X.

Meanwhile, Caitlin was creeping her way through the woods behind the Mystic Falls High School, hoping to find something interesting. Unfortunately, these woods were rather extensive, and covered a lot more area than she'd been expecting. And not only that, but if this mysterious hybrid was hiding out somewhere, there was always the chance he wasn't anywhere near here, and had simply chosen this as a meeting spot so that the witch wouldn't have too far to travel from the school.

After over two hours of not finding anything, Cate was about ready to give up and call it a night. Of course, things always took a turn for the worst once you'd made up your mind about something. She heard a branch snap not too far off behind her and it wasn't until she spun around and saw someone standing behind her that the stench of a hybrid finally reached her.

Sucking in a deep breath while she tried to contain the fear she was feeling, she recognized the boy in front of her as Tyler Lockwood from the picture Elijah had given them. She reached in her pocket and sent Elijah a message that simply read, Found Tyler. In woods with me now, and hoped he'd hurry. This Tyler kid was giving her a very strange look; almost as if he recognized her, but his face quickly went blank again when he caught her staring.

Caitlin assumed she simply read his expression incorrectly, because there was no way she'd ever met this boy before. Though he was a hybrid, he was still just a teenager, and this was her first time to Virginia ever. "Are you Tyler Lockwood?" She questioned quietly, not sure if anyone else was here with him.

"Why are you here?" He countered, and Cate knew he wasn't going to make this easy on her.

"That's not important. You know there are a lot of people looking for you right now," she replied, trying to decide if she should just run now in the opposite direction and get the hell away from him before he could bite her. He was going through so much trouble to keep himself hidden that she doubted he'd give much chase if she did leave. But she desperately wanted to know what he knew, why he was hiding, and find out whatever she could about Elijah's missing brother.

"I think it's important," he announced and Cate pushed a hand through her hair in exasperation. This was not how this conversation needed to go.

"Look, are you Tyler or not? I need to know if you know anything about a hybrid named Klaus?" She was trying not to let anything slip about her relationship to Elijah, in case Tyler ended up back with his friends again soon. She couldn't risk blowing their cover, even if this kid didn't seem to want his friends to find him.

"Why are you looking for him?" he questioned, and Cate was sorely tempted to smash his head into a tree trunk. He was 18; she was 397. She could overpower him any day of the week, and he couldn't bite her if he was unconscious, or tied to a tree.

Sticking to the lie she & her siblings had come up with to keep the Salvatores from trying to kill Elijah to take them all out, she answered, "My family and I are of his bloodline, and we want to find out what happened to him. If we should expect to drop dead at any moment because he's dead, or if he's still alive out there somewhere. And you're his first successful hybrid. We thought you might know something." He looked at her with suspicion, but Cate didn't know what to make of it. He had no reason not to believe what she was telling him.

"Well sorry, I don't know anything," he replied, not sounding sorry at all, and continued to watch her closely.

"Well, thanks anyway. And why are you out here all alone? Is everything okay?"

He smirked at her for a moment before saying, "I'd be more worried about myself if I were you. All alone in the woods with the big, bad hybrid."

"Wow, you guys really believe your own hype, don't you? I'm almost four hundred years older than you, kid. I'm not that worried. Besides, my backup should be here any minute, and combined, the five of us are just shy of two thousand years. All you've got is sharp teeth." Not that that was at all true. She was terrified, and it was probably pretty obvious, but Cate could talk a good game, and right now she was just praying Elijah hurried his Original arse up.

Tyler grinned at her, but it was a rather menacing grin, and when he took a careful step forward Cate decided she'd waited for Elijah long enough. Casually pushing off the tree she'd been leaning against, she looked at him a moment. Opening her mouth as if she was going to say something, she took off as fast as she could in the opposite direction, trying to get out of the woods, hoping she'd caught him off guard and was faster than he was, or that he wouldn't give chase. She'd tried to stall and give Elijah enough time to show up, but she wasn't waiting any longer. That kid had seriously creeped her out.

She ran all the way back to the house as fast as her vampire speed could take her. Once inside she slammed the door shut and threw herself down in one of the chairs. After calming down a bit, she looked around and noticed the house was pretty quiet. "Guys? Quinn? Bran? Anyone?" She called out, listening for a reply. When she got none, she checked her phone. No messages, but it was only 11.

Quickly sending Done. Where are you? to all four of her siblings, Cate waited for a reply. A few moments later she got two texts. One from Quinn that read Grill. Coming? to which she quickly replied yes to. The other she hadn't been expecting. It was from Elijah. We didn't find him. Keep an eye on the witch. Thank you.

Deleting the texts to and from Elijah, Cate grabbed her jacket and started for the Grill. It seemed like everything had gone well, aside from losing the hybrid kid. Why not celebrate with a beer?

She never noticed the figure down the street, leaning against one of the houses in the dark, watching her.