A word from the author:

This is... a pretty confusing fanfiction idea, honestly. At the center of the idea is this being a possibility of from the time travel episode, but it also incorporates ideas of the supposed Psychic Link between Danny and Sam, and also a few other elements that I came up with. This is the reality where Vlad and Maddie got married, and Jack lived alone and single in the Fenton House.

But this story is not about Vlad or Maddie or even Jack. This is the story of Phantom, the manifestation of Danny's unborn soul, tied to the living by his Psychic Link with Sam. And of the Sam of this reality, who grew up with Danny always by her side. Jazz, stuck as less-than-a-ghost due to having never lived to have an obsession. And of course of Tucker, a technogeek who is concerned that his best friend is being haunted, while meanwhile being involved with ghosts on his own.

Prologue: Drifting

In the air above Amity Park, a spirit drifted aimlessly. The spirit had few thoughts, the mentality of a small baby, and was too weak to do anything but float on any breeze of spiritual energy that came its way, sometimes influencing the path a tiny amount, drifting towards whatever felt warm.

It drifted. Onward. It didn't know how long it had existed, and it wasn't intelligent enough to wonder. It was a weak little thing, small, too weak too manifest in human eyes - or even nonhuman. Had anyone or anything been able to see it, they would have seen a shape, a white little mist of energy that was almost but not quite humanoid. Perhaps months passed in its meager excuse for existence, perhaps years.

And still it drifted.

Like a jellyfish, with only the merest semblance of life to it, the spirit drifted this way and that, unable to feel anything but the most simple of sensations. It did not know how long it had been like that, or who it might have been, or really, anything at all. It was simply there, cold, almost lifeless, a spirit that did not exist, it was only there. It took some measure of joy in the colours of the sky, the warmth of the sun, but the night was when it felt happiest. The stars made it...

Feel...

Then suddenly, something changed. It could not tell what, really, being too weak and too young to know, all it knew was that it did not feel so cold anymore. There was warmth, coming from within the town, a brilliant warmth that filled it with strength. The strength was not necessary, though. Energy was drawing him forward, warm and bright, cradling the spirit in its gentle waves. As the spirit moved forward, though still not strong enough to appear to the human eye, it began to take a vague form that became steadily less vague as it approached the source of that strange warmth.

The spirit was strong enough to land when it reached the source. The spirit curled next to the source of warmth, radiating contentment.


Chapter One: Haunted.

"There goes the little goth girl, what a freak."

"I know! I heard like, that she was a witch or something!"

"I heard her house is haunted..."

"I heard-"

Tucker tuned out the usual whispers that accompanied his best friend, Samantha Manson. He didn't like them, but he'd known her for years and knew how to ignore them. Instead of dwelling, he turned to her with a smile. "Hey Sam."

"Hi Tucker."

Her dark clothes, purple and black makeup, dark hair and pale skin made her look odd and scary, someone who tried to avoid people. But that wasn't how she really was, and when she smiled, Tucker knew that he was best friends with the most beautiful girl in the school, and he silently regretted the fact that he could never muster feelings for her besides those of a close friend. Beautiful or not, Sam was like his little sister. He would protect her with his life, chase off any guys who made the moves on her unless he was absolutely certain they wouldn't break her heart.

She was his best friend, but somehow, he knew he wasn't hers. Oh, he was definitely up there, definitely close to her heart, but there was someone closer, who she never spoke of and he'd never met. A boy she loved and whose mind she knew as well if not better than her own. He didn't mind. She was like his sister. Sam had secrets that he might never know, but he knew that he was also the only person who might ever know.

Except for the mystery boy.

"Ready for first period English?" Tucker asked, leaning against his locker. Sam's was next to his, and she walked up to it, not even touching the lock as she opened the locker door. It wasn't that the lock did not work, it was that the lock somehow always managed to unlock itself for her. Tucker had tried the lock during a passing period when she was not there once to find it firmly closed.

That was part of one of Sam's secrets, he knew. The odd things that happened around her. It was as if a friend who knew her combination always unlocked it for her and then left it for her to open. Books would flip to the right page, or be miraculously in the right order, things that were thrown at her would never hit, the last time she'd been bullied the boy had found himself banging into the locker with his pants around his ankles. Sometimes, so faint and so fleeting that Tucker had been sure the first few times he had imagined it, he thought he saw a figure standing or flying next to her.

Yes, odd things always happened around Sam.

"Yeah," Sam's voice pulled him out of his thoughts as she collected her books. "Did you even do the reading?"

"Of course not!" Tucker pushed aside his curiosity and summoned up a grin. "You know me!"

"I heard her house is haunted..."

No, Samantha Manson's house wasn't haunted.

But Samantha Manson herself definitely was.

'There it is again,' Tucker thought, his attention wandering from the book, but he was careful to look only with his eyes. The strange ghost had occasionally caught him looking, and would disappear immediately. He was confident that Sam would have come to him if the ghost was anything less-than-good to her, and he knew she had to have noticed her haunting... Especially since she always evaded his questions and occasionally outright refused to tell him anything. But he couldn't help but worry.

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the vague figure lean over Sam's shoulder, reading the textbook she had laid open on her desk. The ghost put a hand on her shoulder and leaned down to whisper something in her ear that made her smile and give a silent giggle.

Sam was perfectly comfortable with the fact that she was being haunted, but Tucker still wasn't so sure that he was. Heck, the only thing he could tell about the ghost was that it was kinda short, maybe about his own height.

Of course, the ghost had never done anything bad to Sam as far as he could tell. In fact, everything had been helpful, like helping her with work. But still... Ghost hauntings were not normal, even in a city that was supposed to be haunted.

Or so Wikipedia claimed. Sure, there were plenty of rumors, talk of people who had experienced ghost attacks, but he'd seen little evidence.

Except for the ghost haunting Sam.

Before he'd realized it, he'd turned his head towards the ghost, watching with fascination as the spirit pointed to things on Sam's textbook and paper. Tucker's brow furrowed.

Was the ghost helping Sam with her schoolwork?

'Well, it might not have anything better to do while Sam is in class,' Tucker thought. He narrowed his eyes, mentally willing the ghost to become just a little bit more distinct.

The ghost's head turned his way, what was probably an expression of surprise. For a split second, it was completely distinct, and then it was gone.

'He,' Tucker realized. That split second had been enough to notice a very distinct lack of a figure. 'Sam is being haunted by a boy.'

His determination to figure out why the ghost was haunting her doubled immediately.

Somehow, Tucker found himself passing by the old Fenton house on the way home from school.

It was almost universally avoided by the kids at school. Some said it was haunted; others said it was cursed; and still others said that old, bitterly single Jack Fenton was a ghost hunting maniac. Nobody had said that he was a ghost, though, and that was only because he showed up every week at the nearest grocery store to buy food.

"Meow!"

Tucker snapped himself out of his staring (when had he started starting at the Fenton house? He didn't know), to look down and see a large cat twining about his ankles, looking up at him with imploring turquoise eyes. He wasn't a cat person, but he still reached down with a smile and ran his hand over the cat's silky orange fur.

'Pretty cat,' Tucker thought. The look in the cat's eyes was intelligent, but she – or he, he really didn't know, but something told him that this cat was a she – still enjoyed the attention. He found himself staring at the cat, searching for something in the cat's eyes that he did not receive.

"Jasmine!" A rough, loud voice called. The door of the Fenton house opened, and Tucker found himself looking for the first time at Jack Fenton, the resident 'crazy man' if the rumors were to be believed.

He looked simultaneously odd and at the same time, perfectly normal. On the normal side, his roughly cut, slightly overgrown black hair was flecked with grey; he was pudgy, and his eyes were blue and his face seemed as if it had once been friendly. On the abnormal side, he was incredibly tall, clad in an orange jumpsuit, and his face was spotted heavily with enormous red pimples.

There was another rumor, one that said he had some kind of disease.

The cat rubbed its head against Tucker's leg one more time and then streaked over to Mr Fenton, who picked the cat up with surprising gentleness. A tender look came into his eyes, "There you are, Jasmine."

With that, the orange jumpsuit clad man went back in side, leaving Tucker to his thoughts.

A/N: I haven't forgotten Obsessions, but this idea just wouldn't go away.