So I know I need to work on my Ben Ten fic, and I am, but that just not flowing to fast right now. Thank you for your patience, and thank my editor for being a grammar freak.
Phantom took a deep breath of stale air, glad to finally be free of his father's tower. Honestly, did he really need to study that much every day? Sure his father, Vlad Plasmius, was a scientist, and had taken over for Dr. Finkelstein after the old scientist had retired with his wife, but the ghost boy had no intention of following in his father's footsteps. He thought becoming apprentice to the Pumpkin Kings had been enough of a clear message, but his dad just layered the studies thicker in hopes of getting him to quit.
"Doesn't matter," Phantom reminded himself, "I'll just keep proving I'm Holloween material till he gives up." Phantom grinned to himself before he began to casually float through town, his lower half casually becoming a hazy ghost tail as he did. Phantom drifted past the residents of the pleasantly grotesque town with friendly waves to anyone who noticed him.
"Hey Phantom!" A revving engine sounded after his name was called. The ghost boy looked down to see his best friend, said BFF's girlfriend, and best friend's "living" shadow.
"Sup, Johnny?" Phantom floated down to give the voodoo bokor biker a fist bump.
"Nothin' much except for finally finishing repairs on my ride." Johnny shrugged in attempt to look nonchalant while leaning forward on his motorcycle. "Kitty and I were gonna head out for a joy ride, ya wanna come?"
"Yeah, Phantom! We nearly died last time, it was way cool!" Kitty grinned in that way that screamed she was every bit as much of an adrenalin junky as her boyfriend.
"Next time guys," Phantom promised, "Me and Ember are meeting up to work on some music in the graveyard after I finish with Jack and Pariah for today."
"That's cool man, and hey, maybe we'll swing by later and listen to you two jam."
"Yeah right," Kitty giggled with the animated shadow, "as if those two will let Phantom leave before nightfall. They argue so much I'm surprised they have time to teach Phantom anything, much less plan Halloween." The ghost boy sighed before waving the couple off. It didn't matter, he and Ember could just jam under the moon. His dad didn't expect him back before dawn and Ember's mom was busy with her siblings. Phantom had Ember on his mind as he made his way to the Skellington-Dark residence. The wisp's beautiful voice, her passionate songs, the way her blue flame hair flared while she sang, and so much more. If you wanted Phantom to make a list of all the things he liked about his long-time girlfriend he could fill a library. It was Ember who'd taught Phantom to play the guitar. She'd been the key to him breaking out of his father's shadow to find himself. He'd been her shoulder to cry on when she lost her dad, when she lost her first guitar, and especially when her ex-boyfriend Skulker broke up with her.
*BOOM* Phantom was blown out of his thoughts, and nearly out of the air when an explosion blasted poison fog over the area surrounding the Pumpkin Kings' manor. Several passersby began to choke and laugh as blood and mucus were hacked out of their lungs. Phantom tried to not snicker at the vile scene. He failed when Behemoth projectile vomited onto Carmen. The creature under the bed began screaming when the barf ran into her eyes. Behemoth tried to wipe it off only for her to turn and throw a glob of his own spew in his face. Naturally this started a vomit fight as chunks of puke started flying everywhere. A few other people began to get sick, and the foul-smelling ammunition was resupplied.
Phantom quickly went intangible, not wanting to be distracted any further. He silently floated through the Pumpkin Kings' front door. The ghost boy carefully calmed his hysterical laughter before making his way up the middle of purple and green stairs. Sounds of familiar muffled yelling came from the floor above him as he reached the top, and began to climb the second flight.
"Hello, Phantom!"
"Hey, Sally!" the ghost boy trotted to the left side of the house. It was identical in build to the right side, with decor based on spiders, bats, and rats. Jack's wife, Sally, stood out from the grey and purple colors in her patchwork dress. A heavy old gas-mask blocked her pale blue face as she attempted to fan the poisoned air from the house with various odd fans and paddles. "How's Zero doing?"
"Oh he's fine, a little lonely without Cujo around."
"Yeah, I'll totally try to bring him tomo-"
*CRASH* Sally just shook her head as Phantom hurriedly phased upstairs.
…
"Well if you had just used the left revolving screw instead of the right-"
"SCREW THE SCREWS! What we needed was shorter bolts!"
"The bolts weren't even near the detonator!"
"The detonator wasn't the problem!"
"Yes it was!"
"No it wasn't!"
"Um…"
"Yes it was!"
"No it wasn't!"
"Kings?
"Yes. It. Was."
"No. It. Wasn't."
"Guys I-"
"Screws!"
"Bolts!" Phantom gave up on getting his mentors' attention. The ghost boy just rolled his eyes, and began to clean up the mess the brothers were perpetually making as they continued to argue. He had been cleaning around them for nearly an hour by the time Jack's screw argument finally won. Dark turned to start rebuilding his half of the bomb when he finally noticed Phantom.
"Young Plasmius!" Jack's head rotated back with a wide smile at hearing his brother's remark.
"Hey, Phantom!" Jack exclaimed as he stole the boy to his side of the lab/office. "You know, you really should tell us when you get here." Phantom just sighed and smiled. He didn't particularly care if all the work he'd just done went unnoticed, if Sally could keep a bright face despite living with this nefarious duo then he could survive another night working around them working around each other.
Besides - he stretched an inhumanly wide grin across his face as Jack showed him his new plans for cross-bred beasts of horror - the fun was in the chaos.
…
"SAMANTHA MANSON!" Tucker nearly hit his head on the roof of Jazz's van when Sam's mom harpy screeched at the goth teen bolting to the Fenton mobile. Her mother was considerably slower than her in a ridiculous pair of powder-pink heels, but Pamela chased after her daughter nonetheless. Sam reached the van, and swung into shotgun. She'd barely even closed the door when she started yelling for Jazz to "Step on it!"
"What happened this time?" Tucker asked as he watched the image of Sam's mother disappear around a corner that Jazz had taken much too fast.
"Same old 'wear pink and bleach your hair more' routine." The goth scrunched up her face in disgust with her mother's preferences. "Why can't she just respect my wishes and lay off?!"
"Same reason you couldn't stand the cafeteria not serving vegetarian-friendly food." Jazz glanced over at her best friend. "Honestly, you two are pretty similar sometimes."
"Gross Jazz! Don't even joke like that!" Sam complained, but still smiled good-naturedly at the other girl. "So… where did your parents go again?"
"Some ghost convention in Kansas… meaning we got the house to ourselves!" Tucker whooped in the back while the girls high-fived.
…
"You can't cross a bat with a spider, Jack! The bat's bones are too frail, and the spider's exoskeleton won't even fit the way you cut it!"
"Oh, and your owl bots have been functioning just perfectly!" Phantom stood by one of the windows as the brothers' latest argument dragged on. After half an hour they were getting nowhere, and as much fun as the acid fight they'd had over whether or not cow-pigs could be classified as "fearsome" was, he was now bored. Phantom had long since cleaned the burning liquids and broken shards of the bottles that had held them, leaving him with nothing to do but lean on a mop and wait.
"-AND I WILL HAVE YOU KNOW-"
"Can I leave early?"
"SURE!" both the brothers yelled before returning to their argument without skipping a beat. Phantom quickly phased out of the house as the brothers reached for more bottled chemicals of doom to chuck at one another. The ghost boy sent a silent apology to Sally knowing she'd have to both make and help them clean it up later.
Once again, he found himself floating through town, and still too lazy to bother with legs while doing so. Despite getting out early the sun had already begun to set over Halloween town. The sky was brushed with hazy reds, bright oranges, and dusty purples. Phantom floated on his back with his arms crossed behind his head as he watched the sky. He tried to name the first few stars as they began to show. Astrology had always been a passion for him.
Phantom grinned at the memory of promising his girlfriend that the first new star he discovered would be named after her. His stars meant as much to him as her music did to her.
"Well, you'd better show me that star when you find it," memory Ember whispered.
"Why?"
"So I can write a song about it for you." She curled her warm flame body into his cold side.
"Well, you should probably start writing then."
"What, why?" she looked up to see Phantom smiling at space.
"'Cause I just found the star."
"Where?!" she shot up and searched the sky frantically for for the celestial body. She paused only when a pair of cool, stiff hands snaked around her waist. Phantom leaned in close to her ear.
"Here."
Phantom let himself get lost in his mind as he drifted lazily through walls and over yards to the cemetery.
"Embeeeer! You will remeeeembeeeer! Embeeeer! One thin-mmm-ains. Em-mmhmm-teeen..der? Mm...mmn…*smooch*...hah...mn!" Phantom nearly felt his heart beat. The ghost boy instinctively went intangible at the sounds he was hearing. It had taken a moment for him to hear it over Ember's song playing in his head, but he was sure of it; someone was making out in the cemetery. His blood ran warm as he floated with his back to the sounds, and listened. Phantom did not like what he heard.
Ember's smooth voice moaned into the long kiss with pauses every few seconds to breath or giggle. The second voice made Phantom want to live when he realized it was most definitely Skulker's. He nearly sobbed at the realization of what was happening behind him. Ember was- she-she…
Phantom's form shook as he resisted the urge to turn around. Half of him just wanted to leave, hide in a dark alley, and pretend that this never happened.
Another half of him wanted to confirm if Ember really was cheating on him. That part kept him firmly in place despite his urge to fly far away. He couldn't take not knowing for sure. He wanted to ignore that this had happened. If he looked, Phantom didn't think he could ever forgive Ember. He didn't think he could ever forgive himself. This was happening because of him, he was always late to their dates, he was always putting his fun first, he kept Ember waiting for him on long nights when he wouldn't show till morning, and - Oh, Satan! He was an awful boyfriend who'd driven his girlfriend back to her rotten ex!
Phantom only glanced for a second at the scene behind him before flying as fast as he could into the woods. Ember and Skulker never even noticed they'd been seen.
…
"NO! You two are insane if you think I'm doing that!"
"Come on, Tucker! Mom and Dad already tested it, I know it doesn't work."
"If it doesn't work then why do you want me to go in and activate it?!"
"To prove you aren't a weenie, but I guess you already got full marks in that department." Sam rolled her eyes as she stepped past a deeply offended Tucker.
"Remind me why you guys are my friends again."
"You're too lame for the games club, and too cool for the mathletes."
"*sigh* Thank you, Jazz."
"Whatever, you ready?" Sam grinned as she stood in the Fenton Portal with her hand over the on button.
"Why is the power button inside the portal to the underworld?"
"My parent's might be geniuses most of the time, but they're at least 46% stupid," Jazz shrugged. Both the teens watched intently as Sam pushed the on button. Their faces paled when the room was blasted with a toxic-green light, and Sam screamed bloody murder.
…
Phantom tried to hold in the heavy sobs that wracked his form. He felt like something hot and fuzzy had been shoved into his chest to fill the icy void. It was awful, and not in the good way. He was a selfish person who'd, even if it was only for a brief minute, tried to blame the consequences of his actions on the most perfect person in the world. He didn't deserve to be dead.
*Thump* Phantom looked up from his hands at the feeling of bumping into something… despite being intangible. The ghost-proof object seemed to be a tree which was exactly like all the surrounding trees in the area. Honestly, he knew these woods like the back of his haaaaaaaaa- and he was lost. By some miracle, he was in a part of the woods he'd never been to before. When he peered around the strange tree he found that it formed a perfectly circular clearing with several other trees.
What caused him to draw in a breath, though, were the doors the trees had on them. Each one was unique and intricate. The details were stunning. Phantom ran his hands over a large colorful egg door before being distracted by a round bird door.
He inspected each one carefully, but every time he reached for their handles he found them locked. Phantom knew they were hollow by knocking on them, but every handle barely even budged when he tried it.
But before Phantom could ponder the mystery of the doors a wave of cold enveloped him so intense it burned his skin. An agonizing ghostly wail was torn from him as a toxic green and electric blue vortex consumed the circle of trees, and dragged him down into its ever colder embrace till he felt like he was in a raging inferno. He clenched his eyes together as tightly as possible while he was hurdled through the Fenton portal. By the time he'd hit the lab floor and the pain subsided to a low buzz, Phantom has out cold.
…
Jazz and Tucker hurried over to Sam after they managed to disconnect the portal from the the generator.
"Sam! Oh no no no no no! Please be okay-"
*gasp* Sam drew in a huge breath of air as her eyes shot open. Quickly she rushed to her feet frantically looking for something.
"Sam, what are you doing?!"
"Where's a mirror?! Jazz!" Sam grabbed her best friend and started shaking her. "I need a mirror! There's something wrong with my eyes!"
"Sam," Jaz started with her psychologist's voice, "there's nothing wrong with your eyes. They're purple, like always." Sam paled at the information.
"My eyes are blue, and… I didn't … I d-didn't wear c-c-contacts today…"
"Um, guys?" Both panicking Sam and starting to freak Jazz looked back at Tucker. "Who's this, and how'd he get here?" Sure enough a boy was laying in the back of the Fenton portal. Jazz looked at her panicking BFF, then to Tucker, before slowly creeping into the portal. She kept her body tense, and ready to run from any potential danger from the invention posed as she got closer. The boy just layed still in fetal position, not moving except to breathe. Gently, Jazz flipped him on his back. He stiffly unfolded himself in his sleep. Tucker creeped closer at seeing that it was just a normal looking teen, probably around their age, in fact. Sam soon followed, and then they were all three standing over the boy. They glanced at each other before looking back down at him. Out of the portal to the realm of the dead had come a boy with pale skin, shaggy black hair, and a steady pulse.
Dun-dun-duuun! This is a more casual series so suggestion are always welcome, unless it's tone down the gore. This is my grossness and creep outlet.
