Penalty of Youth

Summary: As the hunt for the ghost stirring up trouble continues, Danny and Vlad suffer an unfortunate encounter.
Characters: Danny, Vlad, Tucker, and Sam

"Are you sure it's okay for us to stay with you?" Danny asked as they walked down the street. Already a week passed since he and his friends arrived in the past, but they were having little luck in capturing the ghost.

"Yeah," Vlad shrugged, "my parents are always working, so they'll never notice that you've been living in the attic. And my sister already went off to college."

Hearing that Vlad had a sister still surprised him. Danny had never heard his parents mention Vlad having a sister, and in his time, he doubted Vlad would divulge that kind of personal information to the "punk kid" who kept ruining all his schemes. Now that he knew, he wondered whatever became of Vlad's sister. Or his parents, for that matter. When he and his family stayed at the Dairy King's castle, he never saw any pictures of Vlad's family. He lowered his gaze, not liking the idea of Vlad severing connections with his family, especially when he remembered the Vlad of his time talking about how all he wanted was a family who loved him.

"It's not too cramped up there, is it?" Vlad asked, stuffing his hands in the pockets of his coat. The neighborhood was quiet, and Danny almost couldn't believe there was a ghost lurking around somewhere.

Danny shook his head. "I wouldn't say it's all that comfortable though." He laughed awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck. It got a bit chilly sleeping in the attic, so he and his friends had shoved together their sleeping mats and slept tangled up under a mound of blankets to fight off the cold. It reminded him of when he was little and went camping with his family.

"I'll try to make it more comfortable in any way possible if I can." Vlad glanced around, his blue eyes alert for activity. "Are you sure there's actually a ghost here? Maybe you got it wrong. Or maybe the ghost jumped to a different time the moment you got here."

The thought had passed through his head. He would be lying if he said it didn't. "If it had already moved on, we would have been contacted by now," Danny explained. Clockwork wouldn't leave them stranded to mess with the timeline if the ghost they were hunting wasn't still in this time. Since the Master of Time didn't suck them through a portal back to his tower, Danny could only assume the ghost was still here. Sam and Tucker were checking another area of the neighborhood, spreading out their search party.

Vlad stared at him, his mouth thinning unpleasantly. "I thought you would be better at this."

Danny's eye twitched. "It's not that easy!" He ground his teeth to keep from snapping any further at Vlad. After a deep breath to calm himself, he added, "Ghosts can be rather difficult to find. Sam and Tuck have one of my parents inventions that can scan for ghost energy, but if I'm too close to it, it just points back to me because I'm half ghost. I have my own way of sensing ghosts, but so far, it hasn't gone off. Once we locate it, it should be easy to catch."

Vlad appeared doubtful. "Let's make a bet. See who can find the ghost first."

Danny laughed. "You think you can find the ghost before me?"

"Of course." Vlad smirked, and Danny felt a tickle of wariness.

"All right." Danny returned the smirk, though the look on Vlad's face left him feeling worried. He might have bested Vlad in the future, but the man was quite smart. This Vlad had the same air of confidence around him, causing a tickle of doubt in Danny's own skills. But what did he have to worry about? He had a ghost sense. This Vlad didn't even have his ghost powers yet. The advantage was his.

His smugness lasted approximately five seconds. Then a chill ran down his spine, forcing a gasp from the half ghost.

"Ah. A bet."

Danny and Vlad both twisted toward the source of the voice. He swallowed as he stared at the ghost floating before them. The ghost had its legs crossed like it sat on an invisible chair, and a wide grin split its face. Danny wasn't entirely sure if this ghost had a gender.

"But neither of you found me." The ghost tapped a finger to its chin. "I guess that means you both lose." Its grin turned cruel as its eyes glowed bright and red. "Time to find out what punishment you get."

"What?" Danny shouted, but the ghost ignored him. A giant wheel appeared behind him, split up into more than a dozen sections. Each section had a different symbol on it. What they meant, though, Danny wasn't sure. The ghost grabbed hold of a silver handle along the outside of the wheel and gave it a hard spin.

"Is this normal?" Vlad asked, nervousness creeping into his voice.

Danny shook his head. "We weren't able to get close enough to the ghost before to learn what kind of powers it has." He reached behind him for the Thermos he kept on him. "But this should be easy. Just get him in-"

"Ah! That's a good one!" The ghost's laughter made Danny freeze. The wheel stopped spinning, a triangular tag at the top pointing to one of the divided sections. The ghost's grin filled Danny with dread.

The wheel exploded. Danny flinched, automatically reaching up to cover his face as smoke and confetti rained down on them. Beside him, Vlad coughed and waved one arm, trying to disperse some of the smoke. When all was clear again, they were alone. The ghost had vanished again in the distraction.

"Great," Danny muttered. "Now we have-" His body tensed, and his eyes grew wider. That didn't sound like his voice? What happened? Was that what the ghost did? What good did it do the ghost to mess with his voice?

"Uh," came a squeaky voice next to him, "I think we have a problem."

Danny glanced over at Vlad then nearly fell on his rump when he stumbled back a step. Vlad was even younger than before! Danny dropped his gaze to his own body, and the color drained from his face. He hadn't escaped the ghost's punishment. "I don't wanna be a kid again!"

"I'm not exactly happy about this either," Vlad pointed out flatly as he folded his arms. "This is entirely your fault."

"My fault? You're the one that suggested the stupid bet in the first place!" Danny paused in his anger to consider that for a moment. Did the ghost only appear before them because they had made a bet? Could that be a trigger for the ghost using its powers?

"It's not like I knew that would happen!" Vlad snapped back, his face scrunched up and red with anger. "Because I can tell you I wasn't exactly wanting to repeat childhood today. Or any day for that matter!"

"It's going to be all right." Danny placed a hand on Vlad's shoulder. "We'll capture that ghost and get everything back to normal. First, maybe we should find Tuck and Sam."

Some of the redness faded from Vlad's face, but he still appear quite crossed about the situation. "I guess we can be thankful that ghost at least shrank our clothes with us." Then he squinted and leaned over too close.

"Hey!" Danny protested, holding Vlad back as heat crept onto his cheeks.

"Are those freckles?"

His blush darkened, and Danny slapped a hand over his face. "Ugh! Those didn't fade away until I was ten!"

"You don't like your freckles?" Vlad raised an eyebrow.

"I was bullied enough already. I didn't need freckles giving the other kids another reason to tease me." Danny grabbed Vlad's hand. "Let's just go find my friends."

"You say you have these ghost powers, but you just stood there and let that ghost do this to us. How exactly do you beat me in the future?"

"That smug cockiness of yours doesn't do you a lot of good," Danny muttered as he glanced around the street. "Okay. It doesn't look like there's anyone around. I'm going to fly us to my friends. That'll be faster. I'm going gho-"

"Wait." Vlad stopped him with a raised hand. "You're identity is supposed to be a secret. But you cry out that you're going ghost before you transform?"

Danny's mouth pursed thin, and his face burned brightly as he heard Vlad's words from their first meeting echoing in his ears. "S-So what if I do?"

Vlad stared dully at him. "It sounds like foolishness. If you don't want people finding out about you, it would be wiser not to have a battle cry that gives away your identity."

Danny puffed out his cheeks but swallowed back any biting retorts that came to his mind. He transformed to his ghost form, ignoring Vlad's gasp of surprise. I'm really glad that still works, he thought as he stepped behind Vlad and hooked his arms under the other boy's arms. For a moment, he feared he lost his ghost powers when that ghost made them younger. But thankfully, the ghost's ability only affected his age. After turning them invisible, he lifted off the ground and flew toward the section of the neighborhood where Tucker and Sam were looking for the ghost.

Vlad tensed the moment they were in the air. Then as they soared over the small neighborhood, he relaxed in Danny's arms. "This isn't so bad," Vlad said over his shoulder with almost a laugh in his voice, and a smile stretched over Danny's face.

"Ah! There they are!" After several minutes of circling around, Danny spotted his friends walking down a street. Tucker held one of his parents' devices to detect ghost energy while Sam manned the only other Thermos they had.

"Wait! You're going too fast!" Vlad flailed.

"I know what I'm doing!" The arm waving didn't help with his flying. Even though he had done this hundreds of times before, Danny realized too late that something wasn't right. His experience was with a fourteen year old body, not an eight year old one. He misjudged some factors, like his younger body didn't have the same strength as his older body. After flying around to find his friends, his energy was spent. He reverted back to human, and they tumbled the last few feet to the ground, landing in a tangle of limbs in front of his friends.

"Danny!" his friends gasped.

"What happened to you?" Sam's eyes grew wide when she saw the two of them.

Danny untangled himself from Vlad, who shoved him as they parted, then stood. "We, uh, had a little run in with the ghost."

Tucker snickered. "Little."

Sam smacked him on the shoulder with a loud noise and glared at him.

"It's not funny." Danny huffed and folded his arms. "But because of this, we might have figured out how to lure the ghost into a trap. He appeared to us when we made a bet."

"What was the bet?" Tucker questioned.

"That's not important."

"I still think I would have found the ghost first," Vlad said. "But the point is, if we make another bet, we might be able to make it appear before us again."

"Then we just need to be ready for it and capture it before it can do anything." After a week of searching unsuccessfully for the ghost, Danny finally felt a surge of confidence.

"And the ghost got the jump on you and turned you into kids?" Tucker scratched at the side of his head.

"He spun this wheel," Vlad explained. "I guess it was some sort of penalty thing since neither of us found the ghost. It appeared before us."

"That sounds a bit like the ghost cheated." Sam frowned as she folded her arms.

"Which is why this time we need to be prepared and trap it in the Thermos before it can spin its wheel," Danny said.

"And that will reverse this?" Vlad gestured to their eight year old bodies.

"Hopefully." Danny winced. "If not, I'm sure Clockwork will be able to fix it. Having us remain like this would interfere with time, and he wouldn't allow that to happen." Judging from his expression, Danny could tell Vlad wasn't too pleased with that answer. "Let's focus first on capturing the ghost. We can't do anything about what it did to us until we do." After a minute of grumpy glaring, Vlad sighed and agreed to help work out a plan to trap the ghost.

Author's Note: Whoops! I've had this (and some other drabbles) sitting for a while and I kept forgetting to post them. Sorry! orz

midnight: We can only hope Vlad will have a better future now~

The freedom girl: We can definitely hope! Aw~ You're welcome! 8D Ugh, Phantom Planet. That whole episode was filled with problems. orz I like to pretend it never happened. Except maybe the badger hair for Danny. XD The person who traded with me for the first part of this wanted more, so here it is! 8D