the_bad_brother | For Tara

As soon as Ric had shown up, Damon had started trying to track down his little witchy 'friend'. It wasn't going to be easy to convince her to make another daylight ring, he was sure, but there was not a whole lot that Damon wouldn't do for Alaric.

He hadn't run into her in any of the local haunts: bars, coffee shops, restaurants, so he'd had to turn to plan B. It took him a little bit of time to track down where she lived, so by the time he was at Tara's door he was already frustrated. Ric was stuck a nightwalker until he could get a daylight ring for his best friend, and not only did that lifestyle suck, but it gave Damon less time with him.

He knocked firmly and then folded his arms, listening for movement inside.

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“Coming,” Tara calls out, unsure of who it could be visiting her. There aren’t many people she’s told where she lives, Buffy and Spike mostly and a few of the girls from work. Seeing Damon on the other side through the peephole is completely unexpected. She takes a breath to steady herself before opening the door, glad that the rules about inviting vampires in still work here. “Can I help you?”

Damon forced a charming smile. "I certainly hope so. I need another ring."

"Do you? Did you need to tell me about the other girl, the other vampire who looks just like Elena, or was that optional too?" She stands just inside her door unmoving, arms crossed over her chest defensively. "Because that would have been a nice thing to know."

...Katherine. Katherine had gotten to his witch. That...could be bad. "Honestly? I didn't even think about it. I've done my best to avoid that bitch here, and if you're smart, you will too." He pressed forward, looking frustrated when the threshold stopped him. "What did she say to you?"

“Other than pretending she was Elena, and that she’s been thinking about killing constantly?” She flinches when he moves forward, her relief at the fact he wasn’t able to enter clear and bright in her eyes. “I could have undone the spells on Elena’s ring right then. How is it even possible? They’re identical.”

Damon sighed. It shouldn't surprise him that Katherine was still managing to screw up his life, but it always did. "...Is this really a conversation we have to have in your doorway?" he asked with a grimace. "If you're not going to let me in, at least let me have some alcohol if I'm going to have to explain all of this." Which he really didn't want to do, but--he wanted Ric to have a ring. It wasn't life-or-death, but his friend had been through enough shit. He deserved to be a daywalker, at least.

"I don't want to have this conversation at all." She hisses, but she knows that he has a point. "Wait here."

Tara isn't inviting him in, instead grabbing her bag and messaging Buffy to tell her where she's going. She locks the door behind her. "There's a cafe a few doors down. It'll be quiet now."

"Neither do I," Damon muttered as she ducked back inside, sighing and looking skyward. Would he ever be free of Katherine's bullshit?

Probably not.

He nodded as she came outside, stepping back so he wasn't looming. "Lead the way," he said dryly with an expansive wave of his hand.

She takes the stairs, not wanting to be trapped in an elevator with him, and heads out the side door, landing them next to a small row of stores. The third one down is a bog-standard cafe with average coffee and food. It means that it's mostly empty, Tara taking a table near the back and asking for a pot of tea. Once they're sitting she leans back, arms crossed over her chest. "Who's Katherine and why would she have done that."

Damon sat down with his black coffee, wishing it was something stronger. "Katherine is a selfish, lying, scheming bitch, and she did it because she loves to play games," he answered, sighing as he stared down into the dark liquid in front of him. "Katherine and I go way back," he added quietly. "She's the vampire that turned my brother and I."

"Oh." That's significant, she knows that from knowing Angel and Spike and their relationships with Darla and Drusilla. But that doesn't explain everything to Tara, especially not about Elena and how they look like they do. "You don't get along, then?"

"You could say that." Damon grimaced a little. He was trying to walk the line of telling Tara enough to satisfy her without baring his soul, and that question took them closer to the soul-baring side of said line. "My brother and I were both in love with her, when we were human. We thought she was killed right as we were turned. Turned out she wasn't, she just had better things to do for a century and a half than let us know she was okay." He shrugged. "She only came back into our lives when she wanted something from us. And that's Katherine in a nutshell. She takes care of Katherine."

"Oh." That's complicated in a way that Tara has never imagined. She blinks a few times, convinced that vampires have the most complicated lives and in turn make her just as complicated. "Is Elena her sister?"

Damon sighed and shook his head. "Nope. Elena is her doppleganger. Which is a whole other story." And there were only so many stories he wanted to tell. Knowledge was power, after all.

That’s not enough of an answer for Tara, though, not if she’s going to make another one of these rings for Damon and his friend. “Doppelganger?”

“People don’t have doppelgangers just because.” Usually they’re robots or demons, she’s found, but that’s another discussion entirely. “Why does she have one?”

"Because an insane thousand-year old witch wanted to make sure that I had to tell you the entire history of vampires before I could get a daylight ring for my best friend," Damon snapped, rolling his eyes. "Is that really important? It has nothing to do with Ric." Okay, it had something to do with Ric, but seriously, he wasn't going to sit here and tell the woman everything that had ever happened--with Elena, Katherine, the Originals, Esther--just to get the ring. Especially not sober.

His outburst puts her off even more. Insane witch? Tara's mouth sets into a line as she pulls back, her arms crossed over her chest. "I think I do. If I'm going to make another ring I need the full story."

"Then I need something stronger than coffee," Damon muttered, rolling his eyes again. "Seriously, it goes back to the origin of vampires, that's over a thousand years of history that you want me to explain sitting in a coffee shop?" Even if a lot of those years could be skipped over.

He sighed and sipped his coffee. "It all has to do with balance. The whole nature balances itself out thing. It's a huge thing with the witches in my world, I don't know about yours."

"I understand balance." She knew what happened when they didn't pay enough attention to it. Bringing people back from the dead had a way of skewing that balance. Tara sighs, knowing that Damon's world has a different history than her own and that vampires aren't all soulless by default. "A thousand years of history? You could tell me the important bits. Mostly why Katherine would do that."

"Why Katherine would impersonate Elena? Because she's a bitch. She gets off on making other people miserable," Damon explained with a grimace. "As for the rest of it...okay. Cliff's Notes version."

He drained half of his coffee. "The Original Witch turned her family into vampires, but in order to keep nature in balance there had to be a way to undo what she did. So the doppelganger was that balance: her blood could reverse the spell, turn the vampires back into humans. And a new doppelganger turns up every couple hundred years. Elena is the latest. Katherine is the one before her. Is that good enough?"

It isn't enough overall, but it's enough for now. Tara nods, even though she doesn't understand. "This time. But after this, I want more."

"More what?" Damon asked, frustrated. He'd just shared more with this pushy witch than he did with most people, and hadn't even tried to rip her throat out. What more did she expect from him?

"More of the story. The things you aren't telling me." She doesn't care what he's used to telling people. She only knows what she needs before she can do this again.

"What, do you want me to write you a book?" Damon asked, scowling, but she'd said that was enough for now, so he stopped pushing. "Fine, I'll tell you more next time." Except there wouldn't be a next time.

Unless Stefan showed up somehow, sans daylight ring. In which case, Damon just might make his dear brother deal with her. Maybe she'd find Stefan more palatable. Most people did, for some inexplicable reason.

"I want to meet him." It's the one other demand she'll make right now, and a fair one. It has to be her call in the end to give him the ring. "I need a couple days, but I want to meet him before I hand over the ring."

"Yeah, I figured as much. That's not a problem," Damon said, relieved. If anyone could make a good first impression it was Ric. "And I promise, he doesn't have a doppelganger," he added with a crooked grin.

"Good, because I don't know how many weird twins I can handle." She leaves a bill on the table to pay for her drink, standing and scooping up her bag. "Tell him to pick a ring too. I'd probably get the size wrong."