Duality
Part 1: Family
Drabble: Mother
"Heh, don't be silly. I don't have a mom."
A common theme for engaging with the paranormal is that the conditions have to be 'just right'. The planets must be in alignment, the moon must be directly overhead, the sun must touch the horizon, the diagrams in the magic circle must be drawn exactly, et cetera… The fact that similar stipulations exist in all facets of civilization through time is not in dispute.
However, the fact remains that even when specified conditions are met, the possibility of engaging with the paranormal is not guaranteed. It is for this reason that anything remotely related to ghosts has been discarded by the scientific community. Perhaps it is rightfully so, as historically most 'successes' in the field have been performed by scam artists, or ambiguities in the conditions favor mundane explanations.
And yet, for same reasons the community disregards para-science, we take meteorology as gospel. Under the right conditions, for instance, distance from the equator, the Earth's axis pointing away from the sun (i.e. winter), cloud coverage, and temperatures approximating or below 0º C, you have conditions conducive to a snow storm. But conditions for a snow storm do not guarantee a snow storm, and even when they do, the results can vary from light flurries to a blizzard.
In the same way that the weather is apparently random and yet can be projected, so can gateways to another dimension. Over the past six months, we have on four separate occasions successfully anticipated where a naturally-occurring portal to the colloquially termed underworld would manifest. Of these four, only the first was human-sized. The remaining three were little more than hairline fractures in our dimension. All closed within moments of their creation with no lasting sign that they existed in the first place.
Anticipating where a hole in reality will form is a difficult and time-consuming, but not altogether impossible task. Holding one open is also something we have succeeded in doing, as our college thesis proves that inserting foreign material which we have named "ectoranium" into the hole prevents closure. In effect, we have successfully inserted an doorstop in a self-locking door. However, the practical applications of a stable quantum-sized hole are practically nonexistent. Despite our best efforts, we cannot enlarge the portal beyond the size of a large marble. We hypothesize this is because a stable portal is limited by the size that it manifests as.
If you approve our proposal to build a stable portal of roughly one meter in diameter, in addition to funding and the included list of equipment and materials, we will require unmitigated access to one of your labs, specifically, the ground floor botany lab in the west wing (the one built over the former grounds of an 18th century chapel).
-Proposal to Axion Labs submitted by Jack Fenton, Madeleine Bemelmans, and Vlad Plasmius
Duality
Ghosts were fundamentally different from humans. It was an irrefutable fact. The fact that most ghosts had once been humans didn't matter – ectoplasm was funny stuff, and ghosts didn't think the same way humans did.
That's why Daniel could still remember the day he'd first seen his dad, though his ghost form wasn't even as developed as a toddler's yet. He'd been floating aimlessly through the softly glowing curls of ectoplasm in a fairly empty corner of the Ghost Zone shortly after his creation when some of the ectoplasm had started to pull itself together, strands weaving to form a blob, tensing and tightening to reveal a figure. Two arms, two legs, a head – all the things most human-originated ghosts had. The new ghost was wearing mostly white, but his skin was blue and his hair was black, and when he opened his eyes Daniel saw they were red.
For a moment the new ghost looked around in confusion (or seemed to – he didn't have any pupils, so it was hard to tell). But then his gaze landed on Daniel.
In an instant, Daniel felt himself being grasped by the new ghost's arms, and they were soft and gentle but so strong.
"Daniel? Is that you?" the new ghost asked, pulling out of the hug to scan Danny's face, checking the similarities between the lifeless form he'd seen in the human world and the new, glowing, slightly green face in front of him. He found them so quickly – the nose, the shape of the eyes, everything familiar, if a bit softer, a bit less defined.
Daniel tilted his head to the side to see the new ghost from another angle. This one was strange. The few ghosts he'd met in the short time he'd been in the Ghost Zone hadn't given him a second look, much less talked to him. Why was this one acting differently?
"Oh, Daniel," the new ghost said, hugging him again. "I'm your father."
It had been a while before Daniel had asked. Most ghosts he knew didn't have any parents, but he'd been talking to some of the newer ones like Youngblood that still remembered the human world, and he was curious.
So one day he floated down the stairs of the lair to his father's lab. His father was leaning heavily on a desk covered with diagrams and projections. There was almost as much paper on his desk as there was sitting crumpled on the floor.
The boy asked aloud, "Dad, do I have a mom?"
His father startled fell backwards off his chair, but relaxed when he saw it was just Daniel.
"Why, of course you do, son. Everyone has a mom," he replied.
"But then where is she?"
"She's still in the human world right now, Daniel. But don't worry, one day soon she'll be here, and our family will be whole again."
"Okay," Daniel said, and promptly put it out of his mind.
The experiments his dad was doing in the basement made Daniel uneasy. More than once something had exploded down there, often followed by cursing from Dad that he didn't have the resources of his former associates, whoever those were.
The ghost boy was seven now, or maybe eight, and starting to think for himself. He wanted his dad to do things with him, like explore the Ghost Zone or play games, but most of the time Dad was shut up in the basement, fixing together pieces of metal and other things he got from Technus. Danny was bored.
So one day he decided to go down into the lab again.
He floated his way down the stairs quietly, any noise he did make drowned out by the roar of the hot but narrow beam of fire his dad was shooting out of his finger and using to melt two pieces of metal together. Daniel floated in place to watch for a moment. His dad seemed to be building some kind of big ring, big enough for even Skulker to fit through.
"What are you building?" Daniel asked as soon as the noise had died down.
His dad wasn't surprised this time – he'd gotten used to Daniel coming into the lab.
"I'm building a portal," he answered. "If it works, we'll be able to go back to the human world, where your mom is. We'll be able to bring her here."
"Really?" Daniel asked, excited. It had been so long since Daniel had last asked about his mother, but recently he'd been thinking of her again. He was excited about the chance to meet her, to find out what she was like, what it was like to have two parents.
"Yes," his dad answered, smiling. "Just be a good boy and try not to interrupt me, and we'll both get to see her again soon."
Danny was eleven when the portal was finished. His dad had been so proud when he led Daniel down into the basement and revealed the metallic arch.
Daniel was unimpressed by the simple object.
"My mom is through there?" he asked disbelieving, floating forwards as if to pass through the portal without realizing it.
"She is," his dad answered, gently resting a hand on Daniel's shoulder to hold him in place.
"And now I'll get to meet her?"
"You will. Once the portal manifests here."
"Now?"
"Soon," his dad said, floating lower until his eyes were level with his Daniel's. "In fact, any second now…"
"Okay," he said, smiling.
Vlad looks at his watch, and then counted down with his fingers.
Five
Four
Three
Two
One
A man-sized portal formed in the basement lair. However, the man in question was the giant American folk tale legend Paul Bunyan, not Vlad Plasmius. The gateway shattered outward, with Plasmius belatedly shielding his son and himself from the shrapnel with an ethereal shield.
Years of projections were smashed in an instant. The stable hole was reduced to a natural, short-lasting one. Without a moment to lose, Vlad dove into the portal and it closed almost immediately after him…
…leaving young Daniel Plasmius alone in the war-torn laboratory.
He was gone for almost a week.
Having nothing else to do, Daniel waited.
Oh, he certainly entertained the idea of rebuilding the gateway his father had constructed, but one glance at his father's notes told him that was a dead end. Even if he did have an understanding of the advanced metaphysics involved, which he certainly didn't, there was the issue that his father's handwriting was utterly illegible. To further add to the issue, several fragments of the portal, including the largest, had embedded themselves in the floor, walls, and ceiling of the lab. Whatever the portal had been constructed from, or exposed to, resisted Daniel's phasing abilities.
In short, there was little else Daniel could do but wait.
He wasn't alone for the whole period. Several ghosts that Daniel had recognized as associates, as his father had once put it, had visited. Skulker was the first and most frequent visitor. His interactions with Daniel were curt, short, and generally circled around a payment or delivery of some sort. Empathy wasn't a word in his dictionary.
Technus's visit was by far the longest. Whatever the reason for his visit had been immediately discarded for the prospect of him repairing the portal. Technus agreed, but the moment he discovered the replica of an ancient telegraph in his father's office, it was all over. This "hip new method of advanced communication" was all he could concern himself with. When he finally left, it was with aims of stringing wire to every ghost's lair and install one of those devices. The fact that no one knew Morse code or would even want to learn it, including Technus, did not deter him.
And then Ember visited…
"Your life goes on without me. My life, a losing game. But you should, you should not doubt me. You will remember my name," the ex-pop star sang as she strummed away on her guitar on the couch.
Ember wasn't one of the people his father chose to deal with, and normally upon discovery she would have been immediately turned away. Her reasons to visit normally had something to do with tracking down Skulker for one reason or another. Vengeance over a broken guitar being the go-to excuse.
But the pervasive loneliness was getting to Daniel, and rather than shoo her away, he'd insisted she stay. After initially (and futilely) attempting to kick him off her leg, she eventually gave in… on one condition. She got to decide how they spent their time together, and there was only one thing Ember ever wanted.
"Oh, Ember, you will remember. Ember, one thing remains. Oh, Ember, so warm and tender. You will remember my name."
Daniel sang along to the only song Ember seemed to know, or at least, the only song she ever played. He didn't care. It dulled the sensations of solitude and doubt he felt.
Singing along, however, fed into her obsession, and her blue flaming hair grew to flare with intensity. Even from where Daniel was seated, he could feel the radiant heat.
"Your heart, your heart has mended. You're wrong, now bear the shame. Like dead trees in cold December, nothing but ashes remain."
The further into the song they got, the fiercer the blaze on Ember's hair became. The flames seemed to bounce in tune with the beat. But at some point, the simple pleasure of enjoying her company was negated by the ever increasing heat from the musician. So Daniel ceased to sing along, thinking that would dull her obsession, and in consequence, her hair.
"Oh, Ember, you will remember. Ember, one thing remains. Oh, Ember, so warm and tender. You will remember my name."
Ember continued to sing and strum, and yet the heat didn't dissipate.
… If anything, it got worse.
The young ghost was no longer paying attention to Ember or her song. Instead he uncomfortably shifted around in an attempt to discretely shield himself from the burning. There was no appreciable consequence.
It was hot; It was getting hotter; And then it became too HOT.
Daniel screamed.
The room felt like an inferno, and it was no longer possible to — Wait, smoke? Holy! He was burning! Green embers formed on his surface. Daniel flew around the room and rolled on the ceiling in a wasted attempt to put himself out.
Everything was a blur. He couldn't think. His whole world was just burns and burning.
It was only after Daniel was splashed with a bucket of water was he aware, in the most cursory part of his mind, that Ember was no longer playing her song. Had he paid her any mind, he would've noticed that she was wrought with concern, and that her hair was back to its normal flame.
But he did not… the pain was everything and everywhere and sucked at all his focus.
"DANIEL!" shouted a new voice.
Powerful arms held onto him, and almost immediately, the widespread embers extinguished themselves leaving behind smoldering wounds that would not immediately heal over.
Plasmius turned to Ember and ordered, "Get out."
Ember, confused and helpless, protested, "But I didn-"
"GET OUT!" Plasmius repeated in a shout.
It was perhaps the quickest exit stage left Ember had ever performed. She snatched her guitar and then was gone.
When Daniel had recovered enough to take in his surroundings, he was surprised to see his father looking over him. Surprised for two reasons. The fact that his father was back, and more so, the fact that he was alone.
Hadn't that been the whole point of the trip? Hadn't his dad gone to get his mom and bring her here?
Before Daniel could say anything, his father turned towards the lab. He gathered a huge orb of pink ecto-energy in his hand and then sent it flying. The lab erupted in an inferno of deadly pink flames
"Dad?" Daniel asked confused and alarmed. "What's going on? Where's mom? Ember didn't mean-"
His dad was silent for a moment, and when he turned around Daniel could see that he was sad. He floated towards his son gently, then hugged him in a way he hadn't since the two had first found each other.
Daniel was even more confused now, but before long, his dad pulled out of the hug, gently holding onto Daniel's shoulders instead.
"Daniel, listen to me," he said, and his voice was very serious. "Your mother isn't coming."
"Why not?" Daniel asked, surprised and outraged.
"Because . . . " his dad paused. Daniel was taken aback – was his dad crying? His dad never cried!
"Because," he continued. "You don't have a mom. I'm just glad you're alright."
"Ember didn't mean t-" Daniel insisted.
"Ember?" Plasmius asked, momentarily confused, before realizing what Daniel meant. So he clarified what had actually happened to Daniel, and the nature of obsessions… but he never did explain what happened in his absence or how he got back.
Since that day, Daniel made sure to keep his father close, not wanting to repeat the day's event.
Daniel tried to bring up his mom for a while after that. For the first two months, everything was okay. He would ask, and his dad would tell him that he didn't have a mom, that he never had. He'd only ever had a father. That would be the end of the conversation, and in a week or two Daniel would ask again. Daniel began to doubt himself, to wonder if he'd ever really had a mother. He was sure that his father had told him he did, but every time he asked he was told he didn't. It was confusing.
And then one day Daniel asked and his father snapped.
"Daniel! How many times do I have to tell you this! YOU! DO! NOT! HAVE! A! MOTHER!"
Daniel had gotten upset and flown over to Ember's lair because he didn't want to be in the same place as his father anymore. His father never yelled at him before, and when he did, it was – scary.
Less than an hour later, his dad had shown up and apologized for yelling. Daniel had looked up at him, and he looked different. This wasn't the angry ghost yelling at him who wanted to hurt him. This was his dad.
Daniel forgave him.
And he never believed that he had a mother again.
Dvoo . . . nzbyv mlg mvevi . . .
