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Damon: She's not a toy soldier!

Lily: And Malcolm was not a vase.

Damon and Lily

Never Let Me Go is the second episode of the seventh season of The Vampire Diaries and the one hundred and thirty-fifth episode of the series overall.

Summary[]

ONE STEP AHEAD – When an impulsive decision by Damon threatens to unravel a carefully negotiated deal between Stefan and Lily, he has no choice but to make amends with his mother before things spiral further out of control. However, Lily remains one step ahead and carries out a harsh plan that hits Damon where it hurts most. Elsewhere, after returning to Whitmore College, Alaric turns to Bonnie for help with a mysterious and potentially dangerous artifact he has obtained, while Matt is forced into making a risky life or death decision. Meanwhile, Caroline, who finds herself a pawn in Lily and the Heretics' plan for retribution, uncovers a shocking detail about Stefan's past. Enzo also appears.

Plot[]

In a flashforward, three years later at a news television broadcast station, Caroline is directing everyone until her assistant interrupts her saying that her fiancé called asking what her schedule is right before the wedding because he wants to go to Mystic Falls. Caroline looks shocked for a second and mutters that they are not allowed to go back there. She then walks off.

Back in present time, three weeks after Mystic Falls was evacuated and to two teenagers filming themselves as they begin to walk into Mystic Falls in the middle of the night because they are curious to what really happened there. As they walk near the Salvatore crypt Amanda is pulled up into the trees by something unidentifiable, the cameras then show the two teenagers being fed on by vampires. Matt comes in telling the two girls to let him go, by holding up a weapon, although, they use magic to redirect the weapon into the boy and they attack Matt. The next day Matt is laying on the ground in the forest just waking up, he has a black ribbon on his wrist.

Alaric is teaching a class and begins to talk about death, and what happens after. His class is unusually full as the teenagers want to know if he would know anything about what is happening in Mystic Falls. He reminds everyone to stay out of Mystic Falls and class ends, Bonnie comes up to him and he tells her how all of the college kids are going into mystic Falls and the result of that is that they end up dead. Bonnie asks if he is okay because she heard what he was doing in Europe. He says he's over it but she doesn't believe him, he then proceeds to ask her about the Phoenix Stone.

Stefan is driving in his car and calls Caroline asking where she is and what she's doing. He then almost runs into Beau that was just standing in the middle of the road, Stefan asks him if he is okay and Beau begins to melt Stefan's mind as Lily comes out from behind the car and asks Stefan to excuse Beau but he doesn't like jokes. She then says "I thought we had a deal." Stefan says yes we still do, Lily says she didn't come to blame him but to make him understand why they did what they had to do.

Caroline is all tied up in the cells in the Salvatore house by Enzo as he explains to her that Lily needed to retaliate as someone killed Malcolm. Caroline tricks him into untying the ropes slightly and as he does so she strangles him with vervain ropes. She then proceeds to run out the door until she was caught by two of the vampires. They are exchanging threats until Enzo comes saying he has it under control.

Damon and Stefan are moving into Tyler's house as Lily and her Heretics are taking over their house. Stefan confronts Damon about killing Malcolm Damon jokes around about Malcolm's heart until Stefan tells him that Lily had kidnapped Caroline. Stefan tells Damon that he has to go over to Lily and fix the mess he had made.

Damon knocks on the door and Lily answers, he discovers that she had hired a maid and tells him to leave but he does not. He tells her that he killed Malcolm, he asks her to let Caroline go and leave her and Stefan out of it. She doesn't believe that he acted alone but he assures her he did, he asks if he can trade places with Caroline she says no. He tries to walk in but discovers that he cannot since she has signed the deed over to someone living. She then tells him that she has to go bury her son, she shuts the door in his face.

Alaric is explains to Bonnie about the Phoenix Stone, he says how it is supposed to have resuscitative powers. Bonnie is skeptical and Alaric tells her how he snuck into the maritime museum and stole it. Bonnie says that she doesn't feel any powers coming out of it, Alaric chuckles tells her that she is the most honest person he has asked all throughout Europe. Bonnie tries again to see if a witch has hid the magic in the talisman. She sees flashes of people dying, and says there is something wrong, evil, about the stone. She tells him that they can't mess with that magic, so they have to destroy it.

Stefan is planning to storm the building through the tunnels until Damon tells him that he can't because someone living know owns the house. He explains that he tried to get Caroline out but Lily won't give her up, he also says that he called the registrar's office and they will know who owns the house and then will be able to him him/her and storm the building to save Caroline.

Caroline is all chained up and is being asked for advice on a dress for a funeral by the Heretics, she laughs at the old fashion dress that Nora is wearing and as Nora storms off her girlfriend threatens that if she ever embarrasses Nora again she will stab her eyes out. Caroline then get stabbed with a pencil in her arm, Enzo hears this and winces as he pours himself a drink.

Lily and Beau comes up behind him and asks him why he isn't watching Caroline. He explains that she escaped temporarily and Mary Louise and Nora are watching her. He tells her that she promised that Caroline wouldn't be hurt, Lily retaliates with how he promised she would not escape. She asks him to watch the house while they all go to the funeral for Malcolm. Valerie tells Enzo how Mary Louise and Nora usually get away with murder and Enzo looks annoyed, she tells him how he chose his side and that there's no going back. Valerie tells him to stop caring about Caroline. Enzo walks off.

Damon calls Bonnie and asks how things went with Ric, she tells him how Ric wants to bring Jo back to life with an evil stone. Damon tells her that Lily took Caroline and Bonnie begins to get mad, she feels guilty because this all happened when Bonnie and Damon killed Malcolm. Bonnie then goes up to Matt to tell him that he owns the deed to the house and asks him if she can temporarily stop his heart so that Damon and Stefan can rescue Caroline. Matt hates the idea and only goes along to save Caroline.

Caroline has multiple pencils stabbed in her by Mary Louise and Valerie walks in asking what happened. While Caroline tells her she gives her a book to stand on and takes out all the pencils. She then proceeds to tell her how Mary Louise poisoned her for a month when she made a snide remark about Nora. Valerie says that she can help and chants a spell on Caroline and then promptly leaves. Mary Louise demands to know what Valerie did and attempts to touch Caroline but burns, she gets mad and injects her with more vervain. Nora tells Mary Louise that they have to go to the funeral now and just before Nora leaves Caroline complements her by saying that the dress is cute. She then falls unconscious.

Bonnie is preparing Matt before she kills him, she tells him that he doesn't have to do it but he tells her that it is fine and that it is for Caroline. He tells her to just do it, she begins to chant and slowly stops his heart. Damon and Stefan are walking through the woods, Damon is worried that Matt won't want to die and then proceeds to ask Stefan if him and Caroline are a thing as he is letting Matt die for her. Stefan argues with him about this until Damon gets a text from Bonnie saying that they're all good and ready to go.

Alaric is preparing to destroy the Phoenix Stone in some sort of acid but cannot bring himself to do it as he sees a photo of himself and Jo.

Bonnie begins to bring Matt back to life but sees flashbacks of dying people and pain. She collapses onto the floor next to Matt.

Damon knocks on the front door and is greeted by Enzo, Damon tries to distract him by asking about Caroline and about their friendship issues. Damon walks in and taunts Enzo until Enzo tells him that they're burying Malcolm in the family crypt next to Elena. Damon says that that is impossible since it is sealed shut, Enzo says that it's a good thing that there are a bunch of magic siphoners then. Damon then releases everything in shock.

Lily and her Heretics are walking toward the Salvatore family crypt when Lily instructs them to get Elena's body out of the coffin and dump it in the river under the falls. Saying how she can spend the next 60 years of her life underwater.

Bonnie wakes up and sees that Matt is still dead, she freaks out for a few second but then begins to resurrect him. She resurrects him and Matt tells her how that was an awfully long ten seconds.

Stefan finds Caroline and breaks her out of the chains she was in, he tries to pick her up to carry her out of there but he cannot because of Valerie's spell. Valerie made Caroline's skin like vervain so Stefan can't touch her without being burned.

Damon walks into the Salvatore family crypt and discovers that they already took Elena body, he gets frustrated and begins to yell. Lily walks in and tells Damon how Elena is cloaked and only she knows where she is. Damon tells her to torture him and kill him but to leave Elena out of it. Lily reminds Damon of a time when he broke her grandmother's vase, she tells him that how even though his father beat him until he was bloody and bruised he denied it. When the day was over he played with his toy soldiers, still denying everything. So, the next day she tried a different tactic. She made his room bare, took away all of his toy soldiers. He cried and cried and then admitted everything. Damon tells Lily how Elena is not a toy soldier, she replies with Malcolm was not a vase. She leaves the crypt and Damon finds her and her Heretics all outside, they all tell him what Malcolm meant to them and Damon then says. Alright, what do you want?.

Stefan gets Caroline a jacket so that he can touch her without being burnt, he tells her that they'll find Bonnie and get her to reverse the spell. Just as they are about to leave the house begins to rumble and Stefan is thrown out the window as Caroline is being dragged down the stairs by some invisible force. Enzo is at the bottom of the stairs and tells the maid to invite her in, she does and all the rumbling stops.

Bonnie and Matt are in the car, Bonnie wants to take him to the hospital to get him checked up on. Matt is mad and says that this is all Damon's fault, but Bonnie tells him that it isn't. She tells him that the Heretics are there because of her, and that she helped Damon kill Caroline. Matt says that he prays that he doesn't see anyone anymore because that means they'll get killed. Bonnie asks him why no one is fighting anymore.

Stefan comes home to see Damon in front of the fire, he questions him on why he left and gets mad. Damon tells him how Lily said that they all have to get "as far away from Mystic Falls as humanly possible" for good. Damon says that Lily has Caroline, Elena, the town, the people, their homes. Damon tells him that she wants to take away all their toys, and that she wants them fight. Damon tells Stefan that they have to trick Lily and in doing so get both Caroline and Elena back.

Bonnie calls Alaric and asks him if it worked, he lies and tells her that he burnt the Phoenix Stone in acid. He is actually holding it in his hand. He goes up to Jo's body but at the last moment turns away. He experiments with the phoenix Stone by trying to resurrect someone with it, it works until he takes the stone off his body.

Enzo is playing guitar in front of the fire, Lily stands behind him, watching. She smiles and then as he realizes she is there asks her about the burial. She goes on to tell him that if he wants Caroline can stay with him instead of the girls, he declines and says that Caroline made her bed. He asks Lily if she considers him one of her children, she says yes. Although, he then says that he doesn't want to be her child and that he chose her side not because of them but because of her. He then proceeds to walk off while she is stunned.

Nora walks up to Caroline and tells her that she is still spelled in the room and that she shouldn't trust Valerie since she is actually the worst out of them all. She throws Caroline Stefan's journal and tells her that that was the first thing that Valerie looked for. She told her that the diary entry July the 15th, 1863 should tell her why. Nora walks off and Caroline picks up the journal. She reads the entry, Stefan says how he met a girl called Valerie, only for a moment. But that he thought that she was wonderful.

Then it cuts back to three years later and back on the set of a television broadcast show. She tells her assistant that she needs to call her fiancé back and he tells her she had another call from a man named "Stefan Salvatore". She tells her assistant to tell Stefan that if he calls back she is not her and that she also never wants to hear that name again. She storms off but realizes that she was a bit harsh so turns around to apologize only to realize that Tony was hit in the throat with a dart and is on the floor. As she runs to help him, she gets a stake thrown at her and collapses on the floor to what seems to be unconscious.

Cast[]

Main Cast[]

Special Recurring Guest Star[]

Recurring Cast[]

Co-Starring[]

Trivia[]

  • Antagonists: Lily, Valerie, Nora, Mary Louise and Beau.
  • Damon and Stefan now stay in the Lockwood Mansion.
  • A thermal camera is used and it shows that vampires do have some body heat. In Haunted, Stefan told Vicki the reason vampires drink hot drinks like tea and coffee is so that they're not cold to the touch.
  • The EMF Meter that Amanda is holding goes off and leads her and Ryan to Elena's casket in the crypt, as she told Ryan the meter will go off around anything supernatural.
  • Mary Louise and Nora attended the funeral of Queen Victoria in 1901, Nora didn't want to wear the dress to Malcolm's service cause she felt silly. After Caroline laughed at her she went to find something else to wear, Mary Louise then hurt Caroline for laughing at her girlfriend. She later picked one of Elena's dresses after a suggestion by Caroline.
  • Lily takes Caroline as a hostage, due to Stefan and Damon breaking the deal for truce she and Stefan had made. Even when Damon apologizes to her, she doesn't accept his apology, due to realizing that he didn't kill Malcolm alone, but he had help. Later on, Lily steals Elena's coffin as a further punishment to Damon, especially, willing to cause fighting between the two brothers, by slowly taking away everything they love and care about.
  • Lily took Elena to force Damon to leave Mystic Falls for good and never come back, implying she would kill her if he should return.
  • When Lily and her Heretic family come to place the ashes of Malcolm in the Salvatore crypt, she originally told them to remove Elena's body from her casket and dump her body at the bottom of the falls so she would spend the next 60 years in the river. This is before deciding to use her against Damon. This implies that either Kai's sleeping spell on Elena protects her from dying or that she might not be a human anymore as the only reason she wouldn't die if her body was put into the river.
  • It was confirmed in this episode by Lily that Giuseppe was physically abusive to Damon.
  • Alaric lies to Bonnie that he destroyed the Phoenix Stone as she instructed him to, due to having seen a vision of people dying when she touched the stone, considering it dangerous. Alaric, later, is seen to resurrect Ryan's dead body by putting the Phoenix Stone on his chest, but when he removes it from it, he dies again.
  • Bonnie stops Matt's heart for 6 minutes after he is made the owner of the Salvatore Boarding House, nullifying his claim of ownership. This allows Damon and Stefan to enter the house to save Caroline.
  • It is revealed that Stefan had met Valerie in the past, while Caroline reads a specific page in Stefan's diary, instructed by Nora. Having met him, Valerie kept reading his diary in 1903 Prison World's Salvatore House, where she lived along with the rest of the Heretics and Lily. Hence, the first thing she looked for when they moved from Lily's House to the Salvatore Boarding House, after returning to the real world, was Stefan's diary.
  • The diary of Stefan's that Caroline reads from obviously comes from the 1903 prison world as Stefan burned all of his original diaries in For Whom the Bell Tolls.
  • In a flash-forward to three years in the future, Caroline is seen working backstage for KQBC 3 in Dallas, Texas. At first, her fiancé calls and Tony, her assistant, is informing her that he's planning a trip back to Mystic Falls. When Caroline hears that, she says they cannot go back there. Afterwards, Stefan calls and Tony is letting her know once again. However, Caroline gets mad and tells him that she doesn't want to listen to the name of Stefan Salvatore ever again. While walking away from Tony, they both turn around looking at each other, where Tony has been shot in the neck and Caroline is shot with a stake.

Body Count[]

Continuity[]

Locations[]

Behind the Scenes[]

  • This episode had about 1.40 million viewers in the USA.
  • Horror fan (and this episode's director) Chris Grismer was in his element directing the Phoenix Stone flash-cuts. He was allowed to be as outrageous and gory as he wanted to be because the footage would be so short that it just might sneak past the rule-makers. It's his homage to similar nightmare flashes in the movie "Event Horizon".[1]
  • Lucy is the name of Brian's housekeeper, who is now the name of Lily Salvatore's housekeeper. For years, as a joke, the writers have pitched a comedy web series about the never-seen but clearly well-paid cleaning staff of the Salvatore House. Keeping all the candles burning and the logs stocked is a full time job, not to mention carpet/couch blood stain removal.  [1]
  • When Caroline laughs at Nora wearing the frumpy dress, the camera was rolling on Candice and first AD Tony Griffin walked into the shot in the dress instead of Scarlett Byrne. That laugh was genuine.[1]
  • As Grismer was trying to figure out a whole complicated split-screen gag to shoot the eyeliner pencil that close to Caroline's eye, an epiphany occurred: Every day in the makeup chair, the makeup artist gets that close. So instead of using VFX, he used the makeup artist and did it for real. Clever thinking.[1]
  • Michael Malarkey is a musician in real life, and we couldn't resist giving him the opportunity to show off his skills. He's strumming the chords of a song he wrote.[1]

References[]

Quotes[]

Stefan (to Damon): "Lily took Caroline"
Damon: "What?"
Stefan: "For breaking our deal."
Enzo (to Caroline): "I am the closest thing to a friend you have in here."
Mary Louise (to Caroline): "What do you think of this color?"
Caroline: "It'll totally make your eyes pop!"
Mary Louise: "Do you think it will make your eyes pop?"

Stefan (to Damon): "Lily took Caroline-"
Damon: "What?"
Stefan: "To retaliate for breaking our deal."
Damon: "Killing Malcolm was classic Damon."
Lily (to Damon): "Malcolm was a vital part of this family."
Damon (to Stefan): "You taking her side?"
Enzo (to Caroline): "I am the closest thing to a friend you have in here."
Mary Louise (to Caroline): "What do you think of this color?"
Caroline: "It'll totally make your eyes pop!"
Mary Louise: "Do you think it will make your eyes pop?"

Damon (to Stefan): "Just so we're clear, I'm taking the master bedroom. Carol Lockwood and I had a little thing, I think she'd want me to have it. Let's open some windows too. Reeks of dog in here which is impressive considering Tyler's been with Jeremy for months."
Stefan: "You killed him, didn't you?"
Damon: "Tyler? No. Jeremy once, but are we really bringing that up right now?"
Stefan: "The Heretic. Malcolm. Lily came by earlier: She found him in the Town Square without a heart."
Damon: "Oh. Did she want that back? I mean, I think I packed it somewhere alright."
Stefan: "You know Lily and I had a deal?"
Damon: "A bad deal."
Stefan: "She took Caroline."
Damon: "What?"
Stefan: "To retaliate for breaking our bad deal. She took Caroline."
Damon: "But you weren't the one that did it --"
Stefan: "Yeah I know I wasn't. You were. Which is why you are gonna over there and you're gonna fix it."

Bonnie: "So. Great Mystic Falls evacuation isn't going as well as everyone hoped."
Alaric: "Heh. Well it turned it into a ghost town. That part worked. Unfortunately for us, ghost towns are like amusement parks for kids. The Heretics have killed ten people already. Two last night: Idiots looking for a.... ghost selfie."
Bonnie: "Are you okay? Damon told me what you were doing in Europe."
Alaric: "Losing my money and my sanity to a series of con artists? Yeah. Don't worry. I'm over it."
Bonnie: "It's okay if you're not, Ric. Heck, I'm a little offended you didn't come to me first."
Alaric: "Oh. You wouldn't think it's weird that I'm trying to contact my fiancé who's been dead for months?"
Bonnie: "Honestly, after everything we've experienced....it'd be weird if you weren't."
Alaric: "Hey Bonnie. Have you ever heard of the Phoenix Stone?"

Lily: "I thought we had a deal."
Stefan: "Yeah, we do. Otherwise, I would be at home. Not out patrolling the streets to keep humans out of your minion's fangs."
Stefan (to Damon): "You killed him, didn't you?"
Damon: "But you weren't the one that did it --"
Stefan: "Yeah I know I wasn't. You were. Which is why you are gonna over there and you're gonna fix it."
Doctor: "It's said that once you bury a body, the grieving process begins."
Alaric: "Oh I'm not planning on burying her. I'm planning on bringing her back to life."
Bonnie: "Heck, I'm a little offended you didn't come to me first."
Alaric: "Oh. You wouldn't think it's weird that I'm trying to contact my fiancé who's been dead for months?"
Bonnie: "Honestly, after everything we've experienced...it'd be weird if you weren't."
Damon: "Hello? Somebody burying anybody nobody cared about?"

Multimedia[]

Soundtrack[]

Last.fm_play.png "Dark" – Breaking Benjamin
Last.fm_play.png "Love & Exhale" – AirLands
Last.fm_play.png "Other Man" – Jimi Charles Moody
Last.fm_play.png "Feed The Flames" – Michael Malarkey

Videos[]

Pictures[]

References[]

See also[]

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