Dan hummed in thought as he looked over his final opponent.
Rogue.
"Come on, sweetheart." Dan taunted. "Give me your best shot."
Rogue immediately punched Dan into a wall. "Is that good enough for you?" Her confidence turned to fear as she saw Dan charge at her before throwing her to the ground. He sent several ecto-blasts at her, but Rogue rolled out of the way.
She got to her feet as several guns and blasters popped out of her armor as she fired upon Dan. As Dan tried to avoid the shots, Rogue flew up and kicked him, sending him back down.
The southern belle wasn't done, as she landed on his chest quite violently, making him cough up some ectoplasm as Rogue started to punch him repeatedly.
"Not so tough now, are you?" Rogue teased as she started to unload all of her frustrations on Dan.
The dark phantom grabbed both of her fists and groaned in pain as she was wearing a Spector Deflector, but he managed to push her off as he got to his feet.
"Not bad, Rogue." Dan said as he wiped off some ectoplasm from his mouth. "I can see why Danny chose you, though personally, I think he can do a whole lot better."
"Shut up!" Rogue roared as she tried to hit him, but he kept moving out of the way. "You don't know diddly squat about what we have. You know nothing about love. You got rid of that and everything that was good about you, and you don't even seem to realize how bad it is."
"I am perfection itself." Dan boasted.
"Perfect? You're only half of a person. And not even the good half." Rogue said, reminded of the time she and the others had to deal with Phantom and his attitude. "You're incomplete, and you're too far gone to even see it."
"And how is that a bad thing?" Dan replied. "I seemed to recall you liking the way that his ghost half kissed you." He smirked as he thought of a way to mess with her. "Though I can oblige you if you so desire." He let out his tongue as it licked Rogue's face, making her squirm in revulsion as she tried to break out of his grip.
"What's wrong, Rogue?" Dan mocked. "Getting cold feet?" He was about to lick her again when Rogue bit his tongue as his eyes widened in pain before Rogue let go and pushed him off her.
Dan writhed around on the floor at what Rogue did to him.
"What's wrong, Dan?" Rogue asked as she wiped off his saliva. "Cat got your tongue?"
"You called for me, your highness?" Oracle asked as she appeared in front of her queen.
"Yes, Oracle." Lilandra gestured to Danny. "I need you to access his mind and stir him out of his coma. Earth is in danger, and the X-Men need our help." Lilandra showed Oracle the previous footage of Dan fighting the X-Men.
Oracle gasped as she recognized Dan. "It's him!"
This caught Lilandra's attention. "You know him?"
"He's the one that destroyed Apocalypse." Oracle explained. "My fellow psychics and I managed to trap him in the Astral Plane, but now he is free. He must be stopped."
"Agreed." Lilandra said as she pointed to Danny. "And he is the only one who can do it."
Oracle tried to enter Danny's mind, but his shields were keeping her out.
"His mind is strong." Oracle informed her queen. "It may take some time to break through his mind."
"Time is the one thing we don't have, Oracle." Lilandra stated. "You must hurry!"
Dan's tongue healed as he gave Rogue a look that promised pain. "You are so going to die for that." He was about to fire a ghost ray at her when Rogue somersaulted into his stomach, knocking him down.
"Come on, big boy!" Rogue teased him. "Let's dance!" She fired her guns at Dan, making him stumble a bit, and then grabbed him by the arm and threw him over her shoulder.
Rogue shook her head. "You need to do better than that if you want to keep up with this girl." She grabbed him by the shoulder. "You want a lady to get bored with you, now would you?" She headbutted him before throwing him back to the ground and aiming a kick at his crotch, but her foot felt pain when it made contact.
As she grimaced, Dan took this opportunity to grab her ankle and swing her around.
"You want to dance, then be my guess, sweet cheeks." Dan said. "But I must warn you, I'm a bit rough with my dance partners." He swung her around before throwing her into a wall.
"No wonder you're still single." Rogue muttered as she got up, ignoring her injuries.
Dan shook his head as he saw that Rogue wasn't going to stay down. "You got guts, Anna Marie. I can respect that."
"Don't you call me that!" Rogue snarled at this monster using her real name.
"Oh, I'm sorry." Dan apologized insincerely. "What do you want me to call you? How about Possum?" He said the last word in a perfect imitation of Cody's voice.
"Shut up!" She fired at Dan, but he put up a shield to block her shots.
"What's wrong, Possum?" Dan continued in Cody's voice. "Don't you want to run off and explore the world? Just like we said we would."
"Stop talking!" Rogue now ran up and started pummeling his shield with her bare fists.
"Don't you dare talk to your father like that, you little freak!" Dan scolded in her father's voice.
"You're not my father!" Rogue shouted.
Dan waved his finger as if he were a parent scolding a child. "Now, now, Rogue." He now spoke in Mystique's voice. "You shouldn't get yourself worked up before your mission now. Remember, we need to get that jet."
Rogue managed to break through the shield. "Be quiet, you monster!"
"Monster?" Dan repeated in Carol's voice. "The only monster here is you. Or did you forget what you did to me?"
"Stop it!" Rogue was about to fire at Dan when he waved his hand, and all the blasters sticking out of her armor broke off. Dan then ripped off her Spector Deflector and smacked her in the face as she fell to the ground, her lip bleeding.
"You are strong physically." Dan stated. "But let's see how strong your mind is." He then possessed her as Rogue tried to fight him off.
"Now, Danny, it's time to merge your halves together." Jazz told him as he was inspecting the heart and the core.
"You think this will be permanent?" Danny asked his friends. "Will I no longer be able to switch between my forms?"
"No." Sam answered. "Clockwork said that this would only allow you another transformation, which only occurs in a heat of the moment kind of thing."
Danny nodded. "Well, with Dan now on the loose, this is the perfect moment to test it out. And with nothing holding me back, I can do this." He took hold of the two as he fought against the force pushing them apart.
"You can do it, Danny!" Sam cheered.
"You got this little brother!" Jazz added.
"I know you can do this, dude." Tucker said.
Rogue found herself in some forest as she looked beside her to see Cody back when he was thirteen years old.
"Cody?" She asked as she looked down at herself to see she was younger as well.
Cody was ignoring her as he looked at the moon. "The moon sure is pretty tonight. You ever been kissed, girl?" He asked her.
"Cody, what's going on?" Rogue demanded.
"Just shut up and kiss me!" Cody ordered as his hair ignited into flames and his eyes turned red.
"Dan!" She cried as Dan pushed her against a tree and tried to kiss her, before Rogue pushed him off as she ran away. Dan chased her through the forest as she spotted her old home.
Reaching it, she slammed the door shut as she could hear Dan clawing at it, demanding to be let in.
"Little bitch, little bitch, let me in!" He demanded in a cruel mocking voice. He kept going at it for several minutes before the banging stopped, and Rogue could hear footsteps walking away.
Sighing in relief that the monster was gone, she relished the quietness before a buzzing sound entered her ears. Turning around, she identified the source of the buzzing noise. It was static that was coming from a television.
Her eyes drifted from the television to the chair that was in front of it. Rogue found herself unable to move as the chair slowly started to turn around. There, facing her for the first time in ten years, was her own father. She was struck silent by how time seemed to affect him.
He still wore the same clothes that she saw him wear before she left. The same old bright green shirt with the hat sporting the United States flag proudly on the front. What caught her attention was the state that he was in. All his flesh and blood were rotting away, leaving nothing but the bare skeleton that was underneath his clothes. His head was facing down, making it look like he was staring at the floor.
Approaching him slowly, Rogue reached out for his skull with a shaky hand. Bring his face up to her level. She was greeted with his eyes, or where his eyes used to be. The beady eyes of her father that once stared at her in disgust were gone. There were just two big black holes of nothingness leading straight into his skull. At first, they reminded Rogue of dark tunnels before she stated seeing maggots crawling their way out.
Letting out a yell of fright, Rogue started to back up as she tried to think about what happened. What happened to her father?
As if hearing her thoughts, her father's skeleton lifted its head to stare back at its former child. With a struggle, he began to open his jaw, and Rogue could see some black goo that was inside his mouth hanging out from the top. As he started to move his jaw up and down, as if trying to practice the art of speech, Rogue couldn't help but be disgusted at what she was seeing. It looked like the skeleton was chewing some gum.
"You!" He cried in a hoarse voice as dry as sandpaper. Yet it sent shivers down Rogue's spine. "Why are you here?" He asked. "I thought I told you that you're not welcome here. Why can't you listen? Why can't you do anything right?"
Rogue was shocked beyond words that she was having a conversation with her father. In a timid voice, she asked, "Daddy, is...is it really you?"
Silence filled the room as the skeleton did nothing but stare into Rogue's soul for what felt like hours. After an eternity of neither of them making a sound, her father made the first move. "You're not my daughter, not anymore."
"But Daddy-"
"You must go. This is no longer your home. I am not your father. I will not be the father of some freaky mutant."
"Daddy, it's still me. I'm still your little girl." Rogue pleaded as the tears returned. Why couldn't he see that she was still the same?
"Leave me." With his words towards his daughter finished, the chair turned back around to face the television. When Rogue turned it back around, the chair was no longer occupied by her father but instead by a different familiar face.
"CODY!" Rogue cried out in shock. Right before her eyes was her old boyfriend Cody, but now he was as dead and decrypted as her father. Looking into Rogue's eyes of disbelief, he grinned, or what she felt was a grin. Since he was nothing but bones, you really couldn't tell if he was smiling or not.
"Possum, you came back for me." He said with joy coating every syllable. Although it was hard to detect it with the same type of skeleton voice that he had.
"Cody, sugar, what happened to you?" Rogue blurted out. At those words, it seemed like someone flipped a switch in Cody. As his mood turned a full 360 degrees.
"What happened to me?" He barked in a voice that showed he was holding back every single feeling of rage that was in his heart. "What happened to me? You, of all people, should know what happened. After all, you were the one who did this to me. Remember, you put me in a coma and let those aliens take me away."
"Cody, I'm sorry. I didn't know that this would happen."
"You did this to me. You hurt me just like you did to Carol. You always cause misery everywhere you go." He stated in an accusing voice.
"No, that isn't true." Rogue said, but it didn't sound convincing to Cody or to herself, for that matter. "I made mistakes, but I've changed. I'm with the X-Men now."
"Oh, please, do you really think that you're some hero now?" He asked sarcastically. "No, you're not a hero; you're just some bitch who's never good enough for anyone and always causes misery."
"What? No, I'm not." Rogue protested. "I'm not a bad person."
"Then why are you alone? Where are your friends, your family, your lover?" Cody challenged.
"I do have friends; they're the X-Men, and they're my family as well." Rogue said passionately.
"Really?" Cody's corpse asked in a rhetorical tone. "Then why do you always have to make sure that you're always covered up around them? How do you know they feel the same way?"
Rogue had a response, but before she could say it, she faltered. Did the others feel the same about her? Was she their friend and teammate? Or was she just a person that they kept around for her powers? No, this was ridiculous. Her teammates cared about her, and they proved it time and time again.
"They do care. They always cared about me." She replied in a tone of finality.
"Which you are you talking about?" Cody jokingly asked. "You got six million people in that noggin of yours. Which one is the real you, huh?" As he finished his words, Rogue noticed that they weren't in her old house anymore. The warm brown color of the walls slowly shifted until it was a cold, lifeless white. All around her, the world changed, from her childhood home to a new location.
There were dark hallways all around her. They were so long that they seemed more like tunnels. An endless road with no destination in sight.
Her mind was pleading with her not to keep moving, but her body seemed to have a mind of its own as she floated down the corridor. As she glided through the sea of darkness, her ears were bombarded by voices. Millions upon millions of voices. Old voices, young voices, sad voices, angry voices, desperate voices. Their tones were all different, but together, they communicated a single thing that they desired. To be released from this so-called prison.
"Let us out!" The voices continued screaming, growing louder with every second that they were forced to stay in here. The intensity of their demands caused Rogue to clutch her head in pain, as if all those in her head were striking the edges of her skull with their fists.
"Stop it!" Rogue pleaded. "Please! Leave me alone!" She cried, hoping for a little mercy, wanting the assault on her mind to finally be over.
As if some great deity had taken pity on her, the voices were suddenly silenced in an instant. Sighing with relief, the young woman started taking deep breaths in order to calm herself down. The pain was gone. It was over. She was safe. Looking over her surroundings, she was still terrified at the fact that she was still stuck in this dark hallway. Looking towards the end, she saw a white light shining, beckoning her with the promise of safety.
Determined to flee this place, the power-absorbing mutant dashed across the hall. As she got closer and closer to the light, her heart started beating hard as sweat started running down her face. Just a couple of inches away from reaching the light did she feel something tug at her ankle, stopping Rogue in her tracks. Looking behind her, she saw that it was a shadowy black tendril that was wrapped around her leg. Following the dark coil with her eyes, she noticed that it came from the darkness behind her.
"What th-" She was then yanked back as she was being pulled back in the opposite direction. Getting over the surprise, she fought back as she continued to fly towards the light. She was able to prevent herself from being pulled back, but she couldn't move forward one bit. A couple seconds later, another one appeared from the right side of the hallway, gripping her wrist, as another took her other arm from the left side. When the fourth one grabbed her other leg, she felt herself being stretched to her limits. As her arms and legs were being pulled to each side of the hallway, Rogue tried to break free, but even her super strength was no match. Soon, many more of these tendrils started to wrap around the distressed mutant's waist, knees, and shoulders.
"Get off me!" She screamed. Just what the hell was going on, and why was it happening to her?
After a few minutes of endless struggling, Rogue noticed that the walls were slowly closing in on her. No. This couldn't be happening. She can't die like this. Endlessly trying to break out of the tight grip, she couldn't help but grow even more fearful as the walls started to close in around her. Once it got close enough to her appendages, she thought that they would start to crush her. But instead, the walls became some kind of blob-like texture instead of solid brick. The slimly-like substance started running itself all over Rogue's body as she was slowly being consumed by it. She could only stare at the light as the darkness covered her eyes, and everything went all black as she went unconscious.
"Don't worry, Rogue." Mystique's voice assured her. "I'll take good care of you."
A light then shined as Rogue found herself in some kind of military compound. Looking down at herself, she found that she was wearing the same outfit she had when she was with the Brotherhood.
Before she could absorb this, she felt her body move on its own as she moved down the halls.
A flight officer was looking over his clipboard when Rogue came up to him and made a sexy pose. And then her body spoke without her controlling it. "I'm lost. Could you help me?" She placed her hand on his cheek, knocking him out.
Rogue tried to fight against whatever was controlling her body, but it was useless as she got into one of the jets and prepared it for takeoff. "Initiate takeoff procedure now!"
Mystique and Blob entered the compound when Blob noticed someone in the sky. He pointed at the person. "It's Danny Phantom!"
Rogue was in shock that it was Danny here instead of Miss Marvel.
"Well, well, well." Danny said as he looked over the Brotherhood. "If it isn't the Brotherhood of Losers. Did you come here just to get humiliated even further?" He threw Blob through a wall.
Rogue flew the plane out of the compound, with Danny following after her.
Danny caught up to the plane and phased through it. He grabbed Rogue and threw her to the back. He then got into the pilot's seat as he tried to steer the jet back to base.
"Grab him, Rogue!" Mystique ordered her daughter through Rogue's headset.
Her body failed to respond to her command as Rogue grabbed Danny's face.
"What are you doing?" Danny struggled against her hold, as, for some reason, her powers were actually working on him.
Rogue gasped as she felt the energy enter her body. It was too much. "Momma, something's wrong!" She said. "I want to let go."
"No!" Mystique commanded. "Hold on! No matter what!"
"But something's happening, Momma." Rogue said. "I'm scared!"
Mystique refused to listen to Rogue's plea. "Don't let go!"
Rogue, still holding on to Danny, flew out of the plane as it crashed.
The two fell to the ground.
Rogue pushed Danny away and confronted her mother. "Why did I have to hold on, Momma? It felt bad."
Finally, she was given back control of her body as she slapped Mystique for ordering her to hurt her husband.
She then went over to her unconscious husband. "Danny, are you all right? Speak to me, please, sugar!"
A surge of pain shot through her as Rogue felt something happening to her.
"What's going on?" Her body was starting to transform as the pain was too much, making her pass out.
"His shields are lowering!" Oracle said as she tried to reach into his mind. "He must be focusing on something."
"Can you wake him up?" Lilandra asked.
"Yes." Oracle answered.
Danny had almost gotten the core and heart together when he felt something pull him away.
"What? No!" He cried out before it all went to black. He opened his eyes and found himself in some kind of hospital room.
"Where am I?" Danny demanded as he saw Lilandra and Oracle. "Lilandra? What are you doing here? Where am I?"
"You're in the hospital room being tended to." Lilandra told him. "You've been here for a month after coming into contact with Ecto-Ranium. We managed to cure you, and I had Oracle stir you back to consciousness."
"Why?" Danny demanded. "I needed to do something back in my mind."
"My apologies." Lilandra said. "But your help is needed." She gestured to the monitor, which showed Rogue on the arena floor twisting around as she glowed with green energy.
"Rogue!" Danny cried out in worry for his wife.
"Yes, she was fighting some creature that had the same logo as you." Lilandra told him. "Not only that, but there is a ball of energy hovering above your planet." She changed the footage to show just that.
"Oh my god!" Danny exclaimed in worry. He had to get back there now. It didn't matter if he couldn't merge his two halves together; the world needed him. "I got to get back home."
Lilandra nodded as she led him to the area for teleportation. "Good luck, Danny."
Danny soon found himself back at the institute. He immediately went down to the War Room and typed on the computer.
"Cerebro, the footage that's being broadcast, I need you to trace its signal." Danny ordered.
"Transmissions originate from Mojo's world, where the tournament is being held." Cerebro informed him. "Contestants met at Amity Park in order to enter."
"Amity Park?" Danny said. "Of course he would go back there." He left the War Room and headed to the lab, where he went through the ghost portal. He traveled through the Ghost Zone until he found the portal that connected to the ghost portal at Fenton Works.
Entering it, Danny found himself back in his old home, but he didn't bother to reminisce as his wife was in danger.
Phasing through the roof, he saw the crowd gathered in the center of town and moved toward them.
Everyone gasped at seeing Danny was there, but he ignored them as he made his way to the front, where Spiral was.
"Take me to where Dan is, now!" Danny demanded.
Spiral, knowing that it wasn't wise to deny him, opened up a portal for Danny.
"Good luck." She told him. "You're gonna need it."
Slowly opening her eyes and blinking, Rogue was surprised to find out she was lying in bed. Looking around, she saw that she was in a hospital. She even had an I.V. hooked up to her. On the desk were some get-well cards. Grabbing one, she scanned the words, hoping for some clue to what was going on.
Rogue,
Hope you get better soon, because I want to make sure you're at full health when I come for you.
Dan
"The hell is going on?" Rogue said to herself, wondering what was happening when she heard a knock on the door.
"Come in." She said, but whoever was at the other end kept knocking.
"I said come in." Rogue said in a louder voice, but the knocking persisted.
Getting fed up with this, she got up and opened the door, only to find a mirror on the other end. She gasped in fear as she saw her reflection. She looked just like one of those aliens that kidnapped Cody.
She backed up as the mirror started to edge closer to her before she fell back on her bed. This caused a pair of arms to come out of the bed and wrap around the woman as she screamed in fear. Fighting the arms was pointless, as they were too strong, and they ended up pulling her into the bed as she sank in like it was quicksand.
Falling through a void, she screamed as she made contact with the floor. Getting up, she dusted herself off before she realized she was wearing a wedding dress. Taking in her surroundings, she found that she was in a church with several friends and foes in the seats.
Before she could ask any of them what was going on, she looked to her right and screamed at the sight of Dan. He grinned at her as he wore a tuxedo. In front of the two was a demonic-looking creature that reminded her of Kurt.
"Where have you been all my afterlife?" Dan said as he brought her closer to him.
"Get off me!" Rogue yelled as she tried to get out of his grip.
"Azazel, get on with it!" Dan ordered the priest.
"I now pronounce you man and wife; you may now kiss the bride." Azazel said.
Dan smirked as he leaned in for a kiss when Rogue pushed him aside as she tried to leave the church, only to find herself surrounded by the guests.
"Come on, let's get her!" Ms. Marvel said to the others. "Let's see how she likes being trapped here!"
The small army charged at Rogue as she was being beaten. Being hit and kicked all around as some decided to use their powers to inflict even more harm and damage on their supposed warden. The pain was too much, as Rogue started to feel weaker and weaker. If they wouldn't stop, they would kill her.
"Stop... I didn't mean to. I'm sorry." She pleaded as she looked over at Carol, who was in front of her, before she raised a fist and struck Rogue in the face. Blood was seeping out of her mouth as she could feel broken teeth. Carol then put her foot on the side of Rogue's face as she pushed down. Hard.
Rogue couldn't do anything but take the pain. She just wanted it to be over, but it just kept coming. In the distance, she could hear Dan laughing.
"You think you could stop me?" He mocked. "Please. You're not a threat to me. I can see that as clear as day in your mind. Behind the super strength, flight, killer skin, southern attitude, and flirty personality, you're just a scared little girl crying out for someone to love her. It'd be funny if it weren't so pathetic. Oh, what the hell? I'll laugh anyway."
Dan's laugh echoed throughout the church as something caused Rogue to snap. She was done with all of this. All the people in her head. Her past. Her father. Mystique. And more importantly, she was sick of Dan.
In a burst of strength, she pushed all the guests off of her as she found herself back to her normal self, wearing the outfit she brought to the tournament. "I'm done being pushed around." She said to the people in her head. "This is my mind. And rule number one, I'm in charge." She then started to beat them all up and put them in their place until the only opponent left was Dan.
"I'm not letting you take over my mind." Rogue declared as she charged at him and punched him through the walls.
Dan was forced out of Rogue's body as he landed in the audience.
"About time you did something else!" Mojo complained. "We've been sitting here forever, watching her squirm around on the floor as if she were having a seizure. That's not entertaining. We have ratings that need to be raised. So hurry up and do something interesting! My career is on the line!"
Rogue tried to get up, but she found that she was weak from fighting off Dan mentally.
She saw Dan walking toward her slowly as he grabbed her by the throat.
"Oh shit, he's gonna kill Rogue!" Mojo cried in worry. "I need her and Danny to star in my string of romantic comedies." He held up a VHS tape that had Danny and Rogue on the box art.
Dan shook his head. "You were a strong opponent, Rogue. But this is where your story ends. Goodbye."
He was about to finish her off when an ecto-blast threw him aside, forcing him to release Rogue.
Dan got up and snarled at being interrupted from killing Rogue. He got up, and his eyes widened as he saw who the newcomer was.
Danny glared at his ultimate enemy. "Hey, asshole, get away from my wife."