Chapter 7

Days passed, and as there was no further sign of Vlad, we were hopeful that maybe Vlad wouldn't try to harness Emily's healing powers again. But that all changed one dreary evening.

The four of us were spaced out on mine and Emily's beds, just laughing and chatting and listening to the drizzling rain pitter-pattering on the window. We wanted to have fun, because Emily was being released the next day and going home. Danny and Emily were having a cool ghost duel, and I was rooting for Emily.

As Emily prepared to fire a photon blast, two ghost senses appeared: Danny's icy blue one, and Emily's bright pink one. The ghost sense distracted Emily, and the photon blast went off aim and hit the wall, leaving a gaping hole. None of us noticed though. We were all too busy looking around for the supposed ghost.

We soon found it. The ghost of a young woman, maybe in her thirties appeared in the room. Her long brown hair fell to her waist, and her hazel eyes scanned the room anxiously. Her face looked worried and troubled. She looked a bit hazy, as if some hidden power was constantly tugging her back into the ghost zone.

Emily's eyes came to rest on the woman and her expression changed. It went from alert and excited, to confused, to sad, and then to questioning.

"Mom?" Emily asked softly. And she was plunged into a torrent of heart-wrenching memories.

It was only a few years ago. Her mother had lain on her deathbed, in the last stages of kidney failure. Emily had sat by her mother's side, watching her, and hoping that the inevitable would never come.

"Emily..." her mother had whispered softly, the battle between life and death draining her strength. Emily moved closer, running her fingers through the tangled and dirty hair that hadn't been washed in weeks.

"Please...massage...me." Emily had to lean in close to hear the words.

"Ok, mom." Emily reached over and started to massage her dying mother's shoulders. Purely by accident, her hands became intangible and slipped through her mother's skin. At the time, she didn't realize what was happening. It was only later, when she started to piece together the clues, that she discovered this strange new power.

Emily didn't know how long she had massaged her mother when Michelle, her mother, straightened up.

"You know, sweetie, I think that really helped!" said Michelle brightly. To Emily's amazement, the long-forgotten color returned to her mother's gray face.

Michelle lifted herself out of the bed and stood up for the first time in months. She paced across the room, and faced her daughter.

"I can walk again!" she had whispered, ecstatic.

Emily had felt a shiver of excitement go down her spine. She had made her mother better. Somehow Emily's massage had done what no doctor or medication could do: cure her mother.

But her glory had been short-lived, Emily remembered with a wave of grief. After a few hours, Michelle had become tired, and had climbed back into bed. Within the hour, the battle with Michelle's defected kidneys had been lost, and Michelle was dead.

Emily had moved with her father to Ashmane Park, the nearest town to Amity Park, after her mother's funeral. It was then she heard wild stories, about a ghost kid named Danny Phantom. After a few months of slowly piecing the puzzle together, Emily had come to the conclusion that her strange transformations, her kind of "alter ego" was her ghost half. And her failed healing attempt on her mother was a new ghost power, one that this "Danny Phantom" didn't have. Emily realized that her powers were not fully developed, and this was the most probable cause of why her mother seemed to have gotten better after Emily's massage, but then died anyway.

It wasn't easy struggling with both a physical disability and ghost powers. But now, with the help of Danny and his friends, Emily's powers were more developed, and she was now able to heal successfully. She still felt guilty though. Her powers may have saved Sam, but it was too late for her mother.

Or was it? Emily wondered as she stared at her mother's ghost. Had her mother come back to give Emily a second chance?

"Emily...I cannot stay here for long. Because I was not born a ghost, I can only be a ghost for a very short period of time. But know this: I have come to warn you. Vlad is still after your healing powers, and he will do anything to get them. The only thing that can protect you is if you make peace with your ghost half. I know that for many months, your human and ghost half have been in a constant battle. I warn you now: Make peace. And in order to do that...you must begin..." Michelle was growing fainter now. "...at the beginning!" And then, just as quickly as she had come, she was gone.

The four teens sat and stared at each other for a moment. Then Danny voiced what they were all thinking.

"What was that all about?" Sam and Tucker looked bewildered, but Emily was nodding slowly.

"That was my mother." Emily said, and then she launched into the story of her mother's comeback from death, only to be snatched away by death for good.

"And I believe what she said just now." Emily finished. "And tomorrow, when they discharge me from the hospital, I'm not going home. I'm going on a journey. I don't know where I'm going, or when I'll get there. I just know that it'll help me to begin at the beginning." Emily's friends exchanged looks, then Sam spoke.

"We're going with you." Emily smiled, but her eyes were troubled and confused.

"Begin...at the beginning." she murmured.

A/N: Well, well, well, how'd you like that! I am SO SO SO SORRY I haven't updated in months I've had the worst case of writers block EVER. But now the story's more open. PLEASE READ AND REVIEW! Next chapter should be coming soon...