YOU ARE DANIEL FENTON.
YOU ARE DANIEL FENTON, you are 22 YEARS OLD, and you’re kind of failing at preventing the kid next to you from getting a TOTALLY NOT TRAUMATIZING EYEFUL of the dead body you’ve just run into.
Well, not quite dead. (You think.)
Only mostly dead. (You hope.)
Things like ‘living’ and ‘dead’ fly out the window when talking about UNFORTUNATELY PETRIFIED INDIVIDUALS OF GHOSTLY CAUSE. At least, that's what you assume happened. Thinking about the logistics of literally turning a person into wood was not really something you wanted to do right now.
There’s more important things at hand. People are in danger right now, and that just won’t do at all.
The thought of it twists and churns down to the core. One might almost say it borders on obsession.
(You would know something of obsession, wouldn’t you, PHANTOM?)
"Holy fuck," DIPPER breathes, holding his hand up to his mouth and eyeing the grotesque sculpture with morbid fascination. “That’s- that is a person, isn't it? Are they…”
“Dead?” you interrupt quietly. You glance around the room for any signs of where the culprit may have entered or left, but there were no ecto trails you could detect nearby. “Nah. Looks like a stasis more than anything.”
You walk closer to THE VICTIM and knock tentatively on their forehead. You try not to look too relieved when your spectral senses catch the buried trace of the living soul harbored within the otherwise dead wood.
"Nobody's home right now. It's like they've been put on ice- I seriously doubt they're conscious right now."
DIPPER paces around the thing, the crease in his brow carving ever deeper as he taps on the branches sprouting from the body. "You don’t think we’ve got like- a hidden wizard on the guestbook tonight, do we? Is there another wand that someone stole?"
The kid’s not an idiot and you both know it, but you know morbid humor when you see it. (If it's not, you're actually more concerned. You have heard some weird shit about this town.) Still, it helps to narrow things down, so you answer the question anyway.
“I can neither confirm nor deny any hit wizards on the list,” you say with a shrug, patting the phone in your pocket as you consider telling Vlad about the situation. “But I can say this probably isn’t a mortal druid fucking around. Probably a spirit.” Your mouth flattens. “Probably a ghost. Just a feeling.”
DIPPER sucks in a shaky, resigned breath. “Fuck. This... might be a bit on me, then.”
Your head snaps toward the shorter kid, and you do not miss the way his shoulders hunch forward. “And how exactly did you reach that conclusion?”
DIPPER lets out a long, nervous noise. “Me and the crew were kind of… hired to deal with a haunt in the house here? But it was really short notice, and way higher level than we were led to believe, if it can do this. We’ve been trying to keep a lid on it while the party kept going on-”
You tick up an eyebrow. You would have expected the gut move to be to cancel the event, but keeping it running is actually pretty smart- in a horrid, coldly pragmatic sort of way. With all the people around, breaking up the gathering would lead to hundreds of potential vessels that the spirit could escape through.
If you kept everyone contained, then there was little threat of it being able to leave. Considering the kind of power being thrown around, this is probably the place the ghost is bound to.
“-but I guess we didn’t keep that lid tight enough.” DIPPER runs a hand through his hair, wearily meeting the blank eyes of the wooden statue. “This is a mess. Who knows how many have already been afflicted by now?"
You nod as you take in the information, sparse as it is. "So, what's the situation, then? Do you and your people have any context behind what enraged the ghost?"
DIPPER produces an old red JOURNAL from his jacket, flipping through the weathered parchment pages. You try not to step back- there’s some freaky magic coming out of that thing, and by the looks of it, the kid was swimming in it.
(You get the sense that the only reason DIPPER can hold the book so casually is because the book is letting him.)
"Not… not really, no.” DIPPER scrawls through some of the blank pages with a pen. “I know possible scenarios, or potential triggers, but nothing specific to this case. Our employers have been less than forthright with information."
You both scoff disdainfully. Rich people.
“Ford and I’s running hypothesis is the haunt’s got a grudge against the Northwest line, or potentially something about the property itself. However, knowing the Northwests… that's not exactly narrowing it down. They could've pissed off any number of people for any number of reasons over their "illustrious family history."
You pinch the bridge of your nose and sigh, wracking your brain for anything that you might have missed.
Were there any cemeteries nearby? Did anything seem out of place in the background of your senses that you just ignored? Any residual feelings?
You’ve been at this unfortunate ghost game for nearly ten years now, but you weren’t exactly born into this- your spectral awareness has always been one instinctual step out of sync, and you suspect it might always be. The process that made you what you are obviously was not something meant to be livable, and the fact that you did only makes you wonder just how fucked up your insides were.
As much as you hate to admit it, VLAD would be better at this. He always has been.
Unlike you, VLAD hadn’t died quickly. VLAD had died, slowly, painfully, weakly, over years, systematically scrubbed raw of his human condition as the ectoplasm bonded into his cells and simultaneously cured his disease while it killed every part of his nervous system. (You might say he'd lost his touch, but that's low even for you.)
You and VLAD both have silently concluded that his body is more ghost than not at this point, if the disparity between his mortal and spectral bodies is any indication. His senses, in this life and the next, had gone a little fried, and are always going to be a little more paranoid than yours. More attuned. He could get more information.
DATA.
DATA, DATA, DATA.
YOU NEED MORE DATA.
YOU CAN'T STOP SOMETHING YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND.
…DIPPER mentioned a crew. A crew housing DR. STANFORD PINES. They would surely have some information to share. At the very least, it’d be a good set of extra eyes.
"Why don't we meet with your merry band of investigators?” You suggest. “We’re gonna need to tell them about this fucky new development, anyways.”
DIPPER sighs and nods, finally peeling his gaze from the knobby, gnarled face before you both. "You're probably right. Recuperating and coming up with a plan is the only option we have right now- and this isn't Scooby-Doo. Running off on our own won't do anything."
L̷̝̓͘O̸͕̠̦͛R̸̨̳̖̐͠D̷͚̒ ̸̯̤̣̈̓͠P̶͇͍̐Ȟ̸͇̀A̵̩͊̈͛N̸̟͈̭͐T̸̤̓Ȯ̵̪͙͈͋M̴̰͝ ̸̫͎̎O̴̠̣̝͗͌̔F̸̬̬̖̍ ̴̜̩̞̿T̶̙͝Ḩ̷̢̾͜Ë̶̗͓ ̵̝̃̐͋Z̵͚̽O̷̺̍̿N̸̺̱̫̒̕͠E̴͐ͅ, DANNY FENTON HAS JOINED THE PARTY.
>ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED- DEALING WITH DEATH.<
>[YOU ARE STANFORD PINES.]
>[YOU ARE MABEL PINES.]
>[YOU ARE STEVEN UNIVERSE.]
>[YOU ARE PACIFICA NORTHWEST.]