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Darkness.

All she could see, all she could feel, was darkness smothering her, pressing against her from all sides, curling wisps of it coiling into her mouth, suffocating her as it dripped sluggishly down her throat. She could even taste it on her tongue, bittersweet, the stuff of nightmares. She couldn't see a metre in front of her before the black caved in on her vision. Anything else she saw was grey anyway. She might as well have been blind for all the use her eyes gave her. She couldn't tell if they were open or shut, and, it kinda scared her.

But, this was her death. This was her Afterlife. This was her Hell.

And she was so bored, all of of the time. She couldn't do anything but listen. She had even grown accustomed to counting the strands of her hair if she could see them. She sometimes talked to herself, slowly going mad, expecting someone to answer, needing someone else there.

But the silence was deafening.

Because if there was one thing Katherine Pierce hated above all else, above Klaus, above humanity, above death itself, it was loneliness. And she was all alone.

Well, not completely alone, because sometimes she did hear things. Little whispers that she had to reach out and search for, listen carefully to them before they filtered away because they were better than nothing.

They were better than being alone, in muffled darkness for all eternity.

Harsh, jabbing words they were though; enough to make her turn away, curling up into a ball in mid-air as though she could hide, and carved carefully to skitter across her skin and slice into her like a knife, reminding her of every evil thing she'd ever done, then bring her emotions, her guilt, her grief, her sadness rushing to the surface, only to feed on it. And every time, she became less human, lost the ability to feel those things a little more each time, as the Voices ripped her ability to care apart. It worked. It always worked. She let it because it meant someone was here. It meant she had hope, despite floating through blackness, clawing and fighting against the thick tension that constricted her all around, even though there was no way out, no path, no people...

No light.

And Katherine needed light, she needed something to tell her how long she'd been here, and how long she would be here, even though she knew the answer to the last one. She groped for something, anything, a sliver of a chance so she could hang on to the thought of life before the emotions that made her her were gone forever.

But it didn't look like that was going to be happening anytime soon.

~X~

The Voices were back in full-force. It was a pity. Katherine had almost dozed off, what with nothing else to do. She lay there, floating on ink for a moment, before struggling upright, kicking towards the ground, until she felt something solid underneath her feet. It was a constant battle-to remain on her feet. It was so easy to be swept back off them again in this world. It was like floating on a cloud, but the cloud had a dark, evil substance to it, churning and thick.

Tendrils of fog-like stuff waved and curled about her body as she moved, frantically trying to escape the Voices. It never worked, of course it didn't, but it took her a moment to realise that the Voices weren't speaking. She had adjusted to time without another living soul, so it took her some time to realise the sounds were of scrabbling. A scratching sound along the texture of the floor that sent chills running down her spine. Something was there.

Something was coming for her. Or maybe someone.

Of course, it could be her imagination, sanity wasn't exactly her strong point nowadays. But, only one way to find out.

"Hello?" Katherine muttered, hope soaring in her chest. The one emotion she could find that she had left. Her fear had been stolen, she was dead already, why still be scared? Only silence rebounded back at her though, mocking and cold. So she screamed it this time, needing some sort of sound. "HELLO?!"

Her voice echoed out, ringing in the darkness, guttural, and slightly pleading, to the Voices that stole her pity. Nothing more. There was nobody there. And there never would be. Never had there been a more horrible person than her who had died, never who would end up here. The hope deflated in her chest as she let the fog sweep her back off her feet, dangling a few inches in the air. She was lost. She was lost without hope.

She wouldn't have been surprised if there was anyone there, and she just sounded too mournful to go near.

But then she ended up in for the surprise of her life-or, rather, death-because someone answered back.

"Who's there?" A soft whisper, tinged with hope, stirring memories she couldn't quite reach in the corner of her mind. She knew who that was, she'd heard that voice before. But she couldn't put her finger on it.

But if it was, even if by instinct, that she felt she knew this person, then maybe she would be okay after all, now she had eternal death with someone by her side. She took a deep, unneeded breath, and said, "Wouldn't you like to know?"

She wasn't taking any chances.

There was an echoey stamp a few feet away from her, as though someone had taken a step forward.

"Doppelgänger?" The voice asked wryly, and this time it was louder so she could tell it was a man. Someone she recognised, someone who knew she was a doppelgänger, but didn't know which one she was...

That could only mean a select few people could possibly be here right now.

Only two were men.

Only one had that particular voice, chilling, and yet comforting at the same time. Belonging to two different people, both of whom she felt completely different about.

Oh, no.

Of all the supernatural beings who had died and been dragged into hell, did it really have to be...

"Silas." Katherine stated, slamming her feet into the ground and taking a wary step back further into inky darkness.

"And, judging by your tone of disgust and fear, Katherine." Came his sour reply.

"Funny." She sneered, blindly searching for an escape route, even though she knew there wasn't one.

"What are you doing here?" She asked, still searching, panic overriding instinct and common sense. "Didn't you find peace with Amara?"

"Nope, apparently not, and, it should be pretty obvious why I'm here." Silas said, begrudged.

There was a tight pause, as Katherine slowly backed away, inch by inch. She didn't need to reply to that, they both knew the answer. She just needed to get out of here. Because even in death, he still scared her.

"You still there?" He asked, shuffling forward. He sounded... Scared. Desperate. Alone.

She sighed loudly. "Yeah, I'm still here."

"Good," Another pause. "I'm glad. I was alone for a long time. I've always been alone."

"I know the feeling." She muttered, reluctantly stopping in her tracks. Now she was feeling sorry for him. Great.

"Do the Voices get to you too? Make you... lose sense of who you are?" Silas suddenly asked. He sounded a lot closer now. A lot. She could very faintly feel his breath on her face.

She swallowed, trying to bury the memory. "Yeah. It's awful, a perfect hell. Something... something I'd rather forget... but I-"

"But you can't." He interrupted softly, as though he could still read her mind. She could see the faint outline of his figure, but it was barely anything, and it all blurred together in her confusion and lack of sight.

"I've tried." She muttered. "I've really tried, but they steal my humanity away and I hate it, because I'm powerless. The one thing you can't use as a weapon is your emotions."

"No," he mused, still unmoving. "But emotions can invoke wars. Maybe these... things wanted us here for a reason. Maybe there's something about us that's important to them."

"Where do you wanna start on the list of things valuable about us?" She laughed dryly. He momentarily joined in, and for a moment, she felt the suction-like feeling in her stomach stop in the lighthearted moment.

It didn't last long.

Now the Voices really were back, piercingly loud, shrieking at them, as though they couldn't stand a second of happiness in their hell-hole.

"Ssstupid, ssstupid little girl, little Katerina, little girl who loved too blindly." They hissed as one, all in unison. They all spoke in high-pitched whispers, glee and menace in their tone as they yanked the hope right out of her. Katherine felt vacant, empty, as she fell to her knees, pressing her hands to her ears as she screamed in pure rage at them, before that was stolen too, sucked out of her as though she had been punched and lost her breath.

"No-one caressss, they're glad you're gone, everyone hates, hatesss, HATESSS! HATES you." They all crooned in a sing-along voice. She curled up, suddenly aware that Silas was crouching down in front of her as she silently cried, hugging her tightly, his hands cradling her head as the Voices crushed him too. She desperately reached out, fumbling around for him until she landed on something solid, and clung on with clenched fingers, rocking into his chest.

"You didn't desssserve that child, child, child, her death is your fault, your FAULT! She died when she met you, everyone diesssss when they meeeet you, it's your curssse, your curssse, you inflict on othersss, you don't dessserve happinessss! Your lucky ssshot at human lifffe wasn't enough for you." They screeched, and screeched and wouldn't stop, her emotions were choking her, she scrabbled in a panic, her nails digging into Silas' shoulders in what surely must have been painful half-moon grooves, but his face somehow had become buried in her hair as he rubbed soft circles on her back soothingly as she whimpered.

NottruenottrueNadiaNadiaNadia...

But even as they dug deep into her soul, they clawed their way into Silas too.

"Cheater, cheater, cheater, two thousand yearsss of a life you ssshould ssstill be in, coward, COWARD! You aren't fit to walk the Earth, ssshould have remained trapped in your tomb, rotting, ssstarving, ssstarving..."

His hand pulled on her hair tighter, but she welcomed the pain. It blocked out the claws tearing at what was left of her soul, she could finally concentrate on something other than them. She wanted his inflictions. She needed the pain to survive.

She didn't know how long they were locked together like that, but for some reason she wouldn't have it any other way. The Voices retracted, slid away, and she felt her soul unwind from the choking grip it was in. Once they were miserable and scared enough, it seemed the Voices left them alone.

A little less human than before. And what scared Katherine the most was that she didn't know how much human was left in her.

She shivered at the thought, and unfurled away from Silas as he slid emptily back away from her. It seemed both of them would rather forget that happened.

She was shaking violently as she stood up, the laws of this world keeping her adrift from the floor, trying to expel the thoughts that the Voices had so cleverly woven into her mind. There was silence once more, and for a second she actually dreaded that Silas wasn't there anymore, but the thick, black fog was coiling around him, she caught snatches of his face, before he was swallowed by darkness again. It must have been the dark leather jacket he was wearing that made him hard to see.

"Are you okay?" He finally asked. She cringed; he sounded so faraway and so close at the same time. It was disorientating.

"No."

"Neither am I." He muttered. She subconsciously fumbled for him, desperate for the contact of another human being, and caught the sleek material of his jacket, gripping it tightly. She needed to be okay again. And she couldn't be if she was alone. His arms reluctantly came up, and she could feel them hovering around her shoulders, before he gingerly wrapped her in an awkward hug as though he had never done it before. It was a mutual thing, she knew, so they wouldn't feel so afraid anymore.

Such a difference from all those months ago.

It was an improvement for the better. One less person to hate, to be hated by, there were so many that there was no longer a distinguishable difference.

But her loneliness wasn't reflected back at her in a thick, suffocating death fog anymore.

Maybe it was for the better, even if she was stuck with him for all eternity.

~X~

She was with him for what she counted to be one hundred and thirty seven hours of companionable silence before he came up with a plan.

"What if, we bring them back, then instead of reacting like we normally do, ignore them and think happy thoughts?"

She squinted at him, or what of him he could see. "Well, it's impossible. Duh!"

She was almost sure she saw him smile. "No it's not, they just let us think it is."

"Right." She scoffed, turning away. She didn't want to believe it, that it seemed that easy.

"Fine. I'm going to try it. With or without you." He huffed, standing up, and marching away.

It took her about a second to give in.

"Okay, wait for me!" She wasn't one to give up that easily after all.

~X~

It was almost a laugh. They were already there, like they knew what they were doing and were trying to stop it. The Voices attacked her first. Flew right at her, no longer emotionally, but physically as well, clawing and shrieking, distracting her with all their might. She fought it, hard. Shoving, snarling, but they were persistent, and so she had to be too.

"Get away, get out of my head!" She shrieked, batting at them, as they darted around her head, merely laughing wickedly. She caught little snatches of them that were almost too horrifying for the brain to comply; jagged, yellow slits for eyes, a twisted grimace that revealed unevenly pointed teeth, and their bodies-if you could even call them that, were all melted, and mushed together, like melted marshmallow. You couldn't tell where one grotesque limb began, and where another ended. The bodies all seemed to constantly move too, wobbling like the consistency of jelly.

It made her feel sick just thinking about them.

So instead, she thought about Nadia. Her last moments with her that had been so sad and yet happy at the same time. She had seen her daughter into the world, so it seemed fitting she would see her out of it. A pressure in her head suddenly dimmed, one she hadn't even realised was there, and she had never felt so light. She fought harder, as the creepy creatures crawled away, as though she were no longer appetising. It was working! The suction-like feeling was leaving her body, and she focused, got a grip. She was dead, but right now she'd never felt more alive, triumphant at surviving yet again.

"Katherine!" Silas grabbed her hand, and she breathed out her relief, deliberately relaxing. "Come on, it's now or never, those things are gonna realise at some point!"

She squeezed his hand back, before they started running. Running away from the shrieks and howls of the demented souls within, running from Hell.

Running from death.

The pounding patter of their shoes slapping against the icy, echoey floor as they ran rebounded in her thoughts, knocking around her skull. But she could see her way out, like the light at the end of a tunnel. She focused on her hope, her love, the good parts of her life, being a vampire, meeting Stefan, Nadia, she felt the strain in her body from the exertion of channelling her thoughts into pure power. It hurt, like an ache, but it was worth running through the pain. She didn't care where she ended up now, anywhere but here. Anyplace happy, any peace, even a little, she deserved it in her long, exhausting struggle to stay alive.

The light grew larger and larger, until it filled her vision completely, the brightness searing her eyes as she forced herself to keep looking at that light.

And that was the last thing she saw, for now.

~X~

Katherine felt... blank. Peaceful. Free.

And that was until she realised the sun was warming her face and the grass was pressed against her back.

She jerked upright, gasping in a breath of cool fresh air, that felt completely wonderful compared to the choking fingers of dark evil. Looking up, she saw a bright blue sky, and not a cloud in sight. It seemed like Heaven, but she knew nothing perfect on the top would ever stay perfect for long. A groan sounded next to her, and she whipped her head to the side next to her in alarm, relaxing only when she saw Silas sitting up next to her, eyes wide in surprise.

"Of all the places I expected to be, I did not expect this. We must be here for a reason." He said, standing up, and offering her a hand, which she accepted. She looked at him in wonder; she hadn't seen that face in a long time and she had missed it. From the hungry look he was giving her, he felt the same. About Amara. Yep. A pang of hurt sliced through her chest and she looked away in surprise. Why did she feel that way? Burying it, she marched down the front lawn of the large house behind them that looked strangely like Elena's house.

Wait, she stopped and turned. That was Elena's house. Impossible. She gaped at it, jaw dropping in shock, her insides freezing.

"What?" Silas demanded, seeing her stop, and walking back up to her.

"That's Elena's house." She stated in shock.

"So?" Silas rolled his eyes. "That's a good thing! We're back in Mystic Falls."

"No, bad." She shook her head. "Because Elena burned down her house a year ago." She raked the house with her eyes, searching for anything to prove her wrong, but only a newspaper was on the doorstep. She ran over to it, eagerly scanning it for any evidence of their whereabouts. The date flashed out at her in small, black ink, chilling her bones to the core. They were very far from home. Further than they thought.

"Then, where are we?" Silas pondered aloud, looking up at the clear, blue sky.

She looked down at the newspaper, brow furrowing in confusion. The impossible was now possible. Maybe this was their ticket home.

"Mystic Falls, 1994."

To be continued...

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