"What are you doing?" Marcel probed, crouching on the ground beside Davina and nudging the hairbrush with his fingertips.
Davina shrugged, letting out a huff of air. "I thought I might as well try a locator spell. It didn't do any good though, I've got nothing." She chewed on her lip, fiddling with the hem of the floral dress that lay over her lap. "It's like she's just disappeared off the face of the Earth."
It was Marcel's turn to sigh as he stood from his crouch. "Did you try Elijah? They might be together."
Davina shook her head. "There's nothing on Elijah either. They're both just gone. Inadu must have done something to them; I don't think they chose to leave this house, Marcel."
"She's really that powerful?" Marcel questioned, frowning at her. "This Hollow, you think she could have gotten one over on Elijah and Elena without anyone else in the house noticing?"
Davina let out a breath, biting her bottom lip as she thought. "I don't know enough about her, but Vincent, he seemed to think so." She stood up, dusting off her jeans. "I know he told Elijah it was useless to try and stop her, but I think we should try and talk to him again."
"Vincent." Marcel greeted the witch at the front door of the Mikaelson's house; both of them ignoring the palpable tension in the room behind them. "Thank you for coming."
Stepping over the threshold, Vincent's gaze briefly passed over the bundle wrapped in Rebekah's arms before turning back to Marcel, clearly uninterested in the sleeping child. "I have already told you I can't help you with The Hollow; she's too powerful; she's infected your house already."
"What do you mean infected?" Klaus bit out, glaring at the witch. "How the hell can a person infect a house?"
"Lacking a body of her own she rather favours possession. She was in this house and she has tainted the very bones of this place."
Narrowing her eyes at the man before them, Caroline stepped forward, folding her arms over her chest, "Why are you even here if you think trying to take her on is such a waste of time? We asked you for help, not a defeatist's take on the matter."
"I can't help you; I'm here for answers of my own." Vincent admitted, glancing around the room with a frown. "Do you own a TV?"
Flicking through the television guide, the occupants of the room studiously ignored the sounds of the screaming baby coming from downstairs. A formula run had been made, but the house was vastly unprepared for the arrival of the still unnamed child, and they were struggling to get the hang of calming her down.
"Here it is." Vincent muttered to himself, selecting a channel eventually, watching as the image ballooned into full-size. "It's happened once or twice before, but us down here in New Orleans were never able to get any answers; I thought with two Originals in the city I might finally be able to find out what the hell this means."
"-experts are still at a loss when it comes to trying to explain what exactly is happening across various areas of the globe." The reporter explained gravely; the image of a hospital filling the background behind her. "They have yet to find an answer as to why seemingly unconnected people have suddenly dropped dead in the streets. We currently have no confirmed figure, but the death toll is expected to be at least several hundred."
"You're expecting the Originals to give you an explanation for a plague?" Caroline scoffed, rolling her eyes.
"That's not the confusing part." Vincent sighed, rubbing his brow as they listened to the reporter continuing to talk; the sounds of the baby Mikaelson beginning to quieten down.
"For anyone who's just now beginning to follow this story, you may find the following footage disturbing."
Shaky hand-held footage filled the screen, probably someone filming on their mobile phone Caroline mused, leaning forward in her chair to watch as the man in the video clutched his chest, his skin greying and veins appearing before their eyes as he collapsed in a heap of the floor.
Vincent paused the television on the clearest shot of the dead man, gesturing with the remote. "That's what I want answers to. People haven't just dropped dead all over the world, vampires have. Hundreds of vampires have just dropped dead for no apparent reason. What the hell can cause that?"
Caroline and Bonnie exchanged glances, eyes wide.
"I didn't think it was possible." Bonnie breathed eventually. "I thought they destroyed all of it?"
"So did I." Caroline whispered, her hand coming up to her mouth of it's own accord.
"We did." Rebekah muttered from the doorway, clearing her throat when her voice caught. "Or at least I thought we did." Swiping angrily at her cheeks, she forced her gaze away from the television screen. "I need to talk to Nik."
Turning on her heel, Rebekah all but fled the room, leaving behind a mixture of confused and distressed supernaturals.
"Oh my God, Bonnie, do you think Elena's…" Unable to bring herself to finish her train of thought, Caroline grabbed Bonnie's hand when she reached out to her.
"What is it?" Davina asked, the first of the three others in the room to gain the courage to ask about what on Earth was upsetting the house so much.
"There's a lot of history between us and the Mikaelsons," Bonnie explained softly, "they, Klaus in particular, killed a lot of people we cared about, and things got ugly, we were desperate to find a way to kill an Original." She sighed, squeezing Caroline's hand. "We figured it out, and we killed Finn, but when we did, we found out that every vampire turned by Finn or anyone sired from them died along with him."
"When you kill an Original their entire sire-line dies too." Caroline summed up, letting go of Bonnie's hand and dropping her head into her hands. "It happened when Finn died, and it happened when Kol died, and now…" She trailed off, wincing when she heard a smash from downstairs. "Now it's happened again, and Elijah's the only Original unaccounted for."
She let out a soft groan, blinking away the haze of confusion that was clouding her mind. The sides of her head pulsed, a tight, drawn sensation making her groan again, groggily lifting a hand to her head in a vain attempt to chase away the pain.
Slowly, painfully rolling onto her side, Elena forced herself to blink her eyes open, taking in her surroundings with a confusion tinted gaze. Had she been hallucinating again?
Where the hell was she?
"If it makes you feel any better, I never would have let you live." Shock covered a familiar face at the words that left her mouth, but that was all that made sense about what she was remembering.
Why was she in a basement with Hayley of all people? Those words weren't hers, so why were they leaving her mouth?
"Why all the questions all of a sudden?" Elijah's face looked back at her, soft concern brushing his features, the intensity of the emotions washing over her even as she looked down at his shirt.
Grunting, Elena rolled onto her stomach, planting her palms on the floor and slowly, laboriously, pushing herself up onto her knees.
"Elena, I think that's enough."
She can't have been hallucinating, memories never came back to her like this after she'd had an episode.
"-where did you get that?"
"-you're scaring me."
"Who are you?"
"Sacrificial power?"
"Go on, Elijah, kill us both!"
"Elena, this wasn't your fault, I don't blame you, not for one moment."
Oh.
Oh God.
She'd been possessed. The Hollow.
The Hollow had taken over her body. She killed Hayley, and the baby, that poor baby.
Elijah.
Surely she hadn't.
Elijah couldn't die. The white oak had all been destroyed and if any hadn't The Hollow definitely didn't have any when she'd taken over Elena's body.
Still, though, she remembered the sensation of sinking that cursed blade into Elijah's chest, the knowledge of just what Pape Tunde's blade was capable of cemented in her head from The Hollow. She remembered tearing it out and taunting him, and she remembered sinking it back into his flesh. And she remembered feeling the energy draining from his body as words she struggled to remember flew from her lips; a spell with more power than she'd ever thought possible, made only stronger by the blood oozing from her wrists.
Falling forward onto all fours, Elena fought against the vomit trying to make it's way up her throat. Slowly she turned her body, catching the sight of a foot poking out from behind a pillar of cement blocking her view.
Reluctant, but determined to know, Elena dragged her tired, aching body across the cold floor, clinging to the exhausted scrap of hope she held on to, praying beyond all belief that she wasn't crawling towards certain anguish.
Pulling herself around the last corner, she again felt the bile rising in her oesophagus, a familiar suit adorning a familiar face; grey and cold and altogether gone.
Wrenching it's way from her chest, a great sob tore from her throat as she faltered in her movements, collapsing onto the man in front of her. Her head rested on his chest, making her all too aware of the lack of a heartbeat under her ear.
Closing her eyes, she, saw only his staring back at her, accepting of the death that he was due to meet, and forgiving of the fact that it was being dealt by her hand in a horrible round about way.
Lifting her head, she drew herself into a sitting position beside Elijah's head. Gently lifting him and moving him she pulled his head into her lap, brushing his hair out of his face with a shuddering breath.
He always looked like this when he was killed temporarily, but somehow, whether it was from Inadu being in her head or instinct, she just knew he was gone for real. Bowing her head to meet his, she allowed more tears to escape her; her body slowly rocking as she cradled him. Sucking in a deep breath, she was hardly aware of the keening scream that she released, her throat burning in a way that could never compare to the ache in her chest.
godric777: Thank you very much :)
Guest: Damn, I'm sorry, but there's a load more stuff getting ruined by the Hollow, hopefully I can still have my chefs kisses :( I'm glad you're loving the story though!
lauramorgenstern: You've put it perfectly, I've always enjoyed the fact that Rebekah got to have all that time with Hope and how good she was with her!
It's been a little while, but I'm back! I didn't hear from many of you after my last chapter, so hopefully this stirs some of you out of the woodwork, it is quite the revelation after all!
I really, really can't wait to hear what you guys have to say about this one, leave a review and I'll be back soon!
Until next time
~ I x