the backbone of the story.
at its core, lifeline is about a guy stuck in the past and a girl's relentless run towards the future.
being friends with the whole mystic falls group, mila only knows a life where it's just one thing after another. she's used to just constant chaos in one form or another. so she moves on pretty quickly. she never really lets herself reflect on what she's experienced, and because of that, she's never had a serious relationship or anything real outside of her immediate friends and family. so in a sense, her life is sheltered, which kai can definitely relate to. we all know that character that runs away from their problems, but sometimes mila is sprinting before a problem can even form. so kai showing up and slowly winning her over and making her develop real feelings really does turn her already-complicated world upside down.
with kai, he's the exact opposite. he may think ahead in whatever scheme he's planning, but that's as far he goes in a sense of thinking about a future. he's very absorbed in what he's doing in the present but he's acting because of his past. it's obvious he hasn't been able to move on from it and it's gotten to the point where that IS his life. he doesn't know anything else besides revenge and betrayal until he meets mila and experiences the other side of the emotional spectrum. wbk he can be the slowest learner, but he does end up seeing things differently thanks to mila. in conclusion, kai parker is a king alright. a king of self sabotage!!
why, why, why: why did you this?
i'll address some of the concerns you had when i wrote, but just know basically it's because it just made sense for the characters or it would get a rise out of the audience or both. my main goal is to keep you guys invested; every writer has to be a bit of sadist that's just how it is 🤷♀️
the return of joshua parker
anyway, so let just get started with the goblin that is joshua parker. i hate him just like everyone else but when i actually had to plan this story for once and figure out how i was going to structure the last chapters, i knew bringing him back would be a shock but would also be a good opportunity for kai. i felt like kai and his father were baggage that needed to be adresssed. there's so much unresolved there and i wanted to explore that, to shine a light on what that relationship was and how it also made kai who he was. and then after confronting him, having kai walk away from him, something wasn't able to do before — even for mila — just showed his development and how much he had changed since jo's wedding.
levi parker to the rescue
moving on to the addition of levi, a character who basically stole the show (as he should). i wasn't sure that i was going to have mila get pregnant until i was writing part 3. i know i teased it a lot but i just never knew if it wasn't going to make sense to the story to include it into the present plot. because it's definitely a big deal to both mila and kai and how they would react to that in different ways. but it did end up working out and i'm glad it did because merging kai and mila's personalities to create levi was definitely something i had a lot of fun with. i love that attention-seeking kid sm.
ketzera does it get tiring being right all the time?
another character you guys seemed to liked (thankfully) was zera. i planned on having a seer enter to mend their relationship when it needed it the most because i thought it would be fitting and i've liked the concept of the supernatural creature and adding it with the personality of someone who just genuinely wanted to do good and wasn't doing things for self gain like the other monsters. like mila, i definitely got more sense of zera as i wrote her. i know she's only in a few chapters but i can confirm that a) she's a canon lesbian b) she understands that love shouldn't be wasted because she's experienced it firsthand. zera lost the love her life, she was condemned to malivore, but it never turned her bitter. it never turned her hateful or monsterous. it made her want to try to save and mend everyone else, and i think you do see that with her character in the scenes i wrote.
kaimila's humanity & vampirism
another thing mentioned (i'm looking at you @ sophiearcheron ) was why i decided to revert mila back to being human and kai to back to being just a witch. i'm not trying to be confrontational or anything i just thought your comments sparked good questions that i have answers for lmao.
other than the creation of levi, i once again just thought it would make sense for them. mila had never wanted to be a vampire and the entire time she was one she felt like living a lie, she never felt like herself. i know kai's absense played into that but given the choice, mila, being who she is and knowing what she knows after reconnecting with kai, would choose to be human again. plus, for her being a vampire was just something she utilized so she could always move on quickly and think about what's next while never thinking twice about what she had done before/what had happened to her, which is the major character flaw i talked about before (big red flag!!).
choosing to remove vampirism from kai is more obvious and straightforward. kai became a vampire with the WORST intentions ever. homeboy literally wanted to cause all the murder and mayhem he could muster. he just wanted to be a vampire for the power. he didn't need to live forever he just wanted to experience truly having the upper hand and burning all those bridges he couldn't before, at any cost. so now that he's realized that that's not what he wants anymore, having him be a vampire or become a vampire again would just be a step backwards for him. it's safe to say being a vampire, even with your switch on, there's still that detachment from actually being human, from being in touch with humanity, and kai has worked so hard to be just that.
mila spit it out already !!
this is mostly towards the beginning of the story, part 1 and a bit of part 2, but i do want to talk about mila herself as a character and why she couldn't admit her feelings or what she actually thought. i'm not gonna lie to you guys, i have winged the majority of this story. not a lot planning went into it, even for mila, my main character. i kind of figured her out as i wrote. i always knew that she was not going to be very outward and didn't always say what she meant, which made sense in the beginning because she's angry at kai and is determined not to trust him again.
but having her showcase that quality in the flashbacks, too, having her be hesitant and avoiding and difficult in the friendship stage between her and kai was something that felt right, too. so writing those, i did kind of ask myself why exactly that is. why can't she just say she has feelings for kai when he's clear he has feelings for her back? i treated it like i was a therapist and i was digging for answers on what made her tick. and i figured out, it's because she believes there's no permanence in it.
all around her, relationships crumble, people die, their parents die, and her friends are forced to move on from all of that hurt and tragedy fast. she didn't want to get hurt more than she had to which resulted in a lot of meaningless, short-lived relationships and resorting to lying and compelling her parents so they stayed safe and away from all of chaos that would lead them into the crossfire. mila thought it was better to not get too attached because she couldn't afford what would happen if she did. it was definitely protecting herself from the loss everyone around her went through and what she got a touch of from time to time. it's ironic that she picks that up but doesn't let it sink in that all of that pain is worth the love you get out of it until she meets kai. but hey, sometimes it's like that. we're all that blind in one way or another. you don't know until you directly experience it yourself.
a kai parker legacies fic? do you hate him that much?
finally, there's the overall question of why i would write a kai parker fic set during legacies? even i couldn't salvage that show, guys. believe me, i hate on that show like the rest of you. i haven't even seen season 3. i wrote this watching the least episodes as possible. but to answer the question, i just wanted to do something different. every other fic is either the oc trapped with damon and bonnie in the 1994 prison world or they're condemned with kai for some reason and have been stuck there with him or set before he got imprisoned etc... basically i wanted to do something that hadn't been done before without also being restricted by the wild legacies plotlines. and plus kai's death was so anticlimactic like jesus julie lemme fix your mess 🙄
no but i was brainstorming with my friend grace on how powerful it would be for kai to have a love intrest that didn't stutter in response to his every word or blushed like a tomato (i'm looking @ y/n now) because kai having someone that truly cared and supported him (and put him in his place when needed) would have changed the course of his entire life. and then the idea of them in a purgatory-like world came to mind, something that would let me escape the horrible writing of legacies for a little bit, and yeah i impulsively started writing it. it was only supposed to be 20 chapters, but i continued to 50, which i'm glad i did now because both mila and kai needed more development. anyway, yeah i basically spent a little over a year writing this story and it was great practice for writing my own original work and characters. i have grown to love this lil fanfic about that semi-sociopath kai parker, and if there's anyone that deserves that hot piece of ass, it's mila.
what the future has in store for kai & mila
what i'm confidently calling the Domestic KaiMila Initiative ensures a lot of extreme, comedic moments — so basically just them being them.
levi is still thriving being the only child. he's in little league, which kai coaches after getting into a heated arguement with the man who coached beforehand and causing the poor dude to quit. now, kai directs his bellowing at the ref, who is just about done with him, too. all the moms are hot for him wbk, which is why he's always invited out with them but he only accepts the invitations when it's to a reality tv show watch party because he loves sharing his opinions and they actually listen to him and feed him.
the dads and patrica drool over mila, too, dw. in fact i'm pretty sure the people in the stands all consecutively groan when mila shows up to the games and rounds the fence to greet kai with a passionate kiss. they're definitely the Hot Couple™ of the neighborhood.
mila, at the point i left of off where levi is six, has tranferred to a new company and she's made name partner. she does work full time but she almost always makes it home in time for dinner and gets weekends off. kai was a bit of a stay-at-home dad for a little bit after levi was born, but he got a part-time job, a bartender, once levi started preschool. i figured that makes sense to him because he's very talkative and loves tricking people aka charming people into tips. ngl a lot of men and women think they're going home with him at the end of the night but he just 🥱 takes their money 💵 and goes 🏃♀️.
as far as more kids, i either see mila getting pregnant again around levi's sixth birthday or when he's in high school. kai and mila would physically have the bodies of thirty-eight-year-olds when levi is sixteen so i just think it would be funny if mila got pregnant right when levi thought he was safe of having to endure siblings.
speaking of high school levi, let me pitch my levi x will idea to wrap this up:
levi is definitely an attention whore and loves getting any sort of glory but mostly the kind that comes from winning. like his mother's savior complex, he definitely has a white knight complex. it's easy for him to step into the role because he's smart and effortlessly a problem solver. however, that doesn't mean he is any less mischievous. he's definitely up for scheming grand schemes, and by that i mean brilliant pranks that occasionally land him in the principal's office. he always gets a slap on the wrist though because he's good at winning people over. he's the definition of chaotic good. in conclusion, he has mila's humor, kai's temper, and both of their incessantness.
will arya prides himself on skating by doing the bare minimum. he's happily a c-average student, his bed is his santuary, and he's 100% a gamer. however, he is far from a pushover. although he avoids physical conflict, he definitely doesn't take anyone's shit and absolutely will do anything to get even; maybe you could blame call of duty for making him develop a vengeance streak. so let's just say he probably enjoys it a little too much knocking levi off his pedestal when his superiority mannerisms become too much to bare.
it's slim fit sweaters vs. band t-shirts. a baseball throwing arm vs. quick-reflex controller hands. everyone's favorite vs. everyone's pessimistic inner voice.
i was gonna write an about me but i think these screenshots of me & my friends' convos sum me up well enough:
anyway if there is anything i missed and you have any more questions feel free to comment here! also i'm going to probably create another chapter for bonus scenes so if you wanna comment anything specific (dw there will be levi content regardless) what you would like to see feel free to do that too :)