Author's Note: Feel free to leave a constructive review. I have had a huge case of writer's block in my current creations and find that a little fan fiction diversion usually gets the juices going again. I recently watched this series and found it interesting. I don't have a beta, so feel free to note any mistakes. I often skip words when I get excited about composition.

Also, I uploaded (several) new versions of this chapter and made some changes. My goal is to make this is realistic examination of the love triangle, with the endgame being Damon and Elena, because I find falling in love with someone you hate, someone who has done terrible things, but is a better person because of you, more interesting. I also want to explore some possible ideas for next season, although I have no expectation that I will hit all of the plot points that have been raised.

Chapter One - Transition

"MATT, LOOK OUT!"

The moment I register her blonde hair and calm expression, I know the outcome. Hasn't history shown how it loves to repeat itself, to cycle through the same stories? All things have beginnings and endings, and history delights in pairing them. It loves poetic justice, beautiful irony. This is where my story, my supposed vampire diaries, started.

Here is where it is to end.

Matt reacts to my scream, swerving the car to avoid Rebekah. We fly off the side of the bridge, careening through air. When we hit the water, the sound is deafening, throwing Matt and I against the truck's dashboard. Blackness encloses me, tightening and then loosening, reality fading in and out. I can't be sure what it real… I cannot hold onto the present. I see Matt, and then nothing, the water filling the cab, and then nothing… my father, and then Matt…

What happened that spring, only two years earlier, floats before me, warningly, tauntingly. Matt's face comes and goes again, vanishing for my father's. I can see myself in the backseat, horrified and struggling to break free, hope leaving my body as quickly as water was taking air—life—away. And I'm terrified.

The truck sinks slowly to the bottom, its weight drawing us down. It is an easy drift, oddly peaceful in the endless silence of the water's depths. I can't hear anything anymore. For all of my fear, there's serenity below the water. After all the things that had happened in my life, dying seems comparatively easy. For that's what is to happen, right? I am going to die here. I can feel the burning in my lungs as they crave air, air that isn't here.

This is my ending.

No. I have to stay here. I have to be in this moment! I have to save Matt. This isn't his ending, only mine. Matt! I reach for him, shaking him, smacking his face to awaken him. He's gone… possibly dead, but I have to be hopeful that the hit only knocked him unconscious. "Matt," I try to cry, but there is no sound, only bubbles as my dwindling air supply bubbles away.

Don't give up. You have to save him! I struggle with the door, but to no avail. I don't have enough strength to break the window, uselessly jamming my elbow against the unrelenting glass. My seatbelt is already under water, and my fingers cannot find its release. But it wouldn't help… there's no way out.

Matt fades away again, and there's pressure on my hand. It's my father's hand on mine. He and I gaze at one another as we recognize the inevitable… his hand is slipping away from mine, mine falling, too… Something tugs at me, drawing me away from final moments, I'm slipping under…

Then, there he is, just as before. Stefan, at Matt's door. Our history is coming full circle, except this time it will not be me. Matt is to receive the miracle.

Stefan yanks off the car door and reaches across Matt, grabbing my hand. No! I shake my hands, gesturing angrily. Save Matt! I point at him over and over. Save Matt! There isn't any time left! Stefan reaches for me again. I shake my head and point more. He has to listen. Stefan always respects my choices and this is what I want. My life for Matt's. He saved me before… it's someone else's turn.

I say Stefan's name soundlessly and he stares back, his expression in conflict. He wants to save me and yet knows that it's my choice. He knows what I'm asking. I'm making the choice my father made. The right one.

He rips Matt's seatbelt off and gathers him into his arms. I watch them vanish, feeling a calming sensation. This is the right end for all of us. Without me, there won't be the same dangers, the dangers that came from the doppelganger. I never wanted this anyway, everyone in my life in constant danger. They will be okay… Matt would be okay. Stefan will take care of him… of Jeremy, of Bonnie, of Caroline, of Damon.

Damon… he struggled so hard to keep me alive, even when I chose Stefan every time. Strange how the water is the precise of Damon's eyes, and just as dangerous—

Nothingness takes me.

[Line]

I gasp for breath as the world comes into view.

I'm alive!

Or am I? The world is different. I see things as though I haven't seen before. Suddenly, there's simply… more. The silver surfaces gleam around me, light bouncing around the room, and I can pick out each color in their white light. The coolness of the metal below my fingertips is precise, smooth… perceptible in more than temperature. And I can feel every ridge on my fingertips against it.

I lay there motionless, adjusting to how much I can suddenly sense. I see light, smell light, feel light… I can almost feel the gleam coming off a metal bowl that hits my left cheek. All of this, and the room is basically unlit.

Where am I?

A morgue, of course. And by extension, the hospital. The answer rises up easily. The silver surfaces, the dim lights, the smell of bodies refrigerated. There's a brain, two livers, and a kidney in a small refrigerator by the door. A baby is being born on the fourth floor. A girl, I think. I can smell blood being transfused seven doors away… in a room on the floor above… there's an open wound somewhere on my floor…

Everything, I can smell everything.

Fragments of everything that happened rip through my brain, processing at rapid speeds. I died. I had to of. I'd felt life draining out of my own body, fully aware that it was the end. Stefan couldn't have gotten back to me in time… could he? No… maybe it is a dream, it's all a dream. What else could it be?

The word whispers below my consciousness, pressing itself into recognition. There is an easy explanation. One I have seen many times. The one thing that brings a human back from the brink of death and even back from death itself.

Vampire.

I let out a shriek, rage propelling me to sit up. "No! No! NOOO!"

How did this happen? It can't be! I don't want this, I never wanted it, never! I want to grow old and to have a family and live a regular human life. I want to be normal, to get married… I don't want immortality and forceful cravings and a bloodlust that haunts me… I choose humanity, I chose to keep it despite whatever good there is to being a vampire. Because I wasn't sure I could live with the bad, too. And now that doesn't matter.

"No no no! NOO!" I scream. "I don't want this! I don't want it!

My hand rips through the metal sheet below me, shredding it like cardboard. I rip it off its cart and then fling my hand against the cart and watch it fly across the room, crashing into things, but I don't care.

Someone did this… someone took away my choice. Everything in life, there is so little we control and now… I'm a vampire. I chose not to be, and now I am. Who, though? Stefan could never do it to me, he loves me and respects me too much. Damon could, though. He was probably slipping me blood daily. Oh, I could kill—Rationality forces itself on me, calling me off the brink of an angry abyss. No. Damon hadn't done this. It was Meredith.

Then, I'm going to kill her! I'll rip her heart and drink her blood until it was suckled from every cell—

"Oh, god. Oh my god," I gasp. Because there it is.

The bloodlust. I take a deep breath, noticing the different flavors in the air, pushing it into my lungs and trying to calm myself. I have to get control. Everything I am going to feel will feel more, won't it? Stefan told me, Lexi told me, Caroline told me. This is part of being a vampire. I can't be angry, because then I will be enraged. Then I can hurt someone, a thought that tears me apart as much as I want to tear up everything in this room.

I just – this isn't what I wanted. I never chose this, I never wanted it, I wanted…

It is what it is.

NO! I—

Calm. Stay calm… keep breathing. Caroline said that she just breathes through everything. Just breathe.

"Elena…"

There is a hurt so deep in the room that I inhale sharply.

"You still have a choice."

Stefan sits on a chair in the corner of the room, watching me. I don't know if he has been there the whole time or not. I can't see myself missing his presence, because it hits me hard. His eyes are wide and fearful, dark and stormy. Agony lives on his face, etched deeply. His skin gleams in the low lights, and I suddenly realize that he is… more than I knew before. His facial planes more sharp, the depth of his eyes farther, the subtle, elegant holding of his frame suddenly known…

"Elena," he says softly. Strange how I can suddenly pin point every individual cadence to it, the rise and fall of the air as he says my name, its soft bounces against the room walls. Do all vampires hear like this? It's almost intoxicating to hear so much. Like I can hear his feelings.

I take a deep breath. "I'm dead."

He does not blink or move, but a tear streaks down one cheek. "Yes."

Another breath. "There was… vampire blood in my system, wasn't there? From when I came into the hospital?"

"You didn't know?"

I still have the angry current, but I control it. I just keep breathing until I can say, "No."

He moans, and I hear ten kinds of hurt in the sound. "Elena, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. For this, for everything…" He lets out another despairing moan. "I never wanted—"

My anger is replaced by concern. Overwhelming concern, it floods my system and compels me forward. I move toward him, and he stares back mournfully. "I know… Stefan, I know. And I know there's a choice. It's okay. I still have a choice left. It's just different."

The door flings open forcefully and I watch as light enters the room. I hear his breathing, his heavy steps, before he physically enters the room.

Damon is at my side in an instant. "Elena," he whispers, his hands on my hair, my shoulders, around my waist. His touch lasts less than a second before he drops away and stalks across the room to Stefan, his voice furious.

"How did this happen? How did she die? Who the hell let her die with vampire blood in her system?"

"I'm fine," I interject.

"You're dead, Elena," says Damon carelessly. "Fine is not an adjective to be used by dead people. That's one reserved for the living, a group to which you no longer belong. And I want to know why. "

I am struck by the strong wave of hurt at his statement, more than I would expect, and he seems to know it. "Sorry," he mutters as his eyes flicker over to me. "I'm sorry. I just need to know how this happened, since your survival was kind of Mystic Falls Supernatural Club objective numero uno. I'm feeling a little distressed by our failure…" He does not fail to smirk. "May have to disband now."

"Rebekah," Stefan answers. His eyes remain on me, and he is still motionless, a contrast to Damon's explosive hand gestures and pacing.

I nod, and Damon swears loudly, the smirk gone. "Rebekah? Oh, that little—I should have let Alaric have her!"

"She was…" I try to pull back the moments from my memory. "She was in the road, I yelled at Matt to look out – Matt! Is he okay? Did he make it? Stefan—"

"He's fine, aside from some apparent health insurance concerns. Meredith has him in another room and wants him to remain over night," Stefan answers. "Right now, we need to get you out of here. This isn't—"

"What, Stefan?" Damon's voice is low and vicious. "Tell me, is this not the ideal location for a transitioning vampire? The amount of blood alone—" Damon stops, his eyes suddenly finding me.

I can feel both of their gazes, and I suddenly realize that it is not in a human way. I can't understand it yet, but each feels different – Stefan's is ripe with sorrow so thick it should drown me all over again. And there's a loving purity, a hallowing helplessness. Damon's look has sorrow, too, strong like an ache, but it is buried beneath a burning anger and decisiveness.

"Blood," Damon says softly. "You need human blood, Elena. You have to complete the transition."

"No," I say immediately. "No."

"She doesn't have to, Damon."

"What? Are you fucking kidding me right now? Elena, I—"

"Don't, Damon! I get to choose this, because I didn't choose to be a vampire. This is my life we're talking about… I get to choose if I want to be… like you."

He strides over to me, too close and in my face. Like Stefan, I see him more clearly. I see every sliver of blue that creates his cerulean irises, and the small, stubble hairs rising on his chin, and the delicate hairs of his eyelashes. They were both always beautiful, but now I see each individual piece rather than the collective whole.

"Well, considering the other option is dead, like, really dead, more dead than you are now, I think—"

"She's right," Stefan says. He stands from the chair. "She gets to choose."

I look at him. "Thank you…" I shake another memory loose. "You'll never know how much it meant that you took Matt instead of me. Stefan, it was—"

Damon roars. "WHAT? YOU SAVED THE BOY?"

I know Damon's intent before he even moves. In a flash, I'm in front of Stefan, Damon inches away, his chest heaving and his arm raised in attack. Stefan is still motionless behind me, not cowering but watchful. I can feel his waves of guilt, his hope that Damon will hit him and take away some of the pain. But I can't let it happen.

To say that this is not the right time is an understatement.

"Damon, no! Do not do this right now. I chose to die. I would have never forgiven him if he had grabbed me instead of Matt. Just think of how that would have ended!"

He drops his fist, but remains close. His head tips as he fires at me. "Fine, I will think of it. Let's see… you'd still be alive, and you'd still be human! Great outcome! How about we rewind and try it again?"

"And Matt would be dead. I could never have let that happen. I would have never forgiven myself, or Stefan."

"I. Don't. Care. You'd still be human."

I push him away, meaning to simply move him out of my comfort zone, but he flies against the wall. "Oh, great. Super Elena," he mutters.

"Look, none of this matters, because we can't change what happened. I… I need to get out of here. I need to decide if I'm going to… die again, or not, okay? I don't want to do it here. It's too dangerous."

"Fine," Damon snaps. "Let's take this to somewhere more cozy, shall we?"

I hear his heartbeat and then, there he is, bursting through the door. He's out of breath and sweaty and runs into my arms. I fling my own around Jeremy, struggling to hold him close and be sure that he is safe, he is okay.

"You're okay," he whispers. "I saw Alaric and he was a ghost and I thought that you had…" He stops. "How are you okay? I thought, the spell—did something change? Did Bonnie—"

I can still hear his heartbeat. It's coming over his words, pulling me away from him even though I still clutch him in my arms. The pulse is strong, at the crook of his neck. It's calling to me, a sweet siren call. Fire erupts within my lungs, blazing through every cell, poised and ready to take what I want—

I roughly push Jeremy away, and he crashes into Damon, who seems to know my intentions. Stefan does not move, only observes me with wretched sorrow. I'm afraid for him, he almost seems catatonic.

"No…" I moan. "Jeremy, you have to get out of here, it's not safe right now… I need you to go."

"What the—" Jeremy looks at Stefan and Damon and his eyes light with rage, but tears gather. "No! Who did it? Which one of you turned my sister? No! It can't—"

I fly against the morgue wall, to where I had pushed Damon. I need to be as far as I can from Jeremy. "Jeremy, no. It wasn't one of them… I think Meredith gave me some vampire blood when I came to the hospital, and then Rebekah ran Matt and me off the road… I just… I died. It was an accident. I just… I need you to go. I have to make a choice about…"

The tears fall now, and he looks at me. "Elena… you have to. You can't leave me alone. Everyone is gone. Our parents, Jenna, Alaric… we have nothing left except each other… you have to turn. You can't leave me. A vampire you is better than no you at all."

Despair is the only feeling left in my body as he cries at me. Even my craving for blood vanishes. His hurt is heavy, like the water, except it presses in, suffocating everything. I can feel my despair, his despair…

"Elena…" he begs.

"Jeremy, please… let's just get out of here." I feel myself slip against the metal wall. "I don't want to… be here… anymore…"

I only have time to register Stefan catching me, and the strength in his hands, the way they tangle in my hair, before I know nothing again.

I wake in Stefan's room. I feel horrible, my stomach sour and my body weak. The craving is intense, fiery, like the burning in my lungs when I wanted air, but a thousand times worse. I remember what Alaric's dark side said about the vervain in the rag on Caroline's mouth. "It's like inhaling razor blades." That's what it feels like inside my body, like I've inhaled razor blades and they line every vein, and the only cure is the sweet soothe of blood, to take away the sharpness…

"No," I cry, jumping up.

"Elena? Oh, Elena!"

Caroline's arms are around me instantly. I am surprised to realize that I can smell something on her that I smelt on Stefan and Damon… the vampire scent. I know it now. Caroline's hands are in my hair now and she's issuing assurances as fast as she can, her voice sweet.

"Elena, it's going to fine. I'm going to help you through this! If I did it, you certainly can… trust me. It's going to be fine, I promise!"

Her comfort is too much for me, and I begin to cry. "Caroline… I never wanted this. I didn't want to be a vampire." My sobs shake my frame. "I wanted to grow old, to be human, to have a family… I didn't want any of this."

"I know, sweetie. I know you didn't want to be a vampire. But you are now, and it's okay. Look at me – I mean, I'm probably not going to win next year's Miss Mystic Falls or anything, but I'm happy… I'm okay, you know? You're going to be okay, too, I promise."

I just cry.

When I wake again, I feel weaker than before and my cravings border on all consuming. If it is possible to feel pain in every cell, and to recognize each little box of infinite hurt, I feel it. The time to make a choice is fast approaching; I won't be able to last much longer.

Caroline is gone, though I can sense that everyone is gathered downstairs, discussing my future. I can hear Stefan, resolute in his belief that it is my choice. He is clinging to nothing else but that everything that might happen must predicate on what I decide. Jeremy and Damon are teamed together by their mutual desire for me to live, dead as though I will be… Caroline waffles on whether or not it's right to make that choice for me, even though she wants me to live. Bonnie is waffling, too, but her dislike of vampires makes her question whether or not she can stand to see me like one of them.

I choose not to listen to it… I don't want to be influenced by them. I have to be able to live with (or not, as the case may be) my decision. This isn't like choosing between Stefan and Damon… a part of me knew that if I made a mistake, I might be able to change it. I knew, however cruel the fact was to acknowledge, that if I changed my mind, the other might take me back.

This, I never could.

I try to sort everything onto sides, but the lines are elusive and unclear. Every reason for each side has a counter, an emotional tug that I cannot easily place on one side or another. Nothing about this is clear. For all of my new senses, my emotions feel weaved together more than ever, every thread entangled with another.

I can't leave Jeremy alone after everything he has lost. He needs me, I love him.

But I could hurt or kill him if I become a vampire. I could never live with that.

Bonnie will never feel the same about me if I'm a vampire. Our friendship will never be the same…

But what if she tries to cast some spell to bring me back and hurts herself?

Caroline needs me—she's just lost Tyler—and she could help me. She could ease the transition, and as hard as times might have been, she's okay… she's really okay.

That's right, she is okay… and if I die, she'll be fine, she's a vampire…

Stefan needs me. Damon needs me.

They would be better off if I was gone. Their brotherhood would remain intact, never truly tainted by my choice made under duress. They could keep the idea that, in clearer circumstances, I would have chosen each one. Stefan would know that our love was pure and that I never gave up. Damon would know that in a moment of passion, I had chosen him… had kissed him, not the other way around. That I had… lusted for him, I suppose.

But then they will never forgive one another and themselves if I died. Damon will regret not killing Rebekah and blame himself. Stefan will never forgive himself for taking Matt instead of me. For letting me die.

But neither of them will forgive themselves if I live… Damon knows it was his blood that caused me to be a vampire, and Stefan knows that I never wanted this… I was forced into it… he never wanted me to be a vampire, because I never wanted it.

Alaric is what helps me make the decision. In my death, I brought his death. It was true that he was not himself, but the real him was buried underneath the dark side, too, and it had died. I knew Alaric, and he would have wanted this. He hated his dark side. But it also means his good side can never return, and I don't want that to be a waste. I know what he would want me to do… to buck up, become a vampire, and take care of Jeremy. He'd never force the choice on me, but Alaric always did what was right. He stepped up when we needed him, and despite his self-loathing about his parenting skills, it wasn't about that. It was about being there, even imperfectly. And he'd done it.

I have to be here. And the only way to do that is to become a vampire. That is my imperfectly, it seems.

Had the decision arrived within hours? It seems like no time at all. Time feels strange now, something I can control rather than something that controls me. I'm not used to that – it isn't something anyone shared about being a vampire.

No, it isn't that I can control time.

Just that, suddenly, I have forever.

"Everyone, quiet. She's coming down the stairs." Stefan's voice is low. I can barely hear his controlled despair.

"Stefan, really? She's a vampire now. She's been able to hear us the whole time," Damon scoffs. "Come on, Semi-Vamp, let's hear the verdict. What will it be? Eternal life or dying moral high ground…?"

I enter the room and see them all gathered, my worryingly supernatural family. I take in the moment, in its humanity, a strange thought given their natures. Damon is at the fireplace, ever omnipresent tumbler in hand. He looks over, eyebrows cocked above his eyes, daring me to say something to his taunts. Stefan sits in a single chair, his face brooding, his heart aching. He wants to look at me, but doesn't. Bonnie, Jeremy, and Caroline are on a couch. It is Caroline I watch closely, how easy it is for her to sit next to Jeremy and Bonnie. Her hand is on Jeremy's shoulder. No temptation, no desire to hurt. She loves him, loves Bonnie, loves all of us, really. I can feel it in her. And she's a vampire.

This is my hope.

"I haven't been," I say.

"What?" asks Jeremy, looking up. "Elena—"

"I haven't been listening… I, uh, haven't wanted to. It's not that I don't care about every single person in this room and what they think, but…" I make a soft laugh. "Eternity is fairly long, and I wanted to make the right choice. My choice."

I can feel each wave of feeling, emanating off of everyone like something I could touch. I can't believe vampires have this gift, to be able to feel what everyone feels, for it to have a corporeal element. Bonnie and Caroline with their soft pain, light and clear. Jeremy's wrecked edges, sharp to the touch. Damon's ragged ones, more worn. Stefan's impenetrable walls, like stone rising toward a dark sky.

"I never thought I'd live through my parents' car crash… when the car went down and I was looking in my dad's eyes… I thought it was over. And it was… it should have been." I look at Stefan. "But Stefan, you came, and you saved me. Not just from the crash… but from everything afterwards. I needed you, and you were there. And I love you so much for it. Thank you."

He nods at me, his expression unfathomable.

"Bonnie… Caroline. You two are… the very best friends a girl could ask for. It's so cliché and I hate myself for saying it, but you have been there for more than I could have ever dreamed, and I can't even think of who else could have done the things you've done for me. I love you both."

Jeremy is already crying when I face him.

"Elena—" he starts.

"Jeremy… you are my only family. I love you. I would do anything for you—"

He stands up, furious. "Then live! Choose to live. Stay with me, stay with us! That's what I want. If you'd do anything for me, choose to live! Elena, I need you… we need you. We're a family… a really messed up, supernatural death-ring wearing family, but we are all each other has now. We're a family."

"I know… and that's why I'm choosing to live."

The room erupts: Bonnie's tentative smile, Caroline's wide one, Jeremy's relief. Everyone wants to say something, but I wave a hand.

"No, let me finish. I just… want to make sure I say these things now before there isn't a chance to say them anymore. I don't know… I don't know what I'm going to be like when… when I become one. I don't know if I'll be me, or some warped version of myself, like Alaric. I'll be intensified… more. I just need you all to know how I feel now… that I love you all."

The room is silent until Damon clinks his tumbler. "Sure, Mini-Gilbert. Interrupt her speech before she says goodbye to me. So very typical."

Caroline laughs, and Jeremy does, too. It's dark outside, but I can feel their light. Even Bonnie manages a small smile. I start to say something, reassure Damon that I had something to say, even if I'm not sure I can say it now, but he interrupts.

"No, no, Elena. Let me do it." His voice becomes high, an imitation of mine. "'Oh, Damon… I don't know how I could ever live without you. You're everything I ever wanted: so devastatingly sexy, deviously charming—'"

"Supremely annoying," I respond.

"Seriously, Damon, leave her alone," Bonnie defends. "This is a huge decision—"

"Yeah, could you please not be cavalier about—"

"Oh, you please. I knew you were going to choose to live. We all did."

The anger I start to feel is different than the hospital… I can feel a playful undercurrent. I'm annoyed, but there's no rage threatening to overtake my veins. "Is that so?"

"Yes, that's so. Like you were gonna leave your darling baby brother with the likes of us. Now, let's get down to business. You look like a girl who needs some fresh blood in her life." He raises an eyebrow at my shaking knees.

Stefan rises. He has been the only one not to react and his guilt is threatening to overtake every sense I have. "I'll get it." He is almost out of the room before I say, "Wait. I'm coming with you."

He does not answer, and I follow him down into the basement. I press a hand into the air behind him, almost certain I'll feel the wall he's emotionally constructing so high that no one could ever scale it.

"Stefan…"

He turns toward me, and suddenly everything he is feeling is in me. And it hurts. He is hurting so badly, his guilt pushing and pulling and struggling to drown him. His words are rushed, frantic compositions. Unlike Damon, he remains away from me, not within touching distance. "Elena, you don't have to do this. You can change your mind – it's okay, it's okay. I'll take care of Jeremy, of everyone. You don't have to do this. You don't have to be a vampire, you don't have to drink—"

"Yes, yes, I do, Stefan." I step forward and take his hands in mine. He holds them cupped, frozen and unwilling to yield to my touch. "Don't you see? Jeremy's right. We are a family. I thought I couldn't have one and I never will, not in the traditional sense of Mom, Dad, and baby, but… I have this. This is enough for me."

"You never wanted this. You didn't want to be vampire," he agonizes.

"No, and now I am." I shrug, trying not to give into his pain, my pain. "I also never wanted any of my friends or my brother to get hurt. But they did. That's reality, Stefan, that's the world we live in. If I'm a vampire, then… I'm a vampire. It could be worse… I could be dead."

"Elena, it doesn't have to be that way—"

"What? Die? I can't choose that, not with the way things are. I can't leave Jeremy, Caroline… you. I can't leave anybody."

"No, there's a—"

"You know, I started thinking upstairs and realized that having Mr. On-the-Wagon-Off-the-Wagon help you acquire your first taste of human blood was a bad idea. Much better for the guy who can actually control his thirst to help you. Aren't I right, little brother?"

Damon's voice takes over our conversation, and I can tell that he means it to, that Stefan was going to tell me something. He strolls over to the refrigerator and pulls out a bag. "Oh, choices, choices. I'm not sure what to start with, but this one looks nice and ripe."

He pops open the top, and veins slowly start to form on Stefan's face. He looks at Damon, and then at me. Damon blows across the top, sending a waft of blood scent to Stefan and I, and his veins worsen. I ache for the bag, wishing I could tear it out of Damon's hands, but I stand my ground. He's hurting Stefan on purpose, and I don't want it. And I'm not sure if that's because I can't stand to see Stefan hurt for Stefan's sake, or for my own. Because feeling what he feels hurts.

"Hmm. Perhaps you should head upstairs, brother… better to stay on the wagon. I hear there's a new vampire around town," Damon remarks and then winks at me. "She might be dangerous."

Stefan's face is stoic to the point of stone. "No, I'm fine." The veins darken on his face as Damon approaches to the point where fangs are forming. I can't see him like this… my own veins are darkening, the thirst is burning…

"Actually, Stefan… it's… could you go upstairs?" I ask.

"Elena…"

"No, it's fine. Please. I just… please go upstairs."

He steps into the stairwell, and looks back at me. "Elena."

"I know, Stefan. I know. It's okay - I can do this part alone." He vanishes up the stairs, taking his agony with him.

Damon knocks me with his elbow, his face conspiratorial with an eyebrow raised. "Alone? Hardly. And, boy, is he a drag today or what?"

I turn on him, quick to remind myself that I can't get too angry. I can siphon it out, but I can't lose control. "Damon! What did you interrupt?"

"Uh… you guys… having a really boring and unproductive conversation, as far as I could tell."

"Stop it. He was going to tell me something, something about another way..."

Damon sighs and hands me the blood bag. I don't take it, glaring at him.

"Look, he was going to try and change your mind, after you'd already made it. I merely made sure the Suffering Stefan didn't have a chance. It's like you said. You made your choice without our input. He had no right to try and change it. He only wants to because he feels guilty that you never wanted this in the first place. But what's done is done. There's no other way. You're gonna be a vampire or you're going to die." He hands me the bag again, but I don't take it.

"He wasn't trying… he couldn't. He just wanted to make sure. You're right. We'd… talked about it, and I'd told him I never wanted it… And no offense, you're not exactly the right person to be acting as though my choice is word. You would have ignored it and left Matt to die."

He does not flinch nor look remotely guilty. "Yes, I would have."

"Don't you see that's wrong, Damon? Matt is my friend, my family. I love him, just like I love everyone upstairs. You can't… you can't always pick me. You have to put other people first."

"No, I don't, Elena. I'm not you, and that's why this whole I-Save-Your-Life-a-Million-Times thing works! You are always trying to save everyone else. That's who you are. You can't help it. But I'm the only person who is only ever trying to save you. I'm the only person who doesn't care an ounce about collateral damage, just you. And that works… because between you and I… everyone makes it out alive."

"No, they don't! What about Jenna, Alaric… Tyler? We've lost so many people!"

Damon's face twists at the mention of Alaric, but he is smirking before I can comment. "Yeah, well, okay, maybe we should revisit the plan. But until you drink this little bag of fun—" He wiggles the blood bag. "—there's no point in fighting about it. You have to drink for this to matter."

"What if I didn't?"

He narrows his eyes. "Don't play games, Elena."

"I'm not… I want to know what if I told you I wouldn't. Would you let me make that choice?"

"No."

"That's not fair, Damon. People… choice is all we have. Why don't you respect me enough to let me make it? You of all people know why I might not want to make it."

Damon's voice is soft now, all of the teasing gone. "I know, Elena. And it's not that I don't respect you to make your own choices… it's that you're an eighteen year old girl running around with immortals. You don't always know the things we know. Stefan… he always lets you make a choice and 'respects' it because deep down he is terrified to try and tell you what is right or wrong. He doesn't know! He is too busy remembering mistakes he made in the 1800s, the 1920s—"

"I'm sorry, but your moral code isn't exactly spotless, either. You killed my brother, for starters."

He lets out a small scoff. "Oh, I know. Yes, I'm a bad, bad man, and I'm okay with it. You know why? Because if I don't accept it, then I'll suffer endlessly like Stefan. If I don't accept that I did some things wrong and try to move on, it will kill me and everyone around me. If I sat locked in my room, mourning that I killed Jeremy and just got damn lucky with that ring, nothing would change! And I wouldn't have been around to save you, or anybody else I've saved this year."

A sob reaches my throat, but I don't release it. I can't, I don't want to feel it in this moment. I push it away, wondering if this is part of the vampire experience, too. It's not that I want to 'turn a switch' or however that works. I just… I'm not sure I can cry right now. Everything else is already emotionally loaded enough.

Damon's eyes match his voice now, as he tenderly says, "Look, if you really didn't want to, I would understand—"

I shake my head. "No. I do. I am. I want to. I just…"

I drop to my knees, feeling woozy. I have to have that blood – the thirst is encroaching, blurring my vision and moving my limbs toward the blood bag. I want it, I need it. Damon forces it into my grasping hands. "It's okay," he whispers, dropping his head to my face. I'm relieved to see no judgment, no guilt. "It's going to be okay."

I bring the bag to my lips. The smell is intoxicating, so sweet, almost like candy. I want this, I want it so bad, it smells incredible and there's nothing else as sweet and precious in the world and…

I close my eyes. I can't do this, there's no way, but I want it so badly—

His eyes are still on me. "It's going to be okay."

I take a sip. It tastes like nothing in the world has ever tasted. Sweet, beautiful, delicious… necessary. It replaces everything that has ever mattered, surpasses every touch, smell, taste, experience. I sip a little faster, wanting more and more…

Pain. Something ripping through my gums, my teeth ache, and suddenly I know, without bringing a hand up, that my fangs have broken through.

I'm really a vampire.

I bring my eyes up to Damon. I know what I look like – I've seen it enough in other vampires. They're black, veins spreading away. I finish the bag and drop it, breathing hard. Everything is rushing, coming and going, a dance in my veins that is lovely and hurts and—

"I… I…" I try to choke out some words, but I can't. This is my new reality… I am a vampire. I've lost my humanity.

With one hand on my wrist, Damon pulls me into his arms and holds me close. I can feel his grief intermingling with my own, his recollections over his own transition.

"I know, Elena. Trust me… I know."