Chapter 7

No one fired a shot or made a noise. He heard no heartbeat.

The Original flipped a light switch and looked around the lab. There were at least three tables made to hold people. Elijah recognized what they were. One was an autopsy table, one an operating room table, and one that would be used by a urologist or gynecology doctor to examine the pelvic area. All three tables were empty. No Elena.

He stood for a long moment, looking around and listening. There was rhythmic, deep thumping, which he recognized as the bass of loud music being played upstairs. The basement was soundproofed, so that the melody, if there was one, didn't reach the basement. Likewise, screams of victims wouldn't be heard upstairs.

He saw stairs leading up to the first floor and an open door to a dark room to one side. He quietly eased to the door and listened and sniffed. He smelled food, but no person. The room was a small kitchen.

Disappointed, Elijah went back outside to where Damon and Bonnie lay. "Elena is not there. Perhaps they took her upstairs."

"The cleaning staff would see her," Damon said between gasps as pain shot up his spine and into his head. His stomach contracted again and he retched, but nothing came up this time.

"Not if he managed to get her to the second floor where the bedrooms are," Elijah said. He laid a hand on Damon's shoulder and could feel the trembling in the muscles. "I need to get you inside so I can dig that bullet out."

"I'd rather not go in there. Take me and Bonnie to the car."

"No. There's the perfect place for the procedure right here."

"We could get trapped there," Damon insisted. He was disgusted by how fearful he was of the cells and lab. Wild thoughts flashed through his mind. What if Maxfield was involved? What if he managed to capture Damon, Elijah and Bonnie? The experiments would start all over again! He didn't think he could stand it again. No, Maxwell was dead! But then again, people kept coming back from the dead, except good people like Liz Forbes and Jo Laughlin. A shudder of dread ran though him, but he didn't tell Elijah why.

Elijah was sensitive enough to guess that the younger vampire had lingering fears of the place, even though he had been ready to enter it to look for Elena. In addition, Damon was in a lot of pain, enough to make him vomit. Things were not going to improve with the poisoned bullet still lodged in his spine.

"You can argue with me over this, but you are not strong enough to prevent me from carrying you down there," he said evenly.

"I can punch the hell out of you," Damon growled. Although he was afraid, he also knew that Elijah was right. Quick removal of the bullet would allow his body to heal. He was in a mean situation and he hated that.

"Go ahead. And bite me if you feel you must, but I am taking you down there where I can properly treat you," Elijah said. He bent down and rolled Damon onto his back, ignoring the pained cry this brought. He then scooped him up and moved toward the stairs in a blur, leaving Bonnie lying quietly on the ground. She had said nothing during the conversation.

"We shall be back," he told her.

"I'm not going anywhere," she muttered. "Help Damon."

Stunned by the pain and really weak, Damon neither hit nor bit Elijah. In a moment, the older vampire laid him down on the autopsy table and flipped him onto his abdomen. Elijah pulled up the bloody jacket and the shirt underneath. He could then see the wound in the middle of the back. He knew that at that location, the bullet rendered a person paralyzed from the waist down if the spinal cord was damaged. And obviously, Damon's was. As a vampire, his body would heal the damage and he would regain control of his lower body, but only if the wooden bullet was removed.

Ignoring Damon's moans and cursing, he probed the wound with a finger. The spinal bones were quite deep in the groove between the muscles, but he was able to feel the sharp edge of a damaged bone. He also could feel the back edge of the bullet, but he could not scoop it out or grasp it with one finger.

"There surely are some instruments here adequate for grasping the bullet," said to his patient, and he moved to see what there was.

Damon just grunted and hoped he found something. He also wished he could pass out during the procedure, but he tended to stay conscious despite intense pain. The doctors who had experimented on the vampires had appreciated that factor.

"Ah. This should do nicely," Elijah said, returning to the patient.

"I could use a bottle of bourbon right now. Or a whiff of nitrous oxide," Damon told him.

Elijah scanned the room and then said, "Sorry. I don't see either. Want me to break your neck or look for some vervain?"

Damon considered this. He knew that either one in a sufficient amount would render him unconscious for a while. If Elijah successfully removed the bullet, the vervain would slowly lose its effect and the back injury would heal.

"I guess not. Too much vervain gives me seizures. Get the damned bullet out. Just do it, but do it fast. Please. Damn. My phone is buzzing. Answer it. Might be Stefan."

Elijah had to fish the cell phone out of one of the jeans pockets and he found that it was Stefan.

"Stefan, Elijah here. What have you found?"

"Where's Damon?"

"He's momentarily indisposed. We have Miss Bennett and believe Elena is here somewhere. What news at your end?"

"Not much. Both Mother and Enzo claim they are not involved in the kidnapping. They could be lying. Anyway, it looks like you're closer to Bonnie and Elena. Is Bonnie alright?"

"Drugged. Stefan, Damon has been shot and I need to remove the bullet, so if you will excuse me, I shall get to it."

"Is he okay? I mean, will he be?"

"Yes. Goodbye."

Elijah turned back to his patient. "Ready?"

Damon just muttered a curse and gritted his teeth. While Elijah probed around in his spine he felt as if he were being tortured by the doctors years back or Maxwell more recently. He found himself retching again and he tried not to let tears leak from his eyes, but they did.

He told himself that Elijah had probably shed tears many times over the centuries, even if he was stoic as hell.

"It is out. You should heal now," Elijah said, putting the bullet and instrument aside. He picked up a cloth and wiped blood from around the wound. Already the tissues were closing.

Damon's clothes were bloody and some of it was smeared on Elijah's suit and had seeped into the material. In addition, he had been grazed by two bullets, one on his side and one on his left inner thigh. Neither wound was deep and both healed quickly. He was just relieved that the thigh wound had not been high enough to graze his more private parts.

He didn't like his suit bloodied, a situation that often made the Original anxious until he could change clothes or rinse out the blood. He had often wondered why he felt obsessive about that, but he had learned the cause somewhat recently from his mother. The answer, which his mind had tucked away in a secret corner, was more disturbing

than seeing the blood on his skin or clothes. He now gritted his teeth and ignored the bloody mess, which was what he did when he savagely killed and got bloodied.

"Good," Damon said with relief, wiping his face and his running nose with his sleeve. "Let's get out of here. Outside with Bonnie." Seeing what Elijah's suit looked like, he added, "Your nice clothes are a mess."

"I have plenty of clean clothes," the Original told him. He always traveled with an extra set or two of clothing.

"Of course you do," Damon said. He could not yet get himself up, so Elijah once again turned him over and scooped him up in his arms. The younger vampire put his arm over the older's shoulder to help with the support.

"We need to stop meeting like this, Elijah," he said with a smirk, trying to make light of the serious situation.

"You should be able to walk about on your own soon. I do not really enjoy carry you."

"Aw. That's disappointing. I thought maybe you did."

"How can you joke at a time like this?"

"Just the way I am, I guess."

In a moment they were outside by the bulkhead, where relief flooded over Damon. His relief was brief. "Where's Bonnie?"

Elijah looked around with alarm. The young woman was nowhere in sight. "Could she have recovered enough to crawl away?" he wondered aloud.

"Or did Aaron snatch her up again? Damn, Elijah, we shouldn't have left her out here alone!"

"Unfortunately, you are correct. The fault is mine." Elijah felt both guilt and anger. He was ready to rip someone's head off.

Damon, still in the arms of the Original, saw a hint of red glow appear in Elijah's eyes. Somehow, this made Damon feel better, seeing that the Original did have strong emotions, enough to bring out rage. He could feel the sudden tension in the man's body and hoped not to be crushed as the arms holding him tightened.

"Easy, man," he warned. "We'll find her."

Elijah looked down at him with cold, red eyes. "Hold on. I'm going to try to sniff out where they went." He then leaned forward over the burden in his arms and moved back and forth over the dirt and grass and around the shrubs, like a dog on the scent of some quarry. He did find what he was looking for and it led around to one of the main doors to the house's first floor. He stopped short of going up to the big porch, which was well-lighted. He backed up so that he was hidden by the shrubs at the corner of the house.

"He took her inside," he said, surprised. "He must have taken the chance that no one would see him."

"The stairway to the second floor is just inside the foyer," Damon said. "Moving fast, he could get up there without being seen."

"Then, that is our goal."

"Put me down. I think I can stand now," Damon said. As Elijah lowered Damon's legs, the younger vampire tried to lock his knees to support himself. He wasn't quite as recovered as he thought and his leg muscles were shaky. It seemed like the nerves to his pelvis and legs were tingling. A strange sensation. Elijah was still supporting is upper body, so he didn't end up on the ground again.

While they were doing this, they heard women's voices coming from the house and saw that the front door was now open. Elijah looked back along the side of the house and murmured, "They are leaving. They have turned out the lights."

It was the cleaning staff, three women and a man, who were leaving the house. They carried a few things with them, but other items were apparently kept in the house. The man turned to lock the door and Elijah used his ability to compel people from a distance to suggest the man not lock the door. The fellow hesitated, key in the lock, and then withdrew the key. The four people headed down the brick path and to a panel truck.

Damon and Elijah watched and waited, and as soon as the truck was gone, they moved up onto the porch and to the front door. Elijah let go of Damon, who found he could stand now, and who reached out and opened the door. Silently, they entered and for a moment stood listening and sniffing the air. Because of the cleaning crew, there were too many scents to allow them to catch anyone else's.

"Aaron would have gone upstairs," Damon said. "The rope across the stairs is down."

"I see that," Elijah muttered, noting the barrier of the kind often used to show that an area was off-limits. Where it had likely been stretched across the bottom step, it was now doubled back and hooked against the wall. Elijah zipped up the stairs in a blur.

Damon tried to follow in the same manner, but the impairment caused by the injury and the vervain had not entirely left. A little more than half way up the stairs he fell to his knees with a hard thud, lost his balance, and fell onto his back on the landing. Cursing, he struggled to get up.

Elijah came quickly back down to help him up.

"I can do it!" Damon growled, embarrassed and frustrated.

"Shut up," Elijah said and with an arm around Damon's torso, zipped on up the stairs. He set him down in the upstairs hallway. Years of dealing with his younger brothers Klaus and Kol had taught Elijah that action was more expedient than argument. Damon scowled at him.

"You are welcome," Elijah muttered, even though Damon had not said "Thanks."

Damon scowled at the Original again. "Coulda made it myself, just not that fast."

"Of course you could. The scent goes this way," Elijah said, moving along the hall.

"You are so clever. Where else could it go?" Damon snarked. The stairs to the attic floor were not in the same location.

Elijah ignored the comment and inhaled the scent. "Do you know the male human we can smell?"

Grumpy Damon inhaled and concentrated on the smell lingering in the air. "No. It's Bonnie, Aaron and some guy. Elena's scent if faint. She may not be here now. Where the hell could she be?"

In silence they proceeded along the hall until they heard a noise a bit further along. Elijah surged forward, came to a door and inhaled. He tried the doorknob, but it wouldn't turn. He kicked the door in. Damon was right behind him and praying there was no blast of gunfire.

The only light in the room came from a streetlight outside, but it gave plenty of light for the vampires to see by. What they saw was Bonnie lying on a bed and a human male crouched beside a dresser.

A/N I hope you all like the interaction between Damon and Elijah. Looks like they have Bonnie again; will they hold onto her this time? Has Aaron escaped with Elena again? Thank you for reading, guys.