Injured Souls:
Summary- During BD Jasper and Alice are going through South America trying to find the half human-half vampire that could make the difference against the Volturi. They unknowingly stumble across a newborn war and discover a young soldier. Jasper saves her from immanent death and she in turn assists them in finding the half vampire they are looking for. The more time they spend with her the more they find out about her, and about themselves. Their lives where tied together from the day she was born. In a dangerous race against time and the Volturi, trust is put to the test and the shifty, shady and often unstable girl Jasper saved begins to come out. This is the story of how Nahuel was found, how Jasper and Alice saved a life to help save the Cullens. This is the story of Arianna Felicity Whitlock.
Chapter 1- Soldier
Alice POV-
"Jasper!" I called, shocked at what I had jut seen. He ran up to me and didn't need me to say anything to know I had seen something,
"What did you see?"
"Me and you," I whispered, "We're going to run into a feud while we're somewhere in South America…"
"What kind of feud?" He asked his eyes narrowing, making the scars around his eyebrows stand out.
"There are newborn armies."
His eyes widened, "Oh god…"
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It's been two days since my vision, and chasing down something I can't see is starting to take its toll. I was frustrated and we had barely gotten anywhere, and the visions of my family getting ripped to shreds weren't helping either. We needed a guide, desperately.
I tripped over a root in my concentration on the future, Jasper caught my arm and cradled me gently, "It'll be okay Alice, it'll be okay."
That's when the crashing and snapping noises reached our ears. I heard something splinter, probably a tree, there was numerous cracking and popping noises followed by a high-pitched noise. It was the kind of cover-your-ears-gives-you-goose-bumps noise.
He pointed to a place where small shoots of light burst through the trees, a small clearing. It was full of vampires.
"Run you pathetic excuse for a soldier, run!" Someone yelled angrily. There was an especially loud crack and multiple curses. I peered through some leaves and watched the scene as it unfolded.
There were four vampires in the clearing; the way they stood it was three against one. One, young in human age, girl stood, her back almost against a tree. She had pin straight dirty blond/light brown hair, and her eyes sparked a dull crimson, anger shown from them like a flame. The other three, two black boys, one had dark brown hair the other had brown, and a blonde girl. The girl had the flaming red eyes of a newborn, the others could have been anywhere between two and sixty years old.
Their most dominant features, they all shared. It was the scars riddling their body and deforming their appearance. My heart broke a little when I looked at the girl, she couldn't be older than fourteen, a small child, around my height, and she was a soldier in this war. Moreover, she was going to die. I hadn't seen it, but she was breathing hard, she was covered in dirt and she looked injured. With three other soldiers, two with skill rivaling her and the brute strength of a newborn, there was no hope for her.
The brown haired male took a step forward and the girl's head snapped up. I had never seen… such fire in someone's eyes. The boy lunged, just as the newborn girl maneuvered around from the side, flanking her. She reacted quickly, sidestepping the boy and going after the girl, moving swiftly, attacking from behind and the sides. Jasper's eyebrows raised, he was impressed.
Suddenly, they other male lunged from behind, the two of them tumbled to the ground, feral snarls ripped from her throat as she flailed and struggled. Her foot jabbed into his stomach and he crashed backwards. The other and her began side stepping, trying to get angles on each other to attack.
"Dance boy, dance," She spat, snarling under her breath. The other two lined up in a triangle, she watched them in her peripheral vision, furious growls emanating from her. When one got to close, she whirled, her fist connecting with his jaw. Something cracked and he went sprawling, the others closed in.
"You never know when to just give up Ari!" The dark haired one spat,
"That's because there is never a circumstance where giving up is an option." 'Ari' snarled. The dark haired mail snarled in frustration and the three vampires closed in. They jumped; Ari and the three vampires tumbled into a tree, where they promptly pinned her down. There was a flash of white and one of them sunk their teeth into her forearm. This wasn't to kill her, this was to cause pain, I realized as Ari's head tipped back and she repressed a scream.
Jasper burst from our hiding spot tackling the vampire. I didn't think, I just reacted, going after the others, I was protecting my Jasper. The girl looked at me quizzically once, but then her instincts won and she struggled to her feet. Jasper snarled, willing them to try to get past him. They starred for a second and then slowly retreated, disappearing into the woods.
I wasn't completely sure what happened, but I turned to look at the girl. I tried to fight squish the feeling I got when I looked at her, hundreds, no thousands of scars covering her. Dangerous, stay back! They yelled. It was different with my Jasper, he loved me. She was just a stranger with people out to kill her.
"Are you okay?" Jasper asked her, she nodded stiffly. She stood up stiffly. Ari cradled her arm up against her chest and glared at the freshest scar.
"Who are you?" She asked, looking at his scars. She tensed up once she actually looked at him, her back was rigid and snarl slipped from her teeth. She sounded like an animal, this little kid.
"He's the guy who just saved your life." I said quietly, "For a reason which I do not know."
"I…" Jasper began; his eyes searched Ari's face. Her expression was etched in stone, that fire burned in her eyes. "She's too young to die." He said, "Behind every soldier is a human who never asked for this." Ari sucked in a sharp breath,
"You got out." She said simply, "You ran away."
"That I did. It taught me something, there's more to life than bloodlust and pain, there is happiness and love. Everyone deserves a chance at that." He said, smiling at me.
"I never got your names." She said quietly, her eyes darting every which way like a paranoid animal.
"Oh, Jasper Cullen," He said, "and this is my little Alice Cullen." He ruffled my hair.
"Arianna," She said, shaking my hand, "nice to meet you." I laughed,
"Why did they call you Ari, then?" Jasper asked, his golden eyes were full of questions. It has been a while since he met someone who had been in a war like this.
Ari laughed, "Oh, it's sort of a human pet name. It stuck; I didn't expect people to actually call me Ari."
"Human name? How old are you then?" I asked her, she pursed her lips,
"Fifteen."
"That's not what I meant and you know it." I pressed. She sighed,
"I'm almost four."
"So," Jasper said, "you are young... You're a pretty recent vampire and you would be up with modern times?"
"Of course," she smiled deviously, "I know everything about everyone that lives south of the Mexican border."
"What was the deal with those guys who attacked you then?" I interjected,
"Oh, they're your basic executing team. Once we reach a certain age, someone gets rid of us. I guess I'm there…" She trailed off, the smile fading from her face and despair crept into her eyes.
"Well Ari," Jasper said, "Tell you what, you come with us and help us find someone and we'll protect you and you can have a family." He put an arm on her shoulder. It felt good… for both of us, knowing that we were giving this kid a second shot.
"What makes you think I need a family?" She almost snarled, her eyebrows pulling together,
"Everyone needs someone." Jasper said, squeezing my hand.
"So Ari, what's your last name? Do you remember?"
"Oh, of course! My full name is Arianna Felicity Whitlock." She said, completely unaware that as she said this Jasper's eyes widened and I stiffened. She didn't have blond hair, but it was close. Genetics could have taken care of that… She has some of the same features as him, small nose, long cheekbones…
"Earth to vegetarians!" She said to us, snapping us out of our trance, "We've got to keep moving, we're sitting ducks."
"You think we'll run into more from the armies?" Jasper asked frowning,
"Think?" Ari snorted, "I know we will. No worries though, even if you're to old to handle taking them down, I got this covered. It's pretty much my land to navigate."
"Just don't forget who saved you…" Jasper grumbled, put out with her overconfidence,
"Never." She said, red eyes twinkling, "Soldiers honor." She snapped him a salute. We laughed and began to follow her to where ever it was we where going.
Which was… where exactly?
"Where are we going?" I asked,
"We have to go through a big city. We have these rules, funny thing rules, we're not aloud in the city except at night." She explained, "We'll be taking some sort of car or something so we don't attract more of our kind."
We exchanged stories while waiting for sun down, I didn't really have much to tell, but I listened to one story that Ari remembered as a human,
"When I was a girl, about eight, my mother told me this story. We were at my uncle's old southern manor, and she told me a Civil War story. She said that my great, great, great times a lot uncle had been about my age when he joined the Confederate Army. His name was Jasper Whitlock, and he went missing one day. He vanished, no one ever saw him again. His horse came running into camp with all his gear, and his hat. His hat was stained red with blood. Everyone assumed he had been killed. But, one day a ghost came to the camp, three of them actually. The men swore one of them was Jasper. Only on soldier survived, the others were murdered. No one knew why, was it a traitor amongst the ranks that had angered him? They never found out. Well, my mother stayed in what was Jasper's mother's house, and what she didn't know was that his ghost was there. She could have sworn on her life that the room got colder for an instant, and when she woke up, the door was open and an antique wristwatch was gone." She finished, we were silent.
"You don't believe that do you?" Jasper said quietly,
"Well hell no!" She laughed, "My mom was a lunatic." With that, Ari sighed, "But I do miss her."
"My great, great niece?" Jasper asked himself, so low I could barely hear, and Ari could not. "How's your mother Ari?" He asked,
"I haven't the slightest clue." She said slowly, "I wasn't able to find her after I was changed. The newspapers didn't mention her under obituaries, so she's probably still alive. I could be wrong though."
I watched the sun slip behind the clouds, "Sundown," I watched the waning sun paint the clouds idly and barely noticed the hum of music until a small twang in the notes brought me back. A small southern voice was singing some kind of drawl that fit right in with the feeling I was just having.
"Headin' down south to the land of the pine, I'm thumbin' my way into North Caroline, lookin' up the road an' pray to Gawd I see headlights…" Ari sung to herself, "Well them North Country winters keep on a' gettin' me down an' I lost my money playin' poker so where do I a' go now…" She murmured, with such a perfect southern accent, I blurted out my thoughts before thinking,
"Were you born in the southern United States?" I asked, then gasped, covering my hand, she smiled,
"Sure am Ms. I try not to talk with an accent, but seeing as you all ready know, I don't see no point to it." She flashed me a huge grin, speaking with the smoothest accent I've heard since Jasper.
"Well ma'am, it's nice to meet another southerner like myself." Jasper said, bowing his head slightly. He must have expected her to bow to, but she laughed instead.
"Well you're a real southern gentleman Jasper Cullen, but we weren't born in the same sort of time period and I haven't seen no person bow to anyone recently." Ari chuckled to herself, "I'm more a modern kind of person, no disrespect or nothing but you might find that these more modern soldiers are incredibly rude." She smirked,
"Well, I am old enough to be you're great uncle." Jasper grumbled, "And even I know that song you were humming, it's old."
"Well excuse me, but it's a damn good song." Ari snapped, "Whatever, let's just get through this town before we get jumped and murdered."
I frowned, she didn't sound like she was joking. Jasper squeezed my hand. We followed Ari through the woods and slowly approached the town. It was still in the back of my mind: Ari could be Jasper's great niece.
Ari scanned a parking lot, and her eyes settled on a motorcycle, she clicked her tongue softly. "Well, I'm taking this for a spin, you guys choose something."
"Isn't that stealing?" I asked quietly,
"Yeah." She said, shrugging, "So? Stealing isn't as bad as murdering."
Jasper shrugged to when I looked over at him and looked over a silver motorcycle, I walked over to him, "It reminds me of the one you have back home." I said slowly, Ari looked up,
I twirled around on the spot, a vision… a very bad vision. "Ari!" I shrieked and pointed behind her. She turned just in time to be thrown to the ground. Rolling with the momentum, she tossed one of her attackers to the side. The other was up on it's feet, and glaring at me… oh crap…
Both Jasper and Ari lunged for him at the same time, he didn't have half a chance. The second vampire, however had recovered and went after Ari from behind as Jasper finished off the first one. I coiled to spring at the vampire but Jasper stepped in front of me,
"Too dangerous." He said sharply. I saw Ari pinned under the vampire, both of them baring their teeth and snarling fiercely,
"A little help would be greatly appreciated." Ari said. I glanced over as the vampire lifted her off the ground by the collar of her jacket. "What do you want now?" She snarled,
"How could you." He said simply, "After all I've done for you and you just left!" He sneered, "For what? Honestly, to what point? To join…" He looked over at us disdainfully, "Two lone vampires with no purpose, one obviously a runaway and one a short little pixie girl."
I glared at the black haired boy sneering at me. Pixie, sure, short… don't even start. I tossed a growl his direction and my hands clenched a little at my sides. Jasper stepped in front of me, facing the vampire.
"I'm guessing we're dealing with your creator here, Ari." Jasper said slowly, not once taking his calculating eyes off the vampire.
"Yeah, this would be that jerk." She grumbled glaring at him.
"You never were one for polite introductions." The boy said, he looked about our age, seventeen, give or take a year.
"Oh well ex-keh-use me!" Ari snapped, drawing out the word into three syllables, emphasizing her accent. "Jasper, Alice, this is Connor jackass Malloy. Jackass, meet Alice and Jasper."
"Ungrateful little…" Connor didn't finish his sentence because Ari took a snap at him. He dropped her and they both leapt at the same time, I could see their teeth glinting in the dim light. Ari dodged to the side at the last second but Connor's teeth still cut clean through the edge of her jacket, leaving a neat tear. There was a loud crack and Ari was thrown backwards. She flew into a brick building behind her, leaving a person-sized dent in it.
Jasper stepped between Connor and a large pile of bricks where we both assumed Ari was. "Step aside, this doesn't concern you." Jasper glared and coiled to launch at him,
"It does now." He growled and jumped. I ran over to him, but it was already done. A small object whirled through the air and Jasper caught it, a match. He struck it and there was soon a blazing fire. I looked over at Ari who was sitting on a pile of rubble from the building, her back slightly hunched and one shoulder crooked.
"Bastard crushed my lighter, and that was my last match…" She grumbled angrily, "I need to start buying bigger match packets." I shuddered to think about what this implied, the large number of matches could only be used for one thing. She rose and stood, leaning heavily against the wall.
"Are you okay?" Jasper asked her flatly. Ari's fingers clenched and I heard her knuckles crack,
"You and I both know there's only one answer to that." She said slowly, watching the flames so that their reflection danced in her red irises.
"Ari, that doesn't matter, are you okay?" I demanded, a lump rising in my throat. What if she had been injured… what if we couldn't find the half vampire that we needed to save Nessie?
She grunted, and rolled her shoulders back, "I've had worse." I saw Jasper press his lips together in a tight line,
"That's not an answer, Ari." He said,
"We have to keep moving," Ari said flatly, "The sound will attract them any second now. We have to run, on foot."
"And if we run into someone?" Jasper pressed,
"No soldier likes killing. But they are soldiers, and they do as they must for their leader and to protect their own life." She said,
"Jackson!" Jasper laughed, "The so called 'stonewall' Jackson, he was a coward you know."
"Yeah, well he sounded smart." Ari countered, and took two steps forward leaning against the wall for support.
"You can't walk." I stated simply then frowned seeing what she was gonna do.
"Oh, watch me now." She snapped and took off at a full tilt sprint down the streets.
We snuck through the city, pausing to check every street before sprinting down it. We reached the woods in almost no time, but it seemed like an eternity. We finally got deep into the woods and I grabbed Ari's shoulder, hauling her backwards.
"You will let me make sure you're okay." I growled at her. She snarled, deep and angry,
"You will not tell me what to do." She growled,
"Then you will listen to me." Jasper said coolly. She stiffened and glared a bit before relenting,
"Fine, but I'm telling you that I'm-" I didn't let her finish, but raised her jacket away from her side where it was sliced. Her skin was sliced under the jacket as well. From what I could see, there was a long a deep gash running up her side.
"Fine?" I asked her. She turned to glare at me.
"I am fine, it's just a scratch." She said and pulled her jacket down to cover her side. I grabbed her arm,
"Let me just see, you could be injured!" I pressed, this girl was insane. We needed her in one piece to help us find another half-vampire! She didn't know that yet, but if there were any of them, she would know where to find them.
"Well, don't you have some super important thing you have to do ASAP?" Ari said, raising her eyebrows in suspicion and highlighting the scar that was just above her eyebrow and hooked around to touch her lower eyelid.
"We do. And we need you to help us, so we are interested in whether or not you are injured for that reason." Jasper said. Ari narrowed her eyes,
"And what exactly is it that I'm helping you with?"
"We need to find a half-vampire, soon, or else something very bad will happen to our family." I said, looking her straight in the eyes,
"Care to elaborate." Ari sniffed, "I barely know anything about you, and I don't know who your family is, so why should I help?"
"Because Jasper saved your life and we can help you, as well. We can get you out of here." I said. The words, 'we can get you out off here' seemed to work like a charm. Ari's eyes lit up and she cracked a smile,
"Anything to get out of here." She said, and I saw her saying it before she did,
"Sure… but you will let me see that slice down your back." I said, and seeing her answer, "It counts as part of anything!" I snapped,
Ari sighed heavily and shrugged off her black jacket. It matched her almost black jeans, black shoes, and the black tank top she wore under it. "You… uh, like black?" I asked her. All black… fashion uh-uh big time.
"We're raised to be shadows in the night, I call it ninja, sue me. It's called stealth." She said sighing, I rolled my eyes. Stealth or not, all black was so not cool.
"Okay, so this looks… bad." Jasper said slowly, poking a Ari's sliced side.
"And it feels so good to have you poking and prodding at it." She snapped sarcastically as she rolled her weight uncomfortably onto her right foot.
"So," I said changing the subject, "that guy Connor was your creator?" I asked her. I saw Jasper narrow his eyes and wait for Ari's response, "What… exactly happened to you?" She ducked her head and laughed bitterly,
"Well… it's a weird story…" She said and sniffed as Jasper brushed up against the gash again, "My brother, Everett, had just gotten back from his service in Iraq, he was twenty-two and a marine." She sighed, "It was two in the morning, raining heavily and we had been driving for at least five hours, my dad was driving and at home my mom was making my brother's favorites to welcome him home after three years, pies and stuff."
"You sure you're okay?" I said biting my lip,
"Do want to hear the story or not?" Ari snapped,
"Just keep going, ignore me." Jasper said as he inspected her side. "Nice slice though, pretty big."
"Gee thanks…" She grumbled, "Well I remember just… sitting in the back seat right next to Everett and singing along to 'Peace Train' as loud as we could because that was how we felt about the war. My oldest sister who was twenty-six was also a marine, and still stationed in Iraq, I had already lost two cousins two the war. But the Whitlock's were a military family and most of us have served, so, we just took this happy moment and cherished it. Everett would be deployed again in four months."
Jasper snorted at the military family comment. "Something funny?" Ari asked,
"Oh… nothing."
"Well… as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted," She said, a playful smile on her lips, "We were almost home, driving through the valley to get to the old Whitlock plantation." Her smile vanished, "And then we came around a corner and, bang. Head on collision, we didn't have a prayer of avoiding it, I never even saw it. Can't remember anything about the car that hit us for me life."
"And that's when Connor showed up." Jasper said through gritted teeth
"Mm-hmm. He came to the scent of blood, and I was dragging my brother out of the car, Everett was unconscious or dead, I didn't know. But, I kicked the window out and just started pulling him, my father and my little sister Emily out. I wasn't even thinking, I was just acting… and it was pouring rain." She looked up at the skies as if she expected rain though I knew none would come, "Then I saw him."
Jasper hissed quietly and Ari pretended not to notice, she frowned, "He said something like, 'something's different, shouldn't be able to move, adrenaline rush' random clips like that were all I got. My head was whirling, the last thing I remember was sirens…, and then feeling like someone was carrying me. Then it was just burning." She said, and smacked Jasper's hand away from her,
"Okay, that's enough, I think we've established that I have a giant hole in my side, no need to poke at it." She snapped.
"I'm just trying to pinch the skin back together so it will heal, I've dealt with this kind of injury before, where a vampire's teeth tear and drag instead of just biting." He said calmly sending rolling waves of calm around us.
"Whoa… are you doing that?" She asked,
"Yeah, and Alice sees the future, now what happened to your family." He said simply as if it where nothing. Ari stared at me for a second and then slowly recovered.
"Well… Everett lived and was deployed back to Iraq, he was… killed in action three moths later. Emily… is paralyzed and my father was thrown out the windshield…… He never had a chance." Ari said softly, "The paramedics figured I was thrown from the car and they never found my body…"
"I'm so sorry." I said quietly, wrapping my arms around her in a hug. She stiffened and hissed a little,
"Uh… Alice?" She said, her voice strained,
"Personal space bubble because your instincts are telling you to drop kick me to Canada, yeah, yeah, I know." I said simply and let go.
"Yeah…" She said,
"So, Ari care to explain why you never once attacked offensively against the three vampires before or against Connor. It was all defensive and countering, why no… no offense?" Jasper said, his eyes slightly narrowed. I hadn't noticed this at all, but now that he mentioned it, I was curious to.
"I…" Ari said looking down, "I just have trouble fighting the people who have had my back for the last four years… the only people I've seen for those years who haven't either tried to kill me or I've looked at as… something to try not to kill in public. I just… just can't kill my troops. I trained with them, helped them… they always had my back…" She sniffed,
"I had trouble with that two for the first couple of years an-" Jasper began, Ari whirled to face him
"STOP RELATING MY LIFE TO YOURS!" She screamed at him. "IT. IS. NOT. THE. SAME!" Ari took off sprinting through the thick forest. Jasper stood up, slightly shocked and was about to go after her,
"Don't." I said firmly, "She's just… blowing off some steam. I know where to find her." I said and took his hand in mine.
My visions assaulted my mind. Ari, sitting in the tiny cabin she called a house; curled up in a corner bawling her dry eyes out with her tiny hand wrapped around something. A hazy grew handshake, Ari and some… thing that I just couldn't see. The Volturi, moving ever closer.
A/N- Soooo… if you read this because you read my note in 'Black Feathers' YOU FREAKING ROCK!! And if you're just reading this because, well, you rock anyways. What do you think? Like it? Love it? Want to throw it in a garbage can and torch it? Plot will pick up in the next couple chapters, they'll get back to Forks with Nahuel… don't worry. Thanks for reading. REVIEWS MAKE STORIES BETTER!
~Akari Bahkad~