"Who are you?" Danny asked the tall, slim ghost facing him.
"My name— my name is Chara." She replied, stuttering slightly.
"Alright then, Chara, what'cha got?" Danny inquired briskly.
"W-what?" The brunette ghost asked, wide-eyed in confusion.
"What do you know? What information do you have on this spirit attacking Hayley?" he clarified.
Chara looked down. "Oh," she faltered.
"Well?" Danny demanded, his tone impatient.
Chara blurted out, "It's an entity, not a spirit," then gathered enough composure to murmur, "Spirits are harmless."
"There's a difference?" Danny asked, confounded with the idea.
"Yes, of course," Chara replied. "There are different kinds of ghosts. Entities are violent, evil ghosts who feed off of misery and strife. It's most likely that the presence haunting that girl—Hayley is her name?—is an entity. Phantoms look the most like humans, but have special ghost powers, like you. Spirits follow people but aren't disruptive in any way." She explained, softly adding, "Like me."
"I never knew," Danny contemplated. "Pretty much all ghosts looked alike to me."
"Looks aren't everything," She said knowingly. "I would have thought, being half ghost yourself, you would have realized that. Let's go check on the girl in the hospital first, if you don't mind." The slightly transparent girl beckoned him to follow her through the alley.
Silence followed this exchange as Danny mulled over what she had said. He remembered a time, many months ago, when Plasmius had trapped him in a ecto-proof box. He had been freed by another ghost, the spirit of the Dairy King. Despite his red eyes and green skin, he had shown Danny kindness.
Not all ghosts are evil, dont'cha know…
The two reached the end of the alley, and, nodding to each other, lifted off the ground and flew together towards the hospital.
Danny shook himself out of his thoughtful stupor and addressed his ghostly companion. "So, if you're harmless like you say, what brings you to Amity Park?"
"Um, well," Chara started quietly, once they were headed in the right direction, "The people."
"You know someone from around here?" Danny asked, raising an eyebrow.
"No, not exactly," She replied, ducking a cloud. "I watch people. Humans, I mean. It's kind of my thing."
"You mean like, you haunt people? Follow them around? Isn't that kind of creepy?" Danny asked, the question rhetorical.
"I don't mean to be," Chara said defensively. "And it's what I'm good at. The people I watch can barely notice my presence. I've refined my intangibility and invisibility, and honed my stealth so that I can go unseen. Plus, I can read people's minds." She touched her hand to her mouth, as if wishing she could force her last sentence back down her throat.
Danny stopped short. "You can read people's minds?!" He asked incredulously. "But how'd you learn to do that?"
Chara shrugged, introverted once more. "I just concentrated. Every day." She said modestly. "I didn't have much else to do. The inhabitants of the Ghost Zone, as you call it, aren't exactly the most thrilling subjects to observe. All they think about is world domination, and hunting, and stuff. Actually, most of them are really insecure," She confided. "And no one really paid me much mind. Everyone was always too busy talking about Ember. Ember-this, and Ember-that—" Her tone became mocking and her face twisted into a grimace.
"Whoa, wait—Ember? As in Ember McLane?"
"Yeah," She said matter-of-factly, "She's my older sister. She always gets all the attention, just 'cause she can play guitar and she's evil…"
"But…" Danny frowned confusedly. "You're not evil?"
"No," Chara replied slowly, as if speaking to the village idiot. "I told you, different ghosts want different things. I just want to see people go about their lives. And to become a member of the Observant High Council someday, but they probably won't accept me. Just 'cause I'm not a green blob with one giant eye in the middle of my head…" She rambled resentfully. Danny's mouth remained agape from his rapid enlightenment of a few moments ago.
"Sorry if I'm boring you," Chara blushed. "I don't think I've talked so much in my whole life."
"No, not at all," Danny said truthfully. They touched down to Earth in back of the hospital, and he smiled at his companion, who shyly smiled back.
He changed into the Fenton kid, and she turned invisible. "Lead the way," Her melodic disembodied voice told him. He made his way to the front of the hospital and entered, the large automatic doors sliding closed behind him.