TVD The Blood Games
Disclaimer: The vampire diaries does not belong to me. Only the OC, Dorothy I created belongs to me. I once again borrowed some of the lines from the flashback portion of the episode Black Hole Sun.
Chapter 2: Eclipse Day
May 10, 1994
"Cousin Day, did my Daddy tell you that we're having a party for the ellipse. There's gonna be cookies!" Dorothy informed Damon with a big grin on her face as she ran up to him that morning.
"Eclipse," Damon corrected absentmindedly, "Yeah I know, there's gonna be free booze so I'm there. Plus I'll get to meet all the new founding members. I hope this generation is less dickish then the last ones."
"Sheriff Forbes is a really nice lady. You'll like her. Her husband is nice too but boring like Stefan. Dr. Gilbert is doctor which obviously means he's evil. Mrs. Gilbert is really pretty but not as pretty as Momma! Mayor Lockwood is rude. Mrs. Lockwood is nice but Momma says she's a gold digger. There are too many Fell's to talk about. Daddy's says their all butts though!" Dorothy gossiped excitedly.
Just then Zach came into the kitchen and Damon called over to him, "Hey Zach, Munchkin says the Fell's are butts, that true?"
Zach grimaced, "Dorothy I told you not to repeat that."
"You said not to say it to them. I didn't. I told cousin Day, he won't tell!" Dorothy assured her dad as she took a bite of the pancakes that Damon made her.
Damon just shot Zach an amused look.
"She absorbs way too much." Zach mutters to himself as he leaves the kitchen with Gail's chocolate milk.
"Morning Damon, Dorothy." Stefan greeted as he walked into the kitchen and grabbed some of his stored animal blood from the fridge.
"Good morning Stefan!" Dorothy responded with a mouthful of Damon's famed vampire face pancakes.
Stefan gave Damon a look like he did whenever Damon reference their vampirism. Damon just smirked back at him.
"Hey Stefan, you going to the party tonight?" Damon asked casually.
"Yes, Gail and Zach asked me too. It's just casual, thankfully." Stefan answered.
"Yes, god forbid you wear a suit!" Damon mocked. Stefan just rolled his eyes and drank his animal blood from the water bottle.
"I don't blame you cousin Stefan. I don't like wear dresses either." Dorothy empathized.
"Since when?" Damon questioned with an eyebrow raised as he looked at the dress she was wearing now.
"I'll wear a dress when I want to not because I have to!" Dorothy argued petulantly.
"Well said." Stefan agreed raising his drink in a toast.
"You wear dresses?" Dorothy asked cheekily.
"Damon stop teaching her to be smart ass like you." Stefan complained.
"Don't curse in front of the kid Stefan, you want Gail to kick your ass for teaching her daughter swear words?" Damon cautioned.
"Yeah, what he said." Dorothy said agreeing with Damon.
"You two are the worst." Stefan bemoaned but he was smiling.
The party was in full swing and Damon was bored when he heard Dorothy.
"Cousin Day, come meet Sheriff Forbes!" Dorothy said as she grabbed Damon's hand and began dragging him over to the woman.
"Sheriff this is my cousin Damon," Dorothy said gesturing to him and continued now gesturing to the sheriff, "Cousin Day, this is Sheriff Forbes!"
"It's nice to meet you Damon." Liz Forbes smiled, offering her hand to shake.
Damon took her hand and shook it in greeting, "Pleasures all mine, Sheriff."
"Call me Liz, I'm not on duty now." Liz corrected.
"Sure thing Liz," Damon agreed, "You have a daughter, Caroline right? Munchkin's mentioned her."
"Yes, Caroline is 8 months younger than Dorothy. Gail has arranged play dates between them. It's a sight to witness. Both girls are so excitable. Do you want to see a picture of Caroline?" Liz offers.
"Sure." Damon shrugged. Liz pulled out her wallet out of her purse and pulled out a picture of Caroline in a pink onesie.
"Aunt Liz is breaking out the pictures, I'm leaving!" Dorothy yells and goes to the food table. Damon shakes his head fondly at her and looks at Liz's picture.
"Cute." Damon smiled.
"Thank you" Liz grinned, "Kids are hard work but worth it, don't you agree?"
"I wouldn't know. I'm just cool cousin Damon not a hardworking mom." Damon answered evasively.
"From what I've heard, you'd be a great dad. Pardon the personal question but would you ever want kids of your own?" Liz wonders.
Damon gets an odd expression on his face but before he can answer, Stefan is storming over to him looking angry, "Damon, how could you do that to Gail?!"
"Looks like the jig is up," Damon jokes and then compels Liz, "Hey, look at me. Go home. Forget you ever met us."
As Liz leaves, Stefan grabs Damon by his arm and flashes him into Stefan's room, "How the hell did you feed on Gail? She's on vervain."
"Yeah, in her coffee. I swapped it out weeks ago. Same for Zach." Damon explains.
"Damon these people are our family! They're letting us stay in their home. You can't just treat them like a walking snack whenever you're hungry." Stefan criticized harshly.
"Oh, calm down Stefan. I'm being careful they have no idea. What's the big deal anyway?" Damon dismisses.
"The big deal is that they trusted us to treat them like family not food. Can't you have some respect for human life. You could have killed Gail's baby by depriving her of the nutrients she needs. All because you were too inconsiderate to drink from a blood bag." Stefan argues, angrily.
"Screw you Stefan," Damon sneers, "You think I'd be that careless?"
"I don't know anymore," Stefan yells, "You promised me you'd be better. I thought you were. When you were with Dorothy I saw a side of you that I hadn't seen in a long time. The caring older brother from my childhood. But then you do things like this, uncaring of the consequences of your actions. Have you been faking it this whole time? Is Dorothy just food to you too!?" Stefan asks heatedly.
"You know what Stefan here you preaching at me like your some saint. Your way worse than me with your emotions off! Entire cities are massacred. All I do is snatch, eat, erase. It's the perfect system. Animal blood is nasty and I refused to eat it and you knew that. You knew I was drinking from blood bags but it's not enough to stay satisfied. Vampires need the hunt. You know that, Stefan. So yell at me for acting like a normal vampire not some sad sack with the delusion that he can do normal human things like have a family. Zach, Gail and even Dorothy are all gonna die one day and the Salvatore line will start over with a new generation just like the past hundred years! Their lives don't matter." Damon ranted.
"Cousin Day, Stefan?" a young voice stuttered. Neither brother had realized that Dorothy had entered Stefan's room.
Dorothy had wondered were cousin Day went. She asked Daddy and he said he saw Stefan and Damon leaving the parlor together. She checked a few places before heading to the bedrooms. The closer she got to Stefan's room the louder the yelling was. The bedrooms were pretty deep in the house and Daddy said they were slightly soundproofed. She didn't think anyone else could hear them.
"-Zach, Gail and even Dorothy are all gonna die one day and the Salvatore line will start over with a new generation just like the past hundred years! Their lives don't matter." Cousin Day was yelling.
"Cousin Day, Stefan?" she stuttered upset at what she just heard.
"Dorothy-" both brothers started before she cut them off, "Damon I thought you liked me? I thought we were friends?" she whimpered.
"Munchkin, shit just-" Damon uttered and zoomed over to her inhumanly fast and looked into her eyes, "Forget what you just heard and go to your room."
"So you did take her off vervain." Stefan remarked quietly as Dorothy did what Damon told her to.
"Stefan, will you just drop it. All I did was feed from them I haven't killed anyone since March." Damon sighed sounding tired with the conversation.
"No I can't." Stefan murmured as she rushed Damon and snapped his neck. He flashed Damon's body out to shed outside.
Damon groans as he wakes up, he rubs his aching neck and looks up to see Stefan looking down on him from the shed door.
"So, here's what I don't get, Damon. Why'd you bother to charm Gail and Zach? Befriend little Dorothy? Say you want to make amends be a better brother? When you go behind my back on feed on our human family?" Stefan interrogated.
"I really don't get why this has you all bent out of shape. I can control myself. I'm not the ripper Stefan." Damon sassed and moves to get up but gets burned from the daylight pointing through the shed. He hisses in pain.
"You get your daylight ring back when you decide to behave. Now, answer my question: Why did you really come back here?" Stefan demanded.
"Because I missed my brother. I want to have a connection to my humanity, Stefan. I wanted to feel something again. And when I decided to come back home, it all came rushing back, just like I hoped it would." Damon murmured.
"Was it me or Dorothy?" Stefan asked.
"What?" Damon questioned.
"Which one of us caused us to turn your humanity back on? The brother you've tormented for years or the little girl who thinks the world of you and you repay her by feeding from her." Stefan spat.
Damon was silent.
"Yeah, I asked her and she said she didn't mind letting you drink her blood because she loved you. Dorothy looks up to you and you casually manipulate her without even blinking. No child especially as young as her should be subjected to being vampire blood bag, Damon." Stefan passionately stated.
"You're twisting this entire situation in a negative light. You don't understand-" Damon said trying to defended himself but Stefan cut him off, "You're right I don't understand why you would do that to a child."
"Stop saying it like I feed from her daily. I only did it twice!" Damon shouted.
"Twice too many!" Stefan shouted back.
"Look the first time was an accident! She got a paper cut on one of her drawings and she shoved her bloody finger on my lips wanting me to kiss it better like her mom does. I hadn't feed yet and I lost control for a second. A second! I healed her immediately afterwards." Damon explained urgently, "the second time was when she got bit by a copperhead snake outside. I saved her."
"You shouldn't have told her about vampires in the first place." Stefan scolds.
"You're right," Damon agrees, "but damn if she's the only one in this world who doesn't believe the worst of me like you do! I make bad decisions I own up to that. But I'm not as bad as you like to think I am. Look originally I came to Mystic Falls to ask you to go on a road trip with me but I got distracted by Dorothy. I can tell you want me know were near her now and maybe that's for the best. So what do you say do you want to go?"
"No I don't. You just try and turn me into another you. Just looking at the facts, Damon. 1912, you convinced me to drink human blood again, which is why I became a Ripper. In 1942, you almost pushed me off the rails again because you were so damn needy. 1977, you left my best friend to die after I sent her to come help you. And now, you come here. Treat our human family like their toys meant for your amusement. Completely careless about how your actions will affect them in the future." Stefan analyzed.
"I-" Damon started but Stefan cut him off, "you really have no regard for anyone's agency unless they benefit you in some way. Zach and Gail has been nothing but kind and you treat them with no respect. You're ruining Dorothy childhood by introducing the monsters of the world to her. You mock my lifestyle and you treat me with no respect either. I'm sick of it Damon."
"Stefan." Damon muttered not knowing what to say. Stefan placed Damon's ring on the floor and simply said "Leave Mystic Falls, I'm leaving too, this town is better off without us."
Damon stared as Stefan vamped away.
Stefan was finish up packing when he heard a female scream downstairs. Stefan rushes downstairs to find multiple bodies lying around the living room. Gail was the one who screamed, she looked like she was about to start hyperventilating. Stefan knew this was Damon but he was nowhere to be found. Stefan rushes to help calm Gail down but she wasn't listening and she made herself pass out. He noticed blood running down her legs. Stefan tried very hard not to lose control. Zach finally arrived after hearing Gail's screams. Zach wrestled Gail out of Stefan's arms and rushed her to the car outside. Zach told Stefan to watch Dorothy while he took Gail to the hospital. Stefan nodded and released a shaky breath and zoomed up to Dorothy room. She wasn't there.
"Dorothy! Dorothy! DOROTHY!" Stefan called as he searched the house trying not to panic.
April 1994
"Cousin Day... what are you doing to Daddy?" Dorothy asked hesitantly as she watched Damon biting her Daddy's wrist. He couldn't be hurting Daddy was he? He couldn't be. He was her cousin Day. He was her best friend! Best friends didn't hurt daddy's. Maybe it was an adult thing?
Damon froze and ripped his teeth from Zach's wrist, he compelled Zach to forget what just happened and leave the room then Damon zoomed in front of Dorothy and looked into her eyes, "You will forget what you just saw and go to your room."
"Why would I do that?" Dorothy puzzled.
"Are you on vervain," Damon muttered in disbelief, "Your two years old, how paranoid is Zach for god's sake?"
"What were you doing?" she repeated.
"Nothing you'd understand." Damon dismissed.
"You were biting him. What's confusing about that? I just want to know why?" she insisted.
He looked at her before he said, "I was feeding."
"Feeding?" she repeated.
"Yes I am a vampire so is Stefan." Damon revealed.
"The Halloween monster?" Dorothy questioned.
"Yes- wait what?" he squinted.
"Last year we celebrated Halloween and Daddy dressed me up as a vampire. Momma said it was morbid but Daddy thought it was funny. He said vampires were a monsters and I wanted to be a monster." Dorothy explained.
"Who knew Zach had a sense of humor." Damon mused.
"Wait if you're a vampire doesn't that mean you're old?" Dorothy asked.
"As I told you I'm almost a hundred and fifty-five. I'm not your cousin. I'm your great-great-great-great granduncle. I might be missing a great or two but you get the gist." Damon explained offhandedly.
"That's so cool! I have a vampire godfather instead of a fairy godfather!" she squealed.
"I'm not your godfather. Granduncle and godfather a very different relations." Damon clarified.
"I can't wait to tell Caroline!" she gushed, ignoring Damon's correction.
"You can't tell anyone especially not the sheriff's daughter." Damon said sternly.
"Why?" she whined.
"Because it's a secret." Damon informed.
"Oh okay. My lips are sealed." She promised and happily declared, "you know I thought you were cool before but now you're even cooler!"
"Thanks, munchkin." he smiled.
May 10, 1994
"Uncle Damon, where are we going?" Dorothy asked from her position in the passenger seat of Damon's Camaro.
"Disneyworld." He responded with a smirk.
"Really?!" she gasped looking excited.
"Yep, we're going on a road trip." He grinned.
Mystic Falls Hospital
"Grayson, are Gail and the baby okay?" Zach asked his fellow founding family member.
"Little Sarah is okay, she's a little on the small side but a few months in the incubator and she'll should be just fine." Grayson reassured.
"What about Gail?" Zach asked again, afraid of the answer.
Grayson hesitated for a moment before saying, "I'm sorry Zach, the birth was very difficult on her. Gail's gone."