Amity Park Action News Special Edition: FentonWorks

Written for Phanniemay '16, Day 2: FentonWorks

Lance Thunder checked his hair for the third time in the compact mirror he always kept in his suit jacket pocket. Snapping the compact shut, he considered going back to the news van and telling his cameraman that the Fentons weren't home. He didn't know why he'd been sent out here to report on this anyway. He was a weatherman, not a field reporter, but that didn't seem to stop the producer from sending him out in every ghost attack imaginable to report at the scene.

When he'd complained about this latest offense to his meteorological dignity, she'd explained, "This isn't an action report, it's just a little interview and tour for our viewers of FentonWorks. The Fentons are so tied up in what we regularly report on that this is our most requested story. For something so important, we can only send our best TV personality to do the job."

He'd been schmoozed. And he'd let it happen. Again. He was vowing to himself never to let this happen again when the door he'd been learning against to stay out of the midafternoon sun – direct sunlight bleached out his hair – opened and he fell face first into a wall of orange jumpsuit.

Backpedaling several steps, Lance drew in a breath to inform the orange jumpsuit that orange frizzed out his hair when-

"Good afternoon, Mr. Thunder! I'm Jack Fenton, and this is my wife, Maddie! We've been expecting you," came a rumbling voice from above the hazmat suit. Lance craned his neck to look up at the man and took the black-gloved hand that was offered, shaking it gingerly. Jack Fenton stepped aside and a woman in a blue jumpsuit mirroring Jack's took Lance's hand in turn.

"Great to meet you, Mr. Thunder. I'm Maddie. My husband is a big fan of yours," she said, a little quieter than Jack's near-bellow.

Lance snapped on his newscaster smile. "Always good to meet a fan. I'm here for the FentonWorks TV spot for Amity Park Action News. I assume you folks have some time?"

"Of course!" boomed Jack. "We've prepared some really cool stuff. You'll get to see our newest invention, the Fenton Ghost Battery!"

Lance turned back to the van and waved his cameraman over. "That's great. Really great." Checking the list from his pocket on topics the producer wanted, he continued, "It would be great if we could start off talking a bit about you two, the people behind the… monstrosity in the middle of town. How did this all start? What makes you do what you do?"

Maddie looked thoughtful. "How about you meet our kids? You can interview us all together. Jazz and Danny are both pretty involved in what we do, even if they aren't the most enthused about it."

Lance held back a grimace. Great. Kids. "Sure, whatever you think is best. Where should we set up?"

Maddie called her children down from their rooms while Lance and the cameraman moved into the kitchen. By the time the other two Fentons got downstairs, Jack and Maddie were mic'd up and ready to go. The cameraman handed the teens wireless microphones so they could run the wires up their own shirts.

Once all four Fentons were seated around one side of the kitchen table, Lance began. "Good morning, everyone, this is Lance Thunder here at FentonWorks for an Amity Park Action News Special Edition. I'm here with Jack and Maddie Fenton, along with their children, Jazz and Danny." The teens waved at the camera, Danny a little more wearily than Jazz.

"Why don't we start with you, Maddie. Can you give a short explanation for what FentonWorks is and does, for the folks at home?"

"Sure, Lance. FentonWorks is a company that Jack and myself started primarily to research ectoplasmic entities, or as they're widely known, ghosts. We invent and produce a wide variety of anti-ghost equipment and are some of the very few experts on ectoplasmic entities in the world," Maddie explained.

"Yes, I believe I've seen some of your equipment out and about in Amity Park. Your Fenton Thermos is one of the ghost-fighting tools of choice of Danny Phantom and has received a lot of popularity in recent months," Lance said.

Jack interjected with a grumble. "That ghost kid stole the first Thermos we ever made and has been terrorizing the town with it. If I ever get my hands on that ghost kid, I'll…" He trailed off, mumbling something about molecules. Over at the other end of the table, Lance saw Danny wince while his sister looked over at him sympathetically. He wondered what that was about, so he decided to move the conversation.

"So, Danny, I'm sure being around all this innovation is quite exciting for a young man. What do you think about your parent's work? Ever get to help out?"

"It's pretty interesting, but I don't do much with it because I'm so busy with school. I do help out sometimes with… testing," Danny began, but the cameraman coughed. "Not getting anything from his mic. 'S not on."

Lance pointed at the small black box clipped to Danny's jeans pocket. "Sorry, son, would you mind flipping that little switch there?"

"Oh, my bad, I didn't see it," Danny said, turning on the mic. As soon as he did, the cameraman's headphones screeched so loud everyone in the room winced. The cameraman wrenched the headphones off his head and massaged his temples, groaning.

"I'm so sorry!" Danny said, "Tech gets really weird in here. It's all the ecto-energy from the experiments and the fields that the, uh, ghost tech gives off."

"That's totally fine, son," Lance said, ignoring the glare the cameraman shot his way. Any excuse to move on to the next point on the producer's content list. "I think I've got enough material for some background. How about we move along to the tech you were going to showcase?"

Jack stood up so abruptly he knocked over the chair he'd been sitting in. "Just what I was waiting for! Right this way, Mr. Thunder. You'll love the lab!"

"Best we get out of here before Dad tries to offer him some of the fudge he made with the new Fenton Fudger last night," Lance heard Danny whisper to Jazz. He tried not to think about what could possibly be wrong with the fudge considering the way the equipment had gone haywire just a few moments ago.

The lab turned out to be the basement. Contrasting with the seemingly ordinary suburban house upstairs, the lab's walls were study-looking steel, along with just about everything else in the place. A large set of industrially-sturdy yellow and black doors took up most of the far wall.

"Over on that end is the Fenton Ghost Portal," Maddie explained. "It's our main source of research material. It opens into a dimension we call the Ghost Zone."

Lance signaled for the cameraman to start rolling. "What exactly is the Ghost Zone?"

"The Ghost Zone is a dimension separate, yet connected to ours in many ways that we don't yet comprehend. It is the home of the ghosts that so frequently plague Amity Park and is full of ecto-energy. We speculate that over there, the roles of ghosts and humans are completely reversed. That is, if you went there, you would be able to walk through walls and such, while the ghosts are completely solid."

Danny coughed something that sounded suspiciously like "confirmed."

"Very interesting," said Lance. "Now, about this door – excuse me, portal – could a ghost walk through that portal right now?"

"Don't worry, it's completely secure! Except when it isn't," Jack said cheerfully.

Maddie shot an amused look at Jack. "We have the highest possible security on those doors. However, ghosts are actually deviously quite clever. It's a constant cycle of ghosts figuring out how to get passed our security measures and us putting new ones in place. I wouldn't worry at the present, however. It's currently on lockdown as we're performing some maintenance."

Lance Thunder definitely wasn't sweating. He never sweat on camera. "Mr. Fenton, how about that demonstration?"

"Over here, Mr. Thunder. I present to you the Fenton Ghost Battery!" Jack gestured to a fairly ordinary, if large, battery hooked up to another device that was mounted on a steel and glass cage containing a-

"Excuse me, Mr. Fenton, but what in the blazes is that?" Lance exclaimed.

"For demonstrative purposes today, Maddie captured this ectopus. Ectopuses are one of the weakest, simplest creatures in the Ghost Zone. They possesses no real intelligence. Think of them as the pigeons of the Ghost Zone. Annoying, but overall harmless." The ectopus looked rather insulted. Lance didn't mention it.

"Here we are using the Fenton Ghost Battery in conjunction with some older inventions of ours, the Ecto-Converter and the Ghost Crammer. The Ghost Crammer is used to make the ghost smaller and compress it into this battery while the Ecto-Converter uses the ghost's ectoplasm to power whatever the battery is being used to power. The battery casing is really just so it's compatible with anything that takes nine volt batteries," Jack added.

"I see," Lance said. He didn't.

"So, I press this button and the ghost is sucked into the battery, then we can use it to power Fenton Blasters to fight ghosts! Isn't that great? Using ghosts to fight ghosts! Ha!" Jack's eyes were gleaming with excitement. "Here, watch this!" He pressed the button, and everything went wrong.

Well, not at first. The ghost was sucked into the battery. Check. The ghost bursting out of the battery? Uncheck. Very uncheck.

SCREEEEEEEEEEEEE! The ghost's screech was, for lack of a better term, unearthly.

"Uh oh," said Jack.

"Uh oh? UH OH?!" Lance squeaked, holding onto his hair.

"Activate FentonWorks Anti-Creep Mode! I'm locking down the lab. Just a moment, Mr. Thunder," Maddie shouted, keying in several commands at one of the many terminals around the lab.

"FentonWorks Anti-Creep Mode activated. Our special today is fudge – I mean, pain!" A tinny version of Jack's voice echoed from speakers overhead.

"I've, uh, got to go," Danny said, grabbing Jazz and dashing up the stairs right before a metal wall slid down to block the way out.

"Poor thing, he's terrified around ghosts," Maddie said. "Always runs the other way. You should see him around ghost equipment. Even worse."

"Why are you standing around talking?! GET THAT THING!" Lance didn't know where to go. He was trapped in a metal bunker underground with these people and that thing and it was squirting green goo everywhere and it was totally going to ruin his hair.

"It's quite alright, Mr. Thunder. These things do happen. Just wait until the Anti-Creep Mode gets at it. I've made a few upgrades!" Jack patted Lance on the back.

"Upgrades? Jack, which parts did you upgrade?" Maddie asked, troubled.

"I changed the ecto-energy identification parameters so it'd ignore our ghost weapons! Had to shore up that weak point after the last time," Jack replied, looking rather pleased with himself.

"Jack, we've been running our ghost weapons on ectopus energy for weeks! It'll ignore the real thing now, too!"

"Oh. Whoops," Jack looked dejected. "To the weapons vault!"

Maddie and Jack ran over to another huge set of metal doors. Lance couldn't hear quite well over the screeching, but they seemed to be arguing over the passcode. He ran around the lab looking for a place to hide when four very slimy green tentacles wrapped around him from behind. Lance let out a screech of his own as the ectopus attempted to swallow him whole. Strangely, Lance could still see a distorted green-tinted lab through the ghostly flesh.

"My hair," he tried to moan, but it came out as a choked gurgle. From what he could tell, Jack seemed to have abandoned trying to unlock the vault and was futilely tugging on the vault handle. Lance could feel ectoplasm seeping through his hair to the roots. Surely, this was the end, he thought.

It was at that moment that Danny Phantom phased through the ceiling. At the ghost boy's arrival, what Lance assumed was the FentonWorks Anti-Creep Mode came to life. Phantom got a few ectoblasts off, causing the ectopus to spit Lance out onto a lab table, but was smashed into the wall by a huge metal Jack Fenton cutout that sprung from the floor.

"Ooph," choked Phantom, dropping to the floor once the cutout had retracted. "I forgot about that." He pushed himself slowly off the floor. His earlier ectoblasts seemed to have stunned the ectopus, however, so when Phantom unclipped the Fenton Thermos from his belt and aimed it at the creature, it didn't so much as move. "Thaaaaat's it," he said to himself. "Good ectopus."

As soon as he'd said this, two grappler missiles fired from ports in the walls and caught Phantom by the ankles, hanging him from the ceiling. Lance stared at him from his puddle of ectogoo. The Fentons stared from their position by the vault.

"Did we just… capture the ghost kid?" Jack said, incredulous.

"Uh, hi, Mr. and Mrs. Fenton. I don't suppose you'd let me go for saving your lives?" Phantom asked with a nervous grin. He was ignored.

"Maddie, we caught the ghost kid! HA!" Jack grabbed Maddie's hands and danced them around in circles. They slowed to a stop when they heard a pounding at the metal wall blocking the stairs.

"That must be Danny and Jazz making sure we're alright," Maddie said, pressing a button on the console. The wall slid away and Jazz ran into the room.

"Mom, Dad, I heard the Anti-Creep Mode activate! Are you okay?" Jazz exclaimed, stopping when she saw Phantom hanging from the ceiling. Phantom shot her a rueful grin. Jazz looked like she was trying not to laugh.

"Oh, great, you guys… caught the ghost kid! Great job, Mom and Dad!" Jazz's enthusiasm seemed a little too upbeat. "So, I guess the FentonWorks Anti-Creep Mode caught him? You haven't deactivated it yet?"

"You're right, Jazzy-pants, we did!" Jack said gleefully. "Now to get him down from there and into a containment-"

"FentonWorks Anti-Creep Mode deactivated. I hope you enjoyed your fudge- I mean, pain!" Jack's tinny voice sounded from the speakers yet again. The claws holding the boy to the ceiling fell away, allowing him to orient himself in the air and phase back through the ceiling with a cheeky grin.

"Damn you, ghost boy, the next time I see you I will-" Jack shouted at the ceiling.

Maddie placed a hand on Jack's shoulder. "Next time, sweetie. There's always a next time."

"That is true, Mads, that is true," Jack admitted, letting out a breath.

They seemed to have forgotten about Lance, but his shrill moany noises drew their attention back to him, on the table in a pile of oozing slime. The cameraman was in the same corner that he'd crouched in at the start of this whole mess, camera aimed at the action the whole time. Action that now included Lance Thunder screeching about his hair and Lance Thunder sprawled in a puddle of slime.

"Get. That. Camera. Off!" Lance squawked, flailing about and sliding off the table. He didn't know whether the man complied.

The Fentons helped him up, apologizing the whole way.

"It's alright, Mr. Thunder. "We'll get you in the Fenton Cleaner and you'll be good as new!" Jack mollified.

Lance jerked his arm out of Jack's gloved hands and stormed out of the lab and the house without a word.

A/N:

Sorry, not sorry, Lance. One more one-shot after this and it's really all I've got on the docket. Hope you enjoyed!

-attu