Something silly and light. Set in season 3. Mentions Vlad-Maddie, but not really any shipping. Minor (household servant) OCs.

Chapter 1 of 2.

Thanks for reading!

Maddie stretched out languorously, each leg extending fully for a moment, her back arched. Vlad ran his hand along that back, and enjoyed the appreciative way she shifted against him, rubbing her head against his arm lovingly.

"Ah, Maddie," he sighed. "At least you understand me."

She purred back.

Getting a cat had been the best advice Daniel had ever given him. In fact, it was the only good advice Daniel had ever given him, so far as Vlad could recall. Even if they couldn't exactly carry on a conversation, it was nice to have some companionship, especially a companion who so obviously liked him. True, some of it had to be cupboard love, affection in exchange for a rather carefully considered and arranged diet, not to mention the extensive play facilities both inside the mansion and on its grounds. Such things barely cost him anything, and seemed to make her so happy. It was strange for him to imagine such easily obtained bliss. Even the most expensive objects he'd bought to entertain himself lost their luster quickly.

"If you were in charge of a massive financial empire, you'd find it difficult to relax, too." He scratched under her chin, watching her tilt her head to offer herself for more attention. Today had been an especially trying day. First the latest popularity polls—while he was certainly a more proactive mayor than Mayor Sotomeyer had been, it didn't seem as if Amity Park appreciated his efforts. This morning, he'd learned one of his companies was being sued by the Federal Trade Commission for violating antitrust laws. Again. Worst of all, his latesttête-à-tête with Daniel had been unusually difficult, requiring literal minutes of effort to overpower the boy. And why did he even have ice powers? He hadn't developed enough unique abilities in his brief year of ghostly existence? It was getting to be a bit ridiculous.

Maddie was pacing back and forth across his desk, now, looking speculatively at the gap between the desk and his lap. In retrospect, he really should have chosen a black cat. That, or started wearing white suits.

"It's rather unfair, if you ask me." He shifted his comfortable leather desk chair back, letting her jump into his lap. "I give and give, and does anyone appreciate it? Other than you, I mean."

She blinked up at him, before rubbing her cheek encouragingly against his chest.

"They say cats are selfish." He resumed petting her. "Of course, they say I'm selfish, too. Really, who are they to talk?"

Maddie never interrupted him when he began talking about the obvious faults of some unseen audience. She never made fun of his mental health. She never poured hot tea in his lap. She never even asked him to stop flirting with her mother. Not that he ever did, her mother was another cat, but it was the principle of the thing.

"I suppose it makes sense that two such misunderstood creatures would form a bond. It's us against the world, isn't it, Maddie?"

She continued her efforts to ensure that his suit was completely covered with her own shed fur, proof of her affection. Not that it mattered. He could simply turn himself selectively intangible and let the hair fall to the ground, then leave it for some maid to clean up. Or leave the suit out to be laundered and put on something else. He had plenty of suits, but only one Maddie.

Well... only one Maddie right now.

She allowed herself to be picked up, as Vlad stood to cross the room, staring out the large bay windows at the distant sight of Amity Park. He didn't live within the city boundaries himself, of course, picking one of the more expensive outlying suburbs. This place just wasn't the same as his old mansion near Madison, with its huge grounds and imposing metal gate. He saw his neighbors frequently. It was very annoying. Really, he was regretting the whole mayor business; it had been an impulse in the first place, not any sort of long-term goal of his. If it had been a long-term goal, he'd have done a better job of planning it out. Leaving now would almost be like giving in to Daniel, though. He could just imagine the boy and his annoying friends celebrating Vlad's exit—why, they might even think it was a retreat. No, he had to remain in Amity Park for now, neighbors and negative opinion polls and all. At least he'd met Maddie here.

The sun was just starting to come down, casting a few forlorn shadows that matched his mood perfectly. He sighed dramatically again. Maddie, obviously wishing to cheer him up, started trying to climb up from his arms to his shoulders. He let her, tilting his head a bit to give her more room. She really had an excellent sense of balance, and rubbed her cheek against his.

"You're always in such a good mood." He could hear her purring a bit more clearly, with her body so close to his. "Maybe I should have been born a cat, too. It seems more..."

That was as far as he got, before everything went abruptly black. He heard Maddie yowl in surprise, but lost consciousness without knowing what she was yowling at.

When he woke up, everything was black still, and for a moment he was worried before he realized he was covered in something hot and heavy, and that was why he couldn't see. There was something very strange about his body. He was on his hands and knees—except not—

Crawling forward, he found that the thing covering him was his suit, grown to ridiculous size. Then he looked up at the underside of his desk, and realized that the suit didn't grow, he had shrunk. Trying to stand up straighter and get a better idea of what was going on, he fell over on his side, as if his limbs weren't quite obedient.

Maddie was sitting next to him, looking more curious than worried, sniffing at his face. Vlad shifted back slightly, and tried to sit up again, only to realize that his limbs weren't just clumsy but malformed.

The dizziness and immediate urgency faded as he tried to relax, looking himself over. As it turned out, he wasn't injured or deformed. He was a perfectly healthy cat.

He supposed it had to be the fault of a ghost. This was Amity Park, after all; everything was the fault of a ghost. Why a ghost would decide to turn him into a cat was another question, but then, he'd been the one to suggest it. A passing enemy of his? A chance encounter with some bit of ghostly energy that just happened to correspond with his thoughts? A side effect of one of the many ghostly artifacts he'd hoarded away? A cat ghost? A wish ghost? There were so many possibilities, the question really was not 'how could this happen' but 'how did this in particular happen.' Panicking would probably not make him less of a cat, so he didn't bother. At least he wasn't a mouse.

Maddie made a little questioning noise at the back of her throat, a sound which seemed different to Vlad somehow than her usual meows. He tilted his head and stared back at her. He couldn't understand her, but the tone underneath was clearer than he was accustomed to, as if she spoke a similar language that he just wasn't quite fluent in. She was fairly sure it was Vlad, but not entirely, that was what she meant to express.

"Yes, it's me." His voice came out oddly garbled, but it sounded like English to him. She seemed to perk up, and came closer again, still looking him over as if not sure what to make of this sudden change. "Well, don't stare. This wasn't my idea. Not really."

She rubbed her cheek against his again, and this time he realized that he could smell something about her. Not something unpleasant, and nothing he'd been able to smell as a human. It was just very... her. It was very her, and it was on him, and now that he was paying attention, it was also on the chair, and the desk, and his suit...

A half-hour later, the traces of scent in the room were more evenly divided. He tried to pick things he particularly liked to scent mark with his cheeks, as a way of communicating to Maddie that yes, he might be a cat, but he was the cat who owned this house. She didn't seem convinced.

"Maddie, this chair is mine. It is." He was doing his best to stare her down, but she was just staring back, and he had the feeling she was getting a bit offended. "I brought this chair with me all the way from Madison, because I liked it so much. I've let you have half the desk, the curtains, and most of the chaise lounge. This chair isn't up for debate!"

She let out an indignant little huffing noise, but settled down around the base of the chair, still eyeing him with annoyance.

"Well, when I'm not a cat, you're welcome to scent the room up however you like, so long as I can't smell it too." His coordination had gotten much better, walking about the room, and he tried to brace himself to jump up into the chair. He very nearly made it, but had guessed the distance wrong, and almost left some ugly scratches in the leather as he slid back down to the ground, his feet scrabbling for purchase.

Maddie sneezed with amusement, and he lashed his tail and glared at her. "Oh, be quiet. You'd have just as much trouble as a human."

The maids came into the room shortly after, to clean the office up while Vlad would normally be finishing dinner. He'd managed to get himself into the chair, finally, and sat up straighter to speak to them as they came closer.

"It's about time!"

One of the maids, a pale woman with short black hair whose name Vlad could not recall, looked over at him with surprised annoyance. "Oh, great, he went and got another one already."

Just as Maddie's noises seemed more intelligible, the voice of the woman was muddled somehow, as if he wasn't quite hearing it right. He tried again. "I am not a cat, I am your mayor!"

"She's loud, isn't she?" The other maid, a dusky skinned woman with longer blonde hair tucked up in curls, leaned over him to offer her hand. "Or he, I guess. Hi, pretty boy!"

"This is just the start." Black-hair was running a dust cloth over the desk with a little more force than necessary. "He already lets the first cat all over everything. He talks to her. He sleeps with her. I swear to God, this place is going to be full of cats before you know it. I can see it coming."

"Come on, he's weird, but he's not that weird." Blondie was scratching him under the chin. He understood why Maddie seemed to like that so much, it was very pleasant, and it didn't hurt that the blonde was obviously his partisan in this ugly argument. "It's just two cats."

"He treats that cat like it's his wife. He doesn't treat any of his employees half as decent. I'd say he doesn't treat his friends that well either, but he hasn't got any friends. Unless you count the crazy orange guy." She stood up straight, looking the desk over aggressively.

"You do not count the crazy orange guy," he put in, annoyed. Blondie smiled down at him and with a sweeping motion lifted him into her arms. "What—put me down! I didn't say you could pick me up!"

"He's so talkative!" She laughed, and he found the slight jostling alarming. "I wonder what his name is."

"Maddie's that woman he's stalking, right?" The other maid sat down on the edge of his desk, and Vlad felt his hackles raise a bit. "What's the orange guy's name?"

"I don't remember." She sat him down on the chair again, at least, and he glared back up at her. On the floor, Maddie had been watching with concern, and made a little confused noise.

"I'm not angry at you," he reassured her, although not too happily. "But someone is going to be fired when I'm human again."

The door was left cracked as the maids went on to the next room, and Maddie cheerfully bounded out, presumably ready for her own dinner. Vlad followed a bit more hesitantly, not sure he was ready to try cat food. Maddie didn't eat food purchased from a pet store, of course. Her diet was nearly as carefully planned as his own, and largely consisted of fresh raw meat. Perhaps he could pretend it was tartare.

"Two cats?" The young man in charge of Maddie's diet was chagrined to see his approach, and turned to call into the kitchen, "Anton, it's just like Marie said! He's getting more of them!"

"Oh?" Anton was one servant Vlad cared enough about to remember, a rather burly man whose rough exterior hid a chef of delicate talent. He stared down at them unfavorably, but sighed. "You might as well go on and feed both of the poor things. Maybe I should give them the dinner he didn't eat. I don't know why I even bother, that man doesn't appreciate anything."

Vlad perked up a bit, hopeful, but apparently that was only a joke and Anton returned to the kitchen, leaving the young man to place a slightly larger portion than usual of diced meat in Maddie's food bowl and wipe out the water bowl before refilling it. At least he had that right. It would be very annoying if Vlad had to fire everyone as soon as he returned to his usual body.

At first, Maddie didn't bother making room for Vlad to eat, which suited Vlad just fine. He was still wrestling with the prospect of sharing that meal, although it smelled all right. Well, of course it smelled all right, it was meant for cats and he was one, at the moment. The problem was mental, the idea just a bit too disgusting. Then he thought about the other end of digestion, and winced. If that litter box wasn't being cleaned out nightly, he would have words with his staff. As soon as he could speak.

Eventually hunger overcame his finicky nature, and he pushed Maddie a bit to the side. She had already eaten a good portion of the meal, and only gave him an annoyed glare before stalking a few feet away to curl up and digest. It wasn't as terrible as it could have been, although he wasn't looking forward to remembering this moment when he was human again.

Once the food was gone, and they'd both taken turns at the water dish, Maddie led them down the hallway toward Vlad's bedroom. The door was still closed, of course, and she meowed at it in frustration before turning to Vlad.

"Don't look at me, I don't have hands any more than you do." Looking up at the door from his height, it seemed massive, and even when he leaned one paw on the door to try and balance himself on his hind legs, he couldn't reach the door knob. "Well, this just isn't going to work."

He dropped back down to the floor, and Maddie brushed her cheek against him, either consolingly or to lay claim to his flank. He really wasn't sure anymore.

"There's one more thing to try." He glanced up and down the hallway. It was dark and empty now, the faint moonlight from a window the only illumination. Closing his eyes, he concentrated. Going from human to ghost had become second nature to him, a change he barely had to push to trigger, but he'd never tried going from cat to ghost. Some part of him hoped he could, and that the ghost form would be the same as always, giving him a chance to go into his lab and undo this little problem. The idea wasn't unreasonable. There was no real reason the ghost form should be humanoid in the first place, it wasn't really built like a human beyond appearances. Why should a change in the human body be reflected?

It took more effort to force the transformation like this, as if he were pulling on a muscle that wasn't quite in shape. The cool sensation of the ghost form was a massive relief, right up until he opened his eyes and realized he had gone from a normal cat with pale silver fur to a glowing black cat.

Maddie made a distressed mew as he lifted off the ground, floating a few inches up as a test. The more offensive powers seemed a bit dangerous to try when he still wasn't quite in control of himself, so he tried intangibility next. He knew it had worked when he managed to drift through the closed door. On the other side, Maddie began meowing loudly again in protest.

He turned back to look at her through the door. "You'll have to be in contact with me if you want to come through, Maddie. I can't share intangibility with you otherwise."

She eyed him disfavorably, and shifted back.

"Come on, you've seen Plasmius before. If you can adjust to me turning into a cat, you can adjust to a ghost cat."

Her ears were starting to go back, and as he stepped closer to her, she hissed.

"Maddie, what is wrong with you? You've never reacted this way to..."

Turning tail, she darted down the hall. Annoyed, he gave chase, and found to his surprise that running like this seemed to be getting much easier. Or maybe the ghost form was just better at it.

"Maddie, stop running!" He wasn't even sure why he was running after her. It just seemed like what he ought to do. In fact, he'd almost caught up... "Maddie, I'm warning you!"

They'd made their way out of the master bedroom's hall, and were past the kitchens again, closer to the household servant's rooms. He had just enough time to pull his mind back from the instinctive chase and consider that he was in the ghost form before the blonde maid stepped out into the hallway, clad in a bathrobe. She took one look at him and shrieked.

"Demon cat! Demon cat!"

He assumed that meant his eyes still glowed red in this form. Still, he wasn't doing anything threatening, there was no reason to be so upset. He was just running down the hall... black and glowing... hair raised, intent on a hunt... eyes red... Well, maybe a little threatening.

"What?" Soon-to-be-fired Marie looked out into the hallway after her friend's shouting, and gawked at him for a moment before a look of fierce determination crossed her face. "It's a ghost! You get out of here, creepy cat!"

"Do you really think a ghost will leave just because you tell him to?" Vlad had been shaken out of his urge to chase Maddie, who'd disappeared further down the hall anyway, and watched Marie with a mixture of bemusement and annoyance. "Even a ghost cat?"

"Judy, get me a broom!" Marie stepped forward, looming menacingly. "We'll chase it off!"

"You can't chase a ghost with a broom!" Judy was still hovering on the doorstep of her room, looking terrified.

"A ghost cat's still a cat, right?"

Technically, in this case, not even a cat was a cat, but there was no use standing around arguing with her, since she'd apparently just hear it as a series of meows. He bared his teeth at her with annoyance, then turned to walk through the nearest wall, so she'd at least stop trying to scare him off.

There was no sign of Maddie anywhere. Vlad hadn't realized how helpful her presence had been in growing used to his new state. She served as a good example of how an obviously intelligent and well-mannered cat should carry on. Besides, it was nice to have company. After a fruitless search through the manor as a mortal cat, he made his way back to his own bedroom, and wandered through the door to at least sleep in his own bed.

Somehow, Maddie was already there, curled up on a pillow and fast asleep.