Fanon:Anastasia Vanderburg

 

Anastasia Maria-Teresa Vanderburg was born in Hidden Springs as one of the twin daughters of Catarina and Renauld Vanderburg. She was the second of the twins, born three minutes after her sister, Alexandra. She is cultured and refined, enjoying fine art, fine cuisine, fine books, and fine music. She is of primarily Dutch and German extraction.

In many ways, the twins' existence owed itself to the disappearance of their older sister, Francisca. The palace had spent lots of time and money on the search for Francisca but to no avail. Catarina was consciously seeking a child to replace her lost daughter, but she got more than she bargained for when she birthed twins -- double the fun and double the trouble.

Early years
Anastasia and her twin sister, Alexandra, grew up in a life of privilege. Their mother ensured their top-of-the-line education at the ultra-exclusive Smuggsworth Preparatory School as soon as they could walk, and before they'd even enrolled officially in the institution, they'd had private one-on-one tutoring with some of the world-renowned professors.

As the twins reached their teens, the results of their Smuggsworth education were really beginning to show. At the same time, though, they were developing distinct differences in their personalities. While Alexandra was more athletic and outdoorsy, preferring to ride great distances on horseback and playing all types of sports, Anastasia was cultured and refined, enjoying painting, drawing, sculpture, musical theater, and the opera.

All the while, however, the girls were pretty much isolated from the rest of the family -- and from everyone else. They truly became an island amongst themselves, creating an elaborate imaginary world to which they alone would retreat to, with imaginary friends named Lucky and Patches with whom they'd communicate their deepest, darkest secrets to. One time, Anastasia locked herself in the bathroom with her imaginary friend doll for four hours.

In fact, they were summoned from Smuggsworth only once -- to attend the wedding of their half-brother, Crown Prince Sebastian, to Miss Ella Carlisle, a young woman from the Hidden Springs community.

Young adult years
Finally the girls graduated Smuggsworth Prep School and became young women. At the advice of their new agent and manager, they underwent plastic surgery and liposuction, and completely made themselves over physically. The makeovers were a resounding success as the girls posed for their first magazine covers. And the transformations were not just physical. Because they'd shed their baby fat, they grew more confident as young women. It was a chain reaction that led to them signing a deal to star in a reality TV show, Vanderburg Squared.

In the very first episode, Renauld dies unexpectedly. The girls are devastated by the loss. The rest of the episodes so far are about how each girl copes with the loss. They plan an elaborate funeral dinner for their father, without any input from their mother. Anastasia serves as the unofficial hostess of the gathering.

As an overweight teen, Anastasia was shy and self-conscious, with mostly her art pad as her only companion. But since the surgeries she has begun to show signs of emerging from her shell. Despite the objections of her mother she began construction on a project she admits "means more to her than anything she's ever done" -- the family crypt, which she herself drew up the plans for. An architecture and design student, Anastasia spends a lot of time at her drawing table. But now she's taken over for her sister-in-law, who just gave birth to her second child, as chairperson of the Hidden Springs Heritage Festival planning committee. She's also running the holiday toy drive.