A/N: I started writing this forever ago, forgot about it, and then remembered for the Bash. Expect this piece to have follow-ups.
Pretty much, this is my take on what if Haru hadn't been Lucy in a past life, but her mother had been Martha, and her father had been Van Helsing.
Birthday Bash 2020
Prompt 7: Heist
It was a hand on her shoulder. It nudged her in short, gentle spurts, urging her to forget about the land of dreams.
Haru groaned, grabbing one of her white pillows shaped like a cross and covering her head with it to get her point across. "The sleeping rock you have dialed is unavailable. Please try again later," she slurred like a drunkard.
Through the pillow, she could hear a low laugh. It was warm and didn't sound a thing like one of her father's people.
Come to think of it, when was the last time someone woke her up this gently?
Although she was still dead-tired, Haru forced herself to sit up from her cozy covers and put down the pillow to rub her stubborn eyes into opening. She blinked, a little surprised at what she saw next to her bed.
It was a girl about her own age. She stood out like a fresh rose in a meadow of snow since she was dressed like a goth, even wearing a thin line of black lipstick. The short bob of her black hair was styled like a vampire, but her large blue eyes were kind, albeit amused. Stranger than that, there was also an undercurrent of nervousness as she waited for the girl on the bed to do something.
Anything.
Haru took in her appearance for a full minute before crossing her legs under the white covers. "So, am I having an odd dream, or are you begging for trouble? I doubt you have permission to be this close to me dressed like that."
The strange visitor gave a dismissive sniff while pointedly looking around the boringly white bedroom. "You think I would have had a better chance if I threw on a white dress?"
Haru tilted her head at her, having no trouble picturing her in the flowing gown of one of Dracula's brides. "Actually, that might have made it worse. A wig might help." A long yawn escaped her mouth as she briefly stretched like a cat. "So. If this isn't a dream, I doubt you're here to talk fashion. If anything, you should be tutoring me on the subject."
The girl's outfit was surprisingly low-key, merely a long black shirt with fishnet sleeves paired with black and red-striped leggings. Even the cute black bag hanging over one shoulder was simple but nice.
The goth girl beamed at the compliment but looked down in worry as she sat on the edge of the bed to go through the hobo bag. "Actually, yes. I'm here for something more important. I want you to read a book Mom left me before she died." From within the bag, she tenderly opened a Ziploc bag to carefully extract the contents.
Haru could feel her heartstrings twang like a bow that had been strung too tight. She needed no urging to handle the parchment-colored book carefully as it was passed to her.
It looked like it had been made by a skilled hand, but despite the obvious care it had been given, there was little that could hide the signs that this was an old book.
"True Love by Mom. For your 118th birthday," Haru read from the cover and first page, a second passing before she realized what she just read. She gave a quick look at the goth girl sitting beside her, but only received a nod in response.
"Keep reading," she urged in a small soft voice.
Haru stared for another full minute, slowly shaking her head. "… If… I mean… are you?"
"A vampire? Yes," she admitted, her large blue eyes still on the book. "Am I here to hurt you? No. Please. You need to see what's in there."
Haru opened her mouth to ask more questions, but she slapped one hand across her mouth and forced them back down. 'Later. She wouldn't have slipped past the defenses unless she had a good reason and she wouldn't have woken me up if she only wanted a meal. I guess all these crucifix pillows and decorations are useless.' Taking in a long deep breath, she turned the page to actually start the story.
The author was also an artist, taking great pains in the detail of the palm trees beneath the full moon to show that it was taking place in the tropics somewhere. The same beautiful hand that wrote the title page and dedication narrated the only two animals in the picture.
"Two lonely bats crashed in the night." She turned the page, now seeing a handsome young man and a beautiful dark-haired woman staring at each other with unbridled devotion. "They felt a Zing. Love at first sight."
It could have been Haru's imagination, but a bit about the woman's facial structure reminded her of her own mom. She turned the page again to see them standing upside down on one of the palm leaves, holding hands and looking almost as if they were already at an altar. "They knew right then that they would be husband and wife."
Haru turned the page again to see a close up of the man and woman cuddling inside a heart. Eyes were closed, and they looked like heaven couldn't have been any better. "For a Zing only happens once in your life."
The last page had no illustration, letting the only focus be the final words of a mother to her child. "Your Zing will come, my love. Cherish it. Love, Mommy."
Haru could barely choke out the words, quickly putting the book at arm's length so that her tears wouldn't fall on the pages. Despite the fact that she had been the one reading it out loud, her mind involuntarily replayed the words in her own mother's long-lost voice.
The vampire girl could only smile sadly in understanding, taking back the book and stealing a tender hug from it before slipping it into the Ziplock and back into her bag.
"Dad was wrong," Haru's muffled voice came from the pillow she was burying her face in to hide her tears. "No vampire… he described… would have… written…"
The vampire's hand came up to rub the girl's shoulder in comfort. "I was pretty sure that was why you were saying no. Look, I've felt a Zing, and it's not the sort of thing you can deny. Mom's hands were tied as soon as she laid eyes on Dad, but she never stopped thinking about you, and Dad isn't a bad person. Please, won't you reconsider spending the summer with us?" she begged.
Haru's breathing calmed down, though she now had a small headache tapping at the back of her skull. Taking a moment to process what she had heard, the brunette looked up at her visitor with more than a little confusion, using her hand and pajama sleeve to wipe away the remaining tears. "Everything you said just now doesn't make a lick of sense. Didn't you say earlier that your mom died? Why would she want to see me? I'm pretty sure you're the first vampire I ever met, thanks to Dad's obsession with keeping me away from the world."
That black-lipsticked mouth fell open in complete shock, displaying her tiny, strangely adorable set of fangs. Her blue eyes seemed even wider as they stared at nothing but the girl in the bed.
"Wait, did you get the right bedroom?" she guessed next. "My name's Haru Yoshioka, what's yours?"
With her mouth still hanging open, the vampire's black nails darted out in a blur, taking every pillow off the bed until it was a small mountain in front of her. She then slammed her face into the plushy softness to drown out a passionate tirade that Haru still had no trouble understanding.
"That low-down, good for nothing pig of a human! How dare he say all those horrible things and make us think they were coming from you! Laws and customs can go hang themselves; I'll kill that smug son of a swineherd myself if I ever lay eyes on him!"
There were plenty more things she screamed into the mountain of pillows until Haru felt like she had to gently nudge one shoulder. "If you keep that up, they'll hear you. Please, I don't want you to get hurt."
The vampire forced herself to calm down, taking her face out of the pillows to reveal a fury that looked much closer to the nightmare-ish tales of Haru's childhood. Seeing the bit of fear in the girl's eyes forced the vampire girl to calm herself down and sit on the edge of the bed again.
"What did he tell you happened to your mother?" she nearly demanded.
Haru blinked, not expecting the sudden question but assuming the vampire was referring to her dad. "A plane crash on the way home from her last quilt convention. I was ten. He's been acting crazy ever since, though it's been getting worse as the years pass. He's even been insisting that Count Dracula caused the crash, but why would he bother?"
The vampire slapped one head against her forehead, hissing angrily as her free hand pulled a cell phone out of her pocket. "I will kill him for all of this! Even when Dad was being overprotective and manipulative, at least he didn't lie about Mom!" Her thumb skillfully danced across the surface until she was handing the device to Haru.
She took one look and gasped in shock.
It was her mother. Her hand darted out to take the phone for a closer look, but there was no mistaking that face.
All the old photos had been lost when she and her father moved into this horrible place, but Haru knew this was no photoshop. For one, her mother's hair was longer than it had been when she was younger, and she seemed more relaxed than Haru ever remembered if there were people other than herself around.
Haru raised a finger to keep looking at pictures, using a single glance at the vampire to beg permission.
She nodded, scooting closer so that she could look at the photos as well.
Not every photo had her mother but seeing them in succession was enough to paint a vivid idea of what life was like where her mother was.
She lived somewhere with thick stone walls. She looked perfectly comfortable teaching a skeleton how to use a sewing machine. She was high fiving a lady that looked a little like a zombie while they were wearing identical smirks, but the reason behind it wasn't readily available.
There was another human there, giving a piggyback ride to a son that was nearly identical to him and laughing like a cherub. Haru really had to struggle with herself to stop staring at the beautiful little boy to look at more pictures.
Then there was the one of her mother waltzing with a tall, handsome vampire. The same one that had been captured within the precious pages.
Haru's eyes widened as she also recognized the complete adoration as they stared only at each other. Her mouth slowly fell open as the truth began falling into place as perfectly as puzzle pieces.
"Mom was excited she was going to meet monsters," she whispered as memories began to resurface. Throwing off the remaining blankets, she left the phone with the vampire girl to start pacing the room. "She's always had a soft spot for monsters. She promised to tell me all about them when she got back because Dad refused to let her take me along. But… if your dad's Dracula, he already Zinged, and you only Zing once…" She stopped dead in her tracks as she fully understood who had snuck into her room.
The vampire girl could only nod while trying to strangle a pillow. "Dad says Mom's a bit different in her current life, but her loving nature and creative mind were still there, even though it's manifested in a different direction than last time. He was going to let her come back to you since she was already married, but Mom couldn't make herself leave when the time came. She insists to the press that Dad wasn't a home-wrecker. You were the only reason she ever regretted staying with us."
Haru could only stare at her as a new fear welled up in her heart. What if this was a dream? Was she really so desperate to believe that her mother was alive that she'd even accept that a vampire was … in a way…
She drew close to the vampire again, realizing how desperately she wanted the thought to be truth. "Sis?" she asked in a nearly inaudible whisper.
Her blue eyes welled up with happiness as she stood up and wrapped her arms around the human girl. "I'm Mavis. Your older half-sister by one hundred and nine years." She gave a small laugh full of relief as Haru's arms automatically clamped tight around her. "I don't know about you, but I've always hated being an only child."
Haru gripped her even tighter, unable to keep her sobs under control at what she had been forced to miss out on.
Mavis' outburst had made it clear that her father had said things that Haru would never say. Not to mention that she knew for a fact that hot vampire or no, nothing would have kept her mother away from her.
Not without her father using a lot of money to keep turning down visitation requests. Mavis wouldn't have come if her mother didn't regret leaving her with the man.
Haru looked around her crucifix-laden room with tear-filled eyes. All these extra precautions in case Mavis or her step-father came to take or talk to her without permission. While keeping her here and controlling literally every moment of her life. Even her future was being arranged without her consent, all to keep his 'little angel' from finding out how far he was willing to go to hurt her mother.
Her mind flickered once with the image of her fiancé, and she shivered at how close she had come to never finding out the truth.
"Don't let go, Mavis," Haru begged, clinging to her even harder. "Please. Take me home?"
Her big sister didn't respond, at least with her voice. Instead, Haru suddenly felt weightless, even insubstantial. Almost like a dream, her awareness seeped through a small air duct that even a cat would find uncomfortable. Flooding carefully through the silver lines that she could remember her father complaining about the cost of to make the improvised former prison as impassible for monsters as possible.
Just as Haru was forgetting that she had ever had a body, she almost tripped over her own feet while on the roof of the terrible place. "Cold!" she yelped from the cold stone beneath her bare feet, but Mavis quickly covered her mouth.
"Sorry, forgot that human flesh is more sensitive," she whispered, looking around nervously.
Patrols could literally be anywhere on this quiet moonless night. It wasn't enough for Haru to be kept in what used to be a top-security cell when she wasn't with him. Somehow, he had even gotten enough money for patrols to get at least a warning if a monster showed up.
… Mavis must have really wanted to see her if she was willing to risk getting shot with a silver bullet, though the two sleeping guards lying against a corner explained why no one was raising an alarm so far.
Her sister luckily already had a plan. "The quickest way to get you home is for me to fly while holding your hand. It should only take me maybe ten minutes since I once flew from California to Transylvania in about half an hour. While carrying my husband and backpack that's bigger than he is. Either one is bigger than you."
"Impressive," Haru wheezed while nearly jumping from foot to foot to try counteracting just how cold the stone was. She inwardly cursed herself for not thinking to at least put on a pair of slippers before telling her big sister how eager she was to leave this place.
"It will be cold on the trip too," Mavis apologized with a guilty smile. "But it won't be long enough to get you sick, and you'll have a nice long hug with Mom and Dad to warm you back up."
Haru looked down nervously. "You sure your dad won't mind me?"
"Seeing you again will make our mom very happy. That will make him happy," Mavis assured her with another warm hug. "As long as you don't bring up the 'bleh bleh bleh' thing, he'll give you a chance."
With that, she turned herself into an adorable little bat with her signature blue eyes.
"Oh, tell me he doesn't actually say it," Haru groaned while reaching up with one hand for the bat to grab her. "I won't be able to take him seriously."
The bat flashed her a barely visible smirk while wrapping her claws around Haru's hand and wrist. "In all honesty, he doesn't."
Haru would be lying if she didn't say that she was just a teensy bit nervous about being lifted into the air at least a mile over her prison before Mavis started heading east like a bullet.
"But let me tell you how I pranked him with my son's first words…"