Disclaimer: No, I don't own EastEnders. What I say now is true: I would keep Danielle in if I had power over the tragic storyline that saw her get killed! To rectify the mistakes the screenwriting team has made, I'm aiming to get on there. Someday.

Summary: Whilst the Square assumed that she was dead, Danielle was actually alive. Now she's forced to hide away for her own protection with help from an old friend. Will Archie pay for what he's done? More importantly, will Danielle ever get to see Ronnie again?

A/N: So as you can quite tell, I was very disappointed with last Thursday's episode and decided to show the BBC just how much I despise it by making a plot of my own. This was inspired by many songs I've been listening to lately on iTunes ... notably Run by Leona Lewis and Halo by Beyonce. You'll be happy to know that Danielle is alive and well from the beginning. There maybe some pairings, but they shall be revealed very soon. This is my first Enders fic, so be nice! However, this isn't to the say this is the only Danielle fic I'm going to write. I've got at least another two planned, so watch out for them soon. Hehe, please read and review! Thanks.

Chapter One

Regaining Posture

Danielle Jones could have sworn that she was dead. Her eyes slowly fluttered open and she just managed to see the paramedics surrounding her, fighting to save her fading life. But she could not hear them whatsoever. Images of her “dying moments” occurred to her. Ronnie. Ronnie Mitchell. Ronnie was there, wasn’t she? She had been cradled in her arms, finally accepting that she was her own flesh and blood. However, it had been too late. Prior to that, Janine had knocked her down. Yes, it wasn’t a dream after all. It all actually happened. And to think that she’d been having similar dreams weeks before …

“Can you hear me, sweetheart?” asked one of the paramedics, a female brunette.

Unfortunately, Danielle’s vocal chords didn’t agree with her. She longed to shout out the words to tell Ronnie that she was actually alive, that she could finally get the time she longed to spend with her biological mother. But the sound was trapped in her very body. All that came out was slurred moans and groans of pain. The brunette paramedic grasped Danielle’s hand as a source of comfort, smiling all the time and assuring her that everything was going to be all right.

Her vision was becoming less blurry by now and Danielle finally accepted that she was alive. This was no mere dream. This wasn’t heaven, but it wasn’t hell either. Her heart was beating, she could actually breathe in the air she was taking and her eyes scanned the ambulance. The blood that had been trickling down her nose had all, but dried up by now. It looked like Janine Butcher hadn’t accidentally murdered her after all. But it didn’t change the fact that her body felt so weak and unmoveable.

Despite that Ronnie would be beyond despair with grief right now, Danielle found herself thinking about Stacey, her best and truest friend on the Square. She, Ronnie, Roxy and Janine had watched her die. Dying just felt like a very long stream of unconsciousness, one that she hadn’t meant to come out of. But the paramedics had pulled through and had been successful by saving a life. If there was a God, then Danielle believed in him. When dying in Ronnie’s arms, her life flashed before her eyes. She truly felt a bond between herself and her real mother. Developing that bond would just have to wait.

She continued to drift in and out of consciousness, but this was down to the exhaustion she’d been feeling all day. And come to think of it, her favourite dress was ruined now with all that dirt and blood. Damn, but she’d have to worry about that later. At a time when she was fighting for her life, Danielle would have laughed at her silliness if she could. But she couldn’t. She was still at risk of dying … again.

“Sweetheart, you’re going to be ok,” said the brunette paramedic, but her voice sounded like a whisper to Danielle. “Just hang in there, we’re almost there.”

No, she wanted to rest. She didn’t want to cling on to consciousness and fight the toughest battle of her entire life. All she wanted to do was sleep and let her body do the fighting, not her mind. With the day that she’d been having, it was a wonder that Danielle Jones was still alive. Stacey would have called her lazy if she knew that she wanted nothing more than to rest, but would still respect her wishes. Danielle remembered the past seven months – probably not the best highlights of her life so far. Or perhaps it had been for the best coming to Walford, to the Square, to see Ronnie for herself.

Now there was one vital question ringing in her mind.

What was going on in the Square?

Stacey Slater had always been compared as a younger version of her cousin, Kat. But nothing could prepare her for the oncoming shock that hadn’t been seen miles away. Besides Ronnie and Janine, she’d been the first on the scene to witness Danielle dying in Ronnie’s arms. At the demand of Ronnie, she’d sprinted to the Vic to tell everyone that Danielle had been an accident. In the end, it didn’t even matter – because her best friend was dead and it was partly her fault. There was a sick feeling stirring in her stomach – and no, it wasn’t the alcohol she’d consumed before – and it reminded Stacey of the damage she’d caused.

Ronnie was probably in denial, shock … whatever she wanted to call it.

If there had been one person who truly knew Danielle in the Square, then it was definitely Stacey. After the paramedics took Danielle away in the ambulance, Stacey threw up on the pavement. Again, it wasn’t due to the effects of the alcohol. Maybe shock would have defined it – the horror of losing someone so close and yet now so far away from the world. Now she was curled up in a corner of her house in the living room, refusing to acknowledge her best friend was dead.

Charlie, Mo, Jean … none of them knew Danielle was gone.

The very thought of Janine knocking her down “accidentally” spurred an unseen anger in her eyes. Stacey hadn’t been able to call anyone her best friend since Ruby Allen left a long time ago. It only proved that being a Slater meant that the ones you loved and cherished would soon be taken away from you. That was probably the curse of being a Slater – never being able to have that happy ending. Her marriage to Bradley Branning was a perfect example of that curse. She’d wrecked a lot of lives and now Danielle had been more than destroyed – she was dead.

How could she turn around to Ronnie now and say that everything was going to be all right? Stacey was the one that had encouraged Danielle to hate Ronnie for every little remark she had to give. She was the one that wouldn’t dare tell Ronnie the truth. Her actions led to Danielle’s death. If only she hadn’t pushed her away, then maybe she’d be here now, regardless of Ronnie knowing she was her mother …

Stacey pulled out her phone and started flicking through her pictures. There was several of Danielle alone or standing with Stacey. Seeing her angelic, beautiful face tore Stacey Slater apart. The walls she’d fought so hard to put up to preserve her tough nature were tumbling down and she was losing the fight not to crack. She was cracking. Slowly, but surely, the cracks of emotion were emerging within her very soul. Her hands were shaking, as she continued to look through the pictures. And then suddenly and unexpectedly, she flung the phone across the room, silently breaking down in tears.

There were no words to express how she felt right now.

“Stacey?” came an innocent, concerned voice.

Jean Slater, her beloved and cherished mother, was dressed in her robe. She’d been suspecting something had happened since she didn’t hear the door slam when Stacey walked through the door. Instead, her daughter had been so quiet and that had been unnerving for Jean. It was almost midnight by now, but Jean didn’t quite understand what was going on.

“Stacey, what’s going on? Why are you crying?” she asked quietly. “What’s wrong?”

“Mum …” murmured Stacey, wiping away her tears, and rising to her feet. She didn’t want to appear weak in front of her own mother – that would have been wrong. “What are you … doing down here? You should be in bed.”

“Well, you’re never quiet, you know that!” chuckled Jean. “I thought you’d be ranting and raving over someone or anything really!” When Stacey didn’t respond or even look at her in the eye, there was more need for concern. “Stacey, what’s happened?”

“It’s Danielle,” she said, now forcing the words out of her mouth. The broken Slater looked at her. “She’s dead.”

Jean’s expression of worry quickly turned into horror.

“No … no … you’re lying …”

“I’m sorry, Mum. She was knocked down … I watched her die in Ronnie’s arms …”

“No … not Danielle … she was … so young …”

And before any of them knew it, Jean had collapsed into Stacey’s arms full of cries of hysteria.

Ronnie Mitchell had been a bitch all this time and never realised that Danielle was living right under her nose. Her own daughter … it felt strange to say that, but there was more than enough evidence to prove that. She sat down in the cold cellar, refusing to let anyone inside. She’d locked herself in and her sister Roxy was fighting so hard to get inside. There had been threats of violence, verbal abuse used and so on. Typical Roxy … always trying to resolve an issue, full of fire, whereas she, Ronnie, continued to play the tragic heroine with an icy heart …

“Come on, Ron, just open the damn door!” she moaned.

But Ronnie hadn’t uttered a single word since blurting out Danielle was dead. Her baby girl had died in her arms. Wasn’t that traumatic enough to give an excuse to be alone for a long time? If it had been Amy – Roxy’s baby metaphorically speaking – who had died, then Roxy would have surely felt the same. But this was different. Danielle knew that she was Ronnie’s. So why the hell did she bottle up all that angst inside and spill after months of pretending not to be?

However, her newfound anger was aimed towards her father. Archie Mitchell … the bastard that knew from the start that her daughter was alive! He’d lied all along about everything – and to think that she forgave him in her speech at the Vic! Since she realised Danielle was her baby girl, Ronnie learned that Archie was to never be trusted again. He was no father of hers. He drove her mother, Glenda, away from the family. Now it was his turn to pay and be driven away by not only her, not only Roxy, but also the entire Mitchell family clan. Even Peggy, who had been so intent on marrying him, finally saw the light that Ronnie had been trying to show all this time.

These wounds that Ronnie felt would never heal. Yet again, there was another emptiness in her life. There wasn’t a worse feeling in the world – heck, this was even worse than learning Jack was Amy’s real father! She cared little for Jack and Roxy’s little thing that brought Amy into the world, not that she didn’t love her niece, of course. From the moment that her daughter was taken away, Ronnie longed for nothing more than the day they would be reunited. But she never quite imagined that she’d be taken away on the same night …

“Ronnie, please open the damn door!” exclaimed Roxy. “We can talk things out if you want and … and … look, if you want to be on your own, I can understand that. But I don’t want you to be alone. I just …” She was having difficulty trying to find the correct words to use. “You’re not alone in this, Ron. She was my niece … my niece, Ronnie! I should’ve seen something before! I let her look after my daughter! I always thought that there was some weird resemblance, but …”

This was the type of thing that was meant to happen on TV, not in Walford. However, the more Ronnie thought about it, the more she knew that Walford could never contain any happy endings. There had been more drama here than in Ibiza. Danielle was probably on a cold slab now, just waiting for her body to be identified. Perhaps after the funeral, she would return to Ibiza and leave the miserable life she’d led in Walford. There was nothing keeping her here anymore – perhaps except R&R, but Jack could take care of that – and Roxy had everything she wanted. Roxy had her baby to look after and Jack, who would play happy families.

Her icy heart wouldn’t melt.

There was just no way that she could stay in Walford for a second longer.

Danielle’s eyes fluttered open once again. She felt strong again to move her body. The lights in the room blinded her temporarily, but she was able to adjust to them once she gave herself a minute. She breathed and felt relieved. There was no one in her room. The sun was shining brightly outside. Was this a dream? The dried blood that had once trickled down her nose was all, but gone. Danielle sat up on the bed and looked at the mirror. She was back to normal, although she could feel a few bruises down her body that ached a little.

“Good morning,” said the doctor, who walked into the room and offered her a gentle smile. “You had everyone very worried. How are you feeling?”

“I’m great, thanks,” Danielle replied, smiling back at him.

“I’m Doctor Luke Henson,” he said, extending his hand to her and she took it, shaking it. “I’ve been the one treating you this past four days –”

“Four days?” she gasped in horror.

“Yes. You’ve been in a coma for four days, but I’m relieved to see that you’re awake. We would have called the police to see if there’s someone out there who knows you because … well, we don’t even know who you are for a start! But I wanted to wait and see if you’d pull through first. I’m glad to say that you’re a very lucky girl.”

At least the handsome doctor himself was complimenting her. He only appeared to be in his late twenties, had curly messy brown hair and mesmerising green eyes. Danielle felt embarrassed to be in his presence. Nonetheless, she just felt glad to be alive at least. So she’d been in a coma for a week. She remembered that it was a Thursday that she was knocked down, so that the day today … Monday, right? The seventh day of April – wow, this was a lot to take in.

But now the doctor had implied that he wanted to know her name. Not only that, but he hadn’t called the police to check if there was someone she knew. Danielle thought about the people she did know – Ronnie, Roxy, Stacey, Charlie, Mo, Jean … the list seemed to go on and on. She certainly did feel lucky to be alive. After much consideration, Danielle knew she had to say at least something.

“My name’s Amy,” she blurted out. Well, she couldn’t have said her name was Danielle, could she? It would have been a shock to everyone, who thought she was previously dead. But of course, she couldn’t have used the surnames Jones or Mitchell now, could she? Instead, she randomly thought of a popular one. “Amy Smith.”

“Amy Smith,” nodded Doctor Henson. “Do you have any friends or family we can contact? Maybe an address you’re currently living at?”

“Oh, I live in Scotland,” Danielle quickly said. “There’s just me and my dad. I wouldn’t want to tell him about what happened just yet. It’d take him days to get down here and he doesn’t have a phone.” Doctor Henson looked disappointed. “But he does have an email address. Do you have … internet here?”

“That we certainly do, Amy Smith,” he nodded when necessary. “You can use the computer in my office, but you’ll have to let me get you there in a wheelchair. I wouldn’t want you to be falling on to the ground as soon as you’ve come around from a coma.”

Was that a little bit of flirting there? Danielle certainly caught on to it, but she just laughed nervously and agreed with him. She had to uncover whether she really was alive or dead to the Square. There was one way of knowing that – by now, she would’ve known that Stacey would’ve taken over her online diary and led memorials on her wall – not that her wall had been bombarded with messages in the first place.

Once she’d got into the wheelchair and taken to Doctor Henson’s office, he told her that he’d leave her be for ten minutes and come back as soon as he dealt with a little girl, who needed a sling for her broken leg. Now alone in the doctor’s office, Danielle felt nervous. She was typing away to see if there had been any emails in her account. There were plenty – many of them leading her directly to the memorial wall that Stacey led, as she initially suspected.

As the page was loading, she impatiently tapped her fingers on the desk.

Come on, what’s taking so long? He’ll be back soon.

A hooded figure, keen to hide his true face, walked into the hospital and went straight to the desk, where the helpful receptionist was there. “Hi,” he said in a rough voice. She could see his smile from under his hood, but intimidated that he kept his hood up over the rest of his face. “I’m looking for a girl … she was brought in last Friday because of a car accident or something like that …”

“Excuse me, but could you take your hood down?” asked the receptionist politely.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” the man said apologetically, “but I can’t, really. Um, I was … hit across the face with a glass bottle six months ago and … I’ve had bandages across one side of my face ever since. You see, it’s really, really, really daunting having everyone stare at me when I’m walking down the street. So if you don’t mind, I’d rather keep my hood up and not scare you.”

“No, not a problem at all,” she shook her head and smiled sympathetically. “You’re looking for a girl brought in last Friday because of a car accident? Do you know what she looks like? A name, perhaps? We have a lot of girls coming in and out because of car crashes.”

“Blonde hair, blue eyes, thin … maybe five foot five?” he guessed. “She was in Albert Square, Walford at the time?”

“Oh, you must mean Amy Smith?”

“That’s right! I almost forgot. Damn migraines make me forget sometimes. Do you know where I can find her?”

“Well, she just woke up this morning. She’s staying in room A-53, that’s down the hall; take a left and straight on. Doctor Henson is treating her. If you like, you could wait around here for him to come and see you. He’ll be here in a few –”

However, the tall man had already walked past her and was using the directions she’d given him. This was no time for dilly-dallying. He needed to make sure that she was all right. If she was alive, then this changed everything. There were several people giving him suspicious looks when he passed them, but they didn’t bother him whatsoever. He’d gotten used to people giving him those kinds of expressions these past few months, anyway. He wasn’t a man that many people liked either. But she was one of those few people that probably would’ve trusted him, seeing as how she was dead to the rest of the Square.

However, when he got inside the room, the bed was empty. It wasn’t as if it wasn’t being occupied, but she wasn’t there at the moment. The man leant back against the wall and sighed. So she was awake, probably confused and scared about what was going on. He needed to make sure that she was fine and promise her that he was going to make everything ok once again. Maybe she would’ve been surprised to see him again, but he was the only person she could trust. After all, Archie Mitchell needed to pay for every little crime he’d committed.

And Danielle’s new ally, who would wait for her in the room she was staying, would make sure that justice was served – regardless of what others thought of him as a person.

A/N: Hmm! So this starts from the aftermath of Danielle's "death" and looks upon the key characters - Danielle, Ronnie and Stacey - for now. Does anyone want to take a guess about who the hooded man is? I haven't given him a description just yet ... so it could be anyone. It actually is someone from the Square to give you a hint. See the nice little green button below? If you review, then I'll update as quickly as I can.