A/N: Exams have been seriously kicking my ass, but your reviews gave me life, guys! Thank you for your amazing words and for favoriting and following MPH! Here's a new chapter for you, my little Xmas elves! You thought last chapter was crazy? You ain't seen nothing yet. ;P
Happy reading and Merry Christmas to you all, lovelies!
Disclaimer: I do not own The Vampire Diaries or any of its characters. This is a work of fiction written for entertainment purposes, but the original characters and original storylines present in "My Paper Heart" are my own work.
Katherine's POV
I was finally leaving that crappy little town behind me. I hadn't really been able to stay away from Maya the first time—I hadn't really wanted to—but this time was different. No one was allowed to stamp recklessly on my pride. A lot of people had fallen at my feet, kissed the ground I walked on and begged to get my attention over the centuries. I was about to give them that immeasurable pleasure again. I was done being careful and playing nice. Even though my little revenge plot hadn't been as satisfying as I thought it would be, I couldn't care less anymore. The world was waiting for me. And I was planning to have a feast. I would just have Lucy keep an eye on Maya and keep me posted on what she was exactly.
Now that I was back to being my usual self, I would have felt light, even giddy if it wasn't for the constant buzzing of my phone. I snatched it from the dashboard with annoyance and looked at the screen. Damon was calling for the sixth time already. I put it back on the dashboard. He would get tired of talking to my voicemail eventually.
When my phone buzzed four more times, I snapped it back up irritably.
"What?" I barked icily.
"What do you mean 'what'? I've been calling you for half an hour already!"
"Odd. That's exactly how long I've been ignoring you. Get to the point Damon, I'm not in the mood."
"Aw...are you pouting because your little stunt didn't work out the way you planned it?" he asked, mockingly concerned. I rolled my eyes and hung up the phone. A smirk grew on my lips, knowing perfectly well that he was going to call again in a few seconds. And...bingo.
"Get a hint, Salvatore. When people don't answer their phones or hang up on you, it's because they don't want to talk to you," I sneered, snubbing him in my most distinguished tone.
"Is she with you?" He ignored my taunting, his question sounding serious and borderline desperate. I frowned.
"Who?"
"What do you mean, who? Maya, of course! Who else would even tolerate having you around?" he spat out impatiently.
"I didn't hear you complaining this morning..."
"That's because you had your mouth all over mine."
"Again. I didn't hear you complaining." I giggled when I heard him groan.
"Is she? With you?" he repeated, obviously wrestling to keep his snarky self in check.
"Did her behavior this morning give you the impression that she'd want to have a little one-on-one with me?" I asked lightly, biting back my bitterness.
"No. But since you didn't get what you wanted, I thought that maybe you went back to your good old ways and knocked her unconscious to throw her in your trunk." I gasped at his accusation and tossed the phone on the passenger seat out of anger. I froze a second later, shocked by my own reaction. Was I really feeling scandalized that he thought I would hurt her? It wouldn't be the first time. I had already hurt her. Physically, for sure. Not to mention that I had tortured and killed more souls than I could count. Or remember.
I gritted my teeth and tightened my grip around the steering wheel, not liking the trick my humanity was playing on me one bit. My phone buzzed again. And again. I growled and fished it from the passenger seat.
"You have five seconds," I articulated with cold anger.
"She's missing."
"I figured. Three seconds left."
"No, I mean, it's not like she's playing hooky, or locked herself somewhere to be alone. She disappeared."
"Really fascinating, Damon. But as you cleverly noticed earlier, I'm in my car. I left town. I don't care about your little melodrama."
"Bullshit."
"Excuse me?" I raised an offended eyebrow.
"She was in the woods with Bonnie. She started running and...we've been looking for her for five hours now. She's nowhere to be found," he said in a rush, and for the first time since the beginning of this conversation, there was real worry in his voice. I heard the Bennett witch in the background, pressing him to tell me something. "Bonnie thinks you know. She wants me to tell you that she wasn't exactly herself when she vanished." I instantly slammed on my brakes, hard.
"What?!" Couldn't this moron have said that right from the start? "In which direction did she disappear?" I demanded, picturing myself crushing Damon's heart in my hand.
"According to Bonnie: west." I had headed to the north, planning to go to New York. I turned the steering wheel sharply and hit the gas pedal. The tires squealed as I did a U-turn. "But we don't know if she's running straight ahead, in zigzags or even changing her direction! Hell, we don't even know how fast she can run, or for how long. She could be in Canada right now, or just a few miles from Mystic Falls..."
"That was really helpful," I mocked dryly. "I'm on my way."
I had hung up and slid the phone quickly on the dashboard when a movement caught my eye in the rear-view mirror. I hadn't seen anything clearly, but my gut was telling me to check it out. I eased the car to a complete stop and squinted into the side view mirror. My heart skipped a beat at the reflection, my lips parting in surprise. Maya?
I slowly unbuckled my seat belt and opened the door. I needed to be sure. This girl in the middle of the road looked an awful lot like her, but something about her posture, about her general being, was definitely off. I left the car behind, door ajar, and walked toward her at a slow pace. She hadn't seen me yet, and I didn't want to scare her off. She was scanning the infinity of trees surrounding us, the asphalt, the road lines like she had never seen such things in her life before. I was still three hundred feet from her when she finally heard me. Her head whipped around and her gaze met mine. My breath hitched in my throat as I took an instinctive step backward. Her icy blue eyes had disappeared once more, replaced by two bronze orbs. Black rims were circling her irises and her pupils were incredibly small. She wasn't staring at me. She was piercing every inch of my skin.
I silenced the instinct building inside me telling me to flee and started walking toward her again cautiously, at a moderate pace so she wouldn't feel threatened. She observed every single one of my movements, never averting her eyes, not even for a split second. When I had covered half of the distance separating us, she suddenly hunched down in a startlingly animalistic way. In a defensive way. I paused for a moment.
"Maya?" I tried softly. Her stare didn't falter one bit. Her lack of response gave me the impression that her name wasn't registering to her. That was a bad omen. If she was heedless of her own name, it probably meant that the person I had in front of me wasn't Maya. And I didn't know a thing about that version of her. Well, except that she obviously didn't like bacon, judging by what had happened in my hotel room. I snapped out of my thoughts and mentally went through my options. My better choice was to reawaken her humanity. If it didn't work, well...I would use force. Nothing I couldn't handle. Satisfied with my plan, I resumed my walk toward her.
"Maya?" I called to her again smoothly. Her gaze was locked on my moving legs, her body crouching down even more with my every step. I stopped to get her attention back on my voice. "Maya? It's me. It's Katherine." She looked up slowly and stared into my eyes with a blank expression. Finally, a light frown appeared on her face, and she titled her head to the side. If it wasn't for her dehumanized, impervious eyes, she would have looked like a cute puppy. Her response seemed to indicate that she was familiar with me somehow. Unexpected, but perfect.
"We've been looking for you for a while now...everybody is really worried about you," I exaggerated in a gentle tone, trying to trigger some kind of feelings inside her to bring her back to reality. "Especially Bonnie. She's afraid that something bad happened to you." She was listening to me with riveted attention, but none of my words seemed to affect her. I took a step forward to get closer to her, but she immediately took a step back. I froze and raised my hands in front of me in a reassuring way.
"There's no need to be scared. It's fine. I'm just here to bring you home," I said quietly, giving her a warm smile. She straightened her head and sniffed the air around her. She was smelling me. Hopefully, the scent would not bring back the wrong memories. Just in case, I needed to distract her.
"Elena, Caroline, Bonnie, Damon and Stefan are waiting for you. They are your friends, remember? And they can't wait to see you..." I started walking toward her again cautiously, one of my hands still outstretched as a peace offering. Surprisingly, she let me come closer. She scrutinized me warily all the way but didn't make a move to escape.
When I was finally standing a couple of feet from her, something suddenly flashed in her eyes, and before I could comprehend what was happening, she was running toward the woods. And she was incredibly fast. But not as fast as I was. I dashed and caught up with her when she reached the verge of the road. I opened my arms to encircle her tightly, but met air instead.
I glanced over the area, confused by her magical disappearance, until I heard a rustle of leaves. I looked up and my jaw dropped open. Did she really jump twenty feet up in the air?
Realizing that she was slipping through my fingers, I sped after her. I spotted the perfect branch to hang from and jumped, swinging around the front to land on top of it. I paused for a split second to find the right balance and then chased her. She was moving really fast. I was amazed with how easily she seemed to snake her way between the leaves and branches. How fluidly she bypassed the trunks and jumped huge gaps between trees. I wasn't nearly as good as she was at this tree surfing exercise. My high heels weren't helping either. If I wanted to actually catch her, I needed to do it from solid ground or she was going to outrun me. I let myself fall from the tree and kept running again as soon as I landed. Searching for her between the leaves, I locked my gaze on her figure. I ran along with her from below and forgot for a moment to come up with a plan. In my entire long and experienced existence, I had never met someone like her. And I had crossed the paths of many supernatural creatures. Her abilities were surprising. Watching her use them was mind-blowing. She looked like a black panther moved by a primitive call. She was magnificent.
When she bounced toward an old oak, I snapped out of my awe. That was it. The only moment when she would be vulnerable. I had my plan.
I looked ahead to anticipate my next move and spotted a large gap between two trees. If she kept following her path, she would need to jump. I glanced at her to estimate her speed. The timing needed to be absolutely perfect. I drew on my resources to increase my stride and aimed for the pine facing the left of the opening. I looked at her one more time, and at the last second, put my foot on the trunk to jump in the air. The collision of our bodies was brutal. Flesh crushed, bones cracked, air knocked out of lungs. We were falling at a remarkable speed toward the ground. In one swift move, I wrapped my arms around her and tipped our bodies over to place myself underneath her. When my body hit the ground, a low cry escaped my lips. An intense pain immediately radiated from my skull to the small of my back. My chest was on fire. Maya's weight had broken several of my ribs. I was dizzy and disoriented. So was Maya, but her heart was beating strongly. Good.
My injuries were half-healed when she started to squirm over my body to get free. I immediately tightened my grip around her. It had been difficult enough to catch her once; no way in hell was I going to do it again. She wrestled even more and was about to break the hold I had on her when I wrapped my legs around her knees to shackle her movements. Where the hell was her strength coming from? She wasn't stronger than me, but it seemed like she was quicker and more fluid than I was. As if I was trying to hold back water. She managed to slide on the side and started to crawl on her back to escape. I quickly straddled her before she could get away and put all my weight on the entire length of her body to pin her down. Her movements became frantic underneath me, whimpers and growls escaping her lips, her bronze eyes wide open in fear. She looked like a wild animal backed into a corner. I was terrifying her. For a split second I entertained the idea of releasing my grip around her so she would stop looking at me like I was her death sentence. Instead, I quickly bent down and glued my lips to her ear.
"It's okay, Maya. You don't need to be scared," I lulled her in a smooth tone."I'm not your enemy, I'm not going to hurt you..." I was doing my best to soothe her, but she was still struggling wildly in my arms. Suddenly, I realized that I wasn't using the right approach. She wasn't thinking like a human being right now. She was reacting like an animal. She couldn't care less about words; she was only responding to what her instincts were telling her. I needed to mean what I was saying so she would feel it. I growled inwardly at the thought that I had put myself in such a mess willingly. I closed my eyes for a second and braced myself to feel.
"Shhh...everything is fine. Your friends are waiting for you. I'm going to bring you back home, and they're going to take care of you," I whispered in a reassuring tone, channeling my own humanity. "You can trust me. I'm not your enemy. I would never hurt you." Surprisingly, she calmed down, her body slowly relaxing into my arms. I didn't notice it at first, too confused by my own honesty when I realized as I spoke that I actually meant it. I forced myself to snap out of my haze to focus on Maya again and waited a little longer for her to stop fighting me completely.
"I'm going to release you. I'm going to open my arms and legs and stand up. So you can see that you can trust me. I just want you to come with me...okay?" Her only response was to stare me in the eye, but she didn't tense or make a move that would lead me to suspect she would flee. I slowly loosened my hold, scrutinizing her every reaction, and cautiously lifted my body up. She crawled backwards instantly, curling up into a ball like a wounded animal. I tensed, ready to dash after her, but she stayed still, gazing at me with both distrust and curiosity. I crouched down and stretched a hand toward her gently.
"I think it's time for you to go home. Would you like to come with me?" I asked lightly. She looked down at my hand and then back at me. She hesitated for a while, but finally loosened her grip around her legs to move her hand toward mine. At first, she barely put the tip of her fingers on my palm. Her skin was unusually hot, but her touch extremely delicate. Like she was going to break or disappear in a blink of an eye. I was careful to remain still, letting her come to me willingly. Finally,she rested her entire hand in mine. I wrapped my fingers around her palm cautiously and stood up. She mimicked my move. I turned around to walk toward the car but felt a resistance pulling at my arm. I peered over my shoulder with a questioning look and squeezed her hand in encouragement. She moved a foot forward before changing her mind a couple of times, but finally complied to follow me.
She dawdled behind me the entire time, like she was still considering running back to the depths of the forest, but at least I had managed to lead us back to the car. I grabbed the handle of the passenger side door and opened it for her. She wrinkled her nose and eyed the inside warily. Apparently, she didn't like the scent of leather and plastic. I gestured toward her gently to get in. Hesitating, she glanced between me and the car nervously. She eventually let go of my hand and slid her way gracefully into the passenger seat. She looked like a cat in unknown territory. The backs of her thighs were barely touching the edge of the seat, her arms carefully folded against her chest. Her eyes scrutinized everything around her.
"Maya?" I called softly. She snapped her head to the side to look at me, startled. "I'm going to need you to stay still, okay?" My request seemed to puzzle her, but she didn't move. I grabbed the seat belt and pulled on it, bending down to buckle her up. I barely had time to go around her chest when she suddenly panicked. With a jolt, her back was pinned against the seat, her body straining over her bare tiptoes. Her breaths were ragged, her eyes agitated. I cursed inwardly at my own stupidity. How could I not have foreseen that a wild animal would react like that at the mere contact of a leash?
I moved back carefully, showing Maya that I was removing the offending strap in the process. I let go of the seat belt and stepped backward a little. I gave her time to calm down before speaking again.
"I'm going to close the door, but don't worry. You see that door open on the other side of the car?" She followed the direction I was pointing to her. "I'm going to get in by this door, so I'm going to have to go around the car, okay?" I searched her face for any sign of confusion, but she seemed to understand. I closed the door very slowly to avoid freaking her out and walked around the car. I sat behind the wheel and closed my door. She looked out every window of the car nervously as if she was feeling trapped. I ignited the engine and her head whipped around to stare in bewilderment at where the sound was coming from. When the car started rolling, she clenched at the sides of her seat tightly and I could see the panic rising inside of her again. I reached a button and opened her window, hoping it would appease her. Her head tilted quickly to the side at the sound and movement, and I bit back a giggle. She was really cute when doing that.
She didn't wait long before sticking her head out of the window, taking deep breaths and obviously enjoying the sensation of air on her face. The wind whirled her black hair around, making the view of her happy features even more stunning. I rolled my eyes, reminding myself that she was just looking like any dog would out of a car window, and grabbed my phone on the dashboard discreetly. I typed a text to Damon.
"I found her. I'm bringing her back to Mystic Falls. Meet me at my shadow self's house."
I knew he wasn't going to believe that I had conveniently stumbled upon her in the middle of nowhere, but I didn't care. It was going to take all of her annoying friends to bring Maya back to herself. I had managed to make her come with me, but her creepy eyes were still in place of her usual icy blue ones, and she hadn't said a single word yet. I didn't even know if she could become herself again, or if her current state was permanent. It could also be an intermediary stage leading to something even more powerful and unpredictable. And after witnessing what she was capable of, no way in hell was I going to be around her alone if that happened. She was their problem after all. I was nice enough to drive her back to Mystic Falls already, especially since I was going to drop her off at her house. Not that I had any desire to see my beloved doppelganger, but her place was handy. I could walk in as I pleased, and if Maya ever decided to play cat and mouse again, her house offered a lot less space to run in, or dark corners to hide in, than the Salvatores' mansion.
We were no more than twenty minutes away from Mystic Falls when Maya finally leaned against the seat, pulling her head back inside the car. She turned slightly to the side to stare at me as if she wanted to communicate. I averted my attention from the road to look at her. I was surprised to find that the bronze in her eyes had faded, replaced by a golden shade. I hoped it was a sign that she was slowly going back to being herself again. I waited for her to say something, but she kept quiet with what seemed to be a small smile on her lips. After a few seconds, she turned back to watch the scenery speeding by again. I raised a perplexed eyebrow. She was clearly not herself just yet.
I was going to need to make a little detour to avoid crossing the entire town. It would probably not be a good idea to take the chance that someone she knew saw her with those eyes, or witnessed her bounce out of the car to jump into a tree if she felt threatened. That would probably create a bit of a mess, and facing all of her friends was about to do that already.
A/N: I feel merciful as Christmas approaches. No cliffhanger this time! Lucky you. ;)