I own nothing, not the characters, the space where this story exists, or even the eyes that you are using to read it. This is for entertainment proposes only, no money involved.
I had been at the Hawkins residents for two days without any incident. Maybe the Titans going public about researching them really did make us not worth the energy in the bad guys' books.
My shoulder was good as new and Becky seemed like she was getting back to her normal self. But on the three day we ran into a problem I didn't foresee. "Grandpa, we need to go to go and get some groceries." Why did I see that coming?
"Alright Rebecca, you and Danny go and get the groceries and I will keep working of this inscription. So far I have Prophecy, Great Serpent, and Slumber, but there are a lot of missing spaces." Arthur said from his lab.
"It would probably be safer if we stuck together as a group." I said a little worried that there might be people waiting for us to leave the house.
"I am afraid that is just not possible. I am too old to be walking for miles and the car is in disrepair. I don't think we can get a taxi out here during times of monster attacks." He reasoned. "So we really have no chose in the matter."
I bit my lip. "Don't worry Danny." Becky said. "If there first attack came within hours of all this starting, and then they don't show their faces in two days, I don't think they are coming."
"Well… alright but let try and make it quick." I finally said. Professor Hawkins gave Becky the necklace in case something happened to him while he was gone. We turned on the perimeter motions detectors that Becky and I made ourselves to keep her busy and mind off of what was going on. Then we head to the stables were Becky saddled her horse, Copernicus. I jogged lightly alongside the horse as we went to town.
It was ten miles to the store and we made it in about an hour. I faked a little breathlessness but I was really right as rain. Becky tied up her horse and we went into the shop. "Well hello there Rebecca. It has been I little will since you have come by. What can I do for you?" A gentle elderly woman greeted Becky as we came in. She was sit behind the counter watching the news.
"Hello Mrs. Smith. We are just getting the usual groceries." Becky said with a smile. "Oh and this is Danny, he's helping Grandpa and me around with my Grandpa's new project."
"Oh my, so this young man is with you? It is nice to meet you then. I hope you are taking good care of Rebecca and Arthur. I'm always worrying about those two. They always seem to get into the strangest of situations. And with all these monsters popping up" Mrs. Smith said.
I couldn't help smiling. "Don't worry. Keeping them out of too much trouble is what I am here for after all."
"We didn't get into all this trouble until you came along, Danny." Becky said with a little aggression will she picked out some milk and eggs.
"In other news, during the panic in Domino City another less known near disaster happened." The news man was saying. Becky and I looked at each other knowing what was coming next. "An international flight over the Pacific Ocean suffered engine troubles as a direct consequence of the lights that had appeared in the sky. As a result both engines were dead, and the plane was on a crash course with the ocean. To make matters worse the pilot had a heart attack and the copilot fainted."
"Oh my." Mrs. Smith said holding a hand in front of her mouth.
"But instead of crashing into the sea, two passengers on the plane managed to reset the engines and regain control of the plane and flew it all the way to its destination in Jump City." The news man continued. "Eye witness reports say that the two passengers in question were nothing more than children. One was a high school boy and other seemed to be his elementary school little sister."
"I'm a college student!" Becky shouted startling Mrs. Smith.
"When asked about the identity of the two, news reports were told that the airplane company had to respect the privacy of their passengers. But whoever they are, they are responsible for saving the lives of three hundred forty-eight people and are true heroes." The report cut of there.
Mrs. Smith blinked at us. "I said I was supposed to keep them out of trouble. You know, falling planes, monster attacks, assassins, the usual." I half joked. "We haven't had a dragon attack yet or even a single giant robot and I am three days into guarding them. I think it is a new record on minimum activity."
"Assassins? My goodness Rebecca, what has your grandfather gotten himself into this time." Mrs. Smith said in fright.
"There won't any assassins." Becky said before adding. "I don't think forty people running up to us with assault rifles counts as an assassination." She was starting to pay games with people with a grin on her face. Maybe I am not the best of role models.
It looked like Mrs. Smith would have a heart attack. "If it makes you feel better, the Teen Titans were there to, and nothing has happened in two days. We tried to convince the people that the Teen Titans were investigating them and that they the real threat. So Becky and Professor Hawkins should be in the clear." I then looked up to see that Becky had finished gathering what she needed. "That said we probably should be getting back to the Professor just in case."
We checked out and started to leave. We were out the door when Rebecca's belt began to flash. Our eyes widened. We put the receiver for the perimeter senses on her belt. "Danny you don't think." Becky started.
"Listen Becky, I am going to start running, I need you to get on Copernicus and catch up with me as fast as you can." I told her looking her dead in the eyes.
"Maybe you should take Copernicus and get to grandpa as fast as you can." She suggested.
I shuck my head. "They were probably watching us and waited for us to leave. We have no way to make sure that they wouldn't grab you as soon as I am gone." I said to her. "We need to stick together as much as possible." Then I turned and started to run.
I ran fast enough to pass up any world class runner. I covered the first 8 miles in fifteen minutes meaning I much have been running at an average of 32 miles an hour before Becky finally caught up on her horse. I knew I would have to explain things soon, I doubt she would not ask for much longer.
But right now that wasn't important. We were starting to come into sight of the lab. In front there was a white unmarked helicopter. We where half way down the long drive way when we saw Becky's Grandfather being dragged into the helicopter which took off right as we reached it.
Becky's horse Copernicus was spooked by the helicopter's take off and reared up throwing Becky off his back as he made a mad dash away towards the stables. I darted to the side and caught her before she could even hit the ground.
"Danny, they got my Grandpa!" she was crying.
I knew what I had to do. To hell with my secret identity, I promised Rebecca that I would keep her and her grandfather safe. I looked up towards the Copter and was about to transform when I noticed a man hanging out of the open door. In his hand was a trigger.
"Becky, Duck!" I shouted and throw myself over her to shield her from what was going to happen. The explosion was deafening and I could feel the siring heat and derby pelting my back.
It only lasted a moment but it felt like an eternity. No matter how many times I have been in the middle of violent explosions, I always went into shell shock.
My vision slowly began to clear and I looked down at Becky. She had been shocked into unconsciousness. My eyes darted over her but I couldn't see anything wrong with her. I checked and she was still breathing properly.
'Thank goodness.' Those were my last thoughts before I lost consciousness. Several piece of the house logged in my back.
I don't know how long I was out for, but I wake up to the sound of boiling water. I started to sit up and had to bite down on a scream of pain as I clutched at my sides. "Anyone get the number of that truck that hit me." I mumbled trying to get my bearings. The fog over my mind hadn't lifted yet.
I was in the back of the trailer home that was on the Hawkins's property. The one that Becky and I had set up all the electronic surveillance equipment to radio from. Then it hit me like the ton of bricks off that house. 'Becky… and the Professor.' I started to get up and staged out of the shut off sleeping quarters at the back of the trailer.
"Danny, you're ok!" Becky shouted and gave me a hug. I bit down on yet another scream of pain and looked down at the girl who had tears in her eyes. "They took my Grandpa." She cried.
I patted her on the head. "Shhh, it's going to be ok, Becky. We'll get your Grandpa back, I promise." I said moving to eye level with her and giving her the best smile I could manage. "If they took him alive, then they have a reason to keep him that way and I don't think they will hurt him. Don't worry, we will get him back before you know it."
I then noticed the other people in the trailer with us. It was Yugi and his friends, as well as someone I didn't know. "Man, how can you even move?" Joey asked wide eyed as he looked at me.
I looked down at my own body. I was pretty much bandaged from my shoulder on down to my ankles. "That is a very good question that I am going to ignore if that is alright with you." I said slowly. "Right now we need to get Becky's Grandpa back. After that we can ask questions like what are you guys doing here?"
"We came to America for a lead, but those bikers got to our source before we could and took his soul." Tristan said glumly.
"Mai." Joey mumbled before saying louder. "Why did they take the Professor anyways?"
"Ya, I mean he is just an archeologist." Tristan continued.
The guy I didn't know spoke up. "But didn't you guys say that he made some big discovery."
"Ya, he found Atlantis." Yugi said then he looked at Becky. "Remember that stone, the one I gave to your Grandpa?"
"Ya, I have it right here around my neck, Grandpa told me to hang onto it." Becky said.
"Maybe that is what Dartz and his lackeys are after." Tristan said.
"Then be careful." Becky said taking off the necklace and handing it to Yugi.
"Ok, so now what?" Teau asked.
The new guy spoke up. "Easy, let's find out where this Dartz guy hangs out, let's bust in and get Hawkins."
"But how? I don't think they are registered in the phone books." Becky said.
"I doubt they took the Professor to their HQ anyways." I said walking over to the counter and rummaging through my stuff that I had left there until I found what I was looking for. I pulled out my Fenton Phone. "What we need to do is track that helicopter that they took the Professor in, but if you want to make a list of rich people and look for one named Dartz, be my guest. Because he would have to have some serious money to pull all this off."
"What do you got there, Danny?" Teau asked.
I looked back at the group. "It is a communication device. I am going to call a friend and see if he can't track that helicopter for us." I pressed the button and held earring like device to my ear. "Tucker, you there?"
"Danny? It's like dinner time, can this wait." I heard my friend say from the other side of the line.
"'Fraid not, we got a situation, I am going to put you on speaker so behave." I turned on the speaker and placed the earpiece on the table. I glanced at a clock and noted the time. "About ten hours ago Professor Arthur Hawkins was kidnapped from his Lab before it was destroyed. The perps got away in a white unmarked helicopter. Don't suppose you could work your magic and find where that copter is now could you?"
"Man Danny, that is a tall order. Since it is unmarked I can't just go into the vehicle registry and find out who owns it and relative data, I am going to have to hack military observational stations and check to see if any were pointed at your location during the kidnapping." Tucker said.
"How long will it take?" I asked.
"I upgraded my equipment recently so if I had a direct access point then it would only be a couple of minutes, but with remote connection speeds it could take longer probably a day or so." I heard Tucker say. "I will boot up the preliminary program now and use one of my secondary machines to do a search on anyone nearby that might have the registered remote access to what we need."
"Thanks Tuck. Don't know what I would do with you." I said with a grin.
"Just make sure you tell me way the bad guys are after an archeologist later." Tucker laughed. "I'll call you once I get the info." And with that he hung up.
"Tucker is one of the best hackers in the world. And his tech is all twenty years ahead of what is out on market. If anyone can do it, it's him." I said sitting down and trying not to show any sign of pain in front of Becky.
"Great so we just sit on our butts and wait." Joey said annoyed.
"I still like my plain better." The new guy said.
"I thought this was the find them and take them out plan." I said looking at him. "Who are you anyways?"
"Oh, I'm Duke Devlin." He said shaking my hand.
"Danny Fenton." I said back.
"What a second, Fenton, as in those nutty ghost hunters?" He said with a look. I gritted my teeth and squeezed his hand harder then was probably necessary causing him to hailer in pain.
"If we're going to say here, then I got to eat. I can't wait on an empty stomach you know." Tristan said like an idiot.
"Before we do that, I have one question." It was Yugi… no, it was the Pharaoh. "Why are you helping us?" He said looking at me. "How do we know you are not just a spy for Dartz? I bet you were the one that led them to Rebecca and her Grandfather." I was a little shocked.
"Yugi, what are you talking about? Danny saved my Grandpa and me several times." Becky said.
"Yeah Yugi, what would make you say something like that?" Duke said looking at Yugi's body.
"That isn't Yugi talking. It's the Pharaoh." I said simply looking at him with a bit of contemned. "And I have no affiliation with Dartz or his thugs."
The Pharaoh glared at me. "You expect me to believe that! I know what you are. And yet you walk around in front of me playing nice. Do you have any idea who I am, do you have no shame!"
"Wow Pharaoh, not cool." Joey said looking at his friend.
"Pharaoh stop this. Danny is a friend." The spirit form of Yugi said.
I was getting anger. "So what, I can't help what I am, but you aren't exactly in a position to judge! You're a parasite that is taking control of a human child!"
The Pharaoh seemed taken aback by my outburst but then he got angry to. "That is not my relationship with Yugi at all, Shadow Monster!" He insulted me.
"Guys knock it off." Tristan said stepping between us.
"I might not be some hero from a prophecy, but I do what I can. I don't see you coming up with any brilliant plans or stopping all the bad guys, oh great and powerful Pharaoh." I said in all my sarcasm.
"Danny please stop." Becky said looking straight at me. I calmed down when I saw the signs of tears in her eyes.
"I'm sorry, I just hate people judging me without ever giving me a chance." I said sadly turning back to go and get some rest before Tucker calls back. "Know this Pharaoh, I don't care about any prophesies. I don't believe in them. I don't think that anyone from ten thousand years ago could have known what was going to happen today and that we can't change our own futures. All I know, is that the 'Great Beast' is a threat to everyone I hold dear. So it must be stopped. I don't care if you succeed or not, because if you fail, then I won't." I went into the space in the back, put down the Fenton Phone and went back to sleep.
(Yugi)
"Pharaoh that was not called for." I said after I regained control over my body. "Danny has only tried to help."
"Yugi he is a Shadow Monster, we cannot trust him." The Pharaoh said to me in his spirit form.
"Why do you keep saying that Danny is a Shadow Monster? What does that even mean?" I asked.
"I mean that Danny is a Monster from the Shadow Realm, I can feel his dark power. He was probably sent here to spy on us and will attack us without warning." The Pharaoh said glaring at the door that Danny had gone through.
"Danny is human, Pharaoh. I am sure there is an explanation for all this." I told him.
"He never denied not being human, Yugi." Pharaoh said.
"So… Danny isn't human." I muttered looking at the door. "Pharaoh… you should apologize to him." I said. The Pharaoh looked taking aback. "You judged him evil without ever getting to know him. What if we judged you evil because of the other Bakura?"
"Yugi is right." Rebecca said even though she couldn't hear the Pharaoh. She pulled out her computer and plugged in a wireless receiver.
"What you doing, Rebecca?" Teau asked looking over Rebecca's shoulder. Then Teau paled.
"You are right that Danny isn't human, but he is not a bad guy." Rebecca said. "Do you remember what his card spirit first called him at the museum? She called him Phantom. Later after he save us from a dying in a plane crash we were taken in by the Teen Titans." She said.
"Wait, aren't they that group of superheroes?" Duke asked.
Rebecca nodded. "They found out about us because we were flying the plane. They asked us questions about what we knew about the monsters. Then they tried to decide what to do about security for us." Rebecca said. "One of the options that they suggested was a superhero from Danny's home town. One that went by the name of Phantom." Rebecca finished turning the laptop so that we could see. My eyes widened at what was implied.
On the screen was a picture of a boy with white hair and green eyes in a black jumpsuit who was giving off a weird glow. The boy was lifting up a school bus full of children that had fallen of the side of a road. "I don't need to explain who this is, do I?"
"Never seen him before in my life." Joey said looking at the picture. "Must be one of those lesser known heroes."
"You idiot, it's Danny." Duke said hitting Joey on the back of his head.
"Say what?" Joey and Tristan said together.
"It says that he is a ghost." Teau said trembling. She had always been afraid of ghosts.
"That what he said the more modern name is for creatures from the Shadow Realm. It says on here that he fights them to keep his town safe." Rebecca said and then looked at me. "I know you didn't do anything wrong Yugi, but the Pharaoh's words were deeply insulting to him. Danny never even told me the fact that he wasn't human, and the Pharaoh just started blurting it out in front of people he doesn't even know."
I looked again at the Pharaoh who looked taken aback. "You need to apologize, Pharaoh." I pushed him. But he looked away stubbornly.
"So Danny is a really life superhero, I wonder if I could get his autograph, for my sister of course." Joey said quickly.
"I don't think that would be a good idea, heroes don't usually like it when people know there secret identities." Tristan said looking at Joey.
"This is good though right, we have some professional fire power on our side." Duke said looking around.
"Yeah, except for the fact that the guy took an exploding house to save Rebecca." Joey said causing Rebecca to look a little down again. "Wait… I didn't mean it like that." He said trying to take it back. "I just say stupid things when I am hungry, you saw him, he was moving around right as rain."
"Maybe, but he was doing stretches when he had a bullet wound in the shoulder. I think he just doesn't want me to worry about him." Rebecca said sadly. Then she told us the story about what had happened to them since we had last seen them. It took her two hours to tell it all to us since she was putting in almost every detail.
"Wow he really is a professional." Duke said looking wide eyed at the end of story.
"So I don't think there is any chance that he is secretly working for Dartz." Rebecca said nodding. The Pharaoh was shocked into silence.
Stomachs were heard growling. Duke glared over at Joey and Tristan but then sighed. "I'll start cooking." He said and went over to the fridge Teau joining him.
"Yugi." Rebecca said from next to me. "Can I talk to you in privet?" She said and I could see a card with writing on it in her hand.
(Danny)
I had rested for four more hours and was stretching to check the wounds. I was already almost healed. But the Pharaoh's words were ringing through my head. 'I know what you are.' 'Shadow monster.' I looked down at my hand and clenched and unclenched it. "Look at me. I took an exploding house and a few hours later I'm ready to run a mile." I said to myself. "I really must be some kind of monster."
"And what is so bad about that?" Lumina asked appearing next to me in her translucent form. "I'm a monster too, you know?" She said folding her arms over her chest.
"That's different. You were born that way. Your friends and everyone you know is that way. People still trust you and treat you fairly." I said still looking down at my hand. "I was born human. My parents hate everything to do with monsters like me. People like the Pharaoh and Mana instantly assume I am evil." I gritted my teeth a little. "It's not fair."
"You idiot, that isn't everyone though." Lumina said moving in front of me. "Those friends of yours, Sam and Tucker, they believe in you. Rebecca believes in you… We believe in you." She said reaching out a hand and putting it on my deck. "Mana realized that she was wrong and so will the others. You just have to show them that you are a true Lightsworn."
"Thanks." I said softly as she faded from sight. "I guess I will just have to prove it." The Fenton Phone began to ring with the ghost buster theme song. "I really need to change that ring tone." I mumbled as I picked it up. "Hello."
"Danny, we were in luck." It was Tucker. "All the observational equipment was pointing towards Japan because of the giant eye thing but there was a helicopter that was picked up on radar sixty miles east of your position at an abandoned fueling station. I wouldn't have even found out about it if it wasn't for the fact that it went too close to that project CADMAS that you had me bug."
A grin broke my face. "You're the best you know that, Tuck?" I said into the mouth piece.
"Yah, I know, but you could stand saying it more often. Sam's got the Fenton Jet on standby and is prepared to lure you parents out if you need it." Tucker said and I could hear his grin.
"I don't think that is necessary, besides, Sam would kill me if she knew that I let something as simple as an exploding house stop me." I said chuckling a bit. The sound of my old friend's voice quickly reassuring me of one thing. 'I am not some kind of evil monster. An evil monster couldn't have friends like them.'
"Alright, but don't hesitate to call us for back up. With you and the ghosts gone we have been pretty bored these last few days." Tucker said before hanging up the phone.
I took the ear piece away from my ear still smiling at it. "Are you going to wake the others?" Lumina asked me.
"I don't think so. The Pharaoh doesn't trust me, and I could go there and back faster without them." I said grabbing my duel disc and my deck. "Besides… this is all my fault… I should have saved him." I said bitterly. "I could have saved him if I wasn't so afraid of letting people know what I am." I let the green energy leak from my hands. The sparkling lights were what defined me. Everything I was all of it was because of that power, the power to protect but the power that forced me to live in the dark.
I called up the ring of light to turn me into my ghost form. I could hardly feel my injuries as I turned intangible and went out into the nighttime sky. I looked down at the numbers for the coordinates that Tucker gave me and then I went flying off in that direction.
If the Teen Titans are brought into the picture, then it will be as a supporting role and not as main characters. I didn't mean to bring them up, it just kind of happened. This is the story I didn't really plan very far ahead for and just kind of winged it.
As of when I upload this, no one has guessed who the next opponent is for Danny. I will upload the next chapter tomorrow so last chance to guess.