Light in the Darkness ♥ S. SALVATORE

I - GHOST WORLD

     ALMOST nine decades later, in a small town called Mystic Falls, Stefan Salvatore had once again relapsed but not because he wanted to. However, with the luck of a witch failing to correctly send back a vengeful ghost to the other side, Lexi Branson was back to break him out of the ripper that he was. Stefan had been locked and chained up in the city jail, sweaty and panting as he looked at his ex-girlfriend doppelganger, Elena Gilbert.

"Elena, Elena. I'm hurting." Stefan cried out painfully, sweat dripping down his face. "Please help me."

Lexi turned to her with a stern look. "Don't listen. Shut him out."

Elena nervously looked at Lexi before looking at Stefan softly. "I am helping you, Stefan."

"I'll do anything. I'll change. I promise." He pleaded.

Lexi shook her head. "It's a lie. He'll say anything right now."

"Elena, I'm sorry." Stefan cried out, pulling the Gilbert's attention away from Lexi. "I'm sorry. Just make it stop. Please, just make it stop."

Lexi gave Elena a look. "You have to separate yourself from your emotions. Don't let him play on them."

Stefan looked at Elena softly. "Hey, look at me. Look at me." She looks at him. "Elena. I love you, okay?" He told her emotionally with a smile. "I love you. I love you so much. I love you so much, Elena."

Elena, although her heart wanted nothing more than to hear those words, she shook her head. "I'm sorry, Stefan, I just don't believe you."

Dramatically, his smile fades to an angry glare toward her. "You know what? I don't want your help, anyway. I wish I'd never met you. Every single moment that I've spent with you has been a complete and total waste." He snapped at her, causing her to look at him hurt.

Lexi smirked. "You see that? That's the ripper talking. Once he's weak enough, you have to cause him pain. Make him feel things. Anger, rage, anything. You have to make him see past the blood." She drives a stake through his body then pulls it out. "Think of it as a regimen. Day in and day out. Like running the treadmill. Like making coffee. Until he's ready to be saved."

Stefan groaned in pain and hissed at her. "I will rip you apart, Lexi!"

She simply smiled. "You can't. I'm already dead." She drives the stake through his body again.

Elena starts to cry, tears forming in her eyes as she shakes her head. "I can't..." She leaves the cell. Lexi looks at her.

"This is never going to work." Stefan laughed after a moment, when Elena was completely gone. "This method never really worked, did it?"

"It did." Lexi shot back at him, driving the stake back in his body.

He hissed angrily and glared back at her. "I think you're missing an ingredient."

She looked at him in confusion before remembrance appeared in her eyes. "Scarlett..." Lexi said softly and pulled the stake out.

"Ding, ding, ding." He groaned and dropped his head in pain before smiling. "Good thing you're leaving soon and no one knows where she's been for the last seventy-five years." An idea formed in her mind and she left him alone to his thoughts, him thinking about the girl that changed everything for him.

Italy, 1935

Scarlett dangled helplessly above the bed of her home, only able to hear the pitter-patter of his feet below her. For the past twelve years, Stefan had become Scarlett's playmate as he worked through his emotions. Once 1924 came around, Lexi had finally found the two at Scarlett's home in New York and decided to agree to her offer as when she looked into the apartment, Stefan had been laughing genuinely for the first time in sixty years. The only way she'd agreed to let Scarlett continue her progress was having Lexi come around at night with her version of a "Ripper Detox". It was the first time Scarlett allowed herself to work with someone on fixing a ripper, but seeing how much Stefan meant to Lexi, she allowed it.