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janie_tangerine
Title: I Am The Mask You Wear (It’s Me They Hear)
Author:tellshannon815
Fandoms: Lost, The Vampire Diaries
Fandom 1 Characters Jack, Boone, Hurley, Shannon, Locke, Michael, Sayid
Fandom 2 Characters Damon, Alaric, Liz, Mason
Pairings: Jack/Boone, Alaric/Damon
Rating: PG
Word count: 4886
Spoilers: Through 4x10 of Lost, and 3x02 of Vampire Diaries.
Warnings: None
Disclaimer: Lost and The Vampire Diaries belong to their respective creators, while the title belongs to the Phantom of the Opera creators.
A/N: Thanks togottalovev for the beta! P.S. now you’ll understand why I asked the compulsion question!
Summary: When Damon encounters Boone in Sydney the night before Flight 815 crashes, he’s quick to see the potential advantages of having a human doppelganger and follows him onto the plane. He compels the survivors to believe Boone dead and takes him back to Mystic Falls. However, he hasn’t counted on Jack. When Jack realises Boone is alive, he must team up with Alaric to rescue him.
Prompt: a character from fandom A meets a character played by the same actor in fandom B (or characters from fandom A mistake the character from fandom B with the one they know)
Part 1:
Damon took a sip of his MacCutcheon’s whisky, debating with himself whether to go out for a midnight snack or whether he’d just find someone here to munch on. He’d taken off for Sydney a few months before, but was now starting to feel a bit bored with the city. Plus, people were starting to take the reports of animal attacks a lot more seriously.
“Boone?” came a tentative female voice from behind him, which he ignored.
“Boone?” the voice repeated, slightly louder, then Damon felt a tug on his sleeve. “Bryan took the money. All of it. I got back to find he’d gone without leaving a note or anything.”
Damon twisted around on his stool, stared quizzically at the girl. “Sorry, wrong number.”
“So this is how it’s going to be from now on? You’re pretending I don’t exist? Lame, Boone, even for you. Look, I’m sorry I lied to you and stole from you all those times. And I’ll pay you back everything I took from you, with interest. But this is just pathetic and childish. Will you at least just look at me?”
Damon raised his eyebrows. The girl had either had a few too many already, or she was nuts, he couldn’t tell which. Still, it didn’t matter. He was sure she’d taste just as good anyway, and it would save him going out looking for a snack. And if this Boone whoever were to turn up, well, he could always be dessert.
“Boone?” she repeated, pleading now rather than angry, and in spite of himself, Damon found himself wondering what was going on here.
“What the hell? Shannon?”
Damon whirled around in the direction of the voice that had spoken behind him.
“What the hell indeed.”
How was this even possible? Was this guy some kind of Salvatore doppelganger or something? No, that was ridiculous. Damon had only ever heard of the Petrova doppelgangers so far. Was he related to Damon in some way? Damon had thought the Salvatore line had died out with good old Zach, but maybe there was a branch he’d never known about. Maybe this guy descended from one of his own liaisons back in his Confederate Army days. He’d probably never know. But one thing Damon did know was that there was bound to be some way he could use this guy to his advantage.
“You’ll forget you ever came down here,” Damon said to Boone, trying to resist the temptation of the blood trickling from the wound that indicated this guy had clearly been in a fight earlier. A fortitude that little brother would have been proud of, had he been there to see it. “You’re going to turn around, head back up to your room as though this never happened.”
Boone stared blankly at him for a minute before turning around and walking away.
“And you’ll forget that you ever saw me, too,” Damon said as he turned towards Shannon. “You’re going to follow Boone back up to his room, and tell him what you told me about that guy taking your money.” Shannon nodded before turning to follow Boone upstairs.
Alone once more, Damon reflected on the possibilities that were now open to him. He was glad he’d stopped to think it through instead of munching on his double (although he did kind of regret now that he hadn’t fed on Malibu Barbie – she reminded him a lot of Caroline in the days when she was human and annoying). He just needed a bit more time to consider exactly how he was going to use this to his advantage.
*****
“Don’t try to move,” Damon whispered as he came across Boone lying injured in the jungle following his fall from the Beechcraft.
“What – what happened?” Boone asked feebly, trying to lift his head and look around him. What indeed? Damon thought, wondering where to start. It had seemed like such a good idea at the time, after he’d seen Boone for the first time in that hotel in Sydney and realised the possibilities. It had been simple to follow him to the airport and get himself on the same flight. With the Council becoming more active, Mystic Falls was becoming a little too hot to hold him. Plus a bit of space between himself and Stefan was never a bad thing. Spending some time somewhere new, where no one knew him, where he could pretend to be someone else, was exactly what Damon needed. Course, ending up on this crazy-ass island with the annoying stepsister and all these other losers, not to mention that smoke thing that was in competition with him for feeding on people, hadn’t been part of the plan.
And it had gone well so far; he’d managed to pass himself off as Boone with the survivors without anyone ever realising. There had been one potentially nasty moment when the fat guy had done his census, checking out that everyone was who they claimed to be, but luckily they’d all been distracted by that Ethan guy. Ethan had proved a good scapegoat, too, when Damon had fed on Scott/Steve/whoever. And those people who’d gone missing from the tail section of the plane, the ones whose disappearances Ana Lucia had blamed on Goodwin? All Damon.
Some people had thought Jack-ass’s idea to move to the caves was crazy, or Damon’s idea to be accurate. He’d compelled Jack to suggest it in those first few days after he’d lost his day-walk ring in the crash, before he’d managed to...persuade the redneck to give it back to him. It made it easier for Damon to convince everyone he was Boone. The real Boone was hardly ever there, since Shannon had refused to move and Boone ended up staying on the beach with her. It did get more difficult once Boone and Jack got together, but luckily that had only happened a few days earlier so Damon hadn’t had to pass himself off as Boone with Jack too much.
“Don’t worry about John.” Damon continued. “I took care of him.” He lifted Boone’s face towards him, and away from where John lay, felled by a well-timed blow to the face. “Just drink this, and you’ll soon recover.” He held out his wrist to Boone, made him drink from the vein he’d opened up. He just had to be careful now that nothing happened to him over the next 24 hours. Turning him would defeat the whole object of his plans for his human doppelganger.
“See?” Damon asked as Boone got to his feet tentatively at first, frowning in confusion at the fact that his injuries were healing so quickly. “You’re gonna be okay. Now come on, with me. I’m gonna get you home.”
“What about Shannon?” Boone asked. “And Jack, and John, and the others?”
“Don’t you worry about them.” Damon smirked. “I’ll take care of them.”
*****
“I carried him back to Jack,” Locke repeated, staring blankly at Damon, “but I didn’t tell anyone the whole truth about what happened. Then I ran back to the hatch.”
“I tried to give him my blood,” Jack said as he stared down at the marks on his arm which were actually the result of Damon having fed on him an hour earlier. “But since Locke didn’t tell anyone what really happened, there was nothing I could do to save him apart from amputate his leg.”
“I was ready to construct a device that would have done that,” Michael stated, “but Boone stopped us from trying.”
“He said it wouldn’t work, and he was letting me off the promise I made to him.” Jack continued. “He asked me to let him go.”
“I made a speech at his funeral about how he tried to save that girl from drowning on our sixth day here,” Sayid concluded. “I did not know Boone well, and for that, I was sorry.”
Perfect. Damon smiled to himself. They were all convinced that Boone was dead. Now all Damon had to do was get him into the boat he’d managed to compel Ol’ Bug Eyes over on the other side of the island into giving him earlier, along with the bearings for the safe way off the island. He couldn’t wait to unleash Boone on Mystic Falls. The thought of how Stefan was going to react to him was entertaining (of course, that was if he even noticed straight away). And if anyone from his past came looking for him, or anyone from the Council started asking awkward questions, all he had to do was produce Boone and throw them off the scent. This was gonna be fun.
*****
From his vantage point, Damon could see that Liz Forbes was wondering why she was going along with Mason Lockwood’s plan. He could hear her arguing with him - Damon Salvatore, a vampire? That was crazy. Damon was the one who’d killed that vampire at his brother’s birthday party, he’d supplied her and all the town with vervain. Damon was working to protect them all from vampires, for Pete’s sake, and Mason seriously expected her to believe that he was one? It was ridiculous. She knew Damon, she trusted him. And based on some of the stories Richard and Carol had told her about Mason over the years, Liz knew she couldn’t say the same about him. Mason was looking angrier and angrier, but Liz wasn’t letting him get a word in.
“Look, I tell you what,” Mason suggested at last. “You let me put this in his lemonade, he’s fine, then okay, I admit I was wrong. We’ll never mention it again. But I’m not wrong. Damon and his brother are vampires, and I’m going to prove it to you.”
“Fine, you do that,” Liz snapped, looking like she was only half listening to Mason as she scanned the crowd looking for Caroline. As Damon watched, Boone approached, deep in conversation with Stefan, accepting a drink from the girl who was serving it.
Liz watched as “Damon” took a sip, swallowed it, then carried on with the conversation he’d been having with Stefan as though nothing had happened. She looked at Mason, shook her head in disgust. “You are a fool,” she spat at Mason, walking away from him in search of Caroline.
Damon also watched from his vantage point in the bushes as Mason’s jaw dropped, as his few brain cells attempted to compute how a vampire could have possibly drunk a cup full of vervain with no ill attempts. Did the dick really not know enough about vampires to realise that Damon had superior hearing? Damon knew it was an ideal time to bring out Boone. He’d passed himself off as Damon so well, even little brother had bought it. Now all he had to do was trade places with Boone and return to the party as himself. And he’d enjoy every minute of Liz trying to make up to him for her oh-so-crazy suspicions, without ever letting him know why. This was working out better than even he had expected.
Part 2:
Jack Shephard strode angrily down the corridor towards the blood bank. Who did Erica think she was, trying to tell him she thought he’d had enough of the clonazepam? What did she know about anything? She wasn’t the one living a lie every day of her life, having to tell that stupid story over and over again about what had happened to them. And she wasn’t the one who had to live with the guilt over those she hadn’t been able to save. Even now, Jack asked himself whether there could have been a way he could have saved Boone, whether he could have realised what was actually wrong with him sooner instead of believing Locke’s lie, whether he should have gone ahead with the amputation, what if someone had known that they were a match for Boone’s blood type – you name it, he’d probably thought it at some point.
He’d been telling himself ever since they got rescued that it was no good still thinking of Boone. And for a while, he’d even believed it. He’d convinced himself that he and Kate could make it work, that he could make a go of raising Aaron with her. But Jack realised now that it was the one thing he couldn’t fix. He thought he was making things better for Aaron, as though being raised by his uncle could ever make up for the fact that Jack hadn’t been able to rescue his mother. And all Kate’s talk about whatever she was doing for Sawyer had just served to remind Jack (as if he needed it) of how many other people he’d let down as well.
He could hear Erica calling his name, but continued to walk away without looking back. How was he supposed to explain any of what was happening to her anyway? “I saw my dead father a few days ago”? That would be the quickest route to joining Hurley in Santa Rosa. He’d probably just imagined the whole thing anyway, after Hurley had said someone was supposed to be visiting him. Maybe Jack had better not visit Hurley for a bit, that might help.
A man walked towards him, coming from the direction of the blood bank. “Hey!” Jack called out, picking up his pace to apprehend this stranger who was clearly not a member of the hospital staff and therefore had no business being on that corridor. The man turned around, stared at Jack with a blank expression on his face before turning and picking up his pace.
“Boone?”
He looked at Jack once more appearing not to even see him. “Sorry, do I know you?”
“Boone, it’s me, Jack,” Jack continued, reaching out to touch him, but Boone pulled away from his grasp.
“I’m sorry, I think you must have mistaken me for someone else. I hope you find the guy you’re looking for,” he said as he turned and walked away.
Jack ran after him down the corridor, ignoring the startled cry of the Chief of Surgery as he nearly knocked him to the floor. How was that even possible? He’d sat beside Boone as he died, heard his last words asking him to tell his sister something he never got to finish. There was no way he could be here in the hospital.
There was no way your father could be here either, and yet you saw him, whispered the treacherous voice in Jack’s head that he couldn’t be sure wasn’t the result of the alcohol he’d consumed the night before.
The man who looked like Boone hadn’t vanished like his father, but was making his way towards the exit of the hospital. Cursing himself for the loss of time caused by the collision with the Chief of Surgery, Jack picked up his pace and ran after him. There he was, handing something over to...Boone Carlyle?
Two Boones? To have one Boone here was crazy enough, but two had to be a hallucination. If Erica wouldn’t write him another prescription, he’d have to get someone else to do it, even if he had to forge his own. He was beginning to think that he really had to be going crazy.
*****
Damn, Damon thought as he realised who that was trying to follow them. Of all the hospitals in the state of California, and he had to pick the one where Boone’s boyfriend from the island worked? He did remember, now that he’d seen him, that Jack had been a surgeon before the crash. But even if he’d remembered that before, the odds of picking the same hospital were slimmer than none. The whole point of getting out of Mystic Falls and going on this road trip had been to put some distance between himself and Alaric while he worked things out in his head after what had happened between them, as well as getting some space from the Council and little brother’s dramas, to be somewhere that no one knew him. And who should they meet but Jack-ass fucking Shephard.
He couldn’t let Boone go to that blood bank again. He couldn’t take the risk. He’d have to either send Boone somewhere else for blood, or go himself. At least if he ran into Jack, he’d be able to deal with it in his own way.
*****
“Look, Hurley, please will you just start taking your meds again?” Jack pleaded. He really wasn’t in the mood for this. His head was still pounding after that bender he’d gone on the night before. If he wasn’t careful he’d end up just like his father. Maybe that was what Christian had been trying to tell him that day he’d appeared in the hospital, Jack thought wryly.
“Why?” Hurley glared at him. “What’s the point of taking them? I told you last time I saw you, we’re all dead.”
Jack sighed. “Is that what Charlie told you?”
“Charlie? No, it was Dave who told me that.”
Dave? Jack decided not to even go there. But it didn’t matter, because Hurley was still talking. “When Charlie came by yesterday, he asked me whether you’d had your visit yet. You remember, he said someone was coming to see you. Hey, dude, you okay? You look kinda funny.”
“I’m fine,” Jack snapped, not wanting to share with Hurley what he’d seen. The whole thing was crazy. He’d stood over Christian’s body in the morgue himself, and he’d personally given Boone his own blood. There was no way either of them could have been walking the corridors of St Sebastian’s Hospital. He was tired, he was upset, it hadn’t meant anything. And yet some instinct prompted Jack to ask the question he’d never have asked otherwise.
“So is it only Charlie who visits you, or do you ever get visits from anyone else?”
Hurley’s face lit up. “It’s mostly Charlie and Libby, but I’ve seen just about everyone. We play chess together. Eko comes by once in a while, never says much.”
Jack laughed in spite of himself. “He never did, unless he had something important to say.”
“Ana Lucia came once, tried to tell me I should go back to the island. I’ve seen Nikki and Shannon too, and Michael even came by a couple of times, but, uh, Dr. Brooks had to take me back to my room the first time.”
He’d said all the names from the island except the one that Jack was waiting for. “So, how about Boone? Does he ever come here and see you?”
Hurley frowned. “Boone? That’s weird. I’d never thought about that before, but he’s the only one from the island who never visits me. Wonder why that is?”
“So it wasn’t him that was supposed to be visiting me then?” Jack asked.
“Charlie told me it was going to be your father. He never said anything about Boone.”
Jack shook his head. It didn’t mean anything at all. He was listening to the words of a man in a mental hospital, talking about being visited by dead people, and he was seriously considering using the fact that Boone had never visited Hurley as evidence that Boone may somehow be alive? It was crazy. And how would that explain the other one? He had to be losing his mind.
*****
Alaric Saltzman hadn’t really noticed the guy at the bar until he heard the commotion. Sounded like the bartender was trying to convince him that he’d had enough, but he was arguing that he wanted another drink. MacCutcheon’s whisky? Alaric thought. If that guy’s headache the next morning didn’t convince him he’d had a few too many, the state of his wallet certainly would. He looked familiar somehow, although Alaric couldn’t place him. The expression on his face, however, was one that Alaric definitely remembered. It had appeared on his own enough times in the weeks after Isobel had first disappeared, and more recently since Damon had left Mystic Falls.
He caught the bartender’s eye and made his way over to the drunk guy. “Come on now, I think you may have had enough.”
The man stared at him with bleary eyes. “Have you ever wondered if maybe you’ve seen a ghost?”
The image of Isobel standing before him, strolling casually into the Grill as though she owned it - without a thought for the months Alaric had spent wondering what had happened to her, unable to move on until he had closure - flashed through his mind. “Something like that.”
But the man didn’t even appear to have heard Alaric. “I never used to believe in anything like that, but I thought I saw one today. I was on Oceanic Flight 815, you know, the Flight 815.”
That was it, that was where Alaric had seen that face before. This guy was one of the survivors. Alaric hadn’t actually watched much of the footage at the time, although he remembered Isobel had been very interested in the conspiracy theories which had been doing the rounds.
“Dr. Shephard? Is that right?”
He nodded, holding out his hand. “Jack.”
“Alaric Saltzman. Call me Ric.” Alaric shook his hand, trying not to wrinkle his nose at the strong smell of alcohol emanating from Jack.
“We told everyone that only 8 people survived the crash, right? Well, that wasn’t true. There were 48 of us. And there was this one guy, Boone, he was kind of my boyfriend. He was in an accident, his leg was crushed. I promised I’d save him, but I couldn’t. And I don’t know whether that’s why I seem to be seeing him wherever I go right now, because I still feel guilty that I couldn’t fix him. And today, I really thought I was going crazy, because I thought I saw two of him.” He reached into his wallet, pulled out the photograph of Boone he’d been carrying around with him since the island. Alaric took it absent-mindedly, then felt a jolt in his stomach as he recognised the face staring back at him.
The whole reason he was in Los Angeles was to see this face again. He just hadn’t expected to see it staring at him from a photo in another man’s wallet, and going by another name.
And so many things made sense, now that he knew. Alaric hadn’t been at that party at the Lockwoods’, but he’d heard the story about how Mason had made an idiot of himself accusing Damon of being a vampire and then being proved wrong. He hadn’t had a clue at the time how Damon had pulled that one off, but now that he knew Damon had a doppelganger who was human, he understood completely.
“No, Jack, I don’t think you’re crazy at all. I think you did see two of them. The other one is the person I’m here trying to find, and I’m going to help you find Boone.”
*****
Alaric could tell that Jack had almost talked himself into believing that he’d imagined the whole thing still, or that Alaric was another one who belonged in Santa Rosa with his friend Hurley. “The other man you saw is called Damon Salvatore,” Alaric had explained. “He’s a vampire.”
Jack had almost got up and walked away at that, but Alaric had continued explaining, and Jack looked like he didn’t know what it was, but Alaric was actually starting to sound convincing. “The reason why Boone didn’t recognise you back there is because Damon has him under a mind compulsion,” he’d continued. “He’ll have Boone believing he’s Damon, or he’ll have erased Boone’s memories so he won’t know that he ever even met you. He could have used it on you any number of times and you wouldn’t even know it. You could have seen him in the hospital helping himself to the blood any number of times, and you wouldn’t remember it.”
“And could he have planted false memories of me seeing Boone die?” Jack had asked.
Alaric had nodded. “That’ll be exactly what he did.”
“And you want this son of a bitch back...why, exactly?” Jack had demanded, and Alaric had smiled. “You know what? I’ve asked myself the same question so many times.”
Deciding not to pursue that, Jack instead asked “So how do I break this compulsion that Boone’s under?”
Alaric had sighed. “That’s the problem. It can be prevented by taking vervain, but if someone’s already under a compulsion, then that doesn’t help. Even if you slipped some into his drink or something, it wouldn’t make any difference. The only other thing I remember Damon telling me once...Is there any chance that he was drinking animal blood at the time when you were on the island? Apparently that can make compulsion weaker, and it’s possible to trigger flashbacks.”
“I don’t know, okay?” Jack had snapped. “I didn’t even know Damon was on the goddamn island at the time. It’s possible, but he also could have been drinking human blood. There were some attacks, which other people were blamed for at the time. Any more bright ideas?”
Alaric shook his head. There was another way, of course, but he wasn’t going to tell Jack that killing Damon would break the compulsion. Jack looked pissed enough to actually do it. “The only other thing that I know lifts compulsions is...no, you don’t want to know.”
“Tell me anyway.” Jack insisted.
“Well, Damon had his ex-girlfriend, Caroline, under a compulsion when he first met her, but her memories returned after...she became a vampire.”
Jack looked as though he would quite like to hit Alaric, but was struggling to contain his temper. “I’m not letting you turn Boone into a vampire,” he choked out. “What kind of guy are you? I don’t know why I’m even listening to you. All you’re telling me is that this is yet another situation I can’t fix.”
Alaric watched him thoughtfully as he stormed out. “Maybe you can’t,” he mused to himself. “But I think I can.”
*****
“Looks like you were expecting me.” Damon said as he stood before Alaric wearing just his boxers. “I heard about the time you opened the door like that expecting me, only to find Elena standing there. Gotta say I wasn’t expecting you to find me here, though.”
“I was married to Isobel for long enough. You think I wouldn’t have learned a few things about finding someone?”
“Touché.” Damon grinned. “So, uh, why did you come looking for me?”
“You’re not the first person who’s asked me that today,” Alaric grinned. “And I could see why he asked me. But now’s not the time to get into what you did to Jenna, Isobel...me. Look, I know why you left Mystic Falls. And I’m here to ask you to come home.”
Damon frowned. “I’ve killed you twice, turned Isobel and Jenna’s dead because of me, and you still want me back?”
“We had this conversation after you got bitten by Tyler, remember? And I don’t think either of us is drunk enough for it now, either. Look, I know all that’s happened. And I know that you can be a dick. But I also know how I feel about you, and that I want you to come home. And there’s one other thing I want you to do for me. Let Boone Carlyle go, let him go back to Jack.”
“Dr. Jack-ass Shephard.” Damon smiled. “Should have known he was involved.” But Damon had to admit he was starting to get bored of the kid now. If he’d taken a bit more time to think, he was no longer sure he’d have done things this way. And he’d missed Alaric, there was no doubt about that. He’d let Boone go, back to his boyfriend as Damon was going back to his. “Sure, you can take him. Oh, and just so you know? It was never him with you, that was always me.”
Something flashed on Alaric’s face that showed that the thought had crossed his mind, immediately followed by relief.
“There’s no need to run any more, Damon,” Alaric pointed out. “There’s nothing to be afraid of about caring for me.”
Damon thought he was starting to learn that lesson himself.
*****
Jack groaned and pulled his pillow over his head as the doorbell sounded in the middle of the night. Probably the kids next door, they’d already got him out of bed once this week doing that.
“Okay, okay,” he grumbled as he stumbled down the stairs and opened the door, ready to give them a mouthful. But the face that appeared before him wasn’t the one he was expecting.
“You!” he exclaimed as he recognised Alaric.
“Special delivery for a Dr. Shephard.” Alaric smiled as he gestured behind him to reveal Boone standing there.”
“Jack?” Boone asked. “Is it really you? What happened?”
“I had a word with Damon,” Alaric whispered. “He’s himself again. And he wasn’t turned.”
They would have time to talk, for Jack to try and explain what had happened, for him to tell Boone about Shannon, about their escape, about everything. But that didn’t have to be that night. He had Boone back, and that was what mattered.
janie_tangerineTitle: I Am The Mask You Wear (It’s Me They Hear)
Author:
tellshannon815Fandoms: Lost, The Vampire Diaries
Fandom 1 Characters Jack, Boone, Hurley, Shannon, Locke, Michael, Sayid
Fandom 2 Characters Damon, Alaric, Liz, Mason
Pairings: Jack/Boone, Alaric/Damon
Rating: PG
Word count: 4886
Spoilers: Through 4x10 of Lost, and 3x02 of Vampire Diaries.
Warnings: None
Disclaimer: Lost and The Vampire Diaries belong to their respective creators, while the title belongs to the Phantom of the Opera creators.
A/N: Thanks to
gottalovev for the beta! P.S. now you’ll understand why I asked the compulsion question!Summary: When Damon encounters Boone in Sydney the night before Flight 815 crashes, he’s quick to see the potential advantages of having a human doppelganger and follows him onto the plane. He compels the survivors to believe Boone dead and takes him back to Mystic Falls. However, he hasn’t counted on Jack. When Jack realises Boone is alive, he must team up with Alaric to rescue him.
Prompt: a character from fandom A meets a character played by the same actor in fandom B (or characters from fandom A mistake the character from fandom B with the one they know)
Part 1:
Damon took a sip of his MacCutcheon’s whisky, debating with himself whether to go out for a midnight snack or whether he’d just find someone here to munch on. He’d taken off for Sydney a few months before, but was now starting to feel a bit bored with the city. Plus, people were starting to take the reports of animal attacks a lot more seriously.
“Boone?” came a tentative female voice from behind him, which he ignored.
“Boone?” the voice repeated, slightly louder, then Damon felt a tug on his sleeve. “Bryan took the money. All of it. I got back to find he’d gone without leaving a note or anything.”
Damon twisted around on his stool, stared quizzically at the girl. “Sorry, wrong number.”
“So this is how it’s going to be from now on? You’re pretending I don’t exist? Lame, Boone, even for you. Look, I’m sorry I lied to you and stole from you all those times. And I’ll pay you back everything I took from you, with interest. But this is just pathetic and childish. Will you at least just look at me?”
Damon raised his eyebrows. The girl had either had a few too many already, or she was nuts, he couldn’t tell which. Still, it didn’t matter. He was sure she’d taste just as good anyway, and it would save him going out looking for a snack. And if this Boone whoever were to turn up, well, he could always be dessert.
“Boone?” she repeated, pleading now rather than angry, and in spite of himself, Damon found himself wondering what was going on here.
“What the hell? Shannon?”
Damon whirled around in the direction of the voice that had spoken behind him.
“What the hell indeed.”
How was this even possible? Was this guy some kind of Salvatore doppelganger or something? No, that was ridiculous. Damon had only ever heard of the Petrova doppelgangers so far. Was he related to Damon in some way? Damon had thought the Salvatore line had died out with good old Zach, but maybe there was a branch he’d never known about. Maybe this guy descended from one of his own liaisons back in his Confederate Army days. He’d probably never know. But one thing Damon did know was that there was bound to be some way he could use this guy to his advantage.
“You’ll forget you ever came down here,” Damon said to Boone, trying to resist the temptation of the blood trickling from the wound that indicated this guy had clearly been in a fight earlier. A fortitude that little brother would have been proud of, had he been there to see it. “You’re going to turn around, head back up to your room as though this never happened.”
Boone stared blankly at him for a minute before turning around and walking away.
“And you’ll forget that you ever saw me, too,” Damon said as he turned towards Shannon. “You’re going to follow Boone back up to his room, and tell him what you told me about that guy taking your money.” Shannon nodded before turning to follow Boone upstairs.
Alone once more, Damon reflected on the possibilities that were now open to him. He was glad he’d stopped to think it through instead of munching on his double (although he did kind of regret now that he hadn’t fed on Malibu Barbie – she reminded him a lot of Caroline in the days when she was human and annoying). He just needed a bit more time to consider exactly how he was going to use this to his advantage.
*****
“Don’t try to move,” Damon whispered as he came across Boone lying injured in the jungle following his fall from the Beechcraft.
“What – what happened?” Boone asked feebly, trying to lift his head and look around him. What indeed? Damon thought, wondering where to start. It had seemed like such a good idea at the time, after he’d seen Boone for the first time in that hotel in Sydney and realised the possibilities. It had been simple to follow him to the airport and get himself on the same flight. With the Council becoming more active, Mystic Falls was becoming a little too hot to hold him. Plus a bit of space between himself and Stefan was never a bad thing. Spending some time somewhere new, where no one knew him, where he could pretend to be someone else, was exactly what Damon needed. Course, ending up on this crazy-ass island with the annoying stepsister and all these other losers, not to mention that smoke thing that was in competition with him for feeding on people, hadn’t been part of the plan.
And it had gone well so far; he’d managed to pass himself off as Boone with the survivors without anyone ever realising. There had been one potentially nasty moment when the fat guy had done his census, checking out that everyone was who they claimed to be, but luckily they’d all been distracted by that Ethan guy. Ethan had proved a good scapegoat, too, when Damon had fed on Scott/Steve/whoever. And those people who’d gone missing from the tail section of the plane, the ones whose disappearances Ana Lucia had blamed on Goodwin? All Damon.
Some people had thought Jack-ass’s idea to move to the caves was crazy, or Damon’s idea to be accurate. He’d compelled Jack to suggest it in those first few days after he’d lost his day-walk ring in the crash, before he’d managed to...persuade the redneck to give it back to him. It made it easier for Damon to convince everyone he was Boone. The real Boone was hardly ever there, since Shannon had refused to move and Boone ended up staying on the beach with her. It did get more difficult once Boone and Jack got together, but luckily that had only happened a few days earlier so Damon hadn’t had to pass himself off as Boone with Jack too much.
“Don’t worry about John.” Damon continued. “I took care of him.” He lifted Boone’s face towards him, and away from where John lay, felled by a well-timed blow to the face. “Just drink this, and you’ll soon recover.” He held out his wrist to Boone, made him drink from the vein he’d opened up. He just had to be careful now that nothing happened to him over the next 24 hours. Turning him would defeat the whole object of his plans for his human doppelganger.
“See?” Damon asked as Boone got to his feet tentatively at first, frowning in confusion at the fact that his injuries were healing so quickly. “You’re gonna be okay. Now come on, with me. I’m gonna get you home.”
“What about Shannon?” Boone asked. “And Jack, and John, and the others?”
“Don’t you worry about them.” Damon smirked. “I’ll take care of them.”
*****
“I carried him back to Jack,” Locke repeated, staring blankly at Damon, “but I didn’t tell anyone the whole truth about what happened. Then I ran back to the hatch.”
“I tried to give him my blood,” Jack said as he stared down at the marks on his arm which were actually the result of Damon having fed on him an hour earlier. “But since Locke didn’t tell anyone what really happened, there was nothing I could do to save him apart from amputate his leg.”
“I was ready to construct a device that would have done that,” Michael stated, “but Boone stopped us from trying.”
“He said it wouldn’t work, and he was letting me off the promise I made to him.” Jack continued. “He asked me to let him go.”
“I made a speech at his funeral about how he tried to save that girl from drowning on our sixth day here,” Sayid concluded. “I did not know Boone well, and for that, I was sorry.”
Perfect. Damon smiled to himself. They were all convinced that Boone was dead. Now all Damon had to do was get him into the boat he’d managed to compel Ol’ Bug Eyes over on the other side of the island into giving him earlier, along with the bearings for the safe way off the island. He couldn’t wait to unleash Boone on Mystic Falls. The thought of how Stefan was going to react to him was entertaining (of course, that was if he even noticed straight away). And if anyone from his past came looking for him, or anyone from the Council started asking awkward questions, all he had to do was produce Boone and throw them off the scent. This was gonna be fun.
*****
From his vantage point, Damon could see that Liz Forbes was wondering why she was going along with Mason Lockwood’s plan. He could hear her arguing with him - Damon Salvatore, a vampire? That was crazy. Damon was the one who’d killed that vampire at his brother’s birthday party, he’d supplied her and all the town with vervain. Damon was working to protect them all from vampires, for Pete’s sake, and Mason seriously expected her to believe that he was one? It was ridiculous. She knew Damon, she trusted him. And based on some of the stories Richard and Carol had told her about Mason over the years, Liz knew she couldn’t say the same about him. Mason was looking angrier and angrier, but Liz wasn’t letting him get a word in.
“Look, I tell you what,” Mason suggested at last. “You let me put this in his lemonade, he’s fine, then okay, I admit I was wrong. We’ll never mention it again. But I’m not wrong. Damon and his brother are vampires, and I’m going to prove it to you.”
“Fine, you do that,” Liz snapped, looking like she was only half listening to Mason as she scanned the crowd looking for Caroline. As Damon watched, Boone approached, deep in conversation with Stefan, accepting a drink from the girl who was serving it.
Liz watched as “Damon” took a sip, swallowed it, then carried on with the conversation he’d been having with Stefan as though nothing had happened. She looked at Mason, shook her head in disgust. “You are a fool,” she spat at Mason, walking away from him in search of Caroline.
Damon also watched from his vantage point in the bushes as Mason’s jaw dropped, as his few brain cells attempted to compute how a vampire could have possibly drunk a cup full of vervain with no ill attempts. Did the dick really not know enough about vampires to realise that Damon had superior hearing? Damon knew it was an ideal time to bring out Boone. He’d passed himself off as Damon so well, even little brother had bought it. Now all he had to do was trade places with Boone and return to the party as himself. And he’d enjoy every minute of Liz trying to make up to him for her oh-so-crazy suspicions, without ever letting him know why. This was working out better than even he had expected.
Part 2:
Jack Shephard strode angrily down the corridor towards the blood bank. Who did Erica think she was, trying to tell him she thought he’d had enough of the clonazepam? What did she know about anything? She wasn’t the one living a lie every day of her life, having to tell that stupid story over and over again about what had happened to them. And she wasn’t the one who had to live with the guilt over those she hadn’t been able to save. Even now, Jack asked himself whether there could have been a way he could have saved Boone, whether he could have realised what was actually wrong with him sooner instead of believing Locke’s lie, whether he should have gone ahead with the amputation, what if someone had known that they were a match for Boone’s blood type – you name it, he’d probably thought it at some point.
He’d been telling himself ever since they got rescued that it was no good still thinking of Boone. And for a while, he’d even believed it. He’d convinced himself that he and Kate could make it work, that he could make a go of raising Aaron with her. But Jack realised now that it was the one thing he couldn’t fix. He thought he was making things better for Aaron, as though being raised by his uncle could ever make up for the fact that Jack hadn’t been able to rescue his mother. And all Kate’s talk about whatever she was doing for Sawyer had just served to remind Jack (as if he needed it) of how many other people he’d let down as well.
He could hear Erica calling his name, but continued to walk away without looking back. How was he supposed to explain any of what was happening to her anyway? “I saw my dead father a few days ago”? That would be the quickest route to joining Hurley in Santa Rosa. He’d probably just imagined the whole thing anyway, after Hurley had said someone was supposed to be visiting him. Maybe Jack had better not visit Hurley for a bit, that might help.
A man walked towards him, coming from the direction of the blood bank. “Hey!” Jack called out, picking up his pace to apprehend this stranger who was clearly not a member of the hospital staff and therefore had no business being on that corridor. The man turned around, stared at Jack with a blank expression on his face before turning and picking up his pace.
“Boone?”
He looked at Jack once more appearing not to even see him. “Sorry, do I know you?”
“Boone, it’s me, Jack,” Jack continued, reaching out to touch him, but Boone pulled away from his grasp.
“I’m sorry, I think you must have mistaken me for someone else. I hope you find the guy you’re looking for,” he said as he turned and walked away.
Jack ran after him down the corridor, ignoring the startled cry of the Chief of Surgery as he nearly knocked him to the floor. How was that even possible? He’d sat beside Boone as he died, heard his last words asking him to tell his sister something he never got to finish. There was no way he could be here in the hospital.
There was no way your father could be here either, and yet you saw him, whispered the treacherous voice in Jack’s head that he couldn’t be sure wasn’t the result of the alcohol he’d consumed the night before.
The man who looked like Boone hadn’t vanished like his father, but was making his way towards the exit of the hospital. Cursing himself for the loss of time caused by the collision with the Chief of Surgery, Jack picked up his pace and ran after him. There he was, handing something over to...Boone Carlyle?
Two Boones? To have one Boone here was crazy enough, but two had to be a hallucination. If Erica wouldn’t write him another prescription, he’d have to get someone else to do it, even if he had to forge his own. He was beginning to think that he really had to be going crazy.
*****
Damn, Damon thought as he realised who that was trying to follow them. Of all the hospitals in the state of California, and he had to pick the one where Boone’s boyfriend from the island worked? He did remember, now that he’d seen him, that Jack had been a surgeon before the crash. But even if he’d remembered that before, the odds of picking the same hospital were slimmer than none. The whole point of getting out of Mystic Falls and going on this road trip had been to put some distance between himself and Alaric while he worked things out in his head after what had happened between them, as well as getting some space from the Council and little brother’s dramas, to be somewhere that no one knew him. And who should they meet but Jack-ass fucking Shephard.
He couldn’t let Boone go to that blood bank again. He couldn’t take the risk. He’d have to either send Boone somewhere else for blood, or go himself. At least if he ran into Jack, he’d be able to deal with it in his own way.
*****
“Look, Hurley, please will you just start taking your meds again?” Jack pleaded. He really wasn’t in the mood for this. His head was still pounding after that bender he’d gone on the night before. If he wasn’t careful he’d end up just like his father. Maybe that was what Christian had been trying to tell him that day he’d appeared in the hospital, Jack thought wryly.
“Why?” Hurley glared at him. “What’s the point of taking them? I told you last time I saw you, we’re all dead.”
Jack sighed. “Is that what Charlie told you?”
“Charlie? No, it was Dave who told me that.”
Dave? Jack decided not to even go there. But it didn’t matter, because Hurley was still talking. “When Charlie came by yesterday, he asked me whether you’d had your visit yet. You remember, he said someone was coming to see you. Hey, dude, you okay? You look kinda funny.”
“I’m fine,” Jack snapped, not wanting to share with Hurley what he’d seen. The whole thing was crazy. He’d stood over Christian’s body in the morgue himself, and he’d personally given Boone his own blood. There was no way either of them could have been walking the corridors of St Sebastian’s Hospital. He was tired, he was upset, it hadn’t meant anything. And yet some instinct prompted Jack to ask the question he’d never have asked otherwise.
“So is it only Charlie who visits you, or do you ever get visits from anyone else?”
Hurley’s face lit up. “It’s mostly Charlie and Libby, but I’ve seen just about everyone. We play chess together. Eko comes by once in a while, never says much.”
Jack laughed in spite of himself. “He never did, unless he had something important to say.”
“Ana Lucia came once, tried to tell me I should go back to the island. I’ve seen Nikki and Shannon too, and Michael even came by a couple of times, but, uh, Dr. Brooks had to take me back to my room the first time.”
He’d said all the names from the island except the one that Jack was waiting for. “So, how about Boone? Does he ever come here and see you?”
Hurley frowned. “Boone? That’s weird. I’d never thought about that before, but he’s the only one from the island who never visits me. Wonder why that is?”
“So it wasn’t him that was supposed to be visiting me then?” Jack asked.
“Charlie told me it was going to be your father. He never said anything about Boone.”
Jack shook his head. It didn’t mean anything at all. He was listening to the words of a man in a mental hospital, talking about being visited by dead people, and he was seriously considering using the fact that Boone had never visited Hurley as evidence that Boone may somehow be alive? It was crazy. And how would that explain the other one? He had to be losing his mind.
*****
Alaric Saltzman hadn’t really noticed the guy at the bar until he heard the commotion. Sounded like the bartender was trying to convince him that he’d had enough, but he was arguing that he wanted another drink. MacCutcheon’s whisky? Alaric thought. If that guy’s headache the next morning didn’t convince him he’d had a few too many, the state of his wallet certainly would. He looked familiar somehow, although Alaric couldn’t place him. The expression on his face, however, was one that Alaric definitely remembered. It had appeared on his own enough times in the weeks after Isobel had first disappeared, and more recently since Damon had left Mystic Falls.
He caught the bartender’s eye and made his way over to the drunk guy. “Come on now, I think you may have had enough.”
The man stared at him with bleary eyes. “Have you ever wondered if maybe you’ve seen a ghost?”
The image of Isobel standing before him, strolling casually into the Grill as though she owned it - without a thought for the months Alaric had spent wondering what had happened to her, unable to move on until he had closure - flashed through his mind. “Something like that.”
But the man didn’t even appear to have heard Alaric. “I never used to believe in anything like that, but I thought I saw one today. I was on Oceanic Flight 815, you know, the Flight 815.”
That was it, that was where Alaric had seen that face before. This guy was one of the survivors. Alaric hadn’t actually watched much of the footage at the time, although he remembered Isobel had been very interested in the conspiracy theories which had been doing the rounds.
“Dr. Shephard? Is that right?”
He nodded, holding out his hand. “Jack.”
“Alaric Saltzman. Call me Ric.” Alaric shook his hand, trying not to wrinkle his nose at the strong smell of alcohol emanating from Jack.
“We told everyone that only 8 people survived the crash, right? Well, that wasn’t true. There were 48 of us. And there was this one guy, Boone, he was kind of my boyfriend. He was in an accident, his leg was crushed. I promised I’d save him, but I couldn’t. And I don’t know whether that’s why I seem to be seeing him wherever I go right now, because I still feel guilty that I couldn’t fix him. And today, I really thought I was going crazy, because I thought I saw two of him.” He reached into his wallet, pulled out the photograph of Boone he’d been carrying around with him since the island. Alaric took it absent-mindedly, then felt a jolt in his stomach as he recognised the face staring back at him.
The whole reason he was in Los Angeles was to see this face again. He just hadn’t expected to see it staring at him from a photo in another man’s wallet, and going by another name.
And so many things made sense, now that he knew. Alaric hadn’t been at that party at the Lockwoods’, but he’d heard the story about how Mason had made an idiot of himself accusing Damon of being a vampire and then being proved wrong. He hadn’t had a clue at the time how Damon had pulled that one off, but now that he knew Damon had a doppelganger who was human, he understood completely.
“No, Jack, I don’t think you’re crazy at all. I think you did see two of them. The other one is the person I’m here trying to find, and I’m going to help you find Boone.”
*****
Alaric could tell that Jack had almost talked himself into believing that he’d imagined the whole thing still, or that Alaric was another one who belonged in Santa Rosa with his friend Hurley. “The other man you saw is called Damon Salvatore,” Alaric had explained. “He’s a vampire.”
Jack had almost got up and walked away at that, but Alaric had continued explaining, and Jack looked like he didn’t know what it was, but Alaric was actually starting to sound convincing. “The reason why Boone didn’t recognise you back there is because Damon has him under a mind compulsion,” he’d continued. “He’ll have Boone believing he’s Damon, or he’ll have erased Boone’s memories so he won’t know that he ever even met you. He could have used it on you any number of times and you wouldn’t even know it. You could have seen him in the hospital helping himself to the blood any number of times, and you wouldn’t remember it.”
“And could he have planted false memories of me seeing Boone die?” Jack had asked.
Alaric had nodded. “That’ll be exactly what he did.”
“And you want this son of a bitch back...why, exactly?” Jack had demanded, and Alaric had smiled. “You know what? I’ve asked myself the same question so many times.”
Deciding not to pursue that, Jack instead asked “So how do I break this compulsion that Boone’s under?”
Alaric had sighed. “That’s the problem. It can be prevented by taking vervain, but if someone’s already under a compulsion, then that doesn’t help. Even if you slipped some into his drink or something, it wouldn’t make any difference. The only other thing I remember Damon telling me once...Is there any chance that he was drinking animal blood at the time when you were on the island? Apparently that can make compulsion weaker, and it’s possible to trigger flashbacks.”
“I don’t know, okay?” Jack had snapped. “I didn’t even know Damon was on the goddamn island at the time. It’s possible, but he also could have been drinking human blood. There were some attacks, which other people were blamed for at the time. Any more bright ideas?”
Alaric shook his head. There was another way, of course, but he wasn’t going to tell Jack that killing Damon would break the compulsion. Jack looked pissed enough to actually do it. “The only other thing that I know lifts compulsions is...no, you don’t want to know.”
“Tell me anyway.” Jack insisted.
“Well, Damon had his ex-girlfriend, Caroline, under a compulsion when he first met her, but her memories returned after...she became a vampire.”
Jack looked as though he would quite like to hit Alaric, but was struggling to contain his temper. “I’m not letting you turn Boone into a vampire,” he choked out. “What kind of guy are you? I don’t know why I’m even listening to you. All you’re telling me is that this is yet another situation I can’t fix.”
Alaric watched him thoughtfully as he stormed out. “Maybe you can’t,” he mused to himself. “But I think I can.”
*****
“Looks like you were expecting me.” Damon said as he stood before Alaric wearing just his boxers. “I heard about the time you opened the door like that expecting me, only to find Elena standing there. Gotta say I wasn’t expecting you to find me here, though.”
“I was married to Isobel for long enough. You think I wouldn’t have learned a few things about finding someone?”
“Touché.” Damon grinned. “So, uh, why did you come looking for me?”
“You’re not the first person who’s asked me that today,” Alaric grinned. “And I could see why he asked me. But now’s not the time to get into what you did to Jenna, Isobel...me. Look, I know why you left Mystic Falls. And I’m here to ask you to come home.”
Damon frowned. “I’ve killed you twice, turned Isobel and Jenna’s dead because of me, and you still want me back?”
“We had this conversation after you got bitten by Tyler, remember? And I don’t think either of us is drunk enough for it now, either. Look, I know all that’s happened. And I know that you can be a dick. But I also know how I feel about you, and that I want you to come home. And there’s one other thing I want you to do for me. Let Boone Carlyle go, let him go back to Jack.”
“Dr. Jack-ass Shephard.” Damon smiled. “Should have known he was involved.” But Damon had to admit he was starting to get bored of the kid now. If he’d taken a bit more time to think, he was no longer sure he’d have done things this way. And he’d missed Alaric, there was no doubt about that. He’d let Boone go, back to his boyfriend as Damon was going back to his. “Sure, you can take him. Oh, and just so you know? It was never him with you, that was always me.”
Something flashed on Alaric’s face that showed that the thought had crossed his mind, immediately followed by relief.
“There’s no need to run any more, Damon,” Alaric pointed out. “There’s nothing to be afraid of about caring for me.”
Damon thought he was starting to learn that lesson himself.
*****
Jack groaned and pulled his pillow over his head as the doorbell sounded in the middle of the night. Probably the kids next door, they’d already got him out of bed once this week doing that.
“Okay, okay,” he grumbled as he stumbled down the stairs and opened the door, ready to give them a mouthful. But the face that appeared before him wasn’t the one he was expecting.
“You!” he exclaimed as he recognised Alaric.
“Special delivery for a Dr. Shephard.” Alaric smiled as he gestured behind him to reveal Boone standing there.”
“Jack?” Boone asked. “Is it really you? What happened?”
“I had a word with Damon,” Alaric whispered. “He’s himself again. And he wasn’t turned.”
They would have time to talk, for Jack to try and explain what had happened, for him to tell Boone about Shannon, about their escape, about everything. But that didn’t have to be that night. He had Boone back, and that was what mattered.