Becoming

Author's Note: So this is more or less an alternate take on 6x22, where the Gemini Coven lives and Kai continues to be influenced by the Merge. I'm not sure whether I'm going to continue this story or not beyond this first chapter, I guess it'll depend on how much of a reaction I get to it. I've wanted to write this story for a while now, ever since being inspired by a post I saw on Tumblr, I can't remember who posted it and I can't find the post anymore, but it went something along the lines of "give me a finale where Kai kills his father and not his sister, etc." And what can I say, I like the idea so much I was inspired to write a story based on it and I wish I could send a message to this blog and ask for permission to use this idea, but I can't find it so. Enjoy.

Wedding Location...

Alaric Saltzman was standing before his fiancee Josette "Jo" Laughlin, both of them smiling and staring lovingly into one another's eyes. To Alaric's left was Damon, and to Jo's left was Elena, and standing a little off to the side, by the chairs, was Jo's father, Joshua Parker.

"Neither one of us should be here right now. We've spend our life dodging fate and beating the odds," Alaric started with, a genuine smile on his face as he looked into Jo's eyes.

Damon and Elena gave one another meaningful looks as Alaric continued to speak. "But, because we did, I got to meet you, the most beautiful, hilarious and intimidatingly brilliant woman I have ever known. You inspire me, you've shown me that happiness is actually something that I can have in my life. And so..." Alaric paused, taking the ring from Tyler and putting it on Jo's finger. "I promise to be with you, and love you, and to dodge fate with you, for the rest of our lives."

Jo began to cry a little. "Josette?" the Reverend asked, waiting for her to say her vow next.

"Oh god, that's a tough act to follow," Jo replied, to the laughter of almost everyone at the wedding. "Here it goes, Alaric Saltzman, you are-"

Jo was suddenly interrupted by a loud gasping sound in the room. She and Alaric looked over to Jo's father, Joshua Parker, who was clutching his belly tightly with one hand, clearly in pain. "Dad?" Jo asked. "Are you okay?"

Suddenly, Joshua Parker fell forward on to the ground below, unconscious. Now standing behind the unconscious Joshua Parker, was Kai, holding a bloody hunting knife in one hand, a somewhat angry look on his face. "I debated on whether or not I should wait until after you said your vows to kill dear old dad, but then I realized, I'm really not one for waiting," Kai said bitterly, staring directly at Jo while he spoke, Jo too distracted by the sight of her father dying to pay attention to what Kai was saying.

"Oh my god, dad-"

"Not so fast sis," Kai interrupted, holding up one hand and magically creating a high pitched noise, everyone at the wedding immediately putting their hands over their ears instinctively, with the exception of Jo who put her hands over her belly, some screaming out in pain, others merely grunting.

"Miss me? No? Oh well," Kai added with a slight smile on his face. The noise he had created was so powerful that every glass and window in the building shattered, glass scattering everywhere, Elena falling over and smacking her head against the ground as she fell. Damon immediately ran over to her as soon as he saw her hit the ground, only to find that she was bleeding and unconscious. Desperately, Damon pulled her up onto his lap, a devastated look on his face. She was that much more vulnerable now that she was a human again.

"Elena?" Damon asked, Elena not responding. "Come on. Hey, wake up. Elena?"

Damon brought one wrist up to his mouth and bit into the veins with his vampire teeth, creating an open wound. He then placed his bleeding wrist against Elena's lips, trying to feed her his blood. "Come on, just drink it," he begged, the blood simply dribbling down Elena's chin as he tried to force some into Elena's mouth. "No, no, no, no."

At the other end of the altar, was Alaric and Jo, who had been knocked off their feet by Kai's sound spell as well. Alaric got up first, helping Jo, who was scanning the room for Kai with her eyes, but it was no use, Kai had cast another cloaking spell on himself, becoming invisible to the eyes of everyone in the room. "Kai!" Jo shouted angrily. "Show yourself!"

"Stefan? STEFAN?" Damon called, still holding an unconscious Elena in his arms.

Elsewhere in the building, Stefan and Caroline got to their feet, both of them drenched in their own blood, having been cut by broken glass and other projectiles. Stefan immediately looked for Damon, spotting him kneeling on the floor at the altar, holding an unconscious Elena. Stefan's eyes widened at the sight of it all. Stefan, using his enhanced vampire speed, ran over to Damon and Elena, Caroline following.

"She won't wake up," Damon said to Stefan and Caroline.

"Oh my god," Caroline replied worriedly.

"She won't wake up. I don't understand. I gave her my blood, but—she can't take it. Nothing's working."

"Get her to the hospital, now," Stefan ordered.

Damon nodded, suddenly realizing that that was the obvious solution. "Yeah," he said in response, scooping Elena up in his arms and running out of the building with her at vampire speed.

Caroline turned to Stefan with a fearful look in her eyes. "She's human, what if she doesn't-"

But before Caroline could finish her sentence, her neck was snapped, along with Stefan's, by a seemingly unseen force. As they fell to the floor, unconscious, Kai uncloaked himself again, standing a few feet behind them, revealing himself as the culprit. "Nothing personal, but this is a family matter now," Kai stated.

Kai turned to Alaric and Jo, who were both staring at him with hatred in their eyes. "You know, out of curiosity, what are you the most upset about right now? The fact that I crashed your wedding, the fact that I just injured many of your guests—oh, or the fact that I just murdered our father, 'cause I have to say if it's the last one, the guy was a bit of a dick to say the least."

"He was our father," Jo replied angrily, fighting back tears in her eyes.

"Who once tried to kill you to stop me from getting out of the Prison World. And cared about the wellbeing of the coven more than the wellbeing of his own children. You can understand why I feel no remorse for stabbing him in the back?"

Jo shook her head. "No, all you did, was prove you were the monster we always thought you were. I knew you hadn't changed. You can't."

Kai looked genuinely hurt by Jo's words for a moment before shaking them off. "Well, I guess when your family decides that your nothing but an irredeemable piece of trash... the best thing to do is prove them right, right?" Kai asked rhetorically, holding out one arm and telekinetically lifting and hurling a somewhat small piece of shattered glass into Alaric's belly, wounding him. Alaric gasped, collapsing on to the ground shortly afterwards, one hand over, Jo panicking and kneeling down beside him, immediately examining her fiancee's injury.

Kai tried to fight back feelings of regret as he watched Jo tend to the wounded Alaric, Luke's empathy for others still influencing him, to his frustration. He couldn't be a good man, but he couldn't be the monster he use to be either. A part of him wanted to apologize to Jo and help her, another part of him wanted to finish the job and kill his pregnant sister while he was at it.

"Sanguinem filio. Sanguinem effurgarex perpetuum."

Kai looked around, noticing members of his own coven, getting to their feet and reciting a spell, all of them staring at him as they spoke. He quickly noticed one of them was holding a device in their hand that seemed to resemble an Ascendant. Kai could barely contain his anger. "Let me guess, Prison World? I don't think so."

Telekinetically, Kai moved another shard of broken glass from the ground into one hand, and held that shard of glass up to his carotid artery, every witch in the room closing their mouths almost instantly, some of them gasping in shock and fear. "I'm not going to anymore Prison Worlds. I'll kill himself before that happens, and don't think I won't do it. And if I die... you all die with me. And somehow, I don't think all of you hate me that much, that you'd rather die than have me as your leader."

The Gemini coven witches seemed at a loss of what to do next.

The Salvatore Boarding House...

Bonnie was standing in the kitchen of the Salvatore Boarding House, where Matt was bandaging up her slit wrists from when Kai attacked her earlier. Her cellphone, which was out on the counter near them, began to vibrate furiously. Bonnie grabbed her phone to check to see who the caller was. Once she saw it was Damon, she answered it quickly. "Damon!"

Bonnie could hear Damon sigh in relief on the other end. "Ah. Bonnie Bennett. You have no idea how good it is to hear your voice right now."

"Damon, Kai's out-" Bonnie said anxiously, only for Damon to interrupt her.

"I know. I'm glad you're safe. I was worried the pork-rind munching freak already got to you."

"He did. And I don't know how, but I'm still alive. He took a lot of blood and that's all."

"That's not all. He crashed the wedding. He killed Jo's dad, and god knows how many other people."

Bonnie was stunned. "Oh my god."

"And Elena got knocked out, and she's not waking up. The doctors say she should've woken up by now. I don't know what to do Bon."

Bonnie hesitated. "Just—stay there, okay? I'm on my way."

On the Road, Outside Mystic Falls...

Stefan and Caroline were scrunched in the backseat of a car. Caroline started to wake up, only to find that she was laying with her head against Stefan's chest. A little embarrassed, Caroline quickly sat up, seeing Enzo in the driver's seat, a confused look on her face.

"Oh good, you're up. Sorry to be indecorous, but you were both solidly unconscious when I pulled you from the wedding mayhem," Enzo said as he continued to drive.

"Where are we going? ...Elena!"

"Elena is in the hospital with Damon," Enzo assured her. "Kai's rampage seems to be far from over, but your friends Alaric and Jo were alive when I left them. And, I grabbed the two of you to help me deal with a bigger problem."

"There's a bigger problem?!" Caroline asked, exasperated.

Warehouse District, Just Outside of Mystic Falls...

Caroline, Enzo, and a newly awakened Stefan arrived at a block of warehouses just outside of Mystic Falls. Stefan quickly found his mother Lily, desperately opening warehouse door after warehouse door. "Valerie? Malcolm?" Lily called out.

When Lily realized that there was no one in the storage space, she closed the door she had just opened. Stefan sighed as he approached her, an annoyed look on his face. "Mom, get in the car, please."

"1702 Route 12. That's... That's where we are, right? I mean I read the map very carefully. He... He said they would be here. They're probably scared out of their minds," Lily replied, rambling anxiously.

"Who are you talking about?"

Lily opened the door to another storage space and searched it. "My friends. Kai brought them back with him when he escaped the Prison World," Lily briefly scanned the space with her eyes, before realizing they weren't in there. She turned around to face Stefan. "They're here, somewhere, I know they are. He didn't—he didn't lie to me."

"Yeah, he did. I think that should be kinda obvious to you by now. There's nobody out here. You made a deal with a sociopath, and now a lot of people are dead. You're wasting your time!"

Lily walked away from him, ignoring what he'd just said, to his further frustration.

Outside the Wedding Location...

Just outside the barn where the wedding was being held, Tyler and Liv were laying in the grass, both of them covered in blood, having been thrown outside by the force of Kai's spells. Both of them were just barely conscious, Liv crawling over closer to Tyler, only to realize that he had a rather large piece of glass lodged in his stomach. He wasn't going to last much longer. Without any medical treatment, Tyler was going to die.

"Oh, Tyler. Oh god, no. This can't be happening. Jo! Jo!" Liv cried out desperately, with tears in her eyes. "Jo!"

Tyler looked up at Liv, trying with all his might to hang in there. "I'm going to die here, aren't I?"

"No you're not," Liv assured him, taking one of his hands and holding it tightly with both of hers. "Jo will get here, and she'll save you. She's a doctor, that's what she does, she's probably seen worst than this."

"I love you, Liv."

"No, Tyler come on, don't die on me, don't die, please don't die. You can't, not after everything," Liv pleaded, but Tyler was looking weaker by the second. Liv looked up at the night sky, searching for the moon. It was full. Liv took a deep breathe in before looking back over to Tyler. "It's a full moon. If you turn, it will heal you. I'm not losing anyone else I love."

Tyler shook his head, appalled by the suggestion. "I'm not killing you. No."

"You have to. It's your best chance at survival. Do it."

"No."

Just then Kai stumbled upon the two of them, staring at them for a moment with a conflicted look on his face. Neither of them seemed to notice he was there at first. "That does not look good. If I had to guess, I'd say rich boy over here has maybe ten or so minutes left to live, if he's lucky," Kai interrupted.

Liv turned around as soon as she heard Kai's voice, a furious look on her face. Kai stood there, perfectly still, as Liv ran up to him and put her hands on his throat, attempting to strangle him, only for Kai to grab her hands, stopping her. "You, this is all your fault! It wasn't enough for you to kill my brothers and sisters, my twin—my best friend, you had to kill my dad too!" Liv cried.

"I know, I'm sorry."

"You're sorry?!"

"Well, somewhat. But that's not important right now. What's important is that your boyfriend is dying and I'm the only one who can do anything about it."

"Why would you help me?!"

"Because Luke loved you. And when I merged with him..." Kai paused, Liv growing more emotional by the second. He let go of Liv's hands. "Whether you want to believe it or not, when we merged, I gained his ability to feel empathy for others. It's really annoying at times, not to mention inconvenient. It's why I couldn't bring myself to burn you alive that day in the Boarding House, even though I really wanted to... As hard as I try to ignore it, it's still there. And right now, I wanna make up for some of the damage I've done, by helping you help him. If you'll let me."

Liv hesitated. "Okay, next question, how can you help me?"

Kai took a vial of vampire blood out of one of his suit pockets, to Liv's surprise. "With this. Vampire blood. It'll heal him. Give it to him and he'll live."

Liv shook her head. "I won't. I'm not going to put his life in the hands of a known psychopath. I've seen what happens to people who are stupid enough to trust you."

"If you don't give him the blood, he is going to die. Look, you don't trust me, I get it. You hate me for taking your brother away from me, I get that too. But if you don't give him the blood, he is going to die."