The Vampire Diaries: Bastard Line of Delgallo

The Prison World—2010

Leon exhaled, then burst in laughter. Putting away his blade, he whipped the tears from his eyes and thanked the Gemini for being so predictable. With Two pieces of Hollow bone, quenched in millennia of blood and sacrifice, he was bound to stir up the spirits.

But, the bodies he left from Liousiana to North Carolina was enough to prompt the Gemini. While the coven didn't understand much, he was sure the spirits understood what he wanted to do with Mikael.

However, they miscalculated. Without much more time to lose, Leon moved Mikael's body and found a place in the mountains. With a sacred geometry and geomancy in his grasp, he found a naturally cloaked land to complete his sacrificial ritual. 

In the case of an Original Vampire, who cannot be killed by anything except for a White Oak Stake, the "sacrifice" will instead produce an unlimited power source for a witch who channels them, as the ritual that would typically kill any other creature would have no effect aside from desiccating them; this makes Original Vampires an ideal offering, as because the death of regular vampires, werewolves, and witches result in a much more limited gain in power for the witch in question.

With the body now out of reach, no one could sever the connection. 

After leaving the mountains, Leon had a supernatural shopping list. He traveled to Nova Scotia, various states, a place in China, Mystic Falls over course, and the list went on. The Prison world became his wonderland.

Mystic Falls—March 31, 2010

Elena paced back and forth in the Salvatore boarding house, her arms folded tightly across her chest, frustration radiating from her in waves. Stefan sat on the couch, watching her with quiet patience, his brows slightly furrowed as she ranted.

"I cannot believe this," Elena fumed, her voice rising with each word. "I have never failed a paper in my life! But Vanessa Monroe—Miss Mysterious PhD from Duke—decides my research isn't good enough, and now I'm failing her class!"

Stefan leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "What did she say was wrong with it?" he asked, trying to keep her from spiraling further.

"She said it lacked academic integrity!" Elena threw her hands up. "Academic integrity?! I wrote a paper on local folklore and its connection to real history, just like she asked! But apparently, because I didn't dive deep enough into the 'psychological implications of belief systems,' it wasn't scholarly enough."

Stefan's lips twitched slightly. "Well... did you actually write about that part?"

Elena shot him a glare. "That's not the point, Stefan! The point is that she has it out for me! First, she comes into town with her fancy degrees, then she gets all buddy-buddy with Jenna, and now she's tanking my grades? I swear, she's doing this on purpose."

Stefan exhaled through his nose, his expression calm. "Okay, so you're failing one class. We can fix that."

Elena groaned and sank onto the couch beside him, rubbing her temples. "Ugh. I don't even know why I'm letting this get to me. We have way bigger problems right now than my GPA."

She sighed, forcing herself to let it go—at least for now.

And then her phone rang.

Elena hesitated before pulling it out of her pocket, glancing at the screen. "It's Jenna," she said before answering.

"Elena!" Jenna's voice came through the line, sharp and frantic. "I knew it. I knew something wasn't right, but no—no one ever tells Jenna anything! Vampires, lies, all of it! I am done being kept in the dark!"

Elena's stomach dropped. "Jenna, wait—"

"Oh, don't tell me to calm down! I live in a town full of supernatural nightmares, and no one had the decency to tell me?! Do you know how insane this sounds?"

Elena exchanged a wide-eyed look with Stefan. "Jenna... who told you?"

There was a sharp inhale on the other end of the line. "Take a wild guess," Jenna snapped.

Before Elena could defend herself, Jenna ended the call. Elena looks to Stefan and both find the other flabbergasted.

"That bitch…" Elena exhaled. 

But the problems didn't end as Stefan was next to receive a call

"Damon's going to kill Vanessa," said Alaric.

____________________

Near The Delgallo House- Mystic Falls

The floor was slick with blood, a crimson pool spreading beneath Damon Salvatore as he knelt before Vanessa Monroe, his body convulsing, veins blackening under the weight of magic he could neither fight nor understand. His breath was ragged, his once-dazzling smirk now twisted in pain as blood trickled from his nose, his ears, his eyes—an unbearable pressure crushing him from the inside out.

Above him, Vanessa stood poised, watching him with cool detachment, her dark eyes gleaming with something unreadable. There was no malice in her stance, no rage—only understanding. Pity, even.

"I know what you're thinking," she mused, her voice a smooth, knowing whisper that wrapped around him like silk. "That this is some kind of trick. That I was nothing more than a human grad student when we first met. Someone insignificant. Someone flawed."

Damon clenched his teeth, trying to summon the strength to lunge at her, to do something, but his body refused to obey. He could barely lift his head as Vanessa crouched before him, her fingers brushing against his jaw—soft, unhurried, like a predator toying with wounded prey.

"I am flawed," she admitted. "I am broken in the eyes of my own kind. A witch incapable of holding power, incapable of casting even the simplest spell on my own. I was nothing more than a husk, a failure of magic itself." She tilted her head, a slow, amused smile playing at her lips. "You see, Damon, according to my man, I was born as something very rare. Rarer than werewolves apparently, rarer than the most sacred bloodlines of magic. I am a Siphoner."

Damon's blurred vision flickered with confusion, he had never heard of such a species. But what he could gather…

'Parasites, cursed to live by leaching power from others.' he cursed, ironically.

She stood gracefully, lifting her hand. The air around her hummed with energy—borrowed power, not her own, but manipulated with effortless control. "For years, I was nothing," she continued, "until I met a man who set me free. A man who showed me how to wield the power of others as if it were my own. To take and never be without."

Damon gritted his teeth as another wave of searing agony crashed through him. "Leon…" he rasped, forcing the name past his bloodied lips.

Vanessa's smirk widened. "Now you're getting it."

She leaned down, her lips brushing his ear as she whispered, "I was never powerless, Damon. I just needed someone to teach me how to take what was never mine. And if you think I'm bad, wait until he hears what you tried to do to his woman. "

Damon barely clung to consciousness, his body still wracked with pain as Vanessa Monroe stood over him like a queen surveying a fallen knight. The eerie glow of siphoned magic flickered at her fingertips, raw and untamed, bending to her will alone.

Then, in a blur of movement, Stefan Salvatore appeared.

A gust of air rushed through the alley as he stopped just short of slamming into Vanessa, his expression a mask of sheer terror. His usually composed demeanor was shattered, his chest rising and falling rapidly, horror burning in his golden-hazel eyes as he took in the sight of his brother—broken, bleeding, barely hanging on.

"You bitch!" Stefan snarled, his fangs bared, his body coiled to attack. His hands curled into fists, ready to rip her apart. He didn't care what she was, what kind of magic she wielded—she had hurt Damon, and that meant she had to die.

But before he could so much as twitch, Vanessa's cold, dead stare met his.

"Motum."

The word was spoken softly, yet it carried the weight of an iron decree. The magic erupted from her like an invisible wave, striking Stefan mid-motion and hurling him through the air like a ragdoll. His body crashed into a dumpster several feet away, metal crumpling under the force before he tumbled to the ground in a dazed heap.

For a long, agonizing moment, there was nothing but silence.

Then, groaning, Stefan pulled himself up, shaking off the pain with a sharp inhale. His vision swam, but he forced himself to focus. Vanessa stood there, completely unbothered, watching him as though he were nothing more than a foolish child throwing a tantrum.

"Please," Stefan choked out, his voice raw, desperate. "Please don't kill him."

Vanessa let out a soft, amused chuckle. "Oh, Stefan," she purred, stepping toward him with an easy grace. "You make it sound like you have a say in this."

Stefan clenched his jaw, his hands trembling at his sides. He had faced death countless times before, had fought against monsters and nightmares—but there was something about her that felt different. She wasn't just powerful. She was untouchable.

Vanessa turned her attention back to Damon, who barely managed to glare up at her through his pain-clouded vision. She smiled. Then, with a flick of her wrist—

CRACK.

Damon's body went limp as his neck snapped effortlessly.

"No!" Stefan cried out, his voice breaking as he surged forward—but it was too late. His brother's lifeless body crumpled to the ground, eyes vacant, unmoving.

Vanessa smirked. "Relax," she said casually. "It's not permanent."

Stefan fell to his knees beside Damon, hands hovering over his brother's body as if afraid to touch him. His chest tightened with rage, grief, and helplessness. He looked up at Vanessa, his eyes pleading, his voice barely above a whisper. "Why… why are you doing this?"

Vanessa tilted her head, considering him for a moment before answering. "Because I can. Your scum, bitch ass brother tried to kill me." Her lips curled, her voice laced with something ominous, something final. "And because Leon will be greeting you both very soon. I hate to make him upset."

A shudder ran through Stefan at the mention of that name. He already had to face a Klaus. What kind of existence was Leon if his woman could kill them both if she wanted to?

A few feet away, Elena stood frozen, her breath shallow, her hands clutching her jacket tightly around herself as though it could shield her from the chilling realization that Vanessa Monroe was not who she had thought she was.

No.

Vanessa wasn't just a professor.

She wasn't just another player in their supernatural world.

She was something entirely different.

And Elena knew, with a sinking feeling in her stomach, that Mystic Falls would never be the same.

Another crack filled the alley, and then a thud as Stefan hit the pavement. Elena stood frozen as Vanessa's heels resounded with every step closer, then passed her like a bone-chilling breeze.

After Vanessa had left, Elena could still hear her voice in the wind.

"It's Vanessa Delgallo, by the way. Tell your original friend that."