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Dying felt different than Klaus was expecting. He expected to feel cold and alone. But it wasn’t like that.
He felt warm. He could feel Elijah leaving with him. He could feel his family’s love, still clinging to him after his tragic goodbye. He didn’t feel alone.
But then he felt like he was falling, and he landed on the floor in Caroline’s childhood home with Liz and Matt standing over him.
“What the bloody hell…?” Klaus whispered. He pulled himself up and looked around. “Sheriff? What are you doing in my afterlife?”
“Excuse me? I don’t know what you’re playing at, Klaus, but I need you to heal Caroline. That was the deal.”
He rushed over to her, terror evident on his face. “Caroline is injured? Where is she? Take me to her at once!”
Liz backed away and glared. “You already knew that, that’s why you’re here.”
“I apologize, I’m slightly out of sorts. What year is it?”
“2010,” Matt said from behind him.
Klaus looked around the room, noticing the balloons. “It’s Caroline’s birthday, which means Tyler bit her today. Damnit, I’ll go heal her. Donavon, I want you out of the house by the time I get downstairs; I need to talk with the Sheriff.”
Liz and Matt looked at each other, confused, but Klaus was already upstairs in Caroline’s room.
“Are you going to kill me?” Caroline asked him, eyes tired.
He tried not to flinch, but Klaus knew why she would think that. “It’s your birthday, Caroline. I’m not that cruel as to allow you to die tonight.”
She let out a weak laugh. “Yeah, you were. I remember.”
Remember. “What do you remember, sweetheart?”
“You were so kind,” she answered, too delirious to even understand her own words and what she was giving away. “You loved me, and Hope, and your family. You were so…” She sighed and laughed again, this time it was full of sorrow. “I’m just collateral damage to you.”
Klaus sat on her bed and brushed her hair away from her face. “No, no, love, you’re so much more. The last time we were here, do you remember what I told you? What did I tell you was waiting for you?”
“The whole world. I just needed to ask for it.”
He bit into his wrist and held it out for her. “I’m not going to make you beg for a life you deserve. You’re eighteen again, love; it’s time you live. And I’ll be right beside you the whole time.”
“Klaus? Do you really know me?”
“I’ve loved you forever, Caroline. How could I forget? Now drink, and heal.”
Too caught up in their moment, neither noticed Liz watching them from Caroline’s doorway. She slipped down the stairs again silently, too confused to even consider objecting to what that was.
As Caroline drank from him, Klaus thanked whatever gods had sent him back. He would fix things. He would change things.
Camille, who he had loved for a time, would never know him or of the supernatural creatures that roamed the Earth. Her involvement with him was the thing that killed her, and he knew that.
His siblings would be freed and reunited with the ones they loved. Katerina would no longer run from him but hopefully towards Elijah. Finn and Sage, free to do as they pleased. Rebekah, he would allow her to have all the love she had ever wanted, and he wouldn’t stand in her way if she decided she never wanted to see him again. Kol… Davina had made him happy, so he would direct him to New Orleans where he knew she lived if Kol so desired to find love.
Esther, he would destroy. He would chop up her corpse and burn it, scattering her miserable ashes across the globe so she could never come back to haunt him.
Silas. No one in Mystic Falls would ever search him out, and the best way to ensure that was to kill Professor Shane immediately. Maybe after that he'd find Silas himself and destroy the cure, once and for all.
Hayley, his friend and the mother of his daughter. He would tell her how to find her family, and he would make sure she could be with her pack, as she was meant to.
Marcel, the boy he once called son. Klaus would never fight with him over New Orleans. Instead, he would happily reunite with him, and he would teach him that freedom for the witches and the wolves was the best option. Marcel was a good king, a born king, but Klaus knew his son could improve still.
And Hope. His littlest wolf. His heir. His daughter.
Deep in his heart, Klaus knew Hope could never be born. The life she was subjected to just because she was his daughter was too horrific for an innocent child. So he mourned for the daughter he never got to see grow up, barely knew, and loved more than he had ever thought he could.
“I’ll never get to see my daughters again either,” Caroline whispered to him, reading his mind. “But just know that she had a beautiful life. It took her a while, and she did lose her humanity for a bit, but she found true love eventually. She went to college a bunch of times, and she even invited me to her first gallery opening. Hope was happy, Klaus. And she was so grateful to you.”
“She didn’t even know me,” he choked out.
“Still, she loved you. She knew that you weren’t around so you could protect her, and she knew you were afraid of damaging how good she was.” She squeezed his hand. “You and I are going to fix things, okay?”
He squeezed back. “Yes, my love, we are.” Klaus was silent for a moment. “How long has it been since I died for you?”
“Two hundred years. I was bit by a werewolf, and Hope was on the other side of the world. I ran out of your blood decades ago, and Hope and I hadn’t restocked.”
“Did… did Rebekah ever take the cure?”
“No.”
“But that was all she wanted. Why didn’t she?”
“She decided that staying alive with Marcel, Kol, and Hope was more important. The last Mikaelsons. She was queen of the world last time I saw her. Rebekah was happy, too, in the end.” Caroline laughed. “Kol remarried a century after Davina died, this time to a vampire. I think their name was Arson. Kol was obsessed with them.”
Klaus laughed with her. “Arson? Sounds perfect for my little brother.”
Caroline suddenly sombered. “I can’t stay with Tyler, and I don’t think marrying Stefan is a good idea.”
He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her into his chest. “No, I don’t think marrying anyone who isn’t me is a good idea.”
“You’re so territorial.”
“Sorry, no, please go be with Stefan. I know Aurora is still obsessed with me–she’s my crazy ex, you see. I’ll go and be with her–”
Caroline cut him off with a kiss. “Yeah, I didn’t wear that stupid diamond bracelet and endure Kol calling me sister for a century and a half for you to be in a relationship with someone else.”
“My sincerest apologies, my love. I’ll never suggest it again.”
“Good. Or I’ll castrate you.”
Klaus laughed and kissed her forehead. “So threatening.”
She smiled back at him before frowning. “My parents are still alive. Should I… should I tell my mother about her cancer? Is that a thing I can do?”
“You and I are going to explain everything to your mother. And afterwards, we will free my siblings and explain this to them, too. I recommend telling Bonnie and Elena as well.”
“I don’t know. Elena will tell Damon, who will use me to kill you. We know that.”
He tapped her arm. “So we leave.”
“What?”
“We leave, love, and we don’t come back unless we’re visiting your mother.”
When she didn’t respond for a moment, Klaus immediately thought she didn’t want that, that she would be angry with him for even suggesting it, but Caroline nodded sternly. “First, we fix our mistakes. Then, you take me to Paris, Rome, and Tokyo. Deal?”
“I’ll take you anywhere you want to go, Caroline.”
“Good. Now, help me up so we can talk to my mom.” Caroline tried to push herself up, but he pushed her back down and laughed.
“I’ll bring her up, my darling. You need rest.”
Caroline pouted, and he walked down the stairs and faced Liz.
“What the hell did I just see?” Liz asked.
“Excuse me?” Klaus asked, not exactly politely.
“Ten minutes ago you were taunting me while my daughter’s life was in your hands, and then I saw you confess your love for her. So, what the hell was that?”
“The person who was taunting you, Sheriff, is gone. I just time traveled, and so did Caroline,” he told her bluntly. “Come, she’d like to speak with you and explain.”
She followed him up the stairs and tried not to gape when he sat beside Caroline and she leaned against him. “Klaus said he time traveled?”
She nodded. “For me, I just died in 2229. I was bitten by a werewolf.”
“I was staked in the heart by my brother in 2026,” Klaus told Liz.
Liz scoffed. “Not surprised.”
“I asked him to. Elijah decided to die with me, as well.” Caroline gripped his hand. “We’ve decided to change a few things, starting with you.”
“What about me?”
Caroline sat up on the bed a bit. “You get cancer, Mom, and you don’t beat it. So you’re going to start getting treated, like, now. Every preventative measure you can take, you will.”
“We can’t afford that, Care,” she said with a sigh.
“Perhaps not,” began Klaus, “but I can. My money, my connections, they are all at your disposal.”
She scowled. “I don’t want your money.”
“Mom, I’m not giving you a choice. Take it. ”
Liz looked between her daughter and Klaus. “What were you two?”
“Not what we should’ve been,” Caroline answered cryptically. At her mother’s expression, she continued, “Klaus loved me, but I didn’t really accept that I loved him back until the weeks before he died. We never had a relationship, but I had been planning on it for years. ”
He stared at her, not wanting to get his hopes up. “You had?”
“I married a human, Klaus. I hoped that once I had lived a nice simple life with him, that I could have an adventure with you. Then after he died, I thought I’d wait until Ric and the girls were gone, because the girls needed me , and you could wait, and–” She stopped her rambling and smiled at him. “I was saving Paris, Rome, and Tokyo for you, you know. I went to Rome for the first time with Rebekah and Marcel, Tokyo with Kol, and Paris with Hope and Lizzie about a century after you died.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Lizzie was still alive?”
“She turned with Hope’s blood… I don’t really know what was happening, but it was during your daughter’s no-humanity-I’m-evil-like-my-dad phase,” she explained. “Anyway, what matters is that what happened before, will not happen again.”
So while Stefan, Damon, Elena, and Bonnie tried to find the missing coffins, Klaus, his siblings and ones they loved, and Caroline were having dinner in his mansion, listening to Klaus and Caroline’s tales of a mysterious future that they were grateful to never live. Katherine shuddered at the thought of a mortal body, but Elijah squeezed her hand in support.
“A daughter, Niklaus?” Elijah said. When Klaus nodded, he had tears in his eyes, and Caroline reached to squeeze his hand.
“She was fifteen when he died,” she explained. “I had two of my own; one of them was still running around the world with Hope when I was bitten.”
Marcel whistled. “I’ll have to fix what’s going on in my town if what you tell me is true.”
After dinner was finished, Klaus pulled his sister into a separate room. “Bekah, I need to apologize.”
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “No–”
“No, sister, I do. You mean the world to me. I love you so much, but my fear of being alone kept you from being free. You have always been my favorite sibling, the one who was there when I was in pain. I do truly believe my place is by your side and your place is at mine, but I also think that does not mean we cannot be apart.”
“What are you saying, Nik?”
“I am always going to be there when you need me. Always and forever, like we promised as children. But you deserve to be on your own. After Hope was born, I realized my place was at her side. Now that that past is gone, my place is beside the woman I love. But Caroline and I would be overjoyed if you would every now and then come and travel with us. That is, if you want to take a break from New Orleans, and Marcellus is of course invited.” He wiped away his tears. “You are free, little sister. I just hope that you can find it in your heart to forgive me.”
Rebekah threw her arms around her brother’s neck and sobbed. “Thank you, Nik. I promise, as much as you and Caroline can stomach me, I will be there. We’ll do family holidays like we used to, and you can prank Elijah with Kol and I on April Fools again, and–”
“And we’ll be a proper family.” Klaus nodded. “Does this mean you don’t want me out of your life?”
She shook her head. “A bit of space might be nice. And I’ll be taking my dagger to New Orleans with me, of course. But, no, Nik, you will not be cut out. You’re my favorite sibling, too. That’s truly an honor, you know. Especially since everyone has already picked me as their favorite.”
“It’s because you’re the youngest, the baby of the family.”
Rebekah slapped him upside the head as he cackled. “You wanker! I’m telling Caroline you insulted me!”
The newspapers wrote about the tragic suicide of Professor Shane while Kol wiped the blood off his hands, never wanting to think about Silas again. He chose not to join Rebekah and Marcel in New Orleans, deciding that just because he loved Davina in another life did not mean he should barge into the one she lived here.
“With Silas gone, you don’t need me anymore, brother,” Kol said to Klaus as Caroline stood with them.
“Nonsense. We will always need you. You’ll come stay with Caroline and I for the holidays; we’ve already ensured everyone else will. Bekah’s thrilled; she plans to bring back throwing wishes into the bonfire.”
Kol grinned. “Like when we were kids. What’ll you do if I say no?”
He laughed. “I’ll send our sister and Caroline after you.”
“A fate worse than death.”
Caroline slapped him on the arm playfully. “You better be there. You, Bekah, and I spent the last century and a half being best friends in my world, and I plan to force our friendship back on you.”
Kol just grinned once more and placed a kiss on her temple. “I’ll be there, sister. Besides, if I’m meant to beat Bekah for the role of your maid of honor, I should at least put some work in!”
Enzo listened to Caroline’s recap of the decades he had lost to Augustine and promised to catch up with her every few years before he ran as far away from Whitmore as possible.
“Thank you for freeing me, gorgeous.”
She waved him off. “It’s really nothing, Enzo. Like I said, you were a friend in my old life. Hopefully we can be friends again here.”
“I’d like nothing more. Though, if I’m being honest, I’m entirely sure what to do now that I’m free.”
Klaus squeezed Caroline’s shoulders. “You know, my brother said the same thing. Perhaps you’d like a travel partner?”
When Tyler tried to unsire Klaus’ hybrids, he failed, with Hayley rushing to the Bayou to find her pack and the hybrids themselves already unsired and generously compensated to continue working for Klaus.
“Hayley Marshall?” Klaus called at the girl, who was recovering from changing out of her wolf form. He tossed her clothes at her. “My name is Klaus.”
“What do you want?”
“It’s not about what I want. It’s about what you want. Have you ever heard of the Crescent pack in Louisiana?”
The Mystic Falls Gang had no idea what to do, and Caroline allowed Klaus to spin her around an empty ballroom in the middle of a cloudless night, a diamond bracelet on her wrist and no shoes on either of their feet.
“Where have you been, Care?” Bonnie asked, Elena beside her on Caroline’s bed. “Everything is falling apart, and the Originals are winning.”
Caroline resisted the urge to grin at the assessment and continued putting away her clean laundry. “I’ve been busy. I told you, the doctors caught some early signs of cancer in my mom, so we’ve been dealing with that.” Her phone buzzed, and she quickly checked the text.
Rebekah
We found Freya. Has Nik reported back on Lucien and the de Martels?
Before she could text back, Elena snatched her phone from her hand.
“Have you been telling them things?” Elena accused after reading the last few messages between her friend and the Original.
“No!” Caroline grabbed the phone back. “I’m doing this for your own good, Elena!”
“Then explain it,” Bonnie demanded. “What’s been going on?”
She dropped onto her bed with her friends. “I have a secret.”
“You can tell us anything,” said Elena.
“I’m from the future. Klaus and I traveled back to the same point in time–our first meeting on my eighteenth birthday–and we’ve been working to fix things.”
“Like what?” Bonnie asked.
“The vampirism cure will never be found, we burned all the white oak left in the world, all of the hybrids are loyal to Klaus, and I’ll never make the mistake of marrying Stefan.” She laughed. “As if Klaus would ever let me.”
“You married my boyfriend?” Elena asked, betrayed. “How could you?”
“Well, you were with Damon, so I didn’t really think about it.”
“Can we rewind to the part where Klaus wouldn’t let you?” Bonnie interrupted.
“He’s a bit possessive. Not in a doesn’t-let-me-hang-out-with-other-guys-way, but in a You are mine, and I am yours kinda way." She shrugged. "I don’t know, I like it.”
Elena swallowed hard. “Caroline, I don’t know what your time was like, but Klaus is a monster.”
Caroline smiled softly and took her friend’s hand. “I know, Elena, but he makes me happy.”
She studied her. “I just want the best for you.”
“I know, and I promise that Klaus is the best for me. He’s the love of my life.”
Bonnie laughed. “Top ten things I never thought you’d say.”
“How’d that relationship even start?” Elena asked.
“Oh my god,” Caroline responded, exasperated, “where do I even start?”
The three girls laughed, and Caroline filled them in on her life before returning to the past. Bonnie and Elena listened quietly, occasionally asking questions, and they tried not to gag when they saw the picture Caroline and Klaus had taken a few days before with him kissing her cheek and her smiling like nothing could’ve ever made her happier.
By the time graduation rolled around, Elena was still human, and she and Klaus made a deal to have her frequently give blood if he promised to pay for her college and medical school funds. Liz was currently cancer free, but the doctors were watching it. Rebekah and Marcel ruled New Orleans, now with a supernatural counsel so that vampires, witches, and werewolves could speak for their species. Katherine and Elijah had run off together to elope before Klaus could change his mind about her freedom, but they happily accepted the key to his house in Portugal to spend their honeymoon for the next few decades. Finn and Sage, on the other hand, were planning their own wedding in depth with the traditions of their youth. The last Klaus and Caroline heard, they were in Norway, and they’d send word about the wedding date. Kol was doing whatever it was Kol Mikaelson did, but now with Lorenzo at his side.
And Klaus and Caroline? He was painting portraits of her staring into the Roman skyline as she happily reread some Jane Austen novel for the millionth time, trying to tease him on how intense his focus was. They were holding hands as they walked through the streets of Tokyo, drinking coffee and simply enjoying each other’s company. She was cuddling into his chest in the morning while he was whispering how much he loved her in their Parisian townhouse.
Oblivious to the world around them, Klaus and Caroline danced around the roof under the moon, the sky lit up by the French city.
Hope and Lizzie stood on the rooftop with them, simply watching as they smiled brightly at each other. Lizzie looked towards her left hand, which had begun to fade.
“I guess this is goodbye, isn’t it?” Lizzie asked.
Hope took her remaining hand in her own and let a tear roll down her face. “We’re leaving together, Lizzie. It’s not goodbye.” She squeezed Lizzie’s hand quickly. “Do you think sending them back was a good thing?”
Caroline’s laughter rang out across the roof as Klaus lifted her in his arms and spun her around.
“How could it not be? They’re happy, and they’re free.” A tear of her own fell. “I wish we could stay and look after them.”
“At least wherever we go, we’ll be together.” Hope wrapped her arms around her friend. “I’m so grateful to have been your friend, Elizabeth Saltzman.”
“There’s nothing I would’ve rather been, Hope Mikaelson. See you in the next.”
And so Klaus and Caroline laughed and danced and kissed as their daughters disappeared from existence, like they had never been there to begin with, still clinging to each other, terrified of being left alone in the darkness.