No Mercy

Lies by Evanescence

But through my tears breaks a blinding light
Birthing a dawn to this endless night
Arms outstretched, awaiting me
An open embrace upon a bleeding tree

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Chapter Three: Things Are Never as Simple as They Seem

"Am I in the Twilight Zone or something? Because last time I checked, when someone dies, they don't come back." Ash remarked, a hint of hysteria in her voice as her dark blue eyes remained glued to her brother's face. A voice in the back of her head whispered vampires do.

Caroline's eyes looked back and forth between the two, unsure of what exactly was going on. "Am I missing something?" Elena looked as if she was trying to figure out everything as well because she looked just as lost as Caroline felt.

Damon's eyebrows furrowed as he appeared directly in front of Ash, tilting his head as his eyes roamed her face in confusion. "How is this possible? You're dead."

"So are you. I saw…" She choked on the words, silently cursing herself for her show of weakness as she continued, "I saw Father shoot both of you." Her dark blue eyes were piercing as they looked up at him as if she wasn't willing to let herself believe that Damon was actually alive and in front of her. When you go for so long believing someone is dead, it's more than a little hard to suddenly accept the opposite, even if proof was literally standing right in front of you.

It looked as if Damon was having a hard time believing that Ashlynn was alive as well. "You followed us? We told you to stay inside."

"Since when did I ever listen to you?" She inquired, silently congratulating herself for managing to keep her voice from shaking.

"Am I the only one totally confused here?" Caroline questioned, looking at Elena for some help as if the brunette would have some idea as to what was going on.

Elena simply shook her head, not knowing what to say as pieces of the puzzle slowly began to form together within her head. "Maybe…it would be better to have this conversation in private?" She suggested.

Damon didn't even glance at Elena, his eyes solely on his sister. "Yeah," he said slowly, "that probably would be better." Ash nodded stiffly, her face blank of any emotion whatsoever. Caroline and Elena exchanged a look before walking out the door, planning to meet them at the Salvatore house. Damon started after them before pausing and turning to Ash who hadn't moved at all. "You coming?" He asked quietly, his eyebrows slightly drawn together as if concerned.

That seemed to snap Ash out of the funk she was in and she nodded, taking a deep breath. "Yeah, sorry 'bout that." She replied as she walked towards him.

Damon looked down at his sister and a hint of a smirk crossed his face as he held out his arm to her in a familiar gesture Ash hadn't seen in over a century. "Ready, milady?"

A small smile crossed Ash's face in remembrance before the smile then turned into a slight smirk as well. "Why of course, good sir." Her brothers weren't dead…well, Damon wasn't at least. She had no clue about Stefan, but the hope was ignited within her that, if Damon had survived and become a vampire, then Stefan had to have as well. He had to have.

As the two walked out of the Grill towards Damon's car, a thought began to plague the brunette, causing her expression to darken slightly as her eyebrows furrowed.

Alexa had said Klaus was nearby.

Elena looked exactly like Katherine and, as a result, like Tatia.

Which would mean…Elena was the doppelganger. And, from the looks of it, she was friends with Damon.

Without having meant to, Ash had put herself directly into Klaus's path once again.

And there was no way she could just leave now that she knew Damon, and possibly Stefan, was alive.

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"Try not to think so hard, otherwise you might blow a blood vessel in that pretty little head of yours." Damon remarked, glancing out of the corner of his eye at the dark haired girl in the passenger seat, who was currently glaring at the dashboard. Once again, Damon found it hard to believe that Ashlynn was here, in flesh and blood. Of course, he knew it wasn't impossible considering he too had become a vampire, but he had never suspected that his kid sister had as well.

After having been forced into completing the transition as a result of Stefan, and before they had fled Virginia to go to New Orleans, they had heard the news that poor little Ashlynn Salvatore had vanished without a trace-well, until a leather pouch that had belonged to the brunette had been found drenched in blood a mile from the next town over. After that, the consensus had been clear: the only surviving member of the Salvatore family had perished, though how had still been uncertain.

Obviously, the consensus had been wrong. Either that, or Damon was going crazy and hallucinating, though the last was unlikely considering that both Vampire Barbie and Elena had seen Ashlynn and talked to her as well.

Ash blinked before looking at Damon with an arched brow, a smirk curling her lips upward. "Maybe you should try it sometime. It might give you a chance to shake the cobwebs out of your brain from disuse."

Damon snorted, rolling his eyes as he did so. "Sounds painful, no thanks."

"Wimp." Ash mumbled good naturedly, a small smile on her face as she said it.

A comfortable silence filled the small car as Damon continued driving toward the house.

The brunette looked down at the ground, her face blank of emotion as she said slowly, almost hesitantly, "Damon?"

The man glanced at her with a raised eyebrow in response. When she didn't continue right away, he said nothing and simply waited for whatever it was she had to say.

Ash refused to meet her brother's eyes as she said so quietly that he almost didn't hear her, "I…missed you."

Damon gave her a slight smile in return. "Missed you too kiddo…Mind telling me how you became a vampire?"

Ash winced visibly, very much wanting to steer clear of the explanation she knew she would have to give her brothers. "I'd rather not repeat it a second time, so I'll tell you when Stefan's around…" As much as she hated to, she knew she was going to have to lie when she did get around to the discussion of her continuing existence. She suddenly looked at him sharply, a previous thought reappearing within her mind. "He's alive as well, right?"

Damon hesitated. "Yeah…but just to warn you, he's…changed since the last time you saw him."

"It's been over a century. If he hadn't changed at least a little, I'd be surprised." Dark blue eyes studied the side of Damon's face that was visible to her intently, as if she was trying to glean from it whatever it was that he was implying. She had a feeling that it definitely wasn't something good.

Damon winced, as if he had thoroughly been hoping that he wouldn't have to explain what he had meant. "Well let's just say for now that little ol' Saint Stefan's humanity is currently in the off position." He glanced at Ash out of the corner of his eye to see how she was reacting to this piece of information.

Shock was clear on her face for a moment, before the female made an effort to hide it. She looked at Damon quizzically. "Stefan turned off his humanity? Really?"

Her brother nodded as he pulled into the driveway of the Salvatore house. As he turned off the car and pulled the key out of the ignition, he turned in his seat so he could fully face her. His blue eyes, so similar to her own, looked down at her as he examined her face for a moment before saying, "I'll explain it all later, but yeah. Boring, brooding Stefan has once again been replaced by fun, ripper Stefan."

"Once again?" She inquired calmly.

"Normally, he's the brooding, angsty Stefan we all know and love, but every once in a while he falls off the wagon," he didn't add in the part where this time, it hadn't been Stefan's choice. He'd wait until he had time to explain it all to Ash before mentioning that particular piece of information.

"And you always said Stefan and I were nothing alike," Ash mumbled under her breath, not actually talking to Damon or meaning for him to hear. He did, however, but didn't make a remark about it. Instead, he simply stared at her in his usual piercing way until he was snapped out of it by the sound of a car pulling in behind him.

"We left before you two and yet you beat us here." Caroline remarked annoyed as she got out of the driver's seat of the car and walked towards them with Elena right by her side.

Damon smirked at her. "You snooze you lose, Blondie."

"It seems as if your manners haven't improved any." Ash stated dryly, though her eyes were no longer on her brother and the two females. Instead, her eyes were fixated on the house that stood before her, the house that held her twin within. Stefan's humanity was off…that little fact alone made Ash dread her reunion with him. For all her tough talk over the years, she really didn't know if she could handle seeing her brother like that. The same brother who had patiently taught her how to swim, though Damon had helped as well, despite the fact that their father would have skinned both of them alive if he had found out, especially Damon.

"Au contraire, sister dear, many ladies can attest to the fact that I can be a perfect gentleman." He flashed her a smug grin, though his eyes showed that he had noticed Ash's hesitation at entering the house.

Only slight surprise flashed across Elena's face. It made sense. Actually, it made a lot of sense.

"Wait wait wait wait wait!" Caroline remarked as she walked in between the two siblings. "Did you say sister? Since when do you and Stefan have a sister? How?" She kept looking back and forth at everyone with an annoyed look of disbelief on her face, a look that grew at the response she next received.

Damon arched an eyebrow at the blonde. "For the how part, when a man and a woman love each other very much-"

"-or have had too much to drink," Ash added before sending the others an annoyed look, hiding her unease behind it. "Are we going to stand out here all night or what?"

"Oh, I don't know. It is rather nice out." The oldest of the four said with a grin, before groaning at the looks he received. "Fine, fine. Let's get this over with."

That should be my line, Ash thought to herself as she took a deep breath and acknowledged Damon's look with a nod, saying that she was ready. "Let's go." She agreed.

"Caroline," Elena spoke up seriously, picking up on anxiety hidden by the brunette vampire's stone face. "Why don't we go back to the Grill." It was an order, not a question.

Caroline looked at Elena like she was crazy. "We just got-" She cut off as understanding crossed her face. A cheerful smile crossed her face. "Good idea!"

Ash stared at the two, no emotion clear on her face as she stared at the two girls who said goodbye and hurried off to the car with one of her eyebrows raised. "That was…weird." She turned to Damon and already saw him walking into the house. A low growl of frustration escaped her lips.

"You coming, slowpoke?" Damon called behind him at her, causing her to glare at the back of his head with such intensity that you'd think she was trying to cause his head to explode.

She followed him into the parlor with a quiet solemnity surrounding her as her eyes surveyed everything they landed on. So much had changed in the hundred and forty seven years that had passed since everything had happened. Her face lost all emotion as she struggled within herself not to lose it. She was stronger than this. If she could survive all the things she had to endure within the last ninety years, then she could survive this.

Hopefully.

Damon stopped walking suddenly and suddenly spun around to face the brunette, who stopped just as suddenly and looked at him with an annoyed eyebrow raised. What was he do? A mischievous grin lit up his entire face as he looked down at her, and it intrigued her. Whenever that look would cross Damon's face when they were children growing up, it always meant he was up to some sort of trouble.

When he spoke, his voice was a whisper, as if trying to make sure Stefan wouldn't overhear. "Seeing you won't undo Klaus's compulsion, but maybe," he smirked, "it might be enough to push Stefan just a bit. So stay here and don't come out until I signal you. Got it?" He flashed her a wink and a smirk before taking off while shouting, "Oh Stefan~!"

Meanwhile, shock mixed with burning rage flashed through the dark blue orbs of the female vampire. "Klaus?" Klaus was the reason her brother's humanity was off? She hadn't even known the three had met, let alone the fact that he had messed with her family. Anger burned throughout her. She knew that he knew Damon and Stefan were her brothers. He would have to be an idiot not to have figured that out, considering she had spent years mourning them-something he knew as well, and if there was one thing she was sure of concerning the hybrid was the fact that he was far from being an idiot…most days, anyway.

A feeling of betrayal sliced through her and cut her deep, though she knew it shouldn't have. Klaus was a worthless bastard who cared about no one except himself, despite his loathsome ability to make you believe otherwise. Only a moron would believe his lies…and that was exactly what Ash had once been.

A moron.

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Stefan cast Damon an irritated glance as he looked away from the fire in the fireplace to face his brother, who had been shouting despite the fact that Stefan had been not even twenty feet away-his mind caught up in the discussion they had had with Mikael earlier that day.

"Hello brother." Damon smirked as he leaned against the wall with his arms crossed. Stefan merely rose an eyebrow, waiting for Damon's explanation as to what he was so damn excited about. Annoyed at the lack of response he was getting from Stefan, Damon pushed himself off of the wall and walked closer to him. "It feels like just yesterday when another sibling of ours would look at me exactly like you are doing now."

Stefan's eyes flashed dangerously as he looked at Damon sharply, wondering where Damon was headed with this conversation. There had always been an unspoken rule between the two that Ashlynn was never to be mentioned, a rule that Damon himself enforced full heartedly. "And then she died. End of story."

Damon tsked at him, shaking his head in mock disapproval. "Harsh, Stefan. The old you would never even think of being so cruel when faced with the mention of his dear twin."

"Yeah, well the old me would let his humanity get in the way of doing what needs to be done all the while worrying what his actions would cause for others."

Damon arched an eyebrow. "So are you trying to tell me that you feel no…sorrow anymore over the death of our darling sister?" The sarcasm and disbelief could be heard easily within his tone.

Stefan gritted his teeth to keep from saying something that he knew would show that his humanity wasn't fully gone-most of it was, but there was still the tiniest sliver of it left. His eyes narrowed into slits as he looked at Damon. "The past belongs nowhere except in the past. Ashlynn died over a century ago. Why wallow so pathetically over something that will never change?"

Damon smirked and said slowly, "What if the past isn't set in stone?"

Stefan was growing tired of how cryptic Damon was being and quite frankly, it was pissing him off, so he slammed Damon into the wall and looked at him with cold eyes. "What are you hiding?"

Despite being slammed into the wall, the vampire kept smirking. "Wouldn't you like to know."

"Answer me," Stefan demanded angrily, his hand tightening threateningly around Damon's neck.

In answer, Damon kicked Stefan hard in the stomach, sending his brother skidding backwards into the couch. Acting as though nothing had just happened, he said loudly, "Lynny, that was your cue!"

No response except for Stefan staring at him with scrutinizing eyes, looking as if he believed there to be something wrong with his brother. "What are you doing?"

"Lynny!" Damon called out, annoyed now. "Anytime now would be perfect, really." He remarked sarcastically, before suddenly cursing under his breath as he was hit in the head with a book thrown from the archway between the parlor and the living room.

"Hated that name then, still hate it now." The brunette stood in the archway, her arms crossed in front of her as she glared daggers at Damon. She would've appeared sooner, but she had been in the middle of mulling over what she was going to do to Klaus once she saw him again. Before, she had been hoping to avoid coming into contact with him at all, but as soon as she had heard that he had messed with her family, it was as if something had ignited within her, screaming 'game on'.

"You didn't have to throw a freaking hardcover book at me, though!" The oldest of the three grumbled, sending his sister a small peeved glare.

"You deserved it." She stated.

After a second of rubbing his sore cheek, he glanced at Stefan to see how he was reacting to this particular surprise.

Unsurprisingly, no emotion whatsoever was shown on the ripper's face as he stared at the girl who had always resembled him quite a bit, except for her eyes which had always been the same shade of blue as Damon's. Now however, with the current outfit she was wearing-a black leather jacket, a ruby red top, and dark blue jeans-she appeared to resemble Damon more.

"Hey Stefan." Ash's face was devoid of all emotion, just like her twin. The two simply stared at each other, as if trying to figure the other out. The silence dragged on and on, and for once, Damon didn't interrupt it. He understood that this wasn't the time for one of his comments, so he simply filed what he would have said away for another day.

"You're a vampire." Stefan said at last. That was all he said, causing Damon to groan.

"State the obvious, why don't you." He remarked.

"Shut up, Damon." Stefan and Ash both said at the same time, though Ash's tone differed from Stefan's because hers, despite sounding tired, held an underlying feel of affection to it.

"No, I don't think I will." Damon said after a moment as he walked forward. He looked at Ash, a touch of seriousness could be seen within his eyes. "Now that we're all together and done with our little Hallmark family reunion, I'm curious as to how you're a vampire. I mean, was it that bitch Katherine?" To Damon, Katherine seemed like the most likely suspect. What better way was there to torment them even more than by making them believe their younger sister had died a violent death in the forest?

"No, she had nothing to do with it." Ash's face noticeably hardened and it took all she had not to get angry at the thought of the one who did turn her. "To be honest," she lied as her blue eyes drifted to the fire burning within the fireplace, "I don't remember much. I remember leaving Mystic Falls-"

"Yeah, that. What the hell was going through your head when you decided to go off on your own like that?" Damon demanded.

Ash looked at him, her eyes narrowed and her jaw was set in a way that, to those who knew her, showed just how angry she was. "What I was thinking was that I had just seen that piss poor excuse of a man, our father, shoot and kill both of my brothers in cold blood right before my eyes. After that, there was no way in hell I was going back home." Fire burned within her dark blue eyes and it was in that moment that both brothers noticed the change in their sister. She was obviously no longer the wide eyed innocent she had once been. She was darker. Deadly. Vengeful.

Damon inwardly cursed, pissed at both their father and himself. His father, because it was thanks to him that Ashlynn had left Mystic Falls and started the sequence of events that led to Ashlynn being turned into a vampire. Himself, for not even bothering to dig deeper into her disappearance. Once her belongings had been found covered in her own blood, he had assumed just like everyone else that she had been killed and her body disposed of somewhere else.

If he had looked just a little harder, he might have found her and spared her whatever the hell she had obviously went through.

"I went to Emily and she told me she had a friend in the town north of us who would be able to help me out once I arrived. On the way there, though…" She stopped talking and her eyes glazed over as the memory surfaced.

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1864

Ashlynn shivered as she continued her descent down the long, dusty trail that would lead her to a new town, a new life. Her tears had long ago dried in trails down her cheeks and now she just felt…numb. The reality that she was now utterly alone in the world struck the seventeen year old hard.

All throughout her life, Stefan and Damon had always been there. Even when Damon was off fighting in the war, he had still been there through frequent letters. And Stefan…Stefan was always right there beside her, no matter what was going on in his own life.

Even when his fiancée Roslyn had been murdered by some wild beast, though she now knew it had indeed been Katherine responsible for the poor girl's death, he had been there for her, reassuring her that no matter what, she would be safe because he was there for her.

Stefan's death cut her to the very bone, as did Damon's, though for some reason, Stefan's affected her worse. It felt as if a part of her had died with her twin.

Honestly, she felt as if she should just give up now and not even bother going to this new town. What did she have to live for, now that she had nothing?

Tears once again burned within her eyes as they created a warm trail down her cheeks as she continued to walk, huddled beneath the cloak Emily had gifted her for the journey. She had claimed the cloak would keep her safe from the cold.

It didn't do much good considering it was the cold from the outside that bothered Ashlynn, but instead the cold that she was suffering from within.

She knew though that she had to move on. She couldn't give up, even though she desperately wanted to.

If she even dared to, she knew her brothers would be disappointed in her as they looked down at her from heaven.

So instead, she took a deep breath and steeled herself as she silently promised that she would be strong.

"What is a young girl like yourself doing walking alone at night?" A voice asked from behind her and she froze.

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Present Day

"I'm not sure who they were, but it was pretty clear what they were. Bandits." Ash's voice was cold as she recounted the memory. "Though they didn't attack me for my money, since it was obvious I had none considering I was wearing a tattered old cloak. No, they wanted something else."

Damon's jaw clenched in anger as did his hands that lay at his sides. Oh, he could just guess what it was those bastards had been after…and it pissed him off.

Stefan glared at the burning fire and didn't say a word.

Ash closed her eyes and took a deep breath. "After they were…done," she gritted her teeth at the memory, "they left me for dead, on the ground bleeding and crying for mercy." She had been so frightened and sure that she would be dead soon, but then… "After that, I don't remember what happened." She lied. "A vampire must've been passing through, saw me lying there pathetically, and decided to be merciful by saving me. However, when I awakened, no one was there and I was a vampire."

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After telling her story, and after listening to Damon rant and rave over the bandits, punching the wall in anger quite a few times as he tried to reign in his rage, and face Stefan's silent stoniness, she told the two she was going back to her motel and would be back in the morning. Damon had been adamant about her moving back into the Boarding House, so when she came back in the morning, she would be bringing over all of her things.

That night, not surprisingly, she couldn't sleep, so she simply stared at the stars from the roof of the small motel, her thoughts once again overwhelming her.

She had been so certain after the bandits had raped her and injured her gravely that she would die. She could literally feel herself dying, as weird as that sounded. Even as she was dying, though, the bandits hadn't left. They had continued to torment her.

And then he had appeared and the bandits became no more.

That had been the first time she had seen her blood soaked angel, the man who had saved her…and the man who had destroyed her so totally and completely.

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1864

Ashlynn lay in a pool of her own blood and could feel her eyelids fluttering. It wouldn't be much longer before she joined Damon and Stefan in heaven. She could feel herself dying. She had long ago tuned out the voices of her attackers and now she just wanted to close her eyes and allow herself to fall into the dark abyss of eternal sleep.

"What a waste," a voice spoke, sounding somewhat bored-though the hint of menace to his tone was audible to all. Something in the stranger's tone forced Ashlynn to fight to keep her eyes open. The voice was both melodious and threatening.

"Who the hell are ya?" One of the bandits demanded angrily.

Ashlynn didn't have the strength to turn her head in the direction of the stranger to see who it was, but she could hear the dark amusement in his tone when he spoke again.

"I would be careful of the tone you use with me, mate. Especially considering the fact that I'm already in a bad mood." The stranger answered as he slowly walked forward, a feral aura surrounding him in the way he stalked forward with ease, eying the bandits with open disgust. After finally tracking down his prey, he had arrived just in time to learn she had already been killed in a fire, along with the other vampires who had plagued the town of Mystic Falls. It had been too good of a death for the bitch.

When he had overheard what was going on here, he had been tempted to just keep on passing by. It was a waste of time and he hadn't really felt like interfering, quite content on simply continuing on.

However, he had stopped once he realized that, despite all that had occurred to the girl, she was silent and wasn't even bothering her attackers with a response or reaction anymore, enraging the bandits and piquing the stranger's interest.

A feral smirk curled up on his lips as he looked at the bandits. "However, since I am feeling particularly and unusually generous today, I will tell you my name before you die. You may call me Klaus."