Disclaimer: I don't own the Vampire Diaries. Copyright of the CW. No copyright infringement intended.
A million different thoughts ran through my head as I realized I was stuck on the other side. Every single one of them was about Elena.
First off, what was I thinking letting her get in the car with me to blow up the Travelers at the grill? She could have so easily been the one in this position, stuck on the volatile other side. I know she's stubborn and would have argued until time ran out, but I should have tried harder to change her mind. But I suppose this is a moot point now… I have much bigger problems to worry about.
Second to my stupid decision of allowing Elena to accompany me on my half-suicide mission, I thought of her eyes. Her hair. Her hands holding mine. Her mouth telling me that she sees a future with me in it. I've spent the last few years pining for this girl. I watched my brother love her and watched her love him back. I watched her fall out of love with Stefan and slowly, reluctantly gain affection for me. Though there was not one moment that I felt deserving of her love, I knew that if I had her, I had everything I'd ever need. She is the best part of me.
Don't get me wrong – I have lived a good, long life. I've seen the world. I've had lots of experiences most people wouldn't even dream of. I've loved every minute of being a vampire; fast, strong, powerful. But I'd trade all of these things to have more time with Elena. Though honestly, no amount of time would be enough.
When I walked into the tomb and saw her struggling to remain standing between each violent sob, the pain I felt increased tenfold. It was torturous to hear her call out for me but not be able to reply, to touch her but know she couldn't see me. I suppose I should be thankful for the chance to look at her one last time before being sucked into oblivion, but that insinuates that I'll never see her again, and I just can't accept that.
As hard as it would be to say out loud, the thought of forever being separated from my brother Stefan is quite painful as well. I mean, we definitely never won brothers of the century award… or even of the year. We don't see eye to eye on most things. We're in love with the same girl. And I'll be eternally annoyed at his squirrel diet. But he's my brother. He knows me better than anyone else. Regardless of where we may stand, I know he would have my back at any given moment. He has been the only constant throughout my 173 years on Earth. Though to be honest, I'd rather drive a wooden dagger through my own heart than tell him any of this.
As I walked over to Bonnie, I could feel our time running out. I didn't even know what was about to happen or if anything was about to happen, but it was an ominous, creeping feeling that I'd never felt before. That's why when Bonnie asked me if I thought it would hurt, I couldn't come up with a better answer than "I don't know," since I had no idea what "it" was. But before I could choke out my response, I saw a sudden blast of light and heard the sound of the other side imploding around me.
It felt like the ground was ripped from under us. Blinding light surrounded us and, in a flash, turned to complete darkness. I saw and heard nothing. The only thing I was sure of was that Bonnie was still right next to me; our hands were still grasped tightly. I couldn't tell you how long we stood in the dark silence… I think I might have even drifted off as I waited for something to change. Then, out of nowhere, the lights flicked back on and I could hear Bonnie breathing steadily at my side. We appeared to be in the woods in Mystic Falls… Everything looked the same except it was like the brightness had been turned up five notches. Everything around us was glowing. We were glowing. And we were still holding hands.
"Er… Sorry," Bonnie mumbled as she pulled her hand away and shakily stored it in her back pocket.
"Not a problem. I'm glad to have company at the moment, even if it is just you," I told her.
We made our way through the woods to the square – the center of the town. I had almost forgotten about the curse the Travelers had put on Mystic Falls that sucked the supernatural right out of you… though I felt fine, so I suppose that curse doesn't work on people in – what were we in? Heaven? Hell? Limbo? Still the other side? Somewhere different entirely?
For the most part, the town looked untouched, with one big exception: The Grill. The explosion that Elena and I caused in our half-suicide mission had left the restaurant completely obliterated – all you could see was black ash and a gaping hole in the wall. I knew that if we went in and investigated further, we would find my car and my body burnt to a crisp. This thought sent a shudder down my spine and I tried to think about anything else as we walked through this ghost town.
"I'm so confused as to where we are… and how we got here. It's just us," Bonnie said to me.
"I'm not surprised that you ended up… Here, wherever we are, since you're the to the other side. The only anchor. They couldn't get rid of you - you're too important," I told her.
"Well… I talked to my grams before the ritual began, and she mentioned something about her making sure I find my peace. Could this be what she meant?" Bonnie looked around with confusion as if she were missing some important piece of information that should be obvious.
"Maybe I ended up coming with you by accident because we were holding hands. I'm definitely not upset about it since the other option would probably be a whole lot of nothingness - ceased existence," I replied.
"Well I'm glad you're here too. I guess we should try to figure out what this place is."
The two of us walked in silence along the main road in Mystic Falls until we reached the city limits. That was when I saw something and gained a little hope.
"BONNIE! Bonnie, did you see that? I just saw a car turn that corner down the road!"
"I can hardly even see the corner – human eyes, remember?" Bonnie's annoyance with my question quickly subsided when she realized how great of news this was. "That means there's other people here! Thank god we aren't the only two people left here – it's fine so far but I don't know how long I can handle you," Bonnie said, in a lighter tone.
We continued along the road in the direction of the car at a slightly quicker pace than before. Of course, I could have covered the whole two miles before Bonnie even noticed I was gone, but I didn't want to leave her. We're in this together.
We tried speculating who or what we would find down the road – our guesses included aliens, zombies, a town full of Elvis impersonators, mimes, and the entire Duggar family. I think we were coming up with these ridiculous scenarios and laughing about it so much because it kept us from thinking about the only people we actually wanted to see, because knowing our luck, that was impossible. I can't speak for Bonnie, but I had pretty much given up all hope of seeing them again. I'd say that she had too, because her smile at our jokes didn't reach her eyes.
After what seemed like forever, we finally reached the curve in the road where I had seen the car. The trees quickly became much more sparse and we realized we'd reached a little town. There were people shuffling about here and there, but neither of us recognized anyone we saw. There was a café across the street and we decided to grab some coffee and try to figure out where we were.
As we were walking into the café, a tall, muscular boy was walking out and Bonnie said to him, "Hey! what are you doing here?" He didn't acknowledge her greeting whatsoever and continued on his way.
"That was really weird," Bonnie said. "That boy is one of Tyler's hybrid buddies. I met him at a party once – Tyler brought him back to Mystic Falls when he was visiting from Colorado. He should definitely remember me; we hung out for like two hours," Bonnie blushed.
I didn't think much of it, other than it was a little strange because I wasn't expecting to end up in the same place as anyone we knew.
Oh, how wrong I was.
There they were, sitting at the last booth in the café. Elena, Stefan, Caroline, Jeremy, Tyler, and Matt. The gang was all there.
I didn't even care that there were strangers scattered about the rest of the café – I was at the end of the table in less than a second after I saw Elena. I couldn't bring myself to do anything but stare at her, wide-eyed and open-mouthed. I hardly even noticed the sound of Bonnie sprinting to the table to join me when she saw them as well.
But something was wrong... No one at the table even looked at us.
My stomach sunk. "Elena," I said. "Elena, it's me." No response.
Bonnie looked just as confused. "Jeremy? Caroline?" she said, sounding desperate. Bonnie tried to touch Jeremy's shoulder but her hand went right through him. He didn't react whatsoever.
I looked at Bonnie. She looked at me. I think Bonnie would agree with me when I say that at that moment, I had never felt more hopeless in my life.
"What are we going to do?"