Hello all.

This is probably going to be my last bit of TVD fanfic for…ever.

The fandom for this show has kind of robbed me of my enthusiasm for the TVD and writing fan fiction about it. This has really nothing to do with the folks here on the site so I don't want any of my readers to get offended or feel bad. While it is kind of frustrating that a cookie cutter Delena fic can reach fifty plus reviews five minutes after the posting of the first chapter, with all of them being extremely positive even if the author uses numbers to save time on typing out actual words, that's just the nature of fanfic. I think everyone on this site at least privately admits to themselves if they're going to do something original, they are always going to be passed over in favor of Draco/Harry slashfic #210928310548932472-48302843200.002. It's the way of things here, and indeed everywhere on the net. We accept it, roll with it and ideally we're thankful for the reviews we do get. Believe me you guys, I am thankful for you and I'm glad you've enjoyed my writing so far. It really does feel good to know that someone out there is entertained by my scribbling. That's not the issue here. The issue goes back a lot farther, to the deepest regions of the Vampire Diaries fandumb but this isn't me just rage quiting. I didn't get into a massive flame war with some barely literate Klaroline fan, I'm just…kind of disheartened.

I guess I can blame the CW for the state of the fandom. They've primarily been marketing the show at teenage girls, even though there are plenty of elements to draw in other demographics. Teen Wolf faces a similar problem, but that fandom is considerably smaller and far less organized than TVD. There aren't even any Teen Wolf fan forums yet, so I'm not nearly as fed up with them as I am with TVD. Anyway, because of the way The Vampire Diaries is marketed and because it is very much seen as "Twilight on TV" the vast majority of the fandom is teenage girls and Twilight fan refugees. This has led to…an interesting fandom to say the least. My main problem is the problem I have with the Twilight fandom. The idea that because a character is sexy and powerful they are immediately always morally right and anyone who stands up to them is morally wrong. Not just wrong, but deserving of death for it. We've seen it with Damon, then Klaus and now the other Originals even though other than Elijah, who's still a major dick, none of the other Original's have done a single decent thing over the course of the show. Of course Klaus should get to kill and destroy whatever he wants. He's like totally sexy, lol! I despise the Draco in Leather Pants trope, and it permeates the TVD fandom. There's no escaping it. It's kind of soured the show itself for me. When Damon actually does something decent, I'm immediately cynical about it, all because of the fan base. Ripper Stefan is an evil sleazebag…but that's because Klaus made him that way. Klaus wanted Stefan to go full ripper, and Stefan had no choice other than to go with Klaus or else his brother would have died. Yet Stefan is of course the ultimate villain of TVD, he's the real bad guy here! Klaus is just misunderstood! He's actually a hero! That's the kind of warped thinking that goes on in the fandom, and trust me when I say that it is the majority opinion and it leaves a bad taste in my mouth when I try to enjoy the characters and the show on their own merits. I just have no interest in writing fanfic for The Vampire Diaries anymore. This fic was originally going to be longer, but I just…stopped. Because my enjoyment of the characters and fascination with playing with them has just been sucked out of me.

So yeah, this is a declaration of intent as well as an apology to my readers.

I will try to write something to bring some kind of closure to Wolves on the Run and maybe I'll get around to polishing up the next chapter but until I manage to get my enthusiasm back up this is the end.

****/Flemmingwood: The Price\****

Tyler looked down at the body as the coroner pulled the sheet back.

Mason.

The expression on his face was indescribable, not just pain but sorrow. Grief. Defeat. Mason, the strongest person Tyler had known, the only one who Tyler had ever felt truly understood him lay on the cold slab with a hole in his chest. Beside him his mother made a sound he couldn't quite identify -maybe a gasp, but surely she had already known?- and Tyler looked away.

Animal attack. That's what they were calling it. Animal attack, a wild cougar on the prowl. Just like the cougar that had torn coach up and then drained him of all his blood. Just like the cougar that had rammed a wooden stake in Vicki's chest. Just like the cougar that had snapped his father's neck and then left his body to burn in a house full of Jane and John Does. Most of them with stakes in their heart or their heads separated from their bodies. All the work of one rabid, ravenous cougar. Or maybe a bear, there had been a few sightings of them since this shit had started. Whatever, it was all animal attacks. That's what his mother told him, that's what all the other members of the Founder's Council told him. That's what Elena and Jeremy and Caroline all told him. That's what Damon Salvatore had told him with a mocking raise of his eyebrows and a self assured smirk. A cougar.

Yeah right.

Tyler stood in front of the gravestone. Mason Lockwood, beloved brother and uncle. His father's younger brother didn't have any other accomplishments to his name. At least none that anyone in Mystic Falls knew about but Tyler would never forget him. Because Mason had showed him that he wasn't alone. That he wasn't a freak, an anomaly, and he had offered him something he had never had before. Hope. Companionship. Camaraderie. Friendship.

Tyler owed Mason…something. Justice? Vengeance? What? He had tried to uncover the real truth behind Mason's death. He'd been blocked at every turn, more often then not by the other kids at school. He knew whatever it was Caroline and Jeremy where in on it, and that had hurt. Of all the kids at school, Jeremy seemed like the only one who Tyler could maybe, possibly have any kind of connection with and Caroline…well. Tyler liked Caroline. He had affection for her. His feelings for her were hard to explain but when he realized she had been playing him for a fool he'd been furious. More than furious he'd been heartbroken. He knew Stefan Salvatore and his asshole brother where in on it. Hell, this had all started when they arrived into town. And he also knew that, somehow, Elena was in the center of it all.

Every time he felt like maybe he was getting somewhere, he hit another dead end and it always seemed to be either Caroline or Jeremy slamming the door in his face before he got a chance to peek inside. Matt was useless, Bonnie seemed like the only other person smart enough to perceive that something was wrong but she hated his guts and generally blew him off. Occasionally he got the feeling that maybe Meredith Fell, probably the only hot chick on the Founder's Council shared his suspicions and maybe sympathized with him but she clammed up whenever he started asking relevant questions. She was still a great lay regardless but so far pillow talk was getting him nowhere. She was a devious one, that Meredith. Always two steps ahead of him. Everyone else seemed to be five steps ahead of him.

Mason had been buried beside Tyler's father. On the opposite side of the former mayor's grave was an empty plot, reserved for Tyler's mother. The young man gritted his teeth. Richard Lockwood used to tell him as a child that as a Lockwood he would be mayor one day. Head of the Founder's Council and leader of Mystic Falls, that made the people of Mystic Falls his responsibility. The Lockwoods had always protected the town, ever since its founding. Tyler had never really paid much attention to the words, just more bullshit from Richard Lockwood to try and make his son feel worse about himself. As Tyler came to the realization that he was the last of the Lockwoods (other than his mother, who had married into the family) those words suddenly impacted him. Not fully, but enough for him to realize that his town was in real trouble and no one seemed to be doing anything about it. He had lost two members of his family in twice as many months, he was going to get to the bottom of what was slaughtering his classmates and the other townspeople before he had to burry his mother or before his mother had to burry him.

God help anyone-or anything- that tried to stop him.

As he turned and walked away from the graveyard, he was unaware of the pair of green-gray eyes that watched him as he went.

It was official. Everything, everything, pointed to the Salvatores. They roll into town, Stefan and then Damon and then bodies start turning up. Not the least of whom their mysterious Uncle Zach. Yet now Stefan was the new star football player and Damon was Head of the Founder's Council. A position usually reserved for Lockwoods.

Tyler sat on the doorstep of Elena's house, seething. Jeremy had all but tossed him out when he had starting asking about Stefan and outright said he was suspicious of the Salvatores.

Why were people protecting them? Why wouldn't anyone tell him anything? Tyler put his head in his hands in defeat. A tide of hopelessness threatening to overwhelm him.

How the fuck was he going to do this on his own?

The answer came in the form of the click clack of high heels on pavement. Tyler looked up to see what was quite possibly one of the most startlingly beautiful women he had ever seen coming up to drive with all the confident ease of shark gliding through the ocean. Beautiful, not quite hot inher conservative clothing, but cute. Five foot nothing and with arresting green-gray eyes. She looked to be in her late twenties to early thirties. Dark hair, a necklace with some kind of blue bauble hanging around her neck. She was somehow familiar to Tyler, though he wasn't sure how. Dark haired older women were something of a weakness of Tyler's but tonight he wasn't in the mood for anything but drinking and sulking.

Then the woman smiled at him, and Tyler wasn't sure how but he was pretty sure that gravity in his general area was weakening because that smile made him feel lighter than air. It was dazzling. It was frightening. It was predatory. Normally other women were on the receiving end of such smiles delivered by him but everything in his world was turning on its head. Tyler opened his mouth to say something, but the words never made it past his throat because he realized he really wasn't sure what to say. This in and of itself was odd and something of an ill omen. If there was one thing Tyler could do, it was talk to the ladies, especially the older ones. The bored housewives who were beginning to fear the weight of gravity and time, their fat husbands starting to ignore them in favor for their perky young secretaries more silicon than flesh. A well timed smile and a few perfectly chosen compliments from a handsome young beast of a man like Tyler could impact their worlds like asteroids. Make them forget that not to long ago he was just south of legal. That he was the mayor's son. That their kids went to school with him.

Tyler was used to being the predator, but as the woman stopped not three feet from him he was suddenly under the impression that he was prey.

"If, uh, you're looking for Gilberts I don't live here. I'm just leaving." Tyler said, forcing confidence he didn't feel into his voice as he stood. Trying to mask his frustration with typical teenage apathy.

"That's funny, you didn't look like you were leaving. You looked like someone just kicked your puppy." the voice was pretty, to match her pretty face. Silk and honey, somehow it made his skin crawl. It was a pretty voice no doubt but it clearly masked something, some ulterior motive hidden in some mocking undertone tucked just beyond his ability to fully comprehend.

God help him, he was a bit frightened by the fact that a part of him didn't care.

"Yeah, well, the Gilberts are kind of being assholes. Just a heads up if you're going to go in there." Tyler said, sticking his hands in his pockets. She laughed, Tyler blinked rapidly as his pulse quickened. Wow.

"Yeah, that sounds like the good old Gilberts. They're generally assholes." she said with a nod and a little half turn.

Tyler nodded and chuckled, looked down at her feet and then back up at her, discretely checking her out as he did so. She was aware of it.

"Tyler Lockwood. You new in town?" He held out his hand.

"Isobel Flemming." She took it. Her hands weren't ice cold, but they were not as warm as they should have been. Room temperature, somehow that was...disconcerting. "Just got back in town actually. I grew up here."

"Well on behalf of Mystic Falls and the Lockwood family, welcome home." he said with a sly grin. Some of his old confidence returning. Maybe he was just off his game since being rebuked by Jeremy. Maybe he was just rusty.

"Not much of a Lockwood family left. Not after your father and uncle were murdered."

The smile faded from Tyler's face. Isobel shrugged, the tight lipped smile on her face reminded him of Damon. Knowing, condescending, arrogant. It made his hackles rise.

"You haven't been making much headway in finding out who did it have you?"

"How…how-"

"I can help you find out who did it." Isobel shrugged again, blinked a bit lazily and then tilted her head playfully. "Better yet, I can help you get back at them."

Tyler's heart pounded in his chest, fear and elation and astonishment swelling in his brain at once. Could it really be? Could this mystery woman really be offering him the answer to all his questions? Could she confirm the suspicions he'd harbored for so long?

Was she offering to help him take revenge?

It seemed to good to be true. Part of him knew it had to be, but a part of him was drawn to her, both her offer and her looks. And her personality, her aura of danger and her demeanor of control. He wanted to move, but he didn't know whether to take a step forward or backpedal in retreat. Uncertainty rooted him to the spot and silenced him. She closed the distance between them with surprising speed, looking up at him with baleful green eyes that seemed to want to devour him soul-first and raised an eyebrow. He leaned away from her, not certain he wanted to touch her even though part of him certainly did want to touch her. She slipped a piece of paper in his hand without breaking eye contact, and when he looked down at it she grabbed his chin in her hand and with surprising strength brought his head back up to face her.

"Come alone. Tell no one." Isobel commanded.

"Why?" Tyler asked, not as demanding as he would have liked.

She kissed him then, and it was like someone has hooked his brain up to a car battery. His flesh felt like it was going to peel off the bone, his knees actually felt weak and fucking wobbly. The experience was a kick to the gut, the air pushed from his chest. All his strength and all his power to resist her was drained from his body like water from a leaky barrel. With that one simple kiss she had totally defeated him in a way he had never been defeated before.

"Because I'm offering you something no one has ever willingly offered you before." She finally said when she broke the kiss and let him come up for air. Tyler greedily sucked in a breath, kissing her had been stifling. Like being trapped in some ancient tomb. In some twisted way it wasn't an entirely unpleasant feeling.

"The truth."

Then she was gone.

It was funny, he didn't even remember seeing her go.

This fic was originally going to be a lot longer. It was going to basically entail Isobel manipulating Tyler into activating his curse and then going after the Salvatore brothers. She would have ultimately paid for using Tyler in the end but the emotions would have been complicated. Alas, the rest of the storyline will probably never see the light of day.