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Chapter 013

You Expected Yelling

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Friday, June 25, 2010; in the very early a.m. hours

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Me and my merry band of Brothers and Sisters saved Elijah and his brothers and sister just under three weeks ago. We spent a week exploring the museums and various tourist attractions in Chicago before returning to the boarding house. The museums were actually quite a bit of fun as all the Vampires showered the Humans with stories of our travels and opinions on the history that was recorded and what we know of what wasn't recorded. I can't remember the last time I had so much fun and the others truly enjoyed our time at the museums as much as I did.

A weight I didn't know was there lifted off my chest because Bonnie thought of a way to undagger Rebekah. All the members of our family, including the Originals, piled up in a huge makeshift bed on the floor of the condo's living room the night after we undaggered the brothers and we visited with Rebekah and offered for me to compel her not to betray us to Klaus. She happily agreed, so we hung out with her while we slept and then the following morning we undaggered her and I compelled her before I even made breakfast.

She immediately began adding a spark of enjoyment to everything we did that I hadn't noticed being there before she woke up. The only part I didn't enjoy so much was the shopping trip to buy Rebekah and her brothers' modern wardrobes. But even that wasn't too horrible since I got to watch Elena try clothes on too. Wonder of wonders she even let me buy her a few things.

We've been back in Mystic Falls for almost 12 days and we've been spending most of our time researching several things. First, we've been looking for the coordinates that Bonnie should move Esther's coffin to, which you would think wouldn't be a difficult task but it's proving to be harder than we thought. Second, since there are no tables of contents in any of the books we've spent the almost two weeks since we got back looking for the spells to first reinforce the coffin, put an extra Magickal lock on it, add a Magickal warning system to it, and then actually move it to the desired location. Third, we've been tracking Klaus and Stefan's movements based on the bloody trail of bodies they leave behind.

I've asked pretty much everyone to keep that last effort to ourselves and not tell Elena about it since I don't want to have to explain that they're not Klaus' victims but rather my brother's victims. I hate keeping secrets but I know the truth will break her heart, especially if Balthazaar, Kol, Ric, or Tyler mention what the scenes we've been cleaning up have looked like and the state the bodies were in when we got there.

She'll be angry when she finds out I'm keeping this secret and especially when she finds out what it is, but she's not upset right now. That means she'll be upset for a shorter time period than if I tell her now, and I know that's about the best I can hope for, so I intend to keep this secret as long as possible.

None of my family members have treated the Originals any different than we treat each other. I think it's actually been somewhat surreal for them since I overheard Kol telling Balthazaar, "I can't imagine our family as tight nit as it was when we were Human having taken in a family of Vampires the way our new family has," to which Balthazaar just nodded in response.

The girls, Jer, and Ty happily and excitedly spend all of their free time 'hanging out' with their new sister and brothers.

Balthazaar told me, "Honestly Drago, the Mikaelson family probably wouldn't have worked so hard to find a way to undagger Rebekah sooner rather than later or be so enthusiastic about spending time with Vampires."

He paused then told me, "Of course after we turned we pretty much destroyed families not preserved them, even our own."

He also admitted, "Despite my prior knowledge of your family I've been shocked that your family, which my brothers and sister and I all feel we've been welcomed into unconditionally, isn't like that at all. You all seem to truly respect us, and I can't tell you enough how amazing I find it that you've all completely forgiven me for betraying you all to save my siblings, and that was before you even knew that I've forgiven you for daggering me those two times before the sacrifice."

Right now, they're mostly all sitting in the living room of the boarding house looking through books for the aforementioned spells. Elena and I are upstairs and when I exit the bathroom, I see her standing in front of the open closet where I've been keeping track of all of Stefan's victims. When she sees me emerge from the bathroom she asks, "Why didn't you tell me you were tracking Klaus' victims?"

I sigh and walk towards her as I contemplate how to handle this. When I reach her I pull her into my arms, but she struggles and again asks, "Why didn't you tell me you were tracking Klaus's victims?"

Finally, I stop trying to hold her and step back before looking her in the eye and telling her, "Because they're not Klaus' victims, they're Stefan's."

I don't shout or raise my voice but it sounds loud even to my ears. Her eyes are wide and I can see the tears threatening to overflow as she asks, "W-what?"

I sigh and fold my arms over my chest just to have something to do with them as I try to explain as gently as possible, "I didn't want to worry you while there's nothing we can do about it. I was going to tell you when we find Stefan before we go get him back. I just figured you'd worry about him more if you knew, and I really wanted to keep your upset as minimal as possible for as long as possible."

She's frowning deeply and the tears are building in her eyes but haven't begun their future journey down her cheeks so I tell her, "I am however sorry that you found out this way. I fully intended to be the one to sit you down and explain everything, and I wish you hadn't found the cork board not because you now know I was keeping a secret but because I would have tried to explain it more gently than I just did."

"You lied."

I frown, "No, you knew there were things I wasn't telling you. I just continued not to tell you certain details about Stefan but I never told an untruth. I wouldn't have done that to you Elena. I would have told you nothing as I did or told you everything as I have now, well everything about this. I'm still keeping things from you about the spell placed on my family but that still can't be helped."

I try to take her into my arms again but she struggles again and then pushes me away and says, "Don't, don't touch me, I'm mad at you."

Her eyes are hard and her chin is raised daring me to argue that she shouldn't be angry with me. Instead I look her in the eye and tell her, "I know and you have every right to be. If you don't want me to touch you right now, then I won't."

Her tears finally spill over her cheeks as her tense posture sort of collapses in on itself and she says, "You should have told me. I can't be with you if you're going to keep keeping secrets about things other than the spell. I get that you can't tell me about that, but you knew I wouldn't consider this part of that secret. You had to know I wouldn't and you still kept it. I, I can't, I, I have to go," and she turns and runs out the door and down the stairs before slamming the front door closed behind herself.

I hear Asya explain to everyone who doesn't have Supernatural hearing about what just happened. As I enter the living room a minute later Tyler looks shocked but he and everyone else already knew that Stefan has been the one leaving piles of bodies. Hanz and his men cleaned up all the scenes while we were in Chicago and Balthazaar, Ric, and I have actually been going to all of the scenes since we got back and cleaning up after Stefan. Kol and Tyler went with the three of us a handful of times.

At one of the messier scenes Tyler asked us, "Are all Vampires like this?"

We all shook our heads no, as Kol told him, "Only a Ripper and/or someone with their switch firmly in the off position would likely do this sort of thing to their victims."

He frowned and pursed his lips before continuing, "I've known two Rippers who had their switches on and still did this sort of thing."

I interrupted to tell the young man, "Which is what I think is happening here based on the fact that Stefan is putting the bodies back together as though he feels remorse after the fact. The bloodlust however overpowers his good and gentle nature and causes him to do this sort of thing even with his switch on."

I frowned with my brows drawn together as I told him, "I'm sure the guilt is eating him alive if I'm correct and his switch is still on."

Kol nodded then said, "Then there are those who have their switches firmly off and just don't give a fuck. Though usually this behavior is perpetrated by the Rippers of the world I have known a few Vampires who weren't Rippers by nature and did this sort of thing for fun. However, personally, while my switch was off I killed countless people, often for no real reason other than I felt like it, but even I, with my switch off, wouldn't have done to these poor people what Stefan did."

He turned away from the gory mess of body parts as Balthazaar and I nod. Kol looked at Tyler and he told him, "Rippers and the truly sadistic Vampires with their switches off are thankfully pretty rare. I hate both groups though as a general rule since they're messy and make life more difficult for the rest of us. We're actually pretty fortunate that this sort of scene happens few and far between."

After that day of clean up Balthazaar assured Kol, Finn, and Rebekah that once Stefan remembers who he is his good qualities from all of his lives will mesh and the bad qualities will be drastically reduced. At least that's what Elijah, Caroline, and I have experienced and Bonnie backed us up since she knew two of us while the spell was in place and has all of our memories, then again Finn, Rebekah, and Kol have our memories too so they know we're being honest.

They've decided to reserve judgment until after Stefan has been recovered and his memories returned to him. Nevertheless, I hear several curses said under people's breaths as Elena runs down the stairs and out the door with tears streaming down her face.

They all look at each other and shrug before looking at me as I stand in the entryway of the living room. I frown and say, "Perhaps keeping the identity of the killer to myself was not my best idea but I didn't want to hurt her. Of course now I have."

Asya gets up and says, "Bonnie and I will go find her and try to put it in perspective for her, okay?"

I nod and tell her, "I hear her talking to Matt, she's going to meet him at the Grill since his shift ends in a few minutes." She nods back and leaves with Bonnie to find my distraught girl. The rest of us remain to continue looking through the books.

Ten minutes later Jer is over on the couch with Ty and they're excitedly whispering so I put down the book I've been searching through and wait to hear their presumably good news. Finally, Jer says, "Drago, or any of you really, what do you know about the Indian Ocean?"

We all look at each other for a minute then I supply, "I know it can be treacherous. I've heard of several ships sinking there and to my knowledge even centuries later their remains have never been found."

Jer nods and Tyler smiles before taking over for Jer, "Right, it's supposed to be some of the hardest waters to explore. That's mostly because of the currants but it's huge and the depth is an issue too though I'm not sure it's the deepest. Still I think it might be our best bet to prevent treasure hunters or researchers from finding the coffin in the future.

Finn smiles a rare smile and says, "I may also be able to help with that. There is a spell in this book that keeps hidden 'that which should not be found'. It looks to be a fairly straight forward spell and relatively easy all things considered, so if Bonnie can place it on the coffin beforehand then even if someday down the line, someone discovers the area it's hidden in it should still remain hidden. I mean if the spells Tianna and her ancestors placed on the cave where we're currently keeping the coffin in lasted thousands and in some cases hundreds of thousands of years then surely Bonnie could do this much simpler spell and make it last as long or longer, no?"

I smile and ask, "Can I see the spell?"

He hands the book to me after flipping to the correct page and I read it over and then smile deeply before looking at Finn, Rebekah, and Kol in turn and ask them. "Have you three been told about the power of the few hundred dead Witches?"

Kol's eyebrow raises towards his hairline and Finn, Rebekah and his eyes all shoot open wide and their mouths hang open a little before Kol says, "No… no one's mentioned that."

I laugh and explain, "A few centuries before Damon became a Vampire more than 300 Witches were burned in a specific field for Witchcraft. Most of the executions happened over the course of about a decade and a half though over the years that followed additional Witches were periodically burned there as well. They were the few times I know of where any actual Witches were accused of Witchcraft. Sadly, that was thanks to the younger Pervonachalnyue who used compelled Humans to perpetrate their revenge against Tianna's descendants and Witches in general since they were unable to kill them in a direct assault. Anyway, for whatever reason they were all killed in the same location so a while back in our efforts to destroy Klaus, Elijah suggested that Bonnie go there and try to harness their power. So now, Bonnie has the power of at least 316 dead Witches."

I smile and tell them all, "Honestly even before that she was one of the strongest Witches I'd met, easily in the top three behind only Fontina, who placed the original Pervonachalnyue spell on the six of us and Tianna who placed the spell making us Humans, and Bonnie had practically no training at that point. So with their combined powers and hers, which I've noticed have been getting stronger the more she uses them, I think it should be do able, but we'll have to wait until she gets back to be sure."

I pause then bring up something that's been bothering me and I just haven't had a chance to voice it yet, "So I know Rose sired Katherine, but do any of you know who sired her. I think we need to make sure we're not going to kill Stefan and Katherine if we kill Klaus. Don't get me wrong I want him dead more than most but we need to make sure he's not the one Katherine's line is descended from."

They're all nodding as Bonnie explained what she learned from Esther about if an Original were to die then all of their progeny and theirs and theirs all the way down the line will die. I should have realized that as I've seen it happen with the other six families back 200,000 to 170,000 years ago that used the same spell we did to become Vampires. Lilith compelled Humans to hunt them and when each of them died anyone from their direct line died too.

Kol interrupts my thoughts and says, "Beks, didn't Mary Porter turn Rose-Marie?"

She nods and I smile, "Tell me you mean Scary Mary."

They both nod and say, "I've heard her called that."

Kol continues the thought, "There was a rumor a long time ago that someone named Vernell turned her but I never met him and I have no clue who turned him."

I just grin wider prompting them both to ask, "What?"

"Finally some good fucking news, Mary happens to be of my line, three times removed but mine all the same. I was actually present when Vernell turned her, so I know for a fact whose blood was in her system when she was killed. So if we're talking about the same Vampire then we don't have to worry about accidentally killing Stefan or Katherine when we kill Klaus."

Kol tells us, "She has ginger hair, green-eyes, and is a little shorter than Beks with very porcelain pale skin."

That sounds like the beauty the Vernell I knew, one of my progeny's progeny, fancied over 1,350 years ago. He had never made a Vampire before so I told him how to do it and at his request supervised her transition.

I smile and tell them, "It certainly sounds like the same woman."

Just then I'm pulled out of my thoughts, as my phone rings, and I excuse myself and go out into the hallway, not that the Vampires and Werewolf in the room don't listen to my conversation anyway, "Hello?"

"Drago, Luv, how are you?"

"Laraina, I'm okay, Elena just found out that the bodies we've been tracking are Stefan's victims, not Klaus' but other than that I'm good. Are you three still coming for a visit?"

She laughs, "We just passed the sign welcoming us to Mystic Falls. I called because we need directions to your house."

I give them to her and then she says, "Excellent, we'll see you all in about 20 minutes."

I hope she can hear the smile in my voice as I say, "Looking forward to it," then I hang up.

As I reenter the living room the Vampires and Werewolf in the room all have their heads cocked slightly as they wonder about who these three that are coming for a visit are, but I don't make them wait long. A moment later, I tell Jer, "Jer remember me mentioning Bonnie's undead ancestors?"

His head jerks back slightly at the question, and his eyes open wide, but he nods slowly, so I continue, "Well they're on their way here and should arrive in 20 minutes."

He smiles and says, "Cool, did you warn Bonnie that they agreed to come visit or did you decide to surprise her?"

I pause and look at my younger brother with wide eyes and an arched eye brow, "I'm not stupid or suicidal. I took your advice and told her once I knew they could come. I'm trying my best not to piss her off again."

Jer laughs and says, "Good call, man."

Tyler laughs at that too and honestly so do the rest of us.

I go back to reading and then look up 40 minutes later when no one has shown up. Just as I'm about to call and ask if they got lost, I hear Asya talking to herself, "Elena, why did you have to go and die, do you know what Drago is going to say when he finds out? He's going to yell at me for not getting there fast enough and since you haven't woken up yet you won't be there to calm him the hell down. You're going to owe me, Sister."

I jump up from my seat and speed out the door. I only vaguely hear Balthazaar telling the others what's happened after Kol asks, "What's wrong, Brother?"

I tune out his answer as I focus on Asya, Matt, Bonnie, and my undead descendants who are all driving here. A minute later I'm standing in the middle of the road leading to the boarding house, and Asya slams on her breaks to avoid hitting me. As soon as her car stops, I open the back door and slide in under Elena's head putting it in my lap before asking Asya, "Sister, what happened?"

As she begins driving again, she tells me, "Drago I'm so sorry. She got to the Grill before we did and some Vampire tried to snack on Matt, and Elena apparently tried to intervene, and the asshole snapped her neck."

"There is nothing to be sorry for. So she died protecting her childhood best friend?"

She nods, "Yes."

I smile despite the fact I'm holding the dead body of the woman I love and say, "Good then it should count." I pause a moment then ask, "Is Matt okay?"

When she tilts her head to the side and looks at me through the rear-view mirror with her eye brow arched, I ask, "What's with the look Asya?"

She frowns, "N-nothing you're just handling this much better than I thought you would."

I smile, "I know you expected yelling, but we've all known she had to die to return to herself, so I'm trying to remain calm."

She nods then tells me, "To answer your question about Matt, the Vamp tore his throat up pretty good, but I healed him. He's right behind me in his truck, so we can keep an eye on him until the blood leaves his system since I don't know about you but I learned my lesson when Katherine killed me."

I nod as we pull up in front of the house and tell her "Good," before I open the door and cradle Elena in my arms before rushing past a worried Jeremy as I hurry into the house and up the stairs to my room to wait for Elena to wake as Briseis.