chpt 2
The thrill - The pleasure - The reward - The pride.
Everything about the hunt was an addiction. A strong, clouded drive embedded into his very core, his utmost desire 24/7.
It was what got him killed in life and gave him purpose in death.
Watching the life drain away - the spark leak from a prey's eyes - was the single most beautiful thing he had ever had the pleasure of seeing. And he takes it in with great, agonizing detail every time.
His first kill - a doe - was a fond memory for him.
It had been a humid day in spring. He remembers tracking with a faceless figure, spotting the slim animal for the first time, aiming and shooting. He remembers the pride - the weight of the animal as he took it's corpse to a cabin.
He remembers the feel, the sound, the smell of the doe's skin as he peeled. He remembers the taste. He remembers the satisfaction.
Skulker's eyes glittered.
'You're the ghost zone's greatest hunter? Ha! What a joke! You wouldn't even be able to catch a cold in antarctica!'
The boy's voice nagged him - rattling in his ectoplasmic head.
His left eye twitched, head tilted as he glared at the photos littering the wall of his lair. An exotic creature - perhaps the rarest prey - he had ever pursued.
Both dead and alive.
A halfa. Exquisite and in its prime.
The child wasn't the only halfa - of course he knew that - but the boy was so unlike his older counterpart. So much more authentic - with a very rare ice core to boot.
Compared to the welp, Vlad was nothing more than an unstable imitation. A meagre human with a powerful disease. A disease that had been fortifying the man's delusions for years and would ultimately be his downfall.
If Skulker was being at all honest, he was disgusted by him. But while Vlad instilled that disgust, the welp instilled Skulker's pure unbridled desire.
His eyes narrowed.
But the little brat was like a snake, slipping in and out of his fingers. He twitched again and curled his hands into fists.
This hunt... was taking far too long.
It should've been done and over with ages ago. Yet here he was, mechanical hands empty.
It was a constant grind in his head, a rock that had slowly been chipping away at his patience. He yearned for the boy's last breath. Longed for his body to lose the little bit of warmth it still possessed.
Skulker wanted to see his greatest enemy lying limp on the skinning table.
"Good luck with that bucket head."
He grinned.
So done.
So, so done.
This was not okay.
His rage was strong - yes - he was complete and utterly fed up - yes - but he was also so unbelievably tired that these strong emotions were somewhat subdued in a bleary haze.
Dim pain spiked behind his eyelids, an aching headache, induced by his lack of rest and the blazing sun.
He shook his head and squinted, scanning the perimeter of his ghost sense. The early afternoon traffic was still bustling about, people leaving their home or their work to grab an early lunch or late breakfast.
Small beads of sweat were already inching down the small of his back. His fists were clenched, muscles coiled. His suit felt uncomfortable.
Damn.
If he was this riled up before a fight, something had to be very wrong.
Luckily (or not) it hadn't taken long.
A strong ecto-blast seared into his shoulder.
"Welp!"
If he was functioning at 100% he would've had half the mind to go intangible, dodge or something when he saw Skulker barreling towards him. But he wasn't, so he hadn't.
A metal shoulder slammed into his side, knocking the breath right out of his lungs.
A vague roar met his ears before a thick hand wrapped around his bandaged arm and threw him into a wall; brick from the feel of it.
Cracks splintered out and away from his impact - another Phantom shaped indent in public property.
He heaved.
Ok… ow.
It hadn't even been three seconds and already Danny's whole body was coursing with adrenaline, thumping with pain.
This wasn't going to be pretty.
He started to recover, pushing himself out of the makeshift mold only to be crushed back into the brick with a shrill cry. The pressure on his already abused rips ripped through his brain.
His eyebrows furrowed and he grunted, futilely pushing back on the large arm. Skulker leered down at him, metal body gleaming like some sort of demented statue.
He gave Danny a dark grin.
"You're gonna die today." His words whispered around the hero's ears, uncomfortably warm and smelling like sulfur. "Fully."
Danny almost wanted to whimper, but forced a dark scowl on his face instead. He couldn't let the hunter know how weak he was. How vulnerable he was feeling.
Tired.
His fingers tightened on Skulker's arm.
This was hardly his first death threat - just another out of many that had been spit in his face. Despite, silent tremors of fear cascaded down his spine.
Danny tried not to think too hard on the possibility of the statement.
He couldn't afford to be shaken by it. He was the hero. And hero's don't crack under the pressure.
His eyes narrowed - fists tingled.
"O-only in your dreams buckethead."
Much quicker than Danny thought himself capable of, he let his arm drop down and shot out an ecto-blast, hitting Skulker in the gut.
It caused the hold on his chest to go lax and Danny used the opportunity to deliver a harsh uppercut to the hunter's jaw.
Unlike their typical brawls, there were no insults, no witty comebacks, no words. Just a frenzied blur of limbs blowing through the city like a twister.
This fight was serious - deadly.
Danny - even through the flurry of movements - had subconsciously started leading the hunter away from civilians and towards the outskirts of town. There was a small forest there. A secluded place he often went to with Sam and Tucker to train his abilities in secret.
Pow!
Danny's head snapped to the left.
A split lip, a swollen jaw followed by a sharp knee to the gut. The taste of copper filled his mouth - the fluorescent green dribbling down his chin.
"What's the matter, welp?"
The air around him was shaky - or was it him that was shaking? He could feel bile rise up his throat.
"You look tired." Skulker laughed, his smile unusually wide. The mirth Skulker was displaying only intensified the gut twisting dread in the pit of his stomach.
Danny heaved, sweat mixing with his ectoplasm. His mind was racing. He couldn't reply even if he wanted to.
- Crack -
Danny fell to the ground, rolling with the momentum of his body. The grass was slick under him and he slipped a little before planting his feet.
He panted roughly and shot consecutive blasts to Skulker's shoulders. It stunted the hunter just long enough for the hero to pounce up and get a solid punch in, one he threw all his unbelievably high stress levels into. The impact caved in the metal of Skulker's face and raked his knuckles.
Danny expected it to earn him a couple of precious seconds but was shocked by the instant retaliation.
"Ack!"
"Gotcha."
Danny clawed at the hunter's arm, eyes watering from the tight grip on his throat. He struggled against the hunter, shooting a leg out, but meeting nothing but air. Skulker's large fingers tightened to a bruising point, forcing his nose to scrounge up in pain.
In seconds he began to hear his own attempt at swallowing - his choking breaths - as if it were only millimeters from his ears.
If Skulker started speaking again, odds are, Danny hadn't heard him.
Black spots egged from the sides of his eyes.
"N-no - !"
Dammit, he couldn't think.
-Shiskt-
Cool metal poked dangerously into his stomach. He could feel the intense stream of ectoplasm starting to run down his hip and thigh.
He hadn't realized his eyes started closing until he had to snap them open again. On pure instinct he felt his core hum with power, spreading to his hands and onto the arm holding him. The sensation was strange, desperate even, and the next thing Danny knew, he had hit the ground hard, gasping for his next breaths.
One of his hands dug into the grass below, while his other came to hold his neck while he hacked out wet coughs.
"You insufferable little-!"
"Leave him alone!"
His tilted vision rose towards the new voice.
Three blurry figures were running up to them - familiar figures.
His eyes widened.
Star, Paulina and - of all people - Dash.
Every muscle protested the action, but he staggered to his feet.
With an almost nonexistent voice, Danny tried to ward them away. "Get- !"
Skulker came in with such force he collapsed to the ground, ears ringing. A foot pressed into his back and his spine arched. "Ngh!"
"I'm going to skin you alive!"
Danny grunted heavily, willing himself to find more energy. With a heavy body, he intangibly swung around, shooting the most powerful blend of cyro-ecto energy he could muster point blank to Skulker's chest. The hunter roared and was forcibly thrown a couple dozen yards away. Cracks of trees echoed after him.
Danny heard Paulina's voice.
His head snapped towards them.
Protect, protect, protect.
His obsession was screaming at him. A newfound reserve of adrenaline shot through his veins.
His tongue swished with the taste of blood. Bruised and winded, he stumbled to his feet and limped up to the gaping AListers, viciously aware of just how overexerted he was.
The world tilted, his legs trembled.
Vision in his left eye was almost nonexistent and had an unnerving amount of green in it. "What's wrong with you guys?! Get- *cough* -o-out of here!"
"Wait!"
"No -"
Paulina shoved something in his arms, agitating the raw skin under his torn suit. It took him a second to realize it was a Fenton thermos. "You probably need this!"
Danny's eyes widened.
The thermos had been in his bag... back in the bathroom.
He cursed.
How could he make such a rookie mistake?
"Please -" He grunted. "go."
The halfa took off, however shakily, without checking to see if they had actually listened. Skulker could still be down, which meant it was a perfect opportunity to snag him in the thermos.
But of course it was never that easy.
White pain exploded behind his eyes. A ear splitting boom and went crashing through the forest, breaking through a couple branches before uplifting the ground with his landing. A sickening pop met his ears and he barked out a pained scream.
His right shoulder, that was already blistered and bleeding, was now dislocated. Black dots egged his vision.
He blacked out for a second, jolting awake to spit out a grotesque mixture of grass, dirt, and blood. He groaned.
Bam!
A missile hit the ground next to him and he skid across the grass, flickering into intangibility on pure instinct. The hero sunk into the ground, unintentionally using the smoke as cover and rising up a couple feet behind Skulker. He summoned blue, whispy, power in both of his palms, releasing two combined blasts at the unexpecting hunter's back.
Ice encased Skulker and seconds later, Danny came in with a sloppy kick. The ice shattered, as well as a huge chunk of Skulker's back, along with the arsenal of weapons residing there.
Danny fumbled with the thermos once before he was able to open it.
Then the hunter whipped around.
There was a crazy look in Skulker's eyes. One that Danny had never known the hunter capable of having. Skulker's suit was bent, ripped and sparking behind him only amplifying that crazy. His arm - that Danny assumed was the one that had choked him out - was torn up, the green ectoskeleton shining gooey and gross underneath.
Their eyes locked.
"Not this time!"
Danny had gained an advantage with the destruction of Skulker's arsenal, but didn't account for the weapon still under the plating of the hunters arm.
A large net hit him point blank, wrapping around his body and closing into a coerced cocoon. The thermos slipped through his fingers.
He hit the ground with an 'ompf!'
The net was warm; and that was the only warning before intense electrictricity racked his body - and oh god.
Electricity wasn't fun even on the best of days, but this - this was painful. This was borderline portal pain and he screamed.
Danny could hardly feel the pain of his other injuries - too focused on the fire coursing through his blood. His back arched, his body convulsed.
When it finally ended, phantom currents hovered over his skin. His throat burned.
…
Was he breathing? His body was twitching, lurching. He wasn't getting enough air. The net was still burning.
He dozed.
"Dash!"
- Crash -
"NO!"
A plethora of sounds had him fighting the abyss. He tried to lift an arm, but it… it didn't work.
Hands grabbed at the net around him, pulling. Danny hissed and choked on a sob as the burning became more intense.
"Stop! - not helping - !"
"Well - got to - "
The voices were cut and jumbled, much too far away.
And finally - finally everything went dark.
Ok - ok
Maybe this is a little late, but at least the second chapter made an appearance. The story will continue! I promise! Hope your patience hasn't been worn too thin quite yet.
As always, please let me know if there are any mistakes in my writing, or if you think there was something I could've done better on or improved. Be picky - I love harsh criticism!
I'm also still on the hunt for new songs - so drop me a suggestion and I'll boogie with it ;)
Reviews
PhantomFever81 - Thank you so much! I get nervous when I post stuff and like to second guess myself. Good to know you enjoyed it!
Sonadow2865 - Totally agree with ya, sleep deprivation can kick those emotions into high gear - I'm glad you've enjoyed it so far!
DJmiso - Man dude! Thank you so much! I love your input and the song suggestions totally helped me make my playlists better. I love NF and Rag'n'Bone and after listening to Vallis Alps for the first time, I've become a little bit more inspired. You were very helpful. Again - thanks! ;)
The-Fallen-Spirit - Was your body ready for that? ^^^ XD
Empressmarcy - Technically, he can't kill someone if their all already dead *insert sly face emoji*
Teen launch - XD um, yes, here's a part of the rest of it ^ hope I've satisfied your needs (at least for a little while) and checked another box!
blue lips - I decided to continue! And thanks for reading!
TorioWint - OneNightAngel - The Pottamis - Pheek - Thank you guys - Love reading your reviews!