I do not own Danny Phantom.

Hormones

Alter

The Park

She wasn't supposed to be out this late. She sure as hell wasn't supposed to be in the Park.

But really now, who believed in ghost stories?

… Well, she actually did, but that was the reason she was here. If there was any truth, at all, to the rumors flying around school then she really had to see it. Or was it him? Or maybe her? How did pronouns factor into spirits?

She shook her head. Thoughts like that would only distract her. And being distracted really wouldn't help.

She took one last look to the path she entered on. It was a measly thing, barely fit to be called a game-trail, much less a path. But it was the only view she was afforded of the outside of the park. The street suddenly looked terribly inviting, seemingly framed by the trees and the vines that covered them.

She took one last fortifying breath and deliberately turned her back on her only route out.

And so, Samantha Manson made her slow, but steady way into the tangled abandoned forest known as Blood Blossom Park.

If she had glanced back, even once, she would surely have noticed the path slowly growing closed. It was no mere movement that blocked off the trail.

It wasn't just a matter of a couple of branches moving to impede the faint path. Not at all…

Instead, there was a shimmering in the air, as heat roiling of a baking slab of asphalt. As the wave moved, it left changes in its wake. Whole trees seemed to appear as from nothing, overgrowth suddenly constricted what was a mere moment ago a path and a multitude of faintly glowing eyes seemed to look longingly to the other side of the street.

Then the wave passed, and the eyes blinked away, and the grasping vines of a much cursed flower was hidden from view.

The forest was silent once more.

"That's … weird…"

She had been here before. No way was there another tree like this anywhere in the world, much less in this Park.

She must have gotten lost or turned around or something. How that might have happened, she had no idea. She had taken a random direction and walked straight forward, not once turning… so how exactly did she end up here, time and time again? Before this very spooky tree, with it's hollowed trunk seeming to leer at her like a cavernous eye?

She grit her teeth and chose another direction.

"Damn."

The tree again. Only it suddenly looked a lot less friendly. She blamed the mist that was starting to coil around her ankles. It made the whole experience much more eerie. And more than a tad surreal.

She could have sworn she saw some vague shape moving in the mist a couple of times before, but it always was just a couple of branches in a strangely human posture, if one were to take only a casual glance.

It was spooky, she would admit that. But she still had her flashlight and the full moon was still shining down, rendering it unnecessary to even use it. Until she came to the occasional overgrown grove, where even the moonlight couldn't penetrate.

She wasn't ashamed to say she shove the light very carefully when she moved through those patches of ominous shadow.

"… I'm starting to hate this tree, I really am."

And it was true.

The thing was still there, mocking her. Or was it always there? Did she just not notice?

She shook her head. Where did that come from?

"God-damnit."

Of course. What did she expect?

Only now, it didn't seem quite so funny anymore.

The tree seemed to hunch forward, threatening in its immobility. It was that strange tenseness that she only felt once before, when she'd stood at the bottom of the tallest building Amity had, and looked up, and wondered what would happen if that strong, sturdy, big tower would suddenly just fall over.

It was not the tower itself that was responsible for that vague feeling of unease, but rather her thoughts turning it into something more than it really was.

So she turn her back on the tree; with its hollow looking more and more like a mouth, just waiting for its next morsel; and laughed with forced cheer.

"FUCK!"

She had given up all pretenses of acting calm.

This place wasn't normal, wasn't even near it. The mist had risen, high above her head. She could not even make out the moon, much less the stars. The vague noises of Amity had also faded, eventually replaced by a startling silence.

But it was a pregnant silence, if such a thing could exist… it brought to mind vague phantoms, taking special, malicious care to be quiet just enough that one wasn't sure if they were really there.

Even the trees looked different. Sinister. Once lush with leaves, they had slowly turned into barely-covered skeletons, gnarled fingers raised to the roof of the world in anguish. In her mad dash around (… and around and around and around…), her flashlight had shown sudden patterns on the bark, horribly like eyes and mouths, looking and wanting…

Another terrified look around, searching for pursuers real or imagined, and she shot off again. The dark closing in slowly, inexorably.

Only the faint glow of the flashlight to blaze a path…

"… god help me…"

The light had died.

It shouldn't have been possible. She had put in fresh batteries before she came here. They should have lasted days not… how long had she been here?

She glanced down at the radium covered arms and blinked… That couldn't be right. It was five minutes to twelve. Which was impossible. She came here after midnight.

Even as she watched, the hands jerked again. Not going forward, counting down the minutes. It jumped backwards, driven by some will other than cool, calm logic.

She stared at the faint glow, unbelieving. Everything she knew, or thought she did, cried out in denial.

Even as she stared at the dial, willing it to work as it should, the faint glow dimmed… dimmed.. dimmed…

Died.

"NO! GO AWAY!"

She didn't know what she was screaming at. In the dark, so complete as she had never even imagined before, it could have been branches or hands. She didn't know, and she didn't care.

There it was again. A fleeting touch on her arm… had it been another person, one might have called it a caress… But it wasn't?

God, she hoped it wasn't…

There couldn't be people here, could there? In this hungry dark, filled with cool mist and rustling leaves?

… why not? She was here, after all…

But still something made her frown… something wasn't right, even more so than being lost in a patch of forest not even two city blocks across…

"…something… something's not right…"

Her thoughts were slow, sluggish. Difficult to form, more difficult to understand. She slowed and forced herself to think, stopping everything, even breathing, in the hopes of realizing what she was missing.

…

…

…

There was no wind. She felt no wind on her skin. So why was she still hearing that faint rustling?

She let out a muffled shriek at that realization, quickly smothered by her own hand.

She wasn't alone.

"stop playing with me. please. just… stop."

The noises had gotten louder. She was almost sure there were things in the darkness, things that made the leaves rustle on purpose, things that made the mist coil coldly around her feet and legs and arms.

Things that were playing with her.

"...please god. its been so long, i know, but please… help me. please. i need some help now..."

She wasn't even sure if her eyes were open or closed anymore. She had been in the dark for too long, stumbling forward, occasionally falling.

Always moving.

The rustling had died away again, but she had no doubt they were still there… whatever they were.

She had no idea how long she had been here. She thought she should have grown hungry on thirsty by now, but she hadn't. But would it have made sense? Things seemed to work differently here.

It felt like her heavy jacket had grown lighter, her shoes heavier, her sweat-soaked shirt dried quicker, her skirt was perpetually wet. She had gnawed all of her nails to the quick at least four times now, and her hair was shorter than it was when she first entered this place.

Or was it?

It was with a dim kind of surprise that she realized she couldn't really remember anymore.

There was a light. It burnt her eyes, made them water, but that wavy shine could only be a light.

She shambled after it, always afraid it would vanish before she managed to drag herself up from the ground again, but it was always in her vision, even if only just.

It felt like she walked forever, maybe longer. Her shoes had fallen away, her skirt and shirt ripped apart by stiff branches. She'd balled her socks and underwear together and thrown them away. They were plastered with mud, and it had started to dry. Drying mud itched and chafed and was generally a tad too unpleasant, even for this nightmare

Her nudity didn't bother her. Her whole body had long since grown numb, but even so, it seemed she had no scratch on her. Her lack of worry might have worried her, but she had bigger things on her mind.

The light seemed to be glowing stronger, the glare cutting through the veil of darkness that had pervaded everything.

But no, the light wasn't growing brighter, she was just drawing closer to it. Had it stopped moving? Why? Was the change good?

She moved more slowly, gingerly coming closer. She crouched behind a few bushes, closed her eyes and mouthed a quick prayer. She stood up and moved forward.

A gasp escaped her lips. It was the tree again, but it seemed so much more than a tree in that instance.

The gaping slash in its trunk had lights spiraling out of it, the glowing orbs crawling over its branches and disappearing into the surrounding greenery. The languid crawl of vaguely blue, green and pink lights was mesmerizing.

She wasn't surprised when she found herself closer and closer to the tree.

She felt no fear when the lights surrounded her, seeming to project an air of amusement and curiosity.

She felt no alarm as one seemed to near her face, intent on some hidden purpose.

She felt nothing more when the magenta light entered her mouth, left open in wonderment.

No-one noticed Samantha Manson coming out of the park at 01:34 that faithful night, naked as the day she was born. If they had, they might have been able to stop what was coming.

For want of a nail, as the saying goes.

AN: So yeah… I was gone for a while, but at least a came back with a bang, yeah? Second longest chapters out of all of them...

… guys? I did good, didn't I?

For the record, no… this didn't start out as a creepy, vaguely eldritch horror story. It just span out that way. I actually kind of love how it came out, but my opinion doesn't matter so much.

On that note, I ask you, my cherished readers, if you review only one chapter out of all of them, please let it be this one. I really want feedback on this, seeing as it was just about different from everything else I've done so far, in just about every way I can imagine.

And yes, I feel the ending's a bit weak, but I really gotta go sleep now.

Read, enjoy and REVIEW. Please.

Update AN: Okay, went back and fixed a couple of typos... Also, thanks for a lot of feedback already. Seems that the consensus so far is 'cool, but weird'... I can deal with that :p

Anyway, the 'for want of a nail' line is actually just kind of a teaser. When I was finishing up this piece, I suddenly had an idea for a continuation for this specific chapter. Things are gonna get a lot worse for this Alternate World.

As DannyPhantom619 reminded me, The chances are good I'm finally gonna get around to that Kisses-arc I've hyped so much... But I think I'm going to post that as a separate story to prevent clutter, otherwise there's going to be reward chapters and things in between them all...

So keep an eye out for that. I'm probably gonna drop a chapter here though, just to say that it's up.

Kinda on the fence still if i wanna do it piece-meal, or wait till I can post em all...

We'll see. It's 04:15 (damn insomnia) and I've not much better to do...

... New plan. Check Wednesday as a soft-goal for Kisses. i work best under pressure anyway...

If Wednesday passes without any progress, you guys start spamming me, mmmkay?

~GrinGrin

PS – when this chapter starts circulating, I'll be breaking 30 000 views. Holy Shit.

Thank all of you. Sincerely.

UPS (Updated Post Script): Four reviews in as many hours. Wow. That's really serendipitous (P&F FTW!). Thanks guys!

UPPS : And no, the ghost(s?) alluded to here isn't Undergrowth. The ghosts work a bit different here, is all...

Written: 10/08/2014

Posted: 10/08/2014

Updated: 11/08/2014