Icy Encounters

(Part 5 of the Supernatural Halfa series. If yeh haven't read the earlier parts, panic not. I reckon this stands on its own pretty well!)

Lancer hated him. He was sure of it. If the stack of homework on his bedroom desk wasn't proof enough, the stupidly short deadline provided the perfect cherry on top.

"There is no way I'm gonna get this all done by tomorrow," Danny groaned, throwing his head down against the keyboard of his laptop. The device let out a loud, scolding bleat in protest.

"Dude, chill. It's not like Lancer isn't used to you missing deadlines," Tucker's voice chimed from the screen. Danny's head lifted to direct a glare at his webcam.

"Not helping, Tuck."

"Tucker's right, Danny. Just get as much as you can done and stop worrying about whether you'll finish or not. Lancer will just have to deal. How many hours ghost fighting have you done today?" Sam probed.

"Too many."

Danny sighed, turning his glare to the satellite poster above the screen. The Box Ghost, Skulker, a few of Walker's goons and a brief visit from Cujo. Today had been one of his busier days. As much as he hated to admit it, it felt like his astronaut dream was slipping further away, day by day. If his grades didn't pick up dramatically in his remaining few years, he could kiss any hope of seeing space from a rocket goodbye. And his grades weren't going to get better if he kept getting netted by Skulker every lunch break.

"Hey, maybe you should call back that ghost you met months ago."

"What ghost?"

"You know? That guy who said he could get rid of the ghosts in Amity Park. The creepy one," Tucker clarified.

"Oh, you mean the evil ghost who wanted Danny to work for him? That one?" Sam's tone was sharp but either Tucker missed it, or he ignored it completely.

"Yeah. That one."

Danny's shoulders sagged as he caught on to who they meant.

In an effort to keep Sam and Tucker out of the weirdness of the whole 'demons, angels and vampires' thing, Danny had lied to them. While he'd wanted to rant about the crazy that was Crowley, the thought of getting them caught up in the Heaven and Hell mess put him on edge.

So he'd edited the details a little. In their eyes, Crowley was some evil ghost king out to recruit the strongest of warriors to conquer the Ghost Zone, or something equally dramatic and clichéd. They didn't know about the birthday visit, or the fact that Danny had been exposed to a pair of hunters, but they knew enough to know that his love for Crowley was less than nonexistent.

"I don't think I'm ready to sell my soul just yet, thanks," Danny quipped, though glancing at the still unopened textbooks it might not take too long.

"I don't know, dude. Uninterrupted sleep and free weekends. Sounds like a pretty sweet deal to me."

A knock at the front door stopped the teen from biting back. He frowned, glancing at the clock on his computer. It was past six. Sam and Tucker were right in front of him and he couldn't think of anyone else who'd drop in this late.

"Jazz! The door!" he yelled, looking back at his friends' inquiring faces. Vlad was at some big mayoral event with Danny's parents so it couldn't be him. It was probably just a salesperson trying to sell some handheld vacuum.

"I'm busy, you get it!" Jazz's voice screeched back from the other side of the wall.

"I'm talking to Sam and Tucker!"

"You talk to them all the time, I'm sure they'll cope!"

"Seriously!?"

Jazz didn't respond. The knock came again. Huffing, Danny threw himself out of his desk chair.

"Sorry guys. Jazz is being a fruitcake. I'll call you back later?"

"Sure thing, dude. I should probably get some actual work done anyway."

"Catch you later," Sam added, with a smirk. Danny cut off the chat and slammed the laptop shut before loudly marching himself downstairs.

"You know, for a supposedly caring older sister, you totally suck!" he barked.

"Exercise is good for you! I'm helping!"

Danny reached the foot of the stairs and sent a glower in the direction of Jazz's room. "Right, 'cause it's not like I fight ghosts on a daily basis," he grumbled. He took a calming breath and rolled his shoulders in an attempt to eradicate any signs of a bad mood. He wasn't old enough to buy anything whoever was outside could try to sell and looking younger and relaxed would hopefully help get rid of them sooner.

With a faked smile and a bounce in his step, he made his way to the door and twisted the lock. His hand settled on the handle and with only a moment's hesitation, he pulled it open.

The two men outside were definitely not salespeople. Towering above him like Walker on a bad day stood two people he'd hoped never to see again. Their suits were just as immaculate as the first time he saw them and a half second's glance located the bulk of where he knew their gun holsters to be.

The door slammed shut before either of them could say a word.

"Crud," Danny hissed, shoving his back against the door as though his pathetic weight could somehow fortify it further. A hand flicked to the lock, turning it as tight as it would go, before pulling on the door chain. This was the opposite of good.

A third knock made him jolt and his eyes flew to the stairs. Jazz. He hadn't told her about the hunters. Maybe now was the time to. The Winchesters might not kill him in front of a witness. The thought of her being close to the guns strapped to their waists quickly put him off.

"Danny, open up. We just wanna talk," other-Sam's voice called through the door. Likely story. As soon as he opened that door, he'd be a goner. His shoulder ached at the memory of the barbed bullet Crowley had fired at him two months ago. While they hadn't been the ones to shoot, that was the kind of world they came from. Their weapons weren't ectoplasm based; they were killing machines.

The handle of the door quivered slightly as one of the brothers tried it. Danny's eyes slammed shut as he tried desperately to think of an escape plan. He could just go invisible and fly off, but then what if they managed to get inside and somehow ended up hurting Jazz? Could he maybe lead them away? But if they followed him, it could lead to an all out fight and while Danny knew he could probably take them, he didn't want to give them any more reason to think of him as some monster. They knew his secret. They knew where he lived. Fighting them wouldn't be the same as fighting ghosts. Ghosts he could just toss back into the Ghost Zone.

His mind flashed back to the time Freakshow exposed him to the Guys in White. No matter where he'd gone, they'd followed. He really didn't want a repeat.

"C'mon kid. We're not gonna hurt you," Dean grunted, though he didn't sound all that convinced. In that second, Danny made up his mind.

"I'm going ghost," he whispered. The white rings of his transformation washed over him, replacing his thin t-shirt and jeans with a slightly sturdier jumpsuit. He pulled on his invisibility and phased through the door. The ice in his stomach grew somewhat sharper at the look of irritation on the older hunter's face but before he could chicken out, he found himself floating to the other side of them.

He folded his arms as his invisibility dropped.

"You say that like you actually could," he challenged, false confidence giving his voice a steady volume. The hunters spun, hands instinctively rising to their holsters as their eyes landed on the floating form in front of them.

To Danny's mild surprise, rather than pull out their weapons, the pair let their arms drop. Even as he floated, Sam was tall enough to be at eye level. His hair had grown slightly since Danny had last seen him, but other than that, nothing about him had changed. The expression on his face was softened by what the teen could only guess was tiredness.

Dean's face had shifted into something unreadable as his eyes locked onto Danny's. The ice somehow sharpened.

"We've gone up against a lot worse than you, kid," the shorter hunter retorted. Despite his urge to shudder, Danny's lips formed a smirk.

"Probably." He lifted himself a little higher, trying to ignore the passing cars behind him. Danny Phantom having a conversation with two suited men on the Fenton family's doorstep was sure to bring uncomfortable questions. "But so have I."

His smirk grew as he looked down at the duo and pulled his legs up a fraction in preparation.

"You said you wanted to talk? Fine. But you gotta catch me first."

Without any more of a warning, Danny took off.

"Well, that's mature," Dean bit, just loud enough for the teen to hear him before the wind blocked the pair out.

In comparison to his usual speed, Danny's flight was pretty slow. Desperate to stay out of firing range just in case the pair decided not to play his game, he lifted himself so that he was flying a little way above the rooftops.

A glance behind told him that the Winchesters had indeed dashed for their ancient car. He couldn't say he was all that relieved, but it was better than any likely alternative.

Following the road, the halfa took a sharp left. The streets below weren't as empty as he'd like - the Spring weather bringing out the gardeners and evening dog walkers. His flight went mostly unnoticed until the Winchesters' car shot around the corner. It took seconds for disgruntled shouts and exclamations of excited curiosity to flood the air. Seeing that the hunters were going faster than he'd expected, Danny pushed his speed a little higher.

He didn't want to make it too easy.

A right turn swiftly followed by a left and then another. The only positive thing about Amity Park's regular ghost attacks was that people tended to steer clear whenever they saw Danny Phantom on the move. Thanks to his dad, crazy driving was also a fairly common experience. Right turn.

Unless Crowley was in stalker mode 24/7, it was unlikely he'd be swooping in to intervene this time. Danny hadn't been all that happy with his 'rescue' last time but it he had to admit, it had gotten him out of that cage. The only thing the teen had to cling to now was the fact that finding out about his being part human had caused the hunters to hesitate. Maybe whatever had stopped them before was still there somewhere.

"Yeah, 'cause the universe is always on my side in moments like this," he remarked to himself, sarcasm dripping as cold as the ice that had spread to his chest.

Danny's eyes locked onto his desired location and he pushed his speed a fraction higher. The Winchesters had just turned another corner and he could feel their eyes on his back. His spectral tail sprung into existence as he moved faster, leaving the houses behind and shooting past the "Welcome to Amity Park!" sign.

The woodland wasn't too much further.

The sound of the Winchester's engine roared behind him as his flight continued to pick up pace.

It wasn't long before he reached the cover of trees. Knowing it would take a few minutes for the brothers to park up and follow him in, he slowed. If his plan was going to work, his hiding place had to be perfect. His eyes scanned the area as he continued past the columns of wood.

Eventually his gaze locked on a tree that stood to one side of a smallish clearing. Nerves rushed through him as he pushed forward to rest on one of its larger branches.

"Hope this works," he murmured, shifting into invisibility and listening out for their inevitable approach.

He didn't have to wait long.

A sickeningly familiar, high-pitched buzzing noise flooded the clearing as the two hunters advanced. The EMF reader sat in Sam's hand like a pistol as the pair pushed through the final few trees to stop a little distance away from where Danny sat.

"He's around here somewhere," Sam mused, eyes lifting from the device to perform a quick scan of the area. Dean's hand twitched close to his gun holster, but to his credit, he didn't pull it out.

Please work, please work, please work, Danny chanted in his head. He held his palms out in front of him to form a large wall of ice above the hunters. Miraculously, their attention remained at eye level and neither of them seemed to think to look up. Taking a steadying breath, Danny worked to mould the ice into the shape he wanted. While he'd perfected the instant creation of small sculptures, something as big as this needed a little more time.

"I can't believe we're playing hide and seek with a wannabe superhero," Dean grumbled, exasperated glare burning through the surrounding foliage. Sam rolled his eyes.

"I don't think insulting him is the best way to go this time, Dean."

Danny couldn't help but agree as a grin burst across his face.

He let his creation drop from the treetops and land directly over the hunters.

"What the hell?" Dean started, eyes bulging at the bars of ice that had fallen around them. Unable to hold himself back any longer, he grabbed his gun.

Suddenly wary, Sam lowered the EMF reader.

Danny let his invisibility drop, floating down to admire the makeshift cage his ice had created.

"Well, this looks familiar," he mocked, resting his hands on his hips. "I have to say, I like it better this way around."

"This ain't funny, kid," Dean growled, raising his gun in an attempt to intimidate the half-ghost. Danny shot a small ectoblast at the weapon, causing it to fly from the hunter's hand and fall just outside of the cage bars. Dean drew his hand back in surprise and his glare grew more intense.

"I don't know," Danny chimed, "I'm enjoying it."

"Danny, we came here to talk, not fight." Sam clipped the EMF reader to his belt and lifted his hands in placating surrender.

"Yeah, you said. So talk." Despite his best attempt, Danny couldn't keep the sharp edge out of his voice. He wanted to believe that words were all the hunters had in mind, but experience had taught him that the likelihood of that being true was low to nonexistent.

Sam shot a look at his brother as though prompting him to go first. Dean, still caressing his hand, sent back a look so withering, it could kill grass.

Silence stretched between the three of them and it grew increasingly evident that neither hunter knew how or where to begin. After almost an entire minute, Danny gave a loud hum.

"Good talk. Are we done? Because I have a crud-load of homework on my desk that isn't going to write itself." As painfully true as it was, Danny was hoping the pair would pick up on the underlying plea of 'please leave and never come back'.

Unfortunately, neither one of them seemed to want to make it that easy.

"You're a good actor, I'll give you that," Dean grunted. The look on his face was far from one of defeat, but he didn't appear to be searching for weapons anymore. That had to count for something.

Danny sank a little lower in the air so that he was hovering just above eye level.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Dean shrugged, folding his arms over his chest, casual as anything.

"Your little nervy, embarrassed teen act," he stated, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "You really had us going. Spent a whole day with you and never once saw past the lie."

Danny's smirk faltered and he dropped a fraction more.

"I don't-"

"We've faced a lotta bad before, but you?"

"Dean, what are you doing?" Sam whispered, giving his brother an uncomfortable sidelong look. Dean glanced back at him but whatever silent conversation passed between them, Danny couldn't pick up on it. He gave an agitated shake of the head.

"I never lied to you." Danny's eyes narrowed to the point of squinting, smirk completely forgotten. The older hunter's head quirked to the side a fraction.

"We heard what Crowley said about your powers. Strong enough to take over Amity Park, perhaps more? I don't believe that someone that powerful can be freaked out by a pair of hunters talking about eradicating things that go bump in the night. If that wasn't an act, I don't know what is." The smug look on his face was oddly infuriating and Danny felt his eyes glow an indignant green.

"Are you for real? You were talking about slicing people's heads off. How, how is that not super creepy? Not to mention the fact you spent forever waving around your pistols and talking about all the ghosts you've 'salted and burnt' in your lifetimes. Like, come on. Being half dead is bad enough, I'm not looking for the whole thing, thanks." Danny forced himself to fold his arms in a feeble attempt to stop them from waving around.

Dean scoffed.

"Crowley seemed pretty taken with you. You expect me to believe someone Crowley sees as 'perfect' and full of 'darkness' is afraid of a couple of humans?" he crowed, raising an eyebrow in a way that suggested he was enjoying this far more than Danny was.

Danny got the impression he was being mocked and it only worked to irritate him further. This was not how the conversation was supposed to go.

"You'd seriously take the word of the self-proclaimed King of Hell, over mine? I get that you don't know me, but come on. Yeah, I got a few powers and yeah I get ticked off every now and again, doesn't mean there is any darkness there. The guy's obsessed. I'd get a restraining order, but somehow I don't think the police would believe that evil royalty keeps sneaking into my bedroom and telling me how awesome he thinks I am."

Danny dropped to the floor, flight suddenly unappealing. Having the brothers stand so tall above him didn't help his nerves any, but so long as he kept up the cage they couldn't get close to him. Whatever he said seemed to hit the pause button on Dean's goading. The brothers shared another look.

"And what do your parents think of all this?" Dean accused, once his mouth had caught up with his brain. Danny couldn't tell if the look he shot the hunter was one of frustration, or one of fear.

"They don't know."

Another pause. Another glance.

"They don't know about Crowley or…?" Sam spoke up, eyebrows furrowing in concern. Danny let his arms drop to his sides, confident their need to flail had come to an end.

"They don't know any of it. Not you guys, not Crowley and… not me."

"They don't know you're supposedly half-ghost?" Dean's face twisted into the same conflicted expression he'd worn when he'd walked out of that hotel room. Danny grimaced. He almost prefered the mockery.

"My parents are ghost hunters," he stated, voice as heavy as his core. "Danny Phantom is like… their number one target, you really think I wanna tell them he's living right under their roof? All they talk about on a daily basis is how much they wanna dissect me or… rip me apart molecule by molecule. They're my parents and they love me, but they're also scientists. I don't really want to risk the latter being more important to them." Danny shuddered. Why was he talking so much? All he wanted was to get out of here. How had his escape plan turned into a 'let's talk about how much my half-life sucks' session?

Another silence blanketed the clearing. Danny turned to stare at a small collection of budding flowers at the base of a nearby tree, not eager to watch yet another indecipherable silent conversation between the two brothers. He wondered if Jazz had noticed he was missing yet. Maybe she was already out looking for him, worried that he'd been abducted by some super dangerous ghost out for his head. Or maybe her head was still buried in whatever had her too busy to open the door.

"How did it happen?" Sam's voice gently probed, pulling Danny from his thoughts. He looked back at the brothers, unsettled by the lack of hostility in either of their faces. Whatever communication they'd had seemed to have softened Dean's earlier aggression. Danny was tempted to just ignore the question - to get rid of the cage and fly home to finish his homework and forget about the whole encounter. But while the suspicion had dissipated in their expressions, there was still a sharp edge of determination which meant the probability of them following him was higher than he'd care to risk.

He sighed. Maybe if he was just honest, they'd leave him alone. After all, he'd done nothing wrong. His only crime was existing and while he knew for a fact that this hadn't stopped the Winchesters before, he was getting desperate and staying out in the woods all night wasn't on his already hectic to-do-list.

"It was the portal to the Ghost Zone," he admitted, hand resting anxiously on the back of his neck. "It didn't originally work and I was stupid enough to climb inside to check it out. My parents had put the on button inside the machine. Lucky me managed to trip and hit it. Half-death by electrocution. Wouldn't recommend."

Dean scoffed, taking Danny by surprise with his nonchalance. "I'd take half-death by electrocution over total death by Hellhounds any day. What about you, Sammy?"

Sam seemed uncomfortable with being called out but gave a tight shrug. "It's hard to think of a death that didn't suck."

Danny's face sank into a bewildered frown.

"Wait… you guys have died?"

The dry laugh that escaped Dean was enough of an answer which only confused Danny more.

"Then… how are you…?" He gestured clumsily at their bodies, seemingly unable to find the words to end his question. Dean's smirk had resettled on his face and it was suddenly easy to forget the bars that separated them.

"A crapload of long stories," he replied, taking pleasure in Danny's confusion. "You got some impressive powers, kid. It's obvious why Crowley likes you so much."

Danny groaned as the conversation turned back to his least favourite non-human.

"Crowley can go shove his head in a toilet," he grumbled, glaring at the ground as though the demon was listening in.

His answer was obviously the right one as both hunters shared an approving glance.

"Look," Danny started, scratching his ear as though to kill the awkwardness, "I don't know what you guys want from me. I'm not sorry I kept this from you. I can't help that Crowley has his weird little obsession and I'm not gonna stop-" his words died in his throat as a shot of icy breath took their place. His eyes widened and he carefully pulled himself back into the air.

Not here. Not now.

Dean raised an eyebrow. "You okay, kid?"

Danny ignored the question as his gaze swept across the trees. Sam's EMF reader jolted to life, buzzing louder than the halfa had ever heard it.

"Danny, what's-" Sam started. Whatever he'd been about to ask was drowned out by the halfa's yelp as he was knocked to the ground. Green mesh wrapped around him like a glowing cocoon and before he could pull himself free, a pulse of electricity shot through the chords.

Danny cried out as pain coursed through him, forcing his body into a rigid ball.

"Thought you could get rid of me that easy, did you, whelp?"

A humanoid form appeared in the air across from the Winchesters' prison, causing the two to take a few wary steps back. Sam pulled out the gun from his previously untouched holster, eyes flicking from Danny to his attacker.

Danny groaned, dragging himself up into sitting as he took in the ghostly newcomer.

"Seriously, Skulker? Twice in one day? Don't you have anything better to do?" A sharp charge of ecto-energy from Danny and the net burst apart.

To the teen's mild surprise, rather than throw himself into the fight like he usually would, Skulker simply hovered in place. It took him a second longer to realise that the metal man was staring at the prison of ice and its captives.

"Why do you have two humans in a cage?" Skulker asked blankly. Danny rolled his eyes, charging his fists with ectoplasm.

"Why do you have such a stupid face?"

The teen grinned when said face turned. Without giving the ghost a chance to react, he fired an ectoblast at his chest. Skulker grunted as he was propelled backward into a tree.

"That was for the net," Danny chimed. "Totally unoriginal by the way. You need to get some better tricks."

Skulker snarled, pulling himself up and lifting an arm. "You mean like this?" Danny ducked as an oversized arrow flew from Skulker's wrist, missing him by a few centimetres before it lodged itself into the tree behind him. The teen smirked and was about to make clever quip before the arrow exploded.

The blast was enough to shoot Danny across the clearing, skidding face-first in the dirt until his head collided with a bar of ice. A hiss of pain escaped him as he fought to correct himself, but before he could do so, the ice began to crack. Panic spread across his chest as he realised his control over the sculpture was rapidly crumbling.

Skulker alone he could deal with. Skulker and two apparently well trained hunters?

The ice shattered, splinters disappearing in the air like fast melting snowflakes.

"Oh, crud."

Danny grunted as a large hand clamped around his throat, pulling him off his feet. Skulker's sneer was predatory as his free hand reached back to form a freakishly long blade. Not caring to experience 'total death' by stabbing, Danny swung his legs and sent a sharp kick to Skulker's breast plate. The metallic man staggered back a little but his grip didn't loosen.

"I got you beat this time, whelp," Skulker announced, blade slicing through the air towards the halfa's torso. Danny's right hand shot out to catch the arm before it could connect with him. To his relief, he managed to stop it. A flicker of a smile planted itself on his face as he shifted his core energy.

"I wouldn't be so sure, Tin-Man." Before Skulker could register the challenge in his captive's voice, Danny coated the bladed arm in a thick layer of ice. The ghost howled in frustration as he realised he couldn't get his robotic limb to work. Danny repeated the process on the hand around his throat. Another kick to Skulker's chest, and the hand was ripped from his wrist. The halfa quickly pried the detached extremity from his neck and reached for his Thermos.

Only to find that it wasn't there.

In his rush to lure the hunters away from his house, he hadn't thought to grab it from his desk drawer. After all, despite apparently having died, the Winchesters weren't ghosts.

"Well this just got a whole lot harder," he mused, watching as Skulker broke the ice from his blade arm.

The sound of a gunshot echoed through the clearing causing Danny's brain to grind to a halt. The world seemed to slow to a stop as Skulker's armour ripped open at the shoulder, blasted apart by whatever had hit it. The teen's eyes swept to the pistol grasped in Sam's hand. It shouldn't have been able to do that. A plain bullet should have just bounced from the metal covering, unable to penetrate the ecto-charged material.

It took Skulker a second to get over the shock of the attack but as soon as he did, his eyes locked onto the hunters. A rack of rockets leapt from his uninjured shoulder and began to shoot towards the duo.

Thinking fast, Danny threw himself forward and grabbed the Winchesters' arms, pulling them to the ground and turning them intangible before the rockets could hit. The missiles flew an inch over their heads and exploded as they collided with a collection of trees. Splinters flew from the wood and showered dangerously above the three but Danny's intangibility prevented any injury. When the explosions came to an end, the Winchesters were back on their feet.

"You think you can defeat me with your human toys? I am the Ghost Zone's Greatest Hunter!" Skulker roared, though Danny sensed a note of apprehension he hadn't heard in the ghost's voice before. With one hand missing and a shoulder blasted apart, Skulker didn't look well. Danny swallowed as Dean lifted the weapon he'd retrieved when the ice cage shattered.

"Conder yourself hunted."

And then the shooting began. Bullets fired from the hunters' guns at a rate that would make Maddie Fenton proud. Skulker's armour was shredded, first at the chest and then rising to the neck.

Danny felt a wave of nausea as he realised that if they went any higher, they might just hit the little ghost inside. As much as going up against Skulker on an almost daily basis sucked, he really wasn't ready to watch him expire at the hands of the Winchesters.

"Stop!" he yelled, but whatever murderous trance the brothers were in prevented them from hearing. The bullets were rising and Skulker's expression was beginning to become one of panic. His jet blasters had been blown appart, making flight increasingly difficult and escape near impossible. Danny willed the ghost to just eject himself from the suit and fly away but shock seemed to have him paralysed.

Danny sent two, low-heat ecto-blasts at the hunters' backs, causing them to stagger forwards and their fingers to drift from their triggers. Without waiting for them to recover, the teen flew to hover directly between them and Skulker, palms out in a motion that was both placating and defensive.

"I said stop!" he repeated, eyes glaring a defiant green. While having Skulker behind him was probably not wise, he figured Sam and Dean were the bigger threat right now. As though to confirm his theory, the metal ghost collapsed.

Dean's glower was deadly as his weapon raised to point at the halfa. "Move," he grunted, voice more peeved than Danny had ever heard it.

"So you can fire more bullets? Not a chance."

"He was trying to kill you," Sam reasoned. The softness his face had held earlier had all but vanished, eyes boring into the mass of metal behind the halfa. Danny didn't miss the way the two began to separate, edging slowly around him as though believing he couldn't defend from two sides.

"Yeah. He does that. If I remember rightly, it wasn't so long ago you two were tryna do the same thing." Danny took a careful step back, watching for any twitching trigger fingers.

"Danny, we're hunters. We hunt monsters. That thing behind you is dangerous," the younger hunter tried again, half giving Danny the impression his words were merely meant to distract.

"So am I. Would you call me a monster?"

Neither brother gave any sort of answer, causing Danny to scoff. He took another step back. "You would, wouldn't you? That's why you brought weapons to 'talk'. You just wanted to assess how much of a risk I was." It was obvious now that he thought about it but somehow the sting was still sharp.

Dean gave a very deliberate roll of his eyes. "You got us all figured out, haven't you, kid?" he drawled, mockery thick in his tone.

Danny's eyes flashed a brighter green.

"Skulker may be a total pain in my everything, but ending him isn't the answer. I don't care how you guys do it with your other ghosts or your demons or werewolves or whatever, but that's not how I do things. And as long as you're in my town, I'm gonna have to ask you to play by my rules."

The halfa's ecto-shield burst to life just in time to halt a bullet intended for Skulker. The glare he sent Dean was almost feral as the deadly missile connected with the wall of ectoplasm. The shield shattered and the bullet dropped harmlessly to the ground.

"We're not gonna take orders from a kid in a onesie," the man growled, unfazed by his failed attack.

The two had circled to the point they were almost at opposite sides of him. Danny glanced back at Skulker, unnerved by the fact that the robot's eyes were still glowing. The ghost should have deserted the armour by now. Unless something was wrong.

Panic sparked in his chest. Had he been too late with the save? Had they actually managed to hit him? Without a second thought, Danny formed a clumsy dome of ice around himself and his ghostly enemy. With the ice being mostly ectoplasm free, he hoped their weapons wouldn't affect it as easily as he crouched beside Skulker's head.

"Skulker, you okay?" he probed, surprised by the quiver in his own voice.

"I'm fine," a small voice spat from somewhere in the machine's head. Danny gave a small relieved laugh, sagging slightly as he peered through the semi-transparent dome to find the duo continuing to circle. Something about their movement played on his mind but he figured Skulker was the bigger concern.

"Yeah, you look it," he scoffed, though his eyes didn't leave Sam. "Listen, you need to get out of here."

Skulker didn't respond right away and Danny's eyes travelled down to Sam's gun-free hand.

"I… can't," came Skulker's resigned response.

Though the ice distorted most of the outside world, Danny swore the human hunter's hand was ever so slightly shaking. But why?

It took a second for Danny's brain to catch onto Skulker's words. He glanced down at the glowing head.

"Why can't you?"

"... The escape hatch won't open."

Danny's eyes travelled to Dean and his frown deepened as he realised the older hunter was also shaking his free hand. Whatever it was they were doing likely wasn't good. Unnerved, he reached down and wrapped his hands around the metallic head. With it already being busted he didn't feel so bad about ripping it off. His hand plunged through the mass of wires until it found the small, frog-sized entity within and yanked it out.

Skulker's true from glowed an angry green as he glared up from within the halfa's fingers.

"Get out of here," Danny ordered, allowing the ice around them to shatter. Skulker's face twisted in frustration at the command and he pulled himself from the teen's grasp.

"I don't follow orders from you."

"I mean, if you wanna take your chances with them, be my guest." Danny couldn't help but notice just how far around the clearing the brothers had made it. He was drawn between the a sudden impulse to fly home and a need to distract them long enough to allow Skulker to get away.

Without waiting for Skulker to make up his mind, Danny leapt forward and sent two well-aimed ghost rays at the hunter's guns. The shots landed but their grip held strong. He tried again, aiming at their shoulders in an attempt to at least knock them off balance.

Without the usual heat or force he put into his blasts, they were about as effective as a sharp elbow but despite the anxiety building in his core, he couldn't bring himself to risk hitting them with anything more powerful. Their only armour came in the form of slightly muddied suits. Up against a fully charged ecto-blast, Danny didn't want to think of the damage he could cause.

In his hesitation, Dean fired a shot. The half-ghost threw up a startled ecto-shield which splintered as soon as it was hit. While he got the feeling it was nothing more than a warning shot, it didn't change the fact that he'd been the target this time.

"This isn't over, Ghost Child," Skulker hissed from just behind his shoulder. The teen gave a distracted roll of his eyes.

"It never is," he bit back. His ghost sense flared as the blob of a ghost drifted into invisibility. The Winchesters were only five metres from each other, hands still shaking as their eyes flicked between the now empty heap of metal and the half-ghost.

"Is there a reason for the circling or are you just hoping I'll get dizzy?" he called, sinking into a stronger defensive stance. The upward flick of Dean's lips brought the earlier instinctual fear crashing back.

The gap between the two continued to close.

Danny's eyes narrowed as the filtered light from the trees caught on something drifting by the older hunters side. Now that his vision wasn't obscured by the wall of ice, he could see the thick white particles that fell from the hunter's hand as he moved. He felt his eyes widen as he finally realised what was wrong with the picture.

His gaze locked onto ground where the hunters had been orbiting. A thin line of white trailed a haunting circle that planted Danny right at its centre. He'd listened to enough ghost hunting stories from the pair to figure out what was going on.

In a sudden wave of desperation, Danny flew at the hunters. He needed to get out of the ring before they completed it. Whatever they'd done to their weapons obviously worked and if the circle was the same…

The teen picked up speed, angling his shoulder to take the shorter of the two out.

His realisation had come too late.

Rather than collide with Dean's torso like he'd intended, the teen found himself thrown back by an invisible barrier. He hit the floor with such a force his back became half submerged in the soil.

He groaned, taking a second to rest in the crater he'd created for himself.

"Well, this looks familiar," Dean scoffed, the teen's earlier words sounding far more dangerous in his mouth.

Danny pressed a hand to his forehead as though that would stop the ache that was beginning to take it over. Slowly, painfully, he dragged himself up into standing.

The smug look on Dean's face was enough to make him sick but at least they'd lowered the guns. Keeping a wary eye on the both of them, Danny edged sideways until he was standing directly beside the salt line. Filled with both morbid curiosity and painful apprehension, he lifted a hand. As soon as his fingers were in line with the circle, the barrier surged to life. No matter how hard he pushed, he couldn't get his hand to pass outside the ring.

An exasperated sigh escaped him.

"I have to admit, when you were talking about salt circles, I thought you were crazy," he announced, forcing his anxiety back behind his familiar blanket of false confidence.

"Little green guy. Where did he go?" Dean demanded, sounding almost dutiful. Danny allowed his ghost sense to travel over the circle, searching for any signs of his ghost foe. The relief that flooded through him as he came up short, latched a smooth smile across his mouth.

"Hell if I know. He's probably half way to the Ghost Zone by now," he responded truthfully, folding his arms in momentary triumph.

"You keep letting 'em go, they're gonna keep flying right on back." The older hunter's face had melted into something akin to frustration.

Danny let out a sharp laugh. "Don't I know it."

"Danny," Sam started, gun drooping as he put on his reasoning face. "If these ghosts aren't stopped, sooner or later someone is going to get seriously hurt. You might think you're saving people, but all you're doing is throwing tape at a burst pipe. Eventually it won't be enough."

"The only way to make sure everyone stays safe is to eliminate the threat," Dean added darkly. Danny gave a thoughtful hum.

"Okay, first, that analogy totally sucks. Second, as dangerous as the ghosts in Amity Park may be, they've never once come close to deliberately killing anyone." Except maybe his dad, but they didn't need to know that. "Swearing eternal doom and global domination, sure. But they're not out to steal anyone's soul or… drink their blood or whatever. They're already dead. Robbing them of their afterlives on top of that? Yeah, I'm gonna pass."

It was clear this wasn't the answer they wanted to hear but Danny found that he couldn't care less. He was Amity Park's protector, not its hunter. The place already had enough of those.

"You know, I thought we were actually getting somewhere before," Dean remarked. It took Danny a moment to realise that he was talking about their brief conversation before Skulker had attacked. He gave a slow nod.

"For a second, so did I." His easy smile slid into a more determined glare. "Stay out of Amity Park, stay away from the ghosts and stay away from me. I don't wanna fight you, but I will if I have to."

Dean's face scrunched itself up in bemused disbelief.

"I somehow don't think you're in a position to make threats, kiddo," he bit. Danny raised an eyebrow.

"Why? What are you gonna do? Shoot me?" The boy lifted his head slightly in his defiance, allowing the rings of his transformation to wash over him. "Go ahead."

The shift in the hunters' attitude was instant. Discomfort lined their every feature, adding more to Danny's confidence by the second. His restored heartbeat was faster than he would have liked, but he was able to hide it as he shoved his hands casually into the pockets of his jeans. The importance of this moment weighed heavy on him as he let his eyes slide over the brothers. He couldn't be a scared little boy this time. The ghosts of Amity Park needed him and he'd die before letting the Winchesters near any one of them.

As discreetly as he could, he manoeuvred his elbow to lean gently towards the circle of salt.

"I have to ask," he began, eyes catching on their weapons. "What was your goal here? Like, when you knocked on my door demanding to talk - what did you expect? That I'd just let you in, offer you coffee, answer any and all questions and then let you romp through Amity destroying any ghost you came across?" He twisted so that his elbow was hidden by his torso as he continued to search for the barrier.

"Not exactly," Dean grunted, fingers twitching subconsciously around the butt of his gun.

"No. Not exactly. That's why you came prepared with the ghost guns and the table condiments." The teen glanced at the circle beside him and a small smirk made its way onto his face.

"Word of advice though," he chimed. "Next time you wanna trap a ghost in salt circle, try to remember if there's any part of them that's still human because this…" Danny stepped over the circle. "Is just embarrassing."

The guns were back on him but he found himself eerily unconcerned. If they wanted him dead, they would have shot already.

A tense silence swept over the clearing, the brothers both clearly unnerved by the sudden turn of events. Danny tried his best to keep his face stoic, betraying no sign of the small voice in his head that was desperately begging them both to leave.

The seconds turned into minutes as the Winchesters considered their options. Their eyes never left the raven-haired teenager but somehow a wordless conversation still managed to pass between them.

It was Dean who inevitably broke the peace. His grip tightened around his weapon as he fixed Danny with a inescapable glare.

"We hear about one death, the smallest injury, we come back and we clean up your mess, ya hear?" he threatened, face more serious than Danny had ever seen it. "If we have to go through you to get to them, we will. And I promise you, we won't be gentle."

The teen didn't answer, his nerves poking furiously at the blanket they were hidden under. Dean lowered his gun and placed it back in its holster, prompting Sam to do the same.

"I hope for your sake nothing big ever comes out of that portal because that pain you get when people die because you failed to save them is damn near unbearable."

Danny flinched at the heavy emotion in the older hunter's voice but before he could think of any kind of retort, the pair began their retreat into the trees.

They didn't get to far when Sam turned and threw Danny a concerned frown. "Hey, Danny? Stay away from Crowley," he warned.

Danny gave a sharp eye-roll but kept his mouth shut. Seconds later, he was alone.

He pressed a hand against his eyelids as exhaustion threatened to overwhelm him.

It was official. Hunters were blockheads no matter what they hunted. He withdrew his hand and gazed wearily at the heap of armour that remained at the heart of the circle. As banged up as it was, he couldn't leave it for some passer-by to find. The last thing he needed was some young child stumbling across it and wounding themselves on the giant arm blade.

His eyes drifted to the salt circle. If he remembered rightly, all he had to do was disrupt the line and it'd be rendered useless. As though to test the theory, he ran the heel of his shoe through the salt.

"Going ghost," he murmured before transforming yet again. He met with no resistance as he floated over the line and retrieved the discarded hand that had previously been latched to his throat. He then landed carefully beside Skulker's suit. With a drained glance in the direction the Winchesters had left, he crouched and shovelled his arms under the armour's pits. His fingers twisted around the detached head and he couldn't help the pang in his core as he was reminded of just how close he'd cut his rescue. A few seconds later and...

The teen sighed.

Next time there was a mysterious knock on the door, he was sending Jazz.

AN: This. Is. So. Freaking. Long. 7800 words in one post is just... insane for me. I view 4500 words as a grand achievement. This is new.

Would you look at that though! Part five out only four months after part four. To say the gap between every other part has been a year, I'm actually pretty proud of that!

Update though: I'm contemplating posting possible future parts here so that from this point on, all yeh have to do is follow this fic to get the next blast of SuperPhantom from me. I'd connect the already existing ones but I feel like that would just make things messy.

Hope you guys enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it. If you haven't already - go check out part four! Twas a birthday prezzie to myself and remains my favourite addition to the Supernatural Halfa series. I love it. I'm done. I have to go write other stuff now.

Til we meet again!

~Mea

Side note - Skulker's suit in this is ecto-charged which in my head means that passing through it intangibly is sort of a no-go. Almost like an ecto-shield, I guess. Hence why Skulker was unable to phase out of the helmet and Danny had to forcibly remove himself from the hunter-ghost's hand. In case anyone was pondering. Also. Skulker is my favourite regular ghost invader. Vital info. You guys totally needed to know that.