CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

"Where are they?" Nyx asks Stefan as she walks back into the cellar.

"Stopped at a motel for the night. They had to get away from Kol." He tells her, and she sighs as she looks down. "Dean and Sam?"

"Something about demons. I don't know." She shakes her head and then looks at Ric as he groans, finally waking up.

"Welcome back." Stefan says, and he looks up at the two of them.

"What happened?" Ric asks. "Did I, uh..."

"No." She shakes her head. "No, you pretty much just laid there dead for half the night." She tells him.

"But on the plus side, I did almost finish reading Moby Dick." Stefan says as he stands up, shutting the book in his hand.

"This is stupid." Ric says. "Evil me, or whatever you want to call him, he's not going to make an appearance. Why would he? I mean, the best hiding place is the one where you can't find the person who hid it."

"I know."

"So, how do you want to do this?"

"We don't want to do any of this."

"Well, that makes three of us. But I don't think we have much choice in the matter." Ric says as he takes his ring off.

"Wait​, what the hell are you doing?" Nyx questions. "You need that ring."

"No, what I need is hope that my alter ego doesn't have a death wish. So, I'm taking bets that my dark side has a sense of self-preservation." He tells them. "So, let's see if he defends himself against death."

Stefan scoffs. "Look, Alaric, we're not going to kill you, okay?"

"If we have any chance at this, you're going to have to try."

Stefan looks back at Nyx, and she shrugs. "We have to find the stake, and he's the only one who knows where it is." She says.

He looks back at Ric and then punches him in the face, hard. He hits him a few times while Nyx leans in the doorway.

"You're not putting enough into this." Ric eventually says.

"Any more into it, I'm going to break your spine." Stefan tells him before punching him again.

Ric falls to the ground and there's blood coming out of his mouth. Stefan backs away from him then.

"Well, don't back down now." Ric says as he looks up at him.

"No, no, no, no. I can't. The blood." He says as he continues to back up.

"Come on, you're passed that."

"No, I'm not."

"Then use it." Nyx tells him, and Stefan looks at her. "Give in to it if you have to."

"She's right. Try to kill me, Stefan, come on." Ric says as he pushes himself up and walks toward him.

"Not like this." Stefan argues.

"Yes, like this." She says. "You're going to have to want to kill him for the other him to believe that you will."

"If I go this far, I may not be able to stop." He says and his back hits the wall.

"You want the answers from my darkest side, you're going to tap into yours." Ric says and then looks over at Nyx. "Both of you. So, don't back down."

"Do it, Stefan." Nycole tells him.

"Do it!" Ric yells as he pushes on Stefan's shoulders.

Stefan shoves Ric back, and he hits the wall on the other side of the cellar. Ric starts laughing as he pushes himself up, and Stefan and Nyx look at each other before turning back to him.

"You're both so weak." He says as he looks between the two of them. "Look at you. One of nature's most hideous creatures, and a hunter who's supposed to kill it — and neither of you can even get that right."

"You." Stefan says.

"Me."

"Where's the stake?" Nyx asks him.

"You're worse than I was. Or is that the problem?" Evil-Alaric asks as he looks at her. "You're still worried about what we talked about before."

"And what's that?" She questions.

"That you and Elena aren't just some strange doppelganger-twin occurrence that happened by some cosmic mistake." He says. "You're afraid that you're two halves of the same person, you being the darkest parts. And even your names reflect it."

"Shut up."

"You looked just a little too much into your job, a little too far into Greek mythology." He laughs at her, and she grinds her teeth as she glares at him. "Now, you're scared because you think that somehow yours and your sister's names are reflecting who you really are inside. Elena meaning shining light and the bright one."

"I said shut up!" She snaps as she moves forward, and Stefan watches the two of them.

"And of course Nyx. The Greek goddess of the night who mothered other deities, twins: Hypnos and Thanatos, the Gods of Sleep and Death." He continues, and Nyx punches him, making him laugh as he turns back to face her and Stefan. "And you." He says, looking over at Stefan, who's beside Nycole now. "You're spineless. Pathetic."

"Tell us where the stake is before I kill you." Stefan says, and he laughs again.

"You know, you're all going to burn." He says as he looks at them. "Ashes to dust."

Stefan punches him three times, and now he's on the ground. "Where's the stake?!" He demands, but Ric just looks at him, so he hits him again and again. He then grabs him and puts his arm around his throat. "I'm going to kill you in three, two, one—"

"It's in the cave." Ric tells them, his voice strained. "Where no vampire can get it."

Stefan pushes him forward, and he falls to the ground once again. They walk out, and he closes and locks the cellar door behind them. The pair then go upstairs and find Klaus and Rebekah standing in the living room.

"That wasn't too hard, was it?" Klaus asks, and they look at them.

Rebekah goes to get Ric because Stefan won't let Nyx out of his sight, and he isn't going to let anyone take her to get the stake. Klaus pours himself a drink as the brunette walks over to the couch, and Rebekah then walks back into the living room with Ric.

"It's a little gratuitous, don't you think?" Klaus asks as he looks at Ric's bloody​ face. "I would have been more gentle."

"Go to hell." Nyx mumbles.

"I'm going to take him to the caves." Klaus' sister says. "You're going to go inside and fetch me the stake. And if you think you can hide, you're wrong." She tells Ric, and then they leave.

"And then there were three." Klaus says. "I know about your brother's and your sister's little mission to Denver. They failed — not that that's news anymore."

"So, what are you going to do now, Klaus?" Stefan questions. "Are you going to kill me and take Nycole?"

"I haven't actually decided yet." He says as he sits down.

"Oh, sure you have. See, you've had every chance and every excuse imaginable to do both, yet you haven't. Which means you don't want to."

"You know something​, you're right. See, I'm not as big a monster as you'd all like to believe. I don't want to take a mother away from her two newborn children, and as for you... I'm still waiting for my old friend to come back. By the looks of it, he's just beneath the surface. Waiting to come out and play." He laughs. "Isn't that right, ripper?"

"I've been fighting that part of myself. Thinking that if I repress it, it would go away. But it won't." Stefan says. "And now that I've accepted it, it can't control me. And neither can you. So...unless you're going to stake me...why don't you get the hell out of my house."

"Damn." Nyx laughs.

"Come on, I'll take you back to the hospital." Stefan says as he looks at her, and she stands up.

The two get back to the hospital, and they find somewhere near the NICU to sit. He then looks over at Nycole.

"About what Evil-Alaric was saying back there..." Stefan starts. "You don't actually believe any of that, do you?"

"I admit, after everything that happened, I looked into some of the mythology. I was afraid of some of the things I'm capable of doing. I mean, take tonight for example." She says as she looks at him. "Pushing you to use the blood to bring out Evil-Alaric... And everything that's going on with Sam, and now Ric having a dark alter ego..."

"You think your darkest parts might be able to take over too?" He asks.

"I think it's a possibility for anyone." She tells him. "So, yes, I did all kinds of research, and I talked​ to Ric about my fears. I definitely wasn't expecting him to ever use them against me."

"Yeah, hearing him talk to you like that was definitely...weird, to say the least."

"Nyx, the Goddess, she has siblings, four to be exact. Gaea, the Goddess of Earth and their brothers: Erebus, Tartarus, and Eros — the Gods of darkness, war, and love. The mythology even says that Tartarus lives in the darkest depths of the underworld where no light can reach, a place where the souls of the evil are sent to be tortured for all eternity." She tells him. "I know that some Gods do exist because Dean and I were almost sacrificed to a Pagan God once... But sometimes, myths and legends are just that — they're stories."

"So, you don't believe what Ric was saying then?" He asks.

She chuckles. "My head's not big enough for me to believe that I'm the human personification of this Goddess."

"That's not what I meant." He says, and she sighs. "I meant the part about you and Elena being two halves of the same person, and you being the darkest parts."

She looks away from him. "Speaking of Gods — Damon thinks that I should pray."

"My brother?" He questions, eyebrows furrowed.

She nods. "He says that I should take a leap of faith and pray that God helps the twins."

"Maybe you should."

"And if He doesn't help me? What am I supposed to do then?" She asks as she looks back at him.

"Pray harder." He says, and she takes a deep breath.