Eidolon Hill
It was dark in the dimly lit corridor. Everything was upholstered in dark, warm colors; it was deathly silent. Tucker had to keep himself from tiptoeing through the hallway.
At the far end of the hall was a steep flight of stairs, the carpet plush and red like a vampire's mansion. Tucker's steps made no sound. At the top, the black door stood, featureless; waiting. Taking a deep breath, Tucker reached out and turned the knob.
There was a creak of hinges, followed by a crash of thunder. A flash of light illuminated a figure sitting in an ornate chair, glaring intensely at the intruder.
The voice boomed, "WHO DARES DISTURB MY— oh hey Tucker!"
Sam Manson pressed a switch to turn on the normal room lights. Behind her, her top-floor view of Amity Park afternoon slowly faded into evening.
"Hey Sam," said Tucker. "Nice introduction."
Sam grimaced. "There are accountants hunting me," she said.
"Oh, I get it," said Tucker. It was getting close to April. "You know, they do say that nothing in life is certain but death and taxes... and you certainly have death nailed down."
He gestured around the room. There were no cheery decorations to be found here; Sam's aesthetic sense tended towards the morbid. A rumor around the Hill, which Tucker had never been able to confirm or deny, was that Sam individually interviewed each new hire in this gloomy office.
"Yeah," said Sam, rolling her eyes. "Anyway, what did you need?"
Tucker pulled out his tablet and tapped a few icons. "I think I figured out how that prototype got stolen in the first place. Feel like taking a break?"
"With pleasure," Sam said, getting up from the desk. At her command, a wall panel slid back to reveal an elevator; Tucker and Sam got in and headed downwards.
"Okay," said Tucker on the way down through the building on the Hill, "I've been going over both systems' footage. None of the motion detectors picked up anything, so that's why I thought that there was no video. But then I saw this."
The image on the tablet was a security-camera feed, showing a hallway and a reinforced, barred door. At first, nothing moved. Only a time stamp indicated the video was playing.
Then Sam saw it. A ripple in the air itself. It was only visible as it passed corners and edges, but it was there. And it moved with purpose, with intention.
"What is that?" she asked.
The elevator gave a 'ding' as it arrived. As they got out, Tucker said, "You're not gonna believe it."
The underground corridor was reinforced concrete, painted a sky blue. A painted sign on the wall read Main Lab, but it had been crudely spray-painted over with "FentonWorks Lab and Ghost HQ". Below that, someone had written in permanent marker and much neater handwriting, (Ignore the Ghost Bit).
Tucker glanced at the sign. "You haven't told the big guy about what happened to the prototype yet, have you?"
Sam shook her head, lowering her voice. "No. I'm not really sure how he'd take it, and if Jack found out that—"
"DID SOMEONE CALL FOR JACKFENTON?!"
Sam swallowed a grimace, turning. Eidolon Hill's brightest and oddest researcher was standing in the doorway behind her. In six-and-a-half feet of bright orange jumpsuit, he was the biggest, as well.
"What brings you here today? Here to see the newest FentonWorks has to offer?" He waved at Tucker.
Tucker waved back, keeping a safe distance. Everyone knew about Jack Fenton. Around Jack Fenton, there were explosions.
Jack's lab assistant dodged out from behind him to see what the commotion was. A young woman with bright orange hair, she wore a black-and-teal jumpsuit and an aggrieved expression. Her name tag read, JASMINE.
"Oh, hey!" she said upon spotting Sam. Her expression suggested she was glad for the break. "What's going on?"
Sam looked at Tucker. He glanced back, grimaced a little, and tried to shrug as unobtrusively as possible."I've got some bad news," Sam said. "Remember the newest invention the two of you came up with, the prototype?"
"Oh, you mean the Fenton Exhibitiostentationer?" said Jack, boldly. He lowered his voice a little as he caught Sam's tone. "Er... has it exploded?"
"Not quite," said Sam. "It got stolen."
Dual gasps from Jack and Jasmine. "STOLEN?!"
"But it was in the Vault!" Jasmine said, gesturing down the corridor. "What happened?"
"Maybe..." Jack said, his voice growing tight. "Maybe it was taken... by a ghost!"
Sam and Jasmine both glared at Jack. "Um, ghosts aren't real!" they said, in unison. This came up about once a week.
Tucker chuckled from beside them. "You know, for once I wouldn't be so sure. Have a look at this." He hefted the tablet again. Everyone looked at the video of the ripple in the air.
"Looks like it's going somewhere, doesn't it?" Tucker asked. "Turns out you can follow it to the next camera..."
He tapped the screen. The video changed to another feed, showing the other side of the door. The ripple appeared here, too. Darting around, it made its way straight towards the room with the prototype.
"...and the next."
The ripple passed through the inner door, circled around Jack's invention, then dived at it. Slowly, the Fenton prototype flickered, faded— and became a second ripple itself. The anomaly then headed through the wall, and vanished.
"Prowling poltergeists!" said Jack, seeing the image onscreen. He grabbed the tablet away from Tucker. "It's a real, invisible ghost!"
"Well, mostly invisible," Tucker couldn't help saying. He gently retrieved the tablet before it got broken. "Turns out on infrared—"
Jack wasn't listening. "In honor of this occasion, I will now name the first ghost ever to be discovered by Jack Fenton..."
"You mean by Tucker Foley," Tucker pointed out. Jack started over.
"The first ghost ever to be discovered by anyone, I will now name..." He took a deep breath. "INVISO-BILL!"
Silence. An alert buzzer rang from somewhere in the lab; Jasmine left quickly.
After no one said anything for a few seconds, Jack added, "Be...cause he's invisible. And it sounds like the name 'Bill'. Right?"
Sam shrugged as she thought it over. "It's as good as any other name," she said, slowly nodding. "And now, we've got something we can call him if he shows up again." She looked at the tablet again. "What was that you were saying about infra—"
BOOOOOOOOM!
A very loud explosion shook 'FentonWorks', and a cloud of smoke drifted out the open doorway. Jack looked nervous. "Hold on just one second... I'll be right back!" he said, dashing into the confines of the lab.
Sam caught Tucker's gaze and gestured down the hallway towards the vault. Jack wouldn't be coming back for a while— this happened often enough for Sam to be sure.
As they walked through the vault door shown in the video, Tucker explained. "See, the reason 'Inviso-Bill' didn't trip the infrared sensors was that they're set up to trigger if they spot something warm. Inviso-Bill is actually colder than his surroundings— a lot colder."
Tucker switched the video to a view of the heat sensor's output. "So I had a look to see what was causing it, and I saw this."
'Inviso-Bill' wasn't a ripple in the air anymore. He was a... a man, at least on the top half. A man with snow-white hair and glowing green eyes. Instead of a lower half, the man(?) had a tail, of the kind you might find on an old-time illustration of a spectre.
My god... thought Sam. All this time, Jack Fenton was right!
On the video, the ghost flew through— through!— the inner door once again, homing in on the FentonWorks invention. He touched it— and the invention deepened into a cold spot as well, glowing in the infrared view as the ghost lifted it, pulling it up as he flew through the air.
Right before he and his prize passed through the wall, Inviso-Bill looked back, smiling cockily like he knew the sensor was there.
Tucker paused the video, pointing to the face of the mystery ghost. "And that's our culprit."
Sam didn't answer. She was staring at the grinning ghost, his glowing eyes setting off that smirk.
"You know..." she said, after a few seconds. "It's funny. But I swear I've seen that face somewhere before..."
Meanwhile - Masters Tower
Vlad and Daniel Masters gazed out over Amity Park: their rightful domain. Vlad rested his arm around Daniel's shoulders.
"Excellent job, son," he said. He didn't need to say what he was talking about; they both knew. "Now that that buffoon Jack Fenton has made something that actually works for once, we can study it, dissect it, extract all its puny secrets and make them ours!"
Vlad was definitely in a good mood. He turned to look at Daniel benevolently. "You did well," he commented. "Your control over your powers is improving."
Daniel nodded, smiling in echo of his father. "Thank you, Dad." His gaze shifted up to the brilliant Amity Park sky, its blue masking the stars beyond. "It was rather fun, actually. Just going in there and... taking..."
Vlad's smile widened. "You're beginning to understand," he said. "This city— it's ours. We can do anything we like. No one will even annoy us." His smile faded for a moment as he remembered something.
"Well... almost no one."
Daniel knew that look. His Dad was cooking up something big. The last time he'd seen it, it had ended with him and the prototype zooming far away from Eidolon Hill.
"What is it, Dad?" he asked. "You seem like you're planning something interesting."
"Nothing too important," Vlad said. "Do you remember a Ms. Manson from the party yesterday evening?"
It was a rhetorical question. Vlad had made Daniel memorize the executive structure of all the Masters Corporation's competitors. Daniel nodded, his gaze slowly returning to the sky.
"I found her somewhere very interesting last night," Vlad said, removing his arm from Daniel's shoulder and gesturing below. "She was hanging off the side of the Masters Tower, evening gown and all— on the very floor where we've put the device."
That got Daniel's full attention.
"What?!" he said, realizing what had likely been going on. "What did you do?"
Vlad shrugged, bringing his hands together at the fingertips. "I gave her a tour, of course! Stopping just on this side of the door. She's likely tearing her hair out over it, even now."
"Wait," said Daniel. "Is that all you plan to do about it? She'll probably try again."
"Not quite." Vlad nodded and smiled, pleased to see Daniel's strategic education was paying off. "We need someone to get close to Ms. Manson. To befriend her. To learn her secrets. And then..."
Daniel didn't need him to finish. "Oohhh... you're going to send a spy to her. Who'd you have in mind?"
Vlad's face fell as he realized he'd have to explain this one. "Well, it'd have to be someone we'd find trustworthy. Someone good at keeping secrets. Someone about Ms. Manson's age, it's a friendship thing. Someone she could also, with time, trust." He chuckled a little. "And, most importantly, someone who can come back here without arousing suspicion."
"But who— oh."
"Yes," said Vlad Masters, his grin as wide as the Amity Park skyline. Wish a sweep of one arm, he gestured at Sam's building, dark and brooding on Eidolon Hill.
"You're going to go meet her."
