Darkness
A Danny Phantom FanFiction by Cordria

Chapter 1: Memories

Her eyes flickered quickly over the charcoal blackness. Not a single fragment of light shone through the obscurity of… wherever she was. Finally she closed her eyes, the totality of the blackness making her already aching head dizzy. It was far better to pretend she could see, but merely had her eyes shut.

She reached out with her fingers, tracing the harsh stone tiles of the floor. Fingers slipped into chill puddles of water, danced over sharp cracks and crevices, and explored to the farthest reaches of her arms. Yet she felt nothing more than the stones of the floor: no walls, no furniture, nothing but ground.

Even through her thick Hazmat-like jumpsuit, the cold was trickling into her bones. Slowly, silently, she rose onto her heels, crouching for a moment as her surprisingly stiff joints protested the movements. Unconsciously, her eyes drifted open again, trying to help her keep her balance and search for dangers. Darkness.

Just before she stood the rest of the way up to explore, she froze. Slicing through her mind was a memory dug out of the cobwebs of high school. A memory of a story she had been forced to read by an author nearly as dark as this place she had found herself. A tale of a dark room… of a slicing pendulum… of a deep, bottomless, pit.

Suddenly becoming aware of the dangers of her unknown surroundings, she didn’t dare wander around. Images of her falling to her death filled her mind, followed soon after by thoughts of what else could be out in the darkness. Moldy, dingy skeletons grinning into the black. Maggots and rats scurrying under her feet. Unseen monsters hiding, chained, in a corner, waiting to pounce.

No, she would not be moving. She shuddered and dropped back to the ground, crossing her legs. Her hands slapped at a tingle on her arm, crystal-clear visions of massive spiders and centipedes crawling on her making her jumpy. After a few seconds of sitting perfectly still, trying to convince herself that nothing was crawling up her back, she brought her hands up and rubbed at her face. She vaguely noted that her hood and goggles seemed to be missing. What is going on? Dropping her hands to her waist, she did a quick check of her utility belt. Everything was gone; taken.

She groaned and buried her head back into her hands, pressing her palms against her eyes. As sparks jumped into her vision, questions flitted through her brain like hummingbirds. Why am I in here?

Slowly, ever so slowly, memories started to float back through her mind. No movie reels: only snapshots. Detailed pictures of moments that burst into bloom in her head like fireworks.

Her son: missing for nearly a week.

Jack: sitting in a dirty jumpsuit, staring at the wall of the kitchen, ignoring the fudge Jazz had placed in front of him.

A police officer: trying to explain that it looked like Danny hadn’t run away. They had activated the Amber Alert… but there was no sign of him anywhere.

Her daughter: asleep in Danny’s bed, tears still on her face.

The police: once again telling her that they had found no trace of Danny.

Sam: who by most accounts hadn’t stopped crying in days.

She curled up into a ball, ignoring the chill of the floor. All over again, her spirit suffered from the disappearance of her little boy. Her stomach twisted into a knot, tears leaking out of her eyes and tracing cold paths down her cheeks. Danny is gone.

Pulling her legs tightly against her chest, she allowed the pain of her emotions to flood through her. Her beautiful son had been taken. To where, she didn’t know. By whom, she didn’t know. All she knew was that he was gone.

More firefly memories flittered through her mind.

A trip to the park at night, unable to sleep.

A shadow on the grass.

A sharp pain in her head.

Blackness.

Suddenly, the sharp sound of chains rattled in the distance. She flipped her head around, eyes widening. Even in the complete darkness, she gazed about, searching for the source of the noise. On the far side of the room she saw two glowing, green eyes staring at her. It appears that at least one of her fears was true after all.

To be continued…