A/N: So apparently as soon as humanly possible means more than a week, but I have my reasons. They're all boring and sad, though. Like, my friends' just announced they're separating after having been married for five years, and House just got put on Netflix instant streaming.

Thank you so incredibly very much to each and every single one of you. You all brighten my dark days and make my parents wonder why on earth their daughter looks like she's about to throw up from excitement.

This is the penultimate chapter, guys. Now, and I'm being serious here (because seriousness is a big part of fan fiction), but the next chapter is Klaus breaks his promise and I have two possible scenarios: one angsty, one carefree and funny (believe it or not, but I can be funny. I'm British for crying out loud! I was bred on humour and tea. And apparently stereotypes). Please, please, please, (even if you hated this entire thing and are just waiting for the next instalment) tell me which you'd prefer. Funny or Angsty. I've got both planned out, but I need your input for this one. I want to make people happy.

Remember, all mistakes are mine, I love you all, and please review telling me which option you want more. Oh, and this is definitely rated M. Klaroline remembers their steamy first time. And it's a continuation of the first chapter "In the Dark." Have fun.

"Oh, we stood there,

awkward and youthful, we tangled;

a piece of my soul escaped.

Oh, we are restless and tired of sleeping with giants,

a modern mankind with their egos of fire, and it seems like

it's been a lifetime, a lifetime we've waited for.

A simple question kid, 'are you with me or not at all?'"

Sleeping With Giants (Lifetime) | The Academy Is . . .

Drabble #9 (of 10) | Hail to One Hundred

Someone was talking to her. She could hear their voice whirling around in her head and she lazily opened her eyes, shifting slightly to figure out where the noise was coming from. Light streamed in from the hotel window, sending shots of energy into her veins as she continued looking for the source of the sound. Her eyes landed on a figure sitting at the end of the bed with crossed legs and a scowl.

"I told you not to move," he said, obviously annoyed.

Caroline grinned tiredly, moving her hands to rub at her eyes, feeling the crumbling sleep free her eyelashes. When she finished her stretching routine, she sat up and spotted Klaus still frowning in her direction, sketchpad in his lap and a graphite pencil twirling between his fingers.

"I was asleep," she defended, her sleepy voice removing the unhappy look from his face and replacing it with a dimpled smirk. "Sorry I couldn't carry out your demands in the midst of my deep slumber."

She rotated her head to one side and looked out the open window, pretending not to notice when Klaus scooted next to her. A soft breeze rustled through the trees outside and into the room, and Caroline was forced to take in the scent. Paris smelled fresh, it smelled sweet. Like sugar and love and happy memories. And Klaus.

He was breathing on her, watching her intently as she intently watched the outdoors, spying the world spinning around them.

It was getting harder to ignore him.

His presence was something she'd never quite get used to, but now she didn't have to worry about people judging her for her apparent sins against humanity. This wasn't a dream or a sick fantasy plaguing her ailing mind. She no longer had to ignore him.

"You could make it up to me," he whispered gruffly, sending a sharp shiver down her spine.

Caroline turned cautiously and narrowed her eyes at him, loving the darkness taking over the blue of his irises. "Or, you could make it up to me?" She suggested, nipping his clean-shaven cheek with broken lips.

His eyes slammed shut at the contact and she felt a light static shock her lips. They really did create sparks.

"Why would I have to make it up to you?" He asked, opening one eye carefully.

A giggle escaped her mouth and danced around his face. She saw him inhale as he opened his other eye to stare at her. The look he gave startled her. It always did. Ever since she'd swallowed her pride, travelled to where she knew he was hiding with a suitcase in hand, and asking, begging really, for him to take her away.

She remembered it like it was yesterday, when in reality it had been a good ten years. But time meant nothing to an immortal. Either way, she recalled stumbling up the steps to his place in Louisiana, banging on the door as the winds raged outside, as the sky sputtered rain and lightning; calling his name when no one showed to let her in; deciding that knocking was useless and just barging inside; whooshing all around the place, darting in and out the decadent rooms until she spotted him standing at an easel, wearing a paint-covered shirt and a shocked expression.

Neither of them had dared move, but she had watched the emotions beat him like a mugger looking for something good. Pain and anger, frustration and bewilderment, love and adoration. They were all there, just for her. He'd dropped his paintbrush, sending spurts of yellow onto the floor. Simultaneously, they looked back at the painting. She was only half-surprised to see herself staring back, but her heart still threatened to break. Threatened like it even had a choice. It didn't.

Without thinking, she'd flashed over to where he stood frozen and not nearly as confident as she'd expected. She'd imagined doing this for forty years, barging into his life, but none of those day dreams included him alone, and none included his starstruck eyes.

Take me away, she'd whined, putting her hands on his face, smothering her thumbs under his eyes as his tear ducts started overflowing. He still said nothing, made no move to truly acknowledge her presence. A voice in the back of her mind had wondered where everyone was. Rebekah, Elijah, Haley? None of them were there, it was as if he'd been abandoned. Like a young boy thrown into the dark dungeon of his room by angry parents too tired and too annoyed to bother fixing the problem.

When he finally did move it was a sudden, frightening thing. He'd clutched to her wrists and wrenched them off his face and asked, in a voice too quiet for the biggest, baddest hybrid, the most immortal being, Are you really here? Is it really you?

She'd wheezed out a yes and watched caution overtake his features.

I don't believe you, he'd spat, gripping her flesh tighter, digging his fingernails into the veins on the inside of her wrists.

It's me, I swear.

Prove it.

How?

Kiss me.

Kiss you?

Kiss—

She hadn't let him finish, cutting him off mid-sentence and sealing their lips together. A million years could have passed, wars could have been won and lost around them, and they wouldn't have noticed.

They let go of each other and she saw his smile. It was small and afraid.

Where do you want to go? He'd asked.

She had grinned with all her teeth, and sighed, Anywhere.

"Caroline," Klaus murmured, stealing her away from her memories. She looked at him guiltily. "Why would I have to make it up to you?" He asked again.

"Because," she stated. "It's my birthday and you woke me up before eight. Not acceptable."

"Mm," he agreed. "But it's not every day a girl turns one hundred. I want you to enjoy the experience as much as possible."

He placed a finger under her chin and forced her head up. She complied, staring deep into his eyes, flicking her gaze between them hurriedly, like she was waiting for them to close and never open again.

"I would enjoy it more if you'd let me sleep," she pouted.

Klaus laughed, another thing she'd never get used to. "You're a vampire, love. You don't need sleep."

Nodding her head, she creeped closer to him. His face went out of focus as her lips parted.

"But do you know what I do need?" She flirted.

Klaus gulped. "What?" He asked breathlessly.

"Food."

Before she'd even managed to sound the heavy 'D' at the end of her single word, Klaus disappeared from the room, abandoning her and his sketch. The door slammed shut as he ran to fulfil her needs and she flashed to the window, catching sight of a tall figure blurring across the square.

They had been literally everywhere in the world. There was no piece of land, no underwater kingdom that the two had not seen and explored.

Caroline used to think of herself as a homebody. If it wasn't Mystic Falls, it was Washington D.C. But after Klaus had showed up at the movie theatre sixty years ago, she'd wanted nothing more than to escape her confined life. What was it he told her, that there was a whole world outside, just waiting for her to experience it? Something like that.

He'd started them off small by taking her around the United States and Canada, but soon enough she was rooting for aeroplanes and chunnels and she knew he couldn't say no to her.

Caroline loved all the places they went, but Paris was definitely her favourite.

When she'd mentioned the week before that she was approaching her hundredth birthday, she immediately knew where he'd be taking her.

One reason she appreciated Paris more than anywhere else was the cuisine. Not the people, of course, they had blood banks for that. The real food; the crepes, the breads, the cheeses. Paris had it best, and Klaus knew such things, so when he returned moments later with a bag full of pastries pinched between his lips and a couple cups of steaming coffee in hand, Caroline got up, dressed only in Klaus' t-shirt from the previous day, and walked over to him, happy to have her Paris breakfast.

He waved his free hand at her and mumbled something incomprehensible. Caroline smiled at his puckered eyebrows, taking the bag from his mouth.

"Sit back on the bed," he ordered when he got his lips free.

Scoffing, Caroline stayed put. "And what if I don't want to?" She challenged.

"I have ways of making you do things," he informed her with a quirked eyebrow and lifted lip. God, he looked sexy when he was trying to intimidate her. This was her life; travelling around the world with a man who could never die and who seemed pretty intent on loving her for the rest of his miserable days.

"It'll be difficult to make me do anything when you've got coffee in your hands," she reminded him, pointing to the cups in their cardboard holder.

In a flash of wild colour, Klaus dropped the coffee on the small table by the door before dashing right back to where she was standing. "Cups can easily be placed elsewhere."

"I'm quaking in fear," she whispered mockingly, raising her eyebrows for emphasis.

His smirk grew until his entire face was blown up in a smile. "Good."

He was fast, she knew, but her brain still forced a squeal out of her lungs when Klaus gathered her up in his arms and plopped her on the bed. His body hung over hers, his breath hitting her face harshly. Silence filled the room, like the open window was pouring in muteness instead of air.

Klaus erupted in a roll of laughter, moving to one side and staring down at Caroline. She glowered up at him, unimpressed by his seemingly unwarranted giggle-fest.

"What?" She asked bluntly.

The hybrid shook his head and sighed, lifting his forearm so his elbow dug firmly in the mattress, and rested his temple on his fist. "Nothing," he tried, but Caroline's eyes were slits and she had him wrapped around her finger. "Okay," he relented, "I was just remembering."

"That's never a good sign," she warned, placing a gentle hand on one side of his face where his cheek dipped into a dimple.

"How is it not a good sign?" He asked in mock offence.

Caroline continued smoothing circles on his cheek. "You're over a thousand years old. There are too many things you could be remembering. Battles, friends, hearts ripped from chests, old lovers . . ." she trailed off with a noncommittal shrug of her shoulders.

"Old lovers? Are you afraid of them?" He asked, running his hand down her thigh to the underside of her knee.

He could probably sense, smell even, the way her blood immediately started moving faster at his touch, but she didn't falter. "There are so many. You tell me if I should fear them."

Frowning, Klaus squeezed her skin, causing her unnecessary breath to hitch. "What have I told you before, love, about all these past women?" His voice was gruff and possessive. A long time ago these qualities in his tone would have turned her off, but now they managed to magnify her want tenfold.

"Remind me again," she said in a last ditch effort to qualm her greedy sex drive.

"They are nothing compared to you. You are like filtered spring water to a thirsty man," he told her enthusiastically. "A banquet fit for the entire world to a man growing weak and brittle from hunger. A rich flow of crimson blood to a lustful vampire. You are mine, do not forget that."

The apex between her legs was burning with liquid fire, liquid need, as Klaus' fingers danced up the inside of her thigh.

"Us," Klaus murmured suddenly, tracing odd circles and words into her skin, tattooing her with his short cropped fingernails.

"What?" She huffed through gritted teeth, not enjoying the satisfied smirk on his face. But it lit up his eyes, and those were the same eyes that used to look at her and her old friends with such pain and sadness, so she couldn't really complain.

"I was remembering us," he explained. "Do you remember the first time, sweetheart?"

"Which first time?" She asked, though she had a feeling she knew what he was referring to, but his hand crept just that much closer to her heat and her mind was beginning to go fuzzy and she wasn't so sure she could trust her brain at the moment.

"Is there another first time I'm unaware of?" He teased, moving his fingers to her other leg.

She let out an unrelenting moan and tried to gather her wits. "I like to think we had two first times."

"Oh?" He questioned, the minty word slapping against her ear.

"Yes," she hissed as he pinched her skin. "Time number one back in Mystic Falls eight decades ago. Then D.C. fifty years ago."

"So not three first times?" He asked, his voice low and husky. His lips brushed her ears as his fingers twirled like ghosts relearning an old dance in front of her centre. "Because I recall the time in New Orleans a mere decade ago being rather . . ." he paused, for dramatic effect if nothing else. Caroline would kill him after he relented and helped her finish. " . . . ravenous."

"Klaus." The need present in her own voice sounded too whiny, but then again, it was her birthday. He wasn't allowed to tease her like this.

"What darling?" He smirked at her innocently when she ceased her movements on his face and instead clutched his shoulders. Her nails were sharper and lathered in green nail polish, it hurt more to get stabbed by them, but he kept his stoic look.

She whimpered uncaringly as he dragged up farther. A sticky substance spread on her skin and she could smell her own arousal, but he had yet to actually touch her. And it was slowly killing her.

Imagine that; being told that you're going to live forever provided no one stabs you in the heart with a stake, surviving through a thousand different supernatural occurrences, managing to not get stabbed in the heart with a stake for a hundred years, and yet somehow wind up dying during dangerous foreplay.

What a way to go.

But all Caroline's thoughts halted when a hot finger pressed against her fleshy heat. Her back arched off the bed and she didn't see Klaus' egotistical grin, the feeling of him rubbing smooth circles over her wetness too intense and far too good. She was suddenly glad she hadn't gotten a chance to put her underwear on.

"You never answered me," he said quickly, fervently. He sounded like he was getting ready to fight. It was his game voice, the one he used when he was confronting the various men and women of the world who wanted him dead. The same voice that he hushed to her when he touched her.

Caroline held no capacity to speak as he circled his finger around her entrance tantalisingly. All she could accomplish was a string of growls and moans. It didn't matter, she knew he wouldn't give in yet. He didn't want her to just come. He wanted her to explode.

"Do you remember our first time? Our real first time?" Klaus asked, adding a second finger to the mix, sliding around slick skin. Her brain understood the words, but her mouth wouldn't move, so she decided a nod would have to suffice.

"Good," he soothed, his face warm as it hovered above her heavy-lidded eyes. "I remember it well," he continued, his fingers still managing to swirl up a storm in her lower belly. "Banging against trees, you shouting my name as I ran my hands across your breasts." She closed her eyes and listened, the friction sparking between her thighs shooting tingles up and down her body as his sexy accent told her all.

"I remember how you practically tore through my clothes. I remember how I literally tore through yours until we were panting and groaning and begging. Do you remember, Caroline," the way he lulled her name made her hips jerk and she heard the smile in his voice as he spoke again, "when I pushed two fingers to your pink flesh, when I slid them inside of you?" He did so now, finally giving up his torturous fight and sinking his fingers, well coated with her arousal, deep inside.

Caroline moaned and lifted off the bed, turning her face to look at him. Klaus was watching her with lustful eyes as his fingers pumped in and out of her, a determined tint to his smirk.

"You cried out then, loud and clear. People's ears must have been on fire, quite like you and I. Do you remember," he said gruffly, his hard length pressing into her leg, "when I grabbed you and twisted your legs around my waist and thrust your back to another tree? You were high on endorphins by that time, too elated to feel any sort of pain from the rough bark stabbing into your skin."

His wrist jerked faster, his thumb finding her clit and furiously rubbing at the nub until Caroline's bones turned to ice cream and her brain fell to jelly. Her face contorted in pleasure as he worked her in a smooth, fast pattern.

Parts of her wondered if maybe they were playing a game. That one day he'd wake up with her strapped to him and realise that he, in fact, did not want this life. That he'd decide to leave her, abandon her. Sometimes that thought was so overwhelming that she'd push away until he brought her back with words of love and eternal devotion. Saying that they were an undying flame; a trick candle on the cake of a naive ten-year-old, staying strong no matter how many winds came their way.

Other times she worried that sex wouldn't be as enjoyable after a time. But those thoughts always killed themselves whenever he'd be remotely near her.

She was alive with his touch, right now and always.

Everything felt so amazingly good. Sweat broke out on her skin, her nipples rubbed against the fabric of his shirt. Her head swam with thoughts, with wanting to explain in detail how he made her feel. But her tongue was lead and her mouth was too busy opening and closing like she was fish on dry land, begging to be thrown back into the water.

"Do you remember how you dug your fingernails into my shoulders much like you're doing now? Or how immediately after splitting my flesh with your nails you looked at me with the eyes of a sinner condemned to live their life in eternal, painful pleasure? Because I remember that look," he informed her greedily, pulling out of her in languid strokes as she contracted loosely around his fingers. She wanted to kiss him, but she didn't want him to stop talking. "It was the look that told me you felt the same way. So I gave in then, didn't I, love?" Caroline quivered beneath him.

"You're so tight," he observed, but it didn't stop him from quickening his pace as he continued his story, and it definitely did send another jolt of electric desire through her blood and all the way to her centre. "I gave in then, yes." He agreed with himself, dropping his head from its perch on his fist and bringing his lips to her jaw, nibbling his way in hot, open-mouthed, tongue-filled kisses along her throat.

Her mind went completely blank. She could only feel his fingers and his mouth and his twisted love.

"I warned you, I said there was no going back. I said to you that this was it, this was you telling me that you felt the same way, that you loved me back," Klaus grumbled erotically into her ear. She didn't often hear him say the word 'love' and even in the midst of his orgasm-inducing digits caressing her inner walls, her dead heart found a way to constrict with emotion. She moved her head to the side a bit more and captured his lips in a shameless kiss, deepening their connection with tongues and mouths and minty breath.

"And then I took the plunge, so to speak," he mumbled against her lips. She giggled briefly, caught up by his playful choice of words. Trust him to always go the funny route when things were getting too sentimental. "And then I fucked you."

She would have scolded him, would have yelled at him about using that word, but just as he said it, just as his voice carried to her ears and hit her mushed brain, his fingers curled inside of her one last time, hitting something rugged and sending her thoughts reeling.

"Come, Caroline," he called as her hips started moving frantically, searching for a release. Digging her fingers into his curly-haired scalp, she listened as he whimpered sorely. With a strangled mewl, Caroline grabbed his lips again as she rode on his fingers, coming with a cry muffled only by their glued mouths.

She trembled with residual aftershocks, her legs shuddering and her clit throbbing. He rolled over on his back and slipped his fingers out one final time. Caroline turned away for a brief moment, knowing Klaus was only going to lap at his fingers with his thick tongue. She'd seen him do a lot of things, but that was one she didn't exactly enjoy witnessing.

Rolling onto her stomach, Caroline draped an arm over Klaus' belly, carefully slipping her hand under the fabric of his shirt until it was placed directly where his heart used to beat.

He shifted under her, settling one palm on her back and the other over her own hand.

She rested her head on his chest, listening as he breathed contentedly and watching the world transform outside the hotel room window.

Paris smelled sweet again and she caught the scent of the food and coffee they'd ignored so cruelly. But this was better than food. This was even better than coffee. This was home, and home was Klaus.

"I remember. I remember it all," she said.

He nodded against her messy hair, his cheek catching fly aways. "Happy birthday, Caroline."

"Are we wasting time, or is it wasting us?

It's been a lifetime waiting for now, now.

Well, you've got to find a way

Before you fold in."

A/N 2: Do you get the title? Caroline's turning one hundred and it's also remembering when they had sex . . . in the hundredth episode of TVD. I'm a clever girl. And I know that I'm horrible at writing these M-rated scenes, but I am trying to challenge myself more. Maybe it's paying off? Not yet? No?

Regarding the lyrics, I just love that song. And that entire album. Sadly, the band is no longer together and William Beckett and the other boys are off doing their own thing, but buy Santi if you get the time. It's their best record, in my personal opinion. Which, I understand, means nothing, but still.

Alrighty then, don't forget to tell me what you think and vote on what the next chapter should be emotion-wise! It would help me out so much. Perhaps that's cheating, but ah well. As Doctor House always says, "everybody lies."

Til next time, ladies and gents,

-LoveIsATemple