InsaneJournal

Apprentice of the Sixth Age 4/12
Title: Apprentice of the Sixth Age
Chapter Title: Training
Rated: NC17 (chapter rating NC17)
Pairings: Danny/Clockwork, Danny/Lancer
Fandom: Danny Phantom
Danny Phantom belongs to Nickelodeon and its associates. The Call of Cthulhu role playing game belongs to Chaosium Inc.
Notes from the last three chapters.

-----

This is the second novel of the Apprentice Arc.

Writing of this novel began in May 2006. The novel was finished in March 2007. It spawned a third installment, a short story which was began in March 2007 and is nearing completion. It has been edited for grammar repeatedly.

The Apprentice story arc grapples with a multitude of themes that a great many people may not be comfortable with, including but not restricted to Insanity, Slash, Het, Pedophilia, Drug Use, Polyamoury, and Master/Servant Relations.

-----

Friday after school Danny pushed through the crowds of stragglers still hanging around to Lancer’s classroom. The desks were all pushed to one wall and the man was focused on the music in his headphones. He moved to the music in a very choreographed manner.

step, step, step, kick

step, step, step, kick

He suddenly changed steps while mumbling under his breath “Hot patootie, bless my soul / I really love that rock-and-roll”

Danny grinned. He slammed the door closed behind him.

Lancer jolted out of his dancing, nearly falling over in his haste. He tore the headphones off then relaxed as he saw who it was. “Danny,” he exclaimed, “I didn’t see you there.”

“Worried I was someone else?”

Lancer blushed and mumbled.

“The entire school knows you’re Riff Raff, why care what people’d think if they found you rehearsing in your classroom?”

The teacher shrugged. “It’s something I haven’t done since college,” he admitted.

Screams sounded from the vicinity of the parking lot. A familiar laugh drifted from the same area. Danny sighed. “I need to be somewhere.” He transformed.

Lancer watched Danny fly off through the ceiling. “Good luck.”

-----

Danny hovered over the parking lot. He watched students run for their lives, dive for cover, and in general leave the responsibility of the battle and its damage to him.

“Ghost Child?!” asked a disbelieving voice.

“Hello Technus,” answered Danny.

“It is you!” he cried. “You look good. What happened?”

“I was apprenticed.”

“I know that, for I, Technus, Master of Technology, am not so misinformed as to not know of your apprenticeship to Clockwork, Master of Time! I have been sent by your Master to aid in your training. But what happened? You’ve aged!”

“I grew up. Master did this for me before my cleansing.”

“You underwent that…” Technus shivered. “I feel greatly for you, Ghost Child. I guess I shouldn’t call you ‘Child’ anymore then, Daniel.”

“Please, Technus, call me Danny Phantom. Only Master and my lover call me ‘Daniel.’”

“You’ve a lover now? You have come far, young Phantom. Now, by the authority of your Master I challenge you to a duel!”

Danny bowed before falling into a fighting stance. “I accept.”

Technus shot forward to attack.

Danny swooped up and rose into the sky as Technus monologued his prowess. He turned and dove as fast as he could speed.

“And I, Technus, Master of all things electronic and beeping, have been sent by your master, Clockwork, Master of Time, to whip your sorry hide into…” Technus paused his monologuing when he saw what Danny was planning. He shifted three feet to the left and laughed as Danny shot past and slammed into the ground in confusion. “Now that we’re no longer fighting over your hand, we’re all allowed to unleash our full power against you.”

“Wait!” shouted Danny. “‘Fighting over my hand?!’ Am I a bride or something? What do you mean?”

“Ever since we knew of your presence we’ve all been fighting over your hand in apprenticeship,” Technus explained, lapsing back into monologue. “Myself, Skulker, Ember, we’ve all been fighting over you according to the Elder’s rules of engagement. When Clockwork won your hand we were all very disappointed, after all, rather than impress you with battle-prowess he’d tried being nice to you! Why didn’t we think of that?! But, Clockwork eased our disappointment by allowing each of us to teach you in our own ways. Now, young Phantom, prepare to face me, Technus, Master of Technology! And this time, I’m not holding back.”

The cars in the parking lot below them came alive. Students ran screaming as their cars chased after them. Danny darted about, trying to save people from the wrath of their cars.

Technus sighed. The boy has so much to learn… “ENOUGH!!” Technus shouted. The cars all stopped and their engines died. Technus grabbed Danny and flew away with him.

-----

“That was pitiful,” Technus scolded. He tossed Danny onto a pile of crates in an abandoned warehouse. He hovered over the boy menacingly.

“You were going to kill people!” Danny shouted frantically. “What was I supposed to do?”

Technus sighed. “What has your master told you about the Ages?”

“Ages?” Danny asked. “I know the War of the Rings ended the Third Age.”

Something tickled Technus’s memory, something about a book he’d been in the middle of reading. Flashes of memory returned for a few seconds, memory of that book and a woman and a child and a job and a flash of light… He shook himself all over, forcing his mind back to the present, back to his afterlife. “Not Tolkien’s Ages, the real ones!”

Danny looked confused.

Technus sighed again. “This is a lot to take in at once, but bear with me. You know I’m the Master of Technology. Well, unlike the others I was never apprenticed. I legally declared myself Master of Technology, but I won’t come into my full power until the Sixth Age.”

“Why not?”

“That’s the way it works. I won’t gain my full power until the Sixth Age nor will I be able to take an apprentice until then. Coupled with my full power is my ability to keep up with human technology. I must admit my knowledge has been trapped a couple of decades in the past. It’s like I’m apprenticed to myself. At least I don’t have to punish myself.”

“But what are the Ages?” Danny demanded.

“Don’t rush me!” shouted Technus, slapping the boy across the mouth hard enough to throw him to the ground. He waited until Danny pulled himself back up before continuing. “The Ghost Zone was created a little more than sixty-three million years ago by the human’s calendar. According to those Elders who lived in that time, the two realms were one where the living looked up to the dead in a form of ancestor worship. Then there was some explosion, a meteor or something. I believe human science thinks it was an iron meteorite or something. Anyway, the explosion split the world into two not entirely distinct realms.”

“Why ‘not entirely distinct?’” the boy asked, curious.

“Every five point something thousand years as a result of zodiacal precession, the two realms re-merge. At current we are in the Fifth Age of humanity, I think your master calls it the Fifth World. The Sixth Age dawns just over six years from now when the Winter Solstice sun forms a conjunction with the Dark Rift of the galactic center. Now, this is important for several reasons. First, you’re supposed to be fully trained by then as Clockwork plans to step down on that day.”

“Six years?! I can’t be ready by then!”

Technus raised his hand in warning. “Second, life and death will cease to have much meaning as the two realms will merge again. And most importantly, I, Technus, Master of Technology, will finally come into my full power!” He cackled long and loud.

Danny stared at Technus as though the older ghost had grown two extra heads. Technus finally stopped laughing and sighed as he looked Danny up and down. “I’m going to recommend your master actually teach you about the ways of the worlds before trying to pass you off onto one of us again. You may go.”

“But--” Danny whimpered.

Technus collected a charge of ectoplasm and slapped Danny across the face with it. Danny went flying and slammed into a wall with such force that the wall cracked. Dust floated down to pepper the boy’s hair and shoulders. He groaned.

“Go, Child. Fly back to those humans you still call parents.” Technus disappeared.

-----

Danny got home and threw himself on his admittedly uncomfortable bed. He stared at the walls, at the astronaut posters, at the window overlooking the densest parts of the city. Technus’s words disturbed him. The idea of the real world merging with the Ghost Zone the way it had done under Ghost King Pariah was absurd, disturbing, and oddly familiar. Of course, it was possible that Technus was lying.

He had to know. He ignored his parent’s questions and his sister’s worried looks. He shot straight to the portal and threw himself in.

-----

Danny landed in Clockwork’s lair. “Master?” he called.

Clockwork appeared with a smirk. “It was only a matter of time,” he murmured.

“Until when, Master?” Danny asked.

“Why, until you returned for information. Technus has already informed me of your spectacular failure. He seems to think you’d have done better had you been given the order to learn. I must say, I don’t believe in ordering a person to learn. I believe in opportunities. You were given your first opportunity to learn after your cleansing. Everything in those chambers is yours, including the several thousands of books that cover an entire wall. And yet, you never took the opportunity to read them.”

“I-I didn’t have time’” Danny whispered. “You sent me straight home.”

Clockwork drew the dreaded electric whip and cracked it in the air above Danny’s head. The boy whimpered and stumbled back, falling on his rear. “You are correct, I did,” Clockwork admitted. “However, as Technus informed you, you only have six years before I must step down. You must learn which instructions to follow and which ones to ignore and you must learn this lesson fast. But, I will take my fellow Master’s advice.” He dropped a bag of a strange sticky feathered herb in Danny’s lap. “Smoke this in the hookah. It’ll help you understand what you read.”

Danny held the bag and stared as his Master curled the whip and put it back in his cloak. He scrambled off to his chambers to read.

-----

Danny plopped down in an armchair he’d somehow not noticed during his first night in his chambers. He held a book bound in a soft leather that gave him the creeps for some reason. He opened the book to find naught but strange symbols and the occasional hand-drawn ink diagram of star charts, maps of the Ghost Zone, and a wood cut lithograph of a meteor crater. He turned the book around several times, trying to make sense of the Antediluvian nonsense.

“Eeeep,” squeaked the dragon in its cage.

Danny looked up from the book to see the dragon looking at him. “Hello there, little guy,” Danny said, putting the book down. He got up to scratch the tiny dragon behind the horns.

“Eeeep,” the dragon said. “Eeeeeeeek, eep, eep, eeeeeek.”

Danny thought for a moment. “Well, Master said everything in this room is mine. I guess that includes you. Do you have a name?”

“Eeeekk.” The dragon purred at Danny’s scritching.

“I guess I should name you, then. But first, I’m supposed to read these books and I can’t even make out what language they’re in.”

“Eeep.”

“What’s that?” Danny eyed the bag of feathered herbs on the dressing table. “Oh that. Master said it’d make the books easier to read.” He groaned as what he was supposed to do hit his brain full-force. “I have to smoke the herbs for them to work.” He filled and prepared the hookah. He took a long draw of the resulting smoke.

Colors swam for a few moments. When the world stopped spinning his vision had changed. Objects had… auras around them. The dragon blindingly glowed with a bright yellow haze, curiosity and contentment, Danny’s subconscious mind supplied. The books displayed various emotions; many were sad, others angry, a couple downright scary. The book sitting on the armchair was… wise? Danny picked it up and saw the symbols had become words, words he could understand. He started to read.

-----

Many, many hours later Clockwork knocked on the door. He opened it to find Danny asleep in the chair, an open book in his lap. Stacks of books sat around the chair, books he could tell had been read. In the boy’s hand dangled the mouth-pipe of the hookah. The hookah’s coals had long since turned to ash, their heat almost gone.

Clockwork found the open bag of feathered herb on the dressing table. All that smoke, all that time, had come from a single pinch. He nodded approvingly. He plucked the mouth-pipe from Danny’s hand and took a long draw, sighing in pleasure. He then picked up the boy and tucked him into bed.

The boy deserved some rest from so much knowledge. He smiled as Danny snuggled into the silk pillows. He took another draw from the hookah and left.

-----

Danny moaned and stretched. His eyes drifted open. The auras were gone and he was in bed. He didn’t remember going to bed. Heh. He didn’t even remember when he’d stopped reading.

“It’s all clear to me now,” said a deep, maternal voice. Clockwork leaned in the doorway.

“Master!” Danny exclaimed, suddenly awake.

“Good morning, Daniel. Sleep well?”

“I did, thank you.”

Clockwork glided in and sat himself on the edge of Danny’s bed. “I made a mistake with you, Daniel. I freely admit that. I’d hoped that you wouldn’t need my constant guidance your first year as my apprentice. I was wrong. I was wrong to send you back to the human world so quickly and now I pay the price in your ignorance. You’ll be staying here for a time, long enough to read the libraries, I’d think. Then I shall answer your questions, we shall begin your lessons, and you’ll be sent back to your life in the human world. Of course only a day will have passed in the human world. But I warn you; the two realms are beginning to align. This will be one of the final times I can change the flow of time to cover for your stay here.”

“But what if I need your guidance later?” Danny asked.

“You’ll return to me often in the next six years. You’ll be trained in the ways of the Ghost Zone and in the ways of the recombined world. It will be a great difficulty for you to remember it all, but I trust in your abilities, my apprentice. Understand?”

“Yes, Master,” Danny said quietly. “I understand. I need to work hard.”

“So do I, Daniel. So do I.”

-----

“Master?” Danny asked through the haze of the hookah. He handed Clockwork the mouth-pipe.

Clockwork took a long draw, eyes falling closed. “Yes, Daniel?”

“This book talks of a ‘cataclysm that created all that is and all that is not.’ What does that mean?”

Clockwork blinked a few times and took a good long look at the book. It felt sad but important, a book that kept the secrets of Ages. “Your history tells you of a meteorite that struck the earth and killed off the dinosaurs. It puts the date at 65 million years ago. No one admits this but that number has an error bar. It’s a little less than two million years off.

“Before that time the living and the dead dwelled in the same realm. The living looked to the dead for advice in a form of ancestor worship. Spirits were given the respect that is our due. Some even look living apprentices so that upon their deaths the apprentice would take over for the master. The world was peaceful, death was not to be feared, and societies were allowed to develop that dwarf any dream that humanity has yet to conceive. Alas, it was not to last.

“The meteorite destroyed all that. It shook the very foundations of the world, splitting it in two. The physical realm did not fare well. Most of their realm burned alive in the firestorm. Our realm was quickly populated with the spirits of those who lost everything in the Burning: their bodies, their lives, their memories, their minds… It’s been that way ever since. While the two realms are separate the spirits of the dead lose most of their memories and their minds; we call them Ghosts. When the two realms are combined the dead retain their memories, their minds, their selves; we unofficially call them Spirits.

“The initial separation was long enough that a number of the original Spirits, dead long before the Burning, managed to organize the mindless Ghosts and reduce them to a base ectoplasm. This ectoplasm was then reformed into an obedient slave race known only as the Shadows. And then, the worlds remerged for the first time.

“The physical realm was so different. The plants, the trees, the animals… There were no species intelligent enough to call ‘people,’ not until birds recovered enough of their ancestor’s intelligence to regain sapience. The spirits called themselves Elders and those who died during or after the Burning became known as Ghosts.

“At first the remerging happened for short periods with long intervals between but slowly the two have evened out. Now the intervals, known as Ages, are close to the same length of time. By the Mayan calendar even numbered Ages represent a remerging and odd numbered ones signify another separation.”

“So with the Sixth Age coming up, the two realms will remerge?” Danny asked. “Will they ever fully remerge?”

“It’s been theorized that eventually the two realms will reintegrate in a great healing of the world. Technus has calculated several models and found a couple of points in time when a reintegration might be possible but the soonest won’t be for several million years. But yes, the two realms are remerging for the Sixth Age.”

“And I’m going to be a part of that…” Danny trailed off and went back to reading, occasionally puffing on the hookah as his ability to read the ancient writings wavered in and out.

Clockwork floated out of the room. He paused in the doorway as a wave of weakness washed over him. He watched his hands fade for a moment then return to normal. His time was ending and the strain was beginning to get to him.

-----

Clockwork followed the sounds of fighting to the main chamber of his lair. He peeked in and relaxed. It was only Daniel fighting with Skulker. He leaned against the wall and watched.

Daniel moved with a clumsy grace. He wielded the scythe with more force than skill but he made up for it with his curious ability to dodge. He flailed and flowed around like, what was that called? Oh yes, the drunken master. Clockwork smirked at the similarities. Daniel would never be graceful but there was great strength in being constantly underestimated.

Skulker for his part appeared to recognize that beating the boy in a matter of seconds would do nothing to develop his skill and was visibly holding back. He used only his fists and the great blades braced in his wrists. He purposefully moved slowly, matching Daniel’s inferior speed and strength.

A twist and a feint later Daniel had the scythe around Skulker’s mechanical neck, well prepared to slice through the spine from the rear. Skulker responded with lightning speed, entrapping Daniel’s neck between his wrist-blades.

“Not bad, Whelp,” Skulker admitted. “You’re improving.”

“Daniel is coming along nicely,” Clockwork said as he stepped out of the shadows.

“M-master!” Daniel exclaimed, only just realizing he held his master’s scythe. He held it out to his master. “I know I didn’t ask. I await your judgment.”

Skulker patted him heavily on the head. “Much more well-mannered than when I first laid eyes on the whelp. I commend thee, Clockwork.”

“Your initiative speaks well of your progress, Daniel. I had not thought of training you for battle just yet but you saw the need and satisfied it. There will be no punishment. After I speak to Orion we shall test your skill.”

Danny’s eyes lit up. “Thank you, Master!”

“Please, Clockwork, call me Skulker. I’ve not answered to the name ‘Orion’ since I lost my body to Scorpio.”

Clockwork shrugged. “Old habits die hard, I guess.”

Skulker looked pained, as though flooded with memories he could no longer stand. “I beg of you, let them die. Come, let us watch you beat the stuffing out of your apprentice as you ‘test his skill.’”

The boy suddenly didn’t look so pleased with himself.

“Oh very well.” Clockwork pulled a second scythe down from the wall and glared in sadistic pleasure. He raised it and shot after his apprentice as the boy started to run and dodge. Danny got in a few swipes, more out of desperation than skill, and continued to evade.

“Serpentine, Boy, serpentine!” Skulker shouted from against the wall, sounding very amused.

Clockwork laughed manically, teeth bared in pure happiness as he chased Danny around the room. Danny turned and slashed his scythe at Clockwork’s chest. The blade of the scythe slipped easily into the glass case of his chest.

The pendulum stopped. Clockwork’s eyes rolled back in his head and he collapsed.

“Master?!” Danny exclaimed, lapsing into panic.

Skulker pushed himself off the wall, sensing distress.

Danny fell to his knees next to the lifeless form. He pulled the scythe out of the case and found no damage but his master still wouldn’t wake up. He laid his head on Clockwork’s chest and pleaded for his master to wake up, snap out of it, please, wake up, wake up, don’t leave me…

Skulker stood over the pair, puzzled. This was new to him, this idea of Clockwork passing out for any reason. But then he’d never seen the Time Master’s pendulum stop. Wait… He knelt next to master and apprentice. “Daniel, sit up. I think I know what’s wrong.”

Danny sat up. “You do?” he asked, sniffling.

Skulker sat Clockwork up and held him in that position. He opened the glass case and pulled the pendulum back. He let go. The pendulum started swinging again, emitting a faint ticking sound. He closed the case and the ticking was muffled, almost silenced.

“Did it work?” Danny asked.

“Unngh,” Clockwork groaned. He folded forward into Skulker’s arms. He grabbed his head and tried to shake some sense back into it. “Wha’ happened?” he asked, shifting to a childish form.

“Your apprentice went for the killing stroke,” Skulker said, sounding oddly reverent. “He stopped your pendulum. Ingenious, really.”

“Oh, Master, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I didn’t try to hurt you, I’m sorry…” Tears shone in Danny’s eyes.

Clockwork floated awkwardly to Danny’s side and held him close. Danny held on tight and cried. Clockwork looked apologetically to Skulker. “I think you’d better go.”

Skulker nodded. “You know where I am if you need me. And I still think that that was ingenious, Daniel. You should have been my apprentice.” He left.

Clockwork shifted to his teenage form and ran his hands through Danny’s hair. “Shh,” he hushed. “I’m okay. You didn’t hurt me. I’ll never leave you, I promise. Relax, just relax.” He held the boy’s head still and kissed him. Danny keened and kissed back, claws groping and grasping in an attempt to keep him close.

Suddenly Danny tensed and pulled away. “Lyonell!” he shouted. He tried to squirm out of Clockwork’s grip.

Clockwork held Danny closer as he struggled. “Shh, there’s no one here to see,” he cooed. “You need this, Daniel. You need this as much as I do. Lyonell will understand. Trust me.”

Danny calmed in his master’s arms. “Are you sure?” Danny asked.

Clockwork responded with another kiss. He smirked in triumph as he felt Danny wrap his arms around him, trying to keep him close, closer. Clockwork dragged his hands down, under Danny’s clothes. He threw the boy’s cloak to the floor, tore through silks to get to smooth pale skin.

In the blink of an eye Danny found himself splayed on the floor, Clockwork holding him there with his body, ravishing him. His beautiful blood red silks were in shreds all around them. He ached to run his hands over Clockwork’s tempting teenaged body but the other ghost held his hands to the floor by the wrists.

A green flash appeared out of the corners of his eye, leading to a feeling of being watched. Clockwork pushed himself off of Danny and glared around them before the room got blurry. When Danny’s vision cleared they were in his bed. The dragon in the corner chirped at them.

“No more distractions,” Clockwork snarled. He gestured absently and silk ropes slithered out of the drapes of the bed’s canopy to wrap around Danny’s limbs and hold him immobile, spread out like a sacrificial offering. Teenaged Clockwork grinned, licking his lips in hunger. “Beautiful,” he murmured, drinking in Danny’s blush. “Beautiful and mine to do with as I please.”

“Master?” Danny asked.

“Shh,” Clockwork hushed. He straddled the boy beneath him and proceeded to strip.

Danny watched in fascination, taking in every detail of the body before him. Long red shaggy hair fell haphazardly to Clockwork’s shoulders. Scars criss-crossed the skin of his back. The glass and wood case protecting his pendulum merged clumsily with his flesh and skin. His legs stubbornly attempted to resist their owner’s command to appear and solidify.

He was beautiful.

Clockwork pulled a dagger from the nightstand and carefully flayed Danny’s pants from his skin. He tossed the dagger aside and grasped Danny’s half-mast penis. “Mine,” he whispered, stroking blood into it. He dipped his tongue to the head and pulled back, smirking at the string of precome stretched between them.

Danny groaned as Clockwork then dipped a finger into his slit and sucked up the rest of the drop found there. He ached to touch the being above him but the ropes pulled tighter as he tried to move.

“Don’t,” Clockwork warned, tracing Danny’s lips with that finger. “If you struggle too much it’ll start to hurt and we wouldn’t want that. At least, not today.” He rubbed his hands together once and engulfed Danny’s cock in a fist slick with ectoplasm.

“Wha?” Danny asked through the haze.

“You’re mine, Daniel,” the elder ghost cooed. “Every inch of you to do with as I please. And you do indeed please me.” He stroked Danny’s expectant cock. “Yes, you please me so very much…” He guided the penis to his hungry anus and sat down.

Danny hissed obscenities to the blood red canopy. He tried to thrust into Clockwork’s slick icy channel. Clockwork held his hands up and innumerable ropes slithered up from under the bed to hold him still, immobile. Danny keened in desperate hunger, earning him a slap across the face. “Silence, Catamite,” Clockwork warned. “I take my pleasure from thee and thou shalt not spend before I. Dost thou understand?”

Danny nodded and closed his eyes to think of something else, anything else, anything but the feeling of hands scratching patterns into the skin of his chest, the feeling of muscles clenching around his cock, the idea of ropes stretched over every square inch of his body, the sound of Clockwork’s grunts as he dragged himself up and slammed down over and over and over…

Danny’s eyes shot open as Clockwork grabbed his head and forced him to watch. “’Tis desirous of mine that you see,” he gasped, accent thick. His hands crept impatiently to his organ to stroke and tease. Danny watched as Clockwork’s thrusting grew erratic, hurried. He pulled and squeezed his penis almost harshly before tensing. Danny screamed and came as Clockwork clamped down on him painfully and shot his load all over the boy’s chest, belly, even up his neck.

The ropes slithered away. Clockwork slumped for a moment before catching himself. He ground down onto the softening cock still inside him, relishing the sloshing feeling.

Danny let his limbs go limp. With great effort he lifted his head to see the ghostly semen draped over his chest, down his torso; he could feel it dripping from the underside of his jaw. He dragged a hand up to wipe it off. Clockwork grabbed the insolent hand and placed it back on the sheets. He rubbed his semen into the skin of his apprentice, humming softly to himself as he did.

Danny gave him a confused look but lay still until his master finished. “What was that for?” Danny asked.

“You’re mine,” Clockwork answered, grinning enthusiastically. He pulled off, dripping more semen onto Danny’s torso. “I may share, but you’re still mine.” He lay down next to the boy and held on tightly, settling down to relax, maybe even to nap.

Danny tried to relax but something still bugged him. How is it Clockwork could be felled by something so simple as a stopped pendulum? Why did he have it if it were such a hindrance? “Master?” Danny asked.

“Hmm?” Clockwork asked, tired and sated. He shifted to his adult form, the form he’d had when he died.

“I was wondering about the pendulum in your chest. How did you get it?”

Clockwork got up and gazed at one of the tapestries on the wall. Its scene was one of battle, a unit of knighted cavalry charging a line of spearmen. A line of crossbowmen behind the spearmen fired arrows into the horsemen. He looked closer. The tapestry was irregular in that though the horsemen were victorious, an arrow to the chest felled their captain.

Danny slid off the bed and joined Clockwork at the tapestry.

“That was me,” Clockwork said sadly, pointing to the captain. “The year was 1588. I was a knight of Her Majesty’s Army. We fought a small band of Welsh rebels bent on undermining Sir Francis Drake’s defense of the Isles against the Spanish. We had to stop them; England depended on us.

“The battle was short. Though we suffered few losses, my armor… My blacksmith was one of their supporters though I didn’t know it until after my death. My armor was thin enough in the chest to allow an arrow through. The crossbowmen focused their arrows on me; I led my men, I carried Her Majesty’s banner…

“I suppose I was lucky to take only one arrow. I would have bled to death had it not been for a friend of mine. He was a doctor and a sorcerer of sorts. Quickly enough I was brought to his table. He didn’t even bother pulling out the arrow; instead he opened my chest around it to see where it had lodged. After all, I was doomed to die, why shouldn’t he take the opportunity to see how my insides worked?”

“You were… still alive?” Danny asked, pale with disgusted terror.

“I was alive and conscious through the entire ordeal,” Clockwork admitted. “As I mentioned, he was a sorcerer, well, enough of a sorcerer to keep me alive through all of this. You’d be surprised what the human body can live through. To keep me still he had three of my knights holding me down and a fourth forcing grog down my throat to try and deaden my nerves. It didn’t work.

“The arrow had grazed my heart. He watched my heart beat enough to see it kept a rhythm, erratic though it was. He was intelligent enough to see that there was no way of removing the arrow without tearing through my heart. He was also eccentric enough to always carry around a clock of his own invention. He’d added a pendulum so it never needed winding. He gutted it and fashioned an apparatus for me.”

“H-he took out your heart?” Danny asked.

“He did. I remember watching him pull it out, watching him frantically trying to keep the blood in by connecting everything with a crude wooden valve. It hurt. It hurt so much… Your modern medical science claims that the human body can survive without a heartbeat for many minutes, that degeneration of the brain doesn’t even begin until four minutes after the heart stops. I am inclined to agree. I must have survived long enough for him to install this accursed pendulum, even long enough to find glass panes for the case, and still have enough time for my dying body to recognize it all as something that should be there.”

“How long would that be?” Danny asked, looking ill. “How long would it have to be there for you to…”

“For my ghost to have to deal with it forever?” Clockwork supplied. “Not long. If that arrow had pierced my heart properly the way the rebels had intended I’d just be another ghost flitting about with an arrow sticking out of my chest.”

“So the way a person dies is reflected on its ghost?”

“Of course. Death is the most traumatic ordeal that a spirit can undergo. The death of the body often reflects on the spirit that gets released. Take Warden Walker, for example. He’s as skeletal as he is because he was burned to death in a vat of acid. He was a detective for the Chicago Police Department in 1927. He refused to take bribes from the mobsters; instead he tried to bring them to justice. As a result they caught him and gave him a pair of cement shoes. However, to make sure their handiwork was never recognized they tossed him in a vat of fairly pure nitric acid. When his ghost finally escaped its hellish death the body had been reduced to bones and sinew.”

“I-is that why he wears that archaic suit?” Danny asked, trying to distance himself from his disgust at such horrible knowledge.

“Why, yes, it is. And it’s why he’s so unforgiving about the smallest infractions. He feels he needs to stop any rebellion before it grows into another mob.” Danny’s mental state finally dawned on Clockwork. “Daniel, you need to harden your heart to information such as this. People die horrific deaths. They’ll be dying even more horrific deaths in the future. That is the way of the Ages. I’m going to bombard you with information such as this until your heart is hardened.”

Danny crept back. “Master, no please, have mercy,” he begged.

Clockwork smacked Danny in the back of the head. The apprentice fell silent save keening sounds with every faked breath. “You will hear me,” he warned.

“Y-yes, Master,” Danny whimpered.

“Good. Now, let’s talk about your own death. If I recall, your death was very easy on your body. Your ghost, however, refused to accept it. Therein lies the reason for all of your ‘half-ghost’ nonsense. You stepped into the inactivated ghost portal and tripped on some wires. Disconnected wires crossed, electricity flowed, mainly through you, and electrocution began. But this wasn’t the end of it. The one thing your parents couldn’t comprehend about an artificial ghost portal was the anti-life field produced by its effects. It tore your ghost from your body before you could die of electrocution. Oh, don’t get me wrong, your ghost always displayed signs of its electrocution, you still do, you always will. Your eyes are paler than most other ghost’s and your hands shake. You became quite spastic after your death, do you remember?”

Danny shuddered. He held his hands up and gazed at them, seeing their slight tremor in a terrible new light.

“I do believe Technus had the easiest death of all of us. He died in 1954 in a laboratory accident. He worked for the United States government; his task was to design a better atomic bomb. Something went wrong with containment and enough uranium was mixed to reach critical mass. His body was instantly vaporized. His ghost was left floating in a ruined desert wondering what had gone wrong.”

Danny giggled nervously.

“Mind broken yet?” Clockwork asked.

Danny nodded stupidly through unending giggles.

“You can still answer, that means your mind’s still intact.”

The dragon hissed familiar obscenities at them.

Clockwork sighed and dropped his head in his hand. “And now look what you’ve taught her,” he groaned. “Have you given her a name yet?”

“I-I didn’t know she was a she,” Danny admitted, pulling his mind back together. He stroked her behind the horns. She purred at him. “Lillian, then?” he asked.

“Eeep,” she squeaked. Lillian grabbed his finger with her tiny jaws and gnawed playfully.

“Where did you find her?” Danny asked.

“She was a gift from the Dragon Masters, a ‘Thank You’ for releasing them from their medieval prison. She’s a sign of the times, Daniel. A relic of the next Age.”

Lillian crawled up Danny’s arm and draped herself around his neck.

-----

Danny sat in his armchair and puffed on the hookah. He set aside the book he’d just finished, the last of the non-dark books. The rest had darkened auras: sad, creepy, angry, self-important, terrifying. He sighed. “Might as well get it over with.” He picked up one of the self-important books and paused to read the title.

He dropped the book and leapt out of the chair. He half expected the book to come after him, demanding his soul.

It was the Necronomicon. Not the puny Simon’s Necronomicon like the one his dad kept trying to cast spells out of, but the real one.

“Master!” Danny shouted. He crawled away from the book, trying to stay out of its line of sight. Once on the other side of the bed he made a mad dash for the door and threw it open.

Clockwork stood there. “What is it?” he asked. “Something wrong?”

Danny pointed to the book, hand shaking. “It’s the Necronomicon,” he panted. “You expect me to read the Necronomicon?!”

Clockwork shrugged. “What’s wrong with that? A necronomicon is just a collection of ancient histories and laws. Why? Is there something else about it?”

Danny searched for the words to describe it. He couldn’t find any, but after a moment of reflection he recalled someone who could. “The Ghostwriter will know,” Danny answered.

-----

From one prison to another, Ghostwriter thought to himself.

Clockwork dragged Ghostwriter by his scarf and tossed him into one of his dungeon rooms. He was bound but not gagged. The floor was covered in straw, the walls and ceiling stone. A ghost rat poked its head out of a hole in one of the walls.

“I require information,” Clockwork said without preamble.

“Feeling the tyrant today, O Fearless Leader?” Ghostwriter asked.

“Knock it off, Edgar,” Clockwork scolded. “I have a schedule to keep and you have information I require. What is the Necronomicon and why would my apprentice fear it?”

Ghostwriter wriggled out of his bindings and rubbed his wrists. “Well, well, how times have changed. I get thrown in Warden Walker’s prison and left to rot. And yet, now that Master Clockwork has deigned to take on an apprentice he finds he needs my help. Having a hard time understanding the inner workings of your little late-Age punk?”

Clockwork sank down onto the straw to kneel next to Ghostwriter. “Edgar, I’m sorry I had to leave you there. You’re right, times have changed; my time is ending. I don’t have the influence I once had. You’re my Lore Master, Edgar. You’ve no idea what I’d do for you if I could.”

Ghostwriter sighed. “I know. It’s just… Didn’t Walker know I’m your Lore Master? Why would he risk your wrath by… doing that to me?”

Clockwork pulled Ghostwriter close and wrapped the smaller ghost in his cloak. “I’m fading,” Clockwork whispered.

“I can see,” Ghostwriter whispered back, a tear sliding down his face. The ghost rat crawled out of its hole and scampered onto Ghostwriter’s lap. Ghostwriter picked up the rat. “Hello, Willard.” He placed Willard on his shoulder, feeling slightly better when the rat snuggled into his scarf. “Will I like your apprentice?” he asked.

“Probably not,” Clockwork admitted.

“Do I know him?” Ghostwriter asked.

“Yes. Something about a Christmas poem.”

“What?!”

-----

Danny lounged on his belly on the bed as he waited for the hookah’s coals to warm. Lillian slept curled in the small of his back. He was about to doze when the door burst open.

“Master?” Danny asked sleepily.

“Not quite,” purred a voice dripping with contempt.

Danny tried to get up but Lillian snarled and bit him on the butt cheek. “Ow!” he cried. She snuggled back down.

“Serves you right, for what you did to me. Three days under the thumb of that delusional, paranoid, insane little do-gooder and his oranges and the only way out is to allow myself to be dragged away from my library to help you.”

Three days? Wait… “But it’s been two years since you were arrested.”

Ghostwriter paused. “Two years? But Master Clockwork said--”

“I said I didn’t have the power I once had, Edgar,” Clockwork supplied as he slithered up behind his Lore Master. “That merely means I couldn’t prevent your arrest. I never said I hadn’t used my influence to shorten your punishment to something more… manageable.”

Ghostwriter looked embarrassed. “I guess it wasn’t nearly as bad as it could have been, was it?”

Clockwork shook his head ‘No.’

“And your apprentice is the reason you were able to do this for me.”

Clockwork nodded.

“So I guess I owe him an apology then.”

Clockwork nodded again.

Ghostwriter blushed and mumbled. Danny and Clockwork both looked amused.

“I’ll leave you to it then,” Clockwork said. He left.

Ghostwriter looked embarrassed and annoyed. He pointed gruffly to the hookah. “Is that ready?” he asked.

Danny shrugged. “Should be.”

Ghostwriter strode stiffly over to the hookah and took a very long draw. He visibly relaxed.

“Your name is Edgar?” Danny asked.

“My name is Ghostwriter. Only Master Clockwork is allowed to call me that and only because he would even if he weren’t.”

“He’s your master too?”

Ghostwriter took another long draw and plunked down on the bed next to Danny. He blew a great puff of smoke in Danny’s face, making him cough. “He’s everyone’s master in a way. There’s no ghost more powerful than the Master of Time because, really, are you going to invoke the wrath of the one being who can prevent not only your birth but the births of your ancestors?”

“I guess not.”

They sat in a silence that slowly lost its discomfort.

“I am sorry about your poem,” Danny admitted.

“It’s okay. It needed a rewrite.”

They fell back into silence. Danny kicked his feet idly and Ghostwriter appeared to be using the wall as writing paper for his next story.

“So what’s this about a Necronomicon?” Ghostwriter finally asked.

Danny got up, ignoring the screeches of protest from Lillian. He fetched the book and handed it to Ghostwriter. Ghostwriter held the book reverently, flipping through the pages as though they’d shatter in his hands. “Yess…” he hissed as he read the words therein.

Danny looked over Ghostwriter’s shoulder. There were words, actual words, but he still couldn’t read them, they were in Arabic. Wait… He took a pull from the mouth-pipe of the hookah and looked again. Yep. Right there it referenced the Great Old Ones. Danny flattened himself across the far wall and cringed.

“What?” Ghostwriter asked.

“Th-that’s the Necronomicon!” Danny exclaimed.

“Yes, yes it is. A group of ghosts got together in the middle of the 700s and decided to play a trick on an Arab scholar. They made him write this. It’s nothing to be afraid of.”

Danny still stuck to the wall.

“You read Lovecraft, don’t you?” Ghostwriter asked.

Danny nodded.

“Thought so. Howard got most of his Necronomicon material from his wife Sophia, who in turn got it from Alestor Crowley. Crowley was a bit of a self-important nut who got his soul played around with by one too many Observants. They planted the idea in his mind that the next Age was a bad thing and this idea got passed through Sophia to Howard. That’s all. This is a different Necronomicon. Master Clockwork keeps it out of pride.”

“Pride?” Danny asked.

“Yes, pride. After all, Master Clockwork was the ghost who led the group to playing with that poor little scholar.”

Danny gave Ghostwriter an incredulous look before giggling nervously. Giggling turned to laughter.

Ghostwriter ignored him and started reading again.

-----

“You should go,” Clockwork said.

“What?” asked Danny and Ghostwriter at the same time. They’d been lounging on the bed with the Necronomicon.

“You’ve read every book save that one and your questions have stopped,” Clockwork explained. “Daniel, you’re needed back in your timeline. The book is yours, you can take it with you.”

“But what about me?” Ghostwriter asked.

Clockwork cringed slightly and shifted to his eldest form, a nearly skeletal old man. “You need to stay here for a time,” he said.

“B-but, my library!”

“Barring that, you can follow Daniel. I’m sorry, my friend, but I orchestrated your release so you could aid Daniel. I’m not powerful enough to stop Walker from taking you back if he found you neglecting your duties.”

Ghostwriter pouted. Willard poked his head out of his scarf and squeaked.

“Now?” Danny asked.

Clockwork gave him a dirty look.

“Okay, okay, fine, now.” Danny draped his cloak over his shoulders, grabbed the half-empty bag of herb and tucked the book under his arm. He disappeared.

Clockwork leaned heavily on his staff. He felt on the verge of collapse. Ghostwriter swooped up and led him to the armchair. “The boy doesn’t understand the amount of power it takes to send him through time like that,” Clockwork groaned, annoyed at his own weakness. “And it’s just going to get harder and harder. The Observants sense this. They’re going to try and take over soon. You know what’ll happen if they succeed, Edgar. I need you here to help me stop them.”

Ghostwriter thought for a moment. “I’ll need to enchant a new keyboard,” he murmured.

End