Chapter 3 : The Guardian Angel

Time seemed to slow down to a desperate, aching crawl, and the only "living" occupants left on ancestral ground found themselves unable to move.

The very air froze around them as the saviour of the Mikelson miracle baby, to all appearance seemingly a creature of myth and legend, turned her green eyes on them.

Then, a gasp tore through the thin fabric of silence that had kept them in place and suddenly, broke.

The girl blinked at Klaus.

She blinked again, then stared down at the tiny baby still cradled protectively in her embrace and at her surroundings with honest confusion, as if ending up in a graveyard with a strange baby in her arms hadn't happened to her before. She repeated the gesture, as if the baby or Klaus would suddenly disappear out nowhere, which, of course, they didn't, one being safely secured in her arms and Klaus himself in the startling image his child and her would be Saviour made surrounded by the rubble, smoke and volatile sparks of magic that emanated the air.

It was only then when she looked away from his child in her arms and she look up again, that Klaus suspected she had for the first time truly noticed them. All of them.

Another blink.

This girl was either incredibly slow or incredibly fast.

Once again the girls eyes returned on him, this time with an expression so full of..grief? ..and longing..? and uncertainty that Klaus couldn't begin to interpret it.

"Klaus?," she finally said in a hoarse but not unpleasant mezzo-soprano. The girl abruptly stepped forward as if to reach for him as Hayley grabs their baby from her saviours arms.

"Who the hell are you?" The little Wolf demanded in a cold tone as she stared at the girl.

Another blink "Okay," the girl said dryly then took a step back "Either you´re a hallucination and I have cracked sooner than I thought I would. In which case, I should go and find a bed to die in, again. Or this is some Elder mind fuck for ignoring the call, in which case this is the worst impersonation attempt ever, and I should warn you that I'm second away from following my brothers example and shoving all of you away in some magic depleted pocket demonsion for a while, say, possibly, a couple hundred years or so until you die of old age."

Yes. Definitely not the first words Klaus had expected. But Elijah, now that little wolf had returned to them, remained as unfazed as ever.

"Though flattered that you didn´t mention the possibility of a nightmare", his voice as dry as hers,"Perhaps we should start with your name, my dear girl?" He offered. "I find that introductions are usually the best way to proceed in cases such as this."

In all his years as brother, comrade and at times enemy of the honourable Original, Klaus had seen this tone fail only twice. The first time with a very old, very cranky senile witch that had refused to believe that their darling Rebecca was not, in fact, her long lost cat, and the second time with The little she wolf, who Klaus had come to learn was a force all to herself.

Now he had the honour to witness a third time.

The girl is questioning glared at his brother. "You can sit on your request and rotate, Vampire. I'm afraid I'm not in a cooperative mood ," the woman said coolly. "Not a bit. But you are very welcome to tell me your real names."

If Elijah was perturbed by this, he didn't show it which was more then Klaus could say about himself.

"Now listen here…" Klaus began, determined to finally wrestle control away from her. This simply wouldn't do anymore. But Elijah , who was watching the girl very closely indeed, rested a hand on his shoulder.

"Elijah Michaelson, my brother Niklaus, this is Hayley , and this here is their daughter, the newborn you just rescued, for which we owe you more than we can ever repay." A reminder to him of the debt he owed the girl, if the add pressure to his brothers touch was any indication.

At first, the girl did not react at all to the introduction, she simply inspected Elijah as he spoke, who inspected her right back without the slightest perturbation. But that was Elijahs' nature. Not Klaus. Then the blonde frowned slightly. "You know what's strange, vampire? I know when someone's lying, and I can tell you're not. "

Piercing green trailed from him to his daughter and back to him again.

"She's your daughter?"

So she was slow. And more than a bit mad, Klaus thought with an internal sigh.

"Yes, I do believe my brother just told you that luv.." Klaus trailed off his eyes narrowing, something in her face had changed. It looked less hard, less forbidding, and perhaps there was a hint of grief added around the edges. She took a deep breath, nodded, as if to reaffirm the truth of his and his brothers words to herself.

She closed her eyes, and the grief on her face increased.

"Damn it!" She whispered. "Fucking cross-dressing know it alls…" she scowled. "I must have ransacked villages, committed mass genocide, and kicked a lot of puppies in one of my past lives to deserve this shit."

Then nothing.

When she opened her eyes again, however, the perfect control was back. Klaus was really beginning to wonder about this girl.

But now she had only eyes for him as she turned to inspect Klaus even more closely.

It was an uncomfortable experience, to put it mildly. The girl was a good deal smaller than he, and more importantly now that the distance between them had decreased, her scent, the smell of her hair had an instant unprecedented unpleasantly effect on his wolf, the beast seemed to howl in victory inside Klaus mind, as if it had found something it had been seeking in the strange little bird, something wild and dangerous underneath.

She squinted up at him silently, frowned, she stepped forward, then just as abruptly as she had moved towards him the girl stopped and waved her hand at them in a gesture all to familiar and a nerve wracking sensation akin to weightless free-falling overtook each of them before their body's were forcibly engulfed in a horrible combination of blue and white lights as the girl in question released keen sound of immense pain.

888

Chris froze suddenly as a flash of red infiltrates the corner of vision and she saw what was about to happen when the new vampire on the scene was instantly disarmed by the redhead witch they had all forgotten. Reacting on her well hound instincts she remote orbed the red heads four intended targets to safety. She grimaced, knowing there was no way to stop the attack from hitting her—she only prayed it would not hurt as much the last dark object to have struck her.

Unfortunately, not only was the Creator not listening to Chris, Chris suspected that there was some sort of vendetta in play here. Because while the cursed weapon did not strike her it did manage to embed it self in one of her wings.

The shuriken inflicts a thousand cuts to her now very carpal bloody wings

The pain that laced through her was a thousand times more brutal.

Her mind retreats searching through the days events for a way to escape the pain.

All morning she'd felt as if something was… off. She hadn't been able to figure out what she was missing. And now, something was happening, binding her and the Mikleson child, Klaus child together and she didn't understand it. A hand rose absently to her chest where she felt a sharp pull. It felt as if something was trying to forcefully rip her soul out—she felt a brief moment of panic, as the pulling became more insistent, and the young woman cried out as she collapsed, in front of two started originals, a werewolf and a crying baby. The fall left her dazed and her ribs began to hurt—she curled into herself, her finger digging into the holy ground beneath them and grasping at the space just above her heart, her eyes watering involuntarily from the sheer pain. She was suddenly freezing, her teeth chattering as an icy wind gripped her from the inside.

A soft, gentle hand settled on her shoulder, startling her. She lifted her head as much as she could and was stunned to see devil blue eyes peering at her in concern. It was Klaus. But it was not her Klaus, she didn't know much right now but pain but she knew that, so why was the doubleganger acting as if he was her Klaus? As if he cared that she was in pain? Why did he look at her how she'd always seen him look at her? Like her lover would have had he been here? It must have been her mind playing tricks on her, wishful thinking, but Chris didn't have much time to think on it because she felt ready to die.

The pain she was in was enough to cause her vision to blacken. She didn't want this. She had to leave, she had to get out of here. She didn't want to show weakness in front of this copy, to cry in front of him. He wasn't her Klaus, he didn't have the right to see her like this.

In a desperate attempt to leave, she rolled onto her knees and made to get up, but the ice had spread to her veins and she couldn't get them to respond properly so that when she did manage to get to her feet, she swayed dangerously and fell back onto her knees, unable to hold the position.

Something warm and soothing and wet swept down her cheeks and it took her several moments to discover that it was her own tears. She didn't even have the energy to wipe them away. All she could do was breathe and even that turned out to be a rather difficult task. When her vision cleared, she finally noticed that Klaus was not the only one standing in front of her. Elijah the older brother that she had seen only in her Klaus memory's and the still unknown werewolf behind him circled her, a very scared and crying baby secured safely in her arms. And another addition, dressed in dark leather and jeans, his dark eyes the colour of the night sky and wild as he knelt down by the dead redhead at his feet. Marcellus was the name her fractured mind provided.

Chris hadn't seen the newcomer kill the witch at his feet. She hadn't even heard or seen the redhead fall too consumed in the pain tearing her inside and out. The only thing Chris could see amongst the pain was Klaus attempting to talk to her, she realized belatedly. She could see the Hybrids lips moving, but Chris had to concentrate to disconcert any sounds because all she could hear was her own heart beating rapidly against her hurt wings and the flow of blood waging war in her brain.

"Are you okay?" the other hybrid asked. Chris swallowed thickly and tried one last time to stand, all the while nodding her head. She had not anticipated the intense wave of dizziness and nausea that followed her actions, and she stumbled right into Klaus's arms by accident, dry heaving as she collapsed once more. "Easy there, little bird," the Hybrid said soothingly as he tried to steady her, reminding Chris so much of her Klaus in that one moment that it just added to the pain.

In response to Klaus actions, Chris could only mutter something undistinguishable.

And then something swelled inside of Chris mind that reflected outwardly in her eyes for the briefest of moments—the ring of gold barring her memory of klaus from her thoughts for the past three years disintegrated. The memories danced in her mind over and over like a merry-go-round and Chris keened painfully, burying her face into Klaus neck, seeking protection in his warmth. The Hybrid circled the girls waist instinctively as if they had done so many times before and held onto her tightly, not knowing what else to do for her other than try to offer comfort. He wrapped his arms around the thin frame, somewhat startled at how small the girl was.

His arms held her still and she couldn't help but feel so damned safe in that embrace. The scent of paint was in her nose, paint and leather and she furrowed her brow and Chris finally lost consciousness.

Klaus looked to the others hesitantly, when the girl suddenly collapsed and found the four of them all watching in the same bewilderment he himself felt at petite girl wrapped securely in his arms.

Before his self preservation kicked in and he ordered his brother and mother of his child to return to the safety of the compound. Klaus himself carried the girl, who was far too easy to carry, and laid her down ignoring the strange and sudden urge to begin assessing her condition before walking away to see to his daughters well being.