Oh God...twenty reviews in three days, fifteen in just the first twelve hours. Those are deffinite records where I'm concerned. And so, since I most definitely did promise you that if you reviewed more and faster I would update sooner, here it is.

Now, before we go into the chapter, I want to leave something clear. Some people are under the impression that I'm done with the flashes, that's not so. In fact, the flashes will continue throughout the rest of the fic, though, of course, there won't be as many in any given chapter as there were in the first two. The first two are meant to provice you with a timeline, and give you an idea of what our two heroes went through in that time. However, I've still got to tell you other important stuff regarding just what happened to bring it all to an end. There's also the fact, as I believe I've mentioned before, that this is one of two parts. The Bamon romance was originally meant to last no more than seven chapters, before I expanded things to include everyone else and create a sort of continuation for the show; however, when this story began getting more and more developed I eventually decided to simply do those things in a sequel. So, those of you who enjoy Bamon, this story is for your total delight. Those of you who are interested in a continuation for "Fool me Once" diferent than the show, I'm afraid you'll have to wait for the sequel, but I can assure you it's coming.

About the show, I'm going to save you the rant and just say I strongly dislike most of what's going on right now. Which is why I declared this fic as AU as of last chapter. Hope that won't make you not want to read this fic.

And now, since I sincerly doubt you wanna keep reading my notes. I leave you with what you really want. Enjoy!

(Oh, just one last thing. You're free to try and guess what happened with Bonnie and Damon, how they forgot, whoever wins will get a prize...nothing too big, I can offer either an advance of chapters or a One Shot of his or her choosing. So, if you're interested, start guessing!).

Chapter 3. Answers and Questions

There were more flashes of course, but some were so similar to one another that they got a bit confusing. And then there were those, the last ones, that got progressively fuzzier, until she couldn't see or hear anything, all she had were sensations. She remembered Power, a magic greater than any she had come in contact with in the past few months, even stronger than what she had felt when being possessed by Emily; she also remembered a state of alertness, like what she imagined a soldier would feel in the eve of a greatly anticipated battle; then they all got jumbled, a crazy mix of nervousness, fear, panic, protectiveness, horror, resignation, the desire to fight while at the same time feeling the hopelessness of it all…and then a blank. It was like an abrupt, almost anticlimactic ending to it all.

Bonnie was sure that in those last flashes, the ones she could hardly recall anything of, was the key to it all; the reason why she had forgotten, and why it was so important that she remember. There were just so many things, Dark Angel aside, there was also her magic. In the past several weeks since she had begun using her power, she had been going little by little, she was becoming pretty good at making things float, but anything else seemed just too hard, as if she couldn't focus enough. And yet in those flashes, those memories, she had been able to see herself commanding almost all the elements with ease and relative mastery.

The last memory she could fully recall was of two months or so before she turned fifteen; and she had focused on all her memories after said birthday and couldn't find anything strange there. Which meant that whatever had happened, it had happened in those eight weeks, and it had been something big enough to not only take away a part of her past, but also the power she had learnt to use until that moment. Still, that didn't answer the main question:

"What exactly happened?" She questioned aloud.

And, as if the past wasn't complicated enough, the present really wasn't that much better. She still remembered what had happened hours earlier, in the ruins of that old church…

***Flashback***

They, that is Elena, Stefan, Grams and Bonnie, decided the best course of action to get Damon finally off their backs would be to open the tomb, allow Damon to get Katherine, and then burn all the other vampires. It was a good plan, or so the young witch thought, until she realized that wasn't really it.

The real plan involved opening the door, but leaving the seal in place, that meant that when Damon, and the other vampire girl they had met, Anna, went in to get those they wanted, they wouldn't be coming out, neither them nor those they cared for. The plan was a sound one, even though she felt strangely anxious, probably because of the flashes she'd been having; she had to admit that they would be getting rid of all the vampires that were causing them trouble, at the same time. That was a good thing, right?

It was, until they heard Elena scream, and Stefan went in to get her. He knew it, he knew what Grams was planning, that if he went in he wouldn't be able to get out; Elena, being human, didn't have those limitations, but he…and still he went in, he loved her enough to sacrifice himself to spending the rest of eternity inside that cursed tomb.

And the hazel-eyed witch loved him and Elena, as their best friends that they were, she loved them enough not to allow such a sacrifice to take place.

She made up her mind before she was even conscious of it, that seal needed to come down.

"Here, just show me what to do." She told her Grams, while holding Emily's grimoire tightly. "I'll do it."

"We are not strong enough." Sheila argued. "Even if we were able to bring the seal down there's no guarantee that we can get it back up again."

"You said it yourself, many things can fuel a witch's power." Bonnie turned her own Grams' words against her. "Help me, or I'll do it alone."

It was heartbreaking for the young witch, when she watched the exchange between Elena and Stefan as the girl got out of the tomb and realized her boyfriend was incapable of following her. She knew she had to do something, and so tried to reassure them they would make everything right.

At this point Sheila also pointed out that even if they managed to do it, they wouldn't be able to hold it for long; Stefan went back, most likely to get his brother before it was too late.

Finally, Sheila found the right spell, and holding hands the two witches began chanting. The fire on the torches around them burnt brighter, and the power reached a level that even Elena, who had nothing supernatural in her blood knew something was happening.

Anna and her mother were the first to come out, as the vampire-girl promised not to hurt anyone, she only wanted her mother back.

As the magic finished building and became a bit more stable, Bonnie began having trouble holding it, she began shaking, and her focus slipped a bit; still her Grams held onto her, and onto the spell, as strongly as she could.

"Bonnie, Keep going." Sheila urged her.

Bonnie vaguely heard her Grams tell Elena to hurry, and then as her friend called loudly to those still in the tomb to get out, they were losing it. She was losing it. Never before had the young witch felt and tried to control so much power, never…except in those flashes, those almost memories…

She felt it right then, the same odd feeling she got every time she recalled one of those flashes, but this time there was more to it than that, she pushed aside the images, the sounds and focused on the sensations, searching until she found that, the essence of the magic in herself, she gripped it tightly, and still gripping it, forced herself back to reality.

She vaguely heard her grandmother urging her to hold on, to keep the spell going; but now it wasn't hard, in fact, it was almost easy. As she picked up the chant and connected her own core of magic back to the flow they were creating; she could feel it, the magic in every inch of her body, she could feel the spell itself as it worked around her. She could feel something else too, as the magical essence of her Grams began flickering, she was getting too weak to continue, and yet she refused to let go.

Bonnie knew it was because of her, because of what she had threatened to do; how stupid she had been, talking about doing such a spell on her own, when she didn't even understand her own power. But that had changed now, now she knew, she understood. She could see the strength failing her Grams, she was beginning to pour her own life-energy into the spell, and that was something the younger witch wasn't about to allow.

Focusing more she was able to put more of her own power into the spell, taking the brunt of it off the older woman, just allowing her to actually direct it. After all, her grandma still had more experience than she, Bonnie would just make sure she was the one providing the power.

If Sheila noticed how her granddaughter had changed things she didn't say anything, they just continued chanting, on and on, until finally the Salvatore brothers were out.

Then it was done.

They had done it.

***End of Flashback***

They had done a seemingly impossible spell…and they had paid the consequences.

***Flashback***

She knew her grandmother had to be tired, the spell they had done was certainly not an easy one. It had taken their ancestor, Emily, all her power as well as that of Earth itself, and even a comet that passed through the sky to create that seal…what they had done was practically a miracle. She should have known it wouldn't come without a cost.

Bonnie had prepared some of her grandma's favorite tea, hoping it would help even a little; while the older woman certainly didn't like to be babied, the hazel-eyed girl thought she was in her right to worry.

A worry that turned into panic as she went to put the comforter over her Grams, only to realize she wasn't breathing.

"Grams…Grams? Grams wake up."

She looked as if she were asleep, but she wasn't breathing.

"Grams? Grams?!"

Nothing worked.

"Elena!"

Her best friend, she had to be able to do something.

In any case Bonnie couldn't think straight, she could barely breathe herself, and all she could say was the same phrase over and over:

"She's not breathing…She's not breathing…Please wake up!"

On the background she half-heard Elena calling for an ambulance. But she didn't want an ambulance, what good would that do? By the time they got there it would be too late.

Another memory stabbed Bonnie's mind, that of the policeman who had gone to her home, to let her father and herself know that her mother was dead; his words, how the paramedics had been too late to save her…

"She bled out before the ambulance got there…I'm sorry…"

No, an ambulance would be no good, She had to do something.

"I can fix this…I can fix this…Please, Grams…I will fix this." She began mumbling to herself, while flipping through pages of the nearest spell-book.

Elena tried to do something, stop her? Help her? Bonnie wasn't even sure which, neither did she care, not right then. Right then her mind was focused on one thing, and one thing only, saving her grandmother, no matter how.

The spell-book was useless, there was nothing there, nothing to save her Grams, useless. If she could just get her to breathe again…

And suddenly Bonnie recalled something else, something from one of those numerous flashes she had been having recently: It had been like any day in the meadow, practicing in the Meadow and talking to her Dark Angel, she'd been trying to mix two elements, but it didn't seem to work, and then he had told her that she first needed to understand how the elements mixed naturally in her, to be able to mix them in other conditions, she hadn't understood at first, and so he had explained; she could recall those words with perfect clarity:

"Earth in the flesh, bone and organs that make the body…water in the blood that runs through the veins…" she began whispering to herself as she focused on each element separately, sending energy into her Grams' body as she spoke. "Fire in the heat that keeps the body warm…lighting in the nerves that allow thought and movement…" she focused all her power as she added the last part: "And Air in the breath that gives life…"

And then it happened, like a flash of…something. It circled the room, went through Bonnie and finally into Sheila.

The backlash was strong enough to send the teenager to the ground, hard.

"Bonnie!" Elena called worriedly.

But she wasn't listening to anything her friend was saying, all she cared about in the moment was the sound of the encompassed breathing coming from her grandmother.

It had worked. She was alright, she was alive, and she would stay that way.

***End of Flashback***

But not everything was alright. As became clear once the paramedics arrived. According to them Sheila seemed to be perfectly fine, except for the fact where she wouldn't wake up. No matter what anyone did, nothing would wake her up.

A coma, that's what the family doctor had told them, she was in a coma. She was stable, and in no danger at all, so no one really understood why she had gone into a coma.

No one but Bonnie, that is, even after what she'd done, apparently it had only been enough to make sure she would live, but she wasn't fine just yet, her magical core needed to regenerate itself, and that would take some time, from a few weeks to a month.

'At least she's still alive…' Bonnie thought to herself as she hugged her legs to her chest. 'At least I was able to do that much.

After the people in the hospital had been able to convince her that everything that could be done for Sheila was being done, and they got her contact information (her dad was on a trip off-state, again); Bonnie finally went back home.

She had decided to go to her Grams' home, she felt safer there somehow; Elena of course had tagged along, worried about Bonnie doing something reckless. But Bonnie wasn't planning on doing anything risky, all she wanted in that moment was to know the truth, to know it and understand; she needed to, in order to decide what to do with her life.

She had created a magic circle, and gone into meditation, as deep as she could. Once there she had begun to unearth each and every flash she had had in the past week.

And so there she was, she finally knew the truth, or most of it at least; she had recovered the pieces of her past she didn't know she had been missing; discovered she had once had a best friend other than Elena, one that had also been her personal protector, her Dark Angel; and finally that this same man was also a vampire, and not just any vampire but Damon Salvatore himself. Could life get any more complicated for her? Probably.

Truth is that finding out all that hadn't made things easier, it had just complicated everything even more. She now knew the truth, but she still didn't know how and why she had forgotten in the first place, and had definitely no idea where exactly he stood regarding everything…and she was just too terrified to ask. She honestly didn't know which answer she would hate the most: the possibility that he might still remember, might have always known, and just didn't care? Was she of so little importance to him that he had tried to kill her even after what he'd promised to her? Had her personal savior really tried to become her killer? And if he forgot as well, if he didn't remember…why? What happened to make him into what she'd been seeing the past few months? Where had her Dark Angel gone?

"I need some answers…" Bonnie muttered in a low voice, staring without seeing at the flame of the half-consumed candle before her. "I really need some answers…Please…"

She wasn't expecting an answer, and she didn't get one, at least not directly, instead she felt like some sort of invisible breeze that began swirling around her; she ignored it for several seconds, until she noticed it kept building up. Finally, she got on her feet and allowed the wind to pretty much guide her, from her room down the hall, walking by a bathroom, the guest-bedroom where Elena was sleeping, the study and finally into her Grams' bedroom. She kept walking until she reached the small table by the side of the bed, there she found a letter laying against the nightlight. And then the wind stopped.

Still confused, Bonnie took the piece of paper into her hands, it had her name in her Grams' swirly handwriting, and once she unfolded it she found it was actually a letter addressed from the older witch to her. Half-confused the teenager turned on the nightlight, not really noticing she hadn't actually touched it when doing it and then, not comfortable at the idea of sitting in her Grams' bed after what had happened, she knelt on the carpet beside it and began reading:

My Dearest Child:

There's so much that needs to be said, and so little time to say it. I just left you with your friends in the sitting room, letting you believe I had to get some supplies for the spell we will be casting. But I just knew I had to write this down.

Just a paragraph into the letter, Bonnie was already having trouble wrapping her mind around it all. Her grandma had written that just a few hours before, right as they had been getting ready to go open that tomb.

I don't know how things will turn out tonight; for the first time since I reached my magical-maturity I honestly don't know how things will turn out regarding something serious, and that chills me to the bone. Not for myself, I don't fear my own death, but I fear yours. You my dear, you who are so innocent, so wonderfully bright even after everything you've been through. I fear your death, and the things that could happen to you that are worse than that. I came so close to losing you once already, and I already lost Leah, I can't lose you too.

That's why I agreed with you kids' plan of opening the tomb. I know it's a bad idea, I can feel it in my bones, something will go wrong tonight. But I also know that if I don't go, you'll try on your own, and you'll lose your life.

'It's my fault.' The thought hit the young witch like a cannonball, making her feel dizzy and nauseous at the same time. 'I'm so stupid, so very, very stupid, I should have never insisted we did that second spell, but I was just so sure we could do it, that we had to do it, for Elena and Stefan. She's my best friend, and I owe him my life after what happened in the forest that time. I couldn't just leave him trapped. I truly believed I could handle it, especially after I was able to reach my own magical core.' Another thought entered her mind, making her feel even sicker. 'What if I hadn't reached it? What if not only I hadn't been able but if that had caused my Grams' death, not just a coma, but her actual death?'

She knew the answer to that question easily, she would have never forgiven herself. That was not innocence, not even naiveté, it was plain stupidity on her part.

Something else struck her as well, her Grams had known things would go wrong, and still she had gone through with it. How much must the old woman love her to be willing to lay down her own life but something that wasn't even going to give them positive results…

"Oh Grams…I love you too…" she whispered, her voice broken with sobs. "I was so stupid. Please, forgive me…please."

There was no answer, not that she had actually been expecting one, so instead she went back to reading the rest of the letter.

I know what you must be thinking when you read this, if I really am not by your side you'll blame it all on yourself, whatever actually went wrong, you'll berate yourself until you honestly believe it was all your fault. Don't. I'm not a child, I'm your grandmother, I'm perfectly capable of deciding what to do with my own life. Whatever happens, good or bad, it was my choice, and if you blame yourself for it, it would be the same as ignoring my right to choose for myself, to dictate the path of my own life.

"Oh Grams…" Bonnie gasped, tears steadily falling down her face.

Very well, she wouldn't blame herself…or at least she would try not to.

You have such potential, such great power at your disposal; you just aren't able to tap into it yet. But you will someday; someday you'll become the most powerful Bennett witch to ever live, it's been prophesized that way since the beginning of time: The end of the line, the end of an era…the beginning of a whole new world.

The most powerful Bennett witch…if those weren't high expectations she had no idea what they were. And yet the way her grandma spoke, it was as if she had witnessed such power already, was she a precog? Or maybe it was something of those two months of flashes she still couldn't fully recall.

And then there were those cryptic words: end of the line? End of an era? Beginning of a new world? It all sounded a bit too apocalyptic for her tastes, and yet some instinct in her gut screamed warning into her mind.

Such great things await you baby, which is why you can't die tonight. You are needed, much more than this old lady ever will be. You will be needed soon, the people will need you, Mystic Falls will need you, He will need you. You're the key to so many things…but only if you are willing to be, only if you're ready to deal with the responsibility, to embrace your heritage, your Power.

Even more high expectations, and cryptic comments. Sometimes she wished her grandma could just give her a straight answer, even if just one time; but she had always been that way, even when Bonnie was little.

You must be feeling so very confused right now, and if my fears come true and I'm not there with you when you find this letter, then probably confusion won't be the only thing you'll be feeling. It's alright to grieve, it's alright to cry, but never allow the tears to blind you to the world around you. So much depends on you my dear.

I know it's not fair to lay such a burden on you, but I'm afraid you're the only one who can bear it sweety. And no matter what you may fear, you're not alone, you never will be. No matter how dark things may seem, hope will always shine its light.

Light…oh, how Bonnie wish she could actually see one in that moment, one light, any light, something to make her believe she actually stood a chance in all the craziness.

You're His Hope as much as He is Yours, never forget that. And never forget either that the strongest promises can be bend many times, but never really broken, even when you cannot remember them, they're always there.

"He?" Bonnie couldn't help but speak aloud, even when there was no one who could listen. "Is she talking about…?"

Her mouth lost its voice, but her mind had no trouble finishing the thought: 'My Dark Angel?'

Believe in Yourself, and Believe in Him, and all shall be right.

May the Spirits always guide your path.

With all the love in my heart…

Your Grams.

"I love you too Grams, so very much…" Bonnie sobbed. "I promise I'll find a way to make everything better. You'll recover and wake up, and that whole episode in the tomb will be nothing more than an awful nightmare."

As she knelt there, on the carpet, in her Grams' bedroom, one sole question took form in the teenage witch's mind:

"What do I do now?"

And say you'll hold

A place for me

In your heart.