Danny woke to someone shaking him. He groaned, tired and sore and stiff. His tongue felt like cotton in his mouth, and he was so cold, and—

"Here."

He didn't recognize the voice at first, but he felt the straw at his lips, and he drank. Too late, he remembered where he was and what had him. He spat what he could of the liquid on the floor—what if it was poison?—and tried to focus on the ghost in front of him, squinting against the bright light it gave off.

It looked like his somewhat-friend from before, but that meant nothing.

The ghost had a disgusted look on its face and flickered intangible for a moment, letting what little of Danny's spittle had hit it fall to the floor. "I was just trying to help," it spluttered, and Danny decided that if it was the ghost who had taken him, it had done a good job of copying the new ghost. "Look, I ain't wanting to write a book here, but were you playing it straight earlier? You don't know what it means to be the gatekeeper?"

It was his friend. Assuming Danny could call any ghost his friend. "Yeah," he admitted, and reached out his free hand for the cup of pop the ghost still held. The ghost handed it over, and Danny drank. The drink was warm and flat, and sweeter for that, but it was still something.

"So you don't…." The ghost trailed off. "You don't know?"

"Don't know what?"

The ghost just nodded, ignoring Danny's question and asking another of his own. "Why'd you call through a shifter?"

Danny just stared at him.

"The other ghost. They're a shifter." Danny still didn't know how to respond, so the ghost added, very deliberately, "They can change their shape."

"Yeah, I gathered that," Danny shot back, "but that doesn't mean I know what you mean when you say I called it through!"

"Them," the ghost corrected. "Don't have a hissy fit. I don't know how much time we've got till they come back, and I want to split before they do."

It wasn't worth arguing. Danny drained the last of the drink and threw the cup at the ghost. It passed right through him and rolled underneath the next shelving unit. "I don't even know who you are! Why should I trust you, anyway?"

The ghost straightened his glasses. "You called me through, too. Do you think I wanted to leave my pad for this place?"

"Wh…. I didn't call anyone, okay?"

"Sure did. Me, anyway. For all I know, your shifter friend might've forced themselves through. Since you're doing such a swell job of gatekeeping." The ghost stuck out his hand. "Sidney Poindexter."

"Can you just get me out of here?"

Sidney scowled and dropped his hand. "Already tried. Can't get you out of those," he said, nodding at the handcuffs. "Not sure even you could."

"I could if I had the key," Danny muttered. But at this point, having the key was a pipe dream. He'd settle for what was supposed to have been yesterday's supper, except it seemed to have disappeared. (Was it only yesterday? It seemed like so long ago, except that for all Danny knew, it was still yesterday, sometime in the middle of the night.) He supposed he should be thankful his captor had left him the drink. Assuming Sidney hadn't just eaten his supper and wasn't owning up to it.

"I'm not a creator. I can't help you."

Danny thought about asking what a creator was and then decided it was probably exactly what it sounded like. "Look, just…. You're helping me. Why?"

"I don't like bullies," Sidney said, repeating his words from earlier. "And you're being bullied. And you called me through."

"I still don't get that. The calling thing."

"It's…." Sidney waved a hand up and down at him. "It's who you are. One of the things you can do. As the young gatekeeper."

"The other ghost, it…they…said that I didn't understand anything. That I didn't understand myself."

Sidney crossed his arms. "They're right, aren't they?"

Unfortunately, they were, and Sidney wasn't doing anything that was really helping with that. "You said this calling thing is one of the things I can do. What else can I do?" If he could at least get some answers….

"I don't know. What else can you do?"

Or not.

"Nothing, apparently." He couldn't feel his arm. He'd have to move, to get up and let the blood flow back into it, but that was going to hurt. "Listen. This ghost. They…they threatened my family."

"What are you going to do?"

"I can't do anything! That's the problem! They…they want me to bring their friends through and, I dunno, probably take over the world or something crazy like that, and I can't stop them! How am I supposed to stop them? If I try, they'll just hurt the people I love. They'll kill them."

"But…." Sidney was staring at him again. "But you're strong enough to stop that. You're stronger than they are."

"No, I'm not." If he didn't get any more food or water, he wouldn't be strong enough to do anything, let alone resist some evil ghost. "I can't do anything. You can't do anything. You know what, why don't you just go home? You don't want to be here anyway."

Sidney glanced around and shifted uncertainly, even though his feet weren't even touching the floor. "I…can't."

"Of course you can't." He couldn't do anything, either. Danny wondered why he'd ever thought he could. He was stuck here, at the mercy of some psychopathic shapeshifting ghost who wanted to use him and would kill his family if Danny didn't do what they wanted, and the only one who knew what was going on, who might be able to help, was another ghost who couldn't do anything useful.

If Danny didn't think it would backfire, he'd ask the ghost to take a message for him. To Sam and Tucker, maybe. They'd be safer than his parents, especially for a ghost. But the shifter ghost knew too much about him for Danny to want to risk that. He couldn't risk any of them.

And if he asked Sidney for help, or at least for something so blatant, he would be.

And he'd be responsible for whatever the shifter did in retaliation.

"Just go away."

"Gatekeeper—"

"My name's Danny!" There were tears in his eyes. He was angry, frustrated, scared, and it was just all coming out. "So thanks for nothing, Sidney. Try not to get yourself blasted by some ghost-hunting tech if you stick around to try to haunt this town."

Sidney didn't move. "You didn't call me here to haunt this town."

"I didn't call you here!"

"You did," he snapped back. "You did, and now you're just being a bully, too! So maybe I won't help you after all, because bullies don't deserve to be helped." He vanished.

Danny didn't try to call him back.

He didn't feel like apologizing yet. He wouldn't mean it. Right now, he could tell he'd hit a sensitive subject, and that was too satisfying for him to feel particularly apologetic.

But now that Sidney was gone, he was alone again.

In the dark.

Still thirsty. Still hungry. Still sore and still tired.

And still out of options, knowing next to nothing as he did.

"I don't know what to do," Danny whispered. He didn't know how long it had been. Was it still the middle of the night? Or was the shifter out there somewhere, pretending to be him? Pretending everything was fine in Danny Fenton's life? Did Sam and Tucker suspect anything? Did Jazz? His parents might not, if it was just a short period of time, but….

But what if no one noticed? What if the shifter was right? What if their earlier words hadn't been a lie?

You're stronger than they are. Why would Sidney think that? The only thing he could do—the only thing the shifter wanted him for—was to bring through a whole bunch of ghosts that would just make everything worse. Call them through, if Sidney was to be believed, though Danny still didn't know what that meant.

This thing that was inside of him? He didn't want it there. He definitely didn't want anything coming through it. But that didn't mean he could stop it.

This had all been an accident.

Why couldn't it have just been a normal accident, even if it was the kind that sent him to the hospital, like it would have if he'd been part of a normal family?

He didn't want to be used like this.

He didn't want his friends and family hurt because of anything he did—or didn't do.

But regardless of what Sidney said, he didn't have some kind of power that—

"Awake already, little brother?"

He didn't need to see the soft glow coming off Jazz's form to know it wasn't really her, but he hated how his heart had jumped with hope. He didn't want Jazz to find him here. He didn't want her in danger.

But he knew that if she had any inkling that he was in danger, she'd come looking for him, even in all the illogical places. Because he was her little brother. She didn't have to understand him—or whatever he got himself into—to love him.

"You should be getting your rest," the shifter ghost cooed as they crouched next to him. "You're going to need your strength."

All the more reason not to rest, in his opinion.

"It'll only prolong the process if you're weak," they continued, their tone matching Jazz's matter-of-factness with heart-wrenching accuracy. "You might think that's a good thing, that it'll buy you time, but there's really no point. You're going to stay with me for as long as I want you to."

"No, I won't," Danny whispered, but the defiance in his tone was betrayed by his fear.

"It's cute that you think that." They got to their feet, looked around, and frowned. "You ate."

He hadn't, but Danny wasn't going to admit that. "You brought me food. I thought you said I needed my strength. What was I supposed to do, throw it away?"

They turned back to him and narrowed their eyes. "Someone else was here."

"What?" He couldn't stop his voice from spiking in panic. "No, it's just me!"

They grabbed him and hauled him to his feet, his arm nearly being wrenched out of its socket as it was twisted around thanks to the cuffs. "Who knows you're here?" they hissed. "Which little friend do you have helping you?"

"I don't have anyone!" Danny protested, and he tried not to think about the fact that it was true. That he'd driven away the only person…ghost…who might've helped him.

"I'm not a fool," the shifter snapped. "No food wrappers in sight. Why would that be, if you can't move from here?"

"I don't know! Mice? Seriously, I was asleep!"

"Then maybe you should sleep for a little longer," snarled the ghost, and Danny couldn't avoid the punch that caught him on the side of the jaw.