CHAPTER SIXTEEN

"The ghosts are crawling on our skin
We may race and we may run
We'll not undo what has been done."

~David Gray "Meet Me on the Other Side."

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The sky had lightened into gray around the edges of morning that began to take over the blackness and the stars. The small clearing on the river that hugged the left side of the town was carpeted with small yellow daisies and dandelion puffs that wavered in the warm breeze.

The emerging lines of daylight caught the glint off the polished wooden handle of the Army knife Sam produced from the folds of his pocket.

Damon eyed the weapon. "Gonna slice my head off with that?" The remark was carried up and over the air from where the Vampires stood in a patch where the grass was thick and flattened under the weight of Damon's boots and under the weight of Stefan's body. The younger vampire sat in a kneeled position, arms drawn up and around his knees, head bowed just enough to know that he was alive, but had suffered to make sure it was so.

Sam flicked the blade open, Stefan's head raised up to the noise. Sam moved the blade to his hand that bore a barely clotted scab on his palm. He moved past that scab and drew the blade vertical across the veins in his wrist. Blood poured out of his skin, he placed a paper cup that had been discarded in the grass underneath his wrist, the blood pattered inside.

The sound of an engine rumbled over the early morning. A dark blue Toyota Highlander rolled over the grass coming to a stop by the Impala parked 5 yards away from where Sam stood.

Dean emerged from the driver's seat of the SUV, walking over to Jeremy Gilbert who was only a handful of steps from him watching Sam.

"Here," Dean tossed Jeremey the keys. "Plates are switched out, enough gas to get you back if you don't tear up the engine."

"Thanks," Jeremy's voice distant, because they hadn't spoken to each other except fpr now.

Dean nodded at him. "Listen kid, I know you were worried about your sister, I get that. But, Magical Hunter or not, if you ever smash and grab my car again I will break every bone in your face. Understand?"

"Yeah," Jeremy's voice became less distant, but with just enough trace of fear that Dean knew he got the point.

Dean moved to where he saw Sam, wrist leaking blood over a dirty paper cup. He drew closer, not making a move to stop him. Instead he took the knife from Sam's grip and slashed it across his own palm, making a fist over the paper cup. His blood fell in mingled drips with Sam's into the bottom of the paper cup. This continued for two full minutes before the cup became just over halfway full. Dean pulled his hand back, then wound a green bandana around Sam's wrist, stemming the blood flow before closing his own hand.

Sam watched the gesture in silence. Dean walked over the grass with the blood sloshing inside the paper cup. He stopped in front of Stefan, who turned his face up at the smell.

Stefan took the cup from Dean with a slow hand, like he didn't trust himself, but at a half eyed look from Damon, a look that Dean saw something that he recognized, the younger vampire pulled a heavy set of swallows, the red vicious blood disappearing down his throat.

Sam walked further over the grass where the dandelions were a thick yellow line, stopping at a pile of wood laid out to form a flatbed crossed in in a teepee like fashion supports. The sound of the grass breaking lightly under foot behind him turned him around.

Caroline Forbes walked a path through the small yellow flowers towards him; Marissa's small bloody body in her arms; the whiteness of the girl's dress radiating brighter than any other part of her. Sam reached out and took Marissa in his arms as carefully as if she were a newborn.

Caroline stepped back, watching Sam as he turned to the wooden funeral pyre and set Marissa down on it. He reached out slowly and shut her eyes with the palm of his hand.

Dean emerged on his left with two small canisters. Sam took them both the salt that fell from the canister sprayed wet in lines of lighter fluid that dampened Marissa's white dress.

Dean reached into his pocket and produced a match, striking it on the rough wood. The flame fizzled and lit up Sam's expression against the backdrop of the lightning sky.

Dean waited a breath, then raised the match in a high pitched throw. The flame dropped and ignited the wood in glowing bright orange, encasing the small body.

Sam watched the fire consume what was left of Marissa Patterson.

"You did what you had too Sammy," Dean turned away from the flames and to his brother. "Living as bait in that hell hole- she's better off this way-"

Sam fought for words that wanted to believe Dean, to try and believe anything that wasn't blinding and tearing at him for what he had done to bring this girl burn on a funeral pyre so far away from her home. But there weren't any, so he swallowed something bitter and crushing, seeing Dean's face reflect the pain he felt.

Elena emerged beside Sam, eyes watching the fire, her smaller hand reached out and slipped into his, fingers curled up against his skin.

Damon emerged from the darkness next with Stefan who walked slowly and painfully, but under his own power, both watched the fire as well, the others watching behind them.

The flames rose high, swallowing the sky and the minutes in time as it burned high into the sky.

"So Eden sank to Grief-" Damon recited quietly, earning him a solitary look from his brother which he seemed to ignore, staring at the fire like it might have been alive at one point, and he had been around when that one point was.

"So what happens now?" Caroline turned to stare at Sam first, then Dean, the look of someone who had known them for only a few seconds, but it was a few seconds enough. "I mean, you know about us-"

"You go home," Sam cut her off. "You stay on alert- Darius doesn't like to let things go, so you need to watch your backs," Sam swept his eyes over the vampires, and the two humans that didn't count against him and Dean.

"What about you?" Elena released Sam's hand and turned to Dean in question.

"We go home too," Dean answered her back, watching the light catch the darkness of her hair. "You keep your peace – and Sam and I will drop your town off the hunter's radar."

Elena watched him back with the battle weary look Dean had seen come through too many after a battle, a degree of knowledge that was learned through blood and death.

"Hate to put a damper on the campfire confessions," Damon's said. "But it's been a long night of death, torture and resurrection, so we should probably hit the road." He thumbed back to the stolen vehicle.

Elena turned back around to face Sam, eyes traveling up to his face "You kept your promise," she flicked her eyes to Dean "both of you-" She reached out to Sam and hugged him, arms reached up as high as they could around him.

Sam held her back, her body warm, smelling of ash and blood.

She stayed for a long moment back and walked to Dean, she took long steps towards him, hugging him too. "Thank you."

Dean drew into the hug without hesitation, one long arm closing across her shoulders, fingers gliding down her hair, just a breath of a kiss against her head before she pulled away.

She moved back to stand by Damon, Caroline's Forbes look on her like 'what the hell?' as she stood by Damon. Elena shot back with a look that fizzled out Caroline's in answer.

"Ugh, I'm gonna throw up now-" Katherine complained into the night, looking around for all the world like the field was an annoying school play that she had been forced to sit through. "Can we go?"

"What's all this we stuff?" Damon retorted to the doppelganger, turning to face her fully in the grass. "We're not friends-"

Kathrine scowled. "I saved your life!"

"Stefan saved my life," Damon returned, sharing half a glance at his brother, one that his brother returned. "Elena saved my life, so did the Vampire Hunters, even the law firm of Forbes, Donovan and Gilbert and the saved my life. You weren't even a good filler story-"

"Damon."

Stefan's voice rose over the air, and Sam watched as Damon's mouth closed, words cut off, as the vampire stared at Kathrine, skin reeking of sweat, blood all over her shoulder.

"Fine," Damon's eyes went wide and unblinking at his brother like he was agreeing to something he hated. "But she rides strapped to the hood." He turned away from Katherine's death look.

Damon snatched the keys to the stolen Highlander out of Jeremey's hands, opening the door with the keyless remote. "Enough waiting around Gilbert-Start the engines-" Damon tossed the keys back to Jeremy who caught them and climbed inside the driver's seat of the SUV.

Matt Donovan moved over the grass with Caroline, opening the back door of the SUV for her, and a moment later she climbed into the passenger cabin. Bonnie walked slowly over grass and stood by Jeremy Gilbert, who Dean and Sam could only guess was his girlfriend, judging by how she drew herself close to him watching them with her dark eyes.

Katherine walked quickly behind like she didn't trust any of them not to leave her; but not before one last glance over at Sam. "You'll never be a regret, Agent Jennings."

Sam watched her go wordlessly. So did Stefan before he approached Sam and Dean, standing in the middle stare at them both in the predawn, the suture lines on his skin were visible like Frankenstein's monster, his light brown eyes blood shot, but piercing. "Elena's right- you kept you promise-"

Sam took the hand Stefan offered, the grasp was strong. He reached out and gripped the vampire on the back of the shoulder.

Dean gripped Stefan's hand next, Stefan's grip stronger than it had felt in many hours, and so was Dean's.

Damon's faze gaze to encompass Dean and Sam as a singular unit. "Guess I owe you my life-"And my brothers" there was another glance in Stefan's directions. Damon turned his body around completely, before he held out his hand, a gesture that didn't seem like was one he'd done a lot because of the look attached to it.

"So, thank you-"

Dean eyed the gesture for a long moment before reached out to close his hand around Damon's, the bulky ring that matched his brother's cold against Dean's palm.

"-Don't think that this means I won't rip your throat out if we cross paths in a bad way again," Damon stated this like it was a history fact. "You turned me back on to human blood after all-"

"Don't think that if that happens, we won't stop you." Dean returned, moving his eyes back up to Sam. "But I don't take pleasure in killing anyone I sloughed through trenches with, vamp or not. So maybe you should think about that before you find your next 'bad way' moment."

Damon's look turned on Dean like it a threat, before it turned again, like a changeling, into one that gave. He released Dean's hand slowly and walked back over the grass.

The fire still burned brightly in the clearing that only held Stefan and Damon at one end, and Sam and Dean at the other. The sky had lightened to the shade of blue gray silk, the wind slowed to a trickled warmth.

The moments of silence lapsed and swirled over themselves as they were thrown and lost like the dandelion fluff that blew upwards from the wisps that curled them away.

Stefan's look became the slightest of a nod, shifting his look away from Sam and Dean to his own brother before moving in a slow turn to the SUV with the others. Damon dropped his own look only two seconds later before retreating after him.

There came one last look cast over both Damon and Stefan's shoulders at Dean and Sam who watched them back in the gray morning.

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THE END

I wrote this because I couldn't find a crossover fic that didn't try to make one show's world seem idiotic, or overly impressive versus the other show, which is a stupid premise for a fic to me.

I did my best to incorporate both the "Vampire Diaries" and "Supernatural" worlds evenly. Though at times it would slant more into the other world because it was the way the story drove itself as I wrote and if I tried to force it any way else, I wouldn't have my story, and I don't regret it.

Thanks again for reading.

~Mystic