Devil in Disguise ➳ S. Salvatore [COMPLETED]

➳ 54: prayer for the dying

STEFAN drove down the road toward Caroline’s house while holding his phone to his ear, listening to the annoying ringing followed by the voice-mail tone. Growling in frustration, he hung up without leaving a message and tossed it into his lap.

He jumped when it suddenly started ringing then checked the ID before answering. “Caroline.”

“Stefan.” She greeted him in a shaky manner. “Can you come over? Colin just showed up at my house.”

“Yeah. Yeah. I’m on my way.” Stefan assured her just as he pulled up in front of Caroline’s house. He hung up the phone again and turned toward Efah, was still sitting in the passenger seat. “Wait here.”

She opened her mouth to argue but he had gotten out of the car before she could say anything. Rolling her eye, Efah sat back against the seat with a displeased scowl and her arms crossed over her chest.

Stefan entered the house, meeting Caroline in the living room and taking note of Colin lying on the couch. “Hey.”

“Hey. Mom’s still sleeping. Don’t wake her up.” Caroline whispered frantically as she stood to her feet.

“What happened?” Stefan asked in worry and walked toward Colin.

“I don’t know. H-he was fine when we left him at Duke, remember?” Caroline answered, her voice trembling with anxiety. “He was running around and pain-free and scarfing down all that disgusting vending machine food.”

“Yeah? Well, clearly, he’s not fine now.” Stefan grumbled then pointed a finger at her in recollection. “Wait. I thought you compelled him to forget everything after you fed him your blood. How did he find you?”

“I don’t know.” She snapped in a mix of emotions while trying to keep her voice down.

The door opened again causing the two vampires to spin around, looking at who would be making an entrance. They both sighed in relief when Efah strolled through the threshold, closing the door behind her. “Here are your answers, my pretties. Cancer, doing what it does best, replicated rapidly and because cancer is not a wound and simply a mutated part of one’s own cells, your blood didn’t work. Leaving Colin---” She stopped talking and walked over to the window, drawing back the curtains to prove her point. When the sunlight hit Colin’s face, it started to burn and he winced in pain. “---a vampire.”

“Oh, no…” Caroline stared at Colin with a panicked expression then ran up the stairs frantically.

After spreading the news, the group convened at Whitmore Hospital. Where they looked at an MRI on a view box as Jo started to explain what the diagnosis was. “I had Duke over Colin’s medical records. This head scan is from earlier this week.” She pointed at the first scan then placed another on the board beside it. “This one was taken right here, ten minutes ago. See all that red?”

“Well, I’m no doctor but that guy is screwed.” Damon commented dully, his arms crossed and a bored expression on his face.

“So the blood didn’t heal him, it sped up his cancer and killed him.” Stefan concluded from his observation.

“It fed on it.” Efah said with a nod of her head, walking up to the view box and studying the differences between the two scans.