Hey there guys! This is just the prologue to a plot line that was in my head, and I'll continue with it if y'all like it.
There are three dimensions on this planet.
The first is the most obvious; the human realm. The place where all things mortal thrive and reside.
The second is the ghost zone. The hiding place for the departed souls who have never really left. Sometimes, the barriers that keep these two dimensions isolated are breached. This allows for some of the ghosts to enter the human realm and wreak havoc, though they always are sent back.
The third, and final, dimension is a secret. It is a place where vampires hunt, and witches cast their spells. It is a place where werewolves are not just myths, and the shape shifters are very real. This is the night world. It coexists with the human realm, though the mortals are kept completely in the dark.
There is a series of laws that bind the dimensions together, appropriately named The Binding Laws. Personally, I find some of them to be strange. For example, those who reside in the night world are allowed knowledge of the ghost zone and the human realm, and those from the ghost zone are allowed knowledge of the human realm and the night world. What I find strange is that those in the human realm will be executed if they ever find out about either other dimension.
The night world's own laws are very strict, the majority being punishable by death. The most important law that is upheld is supposed to be simple to follow. Never tell a mortal being about the existance of our world. Simple it may be, though many before me have been executed for breaking it. Including my parents.
My name is Larissa, but what friends I have made in my fourteen years call me 'Riss. I am a resident of two of the three dimensions. Born a shape shifter, I technically belong to the night world, but my parents raised me in the human realm, granting me access to both. My father was a shape shifter as well, this being where I inherited my shifting ability from, but my mother was a mortal. The night I was born, my father broke the law, and told my mother about the existence of our secret world. It was then that we began our life as a family; on the run from the night world authorities.
I remember the present I got from my parents for my third birthday. It was an old family heirloom, a beautifully crafted ring, passed down from shape shifter to shape shifter on my father's side. It allows the wearer complete control over their power, something not easily achieved by those without something similar. It was the best, albeit last, gift I ever got from them.
I was about four years old when they caught us. My parents were executed immediately. I still cannot remember how I managed to survive through the attacks of the night world creatures, but somehow I did. I shifted before I ran away, and I never once looked back.
Call it a twist of fate, or just sheer dumb luck, but I ran until I reached a nice looking house somewhere in Wisconsin. I changed back before I met the owner of the house, a nice, but somewhat strange man by the name of Vlad Masters. He was very kind to me, and took me in, hiding me from the werewolves and vampires that had been sent to track me down and kill me.
After talking for a long while, we discovered that we were related. My father had been his cousin, making him my first cousin, once removed. The shape shifting gene hadn't spread through his side of the family, but he knew of the night world via a change in the law that states that any person belonging to a family with night world connections, but does not have the specific gene that allows them to be a part of the night world, granted life and is allowed knowledge of the night world.
I stayed with him until halfway between my seventh and eighth birthdays, when I discovered that he had been plotting to sell me back to the night world. I left him in the early hours of dawn one day, in search of a small city called Amity Park. I had done some digging before I decided to make my escape, and had found my mother's sister, Pamela Manson. She had a family in Amity Park, her husband Jeremy, and a daughter my age named Samantha. I had made a few phone calls, and it was arranged that I would live with them.
Life in Amity Park was peaceful, to say the least. Sam and I were close friends from the start, with both of us being vegetarians and enjoying the dark. She introduced me to her friends, Tucker Foley and Danny Fenton, and soon enough, the four of us were inseparable.
I only broke the law on one occasion, and before doing so, I made them swear to never tell a soul. Danny, Sam, and Tucker had been talking about their parents and their jobs, and I had accidentally let slip that mine were dead. After making them swear secrecy, I told them my whole story.
I also showed them my second form. A panther. Sleek black fur, piercing green eyes, and razor sharp teeth, I was a look-alike of my father.
The next six years were blissful, our biggest problems being Dash Baxter, a bully who liked to pick on Danny, but also had a crush on me. I made other friends through soccer and volleyball, namely Paulina Sanchez and Valerie Gray. They were some of the more popular girls, and though I kept our friendships strong, I never really socialized with them unless Danny, Sam, and Tucker were all absent. Needless to say, I never really socialized with them.
Everything was normal leading into our freshman year at Casper High School as well. Dash was still a bully, Danny still had an unrealistic crush on Paulina, Tucker was still a techno-geek, and Sam was still a goth. I guess that I was the only one who had changed.
Over the summer, I had decided that it was time for something different. I felt the need to look more like my other self, so I dyed my mousy brown hair black. Not a dark brown, but black as midnight. I bought colored contacts that changed my deep sapphire eyes to a bright shade of green. I traded in my mini skirts for black skinny jeans, my flip flops for white converse, and my frilly tops for a t-shirt that I had designed by myself. It was all white with an upside down crescent moon and three circles printed in black to form a paw print. Tucker though that I was brilliant for coming up with the design until I showed him my birthmark.
All shape shifters are born with the symbol on the inside of their left wrist in the color of their fur. Mine is pitch black. Having the symbol makes it easier to recognize who is a part of the night world. Werewolves have a crescent moon in the color of their fur, all vampires have something like a teardrop in red, and witches and wizards have a brown spiral.
It was the first week of school when the accident happened. The four of us had gone to Danny's house after school to start our homework, even though we had all weekend to get it done. I suppose that if we hadn't gone, things would be a lot different than they are now.
Danny's parents were obsessed with ghosts, and for the past couple of months, they had been attempting to build a portal to the ghost zone. Three quarters of an hour after we had arrived, they ushered us to the basement to watch the ghost portal be opened for the first time.
The rational part of my mind was praying that it would fail so that they wouldn't be executed, but a small part of me was wishing that the portal would work. A lot of the Fenton's gadgets didn't, but they never showed signs of giving in. My rational side was relieved when Mrs. Fenton turned the power on. The inside of the portal sparked to life for a few, brief seconds before the light petered out. As the sparks died down, I could see the disappointment stuck on the Fenton's faces.
With heavy hearts, the adults trudged back upstairs, leaving us with the warning to be careful around their equipment. Sam and I, on the other hand, had a wild idea.
Not five minutes later, I had on a black hazmat suit with a collar, belt, gloves, and boots, all in white, ready to explore the inside of the failed portal. Danny stood beside me, the colors on his own hazmat suit being the opposite of mine; white with black.
Inside the portal, we found two buttons. One was green and read 'on', the other red and saying 'off'. After a small argument between Danny and myself on what action we should take, he pushed the green button. All that I can remember after that was a flash of green and Danny's gasp of pain.
Sam and Tucker had dragged us out, and we were barely able I stand. I was leaning against the wall when it happened. A circle of white light appeared around my waist. It split in two, and one traveled up, the other towards the ground. Looking down at myself, I could see that the colors on my suit had changed into what Danny's were.
Danny. He looked so different. The colors on his suit had changed as well, making it seem like we had switched clothes. His normally dark hair was white, and his light blue eyes had turned a glowing green.
Running to the floor length mirror by the stairs, I gasped at the reflection that appeared when I stood in front of it. Gone were my midnight locks, replaced by the same snow that had fallen atop my friend. My eyes had changed as well. Instead of the green from the contacts that I had grown used to seeing, a stunning shade of violet.
Backing away in disbelief from the mirror, some piece of my mind understood what had happened to us. The energy that coursed through the now active portal had done something to our DNA, and it had turned us into ghosts.
From across the room, I could hear Danny begging for there to be a way to change back. Thinking of the ring that i wore around my neck, I grasped at it and focused on being human, just like I did when I shape shifted. Sure enough, the rings from before reappeared, and turned me back into 'Rissa Traeson.
Sam and Tucker were preoccupied with Danny, so nobody was there to see me sink to my knees and start hyperventilating. I had just set the date for my own demise. One of The Binding Laws was called The Law of Twenty Four Months. It covered only rare instances, like when one soul is spread between the three dimensions. Like what had just happened to me.
My soul had previously been split between the human realm and the night world, which was legal by The Binding Laws. Now, it is in thirds between those and the ghost zone. The Law of Twenty Four Months states that no one soul can have root in all three dimensions simultaneously for a perio longer than twenty four months. On the two year anniversary of their split, both the councils from the night world and the ghost zone would be summoned, and you would be forced to make a choice. You could either kill one of your lives, or have all three be killed.
That happened twelve days ago. I now have seven hundred and eighteen days in my life before I will have to make the decision that will change it forever.
My name is Larissa Jane Traeson. I am fourteen years old. I am a shape shifter, a ghost, and a human. Part of me will die within two years. This is my story.
And that's that! Let me know what you guys think, and if enough of y'all like it, I'll keep going. I just have a small favor to ask of you. If there's any way that you guys could put up the Danny Phantom episodes on YouTube, it'll make this a lot easier on me.
So just click that review button and let me know if I should continue Larissa's story! Toodles! *waves and blows kisses*