#ectober2018

[tsubaki94]

Ectober Blood Moon

[wastefulreverie]

Ectober Week 2018

This is published two days early since Tumblr mobile screwed up but I'm just gonna leave it so shhh

Day One: The Witching Hour

Words: 4648

Warnings: Kinda creepy? Pretty safe. One curse word.

Honestly, if Danny had to keep track of every little tiny thing he'd learned about the nature of paranormal entities since he became one himself, he'd have a very long and existential crisis inducing list. Most of it was little things, like holy water actually hurt him. It'd been a little crushing to learn that his entire existence wasn't worthy enough to be considered natural, that he was one of the 'evil' forces repelled by the will of good. Though, he does admit he expected it nonetheless; he was a ghost hybrid, so in the eye of nature, he was physically tainted, despite the fact that he had a strong loyalty to his moral compass. But again, that was only one of the small facts he'd learned from what it's like to be a part of the world of ghosts and unearthly creatures.

Ghost fights could occur any time of the day, but Danny often noticed that the night was much busier than the daytime for tedious invasions of the town. When he was new to ghost fighting, he assumed that it was much easier to use the portal unnoticed at night, since his parents were asleep and out of the lab. But as time went on Danny seemed to notice that ghosts were almost more... nocturnal? Even though they didn't sleep, it was like their natural clocks were prone to more activity during nighttime. He certainly had no trouble getting to sleep at night, seeing as he was always so exhausted after a day of school and daytime ghost attacks, but he wondered if it weren't for his human social life keeping him diurnal, if he would be naturally nocturnal instead. He couldn't really spare any sleep, though, so it wasn't like he was extremely eager to test his theory out by completely destroying his already irregular sleep patterns.

After he came to that conclusion, he approached his next revelation about what really made ghosts more active at night. Over a period of a few weeks of constant night attacks, he started noticing something. The ghosts he fought at night were stronger than the ones he fought during the day, and he... was also stronger at night. It had taken him a while to figure it out, since he hadn't really noticed that his opponents were stronger and he also had enhanced strength during those hours, but once he realized it, he couldn't ignore the sensation of strength that he acquired at night. It was weird – how much more refreshed and energized he felt at night, like his body had gotten some kind of natural power-up. And once he recognized that sensation, he realized that it didn't happen during the entire night – it only occurred between certain hours. He started keeping track of specific times and decided that it only happened between 3 and 4 AM, the most popular hour for attacks. Of course, none of it was a coincidence.

“Literally anybody could've told you that, Danny,” Sam rolled her eyes. They were sitting in her basement, and Danny had randomly brought it up after thinking about it for a few days. “The Witching Hour is common knowledge.”

“You're a goth encyclopedia,” Tucker argued. “You know everything when it comes to paranormal lore.”

“I mean, I knew about the Witching Hour,” Danny said, “but I didn't really realize that it was a thing that affected ghosts, and me.”

“Well at this point,” Tucker started, “I'm sure we can assume that every myth throughout history is real, so are you really surprised?”

“Good point,” Danny shrugged. “I mean, not really, anyway.”

So, the three of them brushed it off, since it wasn't really significant for anything. They spent the rest of that night watching scary movies, before Danny had to fly Tucker and himself home.

It was a few weeks after that when Danny realized that the Witching Hour had a much more thorough grasp on him than he had initially thought.

Jazz pulled all-nighters a lot. Sometimes even on school nights, which resulted in a considerable coffee demand until she could come home and take a well deserved nap. So there she was, dull red eyes staring into her computer screen, almost completely in the dark, typing up another essay for college applications. She'd lost track of time, and since it was the weekend, she couldn't really find the mind to care very much. She just couldn't stop typing, because she would lose her momentary vision for the essay. The words were in her head now, and she had to transcribe them somewhere, before she inevitably forgot them in the void of sleep.

She wouldn't stop typing until this was completely finished. She was determined that she would not comply to sleep, sleep would comply to her.

'I've found with experience that this is...' Jazz paused. What was the word? 'Important'? No, she decided, that word is too vague. Maybe the words 'vital' or 'crucial'? She pondered each of them, and decided on the word 'vital'. '...this is vital to my formation as an exemplary student' No. Rewrite that. '…this is vital to my outstanding high school career, and that without it I could have never accomplished my current...' She was stuck again. Why do words have to be so complicated? she lamented, almost deciding to give it up and go to sleep before she passed out face down on the keyboard again.

But she resisted the temptation, opting to continue writing instead, though within minutes, she found that her mind was slowly delving into the thrall of unconsciousness, and she was starting to lose the battle against the irrepressible force. Darkness seemed to subtly drip within the words on her computer screen, causing the pixelated text to blur into formless black shapes. Her eyes became dull and her sense of focus was compromised, and her eyelids began to droop with finality.

She wasn't even aware that she was slipping away.

The keyboard didn't even feel uncomfortable when she blindly laid her head on it.

Her mind wasn't present, and her eyes were open by a sliver, but the sudden movement in her peripheral vision unnerved her, causing her heart to adopt an alarming tempo. She felt the invasive sensation of air being vacuumed out of her lungs, and consequently fell out of her chair when she attempted to sit upright. Her forehead met the carpet with a vengeance, and she was left reeling, scouring the darkness for what had startled her out of her near sleep. She pulled herself up once again, and glimpsed motion beyond her doorway, causing her heart-rate to escalate for a second time.

Her groggy brain lagged as it failed to comprehend the sight before her; a suspended figure, arms slack beside it, hovering as if it was being held in the air by a noose descending from the ceiling. It felt like some kind of surreal nightmare, and she probably would've believed it was just that, except that something in her head finally clicked into place, and the figure in the air was suddenly familiarly haunting. He was in human form, and his eyes were closed, and his face showed no hints of awareness as he floated slowly, as if his body had it's own awareness. Even though he was currently Fenton, his skin gave off a faint unnatural glow, which was only visible in the utter blackness of Jazz's bedroom. The light from his skin cast dark shadows, creating jagged blotches of darkness around his eyes and nose, which accented the barely visible green tint moving behind his shut eyelids.

She was used to watching Danny exhibit his powers, but seeing him so... lifeless, was unnerving. It sent pangs of fear within her, and if she hadn't been so sapped of her energy, she might have just scurried backwards along her floor until she was against the opposite wall, her knees buried in her chest. She remained where she was instead, opting to just gape in silent fixation.

But then, Danny disappeared from her field of vision, surpassing the space in front of her bedroom door, continuing his path down the hallway. It took her a few moments after that to disregard the eeriness clinging to her weary nerves. And it was like she had awoken from a trance. Her mind began to function properly again (as proper as it could in the wee hours of the night), she began asking the appropriate questions regarding the situation. For instance, why Danny was floating down the hallway, seemingly asleep, but conscious enough to use his powers without realizing it? If anything, Danny had exclusively told her that hovering in human form was uncomfortable, that his ghost form was much more equipped for defying gravity, so why was this the power that decided to manifest in his sleep?

It was almost like he was... sleepwalking. But that's not what this could be, right? Danny had never sleepwalked as a child, she was sure of it, so that meant that this had to be a recent development. So was he ghost sleepwalking/hovering? That's sure what it looked like, because when he had passed by her bedroom door, Danny was not there; he was definitely somewhere else, dreaming.

Since it appeared that he was asleep, Jazz wasn't keen on waking her brother up, but it wasn't like she could risk having him float out the front door and out into the street in the middle of the night, in human form, nonetheless. She had to wake him up and send him to bed so he could sleep uninterrupted.

She pulled herself off of the floor, her legs wobbling beneath her, and she tried to compose herself as she strode into the hallway. Danny was now making his way down the stairs, descending slowly over the steps, maintaining his levitation and never touching them. Shivers caressed her spine again, watching as Danny absently glided through the air with an otherworldly presence that he usually concealed with his liveliness; Phantom never unnerved her because she was always reassured that he was Danny, zoetic and aware of the world around him. But now his human quirks, what attested his earthly sentience, was absent, and all that remained was the uncanny eeriness within him.

She followed him to the bottom of the stairs. Once he had established himself above level flooring, she took a harrowing breath and cautiously reached out to touch his shoulder. She wasn't too surprised when his skin was cold to the touch, but she was concerned that his temperature was lower than usual in human form. She gripped her hand into his shoulder as his body continued to follow its nonexistent path throughout the house. And then, he suddenly ceased floating and collapsed into a hyperventilating heap on the floor, similar to what Jazz had experienced when she had first seen him outside of her bedroom. He didn't notice her at first, and instinctively held up a fiery green fist while he attempted to maintain his erratic breathing.

“Danny,” she said softly. At the sound of her voice, ethereal green eyes decimated her where she stood, and she nearly flinched at the malice in his defensive glare. Danny realized quickly that it was only Jazz and let his hand extinguish immediately, chastising his fight or flight response for almost accidentally pulverizing his sister. He was still on the floor, and his shallow breathing had already modulated into a regular pace.

“How'd I get here?” he looked up at Jazz, confusion evident in his unceasing green eyes. Instantly, her irrational dread vanished; the haunting version of Danny retired behind his usual human awareness. There was emotion in his expression, in his voice, and he was there – not just an empty vessel floating aimlessly through the house.

“You were sleepwalking,” she explained. “Uh – well, technically sleepfloating? Levitating, I guess. Scared the crap out of me so I thought I'd wake you up in case something happened.”

Danny stared at her blankly. Her words took a moment to process, but when they did he was incredulous. “Sleepwalking? I – I've never done that before, though.”

“I know,” she said, remembering her initial doubts. “It was really weird. Since you were using your powers – I didn't even know you could do that in your sleep – do you think it was a ghost thing?”

…

“Maybe?” he yawned. She could see the wheels in his head attempt to turn and just give up. It was too late to truly think about it, or too early, and now that this was over they both needed to go back to sleep.

“Let's go to bed,” she said. She suspected that he probably would've crashed right there if she hadn't suggested it fast enough.

They started walking back up the stairs. “What time is it anyway?” he muttered.

“Maybe like fifteen 'til four,” she guessed without thought.

He paused. “So like 3:45?”

“Mm... yeah?”

“I got an idea what this is, maybe,” he said. “I'll tell you in the morning, though.”

She didn't object. She was kinda too tired to care at this point. “Alright. Goodnight, Danny.”

“Goodnight, Jazz.”

They both fell asleep, and neither of them moved until late the next morning.

Jack and Maddie were unimpressed at the usual exhibit of teenage laziness, but let them sleep late, regardless. It wasn't until about 11 AM that both of them had ventured downstairs for some breakfast (more appropriately brunch now) and recalled the strange occurrence the night before. Danny, as he promised, explained his theory to Jazz. He told her about the inexplicable increase in ghost activity during the Witching Hour and how he had eventually realized that he was stronger during that time-frame.

“Wait, so you think that the ghostly paradigm during that time of night is causing you to use your powers in your sleep? Not just using them, but making  you sleepwalk.” She sounded skeptical, but it was apparent she was intrigued by the idea.

He shrugged, “Weirder things have happened.”

And with an inappropriate lack of concern, they moved on, not thinking too much about it, since it was easier for both of them that way. It wasn't until the next incident that Danny actually considered that his unconscious haunting was more than just an odd, single occurrence.

Back in middle school, sleepovers with Tucker used to stretch far into the morning, typically concluding their crazy video game nights with a sunrise. Now that they were in high school, exhausted from homework and the responsibility of being a superhero, their rare sleepovers usually expired sometime before midnight. Tucker would sleep on the bed while Danny would roll out a sleeping bag, which was also different from when they were younger. Tucker used to sleep on his own sleeping bag next to Danny, but now that they were older, Danny insisted that Tucker got a good night's rest in his own bed. (“I'm half-dead, I sleep like it too, so don't worry.”)

So there they were, after a long week of school drama, hopeless assignments that neither one of them could expect to complete, and more strenuous ghost fights, Tucker on the bed and Danny in the floor. There wasn't much discussion before they passed out, and they each promptly hit the hay after a few seconds. The room was still and quiet, with the intermittent hum of the heater turning on and off to warm the fresh autumn chill in the air. Simultaneously, the numbers on Tucker's digital clock rose and rose, plummeting after midnight, and continued to climb again into the morning hours of the night.

Neither of the boys were aware of the transition between 2:59 and 3 AM, but there was definitely some sort of supernatural liminality that occurred. The clock fell from fifty-nine to zero, and rose from two to three. Something in the air shifted, something cold, even though the heater was still running, and something... restless filled the room. There was an atmosphere of heaviness, an indescribable ambiance churning in the shadows. If anything, the energy in the room was akin to the poise of power, feeding off the darkness, growing. It was unnatural.

There was no build-up, no anticipation. It simply happened. The insubstantial

energy in the room (it wasn't just in the room, it occupied the moment) flexed and twisted, growing heavy around Danny's core. It left him as he was, asleep, and his body was animated, almost like a marionette. His skin adopted a translucent glow, a light only faint enough to be seen in complete darkness, but unwaveringly present. In the same instance, his body sensed an obstacle – the sleeping bag still had him trapped – and automatically phased through it. His rhetorical strings were pulled upwards, and he was instantly vertical, afloat in midair.

Now that he was hovering, his body naturally leaned into the movement of flying, a dormant action, which was inexplicably guided by some unconscious knowledge of the location of his surroundings. He moved across the room, towards Tucker's window, somehow avoiding crashing into a tall shelf.

The dim light his skin emitted was enough to gradually wake Tucker from his sleep. The black boy stared across his room, seeing the blurry outline of a figure in white hovering around his room. Petrified, he didn't make a sound, squinting in utter confusion since his unaided vision was downright awful. Eventually, Tucker's muddled brain collected the courage to reach for his glasses, and pressed them to his face slowly. When he reexamined the floating figure in his room, he choked out in disbelief.

“What the fuck, Danny?” he sputtered.

It was when Danny's eyes frantically shot open, causing him to unceremoniously fall to the floor, that Tucker realized that his friend might have not been flying around his room like a creep intentionally.

“Wha-?” Danny exclaimed. He pulled himself up, and looked towards Tucker for an explanation. His green eyes were the primary highlight of his current appearance, and his skin hadn't ceased glowing. Tucker was initially taken aback, since usually Danny only glowed and had green eyes in ghost-form.

“Dude, you were like floating in your sleep, going all around the room and stuff and I couldn't see you at first, creeped me out, God,” he blurted in a single breath.

Danny blankly processed his words, “Really?”

“Uh-huh. Yeah,” Tucker confirmed.

Danny didn't seem to hear him, and looked down questioningly. “Again?”

Tucker barely heard it, and found himself concerned. “What?”

Danny showed no indication that he had heard Tucker and bit his lip curiously. “What time is it?” he asked, instead of responding.

“What do you mean 'again', Danny?” Tucker didn't have the patience to play games.

Once again, Danny ignored him, and moved to the other side of Tucker's bed so he could get a clear view of the lamp-like digital clock. Besides Danny, it was the only thing that was currently providing light to the room. It read 3:13 with a haunting sort of elegance.

Danny's jaw dropped to resemble a sort of “oohhh” expression, and Tucker continued to glare at him interrogatively.

“What's going on, Danny?”

The ghost boy's eyes darted between the clock and his friend. He decisively sat on the edge of Tucker's bed and started to explain.

“Remember what I was saying about the Witching Hour making me stronger? Well a few nights ago Jazz found me sleepflying and we sort of decided that it was an extension of that. For some reason my powers kind of turned on without me doing anything. I hadn't realized that it would be happening more than once, though, I just thought it was a glitch....”

“Wait, so some paranormal force in between 3 and 4 AM can basically make you sleepfly? Why though? Because it's creepy or something? Cause it was creepy to me, man. No offense, but when you're asleep, you look really, like... dead. I mean actually like the scary kind of dead you see in horror movies. Absolutely terrifying.” Tucker froze, realizing that he'd said a little too much. “Oh God, I didn't mean for it to sound like that, I'm sorry dude. You know that-”

Danny gave an ironic laugh, “It's fine, Tucker. I'm a ghost, how can I be offended by the fact that I look dead?”

“True, I guess,” he admitted. “So, does this happen some nights, or is it every night and you've just now noticed it? Oh, and if it's only some nights, then why not every night?”

“I think it's only some nights. I don't know why some nights are different than others. I know I'm awake a lot at 3 AM, but not always, so I don't know what determines if I sleepfly or not.”

Tucker put his hand under his head in thought, “So you don't know a way to prevent it, then?”

“If I can't predict it, then I can't really prevent it,” he replied. “So, nope. But to be honest, I don't know if there's a point to preventing it – it's not really harmful, and it's beyond our control, so it's just another thing that I've decided to let go for now, unless it becomes relevant.”

Tucker realized that he was right. If Danny sleepflew around his house for less than an hour while everyone was sleeping, it wasn't really dangerous for anybody. He voiced his agreement, and the two boys simultaneously expressed their wish to go back to sleep. Danny returned to his discarded sleeping-bag, and Tucker surrendered his glasses for the night, burying himself underneath his blankets again.

Their breathing evened as their minds entered a secure tranquility, and the numbers on the clock continued to rise....

It was about a month or so later when Danny was awakened during one of his sleepflying excursions for the third time. He'd been somewhat aware of some nights that it occurred, because every once in a while he would notice that he'd wake up on top of his covers instead of underneath. He never pondered it much, and usually forgot about it after a few minutes of his daily routine.

That particular night was a nice one for Danny. He got all of his homework done for once, he had managed to stick three ghosts back into the Ghost Zone, and somehow fell asleep before midnight. It was honestly too good to be true, which probably explains why his luck turned sour later on. But in the moment, he was grateful for his momentary break.

Elsewhere within FentonWorks, Maddie meticulously cared for Jack, who had caught the flu at an unfortunate time; they were so close to completing one of their latest projects when he had spontaneously grown ill. At first, both scientists were convinced that Jack's sickness was the scheme of ghosts, and had dragged the Fenton Ghost Catcher out of storage so they could purge all of the ghost energy supposedly contaminating his body. However, Jazz (who had been seriously unimpressed) talked down to them and reminded them of their last attempt at using the Ghost Catcher to cure their sickness. They had camped in a tent by the Ghost Catcher for about two weeks expecting their sickness to go away, when in reality, the only thing that alleviated their flu was over-the-counter medication and ample rest.

So, reluctantly, Jack agreed to combat his sickness 'the normal way' and rest in bed with medicine until he got better. It was only the second night, and even though he was improving, he wasn't in a good condition. The only thing he could eat without throwing up were crackers, the bedroom had to be kept boiling hot at all times, and he had already gone through two boxes of Kleenex. Even though she wanted to be by Jack's side at all times, Maddie couldn't bring herself to sleep in a room so hot. She had tossed and turned and sweated nonstop the previous night, and was not willing to repeat that experience. So instead, she discretely snuck downstairs to sleep on the couch. It wasn't a pullout, so it wasn't as nearly as comfortable, but with a good pillow, it was so much more tolerable than the sauna upstairs.

Somewhere past 2 AM she woke up, and went upstairs to check on Jack for a few minutes. He was sound asleep, but she noticed that the glass of water on his night-stand was empty. She figured that he'd been waking up and falling asleep intermittently, as one usually does when they have a fever, so she decided that she'd refill his water for the next time he woke. She quietly trekked downstairs, being extra careful not to step on the extremely loud floorboards. It was a school night and she couldn't afford to be responsible for her children not getting sufficient sleep.

She reached the kitchen, and used the filtered tap on the fridge to fill up Jack's glass. She walked back upstairs and placed the cup where she found it, making sure not to cause any disturbance. Satisfied, she left the room and habitually closed the door behind her. It made an audible squeaking sound and she cringed at the sound, hoping that it'd been quiet enough not to wake Jack.

“Mads?”

Damn, she'd woken him. She peeked back through the door, and saw her weary husband looking at her expectantly.

“I – My head is hurting again.”

“I'll get you some Ibuprofen, sweetie,” she whispered, making a second trip to the kitchen and back. She returned with two of the pills, and double-checked the time. It was nearly 3 AM now, so it was safe for him to take another dose. She put them in his hand, and watched him attempt to swallow them while laying down, too worn to try and sit up.

“Thanks, Mads,” he muttered, finally swallowing the pills.

Normally she would've kissed him, but she was hesitant, in case she caught his sickness. “Go back to sleep,” she smiled.

He didn't reply. She wandered back downstairs, definitely ready to return to sleep herself. But before she could carelessly flop onto the couch, however, she was paralyzed.

She wasn't literally frozen, but... there was some kind of intangible fear clouding her intuition, petrifying her, turning her sense of reason into molasses. She was at the edge of the living room, and it was like her mind just... stopped processing.

And then, the merciless paralyzation dissipated, releasing Maddie from her disorientation, allowing her to comprehend the sight before her. Her heart immediately drummed with an insistent urgency in her ears when she realized what exactly she was looking at. In the center of the room, above the coffee table, there was a figure, shrouded in unearthly white light, suspended in the air like a silent, menacing wraith, awaiting her arrival. She couldn't decipher many of it's features, but she could see that it was small in stature for a humanoid ghost, which oddly incited more inexplicable terror within her.

With her composure forfeited, Maddie gave little thought to her actions, and she was screaming before she even realized that the sound had left her lips. Her scream not only startled herself, but it also caused the floating figure to fall out of the air.

The specter crumpled to the floor helplessly, and Maddie reflexively took a step back, hoping to find protection in the kitchen. But before she could flee, her eye caught something, something much more horrifying than the ghostly invader in her living room. Because she could see the fallen figure's identity now, and she could see his frightened green eyes staring up at her.

She could see that Danny (her son) was afraid of her. And she could see that something was very, very wrong with him.

Alright, so this is going to be a series of oneshots, but the first two themes sort of ran together, so I decided to make it a two-parter. All other entries will be standalones. This will be continued tomorrow for Disappearance. 

Part One | Part Two

[ladylynse]

For Ectober 2018, Day 13: Help (AO3 | FFnet)

When a ghost attacks while Star’s stuck in detention with Fenton, she’s sure they need help—but he’s not acting like the scared loser she’s used to.

Star didn’t deserve the detention she’d gotten. She wasn’t the one who’d planted the whoopee cushion on Lancer’s chair. She didn’t even know who’d done it. She’d just been the one unfortunate enough to still be snickering when Lancer stood up again to survey the class.

Protests about her innocence had fallen on deaf ears, and no one—not even Paulina—had backed her up.

Which is how she’d wound up in detention with Fenton, who’d dashed into class halfway through Lancer’s lecture on respect.

They were supposed to be writing an essay on the subject—something Lancer said he’d use for extra credit, which Fenton needed more than she did—except she was too angry and embarrassed to think straight, and Fenton was beginning to nod off. She’d been staring at a blank page for at least ten minutes, her pen shaking in her too-tight grip as she tried to figure out who had set her up to take this fall—and if she’d even been the intended target of Lancer’s wrath.

Fenton’s sharp gasp came about the same time as the crash down the hall. Lancer sighed and got to his feet. “I’ll look into it,” he said. “You two stay here.”

Even from across the room, Star could see Fenton’s wide eyes. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Mr. Lancer.”

“Mr. Fenton, I do appreciate your concern, but—”

“Can I at least go to the bathroom first?”

“No, Mr. Fenton, you may not. I’ll be back in a few minutes, and then you can go.”

“I don’t know if I can hold it.”

“And I don’t believe you wouldn’t have said something five minutes ago if that were truly the case. You may go when I come back,” Lancer repeated, cutting off Fenton’s protests.

The classroom door closed behind him. Star expected Fenton to slump in his seat, but instead he sprang to his feet and walked to the windows. He obviously didn’t find whatever he was looking for, because he spun on his heels and dashed to the door.

He seemed surprised when it didn’t open.

“What, you think Lancer trusts you after how many times you’ve cut class on the excuse that you had to go to the bathroom?” Star muttered under her breath.

Fenton heard her. “He wouldn’t have locked it,” he countered. “It’d be a safety hazard. And he’s never locked me in before.”

She was bored, which was the only reason she was having this conversation with him. “So? Things change.”

Fenton was shaking his head. “This is a ghost.”

A ghost. Of course. Maybe he was his parents’ son after all. “Just because this is Amity Park, doesn’t mean every inconvenience is ghost-related.”

“I wish,” mumbled Fenton. Then, louder, “I never heard the lock turn. Did you?”

Star rolled her eyes and got to her feet. “Then it’s stuck and you’re just too weak to open it.” Sure enough, the handle turned under her grip. She pulled, already turning to look back at Fenton and berate him for being such a weakling, but the door didn’t move. She frowned and pulled harder.

Nothing.

“What kind of ghost locks you in?” She couldn’t quite keep the panic out of her voice now. It was stupid. Being caught in a ghost attack wasn’t new. She was used to that. But she wasn’t usually locked in.

“Someone new.”

The grimness in Fenton’s voice caught her off guard, but Star latched onto it. “You have some of your parents’ weapons, then?”

Fenton shook his head. “Everything I have is in my locker.”

“That’s not going to do us any good!”

“Don’t panic yet. We’re on the ground floor. See if the windows open.”

“And what are you going to do?”

“Listen.”

Listen? What the heck was that supposed to mean? But arguing wouldn’t get them anywhere, and checking the windows wasn’t a completely stupid idea even if she had a feeling it was futile. If a ghost could lock a door on them, it could lock a window, too.

When Star reached the windows, however, she didn’t even need to try them to know they wouldn’t open. Even as she got closer to them, she could feel the cold. “They’re frosted over, Fenton,” she said. Ice grew on them even as she watched, thickening to the point that the intricate frost patterns became completely obscured. “The door’s probably frozen shut, too.”

“Good.”

“Good? How is that good?”

Fenton shot her an apologetic smile. “It means whoever it is probably isn’t after Lancer.”

“Wait—”

“Hide. It’ll want me, not you.”

“Where the heck am I supposed to hide? Under my desk? It’ll see me.”

“You might be small enough to squeeze into one of the cupboards in the back. Just move the books.”

She stared at him.

He didn’t seem to realize how ridiculous he sounded.

“Why would the ghost want you? Aren’t you the one who normally runs and hides whenever there’s a ghost attack?”

Fenton scowled. “I don’t always…. Look. You guys trusted me before, right? When Youngblood and Ember brainwashed all the adults? I helped you then and I can help you now. I can do this.”

She frowned. “How do you remember their names?”

“That’s what you’re—?” He broke off, and she blinked. Had she just seen his breath? Sure, it was getting colder in here by the minute, but it wasn’t that cold, not yet. “Hide,” he hissed.

Normally, she’d love to hide, but normally, there was someone other than Danny Fenton who could help her get out of a situation like this. “I don’t—”

With a crack, ice crystals burst from the ceiling, jutting down towards them like razor-sharp stalactites. Star screamed and dove under the nearest desk, not remotely convinced that would help. When she looked back, Danny was in a crouch, still in the open, head swivelling as if he fully expected he’d be able to see a ghost that could make itself invisible.

He’d already said he didn’t have any of his parents’ tech with him, so why play at being the hero now?

“You’re crazy,” Star hissed. “Just call your parents for help.”

“I don’t know if this is someone they can handle,” he said quietly. His matter-of-fact tone unnerved her. Why did he make it sound like he could take more than they could? They were professionals. He was…. He was Dash’s loser punching bag, and she could count the number of times she’d seen him fight ghosts on one hand.

Before she could figure out how to respond, the temperature in the room plummeted and she heard a deep voice say, “You’re weak when you wear that skin, halfa.”

She huddled, trying to make herself smaller and not breathe too loudly. The shadows in the top corner of the room by the door coalesced into a bluish white monster of fur and ice. There was no mistaking its fangs and claws, and ghost or not, Star was suddenly, horribly convinced that it could kill her in an instant if it wanted to.

Fenton’s eyes widened. His mouth opened, but nothing came out.

“You do not deserve the title my brother gave you,” the ghost continued.

Star officially had no idea what was going on. Fenton swallowed, but his eyes narrowed and he stood up straight. As if he could face down a ghost!

“You’re Frostbite’s brother,” he said slowly. It wasn’t a question. “So he got to be the leader of the Far Frozen and you got to skulk in the frozen wastelands until you found a portal? Sounds about right. Even Klemper wouldn’t waste his time befriending you.”

Star couldn’t remember who Klemper was, either, though the name sounded familiar. She wondered wildly why Fenton was on a first name basis with so many ghosts, even considering who his parents were; it wasn’t like ghosts would befriend the son of ghost hunters, right?

The snow ghost snarled. It raised a hand—paw?—and ice shot towards Fenton. He dodged with a grace he never showed in gym class, rolling out of the way and springing back to his feet. “You got brain freeze or something? You’re a little slow.”

Stop taunting it! You’re just going to make this worse! But she didn’t dare say anything now. If Fenton was somehow managing to hold his own, she couldn’t be the one to distract him. Not now. They just had to hold on until Phantom showed up. Or the Red Huntress. Or the Fentons, assuming Mr. Lancer was able to get off a call to them.

“You’re an abomination.” The ghost’s feet hit the floor, and ice shot out. Star shivered and tried to keep her teeth from chattering. Fenton didn’t seem nearly as affected by the cold, probably because he kept moving, but the ice had to make it more difficult to keep his footing. “You don’t deserve to know the secrets of our people.”

Fenton pulled a face. “Okay, I don’t like that nickname any better than the one Frostbite gave me, but you? I’m pretty sure you have no say in who learns what. Frostbite agreed to teach me. To help me. As payment for what I did and as a gesture of friendship. So even if he’s the reason you’re acting like Frosty the Snow Monster, I’m kinda more inclined to side with him on this.”

“My name is Icebreaker!”

“Funny, you didn’t really start this conversation with a good one.”

Icebreaker roared. Ice formed at his summons, sharpened spear points of shards, and he flew at Fenton in a rage.

Star flinched.

Fenton held his ground until the last second before diving sideways. He hit a patch of ice and skidded into a desk. She shrieked in spite of herself, and Icebreaker turned his gaze to her.

Fear clawed at her insides, gripping so tightly she couldn’t find her breath.

“Foolish little human,” Icebreaker jeered, “caught up in a world you’re never meant to understand. You’ll have to die for that, just like the halfa.”

There was that name again. He meant Fenton, but what—?

“No!” Fenton shouted, and he was in between them so fast it looked like he’d flown. “If you’re mad at me, don’t involve her!”

Icebreaker bared his teeth, and Star felt the ice forming around her. She scrambled out of her hiding spot, clutching the desks to keep her footing. Fenton—Danny—couldn’t protect her. Not when he didn’t have any weapons. Why wasn’t Phantom here yet? He was never this late.

Danny’s fists were clenched. “Leave her alone,” he growled.

Icebreaker just laughed and flew over his head. Star backed up, bumping into Danny. “We’re going to die,” she whispered. Even in Amity Park, even when it got bad, there had always been someone to protect them. The Fentons had their Fenton Ghost Shield, the Red Huntress could definitely hold her own in a fight, and Phantom…. Phantom stopped every ghost that dared to cross him.

But now none of them were here, and she couldn’t do anything.

“No, you won’t,” Danny murmured. “Just trust me.”

She looked at him. His eyes burned bright blue with a fierceness she didn’t associate with him. The tips of his hair were turning white with frost, and he was cold—colder than she was. Determination alone wouldn’t let him last much longer, even though she couldn’t see him shaking with the cold like she was. Whatever adrenaline rush he was on wouldn’t last forever, and with this cold, he’d crash sooner rather than later. “We need help,” she repeated.

He shoved her to the floor in answer as more ice shot where they’d been standing. “Trust me,” he repeated as he got off of her. “I can help.” He put his hand on her back and pushed her again.

Instead of being held against the ice, she fell through the floor and landed on a stack of empty boxes (possibly stashed there by the Box Ghost). She was too shocked to be in pain. Her heart beat a wild tattoo in her chest as she gulped in warm air. “What…what just happened?”

This time, she didn’t get an answer.

Continued for Day 15: Explain

(see more fics)

[qhostbyrd]

Day 1: Sweater Weather A bit late to the party but heree

[dannyphandump]

2. Chains

“I’m inevitable.”

(1 | 2 | 3)

[sailor-toni]

#ectober2018 day 8: Liquid

[horrendoushag]

Inktober day 2: Tranquil

This was a fun one! Honestly, I wasn’t sure I was going to be doing anything today (staying consistent with Inktober is hard) buuuut I took all the motivation I was planning on using for writing fanfiction and used it to draw this instead. :D Princess Dora, ‘cause she was all I could think of.

[kriber]

Ectober Day 4 - Stranger

No one knows who she is at her debut but she’ll steal your apples and your heart. Kinda rushed but I didn’t have too much time today

[trash-aged-like-fine-wine]

Day 14 Snacks (Shacks?)

“Sam is this really a good idea?” Danny asked, already halfheartedly following the only one in the group who actually was interested in doing this lead them into an old, abandoned shack.

“Yeah, this thing’s falling apart.” Tucker kicked an old wood plank that had fallen off the side of the shack. “And I’m hungry!”

“They say it’s haunted!” Sam insisted. “Anyway, you two have Doritos. You can eat in here.” 

The boys exchanged a glance (did she seriously forget that ‘ghost sense’ is a thing that exists?) before trudging over rotten wood through the hole in the wall.

Sam had already scampered to the second floor. The boys were mildly impressed that the stairs and second floor had actually held.

At least until dust from Sam’s gallivanting fell into their chip bags.

“Yeah, screw this. I’ve got better things to waste my precious free time on,” Tucker announced before leaving, Danny nodding and following.

[goingtobecomeghostly]

Stranger

So I’ve never posted anything original but I thought I’d give ectober a try for the first time. This is set in the first night of Danny receiving his powers. He’s having some problems coming to grips with the accident. The theme was “stranger” and here’s my take!

Danny placed his hands on the vanity and slowly lifted his head to look at the reflection. A distraught and puffy tan face with bright green eyes stared back at him from the bathroom mirror. That face was not his.

Danny’s throat tightened as he looked closely at the face that was mocking his identity. Tears started to build up in his eyes as he stared sadly into those bright green eyes glaring back at him. Those inhuman eyes that swirled and glowed in the darkness of the bathroom. Even the tears that began to fall were giving off their own strange, unnatural luminescence. They slid slowly down his cheek and landed on the glove adorning his right hand. That stupid white glove that was supposed to be black.

He grit his teeth and used his left hand to pry the glove off and throw it angrily across the bathroom. It slapped across the door and fell to the tiles. Suddenly, the glove began to bubble and his eyes watched in horror as it started to melt into the floor with an odd hiss. When it was gone from sight, he snarled, ripped the other one off and dropped it in the sink to join the fate of the first one. He inhaled sharply and grabbed fistfuls of his hair as he saw the reflection copying his every move. Why was was it doing this? That was not him! Why would it make him look like...like a monster! 

Danny pulled his arms in and hugged his torso as he heaved and puffed out air. Breathing was suddenly so difficult and he felt himself start to hyperventilate. All of a sudden a stark white lock of hair fell down into his range of vision and he finally lost the need to stand. He crumbled onto his knees and fell back against the vanity. Holding himself on the cold tile, he focused on breathing and clenched his eyes shut to stop the flow of tears escaping.

Green flashed behind his eyelids and he flew them open to reveal his hands glowing a ghastly green color. They appeared as though they were on fire but he felt no pain as the flames danced across his fingers. Holding his shaking hands out in front of him, he watched them shine and cast shadows across the bathroom walls. Raising his head just a little, he noticed a flash to his right and he swung his head around to face the bathtub. Two green orbs bounced back from the porcelain of the bathtub with shadows lighting up a tan face. The face that was mocking his own.

Why was his reflection the face of a stranger?

[tsubaki94]

Ectober Continue?

(This was inspired by telltale games which could be a way to reboot the show. That or visual novels.)

[wastefulreverie]

Ectober Week 2018

Part One

Day Two: Disappearance

Words: 4994

Danny was glowing, she realized, with an observation that was growing more horrendous with every second. His knees were digging into the carpet below him, arms flaccid at his side, and there was an expression of confusion and fear glued to his face. Maddie couldn't decide if she wanted to run from him, or crowd him with her maternal vigilance. She didn't have to make the choice, however, because he spoke first.

“Mom?” his alien green eyes seemed to pierce through her like a blade, “What... happened?”

Those weren't the eyes of her son. She wasn't even positive that those were the words of her son. And the explanation was simple: he was overshadowed by a ghost. Some nasty specter had overtaken her baby boy and was now playing with the wheel, tainting him with ectoplasm and causing his entire body to be used as some kind of ghostly lamp. As a mother, she felt disgusted, and wanted nothing more than to destroy the thing inhabiting her son.

“Danny,” she said his name with a bad taste in her mouth. (That was not Danny.) “You just fell. You – you need to come down to the lab with me, right now.”

Those soulless green eyes mimicked befuddlement. “I fell?” he asked. “What are you talking about? W – why the lab? I feel okay.”

“We just need to go to the lab,” Maddie insisted. Because there she could save her son and get that thing out of his body.

“No,” he said. “There's no reason to.”

She was getting frustrated. Clearly this ghost knew that she was a ghost hunter, and that the lab meant an inevitable doom for ghosts. She wouldn't be able to deceive it into entering the lab, so she would have to force it. And to do that, she'd have to shatter it's little act.

She took a step towards it and said with minimal hesitation, “There's a reason to when you're possessing my son, ghost.”

She felt something stab her in the gut when she saw the look of immediate hurt on Danny's face. It was raw, forlorn trepidation; his eyes dulled, the corners of his mouth quivered, and for a moment it almost seemed like he was trembling. Maddie couldn't let this affect her, because even though it was eminently convincing, that was not Danny. That was an ectoplasmic entity, extremely adept at acting, residing in his skin.

“No,” he whispered. “Not again.”

“I see through you,” she continued. “And I am not letting you stay in Danny.”

Maddie reached out to grab his arm, and he flinched away, taking a few steps backward. The action was almost redundant for a ghost, but Maddie was grateful that it wasn't running away with Danny's body.

“I – I'm not going to the lab,” he repeated. “I know how this nightmare ends. I don't want to do it again. I've had it too... too many times....”

Whatever the ghost was saying didn't make sense. Was he trying to convince her that she was in a dream? Or was he pretending that he was in a dream? Ghosts certainly couldn't dream, nor sleep, so that meant that it was still trying to imitate Danny.

“I don't want to be your experiment again. I wanna wake up. Please let me wake up, Mom.” The look in those fiery green eyes was desperate. It's a facade, she reminded herself.

“I know you're not Danny,” she confirmed. “You can't fool me. You're just a ghost, pretending. If you don't leave Danny right now, I will make you leave.”

He took another two steps back, strategically putting more distance between the two of them. “Please, Mom... I wanted to tell you. I want to tell you so much, please don't do this to me. I don't want to be ripped apart again.” She was taken aback when tears obviously welled around the corner of his eyes. The ghost must have a very deep connection to Danny's body if it's able to provoke crying. She had to sever that connection before it permanently harmed Danny. “I don't want to be ripped apart again.”

The fake crying was finally what set her off. Maddie was done trying to negotiate with this thing. It was cruel, and it had the very audacity to use her son's body as a flesh puppet, only to act like she was the perpetrator, trying to make her believe that she was the one hurting her son. “Stop pretending to be my son!” she screamed.

He flinched away from her, feigning more false tears. “Can't I just wake up this time?”

There was a scuffling noise behind her, and Maddie turned defensively, ready to fight. Maybe it was a second ghost, maybe the ghost overshadowing Danny was just supposed to be a distraction! She kept an eye on Danny while she maintained a resistive stance towards the direction of the noise.

A new figure emerged from the darkness, descending from the stairs. Thankfully, Maddie took no time at all identifying her daughter's frantic sprint, and stopped herself  before she kicked Jazz in the chest.

“Mom,” Jazz breathed, weakly. Maddie realized she must have scrambled out of bed and ran down the stairs. “I heard screaming-”

Jazz's eyes curiously fell on Danny, who's green gaze was strewn with barely luminescent tears. He held his arms close to his chest and was breathing heavily, like air was a burden to him. Maddie watched in wonderment as Jazz's mouth fell open, establishing a firm determination in the young girl's stare. When Jazz walked past Maddie, opting to go towards Danny, Maddie was stupefied.

“Jazz, your brother is being overshadowed!” she warned. However, Jazz didn't seem to acknowledge that nor care. Instead, she approached Danny and comfortingly put an arm around him.

What...?

The ghost whispered something to Jazz, and Maddie swore she heard the word 'experiment'.

Jazz looked at Maddie coldly. “Mom,” she started, “how much do you know? What did you say to him?”

Why was Jazz humoring the ghost? Anybody could clearly see that Danny was overshadowed, so why was Jazz playing into it's hand? And why did Jazz look so... bitter towards Maddie?

Nonetheless, Maddie found herself answering her daughter honestly. “I – Danny's overshadowed by a ghost. At first it was just floating in the living room until I came down here, and now it's pretending that he's Danny in some sort of nightmare or something. I just, I'm trying to get it down to the lab for tests so I can get it out of Danny.”

“Nightmare?” Jazz repeated quietly. Maddie could almost see the cogs turning in Jazz's head as she reached some sort of enlightenment, prompting her to turn to the ghost. “Danny, look at me,” she said, softly. “It's Jazz. Everything's okay. You're not in a dream, you're awake. You were sleepflying again and mom saw you. This is all a misunderstanding, everything is alright. No one is going to experiment on you.”

Danny blinked the tears out of his eyes and looked at Jazz in shock. “What? This is actually happening? Jazz?”

The ghost had fooled Jazz. It was stringing her along, and despite Maddie's warning, Jazz was falling for every single move. She couldn't let that happen, she couldn't lose her daughter too.

“Jazz, get away from that ghost! It's using you!” she interrupted.

“This isn't a ghost, Mom!” Jazz argued. “This is Danny! He isn't overshadowed!”

“How do you know?” Maddie asked. None of this was making any sense.

“I just do,” Jazz said. “Look, this is Danny, and not some ghost. All the stuff you saw him do was him, not anything controlling him. Isn't that right?”

“Yeah,” Danny added, clearly too frightened to elaborate further.

“That – that's a lie,” Maddie decided. “People can't just float, Jasmine! I'm not an idiot.”

“People can't float, maybe, but ectoplasm can change a lot about an individual's capabilities,” Jazz said.

Was she saying that Danny... was contaminated? He wasn't overshadowed, but his body was tainted by himself?

“Are you saying that Danny's been poisoned by ectoplasm?” Maddie heard her voice crack and almost flinched.

“Look, Mom,” Jazz said quickly. “Danny hasn't been poisoned. Not overshadowed, not corrupted or anything. He's himself, and if there's a little ectoplasm in there, then – then it's a healthy amount. No need for any tests. You just gotta trust me Mom, okay? I promise that we've already made sure it can't hurt him, and that I monitor his mental state like a hawk. Can you just trust us and leave this alone for now? Please?”

“I'm fine,” Danny added.

They were making up lies, Maddie realized. There was something deeper here that they were attempting to cover up. There was something wrong with Danny, and both of her children were saying as much as they could to appease Maddie into a false security and to persuade her not to ask any questions. They were deliberately avoiding a confrontation in the lab, which suggested that medically, there was something that they didn't want Maddie to know about Danny. And it had something to do with ectoplasm and ghosts. Whatever was wrong with Danny, it gave him ghostly attributes, and that wasn't alright. She had to know what was going on with her children.

Maddie clenched her fist against her side, “I want the truth, now. Immediately, or I swear I will drag you down to the lab and find out myself, Daniel Fenton.”

Danny and Jazz looked at each other, sharing some kind of reluctant decision between them. She could see the vulnerability between her children, and the depth of their silent conversation did nothing to reassure Maddie's worries.

Jazz took a deep breath. “Danny has ghost powers,” she said with an unclouded finality. “The portal accident-” she recalled the incident, remembered Danny's skittishness and Sam and Tucker's assurances that everyone was okay, remembered how her scientific eagerness outweighed her parental concern,“-bonded ectoplasm to his DNA. It's not harming him, though, and we've figured out that getting rid of it would definitely kill him.”

Danny was slowly nodding, but Maddie couldn't bring herself to consider Jazz's words. Ectoplasm... bonded to him? There were many reasons why that should be impossible, since ectoplasm is, but not limited to: radioactive, toxic, and pretty much the anti-matter of all life. Beyond the theoretical realm, it would never be able to bond with someone's DNA without downright killing them first. Years ago, Maddie herself had conducted many different experiments examining that hypothesis,  and she had determined that ectoplasm was incompatible with all forms of cellular life. Vlad Masters was living proof for crying out loud! He suffered for years in the hospital after he was poisoned with ectoplasm, and now Danny and Jazz were trying to convince her that Danny was the exception? No, no she wouldn't fall for that.

“Ectoplasm can't coexist with living tissue,” she told them firmly.

Jazz continued to hold her arm around Danny, “It can, given the right... conditions.”

“No,” Maddie reiterated. “Ectoplasm can't bond with DNA because they're basically the opposite of each other. Humans can't have powers. The only way you'd have ectoplasm in you would be if you're contaminated or you're a ghost. And you're not a ghost, Danny.”

When she said the words, she didn't expect the reaction she got. Instead of another argument or half-explanation, Danny visibly swallowed and averted direct eye contact. Jazz acted in a similar manner, unable to bring herself to look Maddie in the eyes.

Maddie's mouth felt dry. “Danny?”

His answer was quiet, almost shameful, but he at least managed to look up. “I'm... part ghost,” the words sounded wrong coming from her teenage son, and she almost convinced herself that they were a figment of her imagination. “I'm still alive, I have functional organs, warm blood, and human brain, but I can... turn,” he said the word distastefully, as if he wasn't used to utilizing such a term, “to be like a - a ghost. My human and ghost sides overlap a lot, which is why my eyes are-” he gestured to his green eyes, “-like this, right now. Well, I mean normally I can control them, but at 3 AM it's hard to explain.”

“You're not a ghost though,” she said, simply. She couldn't... this wasn't making sense. At first they were saying it was just ectoplasm in his DNA, now they were expecting her to believe that Danny was some sort of what – a human-ghost hybrid? Alive but with some kind of permanent ghost attributes? It wasn't sensible, wasn't known, wasn't – wasn't-

“That's what I said, I'm part ghost. Not full,” the way that he said it suggested that admitting this was almost painful for him. “I have the abilities of a ghost.”

To be a ghost, but not completely dead? It was unorthodox, it was a preposterous idea, akin to something from science-fiction.

She clung to denial. “That can't be-”

“It's true, Mom,” Jazz interjected. “You saw him floating.”

She had seen him floating. And even now, his eyes reflected that eerie green haze. There had to be some other explanation, because she would by no means accept that her son was part ghost. Theoretically, the implications of being alive and dead in a single existence were terrifying, unknown and messy. She didn't want that kind of misery for Danny, she had to ensure that Danny wasn't part ghost, she had to achieve some conclusive source of evidence, and that meant....

“Let me run tests,” she said.

“No,” Danny said immediately, “no tests.”

“You definitely have ectoplasm in you, Danny,” she said. “You say you're 'part ghost', and that scares me. I have to find if you're right, and if so... I can't let you be that, I have to fix it.”

“Wha – what do you mean 'fix', Mom?” Danny's voice wavered. “There's no fixing this, we've... we've tried and getting rid of it will kill me!”

“I'm an ectologist, I'm pretty sure if anyone can fix it, I can,” she insisted. “Go down to the lab.”

“No, Mom! I'm this way, whether you like it or not! Don't you get it? What happened did happen, and I'm stuck like this for the rest of my life. I'm okay with it, I have to be, because there's no other option. I'm not going to be yo – your lab rat just to prove you wrong.”

“You don't know everything,” Maddie spat. “You are fifteen, Daniel. You're not the one who makes these decisions.”

“I've dealt with this for the past year, so I'm confident that I definitely know more about what I am than you. I get that you're having troubling understanding it, we can talk it out, but that doesn't mean that you have to experiment on me-”

“I never said experiment!”

“It always comes back to experiments,” Danny accused. “Especially with ghosts. I'm almost one, so don't you think I'm a little justified to be hesitant?”

Maddie's eyes glassed over. “Don't you dare say that,” she demanded.

Now Danny was confused. “Say what?”

“You're not almost a ghost,” Maddie whispered. “You're Danny. You have ectoplasm in you, but you're not almost... almost-”

“That's what this is all about, isn't it?” Jazz summed up. “You can't handle that he's part ghost. You want to run tests, and if Danny's too ghostly, you're going to try and 'fix' him. Because even being part ghost is too much for you to bear.”

“And can you blame me?” Maddie blurted. “I can't let my son be like that, like – like a ghost!”

“And what if you can't fix me?” he muttered. “What if you try everything and still can't?

“I won't let that happen. My son will not be a ghost.” She gripped Danny's arm, once again trying to direct them to the lab. She pulled on him, but despite her tight grip, he wouldn't budge an inch. She was so absorbed in this movement that she missed the look of fear cross across Danny's face, and almost missed seeing him vanish into the air, seconds after he slipped intangibly through her grip. Disappearing.

Jazz was the first to react, “Danny!”

Maddie's mind reeled at the unexpected disappearance, struggling to process what had just happened. “Wha-?” One moment Danny had been there, in her grip, and the next moment he was just gone! For the life of her, she couldn't piece together how that had happened. She wondered, was that... was that one of the ghost powers that Danny had mentioned? (But those powers still couldn't be real!)

“We have to fin him,” Jazz didn't allow much time for Maddie to dwell on her panicked realizations. She noticed that Jazz was also on edge, that she also hadn't actually expected Danny to straight  up fade into thin air.

“What do yo mean find him?” Jazz was talking like Danny had gone somewhere, like he had walked away. But he had completely disappeared. Despite her usual tactful reasoning skills, Maddie still couldn't understand most of this. “What happened?”

Jazz shot her an incredulous look, as if she should know the answer by now. This was all new territory for Maddie. Ghosts... ectoplasm... part-ghosts... refusing to go to the lab... powers.... So much had happened in just the past five minutes – how was she supposed to keep up?

“He used his powers to leave,” Jazz confirmed Maddie's dismissed suspicions. She looked over Maddie and decided something, And on second thought, I should be the one to look for him since he trusts me more. That and you still don't know about...” she trailed off again, before blinking rapidly and forcing herself to continue. “Alright, you stay here. If I don't return by sunrise, go to Sam and Tucker for help.”

She was slowly bringing herself to more conclusions, and this was starting to spiral out of control too quickly. “Jazz!” she protested as her daughter started to trek back upstairs, presumably to get something to aid her in her search. “That's crazy! You can't just go out in the middle of the night-”

“Well too bad,” Jazz shot back, putting the banister between her and Maddie. “I have to, because you scared my brother out there.” She didn't look back down as she practically sprang up the stairs. “Not going after him would be crazy. Protecting him is my responsibility, after all.”

Her words were simple, but she could hear the undertone of venom laced within Jazz's explanation. She disappeared up into her bedroom, and Maddie was left alone and astounded at the turn of events. Everything from the moment she saw Danny floating... to Jazz revealing that Danny had powers... to his reluctant admittance that he was part ghost... and to the moment she went too far, when she crossed the line of what Danny was apparently comfortable with. She still didn't want to believe that he was part ghost, she couldn't wrap her mind around it. But his disappearance... it was gradually assisting in convincing her.

That, and Jazz's harsh words still reverberated in her mind. Protecting him is my responsibility. Those words hurt the most; she was Danny's mother, she was supposed to be the one to protect both of her children, and from what she could see, she had failed. What mattered was that Danny had been tainted by ectoplasm, hurt by the nature of ghosts... no. Her invention, the Fenton Portal, was the thing that irreversibly imbued him with ectoplasm, and by his claims, he was unable to be fixed. And by that logic, since it had been her invention and lack of supervision, it was her fault. She had created the circumstances for what he was, some sort of in-between anomaly.

(No! What was she saying! Danny still isn't part ghost!)

She was still denying it, over and over, and she needed to conquer her denial. Even though she couldn't prove it in the sanctity of her lab, she had to trust that Danny and Jazz were telling the truth. And that's all that mattered now, because she had screwed everything up.

She was the one who told him that she wouldn't allow him to be part-ghost, which was what she unknowingly made him into. She was jagged and cruel and Danny was justified to use his... abilities to run from her. He was right to be afraid of her. Hell, she realized now, that when he had awoken, he had been convinced he was in a recurring nightmare. And his nightmare was her, he had begged her not make him her experiment again. He must have been bearing this burden and harboring this fear for how long and she just... rejected him? (It's common sense that you don't want your children to be part ghost, though! Fixing him is the easiest solution!)

Tears were welling in her eyes, and she didn't have enough awareness to blink them away. As if on autopilot, she slowly dragged herself back to the couch, and plopped down on it haphazardly. She placed her head on her knees, trying to condense her body to occupy as little space as possible. The question echoed over and over throughout her head as she cried into nothingness.

What had... what had she done?

Jazz found the Booomerang discarded in a spare drawer, threw it in the air, and followed it's trajectory. Instead of leading her outside though, it lead her to the Fenton Portal first, meaning that in order to follow it, she had to quickly start up the Specter Speeder without any preparation. She'd only flown it a handful of times, and at times the controls were frustrating, but it was operable nonetheless. She tracked the Booomerang through the portal and let it lead her to Danny, who had already fled deep within the ghostly dimension. She knew that if he really tried he could fly up to 200 mph, so she was a little anxious, since the Booomerang's maximum tracking speed was 10 mph, at most.

However, the search for Danny didn't take as long as she anticipated, and after half an hour she found Phantom huddled on a nearby floating rock. When he heard the telltale sound of the Speeder's engine, he looked up in a panic, but Jazz quickly turned on the intercom to reassure him, “It's just me!”

Seconds later the Booomerang threatened to smack him in the head, and he threw up a hand to catch it.

Almost immediately, his expression placated, but she could that there was still some weariness there. Just like she was afraid of; Maddie's words had really hurt Danny. He was absolutely dejected, and even though avoiding the issue sounded nice in theory, Jazz knew that he needed her as support. She wouldn't let Danny suffer through their Mother's mistake alone, they would reach an understanding with her, allow her to see that Danny's ghost-side wasn't something that needed to be 'fixed'. And then once they reached that point, they could tell her the rest, tell her about Phantom, but only when everyone was ready.

“Why'd you come after me?” Danny spoke, and the microphone outside the Speeder relayed his query. “Leave me alone, Jazz.”

“You really think I'm going to leave you alone? Now?” she asked. “After your little disappearing stunt?”

He was silent, and shifted uncomfortably on his rock. For about a minute, neither of them spoke, testing the unpleasant silence, as if to test who would break their previous reality first, see who would talk about what Maddie did.

Danny eventually buckled under the pressure. “She's gonna hurt me. She wants to get rid of Phantom,” he blurted.

“She doesn't know anything,” Jazz countered. “She hasn't seen enough of your powers to really know that you're not in danger. She cares about you. She was just jumping to conclusions. In fact, I think that your disappearance, maybe... helped her readjust some of her priorities.”

“That doesn't change the fact that she still doesn't want a ghost for a son. She said it herself. All I am is her biggest disappointment,” he muttered, hopelessly throwing his head down.

It was almost painful for Jazz, because everything in her was telling her to go and comfort him, but she couldn't. She couldn't leave the Specter Speeder, since neither Mom nor Dad had installed an autohover feature yet, meaning that she had to manually keep the vehicle in the air.

“No you're not, Danny,” she reassured.

“Yeah, I am, Jazz,” he mimicked. “She hates me now, and everything in my nightmares has come true. And I'll have to stay here alone for the rest of my half-life, because it I ever go back, she'll experiment on me for sure!”

“Not if I can help it,” she said.

“You barely stopped her from dragging me down to the lab tonight!” Danny yelled. “Face it Jazz, I'm not safe with her. I'm never going to be safe with someone who can't accept that I'm part-ghost. I mean, she doesn't even know that I'm Phantom, and she hates me this much already. I'm a hopeless case.”

“She never said that she hates you,” Jazz pointed out.

“That hate was already in her eyes. You didn't see her when I first woke up, Jazz. She was ready to kill me.”

“You're misinterpreting things, Danny.”

“Yeah? And you know everything since you're little Miss Psychoanalysis?” he asked sarcastically. “I can't go home, ever.”

“And what? You're just going to disappear in here forever? Leave Amity Park to fend for itself? Never see Sam or Tucker ever again? Never graduate or go to college?”

“I-”

“You can't disappear forever,” she continued.

“Then what do I do!” he screamed. He floated up from his rock and pointed accusingly at the Specter Speeder. “How am I supposed to deal with this!”

She took a deep breath and articulated her words evenly. “You come with me in the Speeder, we go home and sleep, and we talk about it with Mom and in the morning, and start everything afresh.”

“That's a horrible plan,” he stated.

“It's not,” Jazz said. “We can't just run away from her, because if we do that, she has even more reason to suspect that you're just some emotionless husk of ectoplasm. We have to face this, show her that even though you're part-ghost, that you're still the same you. And we'll make it clear that you, as her son, has boundaries.”

“That's giving her too much trust, though,” Danny looked down again. “What if – what if she does do something-”

“Then you can just disappear again,” Jazz said wryly. “You've made it clear that you're capable of that. But Danny... when I don't think that will be a problem. When I... left the house, I'm pretty sure I heard her crying before I came to get you. That at least means she regrets what she did.”

“Or maybe she was upset that I'm a nasty ghost,” Danny mumbled.

“We know Mom. It isn't like her to cry over a thing that's out of her control, however, she's much more likely to cry over something she directly caused,” Jazz paused. “I said some things to make her realize that it was her fault you left – so I have no doubt that she's guilty about it.”

“I... you're sure?” there was a certain vulnerability in his voice.

“Ninety-two percent, give or take,” she admitted. That seemed to be what made up his mind.

“... Can you turn off the Speeder's ghost shield for a second?”

She obliged, and seconds later Danny was by her side. He turned back human, and she switched the shield back on. The ride back to the portal was spent in silence, and normally, at this time of night both of them would've been fast asleep due to the lack of conversation. Both their minds were occupied with enough paranoia to keep them awake for the entire ride.

When they finally made it back home, it was somewhere around 5 AM, and they realized that Maddie had cried herself to sleep on the couch. They left her there undisturbed, afraid of waking her; neither of them wanted to really try speaking to her again until they were well rested.

The walk upstairs almost felt like some sort of premature acceptance of everything they would have to face tomorrow, realizing that these final hours of sleep would be their last moments of subterfuge; the morning would bring reckoning, and both of them would have to own up to the truth that they had revealed. It was almost surreal, those short moments before reaching their bedroom doors, and both of them reflected on the events that had occurred previously in the evening. However, their sleepy reveries were broken by the startling sound of toilet flushing.

Both children jumped at the unexpected noise, only to spot Jack stumbling out of the bathroom at the opposite end of the hallway. They were both greeted with the feeling of relief.

“Danny? Jazz?” he slurred, questioningly. The hallway was still dark, shrouding him in shadows.

Danny looked at his father cautiously, quietly asking him, “Dad, why're you up?”

Jack steadied himself against the wall, “I think... my fever broke,” he mumbled. “Wha-”

“That's good....” Jazz cut him off.

“Goodnight, Dad,” Danny said quickly, skittishly.

Wordlessly, Jack saw both of his children disappear into their bedrooms. The encounter puzzled Jack, but he supposed that he was still experiencing fever dreams, and fell back into bed without another thought. Unbeknownst to him, there would be a reckoning in the morning, but in the early hours of dawn, everyone was content with resorting to the temporary escape that sleep provided. Because nobody could run away from their problems forever, secrets were bound to be revealed, and similarly, every fever had to eventually break.

[ladylynse]

Ectober 2018, Day 26: Sanity

Helpless, Part 4: Star isn’t sure what to think, doesn’t know whether she’s even making the right connections—but if she’s not, what’s the alternative?

Previously:

Part I, Help: When a ghost attacks while Star’s stuck in detention with Fenton, she’s sure they need help—but he’s not acting like the scared loser she’s used to.

Part 2, Explain: After what happened, Star wants some explanations, and she’s not going to let Danny get away with brushing her off.

Part 3, Mistakes: The more Star looks, the more cracks and inconsistencies she sees in Danny’s story—not that that makes it much easier to fill in the blanks.

Star staggered forward, trying to keep Phantom and Skulker in her sights—not an easy task when both of them could fly and she was stuck moving at a fast limp. Her only saving grace was the way Phantom was forced to weave and dodge and backtrack. If he’d had the freedom the fly straight, they’d be gone before she could blink. Tracking them across the football field wouldn’t be a problem, but once they got off the school grounds….

Star’s mind spun, trying to figure out what Skulker had meant. A halfa pelt?

First, ew. Second, gross. Third, halfa? Meaning Phantom was called halfa, too? Just like Danny?

Not likely a nickname, then, whatever Danny had told her. At least, not just a nickname. If people were sharing nicknames, it was going to be one more common than that. And if Phantom was the one to take Danny to the Far Frozen, this Frostbite wouldn’t have called him something Phantom was already called.

Unless Danny was called it first?

But then why would other ghosts transfer its use to Phantom? That just didn’t make sense.

Maybe it was a title. Some elite group of ghost hunters, maybe?

“That sounds ridiculous,” Star muttered to herself as she pushed forward. But if that was ridiculous, what was the truth?

By the time they reached the park, she was too far away to make out what Phantom and Skulker were saying, too far away to glean any more clues.

She wasn’t too far away to miss Phantom blast Skulker with an ice ray all too similar to the ones Icebreaker had used. She wasn’t too far away to see Skulker drop, all the controls on his suit frozen. She was nearly there by the time Phantom had twisted off the robot’s head and pulled out the little blob inside, holding it up to his eye level with two fingers like he didn’t want to touch it. Star crouched in the bushes and tried to catch her breath, not sure her feeble attempt at hiding would do her any good but more than willing to try to be sneaky.

“Just for that,” Phantom was saying, “I’m going to drop you on Valerie’s doorstep.”

Skulker shrilled something in response, but Star was too busy running Phantom’s words over in her mind again to work out what he was saying. Valerie? Not the Valerie she knew, surely. Between Amity Park and Elmerton, there’d be more than one Valerie, and Phantom could easily be talking about a ghost. Icebreaker wasn’t going to be the only ghost she’d never met before.

And as much as her Valerie hated ghosts, she couldn’t do anything about them. She didn’t have weapons. Even if she managed to get her hands on some, she didn’t have time to do anything with them. Star would swear she was even busier than she’d been while part of the A-listers, and then she’d been out with them nearly every night. Phantom had to be talking about a different Valerie.

“—throw you in the dumpster behind the Nasty Burger with the rest of the trash and let her find you there,” Phantom was saying. He’d adjusted his grip on Skulker’s tiny form, grasping him firmly around the middle. “You’ll still be in the range of her sensors by the time she’s off work at the rate you’re going to be moving.”

…There might be another Valerie at the Nasty Burger. Right?

Phantom took to the air while Skulker was still squeaking out indignant responses. She’d never catch him now, but at least she knew where he was going.

There was no sign of Phantom when she got there, but she hadn’t really expected there to be. By the time Star managed to drag herself through the doors of the Nasty Burger again, Paulina and the other A-listers had departed. Their spot, and every other one, had filled up in the meantime. Star groaned and walked up to the counter to order a small chocolate milkshake from Valerie, who raised an eyebrow—no doubt at both Star’s bedraggled appearance and her self-indulgent order—but was kind enough not to comment.

Drink in hand, Star swallowed and headed over to the table Danny Fenton now sat at with his friends. If he’d been helping Phantom, he didn’t look it. She felt sweaty and exhausted, and he looked exactly the same as he always did.

It was a little annoying, to be honest. How could he pull that off? How the heck was he gaining field experience helping Phantom if she could never see any signs that he’d actually been fighting?

“Hey,” she said when she arrived at the edge of their table. Their conversation had cut off the moment they’d noticed her approach. Sam was glaring at her (no surprise there), Tucker had arranged his features into something he probably thought looked suave, and Danny was smiling sheepishly. “Mind if I join? Everywhere else is full.”

Tucker waggled his eyebrows at her. “Well—”

“Yeah, sorry, you can’t,” Sam interrupted, not sounding sorry in the slightest. “We’re in the middle of something. Why don’t you go over to Paulina’s place? You probably have some party planning to do.”

Star gritted her teeth, but she couldn’t invite them to the party without Paulina’s permission, so it’s not like she could offer anything to Sam.

Danny was the one who saved her, dropping his backpack to the floor and scooting over so she could slide in next to him. “It’s okay. You can sit for a while.”

“No, it’s not,” Sam ground out. “We were discussing our project, remember?”

Project. Sure. Star was in all the classes the three of them had together. There were no group projects in those at the moment. She plastered a smile on her face and pretended to buy Sam’s excuse. She needed to talk to Danny, anyway. “Thanks,” she said, sitting next to him and tactfully ignoring Sam’s scowl. She took a careful sip of her drink and then asked Danny in a quiet voice, “They know, right?”

It wasn’t quiet enough, but then again, she hadn’t intended for it to be.

“You told her?” Sam burst out. Tucker looked equally shocked, the fry dropping from his fingers on its way to his mouth. “What were you thinking?”

Danny winced. “Um, maybe we should, uh, talk outside?”

Then again, maybe he hadn’t told them everything. Or maybe he just didn’t want them accidentally exposing whichever parts of what he had told her for the fabrications they surely were.

Danny took her hand and pulled her around back. Star wrinkled her nose at the smell of the dumpster—the greasy smell of fried food pumped out the back of the restaurant was not enough to overpower it—but all she could see around it right now were flies. If Phantom really had dropped Skulker here, he was long gone. That actually made Star feel a little better, because it meant the Valerie that Phantom had been referring to couldn’t be the Valerie she knew, since she was tied up out front.

“Sorry,” she murmured. She made a point of breathing through her mouth; it didn’t seem quite as bad that way. “I didn’t think you’d keep secrets from them.”

“It’s not that.” Danny rubbed the back of his neck. “It’s…. There are a lot of people in there, Star. Anyone could be listening.”

She raised her eyebrows. “They’d be less likely to overhear you somewhere crowded like that.”

“Maybe, but it’s better not to risk it. You should probably just not ask me about this again.”

Despite still holding her drink, she crossed her arms. “So you want me to drop this and pretend I never found out you work with Phantom? You’d rather I pretend to be some dumb, simpering blonde who can’t remember anything?”

“Uh, no, but that’s not the point.”

“You’re right,” she agreed. “That’s not the point. It’s not even my point. I want to talk to Phantom.”

Danny stared at her.

“You can arrange that, can’t you?”

“Um…you don’t just want to invite him to Paulina’s party, do you?”

Star rolled her eyes. “Please, Paulina’s already done that.”

“Wait, really? When?”

“It’s a standing invitation, Fenton. She doesn’t need to extend it every time. The ghost boy knows that.”

“Uh. Right. I’m sure he does.”

“So can you do it?”

“Do what?” Star just looked at him, and Danny relented. “I can’t make any promises, Star. Phantom only comes when he’s needed.”

“Well, I need to talk to him.”

“That’s not what I mean.”

“Maybe not, but don’t deny how much influence you have over this. You think I still don’t get it? You’re a halfa. So’s he. It’s not that hard to add up.”

The blood abruptly drained from Danny’s face, and he blindly reached out to grab the dumpster for support. “You…you really do know?” he whispered.

That…was an odd reaction if halfa was indeed a name given to anyone—or at least anyone of a certain rank—in a particular organization. Star mentally crossed that hypothesis off her list. But if that wasn’t the connection, what was? Danny’s reaction definitely confirmed that they were both halfas, whatever a halfa was, so she hadn’t been hearing things, and he wouldn’t be panicking so much if it really was just a nickname.

Sam and Tucker definitely knew, but they were obviously all protective of the secret, so it was unlikely anyone else did. Ghosts aside, apparently, but she was not about to try to capture a ghost to question it. Even if she got some weapons and asked for some training from someone (probably Danny’s parents) on the excuse of being able to defend herself, it would take too long for her to gain the skill she needed, and the risk wasn’t worth it.

The best way to get information right now would be to pretend she already knew the answer.

“Yeah,” she said shortly.

“Everything?” he squeaked.

She just gave him a look that said she wasn’t going to dignify that with an answer. Mostly because she couldn’t. If he asked for details, he’d figure out that she was only clutching at straws.

“Star, you…. You can’t tell anyone. You know that, right?”

“You’d be better off if I did.”

That had him looking terrified, and she wondered just how big this was. He straightened up and took a step towards her. “No, I really, really wouldn’t be. You know what my parents do, Star. Just think about it for a second.”

What his parents did? They were ghost hunters. Inventors. Scientists. Crazy, if they hadn’t been right about the whole ghost thing.

But if it wasn’t just hunting ghosts, what else was he involved in? What was he involved in that his parents definitely didn’t approve of? It probably wasn’t just associating with ghosts. She was pretty sure she remembered hearing something about his sister writing about ghost envy, and while she wasn’t entirely sure what that was, it probably involved Jazz talking to ghosts at some point. And Danny was definitely in the majority when it came to supporting Phantom, even if his parents came down on the other side.

This Far Frozen place must be in the Ghost Zone. Maybe that’s what this was about? The fact that he’d travelled there? Probably repeatedly, seeing as he’d gotten training? Maybe halfa was a term for people—or ghosts—who frequented both realms? Phantom was certainly in the human world often enough to warrant the name if that were the case.

Except…. Except that didn’t mesh with what she knew about Skulker as a ghost. The guy—blob, whatever—called himself the Ghost Zone’s Greatest Hunter. If a halfa pelt—that was still gross—was supposed to be the prize of his collection, it wouldn’t be common. It’d be rare, a hard-won trophy.

So if Phantom had decided to work with Fenton because he was convenient, strategic, an average guy who could blend in and get away with things and not have people realizing what he was really up to— How was he unique enough to be called a halfa?

Half a what?

“I’m serious. If this gets out, it’s bad.”

She played for time, deliberately sucking up mouthful after mouthful of her shake. He was definitely waiting for her to say something now. Finally, she decided to go with, “I think you’re overthinking things.” It wasn’t a bad guess. He was clearly panicking. She just had no idea why.

“I’m really not.” He sighed. Looked anywhere but her—the overflowing dumpster, the graffiti on the fence, the fume-belching vents, the broken bits of asphalt beneath his feet. Mumbled, “Even if ignoring everything else, my parents…. They might not see me as their son.”

“What?” The question was out of her mouth before she could bite it back. What was that supposed to mean? Why wouldn’t they see him as their son? Did he think they might disown him? Just because of what he was doing? They were obsessed with ghosts and dead set in their ways against them, but that was more than a little extreme. They weren’t going to suddenly decide he didn’t belong in their family because of what he did, right? Because of what he’d chosen to be? Because of whom he fought alongside? They wouldn’t.

Right?

Star swallowed.

She only knew the Fentons by reputation. They were crazy. It was downright dangerous to be anywhere in the vicinity of the Fentons’ RV when it was in motion; the sidewalks were definitely not safe. If they were pursuing a ghost, they would cut corners. They’d probably drive through a building if they thought they had to. They were obsessed, determined to catch and dissect ghosts to figure out what made them tick, what brought them back, how they could survive. They were brilliant, inventing all sorts of things that shouldn’t work but did. They were over-protective—if one of their kids went missing, or if they thought one of their kids went missing, the entire town knew about it—and pretty much blamed anything bad on ghosts. But as much as they hated ghosts, they loved their family. That’s the impression she’d always gotten.

But the truth was, she didn’t know what would take priority if they had to choose between the life they’d built as ghost hunters and a son who wanted to defy all that.

Maybe they actually would disown him.

Maybe they wouldn’t think him a true Fenton if he kept this up. Jazz at least wasn’t actively helping ghosts, for all that she’d defend them. Had Danny known that that was the line and stepped across it anyway? Did he seriously think he’d lose his family, lose everything, if they found out what he was doing?

Would they really kick him out and leave him to fend for himself?

Star didn’t realize she’d dropped her shake until Danny’s hand snaked out and caught it. She blinked, surprise at his quick reflexes briefly chasing away her unease, but when Danny met her eyes, she could see how much this was wearing on him, how much he was truly worried, and it made her stomach twist.

“See, now you’re thinking about it,” Danny said, no doubt reading her sickened expression. “And, honestly, it would probably be worse than that. You’ve heard my dad. He wants to—” Danny’s voice cracked, and he finished in a whisper, “—tear ghosts apart, molecule by molecule.”

Wait.

What?

“They don’t think ghosts feel pain,” he murmured. She just stared at him. What he was saying was so far from what she’d been thinking that it was hard to follow. “They’d just assume everything—screaming, writhing, begging, breathing—was a trick. Because they think ghosts are master manipulators who have no true emotions, who are consumed by whatever their obsession is, and….”

Wait.

Breathing?

She might not know much about ghosts, but they were ghosts. They were dead. They wouldn’t need to breathe. They might think they did, but they wouldn’t.

“I…. I can’t risk that.”

Okay, she was definitely past the point that she could fake this now. “But you’re not a ghost,” she said bluntly. If he thought he was, he had bigger problems than trying to keep his association with Phantom a secret from his parents. Seriously. His sister was basically a walking psychology textbook; even she knew that. How the heck could Jazz have missed something like this? She was the smartest kid in school. She had to know what he was thinking, but if she did, why not try to help him? Or get him some real help?

Danny barked out something that might’ve been a laugh, if she was feeling generous, but at this point she wasn’t. He was seriously starting to sound crazy. If he was pulling her leg, he was good at it. “You think they’d make a distinction between a halfa and a ghost?”

“Uh, yeah?” They obviously weren’t the same thing. Not if he was one of them, even if Phantom was, too. She didn’t really understand why he was asking. Just because some halfas could be ghosts, didn’t mean all of them were, right? It was like rectangles and squares.

“God, for my sake I hope you’re right.” He finally offered her her milkshake back, and she took it warily. She had a feeling that signalled the end of the conversation, but she had even less clue about what was going on than before, and she hadn’t thought that was possible. “But you get it now, right? Why you can’t tell anyone? I can’t risk them finding out.”

Well, she sort of understood why Danny wanted to keep it a secret, but she wasn’t convinced she should be helping him buy into whatever delusion he had. “I can definitely see where you’re coming from,” she said, hoping he’d be satisfied with that.

He wasn’t. “Promise me you won’t tell anyone.”

He was taking this way too far. Star busied herself with drinking the last of her shake, tilting it at just the right angle—

—and cursed as chocolate dribbled on her shirt from the lid which was apparently no longer on tight. “This is not my day,” she muttered, tossing the rest of the drink into the dumpster so she could better examine the damage. It didn’t look good. It was already soaking in, and chocolate took forever to get out of white, especially when you couldn’t get at it right away.

“Here, let me,” Danny said, reaching for her arm. “I might as well now. I kinda owe you anyway.”

Her entire body went cold when he touched her, just for an instant.

When he pulled back, the splotches of chocolate milkshake that had marred her white shirt were gone, instead smeared on the pavement at her feet.

Star screamed.

Continued for Day 31: Breathe

(see more fics)

[ghostly-penumbra]

Ectober2018. Day One

"The Witching Hour"

She walked through the dark hallways, her steps echoing in the silence generated by the lack of students in the usually-buzzing school.

Her pace held no hesitation, knowing well the path to her destination even with only a small candle as source of light.

She turned once, twice, thrice, until she reached the only open classroom, the door slightly ajar, and walked inside with her chin high.

“You’re late.” The waiting girl snapped as soon as she crossed the threshold.

“I know.” She said simply.

“... let’s just do this.” The other girl said at last.

They arranged the chairs around the place, against the walls, dragging the teacher’s desk to the middle of the classroom, where they placed all of their materials.

Sam started walking, marking where the Protection Circle would be, parting from the east in a clockwise form, praying all the way through.

She stretched her hand towards Paulina, who silently handed her what she would need -a white candle, a water cup, a red candle and an incense stick- to be purified and put in place each one, whilst Sam again marked the circle.

For most of the first part, Sam was the one doing the work, drawing the Circle, summoning each Elemental Guardian from each cardinal point; until the God and Goddess had to be summoned too, and seeing how Sam believen in spirits but none that... specific, it fell on Paulina, who -contrary to what this activity might give off- was actually a chatolic believer, and had exactly the deities in mind to protect them.

“¡Oh, Virgen Inmaculada, Madre del Verdadero Dios y Madre de la Iglesia! Tú, que desde tu lugar...”

Sam honestly had no real idea what the other girl was saying, but trusted her -if reluctantly- to not be messing with the protections. She should learn Spanish, though, if just to know what Paulina and Star whispered when she passed by...

“Señor Jesús, en tu nombre y con el poder de tu Sangre Preciosa sellamos toda persona, hecho o acontecimientos...”

She had passed on to the second summoning, putting each’s candle in place, and once she had finished with a solemn nod, Sam tool the lead again from the center of the circle.

“This Circle is sealed with the power give to it by the Mother Goddess, the Father God and the Elemental Guardians. May they guide us and protect us.”

That settled, they started.

Paulina took out a picture of Danny Phantom -one of the many she had- and put it on the table, placing over it -with a gloved hand- a chicken egg just as Sam lit a small white candle.

And as they had to wait until the candle was consumed, small talk it was.

“So... you do this often?” Sam asked, seeing as the heat melted the wax slow but constantly.

“... no.” Paulina was no way going to tell her -nemesis? Rival? Foe?- about the agua de calzón waiting for the ghost boy back at her house; but just denying it would sound fake. “But my grandmother was a curandera- a healer, and taught me the essentials of it.

Half way through the candle. Yay.

“What about you?”

Sam looked up at her, an incredulous eyebrow rosing up.

“I mean- not about-” Paulina blushed, hoping ut wouldn’t show with her dark skin and their only light sourcebeing the candles, and glanced away, her next words said more in her quick-and-dismissive usual manner. “You are- you’re jew, right? Do you have any sort of...?” She trailed off, awkward enough not to finish the sentence.

Sam looked down at the candle again, trying to melt it quicker by sheer force of glare. “... yeah.” She squirmed in place, feeling the kimiyah wore under her clothes as a necklace pressed against her skin. There is some stuff, yeah...” She half shrugged.

The candle finally -finally- died and they carried on. Sam taking the candle and picture away -she wasn’t going to keep it, of course (even if she tried, Paulina would have none of that)- and the latina took a glass of water -another, yeah- where she dissolved three pinches of salt clockwise and then broke an egg on it, seeing the clear-yellow with pride.

“That’s it, then?” Asked the goth.

“Yeah, it’s clean.” Paulina almost snorted at the thought, a clean limpia.

“Well the, I’m going to end the Circle so we can fix this place.” And so Sam did.

When it was all done and said, both girls parted ways and, even in each’s intimate friends group, none spoke about that weird moment of truce.

AN: I didn’t like how this ended up, but whatever, I guess. I actually did a lot of research for this so I can’t justify how it ended. But well.

Fun fact: I had to get a limpia twice when I was little. Once a lady gave me the evil eye and the other I suddenly fell sick and, by one of my grandaunt’s advice, instead of taking me to the doctor, my parents took me with a curandera. But I got better, so.

This makes total sense to me but I’m biased so if you have any doubt you can always aske me! Also, the first part of the ritual (made by Sam) is bassed off some wicca stuff I investigated just for this fic, so if I’m wrong in anything, feel free to correct me :)

I might try to put all my references for this in a later date, but most of it is in Spanish, lol.

Other Fun Fact: Agua de calzón is a nowadays popular method to “catch a man” in Mexico, the... “recipe” passed on through generations by some abuelas. I’s gross af so I’m not getting in-depth about it. You just need to know it’s disgusting, but I couldn’t help picturing Paulina trying to get Danny to drink it! This meme couldn’t leave me and I’m sorry.

[ectowaves]

Ectober 4: Corruption

The most popular girl watched as Phantom paced up and down the alley way. A few months ago, she would have thrown herself on top of him and beg him to fly her away. Now he was determining what to do with her. She had begged him to leave her alone. Good old Phantom didn’t go, despite her protests.

Paulina Sanchez never thought she would end up like this.

It had started out as a simple test, isn’t that how it always starts? Dash had it, claiming he had gotten it from his older brother. Her friends, except for Star who absolutely refused, had given it a try. It had been one of the best thrills she had ever had. Star told them later that they had been kicked out of the party they had been attending. Dash and Kwan had laughed it off.

Paulina had been confused at the time, but she too laughed it off.

When Dash brought it to another party later on that week, Paulina hadn’t even hesitated to try it again. Apparently, he had gotten it from a goth kid. Paulina had wondered briefly if the goth had been Sam. The thought was chased out of her mind as she entered a new high.

It was funny how quickly she became addicted. It was strange how quickly she was becoming corrupted. It was weird how she couldn’t get away from the life of a heroin addict.

Word spread quickly around Caspar High that the A-list were on drugs. It wasn’t difficult to tell. Paulina was skinner than what she should be. Scabs from needles covered their bodies. Paulina had missed her period (She had feared being pregnant at first) Nobody could prove the drug abuse, and no one tried. Well, Mr. Lancer tried to talk to Dash, but the jock threatened his job.

Dash, Kwan and several other boys on the A-list were kicked off the football team. Dash had thrown a hissy fit that day and threatened anyone who could potentially take his place. The Football team was cancelled that year.

Poor Star was the only A-lister who never did anything. Yet, people wondered how often she was on a high. Star ignored them and continued to look after her best friends.

Eventually, the A-list were set up with a dealer. All the money their parents had dropped given to them wet to that dealer.  Paulina couldn’t survive without the drug anymore. She needed it. Why couldn’t Phantom understand that?

Phantom was blocking her path to the dealer. She knew the man was hiding from Phantom. The ghost had said if he caught the dealer, said dealer would be in a world of pain for selling to minors.

“Why Paulina?” Phantom asked for the fifth time. “You have everything. You don’t need this!”

“Let me have it” Paulina screamed.

“No!” Phantom yelled back.

Paulina slapped her idol across the face.

The look on Phantom’s face was one that would haunt Paulina’s dreams for years to come. He looked hurt, shocked even, that she would ever do that to him. The mark on his cheek was bright red. It would be gone in the morning, everyone knew the ghost boy healed quickly. The mental scars could possible last for a long time.

Paulina didn’t care. She needed that high. She pushed past the shocked Phantom and ran towards her dealer.

Phantom got out of his shock and grabbed her.

“I won’t let you do this to yourself anymore!” Phantom informed her, while ignoring her futile plans of escape.

“Why do you care. You never loved me!” Paulina roared.

Phantom just held her tighter and took off into the air. “If I were you, I’d stop struggling.”

“Where are you taking me?” Paulina cried.

“To the hospital,” Phantom told her.

[sailor-toni]

Ectober day 1: sweater weather

College age Danny getting some advice from his mother. I LOVE ugly sweaters by the way and this was a perfect excuse to add some in.