Rated: K+ (Adult Situations, Language)

Author's Notes:

Second Story, both of which can be found on dA. Not much to say, really. I like this one less than the other, though there is more plot options here. Glyn I adore, the sweet starts-out-as-a-sue and ends-up-cool character. Oh yeah. Gotta love it.

Danny and all other related characters belong to Nick and Butch Hartman.

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Cursings

Prelude

The trap was set. The pawns were placed. All there was, was to move. Any choice the boy made was to be wrong, either morally or for the hope of his cause. And he, Vlad Masters, the dreaded Vlad Plasmius, could finally gain the upper hand in this game of betrayal, intelligence and luck. Moving about in his 'lab' as any pulp fiction writer would say, or evil lair as he himself preferred, he glanced at his trump cards. A boy and girl, barely out of childhood, but then again, so was his prey.

"You won't get away with this, Plasmius!" the boy spoke, his pitched voice grating upon such sophisticated ears such as his. But the words were just too cliché, he couldn't help but fall for the bait. Because this time, they were wrong. No matter how many times Danny had eluded his tutelage and mentorship, this time he would deny that boor of a father and become the perfect little servant.

"Child, have you any idea how one concocts a plan? It is done so one will win. It seems that neither you, nor your naïve friend Danny understands this. This time, my boy, I will not fail." After a loud sound of shattering glass above his strategically placed sky-light, he heard the loud tones of young Fenton's alter ego, Danny Phantom. How quaint, hiding his identity in the obvious.

"Guess again, Plasmius!" Danny flew down to his eye level, and fired a shot of Ghostly green ectoplasmic matter. Deflecting it easily, Vlad split into four Ghost bodies, and began to assault the boy with an unending barrage of attacks.

"Danny, if you refuse to stop this idiocy, I'm afraid that your friends will receive grievous wounds, and I know you don't want that to happen, my boy." He watched the teen realize that one of the other-Vlad's had indeed stationed itself next to Sam and Tucker, with a red Ghost orb ready to sear them to bits of charred flesh. Looking helpless and lost, the child released the last of the energy into the free air and looked, finally, ready to treat with his very own esteemed reason.

"I'll listen." Oh, the boy was good! He tried valiantly to hide the rage in his voice. But when it came to bluffing, the boy should stick to the kid stuff. His anger was apparent in his stance, the angle of his head, his very voice was thin with it.

"Now, that's a good boy. It wouldn't do to have to kill your little friends. What a mess it would be to clean up, even with three extra sets of hands." He let the implication sink in. The boy was well and truly lost now. But Vlad had to keep the other teens alive, much to his displeasure, because a hero with nothing to lose was very dangerous indeed.

"What do you want?" The two other-Vlads had moved to the boys shoulder, one on each side, and moved him to the front of the grand dais he had erected for this very moment. Sitting in it like the villain he knew he looked, Vlad steepled his fingers and allowed a bit of his victorious delight play across his face. Here it was! The moment he had waited for! To give back all the indignities that Jack Fenton had ever paid to him, taken in coin as his own son turning traitor.

"My boy, all I want is all I've ever wanted; you to become my pupil and reject your idiot father. There a few more details than that, but Danny, those can wait. All I want is you to see your full potential!" He saw Danny's fists clench, and felt the first bit of apprehension. Was the boy about to have one of those manic bursts of energy and insight that made him the scourge of Ghosts in the human world? Even with all the planning in the world, fortune, fate and destiny had always favored the hero's victory rather than the villains.

But luck happened to be with him; after a moment, the boys vice like grip relaxed. He looked up then, with such loathing that it made even him squirm in his seat, trying to remove himself from the direct line of that sight.

"I agree, under one condition. You let my friends leave. Now. No 'if I cooperate,' no 'in due time.' Now, because if it waits until later I don't think for a second you would live up to the bargain." Plasmius leaned forward, trying to read the thoughts in the boys head. This showed some promise of a double cross.

"How am I to know you aren't just waiting until your friends are safely away before you try something? What says you aren't trying to force my hand?" Danny's grin held more than just a trace of irony and sarcasm.

"Because I'm the hero." There was no disagreeing with that. After bidding the other-Vlad to escort the other children out, Plasmius himself put the Ghost cuffs on Danny's thin wrists.

"You'll see how this is all much better. Now, onto those details I mentioned…" With a flick of this hand, the two other-Vlads had Danny by his arms and legs and struggled him onto a flat, table like surface.

"What are you doing?" The boy demanded in outrage, trying to break free of the Ghost guards that were worked into the restraints. Plasmius stood over his prostrate form and knew that finally, his plan would work. Barring a miracle in the boy's court, Danny was completely under Vlad's control.

"I am removing the pesky part of your mind called commonly the conscience. And the part associated with remorse. It will be much easier to control you when your mind and goals are allied with mine. I can't really have you trying to revolt amongst a great undertaking, can I?" he pulled out the separator, reminiscent of a giant red and black spider web. It was the size of a semi-truck's tire, and it fit perfectly around the flat-bed, looking a great deal like a MRI, albeit a sinister one. He saw the recognition in the boy's eyes and smiled grimly.

"Yes, the design looks very close to your parents Ghost take on the dream-catcher. But this has been modified to sever the moral, integrity based side of the psyche from the selfish, cruel, destructive side. In Freud's terms, the separation of the super ego from the self-centered id, while keeping the core ego or personality the same. Quite a lot of work was put into this darling. In the moments after the separation, both halves will be weakened by only having half the power of the whole. I will then destroy your conscience, leaving the amoral side to inherit all the power." He nodded at his other-selves and leaned back, readying a ball of ectoplasmic matter.

The process was indeed painful, for splitting ones personality could never be enjoyable. But he had never guessed that it would be torture within it self. Danny's cries of agony were becoming mere moans, reducing the vibrant boy to a shell of his former self. Plasmius had to look away at the most heartrending parts, not sure his conscience was going to sit quietly and allow this.

But just as he was going to order the end of this little experiment and slowly give up on his dream of vengeance, the initial inner separating was complete and the physical severing could commence. Shaking away his feelings of remorse, Vlad looked at what was soon to become the vessel for all his revenge.

Danny's limp body was fed slowly, oh so slowly, through the web, feet first to cause as little trauma to the newly formed separate consciousnesses. As he watched, Danny's feet began to shimmer, as if under water, and finally become two entirely different sets. It was a remarkable sight. As the web moved up the body, there was this shimmering, and then separation. An oddity caught Vlad's notice; it seemed that the bodies differed. One was the customary silver on black of Danny, but the other… was black and scarlet. This was not planned for. The pair were supposed to look identical for the charade to work. But then again, he had never tried the Separation Web before, and inconsistencies were more than probable. He would have to work around that, but later. Now he wanted to watch something new being born.

Motioning to the door, the final other-Vlad brought the other two teens back in. They were unconscious, and gagged should they wake and see what was happening. As his first order to the new Danny, he would order the boy to aim and fire. At the last second Vlad would set up a barrier, saving their lives and erasing their memory. But he needed to see if the boy was willing to kill them

As the circle of the web reached Danny's chest, he was witness to a most remarkable change. Instead of the odd symbol that Danny Phantom wore twinned, there were two separate marks. The regular DP, and the newer, stylized old English D. This new form was also slimmer than the original Danny, possessing more finesse.

"Danny! Wake up! Come on, Danny, we need you!" The girl had somehow managed to escape from the other-Vlad. Danny's eyes opened, one glowing a brighter green than it had ever before. But the other glinted a malicious red. She scrambled forward, and before anyone could move, started pulling wires on the Separator Web's main consul.

The machine groaned, and let out a loud sputter. The Web itself had stopped, spinning around the almost severed bodies. Vlad could only watch in horror as it spun faster and fasted, encircling the boy in white light. The noise level hit an all time high, with the machine whizzing and burring and dying, coupled with screams from two entities on the mechanism. There was a resounding crack, and smoke and steam vented from a break in the Web's casing.

And suddenly, it was all over. Vlad had been knocked to the floor, nearly unconscious from the last blast, but for now he was awake, and seeing. And he saw Danny stagger away from the wreck that had once been the Separator Web, and go to the girl. Helping her up, they went to gather their companion. But as much as watching the Ghost-boy fly off with his friends at full power into the night sky was awful, what he saw in a moment was worse.

Also from the rubble, rising like a plague, was a second form. It glowed slightly in malicious red light, an aura of power. Moving away from the debris, it dusted it self off and flew out the former skylight into the suddenly much bleaker night. And just then, Vlad understood what the girl had done, even by accident. She had copied Danny's malicious intent, instead of creating two separate, half powered entities. There was a selfish, evil Danny running around with all his powers. It should have been impossible… but fate had one again saved the hero.

And before he slipped into unconsciousness, he had the nastiest, most perfect little thought:

But at what price?

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