A/N: So sorry you had to wait for so long!

"What is this place?" Alice asked, looking around the old lab. Metal tables aligned the sides of the rooms; a portal just like her dad had; many types of different weapons; and what seemed to be a giant screen computer.

"My lab," Vlad said, coming up from behind her. He turned her gently towards the strange machine at one side.

"What's that?" Alice asked.

"The Ghost Assistant 1.0," Vlad said. There was such pride in his voice, Alice noticed. He must have worked hard on that thing. It looked similar to a type of capsule or escape pod, but it was vertical and had a glass-like opening surrounded by metal. If you were inside, she guessed, your feet would not be visible. It looked narrow too, but you could surely fit in there.

"What's it do?" she asked.

"In your case, it would send out small impulses of ectoplasmic energy, thus theoretically triggering your powers," Vlad explained. "It will not harm you however."

"Cool," she murmured, walking over to it and laying a hand on the thing. She was flashed with visions, a voice, a scream of pain, struggle. She quickly backed off, holding her hand. "Is it safe?" she asked then, alarmed. She hadn't seen much in her vision, just this machine and what looked like someone strapped inside, struggling to get out.

Vlad looked at her. She had seem intrigued at first, but now she looked a little cautious. "There are a few precautions we must take, but it is very much safe," he said, nodding.

"Good," Alice said, sighing slightly. She turned back to him. "What kind of precautions?"

"Just let me get my assistant in here, and I shall explain." Vlad walked over to the giant screen with the control panels at what looked like a keyboard mixed with other stuff. He pressed a green button to the side of the keyboard where a type of intercom was located. "Joseph," he said. "Please come down to the lab."

Alice froze. Joseph? Could it possibly be the same Joseph she knew? She waited for someone to answer Vlad.

"On my way!" the boy's voice rang. Alice's hands balled into fists as she heard the voice. Stupid, sly, smart alleck, little... "Is that Joseph Foley?" she nearly shouted.

Vlad looked at her and grinned. "Why yes it is," he said. "Have you two met?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact, we have," Alice said.

A door opening and closing and foot steps descending from the staircase sent Alice spinning around on her heels and glaring at the boy who had come down. "Oh boy," the boy whispered and tried to make a run for it back up the stairs.

"Come back here, Joseph!" Alice shouted and chased after him. For a second there was only a cry for help and pain, then Alice came back down the stairs, dragging Joseph down by the back of his shirt. "You're gonna explain yourself, shorty, right now," she instructed.

"Let me go!" Joseph shouted, trying to get free as they descended the last of the steps. Alice let him go alright, but as gently as he would have wished. Her eyes flared a very dark blue, almost the color of a sapphire. She swung him forward, Joseph sliding on the marble-like floor. He stopped sliding and looked up at the girl angrily. He didn't get up, only looked at her. "It wasn't my fault," he said.

"You left us there," Alice said. "To make things worst, you stole Jonathan's folder. I needed those articles and you knew it!"

"I didn't steal anything!" Joseph said.

"Then who did?" Alice asked.

"How am I supposed to know?" Joseph questioned.

"You're a little know-it-all aren't you, you-"

"Enough," Vlad interrupted the fight calmly. "Stop acting like small children."

"She-" Joseph started, but Vlad stopped with a small wave of his hand. "Get up, Joseph," he instructed.

Joseph grumbled something beneath his breath and stood, steering clear of the steaming Alice. He walked over to Vlad. They exchanged a few quiet words that Alice couldn't hear. She sighed and, rolling her eyes, began to look around the lab. It looked very clean, unlike her father's. This place was obviously meant to be kept in good condition for some reason. But there were no ghosts out and about anymore, she knew, or else she'd have found out about ghost-hunting sooner. This was being used for something else.

"Here," a voice penetrated Alice's thoughts. Joseph stood there with a piece of clothing folded on his hands. He handed it to Alice. "Put this suit on," he instructed. "Over your clothes, whatever. We don't want the currents of ectoplasmic energy to hurt you. This will reduce any amount of shock to as little as a small sting."

Alice looked at him, but took the clothes. It was a black hazmat suit, she noticed, seeing as she recognized it as something her parents had put away into the shed before when they had begun to clean out the attic long before. Okay, so it wasn't an attic, it was called the OP Center, but she wasn't allowed up there for some reason. Though she did know her parents stored a lot of stuff up there they didn't want her to go snooping around in. Now she figured it was probably more ghost-hunting things.

Alice unfolded the suit and looked at it. It was plain black, no type of writing or anything, just black. "Hm," she mumbled.

"Also, you may want to put away any type of technology like a cell-phone," Joseph added.

"Okay, thanks," she mumbled.

"Whatever," he said and walked away towards a control panel on the side of the lab.

Alice took her cell phone out of her pocket, but before putting it down somewhere, she took the tiny charm hanging from it and put it deep in her pocket. She didn't know why, but she felt way more safe with it with her. Then he took the hazmat suit and put it on over her clothes. She zipped it up and wandered over to where Joseph had gone. "Now what?" she asked.

"Vlad, if you will?" Joseph said, completely engulfed in flipping a few switches on a separate control panel.

"Come with me, my dear," Vlad said and led Alice towards the Ghost Assistant. Vlad unlatched something on the side and the door to the escape pod-like machine opened. "Step inside, my dear," Vlad said.

"Uhm, okay," Alice mumbled and did so. Vlad buckled a small metal-like, cuff-like strap around either of her wrists and ankles, then closed the pod-door. Alice stood there, watching from the inside. Joseph was once again being serious, not a single smile flashed across his grave expression. She waited and watched as he told Vlad something. Vlad nodded, and Joseph pressed a green button on the control panel. Immediately, Alice could sense the ectoplasmic energy move around through the metal cuffs around her wrists and ankles.

At first, she felt nothing more than cold shock run through her body, no pain whatsoever. But as the cold spread to her lower body, a sudden shock emanated from where she'd put the tiny charm. She clenched her teeth and her hands turned to tigh fists. Also, without her consent, her body began to struggle against the growing shock. Her eyes squeezed shut. "Gah!" she finally spat out, a short-cut scream emptying out her throat. More struggled shouts slipped past her lips as the pain grew worst.

She couldn't see what was going on, only felt the pain and saw bright white as the shock continued. But Joseph and Vlad both watched as strange designs began to appear over her hazmat suit. It began from her waist, threeblue colored vine-like lines began to color her suit like designs adorning the frame of a painting. The first, thin, bluelineseemed to grow a bit wider and it made it's way around her waist before it swirled down her left leg. It disappeared after it made one circle around the top of her black boot.

The second, thinblue line moved in a similar patter, but instead of going around her left leg, it went around her right. It circled right around her waist and began it's descend down her leg, twirling still. It ended in a similar fashion as well: making a ring around the top of her right boot.

The third and final line was a dark shade of blue: sapphire. This line was a bit more thick than the other two. It circled, instead, around her stomach region and upwards under her arm before disappearing onto her back and peeking up again as it circled her neck, then stopped.

"Whoa," Joseph mused, looking in disbelief.

"Stop the machine now," Vlad urged. He was witnessing so many changes in Alice's appearance now. Her skin was more pale now. Some short locks of hair that had fallen onto her face and fell down to almost mouth-level began to become the same vivid blue of the lines on her clothes. What had happened that caused this transformation? "Joseph stop the machine."

Joseph slammed his hand down hard on the green button and quickly stood from the swivel chair he'd been sitting on. He ran to the Ghost Assistant and unlatched the door, swinging it open. Alice stood motionless, ready to collapse. Joseph got to work on the straps about her wrists and ankles and once he unstrapped the last one, Alice came hurtling forward. "Whoa!" Joseph exclaimed. "Watch it!"

"Oooh..." Alice moaned. She felt as if her legs were made of wet sand and would give way any moment now. She didn't have any energy whatsoever. Joseph tried his best to keep her up, holding her beneath the arms, but was losing strength. She was thirteen and he was only eleven, imagine those odds!

Alice forced her legs to keep her up, but her headache was making her dizzy. She leaned off Joseph, giving him a relieved look. She held her head, hand on either side. "Hey, Joseph," she said, her words slurred.

"What?" Joseph asked.

"I see...two of you," Alice replied.

"She's delusional," Joseph said.

Vlad nodded. "All part of the plan," Vlad mumbled and tossed Joseph what looked like a small bottle for pills, or some type of medication. Alice looked at Vlad.

"Oh, Vlad," she said. "Vladz." She made the word 'Vlads' sound like it had a 'z' in the end instead of an 's'. She laughed. "Are we having a party? There's enough people for that, you know." She began to count how many 'Josephs' there were. "Joseph, stand still, you're making me...dizzy."

"Alice, take this," Joseph said, handing her one pill. "It'll get rid of the dizziness."

Alice looked at his extended hand. She could see something white there, a pill no doubt. She reached for it, missed. She tried again and grabbed it. "Gotcha," she hissed triumphantly and popped it into her mouth. Joseph somehow got a glass of water from somewhere and handed it to her. She took a drink, held her head up and swallowed the pill. Then she just drank the rest of the water because she felt like it. She handed Joseph back the glass.

"Feel better yet?" he asked.

Alice was about to shake her head no, when a sudden calming sensation came over her body. Her hands fell limply at her side, and her eyes dropped slightly. "I feel...strange," she muttered, putting a hand to her forehead. Suddenly, a strange vivid blue light appeared around both feet. It looked at if she'd stepped onto a light. The blue, electric-light rings followed close to her body upwards, following every curve. Both thin rings formed into one as it traveled all the way up her body to her arms where it separated again into two. When both rings slipped away from her fingers, a breeze seemed to hit her hair because it flew up just barely, the blue fading from her hair into it's regular raven black color.

"Cool," Joseph whispered. Alice was left in her human form and clothes. But the charm that had once been in her pocket, had now changed into a strange blue crystal. All in all, it looked sort of like two rings , one a beautiful sapphire color with a ring of blackoutsideit, around the crystal. Alice began to speak to Joseph about something. Joseph had asked her a question, and she was answering him.

Vlad grinned as he looked at the crystal about Alice's neck, and at her semi-dazed expression. He didn't know where that crystal had come from, but it could not mean trouble. However, he was wondering about what had happened back there. The transformation and resumption of human form was strange, but understandable either way. Surely now the girl would be able to be manipulated easily. Her curiosity would be raised, and he could answer each question without much hesitation. She would believe everything he said.

Rightaccording to plan.

E/N: The vision Alice got is from a previous Danny Phantom episode. Let's see who can tell which episode it was...

--Airamé Phantom