Balshumet: Sooooo, I'm not going to pretend it hasn't been all of forever since I updated. It has, and I'm sorry about that. First though, I'd like to thank everyone who left reviews or sent me messages, asking when this would update, encouraging me, telling me this story was awesome and that they were still interested in seeing the end of it. Thank you so much. I know I didn't respond, but I read every single one of those, and they helped me get back into this tale. My life took an interesting and hectic turn for a good while there, but I have more free time again, and I'm determined to see this story through, if not for myself, then for the people who have held out hope and who love this world I created and the characters.

Disclaimer: I, Balshumet, do not own Danny Phantom, or any of the characters, and if you think I do, then you haven't read a single disclaimer in this entire fanfiction, and that's amazing because this is the fourteenth chapter and stuff.

So a big thanks to all of you for your patience. No more delays, let's get this show back on the road. Cya at the bottom...

If It's Answers You're Seeking…

For a full five seconds, nothing could be heard except the steady drip drop of water from the cave ceiling to the floor. In the stunned silence, Danny had just enough time to regret having ever opened his mouth, before the eldest Masters sibling found her wits.

"You-you're what?" Jasmine stammered out. Of all the things she'd expected to come out of his mouth, another apology, more lies, definitely more curse words, that statement hadn't been anywhere on her radar.

"I, I um-"

"Oh, oh good God, he's insane! Completely delusional, totally One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest gone. What institution did you escape from? Did you leave the rest of your common sense there too?" Daniel said before moving to stand next to his sister.

"I'm not crazy! I-what's the point? I can't tell you anyway." Danny crossed his arms before leaning tiredly against one of the many stalagmites reaching towards the sky. Well, it's not like I was going to avoid a smiting at this rate. Still, my dad is their mortal enemy and well…I doubt they're going to be any more willing to let me stay if I explain how Jack Fenton is my father.

"Can't tell us? Oh come on now, don't leave us hanging! You just got to the good stuff. You're from an alternate reality that got destroyed so that we can exist? Man that's good, maybe I should write that down, I can use it in the fictionalization of my life for Hollywood or something."

"Knock it off Daniel, this is serious, I mean this is the first remotely honest thing we've gotten out of him. So your last name is Fenton right?" Jasmine fixed her most neutral look onto her face. Calling Danny "skittish" was typically an understatement, and if her parents had taught her anything, it was feigning neutrality could fix all types of problems.

"Yeah it is." Danny huffed and looked away from his sister's penetrating gaze. He'd just admitted as much a minute ago, not like repeating it was going to get him into any more trouble. Although, he'd have to be sure not to let anything else out until he could think of a good reason for the outburst from earlier.

"Ok, so you are Danny Fenton. If you aren't from 'here'" the red head paused and actually unfolded her arms make the air quotes, "then where-when-are you from?"

"Well-"

"Why are you indulging his fantasies? He's obviously some plant from the GSU. Sugar cookies, he's done his job twice already. Once in Wisconsin, and just a few minutes ago at Camp, well what used to be Camp anyway. It doesn't matter what false hypno-memories they've implanted in his brain, we need to tell Mom and-"

"Woah! Wait! You can't just-I mean, I don't have any false memories. These are all real, and I'm not a plant or spy or something. They were just trying to kill me; you can't honestly believe I work for people who were trying to kill me?"

"The GSU hates all ghosts, and they still have captured ghosts on leashes doing their bidding. What are you some type of shape shifting ghost? Thought you could just slither in here and rat us out to your psychotic 'Father' and his little followers, and oh well if you died, no big deal! You'd love to die in service to your human overlords." Daniel shot back.

"No. None of that is true. I'm not a ghost; I'm a halfa just like you or Vlad." At their increasingly skeptical looks, he put his hands up. "I swear. I'm serious. I'm not lying."

"Right, just like you weren't lying about how you couldn't remember what day it was, or that your mother was Harriet Chin."

"I really did lose days, and ok, that part was a lie, but the rest of what I've told you wasn't! Vlad really is an old family friend, that's not a lie. He's really is a family friend of my mother too, so-"

"So who's your mother?" the elder girl asked.

"Um, she's…" he trailed off grasping for a good lie. He'd already admitted Harriet wasn't his mother, and with Vlad so universally hated, that left him with no real options. A little truth never killed anyone right? Well as far as I know. "Well we have the same mom."

The two Masters siblings shared a look before glancing behind them to the softly glowing section of the cave near the back. Their mother had been working diligently for at least an hour now, and they could still hear the soft whirl of the generator working to keep their father in ghost form, and possibly alive.

"You expect us to believe that we have the same mother? Are you seriously suggesting that we didn't notice her-"

"Now, now Jasmine," Daniel interrupted, "you're forgetting he's from alternate reality. So he totally could have been incubating in an alternate version of our mother who is apparently still on good terms with Jack Fenton or something. Is that about right?" When Danny didn't answer, he rolled his eyes and squared off to face his doppelganger again. Taking a better look at the other boy, he could see parts of his face that eerily matched his own. If he didn't know for sure there was no way they were related, he would think they were twins. As if I need anything else weird to happen in my life.

"Listen, I'm being as honest about this as I can. I don't know how much I can tell you without causing more problems."

"I don't seehow. If you really are from an alternate reality, then it's an alternate version that no longer exists, and so, telling us about it isn't going to affect this one in any way. That is, unless you are from the past or future of this universe instead of a different one entirely. In that case any information you tell us, especially about the future, could adversely affect the present to the point the entire timeline becomes unstable and shifts. But if that were the case, it's likely you'd be unable to relay to us any information we wouldn't be able to discern ourselves, thus avoid violating causality. Ergo, spill the beans." Daniel said with a confident smile on his lips.

"I-you-what?" Danny scrunched his brows and blinked a few times before continuing, "is it physically impossible for you to use simple explanations or…? The point is, I can't tell you anything, any details, about the alternate reality where I'm from. I shouldn't have even told you I was from an alternate reality or something, but I just can't stop running my big mouth."

"Well get your mouth back into gear, because you aren't staying in this cave with us until you explain who you are clearly for once. I don't care if we have to march you back through the cave rubble and leave you outside with a 'please pick up your trash GSU' sign." She walked over to one of the make-shift tables near the RV and picked up a weapon. It was one of the few that still held a charge, and she intended to use it if she had to.

"Hold on, you can't just start pointing guns at me and threatening to kick me out! I mean if you don't trust me, Vlad does and-"

"And doing so could have gotten him killed! He's bleeding with poisoned metal burrowing itself deeper into his body every second because either you can't follow simple instructions, or you are delusional brainwashed spy risking my family's safety every moment you continue to draw breath. Personally, I'm no longer in the mood to find out which," Jasmine said while clicking the mini-bazooka up a few notches. "Your options are, come clean about whatever it is you think you know, or get a hole blasted in you, and your body dumped a few feet in front of the cave entrance."

"Are you really going to threaten me with that when I'm the only one with working ghost powers around?" Danny could feel his eyes already beginning to burn green from frustration and anger. "I don't want to hurt you, or Daniel, or anyone here, but if you make me fight, you'll regret it. I'm on your side here, so put down that gun before I have to blow it up." He raised a green ecto-energy covered hand towards the general direction of the eldest Masters sibling.

The air in the anterior chamber grew increasingly tense as Daniel moved besides his sister to grab another weapon and his otherworldly twin lifted another green swathed hand to match. A cold sweat trickled down the back of his neck. In any other situation, he'd be more than capable of handling a fight, but after the day he'd had a stiff breeze could knock him over. They had to be mindful of the GSU as well. Even though they had likely already headed back to their headquarters in DC with their remaining men, they had satellites everywhere watching for their spectral energy. Even under all these tons of rock, there was no guarantee that they couldn't sense even the small amount of energy the other dark haired teen had summoned. Just the same, he wasn't about to back down from a fight with a likely ghost plant.

"What the hell is going on out here?" Maddie growled as she walked from the entrance to the posterior chamber into the room proper. She frowned as none of the teens involved in a poorly thought out Mexican standoff answered her. "Jasmine, Daniel, where are the twins and Lizzie?"

"Inside the RV, playing some tedious board game or watching a video." When her mother only frowned further she continued, "I don't know what they're doing in there. They aren't messing around with any systems, and they aren't fooling around out here."

"Fine. What are you and your brother doing with those guns pointed at Danny?"

"Our favorite fudge-up was just explaining how he's from an alternate reality, Jack Fenton is his father, and he's not a brainwashed ghost spy. Personally I don't believe any of it but-"

"It's true." Maddie stated matter-of-factly before taking two large steps and grabbing the weapons from her now stunned children's hands. "What I mean is, he's managed to convince your father and me that that is the truth. I believed him, for the most part, and was going to finish questioning him tomorrow morning. However, I think due to the circumstances it warrants a revisiting of the subject right now." She set the guns back onto the table and turned to face Danny with her children to her right. "Now, let's see, you never did answer how you knew my husband in your original timeline, so let's start there."

Even though Maddie had set down the guns the teenagers had picked up, he could see her tapping her foot and palming another smaller weapon on her hip. That's not a rhetorical question is it? "Um, it's kinda a long story?" He offered with a chuckle. When it failed to get even the smallest smirk onto anyone's lips, his laughter faded into a cough. "Well, you know you, Jack, and Vlad all went to the University of Wisconsin together? Well, when you and Jack were first married you just uh, never got divorced or whatever. You had Jazz," he resisted the urge to sigh when he saw his sister scrunch up her face at the nickname, "and me." The boy out of time paused to look for something to lean against now that the adrenaline crash was leaving his muscles even more tired and sore than before the hectic drive up the mountain.

"Well?" The auburn hair scientist prompted and watched him slink over to sit on top of one of the flatter stalagmites.

"Well uh, I grew up in Amity Park, and on the 20th anniversary of your college graduation, you went to a college reunion hosted at Vlad's house-er well closer to a mansion really-in Wisconsin. That's the first time I met him. He was, well it doesn't really matter."

"I beg to differ. I'll decide what is and isn't important information. Vlad told me you came back into the past so that the two of you would no longer be enemies. Obviously your first impressions of him are important for me to understand what would possess you to try something so completely ill advised." She softened her stance and leaned back against the table behind her to take some pressure off of her aching feet. She'd been up for what felt like years, and while she was sure Vlad would pull through with little problem-bless his determination-it'd probably be touch and go for the rest of the night.

"Well he hosted the reunion so he'd have a chance to kill my dad and convince you to marry him, so I'd say my first impression of him was shitty. That answer your question? Oh, and after he realized I had ghost powers, he decided to pull a Darth Vader and ask me to join the dark side. So yeah, we weren't best buds where I'm from."add

Daniel let out a rude snort at the other boy's story. "You expect us to actually believe our dad wants to kill yours in your 'timeline'? For what? When he can't even do that now?"

"Don't interrupt him Daniel; I want to hear everything he has to say without your more colorful commentary. So, Vlad and you met at this reunion, and he tried to murder Jack Fenton. I assume he failed."

"Yeah, I stopped him, with some quick thinking and some luck. After that we've been at each other's throats ever since. I mean, he placed a bounty on my head-"

"I thought he wanted you to be his new Sith apprentice?"

"Wuh, oh he did." Danny stopped before scrunching his face up in thought and continuing, "I think it was just to make my dad look bad. What with him trying and failing to capture the million dollar ghost with the entire 'professional' ghost community around also trying to catch me. I think it was also a distraction for something. I don't know what, everything he does has at least three different reasons and a plan F."

"The next most pressing question is of course where you got ghost powers."

"In a lab accident." Danny replied.

"A lab accident where? The more specific you are the better."

"It was my parents-your lab. You have a lab right underneath our house in the basement. You were building a working model of a man-made ghost portal. It didn't work when you first plugged it in, even though this was like the fifth time you'd brought Jazz and me down to watch it get turned on and probably the 50th time you'd tried to make it work. Anyway, you left all defeated and me and my friends-"

"You and your friends were downstairs in a dangerous lab unsupervised?"

"Uh, well…yes. You left to go upstairs. We weren't really thinking about it working. I mean you didn't have any weapons just lying around or anything, it was just the portal and one of the lame Fenton jumpsuits."

"Jumpsuits? Like that tacky ensemble you have going on in your ghost form?" It was Jasmine's turn to interrupt.

"Yes. Exactly like that." Danny grumbled under his breath before continuing, "my friends convinced me to go take a look inside the portal, just to snap a picture."

"Why would you-"

"We thought it would cool ok? It had nev- we didn't think it would even work. No one did. No one had even really seen a ghost back in my timeline. I hadn't, and despite what my parents said, I don't think they had either. It was just a stupid joke, it wasn't supposed to work. I-" Danny took a deep breath to stop his rambling before it got out of hand. It had been almost a year since the accident and it still both boggled and upset him. Even though he, and several of the people standing around, were living proof that half-ghosts were real, when he thought about the accident, it was still hard to wrap his mind around it. "I put on one of my parents dorky jumpsuits and stepped inside the portal. One of my friends was angling for a better shot and asked me to back up. I did and leaned my hand against the wall inside the portal. I turned it on. It gave me ghost powers. That's the end of that story."

Maddie tapped her chin with one finger as she took in Danny's tale. It was, as far as she could tell, entirely the truth. There was still some details missing, like who his friends were and why, why, why no one came running when that portal activated and discovered his powers right then. Just the same, it would suffice for the moment.

"Next question, you told me before that the ghost hunting community in Amity Park was in shambles. In fact, you said they needed your help to catch ghosts, despite having professional ghost hunters around." She paused to hop onto the table behind her, forgoing a better position for offense in favor of her comfort. If I stand up any longer, I don't think I'll ever feel my lower limbs again. "If you were fighting ghosts on the regular, how did your parents not notice?"

"Notice?" Danny squeaked, not liking where this line of questioning was going.

"Surly, someone must have figured out you were fighting. At the very least, you wouldn't have been proficient in either martial arts or your ghost powers when you first started. If ghosts were enough of a problem that two professionals couldn't stem the tide, then you'd have to have taken some injuries from fighting. How did you continue to go to school while ghost hunting? The physical changes resulting from a-an integration of ghost powers into a fully formed human body are incredibly noticeable. Didn't their equipment ever pick you up?"

"Well, um, yes?" Danny offered sheepishly.

"Yes to what Danny?" Maddie clicked her tongue in distaste before shifting on the hard table beneath her.

"Yes their equipment picked me up, but they just thought the equipment wasn't working. No one knew halfas existed so, they just assumed the readings were borked. As for the other questions, my friends helped me out with ghost hunting, but I wasn't doing the best in school when I left. I was tired from the fights even though I'd gotten better and uh, well you know half ghosts heal fast so…" Danny trailed off and scuffed a foot against the side of the stalagmite.

"Alright, I suppose that's good enough, although the last, and most important question is, how you got here. How did you time travel at all?"

Danny suppressed the urge the wince. That was the one question he really didn't want to answer. "I thought I already answered that question?"

"Hardly. You told me you got the time traveling Medallion from a powerful ghost whose name you couldn't tell me. While that basically answers the question in the general "how" the time traveling itself took place, that doesn't explain why that ghost let you have the Medallion at all. You've said it was for unabashedly selfish purposes, don't make that face it's true, so I'm wondering what was in it for this ghost. If they were powerful enough to create this relic, then they likely have time traveling powers of their own, and would be well aware of the delicate the nature of time. My question is really how did you convince this ghost to allow you free reign of the time line? Certainly they would have foreseen that you'd cause trouble-"

"-Er well Cl-he said something about me being outside the time stream and the consequences being my own. He's a friend of mine, and I've been responsible," well sort of, "with the Medallion in the past, so he figured I could handle this."

Maddie took a breath to start another round of questioning, when she heard a loud groan echo from the back of the cave. She glanced behind her and mouthed 'stay put' to the teens, before getting up.

The teenagers spent a few minutes staring at each other across the distance before Jasmine broke the silence.

"So you're telling me not a single person outside of the friends who saw the accident, and my dad, figured out you have ghost powers? The other ghosts you fought-"

"-Knew I had ghost powers and was human at the same time." Danny answered with a shrug.

"And they never said anything to any of the humans around you? On top of that, I mean it's not like your ghost form looks different from your human half, no hybrid's does. I'm just having a hard time wrapping my head around this." Jasmine sighed as the vague picture of the other teen's timeline struggled to coalesce in her mind. Nothing about the reality he inhabited sounded anything like her own. Why was it so different? Does that even matter at this point? It isn't like Danny can get back to it. She thought, coming to the same conclusion her younger brother had only half an hour ago. It was like the more he cleared up, the more numerous the questions became. "Why couldn't you tell us any of this before?"

Danny huffed and crossed his arms in front of him. "Would you have really believed me?" He watched as the Masters' siblings' faces scrunched up in thought. "You didn't believe me when I told you a few minutes ago, why would you have believed me in Wisconsin or on the flight over in that beetle thing? I know you might not believe me, but I'm not stupid."

"That remains debatable." Daniel quirked his lips and sighed. "Well, if you fought ghosts all the time that explains why you could hold your own against the GSU earlier. Although, I'm still a little confused about how you'd get all of that fighting experience in the first place. I mean how many ghosts could possibly squeeze through temporary portals, even in someplace as active as Amity Park?"

Danny scuffed his feet awkwardly against the damp stone floor of the cave before answering, "well they didn't just have temporary portals to work with. For a while, the Fenton portal-"

"Oh you're joking-"

"-Stop interrupting sheesh! Anyway, the man-made portal didn't have a good lock on it. And it's not very hidden in the ghost zone either. So ghosts were uh, slipping through the portal in my parents' basement and escaping." Danny shrugged at the mildly amazed looks the other teens were giving him.

"So you're telling me not only was the portal not locked up tight and hidden on the ghost side, but ghost were regularly slipping past your parents defenses and equipment to escape and wreck havoc?" Jasmine felt her face screwing up in disbelief the longer she thought about it. A man-made portal in the basement of two ghost hunters and ghosts just snuck through their house and out into the open. No way either of them were that incompetent.

"Hey, I know that sounds kind of…impossible, but it's the truth! Ghosts just aren't taken as seriously back in my timeline as they here. I mean, up until about a year ago, no one was even sure they existed. They haven't had a lot of time to adjust." Danny shrugged and shifted on the top of his stone seat. Admittedly, the absolute reach and power the GSU had in this future was something he'd never thought was possible. The Guys in White back home were a cursory curiosity, barely funded and poorly trained. His friends could out fight them on half a night's sleep and no food. And those ridiculous all white suits! I've seen them put in more forms for dry cleaning than ghost catching. Just the same, the agency here was run by…his father. He'd been avoiding really thinking about it. The man he knew, and the unhinged ghost slaying commander he'd met an hour back was like night and day.

Jack Fenton couldn't remember to solder half of his own circuits, let alone run an agency, yet here he was the most serious threat to ghost kind on the planet. Danny took a deep breath, preparing to finally ask the other teens about some of their history, when a crash came from the back of the cave.

A shrill voice echoed from the chamber where Vlad was recovering, "I can't believe you hid the fact he had ghost powers from me! Did you not think it was important? Has the ability to reveal our location to the people trying to murder us suddenly become a non-issue!? You promised me he wasn't a threat, and here we are, in a cave, with none of our equipment."

"I instructed him specifically not to use his powers. It's not like I didn't know how dangerous this could be, give me some credit. And no I didn't tell you, because that was his information to tell on not mine." Vlad, clearly awoken from his injury induced slumber, half stomped half limped into the antechamber of the cave. He made it to a cluster of stalagmites a few feet into the make-shift room before leaning against them. Despite the hand on his stomach, he had a ferocious glare on his face. He breathed heavily into the growing silence, breath ragged, before standing straighter and continuing, "I had no reason to assume he'd disobey. Genuinely, I'd never put this family in danger, you know that." He hissed out the last few words through pain clinched teeth and slumped back against the tallest stalagmite.

"Just because I know you wouldn't do it on purpose, doesn't mean it was alright to lie to me," Maddie held her hand up before he could get a word in, "lying by omission is still lying Vladimir. I understand that you wanted to-"

"-I'm sure you do." The sarcastic bite in the interruption could have peeled paint. "You know exactly why he'd want to work up to telling you about his ghost powers. I mean, it's not like everyone has threatened to throw him out if they got a hint of a reason he was dangerous."

"You're deflecting! The problem isn't him it's you." Maddie hissed.

"I'm not going to betray his good faith and privacy by telling you something he should have the right to-"

"Oh my God, this isn't about privacy it's about safety. Our safety is more important than his bashful whatever the hell it is preventing him from actually communicating with-"

"It's not shyness, it's prudence! When he last spoke to you, you thought he was a ghost plant sent to kill us. He doesn't have any more reason to trust us than we do him. You're being unreasonable."

"You're unreasonable…"

The married couple continued to bicker back in forth, oblivious to the awkward teenage audience shuffling their feet not a meter away. Jasmine and Daniel locked eyes and silently came to a conclusion. They waved a hand to get Danny's attention, and silently the trio slipped farther away into another part of the cave.

Danny winced as the sound of continued arguments echoed away into the dark. Still, wherever the other two teens were headed, it had to be better than listening to them fight about him.

Jasmine reached into her pocket palming the cool silver disk inside. This far away from the heaters and generators of the larger chamber, the air was cool and clammy, like walking through an especially thick fog. She didn't particularly dislike the cold, but after the unnatural heat of the rest of the cave, the change left her fighting back shivers. The disk felt like one of those ice packs placed in lunch boxes. It was cool, but nothing like an actual ice cube. She sighed when the argument behind her finally faded away into the plaintive plinks creating the ambient cave noise. Her right hand still ached like she'd twisted it wrong and slammed it into a wall at the same time. In the increasing gloom, it was hard to get a good look at her younger brother, but she didn't need ghost enhanced night vision to tell he was just as exhausted. The scrapping shuffle of his sneakers against the hard stone combined with his slumped shoulders said enough. "Ok, that's far enough I think." She pulled the disk out of her pocket and gave it a shake. Slowly, the chemicals inside reacted to one another, becoming luminescent as she agitated them. The disk was artificially cooled so the light would slowly fade over the course of an hour or two until it was re-shaken.

Danny stopped just inside the sudden pool of light. He leaned against a wall with his arms crossed, keeping as much distance between him and the hostile siblings as he could manage. The ghost powered teen thought they had calmed down, but he didn't put it past them to pull a gun on him. Their default solution to problems seemed to be shooting it until it wasn't one anymore. Considering what happened earlier today, it's not such a bad solution in general. "So..." He trailed off into the cool tense space between the three of them. They must have brought me out here for something.

"So, I think we should trade stories, life stories I mean. Since you actually managed to be truthful for once, I realize you have no idea how serious-how different this world is from your own. I mean, giant battle aside, do you have any idea what the GSU are like?" Jasmine let the question hang in the air for a second longer before continuing. "I think, to really understand where we are coming from, we need to tell you about the history of the GSU and a little bit about ourselves."

"Even though I don't like you, if you're going to stop being a walking liability, we need to get you up to speed. Naturally, I still think this is a waste of our time and we'd all be better off leaving you on some back road to fend for yourself," Daniel paused and stared at a spot in between Jasmine and Danny. "However, that's not going to actually happen, much to my deep displeasure, so we need to mitigate damages." He shrugged and pressed himself back against the wall opposite Danny.

The eldest Masters' sibling frowned over at her brother before addressing Danny. "The first thing you need to know is that Jack Fenton's only life goal is the eradication of the ghost species. He'll stop at absolutely nothing to get that goal accomplished. You saw the mansion in Wisconsin?"

"Yeah sure-oh that's probably rhetorical isn't it?" Danny stuttered when he saw the annoyed look on the red haired girl's face. "My bad."

"Anyway, that's where we lived before we moved to Amity Park. When I was four, the GSU, or well they were called the 'Guys in White' then, attacked the mansion. We barely escaped with our lives. Our father used the last of his assets, before they were frozen and relinquished to the government as the holdings of a 'non-entity', to craft new identities for us. We disappeared into the United States background. This was a long time ago, I don't really remember much about it other than the fight at the mansion, and always running." Jasmine stopped to rub at her sore wrist before locking eyes with Danny, "eventually, we settled in Amity Park."

"Can I at least ask why? I mean when I was there, it was ghost hunter central. Was it different then or…?" Danny left the explanation open ended and rolled his shoulders. He was feeling a couple of landings from earlier and he'd much rather be sleeping than exploring the wacky past of this reality from Hell.

"It was a pretty active base for ghost hunters back then too. Our parents' reasoning was that it would be easier to blend in right under the enemies' noses. They were right for the most part." Jasmine stopped to give her brother a quick glance. His face was as impassive as it had been since the conversation started. She nodded over at him to pick up where she left off. Talking about their time in Amity Park always left him skittish.

"We dyed our hair, wore colored contacts, and got our first set of spectral bracelets." Daniel stopped to hold up his wrist, jingling the techno-jewelry with relish before lowering his arm. "We lived in Amity Park for nearly six years. We…made friends, went to school, blended in. It was unsafe at times, but relatively normal." Daniel sat up straighter before leaning away from the wall. "We lived in ghost hunters' HQ during the entire War. I'm sure the Head Commander," he paused to sneer, "threw fits about that when he realized how long we'd been there."

"War?" This time Danny had no idea what they were talking about. How did an entire war happen without anybody talking about it?

The eldest Masters' smiled; it didn't reach his eyes. "When Jack Fenton couldn't get to us anymore, he convinced the GSU, they were called that now after the attack in Wisconsin, to wage war against the entire Ghost Zone. It…went well for them. Between my sixth birthday and my tenth, they captured, executed, or otherwise destroyed every piece of ghost civilization in the Zone. The last ghosts alive are either hidden deep inside the Ghost Zone, or held in the many, many experimental labs of the GSU. Most ghosts are either used as slaves or tortured and experimented on. We're some of the last free sentient ghost-like being around, hybrids or not." He leaned back against the clammy wall, shoulders tensed, a frown slowly deepening on his face. "In any case," he started before loosening up once more, "we were eventually discovered." Daniel stared off into the darkness back towards the front of the cave. He crossed his arms, his hands clenched involuntarily at his sides.

"Jack Fenton somehow discovered our secret identities." She started sparing another surreptitious glance in her sibling's direction. "He captured my brother, and our parents, mostly our dad actually, had to fight the whole ghost hunter collective in Amity Park to get him back. We escaped, obviously, and we've been on the run ever since." Jasmine paused and stared down at her hand, swirling the disk in it unnecessarily. "That was almost five years ago, or it will be in a couple months. It's been difficult to put it mildly." Jasmine pinned their living headache with a look before continuing, "apparently, what we needed was for things to be shaken up. The Universe must have thought we'd become complacent, what with no major incidents in the last two years." She tossed the disk to Daniel, to give her aching arm and wrist a break.

" Living on the run, it's required us to be both paranoid and resourceful, something I imagine you're familiar with considering you interesting life choices these last few months." He stopped and swirled the disk another few times, thinking his words through. It had been a long day and without any adrenaline left, things were getting fuzzy at the edges. "So, you'll understand where I'm coming from when I say this: your presence here is like a bucket of flies in the middle of an excrement sandwich. Sure, the sandwich on its own was terrible, but the flies improved nothing with their presence." The ghost powered teen added with a glare. "Unfortunately, I don't get a vote on whether you stay, and my father can be unhelpfully stubborn about helping other people. Chances are, you're stuck here for an indeterminable duration, but at least after that last battle you have some idea of how dangerous the GSU are." He snorted and tossed the light back to his sister, "or well one could only hope, I have my doubts about your cognitive abilities. I mean you did just walk up to ghost hunter HQ in Amity Park. But I'm sure something will eventually penetrate the thick veil of ignorance you're carting around inside your skull."

"I'm sure he gets it." She stopped to switch the light into the hand that didn't feel like it was going to fall off. "I'm almost as sure about that as I am about the fact you're going to mention how much you hate him being here every time you get a chance."

"Oh no, not every time, that would be redundant." He passed a sardonic smile in his sister's direction. "Just every time I can mention it in a new context." The dark haired teen stood straighter and stretched, the crackling pops of his spine echoing in the absurdly quiet space in the small antechamber. "Do you think they've stopped arguing by now?"

Jasmine pursed her lips in thought before replying, "Maybe? If not, we can just sneak into the RV or the Hover. In any case, I don't want to stand here in the damp and cold anymore." With that, she pushed away from the hard rocky wall and started off down the path back to the main part of the cave.

Danny carefully slunk behind her. They hadn't exactly been super forthcoming, but they'd given him a lot more information than he had volunteered on his own. Information that wasn't strictly necessary to wrapping his head around the situation and reality he found himself in. To be frank, he wanted to ask more about their time in Amity Park. They'd lived there for a good while, made friends they'd claimed. It was entirely selfish, but maybe they knew something about Sam and Tucker? As if they remembered the names of people they'd left behind years ago in a panic. Oh yeah, they would definitely care about some random kids they probably never met in a town filled with people trying to kill them. Get real Fenton. He scuffed his feet as he listened to the subdued plinks and plunks of water dripping from the ceiling.

Even if Vlad and his mom had come to an agreement about him or just set aside their argument to figure out what to do next, he had no interest in walking back into the larger chamber. The churning feeling of guilt and hot burn of shame was eating at his mind. I really should have said something…or at least not used my powers like I had been asked. The damage had already been done, but that didn't make him feel any better. In fact, it made him feel worse. Sure, they had already been planning to move, but it didn't take a genius to figure out that they'd left some nice equipment and maybe even important sentimental things back in the disaster zone that was the valley below. Danny was well aware kicking himself in the teeth about this wasn't helping anyone, but stuck shuffling between the two exhausted Masters' siblings; he was having a hard doing anything else. If he had never blundered into their lives, they'd probably be perfectly fine right now. If I had never blundered into their lives, they wouldn't exist either. The thought brought up another flare of frustration.

Clockwork clearly stated his intentions not to interfere unless he completely destroyed Reality or Time something, but in his opinion, this spiraling dystopia with the entire Ghost Zone dead definitely counted as serious fuck up worth intervention. Just as the three of them rounded the last corner to make it back to the main part of the cave, Danny felt a wave of nausea with cold tingles down his back. What if Clockwork was one of the many ghosts killed during that War thing they were talking about before? He hadn't considered the idea before now. Clockwork was the most powerful ghost he knew, or at least of the ghosts he interacted with even occasionally. But it was possible the reason he hadn't come and done anything about this increasing clusterfuck of a universe was because he couldn't. He could be already… The thought was too sickening to contemplate. He had no idea how to work the Medallion currently phased near his core. Even if they got him back into the Ghost Zone and he went into the Realm Beyond Time, if Clockwork wasn't there, he had no way to get back into his own timeline, or to go back and attempt to fix what he'd broken so badly. Danny skidded to a stop right at the entrance to the antechamber with the RV before the other ghost powered teen shoved him from behind.

"Come on, there's no use putting this off. It's not like delaying the inevitable is going to save you from being tossed out on your butt."

"Our parents aren't going to toss him-"

"Shush, let me dream." Daniel closed his eyes while a serene smile took over his expression.

"You are a terrible person. You know if you throw me out of here, the GSU will literally kill me."

"And you have to know that I don't give one solitary fudge covered strawberry about that fact."

"Oh yeah, keep working for the psychopath of the year award Daniel, I'm sure the GSU needs competition." Jasmine frowned over her shoulder at her younger brother. "You don't have to like him, God knows I don't, but could you stop wishing for his demise…at least out loud?" She watched as his amused smirk dropped back into a flat expression.

"Don't have enough room left to care about people who nearly get my family killed. Sorry, oh saintly sister of mine."

"Empathy is important."

"You'd think after Austin, you'd learn to be more selective with your charitable views of other people." He scowled and pressed a hand into the other boy's back. "Come on, move it already." He'd have simply gone around, if he wasn't determined to keep him in his sight at all times. Finally, the other teen scuffled the rest of the way into the main chamber. A quick glance about the space revealed neither of his parents. There was also a lack of yelling or accusations. At least it's quiet.

Jasmine sighed as she set the still glowing disk down on one of the tables. "I'm heading back to the RV to sit down on something that isn't stone. You two can stay here and continue to stare each other down, or you can join me. Personally, my feet feel like lead weights, but if you two want to tough it out for some reason, be my guest." With that, she started towards the vehicle at a slow pace. Moving at anything above 'granny shuffle' was impossible, everything felt like it'd been through a meat grinder, or pounded and tenderized. She glanced over her shoulder to make sure the two boys were following here, before walking the rest of the way to the RV door. She could hear muted conversation from inside. Nothing that sounded like yelling, but it was still impassioned discussion. I guess they moved the conversation to somewhere with soft cushions. A great idea in her opinion. She opened the door and stomped up the steps, fatigue instead of emotion leaving her footfalls heavy.

"I completely understand your position here hun…but can you at least see…why undermining his trust on this issue…so soon after he arrived…would have only made things worse?" Vlad had to stop every couple of words to take another shallow breath.

"I can, I just still think it's stupid." Maddie griped from her seat across from Vlad in the middle section of the RV. They'd moved into the space at her insistence, worried that he'd make his injuries worse by stubbornly standing and stomping around in frustration while talking to her. She turned slightly to watch the three teens clomp up the stairs back into the vehicle. They could table this discussion for later, there were more pressing issues. "Glad to see you're all still alive, I was worried you'd drug Danny away to try and leave him outside the cave."

"I've suggested it twice, but everyone seems to think it's a bad idea."

"Because it's immoral, jerkface." Jasmine rolled her eyes at her brother this time. He was mostly saying it to complain at this point.

Daniel smiled as he settled onto one of the soft cushioned seats, "a difference in perspective then."

"Should I sleep with one eye open or something? Should I sleep at all? You seriously need to re-examine your decision making processes man. If you were in my position-"

"-I wouldn't be anywhere near as stupid or useless or a danger to others." The other dark haired teen said with a shrug. "Truly, the 'attempted murder by stupidity' level of social interaction is not a high bar to exceed here."

"Enough," Vlad started when he saw Danny open his mouth to reply. He took a shallow breath from where he was half-reclined on one of the long form seats. Breathing hurt. Sitting up hurt. Consciousness was a battle that he was currently losing, and he didn't want to listen to more pointless bickering. "Save the snarky remarks for a day when we aren't…about to pass out from…blood loss and exhaustion." He said been pained gasps. "I'm sure there will be plenty of time for you all to glare at each other later." He winced at the stretching burn he felt from having taken a breath deep enough to say that all at once.

"Your father is right. What we need to do now is decide where we are going next. We may be able to salvage some equipment that wasn't stolen or destroyed from the valley below over the next two days, but after that, we have to leave the caves, and we need a destination." She stopped and sighed, placing another pillow behind her aching back. "Usually, Vlad and I would just pick a place, but I think Jasmine and Daniel are old enough to have some good tactical input on where we should go next." She frowned when she heard her younger children moving around farther back in the RV. No point in keeping them out of the conversation. "And you all can stop pretending to be asleep or ignoring us now." She called towards the final third of the RV.

The twins and Lizzie quickly bounded out of the back section of the RV, excited to be included in a conversation on where they should set up Camp next for once.

"So mom, can we go to The Falls next?" Nate asked while bouncing into a seat.

"Nu-uh Nate, we were just there like two month ago that's too soon." He snickered when his brother stuck out his tongue at him.

"I think it's a good place to hide, and it's close to here, but hard to find."

"Well I think that that's stupid because it's too close to where we are now and also because we'd have to fly half of the stuff out to it and they'd be a bad idea cause they are surveying the area with like satellites or whatever." His twin opened his mouth to respond, when his baby sister spoke up.

"Can't we just stay in the caves? They can't get to us because of the cave-in and um, two days isn't a long time to get all our stuff. I don't want to move again so fast."

"This is all great, but you all don't get a vote. You get to listen and not talk, which is exactly what the child of Magnus the Red gets to do."

"That's not even a fair analogy Daniel, you can do better." Vlad suppressed the urge to chuckle. "Oh don't explain it." He stopped to sit up a little straighter, "I mean, that only makes sense if Danny were you…and then you were actually a traitor…and I was actually an immortal god human thing or something…Should have called him a daemon of Tzeentch."

"The Head Commander is Magnus."

"That doesn't-oh, ok but this is…off track. We're supposed to be talking about…new Camp locations." He'd finally worked himself back into an upright sitting position. His middle still hurt like someone had poured coals covered in lighter fluid on it, but he could tell it was healing. Slowly. Far too slowly for his tastes, but to be expected after how much ghost energy he'd expended.

"My suggestion is for Forge Rocks. I know it's the farthest location in our rotation, but it's the most fortified, and it has the most provisions. It also has the distinction of being far away from civilization, which will give this enough time to blow over without us being spotted. Otherwise, my second suggestion is Dawn's Bridge."

"Are any of these places actually named that, or is it all code names for the spy bugs living in the walls of the cave rocks?" Danny frowned when no one seemed inclined to actually talk about real places or areas of the United States. He had to bite back a growl when his alternate reality twin rolled his eyes at him.

"No, those aren't the 'real names', they are just designations that make it easier to remember. Which one would you remember 'Brownsville' or 'Flight's Fall?" He felt a bubble of warm satisfaction when the other teen agreed with a shrug. "Back on topic, those are my top two choices, Jasmine, any other suggestions?"

"Well, I agree with Forge Rocks, but not Dawn's Bridge. I know Dawn is closer, but there was just a ghost incident with one of the GSU handlers losing control there a week back. That has nothing to do with us, but everyone in the area will be on edge, and paranoid people like to call the cops for little or no reason at all. We don't need that kind of exposure."

"It is harder to escape from Dawn the Forge, especially since they started check points recently." Daniel shrugged when his parents looked in his direction. "Ok, not recently, heard about it the last time I was in town, so maybe four months ago. Long enough that they've become routine and they'll be harder to bypass in a rush."

"Forge Rocks is a good location, but we planned on mentioning that it's going to be in inactive cache, and off rotation. Let me explain," Maddie held up her hand, "they just added a new ghost hunter HQ during the last expansion of the network there. It used to make up one of the areas that was part of the 'Great Holes' in their network in the mountain west, but that changed about six months back. We'll be able to strip it during a supply run, but that's about it." She rubbed her temple at the headache forming behind her eyes. "And, Flight's Fall was going to be the next stop, that was the plan, but obviously that's not going to work."

"Obviously?" Danny chanced asking.

"Yeah genius, we'd need a bunch of supplies left in the valley. Fake IDs, different hair, clothing, you name it. Doesn't one of our personas have a fake rebellious tattoo or something for the area?" Daniel shrugged before staring out the RV window facing towards the path out of the cave. "We can't just show up there without it, and we can't make new personas without more supplies either. So, we're stuck looking at somewhere without a whole lot of civilization, that doesn't ask questions, and won't think it's weird when a whole family in an RV shows up on a family vacation using only cash in the middle of the school year. So, Heber City, Utah, or Forge Rocks…before the ghost hunters decided to set up shop."

"Ok, well, what about some place from the older rotations? We haven't been there for a while, so maybe one of the remote locations farther north? Ice Canyon, or Snow Peaks? Or mayb-"

"-The Meadow." Vlad locked eyes with his wife sitting across the RV. "It's well ahead of schedule…but we need the break. We'd have time to actually replenish our equipment supplies and make safe raids of caches without having to worry about the lack of shields. Naturally, shields are the first priority, if we can't salvage something from the valley but, until then, it's our best option. And unlike any of the northern options from the last rotation, we don't have try and run the border without ID."

"We'd have to cross the mountains west, and the last time we were there, we were worried that the fluctuations weren't strong enough-"

"I know Maddie, but it's nearing summer, and the last readings we got from the probes showed everything was setting up for a solid summer pattern. Do you disagree?" He leaned forward some to stretch his back, his insides felt let a balancing act between the bruises on his spine and the healing cuts in his middle.

"No. It's just a little more chance than I like."

"Fortune favors the bold."

"And the people who are actually clear about their plans." Danny grumbled, more than tired of being out of the loop.

"The Meadow is a naturally occurring nullification zone in the western edge of the Rockies near the state line of Washington and Oregon. It was the first place we set up a temporary base, and over the years, it's become our most fortified campsite."

If it does what the shields do, why not create a permanent base there and just dig in? Vlad explained to him why they hadn't without being asked. The nullification strength changed seasonally and even in some place well fortified, it's not like they could fight off a coordinated siege from a well funded government agency he'd said. It was still some place they'd never been spotted though, and with summer approaching the strength of the nullification field, he had no idea how it worked, would be at its strongest, more powerful than even their man-made shields. Unfortunately, that pattern diminished and reversed towards the winter time, so even if they wanted to just dig in, it would be obvious where they were when the winter high of ambient spectral energy didn't show up.

Danny settled deeper into his seat as everyone around him agreed that was the best spot for a new Camp site, and swallowed his ambivalence and helplessness. He had more questions than ever, but whether Clockwork was alive and he could ever get out of this spiraling hell hole of a universe would have to wait until he could even get into the Zone. Never mind how…He heard Jazz mention distractedly that it would take until the end of summer to replace the equipment. And at least that long before they'd be in a position to get me into the Ghost Zone if not longer. Danny thought morose. It was going to be a long summer.

…Then you better ask the right questions.

Balshumet: Ok, not gonna lie, one of the reasons this chapter took so long is because I've found out I hate exposition, even necessary exposition. And part of it was life stuff, and part of it is because my writing style went through some weird and painful changes during this time and so it was hard to get back into the proper style. Anyway, here's the deal. I'm going to try to get back onto a regular updating schedule. Let's say, the second and fourth Saturday of each month. There's an Interlude coming up for the next chapter, so expect that this Saturday and then a regular large sized chapter at the end of February.

Thanks for your patience once again, and as always my lovelies R&R.