AN: I wasn't going to update this soon, but I'm taking my computer to be fixed tomorrow. I thought I would give you Chapter 4 just in case they had to keep it. Thank you to my two wonderful reviewers! To friendlyanon, I'm glad you're enjoying the story! Good guess, but I can't say one way or the other without ruining the story for you. Keep looking for clues: they are there! To Marauders12345, yes, I need to keep updating frequently because we aren't even to the good part yet. There's a whole lot more to E.J. I'm a lot farther into the story than you guys are, and I keep forgetting that. Anyway, to everybody, I have nothing else to say, so enjoy this chapter!

Disclaimer: I don't want to keep repeating this, so reference first two chapters. E.J. belongs to me. P.S., if anybody doesn't remember who Gloria is, she's the witch that Klaus went to before he undaggered Rebekah, when Stefan was with him. She was also there back in 1922 (correct me if that's the wrong year) when Stefan was with Klaus and Rebekah. That's an important fact to this story, so I thought I'd let you know that.

E.J. had never even stepped foot into a high school before Damon had practically dragged her through the front doors of Mystic Falls High. The hallways were wide, and many of them were lined with lockers. She was first taken down a hall to the right of the entrance, to a door marked Office where Damon "checked her in" with the secretary there. And by "checked in" is meant that Damon compelled the woman to list E.J. Hemmings as a new student at the school regardless of her lack of any records. E.J. did have information with her, but it was back at the boarding house since she had been so rudely dragged off here against her will.

The woman had handed her a freshly printed class schedule and had dismissed them with a smile on her face and a dazed look in her eyes. Damon had had to escort E.J. to her first class just because she couldn't read a map to save her life.

She walked into the room behind Damon, trying but failing to hide behind him. He walked right up to the teacher and quickly compelled her to believe that E.J. was her newest student. Mrs. Whitewater nodded vaguely and introduced E.J. to the class in the dazed monotone common to all compelled individuals.

It will take a moment for you to get in the files, so I shouldn't have to compel your other teachers. The thought came into E.J.'s mind unbidden, and it took her a moment to realize it was not her own. She glared at Damon, but he was already waltzing out of the class, black sunglasses glinting in the harsh fluorescent lighting of the classroom.

E.J. nervously took one of the three available seats, the chair in the far left corner (if you were looking directly on). She dropped down into her seat and twiddled her thumbs nervously. She had no textbooks, no school supplies, nada. Damon had simply shipped her off here so that he did not need to "babysit" her all day.

Suddenly, Mrs. Whitewater appeared at her desk with a brand-new textbook in her hands. "This is from the stockpile for next year," the elderly woman told her stiffly, clearly still under the effects of the recent compulsion. After a time, the stiffness and monotone would wear off and the woman would act normally while she still believed what Damon had made her believe.

Some of the other students, mainly those who had beaten-down old textbooks, glared jealously at her as she accepted the book with a soft thank-you. She laid it on her desk, splaying her hand on it and propping her elbow up on her desk and resting her chin in her hand. She had no backpack either. Damon really hadn't thought this through.

She felt eyes on her and glanced up to see one of the girls who had come to the boarding house last night staring at her. She had no idea who she was, but she was clearly associated with the Salvatore brothers so E.J. gave her a weak wave. The dark-haired girl waved back and smiled kindly.

Wait a minute, E.J. thought suddenly. I'm a freshman. Stefan's probably a senior, and that girl looks to be his age. What class is this anyway?

This is English 401, a senior class. The thought in her head was so unexpected that she jumped and swung around wildly looking for the projector. She finally had to force herself to settle down since a few people were staring oddly at her. Strangely enough, she could have sworn the thought had had an English accent. Yes, thoughts were heard in the projector's actual voice, which helped to identify him or her.

Where are you? E.J. rarely found opportunities to project her thoughts, and she was a little rusty, but she knew how to well enough to be able to send a few words. At first, she felt nothing before she was suddenly overwhelmed by a menacing presence. This person's aura made Damon's look like a young child's, and Damon had a strong aura.

Look around you, love, the voice, clearly male, now continued. I am here. You need only find me.

E.J. really did try, but no one was currently looking at her and it was impossible to tell. Suddenly, she saw him. To her left and ahead of her a few chairs sat a dark-haired young man who had his back to her. She could now tell that the presence was coming from him, and she gritted her teeth in anger. Who are you and what do you want?

Kol, who are you talking to? The other voice butted into their conversation, and E.J. physically started. The lanky boy next to her glanced at her oddly, but she ignored him.

She had recognized that voice as belonging to the girl who had attacked her last night. How Rebekah had been able to hear her, she had no idea. The only reason she could think of was that the boy who had been speaking to her had linked his mind to hers, and she could hear whatever he could.

Clearly, that link had been broken, for any other conversation had been cut off. E.J. sighed and slumped down further in her seat. Great, she was now being mind-stalked by a creepy but strangely sexy dude and the crazy psycho bitch who had attacked her last night could end up being her lab partner. Goody!

Go away, Rebekah. E.J. jumped when she heard that thought clearly, leaning forward to try to see the young man's face. Wait, what had Rebekah called him?

Who were you talking to? Rebekah pressed. E.J finally noticed her sitting next to the young man, wearing a short black skirt with a multicolored blouse tucked into it. Her gold chain necklace was four times larger than E.J. would ever wear, and her hoop earrings were ridiculous. Her perfectly manicured nails drummed her desk as she glared ahead.

Get out of my head, Bekah, the young man sighed. He was dressed in tight black jeans and a dark-leather jacket, from what E.J. could see.

Tell me who you were talking to. Rebekah was clearly persistent, E.J. had to admire that. E.J. giggled a little when Rebekah glanced over at the young man, her glare darkening, before turning back to face front.

You will have to answer me eventually, Kol. Kol, yes! That had been his name! Are you listening to me?! Kol, are you ignoring me or did you block me out again?

Who I am is none of your concern. E.J. wrinkled her nose in confusion when that thought came into her head. Wait, wasn't Kol done with harassing her yet?

Your name's Kol, I got that already.

How did you know that?! Kol sounded alarmed now, and E.J. wondered if she should have projected that.

Your fault for creating a link with me. I could hear the entire conversation with Rebekah. She's a nutcase, by the way. She came to my room last night and—

"That's who you're talking to?!" Rebekah forgot to project her thoughts as she turned to glare at Kol. Mrs. Whitewater frowned and turned around to scowl at Rebekah, but one pupil-dilated look from Kol, and she was back to teaching her class. The other students were ignoring them, probably used to such displays and knowing that reacting was suicidal.

Inside voice, please, love, Kol taunted. You are going to scare the pretty little humans. The young man suddenly stiffened and turned a steely-eyed gaze to Rebekah. Wait, how on earth did you figure out whom I was talking to?

Rebekah physically shrugged. You created a link with her. I could hear your entire conversation.

I never created a link with her!

E.J. sensed when the two other vampires turned around to glare at her. She squeaked and leapt up, bolting for the door at vampiric speed and hoping she could get away in time. She paid no attention to the human students, who were pretty much ignoring everything around them.

She was breathing heavily when she reached the front doors, but her relief was short-lived when she was picked up and slammed against the nearest wall of lockers. She gasped in pain and glared down at her assailant. Now that she could see his face, she could see that Kol was indeed very sexy. His dark eyes penetrated right through her, his deliciously curly dark hair framing his pale face. Underneath his leather jacket he wore a red shirt elaborately decorated with black ink and around his neck he wore a number of dog tags.

Rebekah stepped up beside him and smirked up at her. "Did you honestly believe you could get away from two Originals, little girl?"

E.J.'s mind froze at the word "Originals." She remembered what Damon had said about the Originals—a "family of humans" whose matriarch had turned into vampires with a spell. Could Rebekah and Kol honestly be from that Original family?

"Who are you?" Kol purred, sounding both irritatingly sexy and menacing at the same time. He leaned in close to E.J. and breathed heavily into her face. "Do tell, because we really do care."

E.J. lifted up her chin and glared at him. "I'm not telling you anything," she said with more bravery than she felt.

"The hard way it is then," Kol spoke again. When his pupils dilated, E.J. momentarily panicked before remembering the amount of vervain that she had ingested last night.

"Who are you?" Kol asked, his voice taking on the low and seductive tone that was common for a vampire compelling another being.

E.J. blinked up at him before grinning wickedly. "Angeline Jolie. You didn't recognize me?"

E.J. suddenly found herself flying through the air. She slammed into the opposite wall of lockers and hit the floor with a soft thump. She groaned and turned over onto her side, clutching her abdomen and thinking that she had probably broken a few ribs. She heard footsteps approach her but she could do nothing as she was picked up and pressed against where she had hit. Her feet were now on the ground, but that made E.J. no less helpless as Kol's eyes bore into hers.

"She could hear me with no link, Kol," Rebekah hissed.

Kol nodded. "Call Elijah."

There are more of them? E.J. thought dejectedly. And here she had thought she only had two psycho Originals to deal with. Whoever this Elijah was, she had a feeling he could take both of the two who were currently taking her hostage.

Rebekah whipped out her iPhone from the purse she had slung over her shoulder and quickly hit a button. E.J. was breathing heavily when Rebekah put the phone up to her ear and waited, tapping her foot impatiently. E.J. could only watch helplessly as she was sent off to her possible doom.

"Don't know what Elijah will have us do," Kol quipped, either to simply make conversation or make her nervous, E.J. couldn't tell, "but I assure you he will want us to take you hostage. To figure out who you are, you know?"

"You can't do this," E.J. hissed at him, but she already knew she had lost. She could now hear the distant sounds of Rebekah talking to the person on the other end of the line, but all she could take in was Kol.

"Sorry about this," Kol apologized, grinning wickedly, "but I don't want any screaming." E.J. only had time to suck in a breath before Kol reached out and grasped her by the neck.

TVDTVDTVDTVDTVD

When she woke up, she found herself seated in a comfortable armchair in front of a lit fireplace. She stared into the blazing fire, momentarily forgetting what had happened. The memories came back to her one by one, but she still had no idea how she had gotten there.

"I do apologize for my brother." E.J. jerked up at the voice and spun around to look behind her. Leaning against the wall beside a dark-wooded bookcase with a glass of wine in his hand was a man. He looked to be several years older than Kol and Rebekah with neatly trimmed reddish-brown hair. He was dressed in brown slacks and a dark-brown-and-light-brown-striped dress shirt under a light-brown vest. E.J. spotted a suit jacket laid over the back of a chair on the other side of the room.

E.J. made no attempt to answer, keeping her oak-green eyes trained on the man. Her brain was sluggish, but she had put two and two together and gotten four. In other words, this man must be Elijah. He certainly didn't look menacing, not like Rebekah and Kol. Wait, hadn't he said that Kol was his brother?

"You would do well to learn how to shield your thoughts," Elijah broke into her musings. "You are quite literally like an open book to me."

E.J. started and glared at him.

Elijah, or whom she assumed to be Elijah, smiled warmly and pushed off from the wall. As he approached her, she stiffened, but he seated himself in an armchair opposite her with no indication of malice. "My name is Elijah," the man said, "but you had already guessed that." E.J. nodded uncertainly. "You have already met my brother and sister. Rebekah and Kol may have been a bit—unorthodox in their methods."

"What happened?" E.J. was actually not surprised to hear that the three of them were all siblings. She really should have guessed that, knowing that the Originals were family. For some reason, Elijah did not frighten her as his siblings did. He just seemed more . . . human. Rebekah was a bitch and Kol was just—terrifying. Elijah seemed like any other middle-aged man that she might come across on a street or in Walmart.

"My brother felt the need to break your neck to hinder your screaming," Elijah answered mildly. "I do not approve of his methods, but I have learned long ago that Kol is difficult to control when I am present, nearly impossible when I am not."

That would explain why she had blacked out for a time. "I really don't know how I could hear everything," she suddenly spoke. She sensed that Elijah might actually listen to reason. "But I really don't think that warranted being kidnapped."

Elijah chuckled lightly. "It is indeed peculiar that you could hear Rebekah and Kol's conversation, but I would agree that it was unnecessary to 'kidnap' you. However, since you are here now, would you do me the favor of introducing yourself?"

There really was no harm in it. "Tell you what." For some reason, E.J. decided that she had a place to negotiate. "If you tell me who you all are, then I will be more than happy to tell you who I am."

Elijah looked thoughtful. "Am I to assume you expect more than just our names?" E.J. nodded firmly. "Very well then. I believe that is a very reasonable request."

Elijah stood and strode toward the fireplace, setting his half-full wineglass on the mantle above the fireplace. "I am the eldest among the Originals, the first vampires to walk the earth. A thousand years ago, my mother cast a spell that combined the immortality of a White Oak tree with that of the power of the sun to turn us into what we are. I will not go into details, but we became what we are the very next day." He sighed and reached out for his glass again, taking a small sip, keeping his eyes trained on the fire. "Among us there is myself, my brother Finn, my brother Niklaus, Kol, and then Rebekah. We have only recently begun to reside here in this house. Niklaus—" He paused, glancing at her as if unsure if he should say anymore. He must have decided that he could trust E.J. (or simply had nothing to fear from her) for he finally continued, "Niklaus had—kept us all together for a very long time and he brought us all here. We had been—estranged, us all, for some time, and have only recently decided to attempt to live together again." He sighed and shook his head. "I was afraid of what Niklaus would do if we left him again."

Something about how he spoke of this Niklaus person told E.J. that there was more to the story than Elijah was telling her, but she let it go since she certainly wasn't going to give her whole story either. "My turn, I guess." Elijah glanced up in surprise when she spoke, as if he had forgotten she was there. "My name is E.J. Hemmings, and I was the daughter of Rosalinda and Gregory Hemmings. You've probably already figured out that I'm a vampire, so I don't need to elaborate that they died." Elijah nodded. "I was an only child—I don't know why they never had any other children, but they didn't—and I was homeschooled most of my life. After they died, my friend Gloria took me in and became like a mother to me. It was her who directed me to come here, before she died, too, that is."

"I am sorry," Elijah spoke quietly. E.J. believed he really was, too. "How did you have the misfortune to become one of us?"

E.J. scrunched up her nose and shrugged. "I was attacked by a strange man a few weeks after I turned fourteen, and he fed on me, but . . . ." she trailed off and shook her head. "But I never drank any of his blood and he never killed me, I don't think, anyway. I honestly have no idea. I kinda feel like I've always been this way."

To his credit, Elijah kept a straight face. "I hope that you realize that that is impossible. No one is born a vampire. We cannot procreate, so that is entirely not plausible."

E.J. nodded. "Yeah, I know that. I can't change my story, though."

Elijah nodded slowly. "I see. It seems that perhaps there is more to you than meets the eye." E.J. blinked up at him, wondering what he was going to do with her.

"Where have you been staying?" Elijah asked, almost as an afterthought.

"At the Salvatore Boarding House."

Elijah didn't even look surprised. "Then I will call Damon and have him come and pick you up. Perhaps we can sort this out another time?"

It seemed that E.J. had been right about her first impression of the eldest Original. He really was a lot nicer than his siblings. She smiled in relief. "Thank you so much!"

Elijah merely nodded at her. "I am not promising that this is over, but I will not hold you here against your will."

E.J. nodded. "For the record, you are a lot nicer than your siblings." Elijah only looked sad as he left the room.

Damon did not look happy when one of the Originals—E.J. couldn't remember his name—answered the door. "Yes?" he asked Damon mildly, looking as if he'd rather be anywhere else but there.

"You know why I'm here," Damon snarled. "You kidnapped my kid!" E.J. raised an eyebrow at that.

The Original sighed. "First of all, Salvatore, I did not kidnap her. That would have been Kol and Rebekah. And, second of all, I was under the impression that she was not your 'kid.'"

Damon glared up at him. "Will you just please let me in, Finn?" he asked with a barely suppressed snarl.

E.J. repeated his name to herself several times so that she would not forget it. "He doesn't have to come in, Finn. I'll just go out."

Finn glanced down at her, looking genuinely concerned. "Are you sure that you want to go with him, miss?"

E.J. giggled. Finn was more like Elijah in personality, not being menacing and a total douchebag, that is. "Don't make me second guess myself, or else I might not."

"You could stay here," Finn offered, earning him a murderous glare from Damon.

"I like you and Elijah," E.J. explained, "but I'm not so sure that I could live under the same roof as Kol and Rebekah. Rebekah harassed me, unprovoked, mind you, and Kol snapped my neck."

Finn looked thoughtful. "Good point. All right." He stepped aside and motioned for E.J. to go out. She smiled and nodded politely at him as she strode out the door and right past Damon. While Finn was standing so near, Damon clearly did not dare say or do anything, and just followed her down the stone walkway to his parked car, muttering under his breath.

"I can't believe this!" Damon waited to sputter until they were at his car. E.J. was pretty sure Finn could still hear them, since he was standing in the doorway watching them, but Damon either hadn't noticed or didn't care. E.J. was betting the latter.

"The nerve!" Damon continued. "Kidnapping you like that and then even suggesting that you should stay there! As if I am an unfit guardian!"

E.J. raised an eyebrow up at him. "You're no kind of guardian. You're my landlord."

"I'm Stefan's legal guardian!" Damon sputtered. "And, as far as I'm concerned, I am your guardian until you miraculously age yourself to eighteen overnight."

E.J. frowned but climbed into the passenger side when he opened the door for her. She knew that Damon had a point. Even for a vampire, she wasn't very old, and really should not be living on her own. She suspected that was why Gloria had directed her to the Boarding House. Maybe she had known Damon would act—

Her thoughts abruptly ground to a halt. Wait, what if Gloria had actually known Damon?

"Did you by any chance ever know a witch named Gloria?" E.J. asked once Damon had climbed into the car.

He fit his key into the ignition and started the car, glancing up at her briefly. "Not that I know of. Why do you ask?"

E.J. sighed and slumped further into her seat. "She was my godmother, and she took care of me after my parents died. She died a few months ago."

"Oh." Damon turned around in the Originals' large circular driveway and pulled out onto the road. He frowned as he built up his speed. "It's a long shot, but Stefan might know something about it. He—well, we were separated for some time, and he might have met her when I wasn't around."

E.J. nodded. "Yeah, I think I'll do that. Thanks."

Damon sighed and shook his head. "No problem, kid. Just try not to get yourself kidnapped by any crazy bitches or psychotic lunatics—in this case, both—again, okay?"

E.J. giggled and nodded. "But what if I happen to make friends with that crazy bitch and psychotic lunatic?" Damon quirked an eyebrow, but his eyes never left the road. "It could happen!"

"One step at a time, sweetheart," Damon chuckled. "How about you make some human friends first?"

E.J. frowned. "You have human friends?" Who else would Damon introduce her to?

"Don't believe me? There's a little place downtown where we're bound to meet at least one of them. You up for it?"

E.J. shrugged before her face split into a wide grin. "Sounds exciting! But can I invite my crazy-bitch and psychotic-lunatic friends along?"

There was a long pause. "Don't make me call a psychiatrist, kid."

AN: Now we've delved a little deeper into E.J.'s past, but there's still much more to learn. I'll update soon assuming that my computer isn't kept for several days. Review, pretty please, and let me know your thoughts! You can't see, but I'm making the "puppy-dog" eyes right now. They look like this: *.* Thanks for reading! Let me know if you have any questions or are confused about anything. Or feel free to continue to guess what is so special about E.J. Hint: there are many "layers" to it, and I've only begun to scratch the surface.