Like Fire

by AlexisKeller

Chapter 10

I wandered out of the break room of Mystic Falls Hospital the next day, looking for mom. She'd replied five minutes ago to my text to tell me she was running just a little bit late. I'd left lunch in my bag in the break room—a room for doctors to chill out, take a call or have lunch. It was much bigger than the cramped on-call room, which was usually only reserved for sleeping, so this was our preferred place to be whenever I brought lunch.

I walked aimlessly down the hall as I waited, saying hello to the receptionist I knew as I went by.

A lot of people knew me here as the daughter of Doctor Kelly Baker, even though it'd only been a little over a month that I'd come to Mystic Falls. I'd learned that she'd talked about me a lot, and even more so when she found out I planned to visit for the summer.

Then again, I had been coming over to have lunch with her for most part of the month, so that probably had something to so with it too.

"Fancy meeting you here, darling," I heard and my brows immediately furrowed.

Kol strolled towards me from the right, ever casually with his hands in his pockets.

"What are you doing here?" I couldn't help but ask.

"I was just checking on the whole blood bag situation here," he replied and my eyes widened.

Maybe I was biased but he did not strike me as that of a type vampire.

Especially not since the trip to Warrenton, something that happened just yesterday.

"Are you…?"

He understood exactly what I was asking. "God, no," he laughed, deep and husky. A sound that was all I could hear.

God, what was this? How did everything he did get stuck in my head?

No, why?

Hell, even after coming back yesterday, I couldn't stop thinking about the entire thing all night.

I'd decided that the static shock was just that—an anomaly. But the rest of it?

Me marveling at every other little thing he did?

Yeah, no. I needed to watch it.

"That's an atrocity not quite meant for me," he went on, bringing me back to the present. "I heard Stefan saying something about it a few days ago and I had to see it for myself. Honestly, it's beyond me how that ever worked for him."

I laughed in surprise at that and started to walk on ahead as I had been doing. "Yeah? Well, I take from that it went well."

He snorted as fell into step beside me. "And you? What are you doing in the hospital?"

"I'm here to visit my mom," I told him, and then for some reason I even elaborated, "She's one of the head surgeons so she's pretty much always here anyway and I try to catch her for lunch whenever possible."

The sound of my cell phone ringing punctuated the end of my sentence and I pulled it out to look at the screen.

Considering I was the first one back from the second round of trips, that too with nothing found, I didn't think there'd be much happening anytime soon. Damon and Caroline were getting back sometime in the evening and Stefan estimated he'd probably arrive early in the morning.

Seeing Bonnie's name flash across the screen, I frowned. Even though none of us had gotten anything successful this time either, she wasn't discouraged. She was camped out so firmly in front of the Salvatore's fireplace, entrenched in her self-imposed task of finding something that could help all of us that it was odd she'd find the sense to pull herself out of it in order to manage to call for whatever reason.

Which told me this was important.

I had to say I had good intuition, because that thought was confirmed when I answered the call.

"Eve? Are you at the hospital today?" Her voice was urgent and panicked, and I stopped walking abruptly. I noticed Kol had stopped too, his eyes watching me carefully.

"Yeah, why? What's wrong?"

"Eve, listen to me. Get your mother and get out of there." My heartbeat quickened at the sheer terror in her voice and I watched as Kol tensed, clearly having heard what she'd said.

I managed to have a steady enough voice to ask, "What's happening, Bonnie?"

"Listen to me: you need to get out there. It's Esther, she—"

That's when the explosion happened.

I could hear the shattering of glasses and screaming of people but all that took a backseat to the sound of the blast.

It was so loud. God, it hurt.

My ears were ringing and for a few moments that was really all I could feel.

Eventually, the sound dulled into a faded hum and I realized I was on the ground. And it was dark. The force of the blast had to have wiped everything, or at least pushed away everything the way it had jolted me off my feet.

I was on my side and I could make out no heavy weight on me. I wasn't feeling any particular sting anywhere, so that had to be good, right? That meant nothing landed on me or anything.

But then why could I still feel something on me?

Wait, where was Kol?

God, was he hurt?

I started to move but heard a sharp, "Wait," from somewhere above.

Kol. Kol, Kol, Kol. He was okay.

Thank God.

All of a sudden as the hum in my ears faded, the cries of pain and despair entered my notice and I thought I'd have a panic attack at the realization that we'd been caught in the middle of an explosion.

"Kol?" I asked, my voice clearly very alarmed. He must have registered my tone because that's when something came off and the light hit my eyes. I twisted my head to the side to see him getting up to his knees and I put the pieces together.

Kol had just shielded me with his body.

Feeling completely out of it as I got up to an elbow, I tried to get my senses to work and at the same time wondered just why he'd done that. He remained on a knee next to me, looking into my eyes with the same intensity I was feeling, but God, I had no idea what it was.

Granted, he was pretty much indestructible, but what he'd done jarred me deeply.

While I'd felt the force of the explosion hit, I hadn't gotten hurt. I felt my body ache due to the force of the blast, but I wasn't hurt hurt. All I knew was, there were cries of despair and pain from here and there and I didn't have a scratch on me.

Thanks to him.

"Kol…" I trailed off, not knowing what exactly I wanted to say.

He said nothing as he continued to stare at me in that unabashed, magnetic way.

It was getting harder to breathe like this as I was, like I wasn't getting enough air—especially in all the dust—so I tried to push myself up shakily. Instantly, he grabbed me and helped me to my feet.

I noticed how he did not make any skin contact, something that seemed to be deliberate as he pulled me up by my forearms.

That's when I saw the destruction and wreckage surrounding us. There were people moaning in pain as they held onto themselves wherever they were hurt. It shook me to my core because I knew most of the people that worked there, and the people I didn't know were here for a reason—they had to be patients or visitors of patients.

And they were all hurt.

Faces of people flashed through my mind; the receptionist, the weekly janitor, mom's colleagues...

"Mom," I realized with a gasp and began rushing through the dust and pieces of concrete.

As I hurried out of the corner we were in, I took the right turn and reached whatever was left of the hall. Everything was in ruins and there was dust everywhere. I didn't have to look too far for mom, considering she was right there in front of the break room, crumpled to the ground.

Oh, God.

No, no, no.

Making my way through the debris towards her, I immediately gave her a once-over. She had scratches and cuts all over, and there was some blood on her forehead were she must have hit her head. I felt for a pulse and breathed a huge sigh of relief when I found it was there.

It was there, but I realized with a sinking feeling that I could barely feel it.

Looking around for something, someone, anyone around to help, I realized I had no training in this. My mother was a doctor, yes, but I wasn't. I didn't know what to do at all.

And seeing that there were many other immobile bodies around me, I knew for sure I was not ready to lose her.

Not my mom. She was all I had.

I had to save my mother.

I had to.

So when I felt his presence at my back, I pleaded to the only hope I had there with me.

"Kol?" i turned to see him standing behind me, looking down at my mother with vague curiosity. "Kol, could you help her? Please."

He stood absolutely still and unmoving as his eyes traveled up from my mother to me at the request, taking me in.

"It'll cost you," he warned me.

"I don't care," I shook my head at him, "Just please help her. Please."

With a nod, he was biting into his wrist and pressing it to her mouth. I had seen Damon, Stefan and Caroline doing this enough times now. I'd thankfully never been in a position to need vampire blood myself, but I knew about the healing properties of it.

I just hoped it worked right now.

"Please, please, please work," I muttered to myself as I closed my eyes and rested my forehead on mom's hand that I had wrapped in mine. "Please work."

"She's fine."

I opened my eyes to see he'd retracted his wrist. Immediately I felt for her pulse and found it good and strong.

Feeling relief so strong that it crashed through me, I let out a breath I had no idea I'd been holding before turning to him.

"Thank you," I said sincerely. "Thank you so much."

He looked at me in that very Kol-like way again and a moment later, simply nodded once.

I knew I couldn't be selfish enough and ask him to help everyone in the hospital. It'd be too much to ask. He'd never even do it, either.

But I'd do what I could for everyone who was hurt because mom was going to be okay.

She was going to be okay and I finally felt like I had air in my lungs again.

Thanks to him.

NOTE1: If you remember Chapter 3, then you know Kol doesn't exactly have the best of intentions right now. Couple that with the fact that he's got the upper hand after this chapter, how do think he's going to go about things now?

NOTE2: I'm not painting Kol as a vicious monster—but he is definitely going to be how he's depicted in Chapter 3: with self-serving intentions. Though that might be subject to change, of course...

Thank you to everyone for reading and reviewing! I honestly love hearing what you all think of the story!