A/N: Thank you SO MUCH for all the amazing reviews! *hugs*
Disclaimer: The Vampire Diaries belongs to L.J. Smith & CW.
Chapter 9
Jeremy fidgeted impatiently in the passenger seat, looking out of the window and hoping to see Alaric and Bonnie head toward the car any second. He glanced at his watch, acknowledging with growing anxiety that it was already an hour since Alaric had left and Jeremy wasn't sure for how much longer he'd be able to just sit in the car and wait. If this hospital was another enclave for experiments on vampires, Alaric was also in danger and who new how determined and capable of dealing with vampires those people here were.
Jeremy's train of thought was interrupted when a familiar silhouette, unfortunately just one, emerged from between the trees.
"Where's Bonnie?" Jeremy asked with a worried frown, jumping out of the car.
"I couldn't find her," Alaric said with a grimace, glancing over his shoulder and motioning for Jeremy to get back into the car. "I checked everywhere I could on my own, then I went to the director, introduced myself as a private investigator hired by Bonnie's mother and..." Alaric drew a breath and Jeremy braced himself for hearing something he wasn't going to like. "It looks like Bonnie's missing. They claim they don't know where she is."
"They're lying! They hid her somewhere!" Jeremy exclaimed, shaking his head in frustration.
"Maybe. Maybe not," Alaric said with a sigh. "I didn't come across anything suspicious, hidden doors or secret passages, but of course it doesn't mean there aren't any. They seemed to have searched the entire place and that Dr. August looked genuinely upset. They checked the surveillance recordings and they showed someone walking into Bonnie's room while she was in there about three hours ago, but the person never left. Not through the door, at least. So they think Bonnie's been kidnapped. But then again you're right. It might all just be a ruse."
"Kidnapped?" Jeremy blinked, perplexed. "By whom? They must've done something-" he stopped abruptly in mid-sentence. "What if it was Enzo?"
"Enzo?" Alaric widened his eyes at Jeremy. "Why? Is he here?"
"Yes, he was one of the policemen who arrested me," Jeremy said with a pensive frown. "He told me he was tracking the Augustine Society and that he was here 'investigating' the matter. He said he'd make sure Damon and Elena escaped and that he'd help us get Bonnie out tomorrow."
"Lots of volunteer work for a guy who threatened Bonnie and almost choked you to death with a plastic bag," Alaric said wryly.
Jeremy huffed in frustration. "I know. I don't trust him either, but..."
"Let's go back to the hotel so we can decide together what to do next," Alaric said and Jeremy nodded, glancing at the hospital building with a grim frown.
xxxdelenaxxx
"You're all monsters!" Davina seethed with tears in her eyes.
Undoubtedly about to raise her hands and unleash something violent and painful upon them, Stefan thought, not quite sure how he was supposed to counter her arguments after ripping someone's head off in front of her.
"Davina, please, listen to us," Marcel pleaded urgently, drawing Davina's attention to him. "Talk to us," he said, glancing at Camille who nodded quickly. "Talk to me."
"The only monster here was him!" Caroline said, gesturing to Mikael's body on the floor and ignoring Klaus slightly arching his eyebrows at her. "I don't know if you know, but none of us would've ever become a vampire if it wasn't for him. He murdered his own children and turned them into vampires. First vampires in history. Seeing how it's a school day and you're here, you're obviously skipping regular education, but if you're messing with magic, perhaps you should at least get CliffsNotes on the supernatural history," Caroline said, fuming.
"Maybe I don't know everything, but you know what I do know? That he killed my friend!" Davina said contemptuously, glaring at Klaus. "And countless other people!" She added vehemently, and Caroline looked to Stefan, hoping for him to come up with some good arguments, but then Klaus cut in, his tone clipped and Caroline was struck by the all too familiar hint of detached determination in his voice.
"Well, then, I'm afraid my reputation in your eyes is beyond repair," Klaus said, without a smirk or a shrug, despite a sardonic tone of his voice.
Stefan opened his mouth to speak, prompted by a similar observation Caroline had made, but it was Caroline who blurred right between Klaus and Davina just in time, when after tearing his wrist open, Klaus pounced toward Davina with an easily discernible intention of force-feeding her his blood and snapping her neck.
"No!" Marcel shouted, springing toward them, Camille following him as fast as she could.
Davina stared at Caroline's back, caught off guard by the turn of events, only after a second drawing a hasty breath and realizing what had almost happened.
Klaus tilted his head to the side, giving Caroline a thoroughly exasperated look and Caroline did her best to hold his gaze, even if the situation was becoming awkward and uncomfortable very fast, both of them noticing how close they were standing and not being really prepared for that mere months after swearing not to ever meet again.
Well, Caroline scoffed inwardly, technically he had promised not to ever come to Mystic Falls again, so it's not like she could accuse him of breaking any promises, not even in part.
"If you kill her she'll lose her powers and she won't be able to teleport us to New Mexico!" Caroline said in a low voice and Camille blinked, slightly taken aback by Caroline's choice of explanation of her actions. "And we need to get to New Mexico that fast," Caroline said with a huff, snapping her fingers for effect.
"Why? What's in New Mexico?" Klaus asked, sincerely curious.
"You wanted to kill her, turn her into a vampire!?" Marcel broke in, charging on Klaus with anger burning in his eyes.
""Hey, hey, but he didn't," Stefan observed in a reconciliatory tone, zooming in between Klaus and Marcel and stopping the latter with a hand on his shoulder, which Marcel promptly shoved away. "Let's not waste time dwelling over 'what ifs'."
Marcel snarled. "Are you one of his sired hybrids or something?" He asked, looking between Stefan and Caroline.
"We're just ordinary vampires, thank you very much," Caroline snapped, crossing her arms over her chest.
"Oh, then you're his actual friends," Marcel said with a derisive grimace. "Even better. Congratulations."
Caroline was about to protest in agitation, but Stefan cut her off.
"Alright, I don't think we'll make much progress by throwing insults on each other, so perhaps we can turn this into a more civilized conversation?" Stefan proposed, glancing at Caroline who rolled her eyes. "Could you please lift the spell and let us out of here?" Stefan asked with a small, genuinely polite smile, addressing Davina who gave him an incredulous look.
"I don't think it's fair to keep them trapped here," Camille suddenly said and Davina's eyes flew to her. "They don't have anything to do with any of this."
"They're hiding the baby," Davina said with a frown.
"We aren't hiding anyone!" Caroline exclaimed, swirling around on her heels to face Davina. "We haven't seen Rebekah since the day when- when-" Caroline stammered, her breath catching in her throat at the sudden realization just which day exactly it was that they had seen Rebekah last. She was just glad she was standing with her back to Klaus, so he couldn't see her flushed face.
"Since the day when we saw her last," Stefan said in a casual tone, coming to Caroline's aid. "Which was a few months ago," he added, shifting his eyes to Klaus who actually looked rather perturbed by this piece of information.
"Well, perhaps that's for the best," Klaus said, clasping his hands behind his back, his eyes wandering around the attic for a second before he looked back at Stefan, forcing a sour smile on his face. "I can't imagine why she'd think Mystic Falls was the safest hiding place anyway."
"Well, Rebekah can't be in Mystic Falls regardless of what she thinks of it," Caroline said, turning away from Davina and back toward Klaus. "We're kind of locked out of Mystic Falls at the moment. No undead people allowed," she said with a bitter snort and a sigh. Klaus gave her a questioning look. "We had a bit of a Travelers problem, if that tells you anything. We got rid of the Travelers, but they left behind a spell that unfortunately didn't wear off when they died. And now Mystic Falls is a magic-free zone. Any undead person who crosses the town line reverts back to their human form, which in our case is dead form."
Klaus seemed to be listening to Caroline very intently, his eyes narrowing in thought. "Travelers you say," he said without any specific tone to his voice, although Stefan was rather certain he saw some undoubtedly ill-boding glimpse of mischief in Klaus' eyes.
"Bonnie and Damon are in New Mexico," Caroline continued and Stefan's gaze shifted to her. He didn't think it was a good idea to reveal too much about what was currently going on in their lives, but Caroline didn't seem too concerned with such precautions as she delivered, nearly in one breath, a comprehensive summary of what had happened. "So," she said, drawing a breath, "we really need to get to them as fast as possible and in the meantime maybe we can contact Matt and see if he knows anything about Rebekah and if he does, we'll text you," Caroline concluded with a strained smile, considering the situation solved... or at least hoping that promising to call Matt would be enough to get her and Stefan out of New Orleans and keep them from getting involved in Klaus' affairs.
A part of her wanted to find out what was going on here, but the more rational part of her was in favor of leaving as soon as possible without any explanation concerning the baby. Oddly, she was torn between demanding an explanation and not wishing to hear it at all. But it wasn't the baby that bothered her. That was merely perplexing. What bothered her was the baby's mother, as ridiculous as it was, considering that she couldn't care less about all the matters pertaining to Klaus. Caroline gritted her teeth, wincing inwardly. She really needed someone to just yell at her right now, but Stefan never yelled, Elena was going to be too happy to yell and Bonnie wasn't going to remember she would've yelled. Maybe she could get Damon to yell at her.
"Davina, let them go. They need to go see their family," Camille pleaded, taking Davina's hand in hers. "I'm sure we can figure this all out. That prophecy and all. You know it's wrong, what the witches want to do. Some prophecy is no excuse for murdering anyone. There must be another way. Maybe we can find some answers, some solution to all of this in my uncle's archives. You're not this kind of person. You don't want to hurt anyone."
Davina averted her eyes from Camille, but didn't snatch her hand free and for a moment just stood motionlessly, looking somberly into the distance.
"Davina," Marcel said quietly, taking another step toward her and Davina's eyes shifted between him and Camille before she sighed under her breath and raised her hand, almost imperceptibly flicking her wrist, the gesture causing the air to ripple briefly, as if a transparent curtain suddenly dropped to the floor.
"You're free to leave," Davina said, glancing around the attic at everyone with a half-resigned, half-irritated expression. "I can teleport you to... wherever it is that you need to go," she muttered, glancing at Caroline and Stefan who exchanged relieved looks and then looking up to Camille who squeezed her hand in a reassuring gesture.
"Thank you," Caroline said sincerely, looking between Davina and Camille. "Let's go," she added hastily, shooting Stefan a hurrying look over her shoulder.
"Send Bonnie and Damon my regards," Klaus said conversationally, glancing at Stefan when he walked past him.
Stefan's mouth twitched into a mirthless smile. "Yeah, well, don't take it personally, but we're not even going to tell them that you exist."
Klaus smirked and Stefan turned around and made to follow Caroline, even though the self-congratulatory glint in Klaus' eyes made him certain they weren't going to just walk out of here and then limit their interactions in the nearest future to texting. And he didn't need to wait long to be proved correct.
"Oh, about that problem with Mystic Falls, being locked out of your homes and all..." Klaus said noncommittally, stopping Stefan and Caroline in their tracks.
They stopped walking, but didn't turn around and Stefan could see out of the corner of his eye Caroline squeeze her eyes shut.
"Perhaps I could help with that," Klaus said matter-of-factly, only the light in his eyes betraying a little amusement.
Caroline's hands curled up into fists at her sides. "I knew he was going to say that," she whispered through her teeth.
Stefan sighed. "Me too."
xxxdelenaxxx
"We should start getting dressed," Elena muttered, nestling her head into Damon's neck, which was about as much movement as she could afford with Damon's arms clasped firmly around her, keeping her in a tight, warm embrace. She draped her leg over his and snuggled against him a little more.
"Uh-huh," Damon agreed with a small smirk, pressing a soft kiss to her forehead before resting his cheek on top of Elena's head. He traced the length of her arm with his fingertips and then took her hand in his, fiddling with it for a few moments, sliding his fingers in and out between hers.
"Did we have a wedding date set?" He suddenly asked.
Elena propped her chin on his shoulder and looked up at him with a glimmer of amusement in her eyes. "A wedding date?"
"We're engaged, right?" Damon asked, tapping the ring on Elena's finger and then pointing to his ring. He wondered if men wearing engagement rings was a vampire thing, but either way, their rings had same-looking stones and it was the first thought that had sprung to his mind when he had noticed that.
"Actually, these are our daylight rings," Elena explained, biting her lip. "If we didn't have them, we'd burn in the sun," she said and Damon widened his eyes at her. She smiled. "Well, I would-"
"About that," Damon cut her off, bringing their intertwined hands to his lips and pressing a kiss to her knuckles. "So... I need to drink vampire blood, die, wake up and then drink human blood to complete the transition," he recounted the information she had reluctantly given to him earlier and for the first time it occurred to Elena that perhaps his no-nonsense tone wasn't only driven by his feelings for her and his understanding personality, but also by not really grasping all the aspects and consequences of being a vampire.
His knowledge of vampires right now was limited to knowing her and seeing her in quite ordinary circumstances. So far the most repulsive thing that he had witnessed was the vervain accident. He had drunk a little bit of her blood, but that accompanied by the fact that it was meant to heal him and that he loved her couldn't count as anything substantial in terms of getting a clear idea of what he was getting himself into if he decided to turn. As for the rest, it was mostly her words describing things like compulsion that obviously didn't qualify as something that could deter anyone from becoming a vampire.
Elena drew a breath tucking her hair behind her ears. "I think you should think this over yet. There are many things..." she trailed off with a frown. "Being a vampire is not such a great thing. We don't just crave blood. We have to fight an instinct to kill. All the emotions are heightened. Not only the good ones-" She trailed off when he tipped her head upward and kissed her softly on the lips.
"Are you trying to say you'd rather not have me bother you for all eternity?" Damon asked with a smile.
Elena cupped his cheek with her hand. "No, I'm trying to say that being a vampire can be really... tough. I'd like nothing more than to be with you for all eternity, but I don't want to, I can't just selfishly encourage you to turn. You wouldn't do that to me."
"You said I force-fed you my blood," Damon pointed out, grazing the side of her face with the backs of his fingers.
Elena sighed. "That was different. You were trying to make sure that I wouldn't die," she said, lowering her head and pressing her cheek against his chest.
"Alright, but tell me this," Damon continued, undeterred, sifting her hair through his fingers. "If you'd asked me to turn you, told me you were completely sure that was what you wanted, would I've turned your request down?"
Elena slowly inhaled. "I can't be the one to turn you anyway, because if I did, you'd be sired to me," she said, trying to change the focus of the conversation a little. "I was sired to you when I turned. We didn't know it at first, it just came up later and the solution to that turned out to be pretty drastic. We broke the sire bond, but... I'd rather not relive how we did that."
"A sire bond?" Damon asked, trying to guess what it meant.
"It's what happens when you're turned by someone you love," Elena said quietly, drawing abstract shapes on Damon's chest with her fingertips. "You'd have to do everything I told you to do."
"Sounds terrifying," Damon snickered.
Elena snorted soundlessly. "It wasn't as funny as it sounds."
"You mean I made you commit some nefarious acts?" Damon asked with an uncertain smile.
"No," Elena said with a laugh, lifting her head and pressing a kiss to his chin. "But we kept agreeing on everything and it was boring," she said dismissively, not sure how to explain without triggering some potentially disconcerting questions why the sire bond was so awful even if it wasn't actually awful.
"So I can't drink your blood to turn. Got it. Can I drink my best friend's blood?" Damon steered the conversation back to the point and Elena sighed and sat up, giving him a pretendedly exasperated look.
"Can't you give yourself a couple of weeks to think about all that?"
Damon reached out, unceremoniously tearing away the bed cover she was holding to her chest. Elena smiled, letting him pull her into his arms and giggling under her breath when he rolled them over and pinned her hands on either side of her head, smirking down on her.
"Elena, Elena," he said in a playfully scolding voice. "You want me to make an informed decision, but you're only telling me half of the story. The pretty half. So how do you think this is going to work?" He leaned down and Elena's eyes fluttered shut when he trailed open-mouthed kisses across her collarbones.
"I don't know," she admitted honestly with a faint smile, wrapping her arms around his neck and pulling him close.
A knock on the door startled them both and they exchanged humorously alarmed looks.
"I told you we should've gotten dressed," Elena whispered, trying to wiggle her way out from under Damon, but he was deliberately making it difficult for her.
"And I said 'uh-huh'," Damon said defensively and Elena grinned, grabbed his face and kissed him fiercely on the mouth before scurrying off the bed and zooming to the door to check who it was.
"It's Stefan and Caroline!" Elena announced, zooming back into the room. She pulled Damon's shirt out of her carry-on luggage and threw it at him. "Alaric said he brought you some clothes," she said, blurring toward Alaric's suitcase and quickly locating Damon's clothes.
Damon slid of the bed and to Elena's dismay, instead of helping, grappled her from behind, turned her in his arms and kissed her.
"Damon!..." Elena pushed him away, stifling a laugh. "They're vampires, not ghosts. We need to go open the door. Put some clothes on," she chided him with a smile, pressing three hurried kisses to his lips before leaping to the side and strapping her bra on as quickly as she could.
Without averting his eyes from Elena, Damon promptly got dressed and then silently signaled to her that he was going to go open the door. Elena opened her mouth to protest, but then stopped herself and just nodded with a smile and decided to take this additional moment she got to brush her hair.
On his way toward the door Damon slightly rolled up his sleeves and made a mental note to ask Elena if he was wearing any other clothes than black, because everything Alaric had brought was of that color.
Taking a deep breath and biting back a smile, Damon pulled the door open.
"Oh my God," Caroline gasped out, her hands flying to her cheeks. She stared at Damon with wide eyes for a few seconds and then launched herself toward him and gave him a hug.
But before Damon had the time to smile at having met another dear friend, Caroline abruptly pulled away.
"Now I can hate you again!" she exclaimed, beaming and for a moment Damon wondered if he had heard her correctly, because her words didn't seem to match a genuinely happy grin on her face. "Where is Bonnie?" Caroline asked, drawing a hasty breath and almost shoving Damon to the side on her way into the room. "Bonnie!"
Damon blinked rapidly, a little confused, but then his attention was drawn to the other person who was still standing by the door.
Stefan looked at him, apparently trying to smile or say something or both, but failing.
"You must be my brother," Damon said, pointing a finger at him, a trace of humor in his voice.
Stefan grimaced and laughed brokenly and then just took a step forward and pulled Damon into an embrace that seemed to last for really, really long and when Stefan drew back, he looked so distressed and still unable to speak, that Damon decided he needed to say something to lighten the mood.
"I don't think your girlfriend likes me very much," Damon said with a small smile, wondering if perhaps Caroline was a good person to ask about his 'wrongdoings'.
Stefan gave out a weak chuckle, trying to regain his composure. "Yes, I think I finally found one that doesn't," he blurted out what had seemed like a good joke... for about a split second between him saying the words out loud and a confused look making its way back onto Damon's face.
xxxdelenaxxx
She really should've known better when she was wishing for an interesting life back when her world was limited to hospital hallways.
With a stifled groan caused by a lingering headache, Bonnie sat up and looked around a rather large, desolate space complete with tall, empty window frames that made her think of abandoned factories in thrillers-
She stopped herself, deciding that she must quit coming up with all these nonsensical associations. It was her life, real life, not some horror movie and she should stick to logic and facts.
"Ah, you're awake."
Bonnie jumped to her feet, her eyes darting to Enzo who was sitting by a nearby table that looked a little bizarre in such a place.
"I hope you still like hazelnut-caramel mocha," Enzo said, shifting in his chair and propping one of his legs on his knee. He held Bonnie's bewildered gaze for a moment, before he gestured to a steaming coffee cup on the table, a small smirk playing about his lips.
The smirk seemed to ignite the irritation that quickly overpowered any traces of fear and confusion.
"Who the hell are you and what do you want from me?" Bonnie asked, glaring at him.
Enzo sighed and took a sip of his coffee. "Why don't you sit down?" He said, pointing to the empty chair at the table.
"I don't want to sit down!" Bonnie snapped. "I want you to tell me-"
"Yes, yes, who I am and what I want," Enzo cut her off in a bored tone, still smirking. "But it's actually who you are that's more important at the moment."
Bonnie frowned. "Did you kidnap me for ransom or something?" She asked, suddenly remembering that Jeremy had mentioned that her late father had been a mayor. It was hard to randomly establish any immediate connection, but perhaps-
Bonnie's train of thought was interrupted by Enzo's amused snort.
"I didn't kidnap you," he said, tilting his head to the side. "There's just something we need to do. A secret task we need to complete," he added cryptically, holding her gaze, trying to read from her expression the effect his words were having on her.
He hadn't initially planned on doing it that way, intending to just present her with a request instead. But then he realized that a different approach could be more effective, one that would make his plan look like her responsibility.
"We? A secret task?" Bonnie asked with a grimace, beginning to suspect the man was just some kind of a lunatic and engaging with any kind of conversation with him made no sense.
"You are a witch," Enzo said offhandedly. "We made a pretty good team before..." he waved his hand in a nonchalant manner, "all of that happened."
"A witch?" Bonnie echoed. She shook her head in sincere amusement, trying to ignore the tremor that ran through her not because what he had said was ridiculous, but because she couldn't bring herself to feeling that what he had said was ridiculous.
"Twenty three places," Enzo continued, ignoring the interruption, his expression suddenly becoming more serious as he produced a map out of his pocket and swiftly spread it over the table. "Twenty three buildings in addition to the people on this list," he said, placing a few folded pages of paper on the map. "They all must disappear."
"What people? What places? What team? What are you talking about?" Bonnie asked with growing impatience, taking a few brisk steps toward the table in order to show that she wasn't going to let him intimidate her with some weird and vague pieces of information that made her think of bad movies about contract killers.
"We, meaning you, me and Damon must finish what we've started," Enzo said in a low voice and Bonnie blinked at the mentioning of Damon's name, feeling even more confused now, wondering how all of it, how all of them fit into this one crazy story that was now apparently taking a criminal turn, as if making some ludicrous comments about her being a witch wasn't enough.
Enzo inhaled slowly and glanced at the world map covered with about two dozens of red marks, his expression determined and resigned, as if he was merely setting to do what simply had to be done.
"We'll end the Augustine Society once and for all, Bonnie," Enzo said in a gritty whisper, his smile sending icy-cold shivers up Bonnie's spine. "We'll send it up in flames."