Author's Note: So this is another short chapter but I promise after this chapter, they're going to get longer. Especially as we dive more into the storyline of the show.

Thanks for all the favorites and follows. Let me know what you think so far!

Natalie couldn't remember how long she waited for her father to return home. She just knew it had been a while. After witnessing the man getting hit by a car, she went in search of her father but Jenna claimed that he already left. Natalie knew he wouldn't just leave her like that so there was only one explanation.

He went after her mother's killer.

The vampire named Damon Salvatore.

It was why Natalie sat alone in the dark apartment as she waited for hours for him to finally come home. She had the air compressor gun her father made with a wooden stake already loaded. Her hands trembled as she waited for some knock at the door, indicating that her father was dead and the vampire had come for her next. He wouldn't be allowed inside the house without an invitation, according to rumor, but that didn't mean he wouldn't wait for her to come out.

Vampires had immortality, after all.

What was a few hours or a week to him?

Natalie didn't know how old he was. Her father seemed to think that the vampire who killed her mother was older. Older than the vampire he staked a couple weeks before. Her mother's research indicated that the older ones were stronger. They weren't easy to kill.

It made sense.

Older vampires had been around longer. They were survivors so, of course, they wouldn't be easy to kill. Natalie wasn't surprised. She just hated to think her dad would go off to kill an old vampire not knowing if he would come back.

He didn't even say goodbye.

What if he died?

What if he left her all alone in this town full of vampires?

Natalie jumped in her seat when the door to the loft swung open. She gripped the compressor gun in her hands tightly and raised it up, mustering a defiant look on her face as she faced the door. Only to lower the gun a moment later when she saw who it was. Natalie let out a sigh of relief, dropping the gun to the floor.

It was her father.

"Dad," Natalie said in relief. He seemed tired and a bit bewildered as he stepped into the loft, closing the door behind him. She raced over to her father and wrapped her arms around him, relishing in his scent and the warmth of his embrace. For a couple hours, Natalie thought she was left alone but now she wasn't. "You're alive."

"I know, I know. I'm sorry," Alaric whispered as he held her in his arms. "I'm sorry I left you. I just…"

"I know," Natalie told him, pulling away to look up at him. "I heard what he said. It was him, wasn't it?"

"Yes," Alaric confirmed and Natalie nodded, not knowing what to think. "I'm just sorry you had to hear that. I wish you hadn't."

"You knew it was him?" Natalie asked him and he hesitated before reluctantly nodding.

"I saw him at the Grill a couple weeks ago. I recognized him instantly," Alaric explained to her as he led them over to the couch. They both sat down. "I didn't want to tell you because I knew it was dangerous. I've been talking to his brother."

"Elena Gilbert's boyfriend?" Natalie asked and he nodded.

"He's not that bad. He seems like a decent guy despite being a vampire," Alaric said, filling her in. "He was trying to get information for me. Stefan didn't want me confronting him but I couldn't hold off anymore. Not after tonight."

"What happened?" Natalie asked her father and he shook his head.

"I asked him about your mother…what he did to her. All the details," Alaric informed her as Natalie listened to her father's words. "He didn't kill her. I was wrong."

"What do you mean?" Natalie asked in confusion, not understanding her father's words. Alaric gave his daughter a sad look.

"He turned her," Her father finally said and Natalie just stared at him in silence.

She could've asked him what he meant by that.

What did "turning" mean?

However, Natalie already knew. The man who died tonight was enough evidence of the truth behind her mother's disappearance. Maybe she always knew…deep down. Maybe she'd known for a long time now. Her mother who was so obsessed with vampires and the supernatural that she ran off in hopes to be the thing she dedicated her life to researching. It seemed obvious now that Natalie thought about it. Of course her mother would want to be a vampire.

Vampires were the only thing she cared about.

"She's a…" Natalie trailed off, not able to bring herself to say the actual word. Her father nodded.

"She apparently went to him so he would turn her," Alaric told her in a regretful tone. "And he did. Your mother's still out there somewhere…just not the same person we knew and loved."

"I bet she's the same now as a vampire as she was when she was human," Natalie said bitterly, feeling herself start to grow angry at the thought of her mother. "I bet she's the same cold hearted bitch she was when she was with us."

"Natalie Kaitlyn Saltzman," Alaric said scoldingly as Natalie's gaze met his. "You shouldn't say that. She's your mother."

"My mother?" Natalie questioned, shaking her head in disbelief. "When has that woman ever been a mother to me? Have we all forgotten the times she used to fill my head with vampire stories so much that I couldn't sleep at night because of all the nightmares? I had to see a therapist for years. She didn't even care."

"Natalie…" Her father said as Natalie went off. She had spent a moment in disbelief before anger swept over her. The rage she felt that her father had spent all these years mourning her mother and trying to find out the truth about her death when in reality she hadn't been dead. She'd just left them both. Natalie wasn't mad at her mother for abandoning her.

She was mad at her for abandoning her father.

"You spent years looking for her and trying to find out the truth about her death…years mourning her and being broken-hearted," Natalie said, tears flooding her eyes. "Only to find out that she wasn't missing or dead. She's been here this whole time. She just left…like it was so easy for her. Just because she wanted to be a stupid vampire. Who does that? Who just abandons everyone who loves them so they can become this monster and live alone forever?"

"I don't know, Natalie," Her father said quietly and now he felt broken-hearted for Natalie. Not Isobel. He felt broken-hearted that his daughter held such hatred and contempt for her own mother. It wasn't supposed to be this way. "I really don't."

"I hope she's happy wherever she is," Natalie said furiously. "I hope it was worth it because someday I'm going to come for her. I'm going to drive a stake through her cold, selfish heart and she'll burn in hell like all the other blood-sucking monsters."

"You don't mean that," Alaric tried to tell her, giving his daughter a worried look. Natalie gave her father a dead serious look.

"I more than mean it," Natalie promised her father. "She chose her path and I'm going to choose mine. She'll regret the day she turned her back on us."

"Natalie, I really wish that you wouldn't feel this way," He said quietly as he contemplated her answer. "But I know it's only because of your mother you're like this. I'm just sorry that this is what it's come to."

"Mom is the only one to blame," Natalie told him quietly, forcing herself to calm down. She didn't need to think of her mother anymore. It would only serve to infuriate her and Natalie still had a lot of questions for her father. She took a deep breath before asking her father something else. "How did you walk out of there alive? Did you get him?"

"No," Alaric said, shaking his head with a puzzled expression on his face. "He was too fast…too strong. I think he and his brother are old. He got the upper hand and well…"

"I don't understand," Natalie said in confusion, furrowing her eyebrows. Alaric met her gaze.

"I died, Natalie," He told her bluntly and Natalie just stared at him.

"Are you saying that you're a…" She trailed off and he shook his head before she could finish.

"I'm not," Alaric confirmed. "According to Stefan, I would've had to have vampire blood in my system and I didn't. It was actually something your mother gave me."

"What are you talking?" Natalie questioned and he raised his hand, showcasing a familiar looking ring on one of his fingers. She recognized it as the gaudy weird ring that her mother gifted him for their anniversary before she disappeared.

"This ring your mother gave me," Alaric told her. "She said it would protect me from things that go bump in the night."

"Things as in vampires?" She inquired and he nodded.

"Supernatural things," Alaric confirmed, gazing at the ring.

"That's insane," Natalie told him. He nodded but he knew it was true.

"I know it is but I think it's true. It was the only thing that explains how I came back to life after he killed me," Alaric explained to her and she supposed he had a point. "Stefan says that he and his brother have rings that allow them to walk in the daylight. If they can have those then maybe humans can have rings that protect them from vampires."

"I suppose it makes more sense than the alternative…that you just came back to life on your own," Natalie stated and Alaric nodded. He confused Natalie when he suddenly took the ring off his finger.

"I want you to have it," He told her, holding the ring out for her to take. Natalie gave him an uncertain look.

"Dad…I can't take that ring. Mom gave it to you," She tried to tell him. "Besides…it's probably way too big for me."

"We can get it resized," He retorted before continuing. "I'd rather you have it so you can be protected. It's dangerous out there and if there's some ring that can protect you from vampires then I want you to have it."

"No offense but I don't want anything Mom ever gave you," Natalie told him, causing her father to give her a look. "And you're the one who hunts vampires. I'm just a kid, anyways. If anyone's more likely to face a vampire, it's you. I don't need the ring. You do."

"I'd feel better if you had it," He told her and Natalie shook her head.

"And I'd be an orphan if I wore that thing and something happened to you," Natalie retorted and he sighed heavily because he realized that Natalie wasn't going to take the ring "You need the ring more than I do, Dad."

"Fine but if we run into anymore vampires in town, you're taking this ring. I don't care if you don't want it," Alaric warned her and she nodded. It seemed fair. Natalie then frowned as something else crossed her mind. Something she almost forgot to tell her father in the midst of all the new things she learned. Some things that made more sense now that she knew that her mother really was still alive.

Or undead.

Natalie wasn't sure if the word "alive" applied to her mother anymore.

"Dad, something happened tonight," Natalie told her father when she realized she still had a lot of questions on her mind. "When we got separated at the fundraiser."

"What are you talking about?" He asked her, shaking his head in confusion.

"I went outside to get some fresh air and there was a man out there. He knew my name and he told me to stop looking," Natalie informed her father who seemed as perplexed by this as she was. "That she didn't want to talk to me."

"Your mother?" He asked and she nodded.

"I think so and Elena and Stefan seemed to think so too," Natalie told her father who then looked uncomfortable. A confused look crossed Natalie's face. "He wasn't just talking to me about Mom. He was talking to Elena too. Why would Elena know anything about Mom?"

"There's something else," Alaric admitted much to Natalie's surprise. "I only just learned today and I wasn't sure how to tell you this."

"Tell me what, Dad?" Natalie asked him. She could something was weighing heavy on her dad's shoulders. He swallowed hard before answering.

"Your mother hid a lot of things…from the both of us," Alaric confessed much to Natalie's confusion. "Elena Gilbert found out she was adopted recently according to Jenna. In finding her birth mother, she made a startling discovery."

"What discovery?" Natalie asked him. Alaric shook his head, knowing this wasn't going to be easy for her to hear.

"Her birth mother was Isobel Flemming," Alaric told her and Natalie gasped in surprise. At first, the name didn't register with her. Her mother took her father's name after they got married, after all.

"Mom? No, that's not possible," Natalie denied as she tried to reject what her father was telling her. "I don't have any siblings. I'm an only child."

"I thought so too," Alaric said quietly. "Apparently she had Elena when she was still in high school and before we met. She never told me."

"Elena's my sister then?" Natalie asked him softly and her father nodded. "She was asking me all these questions tonight about Mom. It was kind of weird but now it makes perfect sense."

"I'm sorry you had to find out that way," Alaric told her, honestly feeling sorry for his daughter.

"When I met her…she looked so familiar to me," Natalie stated, thinking back to her first interaction with Elena. "I tried to think of where I knew her from but I couldn't."

"It's true, I suppose," Her father finally said. "It's all so coincidental. That we moved all this way to this small town and in it, we discover you have a half-sister."

"I don't think I'm ready to talk to her," Natalie told her father honestly as she tried to process everything she learned tonight. "This is all way too much."

"I don't expect you to be ready," Alaric said sympathetically. "It's your choice whether or not you want to talk to her. I'm sure she'll have questions about your mom but you just wait until you're ready to talk."

"I don't know why she has questions about Mom," Natalie said bitterly as she crossed her arms. "She's better off not knowing her or anything about her."

"I know," Her father said, not even bothering to argue with Natalie about her mom. He knew her mother's disappearance had softened her opinion of her mother somewhat but now that they both knew she was alive and a vampire, it seemed like Natalie was going back to resenting her mother. Maybe even more so now.

"The man she compelled to warn Elena and I…he killed himself," Natalie said in a sorrowful tone. "I watched it happen. I always knew she was cold but somehow she's gotten worse as a vampire. It was evil. She's a monster now and no longer my mother."

Alaric sat in silence as he watched the resentment grow in his young daughter's eyes. There was nothing he could do to comfort her or soften the pain of this new revelation about her mother. A part of Alaric hated Isobel in that moment for doing this to their daughter. For turning her into a resentful person.

Alaric could only hope that her mother continued to stay away.

He didn't know what a reappearance in their life would do to Natalie.

Alaric didn't want to find out either.

Natalie had a sister.

It was ironic to be honest.

Natalie had always wished for a sister growing up. She thought her dad wanted more children but her mother didn't want any. Her father never confirmed it but Natalie was sure that her mother hadn't even wanted her. There was no way she would ever gain a sibling.

Only Natalie did have a sibling but just not a younger one.

She had an older sister.

Elena Gilbert.

Since learning the news of her vampire mother and long-lost sister, Natalie had kept to herself a lot. She saw Elena once with her vampire boyfriend when walking with her friends around town. They shared a glance and Elena moved towards her but Natalie quickly turned her head before walking off in the opposite direction.

Natalie honestly didn't know what to think of her sister. Elena seemed nice enough and was somewhat of a popular girl at Mystic Falls High according to Bianca. That was the extent of Natalie's knowledge about Elena Gilbert. Natalie just didn't know how to feel about her. Especially when learning that Elena had a vampire boyfriend.

Who would date a vampire?

They were super old and sucked people's blood. Natalie didn't find that very attractive. She supposed girls who liked Twilight liked the brooding nature and mysteriousness that vampires brought but at the end of the day, they drank people's blood and killed them. Natalie didn't know how her sister could be so nice if she was willingly dating one of them.

Natalie would rather die than date some gross old vampire.

"Are you Ric's daughter?" A dark haired man asked her. Natalie had just come back from a run. Sometimes she jogged after-school to keep up with her training. She had to keep up stamina if she was going to be able to hold her own against vampires. Jogging also helped her clear her mind which was currently filled with thoughts of a vampire mother and a half-sister.

Natalie had just returned to the apartment building where she and her dad lived. The man was waiting for her just outside the loft. The same man from the night of the fundraiser. He was handsome with his raven black hair and piercing blue eyes but Natalie wasn't fooled by his looks. She knew a dangerous predator was lurking underneath and the very same one who turned her mother into a monster.

Damon Salvatore.

He was standing there with his brother. Stefan gave her a concerned look but Natalie wasn't intimidated by this vampire. He didn't scare her. In fact, he just made her angry. Especially after learning that he tried to kill her father.

Elena didn't seem to be with them and she was thankful for that. Natalie still didn't know how to talk to her or even approach her. It was a difficult situation she found herself in.

"I'm not supposed to talk to strangers," Natalie told him as she walked past him, unlocking the door of the loft and opening it. However, Damon stopped her with his words before she could enter.

"I'm not a stranger. Your dad and I are buddies," Damon bragged and Natalie watched him in silence, misting her face with her facial misting spray as she attempted to cool herself down from her jog. "Isn't that right, Stef?"

"Damon, I don't think Alaric's home," Stefan tried to tell his brother but Damon dismissed him as he gave Natalie a small smirk. Natalie couldn't believe the arrogance of this idiotic vampire. It made her angry.

"Well, maybe we should wait until he gets here then," Damon told his brother before glancing back at Natalie. The girl who clearly wasn't a doppelganger of Katherine like Elena was but still resembled them both in large ways. It was captivating to say the least. "Nat can invite us in."

"My name's Natalie," She told him in annoyance, glaring at the vampire. Did he really think she was that stupid? That she'd invite him in like that? "And I think you should come back at another time. My dad wouldn't like two random weirdos alone with me in the loft."

"But like I said, your dad and I are friends," Damon tried to tell her before looking at the misting spray in her hand with an amused look. Some teen beauty trend no doubt. "What's that in your hand?"

"It's facial misting spray," Natalie explained with a small smile to the very stupid vampire. "I just got back from a run and I worked up a sweat. I want to try out for the track team. Anyways, it has a lot of vitamins and it's good for your skin. Do you want to try?"

"I think I'm good," Damon told her with an annoyed smile on his face. Natalie just shrugged.

"I would try it if I were you. It's good for someone your age," Natalie told him, causing the smile to fall off his face. Stefan held in a laugh. "Especially those lines around your mouth."

"Those are laugh lines," Damon defended and Natalie didn't seem convinced. He sneered at her.

"Maybe I'll let you wait inside if you try it," Natalie told him, baiting the vampire. Damon rolled his eyes, finding the girl ridiculous. Stefan watched the two with interest, not knowing what was going on. A part of him was suspicious that she knew more about vampires than what her father was willing to admit but there was no proof.

Not yet.

"Fine. Spray the damn thing," Damon snapped and Natalie smirked at him before innocently spraying the bottle at his face.

The moment the mist made contact with his skin, Damon hissed in pain and covered his face with his hands as he stumbled forward. There was a sizzling sound as Stefan watched his brother kneel to the ground in pain. Stefan furrowed his eyebrows in confusion, looking between his brother and Elena's half-sister.

"Vervain!" Damon groaned as he gasped in pain. He removed his hands only to reveal the burnt flesh on his face. Natalie glared at him.

"That was for my dad," Natalie told him angrily as Stefan glanced at her in surprise. She quickly backed into the loft, protected by the threshold which kept any vampire from entering. "The next time you come near me, Vampire, I'll drive a stake through your heart and I know how. My dad taught me."

Damon and Stefan watched the middle-schooler give the both of them one last glare before slamming the door in their face.

There was a moment of silence between the two brothers as they both processed what had occurred. Between the feigned obliviousness of Natalie Saltzman and then to her spraying Damon in the face with vervain. It was clear the girl was anything but oblivious. Especially as Damon's skin began to slowly heal.

"Looks like daddy's been having some vampire-killing bonding time with his little girl," Damon said sarcastically and Stefan shook his head at his brother. "A little Buffy in the making. How cute."

"Damon, leave her alone," Stefan warned him and Damon scoffed.

"What kind of monster do you take me for, Stefan? She's a kid," Damon retorted, lifting himself off the ground but stumbling a bit. The vervain made him weak. "That doesn't mean I don't want to teach her bratty ass a lesson. I thought you said she didn't know anything?"

"That's what Alaric said but I'm guessing he wasn't being entirely honest," Stefan admitted and Damon shook his head in annoyance.

"Well, that would've been nice to know before Elena's little sis vervained me," Damon snapped before turning in the other direction to exit the hallway. It was clear there was no way he was getting invited inside the vampire hunter's loft. Not anytime soon, anyways. "She doesn't seem to have your girlfriend's affection for vampires. Did you see how she looked at me with those hateful little Bambi eyes? Like I was the devil himself."

"You did turn her mother into a vampire, Damon," Stefan reminded him and Damon rolled his eyes.

"I did that kid a favor. Any mother who wants to leave their own kid isn't worth having," Damon pointed out which Stefan found strangely unlike Damon to say. He dismissed Damon's leniency towards Natalie as her being related to Katherine on some level. "Looks like Daddy's been giving her vampire-hunting lessons. I'd like to know how much she knows."

"If Alaric's taught her this much then I wouldn't like to find out the extent of her knowledge," Stefan reasoned with him as Damon gave him a look of disbelief.

"Are you kidding me? She's twelve," Damon retorted and Stefan gave his brother a smirk.

"Yet she managed to vervain you very easily," Stefan countered, causing Damon to scoff.

"That's only because she's a kid and I thought she didn't know anything about vampires," Damon defended although Stefan still chuckled. "It won't happen again."

"Whatever you say, Damon," Stefan teased his brother, clearly not believing him. Damon glared after his brother before following but not before casting another annoyed glare at the door to Alaric's loft.

Looks like there wasn't just Van Helsing with a magical ring in town.

There was Van Helsing Jr. too.

"You've been super weird lately," Lydia told Natalie as they walked to their English class. Madison had forgotten her textbook in science and Bianca was still visiting family in the wake of her grandmother's death. It was just the two of them on their own.

Natalie shrugged.

"Weird? How weird?" Natalie denied, pretending like she didn't know what Lydia was talking about. She really wished Bianca was here. Natalie liked Lydia but she didn't trust the girl enough to divulge secrets to. Lydia was a huge gossip. Natalie just wished Bianca was here because she might know what to do about the Elena Gilbert situation.

"You've just been quiet…I mean, more than usual," Lydia told her and Natalie didn't realize she was acting so weird. She thought she was acting normal but maybe she didn't have any clue as to how she was acting.

"Remember how I said my mom disappeared?" Natalie told her and she nodded. "Well, I just found out that she's dead. I mean, I always figured she was but now we know for sure."

"Oh my god, Nat," Lydia said in disbelief. "That's awful."

"It's fine," Natalie said quietly. She supposed in a way that was the truth. Her mother was dead to her, anyways. "I have closure now which is good."

"It's still terrible," Lydia told her. "Didn't a small part of you hope that she'd come home?"

"Well, if she wasn't dead then that just meant that she ran out on me and my dad," Natalie said bitterly. "To me, death is better."

"I guess that's a fair point," Lydia said although sometimes she found Natalie a bit frightening to be perfectly honest. The girl was quiet but had a bitterness to her that Lydia always found disconcerting. "Well, I'm still sorry about your mom."

"It's fine," Natalie said as they continued walking down the hall to class.

"Do they know how she died?" Lydia asked hesitantly and Natalie sighed.

"Suicide," Natalie answered calmly because to her that's what her mother did. The moment she asked that arrogant vampire to turn her into a blood-sucking leech. Lydia swallowed hard.

"Well, I'm still very sorry," Lydia said and Natalie only nodded in silence.

She hadn't changed her mind.

Natalie knew that someday, when she was more trained and well-equipped, she was going to find her mother and drive a stake through her cold, unbeating heart. Maybe then the selfish coward would finally regret breaking her father's heart. Natalie didn't care, she just wanted her mother to pay for all the pain she left in her wake.

Her mother desired immortality and Natalie wanted to make sure she'd never have it.