[Paris' outfit since she went out is at the very top.]

꧁ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ᴛᴡᴇɴᴛʏ-sɪx ꧂
ᴛʜᴇ ɴᴏᴛ-ᴛᴏᴏ-ᴅɪsᴛᴀɴᴛ ғᴜᴛᴜʀᴇ

❝Well, maybe I'm meant to be a vampire.❞

♠

    MURDER. THE ACT of taking someone else's life. A knife in the stomach. A bullet in the head. A snap of the neck. Strangulation, or in Paris' case, pushing someone off the cliff and letting them drown.

The act of a person begging for something as simple as human breath seems so terrifying. To know that the very thing keeping you alive seems to be so out of reach. Where your biggest enemy is simply the water. Where your main goal is to keep your head above the water. However, most people failed to do just that.

But what does one have to do to become a murderer? Of course, kill someone. Although, not all murderers were meant to be murderers, right? Not all murderers find pleasure in seeing other people cling on to their lives as it slowly slip away. Some are forced to defend themselves. Some are just involved in an accident. And there are some who are compelled to do so.

That's what Paris had gone through. She was compelled to kill, of all people, her good friend, Chloe, for some unknown reason. And now that she remembers everything, she aims to unravel the reason why someone would compel her to kill someone as innocent as Chloe. Why that someone is Lucien Castle.

"You compelled me to kill her." Paris muttered as her betrayed eyes stared right into Lucien's guilty ones.

The words that came out of Paris' mouth as she looked at Lucien made the others glance at the oldest vampire in the room with their eyebrows furrowed.

"Paris. You need to hear me out." Lucien asked her.

Paris stands up from the floor and ignores the help of both Alaric and Stefan as she did. She kept her eyes on Lucien. Everyone paid attention to everything that's going on especially Damon and Stefan, just in case Paris goes after Lucien. But while everyone expected Paris to attack Lucien because of her heightened emotions, she instead ran out of the room, and soon out of the house.

♠

Paris lets herself wander in her thoughts as her legs dangle while sitting on the edge of the Wickery Bridge. The sun is almost up, and she wanted to see it. She wanted to feel the warmth hit her skin and relax her rather than burn her.

She wanted to enjoy her last day as a human,  because after this, she would either be lying lifeless in a casket, or be a vampire who pretends to be normal despite the every day urges of having to kill people because it's her nature.

Either way, she's completely ruined.

Becoming a vampire isn't something that had crossed Paris' mind. Yes, she thought about what it must feel like being a vampire. But never exactly her becoming a vampire. It was a thought that she never considered was possible. But why didn't she though? She's surrounded by danger. Thousand-year-old vampires, hybrids, resurrected witches, her supernatural legacy, it's hard to determine whether or not she would still have a normal future or at least have a future.

"You know, I'm starting to renounce this place from being my most favorite one." Damon said from behind her, causing Paris to pull herself back from her thoughts and snap her gaze towards the raven-haired vampire.

"I mean, you almost did die here." Paris commented.

Damon walks towards the brunette and sat beside her. The both of them stared ahead of them, unsure of what they're actually staring at.

"I know you call me Sherlock because you think I know everything. Everyone thinks I know the answers to everything, because I'm good at figuring things out. But it's not true." Paris said.

Damon kept his eyes in front as he listened to the brunette.

"After the incident, I had lots of questions left unanswered. Like, why did Chloe jump off the cliff when everyone including herself knows she can't swim? Why did I just watch her drown? Why did I almost drown when I know how to swim? I couldn't figure it out." Paris said, not taking her eyes of the beautiful sunrise. 

Damon averts his eyes from the sunrise and shifts them towards Paris, the sunlight illuminating her now pale face.

"Then after one mild headache, there's my answer. I was compelled to push her and myself off the cliff. I was compelled to just watch her. And it sucked." Paris added, her voice cracking at the end.

Damon could see her eyes glisten, tears gathering in it.

"She was supposed to stay on the cliff. She was supposed to build a fire with her boyfriend, Bryan, and make us food. She was like the mother of the gang. Always looking after us. When Chloe died, no one was looking after us anymore, so, the gang broke up. We went our separate ways. We convinced ourselves it was for the best. I don't even know what's best for me anymore." Paris told him.

Damon felt bad for the brunette. At such a young age, she had to go through traumatic experiences. But despite all that, she managed to be strong long enough, and it made Damon admire her even more.

"Now that I know what truly happened, new questions are formed. Why would he compel me to kill her? Why didn't he just kill her himself? Why did he have to use me? Why would Lucien do that? Is he pretending to be my friend? Is he with us or not? I have a lot of new questions in my head and it's driving me insane." Paris said.

She runs her fingers through her hair as she sighed in frustration.

"You should talk to him." Damon suggested.

Paris snaps her gaze towards Damon and furrows her eyebrows before she spoke. "What? Are you serious?" Paris asked.

"Well, he wanted to find you and talk to you, but, I told him I won't let him near you until I know everything." Damon said.

"He told you?"

"Yep. Well, I sort of forced him to tell us. He knows I'd do anything for you, so, he had no choice but to tell us."

Paris looks at him tenderly as she reaches for his hand, surprising Damon.

"It isn't your fault that I died. Camila did this. You had no control." Paris assured him.

Damon closes his eyes and shakes his head as he disagreed.

"I still killed-" Damon was cut off by Paris placing her hand on his cheek and facing him towards her before kissing him.

The warmth of his lips relaxed Paris, however, Paris' cold lips indicating her death pained Damon. It was just a few seconds before Paris pulls away, opening her eyes to meet Damon's.

"Is that supposed to convince me?" Damon muttered, their faces still inches apart.

"Maybe." Paris replied, a small smile tugging on her lips.

"It didn't work. Maybe you should try it again." Damon joked, trying to kiss her again but Paris backed away before he could.

"In your dreams," Paris said as she jumps down to the road to go back to the Salvatore House, Damon following her.

♠

Paris and Damon arrived back at the boarding house where the others waited worriedly and impatiently for both of them.

"Paris!" Caroline's voice was the first thing Paris heard when she entered the house.

Caroline speeds towards the brunette and hugs her tightly. Paris smiles and hugs the blonde vampire back.

"Oh my God! How are you feeling?" Caroline asked as she pulls away from her.

"I feel... dead." Paris simply answered.

Caroline's eyebrows went up due to her friend's answer.

"Right. I'm sorry." Caroline said.

"It's fine." Paris said.

She approaches the others waiting in the living room and there she saw that they're all there, including Jeremy, Tyler, and Matt who took a break from being the lookouts.

"For a person transitioning into a vampire, you're doing good." Tyler commented.

"Well, maybe I'm meant to be a vampire." Paris replied.

Her eyes scanned everyone in the room, seeing all their worried faces until Lucien called her.

"Paris." Lucien said, entering the living room after drinking in the library.

Paris glances at the thousand-year-old vampire and her facial expression changed. Her face remained serious as she walks past Lucien and towards the library. Damon gives Lucien an intense glance before Lucien nodded and joins Paris inside.

"Paris, before everything, I want to sincerely apologise for what I did to you." Lucien said.

"Just tell me why you did it." Paris snapped.

Lucien nodded at the brunette. "Right."

"I have a friend. A witch. A seer, to be exact. Her name's Alexis. She can see visions of the future. One night, she came running to me, fear written all over her face. I asked what's wrong and she told me that she saw another vision." Lucien started.

Paris squints her eyes and furrows her eyebrows as she crosses her arms against her chest, paying attention to every word he's saying, but still keeping in mind that she shouldn't believe anything he says that easily.

"And what's this vision?" She asked.

"My death." He simply answered.

Paris' lips parted but she closes it again, she shouldn't believe that easily, so, she asked more questions.

"And where do I fit in all that?" She asked.

"Well, you're basically the one that killed me." He answered.

With that being said, Paris rolls her eyes and uncrossed her arms before looking back at Lucien with a scowl.

"That's exactly what I'm gonna do to you if you don't tell me the truth." Paris threatened.

"I am telling the truth! But in order for you to understand this, I'll start with what happened to Chloe and then I'll explain the vision." Lucien said and Paris just looks at him, motioning for him to continue.

"I was consumed by vengeance. After what Klaus and his siblings did to me, I didn't do anything that isn't related to their downfall. When I heard that Klaus had everything to break the curse, I needed to do everything to stop it. So I went after Chloe Danvers." Lucien said.

"Why Chloe? She's not even a part of this." Paris defended, however, she defended wrong.

"That's where you're wrong. Chloe is very much a part of this even before you were. She's not just a Danvers, she's also a Lockwood. She's Tyler's half-sister." Lucien said.

Paris' eyebrows shoot up at his statement as her lips parted. "What?"

"Tyler's father had an affair. And that affair resulted in Chloe being born. Later on, Richard stopped supporting both of them when he became mayor. I'll tell you everything about her childhood, but that's not really the center of this vision."

Paris slowly sits down on the sofa as she registered everything that she learned. "Then, that means she has the werewolf gene." Paris said and Lucien nodded.

"Klaus was going to make her trigger the curse and be the werewolf sacrifice in breaking his hybrid curse. So-"

"You compelled me to kill her, to stop him from breaking the curse. But it didn't work." Paris said.

"It didn't. But that wasn't the only reason I did that. This is where the vision comes in. I already knew you were the one destined to kill me, so I decided to kill two birds with one stone. By compelling you to kill Chloe, I was hopefully stopping Klaus from breaking the curse and stopping you from being the creature that would kill me." Lucien said.

"And what is that?"

"A vampire. I made you develop a fear towards water bodies because, in the vision that Alexis showed me, you were supposed to rescue someone underwater, because of that, you drowned and died with vampire blood in your system. I didn't know how you got vampire blood because the visions didn't show that much. So, if you are afraid of the water, then you wouldn't rescue that someone, that someone being Damon, and if you didn't rescue Damon, you wouldn't die and become a vampire. But here you are, transitioning into a vampire. Turns out that it was me who gave you vampire blood and Alexis and I interpreted the vision wrong relating to your death. When you emerged out of the water I was relieved. But then hours later, it turned out that you rescuing Damon underwater isn't the reason you died, it's the one that initiated your death. When you rescued him, you became Camila's target. Because of that, you died and became a vampire."

Everything Lucien has been telling her is overwhelming Paris. She just wanted to know why Lucien compelled her to kill Chloe and now she got tons of information making everything much more complicated since the entire situation was complicated already, to begin with.

"Then, my death. While your hand was inside my chest in that vision, I saw your eyes, and they weren't your normal green color. It's red. And there's only one explanation for that, you became an upgraded vampire. Reasons for killing me? Unknown. How did you get your hands on the serum? Also unknown."

Paris thought for a moment, her mind being a mess because of all that. She never thought that she would have to deal with these kinds of stuff, but the world keeps surprising her.

"When I compelled you to kill Chloe, I thought the future would change. But the events leading up to this day says otherwise. All I did was delay the inevitable." Lucien said.

He pours himself a drink and sits on the couch across Paris as he drank.

"Why didn't you just kill me? This would've been all over if you just killed me on that cliff." Paris asked.

Lucien averts his gaze from his glass and fixed it at Paris, wearing a curious look on her face.

"I was planning to, when I approached Damon. But then, you were so nice to me. Believe it or not, I still have a soft spot for people like you. That's why I was willing to give you the serum when you needed a solution with your Camila problems even though I knew you would kill me soon enough. And that's also why I was relieved when you came out of the water, not because you weren't dead and a vampire that would kill me, but because you were okay." Lucien said, his eyes staring right at Paris'.

After all of that, it's difficult for Paris not to believe him. He wouldn't make up all this just to make her believe him, right? It's too well-detailed and complicated, believable as well.

But most of all, after all that, Paris learned something other than her killing Lucien, she learned that she really is meant to be a vampire.

END OF PART ONE;
HEAD ABOVE WATER

♠

It's a rollercoaster, I know. I had a pretty hard time trying to explain the vision but I hope I did a good enough job in explaining it. :)

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