(1) Bloodlines: The Curse (A Vampire Dairies Fanfiction)

22. No Better Than A Vampire

The air was still; the only sounds that surrounded Alex was the movement of the river below. She was struggling to calm her mind; her thoughts were racing, and she struggled to comprehend what she had done. Alex had fort against vampires; killing them was easy after a while, but the guilt had never been anything like the sensation that was swirling in her chest. Killing a monster wasn't a bad thing, but killing another witch...killing her own kin, that made her the monster.

Alex buried her fingers into her hair, trying to take deep breathes to steady the racing beat of her heart and to stop the tears from falling. The salt was already burning her eyes, but she didn't want them to fall; Alex didn't want any of it to be real.

A tear hit the concrete rail that she leaned against. The splatter made her waining strength fail and a sob wracked through her. Alex was a murderer, and she hated herself for it. A witches life had been taken too soon, and that made her no better than the monsters she tried to protect everyone from.

Looking up from the railing, Alex looked out over the river. She had driven out to Wickery Bridge without really thinking about her destination. Her body had brought her here, and she hated it. Wickery Bridge seemed to be a convergence of everything that could go wrong with her life. Her parents had died going off this bridge, and Elena had almost been lost with them.

Wiping at her cheeks, Alex pushed away from the railing. She wanted to scream; she wanted to let go of the control she had of her magic and watch it crumble the bridge beneath her feet. And if it was to bury her beneath the rumble, then so be it.

Never before had Alex wanted her magic to disappear. Even when she had been terrified by her sudden abilities, even when she struggled to learn control, Alex had never once wished she was normal – being a witch was who she was – but now she wanted for it to go. Why did she have to be a witch? Why did Elena have to be a doppelganger? Why did Alex get to live while that witch died? It didn't matter that he had stood by Klaus; there could be several reasons that the witch had been so blindly loyal; manipulation being the strongest possibility. Klaus was the one who deserved to have his unnatural life taken from him, not that witch.

Alex's phone started to ring from inside her car. It was the fourth time since she had left the house, running from the death she had caused. Alex hadn't looked at her phone; she didn't want to talk to anyone. She wanted to be left alone. But she knew they wouldn't stop. Alex had already felt the sensation of a tracking spell touch her, but she had learned awhile ago how to throw off her actual location. Alex walked over to her car and climbed inside; her phone was sitting on the passenger seat. Picking it up, she had three missed calls from Elena, and James was currently calling her.

Alex leant her back against the headrest of her seat and answered.

"Alex? Are you okay?" asked James. It was rushed, and he was panting.

"Stop trying to find me," she grumbled.

James scoffed. "I woke up and found you gone. No one knows where you are."

"I just need to be left alone."

"Alex, please—"

Alex shook her head. "James, I..." She couldn't find the words.

"You didn't mean to, Alex. It was an accident," said James.

"Was it?" she asked. "There were a number of different things I could have done. I didn't have to throw him into that bench. Maybe subconsciously, I did want to kill him."

James sighed. "That is ridiculous. You aren't a murderer."

Alex closed her eyes and sunk lower into her seat. "We are going to have to disagree on that."