Sup guys.. I keep saying I'm not coming back to this site (to those who've followed me in the past) but then I keep getting inspired by trips down memory lane with shows I used to be fond of.. Ugh, if only the characters weren't so addicting! And rad, don't forget rad.

So, yep. A DP story. Takes place post-Phantom-Planet. This chapter is pretty steamy, but it doesn't get so inappropriate that it needs an M rating. Which is why I changed it from M to T.

(In case you're confused, the timeline in this chapter jumps around. Lots of this chapter is flashback, the 'present' is when they're about 19, post-graduation. All of it takes place post-PP.)

Chapter One: A Touch of Snow

x - x - x

"Of course, it's probably too much to ask for a normal date from you," she said sarcastically when he uncovered her eyes.

"Oh please," he scoffed. "If you wanted normal you wouldn't be dating me."

"Normal is synonymous with boring," she admitted, shrugging.

"I'm not gonna lie," he said, plopping down on the spread wool blanket, "I put this stuff up here two days ago."

She snorted in laughter. "Right, when we were supposed to have our date. Two days ago." Sam joined him on the blanket, gazing up at the brilliant pool of stars. She said it dryly, but he knew she was joking. After all, she had been with there him the past two days as they hunted down Vortex across two states. That was just the thing about their lifestyle. Constant cancellations, last minute changes in plans, it all came as part of the package he had chosen five years ago when he first stumbled out of the portal.

"I hope you didn't put the food up here two days ago." She indicated the cooler to their left, where he'd packed food for their date.

"No," he laughed, "that I did earlier tonight."

Sam wasn't really the typical romantic type of girl. She laughed at love poems and scoffed at hallmark cards. She'd be the last person on earth to gush or gossip. Or let show the effect he was having. But Danny had discovered over the past three years since they'd started dating just which buttons to press. God he loved making her blush.

Candles, for instance. She loved candles, though she never admitted it to him. That's why he'd scattered lit candles all over the rooftop of her apartment. It wasn't strictly speaking an apartment complex that let its tenants have access to the roof, but there were benefits to dating a half-ghost. Like phasing directly from Sam's apartment up through several floors, directly to this secluded and surprisingly scenic spot which Danny had discovered two months ago, shortly after she moved out of her parents' house. Whenever they wanted. And they wanted it a lot, as it turned out.

Candles burning low, wax dripping and drying onto the concrete rooftop, they stayed up there for hours, unwilling to call it a night. Talk faded away, as it so often did, and soon there was only silence and their breaths in the flickering light.

As always, kissing her was like stoking a cold flame.

That flame was always there, burning low in his chest, if you could call it burning. It was more like burning ice. It was that energy he tapped into every time he used his powers, that energy that boiled up and flowed forth when he called on it. It was alive inside him, beating there alongside his heart. Kissing Sam riled that flame the same way fighting ghosts did.

At first it had startled him, that she should affect him this way. When he kissed her sometimes he would feel himself shiver, like he used to in the early days of his developing powers, before he found out about the cold inside and that he could control it.

The first time it overflowed he had startled both of them. Kissing her softly behind a tree after they'd dropped Tucker off, ghost patrol done for the evening. (Tucker always seemed to know what Danny had in mind, winking at him conspicuously as Danny rolled his eyes.) She ran her hands down his chest, tentatively, her thumb tracing the threads outlining the stylized "D." They were still so nervous around each other then, trying to bridge the gap between friends and more-than-friends. Lovers- what an awkward word. As awkward as the two of them. He was kissing her neck when she threaded her fingers into his hair, still white and faintly glowing, and she sighed quietly. Suddenly the dull icy fire roared in his chest like a stove-top flame turned too quickly from Low to High. His whole body shivered and so did she as his breath turned to frost against her skin. Her hands flew away quickly, reaching for her neck, her wide eyes staring up at him in shock, in embarrassment, like a girl who's just been told for the first time that she's beautiful.

Of course, like he said, if she wanted normal she wouldn't be dating him. If she was dating someone normal, she'd have regular hickeys, not small burns brought on by exposure to ice.

He'd hoped he would somehow get used to it, and learn to control that icy flame the same way he did before, when his ice powers first manifested themselves fully. But the longer their kissing sessions got, the more difficult it became. Like having your first girlfriend wasn't difficult enough, tripping over those relationship obstacles, learning the boundaries, testing them, learning when it's okay to break them. Being half-ghost just made it so much harder. It wasn't like he could hide the effect she was having on him, like another hormone-crazed boy might. She could feel it as his breath turned to freezing mist, chilling her skin where his lips touched her, she shivered as his fingertips touched the back of her neck.

"It's okay," she said one night, grabbing at his hand as he pulled it away. His hand had glowed blue under her neck, illuminating the pillow eerily. He was glad it was dark in her bedroom because otherwise she'd see how flushed with embarrassment his face was. "Really," she added, biting her bottom lip nervously. "I… I kind of like it."

"You like it when I accidentally freeze you?" he mocked. They spoke in hushed voices. Though they were nearing the end of senior year at the time, Sam's parents still controlled her life, and (to put it lightly) they would not be happy to find Danny in her room at two in the morning.

"It's just..." Sam abruptly looked away.

Danny rolled off of her, groaning. His hands pressed against his face. He contemplated phasing into the bed itself to hide his own embarrassment. "I try to control it, Sam," he whispered. "It's… difficult." He wondered if he sounded as exasperated as he felt.

"So?" she said, letting a smile creep onto her face. She sat up, looking down at him in a calculating way. "It doesn't bother me."

He sat up so that his face was a mere inch from hers, studying her eyes, deciding she wasn't just placating him. "What did you mean when you said you liked it?"

It was Sam's turn to blush. Her eyes dropped. "I guess.. it just…"

"It just what?" he pressed. He didn't mean to put her on the spot but she had piqued his curiosity.

"Makes me feel like.. you want me," she finished, glancing at him uncertainly. "You do, right?" she added, as if it was actually a question. As if there was any possible way he could answer with a no.

"You know," he said conversationally, "that's just about the dumbest question I've ever heard."Her eyes narrowed and she seemed like she was about to retort sarcastically, so he pulled her head in to meet his again.

She seemed shocked by the abrupt 'change of subject' but melted quickly back into the kiss. His hands trailed down to her waist lazily as hers snaked back around his shoulders. He could feel that flame boiling over, and an interesting idea occurred to him. So instead of trying to squash it this time he channeled it. He broke the kiss for a moment, raising his right hand to her cheek. He let that roiling energy flow into his hand, watching as his arm disappeared at the elbow. A tingling sensation where his fingers would normally be. He touched her cheek gently, transferring just enough energy not to turn her skin intangible but to experience that tingling sensation. That hovering impossible feeling just between tangibility and intangibility. The effect was immediate- her eyes fluttered closed as she shuddered against his hand, leaning further into it. A grin crept onto his face.

Danny let his hand wander downward, igniting the skin on the nape of her neck with that tingling sensation. She looked flushed and surprised, but she didn't look at all like she wanted him to stop, so he kept going. His hand found the gap between her tank and her cotton shorts, where the skin on her stomach was peeking through tantalizingly. He traced her waist with his fingertips, finding the groove in the middle of her lower back, tracing it upwards underneath her shirt. Her forehead came to rest on his shoulder, and he could feel her breath warm and ragged through his shirt.

"What does that feel like?" he mumbled against her ear, sincere in his curiosity, pausing in the intangible circles he was tracing between her shoulder blades.

Sam looked up at him, something like laughter in her eyes. "It feels like.." She rested one fingertip against his neck and slowly dragged it down, maddeningly slow. She leaned in to kiss the nook of his collarbone, letting her lips linger there a centimeter away, running her thumb along the base of his stomach, tracing the inside of the seam of his jeans. She was torturing him on purpose, judging by the triumphant way she looked back up at him, almost like she was getting payback for that trick he pulled.

"When I signed up to date you, I didn't realize I was signing up for torture," he mused.

"You started it."

Without warning, she threw her leg over him, perching on his lap and staring into his eyes demurely. Fu-uuuck, was the only thing he could think numbly, as she grabbed his wrist, which had since become tangible and slipped away from her, and placed his hand on her lower back again.

"I didn't say you had to stop, though," she said coyly. She kissed him lightly as he traced her skin again, threading his way further and further under her shirt. He glanced up at her face, unsure where the boundary was anymore, and realized he wasn't going to get a no from her anytime soon. When he found his way under her bra she bit his lower lip, not in the stop kind of way but the don't-you-dare-stop kind of way. His heart flipped over. And suddenly that ice flared up again without warning, and the room behind her back glowed an eerie blue as his hand lit up and fired off a sharp blast of ice, which hit the mirror in the corner of her room, shattering it loudly.

The two of them jumped so violently they could have hit the ceiling.

"Oh shit," Sam muttered darkly, "You'd better hide before my parents get in here!"

"What are you going to tell them?" he freaked, falling off the bed in a panic.

"I don't freaking know-"

"SAM!"

"What are you doing out of bed at this hour? What happened?"

Good thing Danny was on the floor on the other side of the bed. He prayed silently that they didn't notice how the reflective shards of mirror were more like shards of shattered ice, and drifted invisibly through her bedroom floor as Sam began to stutter an explanation.

Under the stars on the rooftop months and months later, he lost himself once again in the warm feel of her skin on his. He liked to think it was getting easier to control these days, but mostly he knew he was just kidding himself. It was like the deeper in they dove, the harder it was to keep his cool. Ha, keep my cool. That was a stupid pun worthy of Tucker. Not that Tucker, or anyone, knew about this particularly frustrating and particularly trying problem.

The candles had all but burned out by now, unlike the burning in his chest.

"We could take this inside, if you want," he said to her cryptically between kisses. "Might be more comfortable than rolling around on a blanket on concrete."

"We could," she agreed, "but it's so much more fun to kiss out here than my stuffy little apartment. Hey, what are you doing back there?"

"Huh?" Danny feigned surprise, pulling his hand out from between the blanket and her back. "Oh, you mean this?" He held up his hand and let it turn tangible again, revealing the black laced bra that he'd been holding invisible as well.

"That is so cheating. You know, most guys have to do that the hard way."

Danny shrugged. "I'm not most guys."

"Figures," she said with an air of sass, "that even in the bedroom you would be a lazy sack of potatoes."

"Hey," he said, throwing the bra somewhere behind him. "I resent that. I'm not lazy, just…" He paused for emphasis, reaching under her loose shirt to deliver that maddening intangible feeling he knew killed her. "Resourceful," he finished as she let out a small gasp.

"Danny," she said suddenly, raggedly, catching him off guard. He'd been expecting her to make another saucy retort. But the way she'd said his name.. He was suddenly struck by the sight of her. Her shining black hair pooled under her head, reflecting soft yellow candlelight. Her pale skin, fragile and soft. Her lips hung apart, like the edge of his name was still trailing out. Her shirt was only half on at this point, and it had never looked so good on her. The fact was, Sam was drop-dead-gorgeous. Another undead pun worthy of Tuck. And sometimes it still struck him fresh and new that she was his, that somehow, when she could have had anybody she wanted, she chose him. And right now her eyes seemed to be choosing him in a different kind of way, there was almost a hunger there.

He felt that all-too-familiar surge of hot energy, and saw her face glow green as the ectoplasm flashed within his irises.

At first back when it started happening, Danny had been terrified that this manifestation of powers during their, uh, activities, would scare her. It scared him, in that he was terrified if they went too far then he wouldn't be able to control it and would accidentally hurt her. But strangely it seemed not to scare Sam but to embolden her. And that's what happened now, as his normally blue eyes flashed green in the dim light of the Milky Way and dying candles.

She yanked him down to kiss her, never mind his scary eyes. Before he knew it her shirt was somehow joining her bra behind them, and so was his plaid button-up. Her whole body was pressed against his and where their bare skin met it was like meeting with the surface of a lake of lava. Do you even know what you do to me? he wondered. And his hand was under her skirt, feeling the way the cotton panties underneath sat against the curve of her hip. He broke the kiss and breathed a stream of half-formed snowflakes over her shoulder, most of which were immediately blown into her hair by the breeze. He'd found if he did this every couple of minutes it was slightly easier to control the overflowing energy. And then her hands were at the button on his jeans, fumbling with the zipper as she kissed his freezing lips.

The two of them had toed this line many times, never sure where they were going to stop.

"We don't have to stop," she had said once before, her back arching against the icy touch of his fingers on her inner thigh.

But they always did have to stop somewhere, as Danny's energy would inevitable surface and ruin everything. But every time it got harder and harder to draw that line. After all, three years was a damn long time to date somebody without sealing the deal.

But she didn't move to stop him when he separated her skirt from her body with a simple surge of intangibility. And he didn't stop her when she yanked on his jeans forcefully.

In the end, these sessions with Sam were an exercise in self-control for Danny. Which would win, his desire for her or his desire to keep her safe from himself?

Before now, the latter had always won out, one way or another. But tonight… he just couldn't force the ectoplasm to dim in his eyes. And he really wanted her. She'd made it clear she wanted him, alright. Not for the first time, he found himself performing mental acrobatics, convincing himself that he was in control and that maybe it's okay.

Sam certainly didn't seem to have any personal qualms as his hand slipped beneath the last bit of fabric she wore. If Danny melted at what she did to him, it wasn't anything compared to how he loved seeing her reaction at what he was doing to her. Turns out that half-intangibility trick worked on all parts of her body. He shivered violently and let yet another flurry of snow escape his mouth, aiming away from Sam. But with the slight breeze, her skin was soon littered with tiny malformed snowflakes. He brushed them lightly off her chest with the back of his hand, shivering even more strongly. His arms disappeared before him, flickering out of existence like a faulty light bulb, causing Sam's whole body to flicker as well. Shit. Lately it was about when this started happening that they were forced to halt progress. But as he pulled back from her Sam held on, her fingers digging into the skin on his back.

And then the last of their clothing was gone, joining the rest of it somewhere in the darkness of the rooftop. By now all but one or two candles had burned out, leaving them alone in the dim washed starlight. There was a voice in Danny's head screaming at him to stop, but it was drowned out by all his other senses. He didn't notice as he hovered over her how the crevice on her neck, between her breasts, beneath her hair, were slowly beginning to fill again with soft flakes of snow. The breeze surrounding them was still warm, but the two shivered against each other like they were naked outside in the depths of winter.

He hesitated over her, searching her eyes for some last hint of denial or reproach. He knew he wouldn't find it but he felt compelled to look, to give her a chance to stop him. Because he knew he would, if she wanted him to. But she blew that notion out of the water, by doing it again, saying his name that way. "Danny." God, she was like a siren or something, the way she could melt his resolve with a single spoken word. The lust in her voice was absolutely unmistakable, and not ignorable.

He felt his hands freeze to the blanket as he broke the last barrier that ever stood between them, somehow simultaneously hating himself and feeling enraptured all at once. Both of those emotions were completely drowned, however, in the wake of the glacial tidal wave that boiled up inside his chest. He'd pictured this moment for so long but now that it was happening he was completely blindsided by the pure ungodly energy he could feel spilling out of him. He knew he should stop at this point, and some small voice inside him was scared when he found that he couldn't. She gasped at first, and he'd meant to take it slow, but it was like there was an engine turning inside him. He wanted to hit himself, but it was like his voice of reason was completely locked away. It was only a distant whisper compared to the raw energy flowing down his arms, and he vaguely registered the layer of ice rippling outward where his hands clutched the frozen blanket, the particles of frozen water each refracting the fiery green light of his eyes. When she threaded her hands into his black hair and started to move against him he felt another surge through his veins, turned his face away from her as a veritable blizzard escaped into the night.

It was then that he knew for sure that he wasn't handling it, and that locked-away voice suddenly flared within him. He looked back into Sam's face and her eyes were closed, snow crusted to her long eyelashes. Her lips were blue.

"Sam?" Danny channeled all his self-control into the effort to stop their motions, his hand flying to her face in concern. Her eyes fluttered open at the sudden caesura of movement, scattered the snow that had gathered on her lashes. His hand tried to brush away the snow that had gathered on her cheeks but as he touched the clump of snowflakes they froze solid beneath his fingers, sticking to her skin. "Oh god," he groaned, pulling back suddenly, sickened with himself. He practically fell backwards as he pulled out of her, tripping over his own two legs, falling partway through the floor as his arm and shoulder disappeared without his permission.

"D-dan-ny?" Sam said, stumbling over her words like she had hypothermia. She sat up quickly, reaching out for him, her wide eyes flashing with concern.

What did I do to her?

As her hand connected with his bare chest there was a flash of blue light and she pulled it back again quickly like she'd been shocked, clutching her hand against her chest. Even now, when she looked at him she didn't seem scared or even aware that he'd half-frozen her. She looked anxious and worried, about him. And there was something else there too, something Danny didn't like at all. It looked like rejection. Danny reached out to her instinctually, hating what he had done, but stopped short, knowing that touching her would only make it worse. So, he did the only thing he could think to do and let loose all that icy fire that was threatening to break out of every inch of his skin. It poured through his hands and froze every inch of the rooftop, cracking and stretching across the cement, encasing the dead candles in cages of ice. Through his clenched teeth a spray of frozen mist forced its way out, covering the two of them in a fresh layer of snow. By the time the deluge of ice subsided it looked like winter solstice up there.

He felt a familiar sensation around his waist as a ring of light appeared, responding to the massive release of energy. Instead of forcing it down he let it wash over him, sweeping outward through his veins recklessly like a hurricane through a broken window. His bare skin was traded for familiar black fabric.

Sam's mouth hung open in shock, but she didn't flinch when he finally reached forward to touch her cheek. Taking that as a sign that he was no longer burning her with his touch, he quickly pulled her into his arms, channeling his energy into her and making them both disappear, leaving only two body prints in the snow as he dropped quickly through four stories into her small apartment.

"Wh-what are you do- oing?" she stuttered, clutching her arms about herself as Danny laid her fragile body in her bathtub. Damn, her lips were still blue. Entire locks of her hair were frozen together.

"Trying to undo the damage I already did," he replied, not meeting her in the eye. He turned the water on halfway up the heat-scale, not wanting to shock her body with the abrupt temperature change. His heart fluttered madly in his chest as the water poured over her. The flame was already roaring again just from looking at her, even with that snowy outburst on the roof.

Looking at her now, both more beautiful and more unattainable than ever before, was the most trying test he had ever endured.

Despite what it may seem, this story isn't going to be 100% fluff and definitely not 100% drama. The adventure comes in in the next chapter. ;)

See you there, folks