Time frame: Years after "From Dead to Worse"

This is a companion piece following "Family", "Bowling for Vampires", "Leather Underwear", "Reunion" and "Vampire Boogie".

Disclaimer: I don't have any claim on any characters in the Sookie Universe. Please don't sue me. The other characters are my own creation and just wanted to play with them for a while.

A/N: Yes, I am completely off my rocker but you love me right? *silence* Anyone?

There are actually reasons why I chose this particular direction to this story, the main one being that I thought it would be fun. I also thought that these chapters can better highlight Bill's magical abilities- important in the upcoming dealings with the Evil One.

Lastly, I had this awesome dream where all my fantasy men came to life and I find out that they weren't fantasies after all, but repressed memories. My ordinary life (sorry hun) was actually the dream that my hot fellas have been trying to break through all of this time. What can I tell ya, I have an extremely overactive imagination. Needless to say I was beyond pissed when I woke up. Anyway, they say that tragedy breeds creativity- well this was definitely tragic in my book- so here ya go.

Now if I can only get back to that dream...

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Chapter 10

Ally's POV

Stolen. Six months of my life stolen from me in a blink of an eye. Everything thing I'd gained over that time now a foggy haze.

Well, that is not completely true. I still retain my deeper understanding of my gifts that I had accumulated over that time. I can also summon my fighting skills and use them to the peak of my training.

What is lost to me are the friendships I had forged during that time, that sense of belonging and of purpose- all the things I'd had craved for my whole entire life. Most of all, I've lost the times and memories of a vampire named Bill Compton.

From what Cole could explain to me, I had known and loved this vampire in not just one, but in two separate realities.

Cole was a little sketchy on the details, understandably, but as he described Bill to me, it was as if he were telling me about a character from a fantasy novel. A lone, dark and brooding vampire who finally found after over a century of wandering the earth his one true love- me. It sounded wonderfully romantic, but I couldn't connect to what I was being told. How much can someone really tell you about your life when you were the one who had experienced it?

I glance over at Cole's sleeping form trying to reconcile with the fact that he and I are no longer a couple. My last memory was of us making love in our tiny cramped hotel apartment after a hectic shift at the diner. To Cole, we were the past, no more than truly good friends. The strange thing was that I was completely okay with our new status. I suppose that even if my mind was in the past, my heart dwells very much in the present. It knew who I belonged with and it wasn't with Cole. Considering how high I rank Cole in both my mind and my heart, this Bill must really be something.

So much has happened. We weren't in Oklahoma anymore, we were in Louisiana. I was not a waitress in a diner, I was a web designer at a vampire bar called Fangtasia (love the name!) a popular tourist attraction in Shreveport. I was friends with the owner, a 1000 year old vampire named Eric Northman, and his mostly human wife named Sookie. Eric was some powerful, high ranking member of the vampire political world and Sookie is one of my closest friends with deep ties to the supernatural community. And then there was Pam, Eric's second in command and Cole's girlfriend. Apparently, she and I are very close- pretty bizarre, but it sure as heck sounds like something I'd do.

Now all of this was just in this time line. There was a whole other one that I know nothing about. Cole had very little to disclose of my experiences of that time since he had been dead in it. Dead because I killed him. To say that hearing that lovely little nugget was disturbing was putting it mildly.

How did I keep all of this straight in my head?

Cole surmised that whatever my father did to my link to Bill somehow took my memories of him with it. According to him, our bond was extremely powerful and intense, interwoven to the point where we practically one. The absence of this connection has left me feeling hollow, like an integral part of my being was missing, as if someone reached into me and tore out my very essence leaving me with just enough tatters to survive.

Standing before the window, I lay my palm flat against the cool glass. Under the moonlit sky I could almost see him, his eyes intense and dark through my hazy veil of consciousness. I could almost hear his voice, cool and smooth yet full of love as he speaks my name. I could almost feel his touch.

I must be losing my mind.

Here I am aching for this man and I can't even tell you what he looks like.

Experimentally, I close my eyes and whisper his name. I could feel the blood blossoming over my cheeks as my heart rate quickens.

I smile to myself and shake my head.

Oh, yeah. I've totally lost it.

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Bill's POV

Love and kindness are never wasted. They always make a difference. They bless the one who receives them, and they bless you, the giver- Barbara De Angelis.

Cloaked in the darkness of night we watch, trying to plan our next move.

They were being held at mansion on the outskirts of town with sentries guarding every conceivable entrance. Correction- every conceivable human entrance. The Fellowship never ceases to amaze me with their ignorance of our kind.

County records show that the house was purchased by a Allen McBrogan two months ago. How completely uncreative. It didn't take a genius to figure out that Ally's father was behind all of this. What would he want with both of them, I wonder? And how did he accumulate such knowledge of the mystic arts?

"She's on the top floor on the west side of the house." Eric says quietly crouching next me. I smile. Whoever has blocked my link to Ally, did not take in account that Eric was tied to her as well. A residual benefit to one of her many acts of selflessness.

It's funny how people can come together or apart based on a single person. Thinking back, I've known Eric for decades and had an amiable relationship with him. We respected each other and he seemed to relish in placing me in uncomfortable situations. Much like Pam does now.

"Stop being such a fang- blocker, Compton." he would say and laugh heartily when I would try to engage in conversation with a human, negating his attempts to simply dine and leave. I think he found me amusingly odd, I vampire who was so intensely conflicted with his own nature. He was like the popular athlete in school who befriends the studious misfit, or nerd as Ally would phrase it. Different yet somehow similar in our uniqueness. I admit that those days did pull me out of my doldrums, if only for a while.

Then Sookie came along and in one fell swoop my opinion of Eric had changed. Suddenly, Eric was no longer fun loving and full of life, he was selfish, arrogant and self absorbed. He was no longer wise and clever, he was devious, he was conniving. He wasn't the one you'd want beside you in a fight because you were probably fighting against him. We were no longer friends we were rivals for Sookie's affections. He was the enemy.

Even when I finally gave in and realized that he and Sookie truly loved each other, I vowed never to turn my back on him less he shove a stake in it.

Then the world turns upside down again, and Ally comes along, changing my views once more. Eric was again the wise and extremely perceptive being I'd known because she saw him as such. He was again full of humor and of life, but was also loving and compassionate as well. She looked up to him and admired him forcing me to rethink and retire past grievances. And just like that, we are for lack of a better term, friends once more.

Such a strange and miraculous creature, my Ally.

"Bill." She speaks in a voice without voice. She calls me from within our connection and for a second I could feel her with me. She was sad, confused and ...amused? The confusing combination of emotions invade my consciousness and then just as quickly as they had come, they were gone again.

I turn my head sharply and look up in the direction of her presence. Fingers splayed open, I see her delicate little hand pressed against the glass for a moment and then vanish leaving a frosty imprint that fades seconds later. I make my way to stand when I feel Eric's firm hand on my shoulder staying me.

"Dawn approaches Bill and we are extremely outnumbered. I know you can sense the strong magic surrounding this place as I do. I don't think it will be easy getting them out of here. There are many obstacles, mainly gaining entrance. We need to go to ground."

"Won't we chance being discovered if we go to ground here?" asked Pam.

"Agreed. It is too risky. We know where they are. Let's just go home now and gather our forces tomorrow at dusk." says Eric.

"No. Let's contact the others tonight and have them all meet us at my house tomorrow night." I say.

"Bill, there's less than an hour before sunrise. We'll be lucky to make it to shelter in time, let alone contact anyone." whispers Pam, the pull of the impending sun making her uncharacteristically anxious.

I give her a sly grin. "Just make the calls. Let me handle the rest."

They nod slowly in unison, understanding slowly registering on their faces.

I cast one last longing glance at her window.

Until tomorrow, my love.

"Reverto nos domus" I whisper as we fade into the night.

TBC

Latin courtesy of translator website. Direct translation- "Take us home".