Disclaimer: I do not own Vampire Diaries
Author's Note: The latest of my Elena/Damon romance ideas, taking place between seasons 3 and 4.
For the second time in my life, I was falling into Wickery Creek.
Water flooded the car, and Matt was knocked out, he probably hit his head on the steering wheel. Damn thing was built before airbags were required.
I shook him to wake him up, but it was no use. I yanked on my seatbelt but it was stuck. My lungs were already starting to burn, but I tried to call his name anyway.
And then Stefan appeared by the driver's side window. He reached across Matt to help me but I pushed him away, pointing to Matt. I had cheated death once in this river, and it had come back for me. Matt was probably the only innocent person left in Mystic Falls, and virtually the only human I knew. He had to live. He was hope, hope that one day the town could return to the quiet, sleepy southern town it had been before the vampires, witches, and werewolves took it over.
Stefan's eyes were filled with pain and he reached for me again, but I pushed him off.
He ripped Matt's seatbelt with an offhanded stroke and pulled him out through the window that was perpetually rolled down because the crank was stuck. I smiled a little, knowing Matt would be safe.
My chest heaved with the effort of holding my breath, my mind knew that I couldn't breathe, but my body didn't care. I coughed once, then water rushed in through my nose and mouth, burning, making me cough again and gasp again, but there was no air. There was just the icy blue water. The world began to fade to black and I knew that my brain was losing oxygen.
My last thoughts were of Stefan. They always were, when I was planning to die. I imagined him as I first met him, embarrassingly exiting the boy's bathroom after jumping down Jeremy's throat about his drug problem. I loved him, through the good and bad, the ugly and the beautiful. Even when Klaus had made it so that he forgot he loved me, I never gave up on him.
And then there was nothing. I was floating, and I couldn't tell if it was from the water, or from what came after death. I was surrounded by silence, darkness, and the soft sensation of floating. I could spend forever here, I thought. It was pleasant enough, even if there was nothing to see. There was nothing to be frightened of here. I had hoped that I would see my parents again, but perhaps the Doppleganger had a different destiny after death than humans, or even vampires.
I flew around aimlessly, the blackness never changing, but I had no sense that I would ever be bored. It was reassuring, the nothingness. Knowing I had no responsibilities, no destiny, and it occurred to me briefly that Damon was safe now, because Alaric would have died with me. That made me happy. The Salvatore brothers were safe a little while longer from the supernatural world.
Then I felt a tugging at my ankles, as though a whirlpool were sucking me down. It seemed like only a short while, but I was already used to the nothingness, and sensation frightened me. I tried to fight and move upward away from the vortex, but it was no use. I was rushing downward at a terrifying speed and then with a jolt I slammed down on my back on something very hard and cold and it made me gasp and sit bolt upright.
The gray tile of the Mystic Falls Hospital Morgue stood out in stark detail to my eyes. I had returned to the world and that could mean only one thing.
I was in transition.