A/N- Here we go. Now we're getting somewhere.
Also, as apology for my lack of Klaroline in this chapter and to partially make up for my absence, I wrote a smutty, smutty Klaroline one piece today called
Bad Girls Don't...
fanfiction dot net/s/10829150/1/Bad-Girls-Don-t
"Where the bloody hell are my brothers?!"
Exhausted by her grief and her heartache, Katerina doesn't immediately answer, preferring instead to keep her gaze on the surface of the stunning white dining table with gold inlay. Her arms are folded in front of her and her head is bowed.
She can't remember ever being this tired, this sick of living, even when she'd buried her parents her mind had been awhirl with determination and solutions.
She'd had to run, had to hide, had to survive.
Though perhaps it is because she no longer has to run and hide that she is this tired.
Before she couldn't slow down for fear of being caught and now…
She can hardly imagine a time where she could want to move again.
"Katherine!" Rebekah's voice calls throughout the mansion, "I can hear you breathing ignoring me won't work"
Klaus had asked her to remain in New Orleans, the now Dowager Princess, the one who would have to step into the role Elijah had left behind.
She would have to be the one to offer Klaus logical and peaceful solutions when he wanted bloodshed.
She would have to be the voice of reason so that every supernatural and knowledgeable human in town wouldn't panic when they found out that the evil Original hybrid was now without his beloved pacifist brother and arm themselves for the apocalypse.
She would have to grit her teeth and smile through the endless parade of sycophants who'd be beating down her door to cry crocodile tears while pretending to mourn Elijah.
As if any of them had every really known him.
"Katherine bloody Pierce!"
With a sigh, she pulls herself up and crosses the room to where her handbag was tossed carelessly on the ground, she rummages through it until she finds her pocket mirror and checks to make sure her make-up is flawless.
"In here Becky dearest!"
When Rebekah stomps into the formal dining room, it's to find Katerina sitting perched on the table in a parody of their first meeting in the house.
It's only been two weeks but so much has changed.
"Where the hell are my brothers?" Rebekah demands with a petulant sigh and her hands on her hips.
It's almost on the tip of Katerina's tongue to tell her the truth, that Elijah will never come home again but this isn't her news to share and she wants to keep her grief to herself for just a little bit longer.
"They're out in the business district" she lies smoothly,
"They spent the day with Erik watching Disney movies and the two of them eventually snapped and ran out of here like the place was on fire…" she tilts her head,
"Although, if the place had been on fire, I suppose Erik would have gone with them, he's in the sunroom playing with Raina if you want to see him"
The maternal instinct that Rebekah sometimes chooses to bring out and wave like a flag during her bouts of self-pity rears its head and she casts a longing glance through the open door as Erik, with his father's appreciation for theatrics, chooses that moment to start laughing.
It nearly works, Rebekah is lured towards the sunroom like a sailor to a siren before pursing her lips,
"What about Caroline?" she asks and Katerina suddenly remembers that even if the Original sister had disappeared early this morning with no explanation whatsoever, she had seen the chaos from the fake call.
"She got to Mystic Falls, her mom was in a car accident, nothing fatal the doctors were just overreacting because it's the sheriff"
Rebekah snorts and offers the insult "Small town fools"
Katerina leaves her hovering uselessly over baby Erik before striding out onto the front lawn and sinking to her knees in the grass, holding out her phone as she waits anxiously for a call,
"Come home Klaus" she whispers.
Elijah rubs the heel of his hand over his chest as he approaches the high school, he's scanned the area and there are no signs of hunters but he's still deeply concerned.
Beside him, Caroline Forbes, who is wearing the most grotesque black and gold tracksuit he has ever seen, is calm and collected, the white oak stake tucked inside her pants as if it isn't one of the most coveted and dangerous weapons in the world.
For a moment he wonders if the girl is simple. Certainly she is charming, sweet and well-bred but she is showing so little fear he has to wonder if Niklaus had mistakenly fallen for a fool.
"Perhaps the gym?" Caroline suggests as they walk in through the front doors, "It's the only room without large windows and controlled access, although they would have raided Alaric's classroom for all the weaponry that he stashed there…Elena only had time to clear some of it out after…after"
She darts ahead and pulls aside a bank of lockers, the screeching noise playing havoc on his eardrums, she ducks behind them and emerges a moment later with a shotgun and a bottle of bourbon.
"This was modified to kill vampires but I figure a bullet's a bullet, you know"
She offers it to him without hesitation and he banishes the cruel, uncharitable thoughts about her from his mind.
She wasn't overly frightened because she lacked proper understanding of the situation but because she trusted him to have her back and get her and the rest of the Mystic Falls coven out alive.
She barely knew him and yet she trusted him.
He envies her in that moment.
"Quite" he murmurs, before handing the weapon back to her, "But I am afraid that the last time I fired a gun was in 1810 and even though I was not ten paces from Niklaus my shot was hardly perfect…do you"
"Oh yeah" she shoulders the gun expertly over her arm, "Daddy was a Republican and mom's a cop, I spent more hours at the firing range than I did in dance class"
Well, Elijah's seen her waltz so her firing skills must be excellent.
"This way"
She leads him to the gymnasium, slowly and cautiously, both of them keeping an ear out for anything that could signal a hunter.
They hear loud sighs and idle chatter coming from the library and Caroline grins,
"That must be the summer school kids" she tells him in an excited whisper, hurrying him past the doors, turning him left and ushering him down a hallway, up ahead he sees ugly red double doors and, though he can't hear anything more than the gentle breeze of breathing, he can sense supernatural creatures inside.
Caroline rushes to the doors and then freezes at the last second, staring at them worriedly, possibly wondering if they were booby trapped or if one of her friends was waiting on the other side with another one of Alaric Saltzman's weapons.
He ushers her back and moves around her, pulling on the long handle and pushing the door open just enough for them to squeeze through.
No weapon is fired at them but Elena Gilbert hits him with the same amount of force as a bullet would have done.
Arms are around his neck and she is apparently trying to squeeze the air from his lungs,
"Elijah, we are so glad to see you!"
She pulls back and he wonders why she looks so strange, so unfamiliar before realising that he has spent the last six months waking up every morning to see Katerina's face and while she and Elena are doppelgangers, in this situation Katerina would never look so vulnerable or frightened.
Then again, his fiancé had lived her human years in a country occupied by the Ottomans and five hundred years fighting for her life.
It took a great deal to frighten Katerina Petrova.
Still, Elena Gilbert is a sweet child and a loyal friend, so he smiles reassuringly at her and nods politely to the Salvatore brothers,
"Hello Elena"
Meanwhile Caroline had spotted her mother lying on the bleachers and raced over, shouting her name,
"She's okay" Stefan calls as she leaps the last dozen metres and lands beside her mother, pulling her up and burying her face into her neck, Sheriff Forbes wakes up disorientated but sobs with relief upon seeing her child and they clutch each other in a true spectacle of a loving mother and daughter.
Esther and Mikael had tried to butcher them all, even Rebekah- their golden daughter.
He turns his face away to give the two women privacy, "How are you all?" he asks the Salvatore brothers,
"Bruised, battered and pissed off" Damon snaps, but then debriefs him properly, "We were called to town by Klaus which we're guessing meant that Caroline was given a fake message to ensure that all of us would be here. Hopkins is most likely the guilty party"
"He is" Elijah interjected, "They're using the town hall and are expecting payment for their services. There is somewhere between twenty and thirty of them and they are of the belief that there is one hundred vampires in Mystic Falls"
Damon snorts at that, "One hundred vampires? In a town of a couple of thousand humans? That's not possible- anywhere"
"Yes" he grins, "I do believe these hunters were hired for their trigger-happy methods not their intelligence"
He jerks his head and leads Damon and Stefan to the far side of the gymnasium, making sure to lower his voice to spare the women the knowledge of what he is about to say,
"There are witches surrounding the town's perimeter" he whispers, "They've spelled the border so that we cannot leave…Ms Bennett's mother is among them and her daughter has sided with the hunters"
Interestingly, while Stefan Salvatore has an expression of shock mingled with sorrow on his face, Damon Salvatore wears one of anguish.
Elijah hurries on to try and distract them from their pain, not out of compassion, but because if he does not complete this mission by nightfall then is little brother will surely come searching for him.
"Right now, our one advantage is that the witches and hunters believe that I am dead, fortunately they only grazed my heart with the white oak stake which is currently in Ms Forbes possession…Katerina told me that there is an underground railroad in Mystic Falls and that you know the location?"
Stefan raises his eyebrows at his brother who purses his lips and nods, "Yeah…mom turned a blind eye and distracted our dear dead father while Samson built it" he explains to Stefan, "As far as I know it's never been discovered in full…but the damn thing comes out in the forest and would barely be outside the perimeter if at all…do you think the witches spell will cover the underground?"
Elijah shrugs and tugs down his shirt sleeve once he notices Damon glancing at the band of his watch,
"We have to try, the alternative is to take shelter and hope that there are no reinforcements coming"
Damon exhales, "Alright…Good news everyone!" he calls across the room to the women,
"We're about to have a hands on history lesson, who wants to help me raid the chemistry lab and then blow up the boiler room?"
Jeremy sighed as Matt unlocked his phone for what had to be the thirtieth time that hour,
"What, d'you think the one hundredth time will be the charm?" he grumbles irritably as they roar down the highway back to Mystic Falls,
"D'you think Elena miraculously managed to send us a text and you somehow missed it in the three seconds you weren't staring at your screen?"
"Dude" Matt replies, not even looking up from his cell, "You being a dick is in no way helpful to the situation"
Jeremy rolls his eyes and then swerves the car to avoid the wild cat skirting across the road, "I'm just saying, if they could call us then they would have already"
"Yeah and the fact that they haven't has me worried" Matt argues,
"I checked the entire house while you tried Elena, they all have their phones on them, so the fact that we can't contact any of them means we're heading into something dangerous"
Jeremy opens his mouth to make some snide comment, something sarcastic to distract Matt from his anxiety and also to get his blood up, to get him in a fighting frame of mind.
Like Damon did every time there was trouble in Mystic Falls.
But just as he's about to say something, Matt's cell starts ringing and he nearly drops the phone in his eagerness to answer it,
"Hello?" he shouts, "Wait…hang on a second"
He puts the cell on speaker before the caller even has time to say anything, "Hello? Are you there?"
"Hi Matty blue blue"
Great.
The voice on the other end sounds so much like Elena's but the tone is too low, too seductive to ever be mistaken for his sister's.
He knows Katherine flirted like crazy with Matt during the summer she was stuck in Mystic Falls as a human and he remembers Matt trying to justify giving in to temptation a couple of times, assuring Jeremy that it wouldn't mean anything because he wasn't interested in her romantically and he wouldn't be using her as a substitute for Elena because in the end, even though they had the same face, they didn't look all that much alike.
Jeremy had listened to the shockingly sound arguments, proof of the fact that Matt had thought long and hard about this but then Rebekah had taken Matt to Europe and when he'd got back there'd been the issue with Stefan coming out of the Quarry, Silas murdering Katherine and then her being resurrected just to make tracks the hell out of town, she'd made it all the way to Mexico before Elijah had caught her and then she'd apparently been forcefully relocated to New Orleans.
So when all was said and done, Jeremy was pretty sure Matt had missed his chance with his sister's evil doppelganger.
Thank God.
"Katherine" Matt sighs into the phone, "Not that it isn't great to hear your voice and all but we're kind of in the middle of…"
"A trap" she interrupts, "You're in the middle of walking into a trap…please tell me you haven't made it to Mystic Falls yet"
Jeremy frowns and quickly pulls over onto the side of the road, "We're about twenty minutes out, why?"
"Uh…did you not hear me say trap?!"
Now that he's concentrating, Jeremy can detect something else in Katherine's tone, she's trying hard but he's so accustomed to Elena's voice that he can pick out the notes of grief,
"What happened?" he asks her, he wants to say 'Who died?' but that question has been answered too many times for him over the years for him to willingly prompt the information from her.
But she herself isn't a novice in grief, one fellow sufferer recognises another,
"Elijah…" she breaks off and Jeremy can hear all the heartbreak in the shaky inhalation of her breath, "Elijah was going to extract everyone but now Klaus has gone instead…and the two of you can't follow him, it's going to be hard enough finding the vampires without him having to go back for you two"
"And you expect us to just sit by and wait to see if they make it out alive?!" Matt challenges,
"Should we head to the nearest IHOP and get afternoon tea while our family and friends are fighting for their lives?"
"You should head to Richmond and hope that you cross paths with Klaus on the way" she barks at them, "Because right now I don't have all the information and he might actually have some answers or some use for you"
She hangs up, either assuming that they'll follow her instructions or simply not caring if they don't and die.
And Jeremy hates her enough to consider disobeying her but the rational part of his brain and the part that still adhered to the code of the Five, tells him that she is right, they can't go running into town blind and simply hope to find everyone.
And, irony of ironies, Klaus is their best chance for survival.
That was how screwed this situation was.
"Let's get as close to town as possible" Matt decides, as Jeremy swings back onto the road,
"Then we can circle around and hopefully catch Klaus as he comes down from Richmond"
Jeremy nods once in agreement and then drops his chin again and nearly throws up onto the steering wheel.
"I don't think we need to circle around to ninety-five man" he mutters as he tries to swallow the bile in his throat, "I think Klaus is closer than that"
Matt frowns, "What makes you say th…oh…oh god"
He dry heaves and turns his face away as they rapidly approach the animal crossing sign.
No animal could have done this to a human being.
A body, a female body is hanging from the sign by her arms, they'd been held over her head and fixed in place by a stick through her wrists. Her face has been torn off and her clothes ripped down to her waist…below that there was nothing, no legs, only thin shreds of skin and tissue where the rest of her corpse should have been.
She looked like she'd been fed feet first into a meshing machine.
And there was only one bastard sick enough to do that to a person.
Jeremy stops the truck, ideally he wouldn't mind running into Klaus and then backing up a few times but Klaus probably isn't hanging out in an area accessible by a vehicle.
So he and Matt climb out and contemplate the forest on either side of the road.
"Well…if any horror movie we've seen ever is any indication, we should definitely not split up" Matt says before cupping his hands around his mouth,
"Klaus!" he shouts into the forest, "Hey Klaus are you there?"
Jeremy punches Matt's shoulder so hard he doubles over and nurses it with his hand,
"Dude, come on that was right where Kol stabbed me"
"Are you insane?!" he snaps, "Anyone could be out there right now, including the people after us!"
Matt gives him a condescending look, "Jer, look what Klaus did to that body, anyone who is in the forest and not on his side is probably running like hell in the other direction right now"
He's right. If Klaus is taking the time to hang bodies like sick Christmas decorations then it's to deter or terrify his enemies into retreating.
But before he can accede that Matt's right, they hear an ear-piercingly loud scream coming from the east.
They take off at a run, racing through the forest, dodging low branches and leaping over fallen logs, skirting thick brush as the screams grow weaker and weaker, finally cutting off with a death rattle.
They emerge into the small clearing just as Klaus finishes his meal, his back to them as he crouches over a body on the ground.
This one belonged to a man.
They can tell from the arms that have been flung against a tree with enough force that the bone is embedded in the wood.
Jeremy is feeling every inch of his hangover right now, not even the adrenaline can settle his roiling stomach.
Klaus hears their approach and raises a single finger, asking them to wait before he wipes his mouth and rises to his feet with fluid grace,
"Ah" he says as he turns to face them, "Matthew, young Jeremy, how are you both?"
His entire front, from his mouth to his knees, is splattered in blood, random drops varying in size splashed over him like paint.
Hell, Klaus probably considered what he'd done to those poor people to be art.
Matt's eyes are bright with tears, he shakes his head in disgust, "What is wrong with you man?"
Klaus blinks, he the most pleasant and polite expression on his face but even through his black and gold eyes Jeremy can see that blood lust has taken over his mind,
"These people" he spreads his arm in a wide gesture that Jeremy interpreted to mean that there were a great deal more bodies spread out across the forest,
"These people came onto my father's- my biological father's-ancestral lands and killed my brother? My own blood on the lands that are mine by birth right!"
His placid expression is replaced by the fury that led to the slaughter, "Death was too merciful for them"
Jeremy felt his arms itching along the skin that had once been dark with tattoos.
The tattoos of the Five hunters.
The tattoos that had told him to kill all vampires.
Matt clears his throat beside him, distracting him from his murderous fantasies
"Uh…so we spoke to Katherine…" he explains slowly, cautiously as if talking to a mad man.
But the scary thing about Klaus is how sane he really is.
"And she told us to find you, to stay with you and help you find Caroline"
Klaus tilted his head with an amused smirk, "Really? Stricken with grief for my brother and her main concern is finding Caroline? Damn" he cursed,
"She told me to bring back their hearts"
He glances towards the corpse with a sigh, "I'll collect them on the way back" he muses aloud, "Maybe I'll be in a merciful enough mood to kill them then"
Jeremy opens his mouth to argue, not a doctor but pretty certain that the guy had died of blood loss when Klaus had ripped his arms off.
Unless…
"You gave them your blood didn't you?" he moans, receiving a proud, cheeky nod in response,
"Witches mate, their absolute worst nightmare is to become an unholy, monstrous vampire"
He strides to the end of the clearing before turning back to them expectantly, "Shall we?
Elijah was not a tall man.
Granted during his human life he had towered over most of the men in the village, but in this day and age of high nutrition and vaccines he was average height at best.
However, he is absolutely struggling to make his way through these tiny passages carved out of the network of caverns he had known as a child.
"I think we're nearly there" Damon grunts from in front of him, "Or we're completely lost and will die down here, either or"
Elijah had volunteered to lead the way in case someone was waiting at the other end to set a trap but Damon had only walked this railroad three times and needed to be able to see every marking to try and remember the right route.
"Not…funny…asshole" Sheriff Forbes gasps from the back of the line.
The poor woman has partial claustrophobia and the air in the railroad is rancid from nearly two centuries without circulation.
As the only human in the party she is struggling to keep up but when Caroline suggested they take a break, her mother had shaken her head,
"We can rest once we're outside Virginia sweetie"
And from the length of time they had been walking for Elijah was almost certain they had to be near North Carolina by now, but when Damon stopped and did a celebratory fist pump, he realised that they couldn't be any further than the forest surrounding Mystic Falls.
"And here is where it gets tricky"
Elijah raised an eyebrow at the eldest Salvatore, "Dare I ask?"
The man pointed up to the ceiling of the passage where Elijah could see a trapdoor, "There's a lock on that and we don't have a ladder or the key"
"Huh" he frowned at it momentarily, "Everybody back up five…make it ten feet"
"Uh Elijah?" Elena called as Caroline obediently made sure everyone was out of the way,
"What are you going to do?"
"Well…" he removed his cufflink from his sleeve and rolled up his shirt, "That lock hasn't been touched in one hundred and seventy years, best case scenario it's completely rusted over and weakened but otherwise there are no complications, worst case scenario…"
"It's completely rusted over and jammed with one hundred and seventy years of dirt on top of it" Stefan interjects.
"Exactly, which is why…" Elijah pauses so that he can slam his hand into the cavern wall and remove a sizeable chunk of rock,
"In lieu of explosives I am going to force our way out of here"
He tossed the rock over in his hand a couple of times to get a feel for it before pulling his arm back and putting nine hundred years of strength into the throw.
The door didn't come off completely but it was torn right down the middle with enough space for one of them to force their way through, he stepped out of the way as the dirt piled into the cavern and came to his knees before trickling to a stop.
"There" he turned to the eldest Salvatore, "Should I throw another or just send one of us through?"
Damon chose to glare at him rather than answer, "I knew Katherine had stolen my watch"
"Oh" Elijah glanced down at the watch on his wrist, "Yes, it is a lovely piece isn't it?"
He opened his mouth but Elena interrupted them, "Elijah, you go first and then you can lift Liz up"
Elijah looked over and saw that Sheriff Forbes breathing had become even more erratic, resenting the fact that he was about to be covered in muck, with his suit even more ruined, he sighed and prepared himself before he jumped.
A vampire can jump great heights if their way is unimpeded, as it was the rusted metal tore at his skin and clothes and hindered him enough that he had to claw and kick his way through the dirt like the vampires of legend.
But he emerged into the light of the dying day, quickly he crouched down and tore up as much of the metal as possible before lowering his arms down to lift the sheriff to freedom.
The woman gasped in great gulps of air before he even had her feet on the ground, she swayed and he reached out to catch her.
Which was beneficial because only seconds later the bullets started flying.
He pushed her to the ground and covered her with her body while the vampires below shouted their names.
Five men emerged from the surrounding forest, all heavily armed.
Amongst them the man that Elijah recognised all too well.
His is chuckling with pride, "I knew you'd take this exit" he crowed, "When the witches told me the magic wouldn't extend to the caves I knew you'd use the underground railroad…Damon Salvatore thinks he's so smart but he never bothered to cover up his ties to the Union army and as this was the only way out of town…"
"You knew we would be here, yes you have made that clear" Elijah climbed to his feet slowly, making sure to cover the sheriff at all times,
"However you forgot to factor in one small detail"
The man frowned, "And what was that?"
"My brother Niklaus"
Gun fire cracks through the summer air like lightning and two of the men drop to the ground with bullet wounds as Elijah races forward and rips out the hearts of the other two. By the time he turns around to face the last man, Niklaus has already decapitated him.
Niklaus had never considered the man worthy of his notice. He'd met him only once, after Tyler's actions had brought him back to Mystic Falls, they had sat at the same table and traded insults and threats but afterwards Niklaus had likely forgotten about him because he had thought his association with him complete.
So when he drops the body of Rudolph Hopkins on the ground and races into Elijah's arms, he wonders if his little brother realises that he had just murdered Bonnie's father.
A/N- Dun, dun, dun!