I lay next to Klaus the very next morning, neither of us talking. I simply stare out to nothing and wait for this moment to be interrupted, like it always does.
Just as I thought, Tyler and Caroline walk into my house with their has occupied. Caroline is holding a laptop while Tyler is holding Klaus' sword which is wrapped in a blanket.
I slowly pry my head off of Klaus' shoulder and stand up from the couch.
"Well, if it isn't little orphan Lockwood. Come to show how laughably impotent you are against me?" Klaus says, a smirk forming on his lips already. Tyler shakes his head, "I'm just trying to help my friends find the cure."
Caroline finds her way to the couch and sits on it while using her laptop. I crept behind her and watch what she's doing. I look back up and Tyler took the blanket off the sword, "Found this in your attic."
"And you think finding the sword brings you closer to the cure?" Klaus questions, an amusing look into his eyes.
Tyler shrugs, "You tell me. I was playing around with the handle on the ride over, and I found this." He unwraps the leather on the top of the sword, revealing some sort of turning device.
I walk towards Tyler out of curiosity and Klaus does the same immediately after me. "And what do you think this is?"
"It's called a cryptex." I turn my head to Caroline who stood up from the couch, "I've seen The da Vinci Code. You turn the different sides to the different symbols to get the translation on the other side. And with the magic of the internet, Elena sent over these." Caroline says, showing print outs of Jeremy's tattoos. "So now all we have to do is cryptex away."
Caroline sits down again. "If you happened to want to help, we wouldn't stop you." she tells Klaus, who nods, "Right. Well, might I suggest using the magic of the internet to purchase an Aramaic-to-English dictionary from your nearest retailer." Klaus smirks.
"What's Aramaic?" I ask him, but Caroline cuts in before he could answer me. "It's a dead language. It hasn't been used since, like, biblical times."
"Qetsiyah's native tongue, I'm guessing. You know, even if you had the best dictionary in the world, it could take days to translate. Perhaps weeks. In bas so-teen-too ara-ma-eet." Klaus says, which stunned me in a way.
"What does that mean?" I ask and he grins back up at me. "If only you spoke Aramaic."
A few hours later, Caroline, Tyler, and I were still finding translation to the Aramaic symbols since Klaus wouldn't budge to help even after I begged him.
I finished writing a symbol on an index card and the meaning before dropping it on the table and laying back on the couch, letting out a huge sigh.
"Okay, this is it." Caroline exclaims. "We've translated all the symbols on the tattoo... 'Passage inside... requires a young senator, and a pretty flower'." she lets out a loud groan, "Okay, none of this makes sense!"
"Maybe it does make sense... we just have use the words right." I tell her, not making any sense but she understood.
Klaus spoke after being silence for a long time. He said something in Aramaic and translates it right after, his eyes set on mine only. "Requires a powerful witch and a hunter in full bloom."
"What are you doing?" Tyler asks. "I don't need to tell you my reasons. Maya. Bring my sword over here." Klaus orders and I obey, picking up the sword from the coffee table and standing in front of him so he could read the cryptex.
"Silas rests on the far side, the means of his destruction at hand." Klaus says, glancing at the pictures of Jeremy's tattoo on Caroline's laptop screen. "Turn the cryptex to the right." he tells me and I oblige.
"Stop. The top of the hilt reveals a key to a nautical map. Turn it to the left." I nod, turning it. "Now turn the other piece. There's something else."
He pauses and I wait for him to explain what that something else is. Klaus begins to speak in Aramaic again and I grow impatient. "What does it mean?" I ask him and he just smiles at me, not answering my question. "Klaus, what does it mean?"
He then tells us that there's only one dose of the cure, which means only one person will get the cure. But, no one knows that yet.
No one was answering their phones since they were on that island and the only person who answered was Rebekah. "Hello?"
"Rebekah! Hey, it's Maya. We finally got the translation of the tattoo and Caroline is emailing you pictures of the map and instructions right now."
I wait a moment before she replies back, "Got it. Thanks."
Klaus walks over to me, "Actually, it was me." He didn't even need the phone since everyone had special hearing powers besides me. "Nik, you helped?" Rebekah asks, her voice sounding shocked.
"You sound so surprised, little sister." Klaus responds. "Shouldn't I be? I mean, you don't want me to be human. You don't want any of us to be human. Why would you help us find the cure?" she tells him.
"Maybe I finally realized the longer I stand in the way of what you want, the longer you'll continue to hate me. Perhaps I want my sister to finally know happiness."
"Fool me once, shame on you; fool me a hundred times—" Rebekah starts, but Klaus cuts her off. "No more fooling. No more games. I hope you get to live, and die, as you wish."
"So do I."
"There is one more thing, Rebekah." I look up at him as he continues to speak. "There is only one dose of the cure. You need to find it first and take it. It's the only way you'll—"
I hang up the phone before he would say anything else. "Shh. We don't want them killing each other on who gets the cure first." I scold him and he smirk down at me.
§
Later that night, Tyler and Caroline were outside. Probably saying goodbye since Klaus is threatening to kill him. I look out the window and see Caroline crying and it made my heart sunk. She shouldn't be feeling that way if I could do something about it.
I turn around and Klaus is right at the barrier of the living room. "Klaus, you need to let Tyler go." I tell him and he turns his head immediately with his eyebrows furrowed.
"How could you say such a thing? After all he did to me, to you?" he replies, stepping towards me. "Yes, I know, but—"
"Are you really going to stand up to him after he turned his hybrids against me?" he asks, his voice getting louder. "You killed his mother! Don't you think you've done enough?! Tyler is my friend and you throwing a fit about your hybrids won't help."
"Those hybrids were all I had and he destroyed that!" he yells, stepping right in front of me. "I'm all you have!" I spat right back, getting angry by the fact he thinks his hybrids revolve around him and I am just nothing.
I stare into his eyes, my fist forming into a ball. In a split second, he was gone and the last thing I heard was the front door slam shut. Bonnie's spell must of worn off.
I let out a shaky breathe. That argument went by so quick yet it still hurt. Without thinking, I went to the front porch and saw Caroline sitting on the swing.
"Where's Tyler?" I ask her and she looks up, a sad look on her face. "He's gone. Klaus said he's giving him a head start to leave before he'll kill him."
§
The next morning, I started scrubbing the floor, trying to clean the burnt mark, but nothing was working. I was so stressed, having an awful feeling about everyone on the island. I couldn't get ahold of them, or Klaus, he kept ignoring my phone calls to the point where I gave up. Now, I'm stress-cleaning and it's not working.
Caroline is also cleaning with me but she keeps talking, which isn't helping me concentrate at all.
The door flies open and I secretly hope it is Klaus, but it was Stefan and Elena instead. "You're back!" I exclaim and get off the floor with a smile, which soon drops when I see Jeremy's body wrapped in a blanket. "What—"
"Come on. Let's get him upstairs." Elena says, ignoring both Caroline and I. "What are you doing with Jeremy?!" I ask, praying that he's not dead.
I run after them and Stefan lays his body on his bed. "Is he–?" I ask, mentally trying to prepare myself for the worse.
"No! He's not dead. He has the ring, remember?" Elena says, giving me a comforting smile, but that didn't make me feel better. "Elena—"
"Maya." I look at Stefan, who motions to the door and I scurry out and he closes the door, rushing me to the bathroom, shutting that door, and turning on the faucet.
"Stefan, he's—" I say and he nods, closing his eyes, "I know." Suddenly, the tears come pouring down as all the emotions come waving over me. "He's dead, he's dead."
Stefan pulls me into a hug and I quietly sob against the chest. "Elena– why does she think he's coming back? He's now supernatural because he's one of The Fives." I ramble, choking on my words.
"She doesn't know that." he tells me and I pull away from the hug. My throat was already dry and my eyes felt like they were burning from all the tears. "She needs to know!"
"You don't understand. It will destroy her now that she's a vampire and her emotions are heightened. She feels grief more powerfully than anyone else. I think her denial is the one thing protecting her from letting it all in." he says. "How could you say that, Stefan? She's going to eventually find out."
"Let's just wait for Damon to come home with Bonnie and then we'll go on from there." he tells me and I shake my head. "Bonnie? What happened to Bonnie?"
"We lost her." he answers and I close my eyes, more tears coming down. "You want Damon here to convince Elena she's okay with the sire bond?"
Stefan nods and I scoff, opening the bathroom door where Elena was standing. "I'm not in denial. I know that he was supernatural, but did you see? His tattoo is gone. The tattoo had the spell that opened Silas' chamber. Maybe it being gone means that he's fulfilled his supernatural destiny. Maybe he's back to normal. It's possible, right?"
"Elena—" I start, but she cuts me off. "It's possible, Maya. There's a chance. It may be miniscule, but it's hope and I'm gonna hold on to that hope with everything that I've got because there's no way that m— there's absolutely no way that my brother is dead. I'm not in denial."
"You're not alone in this, Elena. He's my brother too." I tell her and she nods her head. "I know, which means you need to believe he's coming back too."
§
It was now night time and Meredith came over to check on Jeremy and confirmed he is officially dead. Elena didn't believe that and now left with Matt to god knows where.
So much was happening I could barely process it through my head. I open my front door and step outside, seeing Caroline ending a phone call and a car pulling into the driveway. "Bonnie!"
I run down the stairs and engulf Bonnie in a hug once she gets out the car. "Thank god you're okay." I say, feeling a slight better, but still broken.
"Thank god. We were so, so worried." Caroline says, pulling her into a hug after me. "I'm okay."
"Could you get Stefan out here?" Damon asks one of us. "They said that she knows what to do." Caroline tells him. "Caroline, I need to talk to my brother."
"What's wrong?"
Soon, all of us, including Elena and Matt, were sitting at the kitchen table while Stefan and Damon talk outside. "It's called an Expression triangle. I need to complete it for Silas." Bonnie explains and Matt looks at her in disbelief. "What? Bonnie, you can't kill 12 people."
"I know it sounds crazy, but it's the only way to get enough power." Bonnie says and I cross my arms, "To do what?"
She then explains she has to drop the veil, which makes the other side disappear and there's nothing separating us.
After that, Matt took Bonnie home and Elena finally realized Jeremy is dead and is now forcing Damon to bring his dead body downstairs.
"Okay. I guess we're gonna have to do this the old-fashioned way." Elena says and I furrow my eyebrows, "Do what?"
"Put his body on the couch." Elena instructs and Damon obeys as she goes into the kitchen and starts opening and closing cabinets.
"Elena! Stop. You need to calm down." I tell her but she completely ignores me and takes a bottle of lighter fluid out of a cabinet and squirting it over the counter. "Got it."
"What the hell are you doing?!" I yell at her, hoping she's not trying to burn my house down with her psychotic breakdown.
"We need a cover story, right? You think I didn't hear you guys talking earlier? Well, what are we gonna say— animal attack, tumbled down the stairs? No. We burn the house down with him inside of it." Elena states and walks out of the kitchen and into the living room where she continues to squirt the fluid everywhere.
"Stop it!" I yell at her once again. Stefan steps in front of me, "Elena, stop it." he says, but I know none of our words will do anything.
"Why? Because you want me to not be in denial? You want me to face the truth? This is the truth, Stefan. I don't want to live here anymore. I don't want these sketches." Elena sprays them with lighter fluid and kicks Jeremy's video game. "I don't want this Xbox."
Elena throws down the empty bottle and reaches into a cabinet, "Not gonna need this bourbon anymore. Alaric's not here to drink it, I mean, unless you guys are willing to bring back every supernatural creature on the Other Side to get him back." She turns to Damon, "Would you? I know you want your drinking buddy back."
My heart was beating so fast. My brother is dead and my sister is threatening to burn our house down and making no sense with all the words spilling out of her mouth. I stood in shock, not able to do anything.
"Would you, Damon? Because I wouldn't." She walks over to Jeremy's body and splashes bourbon over him. "I don't know, I mean, does that make me a bad person? I– I have no idea." She pulls the Gilbert ring off of Jeremy's finger and tosses it to Damon. "He's not gonna need that anymore."
"Elena, stop it. You're scaring me!" Caroline shouts at her. "What else are we supposed to do with the body, Caroline? I mean, there's no– there's no room in the Gilbert family plot." Elena throws our family frame down on the floor and the glass cracks. Jenna and– and John took the last spots." She throws the empty bottle of bourbon against the wall and it shatters, then grabs a match from the mantle and lights it.
"No, no, Elena. Stop." Stefan shouts at her and she shouts back. "There's nothing here for me anymore, Stefan. Every inch of this house is filled with memories of the people that I love that have died– my mom, my dad, Jeremy, and Jenna and Alaric, John, even John. I mean, they're all dead. Everyone is dead. So what am I supposed to– I mean, how am I gonna– I can't even– There's nothing left for me– aah!"
"I'm still here! And I'm not going anywhere, so just please, stop. For me. Elena, please." I look at Elena and she stars back at me with teary eyes.
I watch as the flame has burned down on the match and began to burn Elena's hand which caused her to drop it and I closed my eyes, preparing for that moment, but it never came and Damon caught the match before it could touch the fluid.
"Elena, I need you to calm down." Damon tries to calm her down but it didn't he'll. "No, no, no, I can't. I can't. I can't. I–" She falls to her knees and grabs her head. "No. It hurts. It hurts. Just make it stop. Please make it stop. It hurts."
Tears poured down my face as I watch the scene unfold. "Damon... Help her." Stefan says and he nods, crouching down next to her and pulls her to him. "I can help you. I want you to let me help you. I can help you."
Elena calms down slowly, looking at Damon. "How?"
"Turn it off." Damon states and I widen my eyes and almost choked from gasping. "What? No, no, no." I say, trying to stop him, but he holds up a hand to stop myself from intervening.
"Just turn it off, and everything will go away. That's what you have to do. It's what I want you to do. Just turn it off."
I watch as Elena's facial expression changes to sad to simply emotionless.
§
I watch as my house turns into flames in a matter of seconds and as my brother soon joins in. Elena wasn't Elena anymore and there was nothing I could do. Absolutely nothing.
I was speechless and all I could do was stand in front of my house and watch the colors of the fire change and how my own house was falling into pieces. All the memories were disappearing, into nothing.
Caroline had gone home. Stefan and Damon followed no-humanity Elena like a lost puppy and I was alone. Just utterly alone.