CHAPTER 28: MAN MADE GOD, PART 3

Youth is the point in life when one sees their own personality and beliefs start to develop and take place in the mind, creating and shaping the person in which one will become and stay for most of their life. The information that one receives will not cease to end, but to see its influence on them is another question.

To receive and change with the information as they did when they were young is not something that will be so easy to see in one's adult years; the mind, now firmly rooted in its own established sense of identity, becomes adversarial to new input, like an immune system warding off viruses and rogue blood cells alike. Whether they will adapt with the change of information or deflect and defend themselves from it is hard to tell.

That said, this same sense of defense system can be useful in warding off disinformation just as well. When having thought processes well-rooted in logic and reason, even the most believable of lies or statements of ignorance can be debunked and diffused from guiding one to poor decisions, even if well-intentioned.

But what is undeniable is that the youth are not yet ready to make these distinctions on their own, for their young and still-developing minds still have not been given a full understanding of reality, and their sense of reality can easily be shaped at will by those who could make profit or gain from their perception of the world.

This is an action we know all too well as 'indoctrination'.

To spot indoctrination is not as easy a task as one would think, for the propagation of ideas and influence is fundamentally no different than that of a virus trying to keep itself active and relevant, and, like a virus, it evolve and learn to get itself around an immune system to cause an infection.

When managing to propagate itself across enough hosts, the infection no longer becomes recognized as an infection or foreign object, and instead becomes integrated as part of society as a whole and a vital component of it, even if that component causes it more harm than it does good.

It becomes so ingrained the culture that to remove it would be akin to splitting two symbiotic beings, even if the relationship is parasitical in truth. Those who become resistant to the infection or even attempt to cure it become ostracized or even put to death for their actions; the sick killing their savior out of love for their sickness.

All are subject to this alienation and desertion from friends and family, but it hurts no one more than it does children. To question the faith of their own family, or even reject it outright, leads to disownment and even rejection of the child from the family, making them cut off from any semblance of support in a world that they have just begun to understand.

There are many that have fallen victim to this system, though the number has become drastically decreased with the public discovery of the Ghost Zone, putting an end to much of the faiths that were sustained and propagated by those who would still lend them credibility and belief.

But for those whose beliefs were only emboldened and brought to fiercer fundamentalism by the scientific discovery, those cases who still suffered the worst still do suffer, and their suffering is almost all the worst. Like having a candle snuffed out before it can take its course to burn, the joy of life in youth is taken away and extinguished for the simple crime of questioning their own sense of reality.

In their quest to have Danny Fenton's soul recreated and returned to his body, Danielle Phantom and Jazz Fenton have picked up two street urchins that have suffered a life not too different from what has been described above, and now living a disinterested life of nihilism and prostitution for money.

In hopes of changing their young minds while the chance is still ripe, the group now sit inside a Nasty Burger, enjoying a cheap and subnutritional but still tasty meal, in aversion to the unappetizing name of the fast-food restaurant. Jazz is the exception to the group in the act; having no more digestive system or any body to process the food properly, she does not partake in eating with the group.

The children, on the other hand, do indulge very well, and scarf down their food without any second thought or care for decorum or manners. The boy is all the more noisy and messy in his mealtime, interested only in getting food in his stomach as fast as he can.

Danielle recognized their actions not simply of rude, undisciplined children, but desperate, hungry, and distrustful children aiming to feed themselves fast before any harm could come their way. Her recognition comes not just of basic human understanding, but also of personal experience, leading her to provide even more sympathy for the children.

Concluded with their hamburgers, the children laid back in their seats in content, with the boy letting out a loud belch.

"Excuse you." Jazz said.

"Eat shit and die, bitch." The boy said.

"News flash, potty-mouth: I'm already dead, or haven't you noticed?"

"Yeah, don't remind me. Lucky you."

Already having her fill of poor attitude from the boy, Jazz's attempts to be charitable to the child came to a stop, leading her instead to grow hostile.

"Hey, pal, being dead ain't as fun as it sounds. You like that food you're eating? I can't taste that anymore. How about sleeping? Taking a rest when you're tired? I can't even get tired and sleep. How about growing up? Getting to think about girls or boys or a future? I got to do that, and I had a good future ahead of me, but I died before I could live it out any further. You ever stop to think about that?" Jazz asked.

"Yeah. I think about it all the time. You say you can't taste food anymore? At least you don't have to eat food just to survive. You exist forever if you want to. But I got to eat everyday in order to survive, and most days, I don't even know if I'll get anything for the day or where it'll come from. You don't sleep anymore? You don't have to worry about where you're going to sleep, or if you'll be safe where you picked and you won't be robbed, raped, or killed. And a future? What goddamn future? I have no parents, no home, no education, and a little sister that cries every night that I have to take care of. Spare me your 'You still have a future' bullshit. You got it pretty good. All you have to do is just exist and you don't have to worry about anything. I still have to do all the hard work before I get to where you're at, if I'm lucky." The boy said.

Hearing the boy dismiss her plea for his life callously while still making valid points of his hardships, Jazz's hosility backed down to sympathy once more, coupled with a sense of shame displaying itself in the form of silence. Having a better understanding of their personal situation, Danielle spoke up instead to make the same point in a way that they might understand and believe in.

As with any argument to make with another, the first step she makes is to listen, rather than force her own point.

"So you guys got no parents or home, huh? Why don't you tell us about how that happened?" Danielle asked.

"What's it to you?" The boy asked.

"Well, it's worth 200 dollars, so I'd like to see that I'm getting my money's worth, how about that?"

Annoyed with a reverse sense of buyer's remorse over the contract that he had agreed to, the boy let out a sigh before he answered.

"Okay, it's like this. Our parents were big fundie Christians. They didn't really have any specific denomination that they claimed, they just went by 'Christianity' and nothing else. When that whole Disasteroid thing happened, they got even more crazy in their beliefs and didn't trust anybody. And that was before they even had us. We were homeschooled and had pretty much no friends." The boy said.

"Homeschooled? But wasn't homeschooling outlawed, like, years ago?" Jazz asked.

"Yeah, but that came too little, too late for us. We were given the usual sell: The world's only 6,000 years old, evolution is fake, science can't prove anything, boys should be masculine and girls should be feminine, blah-blah-blah. They even put filters on our TV and internet so we couldn't even fact-check half the shit we were taught. And, for the record, they were awful teachers. They barely got the points they wanted to get across well, and, whenever we didn't get it, they'd just hit us with a belt. Our mom was running it more than my dad, he was basically just her pussywhipped little thug."

"Well, how'd you guys get out of it?" Danielle asked.

"We started to question things more when we'd see stuff about Danny Phantom all the time. I always thought he was kind of cool, but our parents would always say that he was 'evil' or an 'abomination to god'. Said that being his fan was like 'worshiping' him, and make us stop believing in god. He wasn't the main cause, but he sure as hell did help me question things further, only to get more belts to my ass and having my toys and games taken away. Eventually, I just got so done with those assholes that I took my little sister, a handful of clothes, money, and food, and we got the hell out of there and never looked back. Ever since, it's been mostly what you see out of us now."

The story left Jazz even more sympathetic and heartbroken at the plight of the children, now breaking her silence to ask more questions.

"But nobody's ever given you a better home to go to?" Jazz asked.

"Where? To another pair of dickheads that can force us to do whatever they want for no reason? I'll pass. I'm better off on my own, and my little sister's better off with me." The boy said.

"And does your little sister agree with that?" Danielle asked.

The sister raised her head as if to speak, but the boy spoke for her instead.

"She'll tell me sometimes that she wants some parents or a warm bed again, but I'll have to remind her that it's not worth it. For all the times that our parents hit her, I guess she didn't seem to get the message that that's all parents will do: Punish you and make you do what they want just for the hell of it." The boy said.

"That's not what all parents do. I had parents, too, you know. They weren't abusive assholes like yours. And I am sorry that you had to deal with them. But being a parent's not about just beating your kid because they didn't believe what you believe. It's about raising them to be a better person for the good of themselves and for other people. Maybe you'd know that and appreciate that if you had good parents." Jazz said.

The mentioning of parents and children were concepts beyond the understanding of the soulless Danny Fenton, but the words that he caught overhearing of still managed to gain an interest for reasons he could not fully comprehend. Some images of Sam began to appear in his eyes prior to her death, but no complete thoughts or emotions could form themselves to give him any feeling yet.

"And what's the difference between the two? What our parents thought were 'good people' were little suck-up bitches that didn't think for themselves. How am I supposed to trust anyone who has that incentive or interest in raising me when all they want to do is mold me into being what they want? How do I know if I want to be what they want? There's only one important lesson that our parents taught me before we ditched 'em: Parents are the only real gods there are. They have complete control over another person, they can mold them into whatever they want, and they do it all on their own whims and interests just because they're convinced they have the right answer to everything. Well, I saw through it, and I'm not having any of it, or letting it happen to my sister." The boy said.

Having concluded his point, the boy took notice of a television playing behind the group, mounted on the wall for customers to watch at their leisure. As the country currently was in the midst of a presidential election, the programming for the TV was set to the next presidential debate, showing yet another discussion between President Foley and up-and-coming opponent Ellis Robertson.

"Oh, hey, ghost, can you turn that up?" The boy asked.

"My name's Jazz, you know. And you could try asking that nicely if you want results." Jazz said.

"Whatever. You're not doing anything else, and I want to see what the debates are on this time."

"Since when do nihilistic child prostitutes take interest in politics? Sure you don't want it changed to the cartoon channel?"

"Just turn it up, will ya?"

Annoyed with the boy's rude demand for the television to be turned to an audible volume, Jazz complied with the request nonetheless, flying out from her seat and towards the television. Reaching to the volume control buttons on the unit's side, she pressed the 'increase' button until the programming could at last be heard.

"There. Happy now?" Jazz asked.

"Yeah. Now sit down, I wanna watch." The boy asked.

Flying back to her seat, Jazz joined the rest of the group in watching the newscast, listening to the political topics discussed by the candidates.

Like before, the setting of the debate was another prestigious college, with a moderator regulating the debate and allowing both of the candidates to state their own respective positions, and then allow them the two a chance to battle out their ideas against one another.

"Now, another issue that's come up during the campaign season is issues regarding the First Amendment, specifically the freedom of religion. The concept of religion itself has been defined as a 'personal search for the ultimate truth'. Americans want to know: How does that concept still apply in this day and age? President Foley, I'll begin with you, how does the First Amendment still apply to the concept of religion as it exists today?" The moderator asked.

"Well, let me put it like this. Religion was invented as and is still a concept that humanity had come up with as a way of answering questions we couldn't scientifically answer yet. Now, you can make of that anything you want, maybe you could say it was for the better or for worse when we had it, but, the fact of the matter is, we do have the answers now, and the answers we had then are proven, verifiably wrong. This is not a matter of searching for the ultimatetruth. This is a matter of dealing with misinformation. Regarding your question as to if the First Amendment still applies to the concept of religion today, I say: No, it doesn't. And that's why I've taken many actions during my time in office to eliminate so-called religious 'rights' to protect children and many other Americans, and that's why I'll continue to do so with another 4 years." President Foley said.

The answer from President Foley gained a decent amount of applause from the audience, leaving them all to turn to Ellis Robertson in anticipation for a response.

"Ellis Robertson, over your campaign, you've held a more moderate view on the religious protections of the First Amendment than President Foley; you've been known to both agree with many of the policy actions taken, while simultaneously disagreeing with the merit of the policies themselves. Please explain your... paradoxical position more clearly." The moderator said.

"I don't believe my position is paradoxical at all. Yes, I've seen all the actions that President Foley and his congress has taken to strike down exclusive rights for religious persons, banning male genital mutilation, eliminating religiously-whitewashed homeschool programming and cutting funding from religiously-affiliated colleges, removing tax-exempt statuses from churches of all religious affiliations as well as non-college affiliated think tanks, but these are all actions which align with the First Amendment, not go against it. Freedom of religion in this country also comes with freedom from religion just as well. That means you don't have the right to enforce your religion onto other people, especially not on your own children who are supposed to shape the future of our country, and especially not on government policy which affects the lives of everyone around us. Where President Foley is wrong in his approach is the idea of trying to eradicate religion as a concept. It's been around since the beginning of time, and it's not going away. He talks about battling misinformation, but the only way that you can attack misinformation besides education is censorship, which not only do I stand against, but is also against the First Amendment. That's why I agree with the actions, but not the reason." Ellis Robertson said.

Ellis Robertson's response gained a cheer from the crowd louder than that of President Foley's, showing yet another sign of the incumbent's dropping popularity and the rise of his opponent. Discreetly hiding his nervousness with a nervous scowl, President Foley waited for the opportunity for their discussion to come, hoping for a chance to recover some of his dwindling popularity.

"We're now in discussion time, Mr. President, you may begin by responding to Mr. Robertson." The moderator said.

"Gladly. First, I'd like to ask you, Mr. Robertson, how exactly you can justify misinformation being tolerated when it leads to clear and present dangers and threats to this country by misguiding people into unlawful or unethical acts. Why would you not advocatefor some form of control of misinformation?" President Foley asked.

"Because the only way you can control what you call 'misinformation' is through censorship, which I'm staunchly against. There is no such thing as 'a little bit' of censorship, Mr. President. When you set a precedent that the government can determine what is 'true' and what is 'misinformation', there is no undoing this opening of Pandora's Box. Who's to say a rival political party might censor information regarding their opponent while in power to stay in control? Or perhaps a senator or representative with a conflict of interest in a multi-million dollar company might pass legislation to protect their interests, even when it puts the public in danger? We cannot simply 'regulate out' religion because it leads a few unscrupulous actors into doing the wrong thing. People still have their own agencies, and, if they were unable to process that before contemplating the crime, then the law will respond accordingly." Ellis Robertson said.

"This is not a matter of watching out for dishonest actors attempting to seek out a profit. This is about people denying objective reality and basic, fundamental truth. We have the truth that people were looking for now, but that wasn't enough for many Americans. We also used to think that the Earth was the center of the universe, but further answers revealed that wasn't the case. Even in recent years, we've had misinformation regarding the efficacy of vaccines, the reality of climate change, and even allegations that the Earth is flat, even with the education we try to put forth to establish that such is not the case. As a result, we have had a significant legitimacy problem in the system of education; with people doubting and denying basic reality, we have had many parents withholding true education from young minds and feeding them lies and propagandafor their own personal gains. The only reason we have these issues, the entire reason they exist in the first place, is because of religion. Are you saying you'd protect these dangerous ideas rather than the American people?"

"Everyone has their own beliefs that don't align with objective reality, but that doesn't mean you have the right to throw them in jail for it. You have a right to be wrong. Just because someone might be born into a certain religion or brought up into it doesn't mean that they'll automatically be part of the faith and keep it for the rest of their lives. I personally was raised in a very conservative family, but, with my own education, I managed to change my beliefs and come to different beliefs and conclusions. The key to guiding people to better lives and outlooks on life is not through censorship, but through education, and making people want to be educated on these issues."

"And what about the people that it doesn't reach? Education might reach a vast number of people, but it won't reach everyone. How many people have we seen that have been fed a skewed perspective on the world, then acted on those beliefs to commit atrocities on others? With Christianity alone, we've seen extremist anti-gay and anti-trans beliefs being forced into the heads of young minds, many of which have gone on to commit domestic terrorists attacks on gay clubs and other safe spaces for disenfranchised individuals. Islam has led to similar instances, and that's not accounting for the Zionist movement in Judaism calling for unlimited funding to Israel to commit genocide against the state of Palestine. We might be able to reach a vast majority of young minds to avert such tragedies, but there's still a large percentage that we can't reach through the policies we've passed alone. A disinfectant product might eliminate something like 99% of viruses, but what about the 1% it doesn't? That 1% will still remain around, still have its methods of propagation, and rebuild itself to pose a greater threat than before."

"You're skating some awfully thin ice with rhetoric of treating religion like a disease or infection. If you're trying to vilifyan entire ideology and make an enemy of the state of it, you might want to take a page from the books of George Orwell. Thoughts are not something that you can or should police. Even if you did manage to implement such policies, who's to say it won't simply have the opposite effect? How much have we seen radical Islam spread throughout the Middle East throughout the War on Terror? And with some sects of Christianity carrying a persecution complex, looking for any reason to play victim and further their own causes, such an approach would be nothing but a gift to the ideologies you are trying to eradicate, assuming that the American people would stand for such actions."

"Well, the American people do actually stand for my actions, as you might have seen from my polls and approval numbers on the legislation I've pushed for and passed. And I didn't make the comparison of religion to a disease. I compared it to a virus. Now, I understand that may not sound the best on paper, but I can clarify that comparison for you right now: What I mean is that ideas and beliefs all survive by spreading and reaching as many people as possible. You can apply this not only to viruses and ideas, but also with genes. We propagate our own species by choosing the partners we best believe to carry our values and suit our lifestyles, but no one would shame us for being discriminatewhen making such a personal choice for ourselves. If they had your logic, they would be calling that eugenics, which no one in their right mind would agree with."

"But what you're comparing is a personal choice as opposed to government intervention. A better comparison in this scenario would be to have the government take away many suitors for a partner, done under the name of giving you the best options for one. How is that not an overreach of government and power? And how is the idea of controlling what ideologies are 'acceptable' or not comparable to eugenics? Both methodologies include eliminating those traits in others that are considered 'undesirable' to achieve a selective breeding of the human species. We've seen this done before with Nazism."

"Oh, so we're at Godwin's Law, now, are we? Eugenics is not something that I do not support, nor have I ever, and it is not comparable to any policy I've enacted. Eugenics is about eliminating genetic traits that are immutable characteristics, things like race and ability, and, not only have I never supported any such policy, the policies that I have written are not the same. What we've supported doing is eliminating bad ideas and factually wrong statements, that's all. Human beings do this on a regular basis for themselves. Every day of your lives, you think about what actions you're going to take throughout the day, and you either think 'Yes, that's a good idea', or 'No, that's a bad idea'. No one would call that eugenics in any way, shape, or form, that's just ridiculous. And what we advocate isn't even any direct control over the throught process of another human being. What we advocate for and what we've always advocated for is to educate as many people as possible to make those good decisionsfor themselves. The problem is to make sure that we know how to reach those that our programs can't reach or haven't reached yet, and that's what we'll continue to keep fighting for so long as I'm president of this great country."

Getting the final say in the debate with his speech, President Foley earned a hearty round of applause from the audience, seeming to win over the crowd with his talking points, or at least come on par with Ellis Robertson. Where the two candidates had a clear landslide in favor of the newcomer over the incumbent, the debate seemed to put the two at head once again for a decent race.

With another debate finished, the moderator set the debate to a break, allowing the program to switch to commercials..

"Alright, we're going to be taking a little break after that, we'll be back with the second presidential debate soon, right after these messages from our sponsors. Stay tuned for more discussions between President Tucker Foley and Ellis Robertson in a bid for the White House." The moderator said.

As the television channel moved to its commercial break, Jazz moved back to the controls and decreased its volume once again, preventing the incoming commercials from interrupting their conversation. Having kept his eyes glued onto the screen for the entirety of the debate, the boy took well to the topics discussed, having much of his own input to add to the concepts spoken by the candidates.

"Man, I like that Robertson guy, but he is way too lenient on the religious nutjobs still in this country. If he actually agreed with Foley on this, I'd give him my vote. If I were old enough for it, anyway. He was right, you gotta find some way to account for the ones you can't reach. When somebody lives inside their own insular community for so long, they're not gonna be as receptive to new information as anyone else. When people get older, they think they know everything, and they think that they know best other than everybody else. They're too far gone. You gotta find some way to break through to these people, or at least cut off the flow of influence they have on other people. Otherwise you get more kids on the street like me." The boy said.

Seeing only apathy and rudeness come out from the boy, the group became surprised to see him take an interest in politics and sociology, Danielle all the especially after seeing it herself. Finally finding some way to reach him in his self-made nihilistic prison of the mind, she took to it immediately and moved to convince the boy of the value of his own life.

"You're very well-spoken and articulate for a boy your age." Danielle said.

Expecting only criticism and harshness with his comment, to hear a compliment in its place is not a response that the boy anticipated, nor one he could find any immediate response to. Having someone show interest in him and his interests for one of the few times in his life, his next response was far less hostile.

"I, uh, stop in the library every now and then. I try to keep myself strong and smart to take care of my little sister. I don't want her to stay where we are forever. I figure, somehow, there's probably a way where we can come back as ghosts when we die, and we won't have to worry about anything anymore. There's all those ghosts that Danny Phantom fought in the past, I see all these religious nutjobs pulling it off, and I figure we could do it, too. We could just live out our lives without any problems or troubles. We wouldn't hurt so much anymore." The boy said.

"Hey, I get it. You see death as the only way you can get out of life, and there's nothing else for you to live for, so why not just get life over with as soon as possible, right?" Danielle asked.

"Yeah, just like that. I guess you aren't as dumb as you seem."

The boy's comment was taken as humorous rather than insulting, leading to the two sharing a laugh together.

"Well, I'll tell you this much, kiddo. You're wrong. Dead wrong, so to speak." Danielle said.

"Wait, what? Why?" The boy asked.

"If you wanted to just get life over with, you would've killed yourself, but you didn't. Why not?"

Caught with a difficult question pitted against his own ideology, the boy laid silent in thought, trying to quickly scrap together an excuse to swat away the question with.

"Well... because... I still want to enjoy life a little bit, you know? If I'm a ghost, I'll just exist, and that's it. I won't be able to actually experience the good in the world anymore. I still have a lot of stuff here that I want to enjoy. I'll just wait to die, and, when I do, then I'll just let it happen." The boy said.

"So there are some thing you find worth living for?" Danielle asked.

"Uh... Well... I guess so. But I don't think that it's worth having to deal with the crap life puts you through to get it. Being a ghost means I don't have to deal with either. But even if I killed myself, there's no guarantee that I'd come back as a ghost. If it doesn't work, then at least I enjoyed myself beforehand."

"That sounds like an awfully good reason to keep yourself alive, then. Why don't you try to make the best out of life and try to enjoy yourself some more? Maybe go to school and learn more, become somebody better?"

"Because I don't care about that. What, I read a few books from the library, and you think I'm some kind of English prodigy or something? I just do what I do for my own amusement, that's it."

"Nobody said that you don't have to have fun when improving yourself. You can have a lot of fun when trying to find yourself, and you can end up with a much better place in life for yourself in the process. Not to mention for your sister. Wouldn't you want to work to give her a better place in life?"

"We both already work to have a decent life."

"Sleeping with strangers for money is hardly a good kind of work for a decent life when you're at your age. Believe me, I know from experience."

The boy once again paused in contemplation from hearing of Danielle having similar hardships as himself, subconsciously becoming more receptive to her advice.

"So you were on the streets for a while, too, huh?" The boy asked.

"For a lot of my lifetime. It was rough, but I still tried my best to find my place in the world." Danielle said.

"Well, at least I can count on you for being less judgmental."

"No, if I was being judgmental, I'd ask you why you'd also allow your sister to sell herself, but I'm guessing it was more complex than that."

"And you'd be right. I didn't want her involved in what I do in any way, shape, or form, but she insisted on helping out in some way, and I ultimately couldn't get enough money. There's plenty of pervs out in the world, but not enough pervs that like boys, despite what homophobes would have you believe. I even tried stealing for awhile to try to keep her out of it, before I almost got caught and had to stop. It's not just because of our parents that she's so quiet, you know."

The sister kept her head low and her mouth shut and quiet, exemplifying the point made by her brother.

"And you don't want to be in a better place where she'd live a healthier life?" Danielle asked.

"Exactly what do you define as 'a better life'? Okay, let's assume that I actually take some of your advice and go to school, try to learn more stuff, find some kind of job, blah, blah, blah. What's so different from that and the situation that I had with my parents? You get an asshole who tells you what to do and holds your life support over your head, make you jump through hoops just to get it, and keep doing it until the day you die. All I'm really doing is swapping one god for another. If it's just me, that's fine, but I'm not going to let my sister go through that." The boy asked.

"And what sets you apart from being that to her?"

Yet again, the boy had been given a difficult question, making him need to stop and think to find a suitable answer to it.

"Because... Well... Because I'm not a dick who tells her what to do for my own amusement. I do it for her own good. Because I love her and care about her." The boy said.

"There's a lot more people out there who care about you and will do things for your own good if you let them. That's called being a decent human being."

"Or being called god. And that can easily be used to take advantage of another person for fun or profit."

"Old saying goes: 'Mother is god in the eyes of a child'. Everybody's god to someone else. We all look to each other for answers to life or advice. You probably act as god to your little sister. You act as someone for her to look up to. The question is, would you act as someone that can teach her how to live a good life and be happy, or would you teach her to trust nobody and keep living life scared and alone, until she dies and maybe comes back as a ghost?"

The boy was put into silence for a final time, this instance being longer and more thoughtful than the last moments of silence he spent. A strong temptation made its case for him to follow the proposal set forth by Danielle, but there still existed a strong degree of skepticism implanted deep in his mind by years of poverty and despair.

"What if it doesn't work? What if we end up in a bad place again, or a worse one?" The boy asked.

"You won't know until you try. Maybe it won't come out good for the first few tries. But finding that one special place you belong is well worth it, believe me." Danielle said.

"And did you find your special place?"

Now, in an unintentional retaliatory strike against Danielle for all the times he was forced to come to a silent pause, the boy put her to a pause. She, like the boy and his sister, has had her own share of troubles in life, in search of a place she can call her own in the universe, putting it on pause for the mission to help Danny regain his soul...

...but in that quest, she has started to find her place at last, and, looking back to Danny and Jazz, she is able to answer the boy's question with a certain and proud...

"Yes. I did. It took me a long while to find it, but I did. And I know that you can find yours, too." Danielle said.

The boy seemed to nod receptively to the answer, coming around to fully be convinced of Danielle's perspective and views, and open to the idea of finding change in his life and for his sister's life. With his meal long past concluded, he took the paper and plastic wrappings for his food and collected them on the tray, signalling for their time to leave the restaurant.

"Okay, we finished eating. So, you said you want to take us to someplace else, then we make up our minds, right?" The boy asked.

"Yep." Danielle asked.

"Then what are we waiting for? Let's go so I can collect my money."

Despite the cynical language behind the boy's request, Danielle detected a lack of seriousness behind his words, letting out a giggle in response.

"Sure. Let's go and I'll take you there." Danielle said.

"Okay. But no promises on what we do yet. I still haven't seen enough to be convinced." The boy said.

"Nobody's asking for any promises. You just make up your own mind when you see what we have to show you."

Disposing of their empty food packaging, the group exited the Nasty Burger in their journey to their next destination, hoping that their next stop would give the children a reason to live their lives in a better way and seek happiness while they still existed as mortal beings. The trip is ultimately a detour in their greater journey, but it is one that all parties can unanimously agree as the correct motion to make.

Where they head next is a mystery to all except for Danielle, who chooses to make their destination a surprise for all involved, as she knows it will be.


Concurrently, the whereabouts of Danny Fenton and his accomplices are out of mind for the spirits occupying Fenton City, as they have their own agenda on their hands to create ghosts of mass destruction to use against the world of the living. The threat of Danny Phantom returning to stop their plans is a concept that does not even register as a possibility to those within, believing him to be dead and gone...

...but that does not ring true in the real world, even to these spirits who currently bend the rules of the real world to their own benefit.

More gods and demons alike are created under the watchful eyes of Demon Phantom and Technus, making their own army of darkness to use against the Earth against their defenses for ghosts and all supernatural threats. Their numbers of gods has already given them enough to put up a fight against the defenses of the world, but it is not a fight that Demon Phantom wants.

What he wants is the complete destruction of the Earth, and elimination of all sentient life on it.

"Well, master, we've pretty much got gods for every religion there ever was. Even Buddhism, I didn't think that religion even had any evil gods." Technus said.

"They basically don't. That one was tricky to work around. A little difficult when the entire religion is based in impartiality; no real sides of bad or good." Demon Phantom said.

"Not a bad philosophy, you have to admit. Just be decent enough and don't hurt anyone. I might've gotten with it if I were still alive."

"Then you'd only be an idiot after you died and realized it wasn't real. And you would lose a lot of respect for being one of the world's smartest human beings."

Demon Phantom's snarky insult made Technus respond with an annoyed sneer, only to stifle his reaction at the risk of gaining the wrath of his new master. Concerning himself only with keeping himself still in existence, he moved back to his task of preparing the gods, knowing it was his only chance at preserving his afterlife.

Moving out of the laboratory to inspect on the other ghosts, Demon Phantom stopped to find Skulker and Ember relaxing on a couch and watching television while eating snack foods. In opposition to the casual activity, the two had kept their feet propped up on the dead bodies of Jack and Jazz Fenton, using their corpses as footstools for their own leisure.

For even Demon Phantom, the sight is one that he cannot help but find comical, and felt compelled to comment on.

"If I had any humanity in myself left, I'd call that nothing short of morbid." Demon Phantom said.

"What? The Fentons? Meh, the fat one lost his boner an hour ago, and Ember couldn't find any more lube for the redhead. Toys are no fun when the batteries run dead." Skulker said.

"Speaking of 'no fun', can you believe what happened to MTV over the years? It's all a bunch of shitty reality shows with loser teenagers getting pregnant." Ember said.

"A bit too close to home?"

"Hey, shut up, Skulker."

"What, didn't you tell me how you were too cheap to buy a condom, and used to have a friend punch you in the gut just to abort the fetus? Good thing there's no Hell, otherwise you'd be going straight there."

"I said, shut up, you little-dicked asshole!"

"Oh, 'little-dicked'? I didn't hear you complaining when the Fentons were still usable for a bang. And why did you go for screwing the older Fenton while you were his daughter? That some kind of Freudian thing I don't know about? Daddy issues of some kind?"

Angered over Skulker's incessant teasing, Ember slapped Skulker in the face, prompting him to get off the couch and return her slap with one of his own, knocking her metaphysical body to the floor. Further enraged over her abusive treatment, Ember grabbed her guitar and prepared to play a riff, aiming the instrument straight at Skulker to maximize the effectiveness of the attack.

In response, Skulker drew out all the weapons on his body, aiming them all straight at Ember as she prepared to attack him. Now, both standing across from each other with their weapons drawn against each other, the two lovers were caught in a Mexican Standoff, putting their newly-rekindled relationship in a new strain.

"Son of a bitch, I'm gonna kill you!" Ember screamed.

"No, you won't! Guess what? I'm already dead, bitch!" Skulker shouted.

"Then I'll erase your bum ass out of the cosmos and never have to see your ugly face ever again!"

"Not if I blast you into a crater and spare this universe from seeing you become an ugly, stupid, talentless, fat bitch all over again like I had to!"

"You motherfu-!"

Needing to put his subordinates in control once again, Demon Phantom grabbed both ghosts by their necks and held them up, instantly putting their fight to a stop.

"Both of you, knock it off! I don't care how much you hate each other, I will not stand for these petty fights of yours, and I will not hesitate to erase both of you from existence if keeping you here becomes a detriment to my goals. Whatever troubles you have in your love lives, I strongly suggest you keep them to yourselves until I get what I want. Until then, you will be free to have at it, but not in my presence. Understand?" Demon Phantom asked.

Humiliated and put at a weak position with the most powerful ghost in existence holding them by their necks, both Ember and Skulker each responded with a meek...

"Yes, sir." Ember and Skulker whimpered in unison.

Releasing both ghosts from his hold, Demon Phantom let them both back on the ground, allowing them to exchange one last share of insults before he look back to them.

"Slut." Skulker whispered.

"Douchebag." Ember whispered.

As soon as the affair had come to an end, however, another had come to the attention of the group. An alarm began to sound in Fenton City, catching the attention of all the ghosts within. None knowing the reason behind the alarm, the ghosts began to look around in panic, including the Fright Knight as he rushed into the room with his sword drawn and ready.

"My lord, I have come ready to defend our base! From where does this threat come?" Fright Knight asked.

Demon Phantom, keeping himself more collected than his own underlings, moved to the nearest M.I.S.T.E.R. console to investigate. Looking to the screen, it displayed a message that said 'INTRUDER ALERT', while showing CCTV footage of the supposed threat that arrived at their base.

What was shown was footage of Valerie Gray landing on the helipad of Fenton City, walking up to the door of the hangar and waving to the camera.

"Hello? Danny? Sam? Any of you guys home? Tucker sent me in for a check-up, you mind opening the door?" Valerie asked.

As Skulker, Ember, and the Fright Knight all looked to one another in anxiety over the unexpected intruder, trying to make sense of the trouble now appearing at their door. Almost completely as could be expected, the blame almost solely fell upon the former two, recalling their moment of intimacy at the United Nations.

"All of our goals come crashing down because of a beast and a harlot." Fright Knight said.

"Hey, screw you, buckethead! If you actually bothered to get laid while you were alive, you'd want to jump at the chance to get it again, too!" Ember shouted.

"Yeah! Especially if you never got any the first time around!" Skulker shouted.

Choosing not to waste time partaking in the pointless blame game and inane fight, Demon Phantom stood silent to contemplate the matter, trying to think of the best strategy to avert any potential crisis. In the midst of his contemplation and the arguments between the other ghosts, they were all soon joined by Technus as well, joining in late to the affair, though not without being informed on it.

"Master, I checked the alert and all CCTV footage. It's Valerie Gray, and she's got about 3 others staying outside Fenton City. They all appear armed to the teeth, and, from what intel I've gathered on Gray, she's gotten all the better at hunting ghosts in the past 10 years. What should we do?" Technus asked.

Having thought over the best possible course to take next, Demon Phantom came to a conclusion at last, speaking out his next order to Technus to fulfill it.

"We do what any good host does for a houseguest. Put your skins back on, let her in and make her feel at home." Demon Phantom said.

"What? But, boss, you heard what Technus said, she's gotten a hell of a lot better over the years. What if she sees through us somehow and attacks us?" Skulker asked.

"Well, that would depend on your own ability to keep her convinced that you're actually Jack Fenton, which, if you value your afterlife in the threat of her ending it, or me, then you would do well to keep up the act. Technus, you stay in the lab and keep working, and speed it up as best as you can."

Having no choice but to obey the orders of their master, Technus departed to continue his work, while the rest of the ghosts possessed the bodies of the Fentons once again, putting on their disguises to fool Valerie and prevent any further problems. In taking note of the Fentons present, Demon Phantom noticed that Maddie was not among them, meaning that Vlad had not yet returned.

"Where's Vlad? Isn't he back yet?" Demon Phantom asked.

"Back? I didn't even know he was gone!" Skulker said.

Groaning in annoyance over the unnecessary obstacle in his path, Demon Phantom nonetheless changed to the form of Danny Phantom, ready to fulfill his plan.

"M.I.S.T.E.R., please open the hangar doors for our dear friend Valerie Gray." Demon Phantom said.

"Yes, Master Daniel." M.I.S.T.E.R. said.

As the artificial intelligence to Fenton City opened the doors to the hangar as ordered, Valerie Gray stepped inside, wasting no time to enter the facility and complete her own mission as quickly as possible. Likewise, the ghosts, needing her gone for their own purposes, stepped forward in the forms of the deceased Fentons, attempting to welcome her with a warm reception.

Removing the helmet to her suit by disintegrating it by nanotechnology, Valerie Gray stood face-to-face with who she believed to be Danny Phantom, who said...

"Hello, Valerie. Such a pleasure to have you visit." Demon Phantom said.