Kai let the sunlight bathe his face as the moon sailed away from the sun. After eighteen years it was finally over and he breathed in great lungfuls of air. A free man. He should be chasing after Bonnie but if he could not stop to take in this monumental occasion when could he? He laughed in giddy delight and his humor was reflected in the happy sky gazers around him. People! Real people! Eating and drinking and mingling.

"I'm back."

He swiped a Bud from a shared cooler, a student giving him a nod in approval as Kai cracked it open. Where would Bonnie be now? He should be thinking of Jo and their merge, which was very much back on the menu, but his thoughts turned to his disgruntled lover. She had her magic back now and could prove a credible threat. What to do?

"One problem at a time," he murmured and drank the last of the beer, crushed the can and threw it into the cooler. When the student looked up he was gone.


Bonnie stopped outside Gram's house and caught her breath. It was deserted, her grandmother currently driving to Mystic Falls with Josette Parker. They were coming all this way to escape from what had happened in Portland only to end up back in Kai's clutches.

"Gotta warn them," she panted, looking down the street but saw no sign of Kai. She was free but it was 1994. Her life was eighteen years in the future. Was that future even real anymore? She sat on the porch steps, her head whirling.

"Hey?"

Bonnie jumped and looked up. A man was looking at her from a car and her relief that it was not Kai Parker clouded that she knew who it was.

Stefan Salvatore.

Oh Fuck. Bonnie wished that she had worn a hat or cloaked herself but it was too late. Stefan smiled, his green eyes dark. He looked miserable.

"Is Sheila Bennett home?"

Bonnie shook her head and he sighed, hands tightening on the steering wheel. Bonnie could feel his anguish and she got to her feet. "Can I leave her a message?"

"Uh...yeah. I'm leaving at the end of the week."

"Oh...okay." That was right wasn't it? He left and came back eighteen years later. For Elena. Bonnie motioned back at the house. "You could try again? She'll be back tonight."

Stefan nodded and then narrowed his eyes at her. "Are you a Bennett? You look familiar."

Bonnie's stomach flopped. "Yeah...I'm Ernestine Bennett." That was her grandmother's name. "From Massachusetts."

Stefan stared as if he knew her lies before nodding and after a brief thanks he drove away. Bonnie sat back down on the porch, watching as cars and people passed by. She should be celebrating her freedom but every movement sent a jolt through her. It was so strange after the emptiness of the prison world. Bonnie lost focus, her thoughts buzzing and only realised she was being watched when he waved at her from across the street. Kai put his hands back in his pockets as Bonnie jumped to her feet. He stayed where he was, his smile bright.

"Hi."

"You stay away from me," her magic soured with fear and anger. Kai shrugged, standing on tip toes for a moment. He looked incredibly content, at odds with the cold rage she had last seen.

"I was hoping to see the future but I'll settle for May 11th 1994. We're free Bon."

"You shouldn't be," she said without much power and he rolled his eyes. He made a move but stopped when she lifted a hand. "I will cook your ass."

He grinned. "When you want to talk I'll be staying at the Boarding House," he said and then frowned. "I kinda need money. Huh, forgot about that."

Bonnie ignored that sensible comment and glared at him. "I know what you're planning. I won't let you harm your sister."

"Don't wanna hurt her Bon. Well, maybe a smidgen," he pressed his thumb and forefinger together, eye squinting. "Already gutted her, any worse would be overkill."

"You're a monster!"

"I'm kidding! She's no good to me if she can't do the merge," he shrugged and looked up at Gram's house. His expression turned introspective. "I know she's coming here and I don't want any trouble. Me and Jo will leave together, she'll reclaim her magic and then we'll wait for the next celestial event. I'll be out of your life for good. If that's what you want?" he added, staring at her sadly.

After a pause Bonnie nodded, clenching her jaw. "Do you promise not to harm anyone?"

"I promise...as long as Jo agrees to finally play her part. It's what we were born for...but if she runs away from this again? The consequence will be entirely on her head," his nostrils flared and that blank expression entered his eyes.

"None of this is right."

Kai smiled. "That we're agreed on. So...do you think you being here will step on some time butterflies? You've literally time travelled, how cool is that?" The question was unexpected and she was thrown.

"Um…"

"What will happen if you meet your younger self? We need to Back to the Future this situation Bon."

"We," she wagged her finger between them, "are doing nothing. Goodbye Kai."

He grinned and tilted his head from side to side. "You're still mad at me."

Bonnie, about to open the front door, spun around. "Are you serious!?" she yelled and the grass under Kai's feet burst into flames.

"Fuck!" he jumped and stamped his sneakers out, smoke curling in the air. He laughed, breathless and moved backwards with his hands up. "Super mad, got it. You know where I am so tell Josette when she gets here. Miss you already," he lifted a hand in farewell and walked away. Bonnie watched him until he rounded the corner and was gone.


Kai's comment about time butterflies swirled sickeningly around Bonnie's head as she waited. What if her being here did upset time? Could meeting grams have dire consequences? If she makes the wrong choices she might change her own future.

Night fell and her unease followed her into a fretful sleep. She slept on the porch swing, too paranoid to go into the house in case she changed anything. Josette Parker, face ghost-like in the light, stopped on the porch and stared as she slept.

"Josie?" Sheila moved to her side and froze at the sight of Bonnie, who stirred. She jolted up, swinging back and forth and all the stories she had been thinking about, the magical disguises and lies vanished as she looked at her grandmother and burst into tears.

"Grams!" she ran into her arms, who accepted her instantly. Time did not shake or tear apart and her grandmother did not fade away. She was alive.


Josette, who was mute, disappeared upstairs to sleep as Bonnie sat with Sheila in the living room. She poured a hefty amount of rum into Bonnie's coffee and sat on the couch with her.

"2013?"

"Yeah. If - if the ascendant worked that's the year it should be."

Her grams, who was now almost twenty years younger, was taking her tale of other dimensions and time travel remarkably well. That was after she had sobbed for an hour.

"And he's out?" grams sighed and sat back. "I only trapped him this morning."

"It's been eighteen years for him" Bonnie explained again. Her grandmother shook her head in disgust.

"He was never meant to be in there that long."

Bonnie blinked in shock. "He killed his family. He thought he was stuck there forever as punishment. He couldn't die."

Grams gulped her sherry and sat forward. "Josh would be happy for him to rot. That man, he's...broken now," she said and tears welled in her eyes. "I suggested the prison world to keep Kai contained until cooler heads prevailed, until the Parker's have time to mourn."

"I guess his dad never got over it."

"Even so I wouldn't allow someone to spend eighteen years in isolation, no matter the crime." she stared into the middle distance, troubled. "You said that I sent you there?" she asked suddenly and Bonnie nodded. She had been careful not to mention her grandmother's fate. A shoot of hope grew in the dark, an opportunity...

"I think it was the only place or plane of existence that was safe..or…" she trailed off, her head whirling and spoke again at her grandmother's behest. "You sent me there because you knew I'd eventually be free...because I'm telling you about it right now."

Grams snorted. "Ain't time travel a messy bitch?"

Bonnie smiled, wiping her nose and sat back with a sigh. Her younger self was having a sleepover with Elena and Caroline after watching the eclipse. Tomorrow her grams will pick her up and take her home.

"I can't stay here, can I? I don't remember ever seeing myself as an adult."

"I can't imagine meeting yourself will end well, child. I've heard stories…" she trailed off, her eyes growing heavy. She was exhausted and Bonnie felt guilty. Her grandmother has had a terrible day.

"You should sleep grams. I'll leave when you go pick me up...god that sounds weird," she sighed and they stood, hugging each other goodnight. Bonnie was to sleep in her uncle's room but before she did she peaked in on Jo. She was in bed with her back to her, clothes in a pile at the foot of the bed. Bonnie felt a sense of deja vu and retreated to her own room.


May 11th 1994 dawned as clear and calm as the day before and to anyone else it would be indistinguishable but Kai Parker was different. The sun rose a minute earlier, clouds formed high up in the stratosphere and the wind blew, a gentle south easterly.

May 10th was dead.

Kai disliked vampires, they unavoidably felt like death and had this weird coppery scent. The Boarding House stank of blood, which it did in the prison world too but it just seemed more fresh here. Stefan Salvatore was not exactly thrilled to see him either. The vampire stood in the doorway, mouth open in shock. Kai smiled at him from the bed, toast in hand.

"What are you...we're closed for business."

"Huh, you were open yesterday when I checked in."

Stefan narrowed his eyes, clearly sensing his lie but after a sigh he seemed to give up. "Whatever. Stay but this place will be closing up at the end of the week."

"Rad!" Kai grinned as Stefan closed the door. The man was super depressed, probably down to the pile of bodies Kai stumbled on in the basement. After wolfing his breakfast down he showered and dressed, combing his hair in the mirror. He wanted to look good, it had been a long, long time since he had seen his sister. He would not give her the satisfaction than seeming anything other than untouched by his imprisonment.

He turned from his reflection and then froze. A shape moved behind him and he spun around. Nothing. Kai looked back and the thunderous visage of his father stared back at him.

"It's true, you're out."

Kai, who had been riding a balloon of exhilaration, felt a crushing dread. "Hey dad, long time no see," his voice shook as his father moved closer to the mirror. He was in the same flannel shirt he had been wearing when he banished him. The dark circles were new and, if he wasn't mistaken, a few extra grey hairs.

"I couldn't believe it when Shelia contacted me. Eighteen years?" he asked and Kai nodded, staring past his father to the room he was stood in. He was in his own bedroom back in Portland. He was thousands of miles away.

"Yeah, we're pretty much the same age. Though I see you've aged overnight pops." Kai smiled and then his knees buckled as pain flared through his brain. His father's hand was against the mirror, his expression terrible. He was across the country but Kai was foolish to think his power could not stretch such a distance. He could draw on the Gemini coven's strength at any time.

"You should be dead! The only reason you're still alive is because you're the spare twin!"

"Thanks," Kai muttered, wiping blood from his nose. He got to his feet, sighing. "The Merge will happen, as it's meant to. You've been in charge long enough and as you grow old the power fades with you. By the time Liv and Luke reach twenty two the coven will be on its knees. You don't know what threats are coming."

"And you do?"

"I do actually, yeah." Thanks to Bonnie, he thought.

"The only threat I see is you. The next celestial event is on the 13th, when the moon and Venus are in conjunction. The coven is coming," Joshua Parker promised and his reflection disappeared, leaving Kai alone.

"Good."

This time he would be ready.


note:

it's been three years but I've finally got the bonkai bug back.