Edited 10/2010
Warning: rated 'T' for horror. Don't read late at night. ;)
Lopeholt
A Danny Phantom FanFic by Cordria
Chapter 2: The Ridges
True fact:
When The Ridges officially closed in 1979, all the patients were transferred… except one. One woman went missing and numerous attempts to locate her failed.
She was dead when she was found quite a while later, naked, her clothes folded neatly on the windowsill. Beneath her body was a bizarre imprint of her form on the floor. Even today, you can see her outline on the old wooden floor. She is reported to still regularly appear in the window, staring down at all trespassers of her domain.
My breath caught in my throat and I took a tiny step backwards, my breath pluming in the air when it finally made it past my lips. My arms felt like they were being pulled backwards, caught in a straightjacket, and my ribs were starting to hurt from how tightly my arms were wrapped around me. "D-Danny?" I tried to call, but my words failed to escape the tight confines of my throat.
Eyes trying to dart everywhere at once, I licked my lips and tried to think rationally. I was, for some reason, terrified to the point of being frozen in place. Valerie Grey does not freeze – she fights. I focused on that thought, whispering, "Whoever's doing this to me, I'm not afraid of you."
The dark shadows loomed over me, seeming to lean in, pressing my nightmares into the depths my brain. The over-reaching fear reached right into the primitive part of my brain and touched the darkest piece of me. A tiny scream slipped out from between my lips. "Stop it," I hissed, but my voice cracked and made the words impossible to understand.
A moan swirled through the darkness. It wasn't a moan of pain; it was a hungry, horrifying moan that made my toes curl and my guts clench. I jerked, staring at the darkened doorway, the buzzing florescent light above my head illuminating nothing behind that hell-bent portal.
In fact, the dim lights in the hallway seemed to make the yawning gap darker than I ever would have thought possible.
The moaning came again, followed by a glimmer of red eyes just beyond the doorway. They blazed a bloody, swirling red, and they didn't seemed to be focused on me. They felt like they were peering straight in my soul.
A wall suddenly pressed into my back and I flinched, surprised to find that I'd been backing away from the doorway and the eyes. My own eyes were wide as panic started to overtake what was left of my mind, unable to wrench my gaze away from the twin points of red flashing in the darkness.
My foot touched the flashlight Danny had dropped, still rolling slightly back towards the stairs, and I slowly squatted down to pick it up. Hand shaking uncontrollably, I pointed the flashlight towards the doorway. The bloody eyes narrowed, a ghoulish mouth appearing underneath them, open and yawning its sharp teeth at me-
I flicked on the light, flinching away from the sight I was sure was going to greet my eyes. A dead moldy corpse, bones sticking out everywhere, pieces of its head missing, a wide gaping mouth full of rotting teeth…
Danny pulled a hand up, blocking his eyes from the light I was shining at him and muttering under his breath. His white shirt shone brightly in the darkness, his black hair disappearing into the shadows. Barely taking the time to focus on him, my gaze darted around the room behind him, searching for the source of the gleaming red eyes. Empty.
"Danny?" I pushed myself off the wall, glancing back up and down the hallway. My heart was still pounding loudly in my ears and my arms were trembling. I glanced down at my watch – there were no ghosts around. There's nothing here, stop this Val. "Danny, are you okay?"
"Save them," he muttered quietly, still rubbing his eyes against the light.
"I think," I said as I lowered the bright beam of the flashlight, glancing over my shoulder once before turning back to him, "we need to get-"
Words died in my throat as the lights in the hallway suddenly cut out, leaving us illuminated by nothing but the flashlight in my hands. I squinted up at the shadow-covered ceiling, then I looked down and stared into Danny's eyes.
They were a haunting, piercing, insane, red.
"Danny?" I whispered.
"I saved the insane," he breathed, an insane smile twisting his face as he took a clumsy step out of the shadows of the room and into the hallway. "I drilled holes in their heads to let the crazy out, I saved them."
I backed away from him, edging towards the stairs. "Danny…" I shot a glance over my shoulder to find the stairs, and when I turned back Danny had moved an impossible distance, those bloody eyes inches from mine, his nose so close I could almost feel it. My heart froze in my chest, my whole body trembling for a rush of adrenaline.
"I saved them!" he shrieked, "Don't you understand? I'm not a monster – I SAVED THEM!"
I scrambled backwards, tripping over a dropped piece of equipment and sprawling on my back on the ground, the flashlight tumbling out of my grip and rolling. Terror stealing the breath from my lungs, I poked frantically at my brain, trying to come up with a plan. You're a freaking ghost hunter! Do something!
Danny took a menacing step forwards, his bangs eerily throwing his face into shadows and making his red eyes gleam demonically. "I saved them," he murmured, "and I'll save you too. I'll drill a hole in your head and you can forget about the dark and the bats and the ghosts and the fear. No more fear…" One of his hands came out from behind his back, showing off the long, rusty piece of metal he'd been holding. "I'm going to drill out your brains, girl. Hold still."
I couldn't move as he took another step, leaning over me with the piece of metal held up and ready to plunge into my head. "No!" The word was jolted from my body as my fighting reflexes finally kicked in. I curled my legs up to my chest then pushed out hard with my feet. My heels slammed into Danny's chest, the momentum and power in my legs sending him crashing into a wall before tumbling to the ground.
"Damn it!" I stumbled to my feet and took off towards the stairs, the light of the forgotten flashlight making my shadow dance in front of me. The harsh lights from the first floor illuminated the stairs, calling to me.
"Save you," a voice rasped behind me. "Save you, save you, save you…"
I was just a few moments from reaching the steps when another shadow joined mine, dancing on the stairs. Glancing back, I saw a dark shape chasing after me with long, bounding grace, demonic eyes focused on me. My foot hit the bottom stair, almost tripping me, and I twisted my focus back to the front, dashing up the stairs three at a time. "Damn it, damn it, damn it," I breathed as my feet slammed into the steps, praying to all the gods I'd ever heard of not to slip.
"Save you." Warm-cold breath brushed against the back of my neck and I had enough time for a startled CRAP! before two freezing hands wrapped themselves around my neck. Danny's lean bulk slammed into my back and my feet lost their purchase on the slick steps. I crashed over the top step, Danny lost his grip, and we both rolled to a stop on the first floor.
I was back on my feet almost before we'd stopped moving, the shin of my right leg shooting sharp pains up and down my spine. My muscles tensed to run, but I hesitated.
The over-riding fear, that horrible terror that had clogged up my brain and made it impossible for me to think… it was gone as suddenly as it has shone up.
"Danny?" I asked softly, gazing down at my friend. The rusted piece of metal he'd been trying to lodge into my brain was lying just beyond his outstretched fingers. I took a small step towards him, licking my dry lips, struggling to get my heart to start beating at a normal speed again. "Danny?"
He groaned and rolled over, his blue eyes flickering open and staring at me. "Val?" he moaned, rubbing at his head.
Glancing back at the stairs, I took a cautious step towards him. "Are you alright?"
He blinked up at me in confusion for a moment, pushing himself to a sitting position and looking around. "Where… what…" Then his gaze fell on the rusty metal pole and he suddenly jerked away from it. "The hell!" he cursed, crab-walking backwards a bit before finally getting to his feet.
I stayed back a bit as he rubbed at his pale face. My stomach was settling down, my breathing slowing. "I think you were possessed," I whispered.
"Yeah," he breathed, letting his hands fall to his side. He was still staring down at the rusted metal, an unreadable look to his eyes. "That's enough ghost hunting for tonight, I think. Let's call Tucker and my parents…"
"Um…" I cut in, glancing down into the dark basement. A lonely light glittered up from the depths, illuminating the shadowy forms of the two backpacks lying at the bottom of stairs. I could see the walkie-talkies stuffed into the side pockets. "After you?"
Scowling at me, he stuffed his hands into his pockets. "Let's go find them and tell them in person," he muttered darkly. "I want out of here." His eyes flickered down to the rusted metal and a wave of longing appeared on his face.
My eyes narrowed, but he twisted around on his heel and stalked off down the first floor hallway before I could try to figure out what had crossed his mind. I watched him walk for a moment before a chill swirled down my spine. Glancing over my shoulder one last time at the dark recesses of the basement, I hurried after him.
The rusted metal stayed on the floor, empty and cold.
I trailed behind Danny as he walked slowly up the steps to the third floor of the condemned building. The old, wooden stairs creaked under his weight, the lights overhead casting dark shadows and making the view through the small windows impossible to make out.
My heart was still pounding from the scare downstairs, my eyes still flickering warily from Danny to the darkness pressing around us and back to Danny. It wasn't that I didn't trust him and it wasn't that I still thought he might be possessed, but every time I looked away, my heart did this odd dancing beat and I found my eyes drawn back to him. For some reason, I felt safer when he was within sight.
Danny had looked more scary than at all necessary and my mind couldn't quite drag those red eyes out of my thoughts. I'd seen possessed people before and they'd always had a feeling of wrongness about them – more of a puppet being controlled than a master. But Danny had held it perfectly, carried it within him, and had embodied the… whatever it had been… in a way I'd never seen before.
We stepped out onto the third floor, the old wooden floor creaking under our shoes. Only a few of the forgotten lights were lit, casting pointy shadows and creating huge masses of pure blackness. Doors lined the long hallway and lead into small rooms that were dark pools of oblivion.
I shivered and let out a slow breath, letting it twist into a soft chuckle when I heard Danny heave a similar sigh right next to me. "Now what?" I asked, glancing down at my water. It still wasn't showing any signs of ghosts… but then again, it hadn't all night either.
"This is like some bad horror movie," Danny muttered darkly. He raised his voice. "Jazz? Tuck?" The names echoed eerily through the hallways and came back at us as a distant whisper. Lifting an eyebrow, he glanced over at me. "Well?"
Just for a split second, Danny's eyes gleamed an insane red. I froze, staring at him, but it was gone before I even really saw it. He tipped his head to the side, his eyes narrowing in confusion, and I shook my head. "After you," I breathed, struggling to push the image out of my mind.
I had to have imagined it. There was no way Danny was still possessed. He was acting too normal right now to be possessed.
He sighed and started the walk towards the bend in the hallway, his body tense and his head constantly moving. Hurrying past the slightly open doorways, he was quite a distance down the hallway before I finally got my feet moving. With one last glance over my shoulder at the shadow-filled stairwell, I followed him.
As each darkened doorway slipped past with nothing happening, I felt my confidence returning. I breathed in and out slowly, unconsciously counting out the meditative pattern I'd learned years earlier. I shook out one hand as we travelled through the first pool of black, barely able to see my feet, and felt the muscles in my arms loosen. The unnerving fear I'd felt in the basement was letting go.
But that's when I felt something. I hesitated between steps when I was near door 37, shooting a look over my shoulder. The little hairs on the back of my neck were starting to stand up, the eerie feeling of being watched curling into my brain. "Danny?"
"What?"
I turned around. Danny had stopped in a pool of light, looking at me with haunted blue eyes. "Do you feel that?"
A look of annoyance flickered onto his face. "'That' is a little vague."
"It's like I'm being watched," I said softly, curling my fingers into a fist. "But my…" I trailed off and glanced down at my watch, licking my lips. I was pretty sure Danny had a guess that I was the ghost hunter in red – he'd basically told me he knew when he invited me along on this crazy vacation – but I still wasn't positive. And I wasn't sure I wanted him to know if he hadn't already figured it out.
"Your watch isn't going off," Danny finished for me. He looked around the hallway, the harsh overhead light making his bangs cast evil-looking shadows across his face. Then he laughed.
It wasn't much of a laugh, it was more of a sad chuckle, but I still tensed. After the adrenaline rush of the basement and the creepy feeling of being watched, my emotions were too near the surface. "I don't think this is funny," I snapped.
He stopped laughing, shaking his head. "I don't either, Val. But here's something you don't get: not all ghosts are the same." He stuffed his hands in his pockets, but then seemed to think better of it and took them back out, rubbing them together nervously. "Your ghost stuff works really good at tracking one kind of ghost. My parents' ghost stuff works good at tracking a few kinds. But there are a whole lot more out there."
I stared at him, watching him gaze at me, before the tickling at the back of my neck grew. I glanced over my shoulder with a narrowed gaze. "What's staring at me?" I asked.
"I don't have a clue," he answered, sounding honest, "and I'm pretty sure I don't want to know. But I can tell you that compared to the basement, compared to some of the other things I think are in here, it's not something to worry about. Come on, let's find someone and get out of here."
He turned and started up the hallway again even as I opened my mouth to ask another question. I'd known that Danny knew more about ghosts than he let on, but he sounded like he really understood all this stuff just then. "Hey," I said, stepping after him, "but then why-"
I cut off as I stepped into a cold spot, my breath suddenly fogging the air in front of me. Hesitating, I glanced around, then down at my watch. Still no ghost alarm. I shook it, shooting my gaze around the nearly deserted hallway before I brought it to my ear. I waited for the reassuring ticking noise before I remembered digital watches don't tick. Your ghost stuff works really good at tracking one kind of ghost.
Letting my arm drop to my side, my eye caught a slight movement and I flinched, twisting to glare at the movement. A cracked, full-length mirror was sitting on the floor, my own pale, wide-eyed reflection staring back at me. I let a small chuckle slip from between my lips.
I moved to follow Danny, but my eyes drifted one last time to my cracked reflection. Only this time, something had changed. Over my shoulder hovered the face of an old woman, her short white hair sticking away from her head in insane angles, her blood-red eyes focused on me. Startled, I gasped in a breath of air and backpedaled away from the mirror.
The woman in the mirror laughed silently. I twirled around in a circle, but there was nothing there. The only place I could see the woman was in the mirror. "Ghost," I hissed softly, reaching for my backpack – only to remember it was in the basement, along with most of my ghost hunting equipment. With the realization I was a lot more defenseless than I wanted to be, I felt a tremor of fear grab at my heart.
Footsteps echoed through the hallways, greeting my ears like an offbeat drum line. Voices whispered, talking about medication and shock therapy and crazy people, and I felt something cold trail up my arm. "Get away from me!" I snapped, terrified and furious, as a breeze curled down the abandoned hallway, tousling my hair. The woman in the mirror reached out for my reflection, and I felt her fingers slide into my hair, wrapping strands around invisible fists.
"Valerie."
Danny's voice cut through the supernatural and I felt everything die away, leaving me alone. The image in the mirror was gone, replaced by my own pale face. My hands were trembling and my knees felt weak. "What was that?" I whispered.
"You're in over your heads, we need to get out of here," he said softly, walking forwards to grab my hand and pull me along. "We need to go find Tucker and Jazz."
I resisted. "I want to know what's going on," I said, my eyes starting to burn. When Danny shook his head and pulled a little harder, I yanked my hand out of his grasp. I don't deal with fear well. "This isn't a ghost like the ones in Amity Park."
Staring at his empty hands, Danny let out a breath. "This is… something else."
Two voices echoed down the hallway, footsteps falling heavily on the old wood. "Danny? Valerie?"
Danny turned towards the voices, but I kept staring at him. He knew something, I could see it etched on his face, and I also knew that he didn't want to tell me about it. "What was that?" I demanded.
He shot me a look and didn't answer. Tucker and Jazz appeared around a bend in the hallway and hurried towards us. "Hey!" Tucker called out, raising his hand.
"What was it?" I asked again.
I was so focused on Danny, I almost missed the silent look that Jazz and Danny traded. "Why did you use the walkie-talkies?" Jazz asked softly.
"We lost them," Danny answered sourly. "Didn't want to go back and get them."
"What happened?" Tucker asked, his gaze flickering between both of us. "I don't suppose you can just be nice and say you saw a ghost."
"We were downstairs," I said when I realized Danny was looking at me, waiting for me to tell the story, "checking out the rooms down there. Danny was… possessed by something." Jazz and Tucker both tensed at that, shooting looks towards Danny. "He attacked me. Wanted to scoop out my brain or drill a hole in my skull or something. We only just managed to get away from whatever it was."
"It's not a ghost like we've ever met before," Danny picked up, his voice quiet, but carrying in the silent hallway. "I'm not even sure it's a ghost. And then Val met something just a few minutes ago."
Somewhere in the distance, a door slammed shut with an angry sound. Both Danny and I flinched, but Tucker and Jazz just exchanged a glance. "We haven't seen hide nor hair of a ghost," Jazz finally admitted. "We were just starting to think this was a creepy place with nothing in it. Sounds like you were having fun."
"Resident ghost magnet," Tucker muttered under his breath.
Danny leveled a glare at Tucker and I just shook my head and said, "We've had enough for one night; we're leaving."
"The RV sounds like a great place," Jazz said with a smile. "We'll go with you – we can play cards."
Danny shrugged. "You'll probably be safe up here without me hanging around."
"Hey!" Tucker cut in. "Don't let us out of the playing cards idea. Besides, there are lots of ghost shields and weapons and stuff in the RV," Tucker added happily. "And no creepy insane asylum."
The stair well was narrow enough that we had to traverse it single file – Tucker leading and Danny at the rear. We hadn't gotten more than a few steps down when Tucker stopped, bringing everyone to a halt. "What's that?" I heard him whisper.
I tipped my head to the side, listening closely. A set of footsteps, slightly off-beat like the person was limping, coming from the floor beneath us and getting closer. My forehead wrinkled, wondering who it was.
"Mom?" the sharp sound of static accompanied Jazz's voice on the walkie-talkie.
"What's up sweetheart?" Mrs. Fenton's voice crackled back.
"Are you two by the stairs that lead up the third floor, by any chance?" Jazz asked. I blinked and looked at her curiously. Of course they were – who else could it be?
"No, we're in the back kitchens. There's some amazing paranormal activity going on…"
I stopped listening, leaning over slightly to peer down the steps. The steps turned halfway, doubling back on themselves, so the bottom was out of view. But the sounds of the footsteps were getting louder, clearly audible over the static of the two-way radio. The footsteps hesitated, then there was the distinctive creak as something stepped onto the bottom stair.
Tucker started to back up, forcing Jazz to push me backwards and cause me to bump into Danny. "Back up, back up, back up," Tucker muttered under his breath. "If it's at all related to the one you met in the basement, I don't want to meet it."
Creak… creak… creak…
My mind was busy wrapping itself around the idea of meeting the thing from the basement again when a cold hand grabbed at my arm. I gasped, my heart racing, and I twisted around. Danny's eyes were glinting at me in the shadows. "Come on," he mouthed, yanking me quietly up the stairs.
Jazz led the way into the first room she could find, hastily opening the door and glancing inside before pushing us through and closing the door behind her. "We stay until it's gone," she whispered. "And then we leave. Simple as that. No need to panic." She met my eyes for a moment, her pupils wide with barely contained fear. "Right? No need to panic."
I smiled and nodded, seeing the panic in her eyes die down a little. "It's just a ghost, right?" I said softly. But my voice trembled.
When she turned around, I slumped to the floor and listened to the distant, semi-rhythmic creaking of the stairs. I pulled my arm up to study the watch at my wrist and then I scowled and wrapped my arms around my legs. My heart was starting to pound again, my breath hitching uncomfortably in my lungs, and I found my fingers digging painfully into my legs.
I'm a ghost hunter. But I'm not even sure these things are ghosts!
I flinched when a hand dropped onto my shoulder. "We'll be fine," Tucker said, settling onto the floor next to me. "Stop looking so scared."
"I'm not scared," I retorted, flicking my hair over my shoulder and sending him a glare, making sure to breathe steadily and calmly.
"Right," he drawled. "You look so 'not scared' it couldn't fool me."
My forehead wrinkled as I tried to puzzle through the logic of that sentence, but then shook my head. "It's just a stupid ghost," I told him with a scowl. "I'm not scared of a ghost."
"If it were just a ghost, you wouldn't be," he replied softly. He stretched out a leg and studied Danny. "You know the only thing that creeps me out about this place?" He waited until I shook my head before continuing. "How pale Danny looks. He doesn't like ghosts at all, but he's pretty good about handling them and he knows a lot more about them then he lets on. I've learned not to worry too much until Danny starts to worry."
I shot him a look out of the corner of my eye. "What makes you think you need to tell me this?"
"Because you just saw some things that scared the crap out of you," he said honestly, "and you look like you did. But I'm saying don't worry too much – between the four of us, we could probably stop the apocalypse if given enough motivation and energy drinks."
I snorted out a half-laugh, shaking my head. "You didn't see it, Tucker. It's not… normal." My gaze was drawn to Danny, how he was standing next to the lone window, staring out into the moonlight. A slight memory of him, the red eyes, the graceful way he moved, flooded into my mind. "You didn't see him."
"I've seen him creepy," Tucker said, very softly, "and I know the nightmares."
I was about to ask what it was about, but Jazz spoke up. "Guys, look at this." Her flashlight was pointed to a spot on the floor, playing the light over a weird, whitish, depressed hollow in the wooden floor. It was the shape of a human figure.
Tucker got to his feet and walked closer. "Freaky," he murmured. "What is it?"
Gazing at the white spot on the floor was making the hairs on my neck stand on end and the nerves in my legs jump and twitch. I tore my eyes off the spot and looked up at Danny. He was staring at the stain with those green sparkles back in his eyes. Suddenly his gaze jumped over to me and he sent me a pale-looking grin, his eyes flashing red just for a split-second.
"Oh, I know," Jazz said softly, "this is where that woman died. I read about this place before we got here. This building closed in 1979 and they transferred all the patients… except one. One woman ran away and they couldn't find her despite all their searching. They came back about six weeks later and found her – dead on the floor with no clothes on. When they carried her body out, it left this imprint in the floor."
"That's creepy-weird," Tucker muttered, crouching down to poke at the white stain.
Danny glanced at him and shook his head. "Don't." His blue eyes glittered in the light for a moment before he went back to studying the window.
Jazz nodded in agreement as Tucker leaned back on his heels. "Remember that story Dad told us a million times on the way here? About the college girl? She touched that spot and she was haunted by the insane woman who died here. The girl eventually committed suicide in her dorm room." Jazz was quiet for a moment. "You want to end up like that, Tucker?"
Shaking his head, Tucker glanced around the empty room before turning his attention towards Danny. "What's so interesting out there anyways?" he wondered.
Danny shrugged, then stiffened.
I caught the vaguest reflection of red eyes in the window and my breath caught in my throat. Cold air was swirling into the room, an incredibly loud footstep creaking the wood right outside the door we were hiding behind. Impossibly dark, chanting sounds started to buzz through the air like bees.
"She died chanting a bunch of spiritual mumbo-jumbo?" Tucker repeated softly.
Jazz nodded, which got both Tucker and I back on our feet, edging towards the far wall. Tucker and Jazz were focused on the door, I was staring at Danny.
The red eyes. The tense way he held his body. The flashes of something else.
"Crap," Tucker muttered, but I couldn't find it inside myself to nod. I had a feeling that what was behind that door wasn't nearly as scary as what was probably already in the room.
I hadn't been imagining anything the past ten minutes.
Something cold grabbed my arm and I flinched, looking down. When my eyes met nothing, I couldn't help the stifled scream.
The two remaining flashlights died, sending the room into darkness, filled by the panicked breathing of three people and a distant, demonic chanting.