Pretty confident I can get a good 5 chapters out of this little ficlet. The characters are definitely talking to me and I think I have the backstory and mythology nailed down. No clue how I'm gonna end the whole thing, so I'm think I'm gonna wing it. My writers block still sucks and I'm sorry. Love me anyway.

Chapter 2

2048

"What are you giggling about?"

Klaus kissed Caroline's cheek as he sank into the beach chair next to her. The Mediterranean Sea stretched out before them in a brilliant blue and green on the crystalline white beaches of Greece. They had explored the ruins of Athens in the morning, napped and made love on their boat anchored in the harbor, and now were relaxing with their feet in the water and the sun high.

"Bonnie." She scoffed playfully showing Klaus her phone. "She and Enzo are in Taiwan. Enzo is panicked over his first gray hair."

"You ever consider it?"

"What's that?"

"Taking the cure." He supplied, his fingers running through the strands of her hair. "Before, you didn't have a choice and now you do."

She bit her lip briefly. "If I were going to take the cure, I would have already taken it when everyone was still young enough that I could age with them. If I take it now, most everyone will be gone."

He bent down, brushing his lips across hers, pleased with her answer. "I'm not going anywhere; even if you are still a baby vampire."

x-X-x

2133

Somehow, he had managed to quell every inch of rage simmering just beneath the surface. He had stumbled away from her as if he had been burned and he had heard the audible gulp slide down her throat once there was distance placed between them. He had cared for this woman for decades, and the hatred and betrayal that was filling every inch of his body was overwhelming; a different kind of desiccation that had him thrumming in every cell and fiber.

Her rapid heartbeat strummed in his ears, the blue of her eyes vibrant in his vision as she winced back the sheen of tears pooling within them. Tearing her look away from him, she took stock of the vegetables arranged around her feet, a new look of determination masking her features. Carefully she placed her hand under the bulging belly and grabbed a few of the vegetables, stalking past Klaus, bumping into his shoulder as she did so.

He watched her, dumbfounded as she stomped her way up onto her back porch and into her house, the back-screen door slamming with a bang. He couldn't think of a single thing in all his thousand plus years that he had been more caught off guard. He had made the vow to stay away and allow her to live a life of her choosing but he never even considered the possibility of her taking the cure. Hadn't she always loved being a vampire?

"Where the bloody hell do you get off?" he spoke through the screen door, the timbre in his voice shaking the house around them. Caroline didn't even acknowledge his presence at the kitchen island as she continued to chop up the tomatoes in front of her. Klaus's palm connected with the frame and the door flew clear of it's hinges when he pulled it open. "Invite me in." the words were spat through clenched teeth as Caroline continued her vigorous mincing, her jaw set. "Caroline!"

Slamming down the knife, she placed both palms flat on the countertop, her head low. "Come in."

"How bloody could you?"

"You have no idea what you're talking Klaus." She hissed, the tip of the knife slicing through the pad of her finger. She let a small gasp escape her lips at the pain, the blade clanking against the butcher block top. Klaus swallowed hard, the scent of her blood hitting his nostrils in a painful swell. He made the motion to go towards her but she held up her hand and threw him a stern look that stopped him in his tracks. "I got it. I'm fine."

He rocked on the balls of his feet and took a step back as she scooped up her apron and affixed it around her bloody finger. "You owe me an explanation."

"I'm aware this may come as a shock to you," giving one last glance over the cut on her finger, she began her chopping once more. "But contrary to popular belief, you are in fact not entitled to every thing you want like some spoiled brat. I swear you could give my five-year-old a run for her money with your petulance."

"Pardon me, your what year old?" he sputtered uncharacteristically. Before he could stop himself, his hand was gripping a chair and smashing it against the old and knotted wood floor.

A stuttered 'oh' fell from Caroline's lips and she took a step back as the wood splintered in her direction. Taking in stock of the destruction before her, a determined look swept across her features and she snatched up the knife left discarded on the butcher block and stomped towards Klaus, the tip of the blade a beacon honing in on him.

"Seriously?" she shouted, stepping easily over the deconstructed chair despite her bulging belly. Klaus remained affixed as still as a statue, the only movement the violent rise and fall of the heaves of his chest as he worked through the anger coursing through him.

Thinking through all the information he had gathered thus far, he had no choice but to assume that Caroline was married. The kinked and worn ring on her left hand was a major clue, however the new knowledge of another child all but sealed the deal. Categorically, he couldn't put it into any kind of order that made him angrier over the other; the cure, children, marriage, lies, betrayal, ache…

He held his palms up in surrender just as she reached him. The knife they both knew would do little but cause annoyance, but his approach thus far had been gaining him very little. "You come into my home, demanding answers when I owe you exactly none, and then start these predictable and disappointing ravings like the big bad wolf you want everyone to think you are and you're curious as to why I stayed away for so long?!"

"I-"

"No." she shunted his efforts of explanation or apology, she wasn't sure, his mouth hanging open. The look would have been comical, considering the source, had she had been seeping in such hatred and unnecessary stress. "There are mountains right in my back yard if you want to tear something apart. Feel free to rip through the forest, but so help me Klaus, if you don't get over whatever this tantrum is right now, I will burn the earth looking for the last splinter of White Oak and shove it in your aorta!"

"Your threats of a good time could use some polishing," he conceded after a moment, his body sliding easily into a chair he had not destroyed. "Unless of course you're saving that for your husband."

The flash of pain did not go unnoticed by Klaus, even though she quickly recovered. "I have to go pick up my daughter from school." Taking in a breath, she too took a seat in a chair next to her breakfast table, her hand snuggly under the belly for support. It was both familiar and foreign as Klaus automatically lent a hand to the small of her back to ease her journey. A small smile was offered in gratitude, even if it was skewed slightly as a grimace. Her voice was warm honey, a memory of soft words murmured in his ears as she spoke next. "I do; owe you an explanation. You aren't owed any of my decisions, but I can explain everything."

Now that he had sufficient time to reel in some of the shock of the position he was in, he was able to appreciate the features that had changed in the near century since he had seen her last. The unfortunate part of the cure was that aging once again resumed, and she no longer was encased as a teenager for eternity. Besides the obvious bump in her abdomen, there was new curves to her hips, laugh lines at the corner of her eyes, a scar on her forearm that wasn't there before. She was still so much Caroline, however. The same soft blonde curls cupped her shoulders, her blue eyes shone just a bright and the same crinkle in her brow indented in the middle.

"This was a mistake." He cleared his throat once; an invisible human reflex that was that wholly unfamiliar to him after a thousand years of being immortal. Caroline, it seemed, even after all this time still brought out the most in his humanity, right down to the ticks. "I vowed to never disrupt your life or intrude…"

"It's ok." She clasped his hand, the shock of heat from her pulsing blood causing him to flinch infinitesimally. Glancing up at the clock, her palm gave way to a gentle squeeze of his fingers. "I really do need to pick up my daughter from school. I don't want to have to explain you to the gossipy moms in the carpool line, so do you think you can behave for half an hour?"

The roll of his eyes and small scoff that accompanied it brought a grin to her face at last.

"It's nice that things haven't changed after all this time." She wiggled herself out of the chair, slipping off the apron and hanging it on the hook. Grabbing her purse and keys off the table she turned back to him. "Be here when I get back." It was a plea, and it sounded desperate to her ears even though the demand came through brilliantly. "And fix the door, please."

X-x-X

2053

"Would you say yes?"

The kink in her head elicited a handsome smirk. Lounging lazily in the oversized chair, the fire roaring next to him, he was up to something. Decades in these dalliances with him and she could always tell he was up to his devious ways. Granted so far, she still had yet to determine most of the time if he was intent of wiping out an entire sub species or coming up with new and creative ways to get her naked and in bed.

"What would I be saying yes to?" she smiled, her grip around the mug in her hand tightening as she took a sup of the cocoa. It was flavored slightly with a hint a whiskey and peppermint, the perfect compliment to the falling snow and twinkling lights outside. Christmas in Aspen had been the exact recipe for everything she desired with Klaus.

"Don't be daft, love." Draping his leg over the arm of the chair, he nodded his head in her direction. "I saw your reaction to the ceremony we came across earlier in the day."

Sinking into the large chair across from him she eyed him curiously but didn't allow her expression to give anything away. "Would I be saying yes to you or some arbitrary man in the future?" His eyes were narrowed but his countenance was still full of amusement.

"Humor me."

"We're vampires, Klaus." She deadpanned with a casual roll of her eyes. He adored that annoyance he brought out. "We have an insurmountable of time stretching in front of us."

"And you've already been married." He pointed out. She winced; she still thought often enough of Stefan and having the reminder of his death on their wedding day was still harsh. Klaus, at least had the grace to look chagrined.

"You would never." She challenged, even as the pit in her stomach grew at the softness in his features as he looked at her. Decades long past, she still had the tiniest twinges of terror remembering the first few years with him in her life. There was such defiance and pain burrowed deep in him, a raging wolf always eager to surface. His sweet two dimpled smile was always her undoing.

"Is that a dare?"

"It's a promise." She pulled the candy cane out of her mug and dipped into her mouth, pulling it out with an audible 'pop'. Setting her cup on the table in front of her, she sauntered over to his chair, her eyebrows quirking up as she motioned for him to make space for her. It was a familiar descent into his lap and his waiting arms as they circled around in a well-worn path around her waist. There was a warm caress along her neck and a gentle tug at her curls as he pulled her lips closer to his.

"yes…"

X-x-X

Pulling into her driveway and shutting off the engine, Caroline glanced back at her daughter. The precocious 5-year-old was preoccupied with the book in her hand, unaware of everything that was shifting around their family unit. She couldn't even be certain that Klaus was still in her kitchen, and it bothered her to no end that she didn't know if that was what she wanted or not.

The small indents in her wedding band glistened in the afternoon sun as she twisted it around her finger. She couldn't bring herself to take it off as the idea had been horrifying and heart wrenching in equal measure. The act just seemed so final; much more than placing his coffin in the ground, or identifying his body, or explaining to her child that her father was never coming home.

"Gracie." She commanded the little girl's attention immediately. "Mommy has a friend here and he's very important. So, I want you to go upstairs and do your homework. Then we're gonna have dinner with him."

There was a mumbled reply from the child and she dove right back into book. There was a small part of her that was wanting a tantrum just so that she would have an excuse to not go in there and face him. As she gathered her and Gracie's things out of the car, she thought over the lifetimes she had share with Klaus so far. It had been naïve to think that he would ever had simply just let them go when they had shared so much.

"You fixed the door."

His shirt was off and his taut muscles stretched across his shoulder blades. She held Gracie's hand as they meandered up the path, his arm swinging a hammer to rehang the door he had pulled off the hinges earlier. Next to him on the desk, the piece of the chair that he had destroyed previously laid stacked up neatly in a pile.

"I was imparted with direct orders."

It had taken him a lot longer than he would have liked to decide to stay. He was normally so very decisive and impulsive; the fact that he had remained a rooted fixture for more than 10 minutes after Caroline had left him in her kitchen bothered him endlessly. As much as every fiber was tearing at him to run, to turn even, he couldn't bear the thought of never knowing.

Taking in the small child clutching Caroline's hand, he searched every stitch to find some resemblance that wasn't Caroline. But everything from the girls long blonde curls, to the bright blue eyes and every present forehead furrow was so much Caroline, that he found both relief in it and a burning ache of what never would be.

"Gracie," Caroline looked down, the little girl's steely burning into Klaus's presence. "This is my friend, Klaus."

"When my daughter was very small, I made her a trinket." Klaus maneuvered down the steps to the pathway, fishing out the trinket he had craved out quickly while they had been away. He outstretched the bauble to Gracie and waited anxiously as she hesitated before taking it.

"A dog?"

Klaus smiled as Gracie turned it around in her hand, examining the features. "A wolf, actually. They're strong and powerful. The truth is, wolf pups especially are so brave and fierce. I can astutely assure you they can do anything."

"They can?" Gracie tone of wonderment had Caroline reaching for her throat as she swallowed thickly. It was scene so foreign; Klaus with her daughter in an interaction so pure but a shadow of a memory she had seen played out so many times with her husband. "My daddy used to tell me stories about wolves."

"Oh?"

"Ok, bug. Run upstairs and do your homework. I'll call you down for dinner in just a little while." Caroline ushered Gracie up the stairs to the back deck past Klaus, careful of the back door still not quite on the hinges.

She didn't wait for Klaus to come back into the kitchen, nor was she surprised when she spun to see him already casually sitting at the breakfast table. Checking on the stew she had left in the crock pot prior to leaving, she placed a kettle on the stove, the gas hissing and popping until the blue flame danced underneath the ceramic.

Leaning against the kitchen island she grew more distressing with each passing second of silence. Time took on a different meaning when she had been a vampire. As a human now, it felt weighted and limited; much more finite. There had been a time that the mystery of what was ticking in his mind at any given moment was a fun guessing game. The shrill of the kettle shook her from her reverie and she poured them each tea in two mismatched tea cups.

"You remember how I like my tea." He commented as she stirred, clinking the spoon a few times on the rim of the cup.

She scoffed, latching onto his hand and turning it palm up. Fingering the scar along his wrist she sighed. "You were 12 or 13; Kol and you were sparring in the woods and you fell. A branched pierced your skin and a rock got embedded. You tried to keep it from your parents so you had Rebekah stitch you up."

"Indeed." He nodded, his hand flipping over so fast and grabbing hers that the gasped. His thumb ghosted over the veins under her skin. "She did a rather piss job of it, but I didn't die. Not then anyway."

"I remember more than you give my pitiful human mind credit for." She sucked in her breath with a raggedness that felt strange to her. Even in the depths of terror and hatred for this man in front of her, she was never so uncomfortable. "Why do you still look at me like that?"

The words tumbled out of her mouth like she was sixteen and bumbling all over again. "How do I look at you?"

"I'm human." She whispered; and even though they both knew it, the admission out loud made it so much more complete. Her hand was still in his and for the only time that she could ever remember, there was a drastic temperature difference that she found she wasn't opposed to. His expression begged for more explanation and she fought back the tears threatening to betray her. "Weak. Fragile. Disposable. Why do you still look at me like-"

His palm was sweeping her jaw and into her cheek before she could finish. "Caroline, love." His thumb caressed her skin as the tears glistened in her eyes. An odd battle raged inside of him; he yearned to give into the anger and pain and destruction but it was quelled so much by the desire to make her happy, to ensure her safety and well-being that it was easy to ignore every ounce of information he had learned in the last few hours. "On the contrary, you are anything but, sweetheart."