They watched in horror, frozen in place on the grassy shore that bordered the mist-enveloped lake, their eyes, all six of them, wide and bulging from their pale faces, their mouths agape in awe. Althea, a strong woman by nature but terribly afraid of water and all its inhabitants, shrieked and backed away from the shore, her hands clutched to her breast, as if trying to control the ruthless pounding of her own heart. Asa was shaking—he looked genuinely horrified, because when he'd told his sister of his sightings of the monster of their lake he'd left out the small detail that he had only seen its flipper as it dove under the water when he'd gone out to fish. He had spent many an hour educating himself on the monster, fictional or not, and though he had not seen the monster in full, he was confident that its features would resemble those he told the black-haired girl that evening while they were eating dinner. And, not surprisingly, the monster looked just as he'd said, and Althea was none the wiser.

Vlad momentarily disappeared beneath the colliding waves, his muscular blue-skinned body seemingly unable to maintain itself for a small moment as he became Masters for the first time in a very long time, his gangly limbs slipping effortlessly beneath the waves.

The monster—it was not Nessie or Champ, but perhaps it was Vlad's father, reincarnated? V back for revenge for the time he'd written "ASS" on the wall of his mother's kitchen in red letters and blamed him for it?—dove beneath the waters again to the place Vlad had sunk, its flippers working, its tail thrashing.

Danny's heart seemed to stop, but his mind raced faster and faster, to the rhythm of the war drums that beat ceaselessly in his troubled mind.

holy fuck holy fuck holy god its going to eat him its going to tear him apart the damn monster is going to fucking eat him oh my god its going to kill him its going to eat him and hes going to die and fuck fuck fuuuuuuuuuuck

These thoughts, so panicked and unfocused—perhaps so unhelpful they were irrelevant—soon began to shift and lead him into a minefield of questions, of answers, of yeses and nos and maybes, of idon'tknows, of chaotic indecision that drove him into a frenzy.

danny oh danny oh danny hes going to die vlad is going to die if you dont do something hes probably unconscious hes going to die in the fucking lake hes going to die in the fucking water in a watery fucking grave danny are you going to let him he saved your damn life he saved your damn life and you need to save his

i wont but you have to you have to save him you do he saved you without him you would have died you would be gone you have to save him but what if he only saved me to make me join him to turn me evil i cant let him do that i have to let him die but he saved me he saved you danny he saved you and you need to save him get into the damn water now—

Althea was screaming again, more sharply, as Vlad Masters resurfaced, thrashing, trying to get momentum like an old cartoon character trying to run. He started to swim to the shore, but this panic was also blurring his own thoughts, muddling his once clear mind, and instead of simply changing back to Plasmius and flying over of the water he tried wildly to swim through it.

The monster was not far behind him, and was effortlessly gliding over the dark water a few feet from him, its flippers working—but not very hard, because Masters was not an entirely fast swimmer, though strong he was—and tail stirring the water as it pushed back and forth.

This seemed to hit Danny Phantom in a way nothing else did. It seemed so ironic, he supposed, that Vlad should be experiencing what he always felt when the man dealt with him, if not literally—swimming madly through thick water with an unrelenting monster trailing his person. Because Vlad was a monster, and his name was Commitment, because that was what Vlad wanted from him. He wanted him to commit; he wanted him to be good and give himself over and allow himself to be molded. And while it seemed there was no escaping it, seemed the water was too thick, too murky, he always tried to swim. He was always swimming for his own goodness, his own self, because even when Vlad was not there the Commitment was making him flee, and he could only wonder how long it would be before Commitment finally caught up to him.

Has it?

Danny did not ask himself this—he truly didn't have to, because he knew. Commitment certainly had caught up to him, because now, as the man fainted from exhaustion, he dove into the water to save his monster from its own, deserving of the punishment Vlad may be. He was committed.

Whether Vlad knew it or not, he had already swallowed Danny...and perhaps he was beginning to digest his remains.

A/N:

I was listening to Nicki Minaj when I typed that one sentence about war drums and then I imediately turned on Counting Bodies Like Sheep to the Rhythm of the War Drums. That's when all the Danny jibberish came about 0.0 Jeez, that song makes me high.

Anyway, I know this chapter is short, but I feel better updating with short chapters if I do it two-three times a week. So if you review again, I will update tomorrow night. And if you review that one, I will update on my Wednesday. So stop being pissy about my cliffies. =P

~your favorite little cupcake-sweetie VC

P.S. WOW! I just made the chapter look like it's about two-hundred more words than it actually IS! =D

Update: I did not like how the Danny nonsense looked with random spaces generated by the word document because apparently you cannot have one long word, so to make it more cohesive I've spaced it all out.