"Are we being detained?" Sam demanded to know. Sure they were in Danny's house in the kitchen, but it definitely felt like they were on trial in some way. The three of them had been brought back to the Fenton household, and brought into the kitchen. The teens were all made to sit down at the table with agents covering the exits. A bowl of incense sat in the center of the table, with sticks two burning at the same time.

There was a third, but when it was put in front of Danny, it immediately went out.

Honestly, Danny appreciated the incense. The smell of rotting flesh still hadn't left his nose from the Lunch Lady, and the house often smelt strange now due to the portal down below them.

"Yes, you are." The agent who had checked Danny's heartbeat gave a solemn nod as he sat across from them. "But not in the way you think. I'm Agent Alpha, we talked on the phone a bit."

"I want a lawyer." Sam interrupted.

Alpha snorted, amused. "Cute, but like I said, not that kind of detained." He placed his hands on the table with his hands folded. "You three just went through something trained agents have troubles with. Not just in dealing with the ghosts, but also in terms of magic. And. Magic. Has. Consequences."

Alpha indicated the agents around the room. "The members of our agency literally give our names, our identities, to the U.S Government for safe keeping, to mitigate damage done to our psyches from dealing with magical events."

He pointed at Sam and Tucker, "And you two seem to be of very sound mind for what you two just went through. Seem to be." Alpha sighed and leaned back. "You're being detained, yes, but you're being monitored. To make sure nothing latched onto you two."

The thought of his friends being injured made ice flow through Danny's veins, and his bones creak like they were being bent. Danny licked his lips. The action mirrored by his ghost form hovering over him, he could feel his tongue passing over long jagged teeth. He tried to ignore what felt like blood pouring out of his mouth as his tongue tore itself on them as it went back into his mouth.

"What about me?" He asked.

Alpha didn't respond. He took in a deep breath through his nose and let it out through his mouth. Sam began to stand up, probably to demand a lawyer, when Alpha finally spoke. "Frankly? Fuck if we know."

The agent shrugged. "You have a heartbeat, you're definitely alive. But you have a corrupted ghost form, I believe your parents are debating on roping in other researchers but…" he shrugged again.

"But what?" Sam demanded, standing up and slamming her hands on the table.

The agent looked at Sam, staring at her until she sat back down. He glanced at the incense, and back at Sam. "Magic is… valuable. And there is a very good chance your parents will want to play this close to their chest. They may not want to risk bringing in another researcher who'd be more interested in cutting you open and seeing how you tick than in your value as a self-aware being."

Tucker gasped as Sam winced. The agent looked back down at the incense again, as Tucker spoke up. "Wait, are you saying there are people out there who'd kill Danny just to study him?"

"The world of magic is a violent one. It's an eternal arms race where knowledge is the greatest weapon we have. We know what poisons work on ghouls because we've studied their anatomy. No ghoul let us do that willingly."

"Ghoul, like a man-eating living dead?" Tucker asked.

The Agent made a so-so gesture with his hand. "Not quite. They aren't living dead, but they do feed on humans. The problem is, up until they're feeding, they look just like regular humans."

Sam put her head in her hands. "Can we stop? I don't want to talk about this anymore. It's making me sick."

The Agent looked down at the incense again. Danny narrowed his eyes. "You've done that multiple times now. What's going on?" Alpha merely raised an eyebrow and Danny pointed at the incense in the center of the table. "You keep glancing at those, what are you guys doing?"

"It's a two-fold spell," Alpha admitted. "It's a calming spell, meant to pacify people. But also, it's a detection spell. If one of several dozen entities were inhabiting you, the incense sticks would be burning faster. Samantha's stick here isn't burning quickly, so she doesn't appear to be possessed, but she's having strong emotional reactions. Which shouldn't be happening."

Sam didn't look up, instead she spoke into her hands. "Is that why my head is burning?" Immediately several of the agents shifted into defensive postures and their hands went to their sides.

Alpha held a fist up, halting their movements. He brought it back down before rubbing his chin. "Burning?" Alpha repeated. He hummed before turning toward one of the agents standing guard. "Agent K, Agent O, remind me. What is the magic you two share?"

"We're bound to fire, sir."

"That's… unfortunate." He turned toward Tucker. "When the device activated all three of you were there, correct?"

"Yeah, uh… it lit up, and then Danny screamed and he fell out, and… well, then we started screaming."

"Interesting…"

"You say interesting, I say excruciatingly painful," Danny said. He leaned back and folded his arms across his chest. Sam winced next to him as if she'd been struck. "What's so-"

Alpha swiped his hand across his neck in a gesture calling for silence. "That's unimportant to the current situation. The current situation is that you three have been only half inducted into our world. There is a lot you don't know, but we'd like to change that."

Alpha held out his right hand. "If you choose, you can all walk away from this. Stop looking into magic, and avoid it. You'll understand more than the average citizen, but you won't be as at risk compared to if you jump into the world of magic." He lifted his other hand up. "On the other hand, you can be fully inducted. You'll know more about what really is going on in the world, and you won't have the wool pulled over your eyes. It'll be dangerous, you've already seen that. But you'll be given tools to survive it."

Danny raised an eyebrow. "I'm being given a choice?"

"Your parents punched a stable hole into an Elsewhere that we don't recognize. We'd rather keep them on our good side."

"Johnny said it was Hell."

"It's definitely not Hell. We've seen that, but I can understand the confusion." Alpha shrugged. He then pointed at Danny, "Additionally, we'd specifically like to offer you, specifically, a job in our agency."

"Me? Aren't I like exactly what you're fighting?"

"You neutralized the ghost attacking your school, and you managed to fight an additional one and capture it. Yes you let it go, but you let it go to neutralize it. Frankly, if it were just our agents involved in this mess, there'd be a body count."

Alpha put his hands on the table. "We wouldn't ask you to make any changes, while our agents give their names to the U.S Government, we wouldn't risk that with you. Something has turned you into an unknown demi-human, one we don't have in any of our record books. Your existence is valuable, even if you never fought another entity. Though we will ask you to."

Tucker frowned. "I thought two a year was considered unusual."

"Two new unknown entities is a lot. The keyword there being new. Our agency is keeping thousands from wreaking havoc. There are also other things that we need to fight..."

Danny sighed. "The thing is, I want to be an astronaut…"

"We should check if you need to breathe in your corrupted form. If you don't, you'd be an amazing asset up there."

Tucker looked up to the ceiling. "Please, tell me the moon isn't haunted."

"It isn't. Not enough life has died up there to haunt it. But after being involved in all this, does it surprise you that there are other types of magical entities out there?"

"So aliens are real?"

"If you can think of something in pop culture, it probably exists in some form or another."

Danny rubbed the back of his head. "Can I think about it?"

"Absolutely," Alpha said, standing up. He reached into his suit and pulled out a business card. "If you wish to work with us, just call this number. If you don't, but still wish to be inducted, you can let your family do it."

Alpha brushed off his suit before folding his hands behind his back. "I hope to hear from you soon." He hesitated at the door, before turning. "Two more things," He pointed at Tucker, "You've proven to have an unnatural resilience. You have an awareness of magic, yet it seems that magic is not quite drawn to you." He then pointed at Sam, "As for you, I recommend going home and trying to forget all this happened." He met Sam's eyes over his sunglasses and held his gaze for just a second before turning and leaving the room.

The agents began to clear out. None of the teens moved until they heard the front door close. Sam reached over and grabbed Danny's hand. "Can we put out that incense, my head hurts."

Danny squeezed her hand before standing up. He grabbed the incense and brought it over to the sink. "Uh," Tucker began, "Should we be doing that? They made it sound like that was making sure we weren't possessed or anything."

Danny chewed on his lip for a second before dumping the incense in the sink and running the water over them. "It's fine. If they were actually worried about it, then they probably wouldn't have left. We probably passed some type of test or something." Danny said as he let the water flow. He stared down at the water as it dragged the sticks of incense down into the drain.

Tucker groaned. "You're gonna do it, aren't you?"

Danny sighed and turned around, leaning against the sink. "Probably. It seems like this is something only I can do."

Tucker let out a puff of air, and slammed his head down on the table. "Fifteen."

"What?"

"You owe me fifteen nasty melts for this." Tucker's voice was muffled by the table. "Look, dude, you're my best friend. And…" he waved his hand about. "Magic is real, and so are monsters. The Lunch Lady didn't care that we weren't involved in this. Like, everything that's happened so far has been because it's been happening despite us. Maybe your parents opening the portal caused all this to come out, but it was all already there.

"You hear him," Tucker continued, "He was talking about ghouls and aliens and… everything, like it was normal… It is normal. I just didn't know about it." Tucker leaned back. "Did you know there's a twenty-seventh letter of the alphabet? I didn't. The agents told me. I got a new programming book. I was gonna pick up a new language as a fun project to take my mind off the magic stuff. The letter is all over it, it's like a… a … weird p or an infinity symbol. I thought it was like some kind of decoration at first, but then I realized it was all over the place, and I could read it. Like, it had always been there."

Tucker groaned and rubbed the back of his head. "I don't want to be involved in this. I really don't. But… I already am. And you already were. If you're going deeper, I'm gonna get involved too."

"Same," Sam said.

Danny whirled on her, "Wait, Sam-"

Sam cut him off, "I told you, I trust you." She sighed as she began to hug herself. "And, I'm not letting you guys go into this alone." She laughed weakly. "And hey, maybe your parents will teach me actual magic." Danny and Tucker glanced at each other as Sam sniffed. "I can read between the lines here, he didn't state it outright, but magic is already in me, I better get something out of this."

Danny took a hesitant step towards Sam, and wrapped her up in a hug. He rubbed her back as he hear the door open again. "Well, I guess that's that. We're all in this together…" He looked over at Tucker, who nodded at the same time Sam nodded into Danny's chest. He stepped away from Sam as his parents walked into the kitchen.

"Danny?" his mom said walking in. She dashed across the room and wrapped him up into a hug. "Are… they gave us a report… are you…" she stammered, as she rubbed the back of his head.

"I'm fine mom," Danny said, trying to escape her grasp. "I'm fine, and Tucker is too."

Maddie froze, and took a step back. "Sam?" she whispered.

Sam shook her head. "I don't know… he didn't tell me, but it was obvious he didn't want to." Sam looked up at Maddie with tears in her eyes. "He told me to go home and pretend this never happened. I can't… I can't do that. And I know, I know, something is wrong with me but…"

"Oh sweetie," Maddie said, reaching over to rub at Sam's shoulder. "You should go home and get some-"

"No," Sam hissed. Maddie stepped back at the heat in her voice. "I'm not gonna turn a blind eye to this."

Danny huffed. "So, mom? I think we really need to know what you guys actually do for a job here."

"Well, alright, let's get you kids something to eat first. Your father does love to blabber on about his work. He's gonna love this…"