A/N: I'm back with a new TVD 'fic :D And I've jumped aboard the Klonnie train! This is also my first properly 'dark' tvd fic. Everything will make sense soon enough. I hope. Enjoy! And don't forget to leave a review ;)
Bennett Syndrome
CHAPTER ONE
'47 MISSED CALLS, 22 NEW MESSAGES' flashed against the neon green wallpaper of her cell phone. Bonnie Bennett watched the tiny silver contraption flicker out of commission as she retrieved the SIM card. Tossing the phone into the trash, she let the SIM card drop to the pavement and ground it beneath her heeled boot. They were all from Elena, Caroline, and Jeremy, she knew. They were worried about her. She supposed she ought to be thankful she had such caring friends.
They were all much safer the further from them she stayed. That was why she was currently standing on the sidewalk of a busy city, awaiting the next cab that would drop her at the airport. She needed to move far, far away and keep moving. Siberia, Yemen, nowhere on Earth was far enough.
'I will find you, Bonnie. Even if you escape to the far reaches of the planet, I will find you. Mark my words.'
The rich, accented voice plagued her every waking thought and nightmare. The dreams were the worst. There, Klaus could exercise his inhuman power. Force her to live through her worst nightmares. Night after night, she saw her loved ones slain by Klaus and he relished her screams. He seemed to get off on them. When he got bored, he would take to hurting her. Cool silver knives tracing crimson patterns into her skin. His breath quickened as her screams intensified. Their pulses would race together, but for completely different reasons. She would awake with fresh scars that disappeared the next night.
'I'll have you, Bonnie Bennett. I'll have you in every way I want, and there isn't a damn thing you can do about it.'
"Do you need this one?"
She jolted out of her reverie at the kind hazel eyes awaiting her answer.
"Oh, uh-"
"I'm heading to the airport. Are you going in that direction by any chance?"
"Erm, yes."
"Care to split a cab? Monday morning, you know. Busy, busy."
"Will you one of you get in the damn cab?" grunted the driver.
"Sure thing."
Bonnie slid in, pressing herself to the far corner of the car. The stranger with the pretty eyes slid in after her and even as her hunched figure indicated she wasn't in the mood for conversation, he pressed on.
"My name is David, by the way."
She gave him a sidelong glance. He was awaiting her response, body angled toward her. He had floppy brown hair and stubble across his chiselled jaw.
"Ingrid." She sighed softly. "Ingrid…Thomas."
"Nice to meet you, Ingrid. Where are you headed?"
Bonnie shrugged. "I'm not sure yet."
David frowned. "Well, if you're ever back in town, I'd love to get coffee with you sometime."
"I'm not ever coming back."
Any conversation David had prepared died then and there. They pulled into the front of the airport twenty minutes later and Bonnie hopped out, heaving her black carry-on behind her.
It was then that she should have noticed the stranger didn't follow her into the airport. She should have noticed the way he pulled out his cell phone and spoke with quiet intent into it, eyes trained on her retreating back the entire time.
But Bonnie was new to this. She had never been one to run from her problems. Even if it meant overestimating her power, she always stayed to fight. Yet here she was, intent on running as far from her enemies as possible. She had no fight left in her.
KB
When she awoke, she was in some sort of garden. A garden awash with colours she could never have imagined; not in her wildest dreams. A garden filled with all manner of exotic and frightening plants. Just as she was reaching to stroke a velvety flower that was pulsating a vivid orange, a voice spoke; the voice that had occupied her every nightmare for a month.
"I wouldn't touch that if I were you."
She whirled around so fast, her head hurt and her vision took seconds to readjust. There he stood, clad in his usual uniform of head to toe black with a requisite smirk gracing his angelic features.
"I chanced upon this place some centuries ago, exercising the reaches of my power. It was always all too brief. I could never enjoy this wondrous place I'd imagined. As a hybrid, however…" He trailed off, seemingly enraptured by a cluster of scarlet flowers.
He fixed her with a cold stare. "I'll bet you don't even know you're dreaming."
Bonnie cursed under her breath. She must have fallen asleep on the flight to… She steeled herself. This was Klaus' dream which meant he could read her every conscious thought. She couldn't have him knowing where she was headed.
With vampiric super-speed, he suddenly knelt against the grass between her legs, hands resting gently on her knees.
"Oh come on, love. I prepared this place, especially for you. I've been waiting for you, Bonnie…or should I call you Ingrid?"
Bonnie swallowed her gasp, composing her face into a careful mask of neutrality. Plucking the orange flower Bonnie had previously been trying to touch, he tucked it behind her ear. Her dark curls concealed the stem. It was every bit as soft as she imagined.
"Don't run from me," Klaus murmured with a deceptively kind smile. "Because I can run faster. Wherever you're running to, I'll be there first. I'll be waiting, Bonnie. For you."
Bonnie tried not to let the fear show on her face. "I-I won't let you hurt my friends. You can't have Elena, Klaus."
A vague emotion swept through Klaus' eyes but it was gone as soon as it had appeared.
"Michael needs Elena," he said simply. "And Michael will have his way."
"Ple-"
The garden faded out of view and Bonnie opened her bleary eyes to see she was back in the uncomfortable airplane seat. She sat up so quickly that her knees banged against the unfolded tray in front of her. Feeling in her hair, she pulled out the buttery soft flower and gasped softly. It had lost much of its beauty here in the bleak, dim lighting of the plane. The unassuming flower sent chills through her spine and left her feeling cold all the same. Letting it flutter to the ground, she crushed it beneath her heel.
"Two hours until landing time," she told her herself quietly. Two hours until she could book herself into an obscure motel and sleep away her fears with some Ambien.
Unfortunately for her, her fears had a habit of following her into her sleep.
KB
"She's been gone for three days, Damon." Elena stopped pacing to fix him with an accusatory look. "Three days. Maybe Klaus has her? We need to find her, Damon!"
We need to do this, Damon. We need to do that, Damon. Help me, Damon, help. Why aren't you helping, Damon?
Damon really wished Elena would shut up.
"My brother is missing as well, Elena," he grunted. Balling his fist tightly, he pressed against the bookshelf and closed his eyes. "I'm trying, just…please."
"Well, you're not trying hard enough. Who next, Damon? Caroline? Alaric? Maybe I should just hand myself over if it's causing everyone else so much harm."
"No!" Damon shouted despite his efforts to retain composure. "No, you will not just hand yourself over to Klaus. That is exactly what Bonnie does not want to happen. She'll turn up eventually, just give it time."
"She'll turn up? Just give it time? Are you out of your mind? This is Bonnie we're talking about here. She doesn't just disappear for three days with no word. That isn't Bonnie!"
Damon ran a hand through his hair, cussing under his breath. He'd loaned the witch enough money to 'kill Klaus and bring Stefan home' – in her own words – but he was beginning to worry she'd skipped out entirely. He couldn't tell Elena any of that, though. Or Caroline, or Alaric. How could he explain that he'd put Bonnie's life in jeopardy to save Elena's? He couldn't. They wouldn't understand that it was for the greater good; that he was coming from a good place. This was the witch's idea, anyway. She'd come to him with this proposition, making him swear not to tell anyone.
So instead, he turned and said: "Leave it to me. Just…leave everything to me."
Elena still didn't look convinced but she was off his case at least.
"I just miss them, Damon. Stefan and…and Bonnie."
Tears were falling fast now and he let her tumble into his waiting arms, reminding himself why he was doing all this; who he was doing it for.
Only Elena matters, he thought.
KB
Bonnie was beginning to wish she'd gone somewhere where her uni-lingualism wasn't a problem. Instead, she spent two hours trying to book a room in a seedy motel because of the language barrier between her and the forty year old Russian man behind the front desk.
Once inside, she showered and changed into an oversized flannel shirt that smelled of her father's high-end cologne. The scent brought hot tears to her eyes and she couldn't focus on the little boxy television that had just sprung to life. Not that she'd be able to understand any of it anyway.
Switching the television off and laying back against the cold sheets, she felt sleep steal over her and sunk into its warm embrace.
"Hello, love."
"Do you ever get tired of stalking me?"
"You mean to say you don't enjoy our late night rendezvous'?"
"Not particularly," Bonnie replied curtly.
"How unfortunate." Klaus shrugged. "I hope you're ready, Bonnie."
"Ready…? What-"
"I told you running was futile. Don't say I didn't warn you."
Bonnie's pulse quickened. She tried to calm herself. Klaus was probably lying. He was trying to scare her, she reasoned.
"They're closing in on you."
"Who is? Klaus, I'm not in the mood for your mind games."
He was at her side in an instant when he did a most peculiar thing. There was no smirk on his face when he reached out and stroked her jaw. There was no arrogance behind his eyes, no schadenfreude glinting in them.
"I did warn you, didn't I?"
"Klaus."
He ignored her. "You should have just turned yourself over."
Bonnie was shaken awake but not because Klaus had ended the dream. There were large, muscular hands wrapped in leather gloves that were pulling her out of her tiny motel bed.
"What? Hey!"
Bonnie gathered her strength and launched an attack against her kidnappers, willing their blood vessels to burst. She didn't stop to think if they were human or supernatural, she just lashed out.
"Leave her."
She'd recognize the cold, commanding voice anywhere. She'd dreamt about it every night for over a month, after all. It was so much more terrifying in real life, she thought.
"She'll come quietly, won't you…Bonnie?"
She didn't need to nod her agreement. She pulled her boots on as quickly as possible and followed the hybrid out of the room, flanked by his minions. She chanced a glance at the oblivious, compelled motel clerk.
"It's so good to see you again."
"The feeling is not mutual," she bit back.
"Yes, you keep that brave face on, Bennett." Klaus chuckled like he'd just heard her say something hilarious. "When Michael is through with you, you'll need it."
Bonnie ignored the implication of his words. Fear was going to get her nowhere now. She had failed. She had failed and this was all that pervaded her thoughts. A weak part of her prayed her friends would find her but the martyr in her hoped they evaded Klaus and his father.
Please God… She later found herself sobbing in the small cell they put her in and realised she didn't care anymore. If you're there…
KB
"Please, Michael. I can watch over the witch. Klaus is indispensable after all. Surely, he should be doing more important work than baby-sitting a teenage witch."
Stefan kept fixed eye contact with the senior Original. He didn't know why he was so desperate to be assigned to the witch. A part of him just knew it was imperative. It couldn't – wouldn't – be Klaus.
"You make a fine point." Michael leaned forward, cocking a brow at Klaus.
"I found the witch!" Klaus shouted, a note of petulance colouring his tone. "It's only right that I watch her."
"The hybrid has a soft spot for his little witch," sneered one of Michael's minions. Klaus shot him a withering look.
"Why not? Let him have his depraved way with the witch. We need her broken anyway. Only then will she help us."
"No son of mine…" Michael leaned forward, his words dropping to a hushed murmur. "Will succumb to the temptation of a witch – a seventeen year old witch at that."
Klaus narrowed his eyes. "I feel nothing for the witch. She is mortal scum to me. She is nothing more than a swindler, like the rest of her kind. I could break her in for you, father. Make her feel pain she never imagined existed. All the worst kinds of suffering. She'll be begging to help us when I'm through with her."
A cheer went up around the hall, the idea of violence exciting all the bloodthirsty vampires.
"Very well." Michael smiled coldly, something akin to pride lighting his eyes. "You shall watch over the witch."
Stefan's eye twitched and he blinked twice to cover up. Why did this bother him so much? He'd left the old Stefan behind in Mystic Falls when he agreed to help Klaus. Or was he compelled? He shook his head, not liking what was happening to him.
Help Bonnie.
No.
It's the right thing.
I'm loyal to Klaus now. Klaus and Michael.
She's your friend. And Elena – you love her, remember? – and Caroline and Alaric. Friends. They need you.
I don't know what you're talking about.
Your brother, Damon, needs you.
Shut up.
The distant sobs of a witch seared at his chest. Rubbing the spot, he noticed Klaus watching him.
"Remember who you serve," Klaus muttered as he shoved past Stefan.
I serve Klaus. Klaus and Michael.
KB