*Hello! I hate to leave you guys hanging so I thought I would get a head start on this upcoming chapter. Hope you enjoy and I would absolutely love to hear some reviews, of any kind! Without further ado, here is:
Chapter 6
"It's not much of a hunt if your prey comes to you." Skulker said, both his arms with cannons on them, pointing one at Danny and the other at the Spector Speeder where his friends were located.
Although he was shaken by Skulker's abrupt appearance, Danny kept their mission in mind. "What is this Skulker?" He demanded, lifting the flier to show the hunter.
"I thought you of all people would know by now whelp. You're the one this all has to do with." Skulker said, inching forward, his eyes locked on Danny's.
"Why. Does. Everyone. Keep. Saying. That?!" Danny said through gritted teeth, anger starting to rise within him. Without his knowing his hands began to glow green. "Tell me right now."
"You are in no position to be demanding such thing from me ghost boy." Skulker reminded him, slightly shaking his left arm to put emphasis on the glowing cannon pointed at him.
Without another word, Danny dove straight at Skulker. The unexpected first move of his prey threw Skulker off balance. Danny retreated and starting making a wide loop in the air above Skulker to come back for another attack. While doing so, Sam and Tucker activated the ghost shield on the Speeder and mobilized its ecto-rays.
"You see, runt, the best part of all of this, is that I get both the money, and your pelt once I get some much needed information from you." Skulker said, standing up out of the pile of wood that was his desk.
"I'm getting my money one way or another. The flier said nothing about having to keep you alive to get the needed information." Skulker quickly fired two blasts that were larger than normal, at the ceiling where Danny had been. Missing him just by an inch, Danny fired three blasts of his own right at Skulker.
"Nice try whelp." Skulker turned intangible but not for long enough. Danny's blasts were accompanied closely by the Speeder's powerful rays. "Ack!" Skulker screamed, crashing into a huge cabinet that crumbled against him.
"Great one guys." Danny said, putting up a thumbs up towards the Speeder. "Ahh! Ah!" Danny suddenly cried out, grabbing his chest and falling to the floor.
"Danny!" His two best friends cried out from within the Spector Speeder that was currently hovering in the opposite corner of the large room.
"What's wrong?" Tucker yelled out, wanting to grab his friend, but unable to leave the floating vehicle due to potentially harmful exposure.
As Danny's friends neared him, they saw how he was thrashing about, his eyes squeezed shut in what must have been terrible pain.
"Danny! Listen to us, what is wrong?" Sam asked urgently now.
"It's…my core. It feels like…its burning." Danny struggled to say, taking shallow breaths in between words. It made no sense, they all knew that. Danny's ghost core was ice based, not fire. They had learned that little tidbit from a certain arch-nemesis a year back. Vlad Masters, a.k.a. Vlad Plasmius, had the idea of cloning Danny Phantom, but before doing so he had needed to do plenty of research to be sure he could do so correctly. When he had his "little badger" under wraps he had mentioned to him how ghosts have certain cores, Danny's being cool and his being warm. These cores affected the powers that would eventually develop for them both.
"Get…out." Danny said, his voice slightly muffled by the cracking of wood that came from Skulker regaining himself. He knew it was only a matter of time before Skulker was back up and swinging, and not just at him but his friends.
"We're not leaving you." Sam said, as she worked frantically over the controls seeing if there was something that could be done. Just then a blast came from Skulker's direction and hit the left side of the Spector Speeder's ghost shield. It caused the entire vehicle to sway violently away from Danny and it struck one of Skulker's trophy shelves.
Danny knew Skulker was worn down, but not done yet. Danny thrust himself to his knees, ignoring the best he could the crippling pain that seemed to pass through each fiber of his being. Even though Plasmius was far more advanced in his ghost powers than Danny, the younger hybrid had learned at least one important thing from his enemy: Danny's powers were his own. And he alone could control them.
"Stay. Away. From. My. Friends!" Danny cried out as he gathered all the energy within himself and forced if from every pore of his body in the direction of Skulker. There was such a blinding light that both Danny and his friends had thought the end was here. But the incredible whiteness that had covered every molecule of the room was beginning to subside. Tucker and Sam stared intently out the window of the vehicle that was now safely parked on the ground, the ghost shield down.
Just a few feet away they saw Danny, lying on the cold floor of the cave face down, eyes shut and mouth slightly open. Sam continued to watch her best friend for movement as Tucker looked around for Skulker who was nowhere to be found. As he looked around, he saw that almost everything in the room was reduced to rubble or shapeless forms that didn't nearly resemble whatever the object used to be.
Trying to think clearly, Sam suggested, "Use the Speeder's claws to grab Danny. We need to get him out of here!" She couldn't help but keep the panic from her voice. Her best friend was lying unconscious just feet away, yet she couldn't run and help him, not until they were out of the ghost zone.
"Okay, I think I got him." Tucker said, his tongue slightly sticking out of his mouth in concentration as he maneuvered the Speeder's hand-like claws to gently grab a hold of Danny, who was still lying limp.
"Let's get out of here then." Sam said, with an edge not just in her voice but posture. They trio began to quickly zoom in the direction that would get them back to Fenton Works the quickest. They had to be mindful of Danny, seeing as he was held slightly under the Speeder and there were many objects and obstacles to float over.
"This isn't good." Sam felt like she could no longer keep her concern within her.
"It's going to be okay. It has to be. Danny will be fine, we've seen him like this before and he's always recovered." Tucker said, speaking so fast out of nervousness that his words almost meshed together.
"We've seen him revert back to his human form before but whatever happened back there has never happened before." She cringed slightly at the thought of what had happened. She was so unsure about everything, but one thing she did know was that trouble never seemed to stop following them.
"Sam?" Tucker asked, his voice getting higher towards the end of her name. "I'm trying to focus on where we're going, but what is that flashing on the radar?"
"No!" There were incoming dots on the radar but they couldn't put the ghost shield back up because Danny was still in ghost form. "We're going to have to out-run them or out beat them." Sam said, trying to muster up enough emotional strength to face the next obstacle.
"I'll go as fast as I can and we'll take it from there." Tucker said, pressing on the gas as far down as the pedal allowed.
Just then a blast of energy hit the vehicle square on its left flank, or on Sam's side. Because the three were traveling so fast, the blast knocked them off course at a speed that was nowhere near comfortable. They were traveling in a part of the ghost zone they didn't have much experience with either. The area was filled with empty door frames, in every direction.
The speeder slammed sideways into a floating island. The steel somehow managed to hold up under the pressure the impact had caused.
"You okay Sam?"
"Yeah, I'm fine. Can we please get out of here?"
"I'm working on it!"
They managed to straighten themselves out and regain speed. Another blast came at them, this time it glowed green and sent the Speeder spinning. Sam and Tucker were disorientated for a moment longer than last time, which is all it took for them to slam into a group of doorways. This time, the floating vehicle didn't get off scratch free. The nose of the Speeder had in fact crumpled under the force of impact. The two teenagers also noticed that the 'claws' holding Danny had released him.
"No!" Sam screamed, holding her head to keep it from, what felt like, falling off.
"No! We don't have many options here!" Tucker called out in frustration, as the engine roared louder than ever.
Three globs of ghostly energy crept even closer to the Speeder as it tried to dive down to get Danny. The two friends were surrounded, forced to stay where they were. Tucker looked out the window to check on Danny and found him floating effortlessly and peacefully just a few meters below.
"What do you want, uglies?" Tucker yelled out over the Fenton Speaker.
The three blobs grabbed ahold of the Speeder, one in front, and one each on the left and right side.
"They're pushing us?" Sam noted, unsure of what the lowly ghosts wanted from them.
"Uh oh." Tucker said, looking straight ahead of them, his mouth half dropped open.
"Is that what I think it is?" Sam asked, looking at a set of open doors that looked particularly interesting.
"It's a portal." Tucker said with a knowing confidence.
"We have to get out of here Tucker!"
"There's literally nothing we can do."
"What about Danny!?" Tucker had never seen Sam so close to breaking down before.
"Hopefully he'll be fine. I think in this case we should maybe worry more about those of us without ghost powers!" Tucker said, beginning to worry as they were inching closer and closer towards the glimmer that seemed suspended in between the two doors.
"Here we go!" Sam cried over the roaring engine, the booming of the portal and the buzzing of the ghosts encasing them.
One moment they were in the Ghost Zone, and the next they weren't.
*Ah! More to come I promise. I wanted this to be a mini climax and hopefully it succeeded! I had more planned for this chapter but it's late and believe it or not I have a few things to accomplish before I finally get some sleep. So I will leave it here, with a slight cliff hanger, but plenty more to come like I said. Hope you enjoyed, if so feel free to review! Until next time my little Phans!