Damon POV
She escaped and never came looking for me. She promised we would spend eternity together; we had a few months. She knew where to find me and she never tried. I lived my life for her, the way of life she taught me, the way of life I chose in order to be with her.
I followed Stephen, to him it seemed I was torturing him for what he had done, that I blamed him for Katherine being taken away. That isnt why I followed him at all though, I had no one else. No other family, no friends, no one; except him, my brother.
He was determined to be the hero, the better man, he did not kill humans, he did not feed off humans. He tried to live as a human and probably would have been able to if it weren't for me following him. Now as I stand here in the tomb that they opened for me, for me to save Katherine, to finally be able to live the life I had searched for so long, she was no where to be found.
"She's not here! She's not here! She's not here!" I screamed over and over.
"Damon we need to get out of here." I heard Stephen tell me. How can we leave without her?
She has to be here somewhere. I saw them take her away. "It doesn't make sense. They locked her inside."
"If we don't leave now we're not getting out." How can he be so calm? Katherine, My Katherine, hell, his Katherine was suppose to be down here.
"How could she not be in here?" Where is she? Why isn't she in here with the others?
"It's not worth spending all of eternity down here. She's not worth it." Stephen said calmy. How can he be calm in a time like this? The love of my life, the one I had been living for, hunting for, searching for, she was not where she was suppose to be.
"No!" She is worth it. I need her. I need Katherine! She has to be here.
"Damon!" Elana. She looks so much like Katherine but is nothing like her. "Please!" She said practically begging.
Stephen pushed me in front of him and I allowed him to lead me out. As soon as we were out of the tomb he dropped his hand and wrapped Elena in his arms. He had Elena. I had no one. It hurt to see him holding her. I had no one to hold and no one to hold me. I had no one.
I followed Stephen and Elena out of the tomb but walked past a few feet into the woods as they checked on Jeremy. I was lost, completely spaced out in my own world. I felt her come closer to me and I looked at her seeing her for the first time.
Elena POV
I saw him stumble past us and I followed him. Stephen was with Jeremy and I knew they were both okay. It was obvious Damon was not. He had lived over a century searching for Katherine and she wasn't there.
I had never seen anyone so lost, I don't think I was even that bad after my parents were killed. I mean I was bad, spacey and shutting the world out, but not like Damon. Damon was broken.
His eyes followed me as I moved to the front of him. His eyes which had always been so full of fire, full of spite, full of hate, full of fear; they were now empty. I wrapped my arms around him and laid my head against his chest, "I'm sorry." I told him.
What else can you say to someone who had lost their purpose in life; or rather lost what they thought their purpose in life was. I could feel Stephen's eyes on my back as I held Damon.
I knew he was scared for his brother, as much as he hated to admit it he enjoyed having Damon around. Someone who he didn't have to be afraid of knowing his secret. Someone who knew of his history, someone he shared a history with. They were both hurt deeply by Katherine not being in that tomb. They were both scared of what the future held for them. Stephen knew he had me, and Bonnie, and Jeremy, and Sheila on his side. Damon did not know he had anyone. I had to show him that we did care.
Stephen needed Damon to be okay and Damon needed someone to hold him, to love him. To show their affection towards him even though he acted as though that was the last thing on Earth he could ever want.
Hell, maybe it was the last thing he wanted, but it is the first thing he needed. He needed to know that Stephen and I cared about him. That he could trust us. I felt horrible to betraying him the other day but I knew we had to do it. I promised him earlier that day that I would help him get Katherine back. Well, if Katherine didn't ever really want him I will do whatever I can to help him feel the love he was hoping to receive from Katherine. I was not about to break my promise to him now, not when he needed me to keep it more than anything else.
Stephen POV
Coming out of the tomb she wrapped her arms around me so tight it hurt. I didn't know she had that kind of strength. The fearlessness she showed running back into the tomb, coming after me to get Damon. She knew I needed Damon to come out of there. She needed him to come out of it as well.
After they came back from Atlanta together something had changed. Things were different between the three of us. Damon wanted to help us and we wanted to help him. Damon had somehow become more human and less of the non-caring, murderous jerk he had been since Katherine was taken.
When Katherine was not in the tomb I didn't understand where she could have been. It was my fault she was discovered, I was hoping to have fixed that wrong by rescuing her, by allowing Damon the woman he loved. I did not believe that he truly loved her, I thought he was just compelled by her. Hell,it took me decades to figure out.
I stood with Jeremy until he was able to stand up, we watched Elena hold Damon. It looked as if she was actually holding him to keep him standing. She was helping him in a way he would never allow me. I was surprised when he allowed me to lead him from the tomb. Physical touch other than sex was strictly prohibited for him; or so I had observed over the last few decades. No one was ever allowed to get close to him, to know him on an emotional level. As soon as they started to he would dispose of them. The last person he allowed in was Katherine.
He was physically and emotionally unable to let anyone close to him. He was too afraid of being hurt again. And who could blame him. Our mother had died during childbirth with me—leaving him. Our Father turned his back on him when he returned from the War because he was not man enough. I had turned on him through our Father's doing in poisoning Katherine with the vervain. I had since done nothing but complain whenever he came around.
He only wanted to ruin me it seemed; that was until just recently. Something about Elena gets to him. I don't know if it is the way she looks or the way she acts but she doesn't put up with his crap and tells him what is on her mind. For some reason he trusts her. My brother, the one who has never fully trusted anyone trusts her, Elena, my girlfriend. He is more like he was when we were young, before Katherine when he is with her. He jokes, he teases, he smiles.
Seeing him this broken, this lost hurts. I can feel the tear glide down my cheek as I walk with Jeremy over to the two of them. I slowly put my arm around Damon's shoulders as Elena loosened her grip on him. He wavered and for a minute I thought he may actually fall over. Instead he allowed Elena and I to lead him back home. Once inside the door he went directly to the sofa and sat down.
I stood in the hallway watching him while talking with Elena. "You should go take Jeremy home and go check on Bonnie." I told her.
"Will you drive us?" She asked me once again enveloping me in a giant hug.
I drove Elena and Jeremy to their house before driving back home hoping to talk to Damon...only he wasn't there.
I knew he went after Anna, and had an idea of what Anna may have to tell him so I started a fire in the fireplace and sat down to wait for him to return home. He didn't have anywhere else to go. He had no one to turn to other than me and Elena. We were his family. A screwed up very dysfunctional family.
Damon POV
I needed answers. Where the hell is Katherine. I have been living in Hell without her all these years. Searching for her, longing to be with her, needing to live the dream life she promised we would. Anna knew that Katherine was not in the tomb. She knew...that means she knows where Katherine is. She knows where I can find her.
I knew Anna would take Pearl back to the motel room just as soon as she was able to get her blood. Until they returned I sat in the dark waiting for them. "You knew Katherine wasn't in there." I said as soon as they walked in and turned on the light.
"You wouldn't have helped me." Anna said looking scared. I was mad at her, she knew all along, knew I would be destroyed by the knowledge that Katherine just left but she had no other choice to get her Mother back.
"Why do you get a happy ending?" I snarled as I sprang onto Pearl. Why could they be together if I could be with no one? Why did everyone else get what made them happy? Why couldn't I also be happy?
Anna freaked out squealing trying to get me off her precious mother. "Why do you get it and I don't?" I asked again trying hard to hold back my emotions.
Pearl had a story ready for me, Katherine bribed the guard. She got away; she was never locked away in the tomb. She was free somewhere, free living the life she promised we would live together the life she also promised to Pearl and Anna. I dropped my grip on Pearl. It wasn't her fault. Katherine had ruined their lives as well.
"Last time I saw her was Chicago 1983. She knew where you were Damon. She didn't care." Anna told me through tears as she held tight to her Mother. I couldnt handle this. I needed to vent but I had no energy, no desire to do anything, to go anywhere. I wanted to find Katherine and ask her why...why she lied, why she never came to find me...Why? Why? Why?
Dazed, lost, scared, angry; somehow I made it back to the Boarding house. Stephen had lit a fire in the fireplace and was sitting in the living room waiting for me. I fell into the sofa and got lost in the flames. I figured he would launch into a lecture about how I was better off and he told me so but he never said a word. He just sat there with me while I tried to sort out my thoughts, my feelings, my emotions.
Elana POV
I feel like I need to be in three places at once; with Jeremy, with Bonnie, and with Stephen and Damon. Jeremy needs me, but says he doesn't. It is like he knows but doesn't know what he knows is the same thing all of the rest of us have been hiding. I wish I could tell him everything that really happened tonight. Who Anna really was. Why he was actually laying passed out on the forest floor.
I got to Bonnie's as she was helping her Grandmother into bed. I waited in the living room while she went in and while I was waiting I called Stephen. "I just got to Bonnies." I told him.
"Everything alright?" He asked. I could tell he was pacing in the hallway.
"Yeah. How's Damon? You think he's gonna be okay?" I asked. Stephen had people he could come to. Damon didn't and for some reason I felt the need to be there for him. Over the last couple months I had grown to care for him. I trusted him; and I needed him.
"I dunno. Can I call you later?" He said. It sounded like he was on the edge. He had loved Katherine—or he was compelled to love her. She was the reason him and Damon had their issues. She was the reason they were both vampires.
"Yeah. Of course." I said getting off the phone. I didnt know what to do. I knew Bonnie needed me there, to talk about what had happened that night. It was her first big spell. What had happened that night was a big deal and it changed our lives; more so than we realized.
"Eeeeeelaaaaannaaaaa!!!!!" I heard Bonnie scream from the bedroom. I dropped the phone and ran in there. "She's not breathing!" Bonnie cried shaking her Grandmother. "Please wake up..." She begged.
I ran back to the hall and grabbed the phone calling 9-1-1. Then went back in and grabbed Bonnie who had gotten the spell book and was trying desperately to find something to bring Sheila back.
I held her, wrapped her in my arms and cried with her until the paramedics arrived. She did everything they could but it was too late. Sheila was dead. The stress of the spell had killed her. It was our fault; if we would have gotten out sooner, or not needed to break the seal at all... "Bonnie I am so sorry..." I cried.
"It is my fault. I made her do it." She cried.
"Are your parents around?" One of the paramedics asked us.
"They are out of town. I will call them." I answered for Bonnie.
"Do you want us to take her or leave her here?" They asked Bonnie.
"Leave her. I do not want Grams going to the morgue!" She said glaring at the paramedic. He nodded and then they left. We were alone with the dead body of her Grandmother.
"I need Stephen and Damon to come here now." Bonnie said sitting up and wiping her eyes the instant the paramedics walked out of the house.
"Damon?" I asked shocked. "Why Damon?" I could understand wanting Stephen to come, he had saved her and her Grandmother cared for Stephen...but Damon?
"Please Elena just call them." She asked me gathering her spell books and packing them away in a trunk with all the other items of witchcraft that were around the house.
I picked the phone back up and dialed. "Stephen, Sheila is dead. Bonnie wants you and Damon to come over here right now." I said softly into the phone.
Stephen POV
"Sheila died. We need to go to Bonnie's." I told Damon as I hung up the phone. I dont know why I told him, he heard the conversation. Still in his zombie state he stood up and followed me slowly out the door. Instead of driving we walked through the dark streets on Mystic Falls to the house. All of the lights were off and when we arrived and the only light was from a single candle on the dining room table. I followed Damon into the house and we sat down around the table.
"I need your help." Bonnie said quietly once we sat down.
"Grams always said she wanted to have a funeral like Emily's but as far as I know Emily didn't have a funeral because there was no family record of her ever dying."
"Uh Bonnie, Emily didn't have a funeral. She made me promise to protect her family and then just disappeared." I answered.
"No..she didn't just disappear. After Katherine and Pearl were taken there were things she had to do...things she couldn't do alone." Damon whispered. It felt like he didnt have the strength to talk any louder and I questioned how long it had been since he had fed.
"What are you talking about?" Elena asked him.
"Katherine turned me, taught me to live the way she did. To kill without discretion. I killed Stephen not knowing that he had some of Katherine's blood in him because he made it so she was caught."
"That was the morning after they were taken..." I whispered finally understanding Damon. It was my fault Katherine was taken away but it was his fault I am a vampire. He kept coming around to make sure I was okay. I allowed him to keep coming because I needed to know he was still okay after what happened with Katherine.
"She had me go out to the woods, by the bridge and chant some gobley-gook witchy stuff and then she fell backwards...only she didn't fall she completely vanished."
"Do you remember what you said?" Bonnie asked placing her hand over Damon's. It was a simple touch and yet Damon flinched at the feeling and drew his hand back into his lap and crossed his arms tight around his body.
"It was in a little green book. It didn't look like anything special. Just a tiny green book...she told me to just read from the book...there were three of us there that night...me, Anna and Emily. That was the last time I saw Anna."
Bonnie got up from the table and ran into the living room. She dug around in a trunk and pulled out a tiny green book. "Damon is this the book?"
Damon nodded and then stood up and went outside. "Stephen are you okay?" Elena asked me.
"I am fine, just worried about him. Katherine not being in the tomb really messed him up. I have never seen him this upset and he cant talk to me about it."
"Stephen how can I help?" She asked me as she leaned over and kissed my forehead.
"He trusts you." Was all I could say. If I tried to say anything more I would have lost it. I needed to hold myself together until Damon was back to normal.
"I love you Stephen Salvatore." She said standing up and wrapping her arms around me. I nearly lost it right then and there. I buried my face into her stomach and she held me for a moment, "It is okay for you to be upset too you know." She said pulling back slightly so she could see my face.
"I have you. I will be fine. It is Damon I am worried about." I told her standing up quickly and walking towards the front window. I could see Damon sitting on the front step leaning against the post staring up at the moon. "Elena please help him." I begged.
She nodded and brushed her arm across mine as she walked out the front door to go to Damon. I needed her to help him. I needed them both and until he was okay I only had her. I needed him too.
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