#dashura-mod

The mansion was just the way she remembered it; large and covered in green and gold. It was empty, as always, and dark, as usual, and the thin layer of dust was the only thing that was really any different... She walked around the empty house for a while, not bothering to turn on the lights. She didn't go down into the lab-- too many bad memories-- but the rest of the memories were better, kinder, even if with what she knew now they were at best bitter-sweet. 

She remembered learning to read on the floors of the library, learning to fly in the downstairs dining room, practicing her agility in the sound-proof gym... And then she found her room.

The dust here was thicker than it was everywhere else in the house, and a part of her wanted to believe that was because he hadn't wanted to move anything... The more likely story was that he didn't want his staff to discover evidence of the missing little girl and was too lazy to clean it up himself...

Still, it was all there, exactly how she'd left it; the clothes hung neatly in the closet, the bed made, and the books stacked neatly on the shelf. All exactly the way Vlad wanted it. She rested a finger on the binding of one of the books as she walked past, not letting go when she stepped away, letting it fall open on the floor. A schematic of a spaceship gaped back at her, filled with facts and figures she'd memorized to impress her father... That he'd wanted her to memorize to impress Danny. 

She made to leave the room, but somehow the mess didn't feel right, blaring back at her like a loose string on a coat. Somehow it felt like if she just left it there the entire mansion would crumble and fall to dust. She remembered the way Danny's room had looked; dirty clothes and half-scribbled papers strewn about. 

She went back in and picked up the book. She stared at the shelf for a long time before, without thinking, she acted. 

She tore the comforter off the bed, revealing the messy tangle of sheets she'd been too lazy to replace or fix properly, tearing those off as well and then carrying the pile off, downstairs, starting the laundry. And then she was back, digging the still dirty clothes she'd hidden under the bed and at the back of her closet, cleaning those as well. And then she got out the duster and picked everything up to dust under it, even the bedside lamp she'd cheated on since day one, and then she got out the vacuum and cleaned everything, lifting up the bed and the boxes in her closet... And when the sheets and the clothes were done she put them on her bed, the right way this time, and she put her clothes away, folding them all, not just the ones on top...

And then she turned off the light and curled into bed and cried. She cried and cried and cried because she knew. Knew that she still wasn't good enough. Even when she did exactly as she was told, even when she tried so hard, did everything she could to be the perfect daughter, even when she cleaned her stupid room, she still wasn't good enough...

It was stupid and pathetic, and she had never really expected it to work... She didn't even know why she'd thought that Vlad would somehow come back if she just finished what he'd told her to do... So she laid their and cried and didn't really know who she was trying to bargain with...

And that was her last thought before she fell asleep.

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Dani awoke the next morning to voices outside her room. She was still groggy with sleep and didn't react until it was too late and the door was opened.

"No one triggered the alarm, but someone turned on the electricity in this ro--" she suddenly found herself staring, face to face, with two police officers who had come to search the house. 

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They took her to an orphanage when Dani refused to say where she was from and nothing came up for her picture or prints in the database. She could have flown off at any time, but maybe that was what stopped her... Maybe she wanted to stop running and just let someone take care of her for a while. 

It was a small house, with just a few kids waiting there until they could find foster homes, but she still had to share a room with a girl who looked about Dani's age (although in actual time she was much, much older) with short, brown hair and freckles. 

"Hi, I'm Dani." She reached out and shook the girl's hand the way Vlad had taught her.

"Maddison. Orphan?" She asked, as if it was a standard question. Dani hesitated; this could be her chance. She could lie, say her parents were dead, that it wasn't her fault, and nobody here would know the difference. She could pretend she was someone else, someone loved, just lost...

"You don't have to answer if you don't want to." The girl looked a bit sheepish at having broached an uncomfortable topic.

"No, it's okay... I'm just... unwanted..." It wasn't strictly true; Danny would take her in if she would let him... But as much as they were similar they were still completely different... and he would never understand how much she wanted Vlad back... even if he was an evil, lying fruitloop...