Hello, citizens! See, I told you that the rest of the chappies wouldn't be so short. Now, so you don't magically mistake me for some old guy named Butch Hartman (well, I don't know how old he is, but he's a lot older than me, that's for sure) I will tell you that I don't own Danny Phantom. I actually don't own any part of this story except for Jaden Glass and his sister, and the plot. Seriously, I don't even own Mrs Brown. I saw her in Mystery Meat-when Mr Lancer unveils their 'meat feast' that's just been stolen in the staff room-and took her here and gave her a name.
...I don't actually watch the show that much. I'm just good at absorbing information.

Danny let out a loud grunt as his back hit a brick wall at about fifty miles an hour. Blinking stars out of his eyes, he managed to duck just as a large steel fist hit the wall where his head had just been.

"Hey! Watch it! My head's been hit enough times without you adding to that number!" he said, throwing a ball of ice at the monster, having learned the hard way that an ecto-blast would only bounce would only bounce off this new metallic ghost-and wouldn't stop bouncing. He was sure that his first blast was around here somewhere... Honestly, it was easier to fight Skulker.

"Ha! Ha! Haaa!" Said the ghost, its mouth opening like a ventriloquist's dummy. Its voice was like metal being ripped apart, loud and screechy. It was usually impossible to tell what it was saying unless it was something simple like what it had just said.

"Alright, let's see how you like it!" he yelled angrily, flying up to the ghost's head and punching him with all the strength he had.

The ghost roared in pain, and Danny tried not to do the same as he clutched his gloved hand, which was throbbing painfully. "Note to self," he muttered as his eyes began to water, "punching a big ghost made of metal equals bad idea" he shook his head to clear it, only to see that the large ghost was down on its metallic knees, holding its head.

"At least it works..." he pulled out the thermos strapped to his back, carefully using his uninjured left hand to suck the ghost in.

He landed on the ground and leaned against an alley wall. He slowly tugged off his silver glove, wincing as it squeezed his now extremely sensitive fingers painfully. His hand was red and raw-looking, and his fingers refused to move unless he prodded them with his other hand-something that resulted in extreme pain. He quietly swore, and stuffed the glove in his pocket. There wasn't any use in putting it back on anyway, unless he wanted to hurt himself even more.

Checking his watch, Danny swore again. English class had just ended, and bio was just about to start.

In the next few seconds, anyone watching from the ground would swear that they saw a shooting star in the middle of broad daylight. About twenty feet above the ground.

"Danny?" called Mrs. Brown, a woman with a large hooked nose that reminded him of an eagle, large, green, tired looking eyes, and the longest neck that Danny had ever seen on a person. He stopped on his way to the door and turned around.

"Yes..?" he replied hesitantly.

"Could you come here for a minute or two, sweetie?" she asked in her soft, whispery voice.

Danny sighed, and walked over to his social studies teacher's desk. Ever since he'd made it late to bio two blocks ago, he'd had to be very careful about what he did, for fear of giving away his hand. That usually included keeping the teacher's attention away from him...he kept it down low by his side, out of her range of vision.

"Do you know why I called you here, sweetie?" asked Mrs. Brown. He shook his head, ruling out the option of her noticing his hand, silently wishing that she'd stop calling him 'sweetie' or any other pet name.
"It's because of your grades, dear." She said, emphasizing the word 'grades' as if he'd never heard of such a thing before. "They're, well, going downhill."

Danny didn't say anything, wondering if she used to work as a kindergarten teacher; if she hadn't, she should start.

"Danny, honey, I'm just worried about you. You're always so stressed looking lately, and it's unhealthy. Is something wrong at home, darling?"
Danny had been thinking about how not even his mother called him this many pet names when he realized that she probably wanted an answer.

"Oh! Um," he said, "No. Nothing's wrong at home. I'm, uh, just-"

"Mrs. Brown!" exclaimed an exceptionally cheery voice. Danny turned to see Mr. Lancer entering the room, looking as excited as Tucker when he'd beat Sam at Doomed that one time-granted, she'd been doing homework at the same time, but they had decided not to tell Tucker that.

Mrs. Brown turned to fix Mr. Lancer with a rather pathetic glare. Danny was surprised she was capable of such a thing.

"I'm sorry, Rick, but I was in the middle of an important discussion, thank you." She said, her tone brisk and business-like. While it wasn't all that scary-actually, the Box Ghost was scarier than her and infinitely more interesting-it was still something that was completely unexpected from the soft spoken teacher.

"Oh, so sorry. I can wait." Said Mr. Lancer, grinning. He turned to look at one of the posters lining the walls-it featured a kitten battling a ball of yarn with an A+ written on it-waiting excitedly as he bounced on his heels.

"So, Danny." Said Mrs. Brown, who was back to using her whispery voice again.

"Huh?" Danny turned back to his social studies teacher. He'd almost forgotten why he was here in the baffling distraction that was his English teacher.

"You were going to say something?" she said, smiling sweetly.

"Um... right. Everything's just fine." He said, grinning back, albeit indecisively.

"You're sure?"

"Yeah! It's all good!" he said, resisting the urge to fidget nervously under her scrutinizing glare.

Mrs. Brown sighed in defeat. "Alright, hun. Just bring your grades up, kay?"

Danny nodded, standing up and leaving the room as quickly as possible.

"You wanted to speak to me, Rick?" said Mrs. Brown, addressing the overweight teacher now intently examining her Garfield poster.

"Hm? Oh, yes, Mrs. Brown. I wanted to ask if we could speak about the upcoming spirit week..."

"Rick, we've spoken at length about this already."

"Yes, well, I thought that maybe we could change our host this year."

"Why would we do that? Jazz Fenton had hosted spirit week for the past two years. She's certainly good at it."

"Ah, yes, that is exactly why I wanted the change."

Mrs. Brown paused. "I don't understand."

"You see, while Miss Fenton is good and practiced at it; wouldn't it be nice to see a new face hosting the school?"

Mrs. Brown thought about this, fingering her necklace of fake pearls around her neck. He had a point; it would be nice to see a change around here. Not to mention that some of the more biased kids tended to fill the air with nonsense about the Fenton parent's profession instead of their daughter's speech. "Okay..." she said slowly, "Who do you propose?"

Rick's smile-which had, up till this point, been so large it looked forced-fell. Obviously, he hadn't thought about this.

"Um," he said, desperately thinking through the roll call of students in his mind, "How about Jesse Whibley? He'd a freshman this year, and a very good motivational speaker. He joined debate club and won every debate he's been on, according to Mr. Salter."

"Rick, he's a freshman. He should at least see how spirit week works before hosting it."

He chewed his lip, thinking. "What about Heather Casson? She's a cheerleader, so she's certainly got pep. She's expressed a desire to host spirit week since her own freshman year, and now that she's a senior, it's her last chance."

There was another pause that felt like forever before Mrs. Brown spoke. "I'll think about it, Rick. But I'll have you know that if we do choose Heather over Jazz, you'll be the one to break the news to her."

Rick nodded, grinning widely, and practically ran from the room.

"If he didn't look so old, I could swear he was a student..." muttered Mrs. Brown, shaking her head as she picked up her pen and began her paperwork.

"Y'know that movie The Iron Giant?" Danny asked as Jazz examined his broken hand carefully, "It looked almost exactly like that, except a lot shinier."

"And you thought it'd be a good idea to punch it?" asked Sam, sitting cross-legged on the floor, doing homework. Danny glared at her.

"Well, it worked, didn't it?" he responded defensively, wincing as his sister dabbed some sort of ointment on his hand.
Tucker gave a snort of laughter from where he was sitting backwards on the computer chair. "Dude, I don't think your hand agrees with you."

"Aw, c'mon guys, my hand will be good in no time. Besides, I don't see you guys getting rid of any ghosts."

"Yeah well we didn't get zapped by mom and dad's ghost portal." Said Jazz, getting out the bandages. "Besides, you told me to stay away from ghost hunting."

"I think that's his point, Jazz."

"Whose side are you on, Tucker?"

Tucker suddenly became very interested in his PDA.

"So," piped up Sam, changing the subject, "how much trouble were you in for being late to English?"

"Probably none, right dude?" said Tucker, pushing up his glasses, "Lancer never gives you any trouble anymore. It's like he's given up."

"Yeah, I didn't get detention or anything. But Mrs. Brown did call me up after class, and he showed up there. It was really weird."

"Weird how?" asked Jazz, knowing that with her family and friends, there were many levels of weird around her life. What most would consider extremely strange, the Fentons found completely normal. She pushed a red strand of hair away from her face as she continued bandaging her brother's hand, despite his twitching away from her.

"Weird, as in he practically bounced in and interrupted me. And he was super happy, too, like, happier than mom and dad when they see a ghost."

Jazz finished bandaging Danny's hand, giving it a small pat as if to say 'all better', ignoring his gasp of pain. She put away the first aid kit before speaking. "Danny, spirit week's coming back around again. You saw him last year-it's his favorite time of year."

"I guess..." he muttered.

"Speaking of spirit week, Jazz, have you started writing your speech yet?" Said Sam, grinning impishly; "it wouldn't happen to compare life to an oyster, would it?"

Jazz blushed as bright as her hair. "Sounds like a couple of lovebirds went snooping through my personal belongings!" she retorted, and Danny and Sam blushed.

Tucker, not having anything around to embarrass him, started laughing. "You've started your spirit week speech already? But you don't even know if they've picked you yet!"

"Well, they've picked me for the last two years, why should this year be any different?"

There. Jasmine Fenton wasn't going to host Spirit Week. Mrs. Brown didn't get the chance to get a real answer out of Daniel. He was glad that he'd been walking by at the time; Danny's secret was safe, and Rick Lancer was not going to be responsible for having the boy's life taken away from him. Not again.

His thoughts wandered back to Jaden Glass. He'd been a bright student, just like his older sister, Nikki. The ghost attack on him-which had happened only days after a large, natural portal to the ghost zone had appeared right in the middle of the small town of Krikket-was widely publicized. Krikket didn't get much news, so the portal had been huge. The ghost attack on a fourteen year old boy had been enormous.

It had taken a month for a ghost to come around and come saving people, something that was desperately needed when the ghosts had caught on to the fact that there was a natural, permanent portal to the human realm. It was the ghost of a young boy with white hair and green eyes, much like the famous Danny Phantom's. What threw him off was the fact that this ghost was missing an arm, while Mr. Glass wasn't. The ghost never talked, either; some speculated he was mute.

But after a while, Mr. Lancer had put two and two together, to realize the, quiet, always-sporting-a-bruise Jaden Glass and the ghost boy were the same person. The knowledge had scared him; what was a fourteen year old boy doing, risking his life every day like that? He was sure somebody could fix the boy. He had called the government, who connected him to a private ghost hunting agency. They'd promised they'd help Jaden.

They'd lied. He was shocked when he saw what they did-everyone was. It was on the news. He was horrified; how could he be responsible for this? For taking a son away from a mother and father? For taking a brother away from his sister? For taking a friend away from two unsuspecting boys?

He'd sat on the couch long after the news was over, stunned into silence for hours before the phone had rung.

He moved out of town three days later. Back to where he'd grown up, back home, to Amity Park.

It had been remarkably easy to figure out that Danny Fenton was Danny Phantom after that. After Jaden, it was like reading Good Night Moon after reading The Odyssey. But this time, the part-ghost's story was going to have a different ending.

He would personally make sure of it.

A well rounded critique is often the most rewarding gift a reader can give . Please use this golden opportunity to offer a well deserved praise and/or tips for improvement...anybody recognize where I got that line from? ...Will anybody take the advice of that li'l line?
I'd write more of an author's note, but I gotta go hang out with my friend-the same friend that is writing my Harry Potter story with me (yeah, that's an advertisement. Harry Potter fans out there had better go and read it. Right now.) THANKS TO MY BETA READER!