Disclaimer: This is a work of fan fiction. I do not own the rights to this work and no profit is being made from this particular work.

AN: If you've seen this first I suggest going to read The Tales of Micah Bennett first or much of this story won't make sense. The reason why I decided to repackage this story are explained in the last chapter of that story.

1-01

There was a knock on my door and for a moment I started, feeling my heart beating faster before I calmed myself. The first night back and there was still the effect that the walls were closing around on me, that a witch of sufficient power could unravel the work I'd done and get at me. After all, it had been proven before that even with my knowledge I still wasn't powerful enough.

Another knock interrupted me from my thoughts.

"Come in," I said and at the phrase the Boundary spell in my room flickered, turning momentarily off before they would come on again. With a sense of objectivity I knew that it was paranoid—it was most likely that everyone around me knew too—but I had been kidnapped a total of two times in the same year so my paranoia was deserved.

The door opened and Bonnie walked in. There was a look about here, a sadness in her eyes that she was clearly trying to hide. For my benefit, no doubt, so I wouldn't say anything against it. She gave me a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes and I did the same.

Silently she walked into the room and sat on the bed beside me, her head leaning against my shoulder. She let out a sigh.

"Everyone misses you," she said. I said nothing in replied. "He's trying not to show it, but I think Enzo misses you too. From what I heard he refused leaving on the trip that Damon and…" She stopped as she felt my body clench. "That Damon is leaving on."

Bonnie let out a breath. "I miss you too, you know. They you that was sort of annoying in that he wanted to do as much with magic as possible. They you that wanted to change the world."

"I think I'm not that me anymore," I said. I sighed, shifting and getting to my feet to look out the window. The forest behind my house was as tranquil as ever, but it was a little far off because it stood beyond a network of three boundary spells, one of which was cursed.

Bonnie moved, breaking me from a stream of thoughts I hadn't even realised I was going down. I let out a breath that contained all my frustration, that was happening more often than I liked. I would get lost in my own mind and what was worse was that I didn't even think anything.

"I still want to learn. I still want to change the world…but," I let out another breath. "It's all tangled in anger and the need for revenge, not mentioning the fear that Klaus is no doubt on his way to Mystic Falls since he's received the message."

"Don't think about that right now," said Bonnie. "What's important is thinking about you." She walked to my side and gave me a hug. It felt a little better, a place in my subconscious calming at the touch. "I know you don't like the idea," she said, her voice hesitant, "but I'm finding this time around I have to insist. You have to talk to someone."

I turned, feeling the urge to say automatically no but Bonnie's expression stalled me.

She continued, "Dad and I have been looking around for the last couple days. Looking for someone who could help you who always knows about the supernatural and we found him. Atticus Shane."

My expression flickered.

"You know him?" said Bonnie, though it sounded more like a question.

"Yeah. He was married to one of Grams' students," I told her, which was true. This could be my chance to actually do something. Since Shane's wife had died he would no doubt be looking for a way to bring her back from the Other Side, something that would eventually lead him to Silas.

Right now I couldn't have Silas out and about, which meant I could speak to him about stopping all of that. I was a Bennett witch, after all, and I was powerful and knowledgeable enough that if I put my mind to it, opening something like a door to the Other Side was feasible.

"Then he's perfectly qualified for this," Bonnie continued, unaware of my thoughts. "What she did to you was…" She stopped again because even mentioning her in a roundabout way spooked me. It spurred up those feelings of hate and that need for revenge.

"You need to work it out so that it doesn't colour what you do," said Bonnie. "People have gone dark for less."

"Okay," I said, let out a huff that I hoped sounded genuine. "I'll do it. A part of me has always wondered if the whole talking thing actually helps."

Bonnie smiled, this time it reached her eyes. Ulterior motives aside it was nice when my sister smiled.

"Okay," she said. "Now for something else. I've invited everyone to Grams' place for breakfast today. Everyone we know. They should be going soon and you should really come."

I felt my heart starting to beat faster, the world around me starting to shake at the consideration that I might have to leave my protections to go outside. I took a breath, closing my eyes and imagining a tranquil ocean before I pushed down the feelings of fear. I even went so far as creating another mental me that managed to convince me that with a sufficiently powerful witch, inside was just as dangerous as outside.

"Okay," I said, though my voice broke in the middle of that one word.

"Shower and meet up in fifteen minutes?" she said and I nodded.

I quickly went about my morning ablutions, the process becoming slower the closer I got to completion. But it had to end and I had to go out of the house to the car. It stood just out of the property and there were already two people inside: Enzo was in the driver's seat while Jeremy sat in the backseat next to the seat I would be taking up.

The feelings that the worlds was closing in abated at that.

I got into the car, greeted by a smile from Jeremy and a nod from Enzo before we made our way to Grams'. I couldn't help but wonder how she felt that her house was now a vampire's den of all things. It was one of the few places in the entire town which every vampires was invited to and there were no magical protections to protect it—then again there was nothing magical about the house save that its dimensions were off for some reason.

Was she metaphorically turning in her grave?

When I'd spoken to her, she hadn't mentioned it, instead telling me to watch myself. When she'd spoken to Bonnie she'd told us both to be careful and think about slowing down. And when the ancestors had been talking to Jared it had been a warning that what we were doing was highly irregular and that he should consider himself walking on a thin line.

Blustering, I'd told him. Going on to say that if the ancestors tried anything to him or any others we invited into the coven then they would lose what they most wanted: Descendants from a purely Bennet side of the family.

It wasn't a long drive and within minutes the car had driven up the driveway and was stopping. My father was already beside the front door and giving Bonnie and me hugs as we exited. He didn't say much, didn't console me nor inquire to how I was feeling which I found okay. I really didn't want to be asked those questions because it was more likely that not that I would lie.

There were more people that I would have thought. Caroline and her family were here, Stefan and Elena were in one corner talking amongst themselves—Elena gave me a smile when she saw me but she didn't venture closer, she was still sore about me breaking her legs, not that I blamed her. Tyler was even here, him along with his uncle, Mason, Jules and three other werewolves I'd met in passing while fixing the wards on the Lockwood Estate.

"Jared," I said. "You're here too? Won't your brother—?"

"He's going to be fine," said Jared. "And anyway I'm not going to miss this. Free breakfast and mingling with a new supernatural species. Brother dearest knows I wouldn't forgive him if he kept me away from this."

I looked at Tyler at the mention of that. He was a vampire-werewolf hybrid. Katherine had abused a particular loophole that made him transform into a wolf even though he was technically undead. It had been unstable at first, drawing in too much power and unfortunately just drinking Elena's blood hadn't worked to fill that.

But with our new found power we'd anchored Tyler to Stefan—it had been fun explaining that the man was too a doppelganger—and had the former of the two active as a generator to keep the other from wasting away. Until we understood Tyler's transformation in detail Bonnie, Jared, Lucy and I had come to conclusion that it was better in the long run if we didn't let the other hybrids be turned by Tyler.

All in all, the morning was actually nice. Being amongst friends working to dim the paranoia if only a little. But it was still there, still hanging over my shoulder like a predator. That another witch would be attracted by the knowledge I had and take it from me without my permission.

I needed to act, become stronger and ward off others by showing them that coming after me would be the worst idea they could think off.

When the breakfast thing had ended and people were beginning to Peter out I stopped a few people. Among them were my coven, the vampires old enough to matter, the werewolves and hybrid and some humans.

"I think we need to start talking about the Originals," I said, standing in front of them all in Gram's living room. "Because already they're making plans and soon they'll be descending on Mystic Falls."

"How much do you know about them?" asked Mason Lockwood, the word choice making Jeremy snort. The older man gave the vampire a questioning look.

"Micah tends to know a lot," said Jeremy. "That question will get us nowhere. The better question, what are their weaknesses?"

I smiled a little because it really was the right train of thought. I nodded before saying, "More than one of them have a weakness for Stefan."

"What?" the man said.

"It will likely become clearer throughout the week," I said. "After Lucy manages to find the spell I asked her to find, but suffice it to say that you were friends with Klaus. And that's saying a lot because the man doesn't really have friends."

"But that can't the only thing we're focusing on," said Mr Forbes. "How do we fight them? How do we kill them?"

"We don't," said Bonnie. She, Jared and I had spoken a little about the Originals. They were the only people I truly trusted with this information when it came to witches. I couldn't have the lives of my father and friends in the whims of bigoted witches.

But this was a different matter. The near loss of our citizens had taught us that we really needed to be able to work together, share information so that each of the 'species' in Mystic Falls was able to think of plans to save the others if things went wrong. This needed to be known by them and it was only a matter of time before the information spread out anyway.

"We can't," Bonnie reiterated. "The magic that brought the Originals into being made it so that they're tied to their sire lines. If we killed an Original we would be killing every vampire they had every created and every vampire they had ever created."

"That would be genocide," Elena said, her voice called. Another you didn't realise that. Another you. Another Jeremy just killed people so you could reach your own objectives.

"Which goes without saying that we won't do," I said. "I can't have that on my conscious and though I know of a way to kill the Originals it's not something I'll be working to share. Matter of fact, until my coven and I have figured out a way to break the Linking spell it can be regarded that I won't even say what that is."

"That severely limits what we can do," said Dad. "But it wasn't a viable option in the first place. Then what do we do? How to we keep them? We've seen that our spells can be broken, they broke through the spells in the prison."

"That was loophole abuse," said Jared. "But I'm already working on a counter. Micah told me what they did to him when he was fighting back at his house and I think I can learn a similar spell and have Micah integrate it into a Boundary spell."

"How long will this take?" asked Mason. "Above everything else you've been working on? I've noticed that your coven seems to take on more than they can chew."

"Which is mainly my fault," I said.

"Which I'm putting a stop to," said Caroline. "I've made a list, magic that's high priority. I've created timetables they can abide by so that they still have time for passion projects."

"Well, then," said Mr Fell. "We should get to the nitty-gritty of it all. So that the rest of us can prepare. Strengths and weaknesses," he said.

"Strength and weaknesses," I said, before ordering my mind of its wealth of information. I started telling them about the Originals.