"It would seem," Lancer finished, "that Danny Phantom was trying to protect your family as much as he tries to protect everyone else in this town."

Jack and Maddie Fenton exchanged glances from their place on their couch; Jazz sat beside them, while Lancer and Danny had taken the free chairs. That Mr. and Mrs. Fenton were reluctant to believe Phantom would help them was obvious; it had been all Jasmine could do to stop them from immediately activating their Fenton Anti-Creep Alarm. But his insistence on the subject seemed to be puzzling them, and Danny had chimed in often to make good use of Lancer's support for Phantom—even if he managed to appear reluctant whenever he did so.

Really, Lancer had always found young Mr. Fenton's excuses rather pitiful, but these were inventive without being obviously contrived. I think Skulker was targeting me because you're my parents. Not the most comforting point, but a valid one. Perfectly believable, given the situation; Jack and Maddie Fenton surely made enemies of the ghosts they hunted. He's the Ghost Zone's Greatest Hunter; of course he'd pit himself against you. A self-proclaimed point, but not one Lancer could dispute, given what he knew of the ghost. This is a weakness. The only thing that stopped him from exploiting it was Phantom. Another point that couldn't be disputed, particularly given that it was true in more ways than one. I'm lucky it wasn't worse.

"Phantom saved me," Danny repeated quietly. "I know you don't trust him, but he's the reason I'm not lost somewhere in the Ghost Zone right now."

Maddie closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose in thought. "Ghosts always try to do this, Danny," she explained. "They want you to see them in the best light possible so they can exploit your trust later. Phantom and Skulker may have been working together in this." She looked at her son then, adding, "I know how much you two look up to Phantom, but you can't trust him. That might be the last mistake you make." Her gaze suddenly switched back to him. "Surely you aren't falling for his ploy, Mr. Lancer."

"I am inclined to agree with your children in this instance, given what I witnessed."

"That's only playing into the ghost's agenda," Maddie pointed out. "Ghosts are masters of trickery. Phantom is hardly different."

"I did work with him once, Mads." It was a feat for Jack Fenton to look uncomfortable, especially when the subject was ghosts, but he managed a close approximation. "I told you about that. Plasmius threatened my family, and no one threatens my family."

"One good deed does not undo the past."

"But one bad mistake ruins everything else?" Jazz exclaimed. "That's a double standard, Mom, and you know it! You can't treat ghosts differently than people."

"They aren't human, Jazz," Maddie said in the tone of one who had had this argument all too often before.

"No, but they were once." Jazz bit her lip, glanced at Danny so quickly that Lancer nearly missed it, and amended, "Most of them, anyway. Phantom is."

He was beginning to get a better appreciation of exactly how much Jazz did for her little brother.

Danny had had enough time to get cleaned up. He didn't look good now, not by any stretch of the imagination. He had stayed as Phantom for as long as possible; Lancer had gotten a brief explanation from Jazz he'd only partially understood about accelerated healing due to the regenerative effects of residual ectoplasm, but he could appreciate the results. While Danny was still clearly exhausted and his wounds were still present, he no longer appeared in dire need of stitches, he was in no danger of bleeding through the gauze, and some of the tiny cuts and scratches that had marred him earlier were gone. Lancer was already unsure if he had imagined the bruises.

Lancer had never thought too much about Phantom's resilience before, but it certainly made sense.

It also explained why there never seemed to be any evidence of Mr. Baxter's abuse of his classmate. Lancer had turned a blind eye to that for too long, but without Danny so much as going to his parents with a complaint, let alone anything official made to the school…. It became difficult to persuade the school board that Casper High should remain open if it wasn't bringing in any money from football games, and Dash was the star of the team. Kwan was very good, but he couldn't carry the team by himself, and Casper High sustained too much damage to rely solely on handouts from the school board.

They'd exceeded their repair budget the first week the ghost attacks had begun, and things had only gotten worse.

But money should never have been a reason to ignore a child's abuse, and Dash's bullying of Danny was nothing less than that. What good was Casper High as a school if its students weren't safe within its halls?

Well, as safe as they could be, given the ghost attacks.

It was rather surprising they hadn't been shut down anyway. Elmerton didn't see nearly as many attacks.

Granted, no ghost attended their school, but despite the attacks, Amity Park's reputation for educational quality remained a shade better than that of their bitter rival.

Lancer only hoped it still would once things changed.

"As I see it, Mr. and Mrs. Fenton—"

Maddie held up one hand. "No, Mr. Lancer, I'm sorry. You've made your opinion very clear, but I'm afraid I don't share it, and like Jack, I'm not willing to compromise our children's safety. Phantom might have saved you this time, Danny, but it's all too likely that he simply has a plan in mind for later. Go fetch a Spectre Deflector. I expect you to wear it until further notice."

"Mom!" The exclamation came from Jazz; Danny's expression was frozen in horror, and Lancer doubted it was all for show. "You can't make Danny wear that!"

"As soon as I check over the other ones, we'll all be wearing them," Maddie said, her voice making it clear she wouldn't stand for argument. "I've half a mind to distribute them free to the entire town, but I'm afraid we can't afford that right now. If we could shut down the Fenton Ghost Portal without repercussions—"

"Wait, shut down the Portal?" Danny's horror had melted into puzzlement. "We can do that?"

This was news to Lancer as well. For all the Fenton Ghost Information sessions he'd attended—and that was many, despite the dismal attendance of the FGIs these days—the Fentons had never mentioned the possibility of shutting down their portal and cutting the ghosts off from what was surely their main entry point. Lancer knew the portal was shuttered, but he'd always had doubts about it staying closed, and the revelation of Phantom's identity hardly inspired confidence.

"Not easily, Danny-boy. Not without a lot of bad mumbo jumbo that your mom's been telling me about."

Lancer saw Danny swallow, look at his sister, ignore the worry that was clear in her expression, and make a choice. Carefully, the boy asked, "Is it because the Ghost Zone is connected with our world?"

Maddie's eyes widened. "You know about that?"

Danny shifted uncomfortably. "I've picked up some stuff here and there," he said vaguely.

"Phantom told us," Jazz added, and Danny glared at her. "I was doing some research on ghosts and ghost envy, and he agreed to answer a few questions."

"Jazz—"

"Don't start, Mom. If Phantom really wanted to hurt us, he would have done it by now."

"Our previous encounters with Phantom do lend credence to Jasmine's theory," Lancer put in. He was trying to be helpful. If Jack and Maddie would at least agree that Phantom wasn't solely a menace, it would make the eventual conversation easier on Danny. And that conversation would happen. Despite Danny's worries, Lancer planned to encourage him to have it.

But because of Danny's worries, Lancer also planned to have a contingency plan in place. He didn't fear that Jack and Maddie wouldn't accept the truth about their son; he feared they might think it a terrible hoax of Phantom's at first, and he feared the psychological toll on the entire family once the truth became undeniable. Jazz's concerns that they weren't currently mentally prepared for the truth were hardly unfounded, after all. Still, at the very least, he would offer Danny a place to stay for the duration if it came to that. He would just rather make plans to ensure it didn't.

Truth was, though, Lancer wasn't sure his plans would make a whit of difference. He didn't really know the Fentons well enough to know how they'd react, and even imagining himself in their situation was difficult. There would be horror, guilt, disgust, denial—angry, defensive denial and tearful, insistent denial—and maybe blank numbness, but in what order? Where would the acceptance finally fall? Initially, before the horror set in, or after, once it had begun working its way through and the need for forgiveness that may never come became overwhelming?

Yes, he could certainly understand why Danny had not told his parents.

But keeping the secret for long would only serve to make the situation worse.

Lancer was supposed to be a responsible adult. However much Jazz fancied herself grown up and fully matured, she wasn't. He was. Which meant he needed to do the responsible thing, and covering for a secret like this…. That wasn't it. Not in the long term. Not even for very long in the short term.

He needed to do whatever he could to change the Fentons' view of Phantom, but he feared they might not unless they were presented with undeniable proof of Phantom's humanity.

The same proof that could tear them apart.

"You did say Phantom helped you before, Dad, and not just when the entire town was under attack." Danny's voice was tentative again, but Lancer was beginning to figure out which emotions were part of his mask. Danny was clearly referring to an incident he knew all about but was pretending he didn't, so his uncertainty couldn't be genuine—unless it was merely there because he was unsure of what reaction he'd receive. "What if he wasn't just helping you out to earn his freedom? What if he really was helping because it was the right thing to do?"

"I never said anything about giving him his freedom, Danny-boy."

Lancer saw the flash of panic this time, could recognize the falsity of the smile Danny plastered on his face. "But you would've captured him if he'd been close enough to help you like that," reasoned Danny. "Besides, wasn't that the time with the Fenton Weasel? You told us about that, too, not just Mom."

This time, it was Jack's turn to look uncertain, and Jazz stepped right in to back up her little brother. They had been at this for a while. "Oh, right, that time. I lectured you for weeks about capturing him in the first place, but as usual you didn't listen to me."

"And," Danny continued before either of his parents could open their mouths, "if he can be trusted with that, maybe he can be trusted with something like this. As a trial. I'll even carry ghost hunting weapons with me at all times, I swear. Maybe he can even help you guys figure out the Portal. Why exactly can't you just close it, again? Phantom never exactly mentioned there being any repercussions of that."

"Danny, we are not having this conversation now. Go get the Spectre Deflector."

Danny still didn't move, instead belligerently crossing his arms. "Mom, seriously. It's connected with our world. I get that. But why can't we shut it down? What would happen?"

"Danny."

"But it would stop all the ghosts! We wouldn't need to worry about them. Phantom might not even need to be around all the time if he doesn't have to fight any of them."

"Listen to your mother, Danny-boy."

"Just answer my question!"

"I confess I would also be interested in the answer," Lancer interjected mildly.

Maddie's lips thinned, but she evidently decided that she and Jack were suitable protection for Danny in the meantime and didn't wish to have a fight in front of a guest. After a pointed look from her, Jack coughed and flashed Lancer a brilliant smile. "As much as I love talking about ghosts, weren't you here to discuss Danny?"

"You can go, Jazz," Maddie added quietly.

"Mom!"

"No, she can stay." Danny's hurried assurance was no doubt born out of fear of losing an ally, lest he find himself in need of one. Lancer couldn't blame him; he wasn't sure he would be able to help the boy if it came down to it. "She's…probably gonna end up helping me with my homework and stuff anyway. Maybe scheduling? A schedule might help…."

Lancer cleared his throat. "That is certainly an admirable idea, Mr. Fenton, if you can stick to it." Looking at Jack and Maddie, he clarified, "I'm afraid Danny's record hasn't improved since our last discussion." I'm sorry, he wanted to say to his young student, but he couldn't suddenly appear unconcerned about the matter. It was still an issue, even if he now knew the truth, and he had pressed for this meeting.

"We've offered to check his homework," Maddie said, glancing at her son, "but..."

Say something, Danny. It was the perfect opportunity for him to pipe up with an excuse, believable or not, but he remained silent.

"I'm afraid restricting his gaming time hasn't been effective, if you've seen no change," Maddie continued apologetically. "We've been hesitant to cut him off from Sam and Tucker. I'm sure they help him, and you know how teenagers are, Mr. Lancer. They never seem to want to come to their parents for help. I mentioned grounding Danny for two weeks once, on a trial basis, but Jack talked me out of it." She turned a small, somewhat apologetic smile in Danny's direction when she noticed his expression; clearly, his parents had never come close to instigating this particular punishment for any considerable length of time. "He reminded me that sometimes kids need an escape, and the real issue here might not be Danny's inability to apply himself but an inability to focus or an uncertainty about how to tackle a deeper issue."

Jazz, surprisingly, looked as if something suddenly made a lot more sense. "That's why you and Dad haven't been talking quite as much about your inventions, isn't it? Because you've been trying to give Danny space and give him the opportunity to open up to you and not have the conversation taken over by ghosts."

Maddie leaned over to touch Danny's arm, though she withdrew her hand when Danny flinched away. "You never seem to want to talk to us anymore, honey."

"I'm a teenager, Mom. You just finished saying we don't talk to our parents."

"Sweetie, please don't twist my words like that. I know Sam doesn't have a good relationship with her parents, but I know Tucker gets along well with his. We'd like you to know that we are here for you if you'll only come to us. The problems we solve don't have to be related to ghosts to be important."

Lancer could see the defensive line in Danny's posture, and he knew—he knew—how this was going to go if he let it play out. So he didn't. "If I may," he interrupted, "perhaps the problem is tied to ghosts after all?"

"What?" Danny's yelp of shock was nothing compared to the betrayal on his face or the thunderous anger beneath it. For the briefest of moments, his eyes seemed to burn green, and he spat, "You don't know anything, Mr. Lancer."

No, he suspected he didn't.

Not compared the whole truth or the little Jazz knew of it, at least. But he knew enough for this. "Forgive me, Danny, but am I wrong in thinking that you and Jasmine do not share your parents' views on Phantom?"

"What does Phantom have anything to do with this?" Jazz shrilled. She looked no less betrayed than Danny, but fear played on her face more than on Danny's. Danny had not forgiven him for this apparent betrayal; Jazz was already thinking ahead to what it might mean. She couldn't see where he was going with this.

"I'm not," Lancer concluded when neither child answered him. "Could it be, then, that in defiance of your parents, and perhaps out of loyalty to one you think of as a friend, you help Phantom?"

He saw the comprehension dawn in Danny's eyes, saw Jazz's shoulders sag as she released her breath. They weren't in the clear, but this was a better route than the one they'd first feared.

"It would, after all, explain the ghost's motivations." He looked at the Fenton parents now. "Rather than trickery, Phantom might simply be acting to protect his friends. Or assets, if you do not currently believe him capable of friendship." It was a perfectly logical explanation, one he had found himself believing—and may have continued believing, had he not stayed to overhear more of the conversation or if the pieces had not been so carefully laid out in front of him. "If your children have formed an alliance with Phantom, they are hardly in danger from him."

Surprisingly, Jack was the one to break the silence that had begun to stretch. "Is this true?"

Neither child made eye contact with any of the adults.

"You're working with Phantom?" Maddie clearly had no trouble believing that conclusion, either. "Both of you? How long has this been going on?"

"I've been doing it for long enough," Jazz finally whispered, "that I believe him more than I believe what you've been telling me about him. Scientists have to have open minds, and you two have a big blind spot when it comes to him." Her voice had been getting stronger, gaining in confidence as she spoke. "He doesn't have an end game, some nefarious ulterior motive. He's good. A good soul. Death didn't twist that, whatever you two think. Did you ever think that that's why he's so powerful? Because his goodness is so pure that it not only survived his death but has sustained him in the afterlife to the point that he doesn't need to frequent the Ghost Zone as often as the other ghosts? That he's been getting stronger because his good deeds are what strengthen him?"

Maddie sighed. "You agree with your sister, don't you, Danny?"

"Phantom might've messed up before," Danny mumbled, "but he doesn't want to be evil."

"But for all of your help, for all that he told you about the Ghost Zone mirroring our world, for all that he seems to have been treating the symptoms rather than the disease— You yourself said that Phantom never mentioned what would happen if we shut down the Ghost Portal. Why do you think that is?"

"Because he didn't know?" Danny offered, finally looking at his mother.

"No," Jack said, "it would be because he didn't want to die again. Jazzy-pants, you know ghosts are sustained by the concentrated ectoplasm of the Ghost Zone. Phantom isn't exempt to that, and he doesn't have the ability to create natural portals."

"So he'd destabilize if the Portal were shut down?" Jazz asked cautiously.

"All ghosts caught in our world would. Maybe not immediately," Jack allowed, "and not the ones who've managed to tether themselves here some other way, but all the ones that have turned up since we opened the Fenton Ghost Portal? Including Phantom? They'd be torn apart molecule by molecule. Just slowly and painfully and not where we could analyze them."

"Then why haven't you shut it down already?" Lancer asked. He was surprised to find himself voicing the question, but he didn't regret it. He knew Jack and Maddie were scientists, that they wanted to study ghosts, but they wouldn't endanger the public like this, especially for so long, merely for the sake of capturing a specimen to study. They would have gone back to the drawing board and discovered a way of fishing ghosts out of the Ghost Zone that didn't risk the entire town.

"We didn't realize it until after we'd built the Portal," Maddie said quietly. "We'd gone over the calculations countless times. Nothing had seemed out of place."

"Not until the Fenton Ghost Portal didn't work," Jack put in. "The designs for that baby were perfect. It should've started up like a dream!"

"But it didn't, so we went back over our notes. I saw it then. What it was supposed to need, what was supposed to sustain it. I was actually happy that it hadn't worked. And then when we came home and it was…." Maddie trailed off. "I thought that meant I'd been wrong, and I was ecstatic to be wrong for once. But as time went on, I realized I wasn't. I couldn't be."

"Wrong about what?" Jazz and Lancer asked the question at the same time, but the seriousness of the situation seemed to sap away any humour the incident might have caused. Instead of teasing his sister or making some sarcastic remark, Danny stayed silent.

If Lancer had learned anything of Phantom, it was that silence was often associated with the most grave and impossible of situations, the ones where grit and determination may not be enough to pull through but must be tackled anyway. It meant acceptance of the inevitable, should it come to that, and a seriousness that couldn't be faced with humour alone. Too often, it meant sacrifice.

That scared him.

No child should be forced to contemplate that.

"The Portal contains a massive amount of energy," Maddie explained gently. "It's currently stabilized by the nature of our design, but the moment we move to shut it down, it would become unstable. Without an appropriate conduit…."

"It would explode," Jack finished. "Worse than anything we'd see if we forgot to change the filter for a few weeks. The Fenton Portal's slicing into the very fabric of our reality. You kids were taught about the energy released when an atom's split, right?" He didn't wait for them to nod before adding, "How many atoms do you think the Portal's sliced through?"

Children of the Dust, the Fentons believed the outpouring of energy, maybe the release of some sort of radiation along with all the free neutrons that would serve to extend the explosion, would be more devastating than a disaster like Chernobyl. They didn't want to try shutting it down until they'd devised a way to contain it, and from what he could gather, they hadn't figured out how.

"But…." Jazz licked her lips. "The Portal's slicing through air. It's not uranium. It's mostly nitrogen." She knew the truth. Lancer could see it. She just didn't want to admit it. Acknowledging that pit of fear in her stomach would make it real.

Unfortunately, he shared the feeling.

"Does that even matter if it's still enough energy to break an atom in half and start a crazy chain reaction?" Danny looked like he might be ill. "And there's still all the ectoplasm from the ghost side." He turned to his parents. "Mom, you said it needs a conduit or something like that?"

"We're working on it, honey. You don't need to worry about it."

But they wouldn't figure it out. That's what Danny and Jazz were worried about, and the thought disturbed Lancer, too. What didn't help matters was the knowledge that the Fenton children might know exactly what their parents were missing. He didn't know without talking to them, of course, but—

"I…I need to go." Danny stood up. "Sorry. Can we, um, reschedule?" He ran off without waiting for an answer.

"Danny, wait!" Jazz was the first to react, albeit too late to catch Danny, and by the time Lancer got to his feet, Danny was nowhere in sight.

Of course, that didn't mean much, now that he knew Danny could turn himself invisible and fly.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Lancer," Maddie said as Jazz rushed out in a futile attempt to catch her brother. "We shouldn't have burdened you with this knowledge. Please, trust that we're working on it and developing more effective weapons to combat all the ghosts in the meantime."

She had no idea what knowledge he was burdened with.

Ignorance really could be bliss.

But it could also be disaster.

Jack and Maddie needed to understand Danny's situation. Lancer didn't want his inaction to lead to ruin as disastrous as the tragedy Jack and Maddie were already trying to prevent. "I Never Promised You a Rose Garden," he murmured, thinking of the horrible situation in which his young student had found himself.

"Pardon?"

Maddie must think he'd made some remark about their portal. He wished, if she did, that she were right. It would be a much simpler subject to discuss.

"Mr. and Mrs. Fenton, I have something I feel I should tell you."