A Danny Phantom fan-fic collaboration by Muddles the Pixie and Spark Knight XIII

Hey all! Muddles here, introducing you to the collaboration fic, Absence of Light by myself and PaladinSparkKnight! Not much to say here, 'scept disclaimers.

Disclaimer: Danny Phantom and all it's respective characters are the property of Butch Hartman and we are making no profit from this.

However Phantom, JD, Alexis, Ariel, Gato (the cat), and Lizzie are all jointly owned by Muddles the Pixie and PaladinSparkKnight. Don't steal.

DANNY PHANTOM: ABESENCE OF LIGHT

CHATPER ONE: THE NEW KID

By: Muddles the Pixie

There had been moving trucks everywhere lately. A new family was moving into the house. The house that she had once called her own, so long ago. Honestly, had it really been that long since she'd died, and her family had moved out to forget the pain? It had been only nine years, but nine years could feel like an eternity with an empty house that she was doomed to haunt.

The young ghost fazed through the walls of a room, remaining invisible as she examined the new furnishings of the room that she once called hers. The room looked so different after being empty for nine years. A bed, bookshelves, posters, the room just seemed so new, so different. It seemed as though she'd never called this room her own, so long ago.

Blue eyes stared around the darkened room, and the sleeping male figure on his bed. Wow, how the times had changed, and how people changed. Her bed had been in a completely different place when she had this room, when she had called it her own.

But the ghost's attention was quickly distracted from the sleeping form of the unfamiliar male to the white and grey lump near the foot of his bed. It was a cat, a sleeping cat too. Her eyes widened as she stared at the cat, an absolutely gleeful expression on her pale face.

"KITTY!" she screamed in absolute glee, as she made a grab for the cat, who had already been woken up and had quickly fled to the other side of the room, though he wasn't the only one that had been awoken. The sleeping male had fallen off his bed with a few curses, and as he made an attempt to get back up, he hit his head on his nightstand. With a quick flick of the switch, the room was illuminated.

"W-who the heck are you?" he stammered, staring at the small, female ghost now floating in front of him, with blue eyes similar to hers. She had pale skin, with brown hair that reached down to her waist, a purple baseball cap sitting on the top of her head, a purple top covering her upper torso, and gloves covering her hands. In place of legs, she had a blue, ghost-like tail and had a gleeful smirk plastered on her face.

"Hiya!" she said jubilantly, "name's Lizzie!" she said, as she looked over the young man that sat before her. He had brown hair like she did, but his was a lot shorter. His clothing consisted of blue, lots of blue.

"Well," he said, getting back onto his bed, "what are you doing in my

room?" slightly agitated now.

"Oh, me?" Lizzie asked, as she looked around, getting a glare from the young man in reply, "I'm a ghost! I haunt this house! See, I used to live here and then I got hit by a truck and I died and, and, and—"

"Wait a second," he said, pausing the ecstatic ghost, "you're a ghost?

You haunt this house?"

Lizzie nodded rapidly, "Why'd ya think no one would buy this house? Don't worry, I won't hurt ya!" she said, reassuring the possible fears she might've instilled, "So, I told you my name, what's yours?"

"J-JD Royale," he responded, still looking shocked.

"Well JD, welcome to Amity Park! Hope you don't get hit by any trucks. It hurts!" Lizzie said jubilantly, "See ya 'round!" as she flew towards the wall and fazed straight through the wall, leaving a very baffled JD sitting in his room. He shrugged, turned off his lamp, and quickly let sleep overcome him.

A deep male voice rang out through the metal bowels of the lab that

Vlad Masters called his own, "Stop, Analysis."

Ever since that incident when his lab in Wisconsin had been destroyed, he'd had to start from scratch on his experiments. And Danielle had betrayed him. Him, and he had created her! How ridiculous she had been. Vlad was now certain that she had degenerated into nothing but ectoplasm by now.

Lost in his own memories of his own failures, Vlad almost failed to notice the sounding of an alarm that was telling the half-ghost that a ghost was emerging from his Ghost Portal. The half-ghost braced himself for the intruder that would emerge soon.

Flying out of the ghost portal was a ghost he hadn't seen before in his extensive travels throughout the Ghost Zone. It was a male ghost, with pale peach skin, and deep blue eyes. Fangs poked out over a bottom lip, and a gray overcoat was wrapped around his frame, a black spandex suit visible underneath the overcoat, a white 'P' emblem on his chest. Hands were gloved, ending in sharp claws. Something striking about this unfamiliar ghost was the long white hair that reached down to his waist. Almost like...

"Daniel?" he asked, staring at the unfamiliar ghost that had so many semblances to his fourteen year old rival.

The ghost turned to face him, confusion barely visible underneath his stone cold mask of a face, "Phantom," he replied simply, glancing around the lab, and then to Plasmius, "would I happen to know you?"

Rather than a proper answer, Phantom was met with a blast of purple ectoplasm to the face, knocking him back into the cold, metal walls of the basement laboratory. As the smoke and debris cleared, the ghost now had a clear view of the computer screen, seeing the image of the white-haired half-ghost. He looked like him. Then that was it. That was who he needed to find. He'd come out at the wrong portal.

"Who are you?" Vlad demanded as he floated in front of the unfamiliar ghost, whose eyes were still fixated on the computer screen. Rather than get an answer, he had a clawed and gloved hand wrapped around his throat.

"You are not the one I am looking for," Phantom replied simply, tightening his grip as Vlad felt himself becoming weaker and weaker as the ghost kept his hold on him, "that one," he said, eyes wandering to the computer screen, "is who I need to find."

"D-Daniel?" Vlad managed to choke out, as he felt himself beginning to weaken considerably as the ghost kept his hold on him. He took in a deep breath as the ghost's grip loosened, and raised an eyebrow.

"You know him?" Phantom asked, as his grip loosened, "Would you like to continue your existence in exchange for helping me find him?"

Vlad smirked, "What do you say we strike a deal? There's someone who I want dead. If you agree to kill him for me, I'll tell you where you can find Daniel."

There was silence between the two for a moment, as Phantom released his grip on Vlad's neck, the half-ghost now relieved, "We have a deal."

JD sighed. He hadn't had much fun his first day at Casper High. School was boring, and now it was lunch. He sat at a picnic table outside the school, pushing peas around with his plastic fork, alone.

"You think we should sit with the new kid?" a female voice asked another female sitting across from her, whose nose was currently buried in a book. She gazed up at her with brown eyes.

"He lives in the haunted house."

"Yeah Ariel, I know. You've said it all day," she said, staring back at the brown-haired girl with equally brown eyes, "he looks lonely though."

"Indeed, 'Lexis."

"That's it. We're going over there!" Alexis exclaimed as she stood up, walked to the other side of the table, and grabbed Ariel by the sleeve of her black hoodie, and dragging the brown-haired, black clad girl over to JD's nearly empty table.

"Mind if we sit here?"

JD looked up as someone asked if they could sit with him. It was a girl. Tall, with slightly tanned skin, and short, brown hair, with two black clips in it. She was wearing a pink shirt with a heart and arrow on it, underneath the grey and red sleeves of another shirt could be seen, both shirts cutting off at her midriff. Below that, she wore dark green pants and white shoes.

"Uh, sure?" he said, as the two sat down. He stared at the other girl, noting that she was wearing one of those French hats, "Nice hat," he commented.

"Thank you," she stated simply before diving back into her book of poetry.

"My name's Alexis, and this is Ariel. Your's?" Alexis asked, staring at JD.

"Eh, JD,"

"You live in the haunted house," Ariel said simply, not looking up at JD as she spoke.

"Yeah. I met the ghost last night."

This got Ariel and Alexis's attention. They both looked up at him.

"You met the ghost?" Alexis asked, eyes wide in disbelief, "No one would buy that house because of the ghost."

"She's not frightening, just kind of annoying. Her name's Lizzie, and she decided to wake me up in the middle of the night to introduce herself."

So, the conversation went on as the lunch period progressed, mainly between Alexis and JD, with Ariel interjecting a few words wherever she deemed them necessary.

"You mean ghosts are, like…common here?" JD asked Alexis in disbelief. He'd moved into a city that he'd have to share with ghosts?

"Yep."

"Looks like someone's making new friends," Danny observed as he stared over at JD, Alexis and Ariel.

"You know him?" Sam asked, staring at him.

"He lives across the street from me. My parents went to see if they could find the ghost that lives there, and Jazz and me introduced ourselves."

"Poor guy," Tucker commented, engrossed in a game on his PDA, "lives in a supposedly haunted house across the street from yours?"

"Yeah, won't be surprised if there's a restraining order by next week," Danny said jokingly, as a blue whisp of ectoplasm floated out of his mouth. "No. Here? Now?"

And evidently, a ghost had decided to attack, there, and now, proven by the screams of students as missiles flew around the school grounds. A telltale sign of the Ghost Zone's greatest hunter, Skulker.

Sam and Tucker had already taken cover, as Danny ran behind a nearby tree, preparing to become Danny Phantom away from the eyes of his classmates. Two circles of white light formed around his middle, one moving towards his head, the other towards his feet, and within moments, Danny Phantom stood in his place, as he flew off to battle Skulker.

Little did he know he'd been seen…

"Danny Fenton? What…the…?" JD muttered. He'd been hiding by that tree as well, when he'd seen one of his crazy neighbors…transform into some kind of ghost-thing!

-To be Continued-