A/N: This is the beginning of the bloodlust multi chapter arc. Just to pre-warn you, the themes of this fic are quite serious and there is a heavy focus on the Damon and Elena relationship. It follows right around where we left off in 2x22 although I have taken Katherine (my poor homegirl gets no love) completely out of the picture, enjoy:
They travel for miles only stopping when absolutely necessary, to hunt and feed and kill. He's murdered 18 people already. 18. He has no idea how long it's been since they've left Mystic Falls, whether it's been days or weeks but the bodies, the bodies tell him. He's not keeping count for a reason; he's keeping count like it's automatic, a tally going around in his head. Body after body. He's messier than he ever was, lazier with the way he moves but he's quicker too, painless even as he fumbles through the blindness of not knowing how hard he'd bitten or sucked because the stench and desire and need for blood is too strong. He tries though, he tries through the screams and the way some people fight him, he tries to make it less painful. For them. For himself. There's no longer a notion of reality in his mind but there is some in the bodies. There is some, in the way Klaus watches on like a predator about to eat his prey only Stefan's the course he won't feed on.
"I'm impressed." Klaus mutters over to him one night; the girl in his arms, who couldn't be more than 15 years old, is barely conscious, her eyes rolled to the back of her head though Stefan can tell by the way she was still softly moaning, that she was in pain.
They've fallen into a back and forth repertoire before and after but never during. The man he's just killed himself, the girl's father, is slumped by Stefan's feet and Stefan merely grunts, wiping his face with the back of his hand and being careful he didn't look back down at the body. He hates Klaus. Even through though this lust and desire for nothing but the way blood oozed from another persons skin, the way it tasted and dried in his mouth. He hates him and clings onto it because it's the only piece of humanity he has got left.
And Elena. He's got Elena. On some nights, when they've found a place to rest and it's still and quiet enough for Stefan to remember, he thinks of her. There's a part of him, that doesn't want to. There's a part of him that thinks remembering her is the worst thing he could do, that remembering her will be the weight on his chest, will be the second he hesitates before killing another person because they've started to cry or breathe too quickly and he wants to die. He wants to die but Elena.
Elena, he thinks. Elena.
And he still lives.
They look for a month. Together because Damon won't let her go by herself and she's not stupid enough to try and sneak out without him; you could never sneak with Damon anyway, Elena's learnt.
It's a solid month of maps and spells and search parties that lead them nowhere and give them nothing but a further dwelling of hopelessness; a helplessness that makes them often lash out at each other because there was nobody else to blame and it feels like they need to be blaming this on someone.
"We're not doing enough." Elena spits one night, looking hard at Damon who was standing on the other side of the room with a scotch glass in his hand. He twirls it back and forth, watching the liquid splash at the sides and wills himself not to look over at her even though he can feel her eyes boring into the back of his neck. Looking at her these days has been dangerous. He sees life and feels an ache that pushes too close against his chest, an ache that doesn't let him sleep anymore. An ache he has for his brother.
He looks at her, always and sees Stefan, completely.
"Do you have any suggestions?" He asks and then he sighs because he's tired but not with her, just at this situation in general because he feels it too, this restlessness, this need to keep moving and doing, working to find his brother. They weren't doing enough but he's tired because what else can they do?
Elena shakes her head, shoving her arms over her chest, locking her jaw; feeling the way her heartbeat was racing, the way she felt like the entire world was about to shake if she so much as moved off balance from it.
"I can't do this anymore, Damon, I can't keep waiting. I can't keep standing here, waiting and doing nothing, I can't."
Damon looks over at her without even thinking about it and sees the tears in her eyes he's sure have been there a lot longer than she's realized. He studies her face, really studies it for the first time in weeks and she looks exhausted, like she hasn't slept anymore than he has. She looks defeated and worn out, like she's had enough but can't bring herself to admit or believe it. She looks lost and lonely and he finds himself wondering if she were thinking as much as he was, of the person Stefan was being forced to become. The person she had only briefly met, the person his brother was years before he was.
"We'll keep looking. We will. I promise." He tells her, putting his glass down and she drops to the couch, unable to keep standing but there's a small, hopeful smile on her face even though he can tell she doesn't really believe it but that's enough. That's enough to suppress not only the ache of missing and wanting his brother back but of also still desperately wanting her, hating himself.
Elena stands from the couch, leaving to go upstairs to Stefan's bedroom, where she had cooped herself up in ever since he had left and Damon ducks his head, feeling for the scotch again but instead finding her hand, soft and small, squeezing his.
"Thank you, Damon." She whispers, her lips at his cheek and she knows how dangerous this is, knows that he does too but he brings himself to closing his eyes and letting her kiss his cheek because right now the only things the two of them had were each other and even though that's exactly what he's wanted for the better half of a year, it feels so much more bitter than he ever would have imagined, without the other third of them there, without the person he's always wanted.
