Chapter Text
Today definitely wasn’t Katherine’s best day. And it’s not like she didn’t have her own collection of bad days.
The last time she had felt like this was when she found her family dead when she had decided to go back to Bulgaria after “betraying” Klaus — she had technically just ran away, like anyone else with a braincell would have after finding out she had been manipulated to be sacrificed in some kind of weird ritual. She didn’t care about her bastard of a father, but her mother’s death had triggered something inside.
That day changed everything.
She became cold, using manipulation techniques to trick others the same way she had been tricked by Klaus. By Elijah. It hurt, but watching her lovers’ faces as she sucked them dry after using them made her feel a bit better. Loneliness was a strong feeling, and she was letting it destroy her from the inside and out. And if her coping mechanisms were hurting other people, then so be it.
She was Katherine Pierce now, a badass manipulative vampire who didn’t hesitate to kill. She wasn’t sweet innocent Katerina anymore, that girl whose daughter was ripped away from her before she could even hold her in her arms. That girl who accidentally fell in love with an original vampire, not knowing he was just using her.
Then why did it feel like that all over again?
Elijah had told her it wasn’t like that, that he had just chosen Klaus before her. He had told her that she had to understand family came first, no matter what. She accepted it, because of course she did. She had loved Elijah a long time ago, and although she didn’t want to admit it, she still loved him with all her heart and soul. So, even though she now was a changed person, she let him inside like she had done five hundred years ago, not as Katerina, but as Katherine.
What a mistake she had done.
Because of course, Elijah just had to scold her every time she killed someone, as if he didn’t do the exact same thing — or worse. Of course, Elijah killing people was justified, because he did it to protect his family. But Katherine? Nope, she was evil. Totally didn’t kill people to protect herself. Sometimes, Katherine wondered if Elijah truly hadn’t noticed she didn’t have a family. That her family was killed by Klaus, five hundred years ago, and that she was so traumatized she had spent centuries playing with people, afraid of creating real connections just to get stabbed behind the back again. So traumatized that she avoided physical contact unless she had to sleep with someone to get information for one of her plans. So traumatized that she hadn’t been hugged in centuries. So traumatized she was afraid to show her vulnerable side. She didn’t want to be used again. He didn’t get that.
Even a thousand year old vampire lacked some empathy nowadays.
Elijah didn’t know anything, or maybe he didn’t want to believe anything. Katherine had done horrible things, like Elena or Damon had. If Elena kills someone, that’s fine. Poor Elena, she doesn’t have any parents. But if she blinks, she’s an evil bitch. Katherine was so done. She just wanted to move somewhere in Italy and live in a cottage in the middle of the forest and run away from everyone in Mystic Falls. Maybe have a pet, perhaps a cat or a dog. Or maybe adopt a child. Yeah, she could do that. She missed Nadia so much, but she was probably dead by now. Dead and turned into dust.
Of course, little innocent sweetheart Elena just had to ruin the bond she had with the only person that cared about her. Even though he loved a version of her that wasn’t true — or that’s what it seemed like every time he called her Katerina instead of Katherine — she clung to him like a lifeline. She didn’t show him how much he meant to her though, afraid to be hurt again.
Maybe that was why Elijah believed Elena instead of her.
So now there she was, in a hotel in Mystic Falls — she had compelled the receptionist, of course — trying not to cry like a weak child as she watched the stars shine in the dark sky, phone in hand. She dialed a number and brought her phone to her ear, hearing it beep with a nervous expression.
There was just another person she trusted in the whole universe, and that person was Dean Winchester.
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Kentucky, some cheap ass motel. 01:34
“Ow, Dean!” Sam complained with a wince, giving him an annoyed glare.
Dean just chuckled and poured more whiskey in his wound, earning a “seriously?” face from Sam. They had just returned from hunting a cult of witches who used voodoo. It was funny until Dean called one of them a bitch. Sam paid for that — he would definitely prank Dean later.
”Suck it up, buttercup.” Dean said with a smirk, now stitching his brother’s wound on his side. He really cared about Sam, even though he didn’t usually show it. Their father — no, John — had been an asshole to both of them, so Dean had been protecting his younger brother ever since he was born — and even more after their mother’s death, when John became more of an asshole than he already was.
Suddenly, Dean’s phone started ringing, a heavy metal guitar riff playing and almost scaring the heck out of Sam, who jumped a bit.
Dean took his phone, his expression shifting once he saw the contact name.
“Heya, kitty-kat!” He said with a shit-eating grin. Sam shifted on the moldy hotel mattress and held the needle that Dean had left hanging from his wound, watching his brother with a confused expression.
”Dean…” Her voice tone was all he needed to notice something was wrong. Sam raised an eyebrow at his brother’s concerned expression. It was something you didn’t see every day, after all. “It happened. Again…”
Dean got up from the bed and started pacing around the room. Each word he exchanged with the mysterious woman confused Sam more and more. Dean wasn’t the type to keep his one night stands’ phone numbers, even less to talk to them so softly if he did so.
“I’m coming.”
Dean hung up and started packing his things up.
”Sammy, we have a new case.”
Sam, who was looking at him with a raised eyebrow, leaned against the wall, demanding more explanations. Dean gave him a bitchy face and threw a duffle bag at him.
”Come on. We’re going to Mystic Falls.”
”And the wound you still have to stitch?”
”Fuck the wound.”
Sam rolled his eyes. ”Jerk.”
”Bitch.”