Disclaimer: I don't own Danny Phantom, Teen Titans, or anything DC-related. If I did then it wouldn't be as popular as it is.

"Talking"

'Thinking'

"Otherworldy/Demonic speech or thoughts."

Chapter 15: Hail to the King

Danny stood with Luthor as they looked at the various photos of the ghosts the Guys in White had recorded currently laid out on the table in Luthor's main office of the island base. Luthor contemptibly looked them over. "So, these were your enemies when you were Danny Phantom?"

"Enemies at first, potential allies now," Danny corrected. "And to save us the time of finding this botanist of yours, we will start with him," he said as picked a photo up and handed it to Lex.

He looked at the photo, seeing a fiend with a metallic body and skull-like face with a mane of green fire. "'Skulker'?" Lex asked reading the name. "Why him?"

"Skulker calls himself the 'Ghost Zone's Greatest Hunter.'" Danny explained. "We want to hunt someone down, why not get a hunter?"

"Very well but...I mean just look at some these...'things.'" Lex complained. "'Johnny 13?', 'Klemper?'...'The BOX GHOST?!'" He exclaimed, looking almost insulted that his nephew was considering recruiting some of these people.

"Admittedly, some are more impressive than others," Danny admitted, "but in the end, once I announce myself as king, they all will serve. The real question would be finding a use for them. I already have plans for who would make up my personal council when it comes to the ghost zone. Others will have to prove themselves to me."

"I see; speaking of plans," Lex sighed. "What are we going to do with the girl in ice?"

"Just keep her there; I will activate her when the time comes. I assume you looked over her genetic profile?"

"Yes, hundred percent you before your experimentation, really it's just the lack of a 'Y' chromosome that makes her, not you," Lex explained. "Out of the previous attempts of cloning you by Masters, she is by far the closest. She is an interesting subject," he added.

"That girl isn't a subject, uncle," Danny said coldly. "She will be much more than just a slab of meat waiting to be poked and prodded."

"Yes, yes you made it clear that you have big plans for her," Lex said. "I promise I won't have any further tests performed on her."

Danny glared at his uncle for a moment. "As long as you understand that, then all is fine," he said. "Now, I have to make preparations before I go. After all, you only have one chance to make an impression when you announce yourself as king of an entire parallel dimension." He said confidently.

"Oh, are you now?" Circe asked as walked into the room with a large parcel in her arms, her black lips in a small, seductive smile on her face as she sauntered over to her lover.

"Circe, how did you know I was here?" Danny said as he kissed the Greek enchantress.

"Well Blackfire told me that you were planning to take your throne with your silly uncle, so I figured now would be the time to give you this," Circe said as she handed him the parcel. Lex rolled his eyes at her comment as Danny looked over the package.

"What is it?" Danny asked.

"Open it," she insisted.

Danny tore into the brown paper to reveal an entire outfit. His eyes went wide as he marveled at it; it was mostly composed of a black hooded robe with long sleeves and silver trimming, a belt that had a silver buckle resembling a snarling wolf, and boots. He traced his fingers along the material, confirming that it was silk, and yet he felt the soft power of magic within the very threads. He turned to Circe, still astonished. "You...made all of this?" He asked.

Circe smiled at his expression. "Well most of it, the material I got from a friend in Tartarus named Arachne. Athena may have cursed her to be part spider but seemed to overlook the fact that now the silk she makes is a great material for protective cloths. It should be strong enough to protect you against most mortal weapons. Of course, I enchanted it so it would protect you from most forms of energy but I hope you to careful of anti-magical measures," she said proudly. "Do you like it?"

He smiled as he embraced her. "I love it!"

Circe smiled at his touch, kissing him again in gratitude. "Well, now you will look like a true king when you go greet your subjects," Circe said as she placed her hands on his rear roughly, earning a shocked gasp from him. "But don't think I did this just out of love, my darling," she whispered in his ear. "I expect you to pay me back in full~."

"Can you please not do that in front of me?" Luthor asked.

"R-Right!" Danny said, slightly red as he forgot his uncle was there. "I should try this on and leave." Circe smiled as she watched him leave, enjoying the excited spring in his step.

"How did you manage to go back to Tartarus without being caught?" Luthor asked the enchantress.

Circe merely shrugged. "I have my ways."

At the Watchtower

"The scene here at Arkham Island is brutal," the reporter on the news said as behind her, several police cars remained. Various members of the Justice League watched from the various screens. "While an official report on the number of dead and wounded hasn't yet been announced, we know that most of the damage was afflicted by an entity that people have started to call the 'Arkham Assailant.'" She went on. "While police believe that the entity has vanished and isn't likely to reappear, people are encouraged to keep indoors late at night and have some lights in their homes on as the Arkham Assailant has an aversion to bright light." Valrie watched as they began to show footage taken from the news helicopter as the beast started to facedown Batman. Supergirl was sitting across from her, a clear frown on her face as she watched the report. Just as the creature was about to attack the helicopter, the screen shifted back to the reporter standing outside the asylum "From what footage we managed to claim, some analysts were able to review it and come to the conclusion that the creature is, or rather was, human. Whether this was an inmate here at the asylum or something else entirely, we aren't sure. All that is certain is that this is one of the worst incidents of violence at this already infamous institute. When we asked the Warden about Arkham's future, he merely stated that it was 'uncertain'. We will report any new information about this case as it develops. As always I am Vicki Vale for Gotham Insider."

Supergirl sighed heavily. "I still can't believe we found no trace of that thing...not even on that metal arm he left behind."

Valerie turned towards the blond girl. "Ghosts typically don't leave behind any DNA traces. The closest you can get is usually ectoplasm, which has no real unique signature."

Supergirl turned her attention to the ghost hunter. "Then I guess that means you haven't found many traces of it either huh?"

Valerie shook her head. "Sadly no. So far the only thing I have to go on is that this Arkham Assailant is most likely an Onryo."

Supergirl sighed more as she rested her elbow on the table and her face against her hand. "And I am guessing an Onryo is very bad, right?"

"According to most myths I managed to research, yeah," Valerie answered. "Though I am curious, did your people have myths or legends about ghosts?"

Kara Zor-El shrugged. "Not that I can say. Before our planet was destroyed, we Kryptonians never really believed in supernatural creatures like that. Our idea of an afterlife never really had an explanation for that sort of thing. The only time I came across the idea of ghosts was..." The Kryptonian woman frowned softly as she looked down at the table.

"Danny Phantom," Valerie answered, remorse finding a home on her face.

"Yeah," Supergirl said quietly. "Don't suppose you found any clues on what happened to him do you?"

Valerie shook her head. "No. It's strange. I went to Jump City, where his teammates were situated, but they couldn't give me many answers."

"And they all say the same thing, right? That he just up and left on Christmas Day and never came back?" Kara said.

"Yeah but," Valerie started, "when I was there to give them a briefing on ghost attacks, the alien girl...do you know her name?"

"Yeah uh...Starfire," Kara said. "What about her?"

Valerie shifted in her seat till she got closer to her. "Hawkgirl asked me to investigate them, see if I could find anything that would suggest if any one of them was being dishonest, or at the least to see if I can find out if there was something they were just not saying."

"And?" Kara asked as she got closer.

"Well...did you know that she and Phantom were dating?" She asked.

Kara's eyes went wide. "N-No! This was never once mentioned during our investigation or any of the times we questioned them. How did you find out?"

"The short pale girl, Argent, told me," Valerie answered. "So...doesn't it seem strange that Phantom didn't even tell his girlfriend where he was going? Or that none of the other Titans mentioned that fact?"

"Did you tell Hawkgirl this?" Kara asked.

"No," Valerie said, "I kinda got swept up in investigating more into the Wendigo attacks over in Dakota and then this incident in Gotham. Yet, if they were keeping the secret that Danny was dating a fellow teammate before he disappeared then what else could they have been hiding?"

Supergirl shrugged. "I mean, it isn't uncommon for members of the smaller teams to start dating each other. Some think that those kinds of relationships could warp the team dynamic or be exploited by desperate criminals, so they try to keep it hidden. Maybe Danny and Starfire were keeping theirs a secret from the others?"

"But how did Argent know?" Valerie asked. "Especially when according to Hawkgirl, Argent didn't even hear about him till she reached out to them?"

Supergirl thought it over, her arms crossed as she sat back in her chair. A look of vexation started to spread on her face. "I don't know...but it's clear that we don't have the full story here."

Later

Skulker peered over the various maps of the Ghost Zone, some ancient while others were new and made by himself. Skulker tapped a metallic finger on the table as he was lost in thought. Various portals opened up across the massive expanse of the Ghost Zone, all of them randomly and unstable. A portal could send a person to the right place, yet at a different time. Trial and error was his main way of telling what some of the portals lead to; one led him to the middle of the Bermuda Triangle, one brought him back to the Salem Witch Trials and one dropped him off...well...it was best not to say.

He clenched his metallic teeth in frustration. So many portals, all of which were nowhere near where he wanted or when! When the Fenton portal collapsed and never reopened again, many denizens became distraught and frustrated, Skulker being one of them. Yet he gave up on that and returned to hunting creatures here in the Ghost Zone. But now after Pariah Dark was returned for all but a brief moment only to be defeated by this 'Fenrir', he knew that he would have to find a way to escape the Ghost Zone should Fenrir return and try to enforce his rule on the population. Some of the witnesses he 'questioned' claimed to have seen this person devour the very soul of the King of Ghosts and on top of that destroy the two most powerful artifacts known to all of ghost-kind like they were nothing. What kind of...monster was this person?

A sudden dark green tear ripped open from behind him. Skulker turned quickly his bright green eyes were wide as the tear became a portal. "WHAT IS THIS?!" Skulker yelled as a figure wearing black robes emerged from the portal. The figure stared him down with red glowing eyes as the portal vanished behind him as quickly as it appeared.

"Skulker, it has been a while since we've seen each other." The figure said in a voice that the hunter didn't recognize at first. "How long has it been?"

Skulker's green, pupil-less eyes went wide. "Ghost Child?" He asked.

The figure removed the hood revealing his white hair and face. "Didn't recognize me at first?" Danny teased.

"Who...what...what happened to you?" Skulker asked, looking over the person in front of him as if trying to piece together the events that led the former 'ghost child' to be this imposing figure before him.

"A lot of things changed Skulker, most of it bad but there was some good in it," Danny confessed as red energy came to his fist and faded away, enjoying the surge of power coursing through him thanks to the magical robes Circe gifted him. "And change has come for the Ghost Zone, change that you will be a part of, Skulker."

"M-Me?" Skulker asked, "Why would I work for you, Phantom?!"

"Because I am not 'Danny Phantom'...at least not anymore," Danny said as he pulled his hood back up. "I go by Fenrir now."

"'Fenrir?'" SKulker said his eyes becoming large once more. "YOU were the one who devoured Pariah Dark's soul?! YOU DESTROYED THE RING OF RAGE AND CROWN OF FIRE?!"

"The same," Danny confessed. "look Skulker, I can go on and on about what happened or how I came to be like this but for now, I need you to do something for me. Work for me and I am willing to offer you anything."

Skulker relaxed slightly. "I see...and what would that be?"

Danny pulled a picture out from a pocket inside his robe revealing a mug shot of a beautiful woman with long red hair and slightly green skin. "I want you to go to Gotham City and find this woman. Once you do, report back to me. She isn't to be harmed or approached in any way." Skulker took the photo and looked it over.

"That's all? You need me to find this...human?" Skulker asked. Danny could pick up on the uncertainty in his voice.

"Yes...for now but if you get this done then all you would have to do is tell me what you want and if it is within my power, I will grant it to you." He said.

Skulker looked at the photo and back at Fenrir a few times as if trying to fully process what was happening. "Why? Just...why me?" Skulker asked. "How many times have I tried to kill you, mount your head on my wall, and have your pelt at the foot of my bed? Yet you trust me with this?" He asked.

"Yes," Danny said, "I am willing to overlook what you've put me through and I am willing to trust you and my trust is very precious, Skulker." He said as the room began to freeze over as dark tendrils emerged from new shadows in the corners of the room, writhing around as if sensing for prey. "I am not that 'ghost child' you used to hunt down, if you betray my trust then I will show you how quickly you go from being the hunter to the prey...understood?"

Skulker felt an unnatural chill go up his spine. While he may be safe behind all the armor and weapons built into his suit, the look in those red eyes glaring into his own froze him to his spectral core. He saw those kinds of eyes a few times when he was a man; those were the eyes of beasts that had killed humans and gotten a taste for blood: a mankiller. "Yes...I understand."

"Good," he said with a pleasant smile. "I trust you have a way to message me back in the human world, yes?"

"I have updated my suit with a messenger. It should work with most cells or personal devices." Skulker confessed.

"Great!" Danny said as he opened a portal. Skulker could only look on in awe as the portal revealed a city skyline. "The woman is named Doctor Pamela Isley, though she goes by Poison Ivy mostly. She is a botanist with some mutant control over planet life. Find her, tell me her location, and I will provide you with whatever you want. Keep doing well and I will give you more benefits. Happy hunting." Skulker looked at the photo before nodding slightly towards Danny. Hesitation was clear even on his metallic face as he walked towards the portal. First, he had his hand go through and bring it back out. When he noticed that his hand wasn't damaged enough to change it in any noticeable way, the spectral Hunter activated his jetpack and flew through the portal and into Gotham. Danny closed the portal behind him. "Now, time to go redecorate my castle!" He said as he flew out of the eyehole of the skull-shaped mountain and into the direction of the red keep.

At Titan's Tower

Cyborg was soldering a few circuits on his newest invention. It was a project that he had been working on for over a couple of years and it grew more important over time. Especially after the ghost attacks in Dakota City and Gotham City. The device was a cube roughly the same size as a cardboard box with light metal and blue circuitry. Once he was done he couldn't help but smile with pride. After so long, he may have finally figured it out.

He glanced over to the side at the device that inspired him to build his cube, his smile instantly going away to a somber frown at the sight of the strange grey and green metallic thermos. Danny's thermos. The Titans rarely had to deal with ghosts, yet the times they encountered such foes Danny's powers and thermos proved all too useful. The technology was beyond him and after Danny 'vanished' the thermos stopped working. He tried to reactive it but it was fruitless. The thermos seemed to be powered by an energy source that Cyborg had no idea how to replicate. He tried looking up the 'Fenton Works' that was written along the device's side but once he learned the news of the Amity Park explosion, he knew that he was on his own. So if he couldn't replicate the energy source, he would have to try and replicate the device itself. Sadly, his best chance to get the understanding behind this device was with the ghost-hunting 'Red Huntress', and the fact that she was poking around for any information on Danny around the tower made it clear that she wasn't going to be eager about offering help.

She did give him some schematics to build some ghost counter-measures, but none of them had the certainty and convenience of the Thermos. He tried to imitate the easy-to-carry nature of said thermos but obviously, getting a device to capture ghosts using a more conventional power source to be that small was impossible for him. After endlessly looking over the thermos and trying his best to replicate the inner workings, he discovered that his best chance wasn't through completely mimicking the thermos but rather building a trap instead.

Cyborg turned back to his box before picking it up and taking it to the center of his workshop. The box wasn't that heavy, at least to Cyborg, but it would take at least two normal men to move and carry it. If this test worked, he would see if he could make it lighter. After setting it down on an 'X' made from scotch tape, Cyborg went behind a glass panel some distance away before flipping a switch. The metal cube's top opened as it emitted a loud electrical 'whir' as the blue circuitry started to glow brightly. He looked down at his arm and watched as the screen showed that the box was reaching seventy percent of energy output. "Come on baby, just a bit more." He whispered as he watched the number climb slowly.

The cube glowed more brightly as it grew louder, reaching eighty percent. Cyborg watched on as a bluish light started to glow from within the box, lighting the workshop in its soft glow. Ninety percent. Cyborg grinned widely in excitement as the number climbed to ninety-four...ninety-seven...ninety-eight. His arm started to blare a warning as 'CRITICAL ERROR' appeared in large red letters. "WHAT!?" Cyborg shouted. "NO NO NO NO!" He said as he furiously pressed buttons on his arm, hoping to resolve the issue but was too late as the box started to spark before exploding into pieces.

"DAMN IT!" Cyborg roared as he quickly ran over to the remains of his failed ghost trap. The pieces were still smoking as he picked them up from the ground. "I was so close!" He ranted. "I was so damn close!" He said, frustration taking over as he tossed the pieces at the wall, shattering them even further. "WHAT AM I MISSING?!" He cried. "How did they make it work?!"

He turned his attention to the thermos and in anger; he picked it up and got ready to throw it against the wall as well but stopped himself at the last second. He looked down at the metallic tube. Memories came to his mind of the ghost boy who wielded it before he got his metal hands on it. He set it aside and walked over to a metal safe on the wall. With a few turns of the lock, the safe came open revealing several items important to him. A photo of his dad and himself before he became what he is now, a letter from his mother before she passed away, a football autographed by his idol, yet what he pulled out was a small blue gear made from ice. A gift from a friend he long betrayed.

"I'm sorry Danny." He said before putting the trinket back into the safe.

END