AN: Happy Halloween! Guess what's FINALLY FINISHED.

If anyone is still reading this after all these years: thank you so, so much. Here is your reward for being the most patient readers on earth. I hope it's worth the wait!

Danny threw himself at his button-eyed, black-clad doppelganger – and fell right through.

He gave a shout as he toppled to the floor, quickly bouncing back up into the air as he looked himself over, confusedly patting his chest. "What? But I didn't -"

Coraline saw a smirk cross the other Danny's face for just an instant before he was swallowed up in rings of sickly green light. In a flash, Coraline found herself staring at two nearly identical ghostly Dannys, the other Danny's button eyes the only thing setting them apart.

Then the other Danny pulled back an arm and swung, catching Danny directly in the stomach. Danny was thrown backwards with a loud 'oof!' as the air was forced from his lungs. The other Danny lunged after him, and suddenly they were both airborne, trading kicks and punches.

Coraline looked frantically around for any sign of Sam. All she saw were the other Paulina and the Mansons starting forward, encircling her and backing her towards the portal on the far wall. The light in the basement lab seemed to have dimmed, the green glow from the assorted ecto-weapons and experiments littering the room suddenly less vibrant, casting eerie shadows over the other Paulina's painted face and the other Mansons' grasping hands as they approached.

The two Dannys streaked by overhead, casting a greenish glow over the lab like a passing comet, and Coraline caught sight of Sam's ponytail bobbing out from behind the shoulders of one of the two goons blocking the stairs. She ducked under the other Mrs. Manson's outstretched arm, and nearly ran directly into the two football players stationed at the stairs. The blond one crossed his arms and glared down at her with black button eyes, while the dark-haired one reached out and grabbed her by the back of her shirt, hauling her up off the ground. Coraline kicked out as hard as she could, wriggling and squirming in the football player's grip, but his arm felt like it was carved from solid rock. He didn't so much as wince.

"I really thought you had more brains than to just barge in here like this," the cat sniffed, from somewhere behind her. Coraline didn't bother turning to look in his direction, partly because she was still dangling from the grip of a button-eyed hulk, partly because being lifted into the air had given her an unobstructed view of Sam, lying sprawled out, apparently unconscious, on the stairs behind the football players.

"So sorry – ow! – to disappoint," Coraline grumbled, twisting around in the button-eyed goon's grip. She managed to spin herself around to face the Mansons, for just a moment before the twist in her shirt unwound, but she didn't manage to get down. "Why do you care, anyway?" she challenged the cat, hoping to get more information, or at least buy some time.

A careful glance over at the steel door back to the real world caught Tucker peeking out around it, unnoticed in all the commotion. Coraline breathed a quiet sigh of relief. She stared in his direction, hoping she could somehow catch his eye without moving too much and giving him away. "I thought you were so proud of being cleverer than me?"

Whatever the cat had to say in response was abruptly interrupted when Danny flew across the room and crashed bodily into the wall above the portal. Three large cracks zagged out from behind him, an ominous crackling noise coming from the concrete wall as he slumped forward, revealing a Danny-shaped indent in the wall. The pounding noise that had been coming from behind the portal doors increased suddenly in speed and ferocity.

Coraline turned, and, while everyone else was busy staring up at Danny, gestured furiously at Tucker, pointing in Sam's direction as best she could without being too obvious. Tucker nodded, straightened his hat, and then, with a look of grim determination, crept out into the lab.

The blond goon looked over at Coraline, his eyebrows furrowing over his button eyes when he saw her pointing finger. Coraline hastily pulled her hand behind her back, grinning as wide as she could. The goon's eyes narrowed further, and he started to turn in Tucker's direction. Tucker froze in place, his eyes wide in horror.

Thankfully, it was just then that the other Danny shot across the room and slammed Danny back against the wall, wrapping both hands around Danny's neck. Danny's choked cry dragged the button-eyed goon's attention back up to the fight.

"Danny!" Coraline shouted, and the football player holding her up frowned and gave her a shake that made her feel like her brains were about to rattle out her ears. "Augh!"

"What are you doing? You almost hit me!" the cat yowled after the other Danny, grumbling to himself as the fur along his back slowly settled back down from its startled spikes, despite the furious pounding from behind the portal doors and Danny's quiet gasps for air. "I don't know how she can work with these puppets. I've only had these for a day, and they're already driving me batty."

"Then why bother?" Coraline demanded, spinning herself around as best she could to shoot the cat a venomous glare. The cat paused in the middle of licking its paw, and fixed Coraline with a haughty look.

"They got you here, didn't they?"

Coraline had to force herself not to smile. She had the cat's full attention now, all she had to do was keep it until Tucker could get to Sam. "The only reason I'm here is to find my friend. Where's Sam?"

The cat looked like he couldn't decide whether to laugh or shake his head. "You really don't think I'm going to just tell you, do you?"

"I don't know, maybe?" Coraline tried to shrug, giving up when the goon gave her another shake. "You're the crazy evil mastermind, not me."

Before she could see if the taunt had had any effect, though, a sudden burst of green light blossomed overhead, casting the whole room into stark shadows. Coraline looked up to see Danny, hovering in front of the portal, breathing hard and gathering another poisonous green ball of light in both hands. Near the other end of the lab, where he must have been thrown by Danny's ectoblast, the other Danny looked down at himself, at the green glow around him that Coraline somehow felt sure was stronger than it had been the last time she'd seen him, and laughed.

"Oh yeah, try that again, that's a great idea," the other Danny called mockingly, as the aura that haloed around him flickered and flared. In answer, Danny only threw the ball of green light he'd been holding. It hit the other Danny square in the chest, and Coraline winced before she realised that he didn't look hurt. Instead, the light seemed to sink into him, and Coraline was sure it wasn't her imagination that his button eyes gleamed green as the light around him grew brighter.

Danny looked about as confused as Coraline felt. He wound up with a grunt and hurled another bolt of glowing green at the other Danny, with similar results. Two more attacks met the same fate, before the other Danny held out both arms and slammed Danny back into the wall with one enormous blast, his brilliant green aura dimming as soon as he did so.

Coraline peeked over at the cat, hoping he hadn't noticed Tucker pressed against the lab wall right behind Mrs. Manson, but the cat was watching the fight with a look of concentrated attention that Coraline had only ever seen on cats chasing laser pointers. She looked around the room, and saw that all of the button-eyed puppet-people seemed as fixated on the fight as the cat was, watching in perfect stillness as the other Danny absorbed Danny's attacks and threw them back at him. Even the goon holding her seemed distracted, Coraline dangling half-forgotten from his outstretched arm (didn't they ever get tired?). Coraline was about to try to slip loose when the cat spoke again.

"Isn't that a nice touch." He sounded proud, if a little surprised, and sat up straighter, with a look that Coraline had seen on all sorts of cats, talking or otherwise. It was a look that said, loud and clear, 'I definitely meant to do that'.

It wasn't funny, but Coraline couldn't help a giggle anyway.

She quickly tamped down the urge to giggle, though, because it was drowned out in the other Danny's horrible, smug laughter. Danny raised his head out of the now much deeper Danny-shaped indent in the wall, his eyes narrowing as he stared at the other Danny, and Coraline caught a glimpse of green light starting to gather around his fists.

"Don't!" she shouted. "He's using your powers against you!"

The goon holding her reached out, with the arm he wasn't using to hold her up, and gave her shoulder a push. Coraline yelped as she spun, too fast, the back of her shirt twisting up around her neck until she couldn't breathe and the spinning made her want to throw up. When she could see straight again, it was just in time to see Danny shoot forward and punch the other Danny hard enough to knock him halfway across the room.

"What did you do to Sam?" Danny yelled, swooping in and driving a fist into the other Danny's cheek before the other Danny had a chance to recover. "Give her back, or I'll -"

He was cut off by another blast of green light, catching him in the stomach and knocking him crashing down into the table the cat was perched on. The other Danny hovered, triumphantly, in midair, green light sucking away from the rest of his body and gathering around his hands before he fired another bolt into Danny, who was struggling to get up. Danny fell back against the concrete floor, a little wisp of greenish smoke rising from the crater he'd landed in.

The cat's yowls filled the whole room.

"How dare you -" he started to shout at the other Danny, and then froze, his tail shooting straight up and his eyes flaring wide as he looked over in Coraline's direction. His eyes narrowed to baleful blue slits, and Coraline felt the bottom drop out of her stomach as he hissed, "And just what do you think you're doing?"

All of the button-eyed people spun, the goon holding Coraline spinning her as well, to stare at Tucker. Tucker, with every pair of eyes in the room on him, plastered himself flat against the wall beside the stairs like he could melt into it, and gave an enormous, sheepish smile.

"Grab him," the cat commanded, and the blond goon reached out and gripped Tucker by the neck of his turtleneck, hauling him up to eye level. Tucker gulped, visibly, as the goon stared him down, then tucked him under his arm like a football. "Do I have to tell you people to do everything?"

"Let him go!" Danny demanded, and Coraline flailed, trying to spin herself around to get a look at him. He'd climbed up out of the crater in the floor and onto his feet, and he'd just planted both hands firmly on his hips when another burst of green light slammed him back into the ground. The other Danny's horrible laughter filled the air again, and Coraline looked up to see him hovering, one hand over his mouth, the other pointing at Danny, whose hair was smoking slightly as he picked himself back up to his feet.

His glow, Coraline noticed, was all but gone. And the whole lab seemed darker. It was getting hard to see, and Danny's glow was casting definite shadows.

She glanced around the lab, looking for anything else obviously different or out of place compared to the lab on the other side of the tunnel, but saw nothing to explain the growing darkness. Everything was just too perfectly recreated, apart from the door leading into the tunnel.

Which was odd, of itself, Coraline realised. In the Pink Palace, the Beldam had simply used the boarded-up, papered-over little door that had been built into the house. It wasn't as though there wasn't a door in the lab already – the portal was sitting right there, humming away. So why would the cat have made an entirely new –

There was a fresh burst of hammering on the inside of the portal door, and the pieces suddenly fell into place in Coraline's mind.

"Wait," the cat said, and the other Danny stopped, in the middle of lining up another green blast. The goon holding Tucker stopped mid-noogie, the one holding Coraline freezing with an arm outstretched to give her another spin.

An eerie stillness descended over the whole room as the cat turned to face Danny.

"You came here for your friend?" the cat said. It sounded like a question, but Coraline knew he already knew the answer.

"Of course we did! What game are you playing now?" she demanded, trying to kick out at her captor again. Her foot couldn't quite reach his chest. She stuck out her tongue at him. His black button eyes just stared back blankly.

"Don't sound so snippy," the cat said, disdainfully, flicking his tail in Coraline's direction. "I just think maybe it's time to try something new. By which I mean playing fair."

He turned back to Danny, his tail swishing back and forth in clear anticipation as he said, "I'll let you leave with your friends."

Danny glanced over at Coraline, at Tucker, at the place where Sam was lying. "What's the catch?"

Cats shouldn't be able to grin, but this one managed it. "You leave Coraline here with me."

Danny stared at the cat for a moment, his eyes wide, before slowly turning to face Coraline. Coraline held her breath, watching him watching her, watching green light gather around both his clenched fists.

Danny drew in a deep breath, and Coraline shook her head.

"It's okay!" she called out, and Danny let the breath out in a surprised burst. "It's okay. You guys get out of here. I can handle this."

Danny didn't look convinced, so Coraline smiled her biggest. "Seriously. I did it once, I can do it again. You aren't gonna get another chance! Go!"

Danny huffed out a breath, the hunted look on his face shifting to determination. He let his hands fall open, resting at his sides, as he turned to face the cat again.

"Here's your answer," he said, and then spun and fired two green blasts at the group of button-eyed people gathered around the stairs.

The grip on Coraline's collar suddenly vanished, and she dropped to the floor, landing on her feet in a crouch. She heard a thud that must have been the goon who'd been holding her up hitting the floor, and another thud that she guessed was probably the goon who'd been holding Tucker. The other Paulina shrieked, and grabbed at Coraline's arm as Coraline ran towards the portal. Coraline tried to pull her arm free, but the other Paulina dug inch-long talons through the fabric of Coraline's shirt and into her arm. Coraline shouted in pain, and spun, one arm already raised to hit the other Paulina as hard as she could.

She didn't have to, though. The other Paulina's head jerked back, and she let out a howl like she was in pain. She staggered back, letting go of Coraline's arm and revealing –

"Sam!" Coraline shouted, in relief. Sam grinned, and gave the other Paulina's hair another vicious yank.

"You have no idea how happy I am to see you guys. How did you find me?"

"Long story," Coraline said, ducking under the other Mr. Manson's arms as he grabbed at her. "Tell you later?"

Sam just nodded, and took a step back, bracing herself before swinging the other Paulina by the hair. The other Paulina wailed in anguish until she slammed into Mr. Manson, both of them tumbling to the floor in a heap.

Coraline didn't waste any more time, just took off running towards the portal. A burst of green light and a horrible tearing sound nearly stopped her in her tracks, and she looked up, to see Danny wrestling with the other Danny. Danny yanked the other Danny's arm up just as the other Danny fired another bright green blast, sizzling into the wall just beside the portal. There was another hideous ripping sound, and Coraline looked up to see that a corner of the lab above the portal had torn away completely, leaving a familiar soft white void.

A furious hissing was the only warning Coraline got. She turned to see what was coming her way, and the cat landed on her shoulder, his needle claws digging into her skin. Coraline screamed, and hit at the cat with her free hand, trying push him off or at least to keep him from clawing her eyes. Something warm trickled down her shoulder, and she knew the cat must have drawn blood.

Still trying to push the cat away, Coraline threw herself at the portal. Two more blasts of green light scorched the wall above her head, and more of the lab's ceiling ripped away to reveal blank whiteness overhead. She ducked as best she could, giving the cat one final shove before she pulled her hand away. The cat bit down on her hand as she did, and she screamed again and dragged it off her shoulder, shaking her hand until the cat finally let go.

Her shoulder stung, and the cat instantly started to claw its way up her pants as soon as it hit the floor, but Coraline ignored them both and slammed her hand against the button next to the portal door. A light started flashing over the portal door, and the door started to grate open.

It wasn't even halfway open before the thing that had been pounding against it shot through, in a silvery, clattering blur of needles and scissorblades.

The other mother skidded to a stop in the middle of the lab, and then dove at Coraline, forelegs like silver spears shooting forward to impale her. Coraline gave the leg the cat was climbing one, hard kick, and the cat went flying, yowling, directly into the other mother's grinning face.

Coraline just heard the other mother shriek "Oh, not again!" before she spun, grabbing Sam and Tucker both by the arm and pulling them away from the button-eyed people they were fighting as she ran for the door back into the real world. Green blasts sizzled around them as they ran, the walls quickly crumbling away to reveal the blank void beyond with each shot. The door seemed to grow impossibly farther and farther away with each burning step Coraline took. Shooting pains kept ripping up her leg where the cat had dug in its claws, Sam and Tucker were both yelling, but she couldn't focus on anything but the door, drawing closer and closer –

Danny swooped down just as they reached the door, throwing it wide open so they could all scramble through. He slammed it behind them and locked it, just as something hit it, hard, with a jarring thump.

Coraline sucked in a breath.

"Come on," she said, starting down the cobwebbed tunnel towards the pinprick of light that was the real world. "We're not out of the woods yet."

…

The little door in the lab wall locked with a rusty shriek.

As soon as it was locked, the whole door seemed to come apart in chunks, rippling forward down the lab wall like dominos toppling in a row. The shards fell around Coraline's feet, turned void-white, and then evaporated, into wisps of greenish smoke.

Finally, finally, Coraline exhaled.

"Okay, what was that all about?" Sam asked, and Coraline turned around, slowly. She found she was reluctant to turn her back on the place where the door had been.

"I got caught in a game two monsters were playing back in Ashland. They followed me here," she said. "I think one of them used ghost power to build a world that looked like a trap the other one set, so it could lure me in."

"That must why the place disintegrated," Tucker said. "They didn't figure on Danny having ghost powers when they made his copy, and then there wasn't enough power to go around."

Coraline nodded, looking down at the little black key in her hand. "Hopefully that's the last we'll be seeing of either of them."

Sam crossed her arms. "You're gonna have to give me way more detail than that. Starting with how you got mixed up with monsters in the first place."

"I'll make popcorn," Tucker offered. Coraline was pretty sure it was meant to be a joke, but her stomach rumbled anyway.

"Actually, yeah," Danny said, looking at Coraline. It wasn't the suspicious glare she'd gotten used to. In fact, she thought she saw a hint of a smile. "Let's go upstairs, get some snacks. My room is way more comfortable, and my parents will definitely still kill us if they catch us in the lab. And then dissect our ghosts so they can study them." He grimaced. "And I've got the feeling this is gonna be a long story."

Coraline smiled back. "You have no idea."

…

Danny's parents came home halfway through the story. Coraline met them for the first time when they slammed open Danny's door and his mom demanded to know if any of them had noticed any unusual activity, the EMF readings in the lab were off the charts.

Sam's parents showed up not long after, hammering on the door and insisting on being allowed to see their daughter. Jazz spent nearly twenty minutes running interference before they finally turned around and went home. Coraline wished she could've heard what Jazz had said to them.

It was late by the time she made her way home, feeling a little stunned. She'd never thought that she could be the weird girl who talked about monsters and still have friends, and yet, here she'd just spent a whole day fighting monsters, then talking about them, and then just hanging out and playing Doomed. With her…friends.

Maybe, Coraline decided, as she opened the front door to her house, Amity Park wouldn't be so bad after all.

Of course, that when she saw what had happened to the inside of her new house, and heard her mother's frustrated shout echoing down the stairs.

"Coraline Jones! What did you do to all of our moving boxes!?"