The hum deepened into a guttural growl, rolling under their feet like the rumble of a giant waking up.
Cracks spiderwebbed across the glassy ground, glowing hot green.
The spires bent unnaturally, like antennae turning to lock on.
From the center of the island, a jagged monolith rose—its surface shifting between raw ectoplasm and some kind of metallic plating etched with runes Rod had never seen before.
"Uh…" Ember took a step back.
"I think your this fucking giant minotaur abomination wants to kill us."
(Pebble's image)
Rod flexed his fingers, the plates under his skin rippling as his bio-engineered musculature surged with energy.
"Correction—it's going to try. Let's not make it easy."
The monolith split down the middle with a screech, spilling liquid light as a tendril of solid ectoplasm lashed toward them.
Rod moved first—his body blurring in a burst of strength-enhanced speed.
His fist slammed into the tendril, not breaking it, but sending a disruptive ripple up its length.
The entire island screamed.
"Holy—" Ember's eyes widened, then narrowed with that familiar rebellious fire.
She swung her guitar forward, hitting a chord that made the air thrum.
The note reverberated through the spires, doubling back with a sonic boom that shattered one of the tendrils mid-lash.
"Alright, your turn, dipstick."
Rod's eyes lit up—not just at the effect, but at the data flooding his mind.
"It's reacting to frequency shifts.
Keep it off balance—I'll hit it where it hurts."
"You got it, science boy."
Ember launched into a riff, her spectral flames flaring hotter with each chord.
The island's glow faltered under the assault, its structure twitching like it couldn't decide whether to retaliate or protect itself.
Rod seized the opening—his soul-sight flaring to life, the ghostly world overlaying reality in sharp, layered detail.
He could see the core—the island's "heart," pulsing deep within the monolith.
And not just see it… he could reach for it.
The monolith loomed like a jagged pillar of midnight, its surface shimmering with eerie patterns of ghost-tech circuitry.
Rod planted his feet and drove a fist forward—fast, heavy, deliberate.
The blow landed with a thunderclap against the monolith's surface, sending cracks spiderwebbing across the glossy black veneer.
Each punch made the air pop with concussive force, his knuckles sparking blue from whatever weird physics he'd been bending into them.
The monolith retaliated in kind.
A deep hum built from within its core, and then—FWASH—a burst of spectral lances shot out from the cracks.
One clipped Ember's shoulder. It was barely a graze, but the wound hissed and smoked with ghostly residue.
Ember froze for half a second, eyes narrowing.
Then her fiery hair flared like an inferno caught in a wind tunnel.
The flames weren't just hot—they screamed.
The sound was somewhere between a guitar amp feeding back and the roar of molten rock.
She slung her guitar down and ripped into the strings, her fingers a blur.
The tone was pure, chaotic death rock—grinding riffs and ugly, glorious noise.
She screamed along with it, a voice dripping with distortion and rage, each note vibrating the air like shrapnel.
Rod felt something then—something wrong but hot in a way that made his chest clench.
His own soul bled partially out of his body, a yellowish-orange force dripping like molten metal into the space between worlds.
It wrapped his fists in jagged halos that burned like hellfire yet hummed with a strange serenity only he could hear.
Every punch he threw after that wasn't just a blow—it was a frequency spike that tore through the ghost-tech's code like an axe through rotted wood.
Some gamers would call it "true damage."
Ember's grin was feral when she caught on.
She twisted her playing to lock into his rhythm, each chord a booming metronome that supercharged the next strike.
Her riffs and his punches fused into a brutal duet—chaos in the notes, precision in the fists.
The monolith trembled, fractures deepening with every synchronized hit.
Rod's fists landed in a blur, each strike punctuated by Ember's searing chords.
Soul-force and firestorm smashed together, making the air ripple like boiling water.
With a final, ear-splitting chord and a downward punch that shook the ground, the monolith split straight down the middle.
A dying glow seeped out, dimming like the last light in a burned-out star.
The hum faded to silence.
Rod exhaled, shaking the ectoplasmic burn off his knuckles. "Well… that was fun."
Ember slung her guitar over her shoulder, smirking. "Fun? You're bleeding green, genius."
He glanced down at his faintly glowing wounds. "Yeah. And?"
She rolled her eyes, but the smirk softened. "You're insane, Rod."
The island lay in ruins, its shattered spires smoldering with fading green light.
Ectoplasmic mist drifted through the air, curling around their ankles like it didn't know the fight was over.
Ember was still buzzing—pacing across the fractured ground, plucking her guitar strings absentmindedly, letting a few ghostly embers float off her hair with each step.
"Man… that was awesome.
But why you didn't tell me you could hit like that."
Rod crouched near a broken shard of the monolith, running his fingers over the surface as if he could still feel the island's heartbeat.
"And I also didn't know you could turn your power into a blunt instrument either.
Guess we're both full of surprises."
She stopped, tilting her head, her eyes locking on the faint, fading shimmer around his fists.
"Okay, yeah—buuut what was that?
That fire thing you had swirling around your knuckles. Didn't look like regular ghost power."
Rod straightened, flexing his fingers.
The glow had dimmed to a faint burn, like embers under ash.
"It wasn't.
That was my soul output—manifested through physical medium and bio-augmented muscle fiber."
Ember stared. "You're speaking nerd again."
He smirked. "Fine. Short version? It's me punching something… with me.
No—more than me.
It's my essence wrapped into the strike, tuned to the target's frequency so it hits on a level you can't block with walls or armor."
She blinked, her brow furrowing.
"So… like… ghost fire but from the inside-out?"
"Closer to ghost lightning with your entire existence wired into it," Rod said, grinning.
"Been researching this for a while now.
And it's because of you that I finally break this wall!
Yeay...you? Me? Hahahah!
I'm kinda lucky, yknow.
The only reason I'm here is because I hit a wall with my experiments.
I wanted a breakthrough. So I… rolled the dice."
"You what?"
"I opened a portal without locking in a destination," he said with a shrug.
"Just put my intention into the opening—'Find me a place where I can push my soul research further.'
That's it. Could've ended up in a dead vacuum or a black hole.
But instead…"
"…you got me," Ember finished with a smirk, strumming a lazy chord.
"Yeah," Rod said, his tone softer than he meant it to be.
She looked away, the green mist swirling around her ankles.
"…Fate, huh." Her voice dropped, almost too quiet.
"Do you believe in fate, Rod?"
Rod's mouth tugged into that half-smirk he wore when he was deciding how much truth to let slip.
"Fate?" He stepped past a shattered column, boots crunching over ectoplasmic crystal.
"If you're asking whether I think the universe has some master plan… nah.
I think fate's just what people call it when they don't wanna admit someone made a choice—good or bad—that led them here."
Ember followed, guitar slung over her back, hair still flickering with residual heat.
"So you're saying us meeting like this is… a choice?"
"Every intersection is.
You had a thousand other places you could've been playing your music.
I had a thousand other realities to crash into.
But we both landed here."
He glanced at her, the faint ghost-light catching in his eyes.
"Not because it was written.
Because we pulled the trigger, whether we knew it or not."
She scoffed, but there was a thoughtful edge to it.
"You make it sound like we're all just… running on impulse until something sticks."
Rod grinned wider.
"Exactly. The trick is making those impulses count."
Ember stepped in front of him, walking backward now, testing him with that look of hers.
"And what if you didn't choose?
What if something bigger shoved us together?
Would you even care?"
He chuckled, low and easy.
"If something's trying to play puppet master with me?
Then I'm gonna take the strings, tie them into a noose, and hang 'em over my fireplace as decoration."
That earned him a laugh, genuine and bright, her voice echoing in the mist.
"You're a messed-up guy, dipstick."
"And you're a messed-up ghost, Firehead."
She smirked, but didn't argue.
The space between them hung warm for a moment—rare in the cold expanse of the Ghost Zone—before she strummed a sharp chord, breaking the beat.
"Alright, philosopher.
You buying the next round of ecto-shakes, or are we gonna wander until something else tries to eat us?"
The ecto-diner floated on a chunk of drifting stone, neon signs buzzing against the pale green void.
A couple of lesser ghosts loitered outside, shooting glances at Rod as he stepped in with Ember, but one sharp look from her had them pretending to study the menu.
They slid into a booth near the back, the table top pitted and scarred like it had survived a dozen bar fights—probably had.
Rod ordered two tall ecto-shakes, extra thick, the kind that buzzed faintly if you held your ear close.
Ember leaned back, boot tapping to some beat only she heard.
"You're gonna like this one.
They put crystallized soul-fragments in the mix—makes the flavor pop."
Rod raised a brow. "Soul fragments in a drink? Classy."
She grinned. "Relax, dipstick, it's recycled.
Not like they yanked it fresh from anyone."
Their shakes arrived, glowing faintly, cold mist curling over the rims.
Rod took a slow sip and blinked.
"Okay… yeah. That's disturbingly good."
Ember smirked, satisfaction flickering in her eyes.
"Told you. You stick with me, you'll get the good stuff."
She was leaning closer now, elbows on the table, her voice dropping without her realizing it.
They talked—nothing earth-shattering at first.
Bits of their past, the weirdest gigs she'd played, the time he almost lost an arm to a sentient black hole ("almost lost" still counted as a win, in his book).
Every now and then she laughed in a way that made her eyes soften, and Rod realized he wasn't just studying her powers anymore—he was learning her.
Then—there's sudden movement that disrupt the local ghost energy level.
Rod's gaze shifted to the window just past her shoulder.
In the pale haze of the Ghost Zone, something vast moved in the distance—so slow and deliberate it barely registered as motion at first.
A ripple ran through the ectoplasm around their diner, a wave with no wind to cause it.
Ember noticed his stare.
"What? You see a fan club forming out there?"
Rod didn't answer right away.
His mind was already running scenarios, comparing energy signatures.
This wasn't a ghost—at least, not the kind he could punch, burn, or bleed.
The readings he'd been subconsciously taking since they sat down had shifted—warped—like the Ghost Zone itself was bending under some invisible weight.
"Ember…" His voice was low now, serious enough to cut through her joking.
"We might need to move."
She frowned, following his gaze.
That's when it came into view—a mass of shifting geometry, half-transparent, half-solid, bleeding colors that hurt to look at.
It wasn't approaching the diner. It was watching.
Rod's gut tightened.
He didn't have the method for this—not yet.
His current arsenal of bio-enhancements and soul manipulation could tear through most ghosts, but this thing was woven into the fabric of the Zone itself.
Damaging it could damage everything.
And worse… it had fixed its focus on them.
Ember felt it too now, shivering.
"What the hell is that?"
Rod didn't answer.
His mind was already building contingencies, sifting through every scrap of tech and theory he had.
Whatever it was, if it decided to make a move, he'd have to go full output—burn through reserves he'd been holding back for months—just to keep her breathing.
The air in the diner changed first—like the moment before lightning strikes.
The ectoplasm around them shimmered, and Rod's knuckles tightened around his shake glass.
The thing outside twitched, every impossible angle in its body flexing at once, and Rod knew. Now.
It moved—not fast in the human sense, but in the way glaciers move when they suddenly decide to fall.
The fabric of the Ghost Zone warped in its wake, every object bending slightly toward it like the entire dimension was its tide.
Rod's mind flickered with calculations, attack patterns, contingencies—each one ending in Ember bloodied or worse.
He could win this fight.
He knew he could.
But she wouldn't walk away from it.
And that… wasn't an option.
In one smooth motion, he pushed off the booth, grabbed Ember by the wrist, and flicked his hand.
The air in front of them ripped open into a swirling oval of deep silver and green.
"Whoa, whoa—what the hell, dipstick—"
"No time." His voice was flat, final.
They stepped through, the portal sealing shut a heartbeat later—
—just as the thing reached the diner.
Its voice wasn't sound so much as pressure, sliding into their ears and bones all at once.
"I smell… a human. Hmm… and a ghost? A HUMAN AND A GHOST TOGETHER? UNFORGIVABLE."
The last word rolled like thunder, and then came the shockwave—pure force, no heat, no sound, just destruction.
The diner didn't explode; it folded in on itself, splintering into motes of green dust as the wave tore outward into the void.
Rod didn't see it happen—he was already moving them away through the space between realities—but he heard the vibration echo through the Ghost Zone behind them.
That thing wasn't finished.
It had their scent now.
Rod's boots hit solid ground with a muted thunk.
The portal behind them collapsed in a ripple, leaving nothing but the dim green haze of the Ghost Zone stretching in every direction.
Here, on a fragment of floating rock shaped like an ancient amphitheater, it was quiet—too quiet for this dimension.
Ember yanked her wrist free but didn't step back.
Her hair still flickered from adrenaline, the blue flames casting jagged light over her face.
"What the hell was that, Rod?" she demanded, voice sharper than the air between them.
"You didn't even try to fight—just grabbed me and bolted like your hair was on fire."
He kept scanning the horizon, eyes narrowing at the faint shimmer where reality had bent around the shockwave.
"That thing wasn't a fight, Ember. Not here. Not now. Not with you there."
She stared at him for a long beat, arms crossed tight. Then her voice softened—barely.
"Why?"
Rod glanced at her. "Why what?"
"Why do you care about my safety so much?" she pressed, the flames in her hair lowering until they were almost gone.
"We've known each other, what—a couple weeks?
You could've cut loose back there.
You wanted to right!?
But instead…" Her words trailed off, frustration mixing with something harder to read.
"Instead you made it your mission to keep me out of that thing's reach.
Like I'm… like I matter to you."
Rod didn't answer right away.
His jaw worked once, twice, as if chewing on words that didn't want to come out.
For someone like him, danger was a language.
Risk was comfort. But this? This was different.
The Ghost Zone wind shifted, carrying the faint echo of distant doors swinging open.
He finally met her eyes.
"You're my firehead, no?" His grin widened into something almost feral. "Shishishishi!"
Ember froze.
A tiny flush crept up her cheeks before she jerked her head to the side, twirling a lock of her fiery blue hair between her fingers.
"What… what's with that weird laugh, huh!?"
Rod chuckled, stepping in close enough to sling his arm around her shoulders again.
His hand found her hair, ruffling it with zero shame.
"SHISHISHISHISHI!"
"Ugh—quit it, dipstick!" she barked, but her voice betrayed the tiny smile she couldn't quite hide.
- - - - - - - - - -
Rod kept his arm draped over her shoulder as they started walking toward the edge of the floating rock.
Ember didn't shrug him off this time—she just made a show of groaning, flicking her hair back into place like she wasn't secretly letting him get away with it.
"So," Rod said, kicking a stray ectoplasmic pebble off into the endless green void, "where to next, Firehead?
We could hit the Screaming Canyons, the Acid Falls, or maybe the Karaoke Caverns.
I'm personally leaning toward karaoke because I'd definitely crush you there."
Ember smirked.
"Oh, please. If anyone's doing the crushing, it's me.
And I don't need some loser dipstick duet partner holding me back."
"Loser dipstick? Wow. Already moving me up the ranks."
He tapped his chin in mock thought.
"But you're forgetting something—" He leaned in with a sly grin.
"—you've never heard me sing."
Her smirk tilted into something curious. "Then sing for me. Right now."
Rod blinked. "Here? In the middle of the nowhere?"
"Yeah, unless you're scared of me hearing your so called heavenly voice?"
She folded her arms, the faint green glow of the Zone dancing off her hair like stage lights.
Rod grinned slow. "Alright. But only if you join in."
She rolled her eyes but didn't say no.
By the time they reached the rim of the rock, Rod flicked his wrist, opening a swirling green-and-black oval of a portal.
On the other side was a Ghost Zone karaoke lounge—a floating, neon-lit chunk of ectoplasmic real estate where rogue ghosts lounged on levitating beanbags, nursing drinks that glowed brighter than nuclear waste.
They took the stage together.
Ember grabbed the mic like it was an old friend; Rod just leaned into his stand like he owned it.
The first notes hit—a pulsing rock ballad with a little blues twist—and Rod surprised the whole damn room.
His voice was rougher than Ember's sleek vocals, but it cut through the air in a way that fit.
By the chorus, they were grinning at each other.
Ember's eyes caught fire—figuratively and literally—as she pushed her voice higher, daring him to match her.
Rod didn't back down.
The ghosts in the crowd started clapping in rhythm, the sound echoing through the void.
When the last note hit, Ember's laugh rang out over the cheers. "Not bad, dipstick. Not bad at all."
"'Not bad'?" Rod said, stepping down from the stage beside her.
"You wish you could harmonize with me like that every day."
She shoved his shoulder but couldn't hide the smile. "Don't get used to it."
Rod smirked. "Too late."
(Bonus Ember's image)
- - - - - - - - - -
Do you get any of that?
Wazzzaaaaaaap! We witness a lot of cute moments with these two...
Sigh, now idk how can he mess around with other ghost....F-Fuck!!
That's all guys, peace!