Hey Yall! I'm finally back with an update. Sorry it took me literally five-ever, writer's block is such a pain T_T
Anywho, please feel free to leave me reviews or comments! I'm hoping that I'm able to keep with the characters personality in this one.
All the characters belong to their creators.
Enjoy! ;]
"I don't wanna goooo!" Becca groaned as they made their way back up to the rooftop later that evening. It was already dark, and after a full day of training with Dan all she wanted to do was eat and sleep.
"Quit whining titty baby," he growled rolling his eyes. "The sooner we get this over with the sooner we can get back for you to go to bed."
"This is such bullshit," she mumbled under her breath. Ignoring her petulant attitude Dan crossed his arms and huffed at her.
"Just quit yer bitchin and get over here already," Walking to where he stood, Becca hooked her arm around around his waist as he looped his arms around her shoulders. With a wave of his hand, a ghost portal appeared out of thin air.
"When do I get to learn that?" She asked curiously.
"Not until you master everything else." He replied curtly.
"What! Why?" She pouted.
"Because if you don't do it right then you'll be stuck in the neither world. And before you ask, no I can't take you there." He grumbled before she could open her mouth to answer. "It's a place where even I can't get in and out of."
"Hm. I thought you said you could do it all phantom." She teased.
"Even I have my limits," he glowered down at her pulling her even closer to him. "Now hang on tight."
Holding her breath, she wrapped her arms around Dan as they teleported them to the ghost zone. Once they stepped through to the other side, she opened her eyes. She was surprised to be surrounded with nothing but emptiness, the only thing in sight was the small floating island her and Dan stood on.
She looked up at him and noticed how his eyebrows knit together in confusion and worry. "I thought we were going to Clockwork's tower?"
"We are," he replied tensely looking around them, "That's where I tried to take us but instead we showed up here."
Taking a step away from him, Becca carefully made her way to the edge of the giant rock to peek over the side. All of a sudden the ground beneath the shook as a booming roar came from every direction.
"Who dares trespass in my territory!" A male voice thundered. The sound was so loud that Becca had to cover her ears. Black clouds swirled from the abyss and surrounded Becca, when all of a sudden she felt herself being lifted off the ground.
Suddenly she saw him. The Black smoke began to materialize into a giant behind Dan. A massive ghost, probably five times bigger than Dan covered in black armor suddenly appeared, his face a glowing white and his hair a bright fluorescent green. Looking into his face Becca noticed an eye patch, and a scar that ran down the side of his cheek into his matching green beard. Atop his head floated a glowing green crown, and slung on his waist was a black and green sword. As he floated there his tattered black and red cape whipped around him.
"Ah," he grumbled, completely ignoring Dan and focusing on Becca, "the entire ghost zone has been looking for you, little reaper."
"HEY!" Dan shouted still in his human form, "keep your fucking grubby hands off of her Pariah!"
Finally noticing his presence, the giant sneered down at Dan. "How dare you use my name with such informality, human."
Wondering why Pariah Dark didn't recognize him, he suddenly realized his disguise was still in place. As an arrogant grin slid on his phase, Dan phased into his true form. "I'm no human, son."
"Phantom," Pariah muttered. Becca could tell by the twitch in his jaw he was trying to hide his apprehension. Just exactly how powerful is Dan if he makes a ghost this big nervous on sight?
"You know I usually hate missing an opportunity fighting you," Pariah began airily, "but I have bigger matters to attend to. Matters in which I need the girl to complete."
Panic settled into Becca as the grip from the smoke began to tighten and bring her closer to Pariah. Shock and worry shone on Dan's face as he tried to think of a way out of this. Just as Pariah opened a portal, Becca saw Dan take a deep breath.
Suddenly he opened his mouth, and the most god awful sound came pouring out. Becca was amazed, the sound was so powerful she could see the actual sound waves echo as they came out of Dan. She couldn't watch for long though, before she knew it her world crashed into complete darkness.
She couldn't tell how long she was out for, but she woke up on she same couch in Clockworks tower, except this time she was alone and still wearing her own clothes. Two voices drifted in from down the hall, through the door that was left ajar. Sitting up on the couch her head began to pound.
"Motherfucker…" she muttered closing her eyes. She was glad that the room was dimly lit, the only light filtered in through the window from the ghost zone casting everything in a emerald hue. Getting her bearings she carefully stood up and made her way down the candlelit hall.
Once she made her way out of the room she recognized the voices of Dan and Clockwork. The closer she got the more louder the voices and clearer their words became until finally she realized that one of them was shouting.
"You've gotta get these fucking bonds off of me!" she heard Dan shout, "I was barely able to get her from Pariah before they shocked the shit out of me. If ghosts are really gonna be coming after her then I have to be able to keep her safe. I can't do that if I have these stupid fucking restrictions."
She could barely hear Clockwork's response. Despite Dan biting his head off, Clockwork's voice was still low and steady.
"I already told you Phantom the conditions of your probation. The only way I let you loose in the human world is with those restraints put in place. I can't have you blowing up the entire planet again."
"But have I fucked anything up yet?!" Dan roared, "This entire time I've been doing your fucking bitch work, never once have I even strayed towards crossing the line."
"You're right, you haven't" Clockwork agreed, "But I can't trust that your temper won't get out of control."
By now Becca had made it to the door of Clockwork's office. There Dan stood in all his ghostly glory, across from him sat Clockwork at his desk. She was surprised to see the capsule holding her reaper self was open, her other half sleeping peacefully suspended in the glowing blue liquid. Before she could say anything, Dan's white fire hair flared with his anger.
"Are you fucking kidding me," he was cut short by glowing bands around his wrists and neck. Dropping to the floor he screamed in agony.
"What the fuck are you doing to him?!" she cried running to Dan's side. She grasped at the glowing bands hoping to pry them off, but instead she recoiled from the electrical shock. Her anger starting to rise she summoned an energy ball in her hand to shoot at Clockwork.
"B-becca, stop it," Dan ground out still doubled over in pain.
"Not until he stops hurting you," she growled.
"I'm not controlling those electrical impulses," Clockwork explained calmly, "those restraints are tied directly to his power core. As soon as he gets angry, he is temporarily incapacitated until his emotions are brought back under control."
"You mean this is happening because he's fucking pissed?!" When Clockwork nodded to her, she fell on her knees in front of Dan, placed her hands on either side of his face and tried to force him to look at her.
"Dan, calm down. Please," She nearly begged. He's eyes were still shut, his face twisted in agony as a groan tumbled out of his mouth. "Dan, listen to me. There's no reason to be mad."
At this his eyes shot open boring into hers. His unneeded breath came in gasps as his bonds relentlessly attacked him, his anger was nearly spiraling out of control. Pressing her forehead to his she tried to get him to focus.
"Look at me Dan. I'm fine," She soothed. His gasps finally slowed down into huffs as eventually the pain slowly began to subside. Slowly petting the side of his cheek, they both sat there foreheads together until he sighed tiredly.
Looking up at Clockwork Becca tried to curb her own temper. "Take the fucking glowy things off. Now." She growled.
"I'm sorry Becca," Clockwork reasoned," I can't tru-"
"Either you fucking take them off or I'm done with all this reaper bullshit." She stood up with a huff to stare him down. "You said yourself the only person who could do it was me."
Looking up at her, Dan's chest bloomed with a warm tenderness that he would never admit to. It was strange after all these years having a person actually stick up for you when you were getting borderline tortured.
Clockwork stood from his desk and floated up suddenly to her. Dan's anger flared again the closer the time ghost came, making his bonds shock him senseless again. Becca's gaze shot to him with worry before squaring up with Clockwork.
"Please," she insisted, "Dan's right. If he wanted to start any issues he would've done it by now."
"You have no idea the chaos he unleashed in his timeline. Maybe I should show you so you can understand the monster you're asking me to release." he stated calmly, raising his ticking staff ready to summon a viewing portal.
"No!" Dan strangled out, "Please, don't show her."
Clockwork raised his eyebrows in surprise. Never had he heard Dan use such polite language with anyone since his creation. Yet here he is asking, not commanding, that he keep his past a secret. This whole situation just made Becca more curious about the things Dan had done.
"If you insist," with a wave of his hand, Clockwork released the bonds making Dan sigh in relief. Slowly the angry glow dissolved until they disappeared completely.
Dan took a couple steadying breaths before getting back on his feet. As he glanced down at Becca he noticed she was watching him with worry, then he realized he was still in his ghost form. In a flash his human disguise appeared once again.
"Oh will you give it a rest already?" Becca groaned crossing her arms, "that stupid human disguise has given us nothing but trouble since we got here."
"She has a point phantom," Clockwork agreed, "If you stay in your natural form other ghosts won't be so quick to antagonize you."
"Tch," he grumbled then let his human looks fade away. Watching Becca carefully he gauged her reaction. Thankfully she just gave him a reassuring smile and looked back to Clockwork.
"So are you two going to tell me what's going on?" She huffed.
Dan and Clockwork shot each other a look before Dan started to explain.
"Well I was explaining to Clocky here how your powers were manifesting sooner and stronger than we expected. Apparently, this now means you have your own ectosignature."
Becca scrunched her nose in confusion. "Ecto wha?"
"Ectosignature. Think of it as an aura for ghosts." Clockwork explained, "No two ghosts have the same ectosignature."
"Okay," Becca nodded slowly, "but why does this mean that other ghosts are after me?"
Dan's eyebrows show up in surprise. "You heard that?"
"Well you were kinda screaming," she deadpanned, before turning to Clockwork, "Speaking of which I'm getting tired of getting knocked out and waking up on your couch."
"You can blame this one and his god forsaken ghostly wail for that," he muttered pointing to Dan.
"ANYWAYS," Dan yelled, "All ghosts can detect another ghost's ectosignature, kind of like a sixth sense you gain when you die. The stronger the ghost, the more sensitive this sense."
"How come you didn't sense it?" she asked.
"I did, but I figured it was because I was close to you." Dan crossed his arms making his chest appear even wider than normal. Becca tried in vain to hide her blush as she watched his muscles move. Thankfully he continued before she could get too distracted. "Think of an ectosignature as a beacon, when you're close to a ghost you'll constantly feel it, but the farther away it is the weaker it gets."
"I still don't get it," Becca grumbled, "Why does this mean that ghosts will start to come after me specifically? How would they know that it's me they're going after and not some other ghost?"
"Because not only can stronger ghosts detect someone's ectosignature from farther away, they can differentiate between different ones." he explained.
Becca stood there for a minute mulling all of this over. Walking over to her reaper half she gazed into the capsule. "So this basically means we're running out of time." she whispered.
"Essentially, yes," Clockwork muttered softly, "I've been able to keep things relatively under control, but there's only so much I can interfere with before the fabric of time starts to tear. We originally thought we had up to six to eight months for you to train and fuse with your reaper half. Now we're looking at closer to three to four."
"So that means-" she began.
"That means we gotta get your ass in gear." Dan cut her off, "The longer we wait the stronger your ectosignature will become, and that means more ghosts will come after you in the human world."
After a few hours of explaining between the trio, they had eventually made their way to one of the many rooms in clockwork's tower. This room in particular was cozier than the rest, a fireplace was the main focus of the room with overstuffed couches and chairs surrounding it. The hearth was lit with a blazing fire, more so to keep Becca warm than anything, she had fallen asleep not long after they settled in, having laid her head in Dan's lap to watch the fire.
Dan himself was too wrapped up in the conversation with Clockwork to even notice her position. After he and Clockwork formulated a new plan of action, Clockwork motioned to Becca and spoke quietly.
"You seemed to have gotten attached to your pupil rather quickly." He muttered, eyeing their position.
Dan just scowled and threw him a glare. "There isn't an attachment. I'm just trying to hurry up and get this over with so I can be free."
Clockwork didn't bristle at his tone like other people would. Instead he just leaned back in his tall wingback chair and stared into the fire.
"You know it's okay to say you like her Dan," he replied smoothly, "just because you form a relationship with someone doesn't mean you're weak."
Dan sat there for a minute deep in thought. He would never admit it out loud, but he had grown to have a special fondness for Becca. She saw him with new eyes, not with disdain for his past actions. Granted she didn't know exactly what he'd done before and he'd like to keep it that way. Having someone look upon him with kindness instead of fear or anger was refreshing, like taking a breath after being underwater for too long.
But he also knew attachments were dangerous. It's what got him here in the first place. He learned when he was human relationships caused more stress and pain than they were worth. Once those bonds were broken, or those people were inevitably killed or died, the pain could be blinding. He made a vow to himself that he'd never put himself in that vulnerable of a position, but he could see himself changing all because of one snarky human and that scared him.
"Like I said, I'm not attached to anybody or anything." He lied.
"Well if that's the case then there's no need for me to share my warning to you." Clockwork smirked.
Dan knew the old time ghost was baiting him, but his curiosity was too great to care. "What warning?" He mumbled.
"If you let things progress with Becca beyond that of a platonic friendship before she fuses with her reaper half, she won't be able to complete the fusion at all."
"What the hell makes you think-" Dan barked, his cheeks and ears tinged with a green blush.
Clockwork held up his hand to cut him off. "Don't play coy with me Phantom. You forget I see it all; past, present and future. I know that Becca will be in your afterlife some way for the rest of your existence, some ways as a close friend and others as a lover. Just know that if things become romantic before her fusion, her soul will become unstable and therefore unable to House her reaper half."
"Well you don't have to worry about that," he stated resolutely. Sliding his hand gently under Becca's head, he adjusted her so he wouldn't disturb her from him standing up. "Nothing will ever happen between us. Ever." As he made his way to pick her up to leave, Clockwork stood to stop him.
"Before you go, I have something I wish to give her," reaching in a hidden pocket in his tunic, he pulled out one of his signature time medallions. "You can explain to her how to use this. In case she ever needs to get to me."
Dan stared at the heavy medal with apprehension at first, then nodded firmly and shoved it in the pocket of his jeans. One of the things they had discussed was Becca being able to flee to Clockwork's tower should shit hit the fan in the human world. Without another word, Dan scooped Becca up bridal style off the couch. With a wave of his staff, Clockwork opened a portal back to Becca's apartment.
"Remember my warning Phantom," he chided sternly before Dan could slip away, "If she can't take control of her reaper half then the world and ghost zone as we know it will be over."
"Yeah yeah I heard ya the first time," he growled. Before he was subjected to more lecturing he carried Becca through the portal and back into the human world.
