The funny thing about living in a city where Frankie had made a conscious effort not to connect with too many people, is that when she returned home after being kidnapped, not one person had noticed her absence. Cami at least had texted twice but she was used to Frankie ignoring messages for days at a time and so she hadn't noticed an absence, only telling her to call when she could.

Frankie didn't let it bother her, why would it, she was the one who chose to pull away from others in the first place. What difference did it make if someone noticed her absence or no one did, it didn't make her heart wrench with loneliness in the slightest, not at all.

Showering was a blessing that she hadn't expected to be so delighted by as she finally stumbled in the door and stripped her clothes off. The events with Tyler and later Elijah hadn't been so gruelling that she was covered in sweat or mud but she had still been trapped in a hut that seemed to heat up like an oven and the bun in her hair was so caked with grease she was sure if she took the hair tie out it would hold itself in place.

Cami's was the first place she went when she felt better, recovered with new clothes on and a stomach full of food that made her feel a little more herself. Skating over she wondered if her friend would allow a wishy washy answer on her whereabouts for the past few days or if she'd need to lie to explain why she hadn't answered her at all.

She was surprised when she knocked on the door, Cami pulling it open barely inches with the security chain blocking her in. She looked frazzled as she answered with her face screwed up in anguish and Frankie could see that behind her the room was covered with papers scattered all about.

"Cam?" she asked gently, "You all good in there?"

"Now's not a good time Frankie," Cami said, her voice almost shaking, "I'm sorry, I've just got some things to sort out. Can you come around another day?"

"What's going on?" she asked, more firmly this time as concern flooded her at her friends refusal and at the terror in her voice.

She wanted to barge into the apartment now to talk to Cami properly. Over all the time she'd known Cami, she'd never seen her like this, never so frazzled or frightened. Cami was normally the more composed of the two, steady and straight and yet now it was as though she was collapsing at the seams. It wasn't that she wasn't inviting her in, Frankie wasn't bothered by that, it was that it was clear she wasn't allowing her entry because she was dealing with something terrifying her.

"Is this about Sean's headstone?" she asked, "It's just stupid kids, I'll clean it up tonight, I just got caught up in some stuff-"

"I'm fine, Frankie," Cami snapped, "I just need a day, I'll- I'll call you."

Cami nearly slammed the door in her face but just before she did, Frankie was able to catch sight of a post it pinned up next to the door.

'Believe nothing Klaus tells you.'

The note combined with Marcel's honesty days earlier confirmed to her that Klaus had been the one to compel her friend not Marcel and she needed to find him before he did it again.

Frankie almost cursed herself that she'd blocked and deleted Klaus' number so many times that she couldn't call him to yell at him. Her next best bet was to skate to the mansion she'd followed Marcel to, hoping he was home and so that's what she did, almost falling off her board in surprise at her luck when she saw Klaus and Marcel sitting together in a bar halfway along the way.

She made it about a foot inside the bar before she began to yell, rage enveloping her as she slammed the door open and barged her way over to the table Klaus and Marcel sat at.

"You compelled Cami, you little shit-"

"Yes," Klaus cut her off cooly with a short grin at the rage brewing from her, "Please do join us, apologies for the lack of invitation, don't let it deter you. Did you enjoy your evening by the Bayou?"

Klaus' cavalier attitude and easy grin made her blood boil. She cursed herself for wasting so much time chasing down Marcel to help her friend, she should've known if there was anyone with a machiavellian plan in New Orleans it would most certainly be Klaus.

"Cami's not your fucking doll," she snapped, "Leave her out of whatever psychotic master plan you have, leave her out of it all. She's better than all this, you let her in this world and you know she's gonna end up dead or a vampire. You saw those kids in Mystic Falls, every one of them got wrapped up no matter how they tried to stay out, don't do that to Cami she's good."

Klaus narrowed his eyes in annoyance at her accusations, "Do not confuse the fact that I have not yet killed you for a promise I won't."

The accusations of course were true, Klaus, Marcel, and Frankie were all well aware that Klaus had been compelling Cami to do his bidding and forget what he said but it was being called out on it so aggressively that was frustrating and angering Klaus' pride.

"Fuck off," she snapped, rolling her eyes as she collapsed into the seat beside them and pulled his glass towards her, "We both know if you had it in you to kill me you'd have done it a lot earlier."

Marcel who was watching the conversation with raised eyebrows let out a snort of amusement at this. Though he knew Frankie was special to the Mikaelson's, he was still surprised with what she was allowed to get away with with Klaus, especially considering how she was certainly human.

Through all the years he'd lived with the Mikaelson's Francesca was spoken of rarely but always reverentially, each Mikaelson speaking more softly of her than anyone else. Watching her now, Marcel could certainly see the appeal in her, the fire combined with her loyalty to her friends, although she certainly wasn't what he'd expected with how they'd described her predecessor.

"An idea that gets more and more appealing with each delightful phrase that comes from your pretty lips."

"Stay on topic," she snapped, "and stay the fuck out of my friends head."

"And if I don't?"

"I'm feeding her vervain and telling her everything, everything about you and Marcel and the whole fucking city, about what everyone in this bar clearly is."

Frankie had noticed the eyes on her as she entered, the eyes that weren't focused on her dramatic entry but on the blood pumping steadily through her veins and she knew that if not for Marcel and Klaus sitting beside her she wouldn't be alive in this bar even half this long.

"And you truly believe that this is a solution?" he laughed, leaning back in his chair with his arms supporting his head, "You don't want her involved in witches and vampires and if I don't leave her out of it then you'll pull her in. How, pray tell, would that ensure her safety?"

"Because at least she can defend herself," she snapped, "at least she'll know what's going on, who she can't trust-"

"And she can't trust me?"

"Can she?"

"I care about her survival."

"Caring about survival and wellbeing are two very different things," she said, downing Klaus' glass in one and letting out a grimace at the sharp taste, "Life is about more than just survival, don't reduce her life to that."

"And do you do more than just survive?" Klaus asked, noting already that her life here was small, work, skate, home, repeat, "Is there much more to your life than survival. One class a week really enough to satisfy your creative-"

"This isn't about me."

Klaus grinned smoothly as he leant forwards, his chin on his fist, "It never is."

"Stay out of her head," she snapped.

Just as she stood to storm from the bar she heard Klaus' phone ring, listening as he pulled it out and to his ear rather than replying to her or farewelling.

"Hello," he said, amusement in his tone, Frankie could see a grin gracing his face in the reflection of the windows and her hand reached for the door when she heard him speak again, a light lilt to his tone that was more than mocking , "Have you?"

She wasn't sure what she heard first after the words left Klaus' lips, the shattering of the glass as it crumpled under the weight of bullets, or the screaming of the night walkers around her as they burst into flames and began to die. Her hand was on the handle of the door but as the world collapsed into chaos she froze in her place, stuck in the calamity.

She certainly felt the chaos too. The feeling of the shattered glass piercing into her, a hundred tiny cuts lining her skin that caused her board to fall to the ground and then the feeling of her body and head pressed against a chest. Klaus rushing over and pulling her away from the door where bullets began to pour through and then pressing her tightly between him and the wall.

"Oh my god," she muttered out in shock as chaos reigned, "what's going on?"

She tried to pull away from him, not because she didn't want to be near him, but because she wanted to know what was going on, she could hear the bullets flying through and the screams but she hadn't exactly comprehended what was happening. Klaus didn't let her move, holding her firmly against his chest though she felt his thumb moving across the back of her head.

"I've got you," Klaus soothed, surprisingly calm though with her head pressed against his chest she could hear the thudding of his racing heart, "Stay here, don't look, love."

"Klaus-"

"Trust me."

She didn't know if she did trust Klaus but the screams were beginning to falter and she didn't want to see what was left behind so she squeezed her eyes shut, pushing the anxiety and terror down as she waited for the horror to end. The bullets continued to reign through the building long after the screams ended but finally the sound of a car screeching away was heard and the silence enveloped them.

"Don't look," Klaus told her, his hands falling to his sides as he let her pull away from him. Her eyes opened and his fingers landed on her chin, pulling her eyes to face him, "Stay here. Don't look. I'm going to help Marcellus and I'll be back. Close your eyes."

She didn't know if it was instinctive or simply because of Klaus' command but the moment he left her side her eyes flooded around the room, taking stock of the horrific scene in front of her.

Klaus, Marcel and Frankie were the only survivors with corpses covering the entirety of the bar. Some of the bodies had wooden bullets in their chests, the lucky ones, clearly they weren't the ones who'd been screaming in pain and terror. She knew why the others had screamed now, there were more of their corpses, they were hardly even corpses, just the charred skeletal remains from the night walkers who burned in the sun thanks to the shattered window.

Frankie had seen a lot from her time with Klaus and Stefan and her time in Mystic Falls but she'd never seen anything like this.

The smell of the flesh seared away in the sun was sickening and even as she heard Marcel and Klaus begin to speak the sounds were blurred away with the smell all she could focus on, the sound of their argument dulled by the ringing in her ears.

She wanted to make herself breathe, she tried to make herself breathe but then she felt the bile bubbling up her throat. Turning to the side she felt herself vomit, again and again until there was nothing left and the smell returned.

Flinching back as a table was thrown in the air she stood, looking and seeing Marcel screaming at Klaus, furious by whatever Klaus' part had been in the chaos that ensued.

"This is on you," Marcel snapped, his finger pointing accusatorially as he stormed towards him, "Now that you're in charge, these are your guys laying dead, your guys. You're gonna run this city, that better mean something to you, otherwise no one worth a damn is gonna follow you. No one."

"I was beginning to worry about you," Klaus grinned, "I don't think I could've taken any more of this differential nonsense. I mean, clearly I underestimated the faction. That won't happen again. But, tell me, now that we've arrived to this point, now that they have come into our home, visited this upon our people, how would you counsel me to respond?"

"Lets go kill them all," Marcel growled out in response.

Frankie knew her board had been destroyed in the chaos and she hoped even after everything that Klaus would help take her home before he and Marcel left for their revenge.

She could see the trucks and the wheels of her skateboard but the deck itself wasn't whole, one of the dying nightwalkers must've set it on fire as they burned and now her board lay in pieces with charred edges. Of course she could still walk home from here but she knew with how shaken she was and how distressed she likely looked that she'd likely get some looks.

"Klaus," Frankie called, her eyes flicking over to the charred remains of her board, "Can you- Will you get me home?"

Klaus turned to her, his face softening as he took her in, no doubt noting the contents of her stomach beside her, "I have to take care of her," he told Marcel, "But I will be back and we will make them pay, we will get our revenge."

Whether Marcel was pleased by the delay or if he'd expected it he didn't show it, nodding and allowing Klaus to race over and speed away with Frankie. She didn't ask how Klaus knew where she lived as they arrived at her doorstep, she wasn't exactly surprised that he'd found out once he knew she was in town.

"Are you alright?" he asked, his voice softer than he was normally with her. His hand rose to brush her hair from her face gently, using her chin to tug her head side to side to check for wounds, "I told you not to look."

"They did that because of something you did?" she asked, Marcels words ringing in her ears, "What did you do that caused a massacre like that?"

"Something I won't do again."

"Thank you for pulling me out of the line of fire, for not letting me get hurt."

"Ah, Elijah would have my head if I let you die," Klaus replied, his grin widening at the punch she shot out to his shoulder, "Would you like me to heal you, the glass-"

"It's fine," she rolled her eyes at this kind side of Klaus she so rarely saw, "they're barely scratches they won't last long. Thanks for taking me home, uh, don't tell your brother he'll probably flip."

Klaus' eyes darkened at the mention of Elijah. They'd hardly spoken since the bayou and while Elijah remained at the mansion they'd been staying in earlier, Klaus and Hayley now had residence in Marcels compound. Though any anger he'd felt at Frankie had long dissipated, his rage due to his brothers beliefs of his intentions hadn't faltered in fact they'd grown.

"Not to worry he's made it clear where his loyalties lie, with Rebekah and the wolf and you. He has made it clear he has no interest in supporting me when there are others whispering untruths in his-"

"Stop being a child," she pushed his shoulder roughly, annoyance overriding her as the exhaustion of the day allowed her rage to return, "You know everything he ever does is for you, you're ridiculous. You're a thousand years old and you act like a petulant kid when it comes to your siblings. You know you don't exactly make it easy for any of them."

"If you had Elijah for a brother-"

"Maybe be grateful you still have a brother," she snapped, cutting him off and watching the playful smirk slide off his face. Guilt enveloped her and her face furrowed into a frown, "Fuck. I should go. Thanks for taking me home, leave Cami alone."

Klaus was frozen for a moment and his hand reached out to grab her arm but she slid away, tugging the door of her apartment open and slamming it behind her without another word.

Her words were cruel and as she slammed the door she sunk into a ball, guilt enveloping her along with the terrified anxiety as she remembered her brother and his death. She knew she'd been cruel, even as the words twisted from her lips, she'd felt guilty knowing that he'd lost a brother too thanks to her family and friends but she'd been so gripped with fury knowing he took for granted something that broke her heart each moment she allowed herself to remember it.

Frankie didn't hear from Klaus nor Elijah for the rest of the day, she spent the afternoon in pure, blissful, supernatural silence. She showered and changed for a second time, tossed her trousers with too many rips to repair in the trash, and ordered food to gorge herself on.

By the time she returned late in the evening from her life drawing class she'd almost forgotten the events of the day, almost gotten over the images in her head of skeletons and charred remains. Klaus wasn't waiting for her but it was clear he'd been by, and she pulled the package he'd left in in through the door with her, dumping her things by the door and ripping the paper off.

It was an apology. Klaus' form of an apology of course which didn't include actual words, but a replacement skateboard for her charred remains.

Guilt enveloped her at the gesture, she knew money wasn't an issue for Klaus so it wasn't that he'd paid for it but that she'd made him feel bad enough in her anger that he felt he needed her forgiveness. She was mad about what he'd done to Cami, that was where her anger lay but she knew he wasn't apologising for that, he was steadfast in his justification of her compulsion. No, she knew he was apologising for reminding her of her brother.

The gift was partly an apology that his brother still lived while hers didn't.

Sighing, she pushed the guilt down, placing the board by the door for when she next went out, instead heading to bed. She knew if she brought the gesture up to Klaus he would blow it off, deny it or make a joke about it, the gift itself being the way he could avoid talking about what had happened.