Bonnie runs her fingers along the worn spines of the leather bound books. "We can't just leave the grimoires." There's a wealth of knowledge and magic buried in those pages, things she hasn't come close to even learning all of just yet. Even with a few more months time and if she had a brain like a sponge, Bonnie couldn't learn half of what she'll be leaving behind when they go.
"No." Damon vetoes immediately. "Absolutely not. We have to pack real supplies. Things we need to survive." He reaches for a grimoire, but off Bonnie's look quickly retracts his hand. "You can't eat books. Unless we need kindling, they're useless."
"We can't just leave them here for anyone to find!" Bonnie protests. She wonders if Damon has even thought that far ahead. Leaving recipe books for spells and magic laying around would be both irresponsible and dangerous.
"Bonnie, I know the grimoires mean a lot to you, but Damon's right." Ric - because Bonnie's taken to calling him that in her head, if not vocally these days because really when they're all living together and surviving together, it seems silly to fall back on stringent routines - hefts one of the boxes and then returns it to its spot on the chair. "As much as I'm sure you could learn a lot from them, and we could use a lot of what you learn, these are heavy and we can't take them with us." He shoots a look at Damon, "Especially since we're not one hundred percent certain where we're going."
Damon ignores the look, if he sees it at all. "Atlanta. We've been over this."
"Assuming that the emergency broadcast was right," Ric points out. "It was weeks ago that the CDC created that safe zone and we haven't picked up anything new or different. The military base is closer. We should at least go there, and if it's a bust, we can go to Atlanta."
"And here we go," Matt mutters as he passes through the room with a box laden with survival gear.
Bonnie can't help but smile. This is an ongoing argument that Ric and Damon have been having for days. North or south, military or civilian, and of course Damon comes down on the side of civilian each and every time. Caroline silently agrees with him, but she hasn't dared get into the middle of it, and really, Bonnie doesn't blame the vampires in the slightest for their choice. While the organization and likelihood of safety in numbers and survival is greater within the ranks of the military, it will be a great deal harder for Caroline and Damon to hide what they are and survive. A civilian encampment, on the other hand, is ideal. Civilians are less organized, less observant and more prone to taking things at face value.
How else could vampires and witches and werewolves have existed for centuries without the masses knowing about it?
Matt staunchly supports Ric, even though he knows Caroline doesn't and it's one of the few points of contention between them. After the Fever, and the Shamblers - both dubbed so by the newspapers and media outlets before they lost coherency and fell into silence - Caroline and Damon's vampirism, and Bonnie's status as a witch are much more manageable in his mind.
Bonnie hasn't picked a side or made a choice yet, but she hasn't been asked. When she is asked, she will choose and that's possibly the reason that she's kept her silence. They can't afford to be divided, not now, even if Caroline and Damon snipe at each other as much as she and Damon do, and Matt sends seething glares at the elder vampire when he thinks that Damon and no one else is looking. They're all in this together, a rag tag group of survivors and they do have to depend on each other.
Not really so different from what they were doing when Katherine first waltzed into town, and Klaus as well.
However, the witch is silent because she'll side with Caroline and Damon, a rarity that she should agree with Damon about anything and even if no one else sees it, she sees the line between supernaturals and humans.
"And it's only out of the way and a waste of gas," Damon tosses back. "Also, last I checked, the army didn't have a recruitment program for vampires." He rolls his eyes and gives Bonnie a look as she lifts a grimoire out of the box and flips through it. "Whatever. You still can't take witch cook books."
"I know that," Bonnie really doesn't want to get into another argument. "I just don't want to leave them lying around for anyone to find. We aren't the only survivors, we can't be." A quick glance around and Bonnie hurries on before Damon can scoff, "And if we survived, who's to say that there's not another witch out there? One who might be able to make use of these spells in not so nice ways?"
"We could burn 'em," Damon suggests and there's a look on his face that says he's deadly serious and not simply being an ass because he can be an ass.
"No!" Bonnie's exclamation is loud. She instinctively presses the grimoire in hand to her chest and only then does she catch the twinkle in Damon's eyes and the faint smirk he wears. "You're an ass." The witch closes her eyes and counts to ten, talking herself down from giving him an aneurysm on general principle.
"So not a news flash," Caroline says.
When she opens her eyes to smile at her friend, she catches Matt leaning in the doorway, his gaze attentively focused on her. "What do you think we should do with the books?" Looking around, he explains. "Bonnie's a witch and they're grimoires, so she should decide."
"We could lock them down in one of the cells," Caroline suggests.
It's not a bad idea. But Bonnie has a better one. She smooths her hand over the cover and gingerly returns the grimoire to the box. "I have the perfect place for them."
###
The old witch house is somehow less creepy and eerie in the new stillness of this new world. There is a rustle of wind through the tall grass and the leaves of the trees surrounding the property and birds exchange chirps and calls as though nothing has changed. From the passenger seat of the borrowed - and by borrowed she means liberated into new permanent ownership - SUV, Bonnie purses her lips and stares at the house.
There are memories, and most of them are not good. Of course, these days there aren't many places - if any at all - that hold anything resembling good memories. Echoes of Elena and Jeremy are in the Gilbert House and Bonnie hasn't been back there. She's wearing one of Elena's shirts from the boarding house, but only because there was nothing else and she tries not to recall the last time she saw Elena wearing it.
This house is connected to death and Klaus and -
"If we're going to do this, we need to get moving." Damon's voice from the driver's seat jars Bonnie from her wandering thoughts. "That small pack of zombies we passed back aways? Don't think they're not going to follow the sound and moving vehicle -"
"I know." Uttered so softly that a human wouldn't hear her, but Bonnie knows Damon hears her perfectly well.
It doesn't stop him from continuing as though she hasn't said a word. " - because I'd like to get in and out before Night of the Living Dead arrives."
Bonnie shoots him a glare. "I know."
"Then let's do this thing." Damon does that eye thing that he does and Bonnie sighs, grabbing the passenger door handle. She hops out of the vehicle as Damon does, closing the door softly behind her.
By the time she reaches the hatch of the SUV, Damon has two boxes of grimoires stacked on top of one another and Bonnie reaches for one of her own. She shifts her weight and hefts it to a comfortable position.
"You got that?" Damon asks.
She doesn't dignify the dig with an answer, hurrying ahead of Damon toward the house.
The witch is not surprised when Damon is in front of her, holding out a hand for her to pause. The vampire puts the boxes down and glances back the way they came, then nudges the door with a foot. It creaks and it sounds like a wail in the stillness. Bonnie bites her lip and looks around again, though they're still alone in the yard. She breathes out softly, supporting the box with first one uplifted thigh then the other.
Damon hesitates at the threshold, then steps inside. Bonnie can see his shoulders tighten and relax beneath his dark shirt, his head tilting as he listens to sounds she can't hear - and might not wish to hear. He takes another step, and there's a faint creaking of wood, not nearly as loud as the door opening, and though Bonnie is beginning to feel as though there are one hundred eyes on her and like something will come shambling across the unkempt and long neglected yard. Still, she doesn't rush the vampire. The witches didn't particularly care for the vampire, and though they have denied Bonnie access to the vast majority of their power, sometimes she imagines she still feels them there.
"Empty," Damon says after what's only a few seconds, but feels like hours to Bonnie. She can feel the sweat beading at the base of her neck. "Unless your witchy ancestors are hanging around to torture me some more."
Bonnie shakes her head, stepping past Damon and into the dimness of the house. "They're gone." She shifts the box and takes a few more steps into the foyer and looks back to make sure Damon is behind her. Even so, the soft click of the door makes her draw a quick breath. "Mostly."
Damon frowns at her over the top of the two boxes he's carrying. "Where are we putting your stash?"
"The cellar," Bonnie says and leads the way, carefully down the stairs. This is familiar to her, too familiar. Putting one foot in front of the other takes effort. She remembers thumbing through grimoires with Jeremy in this cellar, remembers the tears on Elena's face as she reassured her friend she was alive and well. She remembers casting the spell to save Elena from vampirism and being too late for Jenna . . .
Shaking off the memories, Bonnie whispers softly and the candles left behind flicker into life, illuminating the darkness. She continues down the stairs and forward, knowing that if she stops the past will rear up and charge at her. They can't afford that sort of distraction right now.
A section of the floor pulls away to reveal a chamber about two feet deep.
"Didn't know that was down here," Damon remarks with a note of genuine surprise in his voice.
"I did a lot of exploring while I was hiding out from Klaus." That's all Bonnie has to say about that.
Evidently that's all that has to be said, because it's a rare moment of Damon not pressing the issue.
Kneeling in the dusty floor, Bonnie begins moving the grimoires from the box she carried in and into the hidden creche. Damon sets his boxes down beside her and gives a curt nod. "I'll go get the other boxes."
Bonnie is only starting on the third box when Damon arrives with three more. She freezes at the sound of footsteps overhead, and doesn't release the breath she hadn't realized she was holding until Damon calls out softly that it's him coming down the stairs. Pausing her book stashing, Bonnie watches him, having a rare moment of being surprised by the vampiric abilities - how he manages to navigate with three boxes, piled so high he can't see, but still every step is careful and sure.
"Two more. Move fast. They're getting closer." Damon tells her and he's gone quicker than Bonnie can give any sort of acknowledgment.
In the silence of the cellar, Bonnie focuses on carefully moving the books, but she does it as quickly as she can. A chill passes over her, like cold fingers edging along her spine and one of the books tumbles into the hidden chamber with a thump that sounds as loud as a gunshot to her ears. Jerking her head up, Bonnie looks around, peering into the far corners where the candlelight doesn't quite reach.
The candles flicker and sway, flames dancing on their wicks and there is something -
A blink and the shadows are still.
"Stop imagining things. There are enough horrors right outside that you don't need to make any up," Bonnie mutters under her breath.
Again comes the sound of footsteps, moving quickly enough that Bonnie knows they belong to Damon even before the dark boots are visible on the stairs. The vampire kneels on the other side of the chamber beneath the floor and silently helps Bonnie add the books.
"There are about five in the yard," Damon tells her conversationally. The last books go in and Damon grabs the planking to fit it back in place. "We are going to go upstairs, and I'll clear the way if I have to. You just run for the car, got it?"
Bonnie doesn't argue. There are reasons that Caroline and Damon go out for the supplies. She has no intentions of getting too close to one of the Shamblers. It's rare that she doesn't argue, but Bonnie knows the score. Safety and survival first. Live to actually be able to trade barbs with Damon another day.
Damon ascends the stairs first, Bonnie close at his back without being on his heels. They're in the kitchen - or what once was the kitchen - when Damon puts his hand out, signaling that she should stop. Bonnie does and catches her breath, and then comes the words that make her blood freeze.
"Stay. Still." Damon hisses, demonstrating by not moving a single muscle.
Bonnie wonders what it says that she can read the tension in his back and the tightening of his jaw that she can see in his profile. Has she been spending that much time with Damon Salvatore since the world went to crap, or were these signals there and readable before life as they knew it ended?
She can't see what he sees or hear what he hears, but Bonnie trusts his reactions. That is unexpected. Under normal circumstances, she trusts the blue-eyed devil about as far as she can throw him without magic, but these aren't normal circumstances and Damon's her best bet for protection from a Shambling horde.
It really is the end of the world.
Damon looks around, casting his eyes in various locations around the kitchen. The look is intense and full of scrutiny, and then his hand is over her mouth with a quick, hushed, "Shh!" and they've moved. Across the kitchen as quick as Damon could carry her, wedging them both into the dusty, dank pantry, slowly pulling the door closed behind them. A sliver of light from the outside world filters through the cracked door, illuminating Damon's profile, making one eye a pale contrast to his pale skin before he pulls his head back slowly.
In the cramped space, Bonnie is pressed against his back, trying to slow her heart and keep her breathing slow and steady. She wants to ask what he saw, how many there are - but then she hears the shuffling gaits and thumping sounds of dead weight shambling. Bonnie doesn't have to ask - if Damon thought they could have run for it, they would have run for it.
There are too many of them.
Squeezing her eyes closed, Bonnie tries not to focus on the shambling dead or where they came from and how they got there so quickly. Instead she focuses on breathing, of soothing herself. Calling upon meditative exercises she's used to focus and connect with her energies. She catches herself clenching one hand into a fist, balling the other into the back of Damon's shirt and forces her hands to loosen and relax.
It's not easy.
The shambling stops outside of the pantry and Damon leans back. It's a move that presses her uncomfortably into the shelf behind her, but she bites her lip against protest. Bonnie counts to ten, then twenty, and then the shambling moves on. Even so, Damon doesn't relax, meaning that Bonnie can't relax.
Damon moves, his hand reaching back and finding hers to press something cold and metal - the car keys - to her palm. "When I open this door, you're going to run to the car. Don't worry about me."
"Damon." It's instinctive, really, the way Bonnie's hand clutches at his arm and the hem of his shirt, holding him in place. No other words come because she's suddenly half-embarrassed for clinging to him, half-confused for wanting to do such a thing and entirely off-kilter for not being ready to handle this. I faced down Klaus, I can do this. Of course it's different when you're resigned to death than when you want to live.
The vampire stills, and Bonnie's glad that he can't see her face when his hand reaches back to grasp her elbow. She knows that she has to be wearing a look of complete surprise because she knows the touch is meant to be supportive, comforting even and it's not the normal for Damon -
How much trouble are we in?
"You're a bad ass witch, Judgy. You can do this." The words are a contrast to the touch, intentionally snide and laden with snark and Bonnie hears the smug smirk in his voice. He's doing it on purpose, something inside of her tells her that, but it doesn't matter. The attitude and cockiness are familiar, they're enough to have Bonnie straightening her shoulders, enough to have her step away from him though there's really nowhere to go and jerk her elbow away from his touch.
He looks back at her, and then he's gone. The door is open, there's the sound of a scuffle and Bonnie does what she was told to do: she runs.
Something grapples at her arm, at her hair and she keeps her eyes on the target - the open front door and the car beyond. Damon is clearing a path for her, and she takes it, feet flying and arms pumping, running like she hasn't since cheerleading. Bonnie doesn't count the Shamblers. She's aware of them - five, seven, eleven and then she just stops processing. Dodging bloody, stumped hands, skidding past determined fingers and lunging arms until she literally yanks open the car door, throwing herself into the driver's seat.
Hands grip the steering wheel, ignition key digging into her palm. A bloody palm smacks the window and Bonnie looses a yelp. It takes a few minutes of fumbling but the key is in the ignition and she guns the engine to life, looking back for Damon.
Another squeak escapes her as the passenger door jerks open and Damon scrambles in, pulling himself up by one arm while kicking away an offending zombie.
"Drive!" Damon orders as two more zombies launch themselves at the vehicle.
Gulping, Bonnie slams the SUV into drive and guns it away from the witch house, trying not to throw up at the sickening crunch and thuds of the zombies she plows right through.
###
Bonnie heads up the stairs the moment they step inside the boarding house. Well, heads up is actually a weak description for what the witch does. Without a word to Caroline or Ric who've come to see for themselves that the pair made it back from the witch house safely, she flees up the stairs as though if she arrives quickly enough, it will present her with a switch that turns back the clock and makes life normal again..
Damon watches her and then heads right into the study, and directly for the bar and the bourbon.
Ric follows. It's to be expected, after all. Just as it's to be expected that Caroline flies up the stairs after Bonnie and Damon can hear the retching and stomach heaving as he pours himself a drink. Supernatural hearing is a real bitch sometimes.
"What happened out there?" Ric asks.
Damon stares at the fireplace. Drinks the glass of bourbon and pours another. "I didn't do anything."
"I didn't say you did. You have a complex." Ric comes around to his peripheral view and stands there until Damon turns to look at him.
"Sorry." Damon swirls the liquid in the glass and takes a drink. "I'm used to dealing with Stefan. It's always my fault."
"Is it your fault?" Ric frowns. He takes Damon's glass and takes a drink, then passes it back. "Whatever it happens to be."
"Only if I'm responsible for the plague of zombies tearing apart the world."
Ric walks to the bar and begins making his own drink. "Is there any point in time where this conversation is actually going to make sense? Or am I going to have to be drunk for that to happen?" Ric takes a drink and rejoins Damon at the fireplace. "What happened out there, Damon?"
"What always happens out there, Ric?" Damon challenges as he gives his friend a look. "Zombies. More of them than I was expecting." Damon shrugs. "The witch got a little rattled."
"Do you want to talk about it?"
Damon drains his glass and shoves it at Ric. "Not really." He leaves the man alone in the study because Damon is not about to do the warm-fuzzies and friendly chitter chatter about his thoughts and feelings, and how he screwed up.
The door was supposed to be closed. Damon swore the door to the house was closed, but if it had been closed, then there wouldn't have been zombies shuffling through and he wouldn't have been hiding in an old dusty pantry with a seventeen-year-old witch clinging to his shirt.
He wouldn't have almost gotten Elena's best friend killed.
Alone in his room, Damon clutches the vervain necklace in his fist. "I'm sorry, Elena. It won't happen again."
###
AUTHOR'S NOTE(S): First, a big thank you to everyone who is reading along and enjoying the story. I'm so happy to see the story is well received and that it has so many followers. I tend to be a bit wordy and long worded, and take a long time with building background and relationships, so thank you to everyone who has patience and keeps coming back.
I've had a lot of questions regarding where Stefan is and what happened to The Originals, so I thought I would take a moment to recap. This story takes place post-season two. This is the summer following the fallout with Klaus, Elijah and the ritual which resulted in Jenna's and Uncle John's deaths. Damon was bitten by Tyler, and Stefan went to Klaus for the cure. In exchange, Stefan had to agree to go off with Klaus and return to his Ripper ways. That is where Stefan is, with Klaus. Katherine is blowing in the wind. Elijah and the other Originals are daggered. Damon gave up his search for Stefan when the zombie apocalypse hit considering that there were more pressing and immediate matters to which to attend.