#ectoberweek 25

They turned. Danny stepped out of the shadows, pale and trembling, his eyes bright with something that wasn’t human.

“Danny?” Sam asked. “You okay?”

He smiled—too wide, too sharp. “I’m so hungry.”

Sam’s heart skipped. Tucker took a step back. “Uh, dude? You want… pizza? Burgers?”

Danny shook his head slowly. His voice was soft and ragged. “No. You don’t understand.”

When he blinked, his eyes went bright green. The air shimmered around him like heat rising off asphalt. The hunger pulsed in the room, thick and cold, wrapping around them.

Tucker’s breath hitched. “Danny, you’re scaring me.”

Danny took a step closer. “Then run.”

“What?” Sam whispered.

His voice cracked into a hiss—two tones overlapping, human and ghost. “Don’t just stand there RUN!”

They did. Chairs toppled, footsteps slammed down the hallway. The house shook as Danny screamed, the sound breaking glass and freezing the air.

He didn’t remember chasing them, only flashes. A blur of green light. The echo of their terrified voices. The taste of ectoplasm in the air like static on his tongue.

When he came to, he was kneeling in the street. His hands were smoking, his breath visible in the cold night. He looked down. There was no blood. No bodies. Just scorch marks where his power had erupted.

He pressed a shaking hand to his chest. His heart was still, silent.

He whispered, “Sam… Tucker…”

Somewhere far off, he heard sirens. He vanished before they arrived, leaving behind nothing but frost and claw marks on the pavement.

Later, in the Ghost Zone, he would tell himself he’d saved them by warning them. That he’d fought it off. That he could still be human.

But every time he closed his eyes, he saw the glow of their energy. Soft, inviting, alive.