Black Garden
When Vlad finally snatches an apple from Eden, unfortunately for Danny, the knowledge of good and evil was precisely what was lost. AU DannyxVlad Twoshot Request for MasterFranny
'His brain was in one of those violent, yet frighteningly calm, states where reverie is so profound it swallows up reality. We no longer see the objects before us, but we see, as if outside of ourselves, the forms we have in our minds.'
-Les Miserables
~*~0~*~
Hello, everyone! Hope you're all doing well-am trying to keep up with the pace of college life. Not easy. Anyhoodle, MasterFranny and I agreed to an exchange (She did a fantastic picture of Vlad and Danny having tea together...^^ I advise you check it out on DeviantArt muy rapido) and she requested something a little unorthodox: Danny goes to the dark side (Probably for the cookies.). She very kindly left it up to me on how it was done, however.
*Rubs hands together*
Actually, this fiction was a bit more of a challenge than I initially thought it would be...I kept starting and re-starting it because I wasn't sure how I wanted the structure to be-I'd thought of doing a poetry-fiction for awhile now, although I'm not very good. Thankfully, MF is again very generous, and allowed me to do a mix of a normal storyline and a poem.
So sorry it took me so long, my friend-thank you again for the picture. I only hope this is a third as good.
Dear one, I have a tale that to tell you.
But be warned: You won't like it one bit.
As God is my witness, I swear it is true-
Though I know you won't believe me. Not a whit.
The survivors scarcely believe it themselves. Not to worry.
To me, it is certainly strange as well,
To find desire in a happy corner of hell,
In some metallic, sterilized jail,
Where reason did at last quit a resolve made frail-
Where Fenton parents did gently drive their daggers to save-
Their beloved son, whilst unknowingly digging their own grave!
All of this done during a scourge for the prize,
While another gem shone in a blind man's red eyes.
Happened hence in a lab accosted in a humble town, called Amity Park
With windows that would send eerie green light out into the dark.
And it left little imagination for children's dreams
When at night they would hear the screams-
That ended with quaint security being torn to bits
After a howling specter lost himself to enraged fits-
And sent a building burning, burning down to the floor,
And spreading to where Amity Park once was-
ONCE.
It isn't there, now. At the very least, it's not there anymore.
So, my dear, if you haven't yet guessed, this story is a bit uncanny.
But I assume that you've already heard the one about Vlad and Danny.
...
...
...?
What? You haven't?
Then sit, for we'll be journeying soon, to a darkened corridor.
To a place before these gruesome acts which I told you about before.
But we'll have to go back twenty years or so, dear heart.
Let's start from the very beginning-a very good place to start.
Epilogue: Twenty Years Ago
When he had realized just how deeply he'd fallen for Maddie, it had been springtime. How blisteringly typical of his ridiculous life to have that one simple cliché: Springtime. When a young man's fancy turns to thoughts of love.
He remembers the cool breeze sifting through the rain, making him shudder as he'd hurried along to his next class, textbook in one arm, umbrella handle clenched tightly in his other. While the Wisconsin frost was at last beginning to melt, and greenery was beginning to tentatively poke through the gray Earth like a timid creature fresh out of hibernation, he could still faintly see his breath. Winter was sullen to leave quite so soon as March.
But despite the rain whipping about him, and the blasts of cold air that made his skin prickle with gooseflesh, inside, he was jubilant, glowing-as though someone had just lit a warm coal fire deep within him, with brightly glowing embers as red as rubies. Madeline Patterson was hurrying alongside him, close beside him, and while she had blushed darkly and looked determinedly in another direction when Vlad had tentatively put his hand in hers, she had not moved away.
He wasn't going to spend too much time bemoaning with Maddie over what a shame it was Jack was ill. The three had had plans to see a movie tonight, but Jack had woken up with a miserable cold, and was hacking into a bedsheet-sized handkerchief while the two attended their last class for the day-one Vlad blissfully shared with Maddie. Maddie had given Vlad a nervous sort of smile when she suggested they stay with Jack tonight, though the large, overgrown schoolboy had cheerfully insisted that they go on ahead without him; he would be fine. He trusted his best friend completely to take good care of his….uh, other best friend. Or at least, that was how he'd put it, though it had come out sounding like, with his overstuffed sinuses, 'udder bed fred.'
If he had to be completely honest with himself, Vlad would have to admit that he was secretly glad Jack would not be attending the film with them tonight. Madeline had a habit of exchanging secret, sparkling glances with the teddy bear of a man that made him somewhat nervous.
While the idea of her preferring Jack's company over his was ridiculous, albeit slightly stomach-turning, the only things stopping him from proposing to her here on this dreary damp concrete were: One, she most like would say no, break his heart, and he'd ruin things between them in sheer stupidity, Two, He was in love, but thankfully recollected a BIT of his sanity, and three, he could not yet afford a ring.
Yet. But if there was no one else after graduation-and somehow, he very much doubted there could be-he would be the first one at her doorstep, on bended knee. He'd smiled at the thought, his insides somersaulting and fluttering dreamily off into the distance alongside his head.
While he did care for Jack dearly, Maddie was…something truly special. While Jack had been the one to introduce him to this cherubim in the first place, Vlad had hoped his subtle hints at squeezing between them whenever Maddie and jack got too close-and started looking at one another, like that day they'd all stood in that public bus, or that time in the elevator-would soon become apparent to his friend, and he'd cheerfully back off and give in, much as he always did good-naturedly to his best friend.
Resisting the urge to squeeze Maddie's cool hand in his own warm one, Vlad closed his eyes, and he let out a long-suffering sigh, at which Maddie cast him a curious look.
Blast it all, he never wanted to hurt Jack. He already knew the man would never intentionally do the same.
At least, he thought so. His paranoia occasionally prickled suspiciously against the young man, and it bothered him incessantly. Why mistrust Jack, of all people? While the man had grown up with a cheery and loving family by his side, and Vlad had the slightly unhappy, peaky look that came with neglect, the man had all but adopted him immediately and without reserve as his foster brother the day they'd met. So trusting. So sincere. He only could hope that he found another girl to be interested in, for while he smiled at his best friend pleasantly enough, the friction of competition was starting to burn between their once merely warm bond.
Jack was so blissfully ignorant, however, it seemed he hadn't even noticed.
Still, he'd acknowledged, with a full heart, all was fair in love and war.
Once the two had (regretfully) reached their destination, Vlad held the door open for her, and she passed in with a soft word of thanks. He watched her go, color building in his hollow cheeks, his dark, cobalt eyes hungry.
He'd had a girlfriend or two in high school, but he'd never, ever been so smitten with a creature as he'd been with wonderful, perfect, enchanting Madeline. Every little quip, every flaw, he loved, as dearly as he could love his own self.
He adored her. He only hoped that the clever, mischevious, spirited girl knew a fraction of just how much.
Humming faintly under his breath, he followed meekly after the girl, cheerfully scooping his protesting friend's books into his already heavy pile towering in his arms, eyes sparkling merrily.
They passed a large, ornate vase full of freshly bloomed irises on their way down the hall. Even on the inside, the joys of Springtime were trickling.
It was over.
His life was over.
Staggering backwards from the grotesque, terrified creature now also retreating from him, the frail mess of skin and bones bumped against his nightstand, sending the little white water pitcher tumbling to the floor, where it abruptly smashed into pieces, sending icy water trickling over the wraith's shaking feet.
He held up a trembling hand, bloody red eyes widening in distraught when it abruptly disappeared before his eyes.
Gasping, but unable to feel the heart racing in his breast when his hands fluttered towards his chest cavity, he very nearly passed out. But although his violently wobbling limbs nearly gave out on him, he only sank to the floor, still aghast in numb disbelief. He rocked back and forth against the whitewashed walls, whimpering faintly to himself, arms over his head, praying that this was yet just another terrible fever dream. A very long nightmare.
But he could not even draw breath in this form, and soon enough, he knew, even though he'd had to shut his eyes; his arms vanished before him once again, and when he cried out and meant to stand, he only stumbled, and slipped back to his knees.
~*0*~
Vlad Masters should have been pronounced dead at some godforsaken hour in the bitter cold of a December evening.
But, as you already know, my dear, that would only be telling the partial truth. By the time he'd woken up to find himself curled up on the cold hospital floor, (Someone had placed him back in bed, but he found himself UNDER it, oddly enough) the blood flow had already returned to his hands, which were not the unsightly blue suitable for a corpse's. Someone had already come in that night, and swept up the remains of the flask he'd broken the night before, as well as the remains of the withered Christmas poinsetta that he'd hurled at the wall earlier yesterday evening.
It had been early Autumn, when the wood surrounding his castle had been ripe with color and change-when he had invited the Fentons to the ill-fated reunion he'd been scheming for months, if not years. The plans had been set in the motion the day he'd received Jack and Madeline's wedding invitation in the mail.
The twentieth anniversary of his initial downfall, made all the more ostentatious by the wealth and riches he'd managed to reap-most of which most unjustly. But with what he'd stolen, he'd built a name and an empire for himself. All were simply a formality, of course, considering his true prize had always been Madeline. Much as he enjoyed his 'home comforts' of being one of the richest men alive, the fact that a common oaf from the streets still held his darling had his eyes flashing red in the depths of night, and him clawing at his vintage pillows, imagining his hands wringing Jack's fat neck.
Only once Maddie had his surname and was in his bed could he rest easy; only once Jack was left dead, or an outcast, or thrown into some insane asylum for the rest of his hideous life could justice truly be done. He'd been left alone to suffer, and while he'd shouted at Madeline to leave his side when he'd been in the hospital, he'd never meant to drive his poor, precious jewel away, nor had he been purely responsible for the hurt pooling in her eyes when he'd forced her out of his room, ashamed to be seen in his mutilated state.
If Jack hadn't been so careless, he wouldn't have been in that hospital to begin with. While there was no excuse for making Maddie suffer, it was still all Jack's fault.
Powers that allowed him to glide the night sky, fame, prestige, and fortune or not-Vlad Masters saw none of this as fair retribution for twenty years of anguish, of idiot doctors prodding at his oozing, cracked skin while he painfully inhaled the scent of medicine and disinfectant, longing to die, but could not. He ate through a tube, though he'd nevertheless wasted away, becoming little more than an emaciated corpse forgotten and ugly in the hospital, in the dark room nurses are never keen to visit, and no friends or family to come. Doctors had gently encouraged him to write his eulogy when he was twenty-three, he'd tasted blood at night, and had been left humiliated, paralyzed, and forever left with the image of Jack's boyish, manic grin burning behind his eyes.
Then, there had been the sickening terror of waking up one morning to find yourself with flesh as blue as if you'd been cliff diving in the arctic circle, and brilliant, ruby red eyes. He'd shrieked at his own appearance, wondering if he'd driven himself insane.
But he'd recovered, of course. If only out of years of spite.
For even Vlad knew one can't gild a flower, and Madeline was his special blossom. Once Jack was out of the way-and he supposed he didn't mind having two stepchildren, overmuch, though he didn't care tuppence for them-things could be as they should.
His few attempts to murder Jack with a couple of ghost lackeys had failed-not out of any skill of Jack's, but out of the irritating meddling of some eccentric, newly-dead ghost boy who sought to use his powers for good in Maddie and Jack's home town.
The idea curled his mouth into a disdainful smirk as he turned the emerald and gold vintage curtain over, his hooded eyes surveying the approaching green RV that was zooming its way up his drive.
But never mind him. He was of no real concern to the man-and, after tonight, Danny Phantom would have no one over whom to meddle over.
Adjusting his ribbon around his neck neatly, Vlad lightly ascended down the marble stairs, pleasant smile already in place as he went to open the door, biting the inside of his mouth to stop the maniacal grin from looming across his face. Didn't want to scare his darling away, now.
When he stepped out of the shadows to greet the five Fentons now climbing up the steps, a cool breeze brushed reassuringly past his face, and he inhaled it deeply before going out to greet the Fentons, making a mental note to wash his hands if the most undesired event occurred, and he was forced to shake Jack's hand.
A cool breeze stirred his face. He inhaled it. It held the scent of promise.
So he had to wait a little while longer. He'd already learned the game of patience, although his unbelievable discovery of Daniel was starting to wear it unbearably, insufferably thin. He thought Madeline would have been enough to sate him, and complete his glowing vision of a euphoric triumph over the man he so dearly loathed, but now, he knew it wasn't enough.
He had to have the ghost child. Jack's. Rightfully his-after all, Daniel was very well the son he might have had with Madeline if all had gone in the natural order of things, and he and Madeline had perhaps decided to start a family.
But he was so much more than that. He was the fellowship he ached for; the only other who knew the pain of being physically tied to this Earth, when half of your DNA has already fled to the hereafter. Or floating aimlessly in the Ghost Zone. Or perhaps it was tied to him the way Vlad sometimes suspected his was bound to himself-dying for the freedom to move on.
Daniel had angrily rejected his first proposal, and perhaps the whole 'renounce your father' tidbit hadn't actually been the smoothest way of offering, but he would entice the teen to become his apprentice, hell or high water. He'd make him see reason; give up his foolish attempts to keep Amity Park safe, and come stay his side, where he belonged. The boy could even persuade Jasmine to come with him as well-and, if Vlad held her children, than Madeline was as good as his. She loved her children to no end; if they were no longer happy under the same roof as Jack, why, she would come to Vlad's open arms, and learn to love him.
Now, another occupant haunted his dreams at night: the ghost boy that protected a city of stars.
And so it was that Vlad did decide,
That if he wanted Maddie to be his bride,
Daniel was quintessential to have at his side-
While Jack in hell writhed, sizzled, and fried.
Soon, Daniel had become precious lot in his scheme,
And became the star of Vlad's craven, loving dream,
But scorn always followed the specter's sad, recurring plea:
"Daniel...won't you come and live with me?"
Hope had soon soured, and steadily curdled into grim,
For Jack had turned the boy away from him.
Stupid, stupid, child! Ignorant, ungrateful brat,
Brains of his father's, and eyes of a bat!
Who had not one clue, nor one mild guess-
That he held the keys to Vladimir's happiness.
Vlad's rage flew, his obsession grew,
He attempted to engineer a clone close enough to meet-
His expectations of a perfect son. He was rather glad it failed-
It probably wouldn't have been half as sweet.
The second attempt hopeless, he was mad with fury,
And destroyed most of his home in catastrophic hurry.
He'd keeled over in his den, hands pressed over his eyes,
As he desperately considered his long-elusive prize:
Danny...
Danny!
DANNY!
Pain came in flash floods, roaring like rip tides,
And it ate away at the already hollow man's insides.
Danny tricked and thwarted him again and again
While hiding mischief with honeyed words for a friend.
But now, no more. He'd had enough, and was already soiled in sin-
He WOULD have them both if it did him early in:
But Madeline was his Queen. And he would take special pains-
To have the little halfa, even if it was in chains.
But how?
Like a burglar, into the Fenton house, he'd stolen in, while each Fenton was snug in their bed.
Only security stopped him from smothering Jack in bloodstains red-
And like a shadow, he passed over Maddie lovingly,
And over Jasmine condescendingly,
But there was someone quite special yet to see.
Daniel.
Prowling, he'd appeared in the boy's room,
His arrival made it icy as a tomb-
He'd gazed at the boy through lidded eyes
Wondering if he should take him by surprise
And steal him away with Maddie as his prize-
But not just yet.
After rummaging, while Danny turned in bed, sleeping,
Vlad drew out a journal, full of secrets the teenager had been keeping.
What he found astonished him so.
And castrated him with a revolted sort of glow-
It secretly rather pleased, him, though-
So he'd tucked the book back onto the shelf,
Knowing now that the person whom Danny cared for was his OWN SELF.
He spent the night thinking carefully,
And at dawn, haunted eyes lit up with terrible glee
At the marvelous thought of his new cacophony.
"I'll give him no choice but to force him to love me!
And once he is mine,
He surely will find,
That a good friend has the nerve to stab you from behind.
He'll do anything-anything-to please-
So long as he believes it will lease
Affection and tenderness from me.
And soon he'll see
That all I ever truly wanted was Maddie-
And he'll become the obedient heir-
That I always knew he could be."