"we're not who we used to be."

THE ROOM IS WARM AND CLAMMY AND THE SHEETS AREN'T SOFT ENOUGH FOR ME. Somewhere in the room a fan is blowing, but it just seems to be pushing the warm air around, doing nothing to cool me down. I like for the fan to be on either way, the white noise that it produces drowns out the screams that fill my head at night.

He crawls into bed with me in complete silence, the rough texture of his jeans surrounds my bare legs. He hugs my waist and pulls me into his, so I can sit comfortably in the space he has created.

This doesn't have anything to do with sex, this isn't who we used to be, it's who we are now.

He pets my bare tummy with the hand that lays on top of me and seems to be almost humming something into my neck and still wet hair. Whispers of far away places.

His cold fingers tickle tummy, but before I can say anything about that I feel the wetness of tears on my neck. He burrows himself into the comfort of the curve of my back and silently cries.

I never say a word.

"My feet hurt." I am wearing some sneakers instead of the better advised hiking shoes. I just couldn't possibly match those giant bricks with any outfit.

"Then maybe you should have listened when I told you to wear different shoes, Paloma." Klaus answers my complaint. Just a bit ahead of me- in this forest of luscious greens- Stefan is carrying Ray over his back, taking quick steps.

"You okay Stef? Isn't that getting heavy?"

His answers consists of a groan in my general direction, "I'm fine." Earth hits my bare legs and leaves little spots of dirt behind, a rock tries to find it's way into my shoe.

Stefan gets to stepping again.

"You sure about that? You know, we've been walking for quite some time now. If you need some water or a little sit-down...." Klaus has this gift, where he can make even the most horrible situation just a tad worse, by just opening his mouth. It's a real talent, he should do something with that.

"You know, I get that we're, uh...we're stuck together, but if we could maybe just skip the chitchat, it'd be great."  Stefan cuts his bonding attempt off.

Klaus laughs, "so much brooding. Your self-loathing is suffocating you, my friend."

"Maybe it's 'cause I'm a little tired of hunting werewolves. We've been at it all summer."

I try to defuse the situation, "well we found a pack now so we're getting closer to the end."   I know we aren't of course. Back home, in the small town of Mystic Falls, there is still a girl who looks exactly like Katerina Petrova running around. Trying desperately to save Stefan and I.

The only reason she is still there, leading her life, is that there are two boys who will never be willing to give up on her. Ever.

I wonder for a second, while I fish that rock out of my shoe, how Damon and Elena are doing, if they've finally figured out what they mean to each other yet. Will it ever be the same, when Stefan and I return to town?

The word when is used because I still carry a glimmer of hope, not because I am realistic.

He will find out- Klaus- at some point we will have to stop running around looking for werewolves to turn, he will figure out that it isn't working and he will wonder why. He will return to Mystic Falls and see her there, and he will be angry, so angry.

But we aren't there yet, we have some time left.

"Here we are then," Klaus says and shakes me from my thoughts. We are standing in the middle of a small camp site. A fire pit in the middle, surrounded by some red tents. People are slowly starting to emerge from these red tents, they look confused.

Stefan walks past the fire place first and drops Ray to the ground like he is nothing, at this sound people start to come out of their tents even faster.

A woman rushes to his side.

"Ray! Oh, my God. What's going on? Who are you?" Klaus feels like this is the time to appear on the stage, dramatic bastard.

"The important question is who am I. Please forgive the intrusion. My name is Klaus."

She doesn't seem afraid, she's just stating a fact, "You're the hybrid."

He smiles, "you've heard of me. Fantastic."

We are sitting down on a tree trunk in the middle of them all. A splinter of wood finds its way through the thin fabric of my workout leggings. I'm not scared, not in the middle of all these werewolves, not in between two vampires with homicidal tendencies.

I mean, I am scared, but not of anything that has to do with them. I'm scared that I might never come home from this trip, that Klaus will keep me here forever. And I would let him do so, if it meant that Stefan could go home again.

Sitting here, I feel like an accessory more than ever, just a pretty face to rile the crowds up. Just some boobs, to flirt with the lone wolf.

Just a girl, just Lola.

Klaus is telling a story that I have never cared about, not even when he forced me on this journey.

"It's fascinating, actually...A werewolf who isn't beholden to the moon, a vampire who doesn't burn in the sun. A true hybrid." A gasp resonates next to me. Ray has woken up, his eyes are big and sad, he looks so scared. He should be scared, he will die.

"Excellent timing, Ray. Very dramatic." Klaus of all people is one to talk about dramatics.

"What happening to me?" Ray moans from his place on the dirty forest ground.

"Paloma?" Klaus looks at me expectantly, I take a deep breath and roll my sleeve up to elbow.

"Can someone like, get me started?" Niklaus nods and walks to me. He takes my pale arm into his hands carefully, looks me in the eye and waits for me to nod. I do.

He gently bites into my arm. That particular piercing sensation has gotten awfully familiar now, it doesn't even hurt as much as it used to. Stefan takes a step back, I know that he's afraid of what he might do to me when he smells blood. I am not afraid of him.

"I'm Paloma by the way, your token human!" I laugh my way through the uncomfortable feeling of having a vampire bite into your arm. He can't resist but take a sip for himself.

Klaus laughs when he comes up from the inside of my arm and wipes away some blood from the corners of his lips.

"Good girl, Lola."

I'm not a dog, never have been one, "You're a dick." Klaus pushes me almost into Ray and forces me to my knees. A twig digs into the bone of my knee. He presents my bleeding arm to him.

"Come on then Ray, a little sip is all it takes." Ray however doesn't take to my arm, in retaliation Klaus takes the woman still crouched beside him into a choke hold.

Suddenly Stefan is by my side, he holds onto my arm with tight fingers and I notice that I have to control my breathing when he is so close to me, when he looks so violent. Maybe I am afraid.

He pushes me to the ground, this thing that I first perceived as an act to get Ray to drink is becoming much too real. His eyes transform, bloodshot and black, grey veins fill his face. He is sitting on top of me now, holding me down onto the ground. My breathing gets faster.

This isn't okay anymore, none of this has ever been okay.

I struggle in his strong hold, "If you don't drink it Ray, I will. Problem is I don't know how to stop."

Stefan's eyes. They have been what I was holding onto this entire summer, those sweet gentle eyes. And before, I could see through the transformation, now that it is me he is feeding on, I'm not sure I can anymore. He's constricting my throat very tightly and bites into my wrist, he slowly starts to drink from it. Slower than he normally would, maybe there's something left in him.

Tears gather in my eyes, he knows exactly what this reminds me off, I feel a phantom knife slip across my throat. When I close my eyes to blink the tears away I see my dead parents laying on a fluffy, white carpet. My breathing was fast before, but now I am not breathing, my throat has been almost completely closed off by Stefan's strong hand.

He knows me better than almost anyone, he might even know me better than Klaus does.

"Nik," I whisper. But he is screaming at some girl about new orders and vampires and his idiotic hybrids, so obsessed with himself.  I hear another neck break somewhere behind me.

"Stefan, please." I let out with my last bit of oxygen, he seems to only take a bigger gulp of my blood. I don't know how much time has gone by, it could be an hour, it could be ten seconds.

The fact that Klaus doesn't react to my suffering has to mean I am safe, he would help me if I wasn't, right?

Ray gives in and takes just a little bit more of the blood from my body, just a little bit more. Stefan stops him when he sees that my eyes are rolling back into my head. I am so dizzy, this much blood loss really can't be any good for a person.

When Stefan pulls him off me, I know he is back to himself again, I collapse in his arms and he lets me lay on his chest. He carries me back to the tree trunk and settles me against it, then he lets me drink a bit of his blood. He crouches down next to me and while I drink from his wrist he removes a hair from my eye.

Klaus is still standing in the middle of the tents while Stefan does this. He pops out his fangs and I swear I can almost hear the sound of them emerging from his flesh.

"Who's next?" He looks in our direction and smiles, his eyes are yellow like dandelions.

The only good things that came from the moonstone shattering into thousands of pieces are this.

First, that vampire blood has a much easier time healing me, now that part of my strength isn't locked up in an ugly stone.

Second, that some of Klaus's strength seems to have bled into me in the process, so my wound would have healed in a couple of hours without any of Stefan's blood in my system.

"Here." Stefan feeds me some more of his blood. It invigorates, makes me feel alive. It's like a drug, there must be people who are addicted to vampire blood in this world.

"Thanks," my throat is still hurt, so I croak out the words. It's funny how this used to be my regular voice, before the pitch changed to a much higher sound after the incident.

There is another human now, sitting on a foldable chair next to one of the tents. I guess Klaus found him somewhere and decided against using me to feed every single new vampire in this joint.

Ray is in shock, he is sitting on the rock next to me and has grabbed his knees, he is slowly rocking himself and shivering.

"They're dead. They're all dead." He whispers. I look around the camp, he isn't wrong. There are dead werewolves laying everywhere, well they aren't really dead. But Stefan and I both know that they won't survive the transition.

"I know dude, life sucks." I loudly pretend to whisper back. I am still holding onto the fast healing wound on my wrist, it will be gone in a minute.

I take a deep breath, "so this is your master plan? Build an army of hybrid slaves?"

Klaus raises his hands in denial, "no, not slaves. Soldiers, comrades."

"Would me calling it indentured servitude make you happier?"

"For what war, might I ask?" why does Stefan suddenly talk like that. Is he really trying this hard to gain Klaus's trust?

"Oh, you don't arm yourself after war has been declared, Stefan. You build your army so big that no one ever dares pick a fight."

Stefan's eyebrows scrunch up, "what makes you so sure that they'll be loyal?"

"Well, it's not difficult to be loyal when you're on the winning team. That's something you'll learn once you shake that horribly depressive chip off your shoulder." Stefan laughs loudly for the first time since the start of this excruciating summer. It isn't a funny laugh, it's a sarcastic laugh, but it's something nonetheless.

"That's why you're, uh...you're keeping me around? To witness my attitude adjustment?"

"You'll know why I'm keeping you around when I've decided that I want you to know." I look next to me and see Ray. Suddenly his eyes start to bleed.

"Um, guys?" Klaus notices too and sits down next to him, starts to examine his face.

"Somethings wrong."

"That shouldn't be happening, should it?"

"Well, obviously."

"You said it was gonna feel better. Why doesn't it feel better?" I pet his face and shush him. Every in a while I remove the blood still coming from his eyes with my sleeve.

"Some master race." Stefan sarcastically comments

"Lose the attitude."

The woman who originally came to Ray's side wakes up with a loud gasp. Klaus calls for the only other human in the camp, "Derek, come feed your girlfriend."

He gets up from his chair slowly, his instincts telling him not to but Klaus's compulsion overriding them. He has only compelled me once, but it wasn't a nice experience. At the same time as I hear the creak from his foldable chair Ray snarls, jumps up from his spot and runs into the woods. Klaus immediately looks at Stefan. "Go get him."

He does what Klaus asks, of course, and when he comes back he does so with a werewolf's bite on his arm. Exactly like the one I've seen on Rose before.

"Where did he go?" Klaus asks, I look down at Stefan's arm to inspect his wound further when I notice that his finger is moving. It's a movement I wasn't expecting, a code we agreed on when we started this journey. He taps his ring finger on his thigh three time, I know what that means. They are here.

"He, uh... he got away. Forget him, let's go."

Klaus grabs his arm, "a fatal werewolf bite. Ouch."

"Yeah. I'm gonna need your blood to heal me."

"Well, I tell you what. You find Ray and then I'll heal you."

I furrow my brows and let out an annoyed sigh, "you can't be serious Klaus."

He answers, "I'm very serious, Lola." Then he looks at Stefan, "you better hurry, cause that bite looks nasty."

Stefan runs in the direction he was in last and is gone within a second, the only evidence he was there is a leaf dancing in the wind.

"I need to pee. Somewhere very far away from all of you. I don't want any vampire to hear me pee."

Klaus laughs, "and how do I know you'll come back?"

"I will-" I take my phone out of my pocket and hold it up, "if you lose me you can call this and follow the sound. I just really need to pee, Nik. I'm only human."

He waves with his hand and I start the descent to where Stefan last saw Damon and Elena.

The first thing I see when I emerge from the bushes is Ray tied tightly to a tree. He's groaning like he was before and his eyes are still bleeding. They didn't even notice me coming through all this commotion they've created

"What the hell do you think you're doing here?" they all turn around at the same time, but Elena is the only one who actually approaches and embraces me. I don't hug her back, I can't allow myself to do that right now. So she lets go and slowly retreats back to Alaric and Damon.

"I'm gonna repeat myself, what in the everloving fuck are you doing here?"

Damon answers, "someone told me not to give up on him, remember?" they are all wearing large hiking backpack, like this was really their brilliant plan to get Stefan back. Expect for Damon of course, who came to this forest in nothing but black jeans and a black shirt.

"Oh I very much remember and still hold the sentiment. But coming into a werewolf infested forest on the night of the full moon? Are you not right in the head?" Suddenly I hear Ray's bones start to crack, shifting. He is screaming and snarling. We all turn towards him.

"There aren't supposed to be any werewolves out here until the moon is full."

"What do you think we are doing in this wolf infested forest, Damon? We aren't here on a fun family camping trip."

I start to walk away, "you know, those ropes aren't gonna hold a wolf." Damon's face is worried when he looks at me. That's okay, I'll be okay. He has to take care of Elena and Ric now.

I am already turning back into the bushes when I turn around one last time, "Go, now."

He nods and my feet are far ahead of me when I hear Elena again.

   "Damon, we've got to get out of here. We gotta get out of these mountains now! Damon, now!"

All I can hope for is that they are running, too.

The camp is a pit of death and sorrows when I return to it. Dead werewolves lying everywhere, ripped apart, heads missing, hearts on the dirt and leaves of this forest. It has something poetic, but it mostly just has something so sinister it burns my eyes. He is sitting on the same tree I was on earlier, looking down at the mess he has created. I am sure he doesn't see it as that.

I sit down next to him and put my hand on his knee, he shakes a bit at my touch. Like he wasn't expecting it right now.

All I know is that my greatest chance of survival is when Klaus still likes me, so I try to keep it alive a bit, even when it isn't what I want. I love the boy inside of Klaus, but this beast, he makes me sick.

Stefan returns with Ray over his shoulders, he looks like death. He drops Ray to the ground, he just looks dead.

"They went rabid. Some of them, I killed. The others just...Bled out. In the end...They're all dead." He stands up and throws the beer bottle still in his hand at a near by rock.

Then he just yells for a bit, "I did everything he was told!" he comes back to himself slowly, regains his composure. "I should be able to turn them. I broke the curse. I killed a werewolf. I killed a vampire. I killed the doppelgänger." I can't help but shift my eyes to the ground when he says that and when I look at Stefan I see he is just as uncomfortable.

"You look like hell," Stefan raises his brows at me.

"Last I checked, I'm dying-" he looks at Klaus, "-and you don't want to heal me."

Klaus is looking down at Ray's body and when I wasn't sure before, I am now. Dead.

"I had to take him out. I didn't have a choice. I failed you. I'm sorry. Do what you have to do." Drama queen.

"It should have worked." Klaus replies, not only to Stefan but to himself too. He takes an empty bottle of beer, bites his hand and makes a fist, letting the blood drip into the bottle.

He holds the bottle out to Stefan, "Bottoms up. We're leaving." Stefan takes the bottle.

"It appears the two of you are the only comrades I have left."

Stefan drinks from the bottle and throws the bottle aside. The he looks at me and bends down, letting me and my tired feet climb onto his back.

Then we are gone, returning to where we came from in this endless cycle of misery.

editing this was also hell because this chapter is really long. pls enjoy my suffering.