Disclaimer: Don't own Saving Hope or The Originals

Yep. Definitely late. Really, really late. Got no excuses this time, but I will warn you that this will probably happen again. Not this late, but definitely late. Sorry about this. On with the story.

Chapter 8

A few days later, Joel sat in one of the booths in the corner of Rousseau's with Luke and his friend from school Amelia, whose parents were going away for the weekend. The two children had been friends for years, so her parents had been fine with him looking after her for a few days whilst they were away. He watched, amused, their conversation going from train sets to painting to a desperate want to go to the beach soon in a matter of seconds.

'The mind of a five year old is a strange thing,' he thought to himself as he spotted Josh coming towards them with a smile.

"Hey guys, having fun?" Josh asked the kids. They both nodded, giggling. Josh shot Joel a look, raising an eyebrow. Joel just shook his head, sighing. Way too much sugar for one day. Josh smirked slightly. "How about I get you guys some ice cream sundaes on the house?" Joel scowled at him slightly, before smirking himself.

"Sure, but you've got to look after them." Josh looked at him, slightly horrified, before looking back at the two children who were basically jumping up and down in their seats.

"I'm good, I'm good, got the bar to run you know?"

Joel smiled wider. "You can delegate. Come join us. You know, a thanks for giving the hyped up kids I have here with me more free sugar so they stay awake and drive me crazy for the next 3 days." Josh stared, wide eyed before stepping back slightly.

"No seriously, I've got a lot of, important, managerial, stuff to do, you know? I'll just go get you your ice cream and-"

He was interrupted by Joel standing and putting his hands on his shoulders and forcing him down with a smile on his face.

"You sit down with the kids. I'll tell your staff what you said and that you're staying with us. I'm sure they won't mind covering for you." Joel went off to the counter, the first person in the know to truly accept him in this city staring at him before looking at the kids. The two of them stared back at him. Josh resisted the urge to back away slowly and carefully as they eyed him like predators. Or maybe that was just him being paranoid. The last time he had to babysit for Joel and Luke had a sugar high, he'd been the one to tire first. He'd been woken up by Joel laughing at him with tears in his eyes and Luke somehow lying asleep on the table having built himself a fort of pillows from all the beds upstairs. He'd taken a look in the mirror and found his hair to be neon pink with bright green and orange spots and little patterns and shapes drawn onto his face in glittery blue gel pen. That was only a few months ago. So yeah, personal experience says never to hang around too long when Luke is on a sugar high. Bad things happen. Bad bad things.

And now there were two of them.

-TO/SH-

Josh flopped down onto the couch next to Joel who was smirking at him as the kids had finally fallen asleep.

"Do me a favor please?" Josh asked, tired. "Please don't make me babysit them alone when they have sugar highs? Last time was bad enough. I mean, don't get me wrong, I love the kid, who wouldn't, he's adorable, and I've got no problem looking after him normally, but on days like this, it's like he has fun tiring me out. I swear he's planning something every time he does that," Josh grumbled, scowling to himself at the last part. Joel snickered as he got up from the couch, putting the two empty beer bottles in a bin at the kitchen counter.

"I take it this is lesson learned?" he asked with a smirk. "Don't give my kid – or any kid for that matter – more than a bowl of ice cream at the most at one time. Especially 5 year olds. And don't give them anything when they devoured practically a suitcase full of sugar each before you can tell them 'that's supposed to last you at least 3 months'." Josh let his head thump back onto the couch as he groaned. He picked up his phone as it signaled an incoming text and brightened when he saw the name. "Booty call?" Joel asked, smirking.

"Shut up," Josh said, throwing one of Luke's T-shirts at Joel's head, blushing slightly as he waved goodbye. Joel shook his head as he locked the door behind his Vampire friend and went to his own room, intent on getting some sleep before his shift at the hospital the following day.

-TO/SH-

Joel stepped out of the OR a surgery plating a 17 year old's tibia so it could heal properly. What the boy was supposedly doing in a tree high enough to cause a comminuted fracture when he fell was anyone's guess. It was also the worst lie he'd ever heard, especially when you added the already healed fractures and broken bones that had left scarring behind. He would need to wait social services to arrive before telling his family the surgery was done and that their son would survive.

"Did you get social services on the line?" he asked Allie at the nurses station. He'd asked her to call them before he'd gone in to operate after the aunt had signed the paperwork. The blonde nodded grimly. "Did they tell you when they work get here?"

"They're already here," she said. "They'll need to wait for your patient to wake up."

"Yeah, they'll need the kid's statement. The family?"

"In the waiting room. The aunt keeps trying to get passed."

"Hopefully that means Jamie's got someone to look after him instead of sending him into the system. Have social services spoken to the parents?"

"Not yet. They're waiting for you and Jamie." Joel nodded, picking up the file containing Jamie's x rays, then leaving to join them all. His phone started ringing and he took it out to see Josh's name flashing on the screen. "Kind of busy, mate."

"Yeah, I forgot you were working." Joel raised an eyebrow. It seemed Josh could tell, because then he continued. "Then I remembered and I decided to call you anyway, because this is important."

"Josh –"

"Marcel thinks The Hollow might be trying to gain a foothold in the living world using him." Joel was silent for a moment, before sighing. He'd managed to stay out of this for years, even living in this supernatural hot-spot, but apparently, that was now changing.

"What did you want me to do about this?" he asked.

"Well I was kinda hoping you would do that Jedi mind trick of yours. You know, get into his head, get the unwanted psycho spirit out of it." Joel was silent again. "What, you thought I didn't notice? Dude, you're like Charles freaking Xavier in a supernatural hot-spot, somebody had to notice. If it helps though, I don't think anybody else did. Plus there is what happened last week when the Hollow tried to, you know, take over Marcel and Klaus and Marcel told me what Vincent told him happened." Joel just shook his head.

"My shift finishes in 3 hours, I'll see what I can do."

-TO/SH-

Joel walked into Rousseau's and over to the bar. Josh looked relieved.

"You're here! Thank God."

"You can thank God all you like, Josh, but we need to hurry this up, I've got two kids to look after this weekend, who are currently with Luke's babysitter probably trying to con her out of sweets." Josh shuddered slightly as he remembered the day before when he was dragged into helping. God, he was never offering free sundaes again.

"I can't find Marcel."

"Seriously? He's possessed by an evil witch spirit and you go and lose him? How did you manage that?!"

"Well I want exactly there with him 24/7, Joel. I had to work here too. Besides, you're a witch, you can just do a locator spell." Joel have him a blank look. "Right?"

"I'm not a witch, Josh. Well, I am, but it's…" he hesitated slightly before continuing. "It's more complicated than that," he decided to go with. He gestured for Josh to follow him somewhere more private.

"What's so complicated?" Josh asked, confused.

Joel sat on one of the chairs next to the desk in his friend's office.

"It's not so much complicated as it is a very long story," Joel started as Josh sat down opposite him.

"Well, we're kind of short for time here," Josh stated. "Cliff notes version?" He looked at him with a questioning look on his face. "Is there a short version?" Joel snorted.

"Of course there's a short version. Basically everything has a short version. Essentially, a really powerful witch was after the firstborns of my family because we're extremely powerful, so one of my ancestors created a spell which would channel all of the firstborn's magic into one aspect of magic. I had a great aunt I was told about who could manipulate the elements in the most extreme ways. She could calm a tsunami, or set fire to the world. Thankfully, she didn't feel like killing everyone. My magic is all turned towards the mind. If I truly tried I could have a conversation with someone in Africa right now all inside our heads. And I'd be speaking their language too, if I wanted to talk to someone that way. Could learn a new language in a few months of I wanted to. I can find Marcel, but I won't need a map," he added as Josh stood to get one, "I can try and remove the Hollow from him, but if this was only about the mind, she wouldn't have gotten passed me even a little last week. She's a spirit. A spirit latched onto a human – well, human-ish – mind. I can stop her from completely overtaking and influencing him, but that's the only thing I can do to get the Hollow out."

So leave a review guys. I'd love to see what everyone is thinking of this story. Thanks for sticking with me on this for this long.

- Kyrian Mikaelson