The Soul Sepulchre Chapter 25: Saved ?, a danny phantom fanfic

Hiya!

November's over already…?

Disclaimer: Y'know, I keep adding these at the beginning of each chapter, but I don't really know if you really HAVE to… everyone does it, but is it a rule on FFdotnet? Does anyone know?

I don't own Carmilla.

Enjoy!

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The Soul Sepulchre

-By Sholay

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Chapter 25 — Saved…?

It was a very awkward ride back to FentonWorks.

Danny's wounds, though they healed faster than a normal person's, still transferred back to his human form, resulting in his white t-shirt quickly being stained a rather conspicuous shade of bloody red. Jazz had bandaged the wounds as best she could with the emergency first-aid kit in her purse, then loaned Danny her jacket to hide the splotches on his shirt. Unfortunately, not even her jacket could properly hide the scratches on his upper neck.

Then there was the issue of Youngblood, who Danny refused to leave behind.

And so, Jazz sat shotgun in the taxi, trying to distract the driver who kept shooting strange looks at her brother. Danny was oblivious as he dozed against the window; what looked to be inflamed claw marks on his neck disappeared under the collar of a hot pink jacket and his arm was curled around the invisible ghost lying in his lap.

A very awkward taxi ride, indeed.

It didn't help that the drive had ended up costing her all the money she had in her wallet.

Pulling up in front of FentonWorks, the car slowed to a gradual stop.

"Um… Is he all right?" The driver asked when Jazz had to walk around the car to open the back door for her brother, who had slept through her attempts to rouse him.

"He's fine." She assured as she opened the door and casually stopped Danny from flopping out and falling onto the sidewalk. Whatever had happened in the museum had taken a lot out of him. "He's just a little tired. We were at our aunt's house and he was up all night playing video games." She was getting better at lying, she thought.

The incredulous look the taxi driver shot her spoke strongly to the contrary.

Leaning closer to Danny's ear, she called his name and shook his shoulder, trying to be as gentle as possible.

He winced under her touch and she bit her lip in sympathy. Jazz hated waking her brother like this, but it was the only way she'd be able to get him away quickly and without causing a scene.

"Danny, come on. We're home." She said.

"Home…?" He opened bleary eyes, stared right through her.

"Yeah, remember? We need to meet Sam and Tucker." She said pointedly.

"Sam and Tuck… Oh." A little more awareness came back into his eyes. He looked down to his lap and gathered something she could not see into his arms. It was disconcerting to watch Danny mime holding a child, knowing he was holding a ghost and yet not be able to see anything.

"Yeh sure he's fine?" The nosey driver asked again, peering at Danny who was struggling to coordinate his limbs as he climbed out of the car. "He looks like he's been roughed up some." Jazz knew the man was referring to the ugly marks stretching across Danny's neck, but there was nothing she could have done to avoid that. His other wounds had been much worse, and she'd used up all her gauze wrapping those up. By the time she'd reached his neck there was nothing left, short of tearing strips off her own shirt, which, she was pretty sure, would have caused an even bigger scene.

"He's fine. Thank you." She said with a tone of finality, shutting the door behind Danny who had finally dragged himself out of the car.

The taxi driver gave them one last stare before shrugging and throwing the car into drive. Watching the taxi speed away, Jazz sighed. The adults in this town were either oblivious or alarmingly apathetic. Either way, she supposed it did come in handy on occasion.

"Miss Fenton and Mr. Fenton, what are you two doing out at this hour?"

Jazz gasped and spun around. There, coming up the sidewalk towards them was Mr. Lancer. She glanced down to Danny in panic, but his jet hair hid his expression from view. He seemed to be aware enough of their surroundings, though, to realize that clutching an invisible bundle to his chest probably didn't look very good. He lowered his arm and brought his right hand up so that it looked more like he was crossing his arms. As he moved, Jazz briefly got a glimpse of the puncture wounds where that zombie-thing had bit her brother and cringed as he pressed the still oozing injury into her jacket. It was still an odd posture, but not quite as noticeable as his previous one. Nonetheless, as Mr. Lancer neared, Jazz subtly placed Danny behind her, knowing that he was in no condition to be making intelligent conversation.

Or intelligent lies, as it were.

"Uhm… what do you mean Mr. Lancer?" She asked, trying to gauge how much the man had seen. As opposed to his usual shirt and tie, Mr. Lancer was in a jogging outfit, probably out for a morning walk or something: a new diet plan, probably. Prune juice with breakfast, lunch and dinner hadn't worked well for he constitution, as Jazz recalled.

"Well, Mr. Fenton is hardly an early bird. As his homeroom teacher, I'm well aware of this." He sent a dry look in her brother's direction, but frowned when Danny didn't even respond, his head staying bowed. "So I'm curious as to what you two are doing at 6:30am on a Sunday. I saw you coming out of the taxi."

Jazz kept her plastic smile on her face, though mentally she was lamenting the fact that Lancer had seen the taxi. Now she had two things to explain. "Uh… well… Mr. Lancer, our Uncle was just in town for the past couple of Days. He had a… a meeting. Yeah, so he just left and Danny and I went to go see him off at the airport."

"I see. " Mr. Lancer was still looking at Danny, probably noting his dishevelled hair and the fact that he was wearing Jazz's coat. "A meeting you say?"

"Ghost stuff. My whole family's into it." She equivocated, adding a roll of her eyes for effect. Danny was listing against her side and she struggled to inconspicuously keep her balance under his weight .

"I see." Lancer repeated. "Now, if only—Mr. Fenton!"

"Huh? What? Wherezaghost?" Jerking upright, Danny's head snapped up and he looked around with glassy eyes.

"Carmilla! What happened to your neck, Mr. Fenton?" Mr. Lancer cried, eyes glued to the tears across Danny's skin.

Danny's eyes widened as he realized his error and he looked to Jazz in desperation. But she was blanking just as badly, if not worse. She didn't have a way to fix this one.

"I-I-uh… We-we've got to get going, right Danny?" She said, wide eyes flying between Lancer—who was staring at Danny, transfixed—and Danny himself, who seemed ready to bolt

"Right." Her brother nodded vigorously, then tried to mask his wince as he pulled the wounds on his neck. "We gotta go. Nice seeing you Mr. Lancer!" And, with surprising agility for his state of mind, he practically sprinted up the driveway to their house. Jazz didn't dare look back at their teacher as she followed Danny closely.

When she reached the front door, she saw Danny standing there, waiting and twitching impatiently. Understanding his problem, she swung her purse around and plunged a hand in to find her keys. It made sense that Danny never carried his own keys. After all, who needed keys when they could just fly through their window? However, with Mr. Lancer probably watching their every move, they had to enter the house the normal way.

Jazz bit her tongue as her hand fumbled around, searching for the keys. She usually always kept them in the same spot: the zipper pocket on the side. But this time she must've just dropped them into her bag. Of all the times to misplace them!

"Jazz." Danny hissed under his breath. "Hurry up!"

Her fingers closed around a ring of metal and she let out the breath she'd been holding. "Is he following us?" She asked Danny urgently.

"No…" He glanced sideways through his bangs. "He's just standing there, watching us."

Jazz jammed the key into the lock, twisted.

The Fenton kids entered their home, closed the door, then, together, leaned on it in relief.

"Saved." Danny exhaled.

"Until Monday." Jazz pointed out, making Danny groaned. Then his eyes caught on the stairs and he groaned again.

"Here, I'll help you." She said, putting an arm around her little brother's waist. He flashed her a grateful smile as they began trudging up the stairs. Feeling something hard brush against her leg, Jazz looked down to see their mother's utility belt was still fastened around Danny's hips. So it had made the transition with him between ghost and human mode? Strange that the belt made the transition but his clothes never did…

Now was not the time to think of such things though as she and Danny arrived at Danny's room. Pushing open the door, she was more than relieved to see both Sam and Tucker, unconscious but seemingly unharmed, on Danny's floor. It was a testament to how wiped Danny was that he didn't even see his friends as he staggered into his room.

Leading her brother to his bed, she got him to lie down. Washing his wounds would have to wait. First he needed to lie down before he passed out completely.

"Sam and Tucker…" He protested as she slipped her coat off him and guided him under his covers.

"They're safe." She smiled at him proudly. "You saved them."

"Clockwork." He reminded her, his unfocused eyes mostly closed.

"Yeah, he helped too I guess." She said, trying to ignore the red stains on her brother's shirt as she pulled the comforter around his body. The things she did for him…

Well… if her grand plan to become a doctor didn't work out she could always make millions off her 'My Life as a Superhero's Big Sister' book.

The smile she tried to muster at this joke was a little too painful though, so Jazz let it drop as she backed away from her brother. He shifted, tucking his hands under himself, and fell asleep almost immediately. She was even able to spot the moment when he dropped off, the distressed crease between his brows finally smoothing out. Flicking off the lights, she figured she could at least get in four hours of sleep before her parents got suspicious.

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Jazz's alarm had gone off hours ago. Mind muddled from lack of sleep, she'd merely grabbed it and pulled it into bed with her before returning to dream world. When she finally did open her bleary eyes, the small battery clock in her hands read 2:13 pm and she nearly threw herself out of her bed in dismay.

Tossing the clock back onto the table, she flipped the blanket off herself and pushed herself to her feet. 6 am to 2 pm. God, she'd gotten eight hours of sleep without even meaning to. It was amazing that she could go with only one or two hours of sleep the day before an exam, but the one time she stayed up for one of Danny's nightly romps she was dead to the world the instant her head hit the pillow.

'Danny!'

The memory of last night rushed back to Jazz and she gasped, speeding out of her room.

She hadn't bothered to change before going to sleep, so she felt uncomfortably grimy in jeans and t-shirt. But personal hygiene would have to take a back seat—at least until she got things sorted out with her brother and his friends.

'Thank God it's Sunday.'

The first thing she did was stand at the top of the staircase and listen for any sign that her parents were still in the house. Since her mother hadn't come to wake either her or Danny, it was a safe bet that her parents had both left the house early in the day, but Jazz had to be sure. After a few seconds of hearing nary a raised voice or wayward explosion, she nodded in satisfaction and spun around.

Now came the difficult part.

Cracking the door to Danny's room open, Jazz saw that all three teens were just as she'd left them. Sam and Tucker lay on the floor, chest rising rhythmically with sleep and Danny was so twisted in the covers that he resembled nothing so much as a blue worm with a mop of messy black hair.

Smiling to herself at her brother's antics, Jazz crossed the room to his bed. Along the way, she bumped into something cold and invisible. Gasping, she realized that it must've been the child ghost that Danny had brought home with him. Reaching out blindly, she tried to find the body again to no avail: she must have knocked the ghost away when she bumped into it—him.

She scrunched her face. This was beyond odd. But then again, she had a half-ghost for a younger brother. She should be used to this sort of thing.

Reaching Danny's side, she was able to pull away the blankets around his jaw just far enough to see that the wicked claw marks stretching from his ear to his collar bone had almost completely healed: leaving behind only a set of angry pink lines that would be gone by the end of the day. She remembered another wound: an ugly, black bruise blossoming over Danny's right shoulder, and knew, without even needing to check, that that bruise had probably completely vanished by now.

She sighed. No, she'd never get used to this.

Jazz wondered why the thought of her brother's preternatural healing made her feel so resigned. She should be happy that he wouldn't have to suffer aches and pains for days; even sprains and hairline fractures were not a problem for him. He healed fast… It was like wiping a blackboard clean, just to mark it up all over again. And again. And again.

Maybe it was because it made it easier to ignore the wounds, to ignore how he continuously threw himself into danger for her and everyone else. 'If you didn't heal so fast, would you be more careful with your heroics? Would Mom and Dad finally notice what is happening to you, would you finally tell them your secret?' These were hopeless thoughts though, not worth anything more than making her already depressed state even more depressed.

She was running her hand through his hair, noting that it was getting a little long, and Danny unconsciously leaned into the touch. His face was peaceful; at least his demons had let him rest for once. It hadn't escaped Jazz how exhausted her brother had been recently, there were dark rings under his eyes that she knew for a fact hadn't been put there by late-night tussles with the Box Ghost.

'Looks like Danny's terminology's rubbing off on me.' Jazz thought with amusement, remembering how not to long ago she'd been calling the annoying, box-obsessed ghost 'Crate Creep'.

It was probably time to wake her brother.

A low groan behind her made Jazz look over her shoulder in surprise.

"Tucker?" She exclaimed.

A pair of fierce black eyes snapped up at her announcement—and narrowed.

She barely had time for a strangled cry before Tucker launched himself at her, snarling, a hand clawing for her throat.

Danny's eyes shot open at the sound of his sister's scream and he wriggled and strained against the covers tangled around him. All he succeeded in doing was rolling himself unceremoniously off the bed, landing in a heap on the ground with a muffled 'Oomph'.

The pile of blankets seemed to give a disgruntled exhale before they were lit by a flash of light. Danny let the covers slide through him, his powers driving him to wakefulness with a burst of frigid air. Getting to his feet, he stared uncomprehendingly at the scene before him.

"Tucker?" He frowned in bafflement, wondering why his best friend was on top of his sister and why he looked so mad.

"Danny! Get him off me!" Jazz shrieked as Tucker clawed for her face. She wrenched herself to the side and his hand tangled in her long hair.

"Tucker! Jazz!" Galvanized into action, Danny tackled his friend and they both went flying. A few strands of Jazz's hair were yanked out by Tucker's fist and Danny thought he heard her yelp in pain, but he couldn't spare the time to send his sister an apology as he grabbed Tucker's flailing arms. The two boys tumbled across the ground, grappling. It wasn't until Danny managed to meet Tucker's eyes that realization pierced through him like an electric current.

"You… get out of him!" Danny yelled and brought a foot underneath himself before planting it straight into Tucker's midsection. The boy went flying, hitting Danny's dresser with a bang that shook the cupboards before flopping to the ground. Tucker snarled, lifting himself up on all fours like a panther ready to pounce. Where light hazel eyes used to twinkle mischievously, there were now twin pits of ebony.

Danny had fallen asleep with the spirit stone in his hand, which he now brandished in front of him as though it were a holy cross and Tucker a vampire. The Lunch Lady's memento gleamed in his hand like a cycling kaleidoscope, but Tucker's lip merely curled in a derisive smirk.

"You think that trinket will help you, halfling dog?" He said in a voice too hoarse to be his own, head tilting sideways as he regarded Danny with disturbingly wide eyes. "Attack me." It goaded. "Attack me and see what it does to the human."

"What's going on? Is Tucker being overshadowed?" Jazz wanted to know. Her question went unanswered as both boys ignored her and continued their battle of wills.

Danny hesitated, then grit his teeth and lowered the gem. He couldn't attack the creature if there was even a possibility that he'd hurt Tucker. But, he could try to force the parasite out another way.

He grinned and raised a glowing green fist.

A few blasts later and Danny's dresser was in ruins. Tucker's green shirt had holes burnt into it, but otherwise he looked none the worse for wear.

"That won't work either." Came the twisted voice from Tucker's mouth. "I'm no ghost." He lunged at Danny, who raised his hands to ward him off.

Thunk.

Inches away from reaching the half-ghost, Tucker staggered, his head falling back. Eyelids fluttered closed over pools of black and he crumpled to the ground, unmoving.

Danny and Jazz looked up in shock at the person standing behind Tucker's prone form.

"What?" Sam asked, hefting Danny's math text. When no answer was forthcoming from either sibling, she just shrugged and looked around. Her eyes alighted on something in the corner and one eyebrow rose.

"Hey Danny, why's Youngblood floating over your table?"

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End Chapter 25

To Be Continued…

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And Sam and Tucker are back! Though perhaps not in the capacity that we were hoping for, hehehe. Bonus internet cookies to anyone who can tell where the title Carmilla comes from!

Review! Pleasepleaseplease!

To: pearl84, Phanfan925, Rogue Alice (;P), MidnightResWri, aslan333 and smallvillephantom14, thank you! :)

Adio!