A/N: The songs for this chapter are, in this order, "As lovers go" by Dashboard confessional and "Changes" By Butterfly Boucher featuring David Bowie, you can find both on the Shrek 2 soundtrack. Thank you to the following reviewers: Cassie 101, Allie Phantom, Mystitat, PotterPhan21, DxS Phreak, cariadiorarua, LovelyxBunchaxCoconuts, Just A Thinker and aryasaphira. Thank you all! This chapter's a little long so you have been warned! ;;
"Hey Grandpa, Grandma said you were down here." Alex said happily as she walked down the stairs to the basement.
"Hey Alex, you probably shouldn't be down here you know, it's dangerous." Jack said reproachfully.
"I suppose you won't be wanting these cookies then?" Alex grinned offering a plate of the hot treats.
"Oh… okay… but don't tell Maddie I let you stay down here." Jack grinned conspiratorially before nabbing a cookie. After handing her grandfather a few things around the lab that he needed; wrench, screwdriver, ectoplasmic balancer, spirit level (bad dum bum tsch), and so on she was free to roam around her Grandfather's lab. This was a rare occurrence as her grandfather was normally very secretive about his lab. Goodness only knows why, it's not like she was going to go stick her finger in power sockets or something, after all what was the worst that could happen?
She mooched further back into the lab and stopped before a big circular object covered by a white sheet, curiosity got the better of her and Alex reached out to pull aside the sheet.
"Alex! Hey Alex!" her Grandfather's voice called, Alex's hand froze, how did he always know when she was about to find something cool?
"Yeah Grandpa?" Alex asked wandering back to him a little annoyed.
"Can you run down to the mechanics and pick up these things for me? I'm all out." Jack asked sighing and offering a scribbled list to her.
"Sure." Alex nodded grabbing her bag and walking up the stairs.
Alex opened the door to the Amity Park Mechanics and Parts store, the comfortingly familiar sound of the bell above the door rose her from studying the list that her grandfather had written in his obscure handwriting.
"Hey Ms. Fenton." The head mechanic Joe smiled as she entered.
"Hello generic mechanic Joe." Alex teased him.
"Hah! Watch it you! What'll it be today then?" Joe laughed leaning on the counter.
"Hm, well, my Grandpa wrote it so this first thing could be copper wire or shanghai elephants. Which do you think?" Alex asked jokingly.
"I'd go with the copper wire myself." He said placing it on the counter.
"Okay, but if grandpa asks where his elephants are I'll tell him who's responsible. Anyway, a box of size two screws, some standard metal plating and one reel of ectoplasmic string." Alex read off the list.
"You know I only stock this stuff for you lot." Joe laughed waving the glowing string at her.
"Well you shouldn't, it's only encouraging bad science." A snooty man with a long pointy nose sneered next to Alex.
"Oh my god, is that a nobel prize committee member over there?" Alex asked surprised and pointed across the room.
"WHAT! Where!" The man jumped before running off in search of his nobel prize.
"Between you and me, at least you lot pay your tab and don't go around acting like that." Joe whispered conspiratorially.
"Heh, speaking of which, charge it to Fenton Works account will you?" Alex asked piling her grandfather's stuff into her arms and walking off with a goodbye.
Just as she was walking out the door someone slammed right into her, Alex's stuff dropped to the floor with a lot of loud clatters.
"Oh great." Alex muttered bending down.
"Oh no, please let me." A voice said and a boy bent down and helped her pick up her stuff.
"And who the hell are you?" Alex demanded bluntly as she brushed her hair out of her eyes and glared at him.
"I'm Max, and I'm sorry for making you drop your stuff, can I at least help you pick it up?" He asked hopefully, she looked up at him, waves of dark brown hair hung in his chocolate-coloured eyes, he had glossy coffee coloured skin and Alex had to admit, he was pretty cute.
"Sure." She blushed picking up her stuff.
"What's this?" Max asked holding up the glowing blue string.
"I… it's ectoplasmic string." Alex sighed knowing what was coming next.
"Ectoplasm? As in… ghosts?" He asked looking at Alex curiously.
"Yes okay!" Alex snapped snatching it back and starting to walk off, she'd been laughed at enough recently, she didn't need any more.
"Hey wait! I didn't mean to upset you!" He shouted after her.
"You… you're not going to laugh at me?" Alex asked suspiciously.
"No, if it's possible then there's no reason not to try it. After all, if science always stuck to what it knew, we wouldn't know anything." Max said sincerely, Alex face cracked into a broad smile.
"You're not from around here are you?" Alex asked still smiling.
"No, I just got here." He replied a little puzzled at this.
"Well welcome to Amity Park, I'm Alex Fenton." She said re-shuffling her stuff and shaking his hand.
"Where's all that stuff going anyway?" Max asked helping Alex carry her stuff now that she seemed to have forgiven him.
"Fenton Works, my Grandfather's business, him and my dad are kind of the local ghost hunters." Alex said slowly as she watched for any signs of Max about to laugh at her or her family.
"You certainly don't do anything halfway do you?" Max said with a little laugh.
"No, but they wouldn't get any business if- did it just get colder?" Alex asked with a shiver.
"BEWARE! I am the box ghost!" A blue man said appearing out of the floor waving his arms in the air. Max jumped, Alex sighed, even SHE was sick of this particular ghost and unlike her poor father she didn't have to deal with him on a regular basis. She pulled a blue gun out of her pocket that had a strange resemblance to a water pistol and levelled it at the ghost.
"You have three seconds." Alex warned.
"What the hell are you doing?" Max hissed terrified.
"One." Alex said ignoring him.
"Beware?" The box ghost said uncertainly, this wasn't how it was supposed to go was it?
"Two." Alex continued.
"I am the box ghost!" he shouted throwing a box at Alex knocking her and her stuff over and fleeing for his afterlife.
"THREE!" Alex growled shooting after him, there was a yelp of pain in the distance. Alex got up and inspected the box to check it was normal before loading her stuff into it, she casually stuck the gun back into her back pocket before walking off leaving Max standing there with his mouth hanging open.
"Wh- does that happen OFTEN!" He asked shocked as he ran to catch up with her.
"Fairly often, yet everyone thinks we're crazy." Alex sighed, she didn't understand people.
"Well I don't, THAT was crazy, not you!" Max gawped.
"You know, I'm really starting to like you." Alex grinned.
Alex pushed the door to her grandfather's lab open with her foot as she struggled with her newly acquired box full of stuff. "Hey Grandpa I got the things you asked me to get- Grandpa?" Alex called to the empty room.
Alex wandered through the deserted laboratory abandoning the recently haunted box and its contents on one of the few empty work benches. The laboratory was huge now; her father had told her that it had at least quadrupled in size and junk content since he was her age. It was slightly dusty in this section of the lab; Alex guessed it must be used mostly for storage. She continued through the lab, the things around her getting progressively dustier. Alex stopped in front of the same large white sheet covered thing that she had been face to face with before, she paused before pushing a fold of the sheet aside and walking into the space it covered.
"This… this is a ghost portal." Alex murmured looking around, it was larger than the one she had designed, easily big enough for her to stand in and it was slightly different inside but definitely a ghost portal. Why had her grandfather never told her about this? Alex shrugged off her jacket, leaving her in her white sleeveless shirt and jeans and walked further in to investigate. Suddenly her foot caught on a stray bit of metal on the ground tripping her up and making her fall onto the wall. Alex stared at her outstretched hand in horror as it lay on the on button, in the back of the portal a dauntingly familiar green swirl began.
"Oh shi-" Alex whimpered before the bright flash and the force of the blast silenced her.
Words swirled around Alex's memory as she rose back into consciousness.
"What could you possibly need from me?"
"Oh nothing yet, you won't be any good to me until tomorrow…"
Alex blearily opened her eyes and stared at an arm as it lay on the ground in front of her, it took her a moment before she realized that it was HER arm. This was mainly because it was a deathly pale white and glowing slightly. Alex noticed that patches of the skin (it still didn't feel like it was her skin just yet) were black, they looked like cuts and grazes and bruises, but they were all black, as if someone had painted them on her with ink. Alex's hands flew to her face and she dashed to a nearby mirror and gasped in horror at what she saw.
The skin around her eyes was completely black too as if she'd been punched there, as were the undersides of her cheekbones, her face almost looked like Halloween face paint of a skull! Her hair was long, almost to her knees and the part of her hair that had been bleached white was not jet black and the bits the had been black were now a brilliant white, she was missing a trouser leg at the knee and had somehow lost her shoes.
"Great now I look like a zombie." Alex sighed. She looked at her hands, they were a mess of crisscrossed black lines, she made them into fists and idly knocked them together. Suddenly blue rings slid from her fists and up her arms and eventually covered her entire body. Alex turned to the mirror to see her own normal face looking back at her.
"So that's how Danny Phantom remained undetected…" Alex mused at this new insight.
"Alex! Alex are you down here?" her grandfathers voice called her. Alex quickly checked herself in the mirror, she looked normal apart from her clothes… Even the portal looked normal, not like it had just been accidentally used, maybe she was safe…
"Uh, yeah grandpa I'm back here." Alex replied trying to think of excuses for her ragged appearance.
"What happened to you!" Jack yelped shocked thinking of how much trouble he would be in with Maddie if she found out something had happened to Alex, he didn't even want to think about his son's reaction if Alex was hurt in HIS lab.
"I… uh…" Alex panicked with no excuse coming to mind.
"You look like you've just had an electric shock!" Jack gasped.
"I- yes! That's exactly what happened! But I feel fine now, no need for a hospital or anything." Alex sighed relieved.
"Do you feel okay? Let's get you some new clothes, and ah, don't tell your father about this okay?" Jack asked hopefully.
"Sure Grandpa." Alex smiled.
