Title: Comfort in the Emptiness
Rating: K+ (ish)
Mood song: Arms of Sorrow by the Killswitch Engage
Pairings: VladXDanny father-son
Word count: 1,129
Notes: Another for Shiny-san because I said they could make a request. I'm starting to take requests more and more for this, it seems. These drabbles are fun and all but sometimes it's nice to please the readers. :D

Which means: if you have a special request, something you saw fanart made for or your own personal needs for DP, please leave a review or PM me with it. If you like my style of writing, I'll happily use it to your advantage and write something for you. After all, I have 24 drabbles left to do. ;)

This is an AU drabble, nothing like the show's storyline, okay? I just want to say that before someone complains or states the obvious. D:

Masters was a rich man, someone who made easy money off his good intuition and business stocks. But he was also a miserable man, someone who lost his beloved wife in a car accident when his son was only a few months old. Her death still haunts him like a lingering specter, even though it's been years. And it's funny, because his son acts like there never was a mother, acts like everything's fine, and that this is how it was supposed to be. It almost hurts the man inside, because that's not at all what he wanted things to be. Perhaps there was a way to reverse things, to make sure that car accident never happened … but alas, that was not possible. So Vladimir, being the man he was, just kept it bottled up inside him and distracted himself by messing around with science, which he's come to realize is his new hobby.

"Hey Dad, what're you working on?" comes his son's voice from upstairs.

"Nothing, just trying to get this Ghost Portal model to work," he says casually, hearing footsteps approach the stairs.

"Can I come down and see?" Danny asks, taking a step down.

"Sure," his father replies, not caring very much. The Portal was not very large, only being a model and all. It was a small hole in the back wall, just big enough for a middle school girl to stand up inside of. Vlad frowned at it before reaching down and tightening a bolt, connecting a wire to it when it was tight enough. He felt a presence behind him then, and he turned and smiled vaguely to the raven-haired boy. "Looks good, eh?"

"Maybe it'll work this time," the teen says, bending down and looking up at the ceiling of it.

"Maybe." Vlad shrugs, cracking his neck. "And maybe it'll be a complete failure like the previous times."

"Let's try it out; you could be wrong," his son winks.

"If you say so, Daniel. Step back a little, please. I'm going to fire it up."

Danny nods and steps back, but little did he know that by doing so his elbow knocked over his father's ice-cold coffee from that morning, causing it to spill over the exposed wires, short-circuiting them. If only Danny would have known what it had done, if only.

"Here we go!" Vlad says nervously, pulling the switch.

There was a flash and a sickening feeling in the pit of their stomachs, and everything turned black before their eyes. It was cold and empty where they lay, and at first nothing came to mind, and they didn't even know what happened.

"Dad…" coughed the teen. "Dad?"

He heard a low moan off somewhere to his right, but he couldn't open his eyes. Or maybe it was just too black to see anything. Where were they?

"Dad –" cough. " – Dad, where are –" cough. " –You? Are you –" cough, cough. " – Okay?"

Suddenly a scream burst the boy's eardrums, and not soon after he let out a scream of his own. He felt something twist and change in his body, and he wondered vaguely if his father was feeling the same thing.

But it didn't last long. Soon enough, Danny was out cold again, falling back into the cold blackness.

When Danny awoke his head felt heavy and fuzzy, and his eyes slowly opened to find the basement ceiling staring back at him. He laid crumpled on the tiled floor, in front of him a glowing green mass where the Ghost Portal used to be.

"Daniel? Where's my Danny …" came a hurt voice.

Danny forced himself up into sitting position, and the second he did a white ring encircled him and he found himself looking down at a ghostly tail. He yelped and the tail became legs, and with another wrapping ring he was himself again, donned in a pair of blue jeans. "Dad, something weird just –" but he gasped and stood up suddenly, staring dazed at the thing near the Portal.

It was his father, but it looked so much more sinister. It was like staring at a fantasized version of Dracula, dark and cruel. It's eyes were drawn closed and it moaned softly in pain before a pair of black rings wiped over the body and he saw his father, but with rapidly grayed hair. Slowly his eyes opened, and he looked up at Danny. "There you are … are you all right?"

He said not a word in reply, only stared dumbfound as his father struggled to stand. But in his eyes, that wasn't his father anymore. Something occurred when the switch was flipped, and even though he sensed a change in his own self, Danny wasn't so sure about his father. Had a ghost overshadowed him like in the movies? "Wha… what's going on?"

"You look frightened, Danny; what's the matter?"

"Stay back, stay away from me! You can't be my Dad!" he said, panicking. Then, with tears pooling in his eyes, the newly-created Halfa fled up the stairs.

Vlad collapsed to his knees and gaped at the stairs, wondering how all of this happened. And it was then that he saw the broken mug on the ground, the murky brown liquid splattered all over. My coffee …it must have … oh no.

"Danny!" he called, standing back up and heading into a run. "Daniel, I now what happened! Dan–" but he stopped dead as his son fell through the ceiling from his bedroom, his human body transparent. But in seconds he was solid once more and falling from the high ceiling with no way to stop himself. "Danny!" Instinctively he caught the boy in his arms, his knees bending at the sudden weight.

"Dad, I … I don't get it. Wh-what happened?" his boy said lowly, a tired tone in his voice.

"I think … I think something spilled over my coffee and short-circuited the wires, making the Portal burst outwards and infect me and you with some kind of ghostly essence … Daniel, I think we're half ghosts now."

He set his son down on the long rug that ran down the hallway. Light blue eyes met dark teal ones, and slowly Daniel said, "So … what now, Dad?"

Vlad sighed and shook his head. "I have no idea."

"I'm scared," the 13-year-old stated. It was funny, because he was only a couple months from is birthday … what a terrible present to receive two months early.

"I am, too, m'boy," replied the older man hoarsely. Without really thinking about it, he came closer and held his son, afraid for them both. Ghost powers? How can fate be so cruel? It's as if part of him died …