"We're getting nothing done by just sitting here. We need to at least go somewhere."

"I'm all for London."

"Danny, get serious."

The halfa visibly deflated at this comment. How was he not being serious? After all, the name of the game was to stay alive, it would sort of end in a rather terrible way if they were to throw their cards in. He stared between two sets of eyes. Alex stared back, anger flickering behind his eyes while Tucker simply stared. Danny wondered if Alex was possessed again. Sam would look at any of them.

"I don't get it."

"Of course you don't."

"You know what, Danny? You really need to pull yourself together. You almost had it earlier."

"What did I have, exactly?" Danny asked softly, obviously lost a bit.

"Your. Sanity." Alex said slowly.

"I'm not crazy."

"Fine, you're not crazy, Danny. You are only very, very stressed out."

Danny, pleased that he got Alex to agree with him on some level, smiled. He began humming, looking at the small mirror outside his window. Alex rolled his eyes, looking around at Tucker. When his gaze left the halfa, Danny allowed his face to fall into a frown. He didn't want to remember that time. There had been a brief moment of nothingness that had occurred just before he had drifted off to sleep. No sound, no pain, no nothing. It had scared him.

Even still, the feeling was beginning to return. It felt kind of good though, so what was the problem? He might as well get used to it; there wasn't much he could do to stop it at this point. His vision was darkening; pretty scary.

A small noise of fear left his throat before the darkness began to take over. His eyes rolled back into his head, and his body slumped forward. With a crack, his head made contact with the dashboard, and that was that.

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For a short moment, the others tagged Danny's strange behavior with the way he had been acting lately. Tucker laughed a little, reaching around to lightly shake his friends shoulder.

"C'mon, dude! It's not that bad… Danny?" his smile fell into a concerned frown, and he shook the boys shoulder a bit more harshly. Danny flopped back and forth with the movement. "Danny? Dude, this isn't funny!" Tucker said, slight panic showing through his voice. "Guys, he's totally out of it."

Sam turned to look, blinking the haze from her eyes. She had been so zoned out, wanting badly to be almost anywhere than where she currently was, that she had missed Danny passing out. By the time her mind had come back to her, the two other boys had reclined Danny's seat and leaned the halfa back in it. Tucker had moved a little closer to Sam to make room for Danny's seat, so it was becoming a tight squeeze in the back seat. She combated this by shoving the techno geek back further into the back of his seat, leaning forward to see what was wrong with Danny. Upon closer inspection, the girl noted the slight gash on his forehead. Green blood was running down between his eyes at a slow pace due to the dashboard not having too sharp of a corner, and a bruise was beginning to form around the wound. Without asking what had happened, Sam leaned forward even more, now awkwardly forcing her upper body between the front seats to the glove box by Danny's knees. As she had suspected, there were a few napkins there.

"Those will just stick to the cut, Sam." Alex said, guessing what she was going to do. With a sigh, she slammed the glove box shut, briefly resting an arm on Danny's knee.

"What are we going to do about it, then? Just let him bleed everywhere?"

"Sure. Look, he's already healing up."

Alex was right. When Sam straightened up, allowing Tucker to see Danny as well, they saw the strange way that the boys cut was slowing in its bleeding, and that the cut was closing up. The spy continued speaking.

"If it's anything, I think his mind just shut down. He had been asleep just before he had gone back to normal for a minute or two earlier, right?" he paused, waiting for Sam and Tucker to respond. "Right. Then he will probably be back to normal when he wakes up. We can wait for him to wake. It's not like there's much to do around here."

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It was another hour before the halfa awoke. With a groan, he shook his head, demanding to know who hit him and why in a rather slurred tone. He raised a hand up to his head to check the damage, but it was stopped by another hand.

"Danny, how are you feeling?" Alex asked, holding the boy by his wrist. Danny cracked his green eyes open, sending a grumpy glare the spy's way. A moment passed before Danny finally responded.

"Fine, I guess. Where are we?"

Alex bit back his grin. He knew that Danny was back; hopefully to stay at least until this mess was sorted out. It was lucky enough that Danny crashed like he had just in time. There was no way to tell how long that luck would hold out.

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"Hey, Danny?" Alex asked. Danny glanced over at him, giving the spy his full attention. He looked curious, as if he were expecting the boy to say something important. "Pick a color."

"…What?" Danny said. His eyes narrowed in suspicion. "Why?"

"Never mind that, man. Why don't we get moving?"

Alex turned his attention to the car, turning it on and driving down to Amity Park. He took a few back roads, ending up in the back parking lot of the high school. He parked in an empty space, there was many to choose from, and got out of the car. This time he took the keys with him. Whether the car liked it or not, it was now a member of the team. He slammed his door, slightly shaking the new member, and scanned the area. The lot was empty, as was the school grounds. A few people were out in the streets in the area, but not too many. Tucker commented on how he was pretty sure that there was something going on at the mall. He shrugged.

"Maybe we could swing over there sometime or something…" the boy added wistfully, his mind quickly becoming lost at the thought of a new piece of tech gear in his hands. Alex couldn't help but roll his eyes at his expression. Halfway through this, he bit his lip, furrowing his eye brows in concentration. His left index finger made its way up to rest along his jaw, giving him the look of an aged detective.

"You know what, Tucker? That's a good idea. Lots of people, right? That will allow us a greater chance of finding Vlad and getting this over with. There's the chance that he won't go all out if the place is crowded,"

"That's dangerous, Alex. People could get hurt." Sam said, shaking her head. The spy idly waved his free hand.

"No, wait. I've got an idea…"

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Vlad Masters mentally ran through his list of options, picking at his fingernails as he did so. He knew that he could just duplicate himself and find Alex that way. He could call the boy. He could… he could…

Well, he'd think of it eventually. In the meantime, the book in his hands demanded his attention, and he was more than willing to give it just that. Unconsciously, his feet began moving on their own, back to the main streets. Words passed through his lips soundlessly as he read page after page. There was no way, other than simply looking up, for the man to realize that he had just caused a car parked at the high school to roar to life, advancing forward and running into a brick wall of the school. The teens around the car panicked, trying their best to stay silent but failing terribly. Three of them were still in the car, staring on with horror as the vehicle raced to the school. The boy outside the car, forgetting the danger, cried out, yelling another boy's name.

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"Danny! What are you doing?" Alex yelled. He had assumed that the halfa had attempted to have a go at driving, until he saw how Danny was still in his own seat. The raven haired boy had twisted around, taking his friends by their shoulders before phasing them out of the car with seconds to spare. Alex missed this, and only saw the car crash, and was only shaken from his state of shock when someone grabbed his arm.

The spy turned to face the person, almost crying out when their hand went to cover his mouth. Green eyes narrowed, looking past Alex. Danny had seen Vlad, and knew better than to cause a scene. Somehow, the halfa had remembered that Vlad was still after them. He mouthed the man's name to Alex so that he would keep quiet, and then turned both of them invisible. Everyone watched, collectively holding their breath, as the older halfa walked past them. Vlad's nose was still stuck in the book. He never noticed them. He continued walking down the street, stumbling once or twice on a piece of trash in the process. At the last moment, he turned, looking over his shoulder to see Sam and Tucker. He smirked.

"Where is Alex now, hmm?" he sneered. Sam glared.

"He's at the mall," Tucker said. He suddenly made a face, a look of panic in his eyes. "I-I mean, the Nasty Burger! He's at the Nasty Burger!" Vlad stared at him, hardly believing that the boy would blow his friends location so easily. The girl obviously couldn't believe it either, for she smacked him on the arm. Vlad glanced past them, looking on the wrecked car with something close to humor.

"And Daniel, have you seen him? No, how could you? Ever since that dreadful fire, he has been missing. He should consider himself very lucky, lucky. He got out of the fire, and I've yet to find him, lucky little badger." Chuckling darkly, the halfa turned back around, continuing on his way, now towards the mall. The teens remained silent until he was almost a block away, and then Tucker stated the obvious by pointing out that Vlad had the cursed book.

"I think that actually worked." He continued, smiling slightly. "It looks like he knew that I was lying. So, what now, guys?"

Alex pulled away from Danny, regaining his visibility and the new smile that was now across his face. "I guess we should go to the mall. I can't believe he fell for that. I think we'll have to take the aerial route to get there though, all things considered." He flicked his thumb to the ruined car, in all its trashed glory. "Feeling up to it, Danny?"

"Do I get a say in this?" the voice of the young halfa asked. Alex chuckled, shaking his head. "Fine, but I want some answers. What is Vlad after?" Sam stepped in, giving a blunt summary:

"Vlad has a cursed book, and he's trying to destroy you."

"Oh… Well, what's new?"

"Hey, man, if we had told you that an hour ago, you would've flipped out! Why couldn't you have been this calm then?" Tucker cut in, smirking and hitting his friend on the shoulder, which the halfa returned.

"Thanks Tucker. I can always count on you."