A/N: I have been working on three different stories on my computer, and this is the one that seems to be coming together in order so I think it is time to start posting it. (I am also still working on the sequel to Blood and Ashes as well as expanding my one-shot Fade to Blue into a full story, for those who are curious.) This story is a bit darker, and while everyone else is writing season 3 (and doing a great job of it), I am going to rewrite season 2 ;) This is how it could have played out if the show had kept Katherine as the big bad and if the writers were deeply obsessed with Damon - and if the show was not on the CW. This story is centered around Damon and his relationships with Katherine, Stefan, and Elena. Some of the tertiary characters from season 2 will appear in roles similar to those they appeared in on the show. Rated M for dark themes, torture, smut, and language.

Disclaimer: I do not own The Vampire Diaries or any of the characters. This story is written strictly for fun.

Broken

Prologue

Elena parked in front of the Salvatore boarding house and turned off her car. She knew she shouldn't be there, but she couldn't seem to stay away. If she thought things had been bad before, since she had found out she was the doppelganger, everything had fallen apart completely over the past three weeks. And it had all started when the Salvatore brothers had disappeared.

As always, the front door of the house was unlocked, and it was eerily dark and silent inside. Elena missed the crackle of the fire that had always been going in the fireplace, the voice of Stefan or Damon greeting her as she walked in. Now the place was dark and silent, the antique furniture and random knick-knacks gathering dust. Elena didn't know why she kept coming back there when she knew she would find nothing more than silence and another layer of dust. She guessed it reminded her of a time when she thought she and the town of Mystic Falls had a chance, no matter how slim, of surviving this encounter with the supernatural.

Elena took a few more steps into the house, ready to sink down onto one of the couches in search of whatever peace and comfort the silent mansion might offer. Then she saw a man sprawled on the carpet. He was facedown, unmoving and apparently unconscious. It was Damon.

Chapter 1

Three weeks earlier

Damon stopped in the middle of pouring himself a drink. There was someone else there.

Before he could do more than extend his senses, however, he was tackled from behind and driven to the floor. His attacker jerked his hands behind him, pinning him to the ground with a knee between his shoulder blades and a hand on the back of his neck. Damon writhed desperately, trying to dislodge the person on his back, but the hold on him never weakened and he felt his arms being forced up until excruciating pain shot through his shoulders. Then a hand drove his head hard into the ground with inhuman force. Damon's struggles ceased for a moment as white lights flashed before his eyes.

"Guess who, Damon?" his attacker whispered softly in his ear.

Damon knew that voice. Katherine. "How did you get out of the tomb?" he asked. She weighed absolutely nothing on his back, and yet not even all his vampire strength could help him against her. She had him almost completely immobilized. Fuck. This is not good.

"All in good time, lover."

Damon felt her jerk his arms again, then felt cold steel around his wrists. Handcuffs. She fucking handcuffed me. "Really, Katherine? Did Liz recruit you to the Mystic Falls police force?" He tried to test the steel surreptitiously, confident that he could get free.

Katherine had apparently noticed his efforts. "This isn't my first rodeo, Damon, and I have witchy friends. They'll hold you."

Unfortunately, Damon could tell almost immediately that she was telling the truth for once. He should have been able to snap the metal easily, even in the awkward position with his arms behind his back, but the handcuffs didn't give in the slightest as he exerted his strength. Well shit, he thought. What he said was, "So you do this to all the guys? And here I thought I was special."

He felt Katherine's breath against his neck, then her lips against his skin. He couldn't suppress a shudder of horror. "Oh, you are special," Katherine whispered.

Damon hated his helplessness. His mind told him to fight, but his vampire instincts were telling him that she was too strong. Vampires usually lived and hunted alone or in pairs, but when they came together in larger groups, they tested each other to establish a hierarchy. That was why Pearl had hurt him when she had escaped the tomb, but he knew the struggle for dominance was going to be far, far worse with Katherine because, with her, it was personal. Giving in to her would be a very bad idea, but his animal instincts were telling him to submit, that it was his best chance of survival.

Katherine seemed to sense what he was thinking. "You will submit to me, Damon," she murmured in his ear. "You're mine." He felt her tongue lick along his ear, finding a sensitive spot.

Even as Damon growled out a response, "Sorry, Katherine. I've moved on," another shudder ran through him at the conflicting impulses that we're tormenting his mind and body. Fuck, he thought helplessly as his body gave in and relaxed.

"That's a good boy," Katherine said. Damon felt her shift her slight weight, and then pain burst through him as she injected vervain into his arm. He heard Katherine's voice as he passed out. "But I don't trust you just yet, Damon."

•••••

Damon woke up to find himself suspended by a set of chains that held his arms above him. Both of his wrists were encased in heavy shackles, and as he struggled to get his feet under him, he saw that his ankles were shackled and chained as well. There was a wall behind him, and Damon leaned back against it, trying to get his bearings through the vervain that still fogged his mind and drained his body.

Still disoriented, Damon saw Katherine approaching him. "Look who's awake," she said. "Did you have sweet dreams, Damon?"

Damon just looked at her, too out of it to come up with a response.

Katherine just smiled evilly at his silence. "Your brother is having a very pleasant dream right now, you know." She stepped to the side, and Damon saw that Stefan was shackled on the other side of the room. He was unconscious.

"No," Damon murmured hopelessly, the plea of denial slipping out before he could stop himself. Not Stefan, he thought desperately. Please don't hurt Stefan.

Katherine gave him another cruel smirk. "But you, Damon, you wouldn't let me into your dream," she pouted.

Damon felt sick with horror. Had Katherine gotten into Stefan's head? His little brother didn't stand a chance against her with his stupid animal diet. Damon was pretty sure that he could keep Katherine out of his own head. He had always been good at the psychological tricks of being a vampire, and he knew that those powers, unlike physical strength, increased only slightly with age. But Stefan couldn't even compel people reliably. He was almost as defenseless as a human against her.

"Let him go." Damon knew he was pleading with her, and he knew that it was the last thing he should do. But he couldn't stop himself.

Katherine stepped closer to him, running a hand down his chest. Damon shivered as Katherine spoke in a seductive voice. "What will you do if I let him go? What will you do for me, Damon?"

Damon knew that his mind wasn't working nearly well enough to play this game with her right now. He knew he should shut up before he made a terrible mistake. But he couldn't. "I'll do anything," he said. "I'll come with you. I'll let you into my head." The rational part of Damon – the part that might have had a chance in a battle of wits with Katherine – knew that he was going all in on the first hand and tried again to get him to shut up. But it was his fear for Stefan that was in control at the moment. After a pause, he went on, holding out the dream that had sustained him for 145 years. "We can take the world by storm, Katherine, you and me. Just don't hurt Stefan."

Katherine stared into his eyes for a moment, then she laughed. "You aren't worth that, Damon." She tapped Damon lightly on the chest even as he felt his heart breaking into a thousand pieces again. Damn it, why did she still have such power over him? He thought he had stitched himself back together again, and she broke him with one cold truth. "Besides, I will have both you and Stefan. Both of you are mine." She turned away. "Now if you'll excuse me, your brother and I are in the middle of something. Oh, and don't think that you'll be able to break those chains. My warlock has spelled them against vampire strength. You're here to stay, Damon."

Damon bowed his head, fighting back tears of pain and despair. The chains holding his body seemed to drag on his muscles, and he could feel a chain closing around what was left of his heart. Here he was, a vampire who had ruined towns and broken hearts for nearly a century and a half, and he was utterly helpless. He hated his own weakness, but most of all, he hated the knowledge that there was nothing he could do to help his baby brother. He couldn't protect Stefan from Katherine, and she would break them both as easily as she had broken them before.