2
Awakening
May 10, 1994 / February 1 2013
"I don't think I need a Bennett witch. I think all I need is … Bennett blood."
She couldn't take her eyes off the glint of the knife's blade.
She had been running for days, barely sleeping, barely eating. To be finally caught had been a relief.
There were worse things than death.
The last thing Bonnie saw was the face of the devil as it laughed at her.
Darkness.
Silence.
She dreamt of her dead father. He was waiting for her in a field of daisies. She loved daisies.
It was just a dream. Her father could not be on the Other Side. That was the only place left for her to go. If the ancestors didn't send her to Oblivion this time.
She would never see him again.
In her mind, Bonnie wept.
Her father left. He didn't wait for her.
She was alone again.
Darkness.
Silence.
No, not silence. Not alone. Something – someone was beside her.
The devil.
It was laughing.
"BonBon, we made it," she heard it whisper.
They did?
Not her. Not for long.
She closed her eyes and waited for the knife.
She felt the cold blade on her face, on her lips, then it was replaced by something softer, a warm pressure… and then…
Nothing.
Silence.
Had she finally died?
The never ending darkness. The never ending silence.
Hours passed. Or maybe days.
Voices came from far away and far above. They were indecipherable.
Bonnie just wanted to sleep.
Just wanted to sink. Just wanted to drown and never wake up.
But the voices were persistent and louder and louder and clearer and clearer. And soon, with the voices came light, at first faint and dim, like a slow sunrise… then brighter and brighter and with it came eyes… faces… familiar faces.
"Bonnie! Bonnie!"
"Liv?" she thought she said, but what came out was a croak.
"She's trying to say something."
"Shh… stop crowding her."
"Bonnie… can you hear me? Do you understand me?"
Bonnie groaned and closed her eyes back. Please let her die.
"Oh God, is she OK?"
"She's alive." A strangled laugh. "Oh my God, she's alive."
"Is it really, Bonnie?"
Bonnie groaned. "Shut up, Luke."
"Oh God!"
Then something was hanging around her neck, strangling her, and suffocating her under ropes of curly blonde hair.
"Get off me," Bonnie moaned.
The weight was pulled off and she heard someone –people – crying and laughing around her.
Somewhere in the middle of this, she slipped away.
It was dark again, but it wasn't silent. She could hear voices, familiar sounds.
And it was only dark because her eyes were closed. She opened them, and the light poured in, reflecting on the ceiling above her She swallowed against the growing lump in her throat. She knew that ceiling.
She knew the bed she was lying on, too. Her old bed in her old room. Everything was just as she remembered it… right down to the battered old Teddy lying on the lamp table by her bed. Bonnie reached for it, wincing at using long dormant muscles, and grabbed it. She wrapped her arms around it while the tears poured out freely.
The door opened and she jumped, instinctively grabbing the first weapon at hand – the lamp – and brandishing it before her.
Joshua Parker paused at the doorway.
"Bonnie," he said gently, raising an eyebrow.
Bonnie let out the breath she didn't realize she was holding and put down the lamp.
He stared at it gravely, then at her. "I was going to ask you how you were, and where you've been… but I have a feeling that I already know the answer."
"I'm good," Bonnie said, quietly. Untruthfully. But there was nothing wrong with her that would not heal with time. "And I was in the 1994 Prison World."
There was a chair beside the door. Joshua more fell than sat down heavily on it.
"A few weeks ago, we caught word that the vampire Katherine had been sighted somewhere in Virginia. I sent Luke and Liv to get hold of her. She had an interesting story to tell… I didn't want to believe it. But now, I know it's true."
At the mention of Katherine's name, Bonnie's hands balled into fists. "Where is she?" she hissed.
Joshua looked surprised at her anger. He would, Bonnie thought bitterly. Sweet little Bonnie rarely broke into a frown, and certainly never flew into a temper.
"We let her go," he said slowly. Bonnie gasped. "She co-operated with us. We had no reason to hold her."
"She…"
Slender hands on her neck, violence leashed and waiting to snap her into two.
"Now isn't this awkward, Kai? You have something of mine and I have something of yours…"
Teeth sinking into her neck, tearing her.
"I will rip you up and send you to him in pieces."
Bonnie choked back her words. "Never mind."
"And who else was in the Prison World with you and Katherine?"
Bonnie tensed. "No one else came with us."
"But someone was already there, wasn't he?"
Bonnie shuddered.
Joshua sighed. "Did he escape?"
Bonnie wrapped her arms around herself, stared at the mirror across the room. A scared little girl, mostly skin and bones and a shadow of her former self, stared back at her.
"Yes."