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Going Ghost! (Young Justice) Chapter 47: Hidden Realm
🕑 Added 2025-04-27 18:31:15 +0000 UTC[Third Person's PoV]
Both Danny and Dick suddenly found themselves yanked into an entirely different realm, the violent force of their arrival sending them sprawling across the rough, uneven ground. They tumbled uncontrollably, the momentum of their entrance too strong to fight against at first.
Dick, ever the acrobat, recovered almost instantly. With practiced ease, he twisted mid-roll, flipping and somersaulting across the terrain before sliding to a halt on one knee. His sharp blue eyes, now suddenly hidden behind the familiar black domino mask that kept his identity secret, quickly scanned their new surroundings.
Danny, unfortunately, wasn't quite so lucky. He continued rolling awkwardly across the rough surface before finally coming to a stop beside Dick with a heavy, pained groan. "Ow…" he muttered, dragging himself upright with obvious effort.
Brushing dust from his clothes, Danny turned to glance at Dick—only to blink in surprise at the sight of Robin, fully masked and ready for action. His mouth fell open slightly in disbelief.
"How..." Danny mumbled, staring at him.
However, Robin seemed far more focused on the larger problem looming over them. Tightening his grip on his staff in his hands that he seemed to have pulled out of nowhere, he said grimly, "Danny... I think we have bigger things to worry about right now."
Danny followed his friend's gaze—and froze. His body stiffened as the bizarre landscape robbed him of coherent thought.
Stretching endlessly in every direction was darkness—thick, suffocating, and absolute. It wasn't simply night or shadow; it was a complete void that swallowed everything beyond sight. Yet within that emptiness, crisscrossing their immediate area, massive branches stretched out like ancient, gnarled highways. They were colossal in size—each branch easily as wide as a two-lane road—and they twisted and forked unpredictably, forming a tangled, incomprehensible maze.
Danny glanced behind him, hoping for some hint of origin or path back—only to find the same endless maze. No clear beginning, no discernible end. Just the oppressive, twisting network of colossal branches suspended in a void.
Without a second thought, instinct took over. Rings of white light appeared around Danny’s waist, circling rapidly as his body was engulfed in a brief, blinding flash. When the light faded, his appearance had transformed—his fancy clothes replaced with his black and white ghost suit, the bold letter "D" emblazoned on his chest. His hair now glowed an ethereal white, and his green eyes shimmered with energy.
Danny spun toward Robin, stunned once again to see him already suited up in his iconic red and yellow combat uniform, staff in hand, ready for whatever came next.
"How the hell...?" Danny began to ask incredulously.
Robin simply shrugged, smirking faintly. "You really need to learn how to transform faster, Danny."
Danny rolled his eyes in annoyance but quickly forced himself to refocus on the situation at hand. Squinting into the abyss, he asked, "Okay, seriously—where are we?"
Before Robin could respond, Danny cut him off, adding, "And yeah, yeah, I know we're inside the painting... but where inside the painting?"
Robin gave him a flat look, then asked with equal parts curiosity and concern, "I was actually about to ask you the same thing. Is this the Ghost Zone? Did we somehow get sucked into it through the painting—or is this something entirely different?"
Turning to Danny, Robin said, "You're the expert here. You’ve actually been to the Ghost Zone before. What do you think?"
Danny closed his eyes, concentrating. He tried to sense the familiar, unsettling energy of the Ghost Zone. After a moment, he opened his eyes again and frowned. "Honestly? I can't tell for sure. It... feels a little like the Ghost Zone, but at the same time, it doesn't. The Ghost Zone is unpredictable, and it's huge—uncharted, even. This could just be some weird, unexplored corner of it... or it could be something else entirely."
Robin let out a sigh, rubbing the back of his head. "That's super helpful," he muttered under his breath.
Danny huffed and crossed his arms. "Hey, it’s not like I have a map."
Robin shook his head and then asked, "Can you fly around a bit? Maybe get a better view of where we are?"
"Sure thing," Danny replied, lifting a few feet off the ground, his body glowing faintly against the oppressive darkness.
However, no sooner had he risen into the air than a crackling surge of green electricity burst from nowhere, slamming into him like a hammer. Danny let out a sharp cry of pain, "AAAAAAH!!" before being violently hurled back toward the ground.
He hit the branch-road with bone-rattling force, sending tremors through the structure and kicking up clouds of dust and debris. The impact left a visible crater beneath him, smoke curling up from the scorched spot where he landed.
Robin winced sympathetically as he watched. As the dust cleared, he rushed over to where Danny lay, cradling his sides and rocking slightly with a grimace.
"Ow... why is it always me getting electrocuted?" Danny groaned, steam rising from his singed uniform.
"You alright?" Robin asked, offering him a hand.
Danny grunted but took the offered help, letting Robin pull him back to his feet. "Yeah... I think. I'm tougher than I look," he said, trying to sound more confident than he felt. His body ached, but nothing seemed broken.
Dusting himself off, Danny muttered, "Looks like this realm—or dimension or whatever it is—has its own set of rules... and they hurt."
Robin nodded grimly. "Great. A place trying to kill us. Just what I needed today."
Danny chuckled dryly before sighing. "Okay, so... where do we even begin?"
Robin glanced around at the endless, twisting branches. "I don't know. But we’re not gonna find anything just standing here," he said, tightening his grip on his staff and starting to walk forward into the maze.
Danny nodded in agreement and quickly floated off the ground, his feet no longer touching the thick, bark-like surface they stood on. With a casual ease, he began to glide behind Robin, hovering just a few inches above the road-like branch. Although they had quickly learned they couldn’t ascend vertically without getting electrocuted, that didn’t mean Danny couldn't fly forward.
Taking advantage of this, Danny grabbed Robin by the shoulders and hoisted him up into the air effortlessly, before shooting ahead at incredible speed.
Robin remained completely unfazed, his body relaxed in Danny’s grip. He was already used to this method of travel after so many missions together. Their surroundings blurred into indistinct shapes and colors, twisting and warping as they rocketed through the strange environment at breakneck speed.
Without warning, a cold mist began to seep from Danny’s mouth, streaming from the corners of his lips in two thin blue trails—a clear sign that something was wrong. "Kick in front of you!!" Danny barked urgently.
Robin didn’t waste a second. His body reacted instinctively. He swung one leg backward, using the momentum to thrust his foot forward with a powerful snap. Just as he did, a grotesque, zombie-like ghost burst out from the branch road beneath them, its decayed hands clawing toward their legs. Robin’s kick smashed straight into the creature’s head, sending it flying backward with a sickening crack. The unfortunate specter crashed into another rising ghost, knocking them both down like bowling pins.
After dropping him down Robin glanced around quickly, scanning the area. His sharp eyes caught the sight of more ghostly figures beginning to crawl their way out of the bark and void around them. Dozens, maybe even hundreds, of them. They were slowly converging on Danny and Robin from all directions.
Without exchanging a word, Danny and Robin pressed their backs together, moving in slow, careful circles as they assessed the rapidly worsening situation. The two heroes were in perfect sync, reading each other's movements like second nature.
“Alright, first of all—are those freaking zombies?!” Robin exclaimed, voice tight with a mix of confusion and exasperation. “And second, how the hell can a zombie be a ghost? It’s either one or the other! Pick a side!”
Danny snorted despite the tension, his sharp green eyes scanning the strange beings. He noticed how many of them carried weapons—some brandishing rusty swords, others old-time muskets—and how their clothing seemed ripped straight from different eras of history, some for classical outfits; others, tattered colonial uniforms.
“I don’t want to be that guy right now,” Danny said dryly, "but seriously, now’s not the best time to argue about the technicalities of zombie classifications."
Turning his gaze to the horde ahead, Danny raised a hand and called out, voice laced with strained optimism, "Uh, is there by any chance a possibility that you guys are... I don't know, friendly ghost zombies?"
One of the specters—a British Guard by the look of him, complete with a tattered red coat and bearskin hat—answered with action rather than words. He raised a battered musket, charged it with a glowing green energy, and fired a ghostly blast straight at Robin's chest.
Danny reacted instantly. He threw his arm out past Robin's shoulder, conjuring a translucent, shimmering shield just in time to intercept the blast. The ghostly musket shot struck the shield with a thunderous impact, causing the barrier to crack like glass before shattering into shards of glowing mist.
Danny sighed heavily. "Yeah, no. Definitely not friendly."
Robin tightened his grip on his staff, which suddenly extended and flared with a brilliant neon green glow. He turned his head slightly toward Danny and grinned.
"Break?"
"Break."
Danny returned the grin, his fist beginning to glow with ghostly power.
Without hesitation, the two heroes burst away from each other in opposite directions, charging into the encircling mass of hostile specters. Danny’s form blurred as he zipped between two zombies, his glowing fists smashing into one’s gut with a satisfying burst of ectoplasmic light. Robin spun his staff expertly, knocking aside an attacker before flipping over another and striking them square in the face.
Both of them were grinning like maniacs, the thrill of battle pumping adrenaline through their veins as they fought back against the strange undead army.
Comments
Rogue_Eagle99
Let’s be honest we all have had a fantasy at least once to be fighting a zombie horde
Bryan Vargas
That's what he has, it is why the tips of his staff are glowing neon green
Green223
Danny should add some Fenton Tech to Dick's staff at some point. I imagine it like his nightwing escrima sticks/ staff but the electricity they generate at the ends is replaced with ecoto energy.
Bryan Vargas
No idea what you mean 👀 As for the maze didnt it say that the branches road were a maze?
KingSpy25i .
Again, why do you repeat words unnecessarily? This time it was "break", Danny said it twice. Also, did you give up on the puzzle, maze, question kind of thing, to complete the painting? Thank you for the nice chapter 🙏
