Bonnie wandered toward the kitchen to grab another glass of water and to turn on the kettle for tea. She paused when she noticed the woodblock and the variety of dicing knives jutting from it. She removed one, taking note of the familiarity it possessed to that of the one Kai thrust into her belly all those weeks ago. She tested the weight in her hands. Kai handed her his magic—gifted it to her on his last leg—but she also knew Kai could take it from her, that if he wanted to, he could drain it and the life right out of her with no more than a quick—and painful—touch. She lifted the rest of the knife collection off the kitchen counter, cradling it in her arms as she walked it over to the open window and tossed it out. It felt good. She repeated the process with all of the Salvatores' utensils, wanting to leave nothing to chance, feeling a little more in control once done. She picked her selected knife off the marble countertop, dropping it into the basin, adding soap and water to hide it, relieved he'd inadvertently given her a chance to do so. She hadn't thought about it before. She cast a look over her shoulder, half expecting him to materialize behind her with a grin. She even waited for a few seconds while stirring his tea and fought the urge to check on him, to make sure he was still up there and hadn't fled.
He isn't going anywhere, Bonnie. Chill. He's weak. At least he looks it. You're fine.
She turned back to the kitchen sink mid-pep talk to rinse this weeks' worth of stacked plates and glasses, giving him a few more minutes.
Kai rummaged through Damon's drawers fishing for a change of clothes, then used his in-suite shower, turning it the hottest that he could bear without scolding himself. He wasn't sure he had spent just ten minutes in there as he promised, but he couldn't drag himself out before he felt warm enough. It was too strange, how slow he seemed to be getting into norm. The shower perked him up a bit, but there was still something heavy in him head, as though he hadn't slept two days in a row.
When he zipped up Stefan's hoody over Damon's shirt, his eyes fell on a little table next to the window with a bunch of bottles and decanters on it. He picked a half-full bottle of cognac and went downstairs. Bonnie was doing dishes in the kitchen.
"So, how about that tea?" he asked, granting her with a smile as she turned, and waved the bottle in his hand. "I know firsthand how it sucks to drink alone."
"Way ahead of you," Bonnie responded, gesturing to the mug in the middle of the kitchen island. "I wouldn't say it's warm though. Not anymore." She returned his smile, grabbing two of the freshly rinsed glasses off the drying rack, and headed toward the table in front of the kitchens hearth.
Kai narrowed his eyes in feigned reprimand, set the bottle on the counter and tried the tea. It was warm, but not as hot as he craved it to be.
"That shower must have done you some good," she said as she approached a chair, eying him up and down slowly, taking note of the familiar clothes he was wearing. "You're looking a little heathier and less like the walking dead."
"I do feel better, actually," he said, eyeing the tea, then turned on the kettle again and carried the mug and the bottle to the table.
Bonnie toed the chair away from the side of the dining table, throwing a leg over it to gracelessly take a seat. She was tired and perhaps starting to feel a little hungover herself.
"Aside from having to wear both Salvatores that close to my skin. Yuck." He took a gulp from the mug, poured a generous amount of cognac into it, then sipped. "Mm, that's it. Want some?" He held the bottle out to her.
Bonnie watched and waited for whatever drugs he might have put into the cognac to kick in. You're losing it, Bonnie, she chided herself internally, watching his features for even a hint to the bloodthirsty jester she knew he could be.
You're paranoid. What could Kai gain from drugging you?
She smiled to herself, lightly shaking her head to clear it of the irrational thought before stretching across the table to claim a glass. "How's the tea? I-I err… wasn't sure if you took sugar or not," she added conversationally. She set it down in front of her, tapping at the side of the glass in gesture he pour. The pleasantries were killing her. But what choice did she have until he started talking? Started telling her what she wanted to know.
Kai came up to her to spike her drink as asked. "It's cool. Which I mean in both ways – as in nice and cold at the same time." He gave her a jibing smirk and headed back to turn the kettle off and add some steaming water to her drink. "Now we're talking," he grinned once the temperature was to his liking and brought the mug and bottle to the table, settling down and taking a few swigs, enjoying the warmth spreading inside. Bonnie's eyes boring into him were making him nervous, and he hated it. There was this heap of information he had to throw at her, and that alone was a burden enough, given he was already starting to feel tired. Kai added more cognac in the mug and took a deep breath. "Well… There's overwhelmingly much to tell – or at least it feels that way – I mean, it wears me down just clustered inside my mind. So I better start at the beginning." He took another gulp.
Bonnie braced herself in fear of what he had to say, inhaling softly with nervousness as she raised the glass to her lips to take a gulp.
"After I left you and got back to the world we both call home, I met Damon and Elena right after Liv pulled them out from here – without you – because they all heard I was out, and went running."
Liv pulled them out? Bonnie thought. Did that mean Kai was the reason she didn't make it out the first time? He was the one that sabotaged her freedom and aided in her increasing insanity in this place? She took another gulp, trying to will away the bitter taste in her mouth and the hatred that enclosed around her heart like a steely vice.
"Your Pinky and Brain, Damon and Alaric, attacked me, chained me up – guess where? – on the Mystic Falls' side. With all that travelers' magic soaking the ground. Basically, they gave me a boost I couldn't hope for. And yeah, your home town's back to normal again – I fixed it while getting my fix."
Bonnie took another large gulp at hearing how easy it was to eradicate her former suffering, how easily Kai sucked up what had literally threatened to rip her apart as dozens of dead travelers accosted her. She had hoped—selfishly—that amidst everything that happened, at least that would have planned as a constant reminder about where she was. That was two months ago. With the magical barrier down, had it been that easy for them to forgo attempting to rescue her?
"Then I went to search for my twin sister, Jo. Your pesky friends tried to stop me, knocked me out and kept me that way until the magic seeped out. And then your buddy Damon had a perfect idea to make me help undo the stupid trick your pal Caroline pulled for her mom."
Bonnie stopped drinking at the mention of Caroline's name, her heart skipping a beat with a longing need to see her friend. Bonnie missed her sunny smile and her flamboyant optimism.
"See, her mom has cancer, fourth stage, inoperable. So Caroline decided, what the hey, she's an all-powerful vampire, and her blood's the answer to everything. Well, that went wrong and her mom's cancer went on multiplying by the second."
Oh, God. Bonnie tipped what was left of the brandy onto her tongue, lowering her left leg to the floor, stretching forward to claim the cognac for a moment and to refill my glass.
"So they wanted me to suck the blood's magical effect out of the sheriff – which I did and then got to Jo."
Bonnie recalled the young woman to memory, having seen the many pictures littered around his family home when she hunted for a first aid kit to stave the bleeding. The Parker family was good-looking. And, for a second—while she concentrated on his deceptively handsome face—she pitied the Parker Family and what she imagined he sought to do a second time around.
"When we were about to merge, Luke showed up, knocked her out, and demanded to merge with me instead. He didn't care about the consequences – 'cause, come on, we're not twins – and he said we're still one blood and one age. Technically. I had no other choice at the moment, so I went for it since he insisted. And – as you can see – he lost it. In a way, so did I."
Bonnie noticed that his voice didn't have a hint of facetious or gleeful maliciousness at a job well done. He'd come out on top after all, that's what Kai wanted, and yet his face said otherwise.
"I knew the other twin's traits can be passed to the surviving one. I just wasn't prepared for this whole part of me that drives me nuts." He took another big gulp of cognac. "I was so okay with not being burdened by guilt or remorse or caring for others, and now it's a madhouse inside of me. I feel like all these feelings are busting me from within, like in Alien movie. I mean, I never thought there could be such a storm of overwhelmingly painful feelings attacking you all at once as it happened to me after the merge."
Bonnie tilted her head a tad as if seeing him for the first time, registering how much softer he looked and how genuinely troubled. Kai adorned a similar look of hurt while talking about his father during his thanksgiving farce. The difference this time was that his eyes no longer held that reformatory hardness. That was because of Luke? Or was it Luke? She'd never heard of this kind of magic, then again, she'd never heard of much other than what was taught to her—in spite of her unwillingness—and what she could get out of her grandmothers grimoire and occult books.
"I couldn't do anything, I couldn't shake how terribly badly I felt about Luke, Liv, Jo and what I did to them." Something inside of him was starting to tremble again as he was forced to recollect it, and he gulped down another portion of liquor in hopes of keeping it in check. "Jo didn't want to see me – obviously – and I couldn't find her, so I did the next best stupid thing – wrote a letter and dropped by the boardinghouse before being on my way and out of Mystic Falls. And there they were, Damon and Elena, the nasty couple."
Bonnie chuckled softly in spite of herself, rather relieved to see that Luke hadn't entirely eradicated his tactless sense of humor or that things hadn't changed too much. She needed a little familiarity, however out of sorts. She kept the glass poised against her lower lip, shrugging, conceding a fleeting look of apology for her slight disruption in his story.
"When I explained it all to them, they wanted me to bring you back in return. I pointed out that I couldn't do it without the ascendant which I'd destroyed before the merge."
So it was Kai that ruined my return, she thought, drinking. He was the reason I was stuck here.
"But they kept the parts, so I looked into it. They all wanted to go – even Jeremy came by – and I could only transport us here as ghosts."
A sad smile played upon the corner of her mouth at the mention of Jeremy. She couldn't believe he'd tried to come—that he tried to help her. Did that mean he'd forgiven her? That he hadn't moved on and might still be waiting for her?
"We saw you, you didn't see us. Damon saw the bourbon and freaked out, so they smothered me with demands to get my shit together and just become the freaking almighty God to save you."
They saw me, she thought with sudden panic. They knew what she intended to do. She expelled a soft sigh, her cheeks warming with embarrassment and something akin to guilt. She'd never felt more exposed and more vulnerable than she did at this very second.
"I said I could probably be able to make something more corporeal out of just one of them – which was Jeremy. Elena was strongly against it, mind you. But your boyfriend's just as stubborn if not more."
Bonnie drank once more to keep from saying anything, from asking how much they'd seen and found herself encompassed by an absurd hint of hurt. She understood Elena's misgivings, magic was a fragile balance and Jeremy had been caught in a foul crossfire countless times.
Still.
"When we were in the middle of the spell, Liv came by to kill me. It interrupted the spell, and when Jeremy demanded I repeated it, I was no longer capable of taking us both here. I wasn't sure I could do it myself, so I left him behind to ensure his survival in case I failed. The rest you know. Except… I didn't quite do it for them, and not fully for myself to just make amends. I mean, I wanted to apologize to you more than anything, at that point. But what really sucked was thinking how it sucked for you. I've spent eighteen years here, all alone. I didn't want that for anyone. Not anymore. Especially not for you, Bonnie. You didn't deserve to stay here another day. I thought if I could get through and survive long enough to pass my powers to you, you'd at least would be back home." He looked at her pleadingly. "I don't expect you to just forgive me, or trust me, but I absolutely need you to know how sincerely sorry I am. And to redeem myself at least a little, I'll get you out of here."
The emotions sweeping over her face while he was letting her in on the latest news kept changing quickly, and Kai couldn't tell which flickered among them most often: anger, despise, or understanding he aimed for. While he was forced to relive it all over again and actually express to her – one of those he'd hurt most – how he felt now about things he did, he found the need for her to grant him a snippet of understanding. Cognac did less than he hoped for jamming it. By the end of the story and his confession, his heart was thrashing in his chest so that he almost thought she would hear it. He regarded her, awaiting for a reaction like a sentence.
Bonnie eased her arm off her knee and set the glass upon the table dismissively. "And surprisingly enough, I believe you," she answered, the alcohol having taken away her usual restrain or desire to beat around the bush to battle with her inner musings. She was done trying to figure his motives out, she was done trying to make an enemy of him. All she wanted was to go home, to put this place behind her and be there for one of her best friends in her worst times of need.
Her response startled him with both elation and disbelief. She had drunk a lot, and given she'd had a head start, it might be alcohol talking. As much as Kai wanted to hear exactly that, he couldn't quite believe it was that easy. He hated himself for extra suspicions that stalled him from putting his battled nerves at rest, but could do nothing about it. He was good at reading people, and Bonnie Bennett was a book written half in a foreign language.
"I thought that this birthday was to be my last," she said, "that… I'd never leave this place and that none of my friends would care enough to attempt retrieving me again—" she continued pensively, frowning faintly at her admittance, a hand used to wave off the statement as she stood, brushing it aside as if she hadn't even said it. "And yet here you are. The last person I ever imagined to ever headline the 'save Bonnie' campaign." She peered down at him in passing, a genuine, if not welcome smile curving onto her lips. "I should be thanking you." She ambled around the table toward the CD player, removing the disc within and chose another. She pushed play, feeling slightly invigorated and giddy for what was to come. "So," she said, taking a deep breath as she turned to regard him once more. "When do we go and retrieve our ascendant?"
"Tomorrow, before the eclipse." He poured the remaining liquor into his mug and thought of something. "Or… theoretically, if we have enough magic, we might try to go back, well, whenever."
Bonnie swayed to the music, keeping time with the beat and gradually made her way over to the fridge. She was hungry, more so than she had ever been in the last two months and craving sugar. For a long time everything in the prison world lost its appeal, even something as mundane and ordinary as food. She missed the simplicity of going to drive thru or restaurant to drink a milkshake with a friend, she missed ordering in pizza on a Friday nights when her dad wasn't around and calling Caroline well into the a.m. There was no spontaneity anymore and living off peanut butter, bread and cornflakes got old. She wondered as she peered into the fridge what Kai used to do for himself, he was here for nineteen years, he could cook, did he teach himself that out of boredom or necessity? She thought to ask him, turning away from the fridge when she realized he was talking – more like trying to cast a spell.
He held out a hand to a candle sitting in the center of the table. "Phasmatos incendia."
A flame blinked on the wick, as though it were a distorted hologram struggling to turn on, but failed to ignite.
He repeated the process with the same result and frowned. "That's truly weird. I have magic. I can feel it in me. Why then—" It came back to him how he still woke up from the dead an hour ago, despite his expectations, and his frown deepened as anger bit him. "I can't use it. This damn prison world blocks it." He turned to her. "Tell me you still have what I gave you and it works."
"It's been awhile and I'm slightly—out of it… so, if I scorch you," she joked, sounding fairly serious, afraid she, too, might have the same problem, "it's unintentional." She bent at the waist beside him and leaned down to rest her elbows on the table, forcing herself to concentrate before uttering the essential words. "Phasmatos incendia." Magic sprung forth with effortlessness, a tiny flame instantly taking residence upon the candle's wick, bright and vivid in its execution. "You're right. It is blocking you," she said, confirming his discouraging assessment.
Kai gnashed his teeth and sipped the cognac.
"Seems impossible considering this place was made for you. For your DNA. Or magical essence," she reasoned, shaking her head once more. She didn't even know what to think of it at this time. "Maybe you did something wrong coming here? You were severely injured, maybe giving what remained of your power to me did something… bad," she concluded, unable—for the time being—to think of a better word.
He drank, staring at the candle and thinking over what she said. "DNA… It has to be changed by now, with the merge and all. I am different now, so that has to be a factor. Unless… There's still a part of me that's, well, ME, so…" Realization started to dawn somewhere on the horizon of his mind. He concentrated not to lose the train of thought, which was becoming more of a problem since the alcohol began to kick in. "This place still insists on keeping me in – and that can work if I don't have magic no matter what, even if, in fact, I have it. Therefore I can't use it. That's fucking hilarious." He slammed the empty mug on the table and fisted his hand.
Bonnie reached for some cold meat, jerking in surprise and a smidgen of unanticipated fear as his mug angrily hit the table. She stopped what she was doing to collect myself and subconsciously peered over my shoulder. He was still seated. She berated herself internally, pulling free the sealed Tupperware and wondered over to the table once more.
"Yeah, it's still here – that searing urge to set my father's guts on a slow fire. At least in that I'm me."
Bonnie wasn't sure she was particularly happy about that revelation as that was the same predisposition that had him attack her.
He sucked in a deep breath, let it out, and looked at Bonnie. "At least you have some power. And if it worked to give it to you once, it will again shall we need to. So we can still get out of here." A slow smile tugged at his mouth. "Maybe even now."
Bonnie sat down opposite him again and nodded, reaching for the bottle to refill her glass, using her other hand to lift the lid off the Tupperware. "What if you were to take it from me again?" she asked.
Kai glanced at her with a frown of confused surprise.
Bonnie had to think about it logically. If she were hurt or unable to do the spell, neither of them would get out. "Like you did before," she explained so that he could catch onto her thinking. "Wouldn't that reset your magic use here? I mean… before you left you were able to use it, to steal it from me temporarily… maybe now… the prison's simply reverted you back to your former state." She frowned, uncertain she was even making sense. She plucked a piece of meat from inside the see-through container, lightly gesturing that he help himself and calmly popped it into her mouth. "Perhaps we should try?" she added, holding out her left arm in expectance.
He tore his eyes off her hand holding the meat to give her a probing gaze, then looked at the arm she extended to confirm her suggestion. He was both tempted to try and afraid to see it fail. What would it mean then? Nothing new – he'd depend on her, as well as she'd depend on the magic he carried like a damn container she was eating from. Kai turned to the candle. "Motus."
It shuddered but didn't move much.
"See, I couldn't do even as much in my 'previous state'. So it's not precisely the same, anyhow." He glimpsed at her arm again and sighed. "Maybe I'm just drunk to experiment." He rubbed his forehead tiredly and leaned his head back against the chair, observing the ceiling. "We can try to get out now if you want – go get the ascendant and so on – but I think using my old methods on you at this moment won't be wise. What if I won't be able to give it back?" The horrid prospect of such sent an icy trickle of anxiety through his spine.
"Right. I didn't think of that," she said while nibbling on a second slice of sandwich meat, quietly mulling over his suggestion, a lowly ache taking hold of her heart at the thought of waiting another day. She guessed because the magic was borrowed, if he took it from her—it wouldn't return as hers had in the past.
She glanced toward the kitchen window. It was dark out. That would make our search infinitely harder. "Where is the ascendant? Do I need to do a locator spell? And how can you be certain it's here?"
"Because I left it here?" He smiled and stuffed a piece into his mouth.
Bonnie lifted her glass off the table, bringing it to her lips for a sip as she eased into her previous sitting position, resting it on her knee afterwards. An image of a Damon and the ascendant shattering in his wake as he abruptly teleported home sprang to mind. 'Of course!' she thought with some elation. The caves. Since she'd sent Miss Cuddles back home with her magic and ended up in Oregon, she hadn't bothered to revisit the place. There hadn't been a need. She grimaced. What if the device was smashed into tiny bits and pieces again? How many times would they be able to repair it before it became useless?
"I took my car back here and teleported from the caves. The ascendant must be still there, unless there is another creepy prisoner around who found and stole it." He chuckled and took another slice, then noticed her frown. "Ah, come on. Joke. Seriously. Who'd get in here when the ascendant back home was melted – by yours truly," he gestured at his chest and bit the meat. "God, I'm starving. Must be the whole dying thing. Now that I think about it, it does come back, the hunger and all. Dying is exhausting."
"Is it," she commented, taking a large gulp of her drink, her head instantly fuzzier. There was no way they were going to be able to do this tonight. Her lungs still ached a little bit from the exhaust abuse, she was drunk, and Kai—well, he looked as if he'd been run over by a mac track and dragged a few miles. Her only hope was that it was a temporary look for him.
Kai stuffed two more pieces in his mouth, shooting a glance over his shoulder at the fridge, considering looking for something else and simultaneously feeling too lazy to drag himself all the way across the kitchen. His head was buzzing lightly after their libation, and he craved to stretch on a bed and close his eyes.
Bonnie reached for another slice of sandwich ham, toying with it, nibbling at the corners lazily before speaking up again, not sounding the least bit happy about her decision. "We should probably get an early night and tackle the ascendant come dawn."
He regarded her, a bit surprised and a bit concerned, pondering whether it was a trick. Even if she waited for him to hit the sack and went for the ascendant, it would be a lot of work to put it back together and zap out of here. How much magic did he give her? He was so close to dying and practically depleted with the attempts to transport them all and then Jeremy – it just couldn't be enough for her to go back on her own. Could it? Kai didn't really know, and it scared him a little. On the bright side, she didn't look so hot herself. Dark circles under her tired eyes. He chuckled. "Well, duh, since you keep drinking. Fine. Let's have that date tomorrow, say… six in the morning. Don't be late for the Home-Express. I gotta lie down." He got up and started towards the stairs, then turned back to her for a moment. "Thanks. For listening. And, I guess, for not chopping my head off to make sure I stayed dead – though it wouldn't work – but would be messy. And creepy, for someone like you. Goodnight." He walked out and trotted up the stairs.
Bonnie stared at him over the top of my glass, dumbfounded by his unforeseen courteousness. Typically, Kai didn't care whether a person listened or not, he shared what and when he felt like it and could go on for quite some time. She lowered the glass to the table with a small beholden smile, wrestling with the idea of calling him back as he headed for the stairs again, harboring a sudden desire to thank him for saving her life. She didn't, though – choosing to let him get the rest he wanted and deserved. Saving her might not have been on Kai's priority list of things to do today when he woke, but he'd still done it and he was still here. That mattered.
She finished her cognac, closed her eyes and relaxed her head against the back of the chair, taking pleasure in the fact that – although she was still stuck in this godforsaken prison world – at least she wasn't alone. She could hang in there a few more hours.
She stayed downstairs for a while longer, incapable of closing her eyes for more than a minute at a time, too excited and too anxious about what to expect from the morrow. She eased off her chair and slowly danced around the kitchen to the perfected beat of TLC's CrazySexyCool album. She'd survived a lot this day, and there was only a couple more hours and then she'd be free of this place for good. A celebration that wouldn't hurt. And it didn't. Not until a couple of hours later.