A/N: It's been a while since I posted my first chapter after I had posted the prologue. I had completed it a while back but I wanted to get it right with the editing and was obsessing over detailing even when my beta said it was okay. I still don't think it's as I want it but I thought I'd just put it out there and anyway it's just fanfic. I can only learn once it's out there, and if I find the need I could tweak it. For those who already read the prologue, I edited it again to increase the sense of Elena's hysteria and feeling trapped. This chapter is quite long compared to normal standards but my entire Act is so long, if I cut it down it would end up having 8 chapters. Plotwise for this chapter I stay almost within the frame of 4x01. But I deviate from it as well as you'll find in other chapters of the Act and beyond, even further. As a beginning writer 4x01's framework gives me a foundation to build off and manipulate and gain a grounding before I choose different scenarios altogether.
Hope you enjoy it!
Point one: Past - post accident
Beep
Beep
Beep
White light and specks of blurred circles flooded her eyes as she managed to pry them open. It took her a few moments before her vision cleared and she could see the familiar white coloured window blinds on the pale blue walls and the customary walnut coloured cushioned visitor's chair nestled in the corner.
Beep
Beep
The noise wouldn't stop, so she looked around, tracking back where the sound was coming from to find the hospital equipment machines with their multi-coloured lights blinking and vital stats showing on the screen, and to their side the IV and blood drips. She raised herself up a bit more and let her eyes follow where the tubes led and saw them connecting into the veins on a wrist that had to be hers. To check if it was really her own, she spread out her fingers. Seeing them move as she wanted and feeling them, she tried once again. It was her hand. Lifting the hospital sheet splayed on her, she found herself wearing a hospital gown. There were no physical wounds.
What was she doing stuck in a hospital bed tied to tubes and wires?
The events before seemed all fuzzy. She wondered what time it was. The light was still filtering through the blinds so she noted it had to be day still. She tried to knack her brain to remember what had happened to lead her here. The grogginess impeded it at first. Then slowly but all of a sudden, it hit her.
She remembered glimpses of water rushing in, the touch of a hand, still water and crashing against a barricade.
Her parents.
Elena felt like she couldn't breathe. But then she reminded herself that she knew nothing. Considering she was alive so she ordained they had to be too.
Her father's job was to save lives and he had saved hers. He had to have saved her mother's too.
Her mother was alive. Her mother would be alive. Her mother had to be alive.
Her mother was alive. Her mother would be alive. Her mother had to be alive.
She kept repeating these words in her mind almost as if, if she stopped they wouldn't hold true anymore.
Looking at the thin tubes connected to her veins, she frantically pulled them off, wincing in pain. But brushing the pain aside, she tried to turn over to the side of the bed and lift herself up. It was harder than she expected. Her body felt weaker than her resolve to get out of there. She pushed herself again - harder this time - while supporting her arms on the bed, and made her bare feet touch the hospital floor. She flinched from the chilliness of the surface. Forcing herself to ignore the sensation, she manoeuvred further to the side and pushed herself again to stand completely on the ground, still supporting her body with her arms on the bed. Traversing for support from whatever she came by - the bed, the drip stand, the chairs - she reached the wall and leaned against it while dragging her limp body towards the door slowly, despite her weakness. Walking past the door into the hallway, she was stopped in her tracks by Audrey, a nurse she'd been familiar with through her dad working as an attending doctor at Mystic Fall's only hospital.
"Elena! What do you think you're doing? You need to get back inside!" Audrey called out in alarm while running towards her.
"I nee -" It was more difficult to say words out loud that she thought.
"We'll talk when you're feeling stronger. Now is not the time," she cut her off before she could get the words out.
She shook her head. Her throat clenched but she forced herself to croak the words out, "I need…to.. see…my…pa…rents"
"You're not strong enough now, Elena," Audrey held her and tried to pull her back into the room. Elena shook her off with as much force as she could muster, refusing to budge and shouting out "No! Now, I need…to. No-w"
Audrey continued trying to coddle her into getting back into the room so Elena fought her off by pushing past her. She walked two steps before her legs gave out and she fell down. Audrey came rushing to her side asking her if she was okay.
"I have…to see them. Let me…see her," the words came out as a desperate plea, not as a demand this time. "Please," tears were pooling in her eyes now.
Her plea contorted Audrey's worried face into a more worried but inexplicable expression – was it close to sadness? - before she tried to mask it with her customary words, "Elena, you just fell down because you couldn't walk. You need rest".
Something was wrong. Terribly wrong. She could feel it.
"Where are they? Where's my dad?"
Audrey didn't answer but rather her eyes filled further with that guarded expression before, creases formed between her brows.
"Where is he?! He saved me. I know he saved her too," she shouted this time. "Tell me where they are!"
"Elena…"
"Tell me they're okay! Tell me she's okay!"
Audrey's eyebrows knitted together even more, her eyes now filled with a painful expression.
It was then she knew. But she didn't want to believe.
"Is she…" How could she trust anything right now. She corrected herself as her voice broke and she choked out, "Are they alive?"
Point Two: Present - post accident
Elena gasped for air, waking up at once and finding herself seated on her bed.
She felt disoriented. Her head felt oddly heavy, almost like she had been hit at the back of it. She felt queasy, too. But she couldn't remember what that might have been from. Then again, it wasn't uncommon to wake up with a raging headache and scars, these days.
"You've been waking up and spacing out the whole night," Stefan's voice broke her out of her daze, making her conscious that he was in the room.
All at once, the events of last night seemed to break past her throbbing headache in flashes.
She didn't want to dwell on this part much. It brought up memories she kept locked away. Instead she tried to focus on what happened before it that led her there.
She and Matt were driving out of town. Klaus had died. Tyler would die because he was sired to Klaus. Her other friends' lives - however - hung in uncertainty.
Right now, with his green eyes against his olive skin and dirty blond hair, Stefan was here sitting before her. He was alive.
Klaus was lying. Which meant...The rest of them were alive too.
The rest of them...
Her mind travelled back to the one she'd left on the other side.
She knew he wouldn't die. She just...knew. She kept telling herself they would meet again. They had to. He had made a promise to her once. Even if she broke her end, he'd keep his. That's just who he was.
A sigh of relief broke out of her as a small smile planted itself on the corner of her lips. "You're alive" she breathed out the words, only slightly louder than a whisper, not looking at the man in front of her or anyone really. These were words meant for someone they shouldn't be meant for. At this brief realization her smile fell.
Trying to cover up the tracks of her momentary betrayal, she looked up at Stefan and burst out beaming, "I knew he was lying. Caroline, Bonnie's mom, Da-," she caught herself before she could say the entire name, halted for a few seconds at her consciousness and then pushed past it acting like that mishap never happened,
"You're all - you didn't-," her eyes were turning glassy from her disbelief of her almost irrational belief coming true. But Stefan wasn't returning her enthusiasm.
"Well, aint that nice. Too bad there's a party dampener," a husky voice interrupted her.
This voice, she wished she would never hear again. This voice, she wished she would definitely hear again.
She turned around to face him. Raven haired, pale skinned bearing blue eyes - colder than usual - and a firm jaw, there was Damon sitting on the edge of the window settee to the side of her bed.
Elena had always thought of blue to be a calming colour. Maybe it was because the sky and the ocean were painted as serene in the books she read and her mother made her visualize them as such, when she practised writing. But mostly it was because she and Matt had grown up from the same sandbox and she had known the blue in his eyes before she had known the brown in hers. Matt had gentle looking eyes. Even when she and Matt fought, his eyes felt gentle. Which was why she was always afraid that one day, she'd break his heart and lose what he held in those eyes. Blue would never be a calming colour again. Before she could get to it, her parents died and she didn't know what it stood for anymore. After that, she met Damon. Right off the bat, his blue eyes made her uncomfortable. She couldn't tell why. It was only gradually she started noticing the flickers of sadness behind them and even more gradually the concern hidden in his gaze. But even with those flickers when Damon got mad, his eyes got harsher, somehow - filled with storms looming in them. They weren't calm. They hardly ever were. Sometimes she thought the moments where she saw tenderness reflect in them made her more uncomfortable than when he got mad.
Right now was not one of those moments. Right now, his eyes were filled with a thousand raging storms. And she was the one who evoked them.
She'd told herself she'd see him again. But she hadn't let herself think about what they'd be like when they did. He'd push her away. Maybe forever. He certainly was trying that now, at least.
"I see I interrupted a heartfelt moment. Do you want me to leave?" he mocked, gesturing between Stefan and her, reminding her again of Stefan's presence, who was oblivious to last night
She didn't know what to tell Damon without seeming hurtful. She thought of what she'd told Matt after they broke up. Except Damon wasn't Matt - in any way, at all.
Damon wasn't even her ex. He was never her boyfriend. But he was...she didn't know what he was to her.
No matter what she said now, it would end up being hurtful any way, and she didn't want him to have to hear it in front of Stefan.
"What do you mean by 'dampener'?" she tried to maintain her composure. That's the best she could muster. Speaking business. Was that what they were going to be like now?
It occurred to her that what he was talking about might be about Matt...or Tyler because if Klaus died, it meant...
"Is Matt okay? Is this about Tyler? Caro-"
"Of course in all of this, you wouldn't stop once to think about yourself," Damon bit back a laugh and shook his head, before breathing out, "It's always about every fucking one else!"
"What are you talking about?!" She was confused and anxious. At this point, she hoped it was just his anger against her.
Damon let out an exasperated sigh and rested his face in his palm. Stefan tried to call out her name to explain but Damon raised his head and cut him off immediately,
"What is the last thing you remember, Elena?"
"Why?" She didn't like the tone of how it made things seem.
"Just answer the question," Damon pressed.
Normally, she would have picked a fight with him over the fact that she doesn't take orders from him, even with whatever went down between them. But the urgency with which he was pressing and Stefan avoiding looking her way when she glanced towards him to clarify her confusion, it made her seriously consider what Damon was asking and she conceded.
Trying to skim past her memories and feelings of them, she replied, "Matt and I were stuck in water under the bridge. Stefan came to get us."
"And what happened after that?" His voice wasn't as harsh as before but it wasn't gentle either. He was being very impersonal. She didn't like the sound of where this was going at all. She noticed that the room was in shadows, even in the day. The curtains were drawn. She had to stop herself from assuming the worst.
"I asked Stefan to save Matt first, which he did," she said looking Stefan's way, who had his face down to which Damon snorted. Ignoring his behaviour, she continued, "And I'm here, so he-"
"Saved you?," he cut her off. Then acerbically hurled the words towards her, "He didn't!"
"What- No, I'm here so -," confusion played out on her face, the furrows between her brows got deeper. She looked over in Stefan's direction, who wasn't intervening or even looking at her. Her voice cracked at its edges as she corrected herself, "Then who did?"
"No one," If Elena thought Damon had thrown the last words at her, she didn't prepare herself for the tone he delivered these two simple words with such a blow.
She felt the walls closing in upon her.
It couldn't be. She hadn't ingested anyone's blood.
There had to be something else. There was always another way.
"How- what does that mean?" she cried out, starting to panic.
Even Damon who was so hell bent on pouring his whole bottle of harsh truths on her, didn't utter a word. Instead, he got up to stand by her cabinet mirror facing away from her and Stefan.
So she turned to Stefan for answers. He took a few moments to compose his words and when he didn't get to it, she prodded him, "Stefan!"
It wasn't a question. It was a demand.
"Yesterday when you were at the hospital, you didn't just have a concussion. You had a cerebral haemorrhage. Meredith had taken some of Damon's blood earlier and to heal you- "
No. This couldn't be happening.
"She gave you his blood"
No. No. No.
"Am I dead?" There were tremors, in her voice, a break down threatening around the corner.
Stefan didn't answer. Instead he looked down with tightly sealed lips, answering her completely with his deafening silence.
"Oh my god," she said muffling her own words.
She didn't believe.
"I'm...dead," she hollowly blew out, and pushed the next words out, tasting the sound of it on her tongue, "I'm a vamp...ire?"
Finally, she broke. Her entire body shook from within, as she bawled in hysteria.
"I'm not supposed to be-I was ready to die! I was supposed to die! I never wanted to be-"
In that very moment, painful memories that she had kept locked inside, ripped open from her insides and unleashed themselves. The water under the bridge sucked the air out of her lungs, while smothering her. Tentacle-like hands of water wrapping their arms around her neck and strangling her, robbing her of everything she loved and held dear, only to spit her back out each time. Somehow death would not accept her defeat to it, each time. What did it want from her? Where was the end?
Stefan came rushing to her side, and tried to assure her, "There's a way to undo this".
Who was he trying to convince more? Her? Or himself?
But she grabbed at the thought of hope. Her humanity was all she had left connecting her to the person she was and her parents. She needed this.
Standing where he was, Damon said, "There's no other way. You feed and turn or you die. There's no door number 3".
She kept her eyes fixed on Stefan desperately, "How?"
Damon irately remarked, "I can't believe you idiots haven't learnt anything!"
She didn't need logic now.
Stefan ignored him, "You've not yet turned. The transition...isn't complete because you haven't fed on blood yet. You're stuck in a limbo, and Bonnie can get you out on the other end."
None of what he said made sense. Didn't he get it? There is a price one pays for cheating death. She'd paid it so many times. Even magic came with a price. The last time it took John dying to preserve her soul and make her come out on the other side, physically unscathed. Even Meredith didn't trust her very science she practiced, and resorted to the cheat of magic on her. No one could cheat death.
"I will fix this," he said with resolve in his voice and eyes filled with need for something.
She almost believed him when he said he would fix it. She kept holding his gaze through her tear filled eyes, so that she would - eventually. Because she had to. For her parents. For him. For Jeremy.
The sound of footsteps walking down the stairs pulled her out of the moment. She glanced sideways to find Damon was no longer by her cabinet mirror, and the door shut from before, was left open.
Damon stepped onto the landing of the stairs and beelined to the kitchen. He needed a drink. If he had to stomach another minute of their "epic love", Elena still putting Stefan on a pedestal after all this - actually, Elena putting anyone on a pedestal while she thought she deserved to die, he'd end up killing someone.
Opening the cabinet, he yanked out a bottle of bourbon. The images of Elena looking at Stefan and believing him while he was making all these promises of false hope kept flashing in his mind. He needed it to stop. God, he needed it to stop. He wondered how he ever thought he had a chance. She said it herself. It's always going to be Stefan - even if he was dumb enough to enable her suicidal tendencies. He shook his head and put both his hands on counter, sighing out loud.
Why did he even let himself think otherwise? He'd been down this road before with her so many times, and Katherine too before. Hell, why did he always let himself think otherwise?
Taking a glass out of the side cabinet, he poured himself a drink and downed it. He needed something to cut off the edge from all this bullshit. He closed his eyes and let out a breath.
She just had that air around her. She talked to you, tried to understand you, looked at you with her doe eyes and made you fall in love with her without trying, even when she couldn't return it, even when you didn't want to. They were always an almost, but not quite, not enough.
He was pathetic.
And a fool.
But not as foolish as her wanting to throw her life away for every pedestrian who walked by her. Why couldn't she just want to save herself? Sometimes he felt that some of her choices pained him more than her not loving him. She didn't love herself either because she was convinced everyone on this world deserved to live even at her sacrifice. He didn't know what annoyed him more about her: her indecision when it came to him or her firm decision to sacrifice herself. Technically, there was no indecision but that didn't even matter anymore. For the love of anything, he couldn't understand how could she not care about herself.
She wanted a human life. But even that she didn't fight all that much for. She threw it away like it hardly held any worth before someone else's.
He was an idiot for loving her. She was an idiot for not loving herself.
Damon heard the clomping of footsteps coming down the stairs and towards the kitchen in a definite and consistent pace, almost in a hurry but not enough for immediate urgency. A few seconds in, Damon heard a petulant hushed voice muttering under his breath how he shouldn't have to ask permission or take orders.
Just when he was about to enter the room Damon called out, "I give you orders so you don't get killed, Little Gilbert"
Jeremy stepped in, looking surprised but in a second his expression morphed to annoyed, "Says the guy who did kill me"
Not again. He groaned.
"You know that comeback is getting real old," Damon quipped back.
Could there go one day when he wasn't reminded of it? Just one day. They might as well get T shirts reading "Damon killed Elena's brother that one time". He got it. He was the worst. Move on.
Jeremy shrugged, "Doesn't make it any less true"
He needed more alcohol for this conversation so early in the morning.
"And it still doesn't make you any less likely to be killed. Hence, the orders." Damon turned around to pour himself more bourbon.
Jeremy continued speaking and Damon gritted his jaw. "So when by your permission can I see her? I have a ring that protects me, you know," he asked with a tone of sarcasm too much for Damon's liking.
He carefully swivelled his glass around, before taking a sip and turning back to face Jeremy, "She's not stable during the transition, and I think killing her brother would be something she'd want off her list. Plus that ring turned Alaric evil and I'm pretty sure, she doesn't want to drive you to that end, too". He was opening the second cabinet above to his right when something dawned on him that he hadn't thought of before.
When Alaric desiccated in front of him while they were fighting last night, he did the math and knew immediately that it meant Elena had to have died for that to happen. But in his attempts to deal (or rather, not deal) with the reality of losing these two people in his life, it didn't quite settle in completely until now that she was waking up as an orphan once again. Even if they had given Ric a funeral and said their goodbyes, he hadn't physically died on them. Elena would take this hard, and if he knew her – she'd blame herself for it, despite believing she was right saving Matt.
"And when will she be stable? After completing it? Vicki-"
Jeremy's voice made him aware of his surroundings again. He took out a cereal box he was searching for, and turning around, he cut him off, "Elena is not Vicki Donovan, Jeremy. Vicki was a drug addict. Thankfully, your sister never took to the stash when she hit her low." Hoping to have driven the jab in, he went on to rummage through the fridge. "And now, since you lost your guardian and you don't understand this situation," he took hold of the milk carton inside and placed it on the kitchen island, after which he threw the cereal box towards Jeremy to catch, and continued, "You take orders from me." Damon followed that by pushing the milk carton towards him, "Eat your cereal."
Jeremy's face contorted from annoyed to a flicker of sadness and then landed on timid and twitching. It was obvious to Damon the idiot was hiding something.
"Something's up with you. Spill"
"Nothing is up with me," Jeremy answered a bit too quickly.
Damon narrowed his eyes at him in warning. What had he said to him? He had mentioned Alaric. Maybe this was about that.
"Look if this is about Alaric and you wanting a shoulder to cry on or something, I don't do-"
"Thanks a lot for the concern, dick," Jeremy said, dumping the cereal box on the island and stomping off.
"Wait," Damon called out, authoritatively but with concern. The kid had lost his fifth (it was fifth, right?) parental figure. Even he wasn't so much of a douche and whether Damon liked to admit it or not, he actually cared about this dumb Little Gilbert too, despite their history. Adding onto that, the person he'd lost was Alaric. If
Alaric was watching this, he would punch him right now for behaving like this towards Jeremy.
Jeremy stopped in his tracks to turn around, "What now? More orders?"
"Ugh, you're such an overdramatic teenager," Damon remarked, to which Jeremy rolled his eyes. Then he paused, turning serious, "I'm sorry about Ric. He was a good man. He was family to you. And even if he turned evil, you don't just stop caring for someone once they do."
Jeremy was a bit taken aback by what he'd just said. Damon didn't say anything for a moment, which Damon let him have without throwing in an inconsiderate comment to ruin what he'd just said because it'd be easier given he was pissed off at everyone and didn't want to play nice. But he'd let Jeremy have it, for Alaric.
"Were you there with him when he was dying?" Jeremy broke out of his moment of silence.
Damon looked at Jeremy, confused. He didn't understand how Jeremy would know that. As if seeing Damon's confusion Jeremy continued, "Because you were out of town where Klaus' body was Alaric came after him and... you"
Damon considered lying and took a few seconds longer to get the words out. Until he decided against it.
"I was." He felt compelled to say his next words but he wasn't looking at Jeremy anymore. Maybe it was more for Ric. Either way, he knew Jeremy needed some form of a heart-to-heart, as much as he'd like to avoid it. His sister couldn't be there for him now. So Jeremy would have to do with his half-assed version.
"He died - weirdly enough - while we were fighting. Quite poetic, actually. We became friends after I killed him the first time and we always fought. And then while fighting with me, he died on me for real, and ended our friendship." He hated Ric right now. "Bastard" he said referring to his dead best friend.
In response to his insult, Jeremy chuckled. Damon shrugged.
Jeremy's face softened, "I think he misses you too...wherever he is."
Damon looked back at him, not knowing how to react. Jeremy meant it. The kid was so naive and didn't know Ric's evil version would hate him wherever he was. But he couldn't tell that to Jeremy. That would mean telling him his dead guardian hated him too and Damon generally didn't know how to react to people being nice to him. Elena was another story. But even that, he didn't always know how to react. That wouldn't be a problem anymore, though.
As if somehow on cue, Damon heard yet another person strolling down towards the kitchen. Mornings were so annoying, with all the start of routine and repetition. But Stefan was his savior from this awkward conversation. Stefan, the savior. He had to laugh inwardly at the thought given the recent turn of events.
"Hello, Stef. Come on and join us for breakfast," Damon greeted his brother in a saccharine tone, while holding up his glass toasting him.
Stefan walked in looking addled. Damon was pissed as hell at more than one thing because of him. So he knew if he acted unperturbed he would be able to get under Stefan's skin more. Then again it might just be Stefan's hair making him look confused all the time, and something Damon typically couldn't hold back mocking. But he'd hold that off for a moment. There were more pressing matters.
"How is she?" Damon inquired, while indicating upward. He'd left midway through everything that went down in the room and then blocked out his extra-sensitive hearing to it because he didn't want to have to be so masochistic. He wasn't needed there and it was a fact. But it didn't mean he didn't want to know how she was doing.
"She's asleep. She said she needed rest. I stayed a while to check on her." Stefan tucked his hands in his pockets. Stefan's eyes betrayed the calm he was attempting. His brows were knitted enough to have made an almost permanent cross stitch on his forehead, which anyway had quite a lot going on there. Damon could see that Stefan was talking himself into staying in control every millisecond. He ended up saying or doing nothing but nodding in agreement with Stefan.
Stefan then went on to add, "I'm going to talk to Bonnie and ask her if she can do a reversing spell."
The muscles on Damon's neck tightened up. He remembered the level of annoyance he felt against his brother for coming up with this ridiculous idea that had no basis and had never been done before. Because it couldn't be. Wouldn't people be opting to turn human already by now if it was even a viable option? And the worst part was what if it risked Elena's life - again? Witches did everything with consequences, even if it meant reversing one of their most hated creations into the normal to balance nature or whatever the hell. His brother had already screwed up by "respecting Elena's wishes" and saved the useless busboy when he should have saved her first, and now he would risk her life again for a chance that even no witch he knew had spoken of, to absolve his guilt and undo his wrongs.
Jeremy butt in asking, "Wait, reverse what? You're going to reverse her vampirism?"
All need to keep up the pretense was lost in that moment. Ignoring Jeremy, Damon threw his words at Stefan in a scathing tone, "You just had to give her false hope, didn't you?"
"Look, you weren't there when she looked me in the eye and told me she never wanted to be a vampire" Stefan said in his defense.
He hadn't forgotten the time when he force-fed her his blood when she'd offered herself up for Klaus' goddamned ritual. Resentment in her eyes after what he'd done.
Hell, he'd seen that resentment so many times in her eyes. Did any of them really want to turn when they did? No, they didn't, damn it! They still dealt with it.
"Then you should have thought of that when you let her die," Damon spat out.
"I didn't mean for her to!" Stefan retorted, defeated.
"What were you thinking, huh? You'd save the quarterback while you let her stay underwater struggling for air, and she would be fine when you got back down again? You knew she went through this before! You knew she lost her parents to it! Hell, you were there!"
He should have been there in Stefan's place, even if she never wanted him - even if she would hate him forever for going against her and saving her first. He promised her something. He should have never left. Screw the coin toss! He shouldn't have left it to some dumb luck. Since when did luck work in his favor?
"I had to respect her choice!"
Stefan's "arguments" in his defense were so unbelievably weak that Damon wondered how it even made sense to Stefan in his own head.
The dreaded C word. The bane of their existence.
Their lives felt like an eternal proverbial coin toss. Somehow each moment only created a domino effect or just added to a domino effect of other choices. People make life changing decisions once in a while. That's why they're so huge. But their lives? They made those life changing decisions everyday and somehow it felt like it didn't change anything at all, but still changed things.
It had been this way since Katherine stepped into their lives 145 years ago. It remained that way even after she disappeared from it. Even after her importance diminished for them when he gradually realized how he had wasted all that time over someone who never cared all that much, it stayed that way. Knowing Elena emphasized the difference, even if that realization wasn't because of her completely. But it didn't solve anything. They got stuck in another web of another series of complicated relationships, and complicated choices defining who they were and who they weren't, and they still seemed indefinite even while feeling so definite.
Respecting choices sounded very virtuous and all. But behind those words were a bunch of choices made before they had entered Elena's life. It wasn't about what was the right thing to do. In this case, none of them three did the right thing. It was a glorified word, really, for every messed up decision they made. Elena in all her wanting to declare her free will through sacrificing herself for every freaking person, wasn't doing it as some grand gesture of finding her identity. She was doing it because of her guilt of surviving. Stefan supported it out of some misconceived notion of righteousness. Damon knew he didn't make moral decisions in these cases, either. Collateral damage meant nothing to him and one could fault him for that. But respecting these choices? Damon inwardly scoffed.
He exclaimed, "To die?!"
Stefan fell silent but Damon continued to rip away at him, "You know what? She wants to save everyone in the world and sure, she's stupid for not prioritizing herself.
But you're a coward covered underneath all that honorable bullshit. You know what will happen and you let her do it anyway. Because you're afraid of her hating you if you defy her, even if it means losing her altogether."
Stefan didn't say anything for a few moments. Then he uttered, "That's why I need to do this and fix it."
Like he just said. He knew his brother.
The only way Stefan knew how to make up for his mistakes was to try and reverse them, undo them, erase them. So that he could do away with the stains on his knight in shining armour that kept him up at night.
"Well, just because you feel guilty doesn't mean you get to feed her hope of something that will never happen."
"She needs hope, Damon." Stefan hurled back.
Damon snapped back in return, "People need hope to make things better. False hope crushes you after it's all done, even more than before."
When the hell was life fair? Life sucked and they all knew it. They pretty much walked into each other's already shitty lives only to realize it could get shittier and now
Stefan was only making it harder.
Damon had forgotten Jeremy was even present there, until he interrupted their argument, "What if it does work?"
Damon barked back at him, "It won't!"
Great. He cursed his luck that another Gilbert was on board with Team Delusional's plan. He needed to get out of here. Clearly, no one was listening to him and he had no place here. Why was he even here? By what right? He was supposed to leave according to the deal he made with Stefan anyway. But he couldn't. Not now.
He decided to leave the house at least, briskly walking past them and towards the door. At first, no one said anything or tried to stop him. Not that it would stop him.
But, then, Jeremy called out from the living room, "Where are you going?"
Since when did this punk care or keep tabs on where he went?
"Out," he said, opening the door and not looking back as he walked across the threshold and went outside. From upstairs he could hear someone shuffling. She was awake.
Damon marched up to his Camaro, eager to get out of there. He needed a channelled distraction.
He decided that had a score to settle with Barbie Klaus.
Elena pushed off her bed, dragging her sock covered feet towards the mirror, trying to avoid making too much noise.
She wasn't actually resting as she told Stefan. She needed to be on her own anyway and the creaking of the fan was giving her a headache. She heard faint sounds of chatter downstairs while Stefan still sat by her side. It tore her away from the jarring sound of the fan creaking above her and even Stefan's breathing. Damon and
Jeremy were downstairs bickering, as usual. She wondered what Jeremy would think of her now. Would he see her differently? Damon was right keeping Jeremy away from her now. What if she hurt him? What if he'd look at her with disgust? What if she killed him? No, it was better this way.
She froze upon their mention of Alaric.
Under all the stress about everyone surviving, she hadn't given Alaric dying a thought. Esther had robbed him from them by taking away who he was and replacing him with an alter ego. She didn't think about that after he attacked and tortured Caroline because she realized there was no hope of return for him. He was gone. But it didn't stop amount of pain that seared through her now that he was gone physically too. It was now she realized, that wasn't a point beyond return. This was.
Somewhere between it all, Stefan had left. She barely even noticed. Vampires could be really sneaky.
She thought back on when Ric told her he didn't think he could be a guardian to her on her birthday. She should have listened to him. Somehow every parental figure was cursed to die on her. She should have given him that chance to escape. But she foolishly asked him to stay because she and Jeremy needed him like he needed a family. Now, he was gone and Jeremy had lost his guardian and Damon had lost his best friend too. She should have given them that chance too by not asking him to stay.
She heard Damon storming out of the house now. Jeremy even asked him where he was going and he didn't come up with a sarcastic comeback he mostly had up his sleeve. She wondered if she said something just loud enough would he stop. Then she shook the idea out of her head. It was stupid. She couldn't.
Elena stood in front of the mirror checking her gums that were aching. There weren't any fangs protruding - even when she touched the area. She didn't look like a vampire yet, she still looked far from human. In fact the more she kept staring at her reflection with her dishevelled, curly hair and blank eyes, she could have sworn she saw Katherine staring back at her. She ran her fingers through strands of her hair.
There were only three things that set them apart. Katherine was a vampire. Katherine had the two Salvatores at her beck and call. Katherine had curly hair.
She picked up her hairbrush from her dresser, and desperately brushed through her hair to straighten it out more.
"Hey" her brother's voice broke her out of her chore. Still nervously walking past the door, he repeated "You doing-"
"No" she replied back quickly, dropping the brush. Then added "I'm okay. I'm not feeling the hunger pangs yet". She laughed nervously after saying it.
Actually, she could hear everything more clearly than she wanted and it was all like blurred noise; the minimal light filtering into the room was irritating her eyes, and her gums were aching as was her stomach. But she could handle it and as long as she could handle it, she would because she would not become a monster in front of Jeremy. She couldn't face the look of being let down even in her little brother's eyes because she was never meant to be this way.
"Don't do that. Don't act like you're okay when you're not."
"I have it under control, Jer!" Elena snapped back.
Jeremy didn't buy into it though. "Do you? Vicki said that too when she turned and then she -"
Vicki, Jeremy's ex-girlfriend and Matt's sister, was a drug addict before she turned. Back then, Stefan had warned her back then that if they didn't handle Vicki well, she would end up a lot like what he went through. Sadly, Vicki maybe by nature was more like Stefan than she realized, but she didn't survive for more than a few days as a newbie vampire.
Elena wasn't Vicki though. She'd never done drugs and she was clearly not an addict. But then again, neither was Stefan. Or was he? Stefan and her didn't talk about his human life much beyond what he had told her when they were together.
"I'm not Vicki, Jeremy! I'm fine. I'm handling it."
"That's what you always say even when you're not. Look I don't want to lose you the way I lost her. She turned into someone else the minute she turned into a vampire, maybe I don't remember it but she attacked me and would have killed me - even if that wasn't her. Like Stefan."
"Jer" She pleaded. She didn't want to hear how much wasn't in control and how she would lose herself and turn into someone else.
"Like Damon too"
She looked at him, surprised. Sometimes Elena wondered how she could even talk to Damon after what he'd done. Sometimes she wondered how she even felt something more after that. Sometimes she wondered how she could be worried about him after that. It didn't even make sense. But she did.
"Damon's an ass and he would kill anyone who got in his way and if he didn't care about -"
She'd be lying if she said she wasn't scared Damon would now do something he'd regret later. What was she supposed to say though? With what right would she ask him anything?
But no matter what, she wasn't him.
She snapped back into reality, asserting,"I'm not Vicki or Stefan or Damon or Katherine, okay? I'm me."
Jeremy said, "That's the thing. It doesn't matter who you are. You will change and I can't handle that. I can take it any other way but not this way. I know it's selfish but-"
She looked at her brother. Sixteen year old and deep brown eyes filled with concern for her, but filled concern and fear. And she, somehow, felt the same fear.
"I'm doing it"
Jeremy looked at her questioningly.
She said, "The reversing spell? If Bonnie can do it, I'm ready to do it."
He let out a sigh of relief, smiling a bit.
Elena said sympathetically, "I'm sorry about Ric"
Jeremy looked back at her sadly, "We'd already lost him, Elena."
That reminded her of Caroline. In all this chaos she should have thought about her earlier.
"How's Caroline doing? She must be devastated. Is someone there for her?" She rushed through her words.
"Matt is with Caroline. After they revived him and he stabilized, he went there right away to see her"
She asked,"There's nothing wrong with him, right? Is he doing okay?"
She hadn't seen Matt since last night. He would be guilt ridden and she just wanted to take away all of his worry. There was so much going on, she didn't know what to think or who to think about. It was like everything was falling apart at the same time.
"He's fine, Elena" Jeremy tried to assure her. "Just focus on yourself"
She looked down to clench her her hands, "I just want everyone to be okay." She peered up, with her hands still clenched, "Tell Matt and Caroline I'm sorry for what happened."
"Everyone is going through a lot right now. So are you. It's okay" Jeremy tried to assure her, putting his arms around her and pulled her in for a hug. She needed that comfort in that moment so she held on to her only remaining family.
But the longer she held on, she started hearing blood coursing through her brother's carotid artery. The lulling of his pulse becoming the only thing she could hear. Her throat and mouth were getting pit in her stomach felt like an abyss pulling her under for not quenching it. The pit in her stomach telling her to do whatever it took to get under that vein and tap its blood and the hunger was only getting stronger.
He was her brother. He was little Jer. She was supposed to be the one to protect him, not want be the one to hurt him.
Scared, she pulled back quickly, trying not to seem too out control and croaked out, "I think I need to rest. I'm not feeling well."
Jeremy wasn't dumb to not realize the vampire senses were catching up. But he decided not to push her "Sure. Bonnie will finish the spell and you'll be fine. Okay?"
She nodded, and he turned around to leave the room. Immediately after, Elena rushed to the door and shut it closed. She pressed her back to it and closed her eyes.
She held back a sob and then walked to the bathroom to stand in front of the mirror. The brush hadn't worked. Her hair was still wavy. She turned on the tap so even Stefan couldn't hear her over the running water, just in case. She then took out her straightening iron and worked so furiously to correct the likeness, that she burnt her hair. But she didn't care. She just kept straightening her hair until Katherine stopped staring back at her.
A/N: Feedback would be great :)