AN: Well, this has taken a long time. To get started on, I mean. It didn't take that long to type.

Oh well.

And I read through a few chapters of The Darkness Within. By Primus, it's horrible. What in the Pit was I thinking?

Anyway, here we have chapter one, in which Shade temporarily becomes Mr. Exposition, and he and Marie snark at each other. Whee

Disclaimer: Blah blah blah, not my show, Ronnie, Shade, Marie, and Jayja are mine

---

"Good God, whose closet is this?" Shade muttered, pawing through the odd assortment of midriff shirts and fishnet.

"Shaman has an interesting sense of fashion," Marie said dryly from where she leaned in the cracked and rickety doorway.

"…He's gay," Shade concluded, leaning into the closet to get a look at the back shelves. "Ah, finally! Something somewhat decent," he proclaimed, pulling out a wad of clothes. Unperturbed by Marie's presence, he unlatched his cape, kicked off his boots, and stripped out of the hazmat suit. Just as nonchalantly, he pulled on a turtlenecked and hooded black tank top, a pair of black pants, and a pair of fingerless black gloves that came to the middle of his upper arms.

As he stooped to pull his boots back on, Marie muttered, "You just stripped in front of me."

"Yeah. Your point…?"

"I'm probably going to go blind now."

Shade rolled his eyes and straightened. "I'm sure it'll only be short term," he said, refastening the chain around his waist and his cape around his neck. "Now, if you'd be so kind, would you tell me where the Hell I am and give me a tour?"

Marie's eyes narrowed. She didn't like him speaking to her as if they were equal. He had no right to speak to her like that. But until she knew what he was capable of, she supposed it would be wise to humor him.

"These are the remains of a castle. Occasionally, if a place has enough spiritual energy tied to it, a fragment of it will travel to the Ghost Zone. In the human world, I assume the castle is still standing just fine. Here we get, in essence, the ghost of a castle."

"Prime piece of real estate."

Marie restrained a growl, and plowed on with her explanation. "At the moment, we're standing in a servant's room. I gave it to Shaman. This entire hallway is filled with similar rooms. I suppose you can use the one across from here."

"My own room? How lovely. My thanks, Mistress." The mocking tone was not difficult to catch.

Tone tense, Marie turned to leave the room, adding, "Follow me and I'll show you the main hall. Everything other than that is unimportant."

As she left, Shade sauntered after her, arms folded, looking bored with the entire situation.

---

As much as he liked Ronnie, Danny had to admit that life was rather boring when she was the only one around. Sam and her parents had gone on a trip. She had invited Danny and Tucker, and Tucker had agreed in a heartbeat. Danny would have, but his parents were half way across the country at some sort of science convention and Jazz was in charge. Being her usual over protective spazz self, she had forbidden him from going with his friends. Combine that with the fact that she was rarely home, he had nothing to do.

And he was steadily learning how much Ronnie liked to talk. And talk. And talk.

"…and so I told her that if she ever did anything like that again, I'd kick her so hard in the chest she'd only have one breast for the rest of her life…"

'Blah blah blah blah blah.'

'That's not polite, Danny.'

'She can't hear me.'

'No, but staring at the ceiling fan isn't very subtle.'

Danny snapped back to attention from where he was sprawled on his bed, looking at the floor to see Ronnie still splayed out on her back, oblivious to the fact that Danny had only heard about five words of her entire tirade. Internally, he sighed in relief. Ronnie could be scary when she was angry.

Making a more concerted effort to look attentive, Danny renewed his conversation with Phantom.

'So, you ever feel like things have been too quiet the last two weeks?'

'Are you complaining?'

'No. It's just…weird. One day you're off battling Shade, and then the next, nothing.'

'We'll take a short look in the Ghost Zone later, okay?'

'Alright.'

---

The main hall was immense. The stones were cracked and appeared to be falling out of the walls, true, but the room was still massive.

Remains of silk banners hung from the walls and ceiling, and the rafters were cracked and looks like they would collapse at any second. Windows lined the walls, most of them completely shattered, but some still had the remains of ornate stained glass. At one of the room there was a trio of dilapidated thrones.

Marie casually dropped down into the center throne and reclined against the arm. "Welcome to the main hall. The other doors lead to other bedrooms and rooms that we don't need. The only other important room is mine, which I'm not going to show you."

"Why is this room important?" Shade asked, quirking an eyebrow.

Marie shrugged carelessly. "The servants' quarters are unimportant by default, and most of the others are collapsing too much to bother entering." Then she gestured to the throne to the right of hers. "Now, tell me. Where'd you come from? I wanna know the whole story."

Shade sat down in the throne she gestured to, not missing how it put him lower than her, but he let it slide. A moment later, Jayja pushed his head in through one of the shattered windows.

"I would like to hear where you came from, as well."

"I'm just that interesting?" Shade asked, smirking.

"Don't flatter yourself," Marie snapped. "I'm just bored, and there's nothing else to do here."

"Uh huh. Sure." He feigned being deep in thought for a moment, before he started. "It's actually pretty simple. Two people—well, one if you want to get technical—decided they hated each other, even though it was quite the opposite. Emotions became darker and darker and built up more and more, until they basically exploded, creating me." He gestured to himself, though it was a rather unnecessary gesture. "They still didn't want to get along with each other, so I had to figuratively bitch slap them, or their idiocy caused me physical pain. Then they reconciled and had sex, while I met a girl named Ronnie. We made out for awhile, Skulker tried to kill me, Vlad tried to use me as a pawn, and then I got killed by one of the people I was spawned from."

Marie quirked an eyebrow. "That's…interesting."

"Who, if I may ask, were you spawned from?" Jayja asked.

Shade canted his head to one side. "I had thought it was obvious. Danny Fenton and Danny Phantom."

"The halfa?!" Marie asked, obviously stunned by the revelation.

Shade shrugged a shoulder and stretched. "I don't really see how it's such a surprise."

Marie passed off what was an implied insult, looking suddenly eager. "And you're just going to let them get with killing you?"

"Do I have a choice? He's stronger than me."

Marie grinned slowly, and Jayja said, "We could probably fix that, if you're not averse to theft."

Shade sat up straighter, suddenly very interested in what they had to say. "Oh?"

"Jayja, out front," Marie ordered. A moment later, Jayja pulled his head out and lumbered away. "Come with me," Marie directed to Shade and hurried towards the doors, Shade following in her wake.

---

The Ghost Portal slid open slowly. Danny and Phantom, combined and in ghost mode for the moment to make things simpler, entered cautiously.

Everything appeared to be normal, but they flew as far as Walker's prison (where they wisely made sure they remained hidden) before they finally decided nothing was happening and turned back.

They reentered the lab and separated again.

"Satisfied?" Phantom asked.

"I guess. I still think it's weird, though," Danny conceded.

After that, they didn't think much more of it and ventured out of the lab.