3. Inquiries
To say Danielle was hungry was a severe understatement.
The girl raided out his refrigerator, consuming everything but the soymilk and the green peas.
Lancer didn't have very much to begin with, so he took her a nearby buffet.
It was cheap and ...
And he was severely astonished.
He had told her to help herself to whatever she wanted.
And now he was watching her ingest abnormally large quantities of food.
He'd assumed after the fifth serving of food she'd be full, but she continued shoving forkfuls of meat into her mouth.
Lancer wondered if she burned a lot of calories, but that couldn't be possible.
Ghosts didn't have calories.
He voiced his thoughts. "I thought ghosts didn't eat."
Danielle stopped eating abruptly and gave him a look that made him feel like an imbecile.
"How would you know?" Dani queried, shoving noodles into her mouth.
"Well," Lancer began sheepishly. "I've listened to Jack Fenton's ghost rants on more than one occasion."
She flashed him a questioning look.
"He's the parent of two of my students and also an expert on ghosts." Lancer didn't mention his uncertainty of the Fenton's expertise. "Anyways, I've also gathered a smidgen of information from personal research."
"Uh-huh," Danielle replied, rolling her eyes. "If you must know ghosts don't really need to eat. Some do but never out of necessity. They don't get hungry like humans do."
"But you told me you were hungry," Lancer pointed out.
"There's always an exception to the rule."
Lancer managed to hide his frustration. He didn't like not knowing.
He wanted answers, and the girl was being very vague and providing more questions than answers.
A million questions flooded through his mind. He hoped if he kept asking, he'd eventually get some answers.
He decided to go for the question that most begged for a response.
"Do ghosts breathe?"
"No." Danielle responded immediately. "They can inhale and exhale, so they can sigh or blow out air. But it takes a lot of concentration on their part, and they absolutely do not have to breath. No ghost ever bothers to try it either. Breathing is no longer an issue the moment one becomes a member of the undead population."
"But you breath," Lancer noted. "And it's not, as you say, forced, like other ghosts. I saw you do it when you were unconscious. Which means it is not a conscious action for you."
The girl froze for a millisecond then recovered so quickly Lancer almost doubted having made the observation.
She leaned back and crossed her arms over her chest.
"Which means you have mortality," Lancer deduced. "Like a human."
He held his breath, waiting for a response.
"That's for me to know and you to never find out." Danielle flashed him a cheeky smile and continued eating.
Lancer sighed and rubbed his temples.
He had already formed a conclusion: this ghost was very human.
He didn't know how it was possible or even if it was possible, but that what his best bet.
He'd hung around her long enough to recognize those irrefutable human qualities.
Maybe her death was so recent that, as a ghost, she hadn't completely lost her human qualities.
Or maybe she hadn't died.
Or maybe she hadn't died completely, like any other ghost.
Maybe her death was only a partial death.
It was possible, he figured.
And considering the information she had given him, it was probably the latter.
His gaze drifted away from her face, drawn to a familiar logo branded proudly on her chest.
A curious thought floated into Lancer's head.
"So, you're Danny Phantom's cousin."
The spoon's route came to a sudden halt just centimeters from her mouth.
The girl remained in a frozen position for several seconds.
Her immobility made Lancer uncomfortable.
"I mean, that much is evident. The resemblance is uncanny." He paused. "So you must be relatives. Probably siblings. Am I right?"
Danielle snapped out of her stupor immediately.
She slammed her fork on the table earning curious glances from the few customers present.
No one stared, much to Lancer's relief. They probably just assumed a teenage daughter was overreacting towards a parental authority.
She leaned forward and balled her hands into fists.
She ripped the sunglasses off her face, so that her glowing green glare was aimed directly at him.
"I am not talking about Danny," she hissed. "You think you can weasel information out of me? Find out his strengths? His weaknesses? You can forget it. If you really want to know, Ask. Him. Yourself."
The girl remained standing for a few moments before she thrust her glasses back on. She sank back into her chair and took a few calming breaths.
Lancer swallowed. She couldn't have made it any clearer that the 'Danny Phantom' subject was completely off limits, which only served to make Lancer all the more curious.
He reluctantly buried away the inquisitiveness. He didn't want to push Danielle, though she made it aggressively clear that, even if he did press for more answers, her lips were sealed.
He needed to let her know he respected her privacy.
"I'm sorry," he finally said.
Danielle peered over her sunglasses at him. It seemed as if she were gauging whether or not he was being honest.
"It's okay," she sighed, sheepish. "Sorry, if I scared you."
"No, you didn't." Lancer smiled.
"It's just-" Danielle picked up her fork and played with the food on her plate. "I've betrayed my cousin twice already. Once because I was made to believe I had no other option, and the second time because I was gullible enough to believe his enemy. Both those times I was being manipulated, so I kind of freaked out when you mentioned Danny who, by the way, is the last person on earth who deserves that."
"I understand, believe me." Lancer sighed, suddenly reminiscent.
A sudden melancholy surged into his heart. Unwanted memories resurfaced. "I've had a few problems with betrayal, as well."
"Did you betray someone you cared about?" Danielle queried.
"Yes."
Danielle remained quiet for a while. When she finally spoke, her response surprised him. "If someone really, truly cares about you, they'll forgive you eventually."
She scooped up another forkful of noodles and shoveled it into her mouth.
A small smile lit up her face.
And then the ground shook.
A/N: Chapter finally completed.
Yay!
Anywho, let me know what you thought of this chapter.
As I've said, feedback and reviews are always appreciated. ;)
