Njistar: Vincent might have a little problem.
Pokémon fan 1991: Glad you liked how I akumatized Juleka. Yeah, I hated how Adrien never gets proper spotlight in the show, so I've been trying to fix that in this project.
Danifan3000: We'll see about Juleka getting new akuma forms later. Yeah, I hated that Adrien was sidelined in the finale and never got to learn the truth. As one of the main characters, Adrien deserves some agency in that kind of situation.
Julimart: Yeah, since it's Adrien's first year in public school, I wanted to show him reacting to the various traditions of that experience since canon refuses to do it. Glad you liked how I handled Rose and Juleka with the Reflekta situation. As for Beauty Marked, Sam's mother signing her up for the pageant and her putting little effort in it would make sense. I was already planning to remove Danny as a judge if I do that episode because that was dumb. I agree with you about Marinette and Adrien solving each other's arcs, but disagree with you on Amethyst Ocean.
Guest: We'll see about Rose asking Ali about Lila.
Drake wind: Yeah, Adrien was desperately in need of spotlight. Glad you liked how I handled Reflekta. I didn't do Princess Fragrance because I thought her power was too OP.
Jebest4781: Thanks!
Symbolic Joker: Glad you're excited about Tucker's hobby. Yeah, I don't recall the bracelet having a story behind it either, so I made one up for continuity purposes. Unlike canon, I'm emphasizing the importance of Adrien and Chloe's childhood friendship. Vincent contributing to the problem was a blast of inspiration when I realized there were two photographers named Vincent in the cast.
Matt: Glad you liked the chapter. I'm going to disagree with you about season five; nothing in that season was good. Andre abandoned Chloe to Audrey in favor of Zoe because she behaved better when Chloe's behavior is his fault to begin with, Felix was inconsistent as always and was rewarded for betraying Ladybug last season by getting to join her team when Chloe was unfairly kicked off for doing less, and Marinette kept the truth about Gabriel from Adrien when he deserved to know. I fail to see how they can be in a relationship at that point. Apologies for the rant; season five fails in every aspect for me.
Leonardo: Glad you saw the chapter as a birthday present. That was completely unintentional. Haha!
Spear: Glad you liked the chapter. Nobody on the team is immune from being attacked.
La gran diosa zorra fantasma: I agree with you about season five being horrible. Glad I could improve the Reflekta episode for you. I didn't care for Marinette's photo deleting plan either, or Chloe locking Juleka in the bathroom to miss the photo.
Erica phoenix16: Sorry but I don't think the train idea would work.
DemajhaeS2003: No. I just got distracted by new fandoms and needed to step away from ML after how furious season five made me.
RWBY: Yes, season five does suck.
Guest: The United Heroez don't exist in this universe. At best, they're comic book characters like Majestia and Knightowl originally were before the special aired.
Friendly reminder that speculation about future chapters and what you want to see is okay, but please leave a comment about the chapter I just worked very hard on if you intend to speculate.
Also, Two Kinds has a TVTropes page, so if you think of any trope examples for it, go ahead and add them.
Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom or Miraculous Ladybug. They belong to their respective owners. Any and all familiar dialogue is for the sake of the plot.
One Kind of Restored Connection
Thanksgiving passed, and so did Christmas and New Year's, bringing the school year into January. Thanksgiving was uneventful for all, but Christmas was a memorable occasion, especially for Adrien.
What happened at Christmas? That's a story for another time. [1]
With the world welcoming a new year, everybody also set new goals and plans for themselves. Such goals were why Danny, Sam, Tucker, and Cujo were down in his parents' basement lab. Maneuvering around his parents' time in the lab, the trio installed training equipment for Danny to practice his hero abilities.
Tucker held a speedometer while Sam made notes on a clipboard as Danny in his Phantom form flew around the basement, training on his obstacle course. Cujo sat near Sam and Tucker's feet, firmly instructed by Danny not to interrupt.
"112 miles per hour," Tucker read the speedometer when Phantom flew past it. "Lighting up the speed gun, dude."
Pleased with the result, Phantom tried his intangibility power next and phased through the ceiling and back.
Sam marked something on her clipboard. "Intangibility, check."
Phantom turned himself invisible and hovered around his friends mischievously.
"Danny?" The friends darted their eyes around the room, trying to identify the half-ghost teen. Cujo was sniffing at the air, trying to identify where his master was.
"Invisibility, check." Tucker told Sam, who marked it on her notes. He let out a shudder as Phantom overshadowed him.
Tucker's eyes glowed green while Phantom spoke through him with a mocking tone. "Hi, I'm Tucker! Don't let the cellphone, glasses, and lack of muscles fool you. I'm a stud!"
Tucker let out another shudder as Phantom left his body, and frowned at his friend. "I hate it when you do that."
Pulling out a remote, Sam pressed a button on it. "Ok, hotshot. Let's ramp it up."
The training course the trio had secretly installed in the lab emerged from its hiding places, including rings for Phantom to fly through, barriers to pass, anti-ghost weapons to dodge, and targets to practice. Growing increasingly familiar with the course, Phantom glided through the rings and avoided the dart guns firing at him. He came to dummies they constructed of generic ghosts and his family members, and correctly aimed his ecto blasts at the ghost dummies. After a moment of thought, he blasted the Jazz dummy to vent some annoyance at his sister. He then activated his intangibility to fly through a barrier. Done with the course, he turned tangible again and gave his friends a thumbs-up, considering the course a success.
In the moment he looked away from where he was going to glance at his friends, he crashed into a wall and slid down to the floor. Cujo was soon at his side, licking his face to ease his pain.
Smirking at the blunder, Tucker sauntered over to his friend and put on the same phony voice Phantom used while overshadowing him. "Hi, I'm Danny Fenton! Don't let the bruises and concussion fool you, I need more practice."
Mildly annoyed at the comeback, Phantom decided to try a new tactic he had been trying to perfect and put his hand on the floor. Spreading his influence to it, he was able to make Tucker phase through the floor without touching him.
Watching Tucker disappear through the floor, Sam joked, "Wow, it's quiet in here!"
Meanwhile, in the Ghost Zone, residents of the void were receiving an extremely annoying interruption to their daily lives.
Box Ghost was in his warehouse lair, going through stuff he collected, when another ghost poked his head through a stack of boxes.
"Will you be my friend?" The ghost, a middle-school aged boy, asked with a nasally voice and a hopeful smile.
This was Klemper. His skin was a pale blue, he had blond hair, a stocky body shape much like Ivan's, and wore pink-striped footie pajamas.
Box Ghost glared at the younger ghost. "The Box Ghost does not have time for friends, especially not little boys who interrupt the Box Ghost while he is taking inventory of his collection of forgotten possessions left in his beloved boxes!" Grabbing Klemper by his pajamas' collar, he dragged him to the entrance of his lair and gave him a swift kick out. "Now stay out!"
Klemper landed on the porch roughly with his butt. "Ouch! That is not how you're supposed to treat a friend," Klemper complained, rubbing his sore rear. Then he noticed that a scarf was around his neck, it must have gotten on him somehow when he disrupted Box Ghost's pile of boxes and the other ghost either didn't notice he had been kicked out with it, or didn't care.
Since Box Ghost wasn't nice, maybe Klemper wouldn't be nice back and keep the scarf. Huffing at Box Ghost's rudeness, Klemper went to go find someone else.
Johnny and Kitty were on the couch in their living room, making out and making up for the time they lost while Kitty recovered her form.
Everything was going well until…
"Will you be my friend?"
The couple pulled apart at the unexpected voice and looked over the back of the couch to see Klemper staring at them.
Klemper offered them the same smile he had given Box Ghost, but it quickly fell when they glared at him together.
Soon, Klemper was kicked out onto their lair's porch the same way he was at Box Ghost's.
"Creep!" Kitty shouted at him before slamming the door. She spun around to face Johnny flirtingly. "Where were we?"
Johnny smirked at her and led her back to the couch.
Rejection after rejection, Klemper went around the Ghost Zone asking the same question and getting the same response repeatedly. He wouldn't stop until someone became his friend. His search eventually led him to the haunted Casper High, where Poindexter and Lunch Lady resided among others.
Poindexter sat in the school library, calculating math equations, and writing numbers. He didn't need to do them since they didn't do homework anymore, but it was an exercise that kept his mind stimulated.
In the middle of a complex problem, someone abruptly said, "Will you be my friend?"
Poindexter let out a scream, rocketing up from his seat at the interruption. Once what passed for his undead pulse slowed back down, he snapped his attention to the intruder.
"Repeat the question," Poindexter demanded impatiently.
"Will you be my friend?" Klemper asked, hovering up beside Poindexter. "We can hang out, play games, and make inside jokes only we understand." He continued to ramble, following Poindexter back down to the table where his math was laid out. "Want to come over to my lair? We can make snowmen, have a snowball fight, and make snow cones."
Poindexter rolled his eyes, picking up his pencil and scrolling his equations to figure out where he left off. "Thanks, but I'll pass. I'm doing important math calculating here."
Klemper groaned. "Why doesn't anybody want to be my friend? I've asked everybody in this stupid Ghost Zone."
"Well, gee, then maybe you should try Amity Park in the Human Zone," Poindexter replied sarcastically, finding his spot, and typing numbers into his calculator again.
The younger ghost blinked at him. "The Human Zone?" [2]
"Yeah, there's a permanent portal somewhere that way," Poindexter gestured in the general direction with the eraser of his pencil. "Why don't you go there and see if you can find someone who wants to play with you? You know, if they don't turn out to be a bully."
Klemper grinned. "You know what? That's a great idea! Thanks, mister!" He crushed Poindexter in a surprise hug and flew away to exit the library.
Gasping for air upon being released, Poindexter shook a fist at him. "Ever heard of a concept called personal space?!"
While Danny and his friends were in the basement lab, Jack and Maddie were upstairs in the living room. Maddie was wistfully staring at a picture of herself and Danny when he was little, and Jack was playing with action figures of himself and a generic blob ghost.
Maddie sighed as she stared at the picture in her hands, "Danny and I used to be so close."
"Aha, take that! Nobody makes a meat puppet out of Jack Fenton!" Jack had his action figure punch the ghost toy. He looked up and noticed his wife's sadness, sticking a snack in the toy Jack's hand and offering it to her. "Fenton jerky?"
"Thanks," Maddie glumly accepted the piece of jerky. "We shared everything. Secrets, Bunsen burners, soda…"
Jack nodded along as he returned to playing with his action figures. "Ah yes, nothing says bonding like backwash."
"Danny's just shooting up so fast. Those special times seem to be slipping away. Oh, I miss them." Maddie hugged the picture.
"Hey, they all grow up sometime." Jack shrugged. He then put on a corny voice and shook the ghost figure. "Curse you, Jack Fenton! You've defeated me once again! Haha!" The doorbell rang at his laughter and he dropped the voice back to normal. "I'll get it!"
Setting aside the action figures, he went and opened the door. On the porch was a ghost with long hair in a postal uniform, holding out an envelope.
"Thanks, pal," Jack accepted the envelope, "oh, and try to get some sun. You're as pale as a ghost." He closed the door, not noticing that the delivery person was one of the ghosts he described.
The Fenton patriarch took the envelope over to his wife. "Hey, Maddie, some kind of invite for you. I can tell because it has the word 'invite' on it."
Indeed, the envelope had the word on it. Maddie opened it and read the letter inside; the further she read, the happier she got.
"Yes! Just what the doctor ordered." She exclaimed.
Downstairs, Phantom strained with effort. Sam, Tucker, and Cujo watched on as first red spots appeared on his face then he glowed, and suddenly he had sprouted a second head from the neck up. Cujo whined confusedly at his master.
"Wow," Tucker gasped in awe, "you can eat a Nasty Burger and fries at the same time."
"Yeah, the problem is I can only split myself this far," one of Phantom's heads said. The other took up the other half of the statement, "Vlad Plasmius can turn into like four different Vlads at once. That's what this weekend is about."
"Nonstop drills," the head on the left said.
"No homework," the head on the right said.
"No family."
"No interruptions."
"Hey, Danny!" Maddie called down from the stairs.
Acting quickly before she saw him, Phantom strained to make the second head disappear and transform back to his human self. He managed to make the second head go away and become human again, but he somehow only had one eye. Tucker gave him a quick slap on the back of his head, which helped him will the second eye back into existence while Cujo phased into a cabinet to hide.
Just in time too because Maddie sprinted down the stairs, waving the letter she had received. "Pack your bags! We're going to a mother-son science symposium in Florida! Doesn't that sound fun?" She beamed at him.
He let out a groan, slumping his shoulders. She was so excited that she didn't comment on his reply.
A few hours later, Maddie and Danny were packed, Maddie stating they had to leave soon due to the date posted on the letter. Sam and Tucker had been sent home so they didn't distract Danny from packing. That didn't stop Danny from finding a few minutes to sneak Cujo out of the house to Sam's.
"At least you're going somewhere," Jazz commented to her younger brother while waiting for Jack and Maddie in the living room, "I'm doomed to special family alone time with Dad." She looked over the letter she managed to snag from Maddie while she was hurrying around. "The DALV group. Never heard of them. Are they legitimate?"
"Legitimately boring, I'm guessing," Danny quipped, bitter about his plans being ruined.
By the stairs, Jack and Maddie were saying their goodbyes.
"Now, just to make sure you're protected from any rogue ghost attacks on the road, sweetcakes, I made you this." Jack held up a metal, flexible belt with a lock on it and buckled it around his wife's waist. "It's the Fenton Specter Deflector, guaranteed to repel and weaken any ghost who comes in direct contact with you."
Maddie oohed in appreciation, activating the lock and kissing her husband. "Thanks, hon. Oh, and Jack, try not to trash the house while I'm gone."
Jack pouted as Maddie and Danny packed their stuff in the car. "Suck the house into a parallel dimension one time, and you can't let it go, can you?"
Tucker sighed, leaning in Sam's computer chair and swiveling to face Sam.
"Well, Danny's gone again. What do you want to do?" He asked her.
The two friends were in Sam's bedroom, and they had just gotten the confirmation from Danny that his flight was taking off. Figuring that Cujo couldn't hide in Danny's bedroom all weekend without Jack and Jazz possibly finding him, Danny snuck him and some of his things over to Sam's during the packing process. Sam's house was bigger than Tucker's, and her parents were out more often than Tucker's, so she stood a better chance of keeping Cujo hidden.
Sam sat on her bed, scratching Cujo behind the ears to ease his separation anxiety from Danny. He hadn't been so far away from Cujo before since keeping him.
"I don't know," Sam admitted, thinking out loud. "Last time this happened, we hung out a bunch with Marinette and the others. Maybe we should do that again? Might be a good chance for me and Adrien to catch up."
Tucker hummed thoughtfully. "There's an idea. Even though you guys are talking now, you haven't had any time by yourselves."
Sam pulled out her phone, keeping Cujo on her lap as she did so. "I guess we have a plan, then. I'll text Adrien to see if he's free."
"And in the meantime, I'll watch Cujo," Tucker said, spinning the computer chair around lazily. "Then the next time we have to hang out with someone other than Danny, I'll be the one who hangs out with friends and you'll watch him."
"That sounds fair."
Klemper cautiously emerged from the portal into the Fentons' basement.
"Whoa," Klemper gasped, "the Human Zone." He floated around the room, looking at all the strange devices spread out. He even tapped the glass on some beakers.
"Doesn't look like anybody's here…" the young boy ghost murmured. Spotting a staircase leading upward, he flew to follow it and entered the Fentons' kitchen. "Hello! Anybody want to play? Hello!"
Wandering even further into the house, he passed through the kitchen into the living room area and still saw nobody to play with. "Maybe nobody's home," he assumed. Deciding to try elsewhere, he phased through the front door and ventured out into the city to continue his quest.
If he had been more patient and listened closer, he would have realized someone was home after all.
Meanwhile, Jack and Jazz were upstairs dealing with a situation and hadn't noticed the ghost passing through their home.
"This is why we don't bring toys into the bathroom!" Jazz scolded as she pulled on her father's arm.
"It's not like I meant to drop my Jack Fenton action figure in the toilet, now pull harder!" Jack demanded, trying to pull his stuck arm out of the toilet.
To the surprise of Danny and Maddie, their trip to Florida was no ordinary flight. Instead, they were flying on a private jet. Which meant for the annoyed Danny that he had no other choice but to interact with his mother as they sat across from each other.
Noticing her son's discontent, Maddie tried to make him think more positively. "Come on, Mr. Pouty Pants. This weekend is supposed to be about us." She proceeded to gesture to the jet around them. "Those DALV people sent this private jet just for us. How perfect is that?"
Aware of what she was trying to do, Danny snipped back. "Do you want the truth, or one of those little white lies that don't hurt your feelings?"
Seeing that Danny wasn't going to change his attitude toward the situation, Maddie sighed. "Oh forget it, Danny. Just look out the window at that warm, sunny Florida coastline." She pointed to the window next to their seats.
Before either of them could, the plane's intercom crackled to life with the voice of the pilot. "Folks, this is your captain speaking. If you look out the window on your left, you'll see the cold, bleak Colorado Rockies."
Danny wasn't that good at most school subjects, but geography was one he knew. He glanced out the window to confirm they were over mountains. "The Rockies? That's nowhere near Florida. What gives?"
"And if you look out the window on your right side, you'll see me bailing out of the plane before it careens out of control and crashes," the pilot added, somewhat answering Danny's question.
Mother and son looked out the other window, and saw their pilot jump out with a parachute. That was all they needed to spurn them into action, jumping out of their seats to go check the cockpit. When they threw open the door, nobody was in either chair and the plane was beginning to nosedive.
Maddie jumped into the pilot's seat and attempted to regain control of the steering, which refused to budge. "The controls are jammed. Danny, what do we do?"
Danny had one idea, and it was risky.
"I know one way…" He murmured, hiding behind the seat and transforming into Phantom. He went intangible, and tried to spread his influence to Maddie so he could fly them both out, but because Maddie was still wearing the Specter Deflector belt Jack gave her, the accessory defensively zapped him.
Phantom let out a stung yelp and stumbled backward against the cockpit door, reverting back into Danny.
Hearing her son's pain, Maddie looked just moments after he changed back into his human form and jumped up to check on him. She pressed a hand on his forehead. "Danny, you okay?"
Recovering his wits, Danny waved her hand away. "Yeah, I'm fine."
Reassured, Maddie looked around the cockpit for other ideas. The controls were jammed, so there had to be another way, something else they could do. Luckily, there was.
"Danny, parachutes!" Maddie pointed by the wall, and Danny saw a pair of parachutes were still on the plane. Rather suspiciously, they were labeled with their names. If this were any other moment, Danny would have questioned it more. Maddie picked them up, handing Danny his. "Let's go!"
The pair found the exit door the pilot had used, and jumped out, opening their parachutes once they cleared range of the plane.
To their surprise, the pilot came back up to meet them somehow with his parachute and having opened his parachute long before they did.
The pilot smirked sinisterly at them. "Folks, at this time I'd like to inform you that you've been the victims of a cruel hoax!" Cackling, the pilot transformed into the mailman ghost Jack had obliviously interacted with that morning. "Thank you for flying Air Evil Plot!" The ghost flew back up to the plane, and to the bafflement of Maddie and Danny, got the plane back in control and flew away.
Rather frustrated at being duped by a ghost, Danny crossed his arms and scowled.
"Don't be so glum, Danny! Look at the view!" Maddie chirped as they descended into the woods below, trying to make light of the situation.
Nathalie opened the front door to the Agreste Manor, staring professionally down at Sam.
"Miss Manson," Nathalie greeted, "I see you're still dressing in that unapproved alternative fashion."
Sam nodded back, "Nathalie, I see you're still working for that control freak."
Not reacting to Sam's retort, Nathalie quietly led Sam up the stairs to Adrien's room, and opened the door for her. As soon as Sam stepped inside, Adrien rushed over.
"Sam! I can't wait to show you around; my room has changed so much since our last playdate when we were little," he said eagerly while Nathalie closed the door behind them, leaving the two teens alone.
Sam took one look around and nodded her head. "I can see that. The foosball table, the arcade game cabinets, and the rock-climbing wall are definitely new." She pointed to each thing as she named them.
"Yeah! Mother and Father let me redecorate my room once I outgrew the toddler stuff. The foosball table and the arcade cabinets came first so I could play games during my free time. It wasn't until I was ten that they allowed me to get the climbing wall." He led her around the room.
It wasn't until they got to the other side near his private bathroom that she noticed something that made her raise an eyebrow. "Your room has a spiral staircase?"
"It leads up to my personal library. That's where I keep my DVD collection of my favorite movies and anime, my video games, my comic books and manga…" Adrien led her up the stairs.
Sam shook her head. "Whoa, wait, wait! Anime? Manga? Your parents let you watch and read that? I watch and read that stuff sometimes with Danny and Tucker, and some of it can get intense."
Adrien shrugged as they reached the top. "They didn't look too closely. They just saw the cartoons and illustrations, and assumed it was all kid-friendly like most adults do." He pointed to different sections of shelves. "Movies and anime here, video games there, and comic books and manga over there."
Sam browsed the shelves and plucked out a random DVD, the cover featuring a muscular hero dressed in mostly purple and a sci-fi setting. "What's Ultra Lord? Kind of reminds me of Danny's obsession with Crash Nebula."
"Only one of the longest-running anime of all time. You know how Alya is running the Ladyblog? There's a popular fan site for it just like that run by this kid named Sheen," Adrien explained, taking the DVD case from her to flip over and read. [3]
"Fascinating," Sam said, trying to sound encouraging even though she didn't understand the excitement.
Adrien put the DVD back and continued further down the shelves. "You mentioned Danny likes Crash Nebula, right? I have that too, and others like Majestia and Knightowl."
Sam followed him, raising an eyebrow. She wasn't really interested in superheroes, but she was more familiar with Majestia and Knightowl. She had seen plenty of their merchandise at the mall and ads for their movies on TV.
They were nearly at the end of library, overlooking the rest of his room. "What do you want to do first? Basketball, climbing wall, you name it."
Sam considered everything she saw on her little tour, and decided on something. "How about the climbing wall? Not often someone's room is big enough to have one." She smirked at him, lightly teasing.
"Sure, come on!" Adrien, eager to spend time with his childhood friend, raced back over to the spiral staircase.
From atop the tall shelves, Plagg watched as his holder enjoyed sharing his room's many activities.
"Yeah, I think I like this girl. She and Bubbles are alright," Plagg murmured to himself.
It was a chilly January day in Minnesota. Plenty of snow on the ground, and winter coats, hats, gloves, boots, and for some, even scarves were necessary. However, Minnesota people were tough; they weren't going to let the freeze deter them from going out and enjoying the weekend.
That's what every day citizens like Theo and Mireille were doing.
At least until Klemper flew up in front of their faces.
"Will you be my friends? We can play games together!" Klemper asked.
Theo and Mireille ran back in the direction they came from, screaming. Klemper stared at the fleeing pair, confused, and then looked around the street for someone else. When his sight landed on Dash, Kwan, and Dale, the three jocks also ran away in terror.
No matter who he approached, they fled without saying anything to him. Nadja Chamack outright smacked him with her purse before tugging Manon away by the hand.
As the rejections continued to pile, Klemper grew angrier and angrier.
"Why won't someone play with me?!" Klemper shouted to the sky, fists clenched.
-LB-CN-P-
Hawk Moth's window opened.
"Ghost energy again. Could it be possible that a ghost can be an akuma? Let's see if this will work." Hawk Moth filled a butterfly with dark energy, and sent it out. "Fly away, my little akuma, and evilize him!"
-LB-CN-P-
Klemper was so busy fuming that he didn't notice the butterfly enter the scarf from Box Ghost's lair. Then, he froze.
"Snowmonster, I am Hawk Moth, and I will enhance your icy powers to make a game that the heroes will have to play." Hawk Moth thought out loud through their connection. "If nobody wants to play, we'll make them."
Klemper's frown became a grin. "That sounds fun, mister!" The dark energy washed over him, and he grew in size.
After escaping the plane trap, Maddie and Danny spent a while wandering the woods below the mountains. Untouched by humanity, the woods had a lot of foliage to trek through. Luckily for them, Maddie was prepared for that.
Maddie sliced through the tall grass with a machete, and Danny followed her. Half his attention was on her, and the other half was on his phone as he tried and failed to get a signal.
"Ugh, of all the places in North America we had to get stranded, it had to be one of the few dead zones for cell service," Danny complained, lifting his phone every way he could to try and get a link.
"Danny, your generation relies on those phones too much." Maddie shook her head. "Whenever you run into a problem, you can't always use a phone to solve it. A phone certainly can't help fight ghosts." [4]
Not bothering to correct her, instead he replied, "Maybe not, but it never hurts to try the quickest solution first."
"True," Maddie conceded, "but if it doesn't work, I'm perfectly comfortable with us roughing it in the woods."
Not too long after she said that, she cut away some hanging vines that revealed a giant gray and red lodge.
"Or, we could just stay at this ritzy mountain chalet," she amended. Unlike her sister Alicia, she was more of a city woman. [5]
Mother and son heard a honking horn, and the pair looked over to the side of the chalet to see someone driving a golf cart over to them, a bag of golf clubs hanging on the back. When the cart stopped, they saw the driver was someone they recognized.
"Why, Maddie and Danny Fenton," Vlad greeted slickly.
"Vlad Masters?" Maddie and Danny replied in unison.
"Oh, what an amazing, unexpected, totally unplanned surprise," the billionaire blatantly lied. He reached into the back of the cart, and pulled out two gift baskets, one pink with Maddie's name on it and the other blue with Danny's name. "Personalized gift baskets?" He offered, holding them out.
While Maddie gladly accepted hers and sat down in the cart to examine it, Danny stood back skeptically.
"You're up to something," he suspected.
"Oh, you think?" Vlad pretended to be oblivious what Danny was talking about. While Maddie was distracted with her basket, Vlad turned around and typed something into the digital watch on his wrist.
They're here. Kill Jack. [6]
Once the message was sent, Vlad felt a measure of glee that phase one of his plan worked out flawlessly, and decided to use that positive energy to fuel a personal tour of his chalet property to Maddie.
Danny was not amused when Vlad pressed down hard on the golf cart's gas pedal, and sent mud flying up into Danny's face. The creepy billionaire had definitely done that on purpose.
Eager to get some space away from her reckless father, Jazz dialed Kyle to see if he wanted to hang out and do something normal.
"Okay," Jazz said into her phone, "I'll see you later."
No sooner than she did that, Jack burst into the living room with yet another invention, this one being a short metal rod. "Hey, Jazzerincess, check this out! It's my Jack-o-Nine-Tails. How about a quick tutorial?"
Jazz rolled her eyes at him. "How about a quicker no? I'm not interested in ghost fighting, Dad."
Not when her own little brother was now one of those ghosts.
She stood up, grabbing her purse and heading for the front door. "In fact, I'm going to hang out with Kyle."
Jack frowned at her declaration. It wasn't that he didn't like Jazz's friends, but he couldn't be too careful after the pale punk she went out with before Thanksgiving. "Hey, rope it in, little miss. Be careful. Teenage boys are like wild animals."
When she opened the door to leave, Jazz found a giant, beastly ghost rabbit on their porch. It snarled at her, causing her to scream.
The moment he saw neon green, Jack rushed forward and yanked her back behind him before the rabbit could bite her. "Back off, she's a minor!" Holding the Jack-o-Nine-Tails in front of him, he activated it. The invention launched a set of seemingly electrical coils and ensnared the ghost. The energy surging through the coils was too much for the rabbit, and it exploded into a mess of ectoplasm.
Jazz stood back, shocked that just happened. "Dad, you saved me from that monster!"
"Yep, that's what I do, Princess!" Jack hit a button on the device to retract the coils for its next use. "That, and needlepoint, which is artsy and relaxing. Now come on! I'm putting this house on ghost lockdown!"
After the rock-climbing wall, Adrien and Sam sat down to watch a movie from Adrien's massive collection. As they picked out one to watch, Sam asked why he had so many.
"Because physical media is the way to go," Adrien had said, "you never know when those streaming services are going to remove a series or movie you like, and you might never find them again." [7]
Now that he said that, she recalled Tucker saying the same thing once about his own selective collection of DVDs and games.
She checked if he had some of her personal favorite horror movies, but Adrien mentioned that his father automatically banned anything in the horror genre, giving Sam another reason to hate the man.
So, they settled for a Knightowl movie since Sam preferred the dark tones of that series over Majestia.
"Have you been making friends with the others in our homeroom?" she asked as they watched. "I know you're best friends with Nino now and you're trying to reconnect with me, but what about everyone else?"
"I've been kinda taking it slow," Adrien admitted. "Joining a big group like the A-listers stunk, so I've been trying to make more personal connections. I know Nathaniel likes to draw comics."
"Well, I think you should try Alya sometime. I heard she's a big Majestia fan."
Adrien smiled. "Really? I'll have to remember that."
The newly transformed Snowmonster landed in the park. He looked much like common depictions of the Abominable Snowman with large blue hands and feet, tons of white fur all over his body, a purple scarf looped around his neck, and an eerie blue glow like a ghost.
Children and their parents were out playing with their friends, whether it was throwing snowballs or building snowmen or some other winter activity, when Snowmonster arrived and his scary appearance made them all drop what they were doing and run.
"Play!" Snowmonster roared, and lifted his hands to the sky. The snow on the ground began to coalesce together to make monstrous snowmen with icy claws and fangs.
-LB-CN-P-
Marinette was in her room, yet again fixing the mascot head of the Casper High Ravens. She didn't want to know how Dale's little brother got so much macaroni and cheese on it, nor did she want to know how he got it in the most impossible places inside the head. [8]
With her concentration deep, it was up to Tikki to keep watch for disruptions. The ladybug kwami flew over to Marinette's phone as it began to chime.
Tapping the notification, she was surprised to learn it was a news update.
Lance Thunder stood across the street from the park, bundled up in his winter coat, hat, and gloves. "This is Lance Thunder with a special news report. An akuma has been spotted in Park Amity; the villain seems to look like the Abominable Snowman, and is making frankly terrifying snowmen for some kind of army. In possibly related news, there have been reported sightings of a ghost around town, scaring the citizens. Seriously, why am I the one out here reporting this?" Lance turned to look over at the park, and saw a snowmonster approaching. The weatherman let out a scream as the video ended abruptly. [9]
"An akuma!" Tikki gasped before flying over to Marinette, tugging at one of her pigtails. "Marinette, we gotta go!"
-LB-CN-P-
Over at Sam's house, where Tucker was staying with Cujo, also saw the report on his phone. He swallowed nervously, looking down at Cujo gnawing on a dog toy.
"Uh oh…" Tucker murmured.
-LB-CN-P-
Meanwhile, Adrien and Sam's movie had just finished when the news came on. Once they saw the news mention an akuma, they both knew what they had to do.
Sam started edging toward the door, gathering her jacket and hat. "I should get going… you know, parents wanting me home safe and all that."
Adrien jumped to his feet also, scooting toward his bathroom. "Yeah, you should do that! And, uh, avoid the park! I'm going to, uh, get started on my skin care routine. Father won't like it if I look blotchy in my next photoshoot."
Sam gave him a thumbs up. "Cool. So, we hang out again some other time?"
"Sure, and maybe we don't have to wait until Danny's out of town again to do it?" Adrien suggested, smiling a bit more sincerely.
"We'll work something out. Okay, see you at school!" Sam waved goodbye and rushed out Adrien's door.
"Right, see you there!" Adrien called after her.
Once he was sure she was gone, Plagg flew down from his hiding place. "You know, between her and Bubbles, you seem to have a thing for rebellious friends. I like that."
"She is pretty great," Adrien agreed as he stuck out his fist with the ring. "Plagg, claws out!"
While Vlad took Maddie on a tour of his chalet property, Danny invited himself inside to clean up. By the time he got all the mud off, Vlad and Maddie had finished their tour, and were in the living room. Vlad had donned a white bathrobe instead of his black suit he had before, and Maddie was inspecting the book collection on his bookshelf across the room. Wanting space from both, Danny plopped down on the pelt-backed chair by the window and took note of all the hunting trophies of various animals hung up on the walls.
When he happened to glance over at Vlad, he saw the man looking into a mirror and through the mirror, he saw Vlad's name embroidered into the robe.
Since the mirror reflected things backwards, Vlad's name read Dalv.
Like the DALV group, and the Dalv Co. building in downtown Amity Park that was the sight of Phantom's second akuma battle.
He felt stupid for not seeing it sooner.
Vlad turned away from the mirror to put his attention on Maddie. "So, what brings you two to these parts?"
Maddie passively took down a book from the shelf and paged through it curiously. "You'll never believe it. We were on our way to this symposium, and our pilot forced us out of the plane right over your house."
"Yeah," Danny added sarcastically. "it's almost like some sort of villainous plot. Or a well-planned coincidence."
At that remark, Vlad walked over to Danny's chair. "That would be an oxymoron, dear boy. Oh, and speaking of morons, how's your old man?"
Growling, Danny let his eyes glow green.
Vlad pretended to be afraid. "Ooh, the scary eyes…" In retaliation, he fired ectoblasts from his own eyes, forcing Danny to fall out of the chair to avoid it. When Maddie heard Danny hit the floor, Vlad turned around to distract her. "Maddie, I'm so glad you're here. It gives me a chance to apologize for Jack's behavior at our college reunion."
Danny got back to his feet, smirking. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Dad possessed by some filthy, putrid, lonely, single ghost?"
Hands folded behind his back so Maddie wouldn't see, Vlad fired an ectoblast from one of his index fingers, knocking Danny into the far wall.
Getting closer to Maddie to continue distracting her, Vlad took the book she was paging through and replaced it back on the shelf it belonged.
"Well, if he hadn't been so weak, then that wouldn't have happened?" Vlad suggested.
"Now, Vlad," Maddie chided at the dig as she moved onto another bookshelf and grabbed another book. "Jack might be a bumbler, but he means well."
Vlad followed her. "I know, Maddie. And I've forgiven him for many things like causing the accident that ruined my life, stealing you, the backwash incident…"
Maddie snapped to attention suddenly, closing the book harshly. "Whoa, whoa, whoa. What was that?"
Vlad backtracked hastily. "Causing the accident that ruined my life?"
"No, after that."
"The backwash incident?"
Maddie pointed at him demandingly. "No, in the middle!"
"Oh, the stealing you part?" Vlad smiled, seeing an opportunity, and getting down on one knee. He saw Maddie grow alarmed at his posture, but figured she would calm down once he explained. "Ah, you could always see right through me. Oh Maddie, I'm just going to come right out with it. Please dump Jack and stay here. You and Danny both can."
Danny finally climbed out of the hole in wall, slightly singed from the ectoblast, afraid of how his mother might answer.
"What do you say?" Vlad finished his question.
Any fears Danny had about his mom having hidden feelings for Vlad were quickly squashed when he saw the expression on her face change from shock at Vlad's suggestion to outright rage.
"You can't be serious! No!" Maddie shouted, surprising Vlad. "Did you not hear what I just said a minute ago? Jack may be silly at times, but he means well. He's smart, he's strong, he's a wonderful father to Danny and Jazz, and he's no thief! He couldn't have stolen me from you when we were never an item in the first place!" Stomping away from Vlad, she marched over to the front door, grabbing Danny by the arm along the way but releasing when he flinched. "Come on, Danny! We're leaving!"
For once this entire trip, Danny was happy to follow his mother. Over his shoulder, he mockingly called out to his nemesis, "Bye, Vlad! And as a lonely single man in his 40s, might I suggest internet dating? Or a cat!"
"Mark my words, Maddie! Nobody says no to Vlad Masters! You will rue the day you spurned my affection!" Vlad followed them to the door, yelling at them as they left the grounds. "And I will not get a cat!" [10]
Ladybug swung her way to the park, and landed on a light post. Soon enough, she was joined by Chat Noir on another one.
"Good day for building snowmen. Am I right, my lady?" Chat Noir joked.
Ladybug smirked back at him. "It seems today we'll be destroying snowmen instead of building them, kitty cat."
Just as the pair were about to look around for the akuma, they saw a familiar, huge, beastly green dog approach them with two passengers on his back.
"You two?" Chat recognized Sam and Tucker as they slid off Cujo onto the ground. "What are you two doing here? Where's Phantom?"
"Out of town chasing a ghost," Sam answered evasively.
Tucker reached into his backpack and pulled out one of the spare thermoses. "We heard the news report mention another ghost here, so we came prepared."
Ladybug pointed at Cujo. "What about him?"
"Phantom chose us to dogsit since we were there at Axiom Labs," Tucker said.
Ladybug frowned at them; if Danny was out of town, then they would need extra help with the ghost. "Okay, but you two be careful."
Chat Noir looked around. "Where is the akuma? Or the ghost for that matter?"
The ground shook as another creature the size of beastly Cujo landed on the scene. The heroes, teenagers, and ghost dog got their first look at the akuma.
"Play!" Snowmonster roared.
"Found him!" Chat Noir spoke up, glancing at the others. "Aw, and he wants to play with us."
"Whatever game he wants to play, can we not?" Tucker asked, pulling ghost hunting equipment to arm himself and Sam.
Still looking at Snowmonster, Sam noticed something. "Does he seem different from other akumas to you guys?"
Ladybug narrowed her eyes once Sam pointed out her observation. "Yeah, you mean the way he glows? What does that mean?"
Before the group could speculate further, Snowmonster pounded both his giant hands on the ground. "Snowmonster play!"
Chat Noir tensed up, holding his baton ready for attack. "Where's this army of snowmen the news talked about?"
Sam looked around. "Uh, that would be all around us."
True enough, Snowmonster's hideous snowmen were surrounding the group from all angles.
"I guess it couldn't be a simple 4 on 1," Ladybug noted, swinging her yo-yo ready for battle. "Don't turn your backs on these guys for even a minute!"
"You got it!" Tucker said, firing the first shot with a Fenton Bazooka. One of the snowmen exploded into slush. "Hey, that worked! I wasn't sure if it would work on stuff other than ghosts, but I guess a bazooka can blow up anything."
"Good," Sam said as the snowmen took Tucker's shot as their signal to advance. "That means we're not totally helpless." She then proceeded to use her own bazooka.
Back at the Fenton house, the doors and windows were boarded up, but that wasn't enough to prevent the ghosts from entering. The living room was covered in multiple splatters of ectoplasm, and Jazz was hiding behind Jack as they huddled by the divider that separated the living room from the kitchen.
After the first ghost and Jack putting the house into lockdown, Jazz sent off a message to Kyle that she would have to cancel their plans for the afternoon. She hated canceling her plans with friends because of the normalcy they provided her, but it couldn't be helped in this instance.
"You know, in retrospect," Jack admitted as they waited for the next attack, "perhaps I shouldn't have gutted the FentonWorks Ghost Shield to make your mom's anti ghost belt."
A pair of ghost birds, different ones from the vultures, phased through the ceiling and dove in for an attack.
"More ghosts! Get them, Daddy!" Jazz exclaimed from behind him.
Jack moved to use the Jack-o-Nine-Tails, but the birds were too quick. In one swoop, they both knocked the weapon out of his hands and pinned him against a wall. Jazz, filled with adrenaline from the afternoon, quickly picked up the weapon and snared the birds with the coils. Letting out a battle cry, she slammed them onto the floor and exploded them into ectoplasm.
"Wow! Note to self- make a Jazz action figure!" Jack praised, pulling away from the wall and holding up his Jack figure they managed to fish out of the toilet.
Once they were what Maddie deemed a satisfactory distance from Vlad's chalet, Maddie and Danny set up camp for the night. Danny worked on the fire while Maddie prepared the shelter. He watched her pour water onto a couple of tiny capsules she had pulled out of her utility belt, and they morphed into sleeping bags.
His satisfaction at her rejecting Vlad gave way to his earlier grievance about his weekend plans being ruined.
She could invent all that stuff, and she couldn't take the hint that he already had stuff he wanted to do?
While he sulked, she came over to sit next to him and offered him some jerky she also had in her belt. "Fenton jerky?"
"Pass." He turned away from her.
Maddie sighed. It looked like they were back to how the trip began. "Danny, this weekend certainly isn't turning out like I planned, but we're spending it together, and that means the world to me."
She reached out to touch him, but because of the belt, he was shocked like before.
Danny flinched at the touch. "Ok, I get it! Stop touching me!" Standing from his seat, he went to go collect one of the sleeping bags and pulled it to the far side of the campsite away from the other one. "Look, I'm going to sleep over here. Ok?" He shuffled into the sleeping bag.
Dejected, Maddie slumped her shoulders. "Well, good night, Danny. I love you." Making sure the fire would be fine, she pulled her own sleeping bag into the wood shelter she had constructed before hydrating the sleeping bags.
"Good night," Danny replied, rolling over. They both fell asleep, but what seemed like minutes later, Danny was woken up by heavy stomping near him and he opened his eyes to see neon green fur.
"Either Mom needs to shave her legs, or this is really bad news," he quipped, slowly looking upward and finding a whole herd of ghost animals growling and snarling at him.
The group of two magical heroes, two ordinary teenagers, and one ghost dog kept destroying snowman after snowman. Ladybug and Chat would slice through them with their weapons while Sam and Tucker would explode them with their bazookas, and Cujo would stomp all over them, sometimes using his jaws to tear them apart.
"We need to get that scarf around Snowmonster's neck! It's the only thing I see that could be where the akuma is!" Chat Noir yelled out.
Stopping her yo-yo swinging for a moment, Ladybug tossed it in the air. "Watch my back! Lucky Charm!"
In her hands fell…
A red and black spotted sled?
"A sled? What am I supposed to do with this? Whoa!" Ladybug was distracted by her Lucky Charm that she almost got swiped at by one of the snowmen, and she smacked it with the bulky sled. While she had a few seconds before she would be attacked again, she surveyed her surroundings for a plan.
She saw Cujo, Tucker, her yo-yo, and some nearby trees in the park.
"I got it! Tucker, you have a leash for Cujo?" Ladybug asked in a shout.
Tucker fired another blast at a snowman before yelling back, "I have the Fenton Fisher in case we needed to take him for a walk!"
"Hook him up! Time for sledding!" Ladybug leaped over to Chat Noir and muttered something in his ear. He nodded, taking the sled before hurrying over to grab Sam and rerouting toward Tucker.
Tucker quickly dug into his backpack for the Fenton Fisher, whistling for the ghost dog. "Here, Cujo!"
Cujo obediently sprinted over, and allowed for Tucker to hook the fishing line to his collar. At the same time, Chat and Sam arrived with Chat throwing the sled on the ground.
"Okay, both of you on," Chat guided the two teenagers onto the sled. "Tucker, you drive. Sam, you're on defense. Join you in a second."
Cujo took off across the park; his rapid movement seemed to agitate the snowmen because they began moving faster than they were previously.
Snowmonster had been hanging back, letting his snowman army do the fighting for him, until Chat came rushing at him.
"Hey, Snowmonster! Game change!" Chat circled around the akumatized villain, slapping him unexpectedly on the leg. "Tag, you're it!"
Chat ran off again towards Cujo and the sled, leaving Snowmonster to roar childishly and pursue.
"Sledding? This is the plan?" Sam questioned as Chat hopped on the sled.
"Yep!" Chat grinned, pointing at the trees. "Chauffeur, that way if you please."
Tucker pouted at the nickname. "I'm not a chauffeur!" Regardless, he did as told and guided Cujo in the direction of the trees.
Using his large size, Snowmonster closed the gap between himself and the sled like a gorilla.
"Good, good," Chat said, watching Snowmonster follow then turning toward Sam and Tucker. "Keep an eye out for Ladybug, and go that way."
Sam suddenly pointed. "Found her! Tucker!"
"On it!" Once more, Tucker had Cujo change direction.
After handing over the sled to Chat, Ladybug had hidden herself in the trees, taking out the few snowmen that followed her so her location wouldn't be given away. Once she had confirmation that her friends had seen her, she dropped down behind the tree she was in, preparing her yo-yo. The moment her friends passed the tree, she threw her yo-yo across to another nearby tree, creating a tripwire.
Knowing she only had a few seconds before Snowmonster came through, she tugged on the yo-yo string to make it tight.
Just as she hoped, Snowmonster's knuckles caught on the tripwire and the villain crashed into the ground with his face, sliding a few feet from his momentum.
"You don't need this with all that fur," Ladybug remarked, tugging the scarf from around his neck. "Chat Noir!" She bundled up the scarf and threw it to her teammate before Snowmonster could get back up.
Chat jumped off the sled and caught the scarf mid-air, turning it to dust with his power. "Cataclysm!"
As the butterfly emerged from the dust, Ladybug unlocked her yo-yo and purified it. "No more evildoing for you, little akuma!" The butterfly emerged from her yo-yo purely white. "Bye-bye, little butterfly!"
Snowmonster transformed back into Klemper, who pushed himself up from the ground. "Wha? Is the game over?" Klemper wondered in a sleepy daze like a toddler waking up from a nap.
-LB-CN-P-
In his lair, Hawk Moth hummed thoughtfully. "Now that I know ghosts can be akumatized, this opens possibilities for me. When I get another chance to akumatize a ghost, I'll take it."
Danny grunted as he was thrown into the chair he sat on hours before, and looked up to see Vlad approaching in his Plasmius form. The ghost animals stood behind him, poised to attack.
Danny got on his feet, turning into Phantom. "Nice petting zoo, Plasmius. Where's your lonely guy cat?"
"Ah, there's that teen wit again." Plasmius snarked, taking out a small two-pronged device from his cape. The device seemed to generate electricity like a taser, and he jabbed forward to prod Phantom with it.
Phantom screamed as he forcibly transformed back into Danny. The human teen looked at his hands then at the device. "What was that?"
Plasmius held up the device proudly. "Oh, I call it the Plasmius Maximus. It has just short circuited your powers for the next three hours." He glanced at a grandfather clock in the room, and saw it was 9 PM. "That's midnight. I tell you this because I've seen your grades and I know you are bad at math." Gesturing to the ghost animals behind him, he added, "These are my latest experiments. What do you think?" The billionaire ghost pretended to think for a moment. "Oh, that's right. Who cares what you think? I'll give you five minutes to run before I send my minions to destroy you. The clock's ticking, Danny, on you and your father. Run!"
Knowing his odds without his powers, Danny sprinted out the front door back the way he remembered he and Maddie went when they left before.
Plasmius stood at the doorway for a moment, watching Danny leave his sight. Then he turned toward the ghost animals. "Get him!" As they all charged out to hunt, he chuckled to himself. "Five minutes, five seconds. Oh, apparently I'm bad at math too."
Danny hurried through the woods as fast as he could. He climbed over boulders, hopped across a stream, and ducked under branches until his foot caught a stray root. When he tried to pull himself back up, a camouflaged hand hauled him up into the nearest, biggest tree. Initially scared, he calmed when he saw it was only his mother with her suit in camouflage mode which he didn't know it had.
"Remind me later how much trouble you're in for leaving the campsite," Maddie scolded him, setting him on the branch.
In that moment, Danny noticed that when she touched him, he didn't get zapped like before. Vlad did short circuit his powers, so maybe that meant the belt couldn't hurt him at the moment.
They both heard the ghost animals approaching, causing her to act quickly. Taking out a coil of rope from her belt, she dropped down below to the ground. "Be right back."
From his position up in the tree, Danny watched as Maddie managed to snare the ghost bear, and used a staff also found in her belt to fight off the animals, the belt protecting her if they got too close.
"How can she not have something to help get a phone signal in there?" Danny wondered, referring to the ridiculous amount of gear she had packed in that single belt.
After she successfully defeated most of them, the remaining ghosts were too intimidated to challenge her. A quick utter of 'boo' scared them away, signaling to Danny it was safe to climb down the tree.
Once he was back on the ground, she turned her attention to him. "Now, young man, would you mind telling me what you were doing?"
Not wanting to explain everything that was going on, Danny attempted to deflect by giving her a hug. Now that the belt wouldn't harm him, it was safe to do, and she earned it for saving him the way she did. "You are awesome!"
"Oh honey, thank you," Maddie accepted the hug, forgetting her anger since this was the first time the whole trip he was showing her some affection. Breaking the hug, Maddie started walking away. "We better start moving in case those ghost animals come back."
"Wait for me!" He hurried after her.
The four teenagers all shared an expression of shock, but Sam was the one who voiced their singular thought.
"The akuma was the ghost?" Sam checked. She tilted her head thoughtfully. "Huh. That would explain the glow."
Tucker raised his backup thermos. "Who cares? Let's suck him up."
Ladybug held up a hand, forcing Tucker to lower the thermos. "Wait! We should figure out what happened, so this doesn't happen again." She approached the young ghost. "Excuse me, I'm Ladybug. What's your name?"
Klemper blinked awake, and looked at Ladybug cautiously. "Klemper…"
"Nice to meet you, Klemper," Ladybug said with a kind smile. "Can you explain why you were upset? We'd like to help you."
At her question, Klemper frowned. He crossed his arms, pouting. "Nobody will play with me. I asked everybody in the Ghost Zone, and everybody in this human town, but they all either said no or ran away."
"Makes sense for everybody in town. Amity Park doesn't really like ghosts except for Phantom," stated Chat Noir. Sam elbowed him in the gut, and he turned at her. "What? What I'd say?"
Ladybug ignored Chat's commentary, continuing to focus on Klemper. "So, if someone played with you, would you go back to the Ghost Zone?" She became aware of her beeping earrings, and held a hand to one of her ears. "I don't suppose you could wait a few minutes for me or Chat to recharge?"
Before he could answer, Cujo shrank down to his puppy form and wandered over, sniffing the ghost child.
"H-Hey, what are you doing?" Klemper tried not to laugh as Cujo's wet nose tickled his skin.
Chat smiled as his ring beeped. "Look at that. Cujo doesn't think you're dangerous. Other than Phantom, I haven't seen him this friendly with a ghost. He's usually growling at them or in his beast form."
Tucker snapped his fingers. "That's it! Cujo's the answer!"
Sam and the heroes looked at him. "He is?"
"Cujo can play with Klemper, giving him a friend to play with like he wants," Tucker explained, "and maybe if Phantom is okay with it, Cujo can stay with Klemper the next time he goes out of town instead of asking us to watch him. That would free up both of us to spend time with our friends like we want, and Klemper could keep having a playmate when he needs one. Everybody wins."
Sam thought it over. "That's not a bad idea."
"Okay then," Ladybug said, "we'll leave Klemper to you guys. Ghosts are Phantom's territory, anyway."
Then Chat walked over to Ladybug with the sled. "Your Lucky Charm, my lady."
"Thanks, Chat." Ladybug threw the sled in the air. "Miraculous Ladybug!"
After half an hour of walking, mother and son stopped for a break.
"I think we gave those ghost animals the slip," Danny said, "uh, shouldn't we figure out a way to call Dad?"
Maddie frowned, considering their situation. "As much as I hate to say this, I think we should go back to Vlad's."
Danny gawked at her. "What? But, he said all those horrible things about Dad!"
"We both know he's a creep," Maddie agreed, "but he's a creep who probably has a phone signal and transportation. And pancakes!" She pulled the Specter Deflector off and secured it around Danny's waist despite his protests. "Here, put this on. I know it's girly, but it's for your protection." Spying the spire of Vlad's chalet, she began moving in that direction.
Danny looked down at the belt grimly. "Great. At midnight, I get my powers back. At 12:01, the belt zaps me. At 12:02, Vlad tries to make out with my mom." He cringed at that last thought. "Those are going to be the worst two minutes of my life."
While there was a break between ghost attacks, Jazz slipped into the lab to find some more appropriate ghost fighting clothes so she wouldn't ruin her own. She ended up finding her mom's closet of spare jumpsuits, and tried one on. She would be lying if she didn't say that it fit her well.
Jack suddenly arrived with more ghost hunting equipment. "Jazz, honey, I- Maddie! You're home!"
"Dad, it's me, Jazz!" She corrected him.
"Jazz? You look like the spitting image of your mother." Jack dropped the equipment, getting emotional. "I knew this day would come. That's why years ago, I had this made for you." Reaching into the closet, he pulled out a replica of his own jumpsuit. "Sorry about the size. I thought you would be swimming in my end of the gene pool, the end filled with ranch dressing, melted cheese, and fudge. Lots of fudge."
Jazz held up a hand to prevent him from getting too eager. "Look, this is just a sociological experiment. I figure I owe it to myself to experience all this ghost stuff one time so I can hate it in a more informed context."
Namely how to help her brother.
"No way, I am not like you and mom." She continued. "I'm a brilliant, reasonable, sophisticated girl."
"In a blue hazmat suit," Jack pointed out cheekily.
"In a blue hazmat," Jazz groaned at his teasing. "Quit messing with me! No more talking about ghost fighting, okay?"
The growls and snarls of more ghost animals signaled to the pair that the conversation was over. Jack handed her the blaster he brought while he reclaimed the Jack-o-Nine-Tails for himself.
Exchanging a grin, father and daughter charged into the other room to fight the latest intruders.
With great reluctance, Maddie and Danny returned to the chalet. As they approached the door, Danny checked the time on his phone. It was 11:50 PM.
"Oh great, ten to twelve," Danny muttered to himself, putting the phone away to look up at his mom. "Are you sure you want to do this?"
"Danny, if we're going to get out of here, we need Vlad's help," Maddie insisted.
Realizing he only had one chance to get the key to the Specter Deflector before whatever happened next, he quickly grabbed her in a hug, snatching the key while she was distracted.
"I love you too," Maddie said, relishing the physical affection. Not realizing the key had been taken, she approached the front door and knocked.
Vlad was quick to answer, once again wearing his black suit. "Maddie! Daniel! You've returned to me!" He pulled his phone from an inside pocket to check the time, grinning. "And not a moment too soon."
Without losing eye contact with Vlad, Maddie told Danny, "Danny, go somewhere else while the adults talk."
Vlad was initially concerned with the way she said that, but once she smiled flirtatiously at him, he relaxed.
Danny started walking to the doorway at the far side of the living room, hiding the key as he went. "Sure, you and Vlad get cozy. I'll be over there, barfing."
Once the adults thought they were somewhat private, Vlad and Maddie sat on the couch in front of the fire.
"Maddie," Vlad started, putting on a suave smile, "you must be exhausted, carrying the weight of that mistake you made years ago."
Maddie leaned in. "We all make mistakes, Vlad. Maybe I'll make one now…"
She really hoped she wouldn't have to kiss him, and thankfully, the way he took out a bottle of breath freshener to spritz his mouth gave her an opening.
Pretending as if his act reminded her, she pulled away when he moved to pucker up. "I couldn't possibly kiss you like this. I've been in the woods all night. I need to freshen up." Getting off the couch quickly, she went over to the doorway she had seen Danny walk through, and found him leaning against the wall around the corner, indeed pretending to barf at the flirting.
"I'll be waiting with baited breath," Vlad called after her.
Attempting a smile back to him, she disappeared around the corner and whispered to Danny, "Keep old bait breath entertained until I can get us a signal. There's no way he has no service out here."
As she continued down the hall, Danny took out the key to the belt. "Mom's gone, which means time to spend a little quality time with Uncle Vlad." He smirked as he unlocked the belt and hid the device under the back of his shirt. Peeking around the corner of the doorway, he saw Vlad had taken out a romance advice book for dummies and his attention was taken. The teen looked up at the grandfather clock Vlad had checked before. "But first…"
Being careful not to draw Vlad's attention, Danny slipped over to the clock and raised a finger to nudge the long hand a few minutes backward to 11:45 PM. After that, he made a big show of walking into the room to approach the creepy billionaire.
"Hey, um, Uncle Vlad?" Danny spoke up.
Vlad rolled his eyes at the greeting. "Oh, please. Daniel, don't try to butter me up. Especially with your powers shorted out for another fifteen minutes." He glanced at the clock to confirm. "You're barely a threat to me with them. Without them? Well, I wouldn't need fifteen more seconds. Would I?" His eyes glowed red threateningly.
Danny put on an innocent expression of confusion. "How can you say that? You think my mom made the decision to come back on her own? We're a family. We both talked about it earlier tonight, and I want to stay here with you too."
"Really?" Vlad's eyes began to water, his dream coming true. "You don't mean?"
Danny spread his arms wide. "Yes, I do. Come on, give me a big hug, new dad!"
Vlad embraced Danny, and in seconds, he felt a belt snap around his waist. He yelled as he felt it tighten securely. Pulling away from Danny, he found the belt she and Danny had both worn in the past several hours around him. Clutching at it, he scowled at the boy. "You little rat! You tricked me! You know what this will mean for you, don't you?"
Danny's fake smile turned genuine as he pulled his phone out of his pocket to check the time. "Oh yeah, a much fairer fight."
Midnight.
Taking that as his cue, Danny transformed into Phantom just as he tried to do earlier that night. He saw Vlad do the same as Plasmius, though he let out a pained cry at the transformation. Not willing to see if Plasmius could still fight with the belt on, he kicked him through the nearest wall.
The Plasmius Maximus, which Plasmius had tucked under his cape, fell to the floor upon impact.
While that was going on, Maddie wandered the halls of Vlad's ridiculously large chalet, opening and closing doors. "Cell phone signals need a tower, so there must be a tower here somewhere." She opened a door to a garage filled with expensive cars, but shut it. "No tower."
Phantom moved to punch Plasmius, who recovered from being slammed into the wall, but the older ghost managed to bear the pain from the belt enough to go intangible and let Phantom pass through him.
"No tower." Maddie once again opened another door, finding all-terrain vehicles.
While Phantom attempted to course correct, Plasmius struggled to get the belt off, but he couldn't do so without the key. Phantom tried to sneak up behind him, but Plasmius managed a weak ectoblast that knocked Phantom into the fireplace.
"Foolish boy! Even with diminished strength, I'm still more powerful than you!" Attempting to showboat, Plasmius tried his favorite trick of splitting off into duplicates, but because of the belt, he could only manage a second head much like Phantom in his training before the trip.
"Huh? What?" Both heads said, straining to split apart as Plasmius sunk to the floor. "I can't duplicate my form!"
Phantom flew back up, his grin wide. "Jeez, I don't know which head to hit. So I'll have to hit them both!" He dove at Plasmius, both fists forward, and each head got a punch to the face.
Maddie finally found her way to the roof, where she found a helicopter. But she also found a cell tower. "Aha!" Ignoring the helicopter, she hurried over to the device and used a tool from her utility belt to break it open. Once she looked inside, she furrowed her brow. "That's weird. This says the signal is functioning just fine, but if that's the case…" She finally dug out her own phone to check the reception. "Why can't Danny or I get any service out here?"
Back in the living room, Plasmius was knocked flat on the floor. "Fine, Danny. You've defeated me. But you've forgotten my pets." Plasmius whistled, and the ghost animals that survived the fight with Maddie emerged from beneath the floor. "Finish him!"
Before they could attack, Phantom spoke up. "Finish me? But why are you mad at me? I'm not the one who made your pelts into wall art." He jabbed his thumb at the hunting trophies that lined the walls of the room.
Realizing that he had a point, the animals turned their rage on their master, who was pulling himself up with the fireplace's mantle.
"Don't even think about it, you spectral freaks. I'm still more powerful than you," Plasmius threatened.
Phantom, who found the Plasmius Maximus, tasered him with it. The shock forced Plasmius to revert to his human form.
"And now you're not," Phantom quipped once Vlad was done screaming in pain. "I'll give you a five-minute head start, Plasmius."
Vlad's eyes lit with the slightest hope. "Really?"
"Minutes, seconds. You know how bad at math I am." Phantom threw his enemy's earlier words back at him, causing him to frown in annoyance. Phantom pointed at him to the animals. "Get him!"
Unable to transform and fly away, Vlad could only run out the door the same way he forced Danny to do hours before. The ghost animals followed close behind.
As the screams and snarls faded the further away they got, Phantom heard someone coming from inside the chalet and quickly changed back to Danny.
Maddie entered the living room seconds later. "What happened to Vlad?"
"He ran out for a bite." Danny fibbed, turning happily to see her. "How are we getting out of here?"
"Strangest thing, I found the cell tower to check why we weren't getting reception, but it seemed to be working just fine for Vlad. And that's after I found cars, ATVs, and a helicopter." Maddie rambled until she heard herself and facepalmed.
"Maybe we could just take the copter?" Danny suggested.
After grabbing a bite to eat from the chalet's kitchen, Maddie insisting Vlad wouldn't mind, the pair climbed into the helicopter and began the flight home.
"Now sweetie, we're not going to mention any of this to your father, right?" Maddie asked as they left the chalet's property line. "He'd be insanely jealous if he found out, so mum's the word."
"Actually, Mom's the word," Danny joked, sipping a Purple Flurp. He frowned sadly. "Sorry, I was such a jerk. It's just… I had all these plans with Sam and Tucker this weekend, and this is the second time since high school started that one of you guys dragged me along on a road trip without asking me first."
Maddie frowned, understanding his issue.
"Before high school, we would take things day by day because we were younger and didn't think that far ahead. Now that we're older, we are, and it gets a little frustrating when we have to drop those plans, especially with more homework and stuff."
Maddie looked away. "I suppose it was unfair of me to spring this on you so suddenly, even if it did turn out to be a trap. I guess I was just nostalgic for the old days when you were little, back when we did so much together. But you're right, your father and I will try to be more considerate moving forward."
"Don't get me wrong, I really had a good time," Danny said with a smile, getting her to face him again. He held up his soda can. "Backwash?"
"Danny, that is so sweet." Maddie accepted the can, taking a swig.
Sam sighed as she dropped onto her bed, Cujo climbing up to join her. As he sniffed at her, she gently scratched his scalp.
"It's been a day," she said. "Reconnecting with Adrien. Fighting an akuma. Finding out the akuma was actually a ghost. Then having a snowball fight with the ghost."
After Ladybug and Chat Noir left, Sam and Tucker had a snowball fight with Klemper to fulfill his desire for playtime until he was ready to return to the Ghost Zone willingly. They did explain their idea of him watching Cujo for Phantom, and he was excited by the prospect of future playdates, but they did have to clarify Phantom would have to approve first.
Sam's phone rang and she pulled it out of her pocket to answer. "Hello?"
"Hey, Sam, it's Adrien!"
She sat up at the friendly voice. "Hey, what's up?"
"I just wanted to say I had a great time hanging out, and wanted to make sure you got home okay."
"Yeah, I'm home now. I took the long way, but it was worth it."
"Good. Now about next time, maybe I could sneak out and come over to your place? I'm sure your room is different from how I remember it too. And we could watch one of those horror movies that Father banned me from watching."
Sam crossed her legs on her bed, and Cujo cuddled up in her lap, wagging his tail. "Really? You sure?" She teased. "I don't know… you might be too much a ray of sunshine to handle it."
"We live in a city that's being attacked by villains and ghosts. I think I'll survive."
"Okay, don't say I didn't warn you," she chuckled. "See you at school."
While cleaning up the last of the ectoplasm, Jack heard a helicopter and peeked out the window to see Maddie and Danny disembarking.
"Quick, Jazz! They're back!" Jack shouted over his shoulder. "Remember, not a word of what went on here."
Still wearing one of her mother's jumpsuits, Jazz took a bag out to the garbage. "My lips are sealed. And as long as the house is ghost-free, they'll never know." Peeking her head back in through the back door, she added, "Oh, and Dad? Thanks."
Jack smiled as she went out to complete the chore. Pretending to act casual, he picked up his needlepoint of a ghost, and started to work on it when his wife and son came through the front entrance.
"Hey-hey, look who's back! How was your weekend?" Jack greeted.
"Oh, boring," Maddie replied, taking the lead on their alibi.
"Totally dull," Danny agreed. He pointed upstairs. "I gotta go call Sam and Tucker, but… you know." He pecked Maddie on the cheek.
Smiling, Maddie began walking through the house to inspect its condition after her weekend away. While she did that, Danny approached his father.
"So, how was your weekend?" Danny asked.
Jack shrugged. "Oh, you know, same old."
Danny let out a relieved breath. "Well, I guess everything's back to normal then."
"Get out of my house, you freak!" Both Fenton men turned to see a ghost tearing down the stairs with Jazz clinging to its tail. "Hi, Danny!" Jazz called as they passed.
Jack jumped up from the couch, grabbing the Jack-o-Nine-Tails from where it sat next to his needlepoint. "Hey, wait for me! It's my turn!"
"The plan to eliminate Jack failed. He and his daughter defeated every ghost I sent after them."
Walter sat in his home office, on a conference call with Vlad.
"And, it looks like the plan to win over Maddie and Danny failed too." Walter raised an eyebrow at Vlad's roughed up face and partially torn clothes.
"Disappointing," Vlad spat, "and here I was hoping Jack dying would make them reconsider and come back."
Walter reclined in his seat. "I almost had to intervene with Kyle; he was going to meet up with Jazz, but thankfully she canceled their plans once the ghosts started attacking."
"I told you that your boy's friendship with her might be an issue considering what we're trying to do."
The redheaded man raised a finger. "It's not like their friendship is in the middle of all this. You want Maddie and Danny; you want Jack eliminated. You don't care about Jazz."
Vlad waved a dismissive hand. "Hardly. Besides sharing Madeline's beautiful hair, she's almost graduated and without powers like Daniel's, she has nothing to offer me."
"My point exactly." Walter flicked his eyes toward his locked door before looking at the screen again. "What next?"
"First things first, I need to get back to my lab in the castle and figure out how to remove this blasted belt!" Vlad tugged at the Specter Deflector for the umpteenth time.
Smirking, Walter replied, "It looks like you need a key."
"Yes, I'm aware," Vlad snarled, tugging harder. "Thank you!"
"What do you think, Danny?"
Danny thought over Sam and Tucker's idea as he petted Cujo, who was curled up on his master's lap.
"I guess it wouldn't hurt to try that," Danny admitted. "Klemper watching him could help him behave while we're at school, and if I keep needing to leave town, it wouldn't be fair to keep having you two put your own social lives on hold to dogsit for me. You guys already do so much to help keep my secret."
"That's what best friends are for, Danny," Tucker said, giving his friend a supportive smile.
Since they seemed to have an answer on the Cujo topic, Sam changed the subject. "Now about Vlad, that's twice now he's gone after you and your mom. What are you going to do?"
Danny sighed. "Not much I can do right now. We're still holding up that truce we made where we wouldn't expose each other. If I tell Mom and Dad about him, he'll just return the favor for me."
"Just know that we have your back," said Sam, "if there's anything we can do to help, we will."
Tucker smiled brightly. "Yeah! Unlike Vlad, you have friends on your side."
"Speaking of friends," Danny spoke up, looking out his bedroom window, "I should probably update Ladybug and Chat Noir that we have another enemy to worry about. They have Hawk Moth after them, and now I have Vlad."
/
Ladybug and Chat Noir sat on the edge of Casper High's roof, waiting; Ladybug was looking at the screen inside her yo-yo while Chat was trying to balance his baton on his nose.
Noticing movement toward them, Ladybug glanced up from her weapon and tapped Chat on the shoulder, causing him to nearly fumble his baton as he scrambled to catch it.
Phantom touched down on the school roof as his teammates stood up and put away their weapons.
"We saw Alya posted your message on the Ladyblog," Ladybug said. "What's the problem?"
"Does it have anything to do with you being gone?" Chat Noir added.
The ghost hero shuffled his foot before looking up at them.
"Actually, yeah. You know how I was out of town that one weekend? Well..."
Terribly sorry for leaving everyone waiting for a whole year. Between joining new fandoms, getting distracted with new ideas, my personal life changing, and just needing to step away from ML because of how furious season five made me, it's been a lot. But with season six about to air this weekend, I found the motivation to post a new chapter.
The original DP episode used as the base for this chapter, Maternal Instincts, was Maddie's equivalent to Bitter Reunions. Vlad reappeared, Danny was forced along on a road trip, and he grew closer to one of his parents through the experience. This was also one of the rare times that Jazz bonded with one of her parents too after spending so much time trying to make herself seem normal by comparison. The character development was too good to exclude. You'll also notice that I updated the plot point of Maddie and Danny not having a phone to not having a signal because everyone and their cat has a phone these days, but without a signal, cell phones lose their main function.
Keeping in line with this chapter being a sequel to Bitter Reunions, I decided to use the opportunity to continue reconnecting Adrien and Sam, so they could see how each other has changed since Gabriel and Emilie stopped letting them play together. To keep Ladybug and Chat Noir relevant, I created Klemper's original akuma form, Snowmonster. The situation wasn't quite serious enough for the ice power-up. The conclusion also solves the issue of Cujo needing a dogsitter every time Danny leaves town, and freeing up Sam and Tucker for non-Danny interactions whenever he's absent.
[1] – A hint at my plans for The Fright Before Christmas.
[2] – It's only fair that if the humans get to call their place the Ghost Zone, then the ghosts get to call Earth the Human Zone.
[3] – Another reference to Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius. Judging by the episode numbers that Sheen rattles off on various occasions, I can only assume it is an anime rather than a cartoon. Also, a reference to Sheen himself.
[4] – Maddie has no idea that a phone helped stop Technus.
[5] – Reference to Maddie's sister, who shows up in the Prisoners of Love episode.
[6] – Instead of trying to whisper the command into his watch when Maddie is right there next to him, and wasn't the slightest quiet about it, I had him turn away to type it into his watch so she wouldn't hear him.
[7] – Shameless campaign for people getting their favorite shows and movies on tapes or DVDs. There have already been multiple instances of streaming services removing shows and movies from their platforms to justify tax write-offs, which I personally find extremely unfair to the crews that worked on those shows. To name a few examples, Infinity Train on Max a few years back, and Hailey's On It from Disney.
[8] – Marinette already fixed the mascot head once in One Kind of Twisted Wish.
[9] – Lance Thunder, who I mentioned in the notes of Dogged Pursuit is Star's father.
[10] – In the Infinite Realms episode of Danny Phantom, he does get a cat and names it Maddie.
Review in the box below, and remember, reviews are awesome! Also remember to say something about the chapter I just worked hard on, don't just use the review box to speculate on future plot points and what you want to see.
