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"Do it. It's what we've both been waiting for, isn't it? So go on, pull the trigger. Come on!"
Phantom stared down the barrel of her ecto-gun from his- its, position on the ground, tangled up in the nets. She was surprised by the gall it had to talk to her in such a way, and to put its life- no no no, what was she thinking! Ghosts don't have lives. And to put its existence on such a line... this wasn't matching up with anything she knew. Every other ghost they'd captured always tried to escape or got violent or very aggressive; so the fact that, it, was just sitting there, simply glaring up at her, seemed so contrary to every other ghost she and Jack had ever studied. They had theories about Phantom and how he was different, but they didn't truly know just how much of an anomaly he was, and this helped to prove that. This was her chance to gain an upper hand, to learn about Phantom on a more intimate level, see just how much of it was different. But to do that she couldn't kill it right here, not yet. She had to bring it home.
She lowered her gun, but remained ready to shoot if she needed.
"What, you're just gonna leave? That's it?!"
It was beginning to move, but not enough to escape, just enough to add emphasis to what it was saying. It bared its teeth at her, and she wondered how she'd never noticed that he had fangs.
No, it, IT. After a few years, seeing Phantom almost daily, she had begun to humanize it. She knew she couldn't do that. All their studies pointed to the fact that ghosts, biologically, could not feel. Neither emotions nor pain, however much they might believe they could.
She had fallen into the trap of thinking they could 2 years ago, and she and her family had almost died. She would not make the same mistake again.
She turned her attention back to the ghost, it still hadn't done anything except squirm around and yell at her.
"You go through all this effort and for what, to back away like that!? I thought you wanted me dead!"
"I do." She stated calmly.
"Then why won't you shoot me?! I'd finally be out of your hair, isn't that what you want?!"
She picked up the thermos that Phantom had stolen from them just over 3 years ago, pointing it at the ghost, finger over the button that activated it.
"Yes. But that'll come after, you still need to be studied."
At those words Phantom stilled completely. She could see fear in its eyes, in the way they widened and its body tried to grow smaller.
She reminded herself that it was fake, it was an act, and she knew that Phantom was a good actor, had to be, especially after all these years of playing nice.
She watched as it dropped the act, going straight to aggression. She felt almost relieved at that, it finally falling into more normal ghost patterns.
"Are you sure you wanna do that? I will escape and we both know that won't be pretty. You will get hurt, your husband will get hurt, your children will get hurt-"
She shot him in the shoulder, cutting him off.
"Stop. Talking." She growled out, not noticing that the ectoplasm he was 'bleeding' was a weird murky color that was a greenish sort of brown, instead of the normal light green.
Phantom just snarled at her, eyes glowing brighter. "That won't stop me! That table you dissect ghosts on? That won't hold me. You know this, I know this, so just end it! Right here and now! Save all of us from some giant mess and just kill me!"
She was tempted, oh so sorely tempted, but if she did she wouldn't be able to examine it and she ached to see what made him- it, tick. But she knew it was telling the truth, she had seen what it could do, what it was capable of. She knew it could level a city, and on some level she knew that it would, if not in her lifetime then her children's. She couldn't have that, but also, what if this was the only one of its kind? She was stuck, between doing something that would save the lives of thousands, and studying a scientific marvel.
She had nearly decided what to do when a thought struck her.
Why was the ghost practically begging for her to kill it?