Author's Note: Fourth part is now up. Maybe Lizzie can get through to Hope and bring her back...maybe.

Just a short one this time while I'm working on part 5.

Chapter Four

You're Lying

Light brown eyebrows drew together as Hope frowned.

Why did her neck feel so stiff?

Hope opened her eyes to a grey, cracked ceiling.

Her frown deepening, Hope sat up and looked around. Now she remembered.

She glared at the bars of the cell Lizzie and MG had locked her in and knew she was back at the Salvatore school.

Hope stood and walked towards the bars, looking for anyone that might be lurking in the shadows watching her. Instead, all she found was Lizzie asleep in an uncomfortable looking arm chair.

Hope slapped her hand on the bars, making the whole thing rattle and jarring Lizzie awake; the book she'd had in her lap, dropping to the floor.

"Morning." Hope said sweetly, a tight smile on her face.

Lizzie straightened and stood, picking the book up and putting it on the chair as she moved closer to the bars.

"You're awake."

Hope looked down at herself, that smile still in place.

"So it seems."

Lizzie stared at Hope and Hope found herself wondering what Lizzie was thinking.

The tribrid tilted her head to one side and a corner of her mouth lifted slightly.

"So how much time do we have before MG comes back?"

Lizzie blinked, obviously taken from her thoughts.

"What?"

Hope wrapped her hands around the bars and pulled herself closer.

"Well if you wanted to join me in here, I bet we could have a lot of fun." She said, eyeing Lizzie up and down in the most blatant way possible.

Lizzie frowned at Hope but the tribrid could hear how Lizzie's heart rate had increased significantly.

"Oh come on, Lizzie, we both know you want to. This...thing with MG, it won't last. We both know it. Hell, I think even he knows it, the poor kid."

"MG cares for me. He loves me."

Hope sighed and rolled her eyes.

"So?"

"So? That's all I ever wanted, Hope."

Hope arched an eyebrow at the blonde.

"You think having someone to love is the only thing in this world that matters?"

Lizzie shrugged.

"M-maybe? I dunno..."

"It's not, Lizzie. There's power. There's having this belief in yourself that you can do anything you want and you don't need anyone standing beside you holding your hand while you do it."

Hope spoke with such assurance and passion that Lizzie wondered if that was what Hope had been seeking all along; to accept herself. To become the most powerful tribrid the world had ever known, without anyone there to help her. Maybe she really was ok being on her own.

Lizzie folded her arms.

"Well, you might not want anyone with you but I do."

Hope gave her a distasteful look.

"Well you were never one to stand on your own, were you? You always had Josie or your father or-"

"You." Lizzie cut in.

Hope faltered and then she stood a little straighter and turned her back on the witch.

Lizzie wrapped a hand around the bars as she stared at Hope's back.

"I remember when you were there for me, Hope. I know we didn't always get along but for the most part we did. You defended me, helped me...I knew I could count on you and I hoped that one day...you would known that you could count on me too."

Hope's shoulders stiffened but Lizzie pressed on;

"I love you, Hope Mikaelson. I did then and I still do now."

Hope's jaw clenched.

"I know you feel something for me too, Hope."

Hope shook her head.

"I don't." She said but it was through clenched teeth.

"I know you're hurting, Hope. I know why you turned your humanity off-"

Hope whirled around, her eyes full of anger as she strode up to the bars that separated herself and Lizzie.

"Do you? Do you really know why I did it, Lizzie?"

Lizzie swallowed but she wouldn't step back; she wouldn't allow Hope to see that she had her rattled.

"Because you-you got tired of being hurt. I get it-"

Hope frowned and pinched the bridge of her nose like she had a bad headache.

"No I don't think you do. I don't think you know what it's like to lose everything and have to navigate this shit hole of a world on your own-"

"You wasn't on your own-"

"Yes I was! I was, Lizzie. When I first came to the school, I had no one. I'd lost it all...my mom... my dad...everything. You didn't even want to know me at first!"

Lizzie folded her arms and looked a little guilty as she cast her gaze to the floor.

"No but I-"

Hope held up a hand.

"I know why." She said, her tone a little softer this time.

Hope sighed wearily.

"Look, Lizzie...I turned my humanity off because I couldn't handle it, okay? I knew becoming the tribrid would turn me into a monster anyway so why go through it with all my emotions weighing me down? There was just no point to that. I'm happy the way I am."

Lizzie looked up at her.

"Are you?"

Hope blinked and then smirked.

"What kind of a question is that? I told you I am."

Lizzie shook her head and gave Hope a look that told the tribrid she didn't believe her.

"Everyone needs someone, Hope. Even you."

Hope shook her head and her smirk became cold.

"And you think that someone is you, right? My saviour? My one shot at redemption? You think you're the one to bring me back into the light, Lizzie? Think you can save my soul?"

Lizzie hated how Hope's words were cutting her to ribbons but she held firm.

"I would like to try."

Hope stepped closer to the bars so that she could whisper in Lizzie's ear.

"You're wasting your time."

Lizzie grit her teeth and swallowed the nasty retort she had on her tongue.

"You care, Hope. You might not want to but you do."

Hope chuckled darkly and stepped back, folding her arms.

"Do I now?"

Lizzie nodded.

"If you didn't care you wouldn't have come up to me and MG. You would've walked right by without a glance but you didn't. You sat down with us."

Hope faltered slightly but Lizzie took that as a win.

"Why would you do that if you didn't care?"

Hope gave Lizzie a sharp grin.

"Maybe I just hate seeing potential go to waste."

"Potential?"

"Mm. You have it, Lizzie and you don't need someone like MG to complete you or make you any more of a person than you already are."

Lizzie wanted to smile at Hope, to thank her or say something meaningful but she knew that the tribrid would just throw it back in her face.

"Maybe not MG-"

"-Not me either." Hope snapped before Lizzie could finish her sentence.

Lizzie looked down.

"Can I ask you something?"

Hope sighed.

"I have a feeling that even if I said no, you'd ask anyway."

Lizzie ignored her.

"The way I feel for you...did you ever feel anything like that...for me?"

Hope rolled her eyes.

"Oh for fu-"

"Just answer me, Hope." Lizzie said tiredly.

Hope's jaw clenched.

"No."

"You're lying." Lizzie said, triumph in her voice.

Hope grinned.

"Or is that what you want to believe?"

Lizzie glanced down at Hope's chest and the tribrid frowned as she looked down at the pendant attached to a leather cord she hadn't noticed there before.

It glowed red.

Hope grabbed at it and snapped the cord around her neck as she hurled it to the ground and crushed it beneath her boot.

Lizzie had an infuriating smirk on her face.

"So you did feel something."

Hope snarled low in her throat.

"Even if I did, it doesn't matter now. I'm not that girl anymore. This girl, cares for nothing and... no one." She bit out at the end.

Lizzie shook her head at Hope.

"I don't believe you."

"I don't care what you believe!" Hope roared.

Lizzie shrugged. Knowing that Hope had been lying gave her the confidence boost she needed to taunt the tribrid even more.

"So was it like a crush, like you had for Josie? or more than that?"

A muscle in Hope's jaw twitched and she moved towards the bars again, wrapping her hands around them as she looked deep into Lizzie's blue eyes.

"I am done answering your questions, Lizzie. I'd let me out of here right now before I bring all of hell to this place."

Lizzie rolled her eyes as she folded her arms.

"I seriously doubt that, Hope. We have so many protection spells in place you couldn't hope to break through all of them."

Hope arched an eyebrow in challenge.

"Oh yeah? You wanna test that theory?"

Lizzie just shook her head and went over to the arm chair she had been sleeping in.

Picking up the book, she held it up to Hope.

"Have you read this one?"

Hope looked at the cover and found she didn't recognize it.

"Nope. What is it? Some soppy romantic fairy-tale where everyone lives happily ever after and no one dies or gets killed and the prince finds his princess? Some bullshit like that?"

Lizzie shakes her head again and glances down at the book.

"No. It's about a misunderstood villain. He doesn't mean to be evil, he just felt he had no choice but to turn to the dark side."

Hope gave her a sardonic look.

"And I suppose you can see the similarities between me and this...guy, in that book?"

Lizzie shrugged.

"Not really. I just found it interesting how he turns it all around in the end. I figured if there was hope for him-"

"-Then you think there's hope for me too. Yeah. I get it. It's such a shame you're wrong." Hope stage whispered.

Lizzie sat down in the arm chair and opened the book.

Hope watched her and found that Lizzie wasn't going to entertain her anymore.

Boring.

"Is that it?"

Lizzie turned a page without looking at the tribrid.

"Is what it?"

"You're just gonna sit there? Not talk to me?"

"Nope."

Hope sighed and sat down heavily on the cot in the corner.

"Well this is going to be a long night."

"Day. It's day now." Lizzie corrected her.

"Whatever." Hope drawled.

Lizzie sat back and flipped through the book, while watching Hope out of the corner of her eye.

Now she knew the truth, she guessed that she had a pretty good idea of how to get Hope Mikaleson's humanity back.

Author's Note: Part 5 coming soon. Bear with me, it'll be worth it ;)