I changed things, obviously, and so what happens in 3x17 to Alaric won't happen, it already did in this version of the story. Not exactly the same, so no need to freak out if someone does something else than what they were supposed to do, it's not my memory nor yours failing, just, you know, changes.
And just imagine he'll spend more time locked up in a room ( with Damon? Hum... ) to make up for the time I deleted by avancing the timeline.
Each a monster, part 34: For I have to go before I faint
Elizabeth Forbes stared at the dead man on the floor of her holding cells.
There was a corpse in her police station. There was a fresh corpse in her police station. There was a killed corpse in her police station. And the killers were there too, and they were talking as if this kind of things was perfectly normal. And the killers and the corpse were all cousins. Or, actually, they had been cousins, for the corpse wasn't much now, and it sure as hell was nobody's cousin anymore. Not that Theodoric Saltzman wasn't Alaric Saltzman and Magdalena Haguenhauer's cousin anymore, but the corpse wasn't Theodoric Saltzman anymore, so it could hardly be his two killers' cousin. At best, it was Theodoric Saltzman's corpse, but not Theodoric Saltzman himself, because Theodoric Saltzman was dead, and so, not here amongst the living anymore.
Unless someone had given him vampire blood in the last few hours, which would be unlikely in any other city than Mystic Falls, but incidentally enough, they were in the freaking police station of Mystic Falls, and with Liz's luck, it could totally be the case.
The sheriff had stopped breathing for a while now, but since the corpse wasn't coming back from the dead – yet – maybe she could assume it was safe now and start breathing again.
She wasn't optimistic enough, still, to believe this ended her problems, for there was a fresh corpse in her police station, and she knew the killers, and if anything that would be a lot of paperwork.
Elizabeth breathed in and breathed out. She was calming down, now. She had been faced with vampires, werewolfs, and witches, and she could totally handle a dead man in her holding cells.
So she looked at the two cousins crouching next to their other cousin.
They didn't seem really disturbed by the fact that they had killed a family member. The sheriff could understand not liking a family member, but still. They didn't even seem disturbed by having killed someone. Then again, after what Damon Salvatore and the history teacher had told her this very morning, maybe she ought not to be surprised.
Behind them, a door closed, and Liz turned around to see who had entered her murder scene.
It was Meredith Fell, who was currently lunging for Elizabeth's belt and the bunch of keys that was hanging from it.
"Sorry, Sheriff, but gunshots in a police station are bound to attract people, and by that I don't mean only your deputies. As it is, I'd feel better if the door was locked until we agree on a story."
And the young doctor snatched the keys away from an utterly shocked Elizabeth Forbes, before going back to the door which she double-locked.
As she observed the sheriff and the doctor, Magdalena raised an eyebrow. What was it with this city, really? She turned to Alaric, but her cousin only shrugged, as if this was the usual thing to do when someone had been both stabbed and shot to death in a police station – that is, to lock everyone in and make up a believable story without actually panicking.
Of course, she wasn't surprised by Ric's lack of panicking, as a death was nothing to him or herself.
And the sheriff looked reasonably shocked, but not really dumbstruck enough not to argue with the medical examiner, who didn't look disturbed at all. And they weren't Saltzmans. And Magdalena doubted this situation was usual, even for a town as weird as Mystic Falls.
She then looked back at her other cousin – her dead-and-soon-to-be-buried cousin now.
Sure, she couldn't say she was happy that he had died. Hell, she was even pretty upset to have been the one who had pulled the trigger, and if the situation hadn't been so dire, she wouldn't have done it. But Theodoric had left her no choice.
"How in hell am I to explain that to Landyn, now? 'Hey, Auntie, Ric walks free, as expected, but Theo got mad and tried to kill him, so I killed him instead! Are those pancakes?'? 'Sounds great."
"Actually, Mag, I believe we both killed him at the exact same time."
The lawyer frowned as she looked at Ric again, for his voice had been a bit strange.
"I agree that we hit him simultaneously, Ric, but a bullet in the brain kills faster than a knife in the heart. So factually, I killed him."
The history teacher rolled his eyes. Unlike Magdalena, he didn't feel the slightest annoyance at Theo's death, for if it hadn't been the hitman, it'd have been him. And the guy had been messing with his life for quite a long time, too.
"Facts are, both wounds are deathly, and inflicted with the intent to kill. So whatever killed him first, we both are in to explain... that, to Landyn."
After having finally gotten back her keys, the sheriff was listening to the conversation between the two cousins with Meredith. Saying she wasn't unnerved by it would have been a lie.
"It is neither the place nor the time to speak of such things, Mr. Saltzman, Miss Haguenhauer!"
Two gazes fell on her, and Liz refrained from shivering at their coldness. Without a warning, a sly smile invaded the local history teacher's face, and he looked back at his lawyer of a cousin.
"Could you give the sheriff her gun back, Magdalena?"
The redhead frowned at this, but did as she was told. Alaric followed the gun with his eyes as it landed back in Elizabeth Forbes' holder.
He looked up to her face, and met her eyes.
"Congratulations, Sheriff Forbes. You just took out a hitman and seven serial killers with one shot."
Elizabeth Forbes gasped. All of a sudden, she just yelled every thought that was passing by her brain at the moment.
"You killed him?! He was your cousin! And what do you mean, an assassin and seven serial killers?!"
Oh, there was the panic attack, Magdalena thought. It had been quite delayed, but everything was coming back into place.
Yet, she scowled at Ric for what he had just said. They didn't need a sheriff to know that kind of things! But the history teacher only arched an eyebrow at her, as if defying her to deny it.
"Come on, Mag, it's the truth, even if no one will ever find any conclusive evidence. And even if it was possible, the sheriff Forbes won't say a thing about it, will you? And yes, I meant exactly what I said. Believe me, it would be better if you just played along. Theodoric won't kill anyone else now, and neither will Mobile Maker, Tom the Hangman, the Widower, Lady Chance, Black Player, the Sobriety Merchant, and Flipcoin. They were his aliases, fictional serial killers he had created to hide his contracts as a hitman. And no, I never went to the police, because I had no proof of what I know, and the family wouldn't have appreciated."
Magdalena felt very angry he was telling the sheriff everything, but as she felt like this, she noticed two things.
First, Elizabeth Forbes was nodding silently, shocked but apparently resigned to keep everything that had transpired a secret, even if she didn't like it. The woman surely had a secret herself, or the lawyer couldn't see why she would comply to Alaric's demand. That had to be a pretty big secret.
Second, Ric really had difficulties speaking.
The history teacher got up on his feet, and her cousin suddenly knew why he was sounding off.
The first bullet, Theodoric's bullet, hadn't completely missed its target, or rather, said target hadn't managed to evade the bullet efficiently enough. Yes, he was alive. No, he wasn't unarmed.
The bullet had missed the heart, but it had found the man's side.
Before Magdalena could say anything, the teacher winced and walked to the door.
"Now that we agreed, I say you, Sheriff Forbes, found him just as you actually found him, that is, ready to kill me, and you shot him with your gun, and not Mag. It wouldn't do for you to have your gun taken away so easily by a lawyer, and it would be better for Magdalena if she wasn't officially involved. Someone thinks of something to explain the knife, for I have to go before I faint."
Liz nodded. He was right. She turned to the body, hating to have to manipulate a crime scene once again. It was bad enough with the werewolves and vampires and hybrids doing whatever they wanted to whoever had the misfortune of meeting them...
Magdalena, though, wasn't going to let her cousin bleed to his death. She had lost one already this day, and she didn't fancy a jointed burial. She rushed to Alaric, and blocked the door with her shoulder as he unlocked it.
"Ric! Where do you think you're going?!"
"To the hospital. Where else?"
Oh, so he was actually planning to do that. Good...
Meredith Fell walked to the two cousins, and to their surprise, forced the history teacher's left arm over her neck.
"I'll take him. I work at the hospital, and I have my car parked nearby. Could you please phone Damon Salvatore? He's Ric's boyfriend, and he'll want to know."
The doctor handed Magdalena her cellphone, with the number registered in it, and didn't wait for an answer. She didn't have time to spare, and could only hope she wasn't going to regret her decision to get Alaric to the hospital.
After all, she knew what was really the problem with the teacher.
Besides the wound, that is.
Not that the wound wasn't serious or anything. It was kind of actually very serious, and Alaric really needed help with that, or else she wasn't sure he'd be on his two feet again anytime soon. Well, maybe not life-threatening even if not taken care of right away, but grave enough that it could become a problem.
Yet, now that she thought of it, if the hunter was incapacitated for a while, it could be kind of great, as in, she'd be able to study his case, maybe even help him, and all that without running the risk of him snapping back into hunter-mode and scouting the city for victims.
Yeah, right, and she had already shot him and got him in jail for hours. Great idea. Meredith didn't want Ric to hate her, she wanted to help him overcome the Samantha-Gilbertish-madness-that-came-with-the-death-cheating-ring.
Once they got safely to her car, not without Meredith snapping at the deputies who had tried to keep them inside the police station for interrogation when the history teacher was obviously bleeding on their floor, the doctor settled Alaric on the back seat as she could.
As soon as the car left the parking of the police station, Meredith heard Ric's voice.
"What was that about, Meredith?"
Better play dumb for now. Who knew? Maybe he'd drop it, and she wasn't feeling like talking about it and telling him he was turning crazy because of how many times he had died right now.
"You need the hospital. You said so yourself. You certainly can't get there by yourself. I'm taking you there. I figured that was obvious enough."
Meredith could have sworn she heard the teacher roll his eyes.
"That's not what I'm talking about, and you know it. Why do you help me to the hospital, after having shot me, healed me with vampire blood, and accused me of serial murder?"
Gah. He wasn't going to drop it.
"Right... Maybe it's not the right time to be talking about tha..."
"Meredith."
"Okay, okay, I surrender! I just gave the sheriff a false report saying you couldn't have done it because the time of death had been wrongly estimated for the first murder. I had to get her on your tracks, and then get you out of suspicion. We Fells have always been nosey, and I recently found amongst my ancestors' collection of things-that-shouldn't-be-in-their-possession-in-the-first-place-but-are-nonetheless a diary of one Samantha Gilbert who went mad after dying too many times with the Gilbert ring on. At the same time, members of the Council were murdered one by one."
There was a silence at the back of the car.
Meredith couldn't exactly blame Alaric for that.
"Are you actually saying I'm suffering from an alternate personality who not only murdered your ex and Caroline's father, but me too, that is, himself?"
Said like that, she had to admit... But that didn't make it any less true.
"He did it just when Elena came back, and I'm sure he knew she would kill you to be sure you'd come back if she had to."
Meredith parked next to the hospital, and turned in her seat to see if the history teacher was still conscious. He was conscious. And looked furious.
Two hands closed around her neck. She couldn't breath. Ric was strong for an injured man.
"I hate that you found out about me, Meredith, but you were on the list too anyway."
The hunter. Not Alaric. Not Ric.
Suddenly, the hands came loose. The doctor could breath again. She saw a blurry face. Damon's.
