Day 8 - Electric Core AU

Summary: Vlad wants more than anything to help the child who has fallen to his same fate. Unfortunately for him, his help is the last thing Danny wants. (dialogue prompt borrowed from danphanwritingprompts on tumblr)

"I want to go home."

Vlad frowned at the boy huddled into the corner of the couch across from him. "You are home," he replied matter-of-factly before taking a sip of his tea.

"No," Daniel said. The dark bags under his eyes stood out in sharp contrast to his paper-white face. His left eye and cheek convulsed in a tic. "You kidnapped me from my actual home."

Vlad sighed. He'd been over this with the child already. "I didn't kidnap you," he said. "I brought you here to help you, my dear boy. I told you, I'm the only one who can truly help you." The fact that he continued to ignore this fact was beginning to irk Vlad a little, but it was more hurtful than anything.

Daniel pulled his knees even tighter into his chest as his face twitched again. "I had Sam and Tucker. They would've helped me."

"I certainly believe they would have attempted to help you, but their success in doing so is a completely different matter. Do you think they can even begin to understand the things you're going through? The being you've become?"

"Don't say that!" Daniel shouted. His eyes flared momentarily with a toxic green glow. Tiny sparks crackled in his disheveled hair. "I'm fine. We were figuring it out just fine until you showed up and kidnapped me!"

Vlad gingerly set his teacup down and inhaled deeply through his nose. It was… difficult to avoid showing the painful impact of the child's words. It was even more difficult to avoid retaliating with his own shouts. "Please, my boy," he pleaded, switching tactics. "Look at yourself. You can barely keep yourself corporeal! It's a miracle you hadn't blown out your parents' circuit system by the time I found you!"

Daniel pressed his hands over his ears and shook his head like a toddler throwing a tantrum. "No, no," he said as he squeezed his eyes shut. "It's just a side effect, it'll wear off soon. It's just a side effect, it'll wear off soon." He continued to repeat the sentence over and over again like a mantra, his face continuing to tic irregularly.

Vlad found himself at a bit of a loss. It had been a while since he'd been in such prolonged, close contact with anyone, least of all a teenager. He was admittedly embarrassed that he didn't quite know how to conduct himself here. A consequence of choosing to lead a life of reclusivity, he supposed, but it was now proving to be a disadvantageous choice.

Then again, what other choice could he have possibly had? After being quarantined, after losing contact with Jack and Maddie, after discovering just what he'd become…

He resisted a shudder. No, he couldn't let the same thing happen to this poor child.

Silently, he rose from his armchair and moved toward Daniel, choosing to simply phase through the coffee table. The boy still had his hands pressed over his ears and his eyes shut tight; his mouth continued to move in his mantra, but no sound was coming out. Vlad knelt in front of him. He reached out to take Daniel's hand, but he hesitated and settled for grasping the edge of the couch after thinking better of it.

"Daniel," he said, then, remembering how he'd first been introduced to the boy, said, "Danny…" Buttercream frosting, this was hard. He hadn't been in a position where he'd had to comfort someone other than himself in years. Was he keeping his voice gentle enough? Did he seem calm? He certainly didn't feel calm.

Focus, he told himself. Taking a deep breath, he began again. "Danny, please," he begged.

Miraculously, the boy heard him. Watery blue eyes opened and bored straight into Vlad's. The man had to resist the urge to shy away from Daniel's intense gaze. He could see the unfiltered power simmering behind those eyes, and he found himself wondering exactly what the child was capable of.

"Please," Daniel whispered in a cracking voice. "Please… I don't - I just wanna go home. I just want all of this to stop." His cheek convulsed again as he lowered his gaze. Almost inaudibly, he said, "I don't even know what I am anymore."

Vlad watched in empathetic sorrow. He'd been plagued with the same thoughts for years after his accident and forced quarantine. Even now, he occasionally found himself second-guessing his own existence. In comparison, the boy's accident had only happened a few weeks ago. Nowhere near long enough to come to terms with the whirlwind of emotional chaos and confusion that came with it.

"You are… a wonder," he began slowly. Before he could stop himself, he continued, "You have come face to face with Death and denied him - a feat that few others throughout history have been able to accomplish. You - you have been reborn from the elements of your death, into something far greater than an average human. You are nothing short of the miracle that has led you here."

Vlad's own words surprised him. Usually he wasn't one to wax poetic like that. It was this child, though - this unassuming fourteen-year-old boy who never would have caught his eye otherwise. Something about him compelled Vlad, grabbed him by the shoulders and tore at his heartstrings, stirring in him, for the first time in nearly 20 years, the wrenching pain of care for another.

And he was okay with it. More than okay with it. The realization that he'd meant every word he'd said terrified him, but in the same butterfly-inducing terror that possessed a person just before they took the leap of faith.

He was ready to take that leap.

Daniel stared at him, dumbfounded. "A miracle?" he hissed. His eyes burned with green light again, and Vlad caught a vague whiff of sulfur. "You're calling this nightmare a miracle?"

Vlad faltered. He hadn't exactly been expecting this response. "Oh, my child, not like that. Please, I -"

"No!" Daniel shouted. The tears evaporated from his eyes in a tiny puff of steam. Sparks began snapping in his hair again. "I am not your child! Don't you dare call me that!"

He extended his legs abruptly, nearly knocking Vlad from his feet. The man quickly stood, hands raised. "Danie- Danny, please." He was struggling to maintain his calm demeanor in the face of a boy rapidly losing control of his already unstable abilities. "All I want is to help you!"

"I don't want your help!"

Perhaps words weren't the way to placate him, Vlad was beginning to realize. Maybe a physical demonstration would be more effective. He exhaled and concentrated on the buzzing knot of energy right above his sternum. With the precision of two decades worth of practice, he willed the energy forward, into his arms and hands. He was vaguely aware of the crackling electricity rippling across his scalp and down his spine.

Ever so gently, he expanded his energy further. No need to frighten the boy any more than he already was. But he needed to do this. He needed to show him he could help.

Daniel's eyes flew wide open. "What are you doing?" he demanded, though his voice trembled. Whether it was from fear or anger, Vlad couldn't tell.

"I'm trying to show you," the man explained. In one swift move, he allowed his energy to make contact with Daniel's, but he was nearly overwhelmed by the sheer strength and ferocity of the child's aura. A quiet voice in the back of his head began to worry that the boy's power was too much for either of them to handle.

He silenced that voice quickly. He couldn't give into that, not now.

Instead, he said, "Can't you feel it? You and I, we're the same. Our energies are the same." It was true. Being so close to Daniel's own fledgling core, feeling the unwilling yet inevitable ballet between their two spirits, it told him as much. His hot, precise electricity found itself in perfect harmony with the boy's burning cold lightning storm. The resulting potential was intoxicating. Vlad savored it with every passing second.

He needed this. He needed to help the child, to make him understand just how right it was that he was here.

Daniel, sadly, did not have the same reaction. He yelped and tried to scamper as far from Vlad as possible, resulting in him falling through the back of the couch. By the time Vlad rounded the corner of the couch, Daniel was back on his feet, though his form continued to flicker and his face twitched more rapidly. The snapping electricity in his hair fizzled through strands faster and faster, and Vlad caught sight of an angry red lightning pattern painting the underside of the boy's jaw, down his neck, and below his collar.

"S-stay away from me!" Daniel shouted, continuing to stumble backward. "We're not - I'm nothing like you!"

The words stung Vlad like a thousand wasps. Losing all remaining composure, he cried, "That's not true! Please, Dani- Danny, I can help you! I've been through this just like you, I can teach you how to control it, but please, you must calm down before you hurt yourself!" And before I lose you, he added silently.

Daniel's fingers dug into his biceps. His eyes were shut tightly again, but Vlad could still see the remnants of their toxic green glow seeping through the cracks. His facial tic was uncontrollable at this point. "I'm not - I-I can't…" he gasped in between short, panicked breaths. The smell of sulfuric ozone was pungent at this point.

Daniel fell to his knees. Hastily, Vlad drew his energy back in and dropped to his knees as well. "Daniel! Can you hear me?"

The boy didn't respond. Instead, he gasped violently and opened his eyes wide, revealing twin pools of green. "M-my… too - too much," he choked out as his form flickered wildly.

The moments that followed happened in quick succession. Vlad, operating purely from his panic, reached forward to put his hands on Daniel's shoulders. In that moment, he felt every hair on his arms and the back of his neck stand upright; the tang of something metallic could be tasted in the air. He recognized the hallmark signs of the impending disaster and, in the next moment, realized he was too late to stop it.

The instant his hands made contact with Daniel, a blinding white bolt of electricity cracked into existence, forming a ring around the boy's waist.

The resounding force launched Vlad backwards and into a bookcase. The back of his head slammed into the edge of a shelf, and he crumpled to the ground.

The last thing he saw as he slipped into unconsciousness was lightning dancing across snow white hair and Daniel's acidic green eyes.

day 7 is apparently becoming much longer than I originally thought it would, so y'all get day 8 first lol

I ended up creating an AU I want to write for again, whoops. Especially this Vlad. Sometimes I just need more wholesome-Vlad-slightly-unhinged-because-ghost-powers-also-doesn't-know-how-to-Talk-With-Children XD