A/N: Here's the next chapter. So far I've been good with updating. Hopefully I can keep up with that. So thank you again to everyone who reviewed, faved, and alerted this story. You guys are the reason I'm still updating this story. So here it is Chapter 8.

Chapter 8

"Seek the friend who's helped you and tell them what they mean to you."

-Unknown

They had been up for the past five hours listening to the hunters describe the situation. Bonnie could see that her friends were tired. Unlike them, she was use to the getting up early. Most of them slept until about late most of the time, while she was up at the crack of dawn. Damon's hand was intertwined with hers and Bonnie made sure she snuggled up to him. Looking over the room she saw Tyler dosing in and out of sleep, Elena was tired but she looked to be trying her best to stay up, and Stefan he was the only other one besides her from their small group who was wide awake. "So we are going to hit them here and here. The demon who we call Mike."

"Why Mike?" Lena answered yawning in between her questions. Nate's eyes moved to Evan who just shrugged his shoulders.

"I was tired of calling him the demon so I figured Mike sounded evil right." Bonnie grinned at her silly friend.

"While I so want to listen to Evan explain why Mike is an evil name," Meg said sarcastically, "I think we should get back to getting out all the information so they will be ready."

"Good Idea." Jasmine said moving to stand next to her husband. "Nate should be finished giving the basics."

"We've been up for almost four hours listening to the basics?" Elena said the question making her eyes pop.

"Yes and the places he stays and other important stuff."

"The important stuff is the basics?" Tyler asked another questions as Jasmine huffed.

"Bonnie, how do you guys go about killing creatures in your neck of the woods?"

"Damon handles all that. He calls me if he needs me but most of the time him, Alaric, Jeremy, and Anna handle it."

"So blue eyes, how do you get ready for battle?"

"Seeing as though I'm a vampire, I drink all the blood I need and I'm set."

"My brother doesn't really plan he makes it up along the way." Bonnie nodded, that sounded about right she thought.

"We are humans so we have to take precautions and make sure there is little to no chance of us getting hurt or killed."

"Just explain to them the game plan so we can start to put it into practice." Nate moved to let his lovely wife take over.

"Here's what you need to know: Vampires, Hunters, and wolf are going to practice the combat of battle and the witches are going to worry about the potion to kill the demon."

"Mike." Evan said giving Jasmine a duh look. "Alright, the demon." The hunter raised his hands in defeat after getting an annoyed look from her.

"I've got the potion under control, so she can do battle with you." Bonnie was offended. One because he didn't even call her by name, then he had the nerve to think he could do it all by himself.

"You mean Bonnie." Damon said defending his girl.

"Yeah. Bonnie can work with you I've got the potion under control." He huffed getting a look from Nate. Bonnie was so confused on why he was acting like this. Had she done something to make him upset since she arrived. Thinking about she hadn't done anything, maybe in all this time that passed he just became a jerk.

"While I do believe you can handle it, having two witches work on the potion would be better because it would be more power behind it when you spell it." Nate said making sure Josh understood that he was going to have to work with his cousin.

"Alright." Josh said giving up and wrapping his arm around Sara, who gave him a small smile.

"Before we get started I got to get something to eat." Damon said getting looks from everyone.

"Sara has some blood bags downstairs for you and your brother. Sara can you grab them a few?" Jasmine added moving to her friend. "Elena and Tyler since you two lack power…"

"I'm a werewolf." Tyler said making sure she understood he was supernatural.

"Yeah but most of you power comes when we are on or near the full moon. You still have the instincts and some strength but you can still learn hand to hand combat like us. You know just in case." Tyler and Elena followed Jazz and Meg to the back.

"Stefan?" Nate said walking to the green eyed vampire. "While you're waiting for Sara to bring back that blood, I want to show you our arsenal. Maybe you can tell us if were lacking anything in the department."

"Sure." Stefan got up and followed Nate and Evan to the basement. Bonnie looked around and noticed it was only her, Damon, and Josh. Though Josh was completely ignoring the two and staring at the board with all the information on it.

"So when do you want to start working on that potion. I've got some ideas that I think will work."

"Bonnie, you don't have to worry about it. I know what I'm doing. Who do you think has been casting spells before you showed up and after you left? Besides I know you want to spend time with your friends in battle. So don't worry your pretty little head about it." Josh moved around Bonnie but was stopped by Damon who held his hands in front of his chest.

"I don't know what your relationship was with Bonnie but I do know that if you talk to her again like that I'll make sure I rip your heart out from your mouth. Kay?" Damon patted the man's arm.

"What makes you think you can beat me?" Josh said not backing down from the blue eyed vampire.

Damon smiled as if this was funny and took a step closer to the warlock. Bonnie could see what was about to go down. "That's fine. I'll just work out on the field. It's no big deal."

The males didn't move and Bonnie felt like she was going to have to start threatening someone. "HHHere's the blood bag." Sara interrupted the conversation placing a glass and the blood on the table. Looking up she saw that everything was intense she spoke up. "Is everything okay?"

Josh finally moved away from Damon after glancing over to Bonnie. "Everything's alright sweetie. Just making friends with Damon here." Josh smirked at the vampire and went to grab his girlfriends hand leading her away from the two.

"What the hell was that? Why does he have a problem with me when he doesn't even know me?" Damon said picking up the blood bag and pouring it into the glass the Blonde vamp had placed beside it.

"He's never been like this before." Damon looked over to Bonnie and thought now was a good time to question her about that hug yesterday.

"So did something happen between the two of you? I mean that's the only reason he would be such an ass."

"We sort of dated."

"Really and you forgot to give out that piece of information. 'Hey Damon, before we go to N.C. you should know I use to date the blonde warlock who's sort of a douche.'"

"Because it doesn't matter." Bonnie said as if it wasn't a big deal.

"I saw that hug yesterday hell we all saw that."

"Damon you don't have to worry about Josh. We dated it ended."

"Are you sure?"'

She placed a kiss on his lips. "I'm all yours. I promise."

Bonnie walked in from outside after watching them practice. They had spent a week going over the game plan and she was sure she had it down to a T. Well good enough to at least take a break. Everyone had been getting along and she was sure that her friends had befriended her other friends and family. There was only one that was harder than the others and that was Josh. He had barely said anything to the people from Mystic Falls.

Some days they got only hellos and goodbyes and other times they had full conversations. The only people Josh hadn't said anything to were Bonnie and Damon and if he had no choice but to speak to them he usually spoke with harsh words. She had wanted to know what exactly had she done wrong so she could fix it but he was making that harder because he left the entire day and only returned at night when everyone was going to bed.

Today was her lucky day though. She walked into the kitchen to see him grabbing something that looked like toad eyes out the fridge. She wanted to make a joke to break the ice between the two but she couldn't really think of anything that dealt with toad eyes. She decided a normal greeting would be fine enough.

"Hi" He turned to look at her and went back to focusing on the eyes. "I don't know why you're not talking to me."

He paused and finally spoke to her. "I have something I have to attend to." He said moving around her. She grabbed his elbow and he stopped she could feel the emotion coming from him, love, hate, jealousy, envy, pride, and sadness. She could pinpoint a lot but only one seemed to stand out the most. Regret. She could feel him about to turn around and face her when she heard a tone of voice.

"You should have seen me. I think your friends are going to need more practice if they want to beat this bad ass Mike they keep talking about." Damon had been in the fridge grabbing water. When he looked back up to see her. "Bonnie, sweetie, I think you're my good luck charm?"

That's when she felt the anger become the strong emotion. Josh yanked away from her, "I've gotta go." She watched him walk away.

"What's up his ass today?"

"I don't know." But her second goal while here was going to be fixing whatever the hell was wrong with Josh and her friendship. "Maybe he doesn't like the fact that he spends all his time alone."

Damon sipped his water. "He's the one who asked to work by himself. Come on I think it's time for Tyler and Elena."She followed Damon back outside to their training.

She looked to see the Stefan and Tyler were missing. She knew they must have been the targets. Looking down at the monitors she could see Elena and Evan moving. It was their turn to try and hunt Stefan and Tyler. Bonnie watched Evan follow closely behind Elena hiding behind the natural obstacles they had. Elena looked behind her and when she turned back around Tyler had the hunter in a headlock and Stefan soon came knocking the gun out of her hand and shoving her up against the tree. Softly of course because this was Stefan.

"Elena you have to watch out for him. You turned your head for one second and they got him." Stefan had said to her letting her go.

"I know." she walked back towards the group. As Jasmine added her two cents.

"Evan you have to look out for any movement."

"I know." He moved towards the others as Meg gave a victorious smile.

"We've been out here for a week and a half and the only person doing well is Megan."

"We're getting better though."Elena said proud of herself.

"We have to be excellent though. No mistakes, because as you have seen one mistake can get us all killed."

"Put me in." Bonnie felt all eyes on her. She didn't know why that was such a weird request. That's why she was out her anyway. Right?

"What? Why would we do that?" Damon said.

"I've been watching but you haven't let me try it with anyone yet." Bonnie got looks from them all; apparently they didn't seem to agree with her.

"Bonnie I know that you are a powerful witch. We all know that but we can't have you using all those spells and start that nose bleeding." Nate said whom everyone seemed to agree with.

"I promise you, no nose bleeds." It was a minute before Nate had told her she could go ahead, but Damon didn't like it. "Since you're a witch we're going to make it a little harder for you. All of us against you." She was worried then.

"Are you sure?"

"This is the only way you can practice." They all made their way into the woods leaving her alone. She turned he body towards the house and looked up to see Josh looking back down through the attic window. She smiled at him and she was pretty sure she had seen the corner of his mouth raise a little. When she turned back around she grabbed her paintball gun and went into the woods ready for battle.

She was only 10 feet in the woods when she could feel something she stopped for a minute to listen and the sound of a branch made her snap her neck to her left. She walked slowly until she knew she was close. Staring at the tree in front of her, Bonnie saw Elena pointing the gun so that it was facing the opposite direction in which she was coming. Bonnie shot her in the back, causing Elena to jump. "Jeez, you scared me. I thought I heard something coming behind me."

"Sorry about that."

"No problem. Well you got me." She moved into the woods while Bonnie continued. She didn't know who was next up but she figured it would only get harder.

She would protect herself by hiding between the trees. She watched as the leaf fell from the tree. She figured it was odd that it was falling and only the one. Looking around she noticed a few leaves had fallen in the same spot and a couple of trees over.

She looked up and shot two shots.

"Damn." She could hear Megan say as she climbed down from the tree.

"Well at least she didn't hit you in the face." Evan said smearing the paint.

"My fault." She moved putting her finger in the paint that covered his eye and part of his forehead.

"I actually think it's an improvement." Meg said laughing as they exited the woods. Bonnie had now been going deeper in the woods as her thoughts travelled. She had to think about a way to get inside Josh's head to figure out what was wrong with him and why he was taking it out on her. She knew it that she had to repay the favor. She thought back to the first day that they met and why this was so important to her.

~Flashback~ 8 yrs ago (A month after Bonnie left home)

"No, No. I'm not staying here with her." Josh closed the book he was reading and was now facing Nate.

"Please man. She's been here for two weeks and she won't shut up about her friends. Especially someone named Damon. We can't take it anymore."

"Why do you think I stay away from her? I don't want to be dealing with some emotional teenager."

"We are just going to be gone for a couple of hours."

"No."

"Remember what I did for you?"

"What exactly did you do for me?" Josh asked curious as to what his friend was referring to.

"I helped you out with that girl back in Texas. You know the hot nurse."

"You told her I had cancer and that my dying wish was to be with a beautiful woman before I died."

"See you remember."

"Yeah and the rest of the night there she kept talking about treatments and other patients who she knew had the disease. I didn't even get laid man or any harmless flirting done because I kept thinking about sick people."

"Okay so that wasn't the best example but come on." Josh could see his Nate pleading with his face.

"What am I suppose to talk about?" the warlock said giving up and placing his book back on the table.

"I don't know. You're a witch, she's a witch."

"You know I don't like it when you call me that. I'm a male witch, so the correct term is warlock."

"Okay Glenda." Nate said jokingly. Josh ignored him, they were always going to tease him when it came to that. He stood up and walked out of the library.

"Where are you guys going anyway?"

"To that club down the street." He stopped and looked back at his friend upset.

"You didn't think that I would want to go."

"We all agreed someone had to stay here with Bonnie so you were chosen."

"She's your cousin."

"I spent the whole first week with her. More than enough time."

"You're lucky you're my best friend."

"Love you too man. Now we have to go so that the ladies can get in free." Nate smiled at Josh who couldn't help to laugh. He sat in his room, for the next five minutes after he heard the door close. He didn't know what to talk about with an 18 year old girl. So he figured magic would be a safe subject.

He walked to her door which was wide open and he could see her lying on her bed. "What do you want?"

"I was wondering where you hungry?"

"No."

"Okay do you want some company?"

"Why are you even talking to me? I've been here for two weeks and this is the first time you have said more than two words to me."

"I don't really know you."

"Neither did Megan or Evan but they did try at least." Josh couldn't believe it, was she actually complaining because he hadn't spoken to her. Typical teenagers everything had to revolve around them.

"Well excuse me if I didn't spend my time worrying about someone who ran away from their friends and family because they missed one little birthday." He knew he had said something to make her mad because Bonnie's whole body sat up straight in bed.

"Excuse me?"

"You heard me. You left home because nobody was paying you any attention well guess what honey the world doesn't revolve around you. People have lives they need to worry about. The first thing on their mind is not always Bonnie."

"You don't even know me. How dare you sit here and judge me."

"To be honest I wouldn't want to get to know you. Not worth my time." He could see the steam escaping her ears as he continued to speak. "Your friends are lucky to not have someone like you in their lives. I always hated people who wanted everything to be about them." He wasn't expecting her to do what she did next.

"Please just go," she said politely.

"You don't have anything to say." A smile grew on his face.

"No and if I did I wouldn't be talking to you about it." He was about to turn around to leave when he heard a sob. Looking back in the room he could tell that she was crying. Now he felt bad, not for what he said but for how he said it. He walked in and took a seat next to her.

"I thought I said I didn't want to talk to you." She attempted to wipe the tears from her face with the back of her hand.

He sighed. Why did he have to be a nice guy? "I apologize."

"For what? I know you meant every word you said."

"Yes but maybe I shouldn't have said it like that." He had to think of something else to say, something that wouldn't make her feel so bad. "They say that the ones that you love the most are usually the ones that hurt you the most. So it's likely the people you are trying to escape from are the people who truly love and care for you."

"That can't be true. Not completely."

"Why not?"

"I'm positive that Damon Salvatore resident Vampire does not love or care for me."

"Why would you think that?"

"He's the cause of almost all of my pain back home."

"That doesn't mean he doesn't care. Maybe he just has a different way of showing it."

"So he loves me but he's the reason for my Grams death, he used my friend as chew toy, he killed my best friend's brother in front of her, and he tried to kill me."

"It does sound harsh but did you ever think about it from his point of view."

"Yeah, I thought about why the psycho vamp tried to kill me and then I took it into deep consideration." Bonnie added sarcastically. Josh couldn't help but to laugh which in turn made Bonnie do so.

"I think that's the first time I heard you laugh since you been here." She looked up at his green eyes for the first time without tears in her eyes and smiled.

"Thank you."

"No problem." He got off the bed and walked back to the door with one last thought to say. "Something you should take with you. Once the game is over, the king and the pawns go back in the same box. Meaning at the end of the day we all come from the same place and end up back there."

"That's nice. Where'd you hear that?"

"I read it somewhere. It's an Italian proverb." She gave him one last smile as he exited the room heading back to his.

Sitting in his room he didn't know what he was feeling but when heard her laugh it was one of the greatest sounds he ever heard. Well except maybe the sound of victory after he beat Nate and Evan in Madden NFL. Either way he felt good about both.

~End of Flashback~

He had helped her get out of the rut she was in. Made her almost feel like her normal self. Though she wanted to punch him in the face at first. He came around eventually and had become a good friend. She was still moving deeper into the woods when she heard someone's voice cry out for help. Rushing towards the sound she saw Jasmine on the ground grabbing her knee in pain. "Jazz are you okay?"

"I fell out the tree trying to get a better advantage."

"Let me see." Jasmine moved her leg up and Bonnie looked at it. "It's not that bad."

"Oh." Bonnie had been watching Jasmine and she saw her eyes cut to something behind her and she could see a reflection in her brown eyes. She pulled out the gun and turned around shooting Nate in the arm. Then faced Jasmine.

"Did you guys really think I'd be that easy?"

"We might have gotten you if Jasmine hadn't looked at me." Nate said helping his wife up. Bonnie took that chance and shot her in the foot.

"Alright Bonnie you got us."

"Just making sure."

"There is only four left. Damon, Stefan, Sara, and Tyler."

"Saved the supernatural's for last, huh?"

"They would be harder to catch then us humans." Jasmine gave Bonnie extra paintballs while they talked.

"You have to have perfect aim for these four so you have to hit them in the heart."

"I can do that."

"I believe you. Now go get them." Bonnie walked off leaving as the other two made their way back to the house. She couldn't be thinking about anything else now, just ways to make sure she got her targets.

A/N: Hope you enjoyed this chapter. Things are going to start getting complicated for some of these characters. Bonnie will be dealing with the long term effects of her addiction to 'that shit'. Along the way we'll find out what happened with Josh and Bonnie. Then go back to Damon's suspicion of Bonnie. We also haven't seen or heard the last from Anna. Also one of these characters isn't exactly on Team Good. There may be a bad apple lurking about in the group. Only time will tell. Until next time…