They were imprisoned for being monsters, misled heroes. Now they are being freed to die for monsters. Except they're done being controlled and manipulated. Now, they're turning the tables. Now, they're out, and they hunger for revenge.
World On Fire.
I guess this is a sort of AU set after season 7? I don't know, but I do know I'm writing it because I felt the finale didn't do justice to the season at all. Firstly, I'm changing a few things: Caroline and Alaric never got engaged, because their pairing didn't make sense, and Caroline apparently is marrying him for all the wrong reasons on the show, so it's best to just say that they were raising the twins together, and I am actually going to write my speculation on what COULD have been in the vault.
Richmond.
Enzo hated morning people.
He just didn't understand them, how they had the energy to be so cheery and happy so early in the day, which was why instead of going to his job he didn't need on time, he got up an hour later to join Bonnie, one of those morning people, who was munching happily on cereal.
Okay, she was an exception.
"Hey." He smiled.
"Hey," she sipped some juice before speaking. "Aren't you supposed to be at work?"
"Yeah, but I thought I'd spend a few extra minutes with my girl." He smiled. She looked at him.
"Yeah right, lazy bugger."
"Hey, it's a six o'clock shift, no way I'm going in that early. It's like the middle of the night!" He argued, kissing her forehead.
"Hmm, absolutely." She nodded. He grinned, heading for the fridge and pulling out some milk. The post slid through their door and landed on the doormat.
"Is that the post?" Bonnie asked once she finished chewing.
"Yeah, hang on." He walked over and picked up the small pile. Just as he was sifting through, he came across something that made him freeze in horror.
"What is it?" Asked Bonnie, noticing his lack of movement. He looked up at her, face drained of colour.
"Come look at this." He said hoarsely. Frowning, she did so, and when he handed her the postcard, she too, stopped in her tracks. They looked at each other, fearful, breakfast completely forgotten.
"You know what this means, right?" Bonnie asked, eyebrows raised at him in worry.
Enzo looked at the postcard, the incriminating scribbles that meant so much more than anyone could have imagined.
"They're coming back. For us."
-X-
The Armoury, West Virginia, eleven hours ago.
Jason Drinkwell sorted the last of his files into the cabinet into alphabetical order before packing up for the night. It had been a long day; the files for the participants, he swore, had doubled in size since last week, and afterwards the cameras in the entire building had been hacked, and he as one of the few IT technicians, had had to download all the CCTV footage and email it out to his boss before saving it onto a USB to take home for further examination. Standard protocol if you wanted to live up to the expectations of your job, especially if that job was in the Armoury.
He picked up his suitcase and went to take out his USB from the port, when he noticed it wasn't there. Frowning, he searched his pockets and scanned the tables, but it seemed to have disappeared into thin air, and he could have sworn he had left it in the port to finish the download.
"Looking for this?" A man spoke from behind him. He whirled around, and saw a tall man, taller than him at least, with green eyes, with a blue shirt and matching trousers; the standard uniform for the participants, Jason realised, with cold horror. He didn't know all of them, having only seen a few photos, but this man he knew looked vaguely familiar to him. In his clenched hand, he held the USB stick.
"Yeah, it's um..." Jason couldn't think of anything to say, and something cold and crazy in the man's eyes made him take a subconscious step backwards. "Uh...how did you - how did you escape?" Were stupidly the only words that came out of his mouth.
"Aw, how cute, you've gone as pale as a sheet!" He grinned manically. "Look, shadow self, he's so scared he looks like he's about to have a heart attack!"
Jason jumped when another figure appeared from the shadows. Another man appeared, identical to the one in front of him.
"That's the effect you tend to have on people." He smiled, almost fondly at his twin, before focusing on Jason, who gulped nervously in response to the predatory gleam in this one's eyes.
"Urgh, don't be so sullen." He tossed the USB into the air. "So, ah…"
"Jason." Said man filled in shakily.
"Jason. You work for the Armoury, correct?" The one with his USB asked.
"Just - just handling the paperwork. Paperwork in an office, away from the actual cells." He stammered
"So you know what the Armoury have been up to?" The man persisted. A cold smirk hovered on his lips.
Jason shrank back away from those piercing eyes, looking frantically for an exit route. He spotted the fire escape out of the corner of his eye, opposite his office and instincts took over. He turned on his heel and legged it, speeding past the man out the office, feet pummeling the ground as they reached their goal.
"Aw, no, don't go!" One of the men called after him. "We're just getting started!"
Jason kept running, willing himself to move forward, to not look back, keep moving towards the door.
"Ey dome." The man muttered, and he felt his legs give way beneath him, a mysterious force dragging him back on his stomach to them. Then he was yanked up by the man, and sat down in a chair.
Great, so one guy was a witch, the other...
Well, he wasn't entirely sure what the other one was yet, witch or vampire, lack of witchy powers made him believe vampire, but he knew what else they both were. Doppelgängers. It made sense, if one of them was a witch, the other immortal. Why would the Armoury have had them if they were both just vampires?
Which meant, out of the few most notorious supernatural beings they had taken into capture, they could only be...
Shit... His mind was racing into overdrive. "Oh God, you-you're him, aren't you? The first immortal. You're..."
"Silas, yeah yeah, perfect specimen of man, etcetera -"
"Oh God, please no, please," He whispered to himself, squeezing his eyes shut. "I - I have a family...a wife, a daughter..." He blurted out, shaking uncontrollably.
The witch, Silas, pinched his cheek sharply. "Yeah, and does your wife know that she married a narcissistic pig who allowed experiments to go forth on other people, who also had families?" He cocked his head to the side, eyes piercing into him, and Jason was fixated on him, his words, watching for a tiny piece of compassion, even as the other man gripped his jaw, examining him for something.
"No-no, I'm - I'm just trying to support them, please..."
"Oh, it's not me you have to worry about," Silas shrugged. "Me? I'll just hurt you. Bad. But my shadow self over there? He'll hurt you, dismember you, and kill you, all in a day's work, then just do it to someone else."
Jason's insides froze solid. He looked back at the other man, who was smirking, almost sinisterly, a crazed look in his eyes.
"And you're that-that serial killer aren't you?" Jason said. He licked his lips nervously. "That one that leaves their victims in pieces, the Ripper."
The Ripper smiled. "Only sometimes." He leant forward, skimming his finger against Jason's neck, tracing the translucent veins. "Only in here." He pointed to his chest. "Normally I can keep him locked away, but now? Let's just say desperate times call for desperate measures."
And then without warning, he jammed his fangs into Jason's throat and tore through his carotid artery.
He was too far gone to even scream.
-X-
The Armoury, West Virginia.
Caroline shrieked as an alarm vibrated around her cell. Initially she thought it was an aneurysm, but then she realised the sound wasn't in her head; it resonates throughout the entire building.
Pushing herself off of her mattress, she hurried to the window, searching for a clue as to what was happening, when she saw her door cracked open.
The circuit had been broken.
She didn't wait one second and, though weakened by her lack of blood and vervain, she stumbled out of her cell, shoving open the now compliant door, and stepped out into the empty corridor. Why was it empty? Usually there was someone watching, but no one lingered. Wait, correction, an unconscious man lay at the end of the corridor by the door, arm outstretched, as though he had been reaching for it. Veins surged beneath her eyes, and without thinking twice, Caroline sped over and buried her fangs in his throat, relishing in the fresh, coppery taste hitting her pallette, her senses heightening, her strength restored the more she drank.
"Care?" A voice ripped her back into reality, and she stopped, looking over her shoulder, muscles tensed. She relaxed when she saw it was Damon, but wasn't overjoyed. She had been hoping for someone else.
"Damon, thank God," she moved to stand up, but her head spun, and she fell back onto the floor.
"Hey, hey, c'mere," Damon grabbed her wrists and hoisted her up, supporting her weight with his arms. "You're lucky I have to come through this way." He smirked as she sagged against him. "That's what you get for drinking blood with strong sedatives in it after being starved for five years."
"Glad to see you're still an ass." She mumbled, as he hurried her down the corridor and out the open door.
"Glad to see you haven't changed a bit." He retorted, unlocking a car.
"Mmm hmm." She nodded, her vision blurring, her limbs becoming heavy with fatigue. Damon had to lift her to place her into the car. She felt the door close, then Damon slide in next to her as he gunned the engine and sped out of the carpark. She squeezed her eyes shut, exhaustion washing over her, and felt her head slam into the window.
"Ow!" She mumbled, bending her head forward. That snapped her awake.
"Oi, Blondie! Blondie! You okay?"
"Urgh," Caroline sat up away from the window, rubbing her aching head. "Yeah, other than being on the run with you, I'm just great!"
"Just checking!" Damon called cheerily, and how was he even being cheery and happy after the events of the last eight years and their current predicament? "I'd hate to tell Stefan that you died because I failed to take care of you, you know."
"Funny, 'cause I for one, would love to see his face as you did so."
Damon laughed, then looked at her sombrely. "Seriously, though, are you okay?" It was a loaded question.
She sighed, and shook her head. "I don't know." She fought the urge to cry.
"Me neither." He muttered. She looked at him, but he didn't elaborate if it was about the betrayal that led to their capture, the research, or both.
It was both that had nearly destroyed her. That had shattered her hopes of ever seeing the twins again.
She blinked rapidly, trying to stay awake. "First things first, we need to find a way to get rid of these trackers." She pointed to the base of her skull, but it was a sluggish movement. "Then -"
"Yeah, we find the others."
"That's the most important thing. We've scattered. We need to reunite, before they find us again, I mean, what if -"
"Hey, it's gonna be fine, don't worry, Care bear," he said reassuringly. He touched her hand, and smiled. "We'll find the others. We'll find my brother. And the twins." His eyes darkened.
"Even if we have to tear the world apart to do it."
-X-
Brooklyn, New York.
Tyler Lockwood slammed headfirst into a locker door, pain exploding through his skull, liquid trickling down his neck. The concussion wouldn't have been so bad, except he had three broken ribs, and was pretty sure he wouldn't ever have an intact nose again.
"I suppose it's too much to ask for to spare my liver from the battering." He coughed drily.
Katherine Pierce stepped back into his line of sight, holding a splintered baseball bat. "I was aiming for a puncture in your lungs, so I could see you struggle for your every breath, until your heart gives out from the pressure," she stated calmly, cocking her head to the side and examining him. "but I suppose destroying your ability to consume any alcohol and control your sugar levels would be amusing to watch too." She prodded him with her heel. "Of course there's always making you strangle yourself, then we could always try out a game where I time how long it takes to saw your limbs off, and we could decorate you," her expression turned from thoughtful to flighty. "With chocolate sauce. Or sprinkles, maybe cake…"
"You're sick." Tyler spat, struggling to sit up. "You insane bitch."
Her face tightened, and she swung her bat onto her shoulder. She looked down on him, her scowl even worse on her emaciated face. "Hunger will do that to you." Katherine snarled. "I haven't had a decent meal in nearly a decade." She swung her leg out and connected. She heard one of Tyler's legs crack, and took great satisfaction in hearing him scream again. "Ah, but I guess it doesn't matter. I'll just feed from you."
"Is that why you're here? A feeding session? You could have gone down to the nearest hospital, but no, you tracked me down and followed me from work. Why bother?" Of course, as soon as he started speaking, he knew the answer.
Her face, pale white, flushed angrily in response. Her eyes flashed, bright with pain, and not for the first time, he saw the striking similarities between her and Elena. "Let me ask you something, Tyler." In that same, calm, controlled voice. "If you lost your child to an entirely preventable cause, would you burn on the inside with self-loathing? Smother it with vengeful fantasies of the person responsible?" She knelt down, inches away from his face. "When you have a child, that's what I want you to remember. To live in fear, that one day, you'll have to watch them die, for your misdoings, and." she broke a splint from her bat. "That they'll ask you, where you got those scars on your face from, and you'll have to keep on lying, or tell them that you murdered someone because you hated her mother, and risk them hating you."
He looked at her, her pain, for a split-second, before she yanked his head up and drove the splint right through his nose. A screech ripped itself from his throat as she twisted it deeper, blood spraying over her everywhere, and she laughed and laughed, his screams mingling with her glee in the air, creating an awful catawallowing.
Eventually, he stopped screaming, clawing fruitlessly at the wood and whimpering at the pain. She scoffed in disgust and stood back up.
"Luckily for you, I have a much more pressing matter at hand than your stupid screeching right now. Have you got a phone? I need to call someone, and it's urgent."
He grunted some sort of garbled nonsense through the blood and his broken nose, but whatever it was didn't matter, as Katherine rolled him over onto his front and began checking his pockets. Finding his phone, she turned it on, and used the emergency keypad to type in her desired number and pressed it to her ear, willing it to pick up. And then it did.
"Hello?"
Relief flooded through her. Silas's plan to hide his sim card on him had worked. "Hey, it's me, where are you?"
"I'm in Whitmore with Stefan." Silas replied. "How fast can you get here?"
"Well, that depends on my location, and whether or not Tyler survives the next hour." She turned to Tyler. "Where are we again?"
He muttered something like, "New York," and she relayed the information back to Silas.
"I'll just get a plane out or something. I should be there in a few hours."
"A few hours?"
"People might get difficult and may need...disposing of."
Silas laughed. "God, I've missed you." She felt something warm in her chest, and she smiled.
There was a pause, and then he spoke again. "How are you? Did they - did they hurt you?"
"Yeah." She nodded, shutting her eyes and pushing away the images. "Yeah they did, because I thought I'd never see you again, let alone speak to you. I was all alone."
"I'm glad that I provide good company." He quipped, and this time, she laughed.
"Um, I've gotta go, but I will see you and Stefan soon, okay? Text me your address and then remember to delete it right afterwards and throw your phone. They won't be far behind and they have a tendency to phone stalk."
"Okay."
She hung up and pocketed the phone, then turned back to Tyler, flipping open her pocket knife again. She kicked him swiftly in the head, knocking him back and stunning him, before grabbing his wrist and slicing deep into it.
She watched the blood well over his hand for a moment, watched the blood flow from the body of the man who had killed her daughter, had killed her humanity.
And then she drank from it.
-X-
Matt was sorting through a file of cold cases when his phone rang. Seeing Bonnie's name, he ignored it, letting it go to voicemail. Whatever it was wouldn't be that important, probably to do with the Thanksgiving party next month or something.
Which was what he thought before she called him four more times and sent him a series of tests demanding that he pick up and listen to her voicemail as soon as possible.
Sighing, Matt put down his file and clicked on the voicemail. What he heard sent shivers down his spine. "Hey, it's Bonnie. Call me back soon. Matt, we got a postcard, and if you got one too, you know what it means. We need to leave -"
Matt tersely hung up the phone, and looked at the mail on his table.
Sticking out from the middle was a piece of card.
He marched over to it, plucking it out from the pile and crumbled it up without so much as a glance at the cryptic message on it. Five years. Five years of relative peace, and now all of that was set to end for good. Well, he wouldn't let it. Matt hadn't fought this hard to get vampires out of his life for nothing. For all he knew, it was a joke. A joke to get him running and scared right into a trap. No, he wouldn't let himself be duped this time.
His phone, still clutched in his hand, vibrated, shocking him out of his thoughts. He looked at it, and saw his reminder to meet a member of the Armoury in twenty minutes and sighed, grabbing his keys.
He arrived in ten minutes and saw Tony Cross, one of the head assistants in the Armoury who had replaced Alex after her... disappearance when she opened the vault, and who also doubled as a police officer to track down supernatural crimes. He helped Matt keep vampires away from Mystic Falls, so proved to be a good ally.
"Thanks for coming, man." Tony shook his hand. "Sorry for arranging a meeting this late, but this really is important."
"No problem sir, anything I can do to help." Matt replied. "What's wrong?"
"We have a case that took place just thirty miles from here. Since you're the Chief in the department nearest to it, we figured we'd alert you first." Tony removed a small folder from his coat pocket and examined it. "A Jason Drinkwell, an IT technician for the Armoury, disappeared last night. His wife reported him missing this morning after he failed to return home, and when we visited his office, we found him." Toby took a deep breath. "Just sitting there, pale and unmoving. And then when we went to examine him...his head rolled completely off his shoulders. His neck was covered in bite marks."
Chills ran up Matt's spine. Bonnie's words came back to him, and he tightly clenched the postcard into a crumpled ball in his pocket. "And? Obviously you wouldn't be telling me this unless there was something else deeper involved." Maybe it was just a coincidence, nothing more.
"Yeah." Another deep breath. "Last night, about an hour before Jason was killed, the vampires you sold out to us...they escaped."
Rage swept through him, so powerful, he could perhaps forget his fear. "What do you mean they escaped?" Matt asked, gripping the handrail tightly.
"I mean, that something happened, a breach in security maybe, it doesn't matter, but all the cells were unlocked electronically, and the prisoners all fled, scattered." He tipped his hat back. "They're stunned and scared, for now, but they'll regroup. And we can't let that happen."
"What? Why not? They're just vampires and witches you've captured before. What's the problem?"
"Well...they..." He hesitated, and Matt stiffened.
"For God's sake, what is it?"
"The Armoury didn't keep them just because you reported them. They wanted subjects to experiment on...witches and vampires."
"Wait, what?"
"And, it hasn't been determined as of yet..." Tony chewed his lip, in a worryingly nervous way, Matt thought, to speak about the true nature of the participant's...captivity. "or not the experiments actually worked."
"What kind of experiments?" Matt persisted.
Tony paused. "Nothing you need to worry about, unless it turns out that they worked. And it's very unlikely," he added as Matt scoffed. "That they did. In the last four years, none of the three used for the research expressed any sort of change to prove us wrong."
"Look, it doesn't matter at the moment. If they don't know what was happening, they won't be able to use it as a weapon against us, just tell me that you can track them."
"We do keep a tracker injected into them at all times, in case they block locator spells or we need to transport them or use them to work against supernatural criminal activity, so yes, we can track them, but three of them are moving very quickly, it seems, out of Virginia, so we're going to need all the help we can get."
"Okay, I can get my team on it." Matt nodded.
"Thanks, I'll call later," Tony turned to head down the stairs, then turned back around. "And don't worry, we'll have them back soon."
Matt wished he could believe him, but something in Tony's eyes told him that this grand escape was only the beginning.