Chapter 6

"Alright then, let's hear this masterful plan of yours," Damon said, looking at her with a smirk. He didn't seem angry anymore, though Kate doubted he had forgiven her just like that. Though she hoped her story had at least served to chip at his armor of resentment towards her.

"So, first of all, you need to understand that we just can't kill Klaus. For one, he's one thousand years old – even if he wasn't an Original vampire, he's still double my age and therefore much, much stronger than I am and definitely incredibly stronger than the two of you, even together."

"So, it's hopeless?" Elena said, and there was clear fear and despair in her eyes.

"I didn't say that, or I wouldn't be here. No, what I mean is that we can't win against him if we go against him in a fight. We have to be smart."

Elena nodded, looking reassured, and Kate continued with her explanation. "So, the first problem is his age. The second problem is the fact that Originals cannot be killed like normal vampires can. If you stake them through the heart, they just regenerate and come back to life. They are virtually unkillable."

"That doesn't sound reassuring, Katherine," Stefan said, this time.

Kate sighed. "Can you stop interrupting me every five seconds? I'm not trying to reassure you, the opposite in fact. I'm trying to make you understand exactly what we're up against. Yes, it seems like an impossible task. But I have a plan. And, like I said before, if we find the right ingredients, it's a full proof plan."

"Go ahead, then, explain. We're all ears." Damon's sarcasm was a little grating but she understood that he was getting impatient.

"Like I said, the Originals are virtually unkillable. Except for two methods. One method doesn't truly kill them but it still renders them inoffensive. The second actually kills them and destroys their bodies."

"Great, now we're talking. And what is this weapon that can kill them?" Damon's excitement would have been cute in any other circumstances but Kate needed to nip that reckless glint in his eyes immediately.

"Don't get too excited, Damon. Yes, there's a way to kill the Originals. Remember when I mentioned that the white oak tree was called upon by Esther as a symbol for eternal life and rebirth? Well, even if they burned it to the ground after they became vampires, the White Oak Tree regrew. You won't find the actual tree now, but the wood of the tree has been used to renovate Wickery Bridge. Can you imagine how many stakes we can make from that?" Kate smirked at her, because she knew what Damon's reaction was going to be.

"Great. What are we waiting for, then?"

Kate rolled her eyes at him, but she laughed as well. "Damon, remember what I said about playing it smart? That's not smart. Not only, as I already mentioned, we aren't strong enough to take him in a fight, he has an entire family of Originals that will be extremely pissed if we kill him and, even if by some miracle, we'd able to kill him and survive, we wouldn't be able to fight off his siblings. Also, there's a huge problem with killing an Original with a white oak stake, because if you kill an Original, then all the other vampires from his bloodline die too."

"Wait, back up a second. Vampire bloodlines, really?" Damon asked. He looked very irritated now, not liking one bit what Kate was telling him.

Kate shrugged. "Unfortunately. And it just so happens that the vampire who turned me – Rose is her name – was turned by another vampire – Bloody Mary – who, in turn, had been made into a vampire by Klaus."

"But that would mean—" Elena said, horrified.

"Yes, Elena. If Klaus dies, we're all dead. I would be dead. Damon and Stefan, because I was the one that turned them. And Caroline, because it was Damon's blood that turned her. Not to mention all the other vampires from his bloodline. The same would be true of any other vampire from any other bloodline if we kill an Original."

"How can it not be hopeless? What can we do then?"

"Don't panic, Elena. I'm getting there. I told you, there's a way out. It took me 500 years to find a solution, but I know what to do now."

"Wait, what about the other method? The one where the Originals aren't truly killed but only put out of commission?" Stefan asked.

"That method would be ideal for the other Originals, yes. In fact, lucky for us, Klaus did the work for us, for the most part. All of his siblings, except for Elijah, are daggered and in coffins, which he brings with him wherever he goes."

"Wait, did you say daggered?" Even with a deep frown of confusion on his face, Damon was still the most beautiful man she's ever seen. Focus, Kate. She mentally shook her head. I can't let myself get distracted by hot Damon Salvatore is.

"Yes. You see, there are silver daggers spelled by witches that, if imbued with the ashes of the white oak stake, can kill them without destroying their body. They would look like a normal vampire look if they are staked. Except that the dagger needs to stay inside their heart or they return to life. As long as the dagger remains inside and keeps piercing their hearts, it would be like they are dead."

"You said that it would be ideal for the other Originals. Why wouldn't it be ideal for Klaus?"

"Well, for starters – as much as it's a remote possibility – the daggers can be removed. Sure, we can hide the coffins in a place where no one would find them, like at the bottom of the ocean. But there's still that smallest chance that someone might come across their bodies and take the dagger out. Also, a dagger can only be wielded by a human. If a vampire daggers an original, the vampire will die as well. And if that weren't bad enough, a silver dagger doesn't work on Klaus."

"Why not?" Stefan asked. He seemed to have finally lost his air of petulance and was listening intently now. Kate knew that, eventually, he would come to see reason.

"Because of his werewolf side. You see, unlike what the legends say, werewolves are not weakened by silver. The opposite, in fact. They are immune to silver. Therefore, a silver dagger wouldn't do anything to Klaus. For it to work, the dagger would need to be made of another material. As far as I know, Kol – one of the Originals – was working with some witches in the 1910's to create a dagger that would work on Klaus. I think he was close but then Klaus found out what Kol was up to and he daggered him for it. So, you see, for Klaus a dagger in the heart is out of the question. But, as I was saying, we can use it on Elijah. Then we find where Klaus keeps the rest of his family and boom, no more Originals."

"Except for Klaus," Damon said, an eyebrow raised in question.

"Except for Klaus. And that's when my masterful plan comes into the picture. But first, a brief history lesson." Time to explain the origin of the doppelgängers. "About two thousand years ago, in Ancient Greece, there were two very powerful witches and the heads of their two respective covens, one was Qetsiyah – a distant ancestor of your friend Bonnie, Elena – and the other was Silas.

"Silas and Qetsiyah were supposed to get married, uniting their two covens, and Qetsiyah, as a wedding gift for Silas, created what she called her Elixir of Immortality. This would allow both her and Silas to live forever. Too bad for Qetsiyah but Silas was in love with Qetsiyah's handmaiden Amara and he planned on sharing the elixir of immortality with her instead, to spend eternity with her and not Qetsiyah. So that's what he did. He drank the elixir and became immortal, then he gave the rest of the elixir to Amara. But Qetsiayh found out what Silas had done and to say that she was furious would be an understatement. Silas had no idea that Amara had already drunk the elixir and become immortal as well. Qetsiayh made him believe that she had killed Amara, instead she cursed Amara to a fate worse than death. She turned Silas to stone before burying him alive, trapped, in a remote place, with the cure to immortality that she had also created, buried with him."

"What has this anything to do with Elena or Klaus?" Stefan said and Kate glared at him.

"Be patient, Stefan, I'm getting there," Kate replied. "Anyway, as I was saying, Silas and Amara both became the first Immortals in existence. Their immortality was different from ours, different than us vampires. They weren't undead for one, they were still very much alive. They weren't also as strong or fast as we are. And yet, their immortality was absolute. There's no weapon on earth that can kill them. Only the cure for Immortality, which would revert them to normal humans – or, in the case of Silas, back to being an incredibly powerful witch.

"Of course, nature couldn't allow for beings like them to exist. Nature always needs to find a balance. So, since they couldn't be killed, it created versions of them that could. Doppelgängers."

Elena, Stefan and Damon had the same look of astonishment on their faces. "So that's why we look alike?" Elena asked. "Because we are doppelgängers of this Amara?"

Kate nodded. "Exactly. Doppelgängers are a symbol of rebirth, and our blood has natural binding properties. That's why Esther Mikaelson decided to use Tatia's blood to bind Klaus' curse. And why doppelgänger blood is also the only thing that can break the curse."

"Okay, but I still don't understand what your plan is, exactly."

Kate smirked at Damon in answer. "Let's see if you can figure it out. You see, Qetsiyah cursed Amara, in a way. She wanted Amara and Silas to be separated for all eternity, never being able to be together, not even in death. That's why she created the Other Side – a sort of limbo for supernatural creatures – and made Amara the anchor for it. This way Silas, if he were to take the cure and die, he would end up on the Other Side, while Amara would remain immortal or, if she were to also find a way to become mortal again, she wouldn't be supernatural anymore and just move on. They would never end up in the same place after death.

"Like I said, Qetsiyah made Silas believed that Amara was dead, so if Silas were to take the cure he was buried with, he would never see Amara again – so he never took it, never made himself mortal. He's still buried there, to this day, with the cure. A cure that can also cure someone from being a vampire and make them human again. Amara, though, wasn't really killed by Qetsiyah. Instead, she was made into the immortal anchor to the Other Side. This means that, for two thousand years, every time a supernatural creature died, they had to pass through Amara to reach the Other Side and she feels the pain they felt when they died, every single time. This drove her practically insane. She wants to die, to end her suffering."

Damon widened his eyes at Kate's last words, finally catching on to her plan, and much faster than Kate was expecting – but she shouldn't have been surprised, Damon was incredibly intelligent and perspective.

Damon sprung to his feet and started to laugh. "I bow to your genius, Katherine, truly. This is brilliant. This is really brilliant." Kate smirked at him and bowed her head in thanks to his praise. At Stefan and Elena's confused looks, Damon rolled his eyes. "Oh, come one, do I really have to explain everything? Fine then. If we can get ahold of the cure, and find this Amara, convince her to drink the cure and then get sacrificed in Elena's place – since, as you said, she wants to die anyway – then we wouldn't even have to do anything. Klaus is going to do everything for us. Klaus is going to think he's finally breaking the curse by drinking the blood of the Petrova doppelganger and, yet, he'll be drinking the cure from Amara's veins, making himself human in the process. That would also solve the problem of the vampire bloodline since he wouldn't be a vampire anymore. He would be human and therefore easily killed."

Kate raised a finger in the air. "Correction, he wouldn't be a normal human, he would be a werewolf. If I'm right, Amara's blood would enough to break the curse on his werewolf side – since she's identical in every way to a doppelganger, since we were all made from her – and killing Amara would be enough to trigger the werewolf curse. He would become a werewolf. Still better than a thousand-year-old immortal hybrid though, right? Much easier to kill."

"Much," Damon's lips were still upturned in a smile. He looked elated, and hopeful.

"Like I said, the ingredients we need – meaning the cure and Amara herself, won't be easy to retrieve. However I have a plan for that as well."

"Wait, wait, wait," Stefan said and his frown of disapproval didn't bode well for them. "Your entire plan rests on the death of someone else. How is that better?"

"Would you prefer for Elena to die instead? Amara lived two thousand years in hell, she just wants to die and find peace. Trust me, when we find her, you can ask her yourself. You'll see I'm right. She'll jump at the chance to die. It won't be easy at all to convince her to take Elena's place."

Stefan still didn't look convinced and Elena too seemed doubtful. "I don't know, Katherine, it doesn't seem right."

"Look, I get it. You have morals and you feel bad about sacrificing someone else in your place. Your compassion is commendable Elena, but this is our best chance – our only chance, really. And, to sweeten the deal even more, Stefan – I know you never wanted to become a vampire, you hate being a vampire. Well, think about the fact that once Klaus has the cure in his veins, you could drink his blood and not only he would die, but you would turn into a human. You and Elena could have the human life together that you desperately want."

Stefan shook his head, but it was obvious he was very tempted by her words. "We'll have to think about this."

"No, we don't," Damon protested immediately. Kate wasn't surprised that he didn't have any problems with her plan. "Katherine is right. This is our best chance. This plan is brilliant. It solves all of our problems."

"Yeah, well, this isn't about you, Damon. This is Elena's choice."

Damon and Katherine rolled their eyes at the same time. "Yeah, well, think about it as much as you want, I plan on going after the cure and Amara in the meantime. We don't have any time to lose. We have to act now because I'm afraid it won't be long until someone finds out about Elena's existence and therefore someone will warn either Elijah or Klaus eventually. We have to be prepared when that happens."

Stefan and Elena nodded, not having much choice in the matter.

Damon turned towards her with a smirk. "So, where do we start?"