Jeremy's POV

Oh, gosh. How can I explain this in any way that didn't sound insane?

I couldn't.

"Well, actually," Bonnie checked a glistening silver watch strapped around her thin wrist. "I think I have something else going on right now." She turned back to the door with her watch and her bag and her watery voice.

"Wait!" I bounded down the steps, nearly slipping on one of them, though I think Bonnie would've enjoyed the sight of me crashing down the staircase. "Please, Bonnie, wait."

She whirled around, staring me down with a frightening intensity that made me take one more step, only backwards this time. Splaying her hands out, she yelled, "I'm waiting!" Her temple was jumping with a familiar motion.

"Are you doing magic?" I questioned in an accusatory voice. The corner of her mouth twitched,

"I'm giving that bitch what she deserves," she bit, and I felt my eyes go wide.

I knew this wasn't completely about me (Elena being kidnapped probably had something to do with it), but I knew I had set her off. She was a time bomb and I had just started the countdown.

5

"Bonnie, no!" I roared.

I didn't know what she was doing, but I'd stopped her. From what I'd learned, she couldn't kill Annice. That didn't mean she couldn't hurt her. I grabbed her by the upper arm, not too hard, and she ripped it from my grasp, looking as if I'd just smacked her. There were tears leaking from the corners of her eyes.

"You're protecting her!?" she screeched. I gaped at her, my jaw somewhere near my toes.

4

"Bonnie," I begged when I could speak again, "you don't understand. Please, stop it."

Her face relaxed somewhat, and I knew I'd gotten through to her. She swiped her hand across her tear-stained cheeks and crossed her arms, now expecting an explanation, which I didn't have in any understandable way, shape or form. But I tried, nonetheless. I had to. I couldn't lose whatever was hanging by a thread that connected Bonnie to me. Annice was my fallback, but that didn't mean I wanted to need one.

"We're friends, okay?" I tried, but her face was unforgivable and cold, her dark brown eyes betraying no warmth. "There's nothing going on between us!"

Which was as truthful as I could put it.

3

"Oh, really? Then tell me why you were liplocked with her? She's a liar and she can't even be trusted, and you kiss her?! How?" I searched all around the room for an answer that wasn't there. "I thought so."

She brusquely forced her bag onto her shoulder and placed her hand on the doorknob. I knew this would be crazy, but as much as I probably should, I didn't think about it. I jumped forward and grabbed her again, this time more firmly. I spun her around and planted my lips squarely on hers.

2

When I pulled away, she had nothing but sadness in her cold gaze. I brushed my fingers across her cheeks and said the most honest thing I could.

"Everything you know about her is a lie," I whispered, and she didn't need to say anything to show she believed me.She just kissed me back.

We pressed back until we were near the doorway to the living room when the door flew open, and a familiar tall, thin man- or warlock- with a hardened scowl burst through.

"Mr. Martin!?" screamed Bonnie.

1

Elijah's POV

There was no doubt in my mind that something strange was going on. I knew that girl, Rose, was staying upstairs, but I had the mercy to spare her. I'd already killed that rat, Trevor, and my anger and lust for revenge had all but dissapated.

But that's not what I found strange.

It was this girl sitting before me in a dress that was blue like the ocean in a storm. She had a sunhat, one the color of cornsilk with a white and black plaid strap, tipped just over her face, so all I could see was a pointed, ivory chin and a pair of full pink lips. From the looks of it, her hair was bundled up under her hat, but a few strands had escaped the wrap and were spiraling down to brush her delicate, sharp shoulders. I must have seen her before, because there was something oddly familiar about the secretive twist of her scowling lips, about the certain way she held herself utterly still on the worn, wooden stairs.

"Well, well, well, what do we have here?" I asked, but it was not really a question. When nobody answered me, I looked around the room at the two slack-jawed faces of Damon Salvatore and Alaric Saltzmanm (he was fun to play with, nevermind his jealousy) that were staring blankly at the figure at my feet. "Hmm?"

I crossed my arms sternly and took one step closer. Careful not to send the hand tumbling off her head, she scrambled back up a few steps. I clicked my tongue in disapproval and instead reached for her hat this time. Just as my fingers pinched the brim, she wailed like a frightened cat and smashed her hands on top of her hat, welding it to her head. I huffed in irritation, but it seems the wail had broken the two idiots behind me from their silent stupor.

"Th-that's, um, just an old friend," stuttered Damon, leaping in between the woman and I, which made me think of something he'd done before. Then it hit me.

"Ah, now I remember you!" I exclaimed quietly. I felt the room freeze around me. "You were at the Slater household. You wore a hat there, as well." I think everybody but me let out a deep, heavy breath that filled the room with a full sighhhh...

"Right, but-" Damon tried, and I held up a quieting finger and peered over his shoulder, which made me feel childish. I hated feeling childish.

"But, I would like to know what's under the hat, and my politeness is quick to end. I'm short on patience, so if you would just..." I placed a hand on either side of his arm and lifted him up like he was a cardboard cutout.

"Wait, Elijah, please," pleaded Alaric, but I barely glanced at him. "You don't want to do that."

I smiled thinly and said, "Oh, yes, I think I do."

Damon jumped at me, but I swiped my arm through the air, slicing through it like a knife through butter, and my fist collided with his jaw. The girl's frightened outburst churned with the sickening snap of his neck, and he fell to the floor, unconcious. Alaric rushed to his side, tilting his head up and brushing some hair from his forehead.

"Oh, shit..." he muttered, twisting that gaudy blue undead ring around his finger. I rolled my eyes and stomped on his hand, just to make sure he didn't try to grab me. His hand crunched in a thousand places. "Agh!"

"Now to take care of you," I whispered, and reached for the mess of a girl that was lying on the stairs with her hands on her head.

Which is when things went wrong.

There wasn't even a transition that I could catch, she was so fast. One millisecond, my hand was snaking towards her, and the next, I was flying. Sort of. There was a certain sensation of weightlessness as the girl flipped me over her head, but then I was nothing but a heap on the splintering stairs. I groaned and immediately righted myself, seething.

"What the-" I snarled, but she wasn't done with me.

Like the crack of a whip, her hand shot out and let her fingers curl around the collar of shirt. Growling, I grabbed her hand and snapped it backwards, but she sent her other fist flying into my cheek. I stumbled backwards, rubbing the side of my face gently. I was so angry I thought I might explode, with my hands shaking with fury and my vision turning an ungodly shade of grayish-red. It took almost all of me not ot tear this whole house down, bit by bit.

"Who are you?" I hissed, suddenly aware that I didn't want to draw the attention of the humans a couple rooms away.

She only laughed, turning back to the knocked out Damon and his colleague, who was cradling his hand and pulling Damon towards the safety of the crevice between the side of a cabinet and the wall.

"It's all right, Alaric," she said softly, and he released the limp body. There was a fear in his face that told me he hadn't met the girl in the blue dress before either, yet he let Damon go. Who was this bitch?

I took careful, quiet steps towards her, doing nothing but observing, well, everything that I could. Seeing how her muscles smoothly curled as she kneeled, the way her lips tipped the slightest bit as she brushed the darkest of hair from the porcelein forehead that was Damon's. She caressed his face with something I couldn't identify as anything but fondness. This indescribable woman who had the gall and the strength to fight me was Damon Salvatore's... lover? Or a friend? That look in her eyes showed something that I couldn't possibly understand.

I was forced to leave my curious watching, still too undeniably enraged that I couldn't help it. I was losing control. The hushed, fond moment ended and I leaped at her, bloodlust controlling me. In a nanosecond, she was there. She raised me up, up, off the ground, where my feet dangled pointlessly at her knees. I could, but I wouldn't kick. It would make me look like a child. And I don't do childish. Holding stock-still, my fists clenched so hard it hurt me, I glared down at the top of her hat.

"Who. Are. You?"

She chuckled again and turned briefly to look at the body by the cabinet. I didn't. I was staring right at her. Staring right at her

as she finally raised her hand, and took off her hat.

Annice's POV

I was looking down at Damon, my eyes glossy and my throat thick. I was so tired of this. Fighting. Look where it had gotten me! Involved with a human boy who was already in an iffy relationship, in love with a man who probably didn't love me back and fighting my own brother. I had always loved Elijah the most. He was my family.

I heard his silent steps behind me and I was about to spin around to face him, careful to keep this stupid sunhat over my thick locks of fiery hair, even though I could feel a couple strands breaking free, but first I just wanted a few more moments. I just wanted to look at him. I knew he was knocked out, but he was practically sleeping, and he looked peaceful nonetheless. He needed some peace.

I was obviously not the one to inspire that.

I looked to the side, where there was a forgotten envelope that had the words If you use the dagger, it will kill you writted plainly on it. Of course they already knew.

So, as I finally did turn and pick up Elijah's leaping body, and I finally felt his body go still (he would despise scrambling like a little kid), I looked backwards to where Alaric no longer was, and I did the thing I told myself I would never do. I said I'd never love anybody. I said I'd never befriend once more. I said I'd never tell the truth, even if Damon was the only one who really knew it. I figure I can break one more rule.

So I finally took off my hat.

"Annice," Elijah breathed, marveling, his voice as childish as I'm sure he said it would never be.

People like us should know that life is just too long to say never.

"Hullo, brother," I replied quietly, like it was just another day. He looked down at me like he could not believe it. I must be a ghost. I must be a memory. I must be too good to be true. "It's me."

He only smiled.

"It's been centuries." I giggled in a way where no one would be able to tell what I was thinking.

"Ten, to be exact," I corrected, lowering him to the floor. He reached up and put a hand on my cheek to where I could lean gratefully into it, relishing in the unusual warmth that you could find in few vampires. He laughed so softly, I barely heard it.

"Yes." He pressed the base of his palm a bit harder into the soft spot near my neck, and his eyebrows pulled together. "What are you?"

Not who this time, but what. I sighed with what could only be indentified as the weight of the world. A world with vampires and werewolves, witches and ghosts, where people lied to get through life and cheated to make sure they could never be trusted. Because you can't trust anybody in a world where supernatural exists. You can't expect people to hold to their words. They're only words. And I'm sick of trying to get through to people with them.

"I'm somebody who never existed," I hinted. He could not betray my existance. "And someone you're going to have to trust."

He nodded smally, but by then, the dagger was already in his heart, and protruding from his chest. He choked and spluttered, and gray veins crawled up from his chest and covered his arms, legs, then face. With one final breath before he was put to an unstable sleep, he murmured something that would take a long lost, millenia old, hidden sister to get out of him.

"Okay."