CHAPTER 39: ICONOCLASM, PART 2

The city of Amity Park has been ordered to be destroyed by an Ectoranium nuclear strike.

This is the first official act of President Ellis Robertson, the leading opponent to President Tucker Foley prior to his death, winning and assuming his position in office by default. And his first days in office are without a doubt the most chaotic and horrible the country has ever been in; far worse than days of F.D.R. during the great depression, or Barack Obama who came after the mayhem of the George W. Bush administration.

Of the list of problems his hastily-assembled administration has to resolve, the first he has to deal with is the emergence of Demon Phantom, who is responsible for all the chaos already wrought. He has also shared the news that Danny Phantom and the Fenton family are all dead, leaving the world without any defenders against him or the other ghosts under his command.

Already has he laid waste to the past president and his entire executive branch with ease, not stopped even by the Secret Service or any other mechanisms to defend the late President Foley. This, combined with the knowledge that his powers were great enough to topple Danny Phantom, has made for extreme circumstances...

...which appropriately call for extreme measures, as exemplified by the oncoming Ectoranum nuclear missile flying towards the skybound Fenton City.

Every eye in the world lays eyes on their historic event, watching the United States government authorize a destructive attack on one of its own cities to prevent a greater threat to the nation. Among them is also the group of Danny Fenton, Danielle Phantom, and the ghosts of Vlad Plasmius and Jazz Fenton, who watch the news with just as much anxiety as everyone else in the nation does.

But none so are more anxious than those still remaining in Amity Park. Though the city has made its calls for evacuation, a large portion of the population still remained. They have refused to take their final chance to avoid damnation, and they, sticking to their choices, now face the consequence of their actions.

They offer prayers to their nonexistent gods in order to find salvation, hoping that they would show themselves at last to save them. As the missile approached closer to Fenton City, their prayers did not falter or break, but instead continued on stronger, speaking up all the louder that their gods would come.

In a perverse way, their prayers would be answered, but only when the missile had made its way to its target.

Once the missile reached Fenton City, it did not detonate as it reached its target, nor did it even detonate as intended. Instead, it was caught in the lone extended hand of Demon Phantom, standing on the landing pad and grasping the missile with a casual ease that trumped the perceived destructive power of the nuclear weapon through sheer theatrics.

To his side was Technus, who approached the missile and, with a simple touch of his finger, disassembled it to its bare components; the pieces floating in midair at his touch, including the payload of the Ectoranium warhead. Reaching in to the pieces, Demon Phantom extracted the warhead, removing the primary threat to him and his subordinates.

At his mental will, the missile reassembled itself and flew towards Technus, who grabbed the missile and casually held it to his side, as if it were a surfboard. Joining him were the remaining ghosts of Skulker, the Fright Knight, and Ember McLain, standing together with their leader as one.

No longer threatened by the missile, Demon Phantom casually threw the warhead off the balcony, letting it fall to the ground far below.

Still kept on the watch of the APC, the causal dismantling of the missile is witnessed by the staff of the Pentagon, and news of the failed attack reached the news media soon thereafter. With news that the threat of Demon Phantom was still not yet defeated, and the area not threatened by nuclear fallout to observe, news stations began flying in with helicopters to report on the scene.

Flying up to the skybound Fenton City, even against the strong wishes and orders of the United States military, the news stations risk all just for the chance at reporting first on this world-changing event. Demon Phantom nor his subordinates made any attempt to attack, but instead their leader welcomed their approach, as if expecting their arrival.

The expectations are proven when he stepped forward to the helicopters, speaking out the their recording newscasters with a speech for the world.

"Since the beginning of time, the power to destroy the world has belonged in the hands of gods, and the gods alone. When the nuclear bomb was created, human beings created the power to destroy the world themselves, and they have recklessly used this power as leverage over one another to assert their own gods over one another. Now, the gods have returned. They can speak for themselves, and they have returned to take back what is theirs." Demon Phantom said.

Demon Phantom then took out a Fenton Thermos and held it up, displaying it to the cameras to be fully displayed.

"For the great day of their wrath has come, and who will be able to survive it?!" Demon Phantom shouted.

Then, he opened the seal.

[Soundtrack Cue: Ministry - N.W.O.]

Opening the cap to the Fenton Thermos, out from it came the fruits of their labors following the past few days, creating what was one disproven by modern science:

Gods.

In droves and with a vengeance the gods come forth, like opening the gates of Valhalla to release all the warriors and destructors of life inside to be unleashed on the Earth. Forged by black science fueled beyond the understanding of humankind, they are set out to destroy, to kill.

For millennia have the gods been responsible for death and mayhem all across the planet Earth and all its forms of life, even though none had truly ever existed. In their names was the violence propagated and perpetrated; men had used their iconography to rally people to their causes, their own political ends, and many lives were taken.

Many of these deaths were indeed real and tragic, but others were fabricated out from stories of floods and plagues, used to as fables to keep their followers in line. Whether or not the gods existed to kill those who truly did die is irrelevant, however, the deaths are deaths nonetheless and their lost lives are attributable only to those who blindly followed the gods, or perverted them to their own ends.

Now, there is no middleman to corrupt the connection between man and god. The gods are here to speak for themselves.

And they have come to destroy the human race as they have been written to do in years past, bringing their fables to life.


One of the first cities to be subjected to the wrath of the gods is Memphis, Tennessee. A staple in the collection of states colloquially known as the Bible Belt, it has been the state most populated by Evangelical Christians, making it the unofficial capital of the unofficial (though once was a true) confederacy.

The belief in their specific god is still the highest among all other states in the nation, partially in thanks to their stagnating economy and predominantly older population. They are still holding strong to their hopes that their messiah, the one called Jesus Christ, will return back to Earth and ascend them all to kingdom come.

Today, they receive their wish, but only in part.

A ghost of Demon Phantom's design has flown its way down to the city of Memphis, making itself seen before the city's populace to be seen in full. This ghost bore a resemblance to the Evangelical Christian figure of Jesus Christ, simultaneously the son of god while being god himself at the same time.

At first, the sight of their savior gives them signs of relief and rejoice all alike when they see his face and cheer, thinking their beliefs have been rewarded at last.

But they learn unfortunately so that they have not been.

Pulling out a sword in one hand, the ghost of Jesus prepared a ball of fire in the other. Holding his arm back to prepare a throw, it threw the fireball into the cheering crowd, who finally stopped their praises and celebration upon seeing the incoming projectile from their savior.

Those whose survival instinct functioned well enough to give them the strength to run do so far too late, left to be incinerated by the destructive force of the fireball or by what debris hit them as a result from it. Watching many of their fellow believers be blown away and incinerated alive, the surviving bystanders quickly became either atheists or satanists on the spot, a distinction ultimately without a difference, choosing to abandon their faith to live for another day.

But just as the first victims of their god were unable to escape their fate, the rest, too, fell by his hand, this time dying by his sword. Reaching out its sword with one swing of its hands, the ghost of Jesus cleaved dozens of people in half, leaving their severed bodies to fall to the ground, their organs and blood spilling out of them.

Charging up yet another fireball, he cast it into the fleeing peoples once again, burning away yet another large chunk of the population of Memphis. Unleashed on the city as a being of mass destruction, many befell its fire and blade unopposed, leaving the state of Tennessee to its doom, and many more to follow.

The destruction of people is not just its concern, however. Also does it keep a focus on destroying any and all places of worship, destroying churches built for the worship of its own image with fire and brimstone. But worship of others is not just confined to that of religious symbols, for any one man could be symbol to imitated and admired for years to come.

That is why among the places it demolishes, the ghost of Jesus laid waste to the iconic mansion of Graceland, home of a man who was declared a king among men, and one who could unite many to see his presence and talent, just as the man named Jesus supposedly did so many years ago.

With no more places of worship dedicated to him to keep his memory alive, the king is truly dead.


Another American city of great significance targeted is Salt Lake City, home of the religious group of Mormons, or, the Latter-day Saints. Since making the city the home of their faith for many decades since the conception of their religion, the city has since become its own independent city-state of its own, not unlike the Vatican City in Italy.

But the city-state is far more archaic and regressive even that of the corrupt government it sought to separate itself from, becoming a fascistic police state created out of the fears of any Orwellian imagination. In the name of freedom and liberty, they have perverted those very concepts to slavery and tyranny; a far cry than what the founding fathers had intended.

There is little in the way of dissent that has not been quelled by the city-state government, making it unopposed by its own citizens as they now stayed under its control. In turn, those dissidents have returned to the faith in their own interpretation of it, trying to seek out hope when there was no more.

In this way, the dissidents and the patriots alike can share one belief that beings their own hope for the future:

That the savior will come and deliver them, and bring them to their afterlife waiting for them and leave their woes behind.

In that wish, they have only partially had that wish granted to them. Their own interpretation of Jesus, the Lord of the Vineyard, has appeared before the city-state, but it has no intention of delivering them to any graceful afterlife, nor even the comically absurd cosmic award of owning a planet.

It comes instead to harvest the wild olive branches, and it sees nothing but bad branches in place of where the people stand.

Beginning its 'work', the Lord of the Vineyard flew down and began removing the heads of the Mormons below, ripping off head after head of the populace of the city-state below by hand. Returning to some normal human thoughts at last, the populace of Salt Lake City began fleeing their object of worship, hoping in vain that their own human bodies will manage to outrun the speed of an unearthly being.

Unfortunately, just as their beliefs in beings long since debunked are for nothing, so are their efforts to flee the being which stands true and present before them, and one by one they lose their heads; men, women and children are all subject to its violence, violence which it does not even see as inflicting death.

Instead, the being believes its own actions to be merely the act of a harvest, no different than raising crop and cutting away what has already died.

Gathering up the severed heads of its victims, the Lord of the Vineyard began to carry them towards the central church, firing an ectoplasmic bolt towards the building as it flew. Upon impact, the bolt caused the church to explode and set on fire, creating an appropriate bonfire for the Lord of the Vineyard to burn its crop.

Dropping the severed heads into the fire, it lets them burn as the fire peels away all flesh and tissue to bones, reducing human faces and brains, all carrying memories and connections to one another, into faceless skulls, erasing entire remains of peoples in an instant.

And as the Lord of the Vineyard returned to removing more heads, the first ones to burn are merely the first to end their suffering quicker.


Another major target out of many in America to receive its attack is New York City, the first of the American targets to be a major city with a large population. New York City is known to be a highly diverse city of many races and ethnicities, as due to it being an original point for many immigrants to the country, and, although it has dropped in religious affiliation like everywhere else in the world, it still carries its share of true believers.

Among them are the Catholics and Jews, which the city still carries the highest percentage of both religious groups. Like many in the world, they are mostly unaware of the chaos unfolding in other cities, but only because luck would have it that they have not had any reports from the other cities inform them of the situation, nor were they were not among the first to suffer an attack.

Their luck on the latter has only just run out, and their lack of luck on the former has prevented them any chance of escape.

In the sky appeared a ghost taking the form of Yahweh, the interpretation of god worshiped by both the Catholics and Jews alike, disagreeing on their beliefs only where their god had a son or not. Their disagreements are ultimately proven for naught as their god shows no care for either of its worshipers, and responds to them with a vengeance seen only in the few gospels they do agree on.

Reaching its power into the waters surrounding the city, Yahweh pushed them forwards towards the mainland, sending a cataclysmic flood to its populace.

The incoming flood sent the people of New York City running back from the tidal wave; a reaction that comes completely in vain, but is driven by the unstoppable force of instinct. This unstoppable force of nature is in turn met by another, itself driven by a perversion of human understanding of supernature.

All are the people of New York City caught in the flood, damned in the wave to be caught in the deep, heavy waters and be either drowned in the seas, or crushed by the immense water pressure, a double jeopardy of death brought about by a ghost operating on the programming it was set to follow.

Flying down to the drowning city, Yahweh split the flood to allow itself a walkway, wading among the various spread debris of what was once a street in the city. Some few managed to survive the flood and flop out to the dry street in hopes of weathering the storm, but their reaching this one dry patch was one of far more unluck then luck.

With a mere wave of its hand, Yahweh took the life from every person it passed over, murdering them regardless of whether they were firstborn sons or not. In a city that prided itself on a diverse population in the millions, carrying over untold numbers of cultures all around the Earth into this one pocket of a city...

...it is a perfect example of how the wrath of a god makes exemptions to no one, not even those who claim to be its chosen people.


It is not just America that has to withstand these attacks, as the initial wave would have the world believe, just as there are many diverse cultures across the world, there are many different religions, all with different forms of gods that have come to reap the people who had sewn them.

The first of many to go is Greece. Creating many significant contributions in both science and philosophy, choosing to voyeur into both inner and outer space alike for answers regarding the universe, even the Greece of ancient times was not above dreaming up its own gods to worship and pay tribute to.

They were a people who chose to create many gods, and among the most powerful of them all was the commander of lightning named Zeus.

Returning to the nation of its birth, the manifestation of this cultural image has come to reclaim its control over the people of Greece, establishing itself as the one true and most powerful god of them all; to be king again. Its arrival in the country is made by destroying the Parthenon, smashing it down to make way for itself.

Standing atop the position of where the Parthenon once stood, Zeus began sending down lightning bolts to the city below, firing pure, concentrated electricity to unsuspecting victims below, and killing many in droves with large explosions of ectoplasmic energy as a result.

The king has returned once again to take its place.


Just as religions evolve over time, they also steal to create the foundations of their beliefs. Such is the case for Roman mythology as it took much influence from that of the Greeks. Their equivalent for Zeus is Jupiter, carrying much of the same abilities and public perceptions of him, but with a mere Roman twist to distinguish the two.

The distinguishment is ultimately one without a difference for the country of Greece, or for that of Italy. Just as its Greek counterpart does, the ghost of Jupiter makes it debut by destroying a historically significant piece of architecture, this one the Roman Colosseum, and, like the foundation once had done, its remains made a start for Jupiter, allowing it to attack the people of Rome.

Unlike where Zeus had shown style and grace in its terror, Jupiter instead showed nothing but brutality and viciousness; a reflection of the culture it had come from.

To play some defense to a ghost acting on what it was programmed to do, Zeus was still ultimately an idea that came from a world that prided itself on knowledge and wisdom, where Jupiter was a corruption of that idea by an empire that served no purpose other than to expand and kill, just like its own corrupted idea now did to the same land which it came from.

Again, the distinguishment is ultimately one without a difference.


Far away from the region of Europe, below it lies Africa, the next place where the gods make their attack. Famously called the 'Cradle of Civilization', Africa has been home to many tribes which have come and gone over the centuries, each with their own mythologies and religions which have risen and fallen with the cultures that created them.

But the one that comes to lay waste to the African continent and its peoples is one of an estranged culture drawn from many beliefs of the tribes of past, melded with Catholicism to breed a strange hybrid of a faith called Voodoo. As if a prodigal son or bastard child, the deity of Damballah has returned to the home of its ancestors, ready to exact vengeance on the land that led to its creation.

Shedding the snake-like skin on its body, the ghost of Damballah let the skin fall to the ground. Declared the primordial creator of life in Voodoo, Damballah allowed its shed skin to turn into a river of water, leading it into all the cities of Africa, flooding into every town both modern and rustic.

The flooding is only one of the problems that Africa now faces, and one far less than the one engulfing New York City, for those are the least of the problems that the dark continent's people face. The next problem comes with what the water washes away, and brings forth for Damballah to make use of.

In the flood, the many graves all across the continent are unearthed and eroded away to reveal the bodies buried in them. Making use of the Voodoo powers of resurrection of the dead, the bodies rose from their opened graves to walk once more, setting their sights on the population of the cities that buried them.

A Voodoo zombie is far different from that of a zombie found in any Romero film; it does not spread its disease or make others into zombies by bites and scratches, it is simply the reanimated corpse of a human being without a soul. That said, these zombies are more than able to attack the population of Africa, biting and tearing away at the living flesh of the people to end their lives as unceremoniously as their fictional counterparts.

It is unfair that their own faith and beliefs have been corrupted by imperial influence beyond recognition and turned hostile against the land from which it came, but the world is never a fair place, nor could it ever by if one were to rely on the creation of gods and religions.


Mexico is a country with another example of Christian imperialism taking over a region of land and forcefully converting the native population to follow another faith, but it has its fair share of older mythologies to draw upon for Demon Phantom to make his own god-weapon from their beliefs.

Even before the arrival of the Spanish to send their conquistadors and spread their influence by way of violence, the Atzecs were not so different in their own way; exerting their power and religious influence by way of trade and violence alike, not unlike the many Europeans of the time.

Nonetheless, they fell among with the many other nations of Mesoamerica, but it certainly did not go out without a fight.

And now that the land it once thrived in now speaks the same language as the nation that invaded and conquered it, and worships the same god that they did, the way of the Aztecs has come back to finish its fight, and doing so with a vengeance no mortal man could hope to experience.

Enter the ghost of the Aztec god of war, Huitzilopochtli. It has arrived in Mexico City, the capital city of the nation and most populous city, where it hears the language spoken by the conquerers of the land and belief system that it once held over the country before it was known as Mexico, and hearing the prayers to their god made in the Spanish language.

The sounds of blasphemy enrage the ghost of Huitzilopochtli, urging it to exact its anger and desire for blood on the Mexican people. Taking in its hand a serpent of fire, a living weapon by the name of Xiuhcoatl, it cast the serpent with an atlatl, leaving an impact on the ground which resulted in a large explosion of flame reaching over Mexico City, incinerating many people to ash in an instant.

The serpent of fire named Xiuhcoatl regerated into the ghost's atlatl, automatically reloading the weapon for it to use once again. And once again did it use the weapon, continuing to cast its flaming snake-spears to various places across the city, beginning its attack with any and all Catholic churches still standing.

The death and mayhem pleases the ghost, for the god Huitzilopochtli is not just one of war... but also of human sacrifice, which every death it inflicted fed into its needs.


Another nation to befall destruction and death is India, often standing at the most religious country on Earth, even in this age, which carries the two religions of Hinduism and Sikhism. The two faiths share common beliefs and practices, but they are as far apart from each other in beliefs on social status.

Hinduism holds the hierarchy of a caste system and holds women as inferior and to be married off, where Sikhism carries the beliefs that all are equal as human beings. As the former holds ideals of power and status in its beliefs, it is Hinduism that holds the majority of political power in the country, making it the most predominant religion in India and the one which affects the most amount of people in their personal lives.

This faith is represented by the deity known as Kali, who now has been sent upon them as their destroyer. Forged in the artificial hellfire of a Ghost Portal, the ghost of Kali began to wreak destruction over the nation, smashing and destroying anything and anyone that stands in her way.

Buildings are demolished by the ectoplasm that fires out from its hands, reducing them to mere rubble in seconds, and people are all subject to its destruction, being chopped to pieces from its blade and its tenacity, all unhinged and unfiltered by being an ethereal creature of immaterial.

The Hindus are the ones who receive the most destruction from the god, but those who do not follow that god, the Sikhs, are far away enough from the epicenter of the mayhem where they can remain unharmed. As true to their beliefs, they still mourn and feel the loss of their fellow countrymen, bidding them a peaceful afterlife as their own religion made them believe they would have..

But they, too, will join them in a spiritual journey, and they will do so without the anchor of physical bodies.

Just as the Hindus are laid waste to by one of their gods, the Sikhs are slain by their one god, called Waheguru. Coming in the appearance of an orange robe and turban with a blue shawl and long, white beard, the ghost of Waheguru, floating in the air in a cross-legged position, raised a single hand to the Sikhs in a motion that seemed to be noble and gentle in nature...

...but unleashed a blast of ectoplasm that disintegrated the believers, taking their lives in one swift, impartial motion.

Whether valuing equality or status, no religion is spared from the destruction, nor are any of their gods merciful to their own believers.


China is a country which seems to be an unexpected target of the gods, as the country is one of the first and few leading developed nations to mostly eradicate religion as a concept, progressing further than America in progressing the masses to enlightenment. Unfortunately, this leap forward has come with the loss and crackdown on personal freedoms, turning the nation into little more than an authoritarian dystopia.

For better or worse, that unjust government will see itself fall, and do so by two of the most popular religions that have lingered around the longest.

The first of the two is the ghost of the Taoist god known as Shangdi, given the name which means 'Highest Deity'. In Taoist mythology, this god is given domain over matters that concern the country the most: Victory in battle, status of crops, control over weather, and the fate of the capitol.

Unleashed on the country, it will exercise many of those powers in its own conquest. It begins by summoning tornadoes and earthquakes, laying waste to much of the developed land in the country's most populous cities, ending lives as easily and as carelessly as the wave of a brush.

China still stands as the most populated nation on Earth, but that population now reduces down on the scale by the second, wiping out decades of expansion and history at the whims of one of its own social constructs. However, even with a nation as large as this one, one god is not enough to put an end to the land and its peoples.

So enters the other of the two gods, this one the ghost of the Buddha himself. Just as famously depicted all across the world, this Buddha is a fat, smiling man that exhibits a cheerful and peaceful demeanor, but what actions it takes on the Chinese people are far from the image it depicts.

But it is in line with its preaching of impartiality, which the ghost of Buddha delivers in an unorthodox way. With a wave of its hand, the people below him dropped dead to the ground, but did so not in any spectacularly gory fashion or otherwise gruesome death.

Instead, the people fell to the ground as if going to sleep, leaving blank expressions on their faces. Their appearance of sleep was merely one in facetious resemblance only; they were in fact truly dead, but the means in which their lives had ended was one that came about from what the ghost of Buddha was taught to see as impartiality:

To be completely separate from all aspects of life, and the only way that it could be accomplished is through death.


The Scandinavian countries of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway are next, with the latter becoming the ground zero of what god will come next. They are yet another region of the world that has almost completely done away with religion, but this is thanks to their economic policies that have brought healthy, sustainable lives for its citizens, negating the need for a social opiate to ease the pain of life's struggles.

But they are still a country with its own history of violence and mythology, and it comes to return with a vengeance in the form of Thor, brought to unlife as a ghost. Despite what some comic book publishers and their film studios would have one believe, the Thor of Norse mythology is far from that of a noble hero...

...and especially not so after the work of Demon Phantom and his subordinates have done to create this particular ghost. Wielding its mighty hammer of Mjlornir, the ghost of Thor smashed its hammer against the ground, sending all of Norway into a massive earthquake.

Flying up to the sky, the ghost once again raised its hammer to call upon the clouds to congregate and cast lightning on the ground, striking various people on the ground with bolts of electricity that cooked them in place where they stood; slaughtering them where the earthquake did not.

A land which has finally found the blueprint for peace has had its own past catch up on it again, laying waste to the progress made.


It might seem cliche and repetitive to describe so many gods controlling weather and lightning, making the ground shake at their behest, but perhaps it is something in the human collective consciousness that creates these many gods with powers that come from the sky and shake the ground; to create deities that control that which they cannot reach and change the very home they have made on the ground.

But there are many who make worship of nature and its changes as merely a cycle that does not end, a process that simply is without benevolence or malevolence, and to be something that merely 'is', to be respected and treated as a higher power above human control and worthy of worship.

Such is the faith of religions such as Druidism, a belief system more complex than most other mainstream religions. Sharing a worship of nature like Pagans, they do not hold any centrally agreed upon concept for a god or gods, not even set on agreeing on 'god' or 'goddess', carrying something of a decentralized faith in a higher deity.

It was a challenge to create such a being to use on the land of the belief's origin, Ireland, but one ghost has been successfully created to represent most of the core beliefs of the Druidist faith. This ghost can only be called a Druid itself, and it has come to wreak destruction on the Emerald Isle.

Appearing before the Irish people, the ghost of the Druid, an androgynous, white-robed, long-haired mystic, reached its control over nature itself, seeping into the dirt and plants below the ground. Coming at the ghost's beckoning, nature began to take back the cities which were built over what was once a natural progression of life, starting with trees coming out from the ground to retake what was theirs.

Toppling buildings from the bottom up, trees and plants began to overtake not only the city itself, but also the people in it. Branches, vines, and grass all alike began to reach out and grab the fleeing people, drawing them into the plants they shot out from and began feeding off their bodies, repurposing their life to nourish their own.

Those who fled away from the growth of the plants were not so lucky to live, for the ghost of the Druid still kept its eye on them. Extending its control over water, it drained all the liquid from the bodies of the fleeing humans, draining their bodies of all fluids and leaving them to become petrified husks, killing them.

That extracted water was then fed into the growing plants, giving them more nutrients to grow and blossom over the city.


The continent of Australia is another of many islands that carry its own folklore of worshiping nature, and happens to have their beliefs only slightly more made aware of due to their populations being connected to the global community. Their beliefs have been held by their native population, the Aboriginals, told in stories called Dreamtime.

Unlike the Druids which carry no one specific deity, the Aboriginals have carried a shared belief in a creature called the Rainbow Serpent, a being that, as its name would imply, is a large snake whose scales carry the colors of the rainbow on it. It has been given many different names by the various tribes on the continent, but they all fundamentally agree on this one deity nonetheless.

It has fallen out of public awareness by the prisoner population of England who have settled on this island continent many years ago, but it has been awakened once again like many other gods on Earth. The Rainbow Serpent has been called both a creator and destroyer in its time...

...but it is not so hard to guess what role it shall play alongside the other gods it has been released with.

Tunneling under the ground, the ghost of the Rainbow Serpent began to give rise to mountains, decimating the architecture of many cities in an instant. Easily it slithered beneath the ground, caring little for where it went, but its path had left massive property damage and irreparable destruction to the metropolitan areas above it, showing that no human city can withstand the whims of a god.

But there is a lesson to be learned in this destruction.

This god, like many others, has the images of the snake and the rainbow as part of its depiction, and it is credited as the sole creator of the universe. It seems that human beings look to those creatures which are the least like itself to depict its higher beings, and natural phenomena which stimulates the eyes the most pleasantly to be deemed a creator of their universe...

...but, at the end of the day, the concept is still merely a concept, and it can be corrupted to destroy kin and all human kin alike.


Without the Fenton Family or the United States Ecto Corps to assist them in their invasion from the gods, the nations of Earth are forced to scrap together what passes for an anti-ghost military in their countries, and hope that it will serve enough to repel the threat and save them from certain destruction.

To rely on science so quickly and desperately is too little and too late for most of their lands as it is, but it is better late than never that they come to their senses and to objective reality to save themselves. Sending planes, tanks, infantry, and whatever they can towards the gods, they attempt to destroy what their pasts have created.

But their war against the gods is one that hangs with too many imbalances to be called a proper battle. In between the specialized science used by Demon Phantom, put together by the greatest minds all across the globe, and the militaries battling these gods woefully unprepared for a global attack of this kind...

...the end result of the counter-offensive is akin to a tribe of Bushmen throwing spears at a U.F.O. and hoping the U.F.O. will go away.

Still full of vengeance as preprogrammed by the God Machines which created them, the ghosts struck back against the armies of their former nations, laying waste to hard-trained soldiers and warriors bred for the sole purpose of defending their country at all costs.

Whether by lightning or some other force of nature, by fire or some other force of energy, by ectoplasm or some other force of supernature, no human stood against the gods and lived. All together did the armies fall; tanks and planes exploding, soldiers burned to ash or ripped to pieces, and the countries they swore allegiance to left to left defenseless and doomed.

These sights all and more are what President Ellis Robertson currently views at the Pentagon, as well as much of the rest of the world, moments before they are destroyed as well. Believing that the worst consequence to his actions would have been having to live with a nuclear fallout and souls permanently lost, he is instead given a loss and trauma that no amount of time could ever heal, even after his death.

And as the roof to the Pentagon came off above their heads, he found that would be sooner than later. Above the opened roof of the Pentagon was Demon Phantom floating above the building, holding in his hands the missile which was sent towards Fenton City, now deprived of its Ectoranium warhead.

Though without its component of Ectoranium, it still served its purpose as a missile, which would be put to use soon by Demon Phantom to return the attack to the attackers. The death will be a quick one that will give President Robertson the escape from the guilt of his own actions...

...but no one in their right mind would willingly give thanks for this annihilation, even when brought so low.

"Sorry, honey. I didn't care for the present. Hope you kept a receipt!" Demon Phantom taunted.

Throwing the missile towards the president and his aides, the bomb detonated without its warhead, sending both the Pentagon and the surrounding area of Washington, D.C. ablaze, destroying and incinerating the capital city of the United States of America and destroying what remained of a centralized government.

Ellis Robertson is dead.

Stepping out from the flames of the capital city, Demon Phantom looked on from the destructoin with a smile. At last has his plan been implemented, at last is the planet Earth one step closer to being fully killed, and not one human soul will remain, just as it was once before, but better than ever.

And he knows in his heart that, even with Danny Phantom returning, that he will pose no true threat.

"Try and save the world if you want, Danny. There's nothing you can do to undo what I've accomplished. I've already won." Demon Phantom said.

[Soundtrack Cue End]


There is nothing for the residents of Vlad Manor to watch, no more broadcast to give to give them a glimpse into the apocalypse that currently sweeps the Earth. Instead, all they are given from the television is a display of SMPTE color bars and a singular tone, showing a lack of signal from any available network.

The lack of image only feeds further into the imaginations of the group as to what destruction carries on, giving each and every person and ghost present terrible visions of people dying without a savior to come for them. The only one who can hope to fight against these artificial gods is with them and has all the means to face them and save the planet as he has always done...

...but he can no longer bring himself to fight any longer, and all Danny Phantom chooses to do is sit and silently lament about it.

His apparent inaction is cause for concern for Jazz and Danielle; having fought so hard to help him retrieve his powers once again, it is not in their interest nor any others' to see their efforts wasted, and they immediately come to him in the hopes of encouraging him to start the fight.

"Well, what are you sitting there for, Danny? We gotta get out there and kick some ghost butt. Why are you just sitting there like you already lost?" Jazz asked.

Danny's response is delayed by the despair and hollowness felt inside his heart, coming soon with the eventual utterance of...

"What's the point?" Danny asked.

Hearing a response of nihilism given from their brother, the sisters gasped at Danny's dismissal of the situation, feeling their confusion met with anger.

"Damn it, Danny, is it this again with Jazz being a ghost? So what if she's a ghost? She's still your sister, she can fight with you, she's already been doing that!" Danielle shouted.

"You don't understand. I can't win." Danny said.

The next response brought back silence once again, but the anger is this time quelled to curiosity yet again.

"What do you mean, you can't win? They're just ghosts like any other, you've fought ghosts all the time and won!" Jazz said.

"No. You saw what I saw. Those things weren't ghosts like any other. Pariah Dark wasn't even that powerful. Vlad wasn't that powerful. Even Demon Phantom isn't that powerful. I don't know what he did to make them that strong, but there's no way I can fight them on my own. Or with any of you." Danny said.

"That doesn't mean we can't at least try, Danny. People are counting on us." Danielle said.

"You know what people were counting on me to get the job done, Danielle? My family. And I couldn't save them. Demon Phantom killed them all, and I couldn't stop him. Just him alone, he was able to kill everyone I ever knew and loved in seconds. And if those things really are as powerful as him, then there's nothing I can do. Hell, there's not even any family of my own to fight for."

"What about me, Danny? I'm right here, and I'm fighting with you." Jazz said.

"And what about Mom and Dad? Or Sam? Or our own baby? Why did just you have to come back and no one else?"

The implication of Danny's question made Jazz believe that she was unworthy of returning, and her presence did him no favors, making her retract away in shame of her perceived slight. Recognizing his mistake, Danny quickly took hold of Jazz's ghost and held her, hoping to relieve the pain of the unintended message.

"No, no, Jazz. I don't mean it like that. I mean... Why couldn't they come back, too? Why is it that the rest of us didn't come back and stick together? Like a family's supposed to do? Why'd they have to leave us?" Danny asked.

"I don't know, Danny. I just don't know. Believe me, if I had a choice between them or me to come back, I would've chose them. I know you need them, too." Jazz said.

"It's just that I can't do this without them. For years, we've always been a team together; fighting any ghosts that come our way, we send them back to the Ghost Zone, and we save the day. We were the best at it. We did it together. And now they're gone, and I can't fight with them anymore. I can't do it."

Vlad Plasmius is well aware that the ghosts of Jack and Maddie Fenton have materialized far from their present location, having assisted in the recreation of Danny's soul, so he knows that they have returned, and knows why they have returned, so, as part of Clockwork's plan, he has decided to step in and share the information necessary to bring them forth.

"I have something of a theory that might be able to help. Something that can bring them back to us. It's something called 'sending'." Vlad said.

Intrigued by Vlad's comment, Danny turned to him to listen, anticipating a more detailed explanation to his vague suggestion.

"What are you talking about?" Danny asked.

"It's something of a form of telepathy that exists between extremely bonded individuals. The metaphysics of the concept says that, if two individuals are connected enough in personality, environment, or emotional significance, they can begin to sense one's sense of need from the other, and it beckons them to come." Vlad said.

"Oh, yeah? And where'd you hear this idea from?"

"Something we were tossing around back in college. Test results for this connection came the strongest between pregnant mothers and their unborn children. It might have something to do with basic human need to congregate and cooperate with one another to survive, and it most likely was strongest in between family members, due to genetic significance. Perhaps it was some ancient communication method before human beings developed language."

"And how exactly does this weird idea of yours fit in with bringing my family back?"

"Because I think that's what you did to bring back Jazz, and I think you can use it to bring back your parents."

The concept at last began to take root of interest in Danny's mind, making him pay closer attention to make the plan work.

"How did you come to that conclusion?" Danny asked.

"Like I said, the tests were strongest between pregnant women and their babies. A human baby is a vulnerable creature with no way to fend for itself and constantly requires help, and moreso in the womb. The communication method was supposedly a mean of the fetus signalling to its mother for a specific need, usually for a specific nutrient it required to grow." Vlad said.

"Oh, so you want me to bring back my parents by giving them pregnancy cravings. Awesome. Great plan, Vlad."

"Just listen, Danny. The idea is that the communication works only between another individual who is deemed significant enough for the specific emotional or physical need. It was strongest with mothers and children because mothers are the primary source of nourishment and support for any child to recognize immediately. When you were laying in the garbage after you were thrown from Fenton City, what were you thinking of?"

Danny's mind went back to his moment of desperation and felt once again the pain and cold and need he felt then, in turn remembering what was needed to resolve the need and fulfill the desire. As he felt the emotion once again, Jazz's ghost began to light up brighter than before, which the group took immediate notice to.

"I was thinking of... somebody who would take care of me. Who would help me." Danny said.

"And that was Jazz's job for a long while instead of Maddie's, am I correct?" Vlad asked.

"...Yes."

"So it was that need for her which brought her back. All you need to do now is try to focus that need and call on the rest of your family. Try to feel that need and apply it towards them."

Uncertainty is the feeling at the forefront of Danny's mind rather than need, unable to fully grasp how to apply the emotion to another.

"But... how do I do that?" Danny asked.

"Try your best to focus on them. Try to picture them just like you knew them. Like they're right in the room with us. Think of every feeling that you associate with them." Vlad said.

"I'll... I'll give it a try."

Closing his eyes, Danny placed his thoughts solely on his family, trying to create a perfectly-formulated mental image of the group in his head. Jack Fenton, Maddie Fenton, and Sam Manson Fenton are all in his mind and heart, and all thoughts and emotions relative to his relatives.

At first, there are thoughts of joy and peace within, remembering the connection he shared with them as a family, but they soon are overshadowed by horror and pain.

He remembers how Demon Phantom tore apart each of them, beginning with his pregnant wife, going so far as to split her at the belly to tear her from her own child; no, their own child. He remembers each and every attack inflicted on them, how each of them were killed in their uniquely brutal and disgusting ways, taking images of joy and belonging and tearing them apart.

The trauma behind the thoughts are too much for Danny to bear, and he shook his head at the thoughts with tears from his eyes.

"I can't. I can't do it. All I see is how they died. All I see is them dying." Danny cried.

"Don't give up, Danny. You've got to focus on them." Vlad said.

"NO! I don't want anymore! I don't want the pain! I don't want the suffering! I don't want it anymore!"

"Then don't focus on that. Think of all the good that they've brought you before, and how that made you feel back then. Think of the days you had together that you felt were perfect. Just imagine them as perfect as you think they are, or how imperfect you think they are. Just think of them."

Taking Vlad's new directions, Danny once again focused his thoughts towards the sole subject of his family. His thoughts were instead placed not on the final moments in which they passed, but the many moments of his life in which they played a highlight, remembering the times in which they brought him joy.

These memories, thankfully, are plentiful and helpful through and through, abundant and bright enough to wash away the pain of having them taken away and instilling the happiness from which they were alive, making him feel as if they never did perish at all.

He remembers the many times in which he was but a youth, cared for by parents. He was but a small and vulnerable creature then, full of wonder and dreams and imagination, and dependent only on them to survive. The love and support they give him is rivaled only by Jazz Fenton, playing a motherly role herself when the need had risen.

But even with her service provided in this regard, there is nothing that can take away or substitute the support given by his true parents. Every moment of weakness which they tended to, every moment of hunger which they fed him in response, every moment of need which they gave him comfort and support when needed are all in his mind, feeling again the emotions he felt during those key moments.

These moments are true and pure in his heart, but they are not the only moments that he thinks of, and not the only subjects that he keeps his focus on. There is still another human emotional connection that has the potential to form, and it is done with those outside of one's own family to form.

This connection is the feeling of romantic love, and it is shared with the woman named Sam Manson Fenton. She was a girl that Danny had come to grow up with as a friend, and come to call a worthy teammate when they had began their career of hunting and fighting ghosts.

Moreover, she would come to be called his wife as well, engaging himself with her at the tender age of 14. The vow made then is but a promise that bides with 4 more years' time, and finally consummated into the most sacred of vows down the aisles of a wedding chapel.

All of these moments conjured up again are enough to bring a smile to his face, allowing him to relive these highlights of his life for a moment to relieve his pain.

And in that self-made therapy, the souls that he sought to conjure up finally start to arrive, and themselves will live again.

A series of bright lights of ectoplasmic energy began to formulate in the room, constellating into human-like forms and taking distinct and individual shapes. One is recognizable large, portly male, and the other are two female figures, with one slightly taller than the other.

Danny can recognize each shape and the person they mean to represent, and one by one they come into form and being:

Jack Fenton, his father...

Maddie Fenton, his mother...

...and Sam Manson Fenton, his wife.

To see them before him once again after their deaths invokes a feeling too high and ecstatic to describe, making tears begin to fall from his eyes. Likewise, the ghosts of the Fentons are in turn joyous to see the jewel of their family once again, all responding to him with a happy approval of a silent smile.

Overjoyed and filled to the brim with emotions, there is no need for words from either them or Danny, and the latter making all the response needed by rushing up to the group and responding with a firm hug. Jack and Maddie Fenton are the two initial recipients of his affection, reciprocating a loving hug from Danny, each sharing their own tears with each other, but their embrace is only temporary and short to last.

For they know that the majority of his affections are intended for and most needed with his wife, which the ghosts of the elder Fentons do not dare interfere in. Taking the embrace they needed from their son, they both stepped aside to allow the husband and wife to reunite.

And reunite they do, immediately taking to a loving embrace and kiss with one another. Vowing to stay together until death do them part, Danny and Sam transcend the vow to one deeper than mortal term limits, holding and kissing each other in an embrace which carries over from their love to love beyond death itself.

Jack and Maddie Fenton, again, stay aside and let the lovers be, instead choosing to watch and smile on the sight, knowing that their son is happy and vicariously enjoy the fulfillment he now feels by watching it. The sight reminds them much of their own marriage, and they hold one another's hands at the sight.

Vlad is another member of the party that watches on the sight, taking in his own degree of pride at the sight. He has only recently discovered that he is the biological father of Danny Fenton, and, in his own way, acted much as a parent to him by posing as a rival, a challenge to overcome and grow to fight against, and he begins to find the new emotion a pleasant surprise to feel.

But below the surface of the emotion, he knows that he does not deserve the pride nor joy. The way in which he had sired Danny was done against the will of the mother, and made his legal father a cuckold, raising a child without knowing the child was not his own flesh and blood.

Disgusted with himself, Vlad turned away, closing his eyes to the sight.

His self-inflicted punishment is once again put to an end by Jack and Maddie; the former placing a hearty hand on his back, and the latter grasping his hand. Both give him smiles that both offer forgiveness and encouragement, the two recognizing that there was still the potential to change and improve himself.

For one moment, Vlad ended his own punishment, breathing out one sigh of relief.

The sight and its implications are lost on Danny and Sam, for they are too focused on one another to keep their attention on anything else. Just like anyone madly in love, the rest of the world and its people become unimportant, and the only world they can conceive is each other.

However, with more pressing matters on their hands, even this refuge comes to an end, and the two come to speak at last.

"I missed you." Danny said.

"I missed you, too." Sam said.

There is an urge to lean forward and continue what they had started, which Danny gave into, but Sam did not, gently pushing him away to continue their conversation.

"Hold it, cowboy. As much as I'd like to continue that, we have more important things on our hands right now. You need to stop Demon Phantom and the gods, not to mention the other ghosts he's working with. That's why you brought us back, isn't it?" Sam said.

"I know. But I need this. It was hard, being out there alone and not having you. Seeing you die, it was... Oh, god, it was so horrible... I'm sorry I couldn't save you. I'm sorry I couldn't..." Danny cried.

Unable to finish his sentence, even when it was a mere repeat of the last one he spoke, Danny fell to his knees, crying as he held his wife's arms. Continuing to support her husband even after her passing, Sam held his head next to her torso and stroked his head, running her hands through his hair.

"Shh. Don't worry, Danny. I'm here now. I came back because of you." Sam said.

"But I couldn't bring back... I couldn't bring back... I couldn't..." Danny stammered.

Disgusted by the very thought of his perceived failure, he placed his hand across her womb, lamenting over the life lost in it.

"We were going to be a family. He took that from me. I didn't even get to see our child. My child." Danny said.

"Don't speak too soon, Danny. You've still got the chance right here." Sam said.

Phasing her hand into her own belly, Sam began pulling something out of her corporeal form, keeping it unseen in her closed hand. Placing her hand before Danny, she slowly opened it, revealing in it a small blue orb, resembling something like a miniature planet.

The action in which the object was retrieved is enough to explain what it was, but Danny, never before seeing anything of the kind of sight seeing, could not bring himself to accept the reality before him. Gently lowering the orb into his hand, Sam allowed him to hold it for himself, feeling the energy it emitted.

"I-Is this...?" Danny gasped.

"It's a human soul, in its purest, most basic form. It hadn't fully developed to take on an identity or a ghost like you and me, but it's that potential to be anything that starts here. I could feel it since the beginning, but I never had the chance to see it until I died. Now, you can, too, and you can know what it's like to hold it." Sam said.

Feeling potential and infinite possibility in the miniature, undeveloped soul, Danny began to find himself elated at the sight of his unborn child, picturing all the ways in which the child could have grown and the different people it could have been, beginning to imagine many different futures that could have, or, rather, in his mind, should have been.

Even though there still laid the pain of the child not knowing true life and fulfilling none of these possibilities, Danny is nonetheless thankful to have the chance to feel the potential in his hands, and gave the small soul a press to his chest before returning it to its mother, who in turn placed it back in the womb.

"Now, come on. Enough feeling mopey. You gotta keep fighting. There's plenty of futures like that for people out there, and they need us to stop the bad guys trying to take that away. You've got everybody you need with you to do that." Sam said.

Finally, there is at last courage and strength in Danny Fenton to rise again, which he does at the order of his wife. He knows that there is a world depending on him to save it, and only he and those around him now are the only ones who can do it, carrying the knowledge and skills needed to defeat the ghost-gods...

...but he also knows that there is still one more person needed to help reach that goal.

"Not yet, I don't." Danny said.

Once again does Danny focus his thoughts on another, attempting to conjure one final soul to assist in the final battle to commence. He knows that, for all the adventures and battles he has faced against the undead, there is another who has helped in the fight to provide him the assistance needed to succeed, and it is him that he places his thoughts onto now.

And soon does the next member of the party arrive, coming to the existence of immaterial form as the ghost of Tucker Foley, former President of the United States.

Expiring hours ago at the hands of Demon Phantom, leaving behind many regrets and a friendship broken by careers and politics, he has now been called upon by Danny Fenton to redeem himself for all his sins, and assist in defeating the enemy that took away his chance to do the right thing in life.

Coming to form as a ghost, he is immediately greeted by a stern but friendly Danny Fenton, looking on him with a cocky smile.

"Danny." Tucker said.

"Mr. President." Danny said.

"Former president. I've recently been put out of office, and the third president in history to be assassinated."

"Well, the next guy just made number four, so it looks like you're back on the clock. Your country needs you right now, and so does just about every other one on the planet. Are you up for the challenge?"

"Hey, man. I've been waiting for this moment since I entered politics. All you had to do was ask."

Gaining yet another ally for the battle, Danny grabbed Tucker's hand in a firm handshake, making an official pact with him for the job to come. While shaking the hand of his best friend, Tucker took notice to a young woman in their party who bore a strong resemblance to him, even donning a costume the same as him.

"Uh, Danny? Question. Who's the girl who looks exactly like you?" Tucker asked.

Looking back to Danielle, the person in question, Danny wrapped his arm around her in a side-hug, as if presenting her like a prideful family member.

"Danielle, meet Tucker. Tucker, meet Danielle. My little sister." Danny said.

Having many identity issues throughout her short, artificial life as his clone, Danielle has never even fathomed becoming a member of the family of her genetic source material, but the wild possibility has nonetheless come true in this recent journey she has taken with Danny and Jazz, coming to respect and even love them as her family members.

To hear Danny loudly and proudly proclaim her as his sister is a confirmation that brings her great joy, and puts a large smile on her face.

The moment is warm and happy, but the state of the world as it stands is in a shape far from the sweet feelings shared here and now; a fact that the Fentons and friends all understand, calling them to battle. The first to speak out the need for action is Jack Fenton, loudly shouting out...

"Hey, everybody! We've got a world being destroyed here! We don't have time for all this touchy-feely moments! We've got gods to destroy!" Jack said.

"Relax, Dad. They're not gods. They're still just ghosts." Danny said.

Calling on a familiar trigger in his body, a newly-mutated mechanism for changing his physical form to an ethereal one, a pair of rings appeared from his midriff, each moving in opposite directions and transforming his body to that of his ghost's, coming to form once again as the world-reknowned superhero...

...Danny Phantom.

"And hunting ghosts is the family business." Danny said.