A/N: I will admit, I did NOT think you guys would like this. Well, here you go an update!
I thought of an AMAZING idea while I was writing this. ... Then I forgot. ;n;
I'm sorry, but I really like traumatized Danny, so expect him to be around a bit longer, including some random relapses when he's finally starting to over come it. What can I say? I'm driven by ANGST!
TO THE STORY!
There was nothing that could break into the stupor Danny had locked himself in. The car held nothing but himself and the driver- none of his belongings survived the explosion at his home.
Danny at this point didn't care what happened to him. Things didn't make sense, and that was all that mattered. He was going to some stupid family where he was going to be cooed over and pampered, his new family oblivious to how many battles he'd won for them so they could live peacefully.
This car ride was long. Danny glared out the window of the car and bit his lower lip subconsciously. Something nagged at him in the back of his mind, but it was lost behind the intense feelings of guilt and loss.
Danger.
Something wasn't right.
The car pulled to a stop and the driver turned to look at Danny. A kind smile played on his chauffer's face as the man said, "Yer here, son. Welcome to your new home."
Danny could have sworn his caregivers had given him the name and information of the one who had agreed to foster him, but it had been drowned out in the despair of losing his family.
The driver got out of the car and came around to Danny's side, opening the door and helping the kid out. Danny tried to smile his thanks, but it came out as a lopsided mess. The driver seemed to understand and tried to smile back before walking Danny up to the huge front doors of the place he was to stay at.
Why was it so familiar?
Danny had a large nagging sensation that he had been here before; several times, in fact, but he could not place it for the life of him, his mind twisted in its dense fog.
The driver rang the doorbell and a woman answered. Her curly blonde hair ended just below her ears, and her clear green gaze took in both the visitors, resting the longest on Danny. "Welcome." She bowed to them in greeting
She and the driver exchanged a few words and the man clasped Danny on his shoulder before leaving. The woman quietly closed the door behind him as he left. Danny was staring around the large green and gold entrance way and thinking how horrible the décor was, when the woman came over to him and asked him to follow her.
The two made their way into what Danny assumed was a sitting room. A large fireplace (thankfully cold,) adorned most of one wall, the mantel filled with photos and memorabilia of the football team the Packers. There were two golden football ornaments on either edge of the mantel. Danny glanced at them distastefully. He didn't care for football.
There was a small sofa and two arm chairs facing the fireplace. The woman bowed to Danny, holding her arms out to gesture to the small sitting space. Danny turned to it, his mind blaring warnings at him.
He was not supposed to be here.
Where was here?
Danger.
Danny walked around one of the chairs and his heart nearly stopped.
Sitting there, swishing around a glass of wine was his arch-nemesis Vlad. Vlad was watching him, a sad look on his face. Danny swallowed nervously. He suddenly realised why all those bells went off in his head.
Danny was in his ghost form in a flash (literally) but was soon coughing violently, his lungs not yet fully recovered from inhaling smoke. His ghost form vanished leaving a very human and very bleary eyed Danny standing in its place.
Vlad was behind him, slowly rubbing his back, as Danny doubled over, clutching at his chest as the heaves ripped at him. As much as Danny hated to admit it, Vlad's motions were comforting.
"Wh-what's your-" a cough, "-plan, Plasmius?" Danny mustered the bravest glare he could and Vlad looked genuinely hurt.
"Plan?" he echoed, pulling away from Danny and picking up his glass of wine again. "I have no plan, Daniel. I received a telephone call regarding your predicament and was offered the chance to foster you- and I took it."
Oh no.
No.
No.
NO!
Danny went back to his ghost mode, going intangible as he shot up, phasing through the ceiling and out of the castle. Danny didn't know how high he was going until the air got thin and icicles started to form on his nose and appendages.
Figuring he was high enough, Danny flipped onto his back, staring up at the stars he could now see. He floated like that for a while, disregarding the ice that was forming on him. When he got slightly tired of looking at the stars (he could never be tired of looking at stars,) he looked down, expecting to see thick clouds blocking his view of anything below him.
Instead, what he saw took his breath away. He had floated out over Amity Park. He had never been this high up before and he marvelled at the landscape, seeing the way everything knitted together so closely. He had always thought of it as being a mini maze (one he was able to navigate with ease, but a maze nonetheless), but from up here it made sense.
"Marvellous, isn't it?"
Danny nearly jumped three feet out of his skin when the voice spoke up behind him. Whipping around he narrowed his eyes at Vlad, who had flown up to join him.
The older halfa sighed, his black hair held down slightly by ice particles. "Daniel you can't go running off like that."
"And why not? You're not my father!"
"I am now."
Realization crashed into Danny for the third time that day. His parents were gone and never coming back. Danny stared at him, sagging slightly as he remembered the fire.
Three minutes later found Danny sitting in a chair by the (still cold) fireplace, a blanket around his shoulders, and a mug full of hot chocolate in between his hands. Vlad was sitting back in the chair Danny had first discovered him in, swishing a new glass of wine as he watched Danny recover from the cold temperatures.
Vlad was talking, Danny could tell, but the teenager blocked out the noise and concentrated on the brown liquid between his hands, watching the steam dancing off of it.
"SKULKER!"
Danny flinched, looking around for the ghost in question before hearing the laughter coming from the older man in the room. "I thought that would catch your attention."
Danny glared at Vlad, settling back into the cushy arm chair. "Not funny, Vlad." Danny muttered, curling his legs up onto the chair and resting the steaming cup on his knees.
"No, but it got your attention, which is all I wanted." Vlad smirked, taking a sip of wine. "I was saying I'm sorry for the unfortunate event that placed you in this situation, Daniel."
"Danny." He knew it was useless.
"I'm even more sorry for the loss of your family-" don't say it you freak, please don't say it. "-especially the loss of your mother." You just had to go there, eh?
Danny gave Vlad a disgusted look before sipping his hot chocolate. "Leave mom out of this." A sob tried to escape his throat at the mention of his mother, but Danny chocked it back. "She would never have gone for you, you know." Danny's words could barely be considered a whisper. "She was always going to end up with dad."
"How naïve you are, Daniel." Danny didn't look up at the billionaire as the man walked over to the fireplace, taking down the picture frame he had there, that contained a picture of him, Maddie and Jack from their college days. "She would have, if she had been given the chance."
Danny could almost feel the anger and regret radiating off of his nemesis as the man replaced the picture. Vlad was quiet for a moment as he stared into something Danny couldn't see. "But she was stolen from me by that idiotic buffoon you called a father." Something heavy hit Vlad's head, shattering on impact and seconds later scalding water fell over him making him cry out in pain.
Danny watched with glowing green eyes as Vlad danced around, trying to get the burning hot chocolate off of his skin. The billionaire turned to Danny, eyes flashing red before realizing who he was looking at. The older ghost took a deep, calming breath, running his hand through his hair as he watched the young teenager curled up on one of the arm chairs.
"Don't you ever speak like that about my father again." Danny's voice was a growl, his glowing eyes never leaving Vlad's face. "If I ever hear you insult him, or anyone else I've lost again, you'll wish it was you in that fire instead of them." The older man did not doubt Danny's words as the boy got to his feet, his fists clenched. The blanket fell from Danny's shoulders and Vlad gently placed his wine glass down.
"Daniel, calm down. I'm sorry. It was insensitive of me to say such things given the current situation."
Danny took a deep breath. Getting mad at Vlad wasn't going to bring him out of this situation.
It wasn't going to bring his family back.
Danny was able to push back the rage that had rooted in him, but he was unable to uproot it completely, as just seeing the man's face brought back all his previous emotions towards him. The way the older ghost acted, it was like he was asking for Danny to attack him. Danny turned away from his nemesis and avoided his gaze.
The older man sighed and clapped once. A butler appeared almost instantly in the door way and bowed deeply to Vlad. "Take Daniel to his room for the night." He did a good job of hiding it, but Danny could still detect the rage seething under the surface. "Make sure he rests."
Vlad turned a knowing eye on Danny and the boy returned it with a deathly glare. "I've gathered reports saying you haven't been sleeping as of late."
Who could when every time you close your eyes you see the faces of your family screaming for help as their skin melted?
The butler appeared at Danny's side and the boy finally tore his gaze away from the richly clad man and allowed his servant to guide him to his room.
"Here you are, young master." The butler opened the door and motioned with his spare hand for Danny to enter. Danny tried his hardest not to glare at the man; it wasn't his fault he was in this position. Danny carefully entered the room, surveying it and taking it all in as he looked around carefully. The room was spacious, but it was obvious it was a spare room. There was an attached bathroom which Danny just looked at before returning his gaze to the boring room. "Lord Masters has declared that this is your room, Master Daniel. You may do what you like with it, without any consequences."
Danny's eyes flashed green for a second before he turned back to the butler. "Thank you, you can go now."
"I may not, sir." The butler stayed immobile, his arms clamped behind his back. "I was instructed to wait until you fell asleep."
Danny sighed. "I can't sleep with someone watching me."
The butler didn't move on his position, knowing he could not disobey Vlad's orders. Danny ran a hand over his face in exasperation, how could he get rid of this guy?
"Fine," Danny said, resigned, "I'll try to sleep then, if it means so much to you."
Danny lay down on the bed and closed his eyes, sighing when the pictures of his family didn't immediately spring to mind. He pulled the blankets up around him and rolled to his side, his back facing the butler. He controlled his breathing, slowing it down to make it sound like he was sleeping.
The man didn't leave, obviously being forewarned to any trick on Danny's part. Danny sighed deeply, burrowing deeper into the bed (It was comfortable), relaxing his muscles as he tried to sleep.
A hand grabbing his arm caused Danny to stop in his tracks. Flinching, he turned around to look at the man holding him. "Wh..what is it, Dad?" Jack's face was serious, his eyes burrowing into Danny's.
"You need to see this!" Suddenly the serious look dropped off of his father's face, and he looked more like Jack. "I've made the coolest invention!" Danny desperately tried to think of an excuse, but it was after school and Sam and Tucker were both busy. Why didn't Lancer give him homework tonight?
"Uh, Dad, I don't know if that's a good idea…"
Something passed over his dad's face for a second, but it was gone so fast Danny couldn't catch it. "Of course it is, Danny! It's harmless this time, I promise." The man dragged his son by the arm down to the lab. Danny caught a quick glance of something covered by a black sheet, but his mother quickly blocked his view of it.
"Hi, sweetie!" her singsong voice greeted him and Danny waved back.
His father finally dropped the iron grip on his arm and went over to a metal table, picking up something Danny didn't recognize. Holding it up, Danny noticed it looked like one of those circular pool toys. The ones that would sink to the bottom, and kids would dive down to get them. His father ran his finger along the inner edge of it. "This, Danny, is a portable ghost portal."
Danny pointed at the large Fenton Bazooka, dust covered it as it sat unused. "That was a portable ghost portal too, Dad."
"Yeah, well… this one works both ways!" Jack looked distastefully at the forgotten weapon lying on the table. "This one lets us go in if we want to!"
"Not that anyone would ever be crazy enough to," Maddie added, standing next to Danny. "But we thought it'd be neat for the wall portal to be duplicated into something small and portable."
Danny had to admit, it was really cool. His dad handed it to him. "It doesn't work yet. Your mom and I still need to figure out how to charge it with ecto energy."
Danny knew how he could get it to work, but didn't want to do it in front of his parents. He pushed a red button on the side of the device, it whirred a bit before a couple of sparks flew, and then fell silent and dormant again. "Y'see?" Jack asked, gently taking the device back. "Just like the larger model before it mysteriously started working."
Jack frowned in confusion, "Well, whatever. We'll get it working, and when we do, we can send the ghost scum back to where it belongs the second we see them! It's perfect!"
Danny smiled politely at his parents, secretly rejoicing in them finally making another weapon that could aide him instead of hurt him. When he had the chance to fix the miniature portal, ghost hunting would be so much easier. Maybe he'd even have to retire the thermos.
No, he'd never retire the thermos.
Danny sat in the corner of his bed, pressed up against the wall; his chin resting on his knees as he stared at the far wall. He hardly noticed as the door opened and a servant came in to check on him for the hundredth time.
When the servant finally left, Danny still hadn't moved. His limps were aching in protest over being locked like that for over half the night, but he didn't care, enjoying the break from the grief the pain gave him.
When the door opened again, Danny closed his eyes. He didn't want to deal with yet another servant. He was close to firing an ecto ray at them just to get them to shut up. When the person stood beside him and said nothing, Danny assumed it was the butler this time. He had come in earlier and had simply asked him if he was hungry, standing there for a while, not saying anything while Danny ignored him.
He had eventually just left.
Danny could feel his eyes glowing green under his eye lids, but he refused to open them, hoping that the butler would just simply leave after getting no response from him.
What happened next shocked Danny.
He was roughly grasped by the back of the shirt and thrown to the floor. Danny turned around, his eyes glowing green as he stared up at the culprit. Vlad was standing there, his face a mixture of rage and sadness. "Daniel!" The hybrid's eyes flashed red for a second before he tried to calm himself. "Daniel, you've been ignoring my servants all morning, and I've been getting reports you did not sleep last night."
Shut up.
"Why would you do that, Daniel? They're simply there to help you- they only want to make sure you eat and sleep."
Shut up.
"Daniel are you listening to me?"
Danny snapped. He lunged at Vlad, phasing them both out of the bedroom and falling three stories in to the topiary garden below. Danny wrestled the older man as Vlad landed on his back, cushioning the younger hybrid's fall.
The older man gasped as the breath was knocked out of him and Danny quickly sprung back, picking up Vlad in the process and tossing him against a nearby bush shaped like a badger. As the man regained himself, Danny stood, panting in rage, his ghost form upping his emotional state.
Vlad stood, watching Danny as he let his black rings of light transform him into his ghost alter ego, Plasmius. "Why did you do that, Daniel?" the man's anger finally wiggled out of his grasp and he shot towards Danny, grabbing him around the waist and flying a few dozen feet into the sky.
Danny snarled, trying to push his way out of Vlad's arms, but the man had a strong hold on him. When Plasmius had judged he was high enough, he again grabbed Danny by the shirt, this time from the front so he could press his nose into the boy's. "Don't ever attack me like that again, little badger, or you will feel more than what I am about to do to you."
The man flung Danny to the ground, shooting a power blocking electrical attack down after him. Danny was able to slow his fall just before the electricity hit him, causing him to scream and turn back into Fenton. He hit the ground with a sickening thud.
Plasmius landed gracefully next to him and crossed his arms as he turned back into Vlad. Danny squinted at him as his vision blurred. "Nice try, little badger. Next time, try to fight when you actually have the energy to."
Danny blacked out.
