death doesn't come with a warning

in the land of
gods and monsters
i was an angel
living in the garden of evil

.
.

Cold and bitter, freezing London nights and ice-chilling London mornings. Streets covered with hard-packed snow, footprints scattered arbitrarily from road to road. Hunger was rampant; hunger was a constant reminder of better days and wistful thinking.

It thrived on the blood of the departed and made its power, sucking them all raw, and it was perfect. This was the picturesque scene. This was where they made their home. A large house on west side front. A large carriage and snorting steeds. Ruffles and corsets and cravats.

They pretended well, spoke the tongue and mimicked the steps, and for a while that was enough. Rebekah was proud, and Niklaus was brooding (but it was quiet and that was alright).

Big blue eyes. Big blue kind eyes.

That was the first thing he noticed about her.

Klaus saw her emerging from Church. Dressed in white, laced up tight, all covered and shivered, Caroline was an idealized, surreal china-doll. Frigid, rigid, giddy, and gelid the old London air, the girl was a miniature princess with portrait-glazed airs and grace.

She was beautiful (and she was young).
She smiled (and her skin strained to break).
She was a saint among the garbage, the adamant rubbish (and she was going to pay down in hell).

He got that lady-killer smile (aiming her straight). He got a look that said gorgeous, you'll be the one to talk—live to tell the tale.

Her mother softly pulled her along. Caroline jolted into reality, the opportunity gone.

London: 12th December, 1888 (and this was fact). Another body found, slit and mutilated (breasts severed neatly in fantastic verisimilitude of Saint Agatha of Sicily). From her mastectomies gruesomeness, by candle-lit gloominess, they jotted down notes, whispered darkly among themselves, and discerned—

"Couldn't have been older than sixteen."

"Whores come young these days," and cheap.

"Third one this month, Jesus Christ."

– and God would smite them down: "brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven"

(this they chortled and giggled in hoarse chokes)

– because God was pissed

"Take care of this,"

One whore, two whores, no difference, but a thousand and one later (slight exaggeration, chief inspector) he was starting to get annoyed.

– call him God.

"Niklaus Mikaelson is my name, and who are you, may I ask? "

And then he took her heart.

Such a charmer. He was simpering—sociopathic and sycophantic—but he was another person, and she ached for a human conversation.

"Caroline. Caroline Forbes."

Take it, take it. Take it all.

"She reminds me off your human self,"

They sat in their sunless, yellow-baked (the impersonated sun) room and sipped coffee in cheery, rosy leisure and dimpled languor. Sometimes Rebekah recited poetry, voice mocking and hushed.

"If you say so, brother," Rebekah said nonchalantly.

"Such an exquisite beauty," and Niklaus replied, "The epitome of perfection."

"I still don't see why you are so obsessed. Kill her, turn her and just be done with it." Rebekah shrugged, glancing back at the news.

"Patience is a virtue."

"Of course. You are the saint of virtuous men."

London was the city of sin already in decay.

She came to him in a moment of doubt, tiny, untraceable (unnoticed), and gave him hope. Met him with her sparkling eyes, too wide—too immense, engulfing like oceans—for him to escape. And so, she took his words (at face value) and borrowed his courage.

(He called it boredom: the stale, festering ennui of intellectual youths turning old and limp—counting rings in their trunks.)

"I think you're just afraid," she accused, simple as that. A blank statement and no rue.

"Of what?"

"Of me."

"Of you," he echoed back, voice hoarse and strung weak.

"Of hurting me."

The realization was too intense, too devouring. Like a legion of bacteria, it crawled over his skin (into the fissures) and ate him whole. Rapacious, voracious. Klaus faded behind white canvas walls.

(And he was a guy who regretted the defeat he received. It hadn't been fair. She was good, but she was breakable human.)

"Are you sure this will work?"

"I'm positive."

"So heartless, even willing to risk her."

"It's all for the greater good."

She was lax and lovely in his arms. All soft alabaster and a perfect halo of gold hair and lightning. She sighed and nestled against the crook of his neck, still asleep. She was at her most beautiful like this.

Dead.

No. Never. Not that.

Caroline was safe (so was he). They were together (the tentative markings of the illusive "we"). Caroline—oh Caroline—darling, dearest, love

Dead.

He sounded out her name. Bitter and metallic like the staccato dripping of acid on blade. She sighed in her sleep and subconsciously reached for his cheek. Her fingers burned like the guttural wrenching of a brutal birth.

Instantly, he flashed awake.

Breathe out. Once, slow and steady. Good. She didn't stir.

He gently wrestled her arms free, disentangled her long, forever unfolding limbs from his. She didn't protest (couldn't have anyway). He encircled her wrists. Delicate, fragile little things—bound to break, destined to diminish and fade, fade, faint down quiet now.

He kissed her.

She murmured, squirming (naughty child) against his hold, his grip. The tightening, seizing of moments and opportune openings.

He parted her lips.

Four sharp teeth, ivory incisors, and an accidental tongue. He tasted the crimson delight of heaven, forbidden. This was paradise. A city captured in lights, engorged on the romantic prologues promised eons before. This was heaven for the damned.

He was at her throat.

She screamed (his heart ached). She fought, struggling for life (admirable, that was brave). Caroline was strong, but he was stronger. And now, the human was gone—the weakness nowhere to be seen.

He killed her.

But she destroyed him.

She was dead. She could taste the stench. Thick, it inundated her senses and seeped through her flesh. She cursed (the abiding, artless trickster who dreamt up this miasma) loud enough she woke invisible monsters.

It was not heaven, nor was it hell. And since purgatory didn't exist (she lost her faith) she had to be—

"So you woke up, love."

"You turned me."

"It was the only way."

"You have no soul."

"No one does. Besides, some things are best kept in the family."

family.

Even in death, she was still beautiful.

Still glowing.

Still Caroline.

She had a charm that couldn't be extinguished, a grace that augmented forever on. But after all the tears had been shed, she accepted. Damage-run and no regret. She was dead, full stop.

He couldn't help it (he tried).

And so, Klaus went to her. In her long, blue satin negligee, she awaited for him with an earth-shattering smile. He touched her cheek and run long, subtle fingers through her hair. Thinking he would somehow make it okay. Just all right. Better now, always would—

"—be magnificent. You'll be magnificent, Caroline."

You'll see.

He kissed her softly. Toxic, he parted her mouth with his and drank her in. She was like an exotic wine, clarified nectar served in lavender crystal. She got him drugged, oxidized. Weak (and willed) he couldn't break free from her—ever forgetting her.

Still strung up in her chaotic, marionette threads.

Tender and loving, he traced down her skin. She was warm and sweet like she used to be.
Gradual, Klaus pushed in deeper. He kissed her harder.

There was voodoo on her tongue.

Malice on her mouth.

Steadied and jaundiced: a bright, sand less shore with crimson and rolling waves. From a tower blue and blind in the mountains (a millennium to ascend) Caroline called his name.

"I love you, Nik. Only you."

She reached out to welcome him. Sung mellow, little notes.

He hugged her something ferocious and desperate and all the while refused to let go.

So he took her.

Swift (brutal) he took her back—for himself. And there, she would be safe.

Because he loved her, told her so.

Late into the night, Klaus woke up with the livid, vivid scent of Caroline lingering and languishing in his mind. He could feel her breasts and thighs on his hands. Smarting, his palms were inflamed.

Her sighed rings clear and true in his ear. The taste of her on the slice-edge of his tongue, intimating a hunger he couldn't satisfy.

She was laughing as she arched for him, ready and feverish (delirious).

Love me, like a fiasco.

Under his tutelage, she learned to be frugal.

She opened her mouth, closed her eyes, and waited for the familiar iron taste to engulf. Thirty-years, B positive, wisps of red. Red was good. Red solidified as an emblem of her (their) triumph.

Proudly, he looked on as she made her first official kill. (She was catatonic. It was ironic.
Notorious, a dreadful critic.)

"Was that good?"

"Wonderful," he responded, brushing away the splattered blood on her cheek. "Next time, use a little less force. No mess, that way." (he didn't really care)

She nodded solemnly, eyes glassy and breath heavy.

(the loveliest shade of blue he's ever glimpsed).

He once promised her to always put her first.

"There is another Doppelganger."

She watched it slip through his fingers without a care.

She didn't dare to set foot into his city. Instead, she travelled to Paris, to Italy, to everywhere but there.

But there was always an inexplicable wish, like a gnawing, vapid tunnel drowning out all sound (except for the siren call). It bid her to return, just once.

"I don't know when I'm coming back, if I'm coming back." she explained slowly. Rebekah nodded, understanding.

"He's lost without you."

She knew.

(for the future, for the greater, better, good.)

She was too.

Forgiveness was a sin. And so was forgetting.

They met (not) unexpectedly again. Some called it serendipity, she called it terror.

He hadn't aged and so hadn't she. And they both progressed as persons, as vampires, as empty "adults" with wounds spiked with poison.

"Caroline, love—"

Caroline shook her head. Not this time. "In case you haven't noticed, your charm isn't going to help you out of this. I'm too smart for that."

He smiled, a clever retort. "I know. How about some coffee instead?"

"What is with the Doppelganger?"

"She fulfilled her purpose."

"So what, now you're the big bad hybrid?" Oh, is that so?

"Legends are made, not born."

"I've heard that somewhere. A long, long time ago. My memory's not as sharp as before."

"I could help you refresh it."

"You can try."

"I can succeed, love."

Apologies were futile (jumbled words and makeshift, sideway—jumpy—glances). They were mature, experienced. Understood the world and its etiquette-reinforced rules.

Exactly three days later, he sent her flowers and a note, dotted with smiley faces and pencil drawings, asking for a second chance. (Caroline smiled and turned on her phone, prepared to dial.)

Caroline stretched out her limbs and shook out her hair, the ideal scene in all the romantic clichés. She kicked off her sandals, slipped out of her skirt (loose ribbons fluttering—tickling—against her thighs) and entered the room.

She saw him lying on the bed, eyes closed tightly, with long legs dangling off. Careful and quiet, she sneaked—tiptoeing, breath held in trepidation—up to him and

Klaus flashed awake, leaned out to grab her, and failed (she knew he wasn't even trying). Caroline laughed, dodging his grasp. Instead, she leapt catlike onto the bed, ensconced herself happily next to him (under the crook of his arm, nudging against the base of his neck) and kissed him on the cheek.

He gave her a look as if daring her to be embarrassed: dressed only in a sheer white (his) shirt. She shook her head (played coy and the perfectly lithe coquette). Hand to her breast, a laugh. Why're you looking so tense? And up, up the shirt travelled, scaling over her shoulders, past her neck, and lifted from her head. Klaus waited, examined her breasts with an expert eye before touching the soft skin.

His fingers glided over her nipples, erect and warm honey-peach from the sun, brushed over her sensitive breasts. Caroline gasped lightly (hadn't expected that trick). And he smirked arrogantly back: got you cornered.

She pushed him back, head slammed against the headboard. And for a moment, she feared he would be mad, turn sullen, and retreat into the hollowed emptiness he liked to call "contemplation". Stupid prick.

Instead, Klaus retaliated and flipped her over. Now who's on top?

Caroline giggled again and squirmed under him, palms against his abdomen. No avail. He refused (too strong) to relent.

Gently, he pushed down her panties (she conceded and discarded them). His hands roamed to her chest again, cold and taut from being exposed. Flicked at a nipple. She shivered, lovely and bare underneath.

Encouraged and more than slightly amused, he bent to suckle her breasts.

"Stop teasing," she commanded, pouty and so very pretty.

"But we're just getting started."

With emphasis. And with that, he began kissing her all over: starting with her cheeks, lips, jaw, then neck, and breasts. One hand cupped at her breast, fondling the softness, so supple and insanely sweet. And the other travelled down, down, down, and right in between her legs.

He inserted a finger, like a hesitant seeker, and felt the rising moistness. Deeper, in. She moaned, barely audible, against him. A smile (she shuddered). Caroline moved, restless and slippery like a water snake. He wanted to pin her down and give himself hours of idyll time to explore her forever young, lithe body again and again.

"Mmm."

"Good?" he asked.

"Yes," the smallest trace of a whisper.

Breathing short and shallow. His fingers slid in and out, smooth and silky, playing with her folds, and rubbing at the tight little nub of ecstatic nerve endings. Wet and stifled from heat and lust, Caroline looked at him expectantly. Klaus laughed, knew exactly what she wanted—what was coming next.

He shifted, keeping her knees apart, and positioned himself right against her. Klaus thrust into her, one clean, languid motion—and he was completely in. Caroline shivered against him. Skin on skin, soft and hot (both began perspiring). Her head tossed back, hair pooled out in disarray, she felt like her body was ignited and engulfed by liquid fire. His mouth moved to her breast again (one hand cupped over the other protectively), tongue flickering at the nipple. Caroline moaned against his collar.

He picked up speed, elevated the stakes. Mind racing, this was not the time to be thinking clear—logically. She recoiled, a wave of bliss spreading from her core all over. Muscles clenching, fist tight (her hand gracing his neck) chest heaving, an explosion in the air. She cried out, shot with intensified pressure.

(steadily emerging with grace, felling any foe with her gaze)

And Caroline collapsed beneath him, overspent and content.

In the game of chess, she won. Swift, she took his knight, his bishop, and almost king (save the queen) without remorse. She was decisive, was inveterately contra to his stun then feint moves. But this round would be his. Niklaus spied an opening and took.

—wait—

Caroline Forbes smirked at him, her trademark one-eye glisten. "Your turn."

Klaus weighed his options. She had outmanoeuvred him yet again. The woman was a fiend, heartless in mischief.

"A gentleman never contradicts a lady," he said and advanced his surviving knight.

"A true gentleman always defers to his lady."

Of both we were not.

With a sleight of hand, Caroline Forbes deposed his king, leaving him dumbfounded.

...

She took off his necklaces and peeled away his clothes. Layer by layer, she bared him raw. Caroline, he whispered as she went down.

His Queen.

.
.

i just look for someone
who makes me feel like
life is and exciting opportunity

ℱin

A/N: OTP, guys. Something written from the past to the timline that's currently on TVD. I might've taken my attempt of experimental writing style too far in some parts. Certain sections are extremely confusing and ambiguous. This is unbetaed, I am apologizing beforehand. Next Klaroline thing happening soon.