This one's for MystiBleu73, because that dream you had was kind of awesome, I don't know. I liked it :D Was literally putting the final touches on this when your review came through.

This is more of a 'filler', but it's needed before we can get to the good stuff. Of which there is, ah-plenty. Also, there is some swearing here, can't be helped

Caroline Forbes was a planner. She was efficient, she was thorough and she was persistent. So when Damon fell back out of the sky and into Virginia she knew she had to keep going that she had to keep hoping. That's why when Lucy Bennett walked out into the morning light onto the street outside her apartment block everyone fell silent behind her. They should have known better than to think she didn't have an actual plan.

"Thank you for this Lucy." Caroline said earnestly. She figured that since Bennett magic was a component of the clusterfuck that had swallowed her best friend whole so it made sense then for a Bennett witch to help make sense of it all. Lucy smiled warmly at the blonde vampire; they'd been communicating for a few weeks now, Caroline having sent her a message to inform her of Bonnie's death. Lucy had been mournful but reserved as always, she saw Bonnie's umpteenth death as an insult to their Bennett legacy. And as much as she wanted to throttle Caroline for letting it go this far while claiming to be Bonnie's best friend, Lucy also knew that when it came to the collapse of the Other Side there was nothing any of them could have done to stop it, but Bonnie shouldn't have been stuck there when it happened, which brought Lucy to her next port of call. Glaring at who she assumed to be Liv Parker Lucy shook her head in disapproval.

"Hello Caroline, Damon, whoever you are and I'm assuming the one half of the reason my cousin is now stuck in purgatory." Lucy said with a tight smile. Enzo chuckled softly as his hand wound around Liv's upper arm as a precautionary act. Damon was looking around himself in confusion.

"Are we in New Orleans?" The elder Salvatore wondered and Lucy nodded when his gaze fell on her. Lucy tilted her head when she felt something pulsing from him.

"What's wrong with him?" The brown eyed Bennett witch asked with open curiosity as her eyes returned to Caroline's face.

"Remember how I said he wasn't the same when he came back?" Caroline answered her face riddled with anxiety, "Well, he keeps hallucinating Bonnie, it took us five days just to get him to understand that because he was seeing her everywhere. We thought it was guilt but…"

"No, no, Damon Salvatore could never muster up remorse this all-consuming." Lucy scoffed, "At least not the vampire that I was told of." She walked up to him then and held his face in her hands, gripping tighter when he tried to pull away. She closed her eyes and then a frown overcame her features. She pulled away suddenly and turned to face the other three whose eyes were locked on her in expectant silence. "He's too tired; he needs to sleep before I can make any sense of the mess that's inside of his head." She walked passed them then, "Come on in, it's time we all got to the bottom of this."

"Damon? It's time." Bonnie said all business as usual.

"All right," Damon said, allowing a tentative excitement to flood his system at the prospect of them finally going home, he stepped into the sphere of light with her. "Let's get awkward." She chuckled at him but let him proceed. "I'm sure there are a billion other people you'd rather be with –"

"Not exactly." She countered almost immediately, her face scrunched up with the cutest expression as she gazed up at him. He smiled then, really smiled. Who'd have thought that a monster like him and a saint like her, with the history between them could ever share a moment this honest and pure between them? He certainly hadn't. Not in the beginning at least. He was about to say something in kind in return to her, let her know that he felt the same way when the Earth moved under his feet and he was pulled from her, as she was pulled from him.

"Bonnie!" He yelled as he tried to reach for her, but she was slipping; slipping over the jagged edges of the cave floor, she was slipping out of sight. Disappearing as she left a thick trail of crimson behind her. "Bonnie!" but it was too late, she was gone and Damon hadn't done enough to save her. He hadn't moved fast enough, thought and reacted fast enough to get them both out of hell. But she had. He'd told her to leave him behind but she left herself behind yet again to get him home. "Bonnie!"

Damon was flipped onto his back and his vision was flooded with a startling brightness. He was outside, on the ground, in a forest of some sort. But the light was too warm, the colours too perfect for any of it to have been real. But as he sat up he recognised the woods he was in, he and Bonnie had walked through here to get to the cave where it all happened. Damon felt something twist in his chest, a heaviness, begging for freedom and as he exhaled it fell from his lips, a strangled sob that bounced off of the trees. "Bonnie." He whispered, his head hanging low in defeat. Maybe this was how it would be for the rest of his life if he didn't get her back? Maybe he'd hallucinate her for all of eternity. Serves him right for claiming that being stuck with her was his hell. Serves him right for continuously taking advantage of her along with everyone else who claimed to love her and care for her. Damon didn't want to fight this sentence that he'd been charged with – he deserved it. They all did. Bonnie had always put herself last, if she put herself on the list of her own priorities at all – a mentality they all had had a hand in breeding in her consciousness. The misery was quickly swallowing Damon and he was seconds from succumbing to it. Just as his eyes didn't reopen after his slow blinking he felt the world tilt once more and he was transported to one of his fondest memories of Bonnie.

They were dancing; her in that vibrant orange dress and him in his usual black and leather get-up. She actually smiled at him that night after he'd had the decency to wonder about her safety in their latest quest to keep Elena alive. Damon's limbs twitched as he moved along with the memory. "Careful Damon," she'd said, "I might start to think you actually care." And Damon's breathing hitched as he lay there in the desolate forest. He should have cared; he should have let himself care for someone other than Elena. He should have but he never did, he even stopped caring about his brother – the only family he had left, and that should have been the first sign that maybe pursuing Elena wasn't the smartest option for him. But Damon wasn't smart, he didn't think, he just did. He killed, he fucked, he fucked people over and he'd rub salt in your wounds afterwards, because he didn't give a fuck. That's the person Bonnie died for…And the knowledge of that alone was tearing him apart. An infuriated cry ripped through his chest and arched his back off of the floor, it was like all of his emotions had taken on a physical pain, and a physical representation as it tore apart his insides. His hatred for himself and Bonnie's sacrifice in his name was slamming together in his chest and he doubted he'd survive it this time.

"Ssh, ssh, ssh, you're fine," Bonnie whispered softly, frantically, "I'm right here." She pulled him up and held him in her small arms, rubbing circles in his back as he slowed his breathing and pulled himself to her. "Breathe, Damon, I need you to breathe." He tried to heed her words but he was too focused on her fluttering heart as it thrummed through her chest and into his ears. "Breathe." She commanded softly, her voice soothing his insides. Flooding over the pain, smoothing the sharp edges of his heart, slowing his thoughts, bringing him back to himself.

"Bonnie." He whispered and he felt her chin on top of his head, moving his hair as she nodded.

"I'm here."

"Don't go – nothing makes sense when you leave." Damon whimpered, so fragile and so vulnerable in that moment, but he couldn't berate himself for it…he was too tired and he was getting so cold as she held him. But he didn't mind the cold; it was nicer than the coldness of his reality.

"Damon you need to wake up." Bonnie's voice said as his eyes fluttered back closed. "You need to go home."

"No, I left you once before and look what happened to me. We should have stayed Bonnie; we should have stayed where we were."

"No Damon you're wrong." She said adamant as always that he stayed hopeful. "That was no life to live."

"And this is?" He rebutted, feeling himself slowly turn to ice when she pushed him off of her with a horrified gasp. He opened his eyes gingerly and lifted an arm into view. He was literally turning to ice and the look on Bonnie's face was one of horror.

"Damon you need to wake up!" She yelled out. "You need to go!"

"If you won't let me stay here then I promise you I'll find you, I owe you that much." She shook her head.

"You don't owe me anything; I didn't save you to make you live a life indebted to me."

"Of course not," Damon agreed, his awareness coming back to him slowly as the warmth returned to his body, "Which is exactly why I have to save you. Because you deserve to be saved Bonnie."

"Damon you need to wake up." She said again, the sight of her blurring before his eyes. Her short brown hair, that white dress, the bare feet, the perfect dazzling teeth. "Wake up."

"Damon wake up!" Enzo shouted right into his friend's face, his own expression overrun with panic. Damon hadn't woken up in the last twenty four hours. First they thought it was him catching up with sleep but then a sense of dread clawed at Enzo's chest. Why the hell were they letting a man hell bent on losing his mind, stay in his mind for that long a time? Enzo shook Damon once more and laughed deliriously as blue eyes shot open and Damon sucked in a startled breath. Damon grunted and shoved Enzo away, his eyes flying over his surroundings as he tried to catch his bearings. He moaned as he slumped forward a little, he was light headed and confused. Caroline sped to his side and held out a blood bag for him, which he drained in a matter of moments. He exhaled sharply before looking up to lock eyes with Lucy.

"Do you think he's ready?" Lucy asked, her eyes on Caroline, Damon felt when the blonde shrugged in response. Damon found himself thinking someone was missing, had someone else come with them?

"As ready as he'll ever be." Caroline said. Lucy nodded and walked slowly towards Damon.

"Alright Salvatore," she said as she dropped to her haunches at the edge of the bed Damon had woken up on, "It's time for me to take a walk through your head and see just what happened when my cousin sent you home without her."

Next chapter we start off with some Bad-Ass Bonnie and the first steps to getting her home. Because she deserves to come home, dammit.

Stay excellent.