Author's Note: Hello everyone! Sorry about the long wait! I've been working a lot and this was definitely not an easy chapter to write so I've been really taking my time. I was feeling very conflicted about this chapter but of course, the wonderful Millennion convinced me to go ahead and push forward. I hope that you guys continue to enjoy! Let me know what you think!

Comissioned: Millennion

She screams.

Horrible, terribly wailing that shreds away at her eardrums as she collapses into the darkness that swallows her up. She thrashes about wildly, searching for something stable to grasp onto. Every time it feels like she's just about to grab hold of a lifeline, it slips between her fingers like water and she's left to frantically continue her search for salvation.

Caroline knows this drowning feeling. Where it feels like her head has slipped beneath a heavy wave as the weight of the water wraps around her, pulling her further, deeper into its depths. She knows the feeling of pressure in her lungs and a tightness in her throat she struggles for air. The wild panic that turns her fires her blood through her veins like a firehose as her vision is surrounded by blackness, the lightness in her head terrifying her more than almost anything else. The only thing that tops even that? The silence.

Her body is screaming. Her veins pulsating, her heart pounding, her muscles tense, her motions wild, and in her mind, she's screaming. Her eyes flicker back in forth in the growing darkness trying to catch a shred of light. She feels the tearing at her throat and the ache of her lungs as she forces out air as shrill and as strong as she can - yet she hears nothing. Complete and total silence. There aren't even bubbles floating from her lips to let her know that she was in fact screaming, it was just muffled. But there was nothing. Nothing but the fear, and panic, and the silence.

The terror in that chills her more.

She reaches out with one wild hand toward the sky, watching as the light gets further and further away. She can hear her screaming as she imagined it would, in her own head. Somehow she knows that there is no noise in her ears. It's a very disconnected feeling. In a way, she feels like she's being severed from her own body. Bit by bit, thread by thread she's being torn apart.

But this isn't the first time she's felt like this.

When relations between her parents began to disintegrate, Caroline did all she could think of to keep her family together. It felt so abrupt, so sudden, that her father came out as gay and divorced her mother. Then in a matter of days, her father was packing his things and moving out. Goodbye felt like a pat on the shoulder, a kiss on the forehead, and a quick 'I love you'.

There aren't words to describe how she felt right afterward. She felt hopeless and abandoned and the only modicum of cathartic release that she could find was to take it out on her mom. It both made her feel better and made her feel even worse. A horrible vicious cycle.

Caroline blamed Liz for not being enough. For not being good enough. Not to make her dad straight, she knew that wasn't a choice, but somehow, her mom was supposed to be able to do anything. She was supposed to be better than anyone else at everything else. Yet she couldn't make her own husband stay. Yet she couldn't tell that Bill Forbes wasn't straight, and honestly, wasn't ready to be a father.

She knew that her father loved her. He loved her in the way that one would love anything that they were obligated to love. Like a pet or family. He would look after her and talk to her, but the love always felt conditional. It always felt like it was forced, in a way. Sure, there must be something in him that loves her, but it's not what she thinks love should be. It always felt detached, limited. Caroline hated that. She hated always feeling like that. Feeling like she was being tolerated, not loved.

Caroline wasn't completely sure that it wasn't normal. She had seen Elena's loving parents, and Bonnie's dad and grams. Caroline even had her own mom who she felt closer to what she wanted. But she always wanted that connection to her dad, and just being with him and watching him, Caroline was just finally coming to terms with the idea that maybe Bill just wasn't like that. That her father loved her in the only way that he could, which was the same way that he loved everybody, even her mom, who she thought was the love of her father's life.

Then they divorced and while Caroline was desperately trying to hold the frail pieces of her life together, desperately trying to understand, she met Stephan, her dad's boyfriend. And Caroline, for the first time in her life, hated him. Not Stephan. No, Stephan wasn't a homewrecker like Caroline wanted to imagine he was. Stephan was kind and sweet and welcoming.

She hated her father. Hated every bright smile, expression of love, and the absolution that came with feeling free. She was happy that he felt he no longer had to hide who he was, but she hated that he was so much happier without them.

Caroline wasn't ready to accept that she wasn't good enough. That in part, she was another reason Bill couldn't stay. She could visit, and he would love her and treat her well, but there was always a relief that came when she left, a light in his smile like things could go back to normal, that he could be himself once more and be happy. The pain of not being good enough burned Caroline so badly, she wanted someone else to feel her pain as she did.

And the only person left was her mother. It's not fair, it's unkind, and Caroline hates herself even more whenever she thinks about it, but white-hot pain of abandonment that forces the quick, unnecessary jab from her lips and hurts her mom's feelings. And in that split-second decision, another small thread that holds the pieces of Caroline together snaps.

Caroline has seen enough movies, read enough books, and told enough tales about love and life to know that this is nothing. She can get over this. Everyone has felt destroyed in some way when their family life has shaken up. Everyone has felt lost when the interests of their friends divert from their own. Everyone has felt lonely when those that they thought they couldn't live without, live on well without them there. Caroline isn't special. She's not the first person to have felt any of this. Some people even have it so much worse than her, and she has to remind herself that she isn't anything special. That a story like hers is told a thousand times before. At least Caroline has both parents. At least she's in good health and is doing well in school, captain of her cheerleading squad, and well on her way to being Miss Mystic Falls.

Caroline can be sad, but it can only go so far. So many other people have it worse than her, and she has to remember that.

But that feeling is familiar, that sinking, drowning feeling. She'll be okay, she just has to push past the annoying little voice in her head that wants to make it all about herself. Make it about her and her pain. The thing that she remembered best about those times, was the screaming beneath the surface. Her lips fell flat, her eyes wide and alert, but inside she couldn't help it.

Inside, she screamed.

Caroline sits up slowly from her bed, turning her head slightly to look at the light pouring in from the curtains. The light of day feels harsh against her eyes and her skin and when she moves, there is an ache across her body. Her arms, her back, her legs. She looks down at her body to see that she's managed to redress in her undergarments and this sinking emptiness fills her. She lifts up her arm, looking at the series of unusual... bite marks up her arms, and she can feel them on her shoulders and neck. They look like a series of two puncture holes all over her body.

And that ache. That ache that can't be anything but what it is.

The night flashed before her eyes. Damon on the streets, cornering her, telling her to invite him into her house, her body disobeying the screaming in her mind, and the sex. So much sex and biting and... his eyes. He drank her blood. Like... like...

Caroline looks at the bed next to her to see Damon sleeping peacefully and her heart jumps up into her throat. For a moment, she's paralyzed in that fear, staring down at his handsome, sleeping face. He looks like an angel with dark hair, mused by sleep with dark eyelashes resting against pale cheeks. He would have been the type of boy Caroline would shamelessly chase had things ended up differently. Now, all she can do is look down at him in horror and fear. He wasn't just some guy who raped her and for whatever reason stuck around. He was a monster.

She sucks in a few, trembling breaths before slowly pulling the covers off of her legs as she slowly slides off the bed, not wanting to wake Damon up. He's... something. He... he isn't human. She's not sure what he is, but he can't be human.

Caroline looks straight ahead to see her own face staring back at her from the full-length mirror on the other side of the room. She watches as tears trickle down the face of the girl reflected back at her. Her pale face, the dark circles under her eyes. Her hair all messed up from sex and sleeping and bruises like hands across her body. She doesn't look like Caroline. She looks like death.

Caroline screams on the inside as the terror and fear wash through her in waves. She pushes through the shaking in her limbs as she slips her legs out from under the covers and lowers them slowly to the carpet, her heart pounding in her chest. Die... she's going to die. She has no idea why he let her live, but it feels like borrowed time.

Her heart is pounding like a drum in her ears as she slips from the bed and around it, heading for the door. Where was her mom? Was she home? Did she pull another all-nighter?

Caroline didn't know. All she knew was that she had to get out of this room. She had to get away from this dangerous stranger. This Damon. He kept her alive, no doubt because of whatever reason he is obsessed with Elena, but she knows that's only for now. She can feel it. He won't let her live long after he gets what he wants.

Her hand reaches out, wrapping around the cold metal of her doorknob - and the floor creeks under her weight. Caroline freezes as pure fear paralyzes all of the muscles in her body. Adrenaline heightens her hearing but there isn't any sound coming from the bed behind her. Either Damon is still asleep, or he simply opened his eyes and hasn't moved otherwise. There is a slight sound of her hand shaking on the doorknob over the pounding of her heart in her chest. Her lack of blood making her lightheaded, but the adrenaline in her veins urging her forward and forgetting about the ache and weakness of her body.

Caroline blinks a few times rapidly, knowing she should just swing the door open and run for her life, as fast as her legs can carry her to someone - anyone - that could help her, but she felt a fresh wave of fear lock her in place. She had no idea of how light of a sleeper Damon was. What if he heard that noise? What if he was awake and watching her? She warred with herself. Half wanted to damn the consequences and run for it, the other still wanting to air on the side of caution and sneak away quietly.

The internal conflict tightened her muscles and locked her in place. Then, before she can keep fighting with herself, she sneaks a peek over her shoulder to look at the bed, to see that it's empty.

Damon was gone.

Then she felt him standing behind her, watching her with the eyes of a predator, pitying her for being naive enough to think that she could get away from him. She lets out a scream of terror and tries to swing the door open, but he stops her, closing the door with superior strength. She breaks away before he can lock her in between his body and the door, rushing to grab a lamp off of her table, barely hearing him as he tells her to not do it before it she throws it at his head and it breaks off of him without even making him flinch. He just purses his lips at her as her flight instinct kicks into overdrive. She scrambles across the bed, needing to put something physical between them, even though she knows that he's fast enough to get around it.

He walks around the other side, smiling coyly at her. He says something but she doesn't hear, her blood roaring in her ears as she makes another break for the door, screaming when he grabs hold of her and tosses her onto the bed, landing on top of her in a few smooth movements. He leans in close, hot breath washing across her face as she screams, terrified tears rolling down her cheeks.

"Shhh," Damon says softly, staring into her eyes. "Stop screaming."

And she did. Her mouth snapped closed, staring back up into Damon's pretty blue eyes. His irises dance and she feels her desire to scream grow, but the ability to do so fades. On the inside, she screams in horror as her body refuses to obey her once more, and she is caught under his devilish spell, forced to obey.

Vampire. Damon is a vampire.

That's what he told her as he drank her blood. That's what sort of monster he was. He could move fast, was very strong, and was able to manipulate her mind, making her do whatever it was that he wanted her to do. He was able to take away her free will, just like that! Just by looking into his eyes, she would fall under his spell.

Damon compelled away her fear - on the outside. He compelled away her voice - on the outside. And he compelled away her freewill - on the outside. On the outside, she smiled and laughed. She asked questions and listened to him talk about Elena and someone named Katherine. He also spoke about Stefan too, about his own brother.

Stefan Salvatore's brother, Damon Salvatore.

Ironic. Caroline was vying for the attention of the new boy in school but managed to be picked up by the brother. And not in a good way. Damon turned out to be far worse than any of the stories say about bad boys. He wasn't human. He wasn't tormented with a nice side - and if he was, it was reserved for someone else - and he wasn't someone to be trusted. He was a very bad guy.

On the outside, she was as close to normal as someone could make her be. She knew that her actions weren't her own, and prayed that others would be able to tell the difference too, but it doesn't seem like it. Caroline feels like she's trapped, like sleep paralysis, in her own body while it does whatever Damon tells it to. But not always. Caroline, slowly, felt herself regaining small bits of control. Not a lot, and not really control either. It felt like she was able to recognize herself, if only for a moment, beneath the compulsion blanket that Damon pulled over her eyes.

But on the inside, Caroline listened. She listened to him talk, obeyed his commands, and while she tried desperately to reach out to her friends. While smiling at them and trying her best to act out of the ordinary without running into the compulsion wall that Damon put up around her, they smiled back. Relief in their eyes and their smiles, unable to see that on the side, she was screaming. She knows that she isn't the easiest person to get along with, but surely she is acting out of character enough that they know that something is wrong. Shouldn't they?

Then again, they might just be wrapped up in all their own things to notice. They don't owe her anything.

Damon spends a lot of time around her. He kept her home all day from school, finally letting her go to cheer practice afterward. He told her to act normal before kissing her and driving off, promising to be back to pick her up. Caroline's mind whirled. Throughout the practice, she tried to fight the part inside of her that wanted to obey, finding it extraordinarily exhausting and that the will kept slipping away from her, bit by bit. It took tremendous effort to reach out to Bonnie and Elena, and the only way she could without compulsion blackening out her senses was to act somewhat bitchy to Elena, something she wouldn't normally do - or at least she thought so.

But instead of noticing something was up, Elena simply obeyed, walking to the back of the group to half-heartedly watch the moves, and turn her attention to Stefan Salvatore, playing out on the field. In her head, Caroline is screaming for Elena to hear her, to notice that something was wrong, but she doesn't. Her eyes are too focused on the field, her mind elsewhere.

Caroline felt her fight start to leave her again as she slips back into her zombie-like state, trapped within her own mind. They went back to cheer practice as if nothing ever happened. Screaming Caroline slowly grew silent.

Dinner at Elena's house had Caroline shrieking - on the inside. It took her a while - throughout the day - to pull herself back to the surface of the water, trying to fight through the hypnotic effect of Damon's compulsion. Elena was there. Elena was what Damon wanted and she was right there, inviting him into her home - something he needed in order to get to her - like it was nothing. In the darkest parts of her mind, she could see Stefan, through a murky haze, trying to convince Elena to not invite Damon in and it burns Caroline.

He knows. He knows what Damon is, maybe even what Damon wants with Elena, but instead of telling her that he was dangerous, he tries to keep his secrets. Their secrets.

And he knew that Caroline wasn't in control of her body. He had to of known! When his green eyes find her blue ones, she can see it. He knows what's happening to her. Knows that she doesn't have control of herself, and yet he doesn't help her. Pity flashes in his eyes but that quickly passes. Caroline burns in anger on the inside at the look. She doesn't want pity, she wants help. She wants to be free of Damon and the death grip he has on her. He won't let her go because of whatever it was that he wanted from Elena.

Now, don't get Caroline wrong, she's happy that someone is looking out for Elena because the last thing she wants is for something to happen to her best friend, but she can't figure out why Stefan was letting this happen to Caroline. She didn't do anything wrong, she doesn't think. She doesn't deserve this, does she? Sure she hasn't been the greatest friend, and she's an even worse daughter, but this shouldn't be happening to her, right? This isn't punishment, is it? Damon Salvatore, his vampirism, and his ability to make her claustrophobic whilst inside her own body? No, it can't be. It can't!

...can it?

Stefan doesn't like her, that much he's made obvious. But surely she hasn't annoyed him enough to warrant this? To warrant this level of dismissal. Has she? She's never tried to be bad, she knows that it's all based on the person and she definitely isn't the easiest person to get along with, but surely she hasn't done anything that justified Stefan allowing this to continue, right?

Unless by Caroline being targeted like this... Elena is somehow safe? Caroline can't begin to imagine how that is possible, but she's starting to wonder. Seeing as Damon is focused on Elena and Stefan is too, that maybe, just maybe, this might have something more to do with Elena's safety. Can Caroline swallow her fear, steal her heart, and face this fear without flinching to help Elena?

She's not sure, but she'll try. She loves Elena. She can fight her way through this. She just needs to keep calm. She'll figure out how to get out from under Damon, and then both of them will be free.

Damon compels her into the kitchen to help Elena and Bonnie, and the threads holding Caroline above the surface compulsion sever and she slips beneath it once more.

As much as it hurt with her friends being unable to tell that something was wrong with her, Caroline felt absolute agony rip at her chest when Liz could tell right away that something was amiss. One look at Caroline and Liz's face contorted in worry as she walked around the kitchen table to stand in front of the tall blonde with her eyebrows pulled together.

"Are you okay, sweetie?" Liz asks, studying her face. "You look so pale. Are you not feeling well?"

Inside, Caroline cries in relief, begging her mother to just somehow know what was happening as the desire to blurt out what was happening was being stomped down by Damon's compulsion. Of course. Of course. All along, it was Liz. Her own mother could see that something was obviously very wrong with her. Something not even her own friends could tell. Not Bonnie or Elena.

Liz saw it and was reaching out to help her. And all Caroline can feel on the inside is a shame for how terribly she's treated her mother and love for her. Liz really was able to do anything. And no doubt loved Caroline more than Caroline ever gave her credit for. She wanted to tell Liz how much she loved her. How much she appreciated her noticing that something was wrong. Tell her about Damon and everything that has happened. About Elena and Stefan. How terrified she is and how much she desperately needs help.

But when she opens her mouth, "Uh, yeah, I'm fine. Why wouldn't I be?" Slips from her lips. So cold. So bratty. And it kills Caroline to see the concern in her mother's eyes build, but the dismissal of her concerns seems to hurt her. But Liz pushes past it because she's not going to let her daughter's brattiness override her concern for her only child.

"I'm not sure. You just seem a little tired lately. Do you... want to stay home from school?" Liz asks, staring into her eyes.

Caroline does. She wants to so bad because, despite the energy in her body, there is this weakness, this fatigue in her bones that has been following her around since probably long before Damon showed up, but she's just now giving it the attention that it deserves. And there is a bit of relief in that. A bit of comfort in becoming more aware of her body.

But Damon doesn't want that. He wants her to act as normal as possible. Go to school. Watch Elena. Don't draw too much attention.

So she doesn't. She just shakes her head and says, "No. I have things I need to do today. I'm fine. I'll see you later. Bye!" Before turning and walking to the door, pretending she doesn't feel her mother's worried eyes on her back as she walks away. Caroline cries pitifully for her mother in the quiet of her mind as she slips beneath the compulsion once more.

Another thread snapping.

"Damon?"

Caroline slips away after the commotion with Jeremy and Tyler fighting before the game. She didn't want to, she was relieved for any chance to get away from Damon, even for a short time. But something pulled at her. This feeling that she can't explain, something that started burying Caroline once more beneath the surface of her mind. Somehow she knew it was compulsion related. It has to have something to do with the many things that Damon has compelled Caroline to do ever since they first met.

Caroline isn't sure what it was, but she finds herself standing in the back of the building, looking between both Salvatore brothers. Her brain is unable to focus beyond the feeling of needing to be around Damon. Something to fulfill the desire placed by the compulsion, her brain tries desperately to explain.

She stands there, rooted in place as Stefan and Damon argue, her ears filling with water as their conversation dies away. She's slipping in and out of the compulsion's full control, desperately fighting it. She doesn't know why she's here or what Damon wanted her there for, but she knows, with absolute certainty, that this was not the place that she wanted to be. She wanted to be as far away from both Damon and Stefan. One who was her tormentor since the moment that she met him, and the other a cruel bystander, who stands on the sidelines, watching as Damon picks apart the threads that hold Caroline together bit by bit without saying a single word to help her.

He doesn't partake in the cruelty done upon her. Stefan, she means. But in those rare moments between blasts of compulsion, Caroline feels bitterness brewing in her chest. He knows. They are the same. He knows and he does nothing. He's leaving her to her fate like she means nothing. They were sort of becoming friends kinda, before all of this, and even if they weren't. What decent person would just sit by and let this happen?

Caroline can't breathe. Her throat feels torn to shreds with screams she can't release.

Stefan keeps sending her these silent looks that she can barely process as she stands there, swaying slightly back and forth, waiting for a spoken command. She's not sure why she's waiting, or what exactly she's waiting for. She's not even sure Damon knows. She seems... to be a tool to rile Stefan up, but Caroline's mind is too befuddled to be able to comprehend why.

But now that she's there, and they are alone, Stefan says, softly, "Leave her out of this, Damon. She's innocent of all of this. Caroline is just a simple human. She hasn't anything to do with anything. You don't need her. She can't even hurt a fly."

Whatever else Damon was about to say dies just then on his lips, as they slowly form into a smile chilled enough to extinguish the sun. Stefan tenses up, no doubt recognizing that more than even Caroline does, and even while terrified, her face remains impassive, but on the inside, she's crying in fear. Terror is coursing through her so intensely she feels herself starting to push through the thin blanket of compulsion once more. She can't do this anymore. She's so scared. She has to get away from this. Away from them.

Damon turns icy blue eyes over to her, considering something as he brings up a single pointer finger up to his lips, nibbling on the end of it for a moment before looking over at Stefan, pointing at him with that finger. "You know what, brother?" Damon asks smoothly. "You are absolutely right."

Stefan's eyebrows pull together in obvious concern, not even for a moment buying that something has changed for the good in their situation. Caroline's heart sinks into her shoes as a noise draws her attention to the door that she just came through a few minutes before.

Out walks Mr. Tanner, their terrible history teacher, and something about the way that Damon leisurely turns his attention to him makes Caroline's blood turn to ice in her veins. She doesn't know what Damon is going to do, only that it won't be anything good.

Mr. Tanner looks around at them. First at Stefan, then Damon, and finally his eyes fall on Caroline. Their hateful teacher looks at them all confused and while Caroline has never liked the guy for any reason whatsoever, something in her heart told her that Mr. Tanner was in immediate danger. Now, she normally feels that with anyone who comes close to Damon, but something in the way that Damon smiled at the evil history teacher made her knees start to shake as fear swelled up in her chest.

She screamed for him to run, but her lips stayed closed and her face impassive. More and more she fights herself and the compulsion that is wrapping around her like a viper, pulling her further and further beneath the waves. She gasps for air, trying, fighting desperately but she starts to sink further.

And then, Damon is standing next to her, placing his hands on her shoulder and leaning his cheek against her own. She feels him smile as her body relaxes to the compulsion. She turns her face toward his, against her own will, and his pretty blue eyes turn to her own. "Do me a favor, Carebear. Seeing as we love to prove boorish Stefan wrong, why don't you show him that you can hurt more than even a fly."

She tried so hard to fight it but felt herself drown beneath the surface once more, all of the energy, all of the fight leaving her. She screams hoarse as she thrashes about in the darkness, screaming, crying, begging for someone to save her as her body begins to move on its own.