The old clocks of the Salvatore Boarding House sounded before Abigail could even process their last toll.
"Well..." Damon leaned back with his hands clasped behind his head. "This is promising."
Bonnie halted. "Abby will be here."
"I'm sorry, I forgot about her stellar track record in the dependability department." The doorbell rang. "Don't get your hopes up! Might be a Girl Scout."
Abby's voice was undeniable as she asked, "Why didn't I have to be invited in?"
"Only vampires live here."
"We had signed over the deed to Elena, but she died. The seal broke, very long story." Damon offered Abby a glass of blood. "Ah, come on. Think of it as a peace offering. No? Fine. More for us."
Abigail drank the glass of blood in one go, instantly reminded of the way Alaric drank Elena's blood the night before.
"We called you here because I need help with a spell. Esther created a vampire that can't be killed. I want to desiccate him like you did to Mikael."
"Bonnie, it's too dangerous," she argued. "Your magic comes from the Earth. It's pure. This spell asks you to tap into dark places. Places of temptation, places you can't handle."
"You have no idea what I can handle."
"Gotta say I'm team Bonnie on this one." Damon smirked. "How hard can it be to parch a vampire?"
"The spell allows you to stop a vampire's heart. The blood will stop flowing and his body will desiccate." She turned to Bonnie. "To stop a vampire's heart, you need to find a balance among the living. Can you handle that?"
"We don't speak witch, Bonnie." He looked at her with wide eyes. "Spit it out."
Bonnie took a deep breath. "I have to stop a human heart."
Somehow, Abigail found herself alone with her namesake. She didn't remember seeking out the opportunity, only that she wanted to. And now that she had it, she wasn't entirely sure she was ready.
"I'm sorry for the part I played in turning you. And I'm not trying to make any excuses, but it was the only way for me to save Elena. It was-"
"You didn't kill me, Abigail. And, you know, I think I can do this. Caroline has given me the things I need to live a life that I am proud of. It's just going to take some time for me to come to terms with that." When she paused, it was clear that true acceptance would not come for years, but what she had then, it was more than she expected. "You look so much like them both..."
"My mom kept a picture of you all these years, tucked away where only she could find it. She showed it to me once, told me about you. About how much you loved nature and cared deeply for everyone around you. About how much she loved you." She knew more about her than Bonnie ever did, she realized, and it was that which brought tears to her eyes. "I think she would want you to know that."
"Miranda was an amazing woman. She took care of Bonnie when I couldn't, so..." She pulled her into a hug, whispering, "You call me if you ever need anything."
Jeremy was sitting on one of the picnic tables outside of the school when they pulled up in Damon's car, looking down at his ring. He greeted them softly as they crowded around him, not quite able to keep his voice even.
"I just got this app. It connects us through our phones." Abigail's hands shook as she pushed her phone into Damon's hand. "They're in A-Alaric's classroom. We should go in from the south entrance."
"Digital locator spell." He looked at Bonnie. "Why the hell do we need you then?"
Abigail didn't scold him, she didn't even look at him, no, her eyes hadn't left Jeremy. "The ring."
He pulled his hand out of her reach. "No!"
"Jer, you've already died wearing it once, this will be twice." She swallowed the sob threatening to escape her. "I can't watch what happened to Alaric happen to you. I can't. So, give me the ring."
"This is my ring." Standing up, he didn't back away. "Let me do this."
Klaus and Stefan walked up to them. "Look at this, one big, happy family."
"This is my blood. It bridges us all together so that when I stop Jeremy's heart, you'll have the power to stop Alaric's." Bonnie held out a small vial. "You need to make a physical connection to his bloodstream; a vein, artery, something connected to his heart."
Abigail took a sip, silently passing it to Damon.
"If one of us gets a clean shot: take it. The others: hold him down."
Stefan took a swig of the blood and passed it to Klaus.
"Before we all walk through these doors, let's get on the same page, shall we? I was the one who created your vampire bloodline, therefore I am responsible for your lives, Tyler's life, Caroline's life, and of course, Abby's life, should anything go wrong."
Damon scoffed. "Or you're just lying to save your ass."
"I'm not lying." Klaus drank the remainder of the blood. "But go ahead, call my bluff, let the teacher kill me. You'll all be dead soon thereafter."
"Let's just get this over with, shall we?"
They walked toward the school, leaving Jeremy and Bonnie behind without a final look.
In the hallway, Alaric was holding Elena against the lockers by the throat. "There's obviously no humanity left in you, so what's stopping you, Alaric? If you want me dead, then kill me. Do it! Kill me!"
Stefan and Damon grabbed him from behind, releasing Elena from his grasp.
Abigail pushed her down the hall. "Run! Go, Elena!"
Turning back to the scene in front of her, she saw Alaric standing over Stefan and Damon's bodies. He stalked toward her, going for the least obvious move. The one she was prepared for.
"I know all your tricks, Ric. You're going to have to fight a lot harder than that."
His fingers interlocked with hers, almost as if they couldn't stop themselves, pinning her in place against the lockers. "I tried to tell you I wasn't a good guy."
"I still don't believe that." She rested her forehead against his. "Somewhere, deep down, you're in there."
Klaus forced his way between them, plunging his hand into Alaric's chest. There wasn't even time for the spell to begin before a struggle ensued, one where Abigail failed to intervene, as Alaric pushed the indestructible white oak stake toward Klaus' heart.
"Stop!" Elena yelled with a knife to her throat. "Let him go or I'll kill myself."
"Put it down! Now!"
"Why? Because you still need me alive? There's a reason why Esther used me to make you, isn't there?" Her words flew out fast, as if she had been preparing them all day. "She didn't want you to be immortal, so she tied your life to a human one. Mine. That way you have only one life span to kill all vampires and then you'll be gone. So, when I die, you die too. That's it, it has to be!"
He shook his head slowly. "You're wrong."
"Am I?"
"Stop!"
Just as the blade broke her skin, Klaus threw Alaric off of him. He rushed toward Elena, grabbed her, and disappeared out of the building. But left alone with an open shot, Abigail was unable to do what she should have.
"Why are you doing this?"
"You know why."
"Ric, this isn't right."
"You may not have killed anyone since you turned, but you will. It's inevitable. What do you think your parents would say if they could see you now? They led the Council. It was their life's mission to keep this town safe. The mission you turned your back on long before you became the very thing they hated the most." He stepped toward her. "Does that even register with you?"
"Of course, it does."
"I can fix this. You can fix this." He took a step toward her. "Help me kill Klaus, all his siblings, and then I will die. Vampires will no longer exist."
"If Klaus dies, I die. If you die, Elena dies. I'm not-"
"Then lock me up. Have Bonnie put a spell on me. Let Elena live a long, healthy, truly human life and when her life is over, mine will be too." He held up the indestructible white oak stake. "This stake is the one weapon on Earth that can kill them. I'm gonna get Klaus either way, Abigail. Be on the right side of this."
Damon stirred awake. "Why am I still alive?"
"Get up."
Stefan groaned.
"I said, get up. Klaus is gonna kill Elena."
"What?"
"What are you talking about?" Stefan stood up. "Klaus needs Elena's blood to make hybrids. She's the last person that he'd kill."
"The witch bound my life to Elena's. If she dies, I die. Klaus figured that out and now he's taken her." He walked between them, knocking them out of the way. "Now, I'm trapped here until the sun goes down, so you better get to doing what you do best. Saving Elena's life."
Klaus' plan to drain Elena of her blood, and in turn kill Alaric, was interrupted by Tyler, giving Damon and Stefan time to carry out their end of Bonnie's heart stasis desiccation spell. This gave way to Caroline's victory party, but Abigail couldn't find it within herself to stick around to see it. So, she met the pavement just inside of town without regret.
"Oh, my God! Are you okay?" The driver of a small SUV knelt next to her. "What happened to you? Can you hear me?"
"I need help."
"I'll call-"
"Don't call anyone," she compelled them. "And don't scream. This will only hurt for a second."
Once she buried her teeth in their neck, she knew exactly what she was doing. But, again, she didn't stop when the voice in the back of her head told her to. She didn't stop when Damon's voice broke through the barrier she put up around it. And she didn't stop when the person in her arms went limp.
Her phone ringing was enough to break her from what she was doing. Enough for her to realize that Klaus had been right. She wasn't the same girl who was in the gym. Damon had been right, too, for all this time, there was a part of her that scared her. But there was one thing that ruled her above all else. Love.
She threw open the front door of the Gilbert house, meeting Elena's eyes in an instant. "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine." She sat up slowly, fiddling with her hospital band. "Just a concussion."
Caroline, Matt, and Tyler came in from the kitchen.
"Thank you." All evidence of what she had been doing had been erased, but she was terrified they could still see it as she paced in front of them. "I-I'm so sorry I wasn't here."
"You need to rest, Abigail." Caroline pulled her to the stairs. "Come on."
An hour later, Elena and Abigail were the only people in the house. "Where is everyone?"
"Tyler and Caroline got calls from their moms. Matt went to the store." She sighed. "I've been thinking about the day Mom and Dad died."
"Elena, I-I can't think about that..."
"It's just... they let us go to that party even though Jenna was here for your birthday, even though Jeremy had started acting out. They let us go. And then Matt and I got in that fight. I-I couldn't stay, you couldn't leave-"
She fell onto the couch. "I didn't want to leave."
"The last conversation I had with Mom was about how I didn't want to lose Matt. And her exact words were, 'You're not going to lose him, honey. You're setting him free.'" Elena paused. "I'm making the same mistakes I made with him with Stefan and Damon. It's not right what I'm doing to them either, I-I have to let one of them go."
"Which one?"
Stefan entered the house, quickly walking across the room to Elena. She was on her feet in an instant, wrapping her arms around him, whispering his name.
Abigail was sitting straight up on the couch with Elena's feet in her lap, very much aware of the lighthearted conversation flowing between Matt, Stefan, and Elena, but she could not pull her eyes from the boarded-up window.
She told Elena she couldn't think about the night their parents died, but now she couldn't stop. She couldn't stop thinking about the way she'd barely acknowledged the detailed text message she sent her. The way Tyler's knee kept knocking into hers from the left, the way Caroline was sitting way too close on her right. The jokes they made. The laughter. Bonnie's expression as she held another drink out to her.
The lights approaching. The sound of the sheriff's car door. Meeting Liz's eyes through the crowd as it parted. Realizing she was ignoring everything and everyone but her.
A stirring outside pulled Abigail toward the front door. It could've been a friend, but there was a higher probability that it was an foe. And the person staring back at her was someone who at one time fell into both categories.
"Elijah," she whispered.
He smiled softly. "Hello again."
"All we need is to take that stake away from him." Elijah looked around the dining room, letting his eyes linger on each person for a long moment. "Once he's been disarmed, the weapon's in my possession, and I have Klaus, my family will scatter to the ends of the Earth. Alaric will follow us."
Stefan sat down next to Elena. "And you'll just run?"
"We've done it before." He took a deep breath. "Klaus and Rebekah spent the better part of a thousand years evading my father. What's another half century while Elena is able to live out the rest of her natural life?"
"We've finally stopped him, Elijah," Elena said. "After everything that he's done to us, I can't just let you bring him back."
"I give you my word, Elena. I will not revive Klaus within yours nor even within your children's lifetimes." He leaned back in his chair. "Perhaps that will finally teach him some manners."
"Why should she trust you?" Matt asked. "All you've done is screw us over."
"And for that, I am deeply ashamed. But know this, she could have been dead the instant I walked through that door tonight, so..." He looked across the table. "Elena, I leave it to you to make the decision whether to trust me or not."
"Not! Hello? Did that concussion give you brain damage?!" Damon's voice filled the room through Stefan's phone. "His lunatic siblings will kill you the first chance they get!"
"Rebekah and Kol will honor the terms. If you return Klaus' body to us, Elena will come to no harm. Do we have a deal?"
"No!" Damon exclaimed. "No, no, no, no! Did I mention no?"
"It's up to Elena," Abigail finally said. "This is about her life."
He scoffed. "Oh, come on!"
Elena looked to Elijah. "Why do you want his body?"
"He's my brother."
"We have a deal."
The group dispersed, leaving Abigail and Elijah as the only two people at the table.
"Elijah, I..." She looked up from her hands. "Your letter. I-I want you to know I forgive you."
"We made a deal, but I took it too far." His tone sharpened. "My talk of virtue. When it suits my needs, I kill, maim, and torment."
"You did it to protect your family."
"My family..."
"Your family didn't ask for this. Your parents turned on you for becoming the very thing they created. All you've done since then, since before, is try to protect your siblings." She took a shaky breath, offering him the truth, "Which is why you should know I didn't do anything that night that I wouldn't have done without you."
"I am truly sorry about what has happened to Alaric, Abigail." His concerned gaze held onto hers. "In a thousand years, I have found love but twice. So, to see it not only taken from you, but slowly pulled away... I cannot imagine the toll it has taken."
"Knowing he's out there, I-"
Elena led the group back into the dining room with a new addition. "We have an idea."
"I know where Klaus' body is," Jeremy said into his phone. "Damon's on his way to bury him in the woods off Route 12. I'll text you with the specifics."
Abigail turned to Bonnie. "Let's go."
Damon was waiting for them when they made it to where they were going. "You know, I'm not halfway out of Virginia and Elena sells our souls to the Originals..."
"It was her call."
"You know what else is her call? Everything bad. Ever."
"Where's the body?" Bonnie asked. "As long as it's unspelled, Alaric is one witch away from finding it."
"Hidden. I was gonna use Unit 666 but figured that would be a little obvious. So..." They stopped in front of a unit. "1020. Mini fridge, a couple bird cages, a box of old Playboys." He opened the shutter door. "One beef jerkified Original."
Bonnie opened the casket.
"Oh..." Damon wiggled his eyebrows. "Creepy."
"I need a minute."
"Bonnie," he snapped. "Just jam the witch locator, bat signal, or whatever, and get on with it."
Abigail looked over her shoulder. "Damon, wait outside."
Bonnie leaned over the casket to make eye contact with Klaus. "You should burn in hell. But if you die, so do my friends. So does my mother."
"Are you going to do it?"
"I don't have a choice."
Abigail found Damon in another storage unit, lounging on an old couch. "Bonnie just left. Rebekah should be here soon to pick up the body."
"Stefan has Caroline and Elijah in place. Jeremy is gonna lead Alaric to them." He moved to his feet. "You just had to let her make the choice, didn't you?"
"What would you have done, Damon?"
"Grabbed her, gagged her, threw her in a well, I don't know, anything other than let her trust Elijah."
"You don't know him."
"And neither do you."
"Actually, I do."
The elevator bell dinged.
"The Original sister is here." Leading the way to the elevator, he called, "It's about time, sexy Bex."
Alaric came up from behind him, catching him in a chokehold. "Where is Klaus?"
"How did you find us?"
"Oh, you'd be amazed at how competent law enforcement is when it's not corrupted by vampires." He tightened his grip. "Now, where is Klaus?"
"In a storage locker. There's only about a thousand of them, have at it."
Alaric broke his neck, turning his sights on Abigail. "You chose wrong."
"Alaric, you don't have to do this." She put her hands out in front of her. "Listen to me-"
He snapped her neck.
"Abigail! Damon! Where are you?" Rebekah's footsteps got closer. "This isn't funny."
Damon pulled her into the unit they had taken cover in.
"Rebekah." Abigail stepped in front of her, holding her finger to her lips. "Alaric is here."
They made quick work of wheeling Klaus' casket to the car. It was too easy, they should have known that, and when Alaric came out of nowhere, grabbed Rebekah, and slammed her head against her car, there was no denying it.
Damon rushed toward Alaric as Abigail pulled Rebekah to her feet, but it was no use. He'd already opened the casket and pulled the white oak stake from his coat pocket.
Rebekah struggled against her. "No!"
"No, don't!"
"Don't do it!"
Alaric plunged the stake into Klaus' heart, setting his body aflame.
"No!" Rebekah screamed. "No! No!"
He spun around. "Next."
"Rebekah, run." Abigail pushed her in the opposite direction. "Run!"
After a lap around the building, checking each and every unit for signs of Alaric or Rebekah, Abigail found Damon sitting on the floor in the parking garage. "Damon-"
"No, Abigail. I can't."
"He's not dead."
He stood up. "What?"
"Bonnie did a spell, just in case."
"You couldn't have told me that before I said my tearful goodbyes?"
"You never said goodbye to me."
"Ah, best for last." He looked over her head. "I see you're still pissed. I take it Goldilocks gave you the slip."
Alaric rushed toward him, landing punch after punch until he was on the ground. "You're not gonna fight back?"
He chuckled. "You're kind of invincible, Ric."
"Don't call me that. We're not friends."
"We were."
"Well, our friendship was part of the problem." He kicked him twice. "It's what kept me weak."
"Is that all you got?"
He shrugged. "Not quite."
Abigail finally jumped in, ignoring Damon's protest as she wrapped her arms around Alaric's shoulders. "Alaric, stop! Stop."
He fell to his knees, taking her with him. His eyes latched onto hers, his hands gripped onto whatever part of her body they could, and, although he couldn't speak, she knew what he was saying.
"Ric, no. No! Ric!" His body grew cold, desiccated into gray, and his veins protruded from his skin. "No!"
He was dead. And if he was dead, if Alaric was dead, that only meant one thing. Elena was dead too.
Abigail and Damon rushed into the empty hospital.
"Where is she?"
Meredith stepped into their path. "Wait."
"Where is she?" Abigail asked again. "Let me see her!"
"You need to know, when Jeremy brought Elena in here earlier tonight, her injuries were worse than I let on." Meredith shoved her hands into the pockets of her lab coat. "It wasn't a concussion, it was a cerebral hemorrhage, bleeding of the brain."
"What are you saying?"
"He was so worried, I didn't want to tell him, but I-I helped her." She swallowed hard. "She needed my help."