Danny Phantom Post Planet Chapter 8
Danny was beginning to feel that he had a good luck streak going. His movie marathon date with Sam went very well despite the fact that they fell asleep around 11 at night and they didn't realize this until well after midnight. Her grandmother had already called Jazz who covered for Danny so he could spend the whole night with Sam. The rest of the weekend was ghost free and Danny was able to finish all his weekend homework to be ready for school on Monday.
The next few weeks followed the same pattern, very little ghost activity except for the occasional fight with Skulker or the box ghost. This also gave him time to stay on top of his grades and prepare for his SAT tests that spring. His parents had also completed the work on the duplicate scanner and Danny had been taking it out every patrol and pretty much every time he left the house in case Vlad made another appearance. This gave Danny more time with Sam and he even got some hangout time with Tucker. Despite all this though, Danny was beginning to feel anxious. Vlad was still out there somewhere and he didn't like it.
"Maybe he's finally given up on poking at you." Tucker had said one Saturday afternoon at the Nasty Burger. "I mean he's got the FBI, Guys In White and Interpol on his tail."
"Yeah," Sam said. "He might not even be on Earth anymore. If he's smart, he's gonna stay away from you for a while."
"I guess." Danny said, nibbling on his burger. They had a point but it was still strange that Vlad would just show up and then disappear at random. Sam seemed to pick up on his mood because she moved closer to him and snuggled into his shoulder.
"I wouldn't worry about it." She said. "He shows up again, you'll be ready for him."
Danny couldn't help but smile. "Yeah you're right."
Tucker's watch started beeping. "Sorry guys, I need to get back to work. I'll let you know if anything Vlad related comes up Danny."
"No problem." He waved goodbye leaving Danny and Sam cuddling in their booth. After about ten minutes, Sam broke the silence.
"You doing anything tonight?" She asked.
"Not really" Danny replied grabbing the last French fry on his tray. "It's Saturday and even Mom and Dad aren't doing anything ghost related. I'm not doing any more homework this weekend that's for sure. My brain's turned to mush from the extra studying."
"That just means the work's gonna pay off." Sam said drinking the last of her Soy milkshake.
"I hope you're right about…" Before he could finish his sentence, he felt a shiver run down his spine and a wisp of blue energy left his mouth. His head began darting around trying to locate the ghost.
"You ok?" Sam asked.
"No, there's a ghost here. My ghost sense just went off."
"Nice to know you can find me Daniel." Said a voice coming directly above him.
They both looked up and Vlad had turned visible hovering 10 feet above him. Danny jumped out of his seat and transformed to face Vlad face to face in the air. By now the rest of the restaurant had noticed that Vlad was there and everyone was screaming their way towards the doors.
"I'm getting real tired of this Uncle Vlad. How about you do something useful for once in your life and just surrender?"
Vlad shook his head and folded his arms. "Sorry Daniel. I've been waiting a long time to see the two of you here at the same time."
"The two of us?" Now Danny was confused. He quickly glanced towards the kitchen and registers. Valerie wasn't there which meant that she wasn't working today. Plus once Danny thought about it for a couple seconds, Vlad couldn't have meant Valerie. When he first fought him again over the summer, it had been both Valerie and Danny fighting him. Who else could he have meant?
Danny's blood froze. He glanced down and saw Sam holding one of the doors of the Nasty Burger open with one hand and using his parent's scanner to scan Vlad with the other. Was this what Vlad was waiting for the whole time? For Sam and him to be together at the same time? But he couldn't have worried about that right now. Sam had to get to safety.
"Sam! Get out of here!"
Danny then felt a punch at the side of his face and he went flying into one of the walls of the restaurant. He groaned and shook his head. He looked over and saw Vlad cracking his knuckles and was smiling at him. Vlad had gotten in the first punch and Danny was furious about it. He flew directly into Vlad's chest and slammed him into the ground. Vlad was dazed and Danny put his left knee hard on Vlad's chest and pressed his right forearm against his throat.
"Listen to me and listen good!" He growled. "You even think about coming towards her again and I will MAKE YOU REGRET IT!"
Vlad just laughed. "Oh I know you will Danny. It's what I'm counting on." He then fired an ecto ray directly into the kitchen. Danny wanted to know what he fired at but it became clear almost right away. The entire restaurant heated up. Vlad had fired directly at the Nasty Sauce container and Danny knew from experience that if that sauce got too hot too fast, kaboom! And judging from the heat he was feeling, it could blow at any second.
Danny immediately stood off Vlad and flew as fast as he could towards the doors and outside. He immediately found Sam about 50 feet away. He knew that wasn't far enough. He went directly towards her and landed in front of her.
"We need to get out of here now! Vlad's fired at the Nasty Sauce, it's gonna blow any second!"
But before they could fly off to safety, he felt the heat at his back and knew the explosion was coming. His reflexes kicked in and he grabbed Sam, pulled her as close to his body as he could and turned his back towards the doomed restaurant. Then he focused all his adrenaline and energy into turning both of them invisible.
"Cover your ears Sam!" She complied and seconds later they heard and felt the explosion. Debris went flying everywhere and the loud noise from the explosion had rocked his ears. Once he was sure the explosion had passed, he turned them both visible again and looked her over.
"You ok?"
She shook her head like she was trying to get a stray drop of water out of her ears. "A little shaken and I can't hear very well but I'll be ok. How are you?"
Danny could still feel adrenaline rushing through him. He had a feeling it would be worse when the rush had worn off but for the moment he was fine. "I'm good. Call Tucker for me, I'm gonna check the area."
"Ok." Danny left her where she was and went back towards the nasty burger. Once he was there, he immediately started looking for Vlad. He could have done what Danny did, turn invisible and escape. But Danny didn't think so. He said he wanted Danny and Sam together in the same spot at the same time. The spot had to be the Nasty Burger and he wanted to blow the place up. Was he planning some kind of suicide run?
Before he could think further on this, he felt a punch hit the side of his face and he went flying directly into the ground and it hurt a lot more than hitting the nasty burger wall. He sat up on the ground just in time to see Vlad come flying towards him. He flattened his back and waited for him to get closer. Once Vlad was close enough, Danny threw a kick with both legs that caught him in the chest and he went flying hitting a piece of debris.
Danny followed him determined not to give him time to recover. He flew another kick that hit the evil ghost in the chest. Vlad didn't seem to notice though, because he grabbed Danny's foot with both hands and threw him off to the side. Danny rolled along the ground and only stopped when he hit, what once was, the Nasty Burger door.
The adrenaline rush he felt when the sauce explosion happened was starting to wear off and he was having more trouble getting up. He felt aches and pains all over his body and was having trouble hearing. But he saw Vlad getting ready to fire a series of energy blasts at him and he couldn't just give up. He focused his energy into turning invisible to avoid the blasts. He noticed the blasts going right through him and smashing up more debris.
"Oh Danny. You really should take an energy blast when it's thrown at you. It's good manners."
Danny's eyes flared with rage and turned from green to blue. "Same goes for you." His hand glowed with blue energy and he fired an ice blast right at him. The blast caught Vlad on his arm slowing freezing it and threatening to freeze the rest of his body. Vlad's body glowed with purple energy and the ice stopped spreading leaving only the arm frozen.
Danny was now struggling to keep himself standing straight. He had used up a LOT of energy protecting Sam from the explosion, going invisible and firing ice blasts. The good news was, Vlad seemed to be having trouble too. Deciding this may be his last chance to stop him, he jumped up and flew as fast as his tired body would let him and threw a punch. Unfortunately Vlad caught it. Danny threw a kick that caught the evil ghost in the chest. Vlad retaliated with a punch to Danny's face.
Danny fell to the ground and tried to sweep Vlad's legs on the way down. It worked and Vlad fell to the ground. Danny tried to stand up but his lack of energy forced him to his hands and knees. He was getting really tired of this. He couldn't keep this fight going forever, eventually he was going to run out of energy and transform back to Danny Fenton. After that, he didn't want to think about what could happen to him. He tried to stand up but couldn't. Vlad unfortunately wasn't having the same problem. He looked tired but wasn't as badly damaged as Danny.
"It's about time I ended this Danny. Your time is finally up."
Danny looked up at his enemy. Vlad was standing over him, building up a lot of energy in his hand. This was going to hurt. There wasn't much he could do either. His body wasn't responding to what his brain wanted him to do. He couldn't get up, he couldn't dodge, he couldn't do anything.
"Good bye Danny."
Danny tried again to move but couldn't, at least not in enough time to avoid the energy blast from Vlad. But then a miracle happened. Just as Vlad was firing the blast, Danny saw a human figure jump in front of him and pushed him out of the way. The blast collided with the ground sending everyone flying in various directions.
It took Danny a few moments to realize what he had happened. By some miracle, he hadn't transformed out of his ghost mode and he was groaning as he stood up. He surveyed his surroundings. Vlad was nowhere to be seen, he must have flown off. He looked around for the person who saved his life, if that person hadn't jumped in to help, he would've been ghost roadkill.
After looking around for a couple minutes he found another figure lying on the ground about 20 feet away from where he was. He walked over and felt his blood freeze. Lying on the ground was Sam. She was unconscious and laying on her side, her left arm and parts of her left side were covered in burns.
"Sam, no!"