Chapter 05

"I can't believe they didn't kill you," Tucker said, completely in awe, and Danny rolled his eyes at his friend, despite that Tucker couldn't see it over the phone.

"It wasn't all that bad," Danny replied with a shrug, though his attention was on something else at the moment.

His computer was on in front of him, a document brought up for him to start writing out a report for class, which he really should be working on since he only had about two paragraphs of the five pages that he needed to have for tomorrow. It would probably take him the rest of the night to get it finished, along with his remaining calculus problems, but that wasn't unusual for him so he wasn't all that concerned about rushing to finish it at the moment.

"I mean, yeah, Dash is a bossy jerk." Danny sighed at that, thinking back on strange that was, as he flicked one of the random windows away. Ever since he left the NetZone and noticed that flash of green light, he started playing around with opening up random windows. Greenish screens appeared around him, and he had fun poking around at them, spinning around in his chair to check the random feeds running through the screens. He never realized he could something like that. At least, he never thought he could do it when he wasn't in his digital form or when he wasn't in the NetZone. He never even bothered to try accessing digital screens like this when he was completely normal. A grin slipped onto his face as he tapped the air in front him, opening up another random screen. He really needed to figure out control over this, how to bring up exactly what he wanted instead of sifting through various random screens. Maybe he just needed to focus on what exactly he wanted, but at the moment, his mind was scattered with thoughts.

"Shocking," Tucker muttered sarcastically, and probably rolled his eyes. "When isn't he a complete jerk? He acts like he's the king of Casper High just because he can throw around a stupid football."

"What more do you expect from the star football player?" Danny laughed, though Dash wasn't being as big a jerk as usual lately, but his laugh was cut short when he blinked at the newest screen. He grabbed hold of its sides and drew the screen closer to him. Was that? He pressed forefinger and thumb to the center of the screen then pushed them outward. The image expanded, zooming in on the image of a bedroom. He recognized it immediately after spending the afternoon there to discuss play ideas for their theater class project. It was Dash's bedroom!

"So he gets to get away with everything?" Tucker scoffed grumpily. "That's totally not fair. We've been harassed by him for four years! And he doesn't get any punishment for pushing around the losers."

"Uh huh," Danny mumbled distractedly. "Hey, can I talk to you later? Uh, homework. Lots of homework."

"Oh, sure," Tucker replied in disappointment. "I should probably get my homework done too. Catch you at school!"

"Yup. Bye." Danny hung up the phone before turning his attention back to the screen showing Dash's bedroom.

He never even realized that he could access the webcams on other people's computers like this. A laugh bubbled out of him as he glanced around the bedroom. Three years after the accident, and he was still learning new tricks that his digital being could do. Danny amused himself with peeking into Dash's bedroom, spying on the jock when he thought he was alone. He didn't know exactly what he was expecting to find. Maybe Dash doing something predictable like lifting weights or exercising. Maybe the blond jock would being watching some stupid sports show or plotting out some new means of bullying the less popular.

But Dash sat at his desk, leaning on his left arm with his right leg drawn up to his chest, foot resting on the seat of his chair. His head was bowed with a look of deep concentration on his face. Curiously, Danny turned the screen downward, trying to see what had the jock's attention. He was actually surprised when the angle of the camera changed, showing more of the desk. Dash's hand moved, scratching his pencil over a paper. Danny frowned at the thought that the jock was probably sketching out some torture device to make his favorite punching bag miserable, and maybe that was the cause for the lack of recent bullying: Dash had a big plan in mind but it was finished yet. Blue eyes blinked in surprise when he caught of a glimpse of what Dash was actually working on. His mouth hung open as Dash sketched out the familiar form of Phantom.

"Wow," Danny breathed out, impressed with Dash's skills. He saw the posters of Phantom all over Dash's bedroom when he was there to talk about the play for class, but he didn't see anything that indicated Dash was such a good artist. He watched the jock, zooming in for a closer look at his work. Another wave of surprise hit him when he realized Dash wasn't simply drawing out his hero Phantom. Dash was drawing an actual comic! Danny could see the lines indicating other panels for the page. There was a faint sketch of what Danny thought might be Skulker, a common virus that he fought against to protect the NetZone.

Danny slumped back in his chair, staring at the screen in amazement. The thought that Dash could be such an amazing artist never even occurred to him. All he saw when he looked at Dash was a jock, a jerk, and a bully. He guessed it was true that everyone made snap judgments about each other. Even he was guilty of it.

Dash lifted his head, and Danny turned the screen to find out what distracted the jock's attention. The door opened, and small girl bounded into the room with a beaming smile on her face. She had blonde hair like Dash and the same shade of dark blue eyes. Her hair reached to her waist and was drawn back into twin tails that were tied off with baby blue ribbons. Dash placed his pencil behind one ear before he stretched out his arms for her to jump into, drawing her into a tight hug.

"Wait," Danny mumbled in confusion as he tilted his head at the scene. "Does Dash have a sister?"

He scratched his head over that. The girl looked to be about twelve, not yet in high school, which would explain why Danny never saw her. Outside of Dash's bedroom, Danny didn't do a whole lot of looking around at the jock's house. He didn't remember seeing any pictures of Dash and the girl in the bedroom though, but maybe Dash simply didn't keep them out for visitors to see. When he turned his attention back to the screen, he found that Dash and his sister were no longer in the bedroom.

"I wonder," Danny said thoughtfully as he closed all the random screens around him. "Can I do that with anyone's webcam?" He was thinking of Dash at the moment when he opened the screen. If he thought about someone else, could he open another screen showing their room? A grin spread over his face as he decided it was worth a try.

After pondering for a moment, Danny focused his thoughts on Tucker before he tapped the air before him. He laughed excitedly when the screen that popped open showing the familiar bedroom of his best friend. For a moment, he glanced around, disappointed when he didn't see the techno geek anywhere around his bedroom. Then suddenly, Tucker leapt into the view of the webcam. His green eyes were clamped shut behind his glasses as Tucker held a brush close to his mouth like a microphone. His mouth opened and closed as he danced around the room.

"Oh, Tuck!" Danny laughed, nearly falling out of his chair at the sight of his friend singing. "I'm so glad these things don't have sound." For as long as Danny knew him, Tucker was never a very good singer. His voice was pitchy and made everyone nearby clap their hands over their ears to block out his voice.

Still chuckling, Danny closed out of that screen. He stroked a hand over his chin as he debated who to try next. This skill could prove to be rather useful, and he wondered if there was a way he could open a chat with people by opening the screens. It could come in handy if he was without a phone or computer and needed to contact someone in a hurry. But that would only work if he could figure out how to make it a two way thing and how to give the screens sound, though he was still thankful that he couldn't hear anything when he peeked into Tucker's bedroom. That would have given him hours of teasing if his friends knew anything about the accident. He still wasn't sure if he should tell them anything about it. They would probably accept him, but he didn't want to put them in any danger.

Danny thought of Sam as he opened the next screen. It popped up immediately, showing him the dark room with canopy bed that was draped in black fabric. The dim lighting from the candles around the room contributed to the gloomy atmosphere. Sam sat on her bed with various textbooks around her as she busily worked on her homework, something Danny realized that he should be doing at that moment.

"Hm, but how to add sound?" Danny wondered out loud, but he doubted there would be much to hear from Sam unless she was mumbling as she wrote stuff down in her notebook. Leaning back in his chair, Danny stared up at the ceiling. He should probably get back to that report he needed to write that he still only had two paragraphs written for, but the idea of opening a screen to another random person's room for fun entertained his thoughts.

One more attempt wouldn't delay his homework too much, he decided as he lowered his gaze away from the ceiling. Closing the screen to Sam's room, where not much of anything interesting was happening, Danny thought about whom else he could spy on. There were plenty of students to choose from in his class. Crossing his legs under him and folding his arms, he pondered hard on which his classmates to pick.

Kwan's name was the first to stand out in his mind. Danny blinked at that, not sure why he would think of Kwan except that they spent most of the afternoon together at Dash's house for working on the play for their class project. With that name in mind, Danny focused his mind on sound as well when he tapped at the air before him. Maybe that was the key. If he focused on the thought of sound like he did with whose webcam he accessed, then maybe he could pick up on what the people were saying. It was worth a shot anyway.

The screen popped up, and Danny blinked at the neat and tidy bedroom that appeared before him. Grabbing hold of the screen, he maneuvered it around to better look at the bedroom. He was surprised that Kwan kept his room so orderly, thinking the jocks at school were probably slobs at home. His bed was perfectly made with dark navy blue sheets. Every book was perfectly lined up on his bookshelves. Danny blinked at that, zooming in to better read the titles of various books on engineering and technology. Turning around the room again, he realized there was a lot of tech stuff that would make even Tucker jealous if he saw all of it.

"This has to be the wrong room," Danny mumbled, finding it difficult to believe that Kwan's room would be filled with techno geek stuff. But he couldn't understand how he could get it wrong when he managed to get it right for Tucker and Sam. Was it because he distracted his mind by trying to think of adding sound to the image on the screen?

As he puzzled over that, the door to the bedroom opened. Danny's blue eyes grew wider as he watched the Asian jock walk into his bedroom. This really was Kwan's bedroom? Danny was as baffled about that fact as he was about Dash being such a good artist and having a sister.

Kwan looked exhausted as he sat down at his desk. It was the first Danny could recall not seeing a beaming smile on the jock's face. Kwan tended to be the unusually happiest jock at Casper High. He participated in bullying here and there, but he never seemed to really be in it, like he was only going along with it because it was expected of him, because the other jocks might turn against him if he didn't join in when picking on some loser. Having Kwan in the group made Danny feel a little relieved because the jock usually could get through to his bone headed teammate. Dash could be an aggressive jerk, but somehow Kwan could talk him out of beating up on someone. Danny didn't quite know how that worked, but he was thankful whenever Kwan stopped Dash from trying to stuff him in a locker, or worse, over the past years.

His thoughts were interrupted when movement in the corner of his eye caught his attention. The door to the bedroom flew open, slamming into the wall. When he didn't hear anything, Danny frowned, realizing that simply focusing on sound didn't work after all.

Kwan turned in his desk, but Danny didn't miss that flicker of terror that passed through the aqua green eyes. Behind the jock stood a tall man with dark hair slicked back and not a strand out of place. There was a clear resemblance between the two men, obviously father and son. Kwan was out of his chair in a flash, walking past his father, but Mr. Long grabbed his son by the arm, yanking him back. Rage was on the man's face as he yelled at Kwan, who flinched as he looked away.

"What? No," Danny gasped as he watched the interaction between the two men. He pushed away from the screen, his chair rolling back over the wooden floorboards of his room. He couldn't wrap his mind around what he was seeing.

Kwan was the happy jock. Kwan was the nice one. Kwan was always smiling. Danny shook his head in disbelief when Mr. Long grabbed Kwan and suddenly slammed up against the wall, screaming something at his son. Scrambling forward, Danny quickly closed the screen. The image might have vanished from in front of him, but it didn't erase what he saw. His brain felt like a scrambled mess, wondering what exactly took place inside Kwan's house. Was it only yelling that Kwan suffered or did his father take it further than that? Danny didn't think he wanted to know the answer.

Drawing himself over to his desk, Danny buried his head in his arms. What was he thinking messing around with that kind of ability? What right did he have peeking into people's bedrooms like that? He only thought he would have a little fun, but it was an invasion of privacy. It was wrong! His powers were meant for fighting the viruses and protecting the NetZone of Amity Park. They weren't for spying on his classmates. He felt like a terrible person. Now he knew something about someone that he probably should never have learned.

jeanette9a: Oh! That's a pretty good idea! =D

Anon: Why thank you! O: I haven't actually. XD;; So I'm really happy that they all come off as in character! 8D

Sammi: Introducing a plot twist! It's Jack. 8D;;; *shot* I'm just kidding. XD;;

Guest: Yay! =D I thought it would be neat if the viruses all had some little hang out. XD Man, the things FFn doesn't let you do! D:

NikaStarlight: Thanks for reading! =)

XD: I had fun writing Skulker and Ember's interactions. XD;; Skulker's all "be impressed by me!" and Ember's just not having any of it. XD;; Yay alliteration! Since they aren't ghosts, I needed to give him another name. XD;; He's, um... He's a virus that specializes in boxing up his opponents! *shot* Thanks! Haha, I was thinking that Nocturne and Vortex created it. XD;; Though I haven't thought up what actually happened to Vortex. Omg! The image of FK hugging his Soul Shredder like a teddy bear as he sleeps is just Ah~ XD I'm glad it helped! =) Ahaha~ I loved it! XD I might have to think of a way to work in something like that. Or there's always the other jocks that see Dash has backed off his favorite punching bag and decide to rough Danny up a bit themselves and Dash is just like "oh hell no!" and knocks them out in front of Danny. XD;;; I hadn't planned that out. Should he be? XD *already laughing at another detail about the play* Thanks! =)