Nothing to say except sorry for the delay but I got an excuse, my lap top crashed and I couldn't write anything for a LONG time, also the fact that I'm trying to come up with ideas for other three fics besides this one is yet another crappy reason as to why I updated this late, well anyway now I'm back and I hope you enjoy this chapter.
Chapter Seven:
Fenton Works:
The house had never been this quiet. It had never been this empty; it had never lacked any movement either from the living or the dead.
No explosions came from the basement caused by Jack Fenton, no arguments could be heard from the teenagers that once lived here, and not even a ghost like sausage was here causing any kind of havoc.
Everything that once defined the house as "normal" was gone.
Suddenly, the silence ended and the doorknob of the front door started to move. Someone was trying to get in.
And it wasn't a ghost.
Eventually, the door opened and Valerie Gray entered the house. She felt kind of queasy being here; it was not something she ever expected.
She shrugged it off as a sudden moment of paranoia and nothing more.
"I'm a ghost hunter after all" she thought with confidence "I have faced death in the face and survived."
Valerie told herself that in an attempt to… well calm herself.
But try as she might, Valerie knew that deep down even she could and would get scared from time to time. After all, she was human, and we all feel fear.
The dark haired teen girl slowly walked into the house, moving her eyes into all possible directions; she was here for a reason. To pay a little visit, in her own way she was giving her respect towards the deceased family.
She was not alone, however, because another person entered the living room.
Vlad Masters had as a request come along with the young girl.
He had kindly refused at first, saying he wanted to get right down to business, but eventually agreed, he didn't know why, he just did.
The man's eyes turned red for a moment, memories of the woman he loved went through his minds. He could even feel a wave of ectoplasm going through his arm, ready to release it at any given moment but suppressed it because he wasn't alone.
And the last thing he wanted was to reveal his secret identity to his pawn.
Speaking of which, Valerie entered the kitchen, she bit her lower lip.
"Why are we here, Miss Gray?"
She jumped; and quickly turned around, only to be face to face with the billionaire that she forgot was behind her.
She didn't calm down, however.
"I don't know, Mr. Masters" She responded unsurely "I just have this feeling that I should be here."
Vlad gave her a questioning look. "Are you expecting to find something?"
She shrugged "Maybe".
And walked away into the next room, which of course was the basement.
Vlad didn't follow.
He went into another direction, mainly Danny's room.
He walked out of the kitchen and slowly made his way towards the stairs. Once he was there, he slowly made his was towards the second floor of the house.
He listened to the creaking of his footsteps as he walked onto a different stair-step.
Once he reached the second floor he felt something, a feeling that wasn't there all those times he had entered this house and he wasn't sure what it was.
After a few stepsmore, Vlad was in front of Danny's room. He slowly moved his arm to grab the doorknob to open the missing boy's room.
Right then, at that very moment, the ghost hybrid knew what was this strange thing he was feeling.
Respect.
He removed his hand from the doorknob. Vlad and Danny might have been archenemies but even the older half-ghost had a level of respect towards the boy.
It wasn't because he was a ghost hybrid like him, and it certainly wasn't because he came out of Maddie, but because he was so damn serious as to protect those he loved as well as an entire city, a city that once thought of him as a menace to society no less. It was his determination and boldness he respected.
So he moved away from the teen's room, deciding that leaving it unopened was for the best.
However, Vlad had no respect towards his former best friend Jack Fenton, so that gave him a new destination.
The somewhat evil man had mixed emotions once the white door came into view.
He felt like crying anew but also felt his blood/ectoplasm rise.
The woman he loved… oh man, there was no denying it, she was beautiful in every way. Masters remembered quite clearly how he met her, hard to forget since it was JACK who introduced her to him.
It was certainly an ironic twist that because of this fat fool he met the love of his life.
Vlad shook his head and his eyes turned from blood red to their normal light blue.
He grabbed the doorknob of the older Fentons room and it wouldn't budge.
The door was locked.
"Should have guessed," Vlad thought in mild irritation.
But of course that wasn't a problem, not when you have ghost powers at least.
Without further ado, he went intangible and went through the door. Once inside the room, he noticed how neatly everything was.
He couldn't hold them anymore; tears finally came out, however, there was no sadness this time.
These were tears of anger.
He was about to leave not because he didn't want to be here but because he wanted to; and that told him there was something seriously wrong with him.
Just when he was turning around, something caught his attention. The man slowly made his way towards the bed. Right there; RIGHT THERE in the middle of the king size bed of the older Fentons was the yearbook of his college.
Just lying there, as if taunting him about his past
"This is not amusing" Vlad whispered thinking SOMEONE was playing a cruel joke on him.
For all he knew that could have been the reason.
He felt tempted to destroy the yearbook, but another more rational part of him told him not to.
Vlad sighed in annoyance as he sat on the neatly made bed. He grabbed the book and eyed it with contempt.
He could feel ectoplasm forming in his hands again.
The man REALLY didn't want to be here now, but the book for some reason was holding him back.
Vlad opened it slowly, not really paying attention to it, he simply turned the page to the next one, and photographs of his better days came back to him.
"Although I wouldn't call it my best days per se."
Truthfully, they were times when he thought he was in hell, and the only comfort he had back then were his only two friends.
Here, he couldn't help but smile at the memories; it was hard to believe that two old chums would be parted because of a woman and an accident.
But then he remembered that he had a reason for hating his former college buddy.
He ruined his life in more than one way and he just couldn't find it in his heart to forgive Jack for the hell that he had to endure after he got the ecto-acne in his face.
Not that he could now.
He roughly flipped another page of the book. This one had a photo of Maddie, Jack and himself in black and white. It was taken the morning before the proto ghost portal incident. Needless to say that Vlad felt someone was enjoying his internal torment.
He had the urge to shut it and leave, but the thing here was that he couldn't do it; something in his guts told him that he HAD to look through it.
"The question is what?"
He turned another page and what he saw next shocked the billionaire.
This wasn't Jack's yearbook.
It was Maddie's.
How did he know? Simple, there it was, in his own handwriting the "good bye" signature that most people write once the year is over or when you are about to finish your education.
Vlad knew that not many did this in college; he, however, felt he had to, because he didn't know when he was going to see his beloved again.
Vlad read out loud "Maddie, I wish you to have a good life. No matter what happens I won't forget our time together in and outside of campus. May we meet again someday. Vlad".
The half-ghost cheeks reddened embarrassingly. He could never forget the meaning behind those words. He had tried several times to tell Maddie how he felt about her, from the time they went to concerts together to even the backwash incident.
He failed miserable and needless to say that he got desperate.
Vlad had planned to tell her about his feelings for her the day the accident with the proto-portal happened.
But of course, the fat bastard had to ruin his last chance to tell her by trying to prove that there is life after death.
Just then Vlad saw Jack's "good bye" right under his own signature.
"If you could even call it that" He thought in disdain.
"Maddie, even though we may have failed at our first attempt at the ghost portal--"
Vlad scowled when he read that "If he only knew..."He continued reading.
"--I'm sure we'll have plenty of more opportunities to make it work. After all, what is a life of dissecting and examination of ghosts if I don't have you by my side?"
Vlad felt disgusted but he kept reading nevertheless.
"I could never do half the stuff without you so I'm really; REALLY happy I met you, Mads".
Love Jack.
Finally the yearbook was shut.
The white haired man honestly couldn't understand what Maddie saw in that fat oaf. Hell, Vlad didn't even comprehend how this oat of a man was once his best friend.
Vlad decided not to waste anymore time so he left the room, hoping that Valerie was done with whatever she was doing in the lab so they could continue on their search for Daniel.
Once the billionaire was on the first floor of the house he noticed that Valerie was now in her ghost hunting suit waiting for him.
"Ms. Gray"? Vlad asked a bit confused "What are you doing?"
Valerie turned around to meet the man's eyes with a smirk that was under her mask "I found something that might help us Mr. Masters".
"Oh?"
The ghost huntress immediately showed her mentor what she found.
A metallic boomerang.
Kitty's place:
"Shadow; attack!"
Green eyes slowly opened a wicked smile and fangs appearing with them. Suddenly Johnny's shadow took a life of its own and attacked Skulker.
The hunter being prepared for this simply smirked "Too much of a coward to face me yourself, Johnny?" He taunted "That's fine. I'll get rid of your pathetic helper, and then you."
Shadow's claws could be seen, but before they could make any real damage Skulker grabbed him by the neck and pinned him to the nearest wall.
"This is too easy".
Shadow turned intangible and got free from the hunter's grip. After that he grabbed Skulker by the waist using his tail and lifted him with ease and threw him across the room.
Unfortunately, that did little damage.
Kitty was hiding behind her boyfriend and watching in silent amazement as the fight progressed.
The mechanical ghost lifted himself from the floor; the evil smirk never left his face.
Wordlessly, he lifted his right arm and a small compartmentopened, before he threwaglowing net out of it. However, he missed the intended target since the black shadow dodged it. Immediately, Skulker reacted and fired a hot blast at Shadow, and this time he had no time to dodge.
The black entity hit a wall destroying a mirror in the process.
Skulker laughed heartedly, clearly seeing the pain his latest prey was in. "This is turning out to be more enjoyable than I thought."
His small victory was cut short since his opponent screeched in anger as it lifted his now bloody head from the carpeted floor. Small pieces of glass could be seen on top of his head,the green ectoplasm ran down his face, and as if on instinct, Shadowlicked his face and tasted the ectoplasm. With murder in his green eyes, he lifted his arms and threw an ectoplasmic energy ray at the hunter.
This time he caused some damage.
Skulker was now missing an eye.
"Ah!"
He put both his hands over his now missing right eye "Damn it!"
Shadow didn't wasted any time, Instantly he wrapped himself around the hunter and started to squeeze the tech ghost as hard as he could.
Both opponents were hurting.
"That's it Shadow!" Johnny cheered "Show him whose boss!"
Kitty thought the danger might be over soon.
She thought wrong.
The hunter as a last resort bit the shadow as hard as he could, causing him to roar in pain. With that distraction he got free, grabbed the ghostly nuisance by the tail and gave him a menacing glare from his semi-destroyed face.
"You gave me a good fight I'll give you that but you're no match for me!"
Just then, a small cannon from his left shoulder came out and fired at the ghost who tried to get away.
But Shadow was unable to dodge in time.
In an instant, Johnny's shadow was snuffed out of existence, for the moment anyway.
With the pest gone, he turned around to face his two "hostages".
The teen couple wasn't afraid of him and if they were, well they didn't show it.
Within the hole that was made in Skulker's fake head you could see his real blood red eyes and he certainly didn't look happy.
Slowly but surely, the ghost hunter made his way towards his target which was Kitty, Johnny quickly tried to protect her but the tech ghost simply shoved him off.
Kittyyelledin fear and anger, andlunged at the hunter,but he easily grabs both her wristswith one handbefore she could do anything.Now more afraid then ever, she squirmed and struggledfrantically against her attacker,butshe couldn't get out of his death grip, no mater how much she tried.
"Now you can try and fight me like your boyfriend's helper tried to, and failed miserably at it" Skulker said with disgust "OR you can just answer my questions and if I like what I hear I WONT use your body as a rug and put it in front of my chimney".
"DUDE!" The greasy biker yelled in horror "YOUR SICK!"
"QUIET!"
Just then he released with his free hand some ectoplasmic ropes and trapped Johnny, and simply because he didn't want to hear another remark out of him, he put a glob of ectoplasm in his mouth.
Turning his attention back to the green haired girl he gave her a mad grin and said "What's it going to be then?"
Kitty knew she was no match for the hunter and slumped her head in defeat "What you want to know?"
"This is way too easy" Skulkerthought suspiciously, but asked"You remember the ghost child, right?"
Kitty's face darkened.
Ember's Place:
"We're here," Danny said, flying closer to the floating door that had painted purple flames on it.
"Yeah, I can see that, dipstick," Ember told him sarcastically "I have eyes too you know."
He looked at her semi-annoyed. "You know, you COULD try to NOT make those sarcastic remarks, they get old after a while."
"And YOU could try to NOT be the hero type, but that doesn't seem likely to happen, now does it?" Ember thought frustrated.
"Tough luck, Fenton," she said smugly "That's a part of who I am, you can accept THAT or try to change me, but it won't be easy!"
"I won't."
"Huh?!" That certainly got her off guard "What did you just say?"
"I said that I won't try to change you," the half-ghost answered truthfully "That would be like, I don't know, taking away who you are, and frankly, I wouldn't want you any other way."
"Umm, why does THAT sound familiar, little sis?" the voice said too sweetly, but the blue haired ghost teen knew better than to listen to the emotions the twisted voice gave.
"W-why?" Ember managed to croak, ignoring the headache she was getting.
Danny looked at the girl in his arms oddly "What?" The boy asked "What do you mean by ´why´?
"Erm, never mind, I must be getting delirious or something," She said quickly and nervously.
"Ember…"
But before Danny could say anything, the rock diva interrupted him "Look you can put me down now, Phantom!"
Danny could tell that the girl was starting to blush in embarrassment, obviously he had struck a nerve and she was in a feeble attempt to get rid of the awkwardness of the situation.
The half-ghost tried to find some sort of emotion in her neon eyes, but Ember was avoiding his gaze. That confused him greatly to say the least.
His face went blank as he tried to figure out what this meant. All he got was the obvious, and this was that his statement most likely took Ember by surprise, "why?" He wondered.
"I can take care of myself, OK?!" She said still avoiding his gaze.
"I'm sure you can," he said distantly.
And yet he didn't let her go.
"Something is bothering her," Danny thought seriously "And I want to what"
"Aw come on!" She pouted "Put me down!"
"Ember, what's wrong?"
"NOTHING!"
"The question meant something to you, didn't it?"
"No..." Ember denied quickly. "It's nothing... I was just, you know, thinking."
He mentally decided to let her believe she was off the hook with his "interrogation", he also figured that if Ember was going to talk to him about what was going through her mind then at least she would have to trust him enough to share this kind of information.
This brought another question "Did she trust him at all?"
"Of COURSE, she does!" Danny chided himself "What kind of a stupid question is that?!"
For all he knew, Ember probably told him her problems before and didn't want to tell them again. After all, he currently was not in any condition to take any more bad news. He was still hurting over the fact that his own family disowned him and abandoned him when was a surely going to die.
He felt a mixture of anger, sorrow and gratefulness, Danny was pretty sure he wouldn't be here if it wasn't for Ember, this brought yet a new emotion to him.
Happiness.
"I'm sure lucky to have her" Danny thought.
"And what's going to happen if I don't?" Danny suddenly asked cheerfully in an attempt to get his girlfriend to lighten up.
"You will pay!" She said meekly.
"You wouldn't strike someone when he is not at the best of conditions, would you?" the hybrid asked playfully.
Despite his cheerful appearance, Danny was taken off guard by the ghostly diva's sudden demeanor but was determined to make Ember feel better no matter what.
The pale ghost looked Danny from the corner of her eyes and saw that he was giving her a look, a worried kind of look to be specific.
"He is worried about… me?" She asked herself incredulously.
Ember was suddenly feeling sick to the core.
"Actually, you so would, little sis," the voice said wickedly, referring to the final question her "boyfriend" asked just a few seconds ago.
"N-no, of course not! She yelled.
Danny raised an eyebrow skeptically at Ember's sudden outburst "Are you hiding something from me?"
"More that you know, kid," the voice said in disappointment.
"No, of course not, dipstick!" Ember lied nervously.
"I think you are" Danny accused suspiciously.
Ember began to feel claustrophobic; it was the room all over again.
"Nooo" She wheezed.
"When I tell you to come when I call you, you WILL come, understood?"
"I told you I was on the phone; I couldn't hear you dad!"
Peter McLain struck his oldest daughter.
She grabbed her abused cheek with her left hand.
"That's no excuse. I'm your father, and you and your sister will do as I say, or else!"
He was about to hit her again, but something, or rather, SOMEONE got in the way of that.
Ember came out of nowhere and jumped onto her dad's back, "JAN, RUN!" She screamed while distracting the man.
Jan merely stayed where she was.
She was afraid.
Not for herself, but because of her little sister.
Peter grabbed the cigar he had on his mouth and put the hot gray ash in his daughter's arm in an attempt to let him go.
She refused to do that.
Ember hissed in pain as he continued to use his cigar as a weapon. She refused to scream in pain, she wasn't about to give him the satisfaction.
But sadly she wasn't prepared for what came next.
He got a pocketknife out of his pants and had every intention of using it.
But not on Ember.
With a cruel grin on his face, he was about to throw it at Jan. Of course, the younger Ember was watching this with utter horror.
So she slowly let go of her dad.
The man just gave his disobedient daughter a triumphant smirk "I knew you would see things my way," he said.
Then he grabbed Ember by the neck, the girl tried to get free and breath but the man wouldn't have any of it.
"I'll show you to respect your old man" Her dad said coolly.
"DAD, LEAVE HER ALONE!!" Jan bellowed in fear as she ran to help her little sister.
The oldest of the McLains turned to face his other daughter and gave her a dangerous glare, as if challenging her to try anything foolish.
Ember lost conciseness at that very moment from lack of air.
The next thing Ember knew was that she was trapped in a room, it was so small that it could be considered a closet since the only thing she could do was stand.
The worst part was that she could HEAR her older sister screaming in pain. She didn't know what exactly their father was doing to her sibling but she was sure that she didn't want to know.
The young girl started to pound the door, uncontrollably yelling, screaming, BEGGING to be let out.
Ember loved her sister very much, and it was painful to being unable to go and rescue her.
Eventually, she was let out of her "cell".
"How's my little girl doing?" The man mocked with a twisted grin on his face.
The young pre-teen Ember crawled out of there hurriedly and hugged her sister, tears coming out of their eyes.
Both sisters afraid of him, there were no doubts about that but despite everything, it was clear that their father favored Jan since he tended to be more tolerable towards her than with Ember.
Ember could still remember those words that made her feel like she was a mistake in the family.
"Your sister gets straight A´s, why can't you?" Peter McLain said in disgust "Your sister got into the cheer squad, and you?"
It was obvious that he wanted a perfect daughter; she remembered that he even tried to get her out of choir since according to him; it was a waste of time and money.
He wanted both his girls to follow his footsteps, and if they didn't…
They were the worst daughters in the world.
Those words stung.
From time to time Ember would behave "badly" she was given the usual punishment.
"The room."
She slowly developed a fear to be put in that small room.
It was so obvious that the future ghost rock star would become claustrophobic.
It was a fear she took with her to the grave.
Just because her dad tried to make her into something she was not.
Because he didn't accept her.
"Ember! Ember!"
Danny was calling out her name hurriedly, but the ghost rocker was too wrapped up on her memories to actually hear him.
The half-ghost grabbed his pale girlfriend by the chin and looked worriedly at her, the feeling only increased when Ember started to hyperventilate.
Danny started to softly slap her face repeatedly to get Ember's attention, or at least to snap her out of whatever pain she was in.
His tactic was not working since he didn't get any reaction out of her, so he decided to try to go for another approach. First, he opened the door to the house which took a bit of an effort since he still had his girlfriend on his arms.
Once inside he quickly flew to the couch but abruptly stopped when he noticed that they weren't alone.
Youngblood and his parrot were taking a nap on the couch.
The soft snores of the child confirmed that.
Danny was in a state of panic, he didn't even thought of waking up his young friend up so he could help out with this strange situation, so the fourteen year old went further into the house and entered the closest room with a bed on it.
It happened to be Ember's room.
The half-ghost put the ghost on her bed and tried to give her some space, it wasn't easy since Ember was clinging onto him for dear life.
Danny turned intangible; he rapidly flew to close the door and got right back to his girlfriend's side.
The first thing that occurred to him was to keep trying to get her attention, he snapped his fingers several times but no reaction came from her, she didn't even looked at him, Ember was looking directly at the ceiling.
Her breaths became shallow.
In desperation Danny began to clap his hands in front of her face, he didn't know why he did it but he had a feeling that this would work.
"Ember!" He clapped "Ember!"
Nothing.
She was still lost in her own little world.
Or more accurate: a nightmare world.
The pale ghost started to hold herself, unaware of anything that was happening around her.
The situation was bad, but soon took an unexpected twist, because soon enough Ember's ponytail began to move wildly.
Bewildered, Danny could only watch.
He didn't even notice that he reverted back to human mode.
When he stopped calling out her name, the blue hair was no longer rising; it went back to normal.
But Ember was looking worse by the second.
As if on instinct Danny started chanting his girlfriend's name over and over.
"Ember! Ember! Ember! Ember! Ember! Ember! Ember! Ember! Ember! Ember! Ember! Ember!"
Needless to say that whatever he was doing to her was slowly "waking her up" from whatever hell she was re-living, and of course, a very specific blue ponytail started to react and grew brighter and bigger.
A few minutes of this passed, and finally, Danny got something out of this, but it wasn't what he expected.
Ember began to cough uncontrollably.
The half-ghost sat her up, wrapped his arms around her and enveloped her in a tight hug, but he didn't stop there. He began to pat her on the back in an attempt to try and calm her down.
But it made matters worse.
Because right there, at that very moment. Danny heard her say something that completely caught him off guard.
"P-Please… L-Let me out." Ember pleaded while she began to sob.
"Ember?" he asked worriedly "Wh-what are you talking about?"
Another sob racked out of the girl's throat, followed by another, and another.
"What is happening to you Ember?" Danny thought frightfully.
She was oblivious of the boy's question, so much so that the ghostly teen moved her arms to get them behind the boy's neck as if returning the "hug" her ´boyfriend´ started.
Ember didn't know why but it definitely made her feel a lot better, and let out a content sigh as she nuzzled the hero's neck a bit.
It was then that she finally realized what was happening and what she was doing.
She was actually nuzzling her enemy's neck. Not to mention the fact that both of them were in a very questionable position.
If Youngblood and his parrot were to enter and catch them right now, it would certainly be embarrassing for both of them… but mostly for her.
But the musical ghost's main concern was not what her young ally would think; actually it was the awkwardnessand that she just made a scene that was sure to question her mental state.
It also came to her that this was the second time she was this close to her enemy.
This time however the hero didn't catch her blush.
Danny stopped patting her on the back and was now stroking her hair, being careful to not touch the ponytail; he wasn't exactly sure it that it was safe to touch the flaming hair.
The silence was so thick you could cut it with a knife.
Finally after several awkward moments, someone had the courage to say something.
It was the more unlikely of the two.
"Could… could we pretend this never happened?" Ember's muffled voice asked meekly.
Danny stopped stroking her hair. He knew what his girlfriend was referring to. "I wish I could, but I want to know why it happened".
She didn't answer.
"Ember?"
Again, no answer came.
"For God's sake!" Danny growled.
He pried her off of him and they locked eyes.
Danny sat Ember in his lap and grabbing her by the shoulders. "I want to know what exactly going on in with you?" he demanded as he put his index finger on the ghost's face.
"It's… nothing".
"Lying it's not your thing Ember" Danny warned.
"Oh if only he knew how wrong he was" The annoying voice told Ember smugly.
The ghost girl ignored this.
Danny meanwhile took a deep breath and calmly told Ember what he thought of these strange series of events.
"Ember, whatever happened out there, was NOT nothing; I mean, you zoned out, you looked like you were having a heart attack! And probably the most important thing, you were scared, I saw it in your eyes, it was like you saw death right in the face!"
Ember tried to get free from Danny's strong hold.
She completely forgot that she could turn intangible.
While the female ghost struggled to get free, Danny continued to talk, now in a tired tone of voice "I want to help you out Ember, but I have to know, what exactly is bothering you."
He finally let go of her.
No sooner than that happen, did Ember began to play with her ponytail, it was an obvious sign that she was not comfortable talking about this subject.
"Why do you do this?" She asked irritated.
"Do what?"
"Why do you want to help me?" Ember coaxed "I mean; you are NOT going to heal any time soon if you keep stressing out over every little thing."
Danny's face softened "Two reasons" He told her "One, I'm the good guy, and according to you I've been a hero for a while, and if something is bothering you I WANT to know what is it".
Ember was intrigued "And reason number two would be?"
"You're my best friend AND my girlfriend." He smiled warmly "And I care about you."
The rocker's face turned as red as a tomato.
"Goddamn it, no!" Ember thought angrily "He's making it so freaking hard for me to hate him!"
"Why do you want to hate him?" her conscience asked frustrated.
"BECAUSE HE'S MY ARCH-ENEMY!"
"But now he's your boyfriend" the conscience retorted smugly.
"HE IS NOT MY FRIEND! HE IS NOT MY ANYTHING!" Ember protested childishly. "He was my enemy then and he is my enemy now!"
"Then answer me this, little sis" the voice said with arrogance "If you hate him so much, then why don't you tell him the truth so you can fight him like before?"
"Because" Ember thought smugly "Youngblood and I have a planand Phantom just so happen to be in it!"
"I'm pretty sure there is another reason too."
"NU-HUH!"
"Yes there is… I'm pretty sure you don't want to tell him because… maybe, oh I don't know, you don't want him to hate you?"
"You have completely lost your mind!" The pale ghost accused.
"Oh, I think Phantom is thinking the same thing, only he is most likely thinking of you" the voice responded sweetly.
"Huh?"
She finally realized that her body was shuddering uncontrollably, right to the point that Danny was giving her a weird look. Needless to say that Ember felt embarrassed.
"You wouldn't believe me if I just told you I was cold… would you?" Ember said meekly.
She immediately felt like kicking herself after asking THAT.
"God, what is WRONG with me?!"
"Is there something you want to tell me Ember?" Danny said with a serious tone while crossing his arms "Something I should know?"
"For once be honest with him" Ember's conscience ordered.
The pale ghost gave a weak sad smile and said "Erm, Danny… what happened out there… well, I was just… remembering."
"Remembering what exactly?" he asked, still with his serious tone of voice.
"When I used to be human… when I was alive." Ember confessed reluctantly.
Danny was surprised.
"Have you told me about your past before… before my accident?" Danny puts his finger on the side of his head to empathize what he meant.
She slowly shook her head.
"May I know why?"
"To tell you the truth..."
Her conscience crackled viciously after hearing the word "truth"
Ember winced but thankfully Danny didn't notice; and if he did then he didn't think much of it.
"Because, it's not exactly an easy thing for me to talk about"
"Do you… do you want to tell me about itnow?" Danny asked with sympathy.
She gave the half-ghost a look like he was insane.
"What did I just said?!" Ember shrieked.
"Whoa! Whoa!" Danny said while making the calm down gesture with his hands. "I just thought you might want to get this of your chest; it looks like you really want to".
"WELL I DON'T!"
Ember crossed her arms and looked away like a child pouting over not getting the last cookie out of the cookie jar.
"Please Ember…What could it hurt?" Danny asked gently as he reached over and gently grabbed his girlfriend's ungloved hand, causing the ghost girl to jump a bit in surprise.
Ember just didn't know how to react to this.
If she thought that what happened outside was awkward then THIS definitely takes the cake.
The awkwardness levels just turned up a notch.
After a few seconds of silence Ember finally was able to say something but stuttered in the process "I guess I could tell you about the time I was alive… but…"
"…But?" Danny urged.
"I just don't think now would be the time" Ember slowly confessed "It's just too weird".
Danny chucked.
"Weird?" He questioned in amusement "I'm a half dead teenager, you're a ghost, we are living in a dimension where there are floating door everywhere, our only other friend is a kid with a peter pan syndrome and your telling me that talking about your past is weird?"
Despite everything, Ember managed to smile, not a smug kind of smile but a real one, then as soon at it came, it left, and she frowned.
Something just hit her like a bunch of bricks.
"How did you know that chanting my name would help me out?"
Danny raised an eyebrow at the sudden change of subject, but in a way, she asked a valid question.
"I'm not sure" He replied "It's like I just knew that already, like I seen that happening before".
The ghost rocker stiffened.
"I guess you're not the only one who started to remember the past little sis" The conscience thought sadistically.
"Erm, Really?" Ember asked is fake amazement, but before she could continue to say anything else, Danny interrupted her with a question of his own.
"Why did your hair go crazy a few minutes ago anyway?" He asked perplexed "I mean why it went all haywire when I said your name over and over?"
Ember put a hand behind her neck "I'm no so sure your going to like the answer".
Danny raised an eyebrow in confusion "Just tell me, okay? I mean whatever it is, it can be that bad".
"Sure, you say that now!" Ember said sardonically.
"Oh come on! It's not like you absorb some kind of power out of it and get stronger the more people chant your name and used this ability of yours as a cheap trick to take over the world" Danny said with a laugh.
Ember laughed nervously and slowly gt farther away from him "Yeah, right like I would ever do that."
Danny just shook his head in further amusement while the pale teen was growing restless.
Her body began acting on its own, Ember began to tremble uncontrollably.
The half ghost did catch this, his good mood disappearing.
Suddenly, out of the blue, it came to him, his girlfriend feed of humans, she feed of him just now!
Danny scooted closer to her.
"Emberlynn…."
"Hey, I can't help it!" she protested in defense just before her half-ghost "boyfriend" could chew her out.
Since called her by her full name, it was safe to assume what he planned to say, so Ember continued with her explanation "When people chant my name, I absorb the power. I can't stop doing it anymore than you can't stop your heart from beating."
"So just now you were feeding off me" Danny voiced out what he just thought a few seconds ago.
"Told you, you weren't going to like the answer" She muttered while cringing at the coldness of Danny's voice; once again she began to play with her ponytail.
"Have you done this before?"
Ember felt a shiver going down her back but shook her head to get her priorities straight.
"This is actually the first time." She said weakly.
Phantom let out a breath he didn't even know he was holding "For a moment there I thought you might have".
Ember simply gaped at him.
"You're not mad?"
"I won't lie to you, I'm not exactly thrilled that you… you feed of people and I'd prefer if you didn't but I got to know, is it really necessary?"
"Well actually… no… it's more like an act of pleasure" Ember said, trying to explain the sensation she gets when a surge of extreme power rushes through her body "I mean, remember when you just flew for the first time just a few hours ago?"
Danny smiled.
"I take it you do" Ember muttered "Well anyway it's like that, only that this power I have makes me stronger the more people chant my name and my hair here" She empathize the word hair while she pointed her own ponytail, "goes wild."
"But… if it takes a whole lot of people to make your hair do… THAT, then how come I managed to…"
"To help me out?" Ember suggested.
"Yeah" He nodded.
".. I guess it's because you are just way better than a crowd of people".
Danny blushed.
And so did Ember.
The conscience scoffed in disgust.
Because she knew that the older teen was simply butter him up.
And she knew Ember was doing a good job at it, but then, out of the blue, something came to mind.
The voice giggled in mischief.
"This is too weird" Ember said out loud, and then put both her hands over her mouth.
"What is?" Danny's brow furrowed in confusion.
"This!" She started her ranting while making with her ungloved hand an imaginary circle, obviously referring to both of them "I mean you just find out about one specific power I have and you don't even think much of it!"
"Am I supposed to?"
"YES! NO!, I DON'T KNOW!" Ember exploded "I mean, I guess it kind of bothers me that you have so much trust in me, I mean, what if someone else, someone who doesn't like you took you in when you lost your memory?"
Danny was catching up to what she meant "Oh" He said.
Ember once again puts both her hands over her mouth; obviously she didn't mean to say that, someone else said it for her.
And she knew who.
"What are you doing to me?!" Ember accused angrily.
"Your not the only one who can be manipulative little sis" The voice said with conviction. "It doesn't feel good now does it?"
"So you're saying that I have blind trust?" Danny concluded.
Ember saw his neon green eyes; she didn't know what to say to him now, this was certainly ironic. That of all people or ghosts if you want to get technical, that she would be the one to get the ghost boy to think about who could and couldn't trust.
"Well… actually, I'm just looking out for you" She lied through her teeth "I mean think of it this was… if I was an enemy of yours, I would have taken advantage of you just about anyone here in the Ghost Zone would. So I just want you to think things twice, it was your irrationality that got you in this mess in the first place after all".
Danny nods in understanding "I see".
Ember began to rub the back of her neck, obviously this was something she never expected to happen and it certainly was getting harder and harder to lie to the boy in front of her, she didn't want to admit it but on some level, she was beginning to feel guilty about this.
But just a bit.
Simply because she forced herself to remember all those failures given to her by Danny Phantom.
It was like Ember was splitting herself in two, one side wanted revenge on the hero in front of her while the other wanted to do the right thing, so far the cruel side of her seemed to be winning but the humane side of her was not giving up without a fight.
"Come on girl" Ember told herself sharply "You're getting so close to get Phantom to do whatever you want; don't screw it up!"
"I'm warning you little sis, nothing good will come out if this, I suggest you quit right now before things get harder to fix!" Her conscience suggested, no scratch that, ordered to be more accurate.
"HARDER THAN THIS!" Ember exploded.
"See" The bad side of her leered "Everything you done so far is NOT going to be fixed, like your other side so naively suggested, so just ignore your conscience and go on with the plan, I swear, everything ill be fine by the end… for you at least".
"Ember, look sis I know you have some anger issues but think about what you're doing to him!" The good side of the ghost rocker begged "And more importantly look at what this is doing to yourself."
"QUIET!" Ember bellowed in her mind, "Stop it, just STOP IT!, I can do this by myself I don't need you or anyone else to tell me what to do! JUST LEAVE ME ALONE!"
"Fine, I'll leave, but don't think this is over" Her conscience told Ember emotionlessly.
Silence came.
Neither side of her spoke.
Her conscience and her normal side were gone.
Ember was content about this, now to the matter at hand.
Danny.
"Answer me something" The half ghost said "You don't want to tell me about your past because you don't trust me enough?"
Ember struggled uncomfortably, searching for the right words, before glancing helplessly up at Danny, "It's not that exactly…"
"Then what is it then?"
"Look Danny, the thing is, what happened, what I remember, it… it's a HUGE thing for me, and honestly, with time I thought it would be easy to deal with it but… its not… its just not easy to even think about what I went through as a human".
Danny seemed to understand "You went through whatever you're hiding alone didn't you?"
Ember felt crushed when those words came out of his mouth.
She felt that tears were about to run down her cheeks but began to hold them, she already made a fool of herself and she was NOT about to cry in front of her nemesis.
"NOT AGAIN" She bellowed exasperated within her head "Once is enough!"
Ember noticed that the white haired boy was looking expectantly at her, she looked away and squeaked a "sort of". Obviously answering his question.
"Ember…"
"Hey, your back!" Youngblood exclaimed as he entered the room.
Both teens turned to face the youngest member of the trio, Danny and Ember were having different thoughts when their conversation got interrupted.
Ember never thought she would be so relieved to see the little brat, Danny on the other hand was a little angry.
"So, how the training go?" The 10 year old asked as he rubbed one of his eyes.
Remembering the kiss from earlier, Ember blushed and said rapidly "It went ok."
Youngblood scratched the back of his head with his hook "Anything interesting happened?" He looked expectantly at the "couple."
He smiled with mischief, like he knew something the other two didn't.
Danny got up from the bed and said plainly "Nope, we just got around to know what powers I have and that's all."
The only female member of the trio gave the half-ghost a quizzical look.
As he got up, she noticed two things.
One, he had her guitar strapped on his back, Ember had completely forgotten that on the way here he had taken it from her so it would be easier to carry her home.
"Here" Danny said as he gave Ember back her most prized possession and while doing so, he also gave her a knowing wink.
Danny walked away.
Youngblood didn't understand what just happened.
But Ember did.
As soon as he was out of the bedroom the door closed, it was like reality was back to normal.
"Sooooooooooo" Youngblood tried to start a conversation "Everything is going according to plan?"
His reluctant ally looked at the door then at her guitar in her hands.
"I wish I knew" Ember whispered.
For the first time ever in his young afterlife the boy didn't teased her.
He didn't mention he knew about the kiss both the hero and villainess shared, the boy honestly didn't know the other occupants of the house were back, he actually came to Ember's room for another reason.
To return the journal.
While the female ghost was distracted he slowly got the small book out of his back pocket and put it back in its hiding place.
Under the mattress.
"You read it again didn't you?" Ember said darkly.
Youngblood's eyes widened in fear and then summed up in two words in how much trouble he was in now "Uh-oh".
Pariah's Keep:
The Fright Knight was sitting in the stairs that lead to the sarcophagus of forever sleep; from time to time he glanced at the tomb of the ghost king, the dark warrior would never admit this but he was in dept to his young rival for incarcerating Pariah Dark once again.
Because now he didn't have to serve that power hungry king.
He now served Vlad Plasmius and if it wasn't for the very tempting deal the half-ghost made with him, he would have declined and killed him in the process.
One of the benefits of working for Vlad was that he now could freely go to the human world, but there were a few disadvantages as well.
One of them being that the ghosts he met in the mansion were his master lived pestered him a lot, not to mention that sometimes just sometimes he actually preferred to work alone rather than serve others.
But sometimes even a mighty entity had to make sacrifices.
Fright Knight had yet to begin his search for the whelp; it wasn't that he didn't care to find him to please his master.
It was that he was unmotivated.
The warrior still wanted revenge on Phantom, he might have saved the ghost zone but he was still his enemy and the fright knight was a warrior, and a proud one at that, so when he was defeated the first time he encountered the brat, well he felt humiliated, his honor was destroyed and he wanted to get that back.
He wanted to defeat Phantom.
But he couldn't do that now, the boy was lost and possibly vulnerable, the fright knight might be a merciless ghost but even he knew when to fight fair, killing the young half-ghost when he was at his lowest disgusted him.
That was no way to win a fight.
The armoured ghost got up from the stairs and looked at the tomb of his former master with extreme hatred.
"One down, one to go" He said cruelly.
He grabbed a pumpkin and threw it in midair and it exploded, flying in the middle of the room was his ghostly Pegasus "The Nightmare", The Fright Knight jumped and without a trouble got on his horse and ordered it to start flying, they had work to do.
Once out of Pariah's keep the spirit of Halloween thought "The search has begun".
And they disappeared into the unknown realms of the Ghost Zone.
Hey everybody, like I said at the beginning of the chapter, I'm real sorry that this came real late but real life can screw us up sometimes, am I right?
Yeah ANOTHER excuse, those are getting old I know but at least I'm not giving up on my stories like other writers I know.
Hope you enjoyed how long this chapter was, after a five month absence I thought it would be appropriate to make it up to you guys by making this the longest chapter of the story as of yet.
Who knows when I'll update again but I'll to NOT take five to six months next time, ok?
Well then I guess now would be the perfect time to explain a few things that most likely has baffled a few of you out there:
Someone out there told me that Ember's conscience has a mind of its own so to speak and asked; how is that possible?
Well to tell you the truth, that was intentional, you see I'm doing this because I want to make a huge difference between ghosts and humans in the DP universe, all the ghosts have a conscience and they all act in a different way depending on the ghost, Ember for example has an issue with trust and is reluctant about letting others into her life due to past events, her conscience in turn gives her a hard time because even though Ember doesn't notice she is doing the same thing her dad did when she was a little girl and TRIES to open Ember's eyes so that no harm would occur to her or Danny for that matter.
Other ghost like Youngblood, Skulker and even Johnny 13 have a little voice that tells them that this is right or wrong depending on the situation but the conscience level is so low that they easily ignore the voice at times.
There are a few exceptions on the matter like Pariah Dark, The Fright Knight, Walker and Dark Danny who appear to be devoid of any real emotion and thus don't have a conscience and do things without even feeling a tidbit of guilt.
I also want to point out that ghosts feel emotions differently than humans in this fic, for example guilt, All ghosts here will have a warm feeling in the back of their necks which will represent that they are feeling terrible about what he or she has done, like Ember who actually touched the back of her neck a few times in this chapter.
I felt that I should point this out now so that I don't have to explain it further into the storyline, I have the feeling that some readers out there are getting tired that this fic is somewhat slow so I'm going to try to speed things up a bit.
Also for those of you who didn't catch what the silent "conversation" that Danny and Ember had when they stared into each others eyes I'll spell it out for you.
Danny didn't say anything that happened between him and Ember to Youngblood because he wants to show Ember that she can tell him anything and he'll keep it a secret, he wants Ember to willingly tell him about her time as a human rather than force it out of her.
So in other words he wants to tighten up whatever relationship he was with Ember.
WHOO! That was long huh? Well I hope you enjoyed this chapter, I really look forward to your comments, your likes and dislikes, suggestions, doubt, anything that will help me make this story entertaining for you and future readers.
And finally after much thought I have decided that I'm going to get rid of Ember's conscience for a while, it seemed to me that it makes the second protagonist of the story act differently from the show, hell I just noticed after reading what I got so far that she is developing a small case of paranoia and I don't really like her to be that way so... yeah the voice has to go but like I said, not permanantely, mainly because I have plans for the annoying conscience in further chapters.
Whatcha think of this "smart" decision?
Well that's about it, please review, ok?
Invader Johnny Signing Off.