notes | rewriting chapter 3 of be still. it was making me miserable.

this is based off a prompt at vd-kink: "klaus/caroline - he is the alpha male; he tells her and then he shows her."

IT'S A TEEN WOLF-VERSE TVD FIC. this is my life now.

also, despite being on the kink-meme, THERE IS NO SMUT. AND IT IS ALL CRACK.

i have failed you

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Say, say my playmate

Won't you lay hands on me?

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So this whole best-friend-is-a-werewolf-thing?

Nowhere near as cool as it sounds.

"Oh, my God," Caroline jumps the last three benches down to the field, twisting as Stefan reaches for her with a snarl. "I swear, if you rip this shirt Stefan, I am going to end you."

Stefan howls, his eyes a wild, burning gold, and snaps his teeth at her. Metal creaks, the bar running under the bleachers bending as he braces himself and she'd be impressed— no, really— but this is the second time in as many days he's wolfed out on her and seriously, what is her life?

"Stefan," she tries again, putting distance between them and dialling Elena's number with one hand, "just, listen to the sweet sound of your epic love's voice."

Stefan's mouth comes dangerously close to her throat as he leaps at her, and she thinks is it Friday yet? with an amount of distaste she usually reserves for when junior prom snowflake decorations hang instead of trickle.

"Caroline?" Elena's voice crackles over speakerphone. "Something wrong?"

Stefan pauses, head tilted curiously. Caroline grinds her teeth. "Yeah," she forces out, "your boyfriend needs to talk to you."

"Oh!" And gag, she can practically hear Elena beaming. "Um, okay then."

By the time she thrusts the phone to Stefan, he's sheepish and maybe blushing and definitely human. She glares furiously at him; the blush fades into his usual broody, hey-it's-Tuesday-face and she is so on to him because sulking doesn't work when he almost ruined her favourite top and—

"Oh, don't even," she hisses, and he hears her because, you know, werewolf, "it's Wednesday."

Stefan somehow broods even harder with minimal facial expression. Caroline wonders why he couldn't have become, like, a vampire.

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The unfortunate part about Stefan becoming a werewolf, besides the whole trying to eat her thing, is that now she has to deal with his sort-of, not-really mentor, Klaus. Who is crazy. And potentially a psychopath. And probably evil.

Also, he has an accent.

"This must be hell," she deadpans, when she spins in her computer chair and he's lurking in the corner of her room. Because that is a thing now, apparently, him lurking in her room and giving her heavy, wanting looks that make her skin crawl— in a bad way, dammit— and then demanding she help him because apparently she is the only person ever to have discovered the magical world known as the Internet. "Like, seriously, how hard is it to go to the library and use Google?"

"But then I wouldn't get to see you, sweetheart," and yeah, he's definitely like, the king of all creepers and she is putting wolfsbane all over her windowsill the second he leaves. "Besides I'm a felon, remember?"

"And I don't care, remember?" She side-eyes him hard when he snorts and shrugs off his jacket. "Oh my God, put your clothes back on."

He raises his eyebrows at her, patronizing, and she gives him one of her 'bitch please' faces because she's still a mean girl underneath all the werewolf shenanigans that have invaded her life. She goes back to her history paper, the one she was totally doing instead of trying to figure out who the alpha was, no, seriously, and then he's crowding up behind her, laughing.

Laughing.

"You know," he drawls, and the corner of his mouth kicks upwards and she hates his dimples passionately, she really does, "this would be much more believable if you weren't typing gibberish."

Caroline scowls, looks at her monitor, and winces. Asghjsgf probably wasn't going to get her any marks as a thesis statement, come to think of it.

"I," she says haughtily, and pushes away from her desk harder than necessary, "am about three seconds away from screaming for my mom, buster."

"Ah, yes, the Sheriff." The lazy once-over he gives her makes her want to throw something at him, or throw him out, or grab him and shove him up against a wall— and hurt him, she thinks quickly, the wall shoving is completely non-sexual— or maybe just punch him in his smug face.

She's kind of angry, alright? So sue her.

"Yes," she seethes, "the Sheriff."

"Shame she's out right now investigating those bodies."

Caroline blinks once, twice. "What bodies?"

Klaus smirks, his lips curling, but it's the smirk where there's an edge to it, something dangerous, something wild, something untamed. "What bodies, indeed."

"Oh." Caroline swallows thickly, remembers that he can hear the rapid beat of her heart, forces herself not to run. His eyes glint, almost entertained. Almost thrilled. "Goddammit."

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Once, early on, she nearly hits him with her car. He runs out in front of her, stumbling, and when she brakes, the tires squeal. Everyone behind her starts to honk. Klaus raises his hand, unfocused, and she briefly considers running him over because— "Seriously, this guy is everywhere."

Stefan, panicked, races out onto the pavement, crouches down, says, "you need to leave."

She stays in her car, because, ha ha, like hell is she dealing with him, no way Jose, that ship has set sail and docked somewhere else far away from her and it will never come—

"You have to take him," Stefan herds him into the passenger seat, staring down the line of cars behind her, unhinged. Caroline can see Tyler stalking up towards them in her rear-view mirror and good God, he is the last thing they need to deal with right now, he is so far down on the list of things they need to deal with right now. "You need to get him out of here."

"Um," she blanks for a moment, staring, "what the actual fuck?"

Stefan gives her sad, pleading eyes and she's done, just like that, because she is weak and Stefan is her best friend and far too pretty for anyone's good (read: hers). "Oh, my God, fine," the car jerks when she switches gears, and Stefan throws his keys across Klaus and into her lap, "but if he bleeds on my seats? I am throwing his werewolf ass out."

Stefan looks grateful. Klaus looks— well, he's looked better— not that she's been paying attention or anything. "Thanks, Care. I'll call you when I find something."

"I don't even know what the hell is going on right now," she mutters, and pulls away. Klaus lolls against her window with a groan.

Because she hates silence, even when it's because one of the people involved is probably sort-of dying, she says, "so, what happened to you?"

"I was shot," even when he's gasping for breath his accent is still a smooth lull, and she hates him for it almost as much as she fears him, "while I was chasing the alpha."

Caroline nearly veers off the road. "You found the alpha?"

Not like this is important information or anything. Not like she's been researching night and day for clues about who bit Stefan. Not like she hasn't slept in forty-eight hours because the full moon is coming and Stefan might rape and pillage a village if they can't get him under control.

"Yes," he says, deadpan. And then doesn't elaborate.

Werewolves.

She stews in silence, until a thought hits her. "Wait, why are you trying so hard to find the alpha? I mean, Stefan needs him to figure out, like, why his Dog Whisperer senses are always tingling or whatever, but he didn't bite you."

Klaus, with his drawn face, pale skin, sharp-sharp cheekbones, mutters, "he killed my sister." And then, after a beat where maybe he's wondering if he should tell her, "she was all I had left."

Silence. Caroline thinks. Decides.

"My dad died when I was ten," she pulls into the parking lot, Stefan's keys clinking together in her pocket. His head tips, a sign that he's listening. She's only telling him this because it clearly pains him to have shared even a shred of personal information with her. That's all. "Cancer."

She won't say anymore. Sometimes she still dreams about crying in the hospital room, begging, please don't leave me, Daddy, please don't leave me and she remembers the way she hadn't been able to breathe all those months afterwards. There are some things you never get over, some wounds that never heal.

He's quiet, but she can tell he's considering her, their situation, the bullet in his arm. Then, "you drive like some sort of lunatic, love."

She turns sharply into a parking space just to see his head snap off the window. Then, sweetly, "and you smell like death. Your point?"

Later, he'll tell her to cut off his arm if Stefan doesn't make it in it time, and she'll tell him he's insane and his crazy eyes will come out and she will be thisclose to doing it—

Later, he'll faint, his pulse will slow and, while Stefan and the drain get acquainted, her chest will be heavy, pain coiling tight in her belly, and she'll punch him hard enough to fracture bones because she won't let someone else die in front of her, she won't, not when she can save them.

Later, she'll think that maybe she told him about her dad because there was a rigidness in the line of his shoulders when he'd said it, something tightly wound up around him that she might have understood, maybe a little: what it felt like to have something ripped away from you, out of you.

Something like love.

(Not once at all does she wonder why she even cares.)

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The first full moon, things are bad.

"Stefan," she says through the door, and he howls over her, high and pained, loud enough that she winces and feels guilty, "I'm sorry, but it's just for one night, okay?"

His handcuffs bang loudly against the radiator every few seconds, and Caroline knows she's probably imagining it, but she thinks she can smell the blood oozing from the cut in his wrist, where he's pulling tight, too hard. She thinks about calling Elena, talking to her but putting her on speakerphone so Stefan can hear her voice. Thinks she'll probably hear him growling. Wonders how she would even begin to explain that to someone.

Oh, don't mind the crazed screaming, that's just your boyfriend handcuffed to my radiator— in a completely un-sexy way, I swear, we are just friends— and I know you probably, like, want to know why? But you actually don't. You really, seriously don't.

Yeah, no.

She can't lie to Elena anyway; Elena has this dewy, doe-eyed innocence about her. She's just so sweet. Part of Caroline hates her a little bit for taking over so much of Stefan's life. Most of Caroline is just glad that the Invasion of the Stefan Snatchers usually keeps Stefan from slaughtering small children. Because, apparently, that is kind of a problem now.

Her life. Seriously.

Stefan roars again, and Caroline hopes her neighbours are very deep sleepers because there is honestly no plausible explanation she can come up with for this besides maybe I, like, found that mountain lion that's been attacking people and brought it home so it wouldn't hurt anyone, but then it escaped and even that basically makes no sense at all and—

Is her radiator being dragged across the floor?

"Stefan," she screams, throwing open her door, "do not scratch the hardwood."

She's positive he would have listened to her. If he'd actually been in the room.

Caroline flicks between her open window and the bloodied, twisted scraps of metal on her floor that had once been her mom's backup set of handcuffs. Pulls out her phone and grudgingly sends Klaus a message: Stefan may or may not be out feasting on the innocent, just FYI. No big.

Because she is calm. She is zen calm. She could be considered legally comatose she is so calm because she is definitely not having a neurotic break down over Stefan killing someone because she couldn't control the situation— nope, she is like Buddha right now— hell, Buddha would probably be jealous of her—

Her phone beeps. Caroline, sit down and breathe. I can hear you hyperventilating from here.

Where is here!? she sends back, fingers shaking, and promptly collapses onto her bed in a heap. Why are you so mysterious and creepy!?

Someone has to keep you on your toes. And she is not impressed by that at all, she is having a crisis okay, her best friend might be eating babies for all she knows right now. I'll handle Stefan, his next message reads, go to sleep.

"Is that a euphemism for something?" she says, out loud, because she knows he can hear her and she apparently wants to die. "Seriously."

Go to sleep, or I'm going to make you.

She snarls.

And yes, he adds, that is a euphemism for something.

Caroline honestly hates everything.

But she's a little glad when, in the morning, Stefan calls her and tells her he's fine, no one's dead (although a few hikers may have gotten a little scratched up and she is not going to think about what may have happened if Klaus hadn't apparently melted out of the shadows — Stefan's words, not hers — and thrown Stefan into a tree. Or maybe through a tree. She isn't sure) and he's got a little more of a handle on everything now. She doesn't believe him, really, because Stefan has terrible impulse control, but she lets him think she does.

Thanks, she sends later, to that number she refuses to list as a contact in her phone, but you're still a sociopath.

Small victories, love, is what he sends her during fourth period and she almost chokes, small victories.

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Klaus is the worst.

Sure, he protected her from his crazy dad when they figured out he was the alpha and only pretending to be all messed up from when their family home burned down, because, like, apparently being batshit crazy is genetic now, joy, and Klaus seems to have inherited all of his dad's best features (not) but he'd also ruined everything.

He'd told Stefan that if Stefan killed the one who turned him, he might become human again. And then he'd killed Mikael himself. Caroline kind of gets it, she does, because if it'd just been a rumour Stefan would be the new alpha and he'd probably massacre thousands because she's pretty sure he's the Norman Bates of werewolves secretly and then they'd all be screwed. But seeing the heartbreak on her best friend's face, the realization that he can't go back, that hurts her.

And Klaus, the slant of his jaw smeared with blood, he just looks so smug, with his dad's throat slit open and his eyes rolling back. He looks like he's got everything he's ever wanted.

Belatedly, Caroline realizes this probably is everything he's ever wanted. Revenge for his sister. Power. A soon-to-be-realized-pack (because he is crazy and lonely, these are two things she knows for sure). He'd probably been stringing them both along from the start.

"Klaus," Stefan is yelling, which he rarely does when he isn't wolfing out, "you told me you'd let me kill him!"

"The cure is pure speculation, mate," and he's licking the blood off his palm, eyes glowing a deep red, that cruel kick to his mouth back in full force , "I couldn't risk it."

"Couldn't— I trusted you," and Elena has to grab Stefan, physically grab him, because the muscles in his face are shifting, spreading, tightening, and Caroline's never seen him actually transform before but it's scary. It's actually scary.

"As you should." Caroline glares at him, smoothing out her dress. It's unsalvageable, of course, covered in dirt and grass stains and whatever was the in the Molotov cocktails Bonnie told them how to make. She can't believe she just missed junior prom to help kill someone. She can't believe Tyler, Lord of the Douches, helped them. Klaus smiles back, with all his teeth. "I'm the Alpha now, after all."

"Pretty sure Stefan would rather eat your face than listen to you," she points out, folding her arms, rage bubbling in her stomach. She bites her tongue to keep from being any meaner— she kind of likes being alive.

Stefan growls, a low, guttural sound that makes Elena shiver against him, her arms twined around his waist, cheek to his neck. "What she said."

Caroline, despite being just as angry, sighs because really Stefan, really? Worst comeback ever.

Tyler snorts. She digs the sharpest part of her elbow in between his ribs and there is definite satisfaction in Klaus' eyes when Tyler hisses between his teeth and steps further away.

"You're part of my pack now, Stefan. You really don't have a choice."

"You didn't bite me," Stefan snaps back, "I don't have to have anything to do with you."

Klaus scowls. Caroline thinks their lives are about to get that much more difficult.

(This just in: she isn't wrong. Big surprise.)

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She doesn't know who the hell this Kol guy is, but Stefan gives her big, sad, tragic eyes and Elena joins him when they bring him up, so of course she has to help bust him out of jail. Because that is a thing that happens in her life now— her breaking werewolves out of jail.

Also, she is weak.

Also, also, Klaus is still a creepy douche.

"Are you aware you're speaking out loud," he muses, leaning against her car. She pauses, blinks once, pinches herself to make sure she isn't living some vivid nightmare where she had to drive him across town without being snarky, and then blinks again. "Well, that answers that."

"Don't kill me," she babbles, without thinking, even though they have some sort of temporary truce at the moment, because Klaus bit Kol and now Kol's turning in a jail cell on a full moon and someone is probably going to die. "I'm too young and pretty and full of potential to get murdered in a back alley."

Klaus crowds her up against her door far too quickly for her to react. She squeaks, totally dignified, and drops her keys, because wow when did he get that close and that warm and— and—

Dimples.

That bastard.

His fingers skim the bare skin of her shoulder, where her shirt's pulled down. "Why on earth would I want to kill you, Caroline?" He raises his eyebrows, expression charmingly boyish, and she could almost forget he's a deranged, psychopathic stalker with control issues and family issues and basically all of the issues. Almost. "I quite fancy you, actually."

She's watched enough BBC. She knows what fancy means.

"Omigawd," she whimpers, and he presses in closer, thigh sliding between hers, palms skimming over her hips, up the hem of her shirt, to rest on her shoulder blades. This was so not okay. "I think I'm having a heart attack."

He quirks his head to the side, like he's listening. Smiles slowly, painfully, and breathes in her ear. "Not quite."

The police department's security alarm goes off right then, as he's pushing in, dragging his tongue over his bottom lip which she is not staring at oh god and she almost collapses, she's so relieved.

Klaus is entirely too pleased when he takes one step away from her, leaving barely any room between them still. "I suppose now it's time you meet Kol."

Caroline freezes, hands pressed to her chest. "Oh, no."

An officer's body slams through the back doors and skids across the pavement, throat torn out, arms clawed so deeply she can see the bones. Caroline swallows hard, and the boy who sprints out into the alley doesn't look that much older than her, but there is a wild, manic brightness to his eyes that makes her slip behind Klaus.

"Kol," he drawls.

"Klaus," Kol grunts, low, hungry, "that's quite a tasty little thing you've got behind you."

When he lunges, Klaus roars so loudly the windows shake and then Kol is pressed back against the bricks, shivering, human.

"What," Caroline can't get her throat to work, "what was that."

Klaus looks at her like it should be obvious, turns so his body is leaning towards hers, grins crookedly, "I'm the Alpha."

"Oh," Caroline says faintly, "right."

She wonders what it means that when he moves away from her completely, there's an ache in her, somewhere deep down, that makes her want to pull him back.

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Elena breaks up with Stefan.

That night is the first night he kills someone.

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"Klaus," she takes the stairs two at a time, blood soaking through the back of her shirt from where Stefan had shoved her hard into a tree, bits of bark and grass in her hair, and she's bordering on hysterical, she knows, but she can't do anything— she's only human and Stefan— Stefan—

Klaus smells the blood, because he's pushing up her jacket and running the tips of his fingers gently over the cuts dragging across her spine, not saying a word. Caroline hiccups, so hard her chest hurts, and those fingers turn into nails, still soft, still easing. "Stefan, he— he—"

"I'll worry about Stefan," and the way his name comes out, a hiss, loathing, makes her look at him, wide eyed with blotches all over her face, "after I've taken care of you."

"I don't— I'm fine— you need to help Stefan, he's losing it— Elena—"

Klaus fits his palms over the dip in her waist, blood splattered across fair skin, and guides her into the kitchen. She can feel the intensity of his stare, and her body flares up, too hot. "You're hurt and you're here. Therefore, you are my priority."

"What if I weren't here," she blurts out, as he picks her up easy and sets her on the counter. She watches him and the way his shirt spreads across his chest, the way the muscles in his arms bunch and shift. "What if I were hurt but not— not here."

He's gotten under her skin. They both know it. She just needs to see if— if—

"You'd still be a priority," he says evenly, like she should already have it figured out, but she can see the way the lines in his face soften.

"Okay," she mumbles, biting her lip, and after a beat, peels off her shirt.

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"You smell like Klaus," Stefan says, chained to a wall in the old subway station they're using as a hideout. He's getting better; he isn't so cruel, anymore. Mostly, he's just sad.

"You smell like angst," she throws back, raising her eyebrows. "Hey, remember when you tried to kill me? I don't miss that."

"Nice diversion," Stefan deadpans, and tears into the sandwich she throws him almost immediately. "I still know there's a giant hickey on your neck, though."

Werewolves, Caroline thinks furiously, and definitely still hates everything.