The hall was littered with light wisps of colors drifting motionless in a formless void. Sam could somewhat make out the inside of the school building, but it looked as if she was peering through a piece of smokey quartz. Everything was slightly blurred and the background was shrouded in a greyish hue.
Sam watched as the formless flurries of colors drifted aimlessly through the halls. She was confused. What was she looking at? One wisp gave off a warm, candle-like glow; it stood right next to her. It gave her a feeling of safety, security.
It didn't last.
In a sudden jolting motion, the world spun around her. It was as if she was on the edge of an off-kilter, a giant balancing plate as it was spun around on a stick. Out of nowhere, a new wisp of light appeared; one that did not feel safe. It gave off an unusual vibe. Certainly not human. It was difficult to decipher between one energy signature of the other.
In a dizzying blur, Sam watched the scene and began to feel nauseous as she often did when she stared at a TV while the program on it was paused. Then she realized why...
Reality was on pause.
Sam was witnessing a split second of reality from the astral realm. The world just beyond that of Man. She watched with a gut-wrenching jolt as time caught itself napping and moved forward once more.
The unpleasant, inhuman color wisp dove down through the school's roof. At the same time, Sam's consciousness was hurled back into her body so fast, she got whiplash. Within a second, it sent her spiraling into the darkness of unconsciousness. Sam never even felt her body hit the floor. But that's because she also didn't feel the arms had caught her just in time.
--------------------------------------------
Touch was the first sense to come back to her. A pair of large, warm, soft yet calloused hands held firmly onto her right hand. They were slightly tensed as if the person they belonged to was greatly worried. A familiar weight lay on her chest, her silver pocket watch, was reassuring to her. The material beneath her was soft, mildly "squidgy", as Barbra would put it. Probably a mattress.
Her sense of smell picked up the clean – sterile - air along with chemical medicines. It made her throat sting. A medical area of some sort.
She soon heard soft murmuring. It was like a radio losing its signal, going in and out. All of it coming from her left.
"...knew it was..."
"...Before his senses...."
"...Something odd..."
Her eyes slid open slowly, being careful not to blind herself from the lights. Sam glanced to her left to see Valerie, Tucker, Jazz and Mr. Lancer were too busy talking amongst themselves to notice her awakening. She felt her hand being squeezed and turned her attention to her right. She was too weak to hide the meek smile at the boy who had her hand clasped in his.
Danny.
He smiled back at her, his icy blue eyes were soft. He had one hand let free from holding hers to brush a few stray strands of hair out of her eyes. Sam paled when she saw the faint shades of purple in a few locks. Danny frowned when he noticed her discomfort, but the others in the room got slightly louder and startled the two of them. The heated conversation continued and Danny leaned in closer to Sam.
"You remember what happened?" he whispered.
It was Sam who frowned this time. Danny wasn't just whispering because she was in the nurse's office. His voice carried a certain rasp as if he'd gone and screamed his throat raw.
"Hey?" Danny's quiet prompt jolted Sam back to his question.
Did she remember what happened? Sam tried to answer as she thought back.
She remembered colors... soul auras maybe, but what was she...how had she... unless Sam had used another power that was not her own. This one reminded of the power Barbra had once described, a mix between Barbra's own powers of Second and FarSight. Barb had dubbed the power Astral Vision.
Things are going to start changing soon...
Sooner than she thought.
However, she couldn't just say she involuntarily achieved astral projection. Such a confession could end badly, no matter if they believed her or not.
"No," Sam replied quietly. "I just remembered walking through the front doors, and then...nothing. Do you know what happened?"
"Ghost attack," Danny stated simply. "You must have fainted."
Both teens thought that highly unlikely.
"Is everyone else okay?" Sam's whispering voice was laced with genuine concern.
Danny nodded as he rested his chin on the mattress.
"Phantom came to the rescue, as usual," he stated. "Can't say the same for...erm...certain parts of the school. A few broken walls, here and there, but-"
"Sam, it's interesting that you actually passed out before the ghost showed up." Valerie's sharp voice cut in. Apparently the debate was over.
"Did I?" Sam made sure to sound as confused as possible.
Tucker nodded with a hint of jeer in his green eye. "Oh yeah, we all saw it," he chirped. "We were by the lockers and you went whiter than a sheet. You passed out right into Danny's arms. It was like a romance movie or something!"
Sam felt herself being gently lifted off of her pillow.
"Then the ghost came through the ceiling and when straight for you two; Danny picked you up and moved you both out of harm's way. It's his hero complex." Tucker continued to chatter.
Danny sat up straight grabbing Sam's now free pillow. Annoyance at his best friend clear on his face.
"That's about when Phantom showed up; he kicked ghostly butt and left. So, Danny had to carry you here himself. Total knight in shining armor moment."
Tucker opened his mouth as if to add more until the pillow was flung in his face with a considerable amount of speed and strength.
------------------------------------------------
Sam slid into her seat. The group of six had been booted from the infirmary when the nurse arrived in time to see Danny chuck a pillow at Tucker.
Thankfully, the students had Lancer's class now and Jazz had a free period, so they wouldn't be in any trouble. Or any more trouble at least.
The nurse had saved Sam from what could have been a rather awkward game of 20 questions. Questions she would not be able to answer.
The class was in a bit of a mood from the earlier ghost attack, so no work was done. Gossip filled the room as Mr. Lancer read a book. He wasn't even going to bother pretending to teach a class like some of the other teachers did after a ghost attack. Although there was a homework assignment written on the board, just in case.
Valerie was sat on her desk and leaned over Tucker's shoulder watching the screen of his PDA as he played a game of something or other. Jazz had decided to spend her free period with them, a trick she could only get away with in Lancer's classes and was now talking to Danny, who had a bag of throat lozenges and a bottle of water with lots of honey in it, as Jazz had mentioned. None of them had even mentioned why Danny's voice had suddenly caved. Or why he had a giant bag of lozenges in his locker for just such an occasion.
Sam sat slumped at her desk, focusing on one of the lozenges on Danny's desk. It had slipped out of the bag and just sat there.
She thought back to yesterday when she had used another's power to hurl the demon through the air.
Telekinesis, Zoey's primary power...
I wonder...Sam thought to herself.
Danny glanced over at Sam, but she didn't notice. He raised an eyebrow at her sudden look of determination, wondering what she was thinking; she was focusing on the lozenge on the desk right by his elbow. Danny turned back to Jazz, only half-listening to his sister.
Sam closed her eyes and let herself fall into a meditative trance. She reached into her well of power at the heart of her soul. She could feel her fingers reach towards the lozenge.
In her mind's eye, Sam saw the well of power. Something was different. There were four new strands: blue, red, silver/black and, gold, twining around and through the vibrant greens and purples of her own power.
She paused. Blue had always been Zoey's color, even her glamor was blue. Silver/Black was, no doubt, Selene; an almost impossible fusion of two colors that the quintet had only ever seen on the ex-thief. The chaotic red belonged to Hayley, and gold belonged to Barbra, whose glamor form always glittered like the sun.
Sam understood color affiliation; she herself wore greens and purples to avoid disharmonizing. Colors had vibrations, scents, and sounds; when the girls wore colors that clashed with their power's color aura, their powers went wonky.
In two days, Sam had used two powers that did not belong to her, now two strands of power that should have clashed with her own were harmonized as if it had always been there.
Was this what a spell in the Grimoire had meant?
Hearts to hearts to never be divided. And why were Hayley and Selene's colored strand twined within her power core?
Sam reached for the blue strand and was suddenly enveloped in a feeling that was so... Zoey. Sam began drawing only the tiniest thread with her. Even the thread hummed with "Zoey-ness".
Focusing her attention between the strand of power and the lozenge, Sam almost missed that harpy, Paulina's, whining voice rise up over the rest of the class.
"It's just not fair! Why didn't Phantom show up to beat that ghost?" she complained.
What?
Phantom hadn't shown up? Danny and the others said that he did. Her head turned towards Paulina so fast, Sam almost gave herself a whiplash relapse.
Unfortunately for the lozenge, Sam had already extended her "Zoey" power over it. So when Sam turned her head, the lozenge was cast off like a hook on a fishing line and ended up pelting it into Paulina's hair where it promptly decided to stick.
Sam felt dread rise up from her stomach and quickly looked away back at Danny, who was looking at her, a look of confusion that he wore quite a lot around her. Luckily, Sam already looked confused as well, so she didn't need to "slip her face on", as Hayley liked to say.
"AHHHH!" Paulina's shriek drew everyone's attention. It gave Sam the perfect opportunity to slip out of the classroom as the students worried over Paulina's poor lozenged hair.
-------------------------------------------
Sam took a deep breath, enjoying the fresh afternoon air. She plopped down at the base of a large oak tree in the school courtyard. Her head was still pounding from this morning. She closed her eyes as she leaned back on the bark; she felt the tree donate its strength and a sudden warmness coursed through her veins. Her thoughts had been buzzing in her head like a hive angry bees, and the classroom was too cramped.
With all these changes and her confusion with Phantom, the one saving grace for today was that no demons have popped up.
Yet, anyway.
"You should be in class," came a voice with spectral echo.
Speak of the devil...
"Hello, Phantom." Sam kept her eye shut in hopes of him leaving her alone.
"You should be in class," he repeated. "It's not safe to be out by yourself."
Sam held back a scoff. She didn't even look up at him
"Wanna talk about it?" he asked.
Odd, his voice sounded...raspy?
"No, not really," she said rather bluntly.
"I'm not gonna leave you alone until you tell me," He sat down next to her.
"What?" she hissed. "You got nothing else better to do?"
"What else is better than spending time with a beauty like you?" The ghost boy said sultrily. He couldn't stop scanning over her lovely features. She just...drew him in.
Sam turned her face away in a pout so he wouldn't see the blush rising on her cheeks. The pair sat in companionable silence for a while. Finally Phantom spoke.
"Are you feeling better now?" He asked.
"What do you mean?" Sam said, looking at Phantom as she pushed her hair out of her face.
"Well, you fainted at school this morning," Phantom replied. "I'm just wondering if, y'know, you're okay?"
Sam sighed tiredly. "Stuff has just been...happening lately. I'm having a hard time understanding it. A-and it's all happening so fast. I'm barely over being in a new place with new people, a-and I'm still haunted by my old home...I-I just...argh!"
She felt a strong arm rest on her shoulder. "Hey, it's okay," Phantom said calmly. "From what I've seen, you're settling pretty well, so that's a good start. You shouldn't stress so much to the point you make yourself sick. You have your friends, your grandma, and...you have me. If there's anything I can do to help, I'm here for you."
Sam was quite startled at this looked up at him. She smiled at him as she felt her heart skip a beat or two.
It was strange. His acidic green eyes were kind and friendly, and there was something about that warmness in them that made them so familiar. How odd for the, supposedly, most dangerous ghost in Amity Park.
What she didn't notice was Phantom staring just as fondly into her glimmering lilac eyes. He'd never seen eyes like hers before. He found them...enticing.
Finally realizing that he was staring, Phantom quickly cleared his throat as he ran his hand through his ivory hair.
"Y-you seem tired. I'll take you home so you can rest. I don't want you to get more sick."
Sam's smile faded as she came to realize something about Phantom.
Instead of replying, she had a question for him. "Hey Phantom, were you at school this morning?"