Into the woods

Chapter 2 - A salty and buttery reminder

Danny woke up in his bed, the sun peaking into the room from his closed curtains, the birds chirped and cars drove past the house, however he heard some commotion downstairs. He stood up, dragging the blanket off of the bed with him, he poked his head out of the blanket and threw his blanket onto the bed, he ran a hand through his hair and left his room, closing the door behind him before he walked down the stairs to the kitchen, he found his parents in front of the Tv, watching the news.

"Weird, they never had watched the news before" is what Danny thought before he saw what was on the screen, the police were at the school, a large crowd consisting of staff and students held back from the school by some of the force and a large roll of police tape around the scene, Lancer was carried out of the school on a stretcher and put into the back of an ambulance to be taken to the cemetery. Danny smiled internally and shrugged, watching his parents talk amongst themselves, having not noticed him. He planned to keep it like that way too, Danny quickly snuck back up to his room and closed the door, he started to get out of his pyjamas and was interrupted by his phone ringing, he hobbled over on one foot as he pulled his pants off and turned the phone on speaker.

"Danny! Did you see the news?" Danny softly huffed as he went to his closet and grabbed a pair of pants.

"I saw, has Tuck seen?" Danny answered Sam, evading the question as he pulled his pants on and took his shirt off. His phone rang as Tucker joined the call, he winced at the loud background noise from Tucker's phone, he guessed Tucker was in the crowd outside of Casper high.

"I've been watching for like 10 minutes now, the police are searching the school for anything else that might happened." Tucker spoke into the phone, though it was hard to hear him because of the large background noise of the crowd, it calmed down a bit once Tucker walked out of the crowd, going to the curbside so he and his friends could talk.

"It was definitely a ghost, it was invisible." Sam spoke in a matter of fact tone. She was right, good for her.

"Geez, how'd you figure that out?" Tucker asked, hoping a joke would lighten the mood.

"Shut up!" Sam replied, sounding angry, she had crossed her arms over her chest at home even though her friends couldn't see her.

"Sorry, Sorry..." Tucker said, sighing.

"Hey dude, you're not talking much. You okay?" Tucker asked, making Danny stop while putting the shirt on midway, he quickly pulled the rest of it down and fixed the collar.

"Yeah, just tired. I haven't slept well lately." Danny answered Tucker, he wasn't lying, he was fine and hadn't been sleeping. He looked at his mirror and gasped when he thought he saw a tall man sitting on his bed, one in a suit without a face, just smooth white skin. He looked at his bed, finding no one there he raised an eyebrow and muttered a soft "huh, weird."

"What's weird?" Sam asked, distracting Danny.

"Oh, I thought I saw something in the corner of my eye, but I'm fine." Danny answered, he found it strange that his ghost sense didn't go off, maybe it was a hallucination?

"Come over to my house, we still have our weekend movie night starting tonigh.t" Sam said, adding in a
"It will help our moods," and she was right, Danny felt oddly empty after the night before. He nodded, hearing the phone cut off as his friends ended the call, leaving him to put his socks and shoes on, he looked over to his desk and blinked in surprise at the black hoodie draped over his desk chair, his eyebrow furrowed when he noticed a note on the table too, after he finished tying his shoes he stood up and went to the desk, he picked the note up and hummed softly, feeling the rough texture he guessed it was parchment, this was getting really weird.

"Dear Daniel, I've left a gift for you on behalf of someone you may know. I believe you'll be familiar with Jeffery, please meet him at the border of the woods tonight, I know you don't have much to do tonight. Look in the hoodie pocket,there you'll find a necklace with my calling card on it, it will allow me to protect you or help you in the future if you need me to, goodbye little Phantom.

- The Tall Man"

Danny slowly put the letter down, confused. He looked around the room and picked up the hoodie, he shook it and dug through the front pocket, he found a metal necklace, one with a rather thin rope that held onto the metal sign of a math operator and a X striking through it.

"So that's your calling card Tall man, thanks dude." Danny muttered, he looked at the solid black hoodie and shrugged before he put it on and put both the letter and necklace in the front pocket, he grabbed his phone and charger before he left his room, he took the stairs two at a time, checking to see if his parents were in the kitchen, he shook his head, knowing they were already at Casper High to help the police. He transformed into his ghost form, glad that he had a way to clean himself of blood after the night before. He held the stuff in his hoodie close as he turned intangible and flew through the ceiling, turning invisible as he flew through the air on the way to Sam's house, he was honestly more interested in meeting with the Jeffery guy the letter mentioned instead of watching horror movies, he felt a little bad for that. Nonetheless he arrived at Sam's house and flew down to the basement, turning visible as he started to get ready, hearing Sam come down the stairs thanks to his heightened senses.

Once Sam came downstairs they had a small conversation as Sam set up the large theatre screen and Danny got the snacks and drinks. He got himself a water and a large popcorn for the group, deciding to let Sam and Tucker get their own drinks. He turned into his human form once he heard Tucker enter the basement, recognising his smell and hearing his voice as he called hello. Danny wanted the movies to be over soon so he could get answers, but it was still the morning, so he didn't want to rush the movies despite his curiosity. He had thought about going to Vlad for answers, but they were arch enemies. He suspected Vlad would take advantage of him in such a state. He huffed and sat down, sipping on his water as he stared at the black screen and listened to Sam and Tucker talk about the murder. He was honestly too mentally tired to deal with it and he didn't care, he just wanted to watch movies. His friends came over and sat down, Sam in his right and Tucker to his left, Sam started the first movie and the group settled in for a horror movie marathon.