Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Nova’s POV

Her parents finally finished the portal they had been building for years. The stupid thing is that her parents have been fixating on it so hard that they have neglected their own children and it didn’t even work! How could they spend so much time on something and it doesn’t even work?

Nova’s friends Tucker and Sam asked her to shower them with it when they finally finished it, so she had to keep that promise. So, she invited them over when her parents and older sister were out doing whatever. The doorbell went off, and she quickly ran over and opened the door for her friends, not wanting to leave them outside for too long.

“Hi guys,” Nova greats excitedly at the fact her best friends were here,

“Hi Nova,” Tucker says smiling, he has been extremely excited to see the portal finished science the day Nova told him about it,

“Sup Nov’s” Sam mumbles, Sam has been a newer addition to the group so she still is getting used to this whole friend thing,

“Not much,” she answered, “come on let me show you two the oh-so-grand portal,” her tone gets sarcastic, she leads them into her home, closeing the door behind them and brings them down to the lab.

Once they go downstairs Tucker looks around the room in awe, even Sam looks interested. Nova walks over to the big round tunnel hole thing in the far center wall of the lab.

“Here it is! The portal doesn’t work because ghosts aren't real!” Nova announced making a tada hand motion,

Tucker pouts a bit at the fact it doesn't work but Nova did already tell him it didn’t work but it’s clear he still had hope. Sam gets that face she makes every time she gets a dumb but awesome idea.

“You should go inside it, it would make an awesome photo,” Sam suggests, as she pulls out her phone holding it up,

Omg, Sam gets such good ideas, it’s totally fine to be inside anyway because it doesn’t work anyway. Oh wait she should put on a Fention suit to make it look even more legit.

“Hold on, let me put on the safety suit! It’ll make it look cooler!” Nova blurted grabbing her black and white suit and ran into the changing room she quickly put it on,

She takes a look at herself in the mirror and she feels the uncomfortable feeling in her stomach but she quickly pushes it to the back of her head and she runs out once again not wanting to keep her friends waiting.

“Okay I’m ready,” nova says, “get your camera ready Sam,” She smiles as she walks into the portal and she slightly hears Tucker whisper something to Sam,

Suddenly her foot gets caught on something and she falls forward, her hand lands on something and she tries to look before a surge of power flows through her. Her vision goes white and her ears ring as pain shoots through her, it feels like her entire body is vibrating and everything goes numb. For a split second, there’s nothing, absolutely nothing it’s almost comforting till it’s ripped away from her.

Her eyes snap open and she’s now on the ground in front of the portal. Her whole body still hurts but she straight up can’t feel her left arms. Nova looks around a little as her brain feels foggy and buzzy. Two people crouch down beside her but she can’t hear them over the ringing in her ears.

Her fingers twitch at the feeling of being filled with energy that needs to get out. Nova notices that it’s Tucker and Sam beside her and they look so nervous and like something is wrong. Wait what’s wrong? Something is wrong and she has to fix it. The ringing is slowly quieting so she finally speaks.

“What’s wrong?” a voice that’s not her own says from her mouth, what the heck?

“Nova, nova hey can you hear us?” Tucker asks in a voice filled with worry, god what’s wrong? What does she need to fix?

“I can hear you, what’s wrong?” Nova says with the same voice from earlier through her, her tone is slightly demanding, and Sam and Tucker slightly move away at her tone,

“Well umm… I think the portal activated,” Sam hinted, her voice is filled with sorriness,

Wait but how would that happen? Did she do something to activate it? Oh… oh no she pressed something and… a shiver runs through her at the thought of the pain she just experienced. She slowly sits up and makes sure to lean on her right side, white hair falls in front of her eyes, hold on white? Nova reaches up and touches the short white hair.

“Careful, don’t move too much,” Tucker pleads, he’s terrified about what's happening,

“I’m fine tuck,” she mumbles, she doesn’t like the fact that she causing her friends stress,

“Also you’re a dude by the way,” Sam points out, huh?

She looks down and a split spike of pain shoots through her neck, and sure enough, her chest is flat and something inside her, his? Chest hummus, oh wow why does that feel great?

“Huh… cool,” Nova mumbled still trying to process what was happening, “I guess that explains why my voice is so low,”

“I wonder why you got gender swapped?” Tucker says as his smart brain starts realizing,

Without even noticing it he becomes weightless and he starts flouting a little. It feels right like he’s not meant to be on the ground. He’s different now, something not human, he doesn’t know how he knows that but he just does.

“Whao holy shit you're floating!” Sam exclaimed, pointing out him floating,

“Wow, that's so cool! The portal probably gave you ghost powers,” Tucker voiced, which he isn’t really wrong,

He then feels a strange feeling around his stomach and he decides to let it consume him. Two white rings appear and separate around his middle and she turns back to her normal form. She falls the short distance she was flouting and lands on her ass with a whimper. She feels Tucker's arms wrap around her making sure she is okay.

“Now that was weird,” Nova mumbles and wraps her arms around herself, “ow that hurt,”

Tucker gently hugs her and Sam brushes her fingers through her hair. Her eyelids go slightly heavy feeling so tired and tingly. Wow, that sucked and now she has no idea what she is but having a flat chest did make her feel amazing. They should probably get back upstairs just in case her parents come back.

“Let's go to my room,” she concludes as she stands up without even waiting for the two of them to let go of her, the two of them make a startled noise at the motion and they quickly get up,

Once again without waiting for them she slowly starts walking towards the stairs and the only thought on her mind was to get in bed and sleep. Tucker and Sam quickly rush over to her, scared to let her walk without them right next to her to make sure she doesn’t fall and crack her head or something.

They both helped her up the stairs giving each other worried stares at each other that they weren’t exactly hiding, she only slightly stumbled a little on the way up mostly because of the fact that she couldn’t feel her legs. They end up making it to her room and gently lays her on her bed and she lets out a sigh and curls up in bed.

They both get on the bed with him and Tucker pulls his computer out of his laptop and puts on a random show they’ve all seen so Nova doesn’t miss anything. She lets her eyes shut and she falls asleep.

After who knows how long her eyes peck open and she immediately realizes that Tucker and Sam aren’t here and it’s pitch black outside. She rolls over and looks up at the glow-in-the-dark stars on her ceiling and they seem to be glowing brighter than normal.

Nova suddenly feels uncomfortable and she gets up to change out of this stupid safety suit. She changes into a NASA hoodie and sweatpants before crawling back under the blankets. She looks up at the stars on her ceiling.

Chapter Text

Nova’s POV

She looks out her window and sees the sun rising, oops she didn’t mean to stay awake for the rest of the night thinking about what happened but oh well. She rolls over and closes her eyes trying to get at least a little more sleep before school. It didn’t work.

The alarm on her bedside table blares and it makes her jump She quickly turns off the alarm to stop the blaring in her ears, oh great does she have super hearing now? Sitting up with a groan she rubs her face and she wishes she could just stay home but she has a test soon so she just has to go.

Swinging her legs over the side of the bed she stands up and after a second her ears ring and her vision goes black and staticky, she stumbles a bit at the sudden loss of her senses but she is able to hold herself up and her vision comes back after a few seconds.

Nova rubs her eyes and tries her best to just forget what just happened knowing she can’t dwell on it for long because she needs to get ready for school. She changes out of her pajamas and puts on her NASA t-shirt and semi-long black skirt Sam gave her and she pushes away the pit in her stomach when she looks at herself in the mirror. She looks paler than normal and wow those eybags! She grabs her concealer and puts it under her eyes and blends it out with a beauty blender.

She leaves her room grabs her backpack on her way out and walks downstairs faintly hearing her parents talking about the portal and how it’s working. A shiver runs up her numb arm at the thought of the portal, her memory is a bit fuzzy with everything that happened and the pain of what happened is hard to remember.

When he gets a text from Tucker saying their outside she quickly goes downstairs and grabs a dagle and she silently leaves the house not wanting to talk to her parents because something in the back of her blames them for what happened, but it isn’t their complete falt for the accident but still.

She waves at Sam and Tuck as she goes over to them and they give her a once over, “guys I’m fine,” Nova sighs trying to reassure them,

They decide to just let it slide and they walk to school as Tucker rambles about something, she isn’t really paying attention enough to be able to say for certain what he is talking about. They make it to school around the same time they usually do, 10 minutes before the bell rang so they can get their stuff and get to homeroom in time.

For most of the day, it’s just a blur as she tries not to fall asleep. By the time they get to lunch, she’s too tired to even eat. She sits on his and Tucker's side of their usual table and Sam is across from them.

“So… Nova do you want to talk about it?” Sam asks in a surprisingly caring tone, Nova lifts her head off the table with a humm showing that she is slightly confused by her question, “about what happened yesterday?” she clarifies

Nova sighs “I don’t know… I know I'm different now, and honestly, I can’t help but think of how good I felt in that other body,” she mumbles into her cross arms that she’s using as a pillow,

She thinks back to when she looked down to see a flat chest and there's the hum in her chest again. She feels like that’s the person she’s supposed to be. She tells them her feelings about the body change and Tucker pulls out a notebook and starts making notes for some reason.

“Also I’m pretty sure that whatever happened killed me in some way and the other body is ghost me,” she sighs, and that makes Sam and Tucker look a little scared and confused.

Tucker’s POV

The school bell just rang telling them that’s the end of the day. He’s been thinking about what Nova said at lunch and he just has the itch to research for the reason she’s feeling like this and hopefully find a way to help her because she sounded so sad.

As soon as he gets home he quickly goes to his room pulls out his laptop opens it typing out his password from muscle memory, and starts researching some of the things Nova was saying.

After a little bit, he finds an article on trans people and he looks through it and he realizes that everything it is saying is stuff Nova said. He starts researching trans people. He stumbles across an article about he mistreated trans people are and he has to look away taking a deep breath.

They shouldn’t be targeted and hate crimed just because they want to be their true selves. He takes off his glasses and rubs his eyes with a sigh. What is he supposed to do now? How is he supposed to help his friend now, he has always helped them no matter what but now how is he supposed to help with the fact that his best friend is trans and also a ghost, man this is a mess.

He looks out his window and realizes the sun is setting. Wow was he really researching that long? He turns off his laptop and leaves it on his desk as he goes to go to the kitchen to get something to eat before he falls asleep.

Chapter Text

Nova’s POV

Looking into the mirror she sees her pale skin and dark eye bags under her eyes. She runs her hand through her long black hair. How could she ever think this much hair looked good on her? She can feel the itchy feeling on her neck.

The inching spreads to her whole body as she points out all the feminine parts of her. She then starts to feel a humming right where her heart is. For some reason, a part inside her wants to reach out to it and let it consume her. Without really thinking she closes her eyes and lets them consume her and when she opens her eyes meets radioactive green ones.

There you are! A smile spreads across his face as he looks himself up and down. So this is who he’s supposed to be? Well isn’t he handsome! His eyes fall down and sees he's floating. He realizes how weightless he feels. He wonders if he can fly and he focuses on the feeling and suddenly he flies fast towards. He braces himself for impact closing his eyes tightly but she does feel the impact just a rush of cool air runs through him and then he stops going up.

He opens his eyes and sees the houses of his city. Huh, he looks down seeing he’s floating above his home, cool. He embraces the feeling letting it control him and him controlling it as he flies forward.

A wave of comfort embraces him knowing that this is right and that this is what he’s supposed to do. He flies quickly up above the clouds and takes in the sight around him, how could anything be so cool? He looks at the beautiful colors of the sun setting.

He twirls in the air feeling a rush of something comfortable flowing through him and he hears something laughing. Oh wait he’s the one laughing. He’s never felt this happy and carefree.

He continues flying around for a while till he lands on the roof of one of the taller buildings in Amity. Taking a deep breath as he sits down time feels like it has slowed down. He feels like the only person in the whole world as the world goes silent around him.

Phantom looks down at himself. Wow, he looks so much like a boy, a twink for sure but a boy nonetheless. The thing in Phantom’s chest hums again, he needs to figure out what that is but it doesn’t bother him that much because it feels nice, it’s like a cold wind on a warm summer day.

Phantom notices the colours of the sky are changing as the sun starts to set and it’s time to head home. Phantom flies up and starts his flight home. He crawls in through his window and he smells the smell of dinner cooking downstairs.

Taking a Deep breath he lets his form get hidden away but the two bright rings that pass over him. Looking into the mirror she looks at herself feeling sad she’s been feeling her entire life pass through her at the sight of her body. Will this body ever feel like hers?