Your name is Dave Strider, and you're being haunted.
For a number of reasons, you never called the pros on the spook in question. First off, you don't really like the idea of some clairvoyant asshole digging around in your rooms for ghost slime. There's also the fact you did some research on your particular resident specter type and didn't find jack. After a while of pestering your crazy know-it-all sister about the supernatural, you finally came up with two conclusions; the first being that you've discovered a ghost with entirely new characteristics and capacity for annoyance... so the team they send wouldn't even know what to do with your situation. Whoop-de-do. The second, and much less likely option, is that Bro's puppet-based tormenting techniques in your early and innocently impressionable teenage years has finally taken its toll on you.
Well, if you're crazy, it's not so bad.
On this fine (see: hellishly hot and humid) Houston morning, your alarm fails to go off. Good. You didn't set it, but in your state of affairs who knows when this thing could start up. Well, you can't sleep anyway, so you turn over and fumble around for your ironically awesome shades. Courtesy of the other Strider. You've had these things since you were his clingy Lil' Bro and don't intend to get rid of them anytime soon: you need them, and they're just too goddamn valuable to swap out. Even if you wanted to, anyone in possession of these fuckers other than a Strider wouldn't know what to do with the legions of cool points, not to mention the newfound sky-high levels of irony. So you're pretty much stuck with these pointy anime shades that make you look almost exactly like your bro. Fan-fucking-tastic. But hey, you're the only one who can pull shit like that off.
Unfortunately for you, the shades fail to be on your bedside table.
You've got a pretty good idea where they're at, though.
Yawning, you roll out of bed and check yourself in the bathroom mirror as you shuffle down the hall. As usual in the mornings, your white blond hair looks like a magnesium flare with its hitherto unparalleled levels of messy. (You run your hands through it to solve the worst of the problem.) Your pale five-o-clock shadow, which can still manage to surprise you when you're especially groggy, gives you the appearance of that guy on the street who reminds a body of insert-the-name-of-some-sexy-movie-star-here. And your pajamas- red flannel with the Flash logo all over them- make you look like a slob.
To hell with being snazzy in your own apartment, you are Dave Strider and you do what you want.
Stumbling into the kitchen, you hold up your hand to shield your eyes from the daggers of sunlight coming in through the windows. This wouldn't be a problem if you'd donned your tinted shield, but willful ghosts don't give a shit about humans and their sensitive eyes. As you investigate the contents of your fridge, the telltale signs begin to manifest.
Yep, there's the slight increase in air pressure, and soon following it the room takes on a faintly echo-y property, as though your carefully soundproofed penthouse suite has been changed into a marble hall. Next comes the (deeply welcome) drop in temperature, and finally...
"H33H33H33! GOOD MORN1NG, D4V3 STR1D3R."
"Morning, Rezi," is your sleepy reply. The harsh, breathy tone of your ghost's voice would send anyone else running, with the possible exception of your bro, but you've been living in the same house as this departed soul for easily enough time to get used to it.
"YOU H4V3 TO WORK TON1GHT, DON'T YOU?" she asks.
"Yeah. Late shift, too, it's from eight to five."
"WH4T? NO BR34KS?" Slowly, from under the oven, a pale teal mist begins creeping into the open, drifting across the floor like a self-timed smoke machine. You have already ruled out the possibility of this being due to a bad oven: you've replaced the damn thing three times and nothing changes. She just seems to like being where food is at- in the oven, the fridge, the microwave, the cupboard. Sometimes you even open a can of peaches and get an ectoslime explosion for your trouble.
"Nah, you know better than that. Michael coworks these with me, you remember that."
"Y3S, 1 DO. H33H33. H3Y, D4V3 STR1D3R," the rough voice giggles again. "NOT1C3 4NYTH1NG D1FF3R3NT?"
You look up from rummaging around in the fridge to find yourself face to face with your resident specter.
She told you once that ghosts don't do as well with the sun as the time between dusk and dawn, and you can see the things it does to her. Usually her strange shape is solid, clearly defined and firmly on the ground, her voice is free of the marble hall effect, and she's in full color. At night it's hard to believe she's not a living being. But now, she hovers a few inches from the ground, her entirely bluegreen outline is hazy- transparent even- and it sounds like her voice is coming from the bottom of a crypt. Still, while she may look alive after the sun goes down, she's definitely not your conventional dead chick.
The spook calling herself Terezi Pyrope is humanoid, yes. But it's as easy as a jittery equalizer to see that she's not a member of your species. Even in the light of day, the wickedly sharp horns sticking straight out on either side of her head are clearly visible. Her mouthful of equally razor teeth glints at you, and when she leans closer and sniffs the air in front of you, you remember why she's gone and taken your glasses.
"Yeah," you confirm. "My eyes hurt more than usual this morning. Shades please."
"3X4CTLY! 4ND TH3Y SM3LL D3L1C1OUS 4S USU4L, H33H33H33."
Terezi is blind. Somehow, though, her other senses have sharpened despite the fact that she's made of whatever ghosts are made of and logically shouldn't have any kind of sense but a for-reals version of your pathetically weak sixth one. Screw the rules, she's a departed soul. Apparently your freak eyes are her favorite color.
"Thanks, I guess." For now, it's useless to ask for them back. She'll only cackle at you and disappear with the shades, just to piss you off. "Anything I should know for the day?"
Silence falls over your ghost. While you wait for your personal- and much more reliable- horoscope, you nab the milk and a box of Frosted Flakes, leaning against the counter as you make yourself a routine breakfast. Out of the corner of your eye, you see Terezi fading in and out of focus: most of her effort is channeled into predicting for you. She's a seer of sorts. And luckily for you, she's willing to give you a few hazy but helpful pointers from time to time.
"OH NO," she mumbles suddenly. "YOU SHOULDN'T GO TO WORK TOD4Y."
"Why the hell not?" you demand. "We were just talking about how that was chill."
"YOU H4V3 TO ST4Y HOM3!" the ghost insisted, swooping in front of you and grabbing your shoulders with freezing, transparent fingers. "SOM3ON3'S COM1NG, 4ND SOON, 4ND 1 DON'T W4NT TO B3 4LON3 W1TH TH3M!"
"What are you talking about?" Nobody else has a key to your flat. How could your spook end up alone with anyone, bar you? "Even if someone shows up, can't you just lie low for a while? Try not to giggle or hover over their shoulder sniffing their clothes?"
"1 DON'T W4NT TO M33T 4 GHOSTBUST3R, D4V3," she whispered.
You freeze.
"W1LL YOU PL34S3 ST4Y HOM3?"
It's your turn to dive deep into the ocean of thought. You really need this gig- it's a big one, and rumor has it a couple of major recording studio scouts are coming to see who the hell this Strider douchebag is that's taking the musical nightlife by storm. Calling in sick is an option since you never miss work unless it's an emergency. But South Beach isn't known for its tolerance of lazy employees; play this wrong, and you could be out of a job.
But the Ghostbusters are on to you.
It's not that you'll take the blame for harboring a supernatural. On the contrary, they'll shrug and say you were being psychically manipulated. If you try to defend Terezi, the team will just incapacitate you for as long as it takes to lock her up, and let you off- again, scotch free- with the claim that you'd had a small bout of mind control, maybe even a shot of black slime if you got pushy. Ghostbusters never pin shit on the "victims". No, you're definitely not worried about what'll happen to you if they find your spook.
You're scared for Terezi. You've gotten accustomed to having her around. She's friendly, funny, much-needed company, and dead useful, pardon the pun: it's hard to imagine how you'll manage. You think of the handful of times she's had to drag you into your bedroom when you've had one too many at work; when your sister couldn't make it out to Houston for Christmas last year and you and your ghost had had quality bonding time over sugar cookies and brightly colored frosting; your days off when the two of you lie around the apartment with all the lights out and watch Michael Bay movies for the flashes and explosions so she can smell what's going on; her critiques on your beats; your critiques on the fanart of your old comic Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff that she's constantly scrawling over your walls.
She's your best friend, and you know for a fact that if you want to repay her for two and a half years of keeping loneliness and depression at a distance, you can't even think twice about this.
"Yeah, sure," you agree. "I'll just call in sick, I've got a few vacation days left over from last quarter."
The wispy apparition hovering in front of you sharpens enough for you to see her huge grin, and she lunges forward to throw her arms around you. All you get is what feels like an ice cold draft with love from the bottom of the world, and she passes right through you, but you shake off the suffocating feeling of having someone rummaging around your insides. You get used to her ghost glomps after a while.
"TH4NK YOU."
"Don't mention it."
At that moment, there is a knock on the apartment door.
Terezi gasps and vanishes into the stove faster than greased lightning versus a golf club, darting back out for a nanosecond to stick your reflective shades over your eyes, and zips back to her hiding spot. You are now physically your normal temperature in her absence, but your blood couldn't be running colder.
The knocker repeats himself. It's not a timid knock that says someone's coming to see you with flowers, and it's not the confident knock you'd expect from a salesman or a good friend, of which you have few. This sounds like the knock you'd hear in the Lord of the Rings if you were Saruman and Gandalf was all up in Isengard's front door.
In other words, this is the knock of "BITCH YOU'RE SO SCREWED."
You look over your shoulder, glad to see that there's no hint of your oven doing any crazy shit, and edge towards the door, where you can practically feel the hostility of the busters standing on the other side. Everyone's heard stories about the Ghostbusters- they're kind of like the IRS, famous for their lack of mercy and apparent omnipotence, except there's less of them and they're on the same side AS the people. So of course this knocker and his equally thuggish team of assholes are going to be mean and nasty and flipping those proton packs around like they know what they're doing.
It's a little hard to breathe. You're no weakling yourself. Your much respected older brother saw to that from the time you were old enough to walk, and at this point you could be classified as a genuine ninja. The Jackie Chan of the DJ world, so to speak. But the fact of the matter is you're still a skinny white kid on his own in his apartment, and you're up against a group of people notorious for their ass-kicking skills.
You do your best to remind yourself that if the worst comes to the worst you can tell them to get the hell out until they have a warrant. That should give you enough time to find a place to hide Terezi. Steeling your nerves for the best damn stone cold bullshitting you've ever done in your life, you reach for the knob.
But opening the door gives you the shock of your life.