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Klaus saw the name on his phone and was confused. Caroline. She hadn’t called him in years but he didn’t hesitate to pick up.
“Hello, love.”
A little girl’s voice came through the line. “Hello, this is an emergency.”
“Who is this?” Klaus asked.
“This is Josie.” Klaus remembered Caroline had named one of her daughters Josephine, the girls must be about five by now.
“Hello, Josie. If this is an emergency I think you need to call 911.”
“Mommy said we don’t have those kinds of emergencies.” Klaus couldn’t help but laugh at Caroline's honesty.
“Okay, little one. What is the emergency? Is your mother okay?”
“She’s fine.” Klaus sighed, relieved. “But Lizzie and I are going to be in really big trouble when she gets home.”
“Why is that?” Klaus wasn’t particularly busy at the moment and he could always spare time to help out Caroline or her family.
“We accidentally siphoned our babysitter.”
“What does that mean?” Klaus asked carefully. He knew Caroline’s daughters were witches but none of the hybrids he left to watch her had been able to tell him much about their powers.
“Well, Bonnie is our babysitter, and she’s a witch too. So we wanted to do some magic with her and we sucked all the magic out of her and now she’s knocked out. Mom said we weren’t supposed to practice magic without her around.”
“I think she’s right. Your mother is a very wise woman.”
“Can you fix it?”
Klaus thought for a moment. “You just need your babysitter awake before your mother comes back, right?”
“Uh huh.”
“I have some friends in the area who could help to wake Ms. Bennet up. But next time I think you should listen to your mother and not practice magic without her.”
“Okay.” Klaus could tell Josie felt bad about her actions. “Can you not tell Mom?”
“I promise.” Klaus told her. “What name did your mom put me in her phone as?”
“Only for Emergencies.”
Klaus laughed. “Okay, well if you have to call me again in the future you can call me Mr. M. I’ll send my friend along to help wake Ms. Bennet. You need to be very careful to not invite him inside though.”
“Uh huh. Mom says we can’t invite anyone inside the house.”
“That’s right.” Klaus appreciated Caroline’s and her daughter’s healthy respect of danger. “He will leave a cup outside the door and after he leaves you just need to give some of the juice inside to Ms. Bennet.”
“Oh, you mean blood. Yeah, we can do that.”
Klaus laughed again, a healthy respect for danger and a reasonable understanding of the supernatural world. “Exactly. It should all be taken care of in the next ten minutes, Josette.”
“It’s Josie.”
“Of course, Josie.”
“Thanks, Mr. M.”
Klaus heard the phone call end and quickly called one of the hybrids he had guarding Caroline and her daughters to dispatch them to her house. It wouldn’t do to break a promise to one of Caroline’s children. Klaus still held onto hope that she would one day let him know she was ready to experience the world with him, and it couldn’t hurt to have two small cheerleaders on his side.
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Rebekah heard a phone ringing from Klaus’ room in the Mikaelson compound. Klaus Mikaelson had never received a spam call and there were no unimportant people on his phone. Rebekah couldn’t decide if he would be unhappier if she ignored it or picked up, though really it didn’t matter because she was going to answer the phone either way. When she saw the name that flashed on the caller ID she almost changed her mind. Ugh, Caroline.
“What do you want now?” Rebekah asked.
“Who are you?” The voice of a child replied at the other end.
“Who are you?” Rebekah was getting confused. She’d just planned to antagonize Klaus’ crush for a few minutes and hang up on her and now there was a child talking to her.
“I’m calling the emergency line. I want to talk to Mr. M like Josie did.” Rebekah had absolutely no idea who ‘Josie’ or ‘Mr. M’ were.
“I don’t know who those people are but what are you doing with Caroline’s phone?”
“I took it when my mom wasn’t looking. I needed help.”
“Well you’ve definitely called the wrong number.” Rebekah was about ready to hang up when she heard the girl on the other end squeal in anger.
“When my sister, Josie, called she got to talk to someone nice. Why did I get you?”
Rebekah was now insulted. “I don’t know who you or your sister are, why would I help you?”
“I don’t know who you are but I wouldn’t put you out if you were on fire.” came the reply.
Rebekah started to laugh, this little girl had spunk. Granted, she didn’t know she was talking to an extremely old and powerful vampire but that didn’t change the fact that she was now insulting the person she had called for help.
“That’s alright, fire doesn’t usually bother me.”
“Huh, it works on most vampires, witches, and werewolves. You must be pretty special.”
Rebekah reconsidered her stance again, this child was refreshing and in the know. “I am extremely special. I’m guessing this ‘Mr. M’ must have been my brother. If I were to help you I think I’d do a far better job than he would. What is the nature of your emergency?”
“I was playing dress up with mom’s stuff and I got makeup on her dresses.”
Rebekah shook her head. “Yes, you’re much better off with me than with Mr. M. Send me a picture and I’ll tell you if it can be fixed.”
A moment later she saw a picture of what looked like a warzone of fabric and blush. “How did this happen again, . . . oh I need your name.”
“I’m Lizzie, what’s your name?”
“You can call me Beka. So how did this happen Lizzie?”
“I was trying to get one of the boxes from the top of the closet but I’m too short and I got mad and I guess I made all the makeup explode everywhere. I need you to fix it because I’m always getting into trouble. Josie tries to help me but she can’t always calm me down. I’m a freak.”
Rebekah hushed the girl gently. “It’s okay. I can fix it. We’ll just need to keep your mother out of the house for a few hours.”
“Josie already did that. My mom does that thing where she gives us coupons for stuff and Josie is always good so she has a million of them and she told mom we had to go to the museum today. We’ll be here for ages.”
Rebekah laughed at the dramatics, she was now feeling very connected to this child. “Ages sounds like plenty of time. I don’t have the same resources my brother does but I imagine money will do a much better job fixing this problem than hybrids will.”
“You’re so amazing. I’m sorry I was mean earlier, Beka.”
“I was a bit rude too, Lizzie. I certainly wasn’t expecting this when I picked up the phone today. Do call back whenever you need help. Mr. M or I are sure to be able to sort things out.”
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When Caroline returned home with her daughters from a very long day at the museum and then a stop to the ice cream shop and the movie theatre and the grocery store to get Josie’s favorite snack she wasn’t surprised to find her room immaculate. The room was typically immaculate but this time everything was a little different than how she left it. Between that and the rather intense smell she’d noticed outside her door that morning when she came back from visiting a friend she was fairly certain something was up.
She pulled out her laptop and looked at the security footage from that morning. She laughed as she watched Lizzie start pulling everything out of her closet to try it on. A few minutes later when her daughter couldn't reach a tiara everything suddenly flew up into the air and all of her makeup burst smearing the walls and her dresses with vibrant colors Caroline just shook her head and tried not to cry. After all, it had clearly been fixed. She saw Lizzie run to grab her sister to show her the chaos. Josie hugged her sister and while Caroline didn’t have any sound with the video she had a general idea of what her daughters were discussing.
She fast forwarded until she saw a troupe of professional cleaners and shoppers rush into the room. For the next few hours she saw her clothes replaced or cleaned, her makeup carefully replaced and every surface scrubbed until it looked new. Caroline doubted that Klaus would have been quite so thorough and assumed the girls’ savior this time was none other than Rebekah Mikaelson.
Sighing she closed the laptop and went to get ready for bed. After Bonnie had suddenly woken up from getting knocked out a few months ago when she babysat the girls Caroline had placed cameras throughout the house. Her daughters had no idea she or Bonnie knew what happened that night. Bonnie had recognized the taste of blood in her mouth when she woke up, but seeing as the girls were very aware of their mistake and promised never to practice without Caroline again she was okay with leaving things as they were. Bonnie had told Caroline about it as soon as they’d gotten the girls to bed and Caroline had convinced her there was nothing to worry about. Caroline wanted her girls to have people to count on besides her and Alaric, especially with how often the two of them traveled. It hadn’t taken much more than a look through her phone to confirm her suspicions, apparently she’d had an outgoing call to Klaus that night. Caroline thought about talking to him about it then, but she wasn’t ready for the conversation she knew they needed. She thought about it again tonight, and if she’d been sure she would get Rebekah she might have called to thank her, but all she had was Klaus’ number and a million thoughts to sort out before she talked to him again.
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Klaus’ phone rang during a council meeting. When he saw the name on the screen he was torn. He couldn’t step away from this for a moment or people would doubt his commitment to peace in the Quarter but whether this was another call from Lizze and Josie or if Caroline was finally ready to talk to him he couldn’t ignore the call.
“Elijah.”
Elijah stepped into the room. He wasn’t technically part of the council but was always ready to step in to try to halt his brother’s more violent tendencies or to support him if he felt the family was in danger.
“Take this call. Fix whatever the issue is.” Klaus handed him the still ringing phone and gestured his dismissal.
“Hello, Ms. Forbes?”
“No, I’m Lizzie. Are you Mr. M?”
Elijah was confused. He had assumed Caroline Forbes needed his brother’s blood to heal some werewolf bite or for him to come up to Virginia to kill some witches back from the dead.
“My name is Elijah. Are you referring to my brother Niklaus?”
“He told my sister his name was Mr. M. Last time I talked to Beka, can you get her?”
“My sister is unfortunately not present and my brother, ‘Mr. M’ as you apparently know him, is unable to come to the phone but he has asked that I assist you.”
“Oh, um. Okay. Josie, is that okay?” He heard the girl whisper to someone else and a quiet affirmative. “I guess that’s fine.”
“What can I help you with?” Elijah had no idea what assistance girls younger than his niece could require from his infamous brother.
“Our mom got stuck in a prison thing with our aunt Bonnie and our dad is away on a hunting trip so he doesn’t have his phone.”
Elijah’s eyebrows raised. He’d heard Niklaus and Rebekah discussing Caroline’s daughters calling a few times but he didn’t realize they had such colorful lives for small children. No wonder Niklaus wanted him to answer the phone. “I can be at your home in a few hours is there anyone there with you?”
“No. It was supposed to be Mom and Bonnie and us all week but then this guy came for Bonnie and Mom got in the way and now all three of them are in the prison world, or that’s what Josie thinks and she usually knows about that kind of thing.”
Elijah moved swiftly towards his car, leaving a brief note to his brother that he was handling things. “Is there anyone you can call? A babysitter or another adult?”
“Are you sure you can help us, Elijah? You do know about vampires and witches and stuff, right?”
Elijah’s face twitched at the idea that these small children wouldn’t find his help valuable. “I can assure you I am familiar with the idea being a vampire myself for a thousand years.”
“Okay, I was just worried because you asked if we had another babysitter but we’re super crazy twin witches so Mom can barely keep track of us herself. Can you imagine a human doing it? I mean maybe Uncle Matt but he’s busy being the sheriff.”
“Indeed, I can imagine you do have limited babysitters. I was just worried that it wasn’t safe for you to be alone until I arrived.”
“We’ll keep the front door locked and we won’t use the stove and . . . and . . .” he could hear her discussing with her sister again. “Right, yeah, and we won’t use our magic on purpose.”
“Excellent.” Elijah stepped on the gas, hard. He was definitely going to ask his brother some questions when he got back.
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It took Elijah and a few witches he acquired on his drive a day and a half to release only Caroline Forbes and Bonnie Bennet from the prison world they’d been sent into. During that time he got quite an introduction into the lives of Josette and Elizabeth Saltzman, firstly that they hated to be called Josette and Elizabeth. Second he learned that their mother had no idea they had been contacting the Mikaelson family for the past year whenever they didn’t want to incite her anger over something they’d done. Third, they were quite pleasant and determined children who loved their family very much but who lived in a world almost as strange as that of his own family.
Fourth, after Caroline had been rescued and hugged her girls tightly, he learned that her daughters were wrong about the second thing. She set up a movie for the girls and asked them to watch over Bonnie while she talked with Elijah.
“Thank you so much for your help, Elijah. Where is Klaus? Did he run away just before you managed to rescue us?”
Elijah shook his head. “No, he isn’t fully aware of what happened here. He was in an important meeting and handed me the phone so that I could sort things out.”
“Your family is getting very good at sorting things out for us.” Caroline laughed.
“You know about that?” Elijah asked, surprised.
“That my daughters have been using your family to get out of trouble? Of course. But I don’t mind because it led them to trusting you all enough that everything was able to get sorted out today.”
Elijah smiled. “Your girls think that you don’t know.”
“As does your brother.” Caroline returned. “And I’d rather leave it that way for now. I like that they are bonding on their own.”
“You aren’t worried about them learning to go behind your back?” He asked, the constant betrayal of his own family always causing him concern.
“For every mess your family has helped them out of I’ve dealt with ten. Those little angels of mine are going to grow up to be even bigger trouble magnets than my friends and I have been. It can only be good that they have powerful friends. Plus, I can’t say that my mom was always right or that I am either. If they have to go behind my back sometime I’d much rather they go to you or Klaus or Rebekah than to Damon.”
Elijah nodded. “So you would like me to keep Klaus unaware of your awareness?”
“For the moment.” Caroline said. “He and I still need to have a long conversation at some point but I’m afraid that we are in two different worlds for now and it isn’t the time.”
“That is unfortunate.” Elijah said. “I hope that changes someday.”
“I’m sure it will.” Caroline said. “Until then, you always are welcome here, Elijah, as are Klaus, Rebekah and Hope. If any of you need me, please remember I am only a phone call away. Your brother has my number.”
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Over the years the calls from Caroline’s number to the Mikaelson’s dwindled. After the founding of the Salvatore school the girls had any number of other adults they could turn to for help and their mother was more and more frequently traveling the world so they had fewer chances to get her mad at them. They hadn’t heard the voice of Mr. M for a long time when suddenly their mother asked for their help one day with an old friend.
“Mr. Mikaelson here is going to tell you exactly what he needs without a hint of temper or frustration.”
Klaus looked at the girls, now about twelve years old, who he had talked to and helped and watched grow from afar. Of course there would be no temper directed towards them, despite their demands for goods in exchange for this life or death service. He was proud of them, happy to see them in person for the first and now only time. He didn’t expect them to know who he was, but a moment after he began to speak he saw recognition in Josie’s eyes. She poked Lizzie in the side with her elbow and gave a look. Lizzie apparently understood it instantly because she could barely keep from jumping up and down as he continued to talk.
“And at the end of this I will have the hollow inside of me and your mother and I will find a suitable location, perhaps the bottom of the sea, for me to rest while we figure out the next step.” He didn’t let on that he knew the next step was a white oak stake to the heart for him.
Klaus had barely finished when Lizzie started talking. “I’m afraid that won’t work for us.”
Caroline half smiled, interested to see where this went. She hadn’t been impressed with Klaus’ plan either.
“Why is that, little one?” Klaus asked.
“Because your plan is stupid.” Lizzie replied. “You didn’t tell us the whole thing but you definitely are going to sacrifice yourself to save Hope once we put the Hollow in you. Do you think we’re idiots?”
Klaus tipped his head in recognition of the truth of her statement and looked to Caroline who had simply raised an eyebrow at him.
“Well, you are clever aren’t you, Lizzie.”
“Of course we are, Mr. M.” Josie replied.
“Mr. M?” Caroline asked, laughing. “Did you not tell them your name, Klaus?”
Josie, Lizzie, and Klaus all turned to look at her, trying to hide their confusion. “What do you mean, Mom?” Lizzie asked. “You told us his name a few minutes ago.”
“I mean when you were five and called Klaus to hide the fact that you siphoned enough magic out of your aunt to make her black out.”
“You told her?” Josie asked, betrayed. “You promised.”
“I would never break a promise to you girls.” Klaus said. “But your mother, as I told you then, is a wise woman. How long have you known?”
“Since that night.” Caroline said with a smile. “And I agree with my daughters, Klaus. You didn’t tell us your whole plan and after everything you’ve done for me and for them don’t you think we would try anything to help you get out of this alive?”
Klaus looked at the ground for a moment, overwhelmed by Caroline’s statement, but still determined to save Hope. “There isn’t anything else to do. I wouldn’t have come to you if I could have done this another way.”
Josie turned to look at Caroline. “Mom, there has to be something. You’re always studying weird magic on your work trips, come on, is there something we can do?”
“Of course there is, Josie. It’s only a stop-gap for now but I have a few ideas and once I talk with Klaus’ family I’m sure we’ll find something longer term. For now, we’ll still pull the Hollow out of Hope, but I think we can put it into a Mora Miserium which should last at least a few weeks. Bonnie is coming by in a bit to help teach you the spell. Why don’t you two go get some lunch, this is going to be a long day.”
Once her daughters had left Caroline turned back to Klaus. “I appreciate the sentiment of what you were going to do but I have to say Hope will be much happier to have her Dad in her life. I’ll be much happier too.”
Klaus was speechless. He hadn’t talked to Caroline since she helped him to rescue Hope and Hayley. He knew she was vaguely aware of what was going on with Hope, but hadn’t realized she was working on a way to help them.
“Did you just come up with this idea now, love?”
Caroline took a step towards him. “I had some thoughts but I hadn’t realized things were as dire as all of this until today. If you’d reached out to me earlier I would have had a better idea what I was working on.”
“I didn’t know I could reach out to you.”
“Of course you can.” Caroline told him, taking another step forward. “I’m ready now, Klaus. I’m ready for us to be together. I have been for awhile but you just had to have that piece of the Hollow in you keeping you away from Hope. I wanted to be around her so that I could watch out for her the way you’ve watched out for my girls and for me. Now though, we can figure this out together, no stupid sacrifices, no more lies to each other or our children or ourselves. If you’re still interested, I’m ready.”
Klaus took the final step and pulled her into his arms. “I’ve waited so long to hear that, Caroline. On the day I thought I would die, instead you offer me everything. How did I end up so lucky?”
“I could say it’s because you answered that call when my five year old daughter was worried that her mom would be mad. Or I could say it’s because I’ve seen how you fight for your own daughter. But I’ve known for so long, Klaus Mikaelson, that you weren’t the villain in my story, that you were a hero to many, especially to me. I need you to live because I need a hero in my life as much as you do, and I need you to keep being there for everyone that is important to me. I’m just lucky you didn’t do something stupid before I figured everything out.”
They took a moment to hold each other before Caroline pulled away and reached into his pocket. She took out his phone and after having him unlock it she changed her contact name on his phone, “For Every Emergency”. Giving him a small smile and a quick kiss she rushed off to get everything in order for their spells that night.