As Plasmius, Vlad declares that Phantom is his son.
Both Sam and Tucker vehemently advised Danny not to go through with the prank. But they made the mistake of stating during their persuasive monologues that he, Daniel Fenton, could not out petty Vladimir Masters. He had, mistakenly, taken that as an insult and a challenge.
Vlad had purposefully set off the ghost sensors five times the last time he was over for dinner. Danny got stuck running a diagnostic on the house security system with his mom for three hours the next day just to keep her from noticing the modification he’d installed to keep the systems from targeting his signature. Danny couldn’t just let the man get away with that without some retribution, and now Sam and Tuck have instilled the need to prove that he can, in fact, one up a sad, lonely bachelor creep in everything but power level.
Danny thought he’d done a spectacular job coming up with a revenge prank that karma herself would be proud of. Amity Park’s mayoral elections were just around the corner, and Vlad was determined to be reelected, which meant Vlad had been working double time to schmooze up to the public. He was attending events and festivals, giving public speeches, and the like. Danny knew this because his parents attended every. single. one.
Which made Danny’s job so incredibly easy. Vlad triggered their alarms and ruined his day, so Danny made sure to trigger them at every event he could and ruin Vlad’s Mayoral parade. And all Danny had to do was attend with his parents, slip into the bathroom, change, and then hang out invisibly by Vlad’s shoulder until they noticed. Instant beautiful chaos every time. What was even better was that Vlad couldn’t stop him without adding to the ghostly signature readings.
Danny managed to completely ruin three events in the last two weeks, and Vlad’s approval rating was dropping. A surprising bonus that Danny hadn’t been trying for. But he did suppose he should have realized that one of Vlad’s standing points was that he promised Amity increased protection against ghost activity, and that fell flat when he couldn’t even protect himself. He also should have realized that Vlad being strangely non retaliatory wasn’t a good sign.
It was the fourth event, this time a mayoral speech, when it all came to bite him in the butt. Vlad stood on a small stage with a podium covered in so many microphones that it looked ridiculous, and the front of the crowd was entirely made up of news cameras. The sight of it all made Danny grin widely. The idea of getting Vlad shot with ectoplasmic slime with so many watching was so tantalizingly glorious that he hadn’t thought twice about it. He ditched his parents the second Vlad cleared his throat into the mic to start.
By the time he got to the stage, the speech was in full swing. Danny floated over by Vlad’s shoulder smugly and waited. His smug smile slipped into a confused frown when nothing happened for an unusually long time. Danny found his parents in the crowd and paused. They were both looking directly at him and smirking. Danny stared back in stunned silence before both of their eyes flashed red. Danny’s stomach plummeted to the bottom of his spectral tail.
Before Danny could decide on a course of action, his parents jumped up out of their seats, yelling, “ghost! Level six ghost detected!”
“Now hold on a moment, everyone.” Vlad said as people gasped and some even screamed. “Please, remain calm.”
Unlike the times before, his parents listened to Vlad. But only because Vlad was overshadowing them. Danny decided now would be the best time to get out of dodge, but before he could take off, Plasmius grabbed him by the scruff of his neck in a bruising grip. Danny yelped, flailing instantly.
Most of the crowd stayed in their seats or standing where they were, and that’s when Danny realized most of them were also being overshadowed.
The Plasmius behind him dropped his invisibility. A second later, Danny felt a rush of Plasmius’s ectoplasmic energy pulse through him and force him back into the visible spectrum. Danny froze. He didn’t even know Vlad could do that.
Vlad, the innocent human mayor at the podium, stumbled back with a startled gasp. The cameras all shifted to point directly at the two ghosts.
“Be calm, humans, I mean you no harm.” Plasmius’ stated loudly. “I have just come to retrieve my son.”
Danny stopped his scrabbling to get Plasmius’ grimy fingers off his neck in open-mouthed shock. Cameras flashed.
Plasmius turned to Vlad. “I truly am sorry for my son’s childish pranks. Antagonizing you and the Fenton’s for sport is not how I raised him to behave.”
“No!” Danny got over his shock and thrashed, screaming, “No! Let go of me, you sick asshole!! HE IS NOT-”
Plasmius’ hand clamped over his mouth, and he flashed a grin at the cameras. “You know how teenagers are. I’ll be leaving a method of contact with the mayor. If my son shows up causing trouble again, be sure to let your mayor know, and I’ll come and retrieve my son.”
Danny screamed, shooting the strongest ectoblast he could at Plasmius’ face. The man knocked his hand away, sending the blast uselessly into the sky.
“I best be going. Ta!” Plasmius teleported away with him.
The pink smoke enveloped him, and he felt a sickening lurch at his core. Then they were suddenly surrounded by trees. Plasmius let go, and Danny spun around to attack with a furious yell.
Plasmius threw up a shield with a chuckle. “My, my, that temper of yours. You really are such a sore loser, Daniel.”
“Shut the hell up!! You are not my dad!!”
“I know that, you know that, but now, the rest of the world doesn’t.”
Danny sent another barrage of blasts at him.
“Daniel, my boy, do I need to remind you that you started this?”
“You know I didn’t!!”
“Ah, well,” Vlad flashed him a smile. “You chose to play. Until next time, son.”
Danny flew at him, but the clone vanished. Danny won’t ever admit to anyone how long he stayed in the middle of the forest, raging and screaming profanities. But he eventually calmed down enough to find his way back home. He flopped face down on his bed and contemplated moving across the country, murdering a mayor, digging his own grave and finding a nice coffin to lay himself to rest, or perhaps all of the above.
He peeked at his phone. He had messages from Sam and Tucker.
‘I told you, you moron,’ Sam had sent twenty minutes ago
‘Called it.’ Tucker also sent twenty-two minutes ago.
Danny sent a, ‘Fuck you guys’ to the group chat and chucked his phone across the room. He buried his head under his pillow and groaned.
