Murder of One

It took all the strength and will-power I had to not devour the chocolate muffins in the brown bag I was carrying. Maybe they'd soften up Ric's evil side? I was being too optimistic, but it was optimism day for me. I went through all the good points of killing Klaus in the shower, and only realised I was saying them out loud when I turned the water off.

I knocked on the door, expecting Ric to answer it. But of course, Damon did. "Morning sunshine."

"How's Ric?" I asked, stepping into the apartment.

Damon blocked my way, wearing a smirk. "Indecent, but fine."

"Was there any talk about killing... anyone?"

"Nope," Damon replied, popping the 'p'. "Slept like a baby, woke up Alaric. No talk about dead council members."

"Then why do I feel like you're hiding something from me?" I questioned, looking past him and into Ric's apartment. "I know about the stakes. Stefan told me."

His face scrunched in anger. "Ah, well. Of course he did. What'd you bring me?" He snatched the brown bag from my grip and sniffed it. I narrowed my eyes at him. "Ooh, chocolate muffins. You know what they say! A way to a psycho killer's heart is through his stomach."

I took back the bag of muffins from him. "They're not for you."

"Fine. Keep convincing yourself you're still mad at me, even though you and I don't know what the hell you're mad about. But sadly, Ric's gonna have to miss Lou-Lou time today. You know, lockdown and all."

I rolled my eyes. "Just give the muffins to Ric and tell him I miss him. Can you manage do that?"

I handed him the bag. "With pleasure."

"Thanks."

He slowly shut the door in my face. "Have a great day, thanks for coming by."

"Damon Salva-" The door was fully shut. "-tore."

I sighed and stomped out of the building, sulking like a child.

"Alaric Saltzman killed my father?" Caroline exclaimed in disbelief as we walked through the woods.

"I can't expect you to be okay with this," Elena said. She was so much better at handling these things than me. I preferred to give people hot chocolate when they were upset. "But at least these herbs that Bonnie's giving him, they're healing him and they're keeping the dark side buried."

Caroline's voice broke as she said, "Yeah, and that's supposed to make everything okay?"

Elena grabbed Caroline's arm softly. "No, Caroline, it's not okay. It's horrible and I feel horrible about it, but he's a victim of something supernatural, he didn't ask for this, it just happened to him. Like Louise with her moon problem." 'Moon problem'? Moon problem! Seriously? "Just like Bonnie's mom, I mean, she didn't ask to become a vampire. And neither did Stefan or Tyler."

Caroline took a deep breath. "Or me."

Elena nodded. "Or you. None of you asked for this, but who would I be if I just turned my back on any of you?"

Caroline wrapped an arm around Elena's shoulder. "Oh, Elena Gilbert, saviour of the cursed and the damned." She stretched out her arm to me. I rolled my eyes, smiling, and she wrapped it around me.

"Here, here!" I cheered.

Matt showed up and we broke apart. "Hey. What's with the cryptic secret meeting text?"

I shrugged. "I dunno. Stefan just said to meet here."

Stefan and Damon joined us. "Where's Bonnie?" Stefan asked. "I texted her too."

"Bonnie's mom bailed on her. Again," I said. "I think we should leave her out of this."

"What are we doing here?" Matt inquired.

"We found some more white oak. Long story, wait for the movie," a raven-haired Salvatore explained.

This was, apparently, new news to Elena. "Hang on. White oak? You have a weapon that can kill Klaus?"

"Nope. We all have a weapon." Stefan tossed a duffel bag onto the ground. There were a bunch of white oak stakes inside of it. "Klaus has always been one step ahead of us, but now we have the advantage. We're all armed and they are all linked, meaning we only need to kill one of them. We need to seize the best opportunity, which means we need to prepare for every opportunity."

"Scenario number one," Damon said. He grabbed me and moved me to a different spot, because the spot I was in didn't apply to Drama rules. "You get to play Klaus."

I grinned. "Right. Big nasty hybrid, got it. I'm going to kill you all!" I said in my best British accent.

Caroline giggled while Matt, Stefan and Elena laughed. Damon still looked like a stick was shoved up his ass. "Great Klaus impression, Louise, but not needed." I pouted and folded my arms. "Rebekah is our target, so we distract her and catch her off guard." He turned her to Caroline. "You're gonna play Rebekah. We use the quarterback to distract her. Just keep her talking."

"How?" Matt pressed.

"Act interested," Damon advised. "She's lonely, desperate."

"Clearly," Caroline remarked, sending a smirk my way. "She slept with you."

I suppressed a very large grin and held back an incredibly loud laugh. "Hm. Beefcake holds bombshell. I come up from behind her." Damon grabbed Caroline's arms and shoved them behind her back. "Grab her arms like this."

"Ow!" the blonde exclaimed.

Stefan entered the award winning preformance and pretended to stab Caroline/Rebekah. "Gives me time for one shot."

Damon let go of Caroline, who gave him a shove. "Got it? Good. So we all have one stake, we keep it hidden and we look out for any opportunity we have."

"No last minute attacks of pity for any of them," Damon said, looking between Elena and me.

"Don't worry about me," Elena assured. "Not after what happened to Bonnie's mom."

"Likewise," I agreed. "That family has only brought us pain."

Damon nodded. "Barbie?"

"Oh, I'm ready. Anything that will free Tyler from his sire bond to Klaus."

"Busboy?" Damon said, referring to Matt.

"Do I have a choice?"

"Good point."

"We have twelve stakes, twelves shots at killing one Original," Stefan explained. "Alright, let's try another scenario. Elena grab a crossbow." He handed Elena a crossbow. "Matt, you play Klaus."

We were walking through the town square. I liked nature. I could feel it, but I knew that I wouldn't be able to have that connection for much longer. "Mr. Saltzman was like the most normal guy in town," Matt commented.

"Yeah," Caroline and I replied in unison.

Elena walked over to us. "Is it weird that Bonnie's not returning my calls?"

"You and me both, honey," I said sadly. I looked over to where Finn was in the square, along with a lady friend of his. "But I think it's weirder that Klaus' suicidal brother is in the middle of the town square."

"That's Finn," Elena said. "I thought he left town."

Caroline brushed back her hair to listen to Finn and the girl's conversation. After a few moments she 'awed' and said, "That's so sweet!"

"What?" Elena pressed.

"She waited for him for nine hundred years and she never stopped loving him!" Caroline exclaimed, almost jumping happily. "Isn't that cute?"

"I suppose..." Elena trailed off.

"Rebekah kidnapped Damon?" I asked Elena. She had told me that Rebekah knocked out Ric and took Damon.

She nodded. "Yeah."

I saw Stefan outside of the Grill. "One second." I walked up to the vampire. "Hey. How's Ric?"

"Hey. He's just banged up. Caroline's gonna stay with him and make sure Alaric stays Alaric. Matt texted me and said Finn is still in the Grill. We need to plan our next move," Stefan said.

"Rebekah has Damon," I reminded him. "We have to find him."

"No, we need to stay on point," Stefan insisted. "See an Original, kill an Original. That's the plan."

"Yeah, that was the plan before Rebekah the vengeful Original kidnapped Damon!"

"Look, Louise, I understand that you're concerned about my brother's life, but if he even knew, for one second, that we were talking about missing a chance to kill these people he would lose his mind," the vampire told me.

"Yeah, but if the roles were reversed and you were the one being held captive by a psycho Original, he would stop everything to save you," I said.

"I know what my brother would want," Stefan assured.

"What he wants and what we should do are two very different things," I replied. "Stefan, please."

"You gonna help me with this or not?" I pursed my lips firmly together and nodded. Stefan smiled. "Good."

Matt slipped vervain into their tequilas. They coughed and spluttered. Stefan stood up and left. Finn and Sage followed him out. I got a crossbow from underneath one of the tables. Ric had hiding places all over Mystic Falls. Some of them were actually kind of crazy.

I got up and followed him out the back door. The stake was on the ground, as was Stefan. As Finn was about to grab the stake, I shot him in the gut. Elena and Matt rushed out. The quarterback took out his stake and stabbed Finn in the heart.

"No!" Sage roared as she slid next to him, stroking his face.

I felt horrible. I wasn't really thinking about anyone when I played my part in this. All that I knew was that Klaus had to die. But did I really want him to die? I had asked myself that question about a hundred times today. Sometimes it was yes and sometimes... it was no.

We rushed out of the alleyway and went back to the Boarding House. Klaus was dead, they were all dead. The five of them did such awful things in their lifetimes, and it wasn't as if they didn't deserve it. Even Elijah, the so-called 'noble one', backed Damon and Stefan into a corner where they were forced to turn Bonnie's mom in order to save my life and Elena's.

We were greeted by Caroline as soon as we walked into the Boarding House. "Hey. How's Alaric?" Elena asked.

"He'll be okay. I gave him a bottle of Bonnie's herbs and he went home. Oh, did you guys kill Finn, did it work?"

"Nothing worked until I see Klaus' dead body myself," Stefan said.

My phone rang and I answered it. "Bonnie. Where have you been?"

"Klaus has Damon."

I took a deep, shaky breath. "No, Klaus is dead. They're all dead... we just killed Finn."

"No, Louise, he forced me to do a spell that unlinked all the siblings. He's still alive."

Stefan looked crestfallen and angry. "Okay, right. Bonnie, where's Damon?"

"At Klaus' mansion. It's bad, Louise, he threatened Jeremy. And my mom."

Bonnie was crying on the other end of the phone, sobbing helplessly. "Bonnie, are you okay?"

"I don't know. I'm sorry, I have to go. I just – I have to – I have to go."

"No, Bonnie just..."

My phone beeped, signalling the end of the call. Stefan was fuming as he went for the door. "Hey, hey," I called after him. "Where do you think you're going?"

"You two stay with Caroline. I'll call you when it's over," Stefan said.

"Stefan, you're being stupid. Klaus has nine hundred years on you. We need another plan," I told him.

"What we need is for Klaus to be dead!" Stefan growled.

Elena grabbed Stefan and whipped him around. "Stefan, stop it! You're acting on anger!"

"Anger gets things done, Elena!" he insisted.

"Or it'll get you killed!"

"And it'll get Damon killed along with you," I added.

Stefan shook his head. "Klaus does not get to survive this. Not after everything he took from me."

Stefan stormed out, slamming the door in a teenager-y tantrum. Caroline joined us in the front hall, frowning. "I miss well-adjusted Stefan."

All of a sudden, the doors flung open and my vampire best friend was thrown through it. Sage marched into the house, looking very vengeful. "Ding dong."

Caroline went to attack her, but the nine-hundred year old vampire easily overpowered her and threw her to the ground. "I'm not here for you. I'm here for him."

Elena ran to the front door, but Sage's vampire minion blocked her path. "I don't think so."

Sage approached Stefan angrily. "I had to kill him, Sage," Stefan insisted.

The red-haired vampire scoffed. "Oh, you remember me." She kicked Stefan and he went flying into a chair. "Good. Then you know I like to go all ten rounds."

She began to cough violently as blood dripped from her nose. "Sage?" her vampire asked worriedly.

Sage recovered quickly and threw a punch at Stefan, but despite her much older age, Stefan grabbed her fist and threw her to the ground. "Troy, help me!" Troy released Elena and rushed over to Troy. He was coughing up blood as well. "What's happening to me?"

Wouldn't we all like to know?

Then the two of them just... died. The four of us gaped at the scene. "She just died," Elena commented, still in shock like the rest of us.

"Sage and Troy both died an hour within Finn," I realised. "There has to be a connection here."

"But why? Were they bitten by a hybrid or...?" Elena trailed off.

I shook my head. "Hybrid bites don't look like that."

"Maybe Sage was so in love with Finn she just died of sadness," Caroline guessed.

That sounded like a lovely fairytale. "No, that doesn't explain Troy," Elena said.

"Maybe they had one hell of a threesome together?" I suggested.

Elena and Caroline shot me a 'be serious' look. I shrugged. "It's the blood," Stefan said suddenly. "The bloodline. It has to be. Think about it: Finn turned Sage, Sage turned Troy. They're all part of the same vampire bloodline that originated with Finn."

"Wait, so when an Original dies every vampire turned from their bloodline dies along with them?" Caroline said. "Because that would mean…"

Elena bit her lip nervously. "If the Originals die, so do all of you. The entire vampire species would… it'd just be dead."

Elena and I were fixing up the Salvatore parlor. The fight had left it somewhat... uh... messy. Vampires should not had nice things in their houses.

Caroline came back into the house, a disgusted look on her face. "Vampire disposal. Not my strong suit. Ugh. Where'd Stefan go?"

"Trading the stakes for Damon," I told her.

Caroline sat down. "All of them?"

I shook my head. "We still have three of them. Which means we have three shots to kill three out of four Originals. We just need to find out which one to save."

"How are we supposed to do that?" Caroline asked.

"Well, you were turned by Damon's blood. Damon and Stefan were turned by Katherine, who was turned by Rose. We just need to find out who turned Rose," I said.

"And you have no idea?" Caroline asked.

"No," Elena said sadly. "But it can only link back to one Original and if the odds are in our favour, hopefully it won't be Klaus. So that we can still kill him."

Caroline looked worried. "Elena, Louise." She stood up. "Even if Klaus didn't create our bloodline, we know for a fact that he turned one of us."

Then it clicked. "Oh my God," Elena gasped. "If we kill Klaus... then Tyler will die."

Stefan came home later in the night. "You're still here?" he asked me, sitting on one of his armchairs. "Where's Elena?"

"She went home," I told him. "She was exhausted. So was Caroline, actually."

"And you stayed?" he asked.

I nodded and smiled. "Of course I stayed. I would hardly let my best friend sulk alone. This bloodline thing really screws up our plans, huh?"

"I know you wanted them to be screwed up." I shot him a questioning glance. "Klaus." My jaw opened. What about him? I closed my mouth quickly and swallowed. "As much as I hate it and I hate him, you feel something for him."

"I don't f-"

"Yeah, you do," Stefan said. I stared at my lap. "But what you feel for Damon is stronger. Louise, you always say how well you know me, but I know you just as well."

"We need to find out who turned Rose," I said suddenly, changing the subject. "I don't know how, but we do."

He nodded. "And there's one person who can ask her."

"Who?" Ah... yeah... him. "Jeremy?"

"How would you feel about a roadtrip to Denver? Just you and Damon?" he asked with a smirk. "You can sort out those unresolved feelings for him..."

I reached over and smacked him on the arm. "Are you playing evil vampire match-maker now?"

He shrugged, still smirking madly. "Call it what you want. You know you want to."

I rolled my eyes. "Fine."

You'd think I'd get used to vampire-killing by now, but I wasn't. In a way, I was relieved Klaus wasn't dead. Did that make me a bad person? Maybe. And I kind of hoped Klaus did sire Damon, Caroline and Stefan's bloodline. Maybe I was just a horrible person who fell for bad people.

I shut the door behind me and leaned on it. I straightened up when I heard the pitter-patter of footsteps coming down the stairs.

"Elena," I said. "You're up late."

She glared at me venomously. "You didn't tell me," she spat as she walked down the remainder of the steps.

"What?"

"That you're dying!" I shut my eyes closed and bowed my head guiltily. "You knew and you didn't tell me or Jeremy or Ric!"

"Was it Caroline or Bonnie?" I asked her suddenly. "Who told you? Or was it Stefan?"

She scoffed. "You can rule out Stefan. He'd never betray your trust! Not even for me. It was Caroline."

I nodded, scoffing. "Right."

"And she was in the right telling me. I'm your sister!" There were tears welled up in her brown eyes. "You were prepared to die without letting me say goodbye!"

"I was going to tell you," I insisted. "And I'm not gonna die... well, not exactly. Damon's going to turn me into a vampire within the next few months."

"What?" she whispered.

"It's the only way. Bonnie's tried looking for another solution, there is none. Even Esther didn't know what to do! And she's the most powerful witch that ever was," I said.

Tears were streaming down her pretty, oval face. "I don't want to lose you."

I shook my head. "You're not going to."

A/N: Reviews? Suggestions? Love to hear 'em!