It lured him in.
Sure, it wasn't really the massive spectral gateway to the afterlife that was captivating the young half-ghost; it was the swirling zoned death beyond it. But the portal was definitely the way in.
Constantly he felt the tug of half of him wanting to revel in the energy of the dimension only one puny step out of his parents' laboratory. He found himself yearning to enter the zone and drift endlessly in a doze all day, and only crawl back out into the human realm in the obsidian of night. He wanted in. He wanted to finally succumb to the suffocating pull he'd been feeling for months, the one that so outweighed every mental barrier he'd ever built up around himself.
He was tired of it, really. When the sun was out, his eyes practically couldn't stay open for more than a second, sans when adrenaline was pumping through his veins during a ghostly issue. The moon and stars taking up their positions in the sky only meant that he was as wide awake as he could possibly be, all while having to round up even more hyper-active ghosts and still feeling the bodily ache of exhaustion.
Being tired all the time wasn't fun. Sam thought that maybe he had chronic insomnia from all the stress of keeping up his dual life, and he let her believe it. He wasn't about to tell her and Tucker what the real reason was. He didn't even know what the real goddamn reason was.
And so Danny found himself staring at the enormous vortex of green spectral energy like a kitten would gape at its first saucer of milk.
The portal was the source, right? The sole reason he'd gotten his powers? Lost half of his life?
He stepped up to it, face to spiraling hell.
It was the middle of the day, but it was still dark in the lab. School was nearly out, and his parents had taken Jazz out to visit a college for the weekend, something the junior had been ecstatic over. Danny hadn't really seen the point.
He was alone.
The cool darkness of the basement lab was in huge contrast to the warming May day outside, and the ripped hole in reality had drawn him in. He decided he wanted answers, and maybe some relief from his sleep deprivation.
He liked being himself. He had already decided that this life was definitely worth the hell. No one else was going to do his job the right way, anyway.
But to have some actual rest seemed nice.
The other ghosts belonged there, right? They could rest all they wanted. Why couldn't he? Just for a few hours or so?
He took a slow breath. The viridescence of his eyes matched the swirls of the metal-rimmed rip in the fibers of reality.
The portal was the way in. The portal was the reason for his meshed state on the planes of existence. The portal was the gateway to answers.
Settled inside the spectrally-sealed titanium-alloy cage that opened and closed for access, the portal was stable within the walls of the basement. Closing the gargantuan doors only covered it up; it was never closed.
He'd been answering to his human side for fifteen years. No one could correctly call him a simple homosapien any longer without being fifty percent, and undeniably, dead wrong.
His other half needed some attention.
Danny stepped in.