Chapter Six
The smell of coffee filled the suite like a placeholder for comfort—warm, familiar, almost convincing.
Almost.
Stefan stood at the small kitchen counter, pouring a second pot into mismatched hotel mugs. He moved methodically, sleeves rolled up, jaw set, like keeping his hands busy might quiet the thoughts clawing at the edge of his focus.
Caroline sat curled at one end of the couch, legs tucked under her, her eyes shadowed and alert. Her phone sat forgotten on her lap. She wasn't texting. She was watching.
Damon.
He stood by the window, coffee untouched in his hand, gaze locked on the parking lot below. He hadn't moved in ten minutes. He hadn't blinked in five.
Elena approached him quietly, not touching, just standing close. "There's food if you want something."
"I'm fine," he said.
His voice was even. Calm. But it felt like he was holding it still with both hands.
Bonnie entered last.
She looked like she hadn't slept at all.
Her curls were pulled back into a haphazard knot, her sweatshirt wrinkled, her hands tucked into the sleeves like she didn't trust what they might do. She avoided the mirror on the far wall without even thinking. She hadn't looked at her own reflection since last night.
She sat at the table, silent. The dagger was still wrapped and tucked into her bag, but its presence pulsed at the edges of her mind. She could feel it watching.
"Everyone eat something," Stefan said, setting a plate down. "We need to keep our heads today."
Elena took a seat next to Bonnie. "What's the plan?"
"Research," Bonnie said hoarsely. "There are local archives, libraries, even some private collections from Charleston's colonial days. We might find early mentions of the sigil. Or the Entity."
"I'll go with you," Stefan said.
Bonnie nodded, but didn't thank him.
"I'll check out the historical museum downtown," Elena offered. "They've got a section on arcane folklore. At least they used to."
Caroline looked at Damon again. "You coming with us?"
He didn't answer at first.
Then, too quickly: "I'll stay here."
Caroline's brow furrowed. "Why?"
"I don't like being babysat," he said, finally turning from the window. "I don't need to be walked around town like I'm about to snap."
His tone wasn't angry. It was… blank. Like a coat hung too neatly over something sharp.
"I wasn't suggesting—" Caroline began, but Elena cut in gently.
"It's okay. He needs time."
Damon looked at her, something unreadable flickering in his eyes. "Thank you."
Bonnie picked up her coffee. Her hand shook.
Caroline noticed.
So did Stefan.
But no one said it out loud.
"Let's meet back here before dark," Stefan said. "We don't go anywhere alone after that."
Everyone nodded.
Except Damon.
He had already turned away again.
The door clicked softly behind them.
And then there was quiet.
Not peaceful quiet. Not the kind that soothed.
This was the kind of silence that breathed.
Damon stood in the center of the suite, unmoving. The sunlight coming in through the windows looked muted today—paler, somehow. Like it didn't want to come all the way in.
He walked over to the couch, sat down slowly, and stared at nothing.
The hum beneath his skin hadn't stopped since the chamber. It was like his bones were vibrating with a frequency just below hearing—just enough to notice. Not enough to scream.
He leaned forward, elbows on knees, hands pressed against his forehead.
The rug felt too soft. The air too still.
His heartbeat was steady, but he didn't trust it. Because something in him wasn't. Something in him felt like a door that had been left ajar.
He laid back on the couch, one arm over his eyes.
He didn't mean to fall asleep. But after so many nights of fighting it, on top of the mental exhaustion, he did.
—
He stood in a field.
The grass swayed lazily in the breeze. The sky above him was blue and wide, soft clouds drifting like dreams.
It smelled like lilac and warm earth.
Birdsong carried faintly on the wind.
It was beautiful.
But it was wrong.
Because it was quiet in the way nightmares are.
"Damon," a voice said.
He turned.
Katherine stood not ten feet away, barefoot in the grass, dressed in white. Her hair fell in soft curls over her shoulders, her smile warm and familiar.
The first Katherine.
The one who pulled him from the fire of his human life and made him believe in something more. The illusion of love. The lie of it.
"You look tired," she said gently.
Damon said nothing.
She stepped closer. "You don't have to be afraid anymore."
He stared at her.
"You were always meant for more," she said. "More than guilt. More than shame. You were never meant to be bound by what they made you."
He clenched his fists. "You're not her."
Her smile didn't fade.
"No," she said. "But you knew her better than anyone. You loved her, even when you hated her. You understand her."
The wind shifted.
It didn't smell like lilac anymore.
It smelled like smoke.
Burnt wood. Singed hair. Blood.
"You could be free," she said, stepping close enough that he could see the slight crack in her iris—just something else that was slightly off.
"You don't have to carry any of it," she whispered. "Not Marcel. Not your father. Not the girl in the basement. Not me."
"You're not her," he said again.
She leaned forward and whispered it like a secret:
"I'm what's left of her. The part that didn't burn."
The field flickered.
Gone. Replaced by stone.
The chamber.
And the Entity stood where Katherine had been, towering in the dark. Eyes that weren't eyes, but fathomless black holes. A mouth that didn't speak but still said everything.
"You are what they made you," it whispered.
"But you could become what they fear."
Damon gasped—
And woke.
Chest rising fast, breath scraping out of his throat like fire.
He was on the floor.
The couch was tipped.
The table lamp was broken.
His nails had clawed through the carpet.
He stood slowly, shaking.
The room was bright with daylight.
But it didn't feel daylight safe.
He crossed to the mirror in the bathroom. His hands trembled as he gripped the counter.
His reflection stared back.
Normal.
Mostly.
Except the pupils.
A shade too wide.
A shade too dark.
He turned the water on, splashed his face, and didn't look up again.
The Charleston Historical Society was housed in a building older than most of the city. Red brick, narrow windows, ivy curling across the stone like veins.
Inside, the air was dry and smelled of aged paper, wax polish, and something faintly metallic—like the memory of rust.
Stefan pushed open the double doors into the archive wing. The lights overhead buzzed faintly as they flickered to life.
"Charming," he muttered.
Bonnie offered a tired smile but didn't speak.
She moved through the stacks like she'd been there before, fingers brushing the spines of books with the same reverence she gave spellwork. Most of the shelves were filled with dry colonial records—land deeds, family registries, shipping logs.
But near the back—near a door marked Restricted in faded paint—Bonnie stopped.
"This is where the witches used to hide things," she said.
"You mean literally?"
She nodded. "They weren't subtle. Wards, iron-bound trunks, hidden compartments. This town was built on bones and secrets. The witches just organized the aftermath."
The door creaked open under her touch.
Stefan followed her into the room beyond.
The lighting was dimmer here. No windows. Just shelves and dust. Scrolls. Hand-bound books. A glass case filled with ritual objects behind a padlocked grate.
Bonnie moved to a shelf near the back and pulled out a journal—thick, leather-bound, no title.
The cover prickled her fingers.
She sat at the long table and flipped it open.
The handwriting was jagged, old dialect, but she could read it.
"It's here," she whispered.
Stefan leaned over her shoulder as she read aloud:
"We buried the root beneath what they now call the hollow. We carved the sigil with our own blood. Not a binding. Not a seal. A bargain.
We traded part of our line to keep the rest. He took the firstborn. We took the silence."
Bonnie's stomach twisted.
Further down the page, a sketch—faint but distinct.
The sigil from the chamber. Drawn in blood. Burned at the edges.
"I've seen that in one of my ancestor's books," Bonnie murmured. "It was marked forbidden. I thought it was decorative. Symbolic."
"It's not," Stefan said. "It's a contract."
Bonnie flipped further. Her head began to ache as her eyes blurred.
Another entry:
"The chosen vessel must bleed willingly. The body will break. The soul will crack. The shell will open. And he will slip through."
Her hands shook.
Then her nose started to bleed.
"Bonnie—"
She blinked, swayed slightly.
Stefan grabbed her arm. "Hey. Hey, you're bleeding."
She pressed a sleeve to her nose, wincing. "It's the magic. It's reacting. It doesn't want me reading this."
"You need to stop."
But she turned the page one more time.
Another sketch—this one of a face, scribbled quickly. Jagged lines. Too many eyes.
And beneath it, written in the same blood-colored ink:
"The key will know herself when he calls her name."
Bonnie shut the journal.
And from somewhere behind the shelves, in a whisper too soft for Stefan to hear—
"Bonnie."
The Charleston Folklore Center looked like a bookstore that had stopped trying. Faded signs, slanted shelves, and a counter manned by an old man who hadn't spoken since they walked in. Dust danced in the late-afternoon light, and the whole place smelled like leather, lavender, and something faintly burnt.
Elena thumbed through a slim volume titled Superstitions of the Old South, but her eyes kept drifting to the front window.
Caroline hadn't said much since they split from the others. Not since Damon decided to stay behind. She had kept her voice light, her expression cool—but Elena could see the tension in her shoulders, the way her hands kept twitching like she wanted to punch something. Or someone.
"You okay?" Elena asked quietly.
Caroline didn't answer at first. She flipped another page in the book she wasn't really reading.
Then: "I can feel him."
Elena put her book down. "Damon?"
Caroline nodded. "It's faint. But steady. Like a thread pulled tight." She exhaled. "But today it's... off. Like the thread is being pulled from the other side."
Elena crossed the aisle to stand beside her. "Do you think it's the Entity?"
"I don't know. Maybe. I just—" Her voice caught. "I don't know if I'm helping or just feeling him fall."
"You're helping," Elena said firmly.
Caroline laughed softly, but there was no humor in it. "You'd say that even if I wasn't."
"No, I wouldn't. You've been strong for him. Fierce. Protective. And maybe that's part of the bond, but it's also you."
Caroline shut the book. "It scares me."
"What does?"
"That part of me would burn the whole world down to keep him safe. And another part is afraid that if this gets worse—if he chooses it—I won't be strong enough to stop him."
Elena's breath hitched.
Because she'd thought it. Felt it. Feared it.
"What if he wants it?" Caroline whispered. "What if the Entity offers him power? Control? An end to the pain?"
Elena didn't speak for a long moment.
Then: "Then we remind him who he is. And if that's not enough…"
Caroline turned, her eyes glimmering.
Elena held her gaze.
"…we hold him back. Together."
Caroline swallowed, then nodded.
The silence between them wasn't empty. It was fierce. Shared.
And soft.
"I'm glad it's you," Caroline said suddenly.
"What?"
"The one he loves. I'm glad it's you. Because you'll never let him forget he's loved."
Elena smiled. "Same goes for you."
They didn't hug. Not here.
But when they left the center twenty minutes later, side by side, the air between them was warmer than it had been in days.
And neither of them looked back.
By the time the sun dipped below the horizon, the clouds had thickened, and the wind carried the taste of rain.
The group returned one by one.
Stefan and Bonnie arrived first—quiet, focused. Stefan helped her into the suite, one hand steady at her back. Bonnie's nose had stopped bleeding, but the color hadn't quite returned to her face. She looked like she was being pulled in two directions: physically present, mentally somewhere else.
She kept the dagger in her satchel this time.
She didn't take it out.
Not even to check it.
Caroline and Elena entered a few minutes later, voices low. Elena had a stack of printouts and notes, which she handed to Stefan with a glance. Caroline walked past them without a word, heading straight to the back bedroom to check on Damon.
He wasn't there.
He was in the bathroom. Door open. Standing at the sink, shirtless, staring down at the counter like it might whisper something if he just watched long enough.
Caroline leaned against the doorframe. "You okay?"
"Fine."
"Liar."
He looked up.
His reflection stared back at him in the mirror.
His eyes were blue.
But just for a second, Caroline could've sworn the edges had gone dark.
She said nothing.
Damon turned the faucet off and grabbed a towel. "I didn't break anything while you were gone, if that's what you're worried about."
"That's not what I'm worried about."
He tossed the towel on the counter and turned toward her. "Then what?"
Caroline didn't flinch. "That something came back with us. That something followed you here."
Damon held her gaze.
He didn't deny it.
Back in the living room, Bonnie sat on the couch, knees pulled up, fingers pressed against her temples.
Stefan returned from the kitchenette with a bottle of water and crouched in front of her. "You okay?"
"No," she said quietly. "But I don't think it matters right now."
Stefan frowned. "Why?"
She looked up—dark circles under her eyes, magic simmering just beneath her skin like a storm cloud waiting for a spark.
"Because it's already inside him," she said. "I felt it the moment we crossed the threshold."
The others went still.
Caroline stepped into the room with Damon just behind her.
Elena stood up slowly. "Inside him?"
Bonnie didn't blink. "The Entity didn't just wake up. It touched him. It left a mark."
All eyes turned to Damon.
He shrugged.
But the smile didn't reach his eyes.
"Then we'd better figure out what it wants," he said, voice low and flat, "before it decides to take more."
The kitchen smelled like coffee, cinnamon, and the kind of exhaustion that couldn't be slept off.
Sunlight streamed in through the narrow hotel windows, too golden for the mood it lit. Snow still blanketed the cars in the parking lot, but the sky outside was sharp and clear—a crisp, deceptive kind of morning.
Inside, the suite was anything but clear.
Stefan stood at the table with a pad of graph paper, sketching out what they remembered of the basement. His brow was furrowed, sleeves rolled to the elbows, jaw set with focus. Caroline leaned over his shoulder, pointing occasionally at the diagram. Her other hand never left her coffee mug, which she gripped like it might anchor her to the world.
Bonnie sat across from them, curled in a sweatshirt, eyes distant as she turned pages of a spellbook she could barely focus on. Her hair was pulled up, exposing the curve of her neck and the darkened smudges beneath her eyes. Her fingertips tapped rhythmically on the wood—an anxious beat she didn't seem to realize she was making.
Damon leaned against the far wall, arms crossed. Not speaking. Watching.
Elena hovered near him, close but not pressing.
The energy in the room was taut. Held by threads.
"So," Stefan said finally, breaking the silence. "We know the basement has more than one chamber. We only saw three—the main corridor, the collapsing room, and the ritual chamber. But I counted at least four other doors we didn't open."
"Most of them were sealed magically," Bonnie added, her voice low. "One of them… hummed. Not in a good way."
"We go back," Stefan said. "Not for confrontation. Just to map. Measure. Document. Every inch."
Elena frowned. "And risk waking more of whatever we just barely contained?"
"We're not containing it," Bonnie said. "We're interacting with it. We need to understand its architecture. Sigils like that don't exist without structure. Magic that old? It spreads. Threads into walls, objects, people."
She glanced at Damon.
He met her eyes briefly, but looked away.
"I'll stay," Elena said firmly. "Keep watch from here."
Damon snorted. "That's a terrible idea."
She turned to him. "I'm not letting you go back in there."
"You're not letting me?" he repeated, bristling, tilting his head.
"Damon—"
"I'm going."
Caroline watched him carefully, eyes narrowing.
He wasn't posturing.
He wasn't being reckless.
He was certain.
Bonnie's fingers curled against the edge of the spellbook. "If you're going, you're not going alone."
"I'll anchor the spell," Stefan offered. "You focus on mapping the resonance. I'll watch his back."
"Try watching his front," Damon muttered.
Caroline shot him a look. "Not funny."
Damon shrugged. "Didn't say it was."
The tension snapped like static in the air.
Bonnie stood abruptly. "We go at noon. I need time to prepare a containment charm. Something light but reactive. If the sigils respond, I want to feel it."
"You sure you're up for that?" Stefan asked, gently.
She didn't answer.
Because she didn't know.
But she would do it anyway.
The hotel room was momentarily still—Caroline and Stefan had gone to double-check the SUV, and Bonnie had vanished into her room with a book, chalk, and too much energy to be left alone.
Damon sat at the foot of the bed, elbows on his knees, staring at the floor like it had answers. The light from the window cut across his face, catching the angles of his cheekbones. Shadows pooled beneath his eyes—too dark for fatigue alone.
Elena moved to sit beside him, slowly. She didn't touch him yet. Just waited.
He spoke before she could.
"It's growing."
Her throat tightened. "What is?"
He was quiet for a beat. Then:
"Whatever the Entity left in me. It's not a voice. It doesn't speak. It just... pulls."
She turned toward him, folding one leg up onto the bed. "How?"
He shook his head. "It's not like compulsion. It's more... instinctual. Like I start thinking things and I don't know if they're mine. Like I want things I shouldn't."
Her voice softened. "Power?"
"Control," he whispered. "Peace."
That word landed between them with heavy silence.
Elena looked at him carefully. "You're not the only one who wants peace."
He met her eyes. "But you want peace with who you are. I want peace from it."
She reached out, gently tracing her fingers down his arm. "I know. And I get it."
He exhaled, voice tight. "You ever think... maybe it wouldn't be so bad? Letting it in. Letting it take the guilt. The weight."
Her heart ached at how honest he sounded. How tired.
And how dangerous that kind of tired could be.
"I think," she said slowly, "that's exactly what it wants you to believe."
Damon turned to her fully now. There was a war in his eyes—something struggling for space inside him.
"Elena," he said, voice raw, "are you afraid of me?"
She didn't hesitate.
"Yes."
He blinked.
"But I love you more than I fear what you could become."
That stopped him.
She took his hand and pressed it over her heart. "And I trust you to keep fighting. Even when you don't want to. Especially when you don't want to."
Damon's throat worked. His voice cracked.
"I'm afraid of me, too. I'm scared I won't be strong enough."
"You already are."
He looked away.
"Even if I slip?"
She leaned forward and kissed his temple.
"Then we pull you back."
His hand tightened on hers. Not desperate. Not grateful.
Anchored.
And for the first time that day, Damon let himself lean into her. Just a little.
And she didn't let go.
The hotel suite had grown quiet again, the others dispersed across corners of their own anxiety. Outside, clouds were gathering—slow and bruised, casting the windows in a dull gray hue.
Caroline knocked softly on the door to Bonnie's room.
No answer.
She used the extra key and opened it anyway.
Bonnie sat on the floor near the bed, legs crossed, spellbook open across her lap. Chalk-drawn circles and half-formed sigils covered the floor around her. A line of melted wax curved along the edge of the desk, and the scent of ash clung to the air.
She didn't look up.
"Bon?" Caroline asked softly. "You okay?"
"No," Bonnie whispered.
Caroline stepped in and shut the door behind her. "Okay. Start there."
Bonnie didn't move. Her fingers pressed into the page like she was holding the book together with sheer will. Her eyes were red-rimmed, but dry.
"I'm losing focus," she said. "Spells unravel. Symbols smear. I can't remember incantations I've known since I was thirteen."
"Is it the dagger?"
Bonnie nodded. "It's like it's bleeding into everything. The air. The magic. Me. I felt it again this morning—just for a second—but it was... inside my head. Whispering something I couldn't quite hear."
Caroline lowered herself to the floor beside her, careful not to smudge the lines.
"Tell me."
Bonnie closed her eyes.
"In the dream last night, I wasn't me. I was... watching myself. And I felt proud. Like I'd been chosen. Like I belonged to something ancient and hungry and... right."
"That's not you," Caroline said.
"No," Bonnie agreed. "But what if it could be? What if it's wearing me down on purpose?"
Caroline hesitated.
And then: "What if it is?"
Bonnie opened her eyes.
"That doesn't mean we let it win," Caroline said, firmer now. "You're not alone. You don't carry this alone. Not the dagger. Not the dreams. Not the magic. Not anymore."
Bonnie's breath hitched. She didn't cry. But her shoulders slumped like someone finally took one of the weights off.
"Will you help me," she whispered.
"Anything."
"Anchor me."
Caroline nodded and moved closer, placing both hands over Bonnie's. "What do I do?"
"Just breathe. Match me."
They inhaled together. Exhaled. Again.
Bonnie's magic rose slowly, reluctantly—like something wounded and suspicious. Caroline held on tighter.
For one breath. Then two. Then three.
And the sigils stopped blurring.
It started with a flicker.
Bonnie sat cross-legged on the floor of the suite, her spellwork drawn in salt and ink—perfect circles, tight wards, lines of Latin and bloodroot carefully placed in a woven charm. The dagger rested at the center, still wrapped in its warded cloth. It had been quiet for hours. Dormant.
But magic like this never truly sleeps.
Bonnie pressed two fingers to the charm, whispering the final phrase of the containment incantation.
The circle hummed—softly at first.
Then louder.
The candlelight flared.
From across the room, Damon felt it like a hook between his ribs.
He stood from the couch, spine stiffening.
"Elena—"
She looked up from the chair by the window, her face going pale. "I feel it."
In the kitchenette, Caroline dropped her mug.
Stefan jolted up from the table, spellbook tumbling to the floor.
The hum turned into a tone—high, sharp, vibrating through the bones. The dagger unwrapped itself, cloth burning away in a puff of black smoke.
And then everything shattered.
The suite was gone.
They were standing in a clearing.
At night.
The stars above them were sharp and wrong—too many, too bright, ancient constellations twisted into patterns no one had named in millennia.
A circle of witches stood around a carved stone altar, hands joined, eyes glowing.
The sigil pulsed beneath them.
Carved not in chalk or ash—
—but blood.
Thick. Fresh. Still warm.
In the center of the altar, a child knelt.
Not crying.
Not screaming.
Silent.
Bonnie gasped. "It's a memory."
Elena clutched Damon's arm. "Whose?"
Then the child looked up.
And Damon staggered back.
"No," he breathed. "That's not—no."
It was him.
Small. Human. Before. Long before.
The hair. The eyes. The scar above the right eyebrow he'd had since he was six.
The witches were chanting now. The sigil blazing.
"He will open. The blood will bind. The door will turn."
One of the witches stepped forward, held out a bowl of liquid—dark red, too thick.
"From the line that broke the seal—"
"To the bloodline born to bear the blade—"
The child lifted his hands.
He did not scream when they cut into his palms.
He offered them.
Damon dropped to his knees in the vision, panting, eyes wide. "No—no, this isn't—this can't be real."
The witches vanished.
Katherine stepped into the ring in their place, ghostly, burning at the edges.
She looked down at the child, then at Damon.
"It was never supposed to be you," she said. "But you were the one who survived."
The child lifted his head again—eyes black, lips parting, whispering a single word:
"Damon."
They snapped back like rubber bands—gasping.
Bonnie collapsed sideways, hitting the floor hard.
Elena cried out and dropped beside her, checking her pulse.
Caroline swore blurred to Damon clutching his arm. "What the hell was that?"
Stefan was pale, trembling, eyes fixed on the now-dormant dagger.
Damon was still kneeling.
Staring at nothing.
"What did he say?" Caroline asked.
No one else had heard it.
But Damon had.
He looked up slowly, haunted.
"He said my name."
Stefan frowned. "You mean you saw yourself?"
Damon's voice shook. "No. The child said my name. Like he knew."
Bonnie groaned softly, eyes fluttering open.
"Bonnie," Elena whispered, stroking her hair back. "Are you okay?"
Bonnie blinked up at the ceiling.
And spoke in a voice that wasn't hers:
"He was always the lock."
And then she fainted again.
The suite was dark, save for the low golden glow of a single lamp.
Bonnie lay on the couch, wrapped in a blanket, pale and unmoving. Her breathing was shallow but steady. Elena sat at her side, holding her hand, lips pressed together so tightly they'd gone white.
The others moved quietly around the space, shaken and silent.
The dagger lay sealed again—this time buried in a salt-lined box, sigils etched into the lid by both Bonnie's hand and Stefan's, when Bonnie grew too weak to continue.
Caroline stood near the window, arms crossed, gaze distant but sharp.
She kept looking at Damon.
He hadn't spoken since the vision.
He hadn't moved.
He sat in the chair, still hunched forward, hands clasped between his knees, shoulders tense. He looked like a man carved out of stone.
Like something had fractured inside him, and he hadn't decided yet whether to scream or shatter.
Stefan approached slowly.
"You good?"
Damon's laugh was sharp and humorless. "Do I look good?"
"No."
"Then maybe don't ask stupid questions."
Elena turned from Bonnie, her voice soft but firm. "She said something before she passed out."
Damon looked up.
"She said, 'He was always the lock.'"
The room fell still.
Stefan frowned. "What does that mean?"
Caroline spoke up, voice quiet. "We've always said Elena's the key. The one with the bloodline. The bond."
Damon stood, slowly.
"But you can't use a key without a lock."
He crossed to the dagger's box, resting a hand over the lid without opening it.
"There's something in me," he said. "Something that fits whatever that ritual was. I felt it click, like a door swinging open from the inside."
Stefan stepped beside him. "If the Entity marked you—"
"It didn't mark me," Damon said. "It recognized me."
He turned to them, eyes too calm, too clear.
"Like it's been waiting."
They didn't know what to say.
Not yet.
Not until Bonnie bolted upright on the couch, eyes wide, breathing ragged.
Elena caught her. "Bonnie—! It's okay, you're safe, you're—"
But Bonnie looked right past her.
Right at Damon.
And said, with a voice that was hers and not hers:
"I know your name."
Damon froze.
The room did too.
"What?" he whispered.
Bonnie stared at him.
Then said a name no one else recognized.
Not even Elena.
But Damon—
He staggered back like he'd been struck.
His eyes flooded black.
And his knees hit the floor.
