Elena sighed heavily as she climbed the stairs to her front door. She was so tired; it had been such a long day. Being tired did not help her find keys easily or get the right one into the lock. After two attempts, she managed to open the door. She wearily closed the front door behind her and headed to the bottom of the stairs.
"Jeremy? Are you up?" she called. The next second Elena heard a noise from the kitchen. 'If that's Jeremy, why didn't he answer me?' she thought worriedly. "Jeremy?" Are you okay?" she said hesitantly as she walked towards the kitchen.
As she came around the corner, she saw Jonathan crumpled on the floor, bleeding profusely.
"Uncle John!" Elena exclaimed as she rushed over to him. She knelt and puts her hands over his stomach wound, trying to stop the bleeding.
"What happened?" she asked hurriedly.
"Ka...Katherine," he managed to sputter out.
"What?" Elena gasped.
"She...she's here..."
A cold chill ran down her spine. "Where is she?"
Jonathan started to cough up blood. They both could sense that he was not going to make it. He struggled, but managed to say in between his gasps, "She's here...in the house..."
Elena completely froze. She couldn't hear anything but her own heart beating faster and faster. Her mind was moving so quickly, trying to figure out what to do. Part of her wanted to run out of the house and find Stefan and Damon, but the other part of her knew she needed to see if her aunt Jenna and her brother Jeremy were alright, but she was terrified of seeing Katherine.
After a few seconds, she managed to unfreeze and looked down to see that John was dead. She removed her hands from his bloody wound and was just about to get up when she sensed a presence behind her.
"Elena."
Her blood ran cold as she recognized the voice coming from behind her. It sounded like her voice. Taking a deep, uneven breath, she slowly stood up and turned around.
It really was like looking in a mirror; across the kitchen stood Katherine. She looked exactly like Elena: same curly brown hair, same oval shaped face, same rounded nose, same bow shaped lips, same rectangular body shape, even their cropped, black leather jackets were similar. The one difference Elena noticed though was in her brown eyes. There was no life in them. Katherine's eyes were just like her mother Isobel's, void of all humanity.
"Hmmm...," Katherine mused, "I've often wondered what our first real meeting would be like..."
"Real meeting?" Elena asked hesitantly.
"Oh, I've been in Mystic Falls for a few weeks now watching you, and Stefan, and Damon," she explained as she started to walk around the counter. Elena didn't dare move.
"I have to admit," Katherine continued, "you are a lot like me Elena. You certainly look like me and you have the same infatuation with the Salvatore brothers that I used to have," she paused, "or still have..."
"I love Stefan," Elena interrupted, "Damon and I are just friends."
"Oh don't deny it Elena. I saw the way that you two danced together at the pageant..."
Elena took a sharp intake of breath. Katherine had now walked around the entire counter and was standing directly in front of her, only a few steps away.
"Yes Elena, I was there. You may love Stefan, but you and Damon have a connection. The chemistry that you two have is so passionate, it's on fire. It's almost as passionate as what we used to have. The way he kissed you..well me, just now, wow, it was like we'd never been apart."
Elena looked confused and disgusted. "He kissed you?"
"Oh don't fret Elena. He thought I was you."
"Did you do anything to him?" she asked suddenly worried.
"No, he left after your rude aunt interrupted us."
"Jenna? What did you do to her?" she squeaked, feeling tears well up in her eyes.
"She's fine...for now anyway. I just gave her a nasty bump on the head, but you really should go and check on your brother Jeremy..."
"Why?" Elena managed to whisper through her tears.
"Well, when I went to knock him out as well, he was already unconscious..." Katherine's mouth turned into a vicious smirk.
"Jeremy!" Elena screamed. She was suddenly not afraid of Katherine anymore. Jeremy was more important to her. She decided to make a run for it upstairs. She no longer cared what Katherine could do to her. She had to get to Jeremy.
In a flash, Elena bolted from her spot and headed for the stairs. She saw nothing as she ran except for what was in front of her. She could not tell if Katherine was following her or had already beaten her upstairs. She barged into Jeremy's room and saw him sprawled out on his bed passed out.
"Jeremy?" Elena screamed while shaking his shoulders. Without hesitation, she grabbed the phone and dialed 9-1-1.
"9-1-1 dispatch. What is your emergency?" a friendly yet stern female voice asked.
"My brother, he's unconscious for some reason."
"But he's breathing?"
Elena looked at Jeremy's chest and could just barely see the shallow rise and fall of his chest.
"Yes."
"Okay, your address?"
"227 Mystic Lane."
"An ambulance is on its way. Do you know what happened?"
"No, I just found him like this," said Elena panicked.
"Okay, look around his room for me and tell me if you see anything unusual."
"Okay," Elena said shakily.
She began looking around his room quickly. Everything looked normal, but then something she could see from the open bathroom door caught her eye. She ran into the bathroom and realized that what caught her eye was the shine off the side of a plastic orange pill bottle.
"I think he took a bunch of pain meds," Elena said hurriedly.
"Okay, thank you miss. I'll inform the paramedics. Please go and wait by your front door to let them in. They should be there soon."
"Okay, thank you," she blurted out and then hung up the phone.
As she did this, she looked down at the bathroom counter and saw something else. It was a small, clear glass vile, but it had some red residue inside it. As Elena picked it up, she realized what was inside it. She immediately lost grip on the vile and dropped it. It fell, hit the counter top, and shatterd.
"No...no...oh my gosh, no, no no!" Elena sobbed.
A knock at the front door made Elena jump. She quickly ran downstairs to let the paramedics in. Elena grabbed the doorknob and jerked the door open.
"Elena?" a worried voice asked.
"Damon?" she managed to sputter through her tears.
In less than a second, Damon was inside her house and in the next, Elena crumpled into Damon's arms. He just held her tight for a moment and let her cry. Her sobs were so heavy. He felt his heart breaking more and more with each sob.
"Elena, shhh...What's wrong? What's happened?" Damon had smelled blood in the house when he approached their door and now inside, he smelled a lot of it.
Elena lifted her head off of Damon's shoulder and took a deep breath. "Katherine's here, she killed Jonathan, Jeremy's unconscious, I don't know where Katherine's gone, and oh my gosh, I don't even know where Jenna is!" she listed quickly as she jerked her head around looking for signs of Katherine or Jenna.
Damon really had been listening, but Elena had spoken so fast and was still sobbing, so he only got pieces of what she had said.
"Elena...Elena honey," he took her face between his hands and slowly brought her head towards his until their foreheads were touching.
"Shhhh...," he soothed.
They both closed their eyes until Elena calmed down. After a minute, they both took a deep breath and Damon let go of her face. They both stood up straight and focused.
"Alright Elena, from the beginning."
"Okay. I came home and heard a thump in the kitchen. I went in and Uncle John was bleeding. He had a stomach wound and a few of his fingers had been cut off, his ring finger was one of them. He told me that Katherine was here in the house..."
"Is she still here?" Damon interjected, worried.
"I don't think so, but I'm not sure."
"Okay, continue," he instructed as he began to heighten his senses to try and detect her presence.
"Then he died. I felt a presence behind me. It was Katherine. We talked..."
"What about?" Damon interrupted, curious.
Elena hesitated.
"Sorry, off topic," he nervously corrected with a terse smirk.
"I asked about Jenna and she said she knocked her out. She then said that Jeremy was already unconscious. I ran upstairs and he was passed out. There was an empty pill bottle of pain meds. I called 9-1-1 and they are on their way."
"Okay, well that's good then," Damon stated reassuringly, while trying to process all of what Elena had said.
"But Damon..." Elena said as tears threaten to well up in her eyes again, "there was an empty vile on the counter too, it looks like it had blood in it..."
Damon's eyes grew big. "It must have had Anna's blood in it..." speculated Damon.
"Where is Anna?" Elena asked forcefully.
His eyes saddened and her expression softened.
"She's dead. She died in the fire."
"Oh," Elena looked down.
"This is all my fault..."
"What? No Damon, this isn't your fault," said Elena as she looked up into Damon's eyes. She was surprised by what she saw. Guilt and shame were written all over his face. This time, Elena took her hand and cupped Damon's face. He leaned into her hand. For a moment they just stood in silence; him leaning into her hand with his eyes closed and her trying to understand what must be running through his mind.
"But it is my fault Elena," said Damon as he lifted his head up out of her hand and lifted his eyes to hers. "I came by earlier to apologize to Jeremy about Vicki. I told him that Anna was dead and that I wished I could have helped her. That must have set him off..."
They were both silent for a moment.
"And," continued Damon, "just to further prove how this is all my fault, let me ask you this. Did we make out earlier tonight?"
This blunt question shocked Elena, but she managed to shake her head.
"Damn it! I knew I recognized that kiss!" Damon said to himself more than to Elena.
"So you kissed her..." Elena said a little hurt.
Damon looked directly into Elena's eyes.
"I thought I was kissing you Elena," Damon stated, still looking into her eyes, "I wanted to be kissing you..."
Elena surprisingly felt no shock at this declaration. They held each other's gaze for another moment and then feeling awkward, they both looked away. The next moment they heard a sound outside. It was the ambulance pulling into the driveway.
"Elena, you let the paramedics in. I'll run upstairs and look for Jenna."
And in a flash, he was gone, using his super-speed before the paramedics came in. Elena opened the door quickly to let the paramedics and the gurney inside. Her heart began to race again.
"Where is he?" one young, male paramedic asked.
"Uh, first door on your right at the top of the stairs," Elena said quickly.
In what seemed like a flash, the paramedics and the gurney were up the stairs too. Elena stayed glued to her spot on the floor. She knew that she would just be in the paramedics' way. She was also trying to control a new wave of panic that was setting in.
However, this new wave of panic decreased as she saw Damon helping a conscious yet groggy Jenna down the stairs.
"Jenna!" Elena screamed as she rushed to hug her. Damon kept a hand on Jenna's back as she was still a little unsteady on her feet.
"I am so glad you are alright!" Elena continued as they continued to hug.
"What happened?" asked Jenna, touching the protruding bump on her head.
"Please step aside," said the young, male paramedic. They were bringing Jeremy down on the gurney.
"What's wrong with Jeremy?" Jenna asked with a scared expression on her face.
"Just go with them aunt Jenna. I'll come by the hospital soon to explain what happened."
"Excuse me," Damon said, touching the young, male paramedic's arm, "is he going to be alright?"
"We managed to get him to throw up most of the pills. When we get to the hospital, we'll pump the rest of his stomach just to make sure, but yes, he should hopefully be okay since we got to him in time."
Damon and Elena both let out a pent up sigh at the news. Jenna followed the paramedics out and climbed into the ambulance after they got Jeremy in. She gave Elena one last confused and hurt look before the doors closed.