Everything was white.
That was his first thought when he woke up. Usually after an explosion people act melodramatic and say everything was black and bleak, but all he could think was that everything seemed to be bright and clear, almost painful in it's clarity. For the first time in his life he could think clearly without people trying to push him into being someone he wasn't. His brothers did that. All. The. Time. It was getting sort of boring now actually.
He could hear ringing in his ears so sat up slowly to looked around properly. He was lying in the middle of a street. All alone. He could see debris everywhere, as if a bomb had gone off while he was sleeping. Strange, he didn't remember a bomb going off. Shattered glass was still falling around him, like deadly sharp snow. Everything was bathed in warm light from the sun. Bricks were scattered everywhere like fallen dominoes but still had a hazy glow to them. Cars were abandoned and left to rust, some with the doors still hanging wide open and yet they all looked strangely artistic in the sunlight. Curiously enough, he seemed to be lying on a mattress in the middle of the road.
"Memory foam? What the hell?" he was completely baffled.
He clambered to his feet, immediately getting a head rush and collapsing back onto the brand new mattress. His ears started to ring and he promptly blacked out.
His last thought was that he thought he could hear a wolf howl.
Bonnie opened her eyes slowly and was immediately accosted by the smell of greenery, you know that smell that hits you when you walk into a greenhouse on a hot day? Yes, exactly that one. She could hear a faint ringing in her ears and new that she might pass out if she stood up too quickly. So, whilst still laying down, she looked about her. Her dark hair was in her eyes so she lifted a hand to swipe it out of the way. With a gasp she noticed that her hand had some sort of swirly tattoo on it. It reached from her wrist all the way to each of her fingers. There was a strange writing that twined into the design; five different 'letters' printed on each finger and thumb. A quick check helped to prove that they were on both hands. She recognised them as runes but not what they meant Grams would know what they meant her heart ached as she thought of her dead grandmother. She missed her so much.
Her focus was brought back to her hands as, before her eyes, the tattoo swirled and moved across her hand. Smoke-like tendrils skated across her trembling fingers, moving in out of them. Hands shaking she moved them into the light and they faded to a dull grey, almost invisible if you didn't know what you were looking for, they almost looked like her veins in a weird way.
How the hell did they get there? Bonnie was just about to enter full out panic mode when she noticed where she was. From what she could gather she was in a dense forest, light streamed through the branches while she stared up at the patchwork sky. After her brain recognised all of this she naturally started to hyperventilate, panic mode activated. She tried to calm herself but it didn't work, deep breaths only made her sound like she was trying not to cry which just made her want to cry even more. This is not good.
Despite being warm she sensed rain not too far off. As if reading her thoughts the sky grew dark as the thunder clouds rolled into her view. Rolling onto her side she gingerly lifted herself up. Since she didn't feel like throwing up yet she took it to be a good sign and carried on rolling herself until she was propped against a nearby tree trunk. Once again she looked around, still trying to calm her shredded nerves. It was completely dark around her, the sun couldn't break through the clouds or the leaves. She tried to calm herself again whilst willing the clouds away. After a few deep breaths she had calmed herself enough that the clouds had almost completely disappeared.
Bonnie called the sunshine to her and then opened her eyes again,she could now see a path through the woods lit by small patches of light trickling through the dense leaves. Offering a silent prayer of thanks to the spirits she picked her way through the tangle of roots at her feet. Very soon she found herself on the edge of the trees, bordering a meadow of poppies and sweetpeas, it was cute in a way. It reminded Bonnie of the meadow scene in the Wizard of Oz, only with less dozing bodies among the shrubbery. The landscape was baffling, it stopped and started without bleeding into each other. And even more bizarre was the sky, instead of shades of blue it seemed to resemble more of a purple colour. Bonnie remembered something her physics teacher had taught her, something about blue stars changing the colour of the sky because the light is scattered differently? Something like that at least.
She continued her walk through the meadow ignoring the complete silence. Once again the landscape changed dramatically into a green field bordered on all four sides by hedges higher than Bonnie's 5 ft 6 frame. As she wandered through the field she examined her hands again, the colour seemed to be growing stronger as she got towards...something.
She just didn't know what.
His eyes flew open. Gasping, he jumped to his feet. The street had changed since he had last opened his eyes. Everything was wet, damp or washed away. And yet he and his mattress were bone dry. The debris had cleared itself and vines grew over everything. It was almost as if he had been fast forwarded 50 years into the future
"This is crazy." he whispered to himself.
"Got that right lad" the tell-tale rolling 'r' gave away the Scottish accent immediately.
The boy whirled around to face the Scotsman "Who the hell are you?" hysteria had risen his voice to a girlish screech. Coughing slightly he asked "You look familiar, have I threatened you before?". The stranger stared impassively at the boy who took a step back from the stranger, eyeing him warily. In his experience, nothing good ever came from talking to a stranger in a foreign land. He had learned that the hard way. Once upon a time.
"Robert Vincent MacCaulkin. Robbie to ma friends, and twits like yerself " the Scots smirked at the obvious fear in the boy. He enjoyed intimidating little twits, and nobody got more twit-like than the boy standing in front of him.
"Kol Mikaelson. Now, would you be so kind as to tell me where the fuck I am? Please?" he added after noticing the man was at least 6 ft 6, with a bow strapped to his chest while two very heavy looking swords criss-crossing his back, along with a quiver full of arrows. The man in question was wearing a dark green leather vest; on further inspection his arms were actually bare if not from the swirling black tattoos lacing their way up his tanned skin. Starting with his fingers they reached his elbow and snaked their way under his
Surprised at the boldness of the boy he decided on a sarcasm to put the little tyke at ease. "Charmer you are. Talk to your mother like that, eh? Like teh see what she would have sed about you using that kinda language to a good Samaritan like meself." Robbie smiled wryly at the skinny lad.
"I said please." he was getting impatient now. And he could be quite unpleasant when he was impatient. Or hungry. Or annoy- you know what? Kol was just not very pleasant at all. Except when he was around his little witch.
"Aye, that ye did" he conceded. "But we need to get teh business you and I do. Ye see, this is no ordinary place. No. This is the first circle of hell. Limbo you might call it-"
"Wait! Did you just say hell? As in hell!" the Scot only offered a shrug and a twitch of his lips. Kol was baffled, he couldn't remember dying. All he could remember was going over to the Gilbert house for...something. He was probably trying to get something off of those irritating Gilberts. They really were quite irritating, with their holier-than-thou attitudes, like they haven't ever killed anyone. Oh, wait. That was probably why he was in Hell and not Heaven, he killed people. And enjoyed it too.
"Yeah, like I sed. We're in the first ring of Hell, Limbo, and if you want to get out of this place we're gonna have to trace Dante's journey." and with that he turned on his heel and strode off.
"A+ for the ominous tone but just who the hell is Dante? And what journey did he go on?" he called after him. Kol had no other choice but to follow the retreating back