Disclaimer: I don't own TVD or anything associate with it.
Thank you so much to everyone! I love hearing feedback and getting followers/favorites! I'm sorry this story took so long to post. It's not very lengthy, either, but I wanted to give you guys something, at least. With school in, it's going to be hard to keep writing, but I'm going to try to upload a chapter every weekend while I'm off. For those that read Forbidden, I know it's been forever since my last chapter. I promise, I haven't forgotten you guys, I'm working on it. The chapters in it are just quite a bit longer because I try to cover an entire episode in one chapter. I may have to start splitting them up, though, if that's okay with you guys. Anyway, thank you guys! Enjoy!
Elena's POV
For minutes, or maybe hours or even days, I can't do anything but look at Damon, here, standing in front of me. All concept of time is gone, every other thought that's plagued my mind for these last months has vanished. He's consumed my every thought and feeling since I set eyes on him. His eyes continue captivate me with their stunning blue color, so much brighter than I remember, and the smirk playing across his lips now makes my stomach clench in a deliciously familiar way. I stroke the side of his face with my free hand, running my fingers down his cheek, across his lips, while my other is firmly latched onto his, unwilling to let go for even a moment, not even when I hug Bonnie tightly.
"Guys, can we save the heartwarming reunion for a more appropriate time?" Katherine sneers. "Like, I don't know, when we're not being hunted by demented, ugly creatures hell-bent on keeping us here?"
As if to demonstrate how right she is, a sinister scratching starts outside the door.
Damon looks me over. "Oh, don't worry, Katherine. I fully intend on a reunion when we get home." His smirk widens and his eyes flash, making my knees go weak.
"Oh, God. I think I'm going to be sick."
Stefan stands in front of Damon and I can see all the pain he's felt over the last months shining in his eyes. They nod at each other in acknowledgement and Stefan pulls him into a hug somewhat awkwardly since Damon's hand is still clamped around mine like a vise grip. It seems he's just as unwilling to let go as I am.
"Not to be a buzzkill but something is seriously wrong with Lucy. We need to get out of here. Now." Bonnie says with a look that clearly says she's more worried about Lucy's injury than she's letting on. It's not until she shifts her eyes to mine that I realize she was trying to send that message to Damon instead of me.
Damon turns to Tessa. "You heard the woman. Send out the Bat signal and let's leave this dreary-ass place behind."
Tessa scowls at him but it's not filled with the amount of loathing I've come to expect from her. First, the clear and unexpected connection between Bonnie and Damon and, now, this. I wonder exactly what happened while they've been gone. They have been trapped here together for months, relying on each other, so it makes sense that things would change between them, now that I think about it. I don't know why that thought never occurred to me before. I guess I was too caught up in believing that Damon could have been suffering, which is seems to me that he has been. I didn't even know if he and Bonnie would end up in the same place. I sure as hell never thought he'd be stuck here with Tessa and Katherine.
"I'm trying." Tessa snaps, "Luke isn't responding."
"Well, that's fantastic."
Lucy cries out in pain, tearing me from my thoughts. She's covered in a sheen of sweat and the place on her leg seems to be spreading slowing, necrosis inching across her thigh and leaving behind blackened, rotting flesh, which doesn't even make any sense because she's not physically here.
"Something is happening!" Tessa says, "Luke is almost ready. Grab onto each other."
My stomach leaps. This is it. When I wake up, I'll have my best friend back. I'll have Damon back.
Outside, the Wanderers, as Damon called them, respond to this news by screeching and clawing harder at the door. Suddenly, the door buckles. The Wanderer responsible grabs the splintered wood and is pulled back into the forest by an invisible, unrelenting force, still clutching onto the only barrier we had against them. There are more outside the door, more than I can count, piling on top of each other, fighting to be the first inside the small house.
We back up as far as possible, which isn't far, given the size of this place, but looking at what one touch did to Lucy, I'm positive I don't want to experience that. One of the creatures swipes at us, barely missing, or so I think, until I hear a gasp. Shock registers on features that mirror my own, followed by a sound of pain, and Katherine is dragged, withering and screaming, into the forest.
We barely have time to process what happened before Tessa interjects, looking at Damon and Bonnie.
"She's gone. I'm sorry, but there's no getting her back. You need to leave. Luke is ready."
"We need to leave? Aren't you coming?" Damon says, almost sounding upset that she's not.
Tessa shakes her head, seeming oddly okay with this.
"Lucy is weak. She'll barely be able to make it back on her own. There's no way she would be able to take me back with her."
"There has to be a way."
What?
"I'm staying. But you can both make it out." She smiles almost wistfully. "It's not so bad, really. The Wanderers will take me and I'll be able to forget everything I've lost. Now, go. They won't be gone for long."
Damon nods, clearly understanding something I don't, and tightens his grip on my hand. Bonnie grabs her mom's hand and Lucy's and I hold my other hand out for Stefan. Within seconds, the same white light that brought us here envelopes us again and then I'm back in the living room of our temporary house.
Damon's POV
The last thing I remember is looking at Tessa and realizing that she's sacrificing herself for us. She could have grabbed Bonnie's mom's hand at the last second and left Bonnie behind. She could have insisted Lucy try to take her back, knowing it would probably kill her. She didn't. Maybe what she said is true. Maybe it's easier for her to be taken to a place where she doesn't have to remember everything bad that's happened to her. Or maybe she was lying. Either way, she's gone. Katherine is gone. And I'm home.
When I open my eyes, everything is blurry and my head spins. I feel strange, heavy. The sounds of the world seem too loud, too overwhelming: clocks ticking, electric humming, cars passing on the road, animals outside scurrying, the breathing of everyone in the room, heart beats and the swish of blood pumping… especially that one. It makes me feel slightly wild to think about, the hunger that I've not missed returning full force.
"Damon."
Someone touches my arm and I jump at the contact. It feels different than I remember. I blink my eyes, trying to rid of the film that seems to have permanently stuck to my eyeballs. I guess being dead can do that to you. When my eyesight clears, I look to my right at the person who said my name. It's Bonnie. She made it back. I can't help but smile at that. After everything we've been through together, it feels good to be back here together. It feels right. I don't know if you'd call what we have a friendship, but it's definitely more than it ever was and more than I ever expected it to be.
I look over at Elena, who seems to be just waking up. She sits up and holds her head, probably to steady herself. That trip couldn't have been easy. Finally, she looks over at me, her chocolate eyes tearing up immediately and she wraps me in a hug, the first solid hug I've had in what feels like a lifetime. I take it all in, her scent, the feeling of her arms around me. I've imagined this moment a million times over and it was never as good as this.
Bonnie stands up and is quickly ambushed by Jeremy, closely followed by Caroline and her mom. I know she has had a lot of crap with her mom in the past, but I'm thinking bringing her back from the dead earns her a lot of points. Bonnie must agree because she doesn't hesitate to hug her in thanks.
Elena pulls away from me, I'm sure to give me a chance to have my own little family reunion. Still, she stays close by as she hugs Bonnie, both of them crying, now. Somewhere among the I-missed-you's, Stefan comes over and pulls me into a hug, a real one this time. There is a lot that we let unfinished when I died. You'd think that after spending 170-some years with someone, you'd have said everything you ever needed to. Somehow, it doesn't work that way. I guess the Original family is a testament to that. Over 1000 years and they still bicker and continue to make the same mistakes.
He pulls away and smiles. I smile back.
"Good to see you, brother."
He nods.
"You, too."
I don't really know what else to say. I don't know the protocol for coming back from the dead. Maybe I should talk to Jeremy about that. He's died enough. He should know.
Behind Stefan is Alaric. I laugh and give him a hug, too.
"It's good to see you, buddy." He says, and I think I detect tears in his eyes when he pulls away. "I missed you."
"Yeah, you, too. Anything interesting happen while I was gone?"
I mean it as a joke but something flashes in his eyes and he glances at Elena. What the hell was that about? As soon as I notice it, though, the looks is gone and he sighs, nodding.
"We'll have to catch up one day."
I nod and he walks away towards Bonnie, too, making his rounds. Suddenly, I notice someone unexpected leaning against the wall of this unfamiliar house with his arms crossed. Enzo.
"So." He says with his usual smirk. "Dead, huh? How was it? I hear the place is a bit different since I left."
"It wasn't a vacation. It sucked."
He smiles and pulls me into a half hug.
"Yes, well, let's avoid it in the future, eh?"
I laugh, realizing this is probably as close to an 'I missed you' as I'll get from him. I'll take it.
"I have every intention of that."
I watch everyone around the room, smiling and laughing like this is the first time they've done it since we left. Bonnie smiles at me from across the room. Jeremy nods at me from behind her and smiles a little. I smile back, appreciative of his non-emotional reunion style. The only person I've not seen is… Caroline. I turn and come face to face with her.
"Damon. How does it feel to be back in the land of the living?" She tilts her head to the side.
I clear my throat. "I don't know, Caroline. Most of you are dead." I smile and she hits my arm.
"Oh, how I missed your little jokes." She says sarcastically.
"Back at you, Barbie."
She sighs.
"Okay. You know it's going to happen, so, let's just get this over with, okay? Come on. Bring it in."
She opens her arms and I lean into her hug, counting the seconds until it's over. But when I pull back, she looks at me seriously.
"I'm glad you're back, Damon."
Elena circles back over to me, smiling and crying at the same time. Despite her smile, her eyes still look sad and I hate it. She kisses me, tentatively, almost like she thinks I'm going to disappear in a puff of smoke. It makes me sad that she still seems to be waiting for this all to be end, like she's expecting to wake up from a dream. What happened to her while I was gone?
Slowly, her actions become more familiar; her hands tangle in my hair, pulling me to her, and I kiss her deeply, tasting the tears that continue to fall down her face. When we finally pull away from each other, it takes us a minute to realize that the room is silent. It quickly becomes obvious that something didn't go as planned and I remember Lucy's injury. Everyone is gathered around her. She still lays unmoving on the floor. I can hear her heart beat and the sound of her lungs working hard to bring air in.
"She's not waking up." Bonnie says, looking up at me.
Without thinking, I bite my wrist and bend down.
"It won't work." She says, her voice cracking, and I stop. "Her soul was damaged in the Wasteland. Not even vampire blood can heal that."
Her eyes shine with tears and I can't stop myself from wrapping my free arm around her. I can see Jeremy giving me 'the eye', and he's not the only one, but I don't care. They'll get over it. Eventually, she smiles a small smile, which I know is completely fake and just a way to convince me she's okay, before she pulls away and goes back over to Jeremy.
"Is there something else we can do?"
Luke speaks up for the first time.
"Not tonight. Liv is still working on keeping us hidden. It's a long story." He says in response to my confusion. "Tonight's spell exhausted me. We will work on it tomorrow, but I don't want to lead you on. There may be nothing we can do."
Caroline leans down to look more closely at Lucy.
"I just thought she was taking a little longer to wake up."
She looks over at Tessa and Katherine's bodies.
"What about them?"
Elena and I exchange looks.
"They aren't coming back." Stefan says, dropping his eyes. "Katherine was… taken. And Tessa couldn't make it because Lucy was already injured."
"Well, that's a good thing, isn't it? That they aren't coming back?"
I tense and feel Elena's eyes on my face, appraising my every expression. I know she doesn't understand what happened over there and I don't know that I can ever make her understand. I'm sure the same is true of what happened over where while I was gone, though I have every intention of trying to find out through Alaric. Something about his look makes me curious. Did he mean something is wrong with Elena? I look at her beautiful face and she smiles at me. I mean, it can't be that bad, right?