I know that there was a terrible evil cliff hanger in the last chapter and then a long wait until this one, but if it makes you think any better of me it wasn't my fault. My computer wouldn't let me do anything at all.

I became invisible and stared in shock at Sam- err, not Sam. The time belt was nothing more than a thin ring around her waist. What had happened to it you might ask? It is almost too horrible to say.

Sam's skin was pale and vein filled. It bulged in places it shouldn't have underneath her clothes and on her face. You could just barely see through her flesh. The bulges were caused by golden colored tentacles wrapped around inside of her like roots- and they were glowing.

Her eyes were a bright orange-red shade that glowed dangerously as she looked around the cavern. I tried to hold my breath, remembered that I didn't breathe while I was a ghost, and stayed as still as I could. Had she seen me the few seconds that I wasn't invisible? Or had she simply sensed the drop in temperature that comes with the appearance of a ghost?

Finally the suspicious look faded out of her warped face and she stood up off of her throne. Sam's mouth creaked open like a rusty hinge and she began to address the crowd around her. I almost was shocked into becoming visible at the sound of her voice. It was metallic and the syllables were stressed in all of the wrong areas. Oddly enough though it still had pitch and wasn't a monotone like movie robots or mindless zombie ghosts.

"Residents of Amity." Sam said. "Soon I will become the perfect being. The belt I wear on my waist will soon encase me inner structures in metal and my skin will fall off from lack of use." The thought of that made me think of a giant snake that looked like Sam. "I will become a robot. And you will all join me."

As if she was expecting a response from the comatose crowd, (they were all staring at her metallic body like they had when it was just a belt) she paused and then continued. "I have collected enough metal to transmogrify all of you."

I shuddered and her head snapped towards me. I froze in terror and eventually she looked away. "Humans are an inferior race. Only one is more inferior. Would you like to know what that is?" Of course the crowd did nothing. "The most inferior creatures are phantasms, poltergeists, specters, to put it into general terms, ghosts."

The invisible hair on the back of my invisible neck stood up. Why was I always discovered? Is invisibility not enough? Sam turned and stared at where I floated invisibly with intense hatred glaring from her pumpkin orange eyes. She continued staring and a strange shudder went through my spine that made my jaws clatter together.

A smile full of metallic sharp teeth appeared on her face. "I thought that you would come eventually Dan." I blinked and looked at my hand. For some reason I was visible. With a sickening jolt I realized that Sam had somehow stopped me from staying invisible. With another sickening jolt I realized that she had just called me Dan, the name reserved for my evil future self.

My voice caught in my throat as I carefully felt the tips of my ears and bit my lip. Neither my ears nor my teeth were pointed. Sam laughed an evil robotic laugh and said, "You may not be evil yet, but we can change that." Fear clutched at my heart, (if I still had one in my ghost form) and Sam laughed again.

Suddenly I realized that I was floating towards her against my will. The metal visible under her skin was glowing brighter and I realized that she was using my own ghost powers against me. What couldn't that belt do? I struggled in midair and managed to fly away from Sam, but then I lost control and found myself standing next to her.

Sam's evil toothy grin appeared again. "Why are you resisting Dan? Don't you like me?" I felt my powers slip again and my eyes clouded over. What was Sam doing? When they cleared I saw Sam in the dress she had worn at the dance. The metal inside her was gone and her teeth were back to normal. She was smiling and looked beautiful.

I had forgotten that we were standing in a cave filled with hypnotized people. I had forgotten that two seconds ago I was disgusted by how Sam had had metal growing under her skin. I even forgot that she was using my powers against me. All that I knew was that Sam looked lovely.

"Danny," she said in a voice that would make angels jealous, "Why do you have to fight ghosts all the time? Couldn't you give them up, for me? I'll give you a kiss if you want. I do love you after all." I was fighting inside myself. It was almost as if my ghost half didn't want to love Sam, but my human side did.

Sam leaned forward with her lips puckered and the last of my resistance gave. I was about to give her a kiss that would express how long I had loved her when she put a hand in front of her mouth. "Danny there's one more thing I want you to do before we kiss." She said.

In my present state of mind I was willing to do anything, fly around the world, buy gifts, and even become evil. Now that I think about it, it was kind of scary. I smiled and nodded, showing that I was ready to accept whatever she told me.

"I want you to get rid of your ghost form permanently." I jumped back in shock and for a second the room seemed to shudder as if it was fading. Then it became solid and I was back to being infatuated with Sam.

My mouth moved but I couldn't speak. There were times where I had wanted a normal life and for awhile I had lost my ghost powers. But now that I knew what life was like without them I didn't want to go back.

Sam's amethyst eyes bored into mine. Sam. I would get rid of my ghost powers for Sam. It would change my life forever but I would do it only for Sam. I tried to ask how but again the words caught in my throat as if I had lost my voice.

As if reading my mind Sam said, "All that you would have to do is kiss me and those dreadful powers of yours will be gone." She had never called my powers "dreadful" before, in fact she used to like the fact that I was half ghost, but now the only way to have her was to lose my ghost powers.

I was ready. Sam moved closer and puckered her lips gently. I leaned forward and my lips were mere centimeters away from hers when I paused. Her eyes were still open and I had now noticed that the whole time we were talking she hadn't blinked once. It was a silly thing to notice but I did all the same and something about that bothered me.

My eyes flicked and stared into hers. Although they were open they were not seeing, simply open. They were glassy and clear and I saw my own reflection in them. I was still in my ghost form and I looked the same except for one thing. My eyes were blue. They were human eyes.

Sam had short circuited just enough of my ghost form to make me see what she wanted me to see. All of what she had said was a trick. She probably didn't even like me the way I loved her. Anger and sadness mixed and the illusion around me vanished as my eyes became their usual neon green color.

The cavern returned along with Sam's hideousness. My eyes flicked downward and I saw that I was wrapped in golden pulsing tentacles growing out from Sam. Sam was still standing as if she was going to kiss me, and I saw with disgust and sadness that it had been a trap. Out of her mouth a tentacle was waving slightly and I knew that if I had kissed her that thing would get inside of me.

I struggled vainly against the metal things (they had shorted out my intangibility already) and Sam straightened. Her red eyes glared contemptuously at me, and I saw the tentacle slide back into her mouth.

"Maybe I underestimated you Dan." She said in her metallic voice. I realized that I hated being called Dan even more than I had hated being called Daniel. "No human being would have been able to resist that." She looked away as if I was contaminated. "But you aren't exactly human are you?" Sam turned back around and stared at me. An involuntary shudder ran up my spine and a smile formed on her wicked lips.

"So we'll just have to try harder now won't we?"

Can you imagine having metal under your skin? It sounds painful.