Chapter 1
Hello! This is my first fanfiction, so i apologise if this story doesn't make any sense. This is set at the end of 5x21 and is a steroline story, from Caroline's P.O.V and how she felt when Stefan died.
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters or storyline. All the characters and most of this storyline belong to L.J Smith, Julie Plec and any other tvd writers. The line at the end is also a quote from The Mortal Instruments Book 6 by Cassandra Clare. No copyright infringement is intended.
I hope you enjoy this! :-)
The first thing Caroline felt as he hit the ground was disbelief. There was no way Julian had just killed Stefan, but the heart he gripped in his hand and the horrifying sight of Stefan crumbling to the ground like a lifeless doll, greying and decayed suggested otherwise.
"There, dead doppelganger. Stops the spell" Julian hissed, before tossing Stefan's heart to the ground and walking away.
The final things she felt were shock and grief reverberating through her in shockwaves. As she hurried over to his greying body, she knew, if they all came back from this that she may never be able to look at Tyler the same way again before Stefan's veined, dull and empty face would flash before her eyes.
Because although Julian possessed his body it had been his hand that had yanked out Stefan's heart from his chest so brutally, and it was his voice that had uttered the words "dead doppelganger".
She knew she shouldn't have felt that way, and she didn't know why she did.
The grief coursing through her as she placed Stefan's head into her lap, was completly unbearable, like her heart was the one that had been ripped from her chest and it had been sliced into ribbons.
"Somebody help me!" Caroline yelled out as loud as her voice could carry, while she was choking back tears, even though she knew it was too late, but still, praying for something, anything. A miracle, against all odds.
"Please!" That time a sob managed to escape her throat and colour her voice.
Guilt now joined the swirling emotions coiling in her stomach like a snake.
It wasn't supposed to be you.
Caroline should have died, Julian had reached for her, but Stefan, being the ever selfless hero, dragged Julian away from her and he had paid the ultimate price.
She should have tried harder, been quicker, but she had been too slow too slow, always too slow. That second, she spent being too hesitant, too scared, at snapping Tyler's neck had cost Stefan his life.
Something that couldn't ever be repaid.
She felt like a broken toy that couldn't be fixed again without the right batteries or screws. Stefan was her battery. He was the only thing that could fix her. But he wasn't here anymore so he couldn't. She had never felt grief like this before, shattering her like broken glass from the inside out.
Maybe it was the boiling rage that had burst through her grief, adding to her turmoil. She wanted to rip out Julian's heart, the way he had Stefan's, make him pay for taking away the best friend she so cherished away from her life just because he looked like somebody else. It burned through her, a fire exploding from her heart, but the grief overwhelmed the fiery rage bubbling within her, consuming her soul, crippling her.
It felt like it was destroying and eating away at her until there was nothing left.
She wished it would, so she wouldn't have to endure this bone-deep agony any longer.
She didn't care if that made her a bad person. All she cared about right now was him.
Fumbling for her phone with shaking fingers, Caroline half-carried, half-dragged Stefan's body inside the college lounge, lay him gently on the couch and, as quickly as her hands would let her, dialled Damon's number, all the while crying almost hysterically. She didn't know how she was going to tell him she hadn't managed to save his brother and now he was gone-dead.
Stefan was gone and he wasn't coming back. And that, Caroline suddenly realised, was something she didn't think she could live without. She had never become so close to flipping her switch as she did right now. For once, she really understood how Elena felt when Jeremy died.
She didn't know when or how it had happened, but life without Stefan had become life not worth living.
Not even a life at all.
It is always better to be the one who dies, rather than the one who lives on.
She couldn't agree more.
Thank you for taking the time to read this and I hope you enjoyed it! I will update another chapter depending on what you think of it. Please review and tell me if I made any mistakes. :-)
