This one took me a while to do lol so I hope you like it :)

"JAAAKE!!!"

It was all a blur after that. A teenager speeding through the street in nothing but a white t-shirt and red basketball shorts chasing a little eleven year old kid who was laughing his head off. The teen, whose face was blood red from anger, tried to keep his balance as he slipped and slid on his wet, brown socks which were covered in melted dog poop.

"Get back here, you little punk!" Troy Bolton screamed, ignoring the cramps forming in his legs from running for the past five minutes continuously and slipping again.

"Whatcha gonna do?!" the little brunette called back with a devilish smile. "Get me to film that porno you were making with your girlfriend?!"

Troy's face hardened in even more fury. How dare that little ignorant boy spy on him and Gabriella while they were just simply making out in his room, not planning on going any farther?

He growled back. "Not before I shove this shit and my foot up your ass! Get back here!"

"Lose some weight, grandpa, and maybe you'll catch me!" Jake Peterson shot back, turning the corner down the street and disappearing from Troy's sight. The furious teen skidded to a stop and curled his fist, breathing hard through his nostrils like a bull that's just seen a red shirt.

God, how that little boy annoyed him! Jacob Peterson had been on his case ever since he moved to the neighborhood two years ago. Troy didn't know why he was the youngster's main target, but he knew it had something to do with boredom. His mother and father were both lawyers who were both late workers and they barely had any time for their son. Jake must've taken this as an opportunity to pass the time and take away some of his boredom until his parents came home. But no matter how bad Troy wanted to feel for him, he couldn't. Feeling bad would just make him an easier target. It would cause him to let his guard down and end up in more situations like this one.

Troy sighed angrily and looked down at his feet in disgust. Great, now he had to throw out his favorite socks that were soaked in Jake's pug's fresh poop of the morning. Jake had put the stool in a brown paper bag and set it on fire with a match. Immediately after he set it on Troy's doorstep and rang the doorbell, he ran out into the street to wait for his favorite "playmate" to answer to door. As soon as Troy opened the door, the burning odor of melting dog crap wafted up his nose and caused him to panic, jumping all over the bag to try and put out the flame. Finally after a few seconds of his frenzy, Troy heard the all too familiar sound of a little kid laughing from down the street. After an angry growl of "Bastard..." Troy carefully, but quickly, stepped down off of his porch and ran as fast as his slippery feet would carry him towards Jake, screaming. "You think that's real funny, huh?!"

Jake yelled back. "Catch me if you can, loser!" The rest is history.

Troy sighed and, turning back towards his house, stormed back, his face still red and his fists still curled. Before he walked through the door, he reluctantly peeled his ruined socks off of his feet and readied himself to throw them in the trash can on the sidewalk, but got an idea. Turning around to face Jake's house down the street, he balled up the new trash, aimed, and used his amazing basketball skills to propel them across the faded pavement and onto Jake's front doorstep. Troy smiled to himself. Although that wasn't even close to the revenge that Troy wanted to pull on the little demon, it was close enough for now.

--

"This is getting so freakin' old..." Chad Danforth, Troy's best friend, complained beside him ten minutes later. Jake had just pulled a similar prank on the afro-haired teen only instead of using dog poop, he used week-old fish from his refrigerator and instead of setting it on his doorstep, and he set it outside Chad's window when he turned around on his bed. He was just as furious as Troy and when he and his girlfriend Taylor put the fire out, Chad hurled the rotten bag onto Jake's doorstep as well, letting it fall right beside the messy socks.

"I know! I'm about to go egg his house and blame it on one of his little friends." Troy agreed, finishing cleaning up his feet. He brought his left foot up to his nose and sniffed it, only to scowl afterwards. It still smelled like poop. "Dammit, Jake..."

Gabriella sighed. "Come on, guys. He's just a bored little kid who wants to have some fun. What would you do it you were in his shoes?"

"Spit in them and give them back to him." Chad replied, glaring at the Peterson house through Troy's bedroom window.

Gabriella rolled her eyes at him. That was another thing. She and Taylor had absolutely no problem with the little boy, thinking that he was just annoyed with his busy parents and decided to take it out on Troy and Chad. She thought that he was just raising himself. She felt bad for him.

Troy groaned. "Gabby, how many times do I have to say this? That little kid's a nightmare! He needs professional help or something! Can you just side with us for once? He put dog shit on my front porch and rotten fish outside Chad's window!"

Gabriella just groaned after him. "Whatever, Troy. I just don't have a problem with him. I just think he needs some company. Why don't you try-"

"If you say 'Why don't you try being friends with him' I swear to God, Gabby..."

Gabriella sighed again. "Just think about it, Troy. He's just a little kid. A little, lonely kid. Can you at least try to at least reason with him?"

"Nope. He'll just stab you in the back." Troy and Chad stood beside each other with their arms crossed, showing their stubbornness.

Gabriella rolled her eyes. Her phone then beeped from within her pocket. She opened it and read the text that she had just received from her mother.

She put the phone away and stood up, announcing "Look guys, I have to go. My mom wants to go visit my grandma. I'll be back later." She walked towards the door and before stepping through, she gave Troy a stern look. "Just drop it, okay? Don't go anywhere near Jake."

Troy rolled his eyes and sighed. "Fine. But if he pulls any other crap on us, I'll-"

"Troy..."

"I'm kidding, Gabby. I promise I'll keep my distance."

Gabriella smiled and leaned up, pressing her lips to his. When they separated, Gabriella looked over at Chad. "You, too."

"What?!"

"Chad..."

Chad groaned. "Whatever..." he muttered.

Gabriella nodded in satisfactory. "Okay. I'll call you guys later. Bye."

"See ya." Troy closed the door after she sauntered out. He turned back to Chad and sighed, shaking his head.

"Dude, don't tell me you're actually gonna listen to her," Chad dropped his shoulders. "He put trash on our property, for God's sake!"

Troy shrugged helplessly with a sympathetic look drawn across his face. "Sorry, dude. She makes the rules. Can't break 'em or I'm screwed."

"How would she find out, anyway?" Chad crossed his arms, staring Troy down with a glare.

Troy answered. "Jake knows that she's not against him. He'd run straight for her, she'd yell at me, and there goes his next prank. That good enough for you?"

Chad gave a deep throated growl and fell back on his best friend's bed. "Then how are we ever gonna get him back? We have to get revenge sometime."

Troy nodded and walked over to sit beside him. "I know, I know. Don't worry; we'll get that little pain in the ass someday."

"How soon do you think?" Chad asked hopefully.

Troy ran a hand through his shaggy hair. "I don't know, but we're gonna do it soon. We just need to find the one thing that makes him snap. Something that'll scare him senseless."

"A weakness?" Chad raised an eyebrow.

"Bingo."

Chad nodded slowly, signaling that he was following him. "I get it. But how are we gonna do that? He spends most of his time in his house after school if he's not pranking us."

Troy stayed silent for a few minutes, which Chad knew meant that he was deep in thought. The brunette finally snapped his fingers and spoke up. "I got it. The elementary school's recess is the same time as our lunch period, right?"

"Yeah, so?"

Troy continued. "So, we'll just go down to the school during lunch and spy on him and his friends."

Chad replied. "Wait, but it'll take ten minutes to get down to the school and ten to get back. Lunch is only half an hour, so that only leaves a few minutes to spy on him."

Troy thought a little more before answering. "We'll leave school five minutes earlier, saying that we have to go to the bathroom, and come back late. We'll just say that we had some basketball business with my dad and get him to write us passes."

"How? He said that he didn't want us pranking Jake too and he'd flip if we cut class."

"We'll tell him that we had to go back to our houses to pick up our science projects because we forgot them. I'll sleep in, rush in the morning, and say that I forgot. And you say that you just plain forgot."

Chad frowned. "Why can't I just rush like you?"

"Because you usually do forget, Chad."

Chad got ready to retort, but stopped himself in realization. "True..."

Troy nodded. "Yeah. So it sounds like a plan?"

Chad took a deep breath, contemplating the plan for a few more moments. He finally nodded and held out his hand. "Let the revenge begin."

Troy shook his hand, an evil grin spreading across his face. "And let it be oh so sweet..."

--

"Aww!" Chad whispered to Troy. "I remember when we were this small! Look at all the little people!"

"Shh!" Troy urged, slapping a hand over his best friend's mouth. "Do you want everyone to hear you?"

Chad shook his head. He averted his eyes to the hand currently glued to his lips and looked back up at Troy, raising an eyebrow. Troy quickly removed his hand. "Sorry."

"Where do you think he is?" Chad asked, scanning the tanbark covered playground for the skinny youngster. "We've been here for the past ten minutes and no sign of him."

"I don't know," Troy replied, looking everywhere. "Maybe he's still insi-"

Chad suddenly stopped him upon hearing something. "Wait, stop!"

"What?"

"Look over there, by the bushes." Troy followed his finger and could just barely make out a small patch of hair hidden behind the large bushes by the wire fence. Two more heads could be seen as well.

"You think that's him?" Troy asked quietly.

Chad shrugged. "I don't know. Let's go find out."

Troy and Chad started for the direction of their assumption, walking along the fence and keeping their eyes glued to the brown hair that led them there. Once reaching the end of the fence and going as far as they could without being seen, they crouched down again and adjusted to try to see the person.

"Okay, can you see him?" Troy asked Chad who stood in front of him.

Chad looked straight ahead and grinned. Jake. "Yeah, I see him. And I think we can get a little closer without him seeing us."

"How?"

Chad pointed and explained "You see that indent in the wall over there? It looks big enough for us to hide in without being squished by each other and if we hide behind the trash can, there's absolutely no chance of anyone seeing us!"

Troy nodded in satisfaction. "Nice. Only one problem."

"What's that?"

Troy released a glare from his eyes and sharply pointed to the clearing beside him where absolutely no tall grass was growing. To make matters worse, it was the only way to the wall. "How do we get over there without anyone seeing us?"

"Oh..." Chad air-headedly replied, simply staring at the clearing.

"Oh," Troy mockingly repeated. "I think we're just better off here."

Chad rolled his eyes. "What makes you so sure?"

Troy pointed at Jake and his two friends. "They're on their way over here, dummy."

"See, now that's just not nice. There's no need for the name-calling."

"Just shut up before they hear you." Troy and Chad flattened themselves against the ground and waited for Jake and his friends, Chris and Joel, to arrive.

They waited until the three were in direct earshot. They listened as Chris started. "So, Jake, you in or out?"

Jake shrugged. "I don't know; I have to ask Bri."

Chris and Joel grinned teasingly. "You mean your babysitter?"

Jake glared at them, throwing a piece of tanbark to follow. "I don't call her a babysitter. More like a...home safety monitor."

Joel rolled his eyes. "Whatever, dude. So if you can go, what do you think you'll be?"

After a few moments, Jake answered. "Maybe I'll go as that kid from The Grudge. It scares the mess out of my two neighbors." Troy and Chad bit back the groan begging to be emitted from their throats.

"Oh yeah, how'd they like the little prank you pulled yesterday?" Joel asked with an open ear.

Jake high-fived him and smiled. "Let's just say that they loved it so much, they chased me down the street to try and give me a hug."

All three laughed hysterically, earning themselves invisible glares from the two subjects on the other side of the fence. "Gosh, Jake, I love your neighborhood!"

"I know! Me, too."

Chris sighed. "I'm going to be my cousin. He just visited from the army last weekend and he's coming to my party, too."

"Cool. What's he going as? I mean, he's probably tired of wearing that cameo uniform all the time." Jake asked.

"Oh, definitely. That's why I couldn't come to your house yesterday. I was helping him pick out his costume. So far we only got the fake blood, the colored afro, and a ripped rainbow suit."

Jake thought for a little while. "Wait a sec; that sounds just like something that a clown would..." His voice drifted off at the end of his sentence, his eyes widening and his face paling.

"Jake?" Joel and Chris waved their hands in front of his face to try and snap him out of his sudden daze. "Jake, dude, you okay?"

Jake quickly shook out of his trance and replied shakily. "O-oh yeah. I-I'm fine."

Chris raised an eyebrow. "What's wrong? Are you afraid of clowns or something?"

Jake shook his head and crossed his arms over his chest. "Me? Afraid of clowns? Give me a break. I-I just find it weird that someone from that army would be a clown for Halloween."

Troy sat up suddenly, a huge smile growing by the second on his face. He pulled Chad by the hand and whispered "Come on! We gotta get back to school."

"What are you talking about? There's still a few more minutes left and we need to find a weakness."

"I think we already did. Come on." Chad, not following his friend, confusingly followed him back to his car and hopped in, replaying what he heard in his head and not finding anything.

--

After school that day, Troy, Chad, Gabriella, and Taylor met up at Troy's house. They all sat down at the couch and started the conversation with talking about the almost-food fight that occurred that day and ended with a nerd going to get the principle before it got out of hand. Troy and Chad were disappointed to hear about something so fun that had happened when they weren't there, but kept their heads held high. The period skip was worth it.

"So, Chad," Troy started, "Remember what we were talking about during basketball practice at lunch?"

Chad nodded. They had figured out a plan that would practically ask their girlfriends for permission to prank Jake. "Yeah. I can't believe that little kid's still afraid of clowns. That's so weak."

"Who's afraid of clowns?" Taylor asked, placing herself on Chad's lap.

Chad answered carefully. "Jake. We overheard him talking to his friend yesterday and he sounded really scared."

Gabriella jumped in the conversation. "Scared of what?"

Troy shrugged. "We didn't hear the whole thing, but his friend's having a little Halloween party tomorrow and his cousin's going as a dead clown. That's what set Jake off."

"Aww," Gabriella and Taylor both crooned. "That's kind of sad."

Troy and Chad rolled their eyes again. "Yeah, sure. Whatever."

Gabriella said "Just think about it Troy. He's just-"

"A little kid, Gabriella. Yes, I know. You've said it over 10,000 times."

Taylor rolled her eyes. "Why do you care if he's scared of clowns or not? You're not planning anything, are you?"

Troy replied. "Not yet. But once we think of something, he's toast."

"Troy..." Gabriella warned.

Troy shook his head. "I'm not falling for the scary voice, Gabby. That little punk's gotten away with more than he should have. He's about to taste the sweet revenge of Troy and Chad."

The two girls groaned. Taylor spoke up "You guys are making a big mistake. His parents are lawyers, for God's sake."

Chad shrugged. "So? They can't sue if we scare him on Halloween. What's the point of the night if we don't?"

That shut them up.

While this whole ordeal was happening, Troy stayed silent and deep in thought. He had just recently seen a movie with a clown-like figure that he couldn't remember at the moment. Finally, it came to him. A grin spread across his face.

"Hey, Chad?" He started.

"Yeah?"

"Remember when we saw Batman last month?"

Chad smiled. "Yeah, that was such an awesome movie! I loved it!"

Troy nodded, egging him on. "We'll never forget our favorite character, will we?"

Chad shook his head. "Hell no! The Joker was so badass!"

Troy nodded in agreement, continuing his plan. "I just loved his makeup. It made him look so...creepy. Don't you agree?"

Chad stood and started for the kitchen to get himself a soda and replied "Yeah, made him look just like a dead..." He stopped dead in his tracks. He turned slowly to face his best friend, who was grinning evilly. "You think?" He finally whispered, a hopeful smile forming.

Troy walked over to him and patted his shoulder, answering "I don't think my friend. I know."

"Wait a second," Gabriella stood up after them. "So you're planning to dress up as The Joker to scare Jake? Isn't that a little harsh?"

Chad shot back "Was him attacking us with trash harsh enough for you to figure out how evil he is?"

Taylor stood up as well. "Well if you do go through with it, don't expect to see us helping you. I'm one hundred percent against this."

Gabriella nodded. "Me too! You guys should be ashamed of yourselves."

--

"I'm so ashamed of myself..." Gabriella groaned, tracing a smile on Troy's face with her red lip liner.

Troy shrugged and carefully said "Hey, you were curious to see how this would turn out on me. It's just natural. Plus, you probably thought I'd look pretty sexy as The Joker."

"You're impossible..."

Taylor shook her head as she finished with the trace on Chad and got out her red lipstick. "I feel like such a criminal. I'm helping out in a prank and putting makeup on my boyfriend."

"Hey!" Chad defended himself. "It's for a reason! You'll never find me regularly wearing this stuff. I don't even know what half of it is."

Gabriella sighed. "We're using lip liner to trace the smile, lipstick to fill it, eyeliner to get the black as far into your eyes as possible, black liquid eyeshaddow to fill in the eyes, and then we finish it off with gobs of white face powder to fill in everything else. Good enough for you?"

Chad raised his hand. "What's liquid eyeshaddow?"

Taylor groaned. "Oh, just shut up and let us finish."

Thirty minutes later, the girls finished with the boys' makeup and looked over their work. They had smudged everything to make them look dead and just the way it looked in the movie. "Wow," Gabriella scowled at her boyfriend. "This is not what I expected you to look like..."

Troy grinned. "You thought I'd look a little less sexy, right?"

"No, I thought you'd look at least a little like a human being. It's like looking at some kind of alien from biology."

The boys rolled their eyes and walked over to the mirror, checking on the work. Before starting with the makeup, Gabriella had spiked Troy's hair to make him look even creepier and Chad's hair had been tamed to hang down his head instead of upward. They had picked up temporary green streaks for the hair and applied them, making them look like spitting images of the original Joker. To finish things off, the boys had gone shopping earlier. Troy had bought a blue dress shirt with a green vest while Chad bought the same thing, only wearing the purple jacket over it. They were finally ready for their revenge.

"Are you idiots sure you wanna do this?" Taylor asked, putting her makeup back in her purse.

Chad nodded. "Baby, I've never been so sure of anything in my life. That little rat is about to get a taste of the Troy/Chad fury!"

Gabriella sighed. "Whatever. Just don't expect me to bail you out of jail when his parents throw you in the big house."

Troy chuckled. "Yeah right, you know you couldn't live without me."

"Sure I can. I'm seventeen and I only met you last year. I believe that adds up to sixteen years without you."

"That hurts, honey..."

Chad huffed "Can we please go? I think I just saw Jake get dropped off by Chris."

Troy nodded. "Yeah, we're going. You ready?"

Chad smiled. "Let's get him."

"That a boy."

--

Troy and Chad stifled a laugh once more as Jake, Chris, and Joel pushed another little kid to the ground, robbing him of all his candy. The kid ran away crying. The duo knew that he would thank them after their plan had been completed.

Jake laughed. "Oh my gosh, what a wuss! Did you hear him crying for his mommy?"

Joel nodded in agreement. "Let's tell the next kid we jump to grow up. Welcome to the real world, runts!"

Jake looked over at his house and frowned. Bri was waving him over. He turned back to his friends and sighed. "Sorry, guys, gotta go. Get another three kids before calling it a night and tell me how they went tomorrow."

Chris nodded. "Yeah, sure, dude. Night."

"See ya."

Jake watched his two best friends stalk off towards another group of unsupervised children and sighed again. He swung his bag of stolen candy over his shoulder and started making his way over to his house, whistling a random tune to himself.

Just as he was about to open the gate to his yard, he heard a soft rustling in the bushes, causing him to halt. Jake looked over to the puffy bushes in his front yard and knitted his eyebrows together. What was that?

Oh well, he shrugged. It was probably just the wind.

He advanced forward just a step before he heard it again, only a little louder. The rustling seemed to come closer to him as he stood there, starting to feel his heartbeat pound a little faster. Jake called "H-hello?"

Once again, the shaking continued, forwarding to him with every few seconds. The brunette backed up upon hearing this and called again "W-who's there?"

Jake felt the feeling of eyes boring into his skin and daring him to move backward some more, which he did. His breath cut for a few seconds before starting back up again in a long exhale, exposing his fear. "Hey! Cut it out!"

"Mmm..."

He froze. Was he hearing right? Did this thing just moan at him? It must've been a prank. Ghosts weren't real. His parents always told him that.

"Chris? Joel? I-if that's you, then I swear, I'll-"

"Jaaake..."

Jake had to fight to swallow the growing lump in his throat. His breathe advanced to a quick, raspy speed as he backed up against his mailbox and dropped his bag of candy. That most definitely wasn't Chris or Joel. Their voices couldn't get that deep yet.

"W-who are you?" Jake pathetically asked, now hearing footsteps on the pavement and even in the darkness, he could see two figures slowly make their way out of their hiding place.

"Jaaake..." two voices groaned at the same time, slowly walking to the terrified child. Jake stopped breathing entirely. He was trapped.

"Oh my God..." he whispered to himself, seeing an enlarged head that looked fuzzy at the top and another that looked spiked. Both were just standing there with their hands at their sides and feet guiding them to the frozen kid in front of them.

The two pulled one last prank before Jake took off. They leaned forward and breathed heavily in his face, having their breath brush across his face and fill his ears with fright. Jake yelped and made a break for it, running around the first figure with the busy hair to try and dodge him, but was suddenly stopped by a strong hand catching him by the collar. Another hand groped him by the arm and suddenly Jake found himself enthralled in a tight hold from two people grabbing him from different directions: his collar, his arm, his neck, and his other arm. He had half a mind to scream, but as soon as he opened his mouth, a hand covered it.

"Jaaake..." the voices moaned in his ears one last time, throwing him to the ground. Jake backed up on his hands and just stared up at the figures, fear filling his heart and his soul.

"Who are you?!" Jake demanded, backing into his fence.

The most terrifying answer came to him next. The figures revealed themselves and came out of the shadows into the light of Jake's house. Two teenagers, one dressed in a purple suit and the other in a green vest with a blue dress shirt underneath, stood there with their eyes piercing Jake's. Jake's breathing stopped entirely along with his heart and blood.

"J-J-Joker. Cl-cl-clowns..." the panicked boy muttered, not being able to blink once. He just stopped and stared as the pranksters advanced to him one last times. They leaned forward so that they were less than a foot within Jake's face and groaned "Jake..."

Jake closed his eyes, preparing for the pain he expected to come. But instead of the strong blow to the head he saw coming, his eyes snapped wide open. They weren't attacking him. They were...

Laughing.

Why were they laughing?

Jake sat up straight and watched in awe as the two doubled over to the ground and held their stomachs, crying their eyes out with amusement. Jake couldn't move. What was going on?

"What the-"

"GOTCHA!!!" the two boys yelled in his face. They managed to get to their knees and wipe away the fresh tears falling from their hilarious eyes. Jake gasped. Their fingers turned black and the black circles around their eyes wiped off. They were wearing makeup?

"Bolton? Danforth?" Jake realized, the anger building in his eleven year-old system. "Is that you?"

The two grinned evilly, crossing their arms and glaring at him with triumph in their eyes. They finally did it. They finally got Jake back for all the times he had pranked them.

"Didn't see that coming, did ya?" Chad smiled.

Troy nodded. "Chad, I think now's the time for our little dance."

Chad chuckled "Oh yeah. Peterson, this is a little something we like to call the 'We Got You' dance. One, two, three," Troy and Chad suddenly broke out into a random dance while laughing their heads off and collapsing to the ground one last time.

However, Jake wasn't anywhere close to laughing. The shaking of his limbs turned from fear to anger and his speechlessness switched from awe to fury. Unhooking the gate to his yard, Jake turned and screamed "ASSHOLES!!!"

With Chad still laughing, Troy called back "Happy Halloween to you too, Twerp!"

REVIEW!!! Thnx :)

~Rachel :)