An AU, darker version of the story we all know and love. Danny's fears, doubts and struggles as a teen plus a freak of nature his parents want to hunt. Vlad is smarter and more careful in this retelling, and things might take a different turn as the arch nemesis becomes a mentor and friend instead. With Danny slowly giving into his ghost side, will he be the hero or the villain?
Hi, I'm Elisabeth. This is my first fan fiction in five years. I've since learned how to draw and color, so the cover is by me. I hope you enjoy this story. Thanks for reading it. ^_^
Chapter 1: Accident
Danny Fenton grimaced as his friends took in his parents' handiwork. Their pieces of fictional equipment that didn't work. Meant for an even more fictional purpose. Ghost hunting.
He winced a little as Sam finally let out a giggle. Tucker couldn't help but laugh too. Danny felt mortified. This had been a bad idea, and he'd known it. So why had he even bothered bringing his friends down to the basement in the first place? Oh right. Because they'd begged.
"So there," Danny said as he faced them with what little dignity he had left. "Now you see what my parents do all day. Can we go now?"
His ears turned red as Sam walked past him and over to the so called ghost portal looking incredibly amused. "So what does this big one do?"
Danny sighed. "It supposedly opens a portal to a ghost dimension."
Sam giggled again, "Okay, let's go in then." She gestured to Danny. "You first."
"Yeah," Tucker agreed with teasing amusement in his eyes. "You first."
Danny looked at his friends irritably, but he couldn't help being amused with them. It was a really ridiculous situation. Suddenly getting the nerve to make it even more silly, Danny looked at Sam and Tucker knowingly.
"Okay guys, but I'm warning you, it's dangerous." They raised sarcastic eyebrows.
"So," said Danny, walking over to a rack, "I'll need to put on a safety suit first."
He held up a black lab suit and grinned. Tucker and Sam nearly doubled over with their laughter this time. Okay, this Danny could enjoy. They were goofing off. He actually felt like today was becoming almost normal.
He swiftly slid his suit on over his clothes and asked, "So, how do I look?"
Sam and Tucker snickered as a response. Danny just grinned a cocky grin and stepped into the portal chamber. His boots made clanking sounds as he walked deeper in. He scanned the cold steel walls until his fingers reached the on switch.
Strangely enough, knowing that this invention didn't work, didn't make him feel any safer about the idea of turning it on. Part of him wanted to turn it on and see if it somehow did work. Part of him really wished his parents weren't crazy. Before he lost his nerve, Danny braced himself and pushed down the big red button.
Before he could think another thought, he was thrown back in a sudden wave of unexplainable alien energy. Green light exploded everywhere, overpowering his senses. Danny screamed at the top of his lungs, writhing in the most intense agony of his life. His every cell felt like it was burning as the alien power washed through him. It seemed to be laughing at him as its tendrils slithered about his consciousness. More and more of the malevolent force entered him, coursing through his blood, changing him, changing who and what he was. He could feel it.
"What the heck is happening to me?!" Danny screamed.
All he could see was the blinding green light. All he could hear were his screams. All he could feel was pain and the sense of something that wasn't the least bit human settling inside of him. At last it was finally too much to bear, and Danny faded into unconsciousness.
The next thing Danny became aware of was that he was lying on something soft. A bed? He could hear the beeping of a heart monitor pick up its pace as he became more and more awake. His eyes flickered open hesitantly, only to see a dull beige colored ceiling.
He was in a hospital? Why was he in a hospital? Then it all came back to him. The basement. Sam and Tucker. The machine. Had it worked after all? If the on button did something like what it had, then maybe his parents weren't crazy. He took little comfort in that thought as a more horrifying one set in. He was hurt and in a hospital, so what about Sam and Tucker?
He sat up in bed and looked around frantically. "Sam! Tucker!" he shrieked.
He was in a small room all by himself. His friends were nowhere in sight, and his heart pounded. Were they okay, or were they worse off than even he was?
Still foggy from his time spent unconscious, Danny wasn't really thinking things through clearly. He tore his covers off of him and slid out of bed, ready to scour the hospital if that's what it took. No, he wasn't sliding out of bed. His leg was sliding through the floor!
Danny blinked, trying to deny what he was seeing. His leg was literally transparent and halfway through the floor. Recoiling, he tried to lift it back towards him and onto the safety of the bed, but then the arm he was leaning on slipped right through the mattress. That moment of complete disbelief was all it took for him to slip right through the bed, the floor, and to the floor below his room.
He landed with a thud and looked around him to see working nurses. One of them gasped when she saw him. "He's that coma patient! How'd he get out of his room?"
Another nurse hollered, "Get doctor Moore over here, and someone call the Fentons!"
Danny was stunned. What the heck was going on? How had he slipped right through the ceiling? Was he crazy, or were all those things his parents said about ghosts starting to sound a lot more real? If they were, did that mean he was a ghost? He didn't feel dead. He felt alive, but at the same time he felt very different from how he had before. He shuddered, thinking of the malevolent energy that had consumed him back in the basement. What the heck had he gotten himself into by pressing that stupid button? One thing was for sure. It was nothing good.
A cold calculating man with a silver ponytail eyed the armored ghost before him. "Are you sure these rumors are correct, Skulker?"
The ghost glared. "Yes. My information is reliable. Do you doubt me?"
"Of course I do not doubt you. You are the greatest hunter in the ghost zone, Skulker," said the silver haired man, sugarcoating his words with flattery.
"I'm merely very surprised that Jack Fenton managed to create a portal. The oaf has fudge for brains. Its no wonder it took him twenty years."
The man's eyes narrowed, and an evil grin spread across his face. Twenty years. After twenty long years of yearning for revenge, he finally had a way to achieve his dreams. Jack Fenton would die, and Maddie would be his. Of course, it would take some time. Also, if he didn't play with his prey before the slaughter, where was the fun?
"I'll begin by sending some surprises his way," the man mused aloud, then he let a few of his ectopuses out of their cages. They glared and hissed at him for being trapped so long, tentacles writhing.
"Now now, my pets," he chided, "Your freedom is assured. I just want you to do one last thing for me."
The ectopuses hissed excitedly at the word freedom. Knowing he had their attention now, the man grinned evilly and said, "The task is simple. Kill Jack Fenton."
The ectopuses couldn't move through their master's own ghost zone portal quickly enough they were so excited. The man smiled cruelly, knowing this task would be the last thing they would ever do. The ectopuses would simply be the first of many ghosts meant to test Jack's strength.
"Not to interrupt," said Skulker who was eyeing the scene uncomfortably, "but there is more."
The silver haired man sighed irritably and turned to face him, "What more could possibly matter at this point?"
"Well, I just thought you should know what happened when the portal turned on." Skulker winced at the glare he got.
"And that is?" the man prompted with shorting patience.
"The Fenton's son turned it on from the inside. He's just woken up from a week long coma."
The silver haired man felt a strange wave of shock go through him. Could it be what he thought it was? Did another halfa now exist? It was still too early to tell, but he would likely find out very soon. The thought intrigued him, but the implications also frightened him. For the first time since the accident twenty years ago, he felt like he might not be nearly so alone in the world, but would this halfa join him or fight him?
See you in the next chapter! Again, thanks for reading. :D