Hellooooo Readers! SteampunkFairytale here, and I'm back and better than ever with another crossover with The Vampire Diaries and Twilight. The pairing is most assuredly Bella/Damon, since Bella with either Damon Salvatore or Dean Winchester is totally my OTP, and there aren't nearly enough creative takes on either ship, I decided that I would lend my pen to the task. Hope you enjoy!

Summary: Damon amuses himself by checking out the ludicrous myths that people come up with about Vampires. Bella's finally on track to finding out what Edward and his family are. They meet on a Vampire Lore message board, and quickly grow close. Soon Damon finds himself falling in love again against his will. Small problem: Bella's in love with Edward... right? Bella/Damon, mild Bella/Edward. Set in Twilight just after Bella visits La Push, and Season One of The Vampire Diaries, not long after Damon finds out that Katherine wasn't in the tomb

You Have: One New Message

Prologue

Bella lay on her bed, thinking of the trip she took to the beach earlier that day. Or rather, the story Jacob Black had told her in a good natured attempt to frighten her. She stared blankly at the ceiling, listening to the winds whip and howl around her window. Could The Cullens really be Vampires? It was impossible...right? She grit her teeth. What could it have possibly been then? She couldn't just explain away all the impossible things she had seen. It had to be true. She glanced at the clock. It was only half past twelve at night. She had been able to function with far less sleep before. Decision made, Bella rolled out of bed, heading over to her dinosaur of a computer.

While waiting for her ancient computer to finish, she started doubting herself again. "This is crazy." She murmured to herself, shaking her head. The main screen on her computer blossomed to life and Bella bit her lip, hand hovering hesitantly over the mouse. In another fit of determination, she quickly opened the search engine and typed her search into google before she lost her nerve.

Vampires.

Damon lounged sullenly before the fire, knocking back another glass of bourbon. What the actual fuck was he supposed to do now? Katherine wasn't in the tomb. She had never been in the tomb. A part of him hoped that she died in that fire. It was preferable to the alternative, but somehow he doubted that that was the case. Katherine had always been clever, so it stood to reason that she had figured a way out of the fire. That meant that Katherine had been free all this time, and hadn't cared enough to go looking for him. For well over a century his main goal was to have Katherine back, and all this time she hadn't cared, had never cared about him. All that fucking time wasted. He poured himself another glass, and shot that back too. Saint Stefanie was almost too easy to torture nowadays. One little suggestive smirk Elena's way and he was ready to rip his own hair out. It actually wasn't even fun anymore. He groaned and shot back yet another glass. He was over a century and a half old, and this was the first time since becoming a Vampire that he was actually bored of all things. He rolled his eyes and went to pour himself another shot only to realize that he had emptied the last bottle. Lovely, now he didn't even have alcohol to distract him.

He wandered aimlessly around the house, stopping when he reached his brother's room. The laptop he used for school was sitting innocently on the table, and Damon shrugged. Maybe he could get his brother's brooding eyebrows of doom to an all new level by leaving some porn open in the web browser or something to see when he got back from his little sleepover with Elena. Maybe it'd actually encourage his baby brother to pull the giant stick out of his ass for once. Not likely, but hey, a guy can dream. What else could he do to pass the time though? Googling his name wouldn't really bring anything up, unlike Stefan he was actually careful about that sort of thing. It did give him an idea though. Smirking, he quickly typed in a word that'd likely give him hours of amusement over the common stupidity most humans seemed to share.

Vampires.

Bella hesitated again, unsure of what to write. This message board was probably more than just a bad idea, it was probably going to get her stalked and murdered by some goth creep living in his mother's basement. It was less than likely that she would actually light upon something useful. The Lair: Vampire Lovers Only was a website where misguided teens likely in serious need of psychological aid gathered in droves. Which actually could end up applying to her now that she thought about it. Shaking her head, she steeled herself. She had made the decision to go through with this, and dammit, she was gonna stick to it. She had picked out her username and everything already, a vague reference to one of her favorite authors that only a classic literature buff like herself would probably get. She nervously typed out a message, painfully aware of how cliche it looked.

Ellis_Bell: I think a boy in my class might be a Vampire. He's pale white, as cold and hard as marble with eyes that change from black to gold, and seems to be impossibly fast and strong. Could he actually be a Vampire?

Bella braced herself again as she hit the post button. She stayed on the website, scrolling through various topics and public conversations. It looked like one guy in particular was having the time of his life tearing into all the grammatically challenged tweens claiming to have had experiences with Vampires. Bella shook her head, hoping this guy wouldn't go anywhere near her own post.

That was when the stream of denials started popping up under her question.

Damon was absolutely thrilled with this new pastime he had found. Ripping into these idiot little freaks that believed that Vampires were these lonely and misunderstood angelic creatures had been the most fun he had had in ages. He shook his head, grinning maniacally. His grin grew as he came across a more recent post by an Ellis_Bell. Well well, a Bronte fan among these uncultured heathens? This he had to see. He clicked on the thread curiously, seeing how many responses it had already gotten. His grin faded however as he read the post. What were the chances that he would actually come across a genuine Vampire problem? And one of the other kind at that? He scrolled down to see the responses, shaking his head as apparently everyone denied that this girl was actually going to school with a Vampire. Honestly, these children wouldn't know a Vampire if it literally bit them in the ass.

Damon read over Ellis_Bell's post again, internally debating if he should tell the poor girl the truth. If it was the other kind of Vampire, she could very well be in serious danger. Then again, apparently this eternal teen liked bambi as much as his brother. It was possible that the girl would be totally fine, as long as she dropped the whole Vampire line of thinking. Though his brother was a vegetarian Vampire as well, and he was a ticking time bomb of ripper bloodlust waiting to go off. The other kind of Vampire were even less controlled than his own, going completely savage for the first year or so of their unlives. Nodding decisively, Damon went to give his own response to Ellis_Bell.

After all, he couldn't let the first semi-intelligent person on this forsaken website die, could he? She had actually used punctuation properly and wrote in legible English after all.

vampgirl666: OMG HOW CAN YOU TINK THATS A VAMPIRE YOU IDIOT VAMPIRES HAVE FANGS DUH

FangsBro: vamps cant go out at day dont know why you thought this was a vamp tbh

Spuffy4EVA: 2EZ girlfriend. Totally not a vamp

LestatsLover: VAMPS DONT HAVE GOLD EYES 4COL

Bella shook her head as she looked at the growing list of poorly spelled denials. What made her actually go through with this she had no idea. She knew it would be no help. She was about to give up and close everything down when one more response popped up on her thread.

SexyBeast: Looks like you've got a Cold One on your hands gorgeous. Feel free to PM me for more info ;)

Bella stopped short, mouse icon hovering over the tiny red X in the corner of the screen. Alarms went off in her head, every inch of the cop's daughter in her sending up red flags. This was the only concrete lead she had gotten though. After a moment's inner debate, she opened up a private chat and messaged SexyBeast.

Ellis_Bell: You know, your username doesn't really inspire confidence that you're not some kind of internet perv.

Moments later, her inbox dinged with a new message.

SexyBeast: I'm just being honest babe, you'll have to take my word for it. ;)

Bella shook her head, just barely suppressing a light laugh. She didn't want to risk waking Charlie.

Ellis_Bell: I suppose I do. Now, what's this about Cold Ones?

SexyBeast: First thing's first gorgeous, I want to know some things too. You need to tell me everything that's happened.

And that's all she wrote folks, for today at least. Hope you enjoyed. For those who don't know, Ellis Bell is the pen name Charlotte Bronte used when she published Wuthering Heights, which is Bella's favorite book in Twilight Canon, and the message board here is the one Jeremy went on in season 1, episode 16. See ya soon! :)