Three years ago: Bonnie packs up the Super Suite, which will now be empty for the first time since “I Know What You Did Last Summer.” She finds Damon’s letter to her on a dresser, still unopened. As she leaves, she pauses at a spot on the door frame where she, Elena, and Caroline once carved their initials. In the hallway, she realizes that some Armory employees are in the building. Enzo finds her hiding and whisks her behind a couch in the lounge, then zooms her out. He tells her Alex wants her brought in, but he’s not going to let the Armory take her. He injects her with something that knocks her out and says she can thank him when this is all over.
Present: Bonnie finishes packing up her room in Asheville so Enzo can again take her somewhere Alex can’t find her. She tells him she doesn’t feel sick from the pills. He promises that they’ll find a way to save her. Damon’s still outside the door, and though Bonnie doesn’t want to talk to him, Enzo thinks she should let him help. She opens the door and tells Damon that he’s only allowed to talk to Enzo. If Damon has an idea how to save Bonnie, Enzo will share it with her. Damon forfeited the right to Bonnie’s attention when he left to desiccate without saying goodbye in person. Also, they’re taking separate cars.
Stefan goes to Saltzman Shelter, assuring Alaric that there’s no crisis to solve or emergency to deal with. He thanks Alaric for his help with Ambrose, and Alaric says he didn’t really have a choice in the matter. Stefan wants to talk to Caroline, who’s not home. Alaric hesitates before inviting him in.
In Enzo’s car, without Damon around, Enzo tells Bonnie that he doesn’t think her conversational boundaries are going to help their productivity. She won’t budge, and he says he thought she’d moved on from being angry at Damon. She says she did. Then he showed up with flowers – not even her favorite kind – and she’s angry again. They arrive at a cabin that Enzo has maintained as a safehouse for a few years. Damon makes fun of it, so Bonnie says he’s welcome to go home to Vamp Villa. But this is where Rayna is, so this is where Damon needs to be.
Three years ago: Bonnie wakes up in the cabin and attacks Enzo with a fireplace poker. When he takes it from her, she tries to use magic on him, but nothing happens. He tells her she’s not a prisoner there, and she’s safe. He’s hiding her from the Armory. He doesn’t know why they want her, but it must be for a bad reason. They need to find out why Alex sees Bonnie as important, so instead of paying room and board, Bonnie’s going to do research. Enzo will continue pretending he’s Team Armory. He gives her a bottle of magic-neutralizing pills to keep her hidden from locator spells.
Bonnie asks why he’s helping her. He gives her a few options: He doesn’t want her to die, he’s curious about what the Armory is up to, and he’s just being a nice person. She says that if she agrees to stay, she gets to make the rules. Enzo figured she would make that demand.
Present: As Bonnie pulls Damon’s letter out of her bag, Rayna, who’s been stashed in the cellar, writes a bunch of stuff on pages she’s ripped out of books. Enzo explains to Damon that she’s still having visions of the vampires she put in the phoenix stone. Damon tells her they want to make a deal to help Bonnie. They’ll form a “hit squad” and kill the escaped vampires in exchange for Rayna’s last Everlasting life. So it’s like the time Damon got Qetsiyah to agree to make Bonnie the anchor in exchange for killing Silas, only this time the gang has to do a lot more killing.
Rayna notes that if she dies one more time, she’s gone for good. Damon says he’ll kill her whether she agrees to it or not, but at least this way, she’ll get to do something nice for someone else. Rayna insults his sales pitch, so Enzo shuts down the bad cop and steps in as the good cop. He reminds Rayna that she’s had eight lifespans and has spent every day of each one of them hunting vampires. With the souls in the phoenix stone now free, she’ll have to spend the rest of her life hunting them again. She’ll probably die before she can get to all of them. Damon jumps in to say that if he and Enzo take over the killing for her, she can die without seeing visions or hearing voices.
Rayna wants proof that the guys can do what they’re proposing. Once they’ve killed some vampires and their voices are out of her head, she’ll consider the deal. Damon immediately agrees, but the list is long and they’ll have to find out where the vampires are on their own. Rayna thinks they have about 48 hours before the pills wear off and Bonnie’s findable again. They’d better get to work.
Two-and-a-half years ago: Bonnie shows Enzo a picture Caroline sent her of the twins dressed as pumpkins for Halloween. The reluctant roommates seem to have learned to cohabitate peacefully, in what might even be considered a friendly manner. Bonnie got her hands on Armory blueprints, so she and Enzo are able to see the layout of the underground levels, which Alex told Enzo were sealed off. Bonnie figures it’s where they keep the best parts of their collection. Maybe they wanted to put Elena and Rayna down there. I mean, what supernatural museum wouldn’t want a doppelganger and a vampire huntress?
Enzo notes that Bonnie still has Damon’s letter. She keeps meaning to get rid of it, but she always talks herself out of it. Enzo says that Damon left him, too. They were each other’s only friends for five years and gave each other hope. Then one day Damon ditched their escape plan and left Enzo to die. So Enzo gets why Bonnie feels hurt. But he doesn’t want her to carry a grudge for 50 years like he has. She can’t waste her time thinking there’s something she did to be treated the way Damon treated her. She deserves a lot better.
Present: Stefan admires Saltzman Shelter, which Alaric says is as nice as it is because Caroline compelled an interior designer to decorate and the homeowners association to let them do whatever they want. Stefan’s surprised that Alaric was okay with that. Alaric confirms that he’s done with the supernatural, but when it comes to homeowners associations, anything goes. Stefan glances at Alaric’s datebook and sees that he’s written down an appointment with a justice of the peace in just a few days.
Enzo, Bonnie, and Damon get back on the road, getting guidance from Rayna over the phone about where to start hunting. She tells them that the place where the phoenix stone was destroyed is like ground zero. She can see where vampires have gone from there, though they’ll have to be patient and wait for information as it comes to her. Damon has some reservations about Rayna working with them, since, you know, she hates vampires. She tells him she’s tired. She’s never had a day off since she became a huntress in 1857. She just wants a day without vampires. Yeah, so did Jeremy, and that didn’t work out well for anyone.
Rayna sends the hit squad to a dentist’s office in Richmond, where a vampire is having a binge. Damon and Enzo fight him, then hold him still so Bonnie can shoot him. The three haven’t perfected their techniques yet, so Damon ends up beheading the vampire with a wet-floor sign. Hey, whatever works. And they just have to do this, like, 30 more times!
A year and a half ago: It’s New Year’s Eve and Enzo wants to celebrate. That means he and Bonnie are going to have dinner together, and she has to put on nicer clothes. She changes into a dress and is surprised to see that Enzo has not only dressed up as well but has also hung up a bunch of lights. One might even think this was a date.
After dinner, Bonnie comments that she never would have expected to spend New Year’s Eve with Enzo. She’s been reading Virginia’s journals and knows that she and Alex used to be close. Virginia also seems to hate everything the St. John family stands for. Enzo notes that at least she knows what that is. Bonnie asks why he cares, since his family abandoned him. Enzo says that his curiosity about what his parents stood for keeps him from hating them for leaving him. She tells him she feels like she’s finally starting to understand him.
He invites her to dance, and though she thinks it’s a little ridiculous, she agrees. They talk about the few activities she has to keep her occupied – other than reading Virginia’s journals, she’s learning to play the guitar and building fires in the fireplace. Maybe she’ll add “old-people dancing” to her list. Enzo dips her, making her laugh. When he pulls her back up, they start moving closer to each other, as if they’re going to kiss. He backs off first, saying he needs to make an appearance at the Armory before Alex gets suspicious. He kisses Bonnie on the cheek in a way that looks a lot more intimate than a normal kiss on the cheek does.
Present: Stefan ignores multiple calls from Damon while he and Alaric go to a diner. He’s still mad at Damon for not doing the scar transfer. Dude, he saved your life. Maybe call it even? Alaric asks why Stefan didn’t come back for Caroline after Rayna was captured by the Armory. Stefan says it’s more complicated than that, though he never explained that at the time. Alaric finds it pretty coincidental that he’s back in the picture just as Caroline’s about to make a commitment to someone else. Stefan says he made a choice and wants Caroline to understand why. Alaric argues that she deserved answers years ago, before Stefan broke her heart.
Stefan finally answers his phone, knowing that Damon’s probably going to ruin his attempt to put his life back together. Damon say she needs backup and would like help from a “vamp arsenal.” He’s trying to save someone who hates him. “Which one? There are so many,” Stefan replies. Well, it’s Bonnie, which Damon really should have led with, because no way is Stefan going to sit back and let anything bad happen to her.
Alaric and Stefan form their own hit squad and join in the vampire-killing fun. They find one on a golf course in Oklahoma City, and Stefan tears out his heart and hits it with a golf club. In Charlotte, Enzo removes another heart while Damon opts for decapitation. Stefan and Alaric work in tandem in a Wichita greenhouse while Bonnie and Damon shoot two vampires together in the backroom of a furniture store in Atlanta. He thinks this “Bonnie and Clyde and Clyde routine” is helping her sharpshooting skills. She tells him it’s because she pictures him as her target.
Alex shows up in another part of the backroom and tells Enzo it was easy to find him, thanks to the trail of dead vampires he’s left behind. He tells her he’s there alone, speaking loudly enough for Damon and Bonnie to hear. Alex says that Enzo can’t keep hiding Bonnie. He pretends he hasn’t had anything to do with her movements over the past three years. Damon zooms Bonnie out as Alex tells Enzo that she heard about Bonnie and Virginia’s near-violent encounter at the psych facility. Virginia’s episodes are exactly why Alex had her committed…after she killed Lucy.
Four years ago, Virginia forced Lucy to magically seal a vault in the Armory. Virginia and Alex’s other sister, Yvette, was in the vault at the time. Alex wants to get her out, and only Bonnie can help her do that. Enzo figures that Yvette has died of starvation in the past four years, but Alex knows that something in the vault has kept her alive. She can still hear Yvette calling for help. Alex blames herself for Yvette’s suffering, and she knows Enzo understands that kind of guilt. She thinks they can solve each other’s problems. If Enzo brings Bonnie to her, Alex will do everything she can to save her.
Damon and Bonnie get back on the road without Enzo, which means there’s no one there to mediate their conversations. Enzo calls to tell Bonnie that Alex just wanted to talk. He thinks she’s sincere about wanting to work together, but he still doesn’t trust her. As they’re talking, Damon notices a scab on Bonnie’s hand like the ones Mary Louise was covered in before she died. This means she probably has no more than a week left to live.
A year ago: Enzo brings Bonnie coffee at the cabin, hearing from outside how much her guitar playing has improved (though he won’t admit that it’s better). She tells him that Virginia mentions Lucy in her journal. She knows Virginia has been in a psych facility in Asheville for the past three years, and she thinks Virginia can tell them why Alex is so interested in the Bennett bloodline. Enzo puts his hands on Bonnie’s to help her with her guitar technique, and also because he probably just wants to touch her. They end up kissing, then full-on making out.
Present: Damon and Bonnie reunite with Enzo somewhere, and Damon calls Stefan, desperate for a distraction from the two lovebirds. Stefan thinks Alaric is only putting up with him because of Bonnie, which means Caroline is going to be even harder to get through to. Damon urges him not to give up hope of making up with her. After all, Bonnie’s softening toward him. Uh, is she?
Rayna sends the trio to Huntsville, where they quickly take down some vampires dining on customers in a restaurant. Just before Enzo stakes the last one, he says he’s an old friend – Beau. Damon doesn’t hesitate to try to kill him, but Bonnie wants him spared, since he helped save Caroline and the twins. Damon tells her to go for a walk; he’ll take care of “Old Yeller” while she’s gone. While Bonnie’s complaining that Damon’s being his typical self, he zooms back to Beau and yanks out his heart. He’s just doing what needs to be done.
The guys disposes of all the bodies in an alley Dumpster, discussing whether it was okay that Damon killed Beau. He says he takes care of things, unlike Enzo, who gives people pills that kill them. Enzo shoots back that at least he didn’t take a desiccation nap and let other people clean up his messes. “I made a mistake. You made a choice,” he says. Damon attacks Enzo and says he desiccated so he wouldn’t hurt anyone. If anything happens to Bonnie, Damon will treat Enzo the way he’s been treating the vampires on Rayna’s kill list.
Bonnie catches him making threats and calls him off. Enzo walks away to cool down, and Damon says everything is Enzo’s fault. Still, Damon knows he made a mistake by giving up and running away. Bonnie tells him she got over it. He replies that she’s still carrying his letter around. She says it’s a reminder not to trust the wrong people. Damon thinks she screwed up by trusting Enzo, but she tells him that Enzo has been helping and protecting her every day for three years. He’ll figure out a way to save her. If he can’t, she’ll die, but with the man she loves by her side. She knows that no matter what happens, Enzo won’t leave her. She smacks the letter onto Damon’s chest and walks away.
Stefan and Alaric bury their latest victim in Meramec State Park in Missouri, a task Alaric didn’t miss when he left behind all the supernatural stuff. Stefan reminds him that they’re at least helping Bonnie. Alaric tells him not to “try to get the band back together.” They’re not friends, and this doesn’t mean Caroline will welcome Stefan back into her life. Stefan says she gets to decide that herself.
Alaric thinks Stefan’s wasting his time. When they moved to Dallas, Caroline joined a book club. At first she just went once a week, then twice a week. After she started coming home later and later, Alaric followed her and discovered that she was going to the river to cry. Then one day she stopped. She’d accepted that Alaric and the twins were her life, not a “placeholder.” Alaric is sure that Caroline won’t want to see Stefan.
Stefan comments that Alaric seems to know Caroline pretty well. Alaric says he knows her better than anyone. In that case, why don’t they share a bedroom? Stefan noticed at the house that they have separate rooms. Also, he knows that a wedding with a justice of the peace isn’t something Caroline would normally go for. After they’re married, will she start sleeping in Alaric’s bed? Alaric says that’s not Stefan’s business. Stefan replies that the relationship might look good on paper, but it’s a lie. Alaric punches him and admits that he knows Caroline doesn’t love him. But their life isn’t a lie. He just wants to be worthy of Caroline, which is more than Stefan has ever been.
Bonnie, Enzo, and Damon return to the cabin, and Enzo tries to cheer Bonnie up by playing the guitar. She covers his eyes to see if he can still play without looking. Damon hasn’t had any attention for ten seconds, so he just has to announce that he’s going to get their next victim’s name from Rayna.
In Dallas, Stefan shows up at Saltzman Shelter again. Alaric starts to tell him that he can’t just magically make everything okay for Caroline. Caroline’s home now, and she pointedly ignores Stefan. Alaric closes the door on him without a word.
As Stefan’s leaving, Damon calls with some news. Rayna’s finally agreed to give Bonnie her last life. Unfortunately, she’s spent the day adding to her kill list. If the gang wants to finish it in time to save Bonnie, they’re going to need help. A lot of help.
Etc.: Someone said that Michael Malarkey (Enzo) taught Kat Graham (Bonnie) to play a little guitar for this episode, which I think is really sweet.
How does Bonnie not get why Enzo wants to know about the family who abandoned him when she’s let herself get close to Abby again after Abby abandoned her? She should be able to empathize and understand that he has unanswered questions. Did the writers just forget about that?
Alex, “I will do everything I can to save [Bonnie]” isn’t going to fly with Enzo when he knows you like to use vague language. He was there when you clarified to Nora that “I’ll give you everything I have to heal [Mary Louise]” meant “I’ll give you nothing, because that’s what I have.”
An Eternity of Misery 