AN:This is an alternative take on the S/C wedding. This story is not nice to S/C, nor Damon, Elena, Delena so do not read if you like/love any of those. You have been warned.
Contains Baroline, Katholine, and allusions to previous Klaroline.
"If anyone knows why these two love birds shouldn't tie the knot, speak now or forever hold your peace," Damon snarked as he kept an eye out for his bitch of a sire.
Caroline held her breath and tried to keep her face neutral. The only reason they were having this wedding was to lure out Katherine who was still after Stefan. She'd apparently taken over Hell from Cade, which did not surprise Caroline in the least.
After hearing that Katherine was going to come after them from Kai, Damon had had 'the greatest' idea for luring Katherine: Stefan getting married. It had definitely rubbed Caroline the wrong way when Damon had suggested it and Stefan immediately agreeing to it.
Caroline had only agreed because it, at the time, had seemed the fastest way to to get Katherine. But as she'd thought about it, it became wrong. Katherine wouldn't have cared about Stefan's happiness, unless Elena had returned to him.
It was true that before her soul had been banished from Elena's body, Katherine had tried her damnedest to get Stefan back but that could be explained by the Doppelgänger spell Marco had enacted. At that point she'd been the last Amara Doppelgänger.
If anything, the fastest way to lure Katherine would have been to have Damon and Elena marry. Especially if Damon had become human. Katherine would have loved to be able to crush both Damon's and Elena's happiness in one fell swoop.
"Uh, Caroline, you have to say 'I Do'," Stefan whispered breaking Caroline out of her thoughts.
Katherine hadn't shown up? Caroline started to panic, they'd been so sure that she'd show at the nuptials. Especially at that part.
Caroline looked around wildly, the full weight of what she was doing and why crashing down.
"Blondie!" Damon hissed, motioning towards Stefan.
"Care?" Bonnie asked, concerned.
Caroline's head snapped to her oldest friend. She was marrying the guy who murdered her best friend's epic love.
Oh, god...she was becoming Elena. She was making lame excuses and excusing Stefan's behavior, like Elena did with Damon. Caroline was also letting Stefan heavily dictate her life, like Elena did with Damon.
Caroline slowly turned back to Stefan, who was looking expectant, or it was his Thursday face?
"I don't," Caroline said softly before grabbing Bonnie and flashing (as much as her dress allowed) to her mom's house.
"Caroline! What the hell!" Bonnie exclaimed as she tried to not throw up.
"I'm sorry!" Caroline repeated over and over as she grabbed a nearby bin that was leftover.
"Why?" Bonnie asked after a moment, trying not to be too happy about Caroline leaving Stefan at the altar, "I never figured you for a runaway bride."
"Katherine hasn't shown and that's the reason for this sham of a wedding, right?" Caroline said voice cracking, "Why go through with it when it's obvious that the idea of Stefan's wedding wasn't enough to lure Katherine from hell?"
"...Okay?" Bonnie asked, not entirely sure where Caroline was heading with this, "But I thought you loved him. You accepted his proposal twice."
Caroline snorted, "He technically didn't propose. Basically just gave me the ring and grunted."
"Really? You seemed so happy after," Bonnie stated. It had hurt, both times, when Caroline came bounding up to her, ecstatic that Stefan had proposed.
"I thought I was," Caroline shrugged weakly before sliding to the floor of the vacant living room.
"What happened?" Bonnie sat next to her friend.
"You."
"Me?"
"You were at the wedding of the guy who murdered your Epic," Caroline said as Bonnie jerked.
"...but it wasn't Stefan, it was the Ripper," Bonnie weakly protested as she fought back tears.
"Stefan is the Ripper, it's apart of him," Caroline sadly said, "As much as I want it not to be, I need to accept that I can't excuse his 'bad' behavior by blaming it on a part of his personality that I don't like. I'm not…"
Bonnie was stunned, she'd almost didn't believe this was Caroline.
"Wait, who are you not?" Bonnie asked, causing Caroline to wince, "Caroline."
"Elena?" Caroline said in a small voice, preparing herself for Bonnie admonishing her.
"Elena? I don't follow," Bonnie was confused. In the past, Caroline had wanted to be like Elena but now she didn't?
Caroline seemed to be fighting with herself and it raised some red flags for Bonnie. Caroline almost never censored herself, she had practically no filter. It was one of the things she admired, and also hated, about Caroline.
"You're sort of starting to scare me, Caroline," Bonnie said after a moment, "You've never had a filter before, why now?"
"Because, only the bad guys say stuff about Elena," Caroline whispered, tears forming in her eyes.
Bonnie was confused, Caroline always use to complain about Elena and the attention she got. But that was before she'd become a vampire, before Caroline had Matt and then Tyler.
"Just say it," Bonnie said tiredly. This day, while not being what she'd expected, was becoming emotionally exhausting.
"I'm excusing away all of Stefan's bad behaviors like Elena did with Damon," Caroline whispered, staring at her fidgeting hands.
"Caroline," Bonnie sighed and was about rebut Caroline when she started speaking.
"I mean all I've been doing since he came back after 3 years with Valerie, has been making excuses about and excusing his behavior! Every death, I've been saying that it's not him, that the Ripper isn't Stefan...but it is. We have SO many problems that we haven't talked about," Caroline exhaled, tears brimming at her eyes.
"Um, okay," Bonnie said after a moment, "I don't think that this is the same as Damon and Elena. Elena never excused Damon's behavior."
"Yes, she did," Caroline said, "and she ignored it."
Bonnie raised an eyebrow in question.
"Damon's killed Jeremy without knowing he had the Gilbert Ring on, he's basically the reason why Grams died and is the reason Abby became a vampire," Caroline pointed out, blinking away her tears. She was starting to get mad, why did her friends go gaga for the lecherous being that Damon was?
Bonnie stiffened at the reminder of what happened to her Grams and to Abby, who had just resurfaced after almost 6 years of no contact.
"CareBear's got a point," a familiar voice purred, "Pretty sure you'd have a heart attack if you knew the scope of how horrid Damon Salvatore is."
Caroline and Bonnie's heads snapped to the owner of the voice, both having a fleeting hope it was Elena.
But it wasn't, it was Katherine filing her nails.
Bonnie tried to give Katherine an aneurysm but Katherine continued killing her nails giving Bonnie a dry look.
"What? Don't want to know just how bad Damon has treated your childhood friends, Caroline and Elena? Or how about your former beau, Jeremy?" Katherine taunted as Caroline blanched.
"Whatever he's done, he's been forgiven," Bonnie countered fiercely as Caroline closed in on herself.
Caroline was praying that Katherine wouldn't say anything about what Damon had done to her to Bonnie, even though Caroline had no clue how Katherine would know.
"Really?" Katherine asked dubiously, she inclined her head to look at Caroline, "And just how did he gain your forgiveness? It wasn't by using the memory of your dearly departed mother to torture you into forgiving him, was it?"
Caroline's eyes bugged out and she'd have had a heart attack if she'd been human.
"...what…?" Bonnie asked at a loss.
"...how, uh, how did you know?" Caroline whispered.
"Sweetie, I'm the Queen of Hell," Katherine boasted, "Cade hasn't been running Hell for awhile. Plus he never really knew what he could do, beyond ensnaring people to get him his souls. If Cade had taken a more active approach, he'd have realized that he didn't need a 'Siren' to get him his Souls."
"What? So you can just tell what a person has done by looking at them or something?" Bonnie sniped.
"Or something," Katherine smirked. It wasn't hard to enchant a mirror to view a person's acts and then ensnare them herself.
Cade hadn't been any-the-wiser once she'd pointed him to the Salvatore brothers. He was almost eager to take them on. It had been unfortunate that the three of them hadn't taken each other out.
"Why didn't you show yourself at the wedding?" Caroline asked, hoping to change the topic but Bonnie's side glared told her the topic change was just temporary.
Katherine snorted, "I actually was about to but CareBear came to her senses before I could. Yes, I know the wedding was supposed to be a lure for me."
"Aren't you supposed to have this huge obsession with Stefan? I mean, you pit Stefan and Damon against each other for years, centuries," Bonnie pointed out.
"That really wasn't my choice," Katherine grumbled, "He is the Silas Doppelgänger and I am an Amara Doppelgänger."
"So you would have done that with another Silas Doppelgänger? Like Tom Avery?" Caroline asked.
"Probably," Katherine said after a moment of consideration, "It would be interesting to see if there's any differences in technique between them."
Both Bonnie and Caroline cringed at that thought. Caroline had known Tom for a few hours before Enzo had killed him. There were definitely similarities between him and Stefan but there were also marked differences.
"Damon and Stefan already know the differences between two Amara Doppelgängers," Katherine smiled lasciviously.
"So you aren't here to ruin Stefan's happiness?" Caroline asked, confused.
Bonnie and Caroline shared a look, neither wanted to start talking about (or thinking about) the differences between Elena and Katherine.
"There's nothing that I can do that'll be worse than what Stefan and Damon do to themselves," Katherine scoffed before an evil grin spread, "I just thought of the perfect punishment for both Stefan and Damon."
Katherine poofed out of the living room before either girl could react.
"Did she just poof?" Bonnie asked pointing to where Katherine just was. Bonnie had managed to do something similar a long time ago but that was with a piece of paper and it had severely drained her.
"I think so," Caroline confirmed, "I didn't see or hear her flash away."
"What if she did it fast, like really fast? Faster than an Original?" Bonnie asked, she was hoping that Katherine wasn't now a super-powerful being.
"I don't think so? Originals are fast but not silent when they flash. Unless she's faster than an Original?" Caroline put forth.
"Wait, she left to go punish Damon...and Stefan," Bonnie said, her mind catching up to what Katherine had said. She scrambled to her feet and ran out the door.
Caroline instinctively lunged to her feet intent on helping Bonnie, or she tried to. A loud tearing noise caused Caroline to fall back to the ground.
Her dress just ripped...her wedding dress...the one she got at a chain store, that so was not what she envisioned. Distantly she heard Bonnie's footsteps before Bonnie's face appeared in front of her.
"Caroline? Are you okay?" Bonnie asked softly hoping to not scare Caroline.
When Bonnie had realized that Caroline was not following her, she headed back into the house. She saw Caroline sitting awkwardly on the ground with an expression on her face that Bonnie hadn't seen for years. The last time was when her father had left.
"She'll be fine, especially if she gets away from the Salvatores," Katherine dismissed with a wave before tossing a filled plastic bag at Caroline.
Caroline started while Bonnie attempted to give Katherine an aneurysm.
"Aneurysms don't bother me anymore, Bon Bon," Katherine smirked, "Not as the Queen of Hell."
"What did you do to Damon?" Bonnie demanded, moving to place herself in between Caroline and Katherine.
"Just changed his personality more to what it was like before he was a vampire," Katherine laughed.
Bonnie furrowed her brow, how was that a punishment.
"Human!Damon's personality was a lot different than whatever you call it now. Human!Damon would be aghast at his antics," Katherine explained gleefully, "I'm guessing things normal for that particular time also came back."
"What?" Bonnie asked, flabbergasted. What was Katherine talking about?
"He was a member of the Founding Families, who founded this podunk town just before the Civil War," Katherine stated, eyes hard, "The Bennett ancestor he met in that time period was a slave, draw your own conclusions."
"Did you bring me clothes?" Caroline interrupted, "And they're my size? And not half bad."
"I did, sweet cheeks." Katherine almost rolled her eyes, "Get dressed, we're going to The Big Easy."
It took a moment for the nickname to filter through Caroline's mind, the day had been eventful.
"New Orleans?!" Caroline almost squeaked, "I can't leave the twins!"
"True, Ric was dipping into the bottle quite heavily at the Lockwoods," Katherine agreed, "Bring them, they can spend time with their Aunty Kat, while you straighten out the mess your Hybrid has gotten himself into."
"Klaus is in trouble?" Caroline perked up concerningly.
"When isn't he in trouble," Katherine scoffed, "Yes, it's related to why you couldn't find him in New Orleans, or was led to believe."
"You can't be serious," Bonnie said in disbelief. Surely, Katherine wasn't actually suggesting that Caroline go to New Orleans and help Klaus Mikaelson. The same Klaus Mikaelson who spent half a millennium, 500 years, chasing after her and tormenting her. But now Katherine was endeavoring to help her tormentor.
"Yes, I'm helping Klaus," Katherine said with touch of disgust in her voice.
"Why?"
"So I can lord it over him," she shrugged, "You can come also. Kol's running around with many witchy artefacts."