The Soul Sepulchre Chapter 21: Fudging the Issue, a danny phantom fanfic

Hiya!

I am so sorry for the delay in getting this chapter out… if it strikes your fancy to get a more detailed report of why I've been absent for so long (along with more grovelling and begging for forgiveness ;p) then please check out my profile.

But right now, for you awesome readers who haven't given up on this story, I won't waste any more space: let's get on to Chapter 21!

Disclaimer: Ownership of Danny Phantom goes to Butch Hartman and Nickelodeon.

Enjoy!

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The Soul Sepulcher

-By Sholay

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Chapter 21 — Fudging the Issue

Jack Fenton was on the verge of a scientific discovery of epic proportions. He could feel it in his gut.

Oh-m… nope, that was just the empanadas he'd had for lunch backing up.

Turning off the blowtorch in his hand, Jack flipped his welding helmet up even as a few lingering sparks flickered by his face. Grinning hugely, he leaned in to examine his latest creation. This invention was really a stroke of genius, he thought to himself as he attempted to cool down the heated metal with quick puffs of air. Those ghosts thought they could put Jack Fenton on ice? A wrench in his works? A monkey in his… plans? Well, they got another thing coming! No ghost could hide from Jack Fenton: he had the wit of a fox, the eye of an eagle, the nose of a… a… Well, the point was that Jack Fenton was a professional ghost hunter and would not be stopped in his quest to rid the world of ghosts! They already knew to fear him; after all, he had a ghost portal in his own basement and he'd never seen a ghost dare to try and come out of it. That's right! Those malefactors were too afraid to challenge—

The front door slammed closed upstairs, bringing Jack out of his happy musings.

"I'M HOME!" Came Jazz's distant announcement.

"Just on time!" Jack enthused. "Now I can blather on about my invention!" He practically exploded from his chair and bounded up the stairs.

Jazz was standing in the kitchen, frowning at the eclectic collection of ghost weapons and papers scattered over the table. Her head snapped up when he came hurdling in and she looked somewhat nervous, but Jack ignored that as he held up the object in his hands.

"Jazzypants! Look at this!" He effused.

Jazz stared at him, then the object in his hands, then the cluttered island, then back at him.

"Dad, why are—…" Whatever she was about to ask was abruptly swallowed as her eyes fixed on the object in his hands. "Is that a car jack?"

"Not just any jack! This is the FENTON Jack!" He proclaimed, holding the invention aloft.

Jazz coughed into her fist.

"Well…. uh, that's… great, Dad!" She said with good humour. "So… uh… what does it do?"

Jack goggled. His daughter was never interested in his or Maddie's gadgets. A wide smile nearly split his face as he realized what was going on: his daughter was finally getting interested in the family business! "Well!" he blustered. "The Fenton Jack is guaranteed to lift any ghostly object in the air, regardless of how heavy it is. Me and your mother created it to get past the ghost-human shield surrounding the museum!"

"But… uh… doesn't the museum's shield extend below the ground?" Jazz wondered astutely, much to Jack's growing excitement. "How will you be able to lift the shield if you can't get under it?"

"That's a very good question, Jazzerincess!" Jack praised. "And you should ask your mother about that, 'cause she's in charge of that part of the plan."

Jazz gave a small, thin smile and her eyes dropped to the Fenton Bazooka leaning innocently against the counter.

"That reminds me!" Jack added. "Now Jazzy, I know you might be a budding ghost hunter, but you know you're not supposed to be messing around with our gadgets." He gestured at all the weapons scattered across the table.

"But I didn't leave this here!" She immediately defended herself, and then gasped as though regretting her words.

"You didn't?" Jack puzzled. "But if you didn't, and Maddie didn't, then… Oh! It must've been Danny!" He grinned: his son had fought off a dangerous ghost yesterday and now he was interested in the Fenton ghost hunting gear. It seemed like both his kids were getting into the family business. Huzzah! "DANNEH!" Jack bellowed.

"Ahh… He must be in the washroom!" Jazz said quickly. "Yeah! He's probably in the washroom, which is why he didn't answer you immediately; it's not like he left the house or anything. Nope, 'cause he knows better than to do that… yup…" She popped the 'p' on 'yup' and rocked back on her heels, awkwardly avoiding eye contact with Jack.

Jack huffed. "He better not have left! He's supposed to be grounded! Which…" he added reluctantly, "Also means no messing around with the ghost gear either!"

Striding into the room came, not Danny, but Maddie Fenton. She sighed, pulling off the hood of her jumpsuit and adjusting her red goggles around her neck. "Jack dear," She said, sending him a smile that never failed to make him grin stupidly. "Did I hear you calling Danny?"

"Yep. He's not answering though."

"Because he's in the bathroom." Jazz was quick to put in.

Maddie send their daughter an odd glance. "Yes, well… I haven't seen him all day. Is he recovering all right after that ghost attack?" She asked worriedly. Jazz nodded in confirmation and Maddie let out a sigh of released tension. Jack smiled sympathetically. He knew she had wanted to stay home with the kids, but work had pulled them away very early in the morning. They had spent hour after frustrating hour trying to take down the ghost-human shield around Amity Park's Museum of Natural History without success. Jack had returned home in the early evening to start working on the Fenton Jack, while Maddie had stayed back to try and explain their failure to the Amity Bureau of Investigation. He was extremely grateful to his wife for that last part: government types and Jack Fenton had never gotten along well.

All in all, it had been a very trying day. To top it all off, they hadn't even seen a single ghost, meaning no possibility of venting some misplaced aggression.

But speaking of ghosts…

"What is all this doing on the counter?" Maddie asked, looking at the assortment of ghost weapons.

"Danny's takin' an interest in ghost hunting!" Jack beamed.

"He's not supposed to be touching the weapons vault." Maddie said with a frown as she studied the very potent assortment of weaponry her son had apparently laid out on the table. Was this because of the ghost attack yesterday? She wondered. Maybe his pride was still bruised after Vlad had saved him. Maddie knew her son and Vlad Masters didn't get along. In fact, she was rather leery of the man as well— though for reasons that her son had no knowledge of, thankfully. But even still, Vlad had a good heart. After all, hadn't he saved Danny's life twice now?

Striding over to the table, she swept one of the papers off the top, looking at it in interest. "This is Danny's handwriting isn't it?"

Jazz looked over her mother's shoulder, a distinctly anxious air about her. "Uh… I dunno. It might be Dad's."

"No, I recognize Danny's handwriting. Look at this Jack." And Maddie handed her husband the paper in her hands. "It's a map of the Ghost Zone."

Jack's eyes widened and his grip loosened around the paper to hold it almost reverently. "A map of the Ghost Zone! Suffering spooks, how did Danny get a hold of this?"

"I don't think he found it, Jack," Maddie said slowly. "It looks like he made it."

Jack was suddenly bursting with pride. He swept at his watering eyes. "My own son! Making his first ghost hunting map!"

"How do you know for sure that that's a map of the Ghost Zone?" Jazz was suddenly between her parents, snatching the paper from her father's hands and looking at them with wide eyes. "None of us have ever been in the Ghost Zone." She reminded them. "So how could Danny know what it looks like?"

"Well, your father and I have been in the Ghost Zone once," Maddie revealed and surprise painted Jazz's face. "And it does say 'Map of the Ghost Zone' across the top."

Jazz hesitated, and glanced down at the paper. Lips pursed her lips as she saw that even despite the ragged, scribbling penmanship of uneven letters that blurred into one another, the words across the top of the page still undeniably read 'Map of the Ghost Zone'. She internalized her blossoming exasperation at Danny's epic failure at subtlety and quickly rallied. "But Danny's probably just playing around. You know, as a teenager it is very important to have a fertile imagination. Danny's probably fascinated by the idea of a Ghost Zone so he drew that as a way of…expressing his… interest?"

Just then, as though on cue, Danny came ambling into the kitchen, rubbing his head and looking somewhat worse for wear with his rumpled clothes and mussed hair.

"Danny! There you are, m'boy!" Jack almost jumped on his son, putting an arm around his shoulders even as said boy looked up in alarm. Jack was about to praise his son's interest in ghosts when he spotted a large purpling bruise on the teen's cheek.

"Danny! What happened to your face?" Jack exclaimed. Immediately, Maddie was at Danny's side, holding his chin in her hand and twisting his head to get a better look at the bruise.

Danny recoiled, slapping her hands away. "Mo-om! I'm fine, just ran into a door by accident. It's no big deal. I, uh,… I got homework to do…"

"You've been getting hurt a lot recently." She said with concern and looked hurt when Danny stiffened and stepped away from her. "I just want to know you're okay. After last night—"

"I don't know what Vlad told you, but it was just some ghost trashing the lab. I didn't even do anything, just ducked behind a table." His tone was bitter. "The ghost shot a blast over me and something fell on my head. I'm fine now. Can I go?" All this was blurted in a rush, and by the end of it he was already inching towards the door.

Maddie was about to hound Danny with more questions when Jack jumped in. "Not until you tell us what you were planning with all these ghost weapons, son! I know you're interested, but even I have trouble with some of these weapons, you should probably start small with a wrist ray or something—" Noticing his wife's narrowed eyes, Jack backpedalled. "Or not at all! Taking weapons from the vault was very irresponsible of you, young man. Very, very, bad." He waggled a finger at Danny, who simply arched an eyebrow at him.

Jack had worn that exact same 'Are you done yet?' look — closely related to the 'Can I go now?' stare — for much of his youth and recognized it well on his son's face, but he chose to ignore it.

Maddie however, was not so willing to let the topic go. "And why were you drawing a map of the Ghost Zone!" she gestured at the paper still clutched in Jazz's hands.

Now, Jack knew his son was a smart kid. And he'd been on the receiving end of Danny's smart comments enough times to know the boy's tongue was a little too sharp for his own good. But as Jack watched, he was graced with the unusual occurrence of seeing his son completely speechless as the blood drained from his face.

This led Jack to take a closer look at his son and what he saw gave him pause. Danny's clothes were stained, his hair was a mess and more than that, he looked absolutely exhausted. Shadows lined the undersides of his eyes and his posture was too stiff to be natural. Not to mention the bruise across his face: Danny must've been pretty out of it to have walked face-first into a door hard enough to cause that.

"I…wa…um… I was, uh…" Danny stammered as he grasped for words and Jack watched as the teen's eyes flitted about nervously between him and Maddie before settling on Jazz, "playing around?"

There passed some sort of silent communication between his two children that bewildered Jack. He might not have been the most observant guy, but he certainly knew that Danny and Jazz didn't usually play the chummy sibling routine this well. Whatever it was ended quickly though, as Danny tore his gaze away from Jazz and looked up at Jack and Maddie.

"Yeah, it's not a real map." Danny's tone had done a complete 180. What was once panicky and uncertain was now calm and self-assured. "I was drawing it for art class. The teacher wanted us to do an abstract representation of our family. I drew the Ghost Zone because sometimes it's like our family really is from a different world."

This explanation made sense to Jack, but Maddie was still unconvinced.

"Then what about the ghost weapons?" She pressed. Jack nodded vigorously, backing up his wife. He'd forgotten all about that.

"Research." Danny shrugged, looking away evasively. "I'm sorry about the mess. I'll clean it up right away. Just… Jazz, can I talk to you for a sec?" Danny said meaningfully, pointing at the door.

"Sure." Jazz agreed without hesitation and the two teens quickly left the room before Maddie or Jack could get another word in edgewise.

Jack scratched his head while his wife sighed heavily.

"Dan—!" Maddie started.

"No Mads. Let him go." Jack attempted to soften his interruption with a benign smile as he made his way to he fridge. Opening the door, he poked around for some ham… or fudge, whichever he found first. "Hounding him isn't going to help, anyway. I know, I was his age once." He chuckled.

Maddie didn't reply for a while. Instead, she slid wearily into a chair, staring at the mess of papers and weaponry before her.

"Honestly Jack, I just don't know what's gotten into our kids recently." She sighed at length. "Danny's been acting oddly and since when did Jazz start making excuses for him? I just feel like they're pulling away from us…"

Jack shot a look over his shoulder at his wife, sad that all this pained her. But truth be told, he wasn't very concerned. Being a teenager was tough and it was a time for big changes in life; that's just the way it was. Besides, Danny and Jazz didn't have to deal with half the things that he had deal with as a teen, and that in itself was a reassurance. After all, he'd turned out fine, right?

His hand hit a large block of something near the back of the fridge and he grinned. Paydirt.

"Maddie, look, I know I'm not the best at these sorts of things, but everything's going to be fine." He insisted as he extricated the rectangular pound of fudge from the fridge and began unwrapping it. "Jazz is bound for great things and Danny… well, you remember how he protected Jazz from that boy a few months ago?" Jack huffed, still smarting over the fact that he hadn't gotten the chance to deck his daughter's hooligan ex-boyfriend.

Maddie smiled softly in remembrance and Jack, bolstered, pushed forward.

"See?" He appeased, popping a piece of chocolaty goodness in his mouth before placing his free arm around his wife's shoulders. "We raised good kids. They'll be fine, we just need to—"

A loud, piercing screech interrupted whatever Jack was about to say. It was a credit to their nerves that neither of the elder Fenton's so much as twitched at the sudden bloodcurdling shriek of their bizarre doorbell. Instead they simply raised their heads with identical looks of mild interest. Then, a spark of excitement lit Jack's eyes and he jumped to his feet, dropping the forgotten fudge on the counter.

"I'll get it!" He yelled, bounding off, leaving Maddie alone and pensive.

Yanking back on the doorknob with gusto, Jack threw open the door and greeted the man standing on the porch with a boisterous hello.

"Package for Mister Jack Fenton," Was the monotonous reply of the mailman who held out a wrapped parcel and pad to Jack.

"Oh boy! This must be the new ecto-splicer I ordered in the Ghastly Gadgets magazine! I can't wait to see what it does!" Jack eagerly signed off on the pad and handed it back to the mailman, practically tearing the parcel out of the man's atrophied grip. Stopping just before he closed the door, Jack peered closely at the man. "Gee, are all of you guys this pale? You mailmen really need to start getting more sun!" And with those parting words of advice, Jack slammed the door shut.

"Maddie! The new ecto-splicer is here, I'm going down to the lab to check it out!" Jack yelled as he passed through the kitchen to get to the basement lab.

"Hm? Sure, honey, just make sure you come up in half an hour for dinner." Came the distracted reply.

Jack saw that Maddie was gazing, entranced, at one of the papers that Danny had left scattered across the table. But he couldn't be bothered with that right now: he just got new ghost hunting gear!

Rushing down the stairs and into the lab, Jack was humming to himself as he cleared a spot on his over crowded workbench for the package. It was a pretty small box, maybe the size of his fist, and had the words FRAGILE stamped across it in red letters. Jack wasted no time in slicing the top open and reaching inside.

"Huh?" He frowned when his fingers closed around, not a thin metallic blade but something long and tubular. Jack drew the object out and frowned in bafflement at the corked test tube in his hands.

"What's this?" Jack jiggled the object. Inside the glass cylinder was a single thread of what looked like hair: black, and relatively long.

Putting aside the tube, Jack looked back at the parcel. Inside was a thick sheaf of bubble wrap, which he pulled out. Something clinked, tumbling out of the plastic, and Jack spotted a second, identical test tube at the bottom of the box. Tilting the box, Jack caught the delicate object between his thumb and forefinger before pulling it up to his eyes. A lone white hair was bowed against the side of the tube. Glancing down, Jack confirmed that the box was now empty. All that had been in it were these two test tubes. Jack held both up, one in each hand, next to each other.

They held one strand of hair apiece: one jet black and the other a bleached white even brighter than his teeth.

Jack slid the tubes into a rack at the far end of the table. They slid into the holder easily, tinkling lightly against similar test tubes that held a variety of fluorescent precipitates. He flopped down onto a stool, pouting as he put his chin in his hands. He was disappointed that the parcel hadn't held his coveted ecto-splicer. Nevertheless, he didn't throw the hairs away. Obviously someone had ordered them if they came in the mail. Maybe Maddie needed them for something.

Weird that she'd used his name to order them though.

Jack sighed and then swept the empty package into the trash so that he'd have room to put his elbows on the steel table. He'd really been looking forward to checking out his new ecto-splicer.

But… an object in his peripheral vision caught his eye and Jack immediately perked up as he remembered his latest invention. Pulling the Fenton Jack closer to himself, he stared at the object happily.

"Just needs one more thing…" Tongue stuck between his teeth, Jack reached under the table and rummaged around for something. "Aha!" He grinned, as his hand found what he was looking for.

With a flourish, Jack stripped the backing off the sticker in his hand then slapped it onto the invention.

The word 'FENTON' was now emblazoned in electric green on the base of the Fenton Jack.

"Perfect!"

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Jazz stared in awe at the crystal in her brother's hand. It was mesmerizing. And, when he allowed her to hold it, she cradled it reverently in both hands as she gazed into its iridescent depths. Completely captivated by the object in her hands, she only barely caught the words her brother was telling her.

Something about the ghost in the museum wanting this crystal in exchange for Sam and Tucker and Danny not wanting to give it to him—that it was too powerful to give away. Jazz could understand not wanting to part with such a beautiful thing; she'd barely held it for a handful of seconds and already she was reluctant to return it to her brother.

For Danny's part, it had been an impulsive decision to tell Jazz about the stone. He'd done it in spite of the nagging voice in his head telling him it was a bad idea. But with both Tucker and Sam kidnapped by the museum ghost, Jazz was now his primary confidant. Well, it felt nice, at least, to share some of this weirdness with his sister.

"I think it's some sort of amplifier." He said, voice barely over a murmur as they huddled together, holding a quiet conference in the narrow space under the staircase.

Seeing that Jazz was not going to drop the gem in his waiting palm, Danny raised an eyebrow before simply plucking it from her hands, much to her chagrin.

"When I accidentally shot an ecto-beam through it, it caused an explosion so big both me and Vlad were knocked back." He continued.

"Wait… Vlad?" Jazz's attention snapped away from the stone that Danny was rolling between his fingers and she looked up to his vague expression.

Danny sighed, nodding. "Thanks to… the fruitloop, our portal is kaput. Crispy, well-done style. So I had to use his to get to the Ghost Zone."

"So that's how you got that bruise." His sister said softly, tilting her head to look at his cheek.

Feeling self-conscious under her sad gaze, Danny turned away slightly, trying to cover the bruise with the longer sections of his hair. Realizing that his hair was nearly touching his chin, Danny made a mental note to get a haircut soon. "I'm fine; it hardly hurts and it'll be gone in a couple of hours. I'm more worried about Valerie." His eyebrows furrowed with concern. "She was unconscious throughout the fight, but by the time I got her back to her place she was starting to get up—She didn't see me though." He added quickly at Jazz's alarmed look.

"Valerie is the Red Hunter…" Jazz shook her head with a rueful grin. "I still can't get over that. And you knew all along?"

Danny shrugged. "Pretty much."

"Even while you were dating her?"

He flushed, ducking his head and bringing one hand to the back of his neck. "Look, Valerie's nice, okay?"

"Even with the whole 'I'm going a waste Danny Phantom' thing?" Jazz's eyebrows arched.

"Yeah, well, everyone's got their issues." He waved it off.

Jazz just chuckled. "You know, little brother, sometimes I wonder…" she trailed off, shaking her head. "Nevermind. Let's go have dinner. You haven't eaten all day have you? You must be hungry."

Realizing his last meal had been an unfinished bowl of oatmeal for breakfast, Danny was, in fact, rather hungry. Nodding, he led the way to the kitchen.

Upon entering the room though, his eyes widened at the sight of his mother flicking through his ghost files. Remembering how he'd left practically the entire printed version of his ghost encyclopaedia on the table, Danny had to bite back a curse at his own stupidity as he lunged forward.

"Hey!" He squawked, grabbing the papers from his mother's hands. He covered his panic by forcing his best indignant look onto his face. "That's my stuff!" Quick as lightning, he'd gathered the rest of the papers on the desk and held them close to his chest.

"Danny…" His mother was looking at him as though she'd never seen him before. "Where did you get all that information?"

"The internet, 'course." He bit out.

"Don't lie to me." She reprimanded sternly and Danny winced. "Some of that information is very specific to the ghosts in Amity Park. But the information is much more detailed than even what your father and I gathered. Where did you get it?"

Danny's breath was quickening. He wasn't ready to tell his secret and his mother was backing him into a corner.

He couldn't tell her the truth, but what sort of lie would sound believable?

He didn't know. He couldn't think of anything. Jazz was standing in the corner, looking at him helplessly.

His mouth opened, then closed. His mind drew a complete blank as it reached, reached for any excuse. A speck of yellow flashed in the corner of his eye.

Then the anger came.

And it saved him.

"I can't believe you went through my stuff!" His yelled. This sudden explosion of rage had Maddie leaning back with shock clear on her features. Even Jazz stared at him. "This is private, and it's none of your business! And why the… why're you choosing now of all times to become all observant, huh? Is it 'cause it has to do with ghosts? I get suspended for getting into a fight and you want to interrogate me about this? You never see anything that's going on—going on right in front of your face! You don't care—except when it involves ghosts! You and Dad both! That block of fudge probably got more of his attention then I have all week! There are a thousand—million—bigger things going on but—"

"Danny!" Jazz had crossed the kitchen and seized his upper arm, halting his speech as she gave him a blazing 'What the hell are you doing?' glare. "Mom, Danny doesn't mean any of that. He's just upset at being grounded and he was feeling really sick yesterday. There are all these rumours going on about him at Casper High and he never even meant to hit that boy at school. Dash is always bullying Danny, Mom. This is the first time Danny's ever stuck up for himself and he ended up getting suspended. Those ghost files are not important; I bet Danny just made up half the stuff on them. Right, Danny?" She looked at him pointedly, gripping his shoulder to the point of near pain. His right shoulder. Danny felt an electric jolt run through the arm.

His head was bowed. He was still feeling the sulky after-effects of his rage. "Yeah… yeah," Danny groused.

"Go put those papers in your room." Jazz suggested quietly. "I'll put the weapons back."

Recognizing an out when he got one, Danny wasted no time in fleeing the room.

Maddie blinked at the door in her son's wake, before snapping back to herself and turning shocked eyes to her daughter. "Danny… is bullied at school?"

Jazz sighed. "Yes, Mom."

"How long has this been going on?" 'How long…?' The fact that she had to ask such a question…

"Long enough." Jazz's answer was clipped, and didn't give half the information Maddie wanted. But for some reason, Maddie couldn't bring herself to question her daughter further; and she simply watched as Jazz gathered the various ecto-guns on the table—hefting the bazooka over her shoulder with surprising ease—and left the room.

Maddie passed a hand over her face to rest her knuckles under her nose. Glancing over, she saw Jack's discarded block of fudge sitting on the table and remembered his flippant words regarding Danny.

Well, she didn't care if Jack thought everything was going to be okay. She was not going to let her children keep falling through her fingers.

Dinner was a quiet affair. The Fenton family sat around the table chewing on somewhat overcooked spaghetti. Maddie, Jazz and Danny were lost in their own thoughts, while Jack was mostly focused on his food.

Maddie and Jack had started the meal with a passionate exchange about ghosts and their inherent malignancy. For them it was only idle chatter; yet, in their usual way, they both grew increasingly heated and louder as they talked, making it sound more like an argument than anything else. The entire conversation made Danny tense and twitchy, to the point that his muscles were beginning to ache from being held too stiffly. He'd contained himself though, keeping his head down and concentrating on his food—with what he felt was an admirable show of willpower—until his parents finally calmed down and began eating themselves.

Danny prodded the gummy noodles. He was feeling guilty for blowing up at his mother earlier; and the emotion worsened every time he saw her glancing at him with distressed eyes.

At least Jazz had stopped him before he'd said anything really stupid. Not like what he had said was much better. What the heck was wrong with him lately anyway? His temper… it was like throwing water on hot oil: it kept exploding everywhere at the smallest things. He never thought he was that short-fused.

Looking up through his lashes he caught Jazz's eye and sent her a sheepishly grateful smile, which she returned with an upward quirk of her lips. There was an all-too-familiar glint in her eye though which made Danny uneasy: it was the exact same look Jazz had given him before she'd shoved him into a room with Spectra the 'guidance counsellor'.

'Sticking her meddling nose where it doesn't belong.'

Danny winced into his forkful of food. That thought had been a little harsh.

'Jazz is not meddling; she's just concerned. I will not get angry at her because she is trying to help.' He resolved.

'Help or hinder? The intent does not match the outcome.'

Danny shook away that train of thought.

That wasn't important. No… something else… he should think about something else…

'Oh hey! Wasn't there something I was supposed to ask Dad? Something someone important was talking about...' Something someone important had told him?… The most important person he'd seen for a few days was Clockwork…

And in a rush Danny remembered his visit to the Time Master: the conversation, the mirror…

His eyes widened.

"Hey Dad?" he asked hesitantly and gained not only his father's attention but his mother's and Jazz's as well.

"What is it, son?" Jack asked jovially and some of the tension left Danny's shoulders. His dad was still in a good mood. That was a relief. It was always much harder to ask his father things when he was upset.

"I was just wondering," Danny observed his father curiously. "I heard this, uh, name of something recently and I wanted to ask you what it was."

Jack made an accommodating gesture with his spoon as he twirled his spaghetti.

"Well, um, do you know anything about…" Oh, what had Clockwork called it? "A night of aban… abandon?" Not quite that. "Abanon…?"

"The Night of Abaddon?"

A loud clattering reverberated in the room: Jack's fork and spoon falling from his hands as he breathed those words. Maddie inhaled sharply and Jazz just stared in confusion. Danny slowly put his own fork down as he looked between his mother and father in bewilderment.

The loud slap of Jack Fenton's hands hitting the table made Danny jump and he gasped when his father suddenly leaned in close to look straight into his eyes. "Where did you hear that term, Danny?" Jack's voice was so extraordinarily serious that Danny simply gaped at his father for a moment.

"WHERE DID YOU HEAR IT?" Jack bellowed.

Danny yelped and started backward, nearly falling sideways off his chair. A thrill of fear ran through him as he had the sudden, irrational thought that his dad was seeing Phantom and not Fenton. He should have kept his mouth shut. Should have at least asked Jazz first—

"I-I read…" Danny felt more than saw his father's skepticism and stuttered, rapidly changing his story mid-speech, "—saw this poster about a history fair. Then some guy came up behind me and said that Amity Park's past shouldn't be celebrated and he mentioned the Night of Abbadon." He fell uncomfortably into the lie, with sweaty palms and an uncertain voice. Seeing his father still seemed to be expecting further explanation, Danny pulled his trump card. "I think the guy was a ghost."

Strangely, this news didn't seem to excite his father. Jack's eyes were intense, but they were unfocused; and Danny had the distinct impression that his father was thinking deeply—or, maybe remembering something. Danny shifted and, with this movement, Jack snapped out of his stupor. The man tore his napkin from the collar of his jumpsuit and tossed it onto his empty plate as he rose to his feet.

"I'll be in the lab," he said, turning abruptly and crossing the kitchen. The door to the basement slammed loudly behind him.

Danny's heart was still drumming against his ribs as he looked up and around at the people still remaining at the table. Jazz's expression mirrored his confusion. His mother though, avoided his gaze completely.

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End Chapter 21

To Be Continued…

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That's it for now! But there is good news. The next chapter is almost finished, so, barring any event of force majeure, I should be able to post a new instalment in 2 weeks. Promise!

Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone who reviewed; you can never underestimate the power of a single reviewer to motivate a person to write! Although I didn't answer all the reviews for the last chapter, I will definitely do it for this chapter. To my reviewers: TitanQueen13, Princess of Rose, dragondancer123, sciencefreak330, interestedbuteasilydistracted (times 2! :D), Curious Nightmare, Kit Ninja, starsinjars, aslan333, seantriana, Fro52 and The Moon Wolf!

Adio!