All Beatrix could do was stare at him in shock.

"Too handsome to handle," teased Kai, holding up his phone in a selfie mode to capture both Beatrix and Damon in the picture. Damon covered his face, but Beatrix was frozen.

"I think her entire mental computer system is rebooting," Kai commented to a very annoyed Damon, who turned and looked apologetically at Beatrix.

She came forward slowly and grabbed his face, her touch gentle at first as she made sure he was real.

But then the next second, she slapped him across the face.

"Woah, what the fuck?" Kai snapped.

"What did you do to Freddie?" she growled.

"Jeez, I didn't do shit to the kid," said Kai, rolling his eyes. "I just compelled him to give me his Twitter password. His mom's not actually sick."

"What the fuck— why didn't you just message me from your account? Why— why did you feel the need to trick me?"

Kai rolled his eyes. "Come on, it was funny. I came back and after I found out I couldn't taste or feel anything, I went to the library and there was this kid with his laptop open and it said 'Dr. Beatrix La Salle' on the page, so I compelled him to tell me what he knew about you, and he did. He was writing a stupid essay about you for school and how you helped his mom and you're the reason he wants to be a doctor— blah, blah, blah. He's fine, his mom's fine, I compelled them to forget they met me. Just thought it'd be cool— like a surprise! I'm back!"

She slapped him again, ignoring the stares of the few people in the diner. "Do you have any idea what I went through after you died?" she hissed lowly. "I turned off my humanity because of how much pain I was in! And you didn't have the decency to approach me upfront and be honest about things?"

He caught her arm suddenly. Her sleeve had ridden up, and he saw the black veins etched on her arm. He frowned and tore the rest of the sleeve up. "So when you say you're dying... you meant that?"

"Yes, I meant that, you bastard, you think I'd lie?" she said. She hadn't realized she was crying. Seeing him again, knowing that he was here, combined with the constantly stirring negative emotions inside of her was a very volatile combination. It made her angry that he hadn't just told her he was back.

"I wasn't lying," said Kai, holding up a bloody napkin. "I actually need medical attention. Still can't taste or feel anything, but I've been coughing up blood."

As if to prove his point, he started to cough again, and Damon shoved another napkin against his mouth as he purged more blood. Beatrix gritted her teeth and yanked Kai off of his seat and towards a booth at the back of the diner, shoving him down.

"Thank you," he coughed as he leaned back.

The waitress approached them from behind. "You okay, sweetie?" she asked Kai.

"Uh, yeah," he managed. "Lactose intolerance."

"Can we just have some napkins, please?" asked Damon as he sat down on the opposite seat of the booth. "Thanks."

The waitress walked off, and Kai sat up enough for Beatrix to sit beside him. "Oh, it feels like I'm being dragged back to hell by my colon. Oh... I can't go back there. You're on fire all the time, and ghosts from your past come back to pull your skin off, and occasionally, on really bad days, you go face to face with Cade, who is basically torture incarnate. This is all metaphorical. Except for the fire, which is literal."

She held up her hands. "Are you going to tell me what the fuck is actually going on, or not?"

"I just did!" he said before coughing a bit again. "I'm half in hell, half here, or whatever. Takes a lot of concentration for me to use magic. Damon can probably tell you more— he worked with the devil."

"Wow, I missed a lot," Beatrix said, pulling her sleeve back down and flexing her fingers.

"It's nothing much," Damon grumbled. "Had a job with a siren to escape the real deal."

Kai sighed. "Sirens. Man, were they hot?"

"Sure," said Damon. "If you're into cannibal divas."

Kai pursed his lips. "I think I am. Beatrix can be a diva."

"I'm not a cannibal," the Heretic said, rolling her eyes. "What even kept the sirens going? I'm confused."

"Evil people," answered Damon.

Kai clapped his hands. "Oh, yes! Yes, that is it, it's so— it makes so much sense! If hell is fueled by evil, and I'm still a little bit in hell, then maybe I can secure my footing here on Earth by— by killing a really bad person," he lowered his voice to a whisper, "just like those sexy sirens did."

Beatrix and Damon both shared a mildly aggravated look.

"Did I mention I'm trying to preserve my future with Elena by not killing anyone?" Damon muttered.

Kai started to laugh. Clearly, he found this very funny. Beatrix felt unnerved. He was so different, despite looking exactly the same. She always thought that if she saw him again, she'd leap into his arms and kiss him. Right now, she had no urge to do that, whatsoever.

"Damon," said Kai, "if you think that one more murder is going to seal your fate, then I have news for you, you are super deep in the karma hole."

Damon looked unfazed. "I have an eternity to make up for what I've done."

Kai coughed. "Yes, and who knows how long I have left. Face it, buddy, you need me. And I need you right now, because I can barely stand, let alone kill. Okay, come on, come on. Just one seriously bad person, use your best judgment. Do it for me, man. Do it, do it for your bro. Do it for..."

"Don't say 'Elena,'" Damon growled.

"Elen..."

Damon slammed his hand on the table. "Okay. Sure." He got up and left, and Kai made a checkmark in the air.

Beatrix frowned at him. "Let me guess, you only need me to get you fully out of hell?"

"Jeez, I thought you'd be happier to see me, darling," he said, pretending to be hurt.

"It's been four years," she said, crossing her arms. "Four years. I killed a disturbing amount of innocent people after I lost you. I turned my humanity off and killed some more, in very sick ways. I killed my own half-sister—"

"Aw, you have a sister?" he interrupted.

"Not anymore!" she spat. "And you have the audacity to lie, to trick me, instead of being upfront? I spent months feeling like shit because you— you told me you loved me and then you just died and I never said it back, and—"

"Well, you can say it now," he prompted, making a kissy face.

"That's not the point," she said in an exasperated tone, bringing one hand down to her side as a sharp pain shot through her.

He looked her up and down. "What's the deal with you? Why are you dying? Where's your boo, Elijah?"

"He's not my 'boo.' It's a lot to explain. I took in a dangerous amount of dark magic and my body's too old, I can't handle it. It's killing me. But if I do this spell to get you out of hell, I should be able to expel that magic and buy myself some time."

He hummed. "You should definitely get me out. It's not an 'if,' it's a 'when.' I want out, and if it heals you, it's a win-win, right? Woohoo, bad people die, I get to be here."

She just shook her head. "I don't think people need to die to accomplish this. The one thing that helped me heal is acceptance of what kind of shitty person I can be. And I will say this now— we never should have done what we did at the wedding. I never should have killed all the people I did in the aftermath. I never should have killed all the people I slaughtered when my humanity was off. They didn't deserve that. I don't want to go about that way. I couldn't stop Marcel from doing something terrible, and now, I can't go to New Orleans for awhile. And guess what, all this darkness is killing me, so I don't want to contribute to it by having blood on my hands."

He leaned back and surveyed her. "Last time, being good got us nowhere. I still died. So why would we act nice now?"

"We weren't good consistently, Kai. We continued to be bad and just alternated being civil. What we should have done is just gotten out of the 1903 Prison World and left. We should have never gone to that wedding. I don't want to go on a killing spree. I can do the spell without need for that."

He didn't look amused, but he said nothing, since Damon came and yanked the two to one of the backrooms, where he had compelled the cook to stay still and wait there. Kai moved forward and immediately began to feed on the man, diving his fangs deep into his throat as Damon washed his hands.

"Feel better?" he asked Kai after two minutes.

Kai let the dead body fall, his mouth covered in blood. "Eh."

Damon growled and slammed him into the nearest wall. "Wow," Kai muttered, looking mildly surprised.

"Listen here, you little twerp," Damon sneered in his face. "I don't kill for kicks anymore. So if you can't tell me this guy's death meant something, I will turn this room into your own personal hell."

Kai held his hands up in surrender and pushed him off. "All right. All right. I feel a little better. Emphasis on 'little.' If you want to keep this train going to Elenatown, you're gonna need to find me some more evil people to eat. Okay?"

"No," said Beatrix, crossing her arms as Damon left, about to make a call. "No, I don't want to help if this is how it's going to be."

Kai groaned and covered his face. "Why are you suddenly acting so moral? You're sure you didn't screw Elijah or something and get all noble now that you're terminal?"

"I didn't screw Elijah!" she snapped. "This is wrong. Kai, you mistaken my annoyance to be some sort of hatred. I wouldn't mind having you back. But if you're going to go about it this way, I don't want to do you any favors. I don't want you to come back just so you can be problematic and have blood on your hands again. It's what got you killed in the first place. If you're not going to try and redeem yourself—"

"Speaking of redemption," said Damon, coming back in. "We're under a bit of a time crunch now." He looked at Kai. "See, the boss found out that you're here. Cade's coming for you."

Kai looked alarmed. "Wait, he's... he's on his way right now?"

Damon rolled his eyes. "I don't have an exact E.T.A., but you know how impatient he gets."

Kai put his hands together like he was going to pray, resting his thumbs on his chin. "Oh... okay. What do we do, what do we do? What do we do?"

"Redemption," said Damon. "We find a way to redeem you, so you don't have to go to hell. Then Beatrix can do her witchy woo and you'll be back here."

"What are you talking about?" Kai scoffed.

"I'm talking about atonement," said Damon, as if he was talking to a five-year-old. "I'm talking about a giant, noble gesture of selfless generosity."

Kai gritted his teeth. "I hate this already."

Damon shrugged. "You need something that's gonna push you over the edge in the eyes of Cade. Something to make up for all the pain that you've caused. For example, Beatrix here delivered the Saltzman twins safe and sound, after you both tried to kill them."

"And look how well that's working out for her," said Kai, gesturing to her arms. "What does el jefe even have in mind?"

Damon cast him a cheeky smile. "Oh, it's not up to him. It's up to me. People do forgive. And when they do, redemption is possible. I know that. Which is why, if you want my forgiveness, you're gonna bring Elena Gilbert back to life. Right now."

Kai pursed his lips, but Beatrix spoke for him. "Fine, I'm good with doing it," she said, rubbing her arms a bit anxiously. "We'll bring her back, and then I'll bring Kai back so that he can't do anything else. But we're not killing anyone, alright?"

"Sounds fine to me," said Damon.

But Kai looked displeased. "Not even a bit more? For a snack? I need to eat. I'm a Heretic, too."

"Aw, well, you'll just have to wait," she snapped, pulling a blood bag out of thin air and throwing it at him. "If you're not going to try and be better I'm not going to treat you with any respect."

"Ooh, I hit a nerve somewhere along the way," Kai taunted. "Let me guess. You're with Klaus."

"I'm not with Klaus," she muttered.

"Ah, yes you are." He wiped the blood from his mouth. "That's why you're trying to be all good. Something happened to him because you, him, and Marcel were being a bunch of bad little kids, and now you're paying for your failures with all that dark magic."

She had forgotten how well Kai knew her.

"It doesn't matter," she said. "It's not important. Let's just go get Elena's body, alright?"

Damon pulled out his keys and beckoned them to follow him. They went to the back of the diner where Damon's car was. Beatrix recognized it from when she and Kai created its lookalike in the prison world. Damon got into the driver's seat, and Kai climbed into the backseat. Beatrix went to ride shotgun, feeling murderous when, as Damon started to drive, Kai poked the back of her neck.

"What on Earth is so important that you have to poke me?"

"Jeez, someone's got a temper. I forgot that about you, Trixter. Are you really that mad that I lied to you?"

"It's almost like I knew you for nearly twenty years and expected something better."

"Yeah, maybe it would have been better if I just straight up called you and told you I missed you, huh, and begged you to come and see me so you could free me. Be honest— would you have come?"

"Of course I would have come," she said under her breath.

"What's that? Couldn't hear you."

"Yes, you could hear me, I turned you into a bloody Heretic!"

She watched him smirk from the rearview mirror. She felt another pain in her side and pressed her hand against it. Damon cast her a slightly concerned look, and Kai put his feet up against her seat. "Do you still have dreams about me?" he asked.

"I haven't dreamt since I took in this magic," she muttered. "Only nightmares."

"Hmm, okay. What do you do now?"

"I'm a doctor."

"Why in Texas?"

"Because it's cheaper to live there. Close enough to New Orleans."

"Does Hope live with you?"

"No," she lied smoothly. "I have to travel to see them. And I'm not saying where."

"Feisty. Where are the Mikaelsons?"

"What's with the interrogation? Maybe if you hadn't been an ass and impersonated the son of my patient, I wouldn't have hesitated to tell you."

Kai chuckled, and leaned onto Damon's seat. "Can you tell she's mad at me? Ah, imagine how hot the sex will be after this..."

Damon groaned loudly. "Please, please, do not put that image in my head! I had successfully forgotten that you two used to bone anywhere and everywhere inside my house when I wasn't there."

"It's not a bad thing to imagine, you know. I bet in Beatrix's ideal world, she'd be in bed with you, me, Stefan, Elijah, Klaus, Kol, and what's his face— Lucien."

Beatrix's head whipped back. "What?" she hissed. "How— how the hell do you know Lucien?"

"Met him in Hell," said Kai, wiggling his eyebrows. "He's the one that told me about you and Klaus."

"Now I have the image of you and him in my head," Damon grunted as he kept driving.

"Can you stop imagining what I look like having sex with people?" Beatrix hissed.

Kai laughed. "He can't help it. Any guy who hasn't boned you wonders what it's like. I bet Damon wondered about it when he met you."

"No, because I have a girlfriend," Damon muttered. "Who you two very inconveniently put into an eternal beauty sleep four years ago, for literally no reason."

"It was to make you and Bonnie suffer," Beatrix said boredly. "At this rate I just want this shit over with, so I'm good with bringing her back. Nothing better to do. Need the dark magic out of me, or else I'll decay."

Damon huffed, and Kai leaned back onto Beatrix's seat. "Is Klaus better than me?" he asked.

Beatrix slapped her arm back, whacking him in the face. "Not answering that."

"Aw, this gives me prison world flashbacks... you didn't want to tell me about your sex life."

"Is this really a necessary topic of conversation?" Damon asked in a strained voice.

"No, it's not, thank you, Damon," Beatrix answered, covering her face as she felt her eyes sting a bit. She knew they'd probably turned all black again.

Damon turned to face her and frowned. "Well, your sleeves are useless. You have black veins on the back of your hands."

She dropped them down and looked, and cursed as she saw the veins had indeed spread. "They've never done that before," she murmured. "I'm getting too worked up."

"Lucky for you, I'm going to give you a nice little mission," Damon said with a cheeky grin.

When they finally got to the Salvatore Crypt in the Mystic Falls woods, Beatrix practically jumped out of the car. She went beside the nearest tree and spit out, some dark blood coming out.

"That can't be good," Kai said, coming to stand next to her. "You've lost all sense of fun, Trixter."

"You mean that just because I'm not murderous now, I'm not fun anymore?"

"Yes, that's exactly what I mean."

"Can you two save your discussion for later?" said Damon, opening the door to the crypt. The two Heretics shared an annoyed look before going in behind him.

"How do I know you won't kill me as soon as I do this?" asked Kai as he and Beatrix stepped in to see the coffin holding Elena's body.

"You don't," said Damon bluntly. "But if you want out of hell, it's either trust me or run from Cade forever."

Kai shrugged and ran his hand over the lid of the coffin. "Man, this thing has some miles on it." He leaned down near where Elena's head should be. "Hi, sleepyhead. Remember me?"

"Clock's ticking, creeper," said Damon. "Just reverse the damn spell."

Beatrix cast the two a grim expression as she rolled up her sleeves, ignoring the blackened veins as much as she could. But before she could summon anything they might need, Kai motioned for her to wait.

"It's complicated magic," said Kai, rubbing his hands together. "Beatrix may have a crazy amount of darkness as fuel, but I need to siphon more power first, 'cause otherwise, I might slip away in the middle of it, and... well, that'd be messy."

Damon looked thoroughly aggravated. "What is it that you need."

Kai cast him a mischievous smile. "You." He grabbed his arm and started to siphon, making Damon groan in pain. "Magic takes energy—" He plucked a very strange looking dagger from Damon's jacket pocket. "If I'm gonna do this right, I need to drain the biggest, baddest battery of all."

"Kai, stop," Damon grunted weakly as he fell to his knees.

"Hey, I'll revive you soon, I promise," said Beatrix, not objecting to Damon being put to sleep.

Kai smirked and shoved Damon back, crouching down to his level. "I've been in hell long enough to know that there is no such thing as redemption. There are only promises and bargains and tricks we play on ourselves to make us believe that we're good people."

He stood up and came over to Beatrix, putting his hand on her shoulder and addressing both her and Damon. She tensed at his hold, not sure what he was planning. She didn't feel strong enough to counter him. Her side was still aching and the veins running down her body seemed to be getting darker...

"I'm not a good person," Kai said, shrugging as if this fact didn't bother him at all. "I own that. And I will never be good again, no matter how much anyone tries."

He faced Beatrix and put his hands on her face as Damon struggled to draw breath behind him. "It was nice, with you. I liked it. You're good company, and if love is something that someone like me can truly feel, then I did love you, there's no question about it. But Hell changed me. You're not going to see who I was, ever again. That guy's gone and I'm not playing nice guy. So if I'm going to go down, I'm going out with a bang."

He let go of Beatrix and put a hand on Elena's coffin. "Invisique."

He and the coffin disappeared, and Beatrix reached out, unable to feel anything. Damon coughed loudly and collapsed on the floor, his skin turning grayish as he went unconscious.

Beatrix stepped back. "Kai, I know you're still in here," she said, backing up against the wall. "I can help you... I don't want you to go this way. I can get you out of Hell, but please, don't do this..."

She felt cold hands brush up against her neck, and she let out a whimper of fear when a hand wrapped around her throat. He appeared in front of her, a malicious smirk on his face.

"Say it," he whispered. "Say you'll bring me back. Say you'll be with me, and we'll be bad together. Partners in crime."

She swallowed back fearful tears. "Kai... I don't want to hurt people anymore. That's... that's not who I want to be. I care about you, I always will, but this— this isn't the way to—"

He rolled his eyes and snapped her neck, dropping her body carelessly on the floor.