Sure enough, the questions started as soon as Caralla had reentered the living room. It seemed almost everyone had one, and the cacophony of all of them speaking at once had her slumping in her chair and holding up her hand for silence, a wry smile on her face.

"Do I have to institute a 'take a number' system, or can everyone calm down enough to find some order?" she chuckled, seeing the abashed looks on the group when they realized that they'd all been talking at the same time. Angela snorted from her place on the couch, and Jess just looked over at her. Caralla saw the brunette mouth 'later' to her friend, who seemed content with that answer.

"You mentioned that the...Hellbound?" She nodded at Jake's questioning tone and the boy continued. "That these Hellbound created all sorts of supernatural creatures in their...well, in their quest to make a pure child. Does that mean that all of the non-human-type creatures in the world are failed experiments?" She could see the worry in his eyes.

"Not exactly. I suppose from one angle, yes, you could say that. They set out to create one thing and created something completely different. So in that case, yes, these new beings were failures in that they weren't what their makers had wanted to begin with. However over time most of these groups have found ways of living and interacting with the world and the people and other creatures within. They have made this world their own, and there are few that wouldn't fight for it in their own way, so I would see that as being an unintentional success on the part of the experimenters rather than an unmitigated failure. Whether or not said experimenters would feel that way...that I've no idea." She could see that her answer was both more and less than the teen had wanted to hear, and she smiled gently at him. "Jake, don't take it to heart. If you nurtured a sapling you thought was an apple tree and it turned out to be peach instead, would that make its fruit any less delicious? Or would it be just an unexpected treat?" Somewhat mollified, he settled back into the couch cushions again. Caralla noticed the perceptive brunette girl eyeing him with a very calculating look, only to see her eyes widen when her internal instincts kicked in. She looked up at Caralla with a question in her eyes and the elder just nodded slightly. Yes, sometime in the next few days I have to have a long chat with Miss Angela, she thought inwardly.

"You called them 'creators' and 'experimenters'," Jasper said, his soft drawl making his words sound even more thoughtful. "But how did they manage to make these new creatures, anyway? Is it like selective crossbreeding or something?" Of course he would be the one to ask for the details of origin, she thought fondly.

"Do you want all the details or just the basics?"

"Let's start with the basics," he grinned.

"The basics...hmm. How to explain? I suppose it would be most accurate to say that, having decided to try and create a pure soul, they tried first to combine the essences of souls that had already lived out a mortal life. In their endeavors they asked for volunteers from those in – well, the masters of Purgatory, as Carlisle would say -" She winked at the elder Cullen and he just shook his head with a chuckle. "Once they'd secured a number of those souls that were willing to help them in their trials, they returned to the mortal planes and requested the assistance of the banished souls...those who had lived lives of cruelty and malice, the ones that had been chained to the world they could no longer interact with, destined to wander the earth forever as punishment for their horrific actions while alive.

"I don't have the foggiest idea of how these Hellbound got the idea to try and merge a good soul with an evil one, but they somehow managed to make it work...just not in the way they wanted. Instead of good and evil canceling themselves out and leaving a blank slate as they had hoped, the souls ended up bound in eternal hatred and pain. Once joined, it quickly became obvious that there was no way to separate them. It was...a hideous result. There was no hope for these new abominations. They tried again and again, different techniques, different combinations – all had the same result. Before long they had an entire realm of souls so tormented and anguished that they had to give up on that entire line of endeavors. It was then that they realized something even worse...they could not exterminate these creatures they'd made. It seemed that only the Creator had the power to eradicate a soul. Not only had the immortals managed to invent an entirely new line of beings, but they couldn't even put the tortured ones out of their misery. It was a harsh blow for the Hellbound. Eventually they ended up setting aside an area of their own realm to house these creatures, using them for menial tasks and mostly trying to forget that they'd been the ones to cause such pain. The Joined Ones, as they became known, were regretfully classed as an acceptable casualty and it was back to the drawing board."

"That's terrible!" Jess said, indignant. "To just write off a whole bunch of things they made because it wasn't convenient to deal with them? That's so wrong. Maybe there's a reason these monsters are called 'Hellbound'." Caralla just looked at her sadly.

"You say that because you are on the outside looking at. It's far more difficult to make a decision on something so drastic when you're on the inside, not knowing what to do or how to fix what you've broken. It was...the first in a long line of mistakes." Jess didn't seem convinced, but Caralla knew she wouldn't be, so she continued anyway.

"Their next thought was to try to combine an evil soul with a good person on the verge of death – someone who was already destined for the immortal realms. That, also, was a failure. Human beings by their very nature are not designed to be able to harbor more than one immortal soul per body. Introducing a second soul...well, the results were not pretty. In most cases the physical body would perish from the strain and the then-conjoined souls would be set free, though always bound. One half of the soul would continually strive for the immortal realm, but it would be hindered by the evil soul that would forever be tethered to earthly non-existence. The result was something more ghost than soul, and it would come as no surprise that it would be a vengeful creature.

"After that fiasco, they changed their plans a bit. Since blood was the life force of the living body, to them it made sense to see if they could find a way to introduce an evil soul into the blood of a good human."

"Why were they always trying to put evil in with good? Couldn't they have done it the other way?" Emmett seemed a bit confused, as did some of the others, so she took a brief moment to explain.

"Keep in mind, the first batch of good souls that had volunteered for the first trials had been horrendously destroyed and doomed to eternal suffering. Do you really think any more would have volunteered after seeing what had happened to their brethren? On the other hand, evil souls were plentiful in the mortal realm, and as they were doomed anyway, it was much easier to convince them to be part of the experiments."

"Gotcha," the burly vampire said with a nod and a wave for her to continue. Caralla took up the thread of her story once more.

"So...evil spirit into the blood of a good human. It didn't go so well either. For the most part it seemed that there was no effect whatsoever...until the human died, of course. Then the soul that had been laying dormant within the blood took over the body, expending its energy to essentially reanimate the corpse. Unfortunately, this energy needed to be replenished if the soul didn't want to lose its mortal form...which, of course, the evil souls would not want to give up even the semblance of mortality after having been isolated from life for so long. Some of these reanimated souls learned that they could replenish their own energy by eating other living beings. In time they came to know that it was the blood of the living creatures that they needed." She could see by their eyes that everyone knew exactly where this part of her tale was headed, and the expressions ranged from horror to shock to disbelief. She nearly chuckled.

"And thus were created blood sucking demons – vampires, as they would come to be known. These first blood drinkers were powerful, ruthless, and completely unconcerned with anything that didn't directly affect them. Eventually these vampire-creatures learned that they could, with some effort, separate bits of their essence and send it into other living creatures via the bloodstream as well. Without fail, if the unknowing host survived the transfer, it would be reborn as a new vampire. Few survived it, but there were enough that the population began to ever-so-slowly grow and spread."

"My God," Esme whispered from her spot in Carlisle's arms. She looked paler than usual. In fact, they all did. Even Carlisle looked distinctly unnerved, and Caralla shrugged apologetically. She knew this would not be an easy thing for any of them to hear. A glance at Bella showed her that even the human was shaken up a bit, but she could still see the determination in the girl's brown eyes and felt comforted that she hadn't deterred the young one from the path she had chosen.

"Now, having seen that the blood idea wasn't working, the researchers turned to other ideas. Plan after plan was tried out – nothing ever worked. Trying to combine the soul of a new human child with the essence of an animal, for example...the purity of the infant's soul being seen as having the best chance to fuse with the naturally balanced spirit of the animal – well, thus were unintentionally born the creatures we know as shapeshifters now." Jake looked like someone had punched him in the gut.

"These trials went on for ages, and more and more non-human creatures came into being. Meanwhile, the immortal realms were far from peaceful." She paused, gathering her thoughts again. "In the Celestial realm, they were horrified at the attempts of their Hellbound brethren to subvert the curse. As such they granted their protection to the good creatures that were being made. Regardless of origin or design, the portals of Heaven, as it were, were open and welcoming to any creature on earth that chose to live up to the original standards of peace, love, and harmony that were gifted to humanity. If a supernatural creature wished to live their life for good, then on their death they would be greeted in Heaven with open hearts – no being would have its origin held against it.

"Meanwhile, in the Hellbound's realm, the Joined Ones decided they would have their vengeance. They shed the label of Joined Ones, seeing that name as yet another indignity heaped on them by their careless creators. They chose to think of themselves collectively as the Dark Ones. Under the less-than-observant noses of the very ones who created them, the Dark Ones opened their arms to all of those creatures that chose to walk the path of evil. Those filled with rage, with hatred and with fear were welcome to join the Dark Ones and revel in their negativity. Since not even the Dark Ones had the power to harm their creators, instead they focused all of their anger on the mortal realm, knowing that in doing so they would be upsetting not only their makers but those of the other realms as well. These self-styled demon lords of Hell began a reign of tyranny and pain that exists even now.

"The original Hellbound were horrified. They had only wanted to help, to save this little rock of mortal beings. How did everything go so very wrong?"

"The road to Hell is paved with good intentions," murmured Edward, and Caralla nodded her agreement.

"Exactly. Regardless of the hopes and dreams of the Hellbound, in their haste and desire to make the world a better and safer place they essentially created its destruction. Through their meddling they constructed the one thing they never wanted to – an entire race of beings that was pure evil."

"That's awful," Angela said quietly, and Caralla knew the girl was understanding more than her companions.

"Yes, it is. The Hellbound finally had to give up on their endeavors and most of them either fled to the mortal world to attempt to escape the horror they'd inadvertently unleashed, or begged sanctuary with their brethren in other realms. With their defection, there was nothing to stop the Dark Ones from assuming total control of the third realm. It truly became Hell, in more ways than one, and the Dark Ones took over the name of Hellbound as a mark of defiance and of pride. They had been bound to the realm by their makers – but they would rule it as they saw fit. They began to amass their armies, the creatures that willingly fled to their dark arms, and send them forth to wreak havoc and chaos around the world. They were also powerful enough at this time to subjugate the more peaceful supernatural creatures, often using or enslaving them for their own purposes. They were not concerned with the mortal world at all – they were completely focused on their own desires. Soon enough they realized that the mortals were simply in their way, and that they would have much more reign over all they surveyed if the humans were simply eradicated. And so they began to actively thwart any and all attempts to halt or subvert Div's vengeance."

"So they're working against saving the world?" Rosalie asked, and Caralla nodded.

"And that's why we're all here. For some reason or another – something not even I can understand yet – we have all been called to stand against these forces. All of us in this room are being given the chance to try and save everything we know. I would also lay money that the new people in town are a part of this as well." She saw how both Jess and Jake stared at her, their eyes wide, and she took note of that reaction. Things were making a bit more sense to her now as the pieces filled in.

"You mean, Luc and Lili?" the blond girl asked softly. Caralla nodded.

"I need to meet them to be certain, but I am as sure as I can be without having actually seen them. They are part of this as well." She sighed unnecessarily, suddenly feeling very weary. "I just wish I knew which part."