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Hawk's voice was soft.
But—
His words detonated like a bomb going off in broad daylight.
The smile vanished from Gwen's face instantly. Her eyes went wide as she stared at Hawk.
"What?"
Caroline, who had been deliberately avoiding eye contact, snapped her gaze toward Hawk, her expression shocked and her eyes filled with terror.
"How did you—"
"Didn't your cousin tell you?" Hawk looked at Caroline, his gaze deep and impenetrable. "There is nothing I cannot know if I choose to know it. Not even the secrets you keep from yourself."
Gwen's attention whipped toward Caroline like a gunshot.
"You didn't tell me about this."
"I..."
Caroline's mouth opened. She looked at Gwen, and a bitter smile crossed her face. "Gwen, it's not something I really wanted to—"
She didn't get to finish.
The warmth had completely drained from Gwen's eyes. She stared at Hawk, her expression severe, her voice unnaturally serious.
"Who was it?"
"Damon Salvatore."
"He's still alive?"
"Yes." Hawk shrugged, offering Gwen a faint smile. "I was going to kill him, but you told me to stop."
"If I'd known about this, I wouldn't have stopped you."
"I can drag him here right now if you want."
"I want."
Gwen's answer was immediate. No hesitation.
Hawk's smile brightened. With a thought, his Sixth Sense—which covered the entire town—instantly locked onto the valley where Stefan had just finished digging Damon out of the rubble.
Sixth Sense—Psychic Teleportation.
"As you wish, Mrs. Phoenix."
The words fell.
THUD!
Damon Salvatore tumbled through a ripple in space and crashed onto the lawn in front of them.
Caroline, watching this unfold, looked at Gwen.
"Gwen..."
"SHUT UP!"
Gwen snapped at her, then turned back to Caroline. "Does Aunt Liz know about this?"
Caroline opened her mouth.
"I..."
"He didn't just control Caroline. He also used vampire compulsion to infiltrate the town's Founding Council."
Hawk's tone was calm as he delivered the additional blow.
This wasn't his fault.
He'd warned Caroline not to stir up trouble.
And she hadn't listened.
So if Caroline made the first move, it was perfectly reasonable for him to retaliate. An eye for an eye.
Most importantly—
Hawk never gossiped. He only stated facts.
Damon had once compelled Gwen's cousin Caroline, turning her into his plaything for a stretch of time. That was an indisputable fact.
Gwen took a deep breath. She looked at Damon Salvatore—who was currently frozen in place by Hawk, unable to move a muscle or speak a word—and then turned her dark gaze back to Caroline.
"He compelled and assaulted you. You didn't tell Aunt Liz. And you even became friends with your rapist. Jesus Christ, Caroline. You're a sheriff's daughter!"
Jesus.
God.
Holy Mary.
Gwen had always thought she was unconventional. After all, even in New York City, not many people started their first relationship convinced that person was their future.
But she'd been certain Hawk was her future. For him, she'd given up the college she'd always dreamed of attending, accepted his proposal, and moved in with him.
A lot of people said she was gambling with her life. A lot of people thought she was reckless.
But now?
Good grief. Compared to Caroline, Gwen felt downright conventional.
What kind of person gets compelled and assaulted, then chooses to stay friends with their attacker?
And most importantly, Caroline was also a sheriff's daughter.
"A victim's silence isn't protection—it's rewarding the abuser."
"Don't you know that?"
Gwen looked at Caroline in disbelief, remembering something Hawk had once said.
"Or did you get kicked in the head by a horse?"
"No, Gwen, it's not like that."
Caroline looked at Gwen, scrambling to explain. "Damon and I aren't friends. God, I would never be friends with that piece of trash."
Gwen's expression remained flat.
"But you came looking for Hawk with him, didn't you?"
"I wasn't with Damon. I was with—"
Just as Caroline was frantically trying to explain, three figures came rushing toward the manor from outside.
Whoosh! Whoosh!
The next second, Stefan appeared on the back lawn, carrying Elena. The black witch Bonnie followed close behind.
If someone lit a bonfire right now, you'd think they were throwing a block party.
Stefan set Elena down, then looked at his brother Damon—who was currently frozen in place, his eyes screaming for help. Stefan tried to step forward. "Damon!"
Hawk's thought manifested instantly. His Sixth Sense transformed into invisible threads that bound Stefan in place as well.
Stefan, who had just started moving toward Damon, froze mid-step.
Just like his brother.
Limbs locked.
Voice silenced.
Elena, seeing this, moved to step forward as well, but her best friend Bonnie grabbed her arm and pulled her back.
Bonnie stood there, her face pale with terror. She wasn't looking at Hawk. Her voice trembled as she spoke. "Don't go over there. Whatever you do, don't go over there."
Hawk noticed them but couldn't be bothered to look their way.
Gwen turned her head briefly, then looked back at Caroline. "Do they know about this?"
Caroline shook her head.
Being compelled and used wasn't exactly something to brag about. After all, from an outsider's perspective, she'd been the one throwing herself at Damon.
"But they're friends with this rapist?"
"No, no, no. Nobody wants to be friends with Damon. Elena and Bonnie don't want to be his friend either."
"Really?"
Gwen's furrowed brow relaxed slightly.
Just then, Hawk moved to his fiancée's side, leaned in close to her ear, and quietly filled her in on the tangled mess between Elena and the Salvatore brothers.
Gwen listened to Hawk's gossip with a neutral expression, then looked up at her cousin again before turning to Hawk. "She really didn't know what happened to Caroline?"
Hawk never lied. "Stefan probably figured it out. As for Elena, she genuinely doesn't know."
At least not at this point in time.
He could understand Caroline's thinking. Being compelled and assaulted was already traumatic enough. Of course she wouldn't go around telling people.
But understanding was one thing.
Hawk still stood with Gwen.
When it came down to it, he sided with family, not logic.
Gwen turned her head, glancing at Stefan—who was also frozen in place—then looked at Elena, who was anxiously hovering near him. Her brow furrowed. "He knew about this, but he didn't stop it?"
Hawk shrugged. "He wanted to. But Damon Salvatore is a blood-drinking vampire. Stefan's the younger brother, and he's a bunny-eating vampire. Even if he knew, he couldn't stop Damon. And after Caroline turned into a vampire, Damon wanted to kill her. Stefan and Elena stopped him."
As for why Damon had suggested killing Caroline after she turned—
The reason was simple.
To cover up the fact that he'd compelled her into sleeping with him.
After all, his brother Stefan won women over with charm. Damon could only manage it through compulsion and manipulation.
Gwen's expression cleared with understanding.
She'd read about this in SHIELD's files.
Among humans, there were good people and bad people. Vampires were no different. Some vampires embraced their nature and fed on human blood. Others fought their instincts, suppressing their cravings, choosing to survive without killing.
Gwen's understanding had been simple: the former let their animal nature dominate their humanity. The latter kept their humanity in control.
And now—
That assessment held true.
Gwen listened to Hawk's explanation, then looked at Caroline. "Is what Hawk said true?"
Caroline's mind was in complete chaos. To be precise, ever since the secret she'd been desperately trying to bury had been dragged into the open without warning, she'd felt like giving up entirely. When Gwen asked her question, Caroline simply nodded.
Gwen saw the confirmation and turned to Hawk. "Let him go."
Hawk nodded.
THUD!
The moment the binding released, Stefan collapsed to the ground, gasping for air.
Elena rushed to help him up, then looked at Damon—still frozen in place—before glancing at Caroline, who stood with her head bowed under her cousin's quiet but fierce scolding.
"What's going on?"
"..."
Stefan didn't answer.
But—
He looked at his brother Damon, whose eyes were pleading desperately for help, then at Caroline. His mind began piecing things together.
Sure enough, Bonnie, who had been standing in the back trying to blend into the shadows, looked at Damon with undisguised disgust and said to Elena, "Caroline didn't like Damon because she wanted to. Damon compelled her. He made her think she liked him."
Elena's eyes went wide. She looked at Bonnie, then at Damon, frozen and helpless.
At the same time—
Gwen, looking at Caroline standing before her with her head down, had lost the will to say anything more.
"Hawk, kill this rap—"
"No!" Caroline's eyes widened. She looked up at Gwen.
Gwen let out a dry laugh. "What, you actually fell for your rapist?"
"No, it's not that. Klaus is coming. Damon's a piece of trash, but he's the strongest fighter we have. We need him."
"You don't need him anymore."
"What?"
Caroline stared at her cousin, whose expression had gone cold.
Gwen turned to her fiancé. "For a vampire, what's the most brutal way to die?"
Hawk smiled faintly. "Exposure to sunlight."
For a vampire caught in direct sunlight without protection, the omnipresent UV rays were like being thrown into an endless salt pool with wounds covering every inch of your body.
The inescapable pain. The all-consuming agony. It would burn them alive, reducing them to ash amid screams of absolute despair.
Gwen pulled out her phone and checked the time. "Sunrise is in an hour. Perfect. I want him to burn to death in the sunlight."
She was furious.
And she had every right to be.
Gwen and Caroline were close in age. Whenever Gwen visited in the past, they'd always shared a bed. And back home in New York, she only had brothers—no sisters. So even though Caroline was technically her cousin, Gwen thought of her as a sister.
Now her sister had been violated. How could she not be furious?
Especially when the violation in question was one of the worst a woman could experience.
So—
Hawk smiled and replied, "As you wish."
Damon, still bound in place, watched in horror as his daylight ring slowly slid off his finger. His expression twisted into pure terror as he realized what was happening. His body struggled violently, trying to break free.
But it was useless.
If a mere vampire could escape Hawk's psychic hold at this point, it would mean someone had somehow nerfed Hawk's power level behind the scenes.
Hawk opened his left hand. The daylight ring floated into his palm, and he passed it to Gwen. "In one hour, when the sun rises, he'll burn to ash. If that's not enough to satisfy you, next time I visit Mephisto, I'll throw his soul into my Underworld. Once you're able to visit the Underworld yourself, you can personally oversee his torture."
Gwen took the ring, listening to Hawk's words.
"Can you really do that?"
"Easily. Just say the word."
Hawk smiled faintly.
If Mephisto had been telling the truth, then using this Heaven invasion as leverage, Hawk was confident Mephisto would agree to the request.
After all, As long as Hawk wasn't in a hurry, the only one who'd be desperate was Mephisto.
Expecting free help?
Not a chance.
How could anyone allow that?
Hawk's thoughts turned as a voice called out from behind him.
"Mr. Phoenix..."
"Stefan."
Caroline looked at Stefan, who had stepped forward but seemed unsure what to say. Her emotions were complicated.
At first, when Hawk had exposed her deepest secret without warning, she'd been panicked. She'd even felt a flicker of resentment toward him for telling Gwen.
But seeing Gwen's fury afterward, Caroline understood. Gwen cared about her. That's why she was so angry.
So—
Just moments ago, when Gwen had declared, "You don't need him anymore," and sentenced Damon to burn alive under the sun, Caroline had felt a strange, fierce satisfaction alongside her shock.
Damon deserved it.
If Damon hadn't compelled her, she never would have gotten involved with Elena's group. Even if she had, it wouldn't have dragged her in this deep.
After all, she was the school's head cheerleader.
Young. Beautiful.
From a prominent family.
Unlike her aunt, who'd been sweet-talked by George Stacy into moving to New York. Unlike her mother, who'd gotten pregnant young and married Caroline's father.
Caroline's future had been destined to be bright.
But Damon had destroyed all of that.
Now that she was a vampire, there was one thing she could never do.
Have children.
So...
She hated Damon. That's why, when Gwen sealed his fate, Caroline had felt grateful to her cousin.
Because she didn't have the power to get revenge herself.
But now, looking at Stefan—whose eyes held both pleading and apology as he looked at her—Caroline felt her heart soften.
Gwen watched Stefan and Elena approach. She saw the look in Stefan's eyes, understood the meaning behind his unspoken words, and before he could speak, her voice cut through the air like ice. "If it were your sister who'd been compelled and assaulted, would you let him go?"
Stefan's plea died in his throat. Meeting Gwen's frigid stare, he opened his mouth uselessly.
"I'm sorry. I..."
"You should be sorry. If you hadn't come back to town, this rapist wouldn't have followed. My sister never would have been violated."
"But you should be grateful you didn't become his accomplice."
"You should also be grateful I'm a reasonable person."
"If it were someone else, it wouldn't just be the rapist who died. It would be everyone connected to him."
Gwen's face was as cold as stone. She fought to control her emotions as she spoke to Stefan in a low, steady voice.
Hawk glanced at his fiancée.
He had the distinct feeling that last line was directed at him.
But then again, maybe not.
Because if it had been him, if his little sister had been violated like this?
Heh...
Everyone connected to Damon would die? No.
The entire town of Mystic Falls would follow in Wakanda's footsteps, erased from the map completely. And every soul in the town would be thrown into the Eight Prisons of his Underworld.
Stefan listened to Gwen's words and opened his mouth.
"I'm sorry."
"You can say your goodbyes." Gwen was silent for a moment, then looked at Hawk.
"Unseal his mouth."
Hawk said nothing.
The next second—
Damon's panicked voice rang out. "I'M SORRY! I WAS WRONG! PLEASE, GIVE ME ONE MORE CHANCE! I REALLY MESSED UP! I'M SORRY!"
"You're not sorry you did it. You're sorry you're about to die."
Gwen didn't even glance at Damon as she delivered the cold line. Then she turned away, pulling Caroline with her as she walked back into the manor.
Hawk followed behind them.
Gwen suddenly remembered something and turned to Hawk. "This won't wake up Grandpa, will it?"
Hawk chuckled. "You're only thinking of that now?"
Before Gwen could respond, he smiled.
"Don't worry. I've got it covered."
"I know."
Gwen's voice softened. Her gaze turned warm as she looked at Hawk and smiled. "Thank you, Hawk."
She knew that if she'd come here alone, even if she'd learned what happened to Caroline, there would have been very little she could do about it.
But—
She wasn't alone.
Hawk heard the gratitude in Gwen's voice and smiled back.
"You share everything I have, Mrs. Phoenix."
"I know."
Gwen's smile was radiant.
It was because Hawk was here that she could be this assertive.
She always knew that.
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