Isn't it lovely,
All alone,
Heart made of glass,
My mind of stone,
Tear me to pieces,
Skin and bone,
Hello - welcome home
Claudia first gets an inkling of the trouble ahead when it's already too late. They - Stefan, Damon and herself - are in the car heading towards the location Bonnie and Jeremy had pinpointed for them, the isolated, run-down house that Elena is being held at. Her brothers are lightly bickering as they often do, but on this occasion, their back and forth uncovers an angle on the situation Claudia had not yet considered.
"Hey, how much further is it?" Stefan asks, visibly restless as he tries to focus more on the outside world.
"About 80 miles." Damon isn't so obviously concerned but it's there, ever so slightly, in the terseness of his voice.
"Who do you think took her?" Stefan muses.
"Someone from Katherine's past. She said she was running from someone. Maybe they got the wrong girl." Damon responds with the casual air of someone who doesn't realise just how bad this prospect is. As someone who does know better, Claudia sinks further back into the back seat, her mind racing as she contemplates the likeliness of the dreaded scenario ahead. Fortunately, neither brother notices because they're dancing around the topic of who loves Elena.
For a short while, she still has the relative bliss of not knowing. Claudia can fool herself into thinking that she's being paranoid - that she's just so sensitive to the possibility of it being one of the Originals because she's spent the past 90 years avoiding them at all costs.
Claudia clings to this mentality as they come to a stop at the treeline a little while away from the big old house that the image Jeremy sent them dictates as their destination. Stefan is immediately off, his bag of weapons borrowed from Alaric slung haphazardly over his shoulder. Damon gets out the driver's side and doubles back to open her door for her, ridiculously blue eyes studying her closely as she climbs out.
"You feeling alright? You're not usually this... pensive."
"I'm just wracking my brains to figure out who could have snatched Elena this time." She's perhaps a little more sarcastic than she means to be, but she chose the right brother to say this to because Damon merely rolls his eyes, unable to question her own inappropriate use of the sarcasm he spouts every other sentence.
"Ha ha. Very funny. I dare you to say that to Stefan - see if you're the favourite sibling then." They traipse after Stefan together, Damon calling out to him. "House should be just beyond these trees." Stefan nods and moves to head off but Damon pipes up again. "Wait, now I've got a little more experience than you do with this sort of thing."
"So, what's your point?"
"My point is whoever has Elena is probably whoever was after Katherine in 1864 and before that."
"And?"
"It puts them at 500 years old and strong. You sure you wanna do this?"
"Yeah, I'm certain I wanna do it."
"Because if we go in that house we may not come back out." A very brief silence follows Damon's statement, and Claudia - who has drifted a little further towards the house, scoping the area out for signs of life - turns back to watch Stefan as he digests this information.
"All right, then I won't come out."
This irks Damon, she can tell. "So noble, Stefan." He jeers.
Stefan scoffs, "I... can't think of a better reason to die." He exchanges a look with Damon for a moment before he turns to seek out Claudia, and gestures to herself and Damon. "But if the two of you wanna stay out here, I'll totally understand." With that, he continues on his path towards the house.
Claudia and Damon glance at each other in silent consultation and both fall into step behind their brother when they reach a mutual agreement of 'yes'.
The three of them breach an already partially broken window on the second story and quickly pinpoint where Elena and her captors are in the building. They're moving quickly, clearly wise to their presence in the house with them. Claudia catches brief snippets of a voice she thinks she recognises, interjected with one she doesn't, and finally a third she's familiar with as Elena's.
Stefan, who is crouched across from her, starts to do some ridiculous, convoluted hand gestures that she narrows her eyes and shakes her head at. Before either of them can try to communicate more effectively, Damon blurs past them, down the stairs, and then is gone from their field of vision. Elena yelps as she stumbles across the floor, presumably colliding with someone who catches her.
"Rose?" The world stands still. It's him.
"I don't know who it is!" Rose protests.
Stefan, ignorant to his sister's unfolding crisis, does his part to distract their adversaries further. "Up here." He speaks loud enough to be heard but quietly enough to obscure their exact location.
Someone sprints at vampiric speed towards the stairs. Claudia's heart drops.
"Down here," Damon calls from downstairs.
One of her brothers - she can't tell which - throws one of the smaller stakes from Alaric's arsenal at the person on the stairs, and it makes impact, but doesn't do much more than that. The sound of wood being pulled from flesh is evident amongst the relative quiet of the ancient, dusty building and the stake is discarded just as soundly. Stefan pounces on the opportunity to extract Elena and shields her against a wall with his body, holding a finger over his mouth to signal for her to be quiet. Elena makes eye contact with Claudia for a moment and the two exchange a small smile, proof of their budding friendship.
"Excuse me..." Elijah speaks to the house now, annoyance colouring his tone. She resists the shiver that threatens to run through her at the sound of his voice after so long spent recalling it in her memories. "To whom it may concern - you're making a grave mistake if you think that you can beat me. You can't. You hear that? I repeat... you cannot beat me." From the sounds of things, Elijah has just broken something downstairs - Claudia assumes it to be something wooden - in order to fashion a makeshift stake. "So, I want the girl on the count of three," Elijah continues. "Or heads will roll. Do we understand each other?"
Claudia catches sight of Elena and Stefan in her peripheral vision - they seem to be in deep discussion without actually speaking - debating over weapons or strategies. Knowing Elena as well as she does by this point, Claudia can see where this is likely to be going. Elena will put herself in harm's way in order to grasp at the possibility that she can save her friends. As noble as it is, previous attempts have shown little effect. Even as she thinks this, Claudia can see that Stefan and Elena's planning stage is coming to a close.
So, Claudia swallows her fear, stomachs her anticipation, and steps out from her hiding space; a flurry of vampiric movement taking her to the landing at the top of the stairs that lead to the ground level. He's there, back to her at the moment, with some sort of weaponised coat hanger in his grip.
"Elijah," she calls out to him, knowing that had she still been human, her heart would be hammering and her palms would be sweaty - her legs shaky and her composure non-existent. As it is, she swears her undead heart throbs in her chest.
Elijah turns, and it feels like it takes forever for him to do so, but then he's facing her - looking up at her - taking in the sight of her stood above him with the sunlight from the tall windows behind her shining around her silhouette.
"Claudia," he responds in kind, though when he says her name it sounds more like a question - as if speaking it aloud into the space between them brings her into reality for him - he's taking slow steps towards the stairs now, eyes never leaving her face. He begins to smile, and the beauty of it almost takes her breath away.
It's then that Damon strikes, grappling the coat hanger from Elijah and herding him towards the front door with it while Stefan provides backup fire with the crossbow Alaric taught them how to use. Finally, once Elijah's back comes into contact with the door, Damon drives the coat hanger/stake through his chest, securing him to the ratty old door as he does so. Elijah starts to desiccate as all normal vampires do, but Claudia knows that it's far from enough to stop him. She wraps her arms around her torso, hugging herself as she approaches his motionless form. His eyes had never left her, even as he withered away. Elena, Damon and Stefan are mostly unaware of her reaction to Elijah's 'death', but it evidently hasn't escaped their notice that she addressed him by name seemingly without any prior introduction, because after they're done reuniting they fall quiet and watch her from their positions by the stairs. Feeling the three sets of eyes on her, Claudia pivots round to stare back at them.
"Claudia... how did you know his name?" Elena asks, softly. There's a stain on the sleeve of her shirt where blood from a wound has seeped through, and the sight of it nags at Claudia's subconscious, stirring the hunger inside of her.
"I know it's cliche to say that it's complicated, but..." Claudia shrugs, unsure of how else to phrase it while not giving too much away.
"Fill us in on the way home," Damon suggests, and the four of them emerge from the house into the Virginia sunlight.
But I know some day I'll make it out of here,
Even if it takes all night or a hundred years,
Need a place to hide but I can't find one near,
Wanna feel alive,
Outside I can't fight my fear