Road to Hell

The man stood in what seemed to be an office, looking out of a large window. Tho he couldn't be older than in his 30s, his black hair was turning gray in places. His right eye was blue, the left one was covered with an eye-patch. He seemed both incredibly nervous, as well as highly pleased with himself.
"Hello Danny" said a familiar sounding voice behind him.
Dan quickly turned around.
"Ah, it's you" he said as he recognized the visitor. "How did you... never mind, I shouldn't even question it."
"Are you sure you wish to go through with this?"
"Yes, we voted on this. It was three to two."
"And aren't you having second thoughts about those other two who voted with you?"
"Look, Dani and Valerie respect the voting's result, and will go through with it, despite their objections."
"No, I meant the two that supported this decision along with you. You really think they should be trusted?"
"I don't trust Vlad any more than I did when I was a kid, but I trust Sam unconditionally. She was always there for me."
"Always?" asked the guest, barely hiding a smirk.
"Always!" Dan replied with unshaken determination.
"Didn't she abandon you the moment you gave-up you'r power? And didn't she return back to you only after the world declared you a hero?"

Dan's mind flashed back to all those years ago.
It was the worst possible moment for giving-up his powers. Many times he wished he could return to that point and undo it, but he knew well enough not to mess with the time-stream.
He remembered his despair as the Ecto-Ranium asteroid hurled towards Earth, and him being powerless to do anything about it.
But as Vlad's plans of world salvation failed, he still felt responsible.
Not having any of his powers, he turned for help to the only person he thought could still help.
Valerie Gray was more than willing to lend a hand. With her help, he broke into one of Vlad's armories, and took one of the experimental weapons he worked on. A bomb that could theoretically be capable of destroying  the Ecto-Ranium asteroid. With a spare ship, they flew the bomb to the asteroid, and detonated it.
Earth was saved, but at a cost. The shards of the asteroid rained down, spreading destruction. What was worse, they gradually shredded the wall between the human world the Ghost Zone to almost nothing, leaving mankind at the mercy on ghosts.
Still, both worlds were saved from utter annihilation, and Danny was lauded a hero. He remembered Sam throwing herself into his arms. He remembered statues being erected in his honor. Tucker even got elected mayor! For some reason...

"That had nothing to do with it!" Dan replied. "In fact, Sam was a huge help to us all during those rough times! She even took in Vlad!"

The shards of the asteroid weren't the only things to rain down on Earth. Only days after the event, Vlad's still sentient ghostly head was discovered only a mile away from Amity Park. It was immediately claimed as the property of  Fenton Works.
He proved a huge help in the research of anti-ghost technology during the upcoming years, but nobody wanted to look after him once working hours were over.
After long persuading, Sam volunteered for the task.
Shortly after this, Fenton Works and Vladco were officially merged into the Global Headquarters of Spectral Technologies, with Danny as it's CEO. He thought it was strange at first, but no-one seemed to object or question it. After all, they just elected a kid for mayor.

"In fact" Dan continued "she essentially run all of G.H.o.S.T. while I was busy beating back the ghost hordes! Mom and Dad were busy developing ways to contain the ghost invasion. Jazz was too busy juggling the company budget, while me, Valerie, and Dani were on the battle field 24/7. It was Sam who secured all the contracts, she secured the finances necessary, she's to thank for spreading the Masters' Blasters services to every city in the world, making it a safer place!"
"Yes, I'm aware of that" the guest replied "you had you'r Masters' Blasters spread-out across almost every city in the world. The people cheered as you'r employees captured the invading ghosts by the thousands, but you'r problems didn't end there. Soon you started running out of place to contain the captured ghosts. Sending them back to the Ghost Zone was no longer an option, and so new containment facilities had to be constructed. Many of those built in deserts and on arctic plains soon grew to the size of small nations. Not to mention the fiasco with the moon facilities. And the ghosts just kept coming. So you changed you'r strategy, and went for an all-out attack on the Ghost Zone, conquering huge chunks of it, and converting them to new containment facilities. You even recruited The Warden to oversee their construction, even tho you knew of the atrocities the man committed in his own jail."
"The Warden had the technology we needed to build a facility in an environment as unstable and ever shifting as the Ghost Zone. His background was irrelevant, his experiences weren't, it was all done for the greater good."
"And what about slavery dear Danny? Does that serve the greater good as well?"
"If you refer to the Grave Digger Squad, that was Vlad's idea. But yes, it does. Some tasks were way too dangerous for regular humans to handle. Putting pain-collars on ghosts we previously captured and sending them in instead was the best solution. And don't worry, Valerie is a fair boss to them, they only get tortured if they really deserve it. I originally wanted to put Dani in charge, but I was afraid she'd empathize with them too much. No, her skills are of much better use leading the Masters' Blasters."
"I was actually referring to you gradually stripping the citizens of the cities in you'r care of all of their freedoms."
"It's for their own safety. I had my own doubts when Sam came to me asking to use our influence to affect local politics, but she soon explained to me that all of our efforts could go to waste due to the incompetent decisions of local politics."
"Did you ever bother to check what kind of policies it were that Samantha was trying to push? Did you even listen to Tucker when he busted into you'r office on that day? The last day you ever saw him?"
"Tucker's mental brake-down is of no concern to you. He wasn't the only one who snapped during those difficult times. That's why Sam re-located mom, dad, and Jazz to our antarctic facility. Away from all the chaos. And as far as you'r first question goes, I do admit that I should read a document before I sign it, but honestly, do you really think my dear Sam would go into such extremes if they weren't questions of life and death?"
"Then what about Bellwood? Gravity Falls? Middleton? New York? Norrisville? Retroville? Townsville? Tremorton? Ciudad Milagro, Mexico? Megadale, Australia? Splitsboro, Canada? They all seemed perfectly fine on their own. Why couldn't you leave them alone?"
"All of these cities' so called protectors were a bunch of amateurs. Many of them never even faced a ghost before the wall came down. Sooner or later they would have done a fatal mistake that would cause the deaths of thousands, maybe millions!"
"And so you sicked you'r ghosts at them, killing hundreds of bystanders in the process."

Dan remembered that day very well. He knew Valerie would never agree with something like that, and so he bypassed her, and took command of the Grave Digger Squads himself. One squad for every city, except for Townsville, which got six squads assigned, one for each of the most troublesome boroughs. Their mission was to assassinate the protectors, making it seem like a regular ghost attack. It was a disaster. Not only did every single one of the assassination attempts fail, but the attacks in Retroville, Townsville, and Tremorton were successfully traced back to G.H.o.S.T.. Not to mention what massacres most of the resulting battles ended-up being. This, along with the Moon incident where several children were killed for sabotaging containment facility construction, generally ruined G.H.o.S.T.'s international image. Anti-G.H.o.S.T. terrorist cells began popping-up around South, East, and Southeast Asia, South America, and Eastern Europe.
To top it all off, France, Russia, China, and Japan officially banned all G.H.o.S.T. presence in their territory. Everyone expected them to be completely obliterated by ghosts withing a week, but they prevailed. As it turned out, the law-enforcement and military were supplied with anti-ghost and ecto technology produced by DexLabs, Mandark Industries, Membrane Labs, Plumbers, The Secret Scientists, and Venture Industries.
This undermined G.H.o.S.T.'s global position even more. He knew that if he wanted to keep G.H.o.S.T.'s grip on the world, and stop greedy amateurs from driving them out of business, thus potentially dooming all of humanity, he had to take drastic measures.

"And yet I was still right" Dan replied. "Dimmsdale fell last week. For 11 years, the city seemed to be completely untouched by ghosts, as if some mysterious force was keeping them back. All of our attempts to affect it in some way seemed to bear no result, as if a re-set button was pressed at the end of every day. But last week the city was completely overrun by the ghost hordes. When we arrived, we only discovered a tiny group of survivors lead by the amateur ghost hunter and school teacher Denzel Q. Crocker. He provided us with some very interesting information. It seems that there are parts of the Ghost Zone we weren't even aware of. Parts that need to be neutralized as fast as possible."

A glance from the large window revealed the massive abyss of the Ghost Zone slowly unraveling underneath them. The room they stood in was on board of a massive, heavily armed airship. Hundreds more, just like it, were following it, along with thousands of shuttles and bombers.

"Thousands, if not millions of unknown entities. Each one of them able to re-write reality. We can't allow a power like this to fall into the wrong hands."
"By which you mean any hands but your's."
"Nobody else can be trusted."
"And you really believe you can take on these creatures like this?"
"Of course not. This is just an exploration fleet. It's only mission is to locate them. The real deal comes afterwards. Once they are located, we send the co-ordinates back to our friends on Earth. Our Grave Digger Squads have infiltrated each one of America's Nuclear Launch Sites. Once they receive the co-ordinates, they'll launch them. A few may accidentally hit some stubborn cities and nations, or rival corporations, but I'm sure Dani and Valerie will understand that these were mere accidents. But that's just a bonus. Nuclear blasts have an interesting effect on the Ghost Zone. A single nuclear detonation unleashes a maelstrom which can last for months, and affect thousands of square-miles. They tend to leave millions of severely weakened and disoriented ghosts in their wake. I think a nations entire arsenal could be enough to leave a few of the entities shaken-up long enough for us to grab. We can then harness their power to subjugate the rest of the Ghost Zone."
"And have you thought what effect this could have on the human world?"
"We can use the creatures to fix any collateral damage."
"Keep telling that to yourself."
"Hey, you know how all of this is going to end. If you wanted to stop me, you could have done it a long time ago."
"Different time, different place. I only came to witness the birth of the greatest monster in Earth's history with my own two eyes."
"Do't try guilt-tripping me, Clock Work."
"Who said I was talking about you?" said the guest. "If you're still alive by that point, you may ask the Lich King for an autograph."