Archive of Our Own

    In the beginning, there was Life, and then there was Death. For a long time souls passed peacefully from the domain of one to the domain of the other and there was order. It would be wrong to say that everything changed with the creation of the first ghost. For most people, things changed very little. But for those who would die alone, who would die afraid, who would die with work undone, it would mean everything.

    The realm of ghosts is known by many names, The Ghost Zone, The Infinite Realms, The Timeless Wastes. The laws of the natural world hold no sway, it is a wild and chaotic place with both the souls of the not quite departed as well as creatures undead, that is to say, never living. Creatures made from the paradoxical fabric of the space between life and death. However, neither the nearly departed nor the neverborn are the focus of what I'm about to tell you. No, for this story is about something else entirely.

    Once upon a time there was a king. He was not a just king, nor was he a wise king. He was cruel, and he was afraid. As is the way of fearful kings, what he was most afraid of, was dying. As the king grew older, he commanded his magicians and alchemists to procure for him a way of avoiding death. In his desperation he turned to the realm of ghosts, and to necromancy.

    For years his magicians toiled and, at long last, through ritual and the taking of a life, opened a door to the land of ghosts. The king, seeing the power of those denizens of the wastes, desired their power for himself. He ordered his magicians to capture and study them.

    At long last, they discovered a way for the king to gain immortality. A ghost's core, the very essence of its being, forced into a living human soul. Preparation for the ritual took many months, and on the day it was to be held, everything went terribly, horribly right.

    A ghost's core and a living soul were never meant to inhabit the same space. The soul and the core fused, creating something new, an abomination.  Something wrong awoke in a still living body. At once ghost and alive, a walking paradox.

    Not wanting anyone else to share in this newfound power, this being turned on the king's most loyal magicians and killed them all. He destroyed the ritual room and toppled the portal to the ghost zone. Then, fearing spies, he turned on the rest of the castle and everyone inside. There was not a single survivor. The once grand castle was turned to rubble. Like everything else in the castle, the name of this king and the ghost he used to be are lost.  But we know the name of what they had become. Pariah Dark, a name that was to be cursed for millenia.

    Pariah Dark was something new, something never seen before in all of creation. He was alone in the universe, and his future was uncertain, a blind spot in the timeline. However, he was not much different from the king he had once been. Pariah Dark craved power, and he would never be content. Using both his living and dead forms, he was able to establish a mighty presence among the living and in the ghostly realms. However, unbeknownst to all, he was not content with two separate kingdoms. No, Pariah Dark wished to do what no being had done before and combine the land of the living and the land of ghosts.

    He built an army, recruited powerful ghosts to his side with promises of freedom, power, fulfillment. Pariah Dark drove his military campaign with an iron fist. He forced ghosts to join his war or be struck with the Soul Shredder, a fearful weapon that traps its victims in their worst nightmares. It was wielded by his right hand, a ghostly knight known only as the Fright Knight.

    However, a group of ghosts, known even then only as the Ancients, knew that Pariah Dark's plan could only end in utter devastation. For while there is not order in the universe, there is balance. Life and Death and even Ghosts follow Rules, but the Rules of Life are not the Rules of Death are not the Rules of Ghosts; and bringing the Ghost Zone and Life together would upset the balance causing destruction and the ending of things.

    These seven ancient, powerful ghosts used their combined powers to defeat Pariah Dark, but even their powers together could not get rid of him for good. All they could do was take the artifacts he had created to increase his powers, a ring of rage and a crown of fire, and seal him away in a coffin that would trap him in an eternal slumber, hopefully forever.

~~~~

    "Tell me, Aion, will this work?"

    Clockwork, surprisingly, startled at the question. Very few could startle the one who saw all of time, and fewer still used the old names.

    "I do not know. It has always been difficult to See Pariah Dark clearly."

    "Of course, he is unlike anything else, Aion, and you have always been limited by your nature."

    Clockwork tried not to be offended. The personification of Infinite Realms existed, not outside of time like he did, but in all times. There was a difference between being an outside observer and being in the thick of things.

    "Oh Aion, that was not an insult," a ghostly hand caressed his child's face. "Very rarely has there been anything truly new in the never ending cycles of time; the mad king is one of them."

    The figure of a person, the Ghost Zone itself, coalesced before him, shrouded in veils of purple and green that flowed and eddied together in infinite dizzying patterns.

    "He has escaped, will escape, is escaping, and it will be ruin for us all," the phantom said, "but I do not know what could be, not like you, dear Aion. Tell me, do we have hope?"

    Clockwork looked into the time stream again, focusing on what could be. There was escape and destruction and ruin and... something else, a man with a key, a child. Time was hazy around them like it was with the king. He did not know. He could not See.

    "There is...something, but it is unclear to me, a man, and a boy. I know nothing more than that." He stepped to the side so it could look as well. It did, and then straightened.

    "Thank you, Aion. I know what must be done."

    With those words, the figure dissipated and Clockwork was alone in his tower once more.

~~~~

    There were once three friends, best friends. They had grown up together and together discovered a forgotten truth about their world, the existence of ghosts. Ridiculed by all, they grew more and more desperate to prove what they knew and eventually turned to the dark science, that is, necromancy.

    But this was not the necromancy of that mad king from ages past. The necromancy of chants and burning incense and ritual blood sacrifice. No, this was the necromancy of the future, necromancy with shining chrome and blinking lights. Raising the dead with mathematical formulas and the power of science.

    Together they worked for years, toiled hard at a premier institute of higher learning, until one night, a mild autumn evening, they felt they had succeeded. Together they had created a device that would tear a hole in the very fabric of reality itself and open a portal to the Infinite Realms.

    One of their number would die that night. It was inevitable. Even with mathematical formulas and the power of science, one does not raise the dead without a proper sacrifice. Vlad Masters would die.

    But he didn't have to stay dead.

    As the small portal to another realm exploded in the young man's face, the realm pushed a small portion of itself into him. He would die, but he would survive.

~~~~

    Vlad Masters, only twenty four years old, was in absolute agony. He didn't remember how long he had been in the hospital, and they had stopped promising to help a long time ago. They never told him what they were doing, the doctors in their pristine white suits, they took samples and gave him drugs and never ever helped.

    His skin came off. It was blue underneath. One by one his organs failed and one by one they grew back. There was power, under his skin, swirling and settling in his chest. It whispered that he would not die, that he would be more than he was, that he would be a brand new child of a god. He wished the power would let him die.

    The release of death never came. Instead, the power under his skin grew with every passing day. It pulsed out of time with his fading heartbeat, getting stronger as his heartbeat slowed, but never stopped.

    Vlad was losing his mind. The isolation was taking its toll, the doctors didn't count, they never spoke to him, barely acknowledged him. He thought about his "friends" who had abandoned him. The power whispered that it was their fault. They left him to die, to be tortured, to be an experiment. They would pay. These "doctors" would pay.

    The birth of Vlad Plasmius was not sudden.  It was a slow, grueling, painful process. But it was also new. Those white suited doctors did not know the story of Pariah Dark. They had never seen anything like it before. So they can be forgiven for thinking it sudden when Vlad Masters transformed for the first time. When a cocoon of darkness and pink energy enveloped him, raising the young man off his bed, snapping the restraints that kept him there. The roiling mass exploded and left in its place a monster. Dead blue skin, long black hair that seemed to absorb light, hands that curled into claws, a mouth full of fangs, and two bottomless red eyes that seemed to draw out a person’s deepest most primal fears. Vlad Plasmius thought himself a monster, and so a monster he became.

    The G.I.W. files about what happened that day in 1988 are still classified. A secret buried so deep they hope it will never see the light of day. A young man they'd hoped to use as a weapon, a monstrous transformation, and the destruction of the entire facility. There were survivors; the few lucky ones who hadn't been there that fateful day, the ones either smart enough or cowardly enough to flee as their comrades died. But it was a massacre, all too reminiscent of the one countless years before. Vlad Plasmius's creation was necessary, but the Infinite Realms vowed to do better with the next one.

~~~~

    Danny Fenton was fourteen years, three months and twelve days old when he died, two weeks into his freshman year of high school. It was an accident; tragic, preventable.....necessary. For even after twenty years, Jack and Maddie Fenton never much cared for concepts like laboratory safety or the consequences of their actions.

    Despite gaining two children and a comfortable marriage over the next two decades, they still loved nothing more than ghost hunting. The two worked tirelessly, day and night, on a portal larger and more powerful than before. For all that they were necromancers by definition, that title never crossed their minds. They considered themselves scientists: biologists, chemists, and inventors. But not necromancers.

    Because of this oversight they were unaware of the sacrifices necessary to open a portal to the Infinite Realms. Unaware of the toll. That did not stop the toll from being taken.

    Doors were ripped in the fabric of the world and death followed after. It was inevitable. They never noticed. It never touched them and so they continued on, clueless and exuberant.

~~~~

    The Ghost Zone watched as Jack and Maddie, now married, now with a family, plugged in their portal with an expectant look on their faces. The green light flashed, and then fizzled, the last ingredient missing. It was obvious by the distraught look on their faces that the two necromancers were unaware of where they went wrong.

    It continued to watch as three children snuck down into the lab. After a brief but intense conversation, one child, Danny Fenton, put on a suit quite similar to the ones his parents wore. He was young, but it didn't matter, fate was set in motion the moment his parents plugged in the portal. There was a price to be paid. Death was coming. Fourteen year old Danny stepped into the portal, tripped, hit a switch, and died.

    In that moment, the moment before death, the Infinite Realms formed a body shrouded in veils and appeared before him. Death was at its side, ready to take the child.

    "Wait," the phantom said.

    "I cannot. He will die today."

    "I do not ask for a reversal of what was, but a continuation of what is."

    "Very well."

    Death vanished and the phantom was left alone with the child who looked at it curiously.

    "Who are you?" he asked.

    "I have many names, but you may call me a phantom," it said.

    "What do you want?"

    "I am going to make you more than you could ever dream."

    "The other one, he said I was going to die. Do I get a choice?"

    This caused the Infinite Realms to pause.

    "More accurately, you are dying. I can do nothing to fix that. My gift will help you continue on, more glorious than ever."

    "But....do I have a choice to move on or not?" The boy looked up at its infinite shrouded face and the figure reached out a hand to caress him.

    "Who would choose to move on?" It asked before moving its hand down to the boy's chest and shoving its power into him. There were the sounds of faint screaming and flashes of green light. The child's eyes and open mouth flooded with neon power, at once dripping and shining. As the infinite realms twisted the child's essence and gave him unimaginable power it whispered "You have a great destiny ahead of you, young one. You will be the protection of many."

 ~~~~   

    Danny's friends had been there for his accident as his parents had been for Vlad's. But he had died quickly, in the span of seconds; there was no slow wasting away in a hospital bed. His friends watched him scream and die. There was no way to ignore the screams of a dying child, no ability to look away.

    When Danny Fenton stumbled out of a now active portal with snow white hair and glowing green eyes, clutching his arm to his chest and blinking spots out of his vision, his friends were there to see it. As he collapsed onto the cold floor of the lab, his friends were there to catch him.

      The child tried to make sense of what had happened. There had been pain, and blinding light, and something else he couldn't remember. But that didn't make sense. There hadn't been time for anything else.

    He remembered a name, phantom. Was he Phantom? Danny Phantom, a protector. He looked up at his two friends as they held him, worry in their eyes. He could protect them.

~~~~

    Pariah Dark sat in his keep, listening to the sounds of the army preparing for war outside. As he sat, on his throne of cold stone, he wondered at the existence of the two halfas he'd met. They were nowhere near as powerful as him of course, but the fact that they existed at all was interesting to him. He had destroyed all records of how to create halfas after his own creation. And in the many, many years he had ruled, he had kept close watch on the arts of necromancy to make sure that no one else stumbled upon the secret of ultimate power.

    The noise of battle interrupted his musings, and the ancient king stood. There would be time to interrogate the other halfas later. Now, he had a war to wage.

~~~~

    Vlad Plasmius flies through the unusually empty Ghost Zone, an unconscious Danny Fenton in his arms. He's not yet entirely sure what his explanation will be when the boy's parents ask what happened, but he knows he'll be able to think up a suitable lie. It's not hard to pull the wool over Jack Fenton's eyes, but his wife is much more clever. Wonderfully clever, and beautiful....

    Vlad is so distracted thinking up a suitable lie he can tell Maddie, preferably one that casts him as a hero in saving her son, that he doesn't notice the glowing figure that suddenly appears in front of him until it's almost too late. He pulls up fast to avoid crashing, jostling the boy in his arms.

    "Vlad Plasmius," the veiled and shrouded figure says, "you and the child have done well."

    Vlad pulls Danny closer to his chest, shielding him from this ghost he doesn't recognize.

    "Don't be afraid, I will not harm either of you. In fact-" The figure reaches out a ghostly hand, touching Danny's chest before Vlad can stop them.

    A bright green light springs from their fingertips and is quickly absorbed into Danny, who opens his eyes.

    Recognizing who's holding him, Danny shoves Vlad and tumbles out of his arms with all of the grace of a drunk toddler, that is to say, none. Transforming in midair he holds up his hands, preparing for another fight. He pauses when he sees the cloaked figure.

    "Who's that Plasmius? Another pawn? Is this another one of your evil plots? " He sneers, evidently not over the chess comment from earlier.

    "Not everything is a plot Daniel," Vlad says.

    “Says the guy who just gloated about using teenagers to turn a knight and topple a king.”

    Vlad sighs.

    “This, specifically, isn't a plot, I don’t even know who that is!”

    “Peace,” the shrouded figure says, holding out its hands. “I do not work for Plasmius, child. I am the Infinite Realms. I have given myself a shape and form you can understand so I can talk to you, my children.”

    At the term of endearment Vlad sees Danny visibly recoil. For once he has to agree. He is no one’s child…not anymore. He says as much with a sneer.

    “What else would I call my creations?”

    “Hold on,” Danny interrupts, “you didn’t create me, I have parents and stuff.”
    “I didn’t create you in that sense, no, but without my intervention both of you would have died the final death.”

    Vlad scoffs.

    “You’re telling me you ‘re the reason we’re halfas?”

    “That is exactly what I’m telling you,” the being says. “And I must say, the two of you have fulfilled your purpose just as predicted.”
    “Purpose?” Danny asks, “What do you mean “our purpose”?”

    “Few knew this to begin with, and fewer still remember now, but Pariah Dark is a halfa. Though his creation was an act of abominable necromancy and not a blessing like your own. When he was sealed away, I had a vision of his eventual escape. So I called upon the Master of Time, who can see all possibilities, to find a solution. He saw the two of you, though we did not know it at the time.

    “Verily I used my great power to give a little of myself to both of you, that you might be changed and save us all.”

    “No fucking way,” Vlad snarls, causing Danny to look at him in surprise. He distantly remembers trying not to swear in front of the child, but that’s not important right now. “We were supposed to die in those accidents. We did die. And you’re telling me that you “saved” us to defeat Pariah Dark? A ghost that I released? A ghost that no one but me would be foolish and arrogant enough to release?”

    “It all worked out in the end,” the being says.

    Vlad snarls again.
    “That’s not good enough,” he says “You created your own problem!”

“I don’t see the issue.”
    “You don’t- you don’t- ” Vlad stops, he’s breathing heavily, he can feel his form flickering, he’s losing hold of himself. He takes a deep breath and tries unsuccessfully to calm down before continuing. “I could have died happy , I was happy, in college. Sure, I didn’t have powers, or billions, but I also didn’t have a huge gaping void inside my chest. You ruined my life!”

“I saved your life,” the being says.

“What if I didn’t want my life to be saved!” Vlad hears Danny gasp, he knows his form has gone back to what he died in. The hospital gown, the scarring, everything he’s spent so long trying to forget. “I should have died.”
    “It was the first time I had done something like that,” the being says softly. “The transformation did not go as smoothly as I would have liked.”
    “Understatement of the century, ” says Vlad bitterly, “I spent years in that hospital trying to die.”
    “However, I realize what I had done wrong,” the being continues, ignoring him, “I gave the child a Purpose.”

“You what! What the fuck does-”
    Vlad is interrupted in his tirade by a gasp behind him. He turns to see Daniel staring at the being with an open mouth and wide eyes.

“The protection of many,” Daniel whispers, “That’s what you said to me, when I died, I remember it now, Phantom was your name.”
    “Yes,” the being says and Vlad gets the unsettling feeling that it would be smiling if it had a face. “You’ve done well.”

“Wait just a fucking second!” Vlad shouts, “He’s a child!”

“And I gave him a gift with a purpose.”

“A purpose? He’s a child, his purpose is to have stupid crushes and go to school and fuck around with his friends. Not protect people.”

“I didn’t know you cared about his childhood, Vlad Plasmius, you certainly haven’t held back on account of his age,” the being says, an air of judgment in its voice.

“Sure, I’ve done things that are frowned upon by general society, I’ve never made a secret of my crimes, at least among ghosts. But at least I was never a sanctimonious self righteous bastard about it. I know what I’m doing is, according to the standard beliefs, wrong, I just don’t care.”

“I do not understand what any of your failings have to do with me, Plasmius,” the being says in contempt. “I gave the two of you a second chance at existence.I gave you a gift .”

“You keep saying that,” Vlad says, venom dripping in every word, “But if you insist that it is a gift, can you take it back?”
    “I’m afraid I cannot do that, you are as dead as you ever will be, yet too alive to fully pass on. You are intrinsically linked to the very fabric of the Ghost Zone. Even if I wanted to remove this gift, I could not.” The being says, no emotion in its voice.

“So……what? You just turn two people into unnatural abominations without asking and you can’t even fix it after using them to clean up a mess you caused? Halfas shouldn’t exist and I am very aware of this fact at every moment. I would expect Daniel is too.” Vlad gestures to the boy floating beside him, who’s been listening to the whole argument with a stricken look on his face. “You sentenced a child to this existence and you can’t even apologize?”
    “I have nothing to apologize for, Vlad Plasmius.”
    That’s the last straw, Vlad won’t take it anymore. Pink fire flares on his fist as he swings it towards where the being’s face should be. It doesn’t connect. His fist hits nothing as the being dissipates like mist, like it was never there, leaving Vlad and Danny alone.

“Fuck,” Vlad curses, ”fuck,” the fire on his fist spreads and flares around him, enveloping his whole body as he seethes.

“Woah!”

Right. He’d forgotten that Daniel was still watching.

“Go home little badger, your parents will be looking for you.” Vlad pulls the fire back into him and lets out a breath before turning in the direction of his own portal.

“They’ll be looking for you too,” Danny says. “Also, you said fuck, like, a lot. You never swear in front of me, I just assumed you didn’t know the bad words.”
    “Then make up some excuse, I’m sure you know how to lie by now,.” Vlad says, hoping, for once, that the child will leave him alone. He starts flying away, an obvious end to the discussion.

“Did you just learn how to say fuck?”

Or not.

“No. I did not just learn how to swear, I just make a point not to do it in front of children.”

Vlad flies faster, hoping Danny will get bored.

He doesn’t.

Daniel spends the entire flight back to Vlad’s portal chattering incessantly.

    When they get there, Vlad flies through and Danny follows, finally falling silent. Flying up to his entry hall; Vlad doesn’t bother with things like stairs, or walls, but goes straight through, making sure that Daniel is still following and not wandering off through his mansion.

Landing softly on the entryway carpet, Vlad opens his front door and gestures outwards with a sweep of his arm.

“Go home Daniel.”
    “No,” he says, the petulant tone getting on Vlad’s nerves.

“You’re not usually this eager for my company little badger, why won’t you just go when I tell you too.”
    “You seem upset,” Daniel says, “I don’t feel like I should leave you alone after… all that.”

“I’m not upset,” Vlad lies.
    “Oh really? Then what’s the outfit change about?” Daniel asks, gesturing at him.

Oh.

Vlad had forgotten he was wearing what he had worn when he died. He doesn’t think he can change back, not right now.

“Your parents will wonder where you’ve been,” he says, trying one more time.
    “Like you said, I’ve gotten pretty good at lying. Besides,” Danny points out “they’re going to wonder where you’ve been too.”

”Fine,” he snaps, slamming the door, “stay if you want. I need a goddamn drink to deal with this.” He leaves the child in the foyer and goes to his kitchen, hoping that alcohol will solve some of his current problems.

~~~~

Vlad leaves Danny alone, presumably to go find a drink, and Danny wonders if he should leave. Vlad is right, he’s never wanted to be in the same room with Vlad before, finding any excuse to avoid the man. Not after the older halfa had attempted to murder his dad for the first time. When Danny had thought he was just a rich eccentric he’d liked him fine. If it had been any other time, Danny would’ve booked it back to Amity Park without a second thought.

But now…

Danny doesn’t know what to do. The whole conversation with the Ghost Zone had made his thoughts all jumbled. He knows halfas aren’t supposed to exist. That god or whatever had turned him and Vlad into freaks of nature just so they could defeat Pariah Dark, but that was only a problem because Vlad was a halfa in the first place. Just thinking about the situation makes his head hurt.

Vlad tried to punch god. That thought makes him laugh. Vlad tried to punch god because he was angry for him. That thought doesn’t make Danny laugh. It makes him worried again. About Vlad of all people.

It doesn’t take him long to find the older man, all he has to do is follow the sound of cursing in an otherwise silent house. He’s in the kitchen, pouring himself a glass of something brown and alcoholic, and looks up when Danny flies in.

“What a shame, I thought I’d gotten rid of you,” Vlad says, back in human form.

“I’m like a bad penny,” Danny says cheekily as he sits on a stool at the island, changing forms as he does so. “You can’t get rid of me. You still look like shit by the way.”

It’s not completely a lie, there’s dark circles under Vlad’s eyes and his hair is falling out of his ponytail.

“I could say the same about you,” Vlad retorts, Danny believes him. He hasn’t been sleeping recently and just fought a giant. The Ghost Zone might have given him enough energy to wake up, but he’s still exhausted.

“What are you drinking?” Danny asks, changing the subject.

    "Why, do you want some?" Vlad asks, holding up a different bottle than the one he was currently pouring his own drink from.

    "Depends. Why is that one different? Is it poison?" Danny asks suspiciously. "Also, I'm fourteen."

    "It's not poison, it's just cheap, though sometimes there might not be much of a difference. The whisky I'm drinking is worth $200 a bottle, this-" he gestures with the bottle, "is worth $20. And I know you're fourteen, do you think, out of everything I’ve done, underage drinking is where I draw the line?"

    Danny shrugs, he doesn't know what goes on in Vlad's head, especially not right now. 

"Apparently swearing is where you draw the line,” Danny jokes, “Fine, I'll take some."

    Vlad pours him a small glass and Danny tries to be cool as he takes a sip. Only to spit it out immediately.

    "That's disgusting," he says, scrunching his face to try and stop the burning feeling in his nose. He has no idea why adults drink that stuff. Danny glares at Vlad when he looks up to see him chuckling a bit at Danny’s misfortune. There’s the Vlad he knows.

    "And that's why I gave you the cheap stuff, little badger," Vlad says smugly.

    "Yeah, yeah, fuck you too old man," Danny grumbles.

    Vlad hands him a napkin and Danny wipes up the mess he made. He hops off the stool and throws it in the trash. When he sits back at the island, there's a bottle of soda in front of him. It's a nice soda, in a glass bottle, the label proclaiming only real cane sugar was used. It's orange, his favorite. Danny doesn't trust it.

    "Is this a bribe?" he asks, eyeing Vlad.

    "I don't know," the older man says. "Is it working?" He picks up his own drink and takes a sip, leaning tiredly against the counter.

    "How do you even know my favorite soda?" Danny asks as he grabs it and twists the cap off.

    "I thought we already established that I've committed many crimes. Use your imagination."

    "Oh, right," Danny pauses. "How do you know so much about me?"

    Vlad looks up from his drink and looks back down, avoiding eye contact. He looks slightly guilty, which is an expression that Danny didn't think he'd ever see from him.

    "I...uh....I don't think you want to know the answer to that question."

    Danny scoffs.

    "I asked, didn't I? That means I want to know."

    Vlad mumbles something that Danny can’t understand.

    “What?”
    “I said, I bugged Fentonworks.”

    “You bugged my house?!” Danny yells, eyes blazing.

    “It’s not just your house, little badger. It’s also your parents lab.” Vlad says snidely. “I like to keep an eye on your parents' inventions. They affect me too, you know.”

    “Yeah, but you also spy on me,” Danny retorts.
    “I do,” Vlad says, “how else am I supposed to know what you like, it’s not like you ever talk to me.”

    “It’s ‘cause you insult me or my dad every time we talk,” Danny says, taking a sip of his soda. Unsurprisingly, it’s pretty good.

    “Your father deserves to be insulted, he’s a fool,” Vlad sneers.
    “That’s what I’m talking about!” Danny says, “You’d be a lot more tolerable if you weren’t an asshole all the time!”

    “Well I’m flattered,” Vlad says, taking a sip of his own drink. Unlike Danny he doesn’t seem affected by the burning sensation of the alcohol. “I never suspected you would ever consider me tolerable.”

    The sarcasm in his voice is palpable, Danny chooses to ignore it.

    “We’re talking now, aren’t we?” Danny asks, “Besides, you’re like the only person who knows what it’s like, being a halfa. The Ghost Zone or whatever it was basically confirmed that. We might as well learn to get along. Start over or something.”
    Danny taps his fingers on the glass of his soda bottle, looking down at the marble top of the island, nervously waiting for a response. He doesn’t want to deal with being a halfa alone. Based on what Vlad said, the feeling of wrongness that he’s dealt with ever since the accident doesn’t get better. But if Vlad tries to force him to do anything he doesn’t want to do, Danny’s not going to stand for that. And he’s not going to be nice if Vlad tries to hurt him again, but he’s willing to put the effort in if Vlad does.
    “I think I would like that,” Vlad says softly, and Danny looks up. Vlad looks nervous, just like Danny feels, though it’s well hidden, “I’m Vlad Plasmius, and I’m half ghost. I would like to mentor you in your powers.”
    “I’m Danny Phantom,” Danny says, “and I don’t think we’re quite at that point yet.”

    Vlad’s eyes flash red and Danny tenses, preparing for a fight. Until Vlad takes a deep breath and closes his eyes, setting his glass down next to him. When he opens them again they’re back to blue.

    “I’m…… sorry,” Vlad says, with great effort.

Danny wonders if it physically pains him to say, but he relaxes, relieved.

“I accept your apology,” Danny says, “but let’s just start slow.”
    “Very well,” says Vlad, “we'll start slow.”