Chapter thirty (part one)
All right. The next installment. I won’t say much because I want you to find out yourself, but…enjoy.
Chapter 30: Revenge of the Guys In White
The summer days continued to roll by as if everything had just gone back to normal. (For everyone else anyway.) But the misery of Danielle’s absence still lingered with the Fenton’s for some time and every once in a while, one of them, particularly Danny, would stop what they were doing and start to mourn for her loss.
Tucker especially had made note of this and had one afternoon, called a town gathering at City Hall. And he asked specifically for the Fenton family to attend.
Danny never liked going to these events because there were always a lot of people who would instantly recognize him, no matter what appearance he had. And his parents, who were always wearing their jumpsuits, were always standing out in any crowd. But Tucker had insisted, even to the point where he made Danny promise that he would be there. And Danny never broke a promise before.
When the young ghost hero and his family had arrived at the gathering, there were already hundreds of people there. There was a statue in the middle of the town square that had been made in dedication to Danny after he had saved the world from being hit by the asteroid. For some reason, however, it had been covered with a large cloth. This made him a bit curious, and when he asked Jazz about it, she didn’t seem to have any idea of what it was about either.
As the Fenton’s walked through the crowd, The teenage hybrid couldn’t help but notice several of the nearest people were staring at him. He had half a mind to turn invisible, but decided otherwise in realizing that Tucker would probably think that he had not come after all. Still, he felt quite awkward as people parted to the sides to let him and his family through to the front as if he was making some grand entrance that he didn’t want to do. He had hoped with such a big crowd, he wouldn’t be as easily noticed, but apparently this wasn’t so. He felt a huge hand on his shoulder and looked up to see his father smiling down at him in understanding reassurance.
A hush suddenly came over the crowd as the mayor stepped up to the podium to speak. “Citizens of Amity Park.” Tucker greeted. “It is my honor, and yet to my grief that I stand before you today to tell you of a tragedy that has taken place in our town.”
After Tucker had finished saying this, Danny began to understand why the mayor had specifically asked for him to come to this meeting and he looked in the direction of the covered statue before back to Tucker as he began to speak again. The teenage mayor went on addressing the crowd about Danielle almost as if she had gone ‘missing in action,’ as it were. He put in how he had even witnessed her last great deed himself, but he could not give any details of what had truly happened, for only those who were closest to her would ever fully understand.
But Tucker did say to the citizens that before Danielle’s disappearance, Danny had been in a time of great peril and she had battled against all odds to make sure that he could still remain to protect the town and defend its citizens.
“And because of her great service to us, as well as to our own hero, Danny Phantom himself, a new addition to our statue had been made.” Tucker gestured for the cloth to be pulled off the giant sculpture and the assigned men surrounding it uncovered the memorial.
As the giant cloth was pulled, the great statue of Danny Phantom was shown. He was standing tall and holding up an orb that was shaped like the planet Earth high above his head. But this was what Danny had seen before. What was new about it, and that he certainly did not expect, was an added figure of Danielle in her own Phantom form standing behind the figure of Danny with a hand on his shoulder and gazing up at the globe with a smile as if she was supporting him as he held it up.
The crowd mumbled and pointed in amazement and Danny looked back at his parents and sister, seeing them just gaping at the new statue in awe. He continued to glance around, seeing Sam and her parents standing amongst the crowd smiling in delight, and a distance further, Danny could see Andrew sitting on his mother’s shoulders for a better look and he was pointing at the statue looking absolutely ecstatic to see the gigantic replicas of both his favorite heroes.
As for Danny himself, seeing this new and improved statue of him and Danielle standing together reminded him so much of the time back at Freakshow’s train. She had been there, helping to sustain him as he was using the last of his strength to put out the fire that was spreading to his loved ones after he was pulled from the Blood Blossom ring. That was just like her, Danny thought, as he put a hand over his chest: Not wanting to actually take over for him, but always there to help him so he could stay to defend his home and its citizens from the evil that was constantly threatening it.
The reacting crowd’s chatter died down as Tucker continued to speak. “Though a duplicate of this memorial already stands in every nation of the world, this addition has only been made to the Amity Park statue. For the cousin of Danny Phantom was a modest heroine who had never wanted her deeds to become publicly renowned. But I’m sure we can all agree to join in and give her thanks for her devotion. And as mayor of the city she had helped our own hero to protect, no matter how temporary, it is my honor to rededicate this statue to, not only this whole town, but to the entire Fenton family who had considered her to be so much more than a close relation.”
The town square roared in applause with catcalls and loud whistles at the end of Tucker’s speech. As the Fenton’s applauded along with the audience, Danny looked up at his parents and saw that his mother was moved to tears. Danny mouthed a “thank you” to his friend at the podium, who nodded in his direction with a smile in response.
But just after, the ghostly teenager was starting to get the feeling that something was terribly wrong. A feeling that was making him gradually stop his applause and listen. A strange sound was mingling in with the crowds cheering that sounded distant and yet it felt like it was close at hand: and coming in fast. He started looking around, searching for the source of the noise when he felt a sort of compulsion to look up, where he then realize the noise was coming from.
Suddenly, he gasped in seeing what it was and looked back down in Tucker’s direction, who was still waving at the applauding audience. In fully realizing what was happening, Danny started pushing his way through the crowd, running towards the podium.
“Danny?” Jazz called after him in confusion when she noticed her brother taking off in a hurry and Going Ghost.
Danny jumped into flight as soon as his transformation was complete and soared above the crowd that was now starting to murmur in question. “Tucker, heads up!” He shouted in earnest warning as he sped towards the podium. He tackled the now completely startled mayor, forcing them both at least ten feet back before the podium was unexpectedly hit by something that made it go up in flames.
Danny and Tucker both hit the floor hard as the crowd suddenly began to rouse in panic. Security teams quickly jumped in and started leading the crowd to evacuate the scene as two of the guards hurried over to Tucker and Danny.
“Nice save, Mr. Phantom.” One of the guards congratulated as Danny hoisted himself to his knees.
“Are you all right, Mr. mayor?” The second guard asked, bending over the two boys in concern. Tucker was breathing heavily, but he nodded as he was helped to his feet.
Jazz and her parents came running up the steps of City Hall to make sure that both of the boys were all right as the last of the crowd was fleeing, under the escort of the security. “Man, that was way too close.” She said.
Sam soon joined them, skipping every other step, to get to the top. “What was that?” She asked, completely flabbergasted, as she reached the others.
Danny answered by glaring up at the sky where two white, flying objects were closing in. “Stay with them.” He told the security guards, regarding this family and friends. Then, he stepped forward to face the Guys in White as they came hovering in on their Aerial Chasers.
“Knew you couldn’t stay in hiding if a friend was in danger.” Operative O. said with a smile of satisfaction down to the teenage ghost.
“Attacking the mayor in the middle of a town meeting? Just to get at me?” Danny shouted back up in angered disgust. “You guys must be getting really desperate.”
Just after he finished saying this, some automatic blasters came out of their vehicles that shot red beams of energy and hit Danny right on target. His family gasped as he was thrown back from the force of the blast and hit the wall of the white building behind him. But surprisingly, Danny’s back hitting the wall was the only thing he really felt. He brushed off the front of his jumpsuit as if the laser blast was nothing and looked up at the Guys in White with a bit of a confused look.
The men who hat shot him were also looking perplexed. But they shook it off and fired another one of the beams at Danny, which again had no effect, aside from forcing him up against the wall again. Once more, they fired, but this time Danny was able to just swat the blast away as if it was just an annoying fly.
“Okay, you guys have made lame stuff before, but that is by far the worst thing you’ve ever come up with.” Danny announced, giving them a disappointed look.
“It should be breaking the very essence of your being down to nothing.” Operative K said, standing up in his vehicle. At this, Danny cocked an eyebrow and gave a side-glance to his friends who just shrugged. So Operative K continued, in a frustrated tone. “We found a component in the ghost-girl’s DNA that was the main source of her stability. If removed, her entire genetic structure would fall apart.”
Danny scoffed, shaking his head after hearing this. He knew full well that the component was the substance he had used to stabilize Danielle when she was being melted down. And these two lunatics thought that Danny would be the same.
“This new weapon was supposed to be the means of removing that element.” Operative O. put in. “But it’s not working on you. Why?”
“That’s what made Danielle special. Even amongst us hybrids.” Danny explained, folding his arms in a taunting manner. “We may have similar ecto-signatures, but the building blocks that make up our spectral structures are completely different. So anything you’ve made from experimenting on her is completely useless on me.”
The Guys in White glared at the boy through gritted teeth in reaction to what he just informed them of.
“We should have known that there was some trick behind her quick surrender to us in the woods.” Operative O remarked to his fellow agent.
Then they resorted to using their older weapons and started firing them at Danny in pure frustration. Danny dodged the blasts, leaping to the bottom of the steps of City Hall to completely avoid them. However, his family was still up at the top with the only two security guards that were left in the area and as soon as Danny was separated from them, Operative O had taken out a gadget that looked like some kind of remote, and pressed a button on it.
Danny braced himself, but the trigger wasn’t for him. He heard Tucker and the others behind him cry out and he spun around to see that a series of blue walls of transparent light were surrounding the landing at the top of the steps, between the pillars that held up the roof of the white building. They started pounding on the blue walls, but though they were as thick as a sheet of paper, they were incredibly strong and unable to be bypassed. They were trapped.
How could Danny not have seen this sort of thing coming? The Guys in White were only shooting at him just now to get him to leave his family’s side so they could trigger a trap they had probably rigged some time ago. And Danny had no doubt that they had programmed it to block him from going through as well.
Just after the full realization of this event had come to him, something hit him in the back and attached itself there, giving him a painful surge through his body that made him cry out and collapse to the ground. He had never felt this draining feeling before, but something inside him was saying that he knew what was causing it: The spectral-diffusion-device. The electric patch that The Guys in White had used to drain Danielle of her powers for over half a day.
See part two...
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