Fic: The Truth of Who We Are
Title: The Truth of Who We Are
Author: lit_chick08
Pairings: Stefan/Caroline, mentions Stefan/Elena, Caroline/Tyler, Stefan/Rebekah, Tyler/Rebekah, Caroline/Damon
Warning: discusses dub-con/non-con
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Through 3x07 “Ghost World”
Word Count: 5,115
Disclaimer: These characters belong to LJ Smith, Kevin Williamson, and Julie Plec
Summary: Stefan is not Stefan anymore, and Caroline tries to remind herself of that. But old habits die hard and even a ripper, no matter how cruel, still needs a friend
”I believe in nothing, 100 suns until we part
I believe in nothing, not in sin, not in God
I believe in nothing, not in peace and not in war
I believe in nothing but the truth of who we are” - This is War, 30 Seconds to Mars
When Elena tells Caroline how Lexi has Stefan fastened into the anti-vampire cell beneath the police station, Caroline immediately tastes bile in her throat. She feels her skin bubbling and blistering from the sun, she smells the dank walls, and she remembers the bite of the restraints in her flesh, her body screaming for blood. As Elena casually mentions how Stefan will overcome Klaus's compulsion or desiccate to the point where he is no longer a threat, Caroline clenches her fists, rage and betrayal swelling inside her.
No matter what she says, Elena still thinks like a human, like a Founder when it comes to vampires.
Sweat breaks out on her forehead as Caroline descends the stairs to the cell. The lingering scent of vervain singes her nostrils, the main supply turned off upstairs, but Caroline feels her body wanting to recoil from anything which will weaken her. When she pulls open the heavy door, Caroline sees Stefan in the chair, wrists successfully banded with steel, his head hanging limply. She gags at the image, at what only days ago was her image, and Caroline suddenly hates humanity with a fervor she has never known.
Stefan lifts his head, his eyes slightly unfocused, but the smile on his face is as asinine as ever. “Really? They sent you? Must be pretty bad if they're sending in the third-string.”
Caroline tries not to flinch as she rips open the cuff on his left wrist, circling around behind him to open the other. Despite his attitude, Stefan slides to the ground from weakness, but Caroline does not pick him up; that is not what this is about.
Let Elena pick him up, try to piece him back together; that is not Caroline's role in the twisted farce which has become her life.
“I need blood,” Stefan growls as she walks towards the door, her heels clicking on the cement floor.
“You're a ripper,” Caroline retorts. “Shouldn't you be able to handle that on your own?”
“Caroline - “
She kicks him in the ribs, not as punishment but as a result of her own frustration. His body flies across the room, colliding painfully with the wall, and Caroline hears the crackle of bone splintering. Stefan groans and glares, spits out blood and threatens her, but Caroline doesn't hear it. All she can hear is Bill Forbes's in her head, taking about how he was going to make her better.
You cannot cure a vampire.
“I'm not like everyone else, so you can't manipulate me with your bullshit,” she states, glaring as Stefan struggles to his feet. “I'm not Damon, I'm not Elena, and I'm sure as hell not Rebekah; I don't play games.”
“And what game do you think we're playing?”
Caroline scoffs. “All you've done since Klaus flipped your switch is play games. The only reason I let you out is because no one deserves this, not even you.”
She isn't sure how long it takes Stefan to actually get out of the cell.
What she does know is two women go missing that night, and Elena wonders how exactly Stefan got out of the cell.
Caroline waits for Stefan to sell her out, to taunt Elena with her betrayal.
When he doesn't, Caroline wonders if this is part of the game.
* * *
She finds Tyler tearing into a freshman at a party by the falls; when Caroline pulls at his shoulders, she can see and smell the blood all over her boyfriend's face, and, for half of a second, Caroline wants desperately to feel the thick, hot liquid sliding down her throat, satiating a thirst which hasn't been quenched in months, which can never be quenched.
“Stop it!” she orders, tugging harder at his shoulder.
The last thing she expects if for Tyler to toss her away like a tissue; she knows he is stronger than her now, a hybrid on who knows how much human blood, no match for a six-month-old vampire who hunts animals in the woods and tries to limit the amount of blood bank bags she feeds from for fear of what (who) it will turn her into. But Caroline still gets up because he is not a hybrid; he is Tyler and that kid in his arms doesn't deserve to be drained in the forest, to hell with what that kind of exposure will mean.
When she rushes him, Tyler tosses away the skinny kid, but his face isn't a vampire's now; it is the wolf, and Caroline feels the instant rush of fear, remembering what a werewolf bite does to a vampire. She highly doubts Klaus is going to lend her some blood if Tyler bites her, and Caroline can't bet on Tyler's blood being able to heal her.
The blur comes out of the trees faster than she or Tyler can anticipate. Whatever it is, slams Tyler to the ground face first, pinning him easily to the ground; Caroline sees how hard Tyler is struggling but his attacker has him effectively pinned. Her adrenaline is so high, it takes Caroline a moment to decipher the face of her savior, to see Stefan's fangs and red eyes staring at her from atop Tyler's squirming body.
“He get you?” Stefan asks through his fangs, and there is none of the mocking Caroline is now used to in his voice, none of the creature she hates to even glimpse.
Caroline shakes her head. “Don't hurt him.”
Stefan flips Tyler onto his back, glaring down at the now unresisting hybrid; Caroline can see his face has relaxed back to human even if there is blood still smeared around his chin. She can read the shock and remorse in his features, and Caroline wants to tell him it is okay.
But she doesn't because it isn't, and Tyler knows this. She taught him the way Stefan taught her, the way Lexi taught him, and Tyler is choosing not to follow the rules, to just give in and do what feels good rather than what is right.
Caroline is not Elena; she is not going to mix up a vervain/wolfsbane cocktail, lock Tyler in the Salvatore basement, and wait for him to sober up. She is not going to close her eyes and pretend her boyfriend isn't behaving like the bad guy, the kinds of things they kill when the situation warrants it.
What she is going to do is spit, “Proud of yourself?” before picking up the shaken victim, compelling him to forget, and helping him back to the party.
“You're welcome!” Stefan calls to her departing back.
It isn't until later Caroline wonders why Stefan even bothered saving her.
* * *
The night she and Tyler break up, Caroline takes a bottle of Damon's best bourbon and goes out to the falls. When she was little, she used to imagine there was a magical land behind the falls, someplace wonderful and magical where parents didn't fight and she could be a princess rather than the girl people smiled at to be polite while secretly whispering about what a bitch she was.
On her tenth birthday, Caroline convinced Bonnie and Elena to come with her to see what was behind the cascading water. The moment Caroline saw it was only wet rocks, empty beer cans, and condom wrappers, was the day she stopped believing in fairy tales.
Caroline doesn't believe in happy endings anymore, but there is also so much ugliness in her life now, she needs a little beauty.
She is halfway through the bottle when she hears someone approaching. Caroline doesn't bother to turn or brace herself for an attack; she is the deadliest thing in these woods tonight, and she is in the mood to crush, kill, destroy, maim, whatever it takes to stop feeling like such a fucking idiot.
Stefan takes a seat beside her on the edge of the cliff, dropping down as if it is the most normal thing in the world for them to be sitting by the water; the last time Caroline saw him, he was three cheerleaders deep in the living room of the boardinghouse, offering up the bloody neck of a redhead to her like it was some kind of delicacy. Now he just takes the bottle from her hands and swigs, passing it back.
“Heard Rebekah fucked your dog.”
“Shut up.”
“Hey, I'm just reporting the word on the street. Don't give the guy that rough of a time. Rebekah's crazy but her cunt - “
Caroline springs, leaping at him, dragging her nails across his face, trying to hurt him in whatever way she can; by the time Stefan contains her, pinning her to the wet grass, his body is already healing the gouges to his face, the split in his lip.
“That,” he snaps, bouncing her head off the ground hard enough to blur the world for a second, “was uncalled for.”
“Leave me alone!” she screams, every emotion coursing in her body exploding through her mouth. “Just get out of my life!”
Stefan doesn't move, doesn't do anything other than goad, “Yeah, let it out.”
Caroline doesn't know how long she screams, how long she rages, but eventually her throat becomes raw and there are no words left in her body. Then, and only then, does Stefan release her, climbing off of her and picking up the bourbon again, drawing heavily from the bottle before offering it up to her; Caroline takes it, feels the burn as she swallows.
“Tyler Lockwood is a fucking douche, hybrid or not,” Stefan announces, “and you always deserved better than him. I don't know why you even care if he's fucking Rebekah.”
“I love him.”
Stefan scoffs, getting to his feet. “Love and vampires, it's never a good mix.”
Later, when she's washing dirt and grass stains from her body, Caroline wonders if this was Stefan's twisted way of trying to be a friend.
* * *
Alaric pairs her up with Stefan for a class project; given his current state of unpredictability and his general lack of aggression towards her, he thinks it is the best idea, and Caroline doesn't protest when he tells her about it. When she tells him they should meet in the library during their free period to work on it, Stefan smirks, and Caroline doesn't expect him to show.
But he does, smirking as he drops into the seat across from her, brandishing his textbook as if he is expecting a pat on the head.
“You realize I lived through the Vietnam War and don't need to research it, right?” When Caroline doesn't answer, he pushes, “And why do you care? Are you planning on continuing your normalcy delusions through college?”
Caroline doesn't even bother glaring this time. Instead, she lazily replies, “Yes, I also thought I'd run for Senate and maybe become a minister. Girl power and all that.”
He laughs, flipping his book closed. “You know, Care, if you'd just get over this whole humanity thing, you and I could have some good times.”
Thinking of the various bodies she has seen strewed around the boardinghouse, Caroline shivers. “I think we have drastically different ideas of what a good time is.”
“Ugh, why are you acting like such a killjoy?”
“I am how you taught me.”
Stefan's face sours instantly. “That wasn't me.”
“Is that what you tell yourself?” Setting down her pen, Caroline offers, voice kinder, “I know what it's like, Stefan, to be compelled, to not be the person you know you are, to have to do things you don't want to do but not being able to stop yourself. This person...This is what Klaus has made you, not who you are.”
Stefan smirks maliciously. “Are you honestly comparing Klaus setting me free with Damon using you for some quick fuck and sucks?”
She doesn't mean to, but Caroline recoils violently at the callous way Stefan refers to the worst few weeks of her life. Immediately she begins to gather her things, her hands shaking as she struggles to keep it together.
“You know, if you just turned it off, me saying that wouldn't hurt.”
Caroline's head snaps up, tears in her eyes, disgust in her veins. “When Mikael kills Klaus, when the compulsion breaks, I want you to remember this moment. And when you do, if you don't apologize to me, I will kill you.”
Later, when she's trying to muffle her sobs in the handicapped stall of girls' restroom, Caroline wonders if Stefan is so lonely, that hurting her to the point of desperation is his way of getting someone to ride out the darkness with him.
* * *
The night Mikael nearly kills her, Caroline goes home to her empty house, her mother out protecting the citizens of Mystic Falls who matter. She strips off her clothes, stiffened with her blood, and drops them into the trash, ruined beyond repair; she walks naked through the house, her flesh still healing, blood tacky on her skin and in her hair.
Caroline does not bother testing the temperature of the water before she steps into the shower, watching as the water turns pink as it disappears down the drain. It takes three washes before her hair is clean again.
She wonders if she'll ever be clean again.
When the water runs cold, Caroline finally steps out, wrapping herself in a towel, not bothering the process of untangling her hair. As she flicks on her bedroom light, she is startled to find Stefan sitting on her bed, his head in his hands.
“What are you doing here?”
Stefan raises his head, a puzzled expression on his face. Getting to his feet, he begins, “I don't feel anything. I mean, I do but I don't...It doesn't really matter in the scheme of things. But I remember...before.”
“Okay...?”
“I just thought...” Shaking his head, genuine confusion all over his features, Stefan admits, “I don't know why I'm here but I thought I should be.”
Caroline knows instantly what he's remembering; she will never forget the tenderness he showed her after Brady tortured her in that cage, after Jules nearly killed her. If she hadn't loved Stefan Salvatore for saving her from Damon post-transformation, she loved him then; she even privately referred to him as her best friend, especially after Bonnie and Elena got so wrapped up in their boyfriends and supernatural shenanigans.
But this Stefan is not the guy who supported her that night, and Caroline does not want him twisting up her memories of the Stefan she loved.
“Thanks but...I'm okay.”
Stefan nods, stutter-steps towards her before reversing course; Caroline hears the front door open and close.
When she climbs into her bed, she smells Stefan on her sheets, and it makes her cry for what Klaus has taken from her.
* * *
She is dropping off something for Damon, rushing down the stairs, when she realizes Klaus and Stefan are there. Before she can zip out the door, Klaus has grabbed her from behind, one powerful hand clutching her throat, his arm wrapping around her waist to tug her hips to his. Caroline tries not to telegraph her terror, but she is certain Stefan can read it as he approaches, a tumbler of scotch in each hand.
“Let's share this one tonight,” Klaus suggests, nuzzling at her neck, biting her hard enough to bruise with blunt teeth. “This one's got spunk, and I like her tits.”
Caroline feels the urge to panic reverberating through her body, every instinct screaming to kick, punch, do anything to avoid what Klaus is threatening, but she knows it would be useless; if Klaus decides he wants her, he is going to have her. Right now, there is only the varying degree of damage the Original is going to do to her body and soul.
Stefan scoffs. “Maybe you want Damon and Tyler's sloppy seconds, but I have higher standards.”
Klaus sighs regretfully, palming her breast and squeezing it as if he is checking fruit for ripeness, before releasing her. “Fine. I shall go find us something...fresher. Any preferences?”
“I'm in the mood for Asian tonight,” Stefan declares, as if he is ordering take-out rather than sentencing a woman to death.
The moment Klaus walks out the door, Caroline starts to cry, her entire body shaking as the full weight of the fate she just escaped hits her. Stefan hands her the tumbler meant for the Original, and she throws it back like a shot, the alcohol doing nothing to soothe her system.
“You should be gone by the time he gets back.”
Caroline nods, setting the glass on the nearest piece of furniture before moving to do just that. As she touches the doorknob, she pauses, turns to face Stefan, who is lingering near the foot of the stairs. “Thank you.”
Stefan meets her gaze steadily, his face utterly blank. “Whatever.”
Caroline shakes the entire drive back to her house and the entire length of her scalding shower. When she finally slips into bed, Caroline picks up her cell phone, staring at a picture she took at one of the Founders' events. Her arm is looped around Stefan's neck, dragging him down into the frame, her smile wide and happy, his subdued but genuine.
Caroline doesn't know if she will ever see this version of Stefan ever again.
But it calms her to know, even at his worst, Stefan will not let anything happen to her.
* * *
She wakes up one night to someone slipping in her window. Caroline grabs the stake she keeps in her night stand, but then Stefan's voice says, “It's just me.”
As if that should comfort her.
As if that means he is not a threat.
Caroline puts the stake down anyway.
“What are you doing?” she hisses, keeping her voice low so her mother doesn't burst in on the town's resident ripper in her daughter's bedroom.
Stefan drops down onto her bed; Caroline can smell the blood on his breath, and her stomach rolls with hunger. She sits up, trying to hug the blankets to her chest, embarrassed by the amount of cleavage her tiny tank top is revealing, but Stefan tugs the edge of the blanket, amusement in his eyes.
“You are so beautiful,” he breathes, and the part of Caroline who has always felt less than Elena preens under what she is suspects is an empty compliment anyway. “I was an idiot to turn you down when I first got to town.”
Blush rising on her cheeks, Caroline folds her arms over her chest. “Stefan, why - “
“Let's leave.”
“Leave?”
“There's a war coming, and it isn't ours.” Leaning in, Stefan implores, “Think about it, Care: we'll go somewhere far, far away, anywhere you've ever wanted to go. High school fucking blows, and you know it. Let's be new people in a brand-new place, and forget this town.”
“Stefan - “
“Nothing good has ever happened in this town, not for you and me. C'mon, Caroline...Don't you want a new life?”
All she ever wants is a new life; Stefan knows this.
She hates how he is using her greatest desire against her now.
“Why are you asking me?”
“Because I don't want you to die.”
Caroline shakes her head. “You're lying.” When he opens his mouth to protest, she rushes on, “This isn't about life or death. There's a reason you are asking me to go with you instead of Rebekah or Elena or even Damon. Why me?”
Stefan glares at her for a moment, his jaw clenching tightly, before snapping, “Because I promised I wouldn't let anything happen to you!”
“But you don't care about that. You can't. Klaus compelled it away.”
“Just because he took away my humanity doesn't mean I can't have loyalty, Caroline.” Getting to his feet, he growls, “If you want to die, fine. I don't give a fuck.”
Caroline doesn't know why, but, when Stefan leaves, she feels an overwhelming sense of guilt for sending him away.
It keeps her up for the rest of the night.
* * *
The night the compulsion breaks, Stefan flees. They all look for him in the aftermath, but there is no sign of him anywhere. Elena starts to fall apart, Damon is rapidly unraveling, and Caroline knows she is going to have to take control of the hunt.
Caroline is a very good hunter.
She learned from the best.
Stefan is standing at the top of the falls when Caroline finds him; he does not acknowledge her presence when she sidles up beside him, climbing up onto the railing of the overlook to stare down at the water crashing against the rocks.
“I don't think it would kill you,” she finally evaluates.
“Will you?”
His voice is so utterly pathetic, achingly desperate, it brings tears to Caroline's eyes. Closing her hand over his, she shakes her head. “Nope. You're just going to have to live.”
Stefan stares down at the water. “You don't know the things I did.”
“Not all the bad things,” Caroline acknowledges, “but I know all the good things. And there are good things. You're a good person, Stefan.”
“No, Caroline,” he argues softly. “I'm a bad person who has to be forced to be good. That's who I am.” Shaking his head, face twisting in pain, he adds, “I'm not like you.”
“Well, that's just wrong, because I'm exactly how you taught me to be, so obviously there's some good in you.”
Stefan smiles shakily before murmuring, “I'm sorry for what I said to you in the library, about you and Damon.”
The laughter bursts from her lips so quickly, Caroline cannot catch it; even as the tears slip down her cheeks, Caroline cannot stop the insane laughter, and she wraps her arms around Stefan, jostling his body with the strength of her emotional instability.
“I missed you,” she confesses to his chest.
“Why?” Stefan asks, his lips brushing the top of her head as he speaks. “I never left you alone.”
It isn't until he says it Caroline realizes just how true it is.
* * *
Caroline wakes up when her mother enters her bedroom, stopping in the doorway, her eyes bulging. She instantly leaps out of bed, careful not to jostle Stefan awake, before pushing Liz out into the living room, closing the door behind her.
“Why is Stefan Salvatore in your bed? Damon has been - “
“I know, I know!” Caroline interrupts, shivering as she pulls her robe tight around her body. “But he's not in a great place right now, and Damon and Elena, they're just going to make it worse. I can take care of this.”
“Caroline, you can't detox Stefan in your bedroom. He's dangerous.”
“So am I,” she reminds her mother, injecting as much ferocity into her voice as possible, “and Stefan won't hurt me. This is just...He just needed to sleep, Mom. I'll call Elena when he's awake. Just...don't tell Damon yet, okay?”
Liz shifts uneasily before stating, “As soon as he's awake, you call Elena.”
“I promise.”
Stefan does not wake up for three days.
When he comes to, his body screaming for blood, his entire body shaking from withdrawal, Caroline wraps her arms around him and asks, “What do you need me to do?”
She expects him to beg for blood, to plead for her to go get a blood bag from the refrigerator, to bring home a compelled human for him to feast on.
Instead, Stefan grasps her hands so tightly, it makes the bones grind together. “Don't let me go.”
So she doesn't.
* * *
He makes them lock him in the basement cell of the boardinghouse; Caroline takes turns with Elena and Damon to deliver animal blood. The longer he goes without human blood, the meaner and more unpredictable he becomes, so soon it is only she and Damon who enter the cell for the deliveries.
Caroline enters one evening only to find herself pinned against the wall, Stefan's wild eyes tripping over her.
“You're my best friend.”
“I'm Caroline, Stefan, not Lexi.”
Stefan looks at her as if she is crazy. “I know.”
She exhales shakily before confirming, “I'm your best friend.”
He pulls away, breathing heavily, nodding his head silently. Caroline sets the doe's blood on the ground before turning to leave.
“Caroline?”
“Yeah?”
“Will you stay?” When Caroline says nothing, he adds, “I need someone to talk to.”
She shrugs agreeably, sliding down the length of the wall as Stefan sinks to the floor opposite of her, fiddling with the cap of the bottle which bears his blood.
Stefan does not stop talking for nineteen hours.
When Caroline finally leaves, she feels like she finally knows Stefan Salvatore.
For the first time, Caroline sees jealousy in Elena's eyes.
* * *
Stefan is in the basement for a year before he trusts himself enough to be let out. Caroline tells him he's being ridiculous waiting so long, but Stefan insists it is necessary, reminds her it took Lexi thirty years to get him back to the person Caroline first met.
“Well, Lexi probably had way more patience than me, and my blood delivery service stops at 12 months,” she had teased, pressing a kiss to his temple before heading off to class.
It takes another six months after leaving the basement for Stefan to leave the boardinghouse. When he suddenly shows up on the doorstep of her apartment in Richmond, his hands tucked n the pockets of his jeans, a sheepish smile on his face, Caroline is so genuinely surprised, she is silent.
And then she pulls him inside, showing him the tiny efficiency she is so proud of with its amazing view.
Stefan spends the next three years sleeping on her futon, only going back to Mystic Falls when Caroline goes home for breaks. They never talk about their living situation, and Caroline never discusses it with her mother or Elena. It is simply what is, requiring no explanations.
When she graduates, when the job offers come in from three different cities, Caroline drops three different city guide books on the coffee table and asks, “So where are we going?”
Stefan looks at the glossy covers, running his fingers across them, before declaring, “I've never lived in Texas before.”
And so Caroline becomes the weekend weather girl for an affiliate station out of San Antonio, and Stefan takes a job as a carpenter.
* * *
On her 25th birthday, Caroline wakes up to the smell of brownies. As she forces open her eyes, she sees it is only seven-thirty in the morning, and Caroline squeals as she sees the feathery birthday tiara, sash, and gerbera daisies lying on the pillow beside her head.
Putting on her tiara and sash, inhaling the scent of her flowers, Caroline bounces to the sunlit kitchen to see Stefan pulling a pan of Mississippi Mud brownies, her absolute favorite dessert, from the oven. As she squeals again, Stefan laughs, grunting as she throws her body into his arms, wrapping her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist, clinging to him like a monkey.
“You are the best best friend ever!”
“You're only saying that because I made you brownies.”
“And bought me flowers and a tiara!” Smiling widely, she inclines her head, resting her forehead against his. “Seriously...best friend ever. Stefan, this is so - “
She isn't entirely surprised when Stefan kisses her. If she is honest, she has been trying to gather the courage to kiss him for the past two years.
“You taste like brownie batter,” Caroline announces as they pull apart.
“That's all you have to say?”
She pauses for a moment before nodding. “Yep.”
And then she pulls him down for another kiss.
* * *
He still has nightmares about Klaus sometimes. On the days after, Stefan is short, sometimes mean; he always apologizes, trying to vocalize what the memories do to him, but Caroline always cuts him off, assures him he knows.
“How did you ever forgive me for the things I did to you, the things I said?” Stefan asks one night as the sweat of their coupling is cooling on their bodies.
Caroline, who is lying on her stomach, rolls her head to look at him in the darkness. Propping herself up on her elbows, she declares, “I forgave you because I know who you are, and even at your worst, you never really hurt me.”
“I couldn't,” Stefan confesses, running a hand down her bare back. “Even when...Even without my humanity, hurting you....I always wanted you with me.”
“You'll always have me with you,” Caroline swears.
Damon tells her she's more naïve than Elena if she thinks Stefan won't eventually relapse, won't become the ripper again. Caroline doesn't bother to correct him. She knows someday Stefan will relapse.
But even when he does, Caroline knows he will still want her, still stay by her, and that is all she will need to bring him back from the edge.
The edge isn't so scary once you've already survived the worst fall.
Author: lit_chick08
Pairings: Stefan/Caroline, mentions Stefan/Elena, Caroline/Tyler, Stefan/Rebekah, Tyler/Rebekah, Caroline/Damon
Warning: discusses dub-con/non-con
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Through 3x07 “Ghost World”
Word Count: 5,115
Disclaimer: These characters belong to LJ Smith, Kevin Williamson, and Julie Plec
Summary: Stefan is not Stefan anymore, and Caroline tries to remind herself of that. But old habits die hard and even a ripper, no matter how cruel, still needs a friend
”I believe in nothing, 100 suns until we part
I believe in nothing, not in sin, not in God
I believe in nothing, not in peace and not in war
I believe in nothing but the truth of who we are” - This is War, 30 Seconds to Mars
When Elena tells Caroline how Lexi has Stefan fastened into the anti-vampire cell beneath the police station, Caroline immediately tastes bile in her throat. She feels her skin bubbling and blistering from the sun, she smells the dank walls, and she remembers the bite of the restraints in her flesh, her body screaming for blood. As Elena casually mentions how Stefan will overcome Klaus's compulsion or desiccate to the point where he is no longer a threat, Caroline clenches her fists, rage and betrayal swelling inside her.
No matter what she says, Elena still thinks like a human, like a Founder when it comes to vampires.
Sweat breaks out on her forehead as Caroline descends the stairs to the cell. The lingering scent of vervain singes her nostrils, the main supply turned off upstairs, but Caroline feels her body wanting to recoil from anything which will weaken her. When she pulls open the heavy door, Caroline sees Stefan in the chair, wrists successfully banded with steel, his head hanging limply. She gags at the image, at what only days ago was her image, and Caroline suddenly hates humanity with a fervor she has never known.
Stefan lifts his head, his eyes slightly unfocused, but the smile on his face is as asinine as ever. “Really? They sent you? Must be pretty bad if they're sending in the third-string.”
Caroline tries not to flinch as she rips open the cuff on his left wrist, circling around behind him to open the other. Despite his attitude, Stefan slides to the ground from weakness, but Caroline does not pick him up; that is not what this is about.
Let Elena pick him up, try to piece him back together; that is not Caroline's role in the twisted farce which has become her life.
“I need blood,” Stefan growls as she walks towards the door, her heels clicking on the cement floor.
“You're a ripper,” Caroline retorts. “Shouldn't you be able to handle that on your own?”
“Caroline - “
She kicks him in the ribs, not as punishment but as a result of her own frustration. His body flies across the room, colliding painfully with the wall, and Caroline hears the crackle of bone splintering. Stefan groans and glares, spits out blood and threatens her, but Caroline doesn't hear it. All she can hear is Bill Forbes's in her head, taking about how he was going to make her better.
You cannot cure a vampire.
“I'm not like everyone else, so you can't manipulate me with your bullshit,” she states, glaring as Stefan struggles to his feet. “I'm not Damon, I'm not Elena, and I'm sure as hell not Rebekah; I don't play games.”
“And what game do you think we're playing?”
Caroline scoffs. “All you've done since Klaus flipped your switch is play games. The only reason I let you out is because no one deserves this, not even you.”
She isn't sure how long it takes Stefan to actually get out of the cell.
What she does know is two women go missing that night, and Elena wonders how exactly Stefan got out of the cell.
Caroline waits for Stefan to sell her out, to taunt Elena with her betrayal.
When he doesn't, Caroline wonders if this is part of the game.
* * *
She finds Tyler tearing into a freshman at a party by the falls; when Caroline pulls at his shoulders, she can see and smell the blood all over her boyfriend's face, and, for half of a second, Caroline wants desperately to feel the thick, hot liquid sliding down her throat, satiating a thirst which hasn't been quenched in months, which can never be quenched.
“Stop it!” she orders, tugging harder at his shoulder.
The last thing she expects if for Tyler to toss her away like a tissue; she knows he is stronger than her now, a hybrid on who knows how much human blood, no match for a six-month-old vampire who hunts animals in the woods and tries to limit the amount of blood bank bags she feeds from for fear of what (who) it will turn her into. But Caroline still gets up because he is not a hybrid; he is Tyler and that kid in his arms doesn't deserve to be drained in the forest, to hell with what that kind of exposure will mean.
When she rushes him, Tyler tosses away the skinny kid, but his face isn't a vampire's now; it is the wolf, and Caroline feels the instant rush of fear, remembering what a werewolf bite does to a vampire. She highly doubts Klaus is going to lend her some blood if Tyler bites her, and Caroline can't bet on Tyler's blood being able to heal her.
The blur comes out of the trees faster than she or Tyler can anticipate. Whatever it is, slams Tyler to the ground face first, pinning him easily to the ground; Caroline sees how hard Tyler is struggling but his attacker has him effectively pinned. Her adrenaline is so high, it takes Caroline a moment to decipher the face of her savior, to see Stefan's fangs and red eyes staring at her from atop Tyler's squirming body.
“He get you?” Stefan asks through his fangs, and there is none of the mocking Caroline is now used to in his voice, none of the creature she hates to even glimpse.
Caroline shakes her head. “Don't hurt him.”
Stefan flips Tyler onto his back, glaring down at the now unresisting hybrid; Caroline can see his face has relaxed back to human even if there is blood still smeared around his chin. She can read the shock and remorse in his features, and Caroline wants to tell him it is okay.
But she doesn't because it isn't, and Tyler knows this. She taught him the way Stefan taught her, the way Lexi taught him, and Tyler is choosing not to follow the rules, to just give in and do what feels good rather than what is right.
Caroline is not Elena; she is not going to mix up a vervain/wolfsbane cocktail, lock Tyler in the Salvatore basement, and wait for him to sober up. She is not going to close her eyes and pretend her boyfriend isn't behaving like the bad guy, the kinds of things they kill when the situation warrants it.
What she is going to do is spit, “Proud of yourself?” before picking up the shaken victim, compelling him to forget, and helping him back to the party.
“You're welcome!” Stefan calls to her departing back.
It isn't until later Caroline wonders why Stefan even bothered saving her.
* * *
The night she and Tyler break up, Caroline takes a bottle of Damon's best bourbon and goes out to the falls. When she was little, she used to imagine there was a magical land behind the falls, someplace wonderful and magical where parents didn't fight and she could be a princess rather than the girl people smiled at to be polite while secretly whispering about what a bitch she was.
On her tenth birthday, Caroline convinced Bonnie and Elena to come with her to see what was behind the cascading water. The moment Caroline saw it was only wet rocks, empty beer cans, and condom wrappers, was the day she stopped believing in fairy tales.
Caroline doesn't believe in happy endings anymore, but there is also so much ugliness in her life now, she needs a little beauty.
She is halfway through the bottle when she hears someone approaching. Caroline doesn't bother to turn or brace herself for an attack; she is the deadliest thing in these woods tonight, and she is in the mood to crush, kill, destroy, maim, whatever it takes to stop feeling like such a fucking idiot.
Stefan takes a seat beside her on the edge of the cliff, dropping down as if it is the most normal thing in the world for them to be sitting by the water; the last time Caroline saw him, he was three cheerleaders deep in the living room of the boardinghouse, offering up the bloody neck of a redhead to her like it was some kind of delicacy. Now he just takes the bottle from her hands and swigs, passing it back.
“Heard Rebekah fucked your dog.”
“Shut up.”
“Hey, I'm just reporting the word on the street. Don't give the guy that rough of a time. Rebekah's crazy but her cunt - “
Caroline springs, leaping at him, dragging her nails across his face, trying to hurt him in whatever way she can; by the time Stefan contains her, pinning her to the wet grass, his body is already healing the gouges to his face, the split in his lip.
“That,” he snaps, bouncing her head off the ground hard enough to blur the world for a second, “was uncalled for.”
“Leave me alone!” she screams, every emotion coursing in her body exploding through her mouth. “Just get out of my life!”
Stefan doesn't move, doesn't do anything other than goad, “Yeah, let it out.”
Caroline doesn't know how long she screams, how long she rages, but eventually her throat becomes raw and there are no words left in her body. Then, and only then, does Stefan release her, climbing off of her and picking up the bourbon again, drawing heavily from the bottle before offering it up to her; Caroline takes it, feels the burn as she swallows.
“Tyler Lockwood is a fucking douche, hybrid or not,” Stefan announces, “and you always deserved better than him. I don't know why you even care if he's fucking Rebekah.”
“I love him.”
Stefan scoffs, getting to his feet. “Love and vampires, it's never a good mix.”
Later, when she's washing dirt and grass stains from her body, Caroline wonders if this was Stefan's twisted way of trying to be a friend.
* * *
Alaric pairs her up with Stefan for a class project; given his current state of unpredictability and his general lack of aggression towards her, he thinks it is the best idea, and Caroline doesn't protest when he tells her about it. When she tells him they should meet in the library during their free period to work on it, Stefan smirks, and Caroline doesn't expect him to show.
But he does, smirking as he drops into the seat across from her, brandishing his textbook as if he is expecting a pat on the head.
“You realize I lived through the Vietnam War and don't need to research it, right?” When Caroline doesn't answer, he pushes, “And why do you care? Are you planning on continuing your normalcy delusions through college?”
Caroline doesn't even bother glaring this time. Instead, she lazily replies, “Yes, I also thought I'd run for Senate and maybe become a minister. Girl power and all that.”
He laughs, flipping his book closed. “You know, Care, if you'd just get over this whole humanity thing, you and I could have some good times.”
Thinking of the various bodies she has seen strewed around the boardinghouse, Caroline shivers. “I think we have drastically different ideas of what a good time is.”
“Ugh, why are you acting like such a killjoy?”
“I am how you taught me.”
Stefan's face sours instantly. “That wasn't me.”
“Is that what you tell yourself?” Setting down her pen, Caroline offers, voice kinder, “I know what it's like, Stefan, to be compelled, to not be the person you know you are, to have to do things you don't want to do but not being able to stop yourself. This person...This is what Klaus has made you, not who you are.”
Stefan smirks maliciously. “Are you honestly comparing Klaus setting me free with Damon using you for some quick fuck and sucks?”
She doesn't mean to, but Caroline recoils violently at the callous way Stefan refers to the worst few weeks of her life. Immediately she begins to gather her things, her hands shaking as she struggles to keep it together.
“You know, if you just turned it off, me saying that wouldn't hurt.”
Caroline's head snaps up, tears in her eyes, disgust in her veins. “When Mikael kills Klaus, when the compulsion breaks, I want you to remember this moment. And when you do, if you don't apologize to me, I will kill you.”
Later, when she's trying to muffle her sobs in the handicapped stall of girls' restroom, Caroline wonders if Stefan is so lonely, that hurting her to the point of desperation is his way of getting someone to ride out the darkness with him.
* * *
The night Mikael nearly kills her, Caroline goes home to her empty house, her mother out protecting the citizens of Mystic Falls who matter. She strips off her clothes, stiffened with her blood, and drops them into the trash, ruined beyond repair; she walks naked through the house, her flesh still healing, blood tacky on her skin and in her hair.
Caroline does not bother testing the temperature of the water before she steps into the shower, watching as the water turns pink as it disappears down the drain. It takes three washes before her hair is clean again.
She wonders if she'll ever be clean again.
When the water runs cold, Caroline finally steps out, wrapping herself in a towel, not bothering the process of untangling her hair. As she flicks on her bedroom light, she is startled to find Stefan sitting on her bed, his head in his hands.
“What are you doing here?”
Stefan raises his head, a puzzled expression on his face. Getting to his feet, he begins, “I don't feel anything. I mean, I do but I don't...It doesn't really matter in the scheme of things. But I remember...before.”
“Okay...?”
“I just thought...” Shaking his head, genuine confusion all over his features, Stefan admits, “I don't know why I'm here but I thought I should be.”
Caroline knows instantly what he's remembering; she will never forget the tenderness he showed her after Brady tortured her in that cage, after Jules nearly killed her. If she hadn't loved Stefan Salvatore for saving her from Damon post-transformation, she loved him then; she even privately referred to him as her best friend, especially after Bonnie and Elena got so wrapped up in their boyfriends and supernatural shenanigans.
But this Stefan is not the guy who supported her that night, and Caroline does not want him twisting up her memories of the Stefan she loved.
“Thanks but...I'm okay.”
Stefan nods, stutter-steps towards her before reversing course; Caroline hears the front door open and close.
When she climbs into her bed, she smells Stefan on her sheets, and it makes her cry for what Klaus has taken from her.
* * *
She is dropping off something for Damon, rushing down the stairs, when she realizes Klaus and Stefan are there. Before she can zip out the door, Klaus has grabbed her from behind, one powerful hand clutching her throat, his arm wrapping around her waist to tug her hips to his. Caroline tries not to telegraph her terror, but she is certain Stefan can read it as he approaches, a tumbler of scotch in each hand.
“Let's share this one tonight,” Klaus suggests, nuzzling at her neck, biting her hard enough to bruise with blunt teeth. “This one's got spunk, and I like her tits.”
Caroline feels the urge to panic reverberating through her body, every instinct screaming to kick, punch, do anything to avoid what Klaus is threatening, but she knows it would be useless; if Klaus decides he wants her, he is going to have her. Right now, there is only the varying degree of damage the Original is going to do to her body and soul.
Stefan scoffs. “Maybe you want Damon and Tyler's sloppy seconds, but I have higher standards.”
Klaus sighs regretfully, palming her breast and squeezing it as if he is checking fruit for ripeness, before releasing her. “Fine. I shall go find us something...fresher. Any preferences?”
“I'm in the mood for Asian tonight,” Stefan declares, as if he is ordering take-out rather than sentencing a woman to death.
The moment Klaus walks out the door, Caroline starts to cry, her entire body shaking as the full weight of the fate she just escaped hits her. Stefan hands her the tumbler meant for the Original, and she throws it back like a shot, the alcohol doing nothing to soothe her system.
“You should be gone by the time he gets back.”
Caroline nods, setting the glass on the nearest piece of furniture before moving to do just that. As she touches the doorknob, she pauses, turns to face Stefan, who is lingering near the foot of the stairs. “Thank you.”
Stefan meets her gaze steadily, his face utterly blank. “Whatever.”
Caroline shakes the entire drive back to her house and the entire length of her scalding shower. When she finally slips into bed, Caroline picks up her cell phone, staring at a picture she took at one of the Founders' events. Her arm is looped around Stefan's neck, dragging him down into the frame, her smile wide and happy, his subdued but genuine.
Caroline doesn't know if she will ever see this version of Stefan ever again.
But it calms her to know, even at his worst, Stefan will not let anything happen to her.
* * *
She wakes up one night to someone slipping in her window. Caroline grabs the stake she keeps in her night stand, but then Stefan's voice says, “It's just me.”
As if that should comfort her.
As if that means he is not a threat.
Caroline puts the stake down anyway.
“What are you doing?” she hisses, keeping her voice low so her mother doesn't burst in on the town's resident ripper in her daughter's bedroom.
Stefan drops down onto her bed; Caroline can smell the blood on his breath, and her stomach rolls with hunger. She sits up, trying to hug the blankets to her chest, embarrassed by the amount of cleavage her tiny tank top is revealing, but Stefan tugs the edge of the blanket, amusement in his eyes.
“You are so beautiful,” he breathes, and the part of Caroline who has always felt less than Elena preens under what she is suspects is an empty compliment anyway. “I was an idiot to turn you down when I first got to town.”
Blush rising on her cheeks, Caroline folds her arms over her chest. “Stefan, why - “
“Let's leave.”
“Leave?”
“There's a war coming, and it isn't ours.” Leaning in, Stefan implores, “Think about it, Care: we'll go somewhere far, far away, anywhere you've ever wanted to go. High school fucking blows, and you know it. Let's be new people in a brand-new place, and forget this town.”
“Stefan - “
“Nothing good has ever happened in this town, not for you and me. C'mon, Caroline...Don't you want a new life?”
All she ever wants is a new life; Stefan knows this.
She hates how he is using her greatest desire against her now.
“Why are you asking me?”
“Because I don't want you to die.”
Caroline shakes her head. “You're lying.” When he opens his mouth to protest, she rushes on, “This isn't about life or death. There's a reason you are asking me to go with you instead of Rebekah or Elena or even Damon. Why me?”
Stefan glares at her for a moment, his jaw clenching tightly, before snapping, “Because I promised I wouldn't let anything happen to you!”
“But you don't care about that. You can't. Klaus compelled it away.”
“Just because he took away my humanity doesn't mean I can't have loyalty, Caroline.” Getting to his feet, he growls, “If you want to die, fine. I don't give a fuck.”
Caroline doesn't know why, but, when Stefan leaves, she feels an overwhelming sense of guilt for sending him away.
It keeps her up for the rest of the night.
* * *
The night the compulsion breaks, Stefan flees. They all look for him in the aftermath, but there is no sign of him anywhere. Elena starts to fall apart, Damon is rapidly unraveling, and Caroline knows she is going to have to take control of the hunt.
Caroline is a very good hunter.
She learned from the best.
Stefan is standing at the top of the falls when Caroline finds him; he does not acknowledge her presence when she sidles up beside him, climbing up onto the railing of the overlook to stare down at the water crashing against the rocks.
“I don't think it would kill you,” she finally evaluates.
“Will you?”
His voice is so utterly pathetic, achingly desperate, it brings tears to Caroline's eyes. Closing her hand over his, she shakes her head. “Nope. You're just going to have to live.”
Stefan stares down at the water. “You don't know the things I did.”
“Not all the bad things,” Caroline acknowledges, “but I know all the good things. And there are good things. You're a good person, Stefan.”
“No, Caroline,” he argues softly. “I'm a bad person who has to be forced to be good. That's who I am.” Shaking his head, face twisting in pain, he adds, “I'm not like you.”
“Well, that's just wrong, because I'm exactly how you taught me to be, so obviously there's some good in you.”
Stefan smiles shakily before murmuring, “I'm sorry for what I said to you in the library, about you and Damon.”
The laughter bursts from her lips so quickly, Caroline cannot catch it; even as the tears slip down her cheeks, Caroline cannot stop the insane laughter, and she wraps her arms around Stefan, jostling his body with the strength of her emotional instability.
“I missed you,” she confesses to his chest.
“Why?” Stefan asks, his lips brushing the top of her head as he speaks. “I never left you alone.”
It isn't until he says it Caroline realizes just how true it is.
* * *
Caroline wakes up when her mother enters her bedroom, stopping in the doorway, her eyes bulging. She instantly leaps out of bed, careful not to jostle Stefan awake, before pushing Liz out into the living room, closing the door behind her.
“Why is Stefan Salvatore in your bed? Damon has been - “
“I know, I know!” Caroline interrupts, shivering as she pulls her robe tight around her body. “But he's not in a great place right now, and Damon and Elena, they're just going to make it worse. I can take care of this.”
“Caroline, you can't detox Stefan in your bedroom. He's dangerous.”
“So am I,” she reminds her mother, injecting as much ferocity into her voice as possible, “and Stefan won't hurt me. This is just...He just needed to sleep, Mom. I'll call Elena when he's awake. Just...don't tell Damon yet, okay?”
Liz shifts uneasily before stating, “As soon as he's awake, you call Elena.”
“I promise.”
Stefan does not wake up for three days.
When he comes to, his body screaming for blood, his entire body shaking from withdrawal, Caroline wraps her arms around him and asks, “What do you need me to do?”
She expects him to beg for blood, to plead for her to go get a blood bag from the refrigerator, to bring home a compelled human for him to feast on.
Instead, Stefan grasps her hands so tightly, it makes the bones grind together. “Don't let me go.”
So she doesn't.
* * *
He makes them lock him in the basement cell of the boardinghouse; Caroline takes turns with Elena and Damon to deliver animal blood. The longer he goes without human blood, the meaner and more unpredictable he becomes, so soon it is only she and Damon who enter the cell for the deliveries.
Caroline enters one evening only to find herself pinned against the wall, Stefan's wild eyes tripping over her.
“You're my best friend.”
“I'm Caroline, Stefan, not Lexi.”
Stefan looks at her as if she is crazy. “I know.”
She exhales shakily before confirming, “I'm your best friend.”
He pulls away, breathing heavily, nodding his head silently. Caroline sets the doe's blood on the ground before turning to leave.
“Caroline?”
“Yeah?”
“Will you stay?” When Caroline says nothing, he adds, “I need someone to talk to.”
She shrugs agreeably, sliding down the length of the wall as Stefan sinks to the floor opposite of her, fiddling with the cap of the bottle which bears his blood.
Stefan does not stop talking for nineteen hours.
When Caroline finally leaves, she feels like she finally knows Stefan Salvatore.
For the first time, Caroline sees jealousy in Elena's eyes.
* * *
Stefan is in the basement for a year before he trusts himself enough to be let out. Caroline tells him he's being ridiculous waiting so long, but Stefan insists it is necessary, reminds her it took Lexi thirty years to get him back to the person Caroline first met.
“Well, Lexi probably had way more patience than me, and my blood delivery service stops at 12 months,” she had teased, pressing a kiss to his temple before heading off to class.
It takes another six months after leaving the basement for Stefan to leave the boardinghouse. When he suddenly shows up on the doorstep of her apartment in Richmond, his hands tucked n the pockets of his jeans, a sheepish smile on his face, Caroline is so genuinely surprised, she is silent.
And then she pulls him inside, showing him the tiny efficiency she is so proud of with its amazing view.
Stefan spends the next three years sleeping on her futon, only going back to Mystic Falls when Caroline goes home for breaks. They never talk about their living situation, and Caroline never discusses it with her mother or Elena. It is simply what is, requiring no explanations.
When she graduates, when the job offers come in from three different cities, Caroline drops three different city guide books on the coffee table and asks, “So where are we going?”
Stefan looks at the glossy covers, running his fingers across them, before declaring, “I've never lived in Texas before.”
And so Caroline becomes the weekend weather girl for an affiliate station out of San Antonio, and Stefan takes a job as a carpenter.
* * *
On her 25th birthday, Caroline wakes up to the smell of brownies. As she forces open her eyes, she sees it is only seven-thirty in the morning, and Caroline squeals as she sees the feathery birthday tiara, sash, and gerbera daisies lying on the pillow beside her head.
Putting on her tiara and sash, inhaling the scent of her flowers, Caroline bounces to the sunlit kitchen to see Stefan pulling a pan of Mississippi Mud brownies, her absolute favorite dessert, from the oven. As she squeals again, Stefan laughs, grunting as she throws her body into his arms, wrapping her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist, clinging to him like a monkey.
“You are the best best friend ever!”
“You're only saying that because I made you brownies.”
“And bought me flowers and a tiara!” Smiling widely, she inclines her head, resting her forehead against his. “Seriously...best friend ever. Stefan, this is so - “
She isn't entirely surprised when Stefan kisses her. If she is honest, she has been trying to gather the courage to kiss him for the past two years.
“You taste like brownie batter,” Caroline announces as they pull apart.
“That's all you have to say?”
She pauses for a moment before nodding. “Yep.”
And then she pulls him down for another kiss.
* * *
He still has nightmares about Klaus sometimes. On the days after, Stefan is short, sometimes mean; he always apologizes, trying to vocalize what the memories do to him, but Caroline always cuts him off, assures him he knows.
“How did you ever forgive me for the things I did to you, the things I said?” Stefan asks one night as the sweat of their coupling is cooling on their bodies.
Caroline, who is lying on her stomach, rolls her head to look at him in the darkness. Propping herself up on her elbows, she declares, “I forgave you because I know who you are, and even at your worst, you never really hurt me.”
“I couldn't,” Stefan confesses, running a hand down her bare back. “Even when...Even without my humanity, hurting you....I always wanted you with me.”
“You'll always have me with you,” Caroline swears.
Damon tells her she's more naïve than Elena if she thinks Stefan won't eventually relapse, won't become the ripper again. Caroline doesn't bother to correct him. She knows someday Stefan will relapse.
But even when he does, Caroline knows he will still want her, still stay by her, and that is all she will need to bring him back from the edge.
The edge isn't so scary once you've already survived the worst fall.