Chapter Text
Vladimir Gregory Masters did not consider himself to be a good man. A good businessman? Absolutely. A good, upstanding, moral man? He's seen what happens to those kinds of men, and he's not interested.
Because of this, instead of ignoring the invitation from Jack and Maddie Fenton to discuss possible patent partnerships as he should have, Vlad Masters went. He was uninterested in their patents, largely, but seeing Madeline again, and possibly destroying Jackson was a thrill too great to resist.
One should never spill blood in the water when there are sharks. But they didn't know his hearing was so much better than a human's, that he could hear Maddie's worry about bills.
Maddie greeted him with a tight, worried smile while Jack was as boisterous as he remembered. 10 years. They left him for dead in a hospital for 10 years, and now they were looking for money from him.
They sat him down on a comfortable if old couch and Maddie left to the kitchen. He could hear Jack tinkering downstairs. Perfect.
Before he could go find Maddie, persuade her that she didn't have to worry about another bill in her life if she would just come with him, he was interrupted by a small voice.
"Hi." The child was adorable- Maddie's sunset hair combined with bright teal eyes. She toddled up to him with no fear. "I'm Jasmine. Who are you?"
Well, he saw no use in being cruel to a child (the world would do that soon enough), and if this was Maddie's daughter, she would want to bring her. Best to make a good impression. "My name is Vlad Masters, little one."
"Will you color with me?"
"Of course." The girl- Jasmine, he mentally corrected- clambered onto his lap as if he was a trusted family member instead of a stranger. How- did she have no experience with adults? Did her parents not teach her about stranger danger?
He found himself coloring with a what, four-year-old? Eight-year-old? How did anyone ever tell? She was so small- were children supposed to be so small? And so bony- did they feed her enough?
He forced himself not to jump at the cracking sound from the floor or basement below. A human shouldn't be able to hear it, after all.
Shortly after, an even smaller child (why were children so tiny and fragile?) headed upstairs. Vlad felt his already slow-beating heart stop for a moment. The child was covered in ectoplasm.
(It felt like fire at first, then it spread to his bones. He felt it killing him, drip by horrible drip, and bringing Something Else in its place.)
"Daddy get the green stuff on you again, Danny?"
Danny looked like he wanted to cry.
"Come here chi- Daniel. Let me help." Vlad commanded. The $500 handkerchief was ruined by swiping away life-taking fluid, but he didn't mind. Dear Ancients, were they trying to recreate his accident?
"Jasmine, get off of Mr. Masters, please. Danny, grab a shower." Maddie called, and that was the moment he felt his obsession move. He didn't know they could do that, but when he looked up at Madeline, he didn't feel the fierce love he had since the accident. But these children?
They were his children now. He always wanted a family.
He sat on the couch for the better part of two hours, and witnessed firsthand how negligent they both were. When Daniel couldn't reach the cookies on the table, he busied himself with one of Jasmine's crayons. Jasmine seemed resigned to it, though she, too, looked longingly at the cookies she couldn't reach.
When the other adults weren't looking, Vlad slipped both of them protein bars from his suit pockets, as a test of sorts. The things tasted like cardboard at best, but had almost every vitamin and mineral a human body needed, as well as enough protein to re-energize a halfa who recently used his powers in a fight.
Would they accept food from strangers? Were they spoiled and looking for treats, or legitimately hungry?
The moment the wrapper was off, Daniel happily bit into it. After a moment, he discarded the crayon to focus on the bar. Jasmine took a moment and made a disgusted face, but ate it without complaint. For a child to eat that-
"Tell me, have you all eaten dinner yet? I'll be happy to treat old friends."
Vlad was no stranger to being distracted by science. But to forget to feed your children since breakfast, and have the only food within a child's reach contaminated with ectoplasm and willing to bite back?
Before he left, he took the 48-pack box of health bars from the trunk of his car and gave it to Jasmine. While he wanted to snarl at Maddie and Jack, he was a good businessman. Sometimes, that required working with people he could barely stand.
So he smiled instead of snarled, made sure the restaurant sent two to-go meals for the children, and agreed to visit next time he was in town.
(Despite spreading filth on his pants leg, he found the hug Daniel gave him charming. And if he hung the badly-colored picture with 'thank you' on the back on his lab fridge, that was between him, the Dairy King, and a trio of senile vultures.)