Sacrifice:

Chapter One

Summary: Futurefic—takes place during the inevitable battle. While the battle to protect Elena from Klaus reigns on, Elena is locked in the tomb with Katherine for her sake. Elena discovers more about Katherine and her past. A dark, twisted introduction to the vampire world and its secrets…including a tragic way how Damon's erased memory of Elena's will resurface…at a cost.

Drip…drip…

Somewhere water droplets were forming, and its slow transcend was the only sound that echoed throughout the tomb.

They sat exactly across each other with their eyes watching the other's movement (if any) and never leaving it. One had a devious smirk on her face. The other tried to muster the same amount of confidence while clutching her necklace with such a tight grip that turned her hands white.

No words or sound passed between them. However, they both soon became alerted to echoing noises from the outside. Slowly, starting with a few muffled cries, the sounds of battle outside amplified and moved closer to the tomb, closing in on them. As the noise grew, Elena could make out the sounds much clearer: a deafening scream, a yell of agony, and occasionally the indescribable sound of pain due to a bone breaking or an arm being ripped off. The reality of battle, being so overwhelming to her, caused Elena to retreat to a position where she hugged her knees with her head down whilst slowly allowing a tear to escape. The cruel sounds of battle filled her mind, and she sought an escape but found none. She had long forgot about her devious mirror image sitting across from her, and only sobbed helplessly while praying for the safety of her friends to no avail.

Katherine sat there watching, essentially watching herself cry. Feeling disgusted that her doppelganger could make her image look so weak—she hasn't shed a tear in over two centuries—, she broke the silence between the two.

"Looks like everyone's dying to protect poor, innocent Elena." She tilted her head to the left, making a sarcastic pout and look of pity.

"I never wanted this to happen! I was supposed to give myself up so they would be saved!" She retorted, a slab of guilt weighing down her voice.

Katherine rolled her eyes. "Oh please! Do you honestly think Klaus would come, pick you up and just go on his merry way?" She paused, not for an answer, but for a dramatic effect. "No! He would kill everyone—vampires, witches, and werewolves alike—anyway!"

"Then what do you want me to do?" Elena desperately demanded, half-hoping that Katherine could actually come up with something reasonable that she could do something—anything—that might help her friends from going straight to their death.

But no. Katherine simply replied, "Nothing. But, you can stop looking so whinny and pouty so that your friends at least don't die in vain."

Elena scoffed. "When have you ever understood friendship? Tell me, why are you even here?"

Katherine sighed again, briefly flashing back to the past which Elena's words reminded her of. "Well, I'm here because, in this great scheme to protect you, I ended up being the babysitter. I suppose they consider I would be too selfish to actually kill you. And to answer your first question, my true friends had long been dead to me. The moment I wasn't human anymore, they were gone. And.." She added, with a finger pointing. "They were literally gone too since Klaus actually killed them."

Before registering Katherine's words, Elena heard a cry of agony in which she recognized to be Damon. Just as she heard it, she felt as if someone had taken a hold of her and tried suffocate her. As if instinct took over, Elena got up on her feet, ran toward the exit of the tomb, and struggled to pull the brick wall open.

The next second, Katherine appeared before her and pushed her to the ground.

"You. Will. Not." Katherine loomed over her.

"Why?" Elena questioned, ignoring the pain her elbows felt as rocks met her impact on the ground. "Is it because you're scared that you'll be exposed yourself?" She taunted.

The next, she felt Katherine's heels on her and suffocating her. After seeing Elena struggle desperately, Katherine finally decided to relieve her foot from Elena. Waiting after Elena stopped coughing, she replied:

"You may think what you want about me, Elena. Yes, I'm the evil one, the unredeemable one, the heartless one. But don't you dare assume what I am. You have no idea about my past. Well, didn't you feel so much sympathy for Stefan after he revealed his little sob story? Guess what? I have one too. All of us do. And the fact is, I'm not afraid of death. You may ask myself why I haven't killed you yet. Well, you'll be the last of the Petrova women. And in a sense, I am too selfish to kill you because I'm too proud to let my bloodline die off." Breathing heavily, she finished her sentence. She sought to resolve her composure, suspecting her harangue right then had been too revealing.

Elena slowly got up, confused and speechless. Then, she ran the words over her head again, and she realized:

"You're dying."

To BE CONTINUED

A/N: Hi! I hope you've enjoyed it! And thank you for reading! I don't know why, but I love writing angst at moment so this story contains pretty much the worst possible way Damon's "I love you" can be remember by Elena.

And yes, I do believe there's even more to Katherine than her evilness. I think it's very unnatural if she is just left evil and evil alone—characterization basically just…well, sucks. There's just something interesting about writing a villain.

And just so you know, this story is DAMON/ELENA (I am a huge D/E shipper)…but there will be no real interaction between them (after all, this story is going to be pretty short—3 chapters at most?) so you'll have to wait and find out how in the world she is ever going to get that memory back.

Oh and, PLEASE LEAVE REVIEWS & COMMENTS! If you want me to, I can totally take a look at your own story and write what I think about it! :D

~M&M

P.S. One more thing: is it just me, or does Paul Wesley look almost exactly like Robert Pattinson? Ughh-I mean the forehead! The bone structure! Ha! Sorry, but I had always found Ian Somerhalder to be much more…MMMMHHMMM YUM.

Oh and HAPPY NEW YEARS!