech and they short out, falling. As they fall they catch themselves on a flagpole.

"Aw, poo." They say. "Wow, that flagpole thing—" They never finish for the pole snaps, and they fall, crashing and landing doubled over a lamppost.

"Way to go, guys!" Danny cheerers while still trapped in the cuffed arm.

Sam sighs. "Come on, Tucker, let's see if we can get this off!" She grabs the cuff and Tucker grabs Sam as they try to wrench it open.

"You might want to hide for this part." Clockwork admitted to the Observers as they continued to watch the events playing out on the rifts.

"What for?" Melk asked.

"Just trust me." Clockwork insisted.

"Very well." Klem agreed, but they didn't look happy about it.

Once they were hidden Clockwork hid in the shadows himself and then snapped his fingers.

Suddenly Skulktech's medallion falls off and falls to the ground, the three friends start to glow blueish-white.

The glow races along the arm, enveloping the trio, and Skulktech.

Seconds later they all vanish!

The Time Rifts in Clockworks tower begin to show swirls of green, and gears tick and turn everywhere. One rift blazes, and Skulktech and the trio are thrown through it to land on the floor.

The cuff springs open.

Danny stretches his back, happy to finally be free.

Tucker looked around in awe. "Where are we?" He asked.

The three wander around the tower, looking up into the gear-ridden darkness. They approach a window with a clock face embedded in it.

"I don't know." Danny answered. "The Ghost Zone, I think. But...no part of the Ghost Zone I've ever seen."

"It happened right after his medallion fell off." Sam realized.

"Then I think I know how to get us back!" Tucker said seeing a box on the wall, where six more of the medallions hang. Tucker seizes one and puts it around his neck. Pumping his arms triumphantly he says, "Haha!" But nothing happens.

Looking around, Tucker drops his hands in defeat. "Nothing, huh?" he asked.

"No, but nice bling." She teased before going to take a closer look at one of the rifts.

It's the future time rift, which begins to show Danny's Dark future.

Danny looks more closely at Tucker's medallion. "I don't like this." He admitted.

"You're going to like this even less." Sam said, ushering them over.

The boys join Sam at the rift, where Dan is laughing and throwing ecto-blasts at screaming people and buildings, then laughing. A label on the rift reads FUTURE: 10 YEARS.

"I think I'm seeing your future." Sam told Danny. "And you're kind of a jerk."

On the rift, tanks, helicopters, and police cars approach Dark Dan. He easily dispatches the lot of them with his Ghostly Wail.

Sam looks aghast. "Ok, you're really a jerk." She corrected herself.

Danny pushes Sam out of the way. "Wow, what is that?" He asked all excited, as he witnessed Dark Dan's latest new power. "Some kind of ghostly wail? What a cool power!"

Sam and Tucker give him a cross look.

Danny backtracks quickly "...If it weren't being used for evil!"

Tucker turns to Skulktech and clicking on his PDA. "Let's see if this future boy knows any more about—"

Glowing blueish-white, Skulktech suddenly rises and flies back into the future rift.

"I didn't do that." He admits.

"No, I did." Clockwork says, finally coming out of hiding.

The trio all look up as adult Clockwork descends from the darkness.

"I sent him back to his own time." Clockwork explained, switching to elderly version. "Or, should I say, forward to his own time. You see, for me, time moves backwards and forwards, and—" He pauses realizing the blank expression of his audience, and sighs. "Oh, why am I bothering? You're fourteen." He said remembering how Future Valerie had said a 14 year old teen doesn't really understand the connections of the time stream, and how their actions effect it.

"Who are you?" Danny asked. "Where are we?"

Clockwork's brow rose. "Introductions?" He asked. "Fine. I am Clockwork, Master of Time." He explained. "I've been charged with the task of eliminating your future, so that-" He says pointing at the future time rift "Never happens."

In the rift, Dan picks up a tank and throws it, then tosses a few more ecto-blasts around.

"You've got to be kidding me." Danny snapped. "Name one evil thing I've done!"

Smiling, an adult Clockwork points his staff at the present day time rift. In it, we see Jazz pulling the C.A.T. answer packet out of Danny's backpack and gasping, "Danny is a cheater!"

"Bet you can't find two!" Tucker challenged.

In the rift, a sobbing Jazz turns into Dan standing triumphantly over the wreckage of a city street, decorated liberally with fallen helicopters.

"How about two thousand?" Clockwork asked switches to his child form.

"I don't have to sit here and explain myself to you!" Danny shouted. "I'm going ghost!" He does so, and flies at adult Clockwork.

Clockwork smiles and says. "Time out!" He then points his now-glowing staff at Danny, who slows and freezes in place just short of it, then rewinds to fly backward, land, and return to his human form. Clockwork then allows time to play forward once more.

"I'm going ghost!" Danny said, only to freeze. "—Whoa serious Déjà vu." He admits putting his hand to his head. He shakes it off, and goes ghost once more before flying back at Clockwork again.

Clockwork punches button on his staff again, grinning. "Time out!" Danny slows way down, and Clockwork swoops off to the side; Danny watches him go. "Time in!"

Danny resumes normal speed, his momentum carrying him through the spot Clockwork previously occupied and slamming him into the clock tower bell.

Clockwork then rewinds and forwards him through colliding with the bell several times. "I could do this all day." He admitted, changing back to his elderly form. "But I have a schedule to keep." He said remembering to keep his meddling short and sweet. With that said he presses the button one last time, and Danny crashes to the ground. Above, Clockwork pulls a scythe from the hands of a reaper statue and swoops down.

"Danny! Look out!" Tucker, and Sam say together.

Danny zips out of the way and the scythe comes down on a gear, shattering it. Clockwork shakes his head and freezes him in midair. Then looming over Danny with the scythe he goes to swing his death down on to the young halfa. Of course Clockwork has no real intention of killing the boy, this is merely a ruse to keep the Observants from discovering his real motives. "Times up Ghost Boy." He declared for dramatic effect.

Over to the side, Sam is also frozen in the act of gasping, but Tucker is unaffected.

"Hey, wait! Why would he freeze time for Danny and not for us?" Tucker asked, only to turn and notice Sam too is frozen. He waves his hand in her face. "Sam?" 'How come I'm not affected?' He wondered. Then he gasped and remembered his medallion, he looks down at it, grinning to himself. "I knew these medallions were good for something. It's like a Get out of Time Free card!" He then runs and grabs a pair of medallions from the wall.

Tucker then races over and snatches the scythe from Clockwork's grasp.

"Sorry, no sudden death overtime in this game!" Tucker declares before throwing the medallions to the right and left. The first one lands around Sam's neck; she blinks then assumes a fighting stance. The second one lands around Danny's, and he abruptly resumes his flight trajectory.

"Huh? What happened?" He asked landing in between Tucker and Sam.

Sam held up her medallion knowingly. "We leveled the playing field." She explained to him. Now just get the bad guy!"

Clockwork scowls in fake anger in order to keep up the charade. "You three have seen too much. You must be eliminated before you permanently alter the time stream." He said darkly as five ghost soldiers from different eras appear one by one, fully armed.

The trio gasps as the ghost soldiers surround them with no way out.

"Nowhere to run, children." Clockwork muses.

Danny looks all around him seeing his words to be true that is until he see the Future time rift behind him. Suddenly he has an idea. "Nowhere but the future!" He cried before grabbing Sam and Tucker, and jumping into the rift.

Clockwork smiles darkly, shifting into his child form.

"Then let's see if you have what it takes to face that future…"