"Your parents haven't left the house in ages," goth girl Sam Manson said to her best friend Danny Fenton.
"Yeah," third best friend Tucker Foley added. "You have to take advantage of that!"
They descended the stairs into the massive basement lab, Danny in the lead. It was his house, after all, and his parents' lab. He had been in the lab many times, tinkering with this or that while waiting for his parents to notice him. Right now, the computer was shut down for once, papers filled with notes littered the tables, and an ominous red glow lit the room. Danny felt better when he switched on the fluorescent lights upon reaching the bottom of the stairs.
"Plus, with Jazz at the library, we have the whole house to ourselves!" Tucker continued.
"Then why are we in the basement?" Danny lamented. He looked at the scattered papers and sighed. He would probably have to clean those up later. His parents often made him clean up the lab as part of his chores.
Tucker practically skipped to the far end of the room where a gaping hole filled the wall, saying, "Because of this, duh!"
That hole in the wall was the bane of Danny's existence. It wasn't just a random gap with a six-foot tunnel behind it. No, it was a portal his parents had been working on for as long as he could remember. They worked on it on and off for years until they hit a breakthrough a few months ago and spent all their waking hours fiddling with every detail since. Then, just that afternoon, they tried to plug it in, only to fail. They left the house dejected, muttering to each other about what went wrong.
"What about it?" Danny asked warily.
"Aren't you at all curious what your parents have been up to?" Sam asked, smirking. She's always smirking.
Danny had to admit he was. He stepped toward the portal as though in a trance. It was a metal ring with unlit lights. Beyond the opening, metal panels and wires filled the circular tunnel, so it looked like a futuristic tube. He wondered what it was like in the tube.
"Wait, put this on," Sam said, tossing him a white hazmat suit with black accents from the cupboard.
Danny held it up, a skeptical look on his face. "Why?"
A flash went off and he looked up. Sam took his picture.
"It's yours, isn't it?" she said with a chuckle. "It was hanging under a label with your name on it."
"I didn't know my parents made me one," Danny said.
"Try it on!" Tucker said. "I wanna see it!"
Danny shrugged and slipped the suit over his clothes. (No way he was getting undressed in front of Sam.) It fit perfectly and even covered his shoes. There was one problem with it.
"Ew," Sam said, "let's get rid of that sticker."
Danny's dad's face smiled from his chest. Sam peeled the sticker off and threw it aside. She took another picture.
"Much better," Sam said.
"Looking fine!" Tucker added.
Danny gave a double thumbs up and grinned. "I look like an astronaut!"
"Yeah, space boy," Sam said. "Are you going to go in the portal now?"
Danny's smile dropped. "What? Go in there?"
"Yeah," Tucker said. "It'll look cool!"
"I thought that's what you were going to do," Sam questioned.
"Well, yeah, I guess I was…" Danny muttered. He turned back toward the portal and tunnel beyond. He was curious to see the wiring up close. He walked up to the edge and touched the portal ring. It was cold, even under the glove of the hazmat suit. He took a deep breath and said, "Here goes nothing."
He stepped into the tunnel.
Nothing happened. He let out a breath and relaxed his shoulders. He didn't know what he was expecting. Why had he been so nervous? He chuckled and stepped deeper into the circular tunnel. He kept his hand on the wall, feeling the metal panels beneath his fingertips.
"Turn around and smile!" Sam said.
Danny smiled and turned around, and his hand hit a switch. Suddenly, everything stopped. There was another flash of light, but this one was much too big to be from Sam's Polaroid. The light filled his vision, blocking out everything else.
He heard screaming next. Who was screaming? Oh, it was him! He realized everything hurt – no – seared. He never felt such intense pain before in his life. Everywhere from the tips of his toes to the hairs on his arms burned. He couldn't tell if he was standing anymore, had no inclination of where up was. All he knew was pain, light, and screaming. Then the light faded until all was black. The screaming and the pain subsided.
Danny's heart stopped.
~~~
"Turn around and smile!" Sam said.
She watched Danny start to turn, but his hand hit something, and the room filled with light. She and Tucker raised their arms to shield their eyes. A scream ripped the air, and Sam squinted into the light.
"Danny?!" she shouted, dropping the camera. She reached forward, but when her hands touched the light, they flared with excruciating pain. She fell backward with a startled yell. "Danny?" she cried again.
"What's happening?" Tucker shouted. He sounded as scared as Sam felt.
"I don't know!" Sam yelled back, tears streaming down her face. "Danny, get out of there!"
Danny's scream seemed endless. The light, however, changed. Green took over the white, and it dimmed so it wasn't blinding to look at. The green swirled in shades from forest to lime and seemed solid, like goo.
The screaming stopped. Sam's heart pounded in her ears, and her breath came in ragged gasps. Where was Danny? Could she get to him now that the light was gone? Before she could will her body to move, Danny stumbled out from the green mass and landed in a heap on the floor. But he looked… different.
The first thing she noticed was a shock of white hair where his black hair used to be. Next, she saw that the colors of the jumpsuit had inverted. His skin was deathly pale, and no wonder. Whatever happened to him must have been traumatic. A glow seemed to come off him.
Danny rose to his hands and knees but kept his head down. Sam desperately wanted to see his eyes, to see if he was okay. She inched forward, still on the ground, and tentatively put a hand on his shoulder. Or, tried to. Her hand went right through his shoulder.
…Like he was a ghost.
Sam gasped and fell back again. "D-danny? Are you… okay?" Was he… not breathing?
Danny shook his head as though to clear it. Then, he smiled up at her. His eyes… were bright green… just like the circling vortex behind him. (Not the beautiful blue she was used to.)
~~~
After the screaming subsided, Danny waited. He waited and waited and waited. For an eternity he waited. For no time at all he waited. He didn't know what he waited for. He just waited.
A billion clocks chimed all at once. Some high-pitched and cheery. Some deep and gong-like. A pendulum swung on his left and he turned to look at it. The pendulum vanished into smoke, and he was left in darkness again. He stepped toward where the pendulum had been and stumbled. Ignoring his unsure footing, he pushed on. He had to get out of there. He had to get–
He was on the ground. His limbs felt like jelly, but his body felt light. Lighter than air, like he could fly off if he wanted to. He didn't. Not yet.
"D-danny? Are you… okay?"
He was on his hands and knees now. He became aware of breathing around him. Quick breaths. Scared breaths. Louder-than-normal breaths. He heard the buzzing of the lights above. A comforting hum came from behind him. He shook his head and the noises calmed down.
Danny finally looked up to see his friends on the floor, staring at him with horror-filled faces. His smile dropped.
"What?" he asked. His voice sounded different like it had an echo to it. It harmonized with the hum behind him.
When his friends remained silent, he looked back to see what that hum was. To his surprise, the portal was filled with a brilliant green glow. He craned his neck, taking it all in. Something about that emerald expanse invited him in. He wanted to investigate…
"Don't go!" Tucker and Sam shouted together.
Danny came to his senses. He stood – no, floated – in front of the portal with a hand outstretched. His fingertips brushed the surface of the portal, sending ripples to the edge. Understanding his situation, his eyes bulged and he moved to a mirror. He couldn't say if he ran or flew, and that added to his fear.
Green eyes stared back at him, nestled under stark white hair. The black and white of his jumpsuit had inverted. He looked down and saw a wispy gray tail where his legs should be. His head felt light and his vision swam.
A white ring appeared around his middle and split into two. The two rings traveled up and down respectively, and where they passed changed back to the normal colors. To his relief, his legs came back, too. They felt wobbly, and he clung to the table to keep from falling. He took a deep, steadying breath. It felt like his first breath in a long time, but that didn't make sense.
None of this made sense!
"What happened to me?" Danny desperately asked his reflection.
Sam and Tucker came to his side. Sam hesitated to touch Danny, and he turned to her.
"What is it?" he asked. "Why aren't you touching me? Why are you crying? What's with that… that transformation? Why did my hair change color? What is going on?" He waved his hands around with each word.
Sam caught his hands and held them. She stared into Danny's terrified eyes, grounding him with her calm ones. In a steady voice, she said, "Whatever's going on, we'll figure it out."
"Together," Tucker interjected.
Sam nodded and went on. "What's important is that you're okay. You're safe. We're here with you."
"Thanks, Sam, Tucker," Danny said, his heartbeat slowing down.
He realized she was holding his hands and blushed. He took a step back, and his wrists phased through Sam's hands. Did he just turn intangible?! He looked at his wrists. They were invisible. Invisible! They flashed back into view, and he rubbed one wrist with his other hand. His wrist was still there, still connected to him.
"What's going on?" he shouted.
"Dude, chill out." It was Tucker's turn to calm him down. "Remember what Sam just said."
"Right," Danny said. "Chill out, Fenton. Everything will be fine–"
The rings returned and Danny transformed again. He still had his legs, so that was a relief. He couldn't help but smile at the weightless feeling. Before he knew it, he was floating a few inches off the ground.
"Dude," Tucker said, "I think you have ghost powers!"
"Ghost… powers?" Danny wondered.
Tucker put a hand through Danny's side to illustrate. "See? I can't touch you in this form. You're a ghost. Change back to your human form."
"How?" Danny asked.
"I don't know," Tucker said. "That's up to you to figure out. But you better do it before your parents get home or–"
"My parents!" Danny said, startled. The rings reappeared and he turned back into his normal – human – self. "They're obsessed with ghosts! What will they do if they find out I'm…"
Sam shrugged. "Don't tell 'em. I know I won't tell my parents."
"You especially can't tell Jazz," Tucker said.
Danny laughed. "Yeah, she'll psychoanalyze me about it." His mirth faded when he thought about what she might ask him about. "Guys… did I… die?"
The word hung heavy in the room.
Sam was the first to recover. "Pfft, no. You're still breathing, aren't you?"
Danny took a deliberate breath. "Yeah, I guess so."
"And your heart's still beating?"
He felt his pulse. "Yeah."
"See, you're not– that," Sam concluded, even though she couldn't say the word "dead." "You're perfectly healthy."
"With an added power buff," Tucker said.
Danny chuckled. "Alright, thanks, guys. You're the best." He squeezed them tightly in a hug, soaking in the feeling of realness.
"We love you, too, Danny," Tucker snarked.
After the hug, Danny said, "Will you help me learn how to control these powers?"
"I told you," Tucker said, "that's on you–"
Sam cut him off with a jab from her elbow. "Of course, we'll help you! Let's get started right away!"