I know the part about Klaroline was much appreciated, and that you'd all love to see more, but sadly, there's not much of that in here. Sorry. Instead, take tons (~4,500 words) of Mikaelson Family feels.

WARNINGS: pregnancy hormones, Kol being Kol again, a homophobic slur (just one, and it's not aimed at anyone), a comment on mental health and suicide, lots of stuff about the family and the abuse... Oh, and two flashbacks!

6.3

There isn't much in the way of proof, other than her birth certificate (as well as Henrik's, Kol's and Nik's that she stole from their baby books weeks before Mother died) and a picture taken May 8th, 1996.

The picture shows all of her family - except her wretched parents, of course - happy, whole, safe. Nik has a black eye, and both Elijah and Kol look roughed up. Rebekah herself is missing a tooth, from the slap her mother hit her with, and Freya's makeup is running. Only Finn and Henrik look okay physically - though at the time, Finn had been shaking with fury, and Henrik had just calmed down from a crying jag that lasted hours.

But they were happy, to be together without their parents, and safe, since their parents weren't home. Their levels of overall happiness and safety hinged on their parents, as you can tell.

She shows the picture to Fred. It's a bit nerve-wracking, since she's kept this secret for almost twenty years, but he reacts well.

"That's you?" He asks, grabbing the picture gently.

She nods, biting her lip.

"When was the taken? How long have you had this?" He glances up at her briefly, then looks back down to the picture.

"It was taken two days before my mother's death, and I've had it since my social worker let me get the film turned into actual pictures."

He looks both impressed and a little sad. "Wow. That's…."

"It's depressing, I'm aware." She laughs a little nervously. She's tempted to tell him about what she does when she's sad - look at the picture and pretend she can talk to them again. She won't divulge that, but she wants to.

He smiles a fleeting smile, still looking at the picture. She doesn't miss how his eyes land on the bruises and other flaws. Eventually, he says, "you should send this in when you call. It'll be the second picture they have of all of you guys, and it shows Niklaus' face. That's a big deal."

"Oh, if he knew you'd said that, his ego would inflate ten times what it already is."

"Is that what he was like?" Fred questions curiously.

"Yes." She reflects for a moment, what her siblings were like. In the face of abuse and neglect, they had all carved themselves a space in the family. Freya was the mature mother-like figure, Finn the perfect son/brother, Elijah the martyr, Nik the egomaniac, Kol the troublemaker, Henrik the happy one, and herself the princess.

They had all had their "alter egos" of course. Freya had locked herself away, Finn had angry jags of misbehavior, Elijah had put himself first, Nik had treated her like she was the best thing to ever happen to him, Kol had been good, she had put Henrik before her, and Henrik had cried and cried.

She can't stand to think about it anymore, though. Her hormones aren't helping what's always been a delicate subject. So, instead of expanding on it, she says, "I'm going to call in now. Can I have that back?"

He frowns at the way she's shutting her emotions out - he hates it, but it's not something she can fix - but says nothing and hands her the picture. Once she has it, he offers, "I'll be right out here if you need anything, alright?"

"Yes, thank you, love." She gives him a smile, and moves to their bedroom.

8.6 - May 8th, 1996

"Okay, everyone, settle down now! I'm going to put it on a timer, and if it's not perfect, we're going to do it over and over again until it is." Freya clapped her hands, like that would make her siblings listen.

Finn, clenching his jaw, pulled Henrik away from Rebekah and Kol, and rocked him. He wasn't exactly gentle, but Henrik responded better to it than he did to the kids' poking and shushing.

Freya, knowing what he was doing to help her, shuffled him into the seat at the table. "You two just sit here, while I get the others." She leaned in, and added under her breath, "I know you're upset, so thank you for not doing anything about it."

"What am I supposed to do? Punch the wall?" He snorts, "hit Niklaus and blame it on him?"

She eyes him sternly. "Don't joke about that."

"Was I laughing?"

"Whatever, Finn." She turned, and in her normal pitch, she said, "okay, kids, let's go."

Elijah sighed, and pulled Niklaus to the table. "Come, brother." He used his haughty tone, the one that made Niklaus smile.

This time, it was barely a smirk, one that didn't reach his eyes nor last long. But it was a smile nonetheless, so Elijah, and by extension, Freya, took it.

Rebekah scurried to the table, eager to get the spot next to Niklaus. Kol, however, leaned up against the wall, acting like he was Finn's age instead of his own.

Niklaus rolled his eyes, and ignored the smarting of his blackened one. "Kol, just sit down. It's just a picture. It won't take that long."

His levity was noted. It was also a facade, since they all knew what he thought about pictures. He hadn't been in one with any of them since Henrik was a baby, not ones that Father hadn't removed him from at least. This would be his first, and since Father wouldn't know, it would get to last more than a few days.

Even Kol, who loved to do the opposite of what he was told, understood that. With a heaving sigh, like sitting for a picture would kill him, he hopped into the chair next to Elijah.

Freya came over to pull her seat out, and ruffled his hair. "You look like a king, sitting there," she teased. Rebekah instantly asked if she looked like a queen. Even though she wasn't at the head of the table like Kol was, Freya assured her she did.

Then, she moved to the camera, and set up the timer. "Okay, everyone, it's starting." She ran to her chair, between Kol and Finn, who had Henrik in his lap now, and had just gotten herself settled when the camera flashed.

She stood again, and moved to the camera. The picture looked great. She smiled, glad that there would be a memory like this for them to look back on in the future.

"How's it look?" Elijah asked.

"It looks like the bomb." Finn rolled his eyes at her attempt to be cool, but Kol and Rebekah laughed. "I was thinking, though. We should do one more, making silly faces. You guys wanna?"

Rebekah nodded so hard her hair whipped around and hit Niklaus. He just smiled, though.

His tender moments, like so many of theirs, were few and far between. For Niklaus, Kol, and everyone older than them, they often were only about Rebekah and Henrik. Even when Rebekah was acting like she owned the world, and when Henrik would cry until he couldn't anymore.

Freya pushed the thoughts away. "Okay, I'll start it….now."

She ran to her seat, and had a few more seconds than last time to make a silly face. Only Henrik hadn't done it, but then, he was barely a year and a half old.

Kol bounded out of his seat to see the picture, so Freya crouched down to his level. Rebekah came over to see it, too.

Kol laughed at the face Finn made, where he rolled his tongue and crossed his eyes, while Rebekah said that Henrik looked adorable with his dopey look.

Before she could show her other brothers, the sounds of Mother and Father's car coming up the driveway sounded. Frantically, she handed the camera to Rebekah, and told her, "hide this where our parents won't find it."

She didn't seem to understand quite why, but she nodded, and ran upstairs. Kol cocked his head at her like he was deeply thinking about why she said that. Then he made a little shrug, and ran after Rebekah.

Niklaus swallowed anxiously, and made sure he and Elijah looked busy. Finn stood, and moved towards her, cradling Henrik more gently. In an undertone, he said, "if he hits Niklaus, or calls Kol a fag again, I'm going to kill him."

"You can't," she responded in the same whisper. "I'm not eighteen yet. Just wait until then, Finn, please."

Angrily, he gave her the Mikaelson Family Eyebrow of Incredulity. "Fine. Take him," he said, handing Henrik over. The baby made a protest, but quieted immediately when he heard Father's voice. "I'm going upstairs. Have fun dealing with them."

And with that, he had left her with three of her brothers and their parents. Dammit, Finn.

8.7 - May 16th, 1996

Nik blinked his eyes open. There was a nurse standing there, and when she saw that he's woken, she smiled brightly at him.

It was a fake smile. He'd seen enough of them in his almost nine years of life to know which ones were real and which ones weren't.

She gushed, "it's your birthday, honey. We got you a present, me and Kyle. He's not here just yet, so you'll have to wait, but that's okay. We can do our tests first."

He gaped at her. It was his birthday, the first one he'd ever spent without his siblings. He was alone, except for his two nurses who tried so hard to cheer him up, it made his sadness worse.

Humiliatingly, he felt his eyes well up with tears. He hadn't cried in years, not since Kol was learning to walk and almost fell down the stairs. Crying brought on an odd, terrible feeling that he hated. He felt weak, and vulnerable, and like he was laying himself out so Father could hurt him even more.

Rachel's eyes widened, and she comforted him awkwardly. She tried to pull him into a hug, but the railing was between them, and he didn't want a hug, anyway. There were only six people on the planet who could hug him, and they were gone.

He pulled away, angry at the circumstances, and sobbing like a baby. "Just leave me alone," he pleaded.

She patted his hair, and said, "I'm sorry Niklaus, I can't. I can't leave you alone like this."

If she wouldn't leave, then he would hide. It was the coward's way out, but he didn't care anymore. He pulled the sheets over his head and curled into the fetal position, not caring when his broken ribs twinged painfully.

His concussion was making him dizzy, but he didn't care about that, either. He just wanted to be alone, far away from the nurse who thought her presence would make up for his siblings'.

She wouldn't leave though, and he knew it. He knew it, because he never got what he wanted, and he never would.

0.6

A knock sounds on the door of Finn's hotel room.

"Hold on, Sage," he says, and moves towards the door. It's Graham. He smiles easily and tells Finn it's time to go to dinner. Finn says he'll be right there, tells his wife and their children he loves them, and makes his way downstairs.

Leif smiles at his grandson, when he gets to the table. "We'll order first, but then, we have a surprise for you, Finn."

"Really?" Finn questions, a bit excited. He has no idea what it could be, and that makes the suspense better.

Leif and Aerona nod. He smiles, but doesn't ask about it again until after everyone has placed their orders.

Aerona starts, "now, usually, I would not allow this, but you'll want to pull out your phone."

It clicks then, without them saying anything else. He grins, and pulls up the ancestry app.

"We're going to tell all of you about the family you have yet to meet," Torunn adds, excited.

"What do you have so far?" Leif questions.

"On our side, just my siblings, Mother, and Father. I added you three as well, but I don't have any dates or anything."

"I'll start, then," Torunn says. She gestures with her words, and almost knocks over Elijah's drink. "Sorry about that."

"It's alright," he waves off.

"If you're sure." He nods, so she turns back to Finn. "I was born the 11th of April, 1976, in Tromsø, Norway." Finn adds the info quickly, and delights at the hint that shows up. He ignores it, though, and gestures for any more information. "On the 23rd of November, I had a daughter named Octavia Daanson, two 'a's."

"Who is her father?"

"Zachariah Daanson. We married in 1994, oh, and all of this happened in Tromsø. Then, on the 3rd of June, 1996, we had another daughter, Rachel."

Leif and Aerona went on to say their birthdays - the 25th of July, 1929, and the 22nd of September, 1930, respectively - and that Aerona had been married once previously before Leif. His name was Emil, he was much older than her, and with him, she had four kids: Gregor, born 1947, Annalise, born 1948, Birgitta, born 1950, and Greta, born 1952. Emil died in 1953, she met Leif in 1954, and in 1957, they were married.

Together, they had 13 children, not including her first four. He puts in the information of all of them while ignoring Kol's constant complaining and Elijah's answering bickering of how they're hearing about their aunts and uncles, and isn't it interesting? and no, of course it isn't, what do I look like, someone who's having fun? and of course you do, I thought it was obvious.

Finn ignores them so hard, Freya has to deal with them, despite it usually being his job. They love, and they'll listen to her sometimes, but she doesn't have his 'keep doing whatever it is you're doing and you'll suffer' voice.

They calm down, though, when the food comes, and allow Finn to continue to hear about how Leif and Aerona's oldest, Freydis, died young, and left a daughter not much older than Freya. The daughter, Ellinor, had been raised by Gregor and his wife in America.

They go over the rest of their cousins, and Kol interrupts only a few times: once to comment on poor Ogechukwukama "Ogechi"'s name, their cousin who was born only a year after Niklaus, and the other two times to ask if he could leave.

By the time dinner is over, Finn has a lot of his side filled in. They'd also gone over Leif and Aerona's parents, and when they heard that, other than Leif's mother who died in childbirth in 1945, and Leif's father, who died in 1978, they could've met their great-grandparents on Aerona's side. Her mother had died in 2002, and her father in 1999.

Elijah and Freya had been most upset about it, but calmed quickly when Torunn said she has news.

"Earlier, I got a call," she starts, "from a woman who claimed to know Niklaus." Freya, Finn, Elijah, and Kol gasp, while Leif, Aerona, Graham, and Katherine look interested, and Matt plays with the food left on his plate. "She said her name is Caroline, and that she and Niklaus - or Klaus, as she said he goes by now - had been together for six years."

"Six years?" Kol cries, garnering even more looks from the people around them than they had been before. "Six freakin' years?"

"Are you sure?" Elijah asks, prompting Katherine to lightly punch his arm. "I don't mean it like that. He always said he'd rather die alone than lose someone important to him, and he'd sworn off dating."

"He was nine."

"He was eight. And it wasn't a light decision, even though it sounds like it. We'd all made a pact, to never have children that could be tormented by either our parents or us, lest we turn out like them. He thought it best to just never date anyone, or fall in love. He didn't want to become our father."

Kol, swallowing visibly, cuts in, and redirects, "Torunn, did she say anything else?"

"Just that he didn't seem depressed generally, and that he left her on the fifteenth anniversary of your mother's death. Apparently, it affected him, unlike all the other ones they'd spent together. She wasn't sure why, really."

"May I see your phone? I'm going to call her back, see if I can't get anything out of her," he says, reaching a hand out expectantly.

"Bad idea," Freya coughs with a smirk.

"Shut up. Don't you want to see if there's anything else we need to know? Not depressed doesn't mean non-suicidal, or even mentally healthy."

"She hasn't seen him in, what, three years this coming anniversary? How would she know?" Elijah counters.

"Because six years is not an insubstantial amount of time. Surely, she had gleaned something about him we should know in the six years they were involved."

Finn adds, "I think you should call her."

"Don't be stupid," Freya responds as Elijah says, "that's an awful idea".

"Well, without one of our other siblings here to break the tie, I will be calling her. Torunn, the phone, please."

Reluctantly, she hands the phone over.

He goes to the call history, ready to dial the number again, but before he can, the phone rings.

0.7

Hesitantly, Kol answers the phone. "Hello? Are you calling for the Mikaelson Manhunt, or is this like a telemarketer, or something?"

"Kol? Kol 'Maid Service' Mikaelson? Is that you?"

All the air leaves Kol's body in one fell woosh.

There's no one else it could be. It's a female voice, and since he's been sitting across from Freya all night long, it can't be her. There's no one else who could possibly know about that nickname from his childhood.

"Rebekah? Princess Rebekah Mikaelson?"

"Yes, yes it's me." She makes a noise like she's crying, but he can barely handle his own emotions on a good day, so he pretends she isn't.

"Oh my god. It's wonderful to hear from you." He laughs wetly. He loves his older siblings, but Rebekah had always been the one he was closest to, even if it wasn't true for her. "How are you? How has life treated you?"

Everyone is staring at him, none more than his siblings. It's clear they want to talk to Rebekah, too, see if it's actually her. He's not about to give up the phone, though. Hell no.

"Well, I was adopted by a loving family. I'm married. We live in Denver." She doesn't waste a second to say, "I'm happy to know that you've made it out well."

"Yeah, I think my life is pretty obvious, and well-known, sister. But you, married? Pfft. What a poor guy."

She huffs at his teasing. "Fred is very lucky to have me."

"Fred? Like Flintstone? Or more Jones? Does he wear an ascot, or does he drive to work in a foot-powered vehicle? Bekah, it's important that I know these crucial details - "

"No, he doesn't wear an ascot, or drive a...whatever you said."

"A foot-powered vehicle? Shame, his legs would be amazing." He snickers, at both the sound she makes like he's completely offended her, and at the faces his other siblings, grandparents, and aunt are making.

"Whatever. Are you with our other siblings? I'd love to talk to them, since they won't annoy me nearly as much as you do."

He grins at the venomous tone, all too used to it, ever after so long. "You know, that reminds me - Freya, Finn, and Elijah all have children, now. Can you believe they're so old? And they went against the pact we all made! They - "

Rebekah hitches a sob, and he shuts up. Tentatively, he asks, "what's wrong?" Elijah gives him the evil eye, like he's done something to hurt their sister's feelings for real. They'd always teased each other, and he wasn't going to stop now.

"You hate children?" Her tone is blank, but that says more than it would have if she'd screamed at him.

"What? I love children, just not Mikaelson children. I mean, I've only met the one, and he's a sweet kid, but from what I hear, I don't need any more nieces or nephews - "

"I'm pregnant, you ass. Are you going to just not acknowledge my child, since you already have so many nieces and nephews or - "

"What? Rebekah - "

She hangs up on him. He pulls the phone away from his ear, shocked.

Elijah and Freya glare at him. Freya questions, "how do you even know it's her?"

He snaps, "she called me Maid Service Mikaelson. Who else knows that nickname, and isn't Nik? No one, not even Henrik."

Finn demands, "then what the hell did you do?"

"I didn't do anything," he insists before pressing her number again.

"What do you want, Kol?" She asks instantly, her screw you tone coming out in full.

"Listen, you brat, that's not what I meant, and you know it. I'm sure I'll love the kid. I just meant, I'm enjoying my life without any mini-me's running amok, and I thought you would feel the same way. Clearly, that was incorrect."

"Clearly," she icily responds. "Now, if you could please hand the phone to someone who isn't you, that would be much appreciated."

"How do you this isn't my phone?" He can't help but tease.

"Even you aren't stupid enough to put your personal number online. Now give the phone to someone else or so help me, Kol Nathaniel Mikaelson, I will - "

"She wants to talk to you," he blurts, and passes the phone off to Elijah. Leif snorts, while Aerona and Torunn watch the exchanges avidly.

"Hello? Who is this?...This is Elijah…..Yes, yes…..I truly apologize for his behavior, Rebekah, I'm not quite sure what he….Oh, he did, did he?" He gives Kol the evil eye again. "I'm going to have a talk with him, definitely…..Well, in that case, I'll hang up so that you can send it in. It has been great to hear from you, really…..You too."

Then he puts the phone down. "Katherine, could you take Matthew to the bathroom, to get cleaned up, please?"

"Sure. But you're going to tell me what happens while I'm in there."

In the face of her finger pointing at him dangerously, he easily agrees, "of course, love." She smiles, nods, and takes Matthew away from the table. Once she's out of earshot, Elijah turns to glower at Kol. "You told her you wouldn't love her child?"

"Rebekah's pregnant? Are we sure about this?"

"You know what, I think I need to use the restroom, too," Graham inserts awkwardly before hastily leaving.

"Well, it was definitely Rebekah on the phone. And she's going to text a picture that she called 'proof'. But I don't care about that, I care about Kol telling her he wouldn't love her child."

He puts his hands up. "Hey, it's not my fault, I thought she was single, or sticking to the pact, at the very least."

"Sure, Kol. If she tries to rip you limb from limb, I won't be stopping her."

"What? You'll just let her hurt me?"

"If there's one thing I've learned about pregnant women, it's that you let them do what they want." The phone buzzes, but they ignore it momentarily.

"Oh my god," Kol sighs. "Just check to see if the proof is good or not." He mumbles, "what do I care."

Elijah, fed up with him, shakes his head and looks down to the phone. He gasps. "Oh my god. This is that picture, the one that was taken just days before…."

He trails off, so Freya grabs the phone. She gapes. When Finn sees it, he lets out a shocked laugh. And when Kol sees it, he lets out a hoot. "That's us, alright. That means that we've found our dear sister."

He hands the phone to his elders, who look at it with delight and surprise. This is only the second instance of Niklaus, Rebekah, and Henrik that they've seen before.

And even though Kol just made Rebekah mad, it's a very successful dinner.