A/N – Hello, yes I still write. Shocker I know. I finally had a stroke of inspiration and voila! Here is my first three part story in like forever. So please, be nice to poor me. Part 2 and 3 should be up soon as well! Let me know what you thought! It would mean a lot.

Written for Caryn's Birthday (Mytraitorousheart on FF/ Stannissqueen on Tumblr)

Klaus wasn't a believer. Never had been.

He didn't believe in it. In change. In someone's will to change.

He didn't think that one person, one moment, one event could alter someone's life so drastically.

Until he met her.

"I did what I had to do and because of me Husband of the Year is alive and back to being a dick to his wife. You should be thanking me Elijah, not yelling at me. I saved his life." Klaus bellowed into his phone, hoping it could convey to his brother just how loudly he was yelling. Shifting on his legs and leaning against the car behind him, Klaus tilted his head and sarcastically added, "That's kinda what doctors are supposed to do, in case you missed that day in cuckoo college."

"His head was either going to get cut open in the morgue or my OR. Only one of those end up with him alive, so stop being a sissy, go sit on your bureaucratic ass and sign some papers." He added, thoroughly ignoring Elijah and speaking over him. Rolling his eyes and tapping his cane against the concrete floor, Klaus tried and failed paying attention to his brother. It was the same thing as always; he was irresponsible and impulsive, and his drug addled brain was going to end up getting him fired, arrested or dead, or all of the above. It had been the same lecture for 7 years now, and Klaus was getting sick and tired of it.

In the distance, he could hear the faint clicking of heels against the floor. And sure enough when he looked up he saw a woman walking towards him. Blonde hair, what looked like blue-green eyes and from his years of debauchery he could tell, a sumptuous figure under her trendy black coat. Now, he was definitely not paying attention to Elijah.

"How long are you going to use your leg as an excuse for your behaviour?" Elijah snapped from the other end of the line, and this time, Klaus paid attention.

"My leg is not an excuse," Klaus yelled back, shifting his weight over to his right side and violently tapping the cane against the floor. As he turned to face the other way, away from the prying eyes of the woman that had almost reached him. "I'm in pain. I've been in pain 24x7, 365 days a year for 7 freaking years. Vicodin takes away the pain. Would you prefer I skip over the slightly dangerous prescription pain meds and go straight to shooting heroin? Would that dull your guilt, brother mine?" He added in a snarl, acutely noticing the lack of clicking heels behind him.

There was silence from the other end, until with a heavy voice and steely anger Elijah replied, "Only you blame me for your leg. I saved your life."

"Just like I did with the patient." Klaus pressed back, turning around on his heels to see the blonde woman staring at him with wide and mildly judgy eyes. As always, he controlled his scoff when her eyes travelled down to his cane and her face softened just a little bit. "And now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go track down my dealer and score some heroin to cure the massive headache you just gave me."

Snapping his phone shut and slouching his shoulders, Klaus nodded his head sarcastically as he said, "Yeah, cripples can be jerks. Shocking, I know. But show's over."

She looked taken aback, taking a step away from him and shaking her head, in anger or surprise he couldn't tell. Turning back to look at him with narrowed, incensed eyes, she said, "Yeah. I'm just trying to get to my car." He startled slightly, straightening up and looking over his shoulder at the blue Honda he was leaning against.

Clearing his throat, he moved to the side giving her room to get to the car as he muttered a 'Sorry' under his breath. Something she heard and dismissed as she let out an exasperated laugh and hunted for her keys in her giant oversized handbag.

"I'm Klaus," he provided awkwardly, unsure of what to say, and even more unsure of why he hadn't just walked away already. "Or Nik if you prefer. That sounds less like Himmler's sidekick, yes." He continued, almost rolling his eyes at himself. Sure, she was beautiful, but he saw pretty women all the time. And if he paid them enough, they didn't even look at him with pity. Or distaste, like the mystery Blonde woman was looking at him right now. "I usually try to fight about drugs in more public places, but I missed the office rush."

"Good to know," she replied cockily, giving him a sarcastic look, opening her car door and throwing her bag in the backseat.

"I didn't catch your name," he asked subtly, or as subtly as he thought when she chuckled and shook her head and spoke, "That's because I didn't give you a name."

"Hey," he perturbed, feigning hurt, "I showed you mine."

Turning to look at him, she cocked her eyebrows and looked down at his leg, a half amused smile on her face as she said, "I'm sorry about your leg."

His whole body language changed in the flash of a second. His shoulders slumped as he pulled all the weight of his body onto his left side, supporting himself on his bum leg with the help of his cane. Containing a scowl, he puffed out, "Here we go." in a small, disinterested voice.

"What?"

"This is the part where you tell me the sob story about your cousin thrice removed that broke his leg and had the worst 6 weeks of his life. Spare me." He added condescendingly, spittle flying out of his mouth as he turned around to walk away.

"Actually," she bellowed back, a tinge of anger in her voice as she took a few steps towards him and spoke, "I was going to tell you about the time I met this monk in Tibet, who lost both his legs and one arm, and was in worse pain than you can even imagine. And yet, he was the happiest man I've ever met." She paused for a second, most probably noticing the way his back tensed at her words, "Not all people in pain are giant douchebags."

Stopping in his track, he smiled to himself as he turned around and pointed his cane at her, a mischievous squint in his eyes and he probed, "You made that up."

"Nope," she chided back, popping the 'p', bouncing on her heels and playfully widening her eyes at him.

Laughing to herself, as if unsure why she was doing it, she tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear and spoke softly, "Caroline. My name is Caroline."

He smiled inertly, feeling out her name in his head. It fit. She looked like a Caroline. Taking a step towards her, he nodded preemptively and felt out her name on his lips, "Nice to meet you, Caroline."

The last thing he remembered was feeling her name roll over his tongue. And then.

Darkness.

When he was 9 his parents had dragged him to Hawaii on vacation. He hated the sun, and the water, and people in general. But he was 9 and wasn't exactly given a choice. Mommy was depressed that daddy was banging his secretary, so mommy was getting an expensive vacation to 'heal'. They went swimming with the dolphins, which took a turn for the worse when one of the instructors started to, well, die. He remembered his sister crying and Elijah trying to comfort her.

He'd never forget the sound the man was making. It sounded like something from a horror movie. Deep, guttural noises that made it obvious how hard he was finding it to breathe. It sounded like pain and helplessness. It sounded like death.

It was the same sound he could hear now. Helpless, painful short breath sounds not far from him.

And other noises; loud voices yelling out things he couldn't understand. An ambulance siren far off in the distance. The beeping of a machine. But it was that sound, of the dying person that stuck out in his head.

Why? Where was he? Who was dying? And why did it matter?

Curiosity, and basic human instinct prodded him to open his eyes and try to make sense of the blurry shapes in front of him.

Metal, concrete, debris. Metal, concrete, debris. Metal, concrete, debris.

And that sound. That damn sound.

He bounded his eyes shut, trying to clear the blurriness and remember what had happened.

Friday. Burnt Toast. Kol being an ass. Cutting open the patient's head. Elijah. Yelling. Heroin. Tibet. Girl. Collapse.

"Caroline," He muttered, his eyes flew open as he attempted to lift up his head and realized that he was lying flat on his back. And then, the thumping in his head got worse but the voices got closer. He could make out people talking not far away from, their frantic worried words finally starting to make sense.

"She needs oxygen."

"We can't risk bringing oxygen down here."

Painfully, he turned himself around and propped onto his elbows, slowly inching his way towards the noises, ignoring the intense shooting pain in his leg. He could make out shapes in the distance now, a body lying on the ground and two men, who looked a lot like firemen fretting over it.

"Caroline," he managed to gurgle out when that noise got louder and louder, and he realized, it was coming from her. She couldn't breathe. She was dying.

"Is my brother down there?" A voice that sounded suspiciously like his brother yelled from far off in the distance. But the fireman ignored him, fretting over Caroline and hunting for something in his bag.

"We need to intubate her."

"Maybe it's her heart."

"Stop, stop," Klaus warned as loudly as he could but no one paid any heed to him. So he yelled louder, "STOP!" And this time, everyone heard him.

Rolling his eyes and taking one giant pull against the ground he managed to reach Caroline, and she looked right at him; her face speckled with debris and blood, fear in her eyes and her breath stuck in her throat. It did him in, he couldn't comprehend why, but the fear in her eyes dissipated just a speck when she saw him, like she was relieved to see him. It struck a chord somewhere deep inside him. Frozen for a second, he shrugged it off and positioned himself in such a way that his face was right on top of hers, and she followed every inch of his movement with teary eyes.

"Just shut up, keep quiet." He warned the firemen around him as he bent his head at an angle, positioning it right over her lips so he could properly hear her strangled breathing. "Give me a syringe," he demanded within a second. Ignoring the fireman who promptly handed him one, he looked down at Caroline with determination as he said, "Your left lung collapsed, I have to deflate it and then you'll be able to breathe. Understand?"

Hurriedly, she nodded her head and grabbed the ends of his t-shirt that were within her grasp.

"You're going to feel a prick, and a lot of pressure. But you're going to be fine." In the flash of a second, he jammed the syringe in her chest, a soft sob of pain escaping her, but within seconds she was breathing better and finally relaxing. The sound was gone.

"Nicely done," one of the fireman remarked, taking out a blanket from his carry on to drape over Caroline.

"Yeah," Klaus bit back in an instant, "I cut into a skull this afternoon, but that was much tougher." He could see the inner debate within the unsuspecting fireman, but thoroughly ignored it as he scanned the area around him. There was nothing but concrete and rubble and metal for as far as he could see, a small man made pathway a few feet from them, which the firemen had obviously dug through.

"Caroline," he asked pointedly, looking straight into her eyes, "Do you know who you are?"

Trying to control her breathing, she slowly nodded her head.

"Do you know my name?" Again all he got was a nod. "What's my name?"

She cleared her throat loudly, tears flowing down the side of her face as she murmured, "Himmler's sidekick."

Klaus let out an amused laugh, chuckling to himself as he patted her hair absent mindedly and sighed in relief.

"Klau-.."

"What the hell happened?" Klaus spoke over Elijah, grabbing the fireman's wrist so he could monitor his watch and took Caroline's pulse.

Sighing, the fireman spoke in a low voice, as if afraid of spooking Caroline, "The construction on the side of the structure? The crane operator had a stroke, he lost control of it for a few seconds and…" He trailed off ominously, not needing to explain any more. It was very obvious what had happened.

"Well get us the hell out of here," Klaus ordered, letting go off the mans arms once he was satisfied with Caroline's pulse. It was fast, but that was expected considering how absolutely terrified she must have been.

"Klaus, are you alright?" Elijah bellowed from up, his booming voice coming through into the small chamber as a whisper.

"Yeah!" Klaus yelled back, a sardonic expression on his face as he pondered on how dumb his brother, the dean of medicine of an entire damned hospital, could be. "I'm dandy. Apart from the whole a building collapsed on me part." He yelled out in anger.

Before he could hear Elijah's response, Caroline grabbed onto his hand, squeezed it tightly and pulling him towards her.

"Klaus, Klaus…" she cried out repeatedly, straining to pick up her head but in vain.

"What? What?" he questioned hurriedly, tensing immediately at the agony in her voice. "You can't breathe? Caro-.."

"My leg!" She cried out, frantically trying to look down at her legs, but he was holding her back, "My left leg, I can't move my leg." She halted in her attempts and looked up at him, her eyes maddened with fear, "I can't feel my leg, Klaus."

Dread coursed through his veins as he looked down at her feet. No. No. Please, no.

"Her left leg is trapped under the beam," The fireman supplied in a sad, low, tone, "It won't budge."

"We have to amputate."

A/N - I plan on having this story completed by August 2nd! Hopefully! Also, cookies for anyone who can guess which show this is based from. Let me know what you thought!

And if you don't know what to say, just follow this -

Dear Tanya,

How dare you come back after 84 years and not update Breath of Life?

How dare you do that to poor Caroline?

How dare you end on cliffhangers?

Insert name here