Into the woods

Chapter 8 - Welcome to the jungle

Danny scowled, looking around the stray island they stood on, Skulker's territory was made up mostly of islands because of the animals that normally inhabited the small island, Danny was just glad that no animals were on the island, he suspected that Maddie and Jack would've shot it until it was ectoplasmic goop, he shuddered at the thought, knowing full well that he'd die like that too if he wasn't careful. Danny thought, arms crossed over his chest while he tapped his foot on the rocky ground, Skulker would likely make a game of their appearance, which the trio normally didn't mind, but now they had to be quick and get the class out of the ghost zone as soon as possible.

"Ghosts usually fly across, so maybe we can contact Skulker and have him get us?" Tucker answered Danny, he fiddled with his PDA, frowning.

"The whelp and his human friends, to what do I owe the pleasure of your call?" Skulker asked, he had long since stopped referring to Danny as the king, in favour of calling him "Whelp" instead, most of the ghosts didn't call him king, which Danny was fine with, he tried to be friendly and kind to other ghosts, but he preferred to be left alone by the ghosts. Unless they needed him for something, they usually obeyed his request. Tucker and Sam figured that it was because of the previous king, but they wouldn't say it aloud.

"Hey Skulker, I was wondering if I could take some humans over to your island, you can't use them in a hunt though, I doubt they would survive. We just need a while to take care of them while Sam, Tucker and the rest of us figure out what to do to get to the Far Frozen, could you help us?" Danny greeted Skulker, the Mechanical ghost's face was close to the screen, meaning he was using the PDA on his arm to speak with them, Tucker helped him to get the schedule to stop, allowing Skulker to skulk around the ghost zone without interruption.

"Is that Babybop?" A familiar female voice called, a blur of blue fiery hair appeared as Ember put herself in between Skulker and the screen.

"Hey Ember!" Danny greeted, a jovial smile on his face, he noticed that Maddie and Jack were oddly quiet and glanced over, he chuckled when he saw Sam and Jeff covering the mouths of his parents so he could speak with his friends.

"How you been kid, haven't seen you in a while. You doing around with some guests?" Ember asked, smiling as she moved away from the screen and leaned against Skulker's right side, Skulker adjusted his arm and made sure the screen captured himself and his girlfriend.

"Yes, there's been a small emergency. The school had a field trip to the zone and the vehicle broke down, I'm hoping we can get to Frostbite and his people to fix it." Danny answered, nodding his head.

"We're hoping to visit to start on our way to the Far Frozen." Sam spoke up, smacking away Maddie's hand when she rose it to move her away. Danny, Tucker and Ben snickered as Sam and Jeff smirked.

"That's fine, come on over whelp." Skulker said, nodding as Ember raised a hand, giving a thumbs up, they were happy to allow Danny and the humans over, Skulker especially since he knew that he'd be able to hunt the ghost boy for a little bit, allowing the humans to see his might and impress his girlfriend since she hadn't seen him fight Danny before.

"That will be great, the only problem is that I'm not sure how to get over to your island, I'll figure something out though." Danny said, smiling at his friends. Sam scowled when Maddie moved her head away from her hand, she was appalled by her son seeming friendly with ghosts.

"Young man, how do you know them? These are ghosts, they're dangerous!" Maddie said, frowning deeply.

"Just because I'm the son of ghost hunters doesn't mean I can't be friends with ghosts, they aren't all bad." Danny said, he knew trying to convince Maddie would be hard so he didn't want to try, he focused more of his energy to get the humans across.

"See you in a few minutes Skulker, Ember." Danny said to the two ghosts, waving to them before Tucker ended the call.

"I'm going to take a better look around, I'll be back soon." Danny said, he started to jog off and waved a hand back behind him, he saw Ben be dragged off to the geek group and Tucker go over to join them as he left, he hid behind a piece of the Speeder, the familiar white rings appearing around his body as another version of himself split from his side, a human clone stood beside him as he turned into his ghost half, he gave the clone a wink and turned invisible, flying around the island, he flew to one of the smaller islands nearby, it was about the size of a human, a floating boulder more than anything, he pushed it near the island the humans were stranded on, watching his clone go back to the group, talking to the others about something, he flew off and started to gather a few floating islands, pushing them to the island to create a bridge to Skulker's island, he flew to his clone after he finished and turned intangible as he flew into his clone, taking its place, the memories of his clone apparent in his mind.

"I didn't see much, but there is a path, I noticed that some of the rocks started moving, I guess the ghost zone moves sometimes." Danny said, smiling to his friends and brother as he gave them a wink. He sighed, he'd have to get the attention of the class. He picked up the piece of metal Jeff removed from Maddie's leg and went to a large piece of the speeder, he threw the metal piece at the large wall of the ship, a loud scratchy crash was the resulting noise and when he heard yells of outburst and surprise he knew he had the attention of his class.

"Look, there's a path, it's going to the island of Skulker, the greatest hunter of the ghost zone, we have to be careful. I know the way around and it will be enough to house us for a short time, come on." Danny called, all of the cliques of the class looking at him, he saw Paulina stand up and walk over to him, he huffed softly in amusement, this would be fun.

"Fenton, why should we follow you? You're just a freak, along with the rest of your loser friends!" Paulina asked, crossing her arms as she walked to him, standing in front of him. He gently shook his head, shrugging.

"You could lead everyone around the zone, but if you do everyone will be dead in a few minutes, Skulker is the only ally around here." Danny answered Paulina, he crossed his arms over his chest, mocking her with a smirk on his face. Paulina let out a huff, she had no knowledge of this place so Danny was right, no one knew and Danny was the only one taking charge of the situation.

"We'll follow you..." Paulina said, deciding for the A-List group.

"Us too!" Mikey said, raising a hand as he stood up, he trusted Danny since he always liked the guy, he was nice. Jeff let go of Jack's mouth and patted his shoulder as Ben stood up from the group of his new friends and went to Danny, Sam and Tucker following.

"Everyone will eat first and then we'll go to see my friend Skulker." Danny told everyone, his little group splitting up to take food out of the food bag and hand them out to the class, along with the water. The humans took the food, eating among their small groups, afterward Danny got their attention, so they all stood and followed the Creeps into Skulker's island, though they ignored Maddie when she made her dislike known, but she and Jack weren't in the best shape to lead around the Zone.