THE PHANTOM'S REALM
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: DAY OF A PHANTOM
Fenton, Phantom. Phantom, Fenton. Fenton, Phantom. Phantom, Fenton.
"Samantha Manson! I want answers and I know you have them!" Maddie cried, marching up to the Goth girl, who glared defiantly.
"Just because you know something new doesn't mean you know everything. You know the bare minimum of information anyone who knows Danny's secret could have." Sam insisted.
"I have a right to know! I'm his mother-"
"Some mom." Kitty cut in, but Sam stopped her before she could go on further. Kitty glared, but relented when Sam shot her a look that more or less read 'Danny wouldn't want you making his parents feel worse'.
"Fine, we'll answer some questions. Within reason!" Sam added pointedly when she saw the twinkle in Paulina's eyes.
"Okay." Maddie agreed, a little reluctantly. She didn't like Sam having control of the situation but there wasn't anything else she could do. "I'd like to know how in the hell my son has a daughter!"
Everybody flinched as Maddie's voice went up higher and higher in volume with every word. Sam sighed to herself, seeing this question as a long story.
"Before you know that, you'll have to know the…" She said, pausing to choose her words carefully. "Dynamics," She settled on. "Of the relationship between Danny and Vlad." Sam started carefully.
Fenton, Phantom. Phantom, Fenton. Fenton, Phantom. Phantom, Fenton.
Mikey, who had passed out after making the discovery of Danny's identity and hadn't been fully coherent until a few moments ago, looked at her as if she was stupid.
"I think it's blatantly obvious to us all that they don't get along and therefor, are enemies." Mikey stated as-a-matter-of-factly as the others nodded along.
"Well yeah, but it's more complicated than that." Kitty started, doing her best to explain Danny and Vlad's dynamic, which was NOT easy.
They were enemies, sure- that much was a given- but it went beyond that. They went out looking for each other, determined to screw the other over at random times. They went looking for each other, attempting to gloat about a recent success. They went out looking for each other a lot.
Vlad went to Danny for help sometimes. To get his own lair in the Ghost Zone, to help get rid of all the ghouls overriding his mansion in Wisconsin that he hadn't returned to since he'd become mayor, to compare ghost tech.
Danny went to Vlad for help sometimes. To fund his parents inventions, to get answers about his halfa condition, to get the Guys in White off his back.
They always covered for each other. It usually made a later point in their lives worse, but they covered.
When Danny was late getting home because he was broken and beaten up lying in Sam's room as she and Tucker fixed him up and his parents called Vlad to question his whereabouts, Vlad wouldT say "Oh yes, Daniel is here with me. He asked if I could tutor him for a bit. He is failing algebra of course, the poor lad." And sure it did him no good that his parents now knew he was failing algebra, but they were assured he was okay.
When Vlad was blowing off his father's invitation to a dinner out for a business meeting in the Ghost Zone and his father insisted on bringing the party to Vlad's house, Danny would say "Don't dad he's going on a date tonight, finally! With some woman named Maddie I think." And sure it made him look even creepier to his mother but now they wouldn't show up at Vlad's only to find a vacant house and an open Ghost Portal.
When Vortex returned a second time, Vlad saw that Danny had to be out there if the town of Amity were to stay in one piece. So in the middle of 'bonding night' at Vlad's mansion (Jack's idea) Vlad had given Danny the out of "Didn't you want to learn about the business world, Daniel? There's a nice empty room upstairs two doors down on your left you could study in." And preceded to deter any interruptions to said room, which turned out to only be a bathroom.
When Fright Knight tore through town looking for Vlad during a celebration party for Jazz, Danny knew it wasn't going to end well. He also saw Jack wasn't letting Vlad out of playing the game of darts without an impeccable reason, which Danny provided in the form of "Isn't your meeting with that guy you bought dad's birthday gift from in like, two minutes? You should probably go do that." And refused to tell his father more about his supposed 'gift'.
They had a mutual respect between them. They had respect of the other's beliefs, techniques and most of all, power.
Vlad respected that Danny needed to save the town, although he didn't like it. Danny respected that Vlad needed to find love, although he didn't like it.
Vlad respected that Danny didn't always rely on physical power to win battles, although he didn't like it. Danny respected that Vlad worked angles to win battles, although he didn't like it.
Most importantly, Vlad and Danny both respected the power the other held. Danny, Vlad and Vlad, Danny. They respected each other enough to use their chosen names of "Plasmius" and "Phantom" almost all the time now.
They were stuck with each other, almost. Up until a year ago they had been the only two halfas in existence, but they had decided to be enemies. The only person that could understand them, on the complete other side of the battle between good and evil. The only person either could relate to, you couldn't relate to at all.
They were different. They were similar.
They were trapped between two worlds. Right and Wrong. Hero and Villain. Human and Ghost.
How did she put that into words?
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Danielle sat in the control room with Ember, Valerie, Tucker, Johnny and Jazz, carefully watching the picture 3D image built by the Ectowave-sonar. She cheered as her father struck Vlad and gasped when Vlad struck Danny every time.
"Dani, it'll be okay. Danny wouldn't let anything happen to Phantom City, us and especially not you." Jazz tried to soothe the worried girl.
There was echoing bangs that could be heard coming from the monitor Jazz and Valerie were watching. Danny and Vlad repeatedly collided attacks or collided into nearby buildings; the sound of firing Ecto-blasts was almost constantly coming from the battle.
Both hybrids looked like hell, torn and tattered clothing, cuts and gashes seeping ectoplasm and bruises already forming. Danny's snow-white hair was messier than usual except there wasn't always cement chunks there, and Vlad's slick black hair was covered in cement dust, giving it a grey look to it. The two halfas were breathing heavily, holding themselves in air with pure willpower; Vlad was clutching his abdomen where Danny got a good shot and Danny was hauled over in an attempt to ease his gut, where Vlad hit with a vivid white Ecto-beam.
The people in the Ops Center noticed the two stand up straight and saw their gazes harden. They knew it would end soon.
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"It appears this bout has come to an end, Daniel." Vlad taunted weakly, powering up a duel Ecto-blast.
"Come and get me, Plasmius." Danny retorted, flashing his eyes green as he too poured ghostly energy into his fists.
In a flash Vlad rocketed towards Danny, shooting one of his Ecto-beams but Danny swiped it away with one of his hands before firing his duel ghost rays at the older hybrid. Vlad used his remaining charged attack to hold off the green Ecto-beams while he vanished under the cover of invisibility. Danny raised his hand to shoot another blast, shooting blind, but a mysterious force grabbed his wrist in the motion of swinging it forwards.
'Vlad.' Danny realized too late, for his entire body was racked with pain after. Danny realized with horror Vlad was using his favorite trick, and electrocuting him with ectoplasm.
'This is it,' Danny thought as he cried out in pain. 'I'll pass out and change back just like before. I- I failed.'
"When will you learn, Daniel? You think you can beat me because you've got some fancy new tricks? Because you've grown and trained? Well so have I! Except, I haven't anyone to let down. How will your friends look at you now that you've lost them everything you all worked so hard to gain?" Vlad mocked over Danny's cries.
Sure enough, the ring of light appeared around Danny's midsection. Only, it didn't move, and merely spun in circles around his waist. Vlad continued taunting.
"And poor Danielle. How awful must it be to have a failure as a father? You would know, wouldn't you? Having grown up with Jack Fenton all your life?" Vlad laughed. "She was a mistake anyway. Just like your kingship! I should've been king and now-"
"Shut up." Danny growled out. Vlad looked down to see bright green, almost white hot, eyes glaring up at him.
"What?" Vlad repeated angrily, pouring more ectoplasm into Danny's wrist. But the teen seemingly didn't feel it, because he just growled again.
"I said, shut up!" He yelled out loud. So loud and forcefully that it turned into his most powerful attack; The Ghostly Wail.
Vlad was flung away from the Phantom-teen by the sheer force of the powerful attack. The Ectoplasmic sound waves echoed throughout the city, tearing multiple large buildings apart on top and scaring the hell out of some ghost pigeons. More importantly, it knocked Vlad back.
Focusing, Danny condensed the attack to turn it only on Vlad, who was struggling to stay in the air now. When the condensed version made its way to the billionaire, he was done for and was flung helplessly back onto the concrete slab below. Danny kept wailing until Vlad was barely conscious, lying defenseless against some building. Then he stopped.
All the noise stopped, the sound waves were gone and any ghosts that might've still been in the area. All that was left was a barely conscious Plasmius and a landing, tired Phantom. Danny walked over to Vlad determinedly, looking right into his red eyes with his green ones.
"Never call my daughter a mistake." Danny threatened, before punching Vlad across the face, sending him back to human form.
Satisfied, Danny sighed, let his own transformation ring appear and subsequently passed out himself only feet away from his arch-enemy.
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"Danny, are you okay? How do you feel? Does anything hurt?" A familiar voice asked.
Danny's blue eyes dazedly opened, seeing a blur of black.
"Sam?" He asked, confused.
"Danny! Thank Clockwork your awake again!" Another familiar voice said, only male this time.
"Tuck?" He asked again.
Before he knew it both Sam and Tucker were hanging onto him, like he hadn't seen them in decades. Air was tight and he couldn't find space to breathe, he felt like he could collapse if a feather landed on him and he couldn't make his arms work to hold them back but that was okay. He wouldn't have it any other way.
"Told you I'd be fine." He said, before going back into darkness.
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"Let's go, Baby-Pop, you've slept for almost seven hours." An annoyed voice sounded, but it was music to his ears.
"Ember?" Danny questioned as he sat up, seeing he was in his own bed this time rather than on a street like before, when he'd woken up by Tucker and Sam.
"Who else?" The ghostly diva replied, sitting herself on Danny's bed. Danny sighed.
"So, seven hours, huh?" He asked. He continued when she nodded. "A lot can happen in seven hours." She rolled her eyes at him.
"Um, first the Council cast Ol' Mc. Creepy Pants out of Phantom City for life, not allowed in or within 10 miles of the perimeter for any reason whatsoever." Ember finished with a smirk. Danny smiled.
"Next there are those classmates of yours that found out about your secret." She started. Danny paled. "And your mom and teacher." Danny choked. "But I think that pompous one ruined it for everyone there because your Goth friend put some spell on them and now they don't remember a thing."
"My parents and Lancer too? What about Valerie?" Danny asked. He could get behind his parents not knowing anymore but he'd prefer if Valerie knew now. Ember shook her head as she shifted closer to Danny.
"No, just the populars and that ginger kid. Your folks, teacher and black-belt friend remember it all the way it happened." Ember tried to ease his worries, but he just sighed. He'd look into that more later.
"Anything else?" He asked expectantly.
"Other than your mother knows where Dani came from and your teacher knows she can speak twelve languages? Just that we got the Infi-map back from Vlad." Ember said with a shrug. Danny blanched and sputtered.
"Ember! You can't say that like it's no big deal! You can't just drop that on a person!" He told her, as if it made sense. She just smirked and adjusted herself to look right into Danny's face now that he was sitting on the bed like he was going to stand up.
"Well you're only half a person, Baby-Pop." She said slyly, leaning in a bit and giving Danny a look. "But I wouldn't have it any other way."
That was all she said before she leaned in and connected her purple lips to his pale ones, kissing him with everything she had. Everything she'd thought she almost lost when Danny was fighting Vlad. Consequences be dammed, she was getting her kiss!
Although shocked at first, Danny gradually responded to the kiss, enjoying the feel of everything he'd wanted for so long. Her lips felt surprisingly warm against his cold ones, their cores being polar opposites only made the feeling ten times better.
"Whoa." Danny said as he moved back, enjoying the feeling. Ember wasn't much better, but she played it off better with a scoff and a playful roll of her eyes.
"You're such a dork, Phantom." She said, shoving him with her elbow. He smiled.
"Well I'm your dork now so get used to it." He said, before wrapping his arm around her in a side-hug. She rolled her eyes and gave an exaggerated sigh in false protest before hugging back.
They sat in a comfortable silence before Danny turned to Ember with a questioning look.
"And just who thought it would be a good idea to let Dani talk to my mother and Lancer in the first place?"
Ember whistled innocently.
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"Actually, the manipulation of 'quantum energy fields' part isn't completely accurate. As you probably already know, Einstein's theory of relativity revealed that space and time are linked together into a single fabric thing, space-time, which could be… warped by the presence of matter, or mass, whatever you want to call it. Then, Einstein's most famous equation; E=MC^2, which means 'energy equals mass times the speed of light squared', teaches us that mass and energy are corresponding while quantum mechanics shows us that mass and energy both get their properties depending on how subatomic particles behave. So, by changing how subatomic particles can behave you can change how we perceive reality and as so, we can do the impossible. How Sam can do this is because of the amount of time she's spent in the Ghost Zone. It's just caused her body to stop using electricity as communication between the neurons in her brain and the nerves in her body and use Ectoplasmic energy instead. And, like we've all seen, Ectoplasm has the ability to chance the way subatomic particles behave, which also makes this the source for a ghost's ghost powers and everything else falls under the supernatural spectrum." Dani rattled off as if it was nothing, proceeding to entertain herself with a ball of her own Ectoplasm that she twirled around her own head.
Lancer was questioning her about the nature of Sam's 'magic'. He'd assumed it was connected to Danny's ghost powers, since they both stemmed from Ectoplasm, and wanted to ask Danny himself. But Sam did say both Phantoms' could explain it better.
Sure he'd expected a better explanation than Sam's simple 'quantum energy fields', but that was not one of the things he'd been expecting. The girl didn't look a day over thirteen and she could put top scientists to shame the way she talked about science. Did that mean Danny could've given the same explanation? Possibly better? Just what had he been missing in his student?
"Well, um, that's very, uh-" Lancer stuttered his words. He didn't want to make a fuss over the girl, it seemed she'd had enough of that, but he couldn't just ignore the fact this girl was above genius level IQ.
"It's fine, Mr. Lancer. She knows she's special enough." Jazz said, walking over to Dani and ruffling her hair, despite her grumbles of 'only daddy can do that' in protest.
"Oh? How so?" Lancer asked, inquisitively. Dani smiled proudly and she looked up at the bald man.
"I'm fluent in twelve languages for one." Dani told him, enjoying the look of shock on his face.
"Crucible! How in the name of Hemmingway did you learn twelve languages in such a short time?" He asked, amazed. Dani shrugged.
"Been all over the world, you pick up a few things." She said, waving it off before sighing. "Can't write in any of them though. I never went to school or anything, but you probably already know that." She said with a smirk.
Lancer didn't know why he was surprised. He'd been there when Ms. Manson and Ms. Kitty went over the story of Danielle's origin and how she had 'flown off into the sunset dramatically' as they put it after both of their encounters, so he'd known she wasn't going to school of any kind. Why was he so shocked to find out she couldn't write?
Lancer was about to question further on that subject, as awkward as it was getting, but was saved when the voice of his strangest student echoed through the room.
"What's everybody doing? We should be celebrating!" Danny cried happily as he strutted into the room, Ember behind him as she rolled her eyes. Dani's eyes, however, lit up like a Christmas tree.
"Daddy! You're okay!" She yelled, ecstatic, before she launched herself at her father as fast as she could.
Danny grunted when the younger halfa collided with his still-injured chest but caught her nonetheless, hugging her back just as hard. He could feel her crying on him through his shirt, so he just stood and hugged her tight.
"I thought you were gonna lose for a minute there." She whispered. Danny could here the underlying and unspoken "I almost lost you" in her words. But he smiled back as he responded.
"Giving up faith in me already, eh? Come on, nothings gonna stop your ol' man from coming home." Danny said confidently. Dani forced a chuckle as she let go and dropped to the ground, looking happier almost instantly.
"Good." She said. Then she floated up, gave Danny a kiss on the cheek and landed again, looking even happier. Danny smiled ruffled her hair, earning a set of giggles from the girl.
"Daniel James Fenton!" Maddie's voice rang through the room. Danny's head shot up as he gulped nervously at seeing his mother and father walking up to him and Danielle.
"Yes?" He said, unsure. Maddie's face lifted into a smile as she looked out at the two Phantoms'.
"I'm not angry with you, Danny. Upset you didn't tell me, yes, and I even understand why, but I'm not angry. But I do have a lot of questions for you, young man." She said sternly. Danny sighed in relief before chuckling.
"Whatever you want mom, honest. It'd be weirder if you didn't have questions." Danny said. Maddie smiled slyly and knowingly.
"Well for starters, before when you and Vlad were talking about 'love' and whatnot, right before you both passed out. Vlad said my birthday, ugh the nerve of that man, but… who did you say?" She said, glancing lightly at Ember, as if she already knew.
Danny chuckled nervously as he rubbed the back of his head. Then Ember came up to his side, starting at him as if daring him to say someone that wasn't here.
"Yeah, Baby-Pop, who'd you say?" She asked in a false-sweet tone that implied death if he didn't give the right answer. Now it was Danny's turn to roll his eyes.
"You, you dork. Who else?" Danny said, hugging her from the side again and enjoying the feeling of making her blush for once, instead of the other way around.
"Better've been me." She muttered, although everyone else heard it too and everybody broke into loud laughter.
And like that they stayed, for hours on end, talking, laughing and exchanging stories. The Phantom Family had grown a lot that day.
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"So, let me get this straight. Vlad was right when he said I had the mind of a child, you've known for a while and now you want to just change me into a six year old with the use of iffy magic?" Dani questioned, like she couldn't believe what she was hearing.
"Well, Vlad could've phrased it better." Danny started.
"We tried to tell you sooner, but things kept getting in the way. We wanted it to be just us." Jazz defended.
"Six years old was a fun time?" Tucker offered.
"Iffy magic? What do you mean 'IFFY MAGIC-" Sam started, but Danny, Tucker and Jazz shot her looks and she stopped her impending rebuttal.
"It doesn't have to be permanent. We just think you'll like being six better. Just for a week or so and if you don't like it we'll just change you back and we can forget the whole-" Jazz started to rant in explain their reasoning, but Dani cut her off with a sigh.
"Fine, I'll go along with it. But be ready to change me back when I don't like it." She bargained. Danny smiled.
"That's all we ask. Ready, Sam?" Danny asked, stepping back with Tucker and Jazz. Sam gulped, along with Dani.
"As I'll ever be." She said, get eyes glowing faint purple. Dani cringed. "Ses la ked le niŝ unerp!"
Danny closed his eyes to protect them against the light that followed Sam's chanting. Once he felt it was safe he opened his eyes to find Sam, on her kne"es, wiped out from doing such a powerful, long-lasting spell.
Behind Sam was another figure, but a lot shorter than it was before. The light surrounding her faded away, to reveal a three and a half foot tall Danielle, even more adorable than before. She hadn't changed much physically, still wearing the split HAZMAT that went with her snow-white hair and glowing green eyes.
Danielle shook her head slowly, as if to see it was still there, before her eyes shot open even wider. She smiled and jumped into the air to begin floating around in circles as if she was swimming. Then she started playing with a ball of Ecto-energy in her hands, giggling as she did so.
"So, how do you feel?" Danny asked, unsure. Dani grinned.
"Better than I've felt in forever! I feel so... normal!" Dani squealed. The rest of Team Phantom smiled at the sight.
"So you like the 'being six' thing?" Tucker asked happily. Dani nodded enthusiastically.
"Yes, so much! This feels great! Like I've been in the wrong body my whole life!" Dani yelled happily again. Danny rolled his eyes.
"Come on, better get you to the dining hall. Dora will want to see you and Frostbite can run an analysis to see if your as healthy as you feel." Danny ushered her forward.
With a grin, she took off speeding for the dining hall, leaving a grinning Team Phantom behind.
Jazz followed after with Tucker and Sam not far behind. Danny stalled for a minute, standing alone in the room, before he smirked to himself.
"Guess that ended pretty well afterall." He muttered to himself before going to follow his family to dinner.
*Wipes sweat off brow* that was tough.
Just as I was wrapping this up, my computer completely spazzed out and wouldn't let me access fanfiction at all for majority of the day. I fixed it finally, but only recently.
So, I decided to update today because it's a special day. It's the day my friend Chaos Infinity-X started PM-ing me about this story and we worked together from there on most of it.
But don't worry, this seems like the end but there will be an Epilogue coming soon that sets up something a lot of you might want to see; A PREQUEL! That's right, a prequel to see just HOW Danny became King and what happened around it. Well, that should be interesting.
I'd like to thank DanPhan1324 also, mostly for the laughs. And DuelStarduster, for a steady friend for over a year now.
Look at me, I'm such a diva. Oh well, thanks to all of you who read and reviewed and sent me questions/comments and everything! I love getting those!
So anyway, fear not! There will be more of "The Phantom's Realm" after an Epilogue goes up, which will be soon. Be on the look out for "The Phantom's Realm: Royal Origins".
Until then, TheIceRaven is out!