Chapter 1: Fly Like a Bat by Sivan5733
The day Danny fled Amity Park was the most horrifying and surreal day of his half-life. One sunny morning just after Danny's junior year of high school had ended, the world came crashing down on the Fenton family. There was no warning. Something woke Danny up from a dead sleep. He wasn't sure what it was that had disturbed his slumber, but he suddenly had chills running up and down his spine. Something wasn't right. He knew instinctively that there was danger. Without pausing for thought, Danny slapped an ecto-suppressor on his wrist to hide his presence and changed into his Phantom form. He put his phone on his nightstand, then he grabbed his emergency kit and jump-bag. Taking an extremely cautious approach, the teen invisibly and intangibly floated through the house looking for the source of the trouble.
He did not get far before the sounds of suppressed gunfire reached his ears. With lead in his stomach, he stuck his head through the kitchen ceiling just in time to see his adoptive family fall dead on the floor around the kitchen table. They had been assassinated—killed in cold blood. The lingering agents in blood-spattered white told Danny who the assailants were. The half-ghost took a quiet, few seconds to mourn his family's loss. He would grieve later. Now, he had to act before anything worse could happen.
For all the Fenton family had been labeled quacks, they were incredibly smart in the manner of secret warfare. Maddie's planning, in particular, had been thorough and specific. Danny knew exactly what to do. He quickly made his way to the basement lab and saw several men attempting to get information out of the computer. Danny gave a humorless huff of laughter. His parents had already built fail-safes into their system in case any hostiles ever turned their eyes to the family. The half-ghost reached into the wall by the Portal and grabbed the SSD drive that was hidden there for a situation like this one. It contained all of the Fenton's latest research and blueprints. Everything else was stored off-site in a hidden location.
After grabbing the drive, there was only one thing for Danny had to do. He quickly flew to his bedroom and accessed the secret button hidden in the floor beneath his room; there was one in every bedroom, just in case of emergencies like this. Danny wanted to be surrounded by the comforts of the seven years he had lived in this loving home. Danny eyed the garish red button that Jack had installed—the man had hoped during the entire installation that those measures would never need to be taken. Now, Danny was glad for all of their preparations—they helped him act through his grief and shock. After gathering the things he had prepared, the half-ghost took a longing last look at his phone sitting alone on the nightstand. He thought of Sam and Tucker and decided it would be safer if they thought him fully dead. It might save their lives—even if it broke their heart. Decisions made, Danny took an unneeded breath and pressed the button.
He could hear the whine of the portal quickly overloading from where he sat. He fell intangible, closed his eyes, and let the explosion engulf him. When he opened his eyes again, he was floating above the wreckage of Fenton works. Everything around him was devastated. There weren't two bricks of the building left put together. Danny wiped his stinging eyes, and started flying in the direction he was facing. He didn't know where to go. He was not expecting a shout from a van parked two blocks away.
"I've got something on the scanner sir!" A white suited agent proclaimed.
Danny had hoped that all the agents would've been inside and caught in the explosion; he was wrong. He didn't understand why the ecto-dampener wasn't working. Terrified, Danny flew up and away as fast as he could.
When he reached the edges of Elmerton, he noticed the strange sensation of a bubble, it didn't quite feel like a ghost shield, it felt more like a strange amalgamation of magic and technology; it didn't matter what it was. He knew he did not have the luxury of rest or mourning, so he pushed through with his power, and promptly received a shock. Angry and determined, the half-ghost returned to his human form, flung himself at the barrier, and popped out the other side. Then he just flew.
The world outside of the "bubble" was different than he had ever felt before. It felt less oppressive. As he had never seen the need to go further than Elmerton during his time in Amity Park, he was shocked to discover just how different things were outside of those two areas. There was no way he could have guessed that life outside of his home county was so different.
After flying invisibly for what seemed like hours, he made his first stop at a convenience store for snacks. Maddie had always insisted that he carry "emergency funds" in his jump-bag. Danny was glad for that now, as he carefully put some $20's in his wallet before dropping his bags on the roof of the store. After a quiet landing in a near-by alley, he made sure he was alone when he faded into visibility. Heavy-hearted, he went into the story and bought lunch and snacks for himself, along with a newspaper. Once done, he went back to the alley, turned invisible, and retrieved his possessions from the roof of the building. He would find a place to sit and read when his troubled mind could absorb the information.
He ate as he flew. Surprisingly, the calories helped clear his head. Finally, he stopped to rest at the edge of a forested park, finding a perch on a high branch. He took stock in what he knew. 1.) The GIW was most likely in control of not only his former city, but the entire surrounding area. 2.) There was a strange "bubble" surrounding their area of influence—that no one seemed to notice. 3.) The GIW could track him in his Phantom form—even with his ecto-suppressing bracelet on. 4.) His family was dead.
That last bit stopped his brain for a while. His family was dead. With the Portal gone, there was no way of finding out if they were safe in the Infinite Realms, or if they had simply passed on. His only option would be to find Vlad and use his portal—but that really wasn't an option at all. There would be no Dan. He would stay as far as possible away from the Frootloop—even if it meant living on the streets. He would not let the ghosts of his past come to life again. He wouldn't! Sitting near the top of a tree in a quiet park, he finally allowed himself the tears that had been threatening to fall since early that morning when the GIW had broken into the only home he had ever known.
Minutes or hours later—Danny couldn't tell—he finally felt settled enough to open up the newspaper and see what the world was really like outside of the mysterious "Amity Park Bubble." He was flabbergasted. He had no idea the extent of media isolation that the organization known as the Ghost Investigation Ward had put his town under. The "real" world—outside of the "bubble" was amazing.
Superheroes were everywhere! There were even superhero organizations like the Justice League—even teams of teen heroes, like himself! It was overwhelming. He briefly wondered why people who had visited or left Amity never mentioned the discrepancies. His best guess was that it had something to do with the magic/tech bubble surrounding his county. The magic part must be messing with people's minds. A low growl escaped Danny, and he did not try to stop it. He hated it when people with power used it to take advantage of other people—especially when mind manipulation or mind control was involved.
He thought about the possibility of trying to get help for Amity Park from one of these other "superheroes," but decided it would be too difficult to worry about at the moment. What he needed was rest and time to heal where he wouldn't be found. He would research that tomorrow. He decided to sleep invisibly under the stars that night, and then get some more distance between him and the GIW tomorrow before doing anything else. Weary beyond belief, and full of grief, the seventeen-year-old hero settled back and fell asleep.
The following morning, the newly orphaned hero flew until his stomach made him stop at the next town he came to. After eating, he went to the public library and did an Internet search on the heroes that he had read about the previous day. He spent an entire hour just studying the Justice League. He was determined to find a way to contact them and tell them what was going on in his hometown. He was reading newspaper articles about a rogue organization called Cadmus, when his unearthly hearing picked up voices near the window he was sitting by.
"We've got a faint reading of Phantom's ecto-signature somewhere nearby. I suggest we fan out and investigate."
Danny knew that voice. It was one of the same ones that had been at his house. He wondered with no little bit of hate, if the man had time to clean the blood off of his clothes before he started his workday today. Danny briefly looked longingly at the computer and thought about the friends he had left behind. He could really use Tucker's help in his quest for justice, but he refused to put any more innocents in the line of the GIW's fire.
Suddenly, he heard the library doors open, and he quickly looked for the restroom. Danny quickly made his way to the old doorway at the back of the building and intangibly slipped inside. From there, it was easy to float up to the roof and grab his bags. He took to the sky, looking down only to see upwards of five white vans patrolling the neighborhood he was in. He needed to figure out how they were tracking him—and fast. With nothing else to do, he picked a random direction and began flying. The only pertinent information he had gained was the fact that his ecto-dampener mostly masked his ecto-signature in human form—just not all the way. He would have to be very, very careful where he stopped from here on out.
At least he had some goals now. The first was to find a place with enough ambient ectoplasm to hide his ecto-signature. The second was to find a place to live where he wouldn't be noticed. The third was to find the Justice League and make his plea for help. His last goal was to learn as much about this "new" world as possible.
With those things in mind, he reached out with his senses until he connected with a resonating ectoplasmic entity. He mentally cried out for help and refuge, and the entity responded with warmth and welcome. Danny sighed, tears in his eyes. He might not have a home now, but hopefully, he would find one in the place he was being drawn to. He sent gratitude and thanks to the being that had offered him shelter, and turned his flight path to the northeast.
Weekly Power Status
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