Chapter Text
Danny was not a fan of planes.
It was hard to have any sort of appreciation for any sort of large flying machine after he’d been pushed out, phased out, and ridden them down into a fiery explosion more times than he could count in the last seven years.
Vlad had way too much money to throw away.
The knowledge that unexpected intangibility or ghost-induced mechanical failure was a real and present danger while aboard any aircraft that could fly far faster than he could catch up… well, it made getting comfortable a bit of a stretch.
15 hours into this particular flight, and anxiety still had him checking their ETA every half-hour or so, pacing the cramped isles as often as he could. (Vastly preferring public opinion of a small bladder than allowing even the slightest hint of ghost sense to go unnoticed.)
Jazz had no such issue, having been spared the majority of Vlad’s weird aircraft-related shenanigans. She’d been sleeping soundly most of the flight, over-salted peanuts limply cradled in her lap.
Yes, he was envious.
When the seatbelt notification finally dinged on, Danny made one last rush up and down the cabin isle before squishing himself back into the narrow seat clearly designed by someone who didn’t actually have legs or elbows of their own.
As Danny’s knuckles whitened on the armrests of his seat with every swooping dip of a jet plane landing through turbulence, Jazz spilled her peanuts in a twitching return to wakefulness.
“About to land.” Danny clenched through his teeth.
Jazz just nodded, yawned, and picked the peanuts off of her lap to drop back into their bag. She ignored his nerves, quite used to them at this point, and gathered up her earbuds and laptop back into her bag.
“Did you get any sleep?” she asked, already knowing the answer.
“I didn’t phase through anything.” He answered instead. She looked up, surprised.
“Not even storage? Or to see the cockpit?”
He shook his head.
“Nice!”
She took out a tin of mints and offered it to him, calmly ignoring the tremors in his fingers as she shook a few pieces out into his hand. He palmed them into his mouth, focusing with laser-like intensity on the seat in front of him as the plane continued its final descent to the runways below. Swallowing helped ones ears pop when changing altitudes, and any little comfort helped.
It wasn’t until the two of them were safely landed, peering through rotating baggage to find their stuff that Danny’s ghost sense (and Jazz’s spectral detector) finally went off.
“It’s weak, I’ll be super quick.” Danny insisted, but still waited for Jazz to check the SD for confirmation.
“Alright.” She nodded, and tossed him an earbud from her pocket. “I’ll get our bags. Give me a call when you’re finished and I’ll set a beacon to guide you back.”
Danny had already dumped his bag against Jazz’s shins, Thermos clipped to a belt loop, earbud screwing into his ear as he gave her a thumbs-up and rushed away.
Jazz sighed and watched him duck between people toward the bathrooms for a few moments. She idly texted their parents that they’d landed and kept an eye on the conveyer belt of luggage. It was better that her brother settle in quickly. Otherwise, jet lag would keep him exhausted and grumpy all day, and he was no fun to be around like that.
Getting accustomed to the local ghosts should do the trick just fine.
---
“What else should we send? Laser lipstick?”
Madeline Fenton sorted through their older gear, trying to keep things organized by size and function. They’d already decided on what range of their newest inventions they’d be sending as a ‘First Release’ to their Japanese contacts, but some of the older models would be less expensive. An easy upsell, or just a value addition to the cart.
“I’d go for the Bo Staff, or the portable shield. Maybe introduce the Lipstick another time, it’s a bit kitschy.”
Danny kicked his feet from where he sat in the lab’s cord-crowded rafters, tablet perched on glowing knees. The adaptor on the side pulsed softly with green light, and the laptop’s ‘Charging’ icon hadn’t flickered since he started holding the thing.
“Spectral Charging Adaptor is still going strong, by the way.” He called down, and his dad’s excited “Sweet!” could be heard from the upstairs kitchen.
“Could you-” His mom started. “I’m already noting it in product tracking.” He interrupted gently.
“Thank you, dear.”
Maddie stepped back from the final array of weapons and tools, sighing out a deep breath.
“I think this is good. Did you log everything?”
Danny took a moment to double-check the list, and took a picture of the spread on the table.
“Yep, we’re good to go.” He sent both to Jazz before he could forget.
“Do you need any help loading up?” Maddie asked, already putting the larger weapons into individual hardcases.
Danny floated down from his overhead seat.
“Only if you want to.” He swept his hand through the air, a swirling green tear opening up in the path his fingers left. Danny accepted the first case and slid it carefully inside, squinting into the torn dimension to double-check that he’d opened to a space not already occupied.
He’d gained access to what had been playfully named his ‘Lair’ a few years back - his own door inside the ghost zone. He kept the actual front entrance inside the ghost zone blocked off, and honestly just used it for storage most days.
Food tended to come back out more alive than when he’d put it in there, but it was a great place to store technology, overnight bags, chapstick… Sam unrepentantly called it his ghost-purse, and at this point he’d mournfully accepted she wouldn’t back down.
His phone dinged.
“Jazz wants to confirm we’re flying out of the O’Hare airport on Friday.”
“At 9am.” His mom confirmed.
“Cool, thanks.” He typed the time, and received a thumbs-up in return.
“Tokyo Jujutsu High School said they’d send a representative to meet you at the airport.”
Danny was halfway through typing that to Jazz when the words caught up with him.
“Wait, Highschool?” He looked up. “What do they need firepower like this for?”
Maddie smiled pleasantly. “Jujutsu High School, dear. They train the newest generation of Jujutsu users.”
Danny squinted at her.
“How do you spell that?”
“JU, JU, TSU.” she spelled for him. “I trained with them briefly when I was younger, as an exchange program. Can’t say I had much aptitude for the skills themselves, since you need to have innate talent to actually DO most of it, but their concepts for spectral manipulation started my research back in my college days, shortly before I met your father.”
Danny let that digest for a moment, surprised he’d never heard of it.
“So you know these guys?”
“The folks at Tokyo? Probably not. I studied in Koriyama. But, when someone at Tokyo reached out about our work, I knew enough to get an invite and be taken seriously. Anyway, you’ll want to brush up on their terminology before you go. They have different names for ghosts, and tend to classify them based on how difficult they are to destroy, rather than their form and purpose.”
Danny frowned, white sparking around his waist.
He let himself transform smoothly back into his human form, black hair flopping down around his face once gravity got ahold once more. The green light on the tablet’s adaptor flickered and faded as his own glow did.
“Should I be worried?”
“I’ll give you and Jazz a rundown of how to classify yourself before you go, don’t worry.”
He hummed dubiously, but didn’t pull away as her hand reached up to ruffle the back of his mess of hair.
“I keep forgetting how tall you’ve gotten.” She sighed.
“You’re just short. Everyone’s taller than you.”
The fond ruffle became a gentle swat that he ducked away from with a laugh.
“Dinner in two hours. I’m ordering chicken wings, so let me know what sauce you want.”
“Habanero Mango.” Was his instant reply.
“Anything more edible than that?” His mom started up the stairs. He trotted behind her.
“Hmmmm… the ranch rub is pretty good. Do we have any chipotle sauce left?”
“You’ll have to check the fridge.”
The week passed faster than he expected, and it felt like only hours later that he and Jazz were boarding a plane to Tokyo.
----
Jazz dragged their stacked luggage out of the terminals, onto a bus, and out to a walking area thick with people. She set herself up and started peering over the crowds, regularly checking her phone for any follow-up text from her contact.
Someone named Masamichi Yaga had been her mother’s main point of contact, and had only sent her two texts since she’d introduced herself.
One ‘Hello’ and one “Maki Zenin for pickup”
Jazz sighed, and sent a selfie of herself in front of the massive sign that loomed behind her. Even if he wasn’t being helpful, her guide would likely appreciate a visual aid. Then again, she didn’t know how fluent he was in English.
She looked around, hoping Danny would get back soon. He was useful as a universal translator, and it’d be a shame to get off on the wrong foot.
--
The ghosts in Japan were UGLY .
Danny gained this conclusion less than 2 seconds into his first encounter with one.
It was some bizarre six-legged amalgamation of a frog and an anteater, with buggy eyes and a mouth that hung wide with teeth. He caught it trying to corner a kid in the bathrooms, and dragged the ugly sucker by its saggy skin into an airplane hanger before it could do any damage.
He got a spiny tongue to the gut for his efforts, but hey! At least no one else was hurt.
The ghost had fairly tough skin, and Danny at 14 would have had quite a time trying to batter it down enough to suck into his thermos.
His current level, though?
The thing took about two glancing blows as it tried to scuttle away, and one solid blast to the face before its outer form shivered to pieces. Danny snatched its core before it could dissolve completely, popping that into the thermos for later.
He started gliding back to baggage claim when his ghost sense went off again .
This time, it led him to a snake-centipede looking thing, coiled around the shoulders of an exhausted-looking woman.
He invisibly yoinked it off her, crushing its head while she exclaimed to herself about the sudden weight off her shoulders.
And thus he lost track of time, exploring the airport and clearing the place of low-level ghosts clinging to passengers and dark places where the fear of flying and fear of losing one’s home clung to corners and grew fangs.
Along the way, his conclusion about the sheer aesthetic grossness of the ghosts cemented itself.
There was, at least, one very good ghost dog who waited at one of the terminals for her person to return.
He left that one alone with an ear scratch and a quick belly rub.
Distracted as he was by a constantly-hissing ghost sense, he missed Jazz’s beacon flaring up in the distance.