Snowflakes, like the gentle debris of life as she knew it, brushed Bonnie's cheeks. They seemed to know, in their calmness, something she didn't.

But as she trudged frantically through the snow-laden forest, she was afraid that she did know it. And she couldn't accept it. She wouldn't. So she called him. She screamed his name. She heard her own voice bounce between the cold trunks of trees, tear through the silent night, and no sound more than that.

She had known the risk: that he might have been caught in the crumbling of the prison world. That he wouldn't survive to make the trip with her.

The whole thing just didn't feel right. Kai Parker wasn't a quitter, certainly not with his life on the line. She'd sooner believe that he was playing a trick on her at the worst time than believe he was actually dead. He had to be hiding behind a tree, or buried in snow. Maybe the rough trip through time and space broke them apart and he had fallen to Earth at different coordinates. Was that possible? She couldn't know. She had more experience with this sort of thing than most, and still not enough to understand it all. Maybe the traveling separated them only by time, and he had gotten back first. Maybe he was out looking for her. Or maybe she was the first one back and he was still on his way.

Even these ideas seemed hardly possible, but she had to cling to them.

Sooner than she expected, Bonnie found herself breaking out of the trees and standing on the highway that passed through town. She was less concerned about being able to find her way back to her luggage than she was about finding Kai, and followed the road. Her feet ached with cold; snow had sunken into her nice boots at some point and her socks were wet, sponging up and squishing out freezing water with every step. But she endured.

The town square was deserted. It felt hauntingly like nothing had changed at all. The only difference between this Mystic Falls and the one she had just left was the snow, her only clue that she had entered another dimension. Yet as she plodded around the square, calling for Kai every few minutes, getting nostalgic closer looks at the real version of her old stomping grounds, she began to doubt.

The windows of the Mystic Grill were all broken out. It had to have happened recently because there was no sign that anyone intended to fix it. There were no coverings and the glass still lay in a delicate mess on the sidewalk. As she glanced around for any sign of another person, she noticed other shops shared this trait of disrepair. None of the street lamps were lit.

The stoplights, similarly, were not working. They weren't red, green or yellow, but grey. She didn't know how long it had been snowing, but there were no tire tracks on the street. Maybe there was a winter storm warning, everyone was home and the power was out. Maybe the storefronts were all destroyed by some desperate town vandal needing supplies, and she had just missed him. She hoped it was all of these. The alternative might be too much. She didn't dare to even worry that she had somehow entered yet another dimension that was not home. It couldn't be the case or she was sure she'd lose her mind.

Out of shear panic this time, she howled, "Kai!" and then, "Somebody help me!"

She needed to see someone, anyone. Hope, in any form.

Then she heard something in the distance. A subtle grinding, growing louder as seconds passed. She looked toward the sound, at the corner of the Mystic Grill, where two yellow beacons of light shined through the snowfall. She became certain that she was hearing tires cutting new tracks in the tall snow.

An SUV slowly rolled up at the corner and if Bonnie looked past the distorting snowflakes, she could make out the word SHERIFF in large print on the side.

She sighed, quite relieved, until whoever was driving the car noticed her and the tires squealed with speed. She stepped back on the sidewalk, ready to leap out of the way as the vehicle tore in her direction and slid to a crooked stop. All her nerves fired but she refused to run because of how much she needed to see another person, whatever might happen next.

The driver's side door flew open and the driver dropped behind it.

"Kai?" she called.

With the headlights pointing so brightly into her face, Bonnie was unable to see who it was or what exactly they were doing, but she heard the cock of a rifle and a commanding, "Hands in the air!"

There was a familiar tone to the man's voice, but it wasn't Kai's so she knew this was real. Whoever it was, aiming the gun at her like she was some kind of criminal, wasn't kidding around.

"Hands where I can see 'em, trespasser! I've got bullets for whatever you are."

Fingers twitching, eyes squinting at the huddled silhouette of a man, Bonnie slowly raised her hands. That voice. Perhaps it was tough to distinguish because that voice had never spoken to her in this way before. But she knew she'd heard it, many times.

"Matt?" she croaked.

The silhouette said nothing for a moment. Bonnie strained to see what was going on behind the open car door. Finally the silhouette moved to the side and the car door quietly closed. A tentative footstep crunched in the snow, and another, until her following gaze trailed out of the lights beaming into her pupils. Matt Donovan, in uniform, stepped into view.

His eyes narrowed harrowingly.

"Bonnie?" he asked, like he didn't really believe it. His gun lowered only slightly.

Bonnie nodded, feeling her eyes run warm with tears of relief.

"It's me!" she assured. And so glad to have seen a friend first, she dropped her hands and ran toward him. She ran into a stiff hug, and she couldn't ignore the attentive rifle at her back. But Matt's body heat warmed her, his friendly energy calmed her and she was certain now that her mind wasn't a total loss. Matt Donovan, the officer, was here to take care of things.

"What are you doing here?" Matt asked, "We all thought you were…"

"I'm not," Bonnie insisted heartily, and had to repeat it to believe herself, "I'm not."

"But how? Bonnie, do you know where you are? We've gotta get you out of here."

Matt stepped out of the friendly embrace.

"What?"

He hurried her into the nearest car door, which put her in the back seat. She wasn't about to fight; the inside of the car was so warm. Before she could get her frozen hands to buckled her seatbealt, they were speeding out of the square and back down the highway out of town.

"Where are we going?" Bonnie asked, slipping her numb feet out of her soaked footwear.

"Whitmore," Matt answered resolutely.

"Why? I need to go home," Bonnie said achingly. She was also dying to take a peek in the little yellow house on Jubilee and see if Kai was there. But the last time Matt had anything to do with Kai, he was being attacked in the Salvatore holding cell, and Bonnie doubted he would react well to the thought of Kai maybe being out there somewhere.

But is he?

"Mystic Falls…isn't your home anymore, Bonnie."

"What are you talking about? Just take me to my Grams' house. Please. I need to change, I need to…to…get home." And look for him.

Bonnie thought of the way Kai had looked at her when they last danced. There was no way he wouldn't have waited for her in the woods if he was still alive. There was no way they wouldn't have found each other.

"I can't take you there, Bonnie…"

Kai was dead.

"…I'm sorry."

All she could do now was sit with her hands in her lap and accept it, and move on to more pressing matters. She felt her throat tightening and she stared out the window, watching trees and flurries pass, urging herself not to hope she'd see him.

"Where have you been?" Matt's voice interrupted her quiet mourning. He was possibly even more intent on an update than she was.

Bonnie tried swallowing the tightness away, but her voice cracked anyway.

"It's a really, really, really, really long story. Why can't you take me home?"

"It's a really, really, really, really long story."

Something big was going on. Matt's stiff behavior was just one sign. She could see how tightly his hands gripped the steering wheel, his nervous profile every time he glanced from side to side. He seemed to be watching out for something. Or someone.

"Matt, what's wrong with Mystic Falls?" she pressed, not able to speak as clearly or loudly as she wanted. She could only sound as solemn as she felt. "The windows in the Grill were broken. All the power's out."

"I know."

"So?" Bonnie leaned forward and hooked her fingers through the wire caging between the front and back seats.

"Everything changed after the wedding, Bonnie."

"You're telling me."

"You disappeared, we all thought you were…well, we didn't know what to think. Because Kai was gone, too. We didn't know if he took you, if he did something to you, or if you just ran. But Elena never woke up."

"But what happened to the town, Matt?"

"Lily's Heretics happened to the town. And Damon. Damon just…lost it. We had to evacuate Mystic Falls."

"How long ago?"

"Pretty soon after the wedding. Damon and the Heretics just started picking people off, then Damon started picking Heretics off. Stefan managed to lock him up long enough to compel whoever was left to leave their homes and forget it all happened. Now Mystic Falls is practically a ghost town."

"What about Jeremy? Where's Caroline?"

"They're fine. Jeremy's off doing whatever the hell he's doing. Caroline's finishing school. Enzo is Enzo. Besides everything, everyone's fine. Not great, but fine."

Bonnie hesitated to ask about Alaric.

"I guess I'm pretty lucky you were there, then," Bonnie mentioned of her chance rescue. If Matt hadn't been there to pick her up, she wouldn't have a clue about the sad story she'd walked right into. She would have been stranded. Someone else might have found her first. "Why were you? If the town is empty…"

"Whole towns don't usually lose their entire population for no apparent reason. Rumors get spread. Sometimes other vampires pass through. Sometimes kids sneak in. So…I patrol."

"To protect them from…"

"Damon still lives at the boarding house."

"And Stefan?"

"He's there, keeping Damon in line. Mystic Falls, population of two."

"What about Lily?"

"Lily's gone."

"Gone where?"

"I killed her."

"Wow."

"Self defense."

"And the Salvatore brothers haven't retaliated for that?"

"As far as I can tell I did them a favor."

It seemed Matt had no idea that Damon had left Bonnie for dead. Which probably meant that Damon, in the fashion, had kept his dirty little secret all to himself. She suddenly couldn't wait to tell Caroline.

She sighed.

"Damon just lost it, huh? Figures."

"Bonnie…" Matt began, turning his head just a little to his right so she could see very plainly the concern in his features. "When I got out of the car back there…why did you call me Kai?"

Bonnie hadn't realized until she smelled the wood that she really missed walking through the halls at Whitmore. She missed being there altogether, having classes and homework and learning new things.

Matt quietly led the way. Bonnie followed on bare feet, carrying her wet boots in each hand, keeping her head down. She could tell he didn't know what to say anymore. He'd already filled her in on most of the bad news and she had put off telling him her story. She was still debating whether to gather everyone around so she only had to tell it once, or just keep it all to herself.

"Still in the dorms, huh?" Bonnie made small talk. "You'd think by now she'd be living in an off-campus party house."

Matt chuckled.

"She's gonna be so happy to see you, Bonnie."

"I hope so."

"You know she's gonna harangue you for answers."

"I know."

"Maybe she'll let you get some rest first, you look like you need it."

They came upon the door to Bonnie's old dorm room, and Matt stopped to knock.

After two sets of three knocks, the door finally opened a crack.

"Matt, what on Earth?" a voice asked. Bonnie knew already it wasn't Caroline's voice. The pitch was just a little lower, with a European accent.

So she was about to meet a roommate.

Great.

She wasn't ready to meet any strangers. Readjusting to her own friends, who she loved and missed painfully, was going to be enough work.

"It's kind of an emergency," Matt lowered his voice, "I need you to let us in."

"Us?"

The crack in the door widened and Bonnie caught sight of the young woman on the other side. Big green eyes peered at her from a pale, round face and quickly widened in amazement. Her brown hair fell in bed-messy waves down past her shoulders and she wore a long silk robe, beautifully patterned with paisleys in pink, dark blue, silver and green, tied tightly and effectively around her thin waist. Bonnie realized she was staring at the woman's proper frame and worked to make better eye contact, at which point the woman stepped aside and rushed them into the room.

"Thanks," Matt said, so politely, and Bonnie didn't know what she should say.

The room was dark but seconds later a small bedside lamp was turned on, illuminating the dorm room. Except for the other woman's belongings set up around what used to be Elena's bed, the room was exactly the same.

"Caroline's freshening up," she said, "She'll be out in just a minute, I'm sure. Caroline!"

From the closed bathroom door, Caroline's voice shouted, "Just a minute!"

Bonnie's heart leapt.

"She has some drama class in an hour, she always gets up early enough to look her best, that girl," the woman said, folding her arms delicately across her chest, "Caroline, I think you'll want to come out here now!"

Matt sat down on the foot of Caroline's bed and Bonnie remained awkwardly standing, not sure if she was still welcome enough in this space to sit and feeling too nervous to sit anyway.

"So you're Bonnie," the woman said incredulously, having received no introduction. She was looking at Bonnie with amazement, and what almost struck her as a touch of attraction. Her heart shaped mouth sat curved in an unexpected smile.

Bonnie frowned and nodded. She guessed if this woman was Caroline's new roommate she must have heard about her at some point in time.

"You're even prettier in person," she complimented with a small smile.

"Thanks," Bonnie muttered, and glanced uncomfortably to Matt.

"Bonnie, this is Nora," Matt finally filled her in on the name of the strange, petite woman who wouldn't stop staring at her.

"Oh."

"She's uh…she's sort of the last Heretic."

"Oh," Bonnie repeated with more emphasis than she intended.

"Goodness, Matt, you don't need to say it like that," Nora said civilly with a hint of stress, then added, "Not that it isn't the truth, I suppose."

"And she's…" Bonnie began, not sure how to finish her question without being rude.

"She's off the dark side," Matt enlightened.

"Honestly," Nora complained and Matt chuckled.

"What? You're with us now."

"Because my companions were killed and Caroline kindly took me in."

The bathroom door opened and Caroline stormed in with her head tilted and a hair curler clamped in her hair.

"Nora I thought I told you to get more of that awapuhi shampoo next time you went to the store because we've been out since last Tuesday and I know you went there yesterday because where else did you get the new loofa I just saw hanging in—oh my god."

Bonnie watched as Caroline's eyes found her and everything stopped; her sentence, her walk, everyone else in the room. The curler in her hands fell to the floor.

"We really don't need to go to the hospital, Care, I'm fine," Bonnie insisted as Caroline, in tears, dragged Bonnie across campus.

"Look at you, you're Twiggy, Bonnie, and you won't tell us what happened and your skin is cold and you might have hypothermia, you need to see a doctor, damn it!"

"She's right, Bonnie," Matt chimed in. "If you don't go now, she'll just call an ambulance on you."

Bonnie groaned and stomped along. Nora followed silently behind.

She had gotten as far as announcing that she'd been in a prison world since the day of the wedding, and that was when Caroline cut her short with, "We're getting you to a hospital." Bonnie pleaded her case, that she was in no need of medical attention, that if Caroline was so worried she should simply feed her blood. "Well you never know what vampire blood might not heal," her indignant friend whispered and tutted her on. Now they were caravanning through the sliding glass doors to the ER.

Caroline compelled the front desk to set Bonnie up in a room that instant, and just two minutes later she found herself pouting in a hospital gown, in a hospital bed, avoiding eye contact with the two vampires seated nervously across the room. Matt, the only calm and reasonable person, had stayed behind in the waiting area.

A nurse finished fitting her fingers with pulse socks and left the room. Bonnie felt appreciative that Caroline was so worried about her but at the same time she wanted to disappear. It was six in the morning and not a terribly busy ward, but even the occasional stranger passing by the open door made her nerves skitter.

People. So many people.

Apprehending a request, Caroline jumped out of her chair and closed the door for Bonnie.

"Thanks."

Caroline nodded and returned to her chair to wring her hands and stare Bonnie down, next to Nora, who still sat without a peep.

Bonnie sighed, "They're just going to tell you how fine I am."

"Then we'll let them," Caroline retorted before she started crying again. "Have you been all by yourself, all this time? Again?"

Bonnie shook her head and braced herself, knowing that she wouldn't have the energy to keep many juicy details to herself.

"Actually, no," she admitted.

"Who else did Kai punish?"

"Um…himself."
"What?"

"I've been with Kai, Caroline."

"Oh my god," she squealed. The door opened.

"Sorry," Bonnie's nurse interrupted pleasantly as she bustled back into the room, "I forgot to turn this thing on. We hardly use this room." She poked around with something under Bonnie's bed until whatever it was that needed fixing was fixed. On her way back out the door, Caroline hooked the woman by the elbow.

"Bring a rape kit when you come back," she ordered.

"Caroline," Bonnie scolded as the nurse nodded and left. "That will not be necessary."

"Well I don't know! I just want to get you all checked out and make sure that every little thing is okay, I swear to god I'm going to find him and I'm going to—"

"There's no need."

"Please. He took both of my best friends, my home town and my almost boyfriend all in one fell swoop. Everything that is wrong with my life is his fault. He's getting it, Bonnie."

"He's dead, Care."

Caroline paused and Bonnie took the silence as a good opportunity to tell the whole story, or as much as she could before the doctor came.

"If you let me, I'll tell you what happened," Bonnie offered seriously.

The other girls exchanged glances and returned eager, silent gazes back to Bonnie.

"Okay then."

She was sure to mention how her relationship with Kai changed over time, that for the most part he was more like a companion than a captor. She left out the extent of how close they did get, temporarily. She didn't need a rape kit and a psychoanalyst. And most importantly she told the truth: that Kai had sacrificed himself to set her free.

She began to worry that her story was too watered down for how intense it really was because of the stunned look on Caroline's face. Nora seemed only moderately surprised by the end of Bonnie's story. A little saddened, even. Both girls said nothing.

"Come on," Bonnie urged, "One of you tell me I'm not crazy."

"I have to make a call," Caroline announced, and popped up from her chair. The door closed behind her, leaving Bonnie and the weird, pretty, quiet Heretic she had only just met to endure what could've been the most awkward silence of Bonnie's life.

"You're not crazy," Nora said at last, her emerald eyes boring into Bonnie's with wide earnestness.

Bonnie nodded and pursed her lips, but all she could think to say was, "You didn't have to come."

"I wanted to."

Bonnie nodded again and looked to the glass panel in the door for any sign of Caroline.

"I'm sorry," Nora said, "When you said that, did you mean you wish I didn't come? I can leave if you'd like, I know we've never met. God, this must be awkward for you. I'll go."

The tiny woman tightened the robe she was still wearing and stood up. As much as Bonnie wanted to be alone, (and couldn't fathom why), she was also a little intrigued by Nora, not just by the accent that was pleasing to her ears, or her prettiness that was pleasing to the eyes.

Nora was one of Lily's Heretics. It meant she knew Kai, at least a little. They were stuck together in 1903. Kai was responsible for her freedom. Did Nora feel any sense of loyalty to him for that? And just as Bonnie had been Kai's living blood bag, Kai had been Nora's. It was a peculiar thing, she thought, for her to be sharing a room with this woman.

Annoyingly, it occurred to her that Kai could've found this woman attractive. How could he not? She was gorgeous. She had to wonder if anything else had happened in 1903…if any other needs of Nora's had been his duty to quell.

"Don't go," Bonnie said before Nora opened the door.

As she turned around, Bonnie noticed she could feel more than just the presence of another living being in the room with her. She felt magic, too. Of course. Nora's magic. It was the first magic she'd felt since she'd been back, and it was so unlike Kai's. While Kai's was sharp and goading, Nora's almost stung. But it was a sweet sting. It didn't hurt but it was very there. For as quiet as she had been, her magic and her aura was almost abrasive, but welcomely so.

Bonnie watched the sophisticated yet publicly robed woman cross the room to stand at her bedside.

Her thin hand found Bonnie's and she held it gently, her eyes searing.

"Are you okay, Bonnie?"

For what felt like the first time in Bonnie's life, her heart crumbled at the sight of so much honesty in another person's eyes. She couldn't place what it was about Nora, who she thought she was. But all of a sudden, though seconds earlier she had wished to be alone, she felt safe and content, and normal and sane, with her there.

The door swung open again, sufficiently interrupting Bonnie's intention to answer Nora's question just as honestly as Nora had asked. A dark-haired, statuesque beauty of a doctor entered the room with a clipboard and as much shock on her face.

Bonnie almost stuttered her plea for confirmation.

"Jo?"