Disclaimer: I do not own TVD

Notes: Severely AU, but I hope you like it.

e

The crows are loud, cawing into the evening sky as Caroline walks down her street. They've replaced the fallen leaves on the black branches, creating a silhouette against the yellow sky and a picture worthy of a fairy tail. It feels as if their eyes are trained on her, but Caroline tells herself she's imagining things.

You're not crazy, it's normal. Breath in, breath out.

Her wedges are making the walk from the place Matt dropped her off, a block away, to he house, a few more feet, longer than it should be. Her hand tightens around the handle of her designer bag, knuckles white.

A few minutes, then it'll all be over.

Then a bird flies, the frenzy begins.

All at once, a flock of them takes off, not to the sky but to her, and they screech and ready their claws as they do so.

They hit her in a whirlwind of sharpness and feathers and she screams but no one can hear her. And her skin breaks and tears and her hands guarded her eyes and her hair is being pulled- and then it's over.

She falls to the street, head smacking against the pavement, dead.

Don't worry, it get's better.

She wakes up from the bright lights, her skin molding together and her skull reforming with a sickening noise. She's confused but no longer scared- even when she sees another crow, looking straight at her.

Louise Carlton. Natural causes, Tuesday, four thirty six, don't stop it.

She nods, as if she understands, and gets up, making the short journey to her house and walking in, closing the door with a click. What just happened? She foes over the events in her head- they make no sense.

"Honey, you're home? Where were you?" her mom asks from the table, where she's filing police records or something.

"I was outside- I think I was killed by a flock of crows, then brought back to life..." it feels nice to say out-loud, to see how crazy it sounds.

"That's nice sweetie. Dinner in ten."

It will all make sense on tuesday.