{New Orleans. After her fiancé Tyler's sudden death, the young Dr. Caroline Forbes falls in a deep depression. That is, until she discovers some old diaries belonged to one of her ancestors – some study about bringing life into dead subject – and that is why she has spent the last months digging graves and stealing equipment from her hospital.

But before starting to work directly on her fiancé's body, she decides to test her new discoveries on some corpse she has stolen from the nearby prison – where she has managed to enter as the doctor who supervises the executions. The body has belonged in life to a certain Niklaus Mikaelson – a quite dangerous person, with no relatives, or friends who would have recognize or looking for him in the case her experiment went fine.

Unfortunately, her plans change dramatically when the convict comes back alive. The man has no memories of his past life, he has actually several difficulties trying to communicate or behave like a person again: he's like a child, a child of which Caroline feels responsible, and honestly she doesn't think she would be capable of doing such a thing to Tyler. The man, or should she say 'the Creature'?, is more inhuman than human, and Caroline is both awed and terrified by what she has accomplished. In the end, though, the fear wins – and she grudgingly decides to get rid of him. But she finds killing him impossible – the way he looks at her, the complete and utter trust in his eyes too honest and heartbreaking – so she ends up abandoning him somewhere in the country, confiding that he won't be able to find his way to her again.

A year passes uneventful – Caroline hasn't revived Tyler, instead she has slowly started to live again. She has even started dating her colleague Stefan, and the memories of her macabre experiments have been prudently concealed deep inside her mind. But one day, one day suddenly the Creature is at her door, and the nightmare she thought she had escaped is again in her life: he goes by Klaus, now – he insists that she calls him that – and he has no intention of letting her go.}

AN. Even though it's a Modern!AU, I've tried to maintain the charm of the original character [credits to Mary Shelley], so perhaps our Creature!Klaus may talk in a bit of a redundant way. Perhaps he has learned to speak in that fashion thanks to all the old literature books he has read? I'd also like to point out that he chronology of this story is pretty irregular: this first chapter covers the part when our characters - Klaus and Caroline - met again after the year apart, which is why I've felt the need to write that long preface about the events that take place before this first chapter. Anything that may be only mentioned here will be in any case deepened in the next chapters, so don't worry! And if there is something you'd like to ask or know about this particular universe, don't be afraid to tell me - and I'll do my best to put it in the story.

Feel free to point out any typos or mistakes – no beta, unfortunately – aaaand… that's all for now. Enjoy! :D

PARADISE LOST

Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay

To mould Me man? Did I solicit thee

From darkness to promote me?—

[John Milton, Paradise Lost (x. 743-5)]

When she crossed her doorstep, Caroline found only somberness and silence waiting for her, as had happened every day for the last year. Her hand went to search the switch on the right side of the wall, but after pressing it a few times the house remained in complete darkness, informing her of the absence of electrical current.

"Crap. Every time it rains…"

With a sigh, she closed the door behind her, threw her bag on a chair nearby and took off her coat, hanging it in the closet. Then, giving in to the dark, she crossed the corridor going by memory and she went gropingly toward the kitchen, from whose window came luckily the light of the street lamps.

The candles were in a drawer of the dresser: she took one and wedged it in the neck of a Coca Cola bottle, lighting it and giving it a few seconds to fuel. Then she crossed the living room and went to her bedroom, holding one hand in front of the flame to prevent it extinguished; lightning lit up for a moment the living area, soon after followed by a thunder that made her jump.

As she undressed to get into something more comfortable, removing sweatshirt and pants, Caroline had the strange feeling that there was something wrong. Maybe it was the dark or the time, still the sensation that something was going to happen did not leave her – it was the same as the night Tyler had the accident, after all. Suddenly she felt a bundle of nerves, and her whole body seemed to tense in apprehension.

Caroline closed her eyes and took a deep breath, then gave up finding her pajamas and she just put on a robe over her underwear. Then she took the candle and turned to the door – her intention was to approach the phone and stay in the dining room until the current was back or until she would have the courage to call Stefan, asking him to join her. However, she didn't manage to move for a dark shadow, massive and imposing, loomed in front of her, as if it had materialized out of the darkness itself.

A quick lighting illuminated the living room, shedding light on the figure and baring familiar features – dark, tussled curls, pale and marred skin, vitreous yellow eyes, a mouth pressed in a grim line – and she screamed. The bottle slipped from her hand, going to shatter on the floor and depriving her of the faint light of the candle.

The figure quickly covered the distance between them and pressed a hand over her mouth, making her cry in disjointed mumblings. "Silence," he ordered her with a hiss, hoarsely. "I'm not here to hurt you."

Caroline stared at him with wide eyes, unable to restrain the tears caused by fear and keep them from slipping down her cheeks toward the rough hand that prevented her to issue a single noise. However, she nodded, slowly, and that movement seemed to be sufficient to make the shadow low his hand. Thus regained the ability to speak, all that Caroline could mutter was, "Niklaus."

On hearing his name, the creature stood up and seemed to be even higher, but he did not back away or moved one millimeter, forcing the woman to bend her head to be able to peer into the darkness. "So you remember the monster you created and then abandoned, mh? Good. Though it's Klaus, now. Yet it is curious, because I thought by now you had forgotten me, relegated me to the identity of a nightmare."

Caroline tried to back away a few steps, but the presence of the dresser behind her halted her movements. "Niklaus – Klaus, listen to me…"

"No! You listen to me!" He cut her off violently, grabbing her shoulders to keep her from getting away. "You've got rid of me like one does with garbage; you think I will ever forgive you? I did not ask you to give me life, but you did, and you should continue to take care of me like you did before you started to get distracted by that man so much to allow him to take you away from me… Say, have you forsaken me in order to be free to bring him to bed? Yes, yes, I know everything, I've seen everything! Did you think I would leave without even try to oppose me? I've been spying you for so long. I wanted to understand the reason behind your decision, to understand and justify your behavior, because I just could not realize how could you go from being so sweet and good to being so heartless… And eventually I understood, yes! I realized so many things in these recent months. I understand that I have no other purpose in my life, than to belong to you: I am yours, I am your son, your creature, but then I am also your friend and companion, and even your lover, if you so desire! And just as so, you're mine. Do you understand? You are mine!"

That last word came out like a roar, shaking Caroline from head to toe. Everything had been so sudden that she could not predict the next move of the creature, which caught her off guard. Klaus fell ravenously on her lips, pressing their mouths together with such ardor that she couldn't help but groan: although cold as death, his lips were soft and plump and desperately familiar.

Caroline could not free herself, for he was too strong. His hands held her tight as steel chains, so the only devised way to lessen the violence of his assault was to surrender and open her lips, allowing him to find the outburst that he wanted – her grandmother always said that the most delicate reeds survive the storms because they bend to the wind. So, as soon as he found an opening, Klaus deepened the kiss with greater vehemence, violating Caroline's mouth with an impetus that was meant to impose his mark and his possession on her more than show her who knows what distorted form of affection. Yet, after the initial anger and fury, the creature became aware of the woman's total impassivity, and a thick guilt began to creep treacherous in his soul, making him deeply ashamed for that gesture. Therefore, gently, he turned away from her, easing his grip on her shoulders until completely lower his hands, mortified.

"I did not want to hurt you," he repeated softly, looking at her pale face and red eyes, who seemed to shine with tears in the dark twilight. "I'm sorry. I let my anger get the best of me, and…" His voice trailed off in the tense silence of the room, and for a long few seconds, she only heard the sound of their heavy breathing and the rain beating on the windows.

It was Caroline, unexpectedly, who spoke again. "Oh God, what's wrong with your hand?"

Confused by the sudden change of topic, Klaus looked down on both his hands, and only then he noticed the blood that smeared his right one, running off the ground from an open wound. "Oh," he murmured, as if the hand did not belong to him: in fact, he didn't even feel pain. "I broke a window to come inside."

Caroline's professional instinct got the better of any other thought she had on her mind – or maybe it only served to focus her attention on something that would not make her run away screaming desperately. She walked over to Klaus, being careful not to walk over the broken glass from before and she took his bloody hand, lifting it up: it was really a bad cut, it was fortunate that there were no remaining stuck pieces of glass.

"Come," she said, with a polite yet firm tone that brooked no argument. The habit of always doing what she said made Klaus following her without a word to the kitchen, where he sat on a chair and waited that she carefully light up more candles. "I'll get my bag," she informed him, disappearing for a few moments in the dark hallway. Klaus' disgraceful behavior and his curt speech seemed to have been momentarily forgotten.

Caroline carefully cleaned the wound, by washing and disinfecting it before moving on to mend the cut that separated the back from side to side, all without ever look up and risk of crossing the eyes of the creature that she was facing. She had not yet decided how to deal with the whole situation – in the meantime, she just silently cursed the persistent absence of current.

Klaus, however, was not by nature a very patient man. "You hate me so much, then, Caroline, that I'm not even worthy of a measly look?" He asked in a low voice, without taking his eyes off her for not to miss even the smallest of her movements. "I'm really so repulsive and monstrous in the eyes of the one who created me?"

Her blue eyes rose on him for a brief moment, long enough for him to see them filled not with horror, but rather a deep sorrow, before they lowered again on her job. "You shouldn't have come here, Klaus," she said, her voice wrapped in a palpable fatigue. "Why did you come back? What do you want from me?"

The surprised and hurt eyes of the creature took her off guard. "Do you really… Do you really think I would be able to leave and to invent a new life, away from you? When all that is in my past and in my mind is you? What I want from you, you ask… Do you really need an answer? No, please, let me finish. When you forsake me, I felt like dying, and only now that I have you here next to me I can breathe again. Do you not believe it? Caroline, I've already said the words – I am yours, and yours only. You may also try to kill me, and I wouldn't avert it. Indeed, I would guide your hand to help you, if that would make you happy… A year away was enough to understand that the pain I feel, here," and he patted his chest, hard, over his heart, as to give more force to his words, "it is caused solely by the absence of you in my life. I was unfair before, there are no excuses for the unworthy manner in which I behaved. My patience was exhausted, and I had accumulated so much anger, you know… But now I want to talk and reason with you in a civilized manner, like an honest man. After all, that's what you taught me, remember? Certainly not to be a scoundrel. I know the gratitude, and I also know many other feelings, my soul is so full that it could erupt at any moment! But I digress. As I have already told you and repeated, I am not here for revenge or hurt you. I would be able, yes, indeed you have made me capable, making me a hundred times stronger than any ordinary man, let alone a woman, with all due respect I have towards you; yet I will not raise a finger on you, neither one way or another, unless it is you who ask it of me. You have my word, Caroline… Can you trust me?"

How could she not? Klaus was right, and she knew, in her heart, that he would never do anything against her – unless, of course, he had completely changed since the last time she saw him. So, she decided to give him the confidence that he seemed to crave so much, and nodded.

Klaus seemed incredibly relieved. "Good," he sighed, a hint of a smile gracing his lips. "Good."

Caroline couldn't sleep. The thought that he was just a few meters away from her, in her small living room, made it impossible to fall asleep. For that reason she kicked off the covers, slipped out of bed and hurriedly pulled on her robe, walking on tiptoe to the door of her room and opening it up, in silence, hoping not to wake his guest.

Caution that proved to be useless, because he wasn't sleeping either. Caroline appeared in the doorway, leaning against the jamb with her arms crossed and watching him through the twilight, sitting on the couch with his shoulders down and head bowed close in his hands, as if absorbed in a problem too difficult to resolve for a single person. But when he heard the creak of the door he looked up almost suddenly, looking as if he did not understand why she wasn't asleep and instead she had gone to him. For a long moment neither spoke: they simply settle with the same circumspection used between prey and predator, waiting for the moment when one of them would let their guard down and be captured.

Caroline was the one to surrender. Still without saying a single word, she crossed the room, reaching Klaus and stopping to stand in front of him, forcing him to bend his neck to be able to continue looking at her. She released her grip on her robe and put her hands on the shoulders of the creature, hesitantly at first, then with more decision, and finally she pulled him against herself and hugged him, letting him bury his face on her stomach. Immediately Klaus' arms rose in turn and surrounded her hips, his hands grasping the back of her robe; the shy and cautious hug turned into a fierce and vigorous one, which tore a groan from both.

"God," she whispered, her lips pressed against the creature's blond curls. "I've missed you so much."

Klaus trembled, his fingers like claws sunk into Caroline's flesh, and only when she felt a slight wetness over her belly she noticed that he was crying.

-.-.-.-.-.-

Words count: 2328.