Sophia's POV
On another road trip my brothers is possibly the last place I wanted to be right now but I didn't trust them to do this alone since they didn't have the best track record of getting things done on their own.
Stefan had the Sheriff track Damon's plates given that Elena and Rebekah stole it which honestly made me laugh a little since leave it to Rebekah to join up with Elena to get her hands on the cure before my brothers could get it and shove it down the doppelgangers throat.
We told Damon where his car was and he met us there grabbing the Jerry cans of gasoline from the car Stefan and I drove here in that we'd grabbed in order to fill his car's tank given Elena and Rebekah dumped it after it had run out.
"If they so much as even scratched the paint on my car…"
"Why don't you just be grateful Sheriff Forbes was able to track down the car after you let them, uh...you know steal it from you" Stefan cut him off stating a more serious topic than the crappy paint job on Damon's Camaro.
"Remind me to send her some mini-muffins" I rolled my eyes at Damon's reply. "Do we really need 10 gallons of gas or are you making me just lug this around as punishment?" he then complained lifting up the two cans of gas.
"Well they ditched your car after it ran out of fuel, we got to fill it up" Stefan replied as Damon pulled down the back license plate where the gas tank cap was and started filling up his car. "We got a hundred miles before we get to Willoughby"
"Yeah well I don't remember that name from the list of places that I got in New York" Damon argued.
"Oh the list, you mean the list they stole from right under your nose after you let your guard down?" Stefan remarked childishly. "They'll be there, Sheriff Forbes tracked down the car they stole after yours"
"Screw the muffins I'll get her champagne if Elena is wherever it may be" Damon replied making me once again roll my eyes.
"Willoughby, cream corn capital of Pennsylvania" Stefan clarified. "They'll be there, let's just hope we get to them before they get to the cure"
"Ooh silver lining, if Rebekah takes the cure then she's mortal and then we can just kill her right then and there" I turned towards my twin with a glare since nobody was killing Rebekah.
"Ooh dark cloud, Elena stays a vampire forever" Stefan immediately protested.
"And not to mention I'll kill you if you even try to kill another one of the Mikaelson's" I snapped at Damon who looked up at me.
"Look, why don't you just table the revenge fantasies for now and just keep your eye on the prize?" Stefan spoke up before Damon and I could go at it. "Find Katherine, get the cure, get out before you get your neck snapped...again"
"Believe me I learned my lesson, Elena without humanity is a stone cold bitch and I won't trust her until we get the old Elena back" I rolled my eyes as we were once again talking about Elena, did these two morons not have anything else to talk about besides saving the bitch.
"Look at that, we're finally on the same page about something" Stefan remarked.
"Look at that" Damon agreed.
"Well I don't agree since you two are idiots if you really think your sweet, sweet precious Elena is gonna be the same after this"
"Remind me again why you brought our delightful cynic sister?" Damon asked looking towards Stefan.
"Because you two would undeniably end up getting both your necks snapped on your own given both your blind faith that Elena Gilbert is some kind of saint hidden beneath a devil attitude right now"
"What do you think you can do-"
"Can you two do this some other time?" Stefan cut in stopping Damon and I from bickering leaving both Damon and I to roll our eyes but nodded our heads simultaneously.
After his car was filled up we got in with me being thrown into the backseat where I tried multiple times to call Nik but he wasn't answering and my worry was clearly written all over my face.
"Why the long face Soph?" I looked up meeting Damon's eyes in the mirror narrowing my eyes.
"I'm fine, not like you care" I grumbled picking up my phone checking for any messages but there was nada.
"You can always head back you know, wouldn't want you to be separated from-"
"Mind your own business Damon" I glared at him.
"Take your own advice Sophia" he shot back.
"Really guys, you lasted 10 minutes" Stefan called us out looking between us, I rolled my eyes turning to look out the back window so I didn't have to look or talk to either of them but more importantly the space that was growing as we drove further away from Mystic Falls and Niklaus with a sinking feeling that something was wrong.
Third Person's POV
Klaus is hunched over still in agonizing pain as he leant against the piano bench when Caroline Forbes enters the mansion calling out for him.
"I got your 50 bajillion messages, this better be life and death"
"Go away" Klaus speaks from somewhere inside so Caroline walks to the sound of his voice.
"Klaus, where are you?" she asks before she enters the room and sees him sitting on the ground next to the piano. "What happened to you?"
"I need more time, stop hounding me!" Klaus yells at her thinking that she's Silas returning to pressure him into finding the cure which he knows Sophia is on the trial right now with her brothers.
"I'm hounding you?!" Caroline seethed glaring at him. "I am supposed to be running 3 different prom committees right now and you keep phone stalking me" she protests which finally makes Klaus stop and look up at her.
"Caroline is it really you?" Klaus asks as he notices that this Caroline was different and lets out a small whimper as he stands steading himself using the piano. "Prove it to me?"
"Ok I don't know if this is some new way of flirting but it sucks and I have more important things to do and you have a wife to test them out on" she complains as she turns to leave.
"Wait please, Silas he stabbed me with the white oak stake there's a little piece of it stuck inside me" Klaus called out stopping her from leaving.
"Why would Silas attack you?" Caroline asked him.
"Well I was in no position to ask questions, suffice it to say I'm hurt and I don't want Sophia to rush back and worry about me so you can understand why I called you" Klaus replied looking up at the teenager as she scoffed at him.
"You ran Tyler out of town, you kill his mother and you think I'm the person to call for help?"
"If I die, you, Tyler, all of your friends die with me" Klaus reminded her with a glare and Caroline groaned at the realization that he was right.
"What do you want me to do?" Caroline asked stepping towards him.
"Well it's quite simple really, I need you to cut the stake out of me" Klaus replies pointing down at a pair of garden sheers already covered in blood from his own attempts to removed the splitter of wood from his back.
Sophia's POV
The rest of the drive to Willoughby, Pennsylvania was in silence before we spotted the car that Sheriff Forbes had traced the terror twosome to have stolen parked on the side of the road so we got out and walked towards it with Stefan pulling out a piece of paper from his pocket just to check that it was the right car.
"Something's not right, Katherine Pierce does not hole up in hicks town P.A" Damon whined.
"Well this is definitely the car they stole, we're in the right place" Stefan argued nodding at the car in front of us.
"Points to them for their choice in vehicles" Damon replied quickly looking through the back window.
"So let me ask you boys something, what happens when we find Elena, how do you knuckleheads expect to get her back to Mystic Falls?" I asked them looking around since I was not going to follow them into this only to have them falter and end up getting our necks snapped by the doppelbitch. "I mean, she's not exactly gonna go quietly and she has an original vampire as her bodyguard" I added scoffing out a laugh.
"We do whatever we have to do, I don't care if we have to throw Rebekah under a school bus and wrap Elena in a burlap sack we do whatever we have to do" Damon replied making me glare at him for the threat against Rebekah.
"I'm serious" I spat at him.
"I am too, I don't care what Elena wants right now she's this close to going off the rails for good and that ain't happening, she's a pain enough as it is" I scoffed since my twin was only seeing this now.
"So what happened to the guy who thought Elena should embrace being a vampire, let the chips fall where they may?" Stefan cut in looking at Damon.
"That guy got his neck snapped in New York and this guy is royally pissed off" Damon complained walking off, I turned sharing a look with Stefan before huffing and we followed after him.
Proved it wasn't that hard to track down the girls since I knew Rebekah a lot better than my useless brothers knew humanity-void Elena and I lead them to the quaint little café immediately spotting my sister-in-law sitting with Katherine who tries to eat a piece of Rebekah's cake but my bitchy sister-in-law catches her arm and twists it as we approach their table.
"Ladies, playing nice?" Stefan speaks up gaining their attention.
"There goes the neighborhood" Katherine whined rolling her eyes as Damon and I slid into the booth opposite them.
"Actually that would have been the day you rolled into town, doppelwhore" I glared at her as she narrowed her eyes at me.
"I see you got Katherine already" Damon pointed out the obvious to Rebekah before turning to Katherine. "You're losing your touch, evil one"
"Where's Elena?" Stefan asked leaning down towards Rebekah seeing as she wasn't here.
"So let me get this straight, I tell you where Elena is you shove the cure down her throat and then I end up in a box, right?" Rebekah argued making me frown but I kept my eyes on Katherine noticing she looked particularly happy for someone under capture. "I don't think so"
"What about you over there, smiley?" I remarked narrowing my eyes suspiciously at Katherine. "Do you know where she is?"
"I can give you a hint. Start by looking at the town morgue, she's probably dead" she replied and they all frowned with looks of confusion. "She went to meet up with a friend of mine, you may know him…an original brother, impeccable taste" she smirked.
"Elijah?" Rebekah and I answered simultaneously.
"Elijah's here?" Damon pressed.
"Well you sort of have to question Elijah's impeccable taste if he's friends with you" Stefan argued and I scoffed laughing a little.
"Oh when I say friend, I mean 'Friend'..." Katherine smirked and we all groaned in disgust realizing exactly what she was implying and it was enough to make me want to throw up.
"Well now I'm gonna throw up" I voiced.
"My sentiments exactly when I found out about you and Klaus" Katherine remarked making me glare at her. "But it probably took him about 10 seconds to realize that she wasn't me, at which point he probably yanked her heart right out of her chest"
"All right, where are they?" Stefan presses them annoyed with the run around but neither of them answer so I give Rebekah a look.
"Rebekah you do realize if something happens to Elena, you have zero chance of finding the cure, right?" I reminded her using the voice of reason which usually always worked on Rebekah.
"Fine, they were supposed to meet at the gazebo by the park" she finally told us and I smiled nodding my head.
"I'll go talk to Elijah" Stefan nodded and went to get up.
"You deal with Elijah, Katherine will take us to the cure"
"No she won't, the cure's my one chance to win my freedom back from Klaus" Katherine argued scoffing and I bit back a laugh.
"You're gonna broker a deal with Klaus?" Damon asked her.
"No, she's gonna get Elijah to broker a deal for her" I argued glaring at Katherine since I knew that trick by now, she's only tried it about a dozen times to escape my husband. "That's why you need your little friend, isn't it?" I pressed watching her glare at me meaning I'd hit the head on the nail. "Some things never change, Katherine" I glared at her.
"Nope" Damon agreed.
"Fine" Katherine finally spat before turning towards Rebekah. "Move, you have to follow me"
Damon, Rebekah and I followed Katherine to a very unlikely of little houses and Damon pushed her towards the door opening it letting us inside but the moment I saw the décor I raised an eye since this had to be a trick, there was no way this was where Katherine was staying.
"No sudden moves, no tricks either, no Katherine-ing" Damon warned her as she headed inside. "A quilt and a fish aquarium, who the hell are you?" he then asked noticing the same thing I had.
"A very old lady with dreadful taste" Rebekah replied and I smiled lifting up books and shaking them for any sneaky false ones while Katherine opens a safe and looks inside.
"It's gone" she frowned. "The cure, it was in the safe but it's not there" I rolled my eyes since did she think we were stupid.
"No not falling for it" I argued glaring at her.
"Where is it, Auntie Katherine?" Damon asked her.
"I swear it was in the safe"
"What just like Elijah's really your boyfriend and this is really your life and for all we know, this isn't even your house" Rebekah argued.
"It doesn't look like the Katherine I know" Damon agreed with her and I nodded my own agreeance.
"Maybe you don't know Katherine at all, did it even occur to you that you have no idea who I really am?" Katherine argued glaring at us.
"Did it even occur to you that you're not that deep?" Damon shot back at her. "This whole small-town girl thing, we know it's an act"
"Where is the cure?" Rebekah snapped glaring at her but Katherine doesn't answer and smiles so Rebekah rushes towards her but Damon stops her.
"Whoa, whoa hang on we need her alive the cure's not here you check upstairs I'll check down" Bekah hesitated clearly not trusting Damon. "I got this" he added and she finally leaves the room. "So if I was a paranoid, distrustful sociopath, where would I keep my most prized possession?" Damon asked himself turning to survey the room.
"This should be fun" Katherine chuckled.
"Because I'd want it to be close but not on me-"
"Accessible but not obvious, I'd want to keep it safe" I smirked cutting Damon off as he and I took to opposite sides of the rooms looking in little boxes and nooks that you'd likely hide something.
"But not so safe that it'd be too difficult to grab and run" he finished stopping in front of the aquarium and knelt down looking inside. "Well, that is a fancy little treasure chest in a tank with no fish" he pointed out turning to Katherine. "I think I'm gonna have to check that out" he stands and locks eyes with Katherine as he puts his arm inside but hisses when the water immediately burns and my eyes widen since we found the cure.
"Vervain water, looks like we have a winner" I remarked picking up a net as Damon hastily pulls his arm out and handed it to him but next thing I know is I'm face down in the water and screaming as it burns my entire face before I'm thrown to the floor feeling my entire face blistering and burning barely looking over at Damon seeing him exactly the same way while Katherine's making a run for it.
"Give it to me or you're dead" I hear Rebekah say and look up seeing she'd managed to stop Katherine.
"You're gonna kill me anyway, so what's more important to you, huh?" Katherine asked her. "Killing me or getting the cure?" she throws the cure in the air behind her and runs past Rebekah who goes after the cure catching it.
"Look Rebekah...don't even think about it, let's just talk about this like the two rational vampires that we are" she refused to even look at us. Rebekah?"
"Oh, give it a rest, me taking this cure is the best thing that'll ever happen to you" she argues.
"Don't do anything stupid" Damon warned her.
"Admit it, you don't want human Elena running back to Stefan whilst you're left out in the cold again" Rebekah argued looking up at us on the ground recovering from the vervain burns. "Go on Damon, tell me why you want Elena to have the cure" she adds and I look over at my twin as he doesn't answer. "That's what I thought" she smiles before she breaks it open right as I saw Stefan enters but he's too late as Rebekah downs the contents.
"No!" he yells right as Rebekah chokes once before she collapses on the couch. "Did you even try to stop her?" Stefan yells at us checking over Rebekah while Damon and I have managed to pull ourselves off the ground and was wiping the last of the vervain water from our faces with towels and blankets to heal.
"You forgot the part where Soph and I were bobbing for boxes in vervain water!" Damon yelled back at our little brother.
"All you had to do was stall her, Damon"
"Sorry it's Rebekah, I didn't have a pony to distract her Stefan" I rolled my eyes at Damon's reply since nothing was gonna distract Rebekah from taking that cure.
"You let her take it, didn't you?" Stefan demanded standing up glaring at us. "You were never on my side, either of you and now Elena will be a vampire for the rest of her life just like you wanted"
"Actually I didn't want that" I argued glaring at him right as Rebekah woke up. "How do you feel?" I asked Rebekah taking a step towards her sitting on the coffee table in front of her.
"I…I feel good, I... I feel great, I feel alive" she smiled laughing out her joy.
"Slight problem with being alive…I can kill you now" Damon seethed and before any of us could react he throws a letter opener at her but she catches it easily within a blink of an eye, she opens her hand palm up and we see her bleeding but the cut heals. "I'm still a vampire, the cure didn't work" she frowned her hope fading from her eyes.
"It worked just like she wanted it to" Stefan suddenly spoke up and we all turned to look at him. "The cure was a fake, it must have been a concentrated shot of vervain or something" he added and our confusion turned into glares as we realized what he meant.
"Katherine..." Damon growled out.
"Well done brothers" I clapped sarcastically and watched them glare at me. "I trust you can handle your doppelbitch while you leave the doppelwhore to Rebekah and I since you two clearly have no idea what were up against" I flicked my hair over one shoulder walking out hearing Rebekah following me as we tracked down Elijah and Katherine which honestly wasn't that hard deciding to let them have their little lovers quarrel as it seemed like trouble in paradise while we waited next to the car that screamed Elijah Mikaelson.
"You and Katherine...and I thought you were the smart brother" Rebekah spoke up as we saw Elijah walking towards us.
"You don't have a smart brother" Elijah quipped back.
"Ouch I'd say Nik's pretty smart to have married me, don't you think so"
"But your not smart to have married him" Rebekah shot back and I mocked hurt pressing a hand over my heart.
"It turns out I'm just as stupid as the rest of you" Elijah added.
"Why don't you just give me the cure so I can judge you silently elsewhere?" Rebekah shot back at him.
"And what could you possibly want with the cure?" Elijah asked her.
"I want to be human again"
"How do you know that being human is the answer you're looking for?" Elijah asked her and I frowned since that was the big question. "I mean it's nothing but a romantic notion, the grass won't necessarily be greener, Rebekah"
"You're probably right but I don't care, I want to live a simple life as a normal person and when it ends, it ends" Rebekah replied while I looked down. "We've had 20 lifetimes together, Elijah...isn't that enough?"
"I just don't understand, I mean why must you always consider our family a burden?" Elijah shot back at her, to me the Mikaelson's were my saviors. "Always and forever, I mean those words are as important to me today as they ever were"
"You will always be my brother and I will never stop loving you but now it's time for me to live and die the way that I choose, not the way you and Nik want me to...please, please just give me the cure" she begs him right as her phone rings and she answers. "What do you want, Nik?" I looked up with a frown since where has he been all day and why wasn't he calling me.
"An update on our search for the elusive cure" he replies.
"Let's just say that things have gotten complicated, in fact why don't you speak to one of those complications here" she hands the phone to Elijah who takes it and presses it to his ear with a smile.
"Complication speaking" I bit back a smile shaking my head.
"Big brother, at last you join the fray"
"Somebody had to take charge and now that I have, I've got the cure and I'm bringing it back to Mystic Falls" Elijah replied.
"With a long list of demands, I assume" Nik protested knowing his luck that his siblings would barter with him.
"Not that long"
"Come home brother, we'll settle this like family"
"Well this has been a long day, tell Nik I'll be home as soon as I feel like it"
"What's he done now?" Elijah asked as I began to walk away.
"Nothing really, I just feel I need a break from the drama that is both halves of my family, he knows I'll come back...I always do" I sighed before skipping off figuring I'd hotwire a car and take some much needed 'me' time while they sorted out the legalities and drama of the cure which I wanted no part in hence why now was the perfect time for once of my hiatus's.
