A/N: Here you go, thanks to all those people who reviewed.
Chapter Seven- Lines Of Attack
Bella POV
I leaned back into the chair in Carlisle's study, watching Renesmee and my mom play on the swings out of the corner of my eye. They were smitten with each other, something I would have never hoped for. I was also proud of both her and Phil for how well they were taking things- Phil and Emmett were watching sports for male bonding time. Most people who knew the secret would run screaming from Emmett, not watch sports with him.
The fact that both of them were occupied gave the rest of us a chance to talk about what we were going to do about the whole 'aliens are attacking the earth and we're all going to die if we don't do something' problem. Albeit, it's still better than the 'the Volturi are coming to kill us all and we're all going to die if we don't do something' problem. The Volturi are scarier than the aliens. And that really says something about our not-so-fearless leaders.
Jake frowned, "What if you just quietly go and disable their ships? Just find the engine room and smash through it. Bella can put her shield up and protect you, and you sneak onto the ship and free the humans."
"Three problems with that one Jake- it's a good idea, but unless we can solve the problems it won't work." I responded, "Problem one- the governments are monitoring the ships with everything they've got. If we try to get onto the ships we will get caught, and then the Volturi will wipe us off the face of the earth. I don't know about you, but I'm more afraid of the Volturi than the aliens. Problem two- we don't know what kind of technology that they're using. For all we know they're ships could be totally indestructible. Add onto that that the humans would need guides to get off of those ships without killing themselves. There's no way to get the humans off of those ships without going into the public eye. Third problem- I think that we should test the whole shield thing before we can rely on it. My shield stops only mental gifts, and that electricity thing that the aliens do is not a mental trick. It's very clearly physical. The whole thing must have been a fluke."
Carlisle shook his head, "I don't think that's quite it Bella. What makes you think it's physical?"
"Two things," I said with a shrug, "How does a mental gift stop a human' heart. And how does it collect electricity. It's like a giant taser gun, Carlisle, not like a gift."
"Ah, but you're wrong on both counts." Carlisle said, "There are mental gifts that can do both of those things."
"But they've never been tested on my shield."
"Actually..." he said, "Do you remember Jane and Alec?"
I shuddered, "Of course I do. How could I possibly forget those two?"
"Both of their gifts can do what you just described. Jane's gift, if she ramps it up a bit, can stop a human's heart dead. Very similar to the way a defibrillator would, or the way an alien from outer space would. Alec's gift collects moisture- tiny droplets of water cling to it for some reason. It's why his gift looks a bit like fog. I'm betting that it isn't the electricity killing the humans, although that alone would do it, but the gift that the electricity clings to."
I fell silent, thinking. "Alright, Carlisle," I said finally, "you win for best puzzle solving again. But can you figure out how to sneak past government security and kill a bunch of aliens before destroying their spaceship?" I challenged. Our family has a bit of a competitive issue- what can I say? It's really fun.
He rolled his eyes, "Jasper and I will hack into government systems to figure out where exactly they've got their cameras. Jacob and Alice, I want you to get Charlie and all the other people staying in the hotel out of harm's way. Use whatever money you need. Rosalie and Emmett, I want you to try to figure out how the engines work. Bella, Edward- try to figure out what happens to the humans once they're in the spaceship. Esme, keep Renesmee and Bella's parents out of the way. I don't want them getting hurt."
He smiled at me, "Was that about what you were looking for Bella?"
I grinned, "Perfect!"
Carlisle looked around the room, "Remember- no letting Renee and Phil in on it unless they ask. I do not want them getting worried. Or worse- trying to ask us why we can't even risk stepping out of line slightly, we might accidently end up having to tell them about the Volturi incident. And they don't really need to know that it's a matter of time until we get handed a death sentence. Plus giving them false hope is a cruel thing to do."
"Let's go then." said Jacob, "besides- who cares about what the Italian leeches are doing. I bet they're so busy protecting their precious city that they're not paying attention to the outside world."
We all shared a look, "What?" asked Jacob, "You all just simultaneously thought of something, didn't you?"
"It's not a good thing, Jake." said Jasper. "The Volturi know the nature of our family, they know that we value human life. Aro is intelligent enough to guess that we're doing something about it. He knows that if he catches us interfering with the aliens, then he'll have the excuse he needs to destroy us. I think we can all guarantee that they'll be watching."
All of a sudden the forest around the house seemed full of red eyes, just waiting for the chance to pounce. I looked around, "Anyone else feeling suddenly paranoid?" I asked my family.
"Hell yeah." Jake agreed, looking down at Nessie protectively. She was still playing with Renee. "If they're watching then they'll have all the reason they need to go execute us. Renee and Phil both know now."
"Cross your fingers and hope that they're bust waging war against the aliens in Italy." said Alice grimly, "I can't see a damn thing, so if they decide to attack then I'll never know."
"My paranoia just jumped ten notches." I whispered. "Let's deal with this guys. We need to get rid of those ships so Alice can see again."
Carlisle and Jasper looked at each other, "We'll get started then." Jasper said, standing up. "We'll tell you what we find."
"You'd better." Jake said with a grin, "if you leeches start withholding info I might rip my own fur out. We have enough problems as it is."
Rosalie laughed viciously, "Let's withhold some info. I want to see that."
Jake didn't deem that worthy of a reply, he just grabbed Alice and the two of them went to call Charlie and Billy.
Rosalie's smirk grew, "I win." Walking into the room and grabbing Emmett she said, "Let's go Em- we've got some engines to play with."
"Make sure that engines are all you play with, sister dearest. As important as it for you and Emmett to have a good time, none of us really needs to hear you doing that right now."
"No worries Edward- that was idle fantasy. You do have some of those every once and awhile. Right?"
"No need to have a fantasy, Rose. I get the real thing all the time." He replied, grinning.
Esme shuddered, "And as important as it is for all of you to have active sex lives, I'd rather not hear about it at all, so please don't talk about it."
"Sorry mom." We all said, perfectly synchronized. We all stood up and left the room, ready to go try to figure out what to do to stop humans from going extinct. That would just make the Volturi- and every vampire on the planet- even more irritable, so they'd probably end up killing us for not doing anything.
All I can say is: hypocrites.
Edward and I went up to our room to do some research, "I guess the first place to look is to see if anyone's escaped, then if the government discovered anything. Maybe they've got a spy inside there or something."
"I hope they aren't planning on seeing that spy ever again." Edward laughed.
I chuckled, "I'll take possible escapes, and you take government?"
"Deal."
I flipped on one of the many laptops that the house had while Edward grabbed the other one. Sitting side by side on the bed we looked for possible ways to kill aliens. Yep, two vampires looking for ways to kill aliens. Welcome to my life.
I got something almost immediately, it was a very big story. I'm not quite sure how we managed to miss it. I turned to BBC news first. They're normally a pretty reliable source. Better than 'aliens 'r' '. The fact that people are going to a site like that shows the stupidity of the human race.
Sixteen Year-old Teenager Escapes from Alien Spacecraft
Anna-Marie Johnson from Jacksonville, Florida was the only person to escape from the spaceship. It all started for her early yesterday morning, when everyone in her city was given the warning to take cover. 'There wasn't enough time to do anything but hide.' Johnson stated, 'all we could do was go to the basement and hope for the best. We could hear explosions and people screaming outside, it was like a warzone.'
The spacecraft hit Jacksonville at approximately eleven in the morning. First it stopped just outside the city. Platoons of aliens got off and began rounding up the humans, taking them outside of the city perimeter to an open field. There were thousands of them. They thoroughly searched every building, finding every human in the city. After finding every living creature in the city they destroyed it. It wasn't only humans that they captured, but they took the animals through different doors. The ship has now flattened all of Florida- that means it has over nineteen million people in it. It is still capturing humans and placing them on board. Any humans who resist are temporarily paralyzed then dragged on board.
Johnson was captured in one of the last groups. She said that the aliens were very, very organized. Despite having shoved over a million people onto their ship in the past half-hour they still managed to keep tabs on almost everyone. 'they could tell we were afraid of them, they only anticipated people going backwards- away from wherever they were herding us- I took the opportunity and went forwards before they had a chance to tag me, joining those already tagged. The aliens reacted whenever a tagged person did something, but they never reacted when I did anything. I separated from the group, sneaking away from them and slipping down an abandoned passageway.
'I saw a picture of what looked like a map, so I took a picture of it with my cell phone. I used it to get out.' Johnson said, for a look at the encrypted map click here. The information that Johnson supplied has been added to the database. For a look at the database, click here. Johnson's story is a heroic tale that helps to give us hope in these terrible times.
"Bingo." I muttered, "Edward, look at this. It's everything we need."
He leaned over and scanned the page. "Good find. Have you looked at the map yet?" I shook my head, running my cursor over the page I clicked on the link, bringing up a map that looked like total gibberish to me.
"Well, they're certainly right about it being encrypted." I said, wincing. "It's useless if we can't understand what it is."
"We'll let everyone have a look at it. It won't hurt, and since everyone has perfect memory it's not like we'll have to carry it with us." He said calmly. "Would you mind having a look at that database that they mentioned?"
I went and flipped back to the database, "There's nothing new that we don't already know here." I said.
"Print off the article and the map and we'll just keep looking." I pressed print and sent it to the printer in Carlisle's office.
"Be right back," I promised Edward, pushing my laptop to the side and standing up and leaving the room. I snuck down to Carlisle's office, making sure that Renee and Phil didn't hear me. I was kind of busy right now, and I think Phil is angry at me for putting Renee through all that trouble. I grabbed the papers, and a file to put them in, and slipped back upstairs before they even notice I had left Edward's room. Walking back into the room I said, "I have the secret documents!"
He laughed, "I think I may have found one more. Read this one."
Man Takes Photos of Inside Spaceship from Inside a Plane
Ralph Leary, a sixty year old man, was doing his morning flight in his plane when he saw a large looming black shape in the distance. He flew up closer; there was a large see-through section of the roof, revealing several rooms where aliens were doing everything from eating, to performing tests on humans. There is even a photo of a room filled with glowing blue pods of some kind, just like the ones you'd find in your classic video game or horror movie. Here are some of the photos, be warned however- they are not very nice to look at.
After that I would have to say they described it perfectly when they said it was like something out of a horror movie. There were people and animals strapped to tables and being cut open, there was a room where aliens were eating something that looked similar to the toxic substance that Esme had us paint the fence with earlier. Plus there were a few holding rooms and one room that had aliens shooting blue energy at what appeared to be targets.
I guess we're not the only species who practice shooting inanimate objects.
"Good find," I choked out, "It gives us a lot of information, but all I can say is eeeewww. We should get those to Carlisle, he might be able to match them to some medical procedures that are being performed here on earth. We could also see if we can identify what they're eating- it looks kind of like spam..."
"We will, but I doubt it's going to match anything done for medical science." Edward said.
"What do you mean?" I asked curiously.
"I've been through med school twice. All I can say is that you can't perform tests like that on somebody unless they are very, very dead."
I winced, "lovely..."
He pressed print and I went to go grab the article from downstairs again. I feel very strange having to sneak around in my old house. It's like April Fool's Day all over again. Minus the fun, competitive feeling of course- now I just felt slightly repulsed by those photos.
Carlisle and Jasper were sitting in his office. Jasper looked up, "Find anything yet, Bella? I'm going to say you've found something not to nice. The feelings of disgust and revulsion rolling off of you and Edward a few minutes ago were enough to make me want to throw up."
"Sorry," I said apologetically, "We found some photos a few minutes ago. They're not pretty 'my little pony glitter stamps' pictures. I'll show them to you later."
Jasper inclined his head, "You're having more luck than us. The security on their system is major tight. We're getting in, but it's taking ages."
I shrugged, "If anyone can get in, it's you two."
"Thanks Bells." I chuckled and walked out of the room, immediately slipping into 'don't let my parents catch me' mode. It reminded me of when I was little and I snuck downstairs in the middle of the night to grab snacks- chocolate chip cookies and milk normally.
I reached my room safely- there were no awkward questions asked. Edward chuckled when he saw the look on my face as I shot through the door. "I think I'll take the next run down to the printer. Does having an awkward conversation with your parents really scare you that much?"
I nodded, it really did. "Find anything else?" I said, changing the subject. Having aliens taking over the earth is real useful when you need to avoid awkward conversations with other people.
He shook his head, "nothing yet. Let's keep looking though. Did you get a chance to talk to anyone else?"
"Carlisle and Jasper are having some difficulties breaking into the government databases. Apparently they're all pretty heavily guarded. They're getting there, but it's going to take some time."
I stuck the photos into the folder and sat down beside Edward again. After about a half an hour I hissed, frustrated and said "This is pointless. We've found everything there is."
Edward sighed and rubbed his forehead, agreeing. "Fine, let's go talk to the rest of them. Esme just took Phil and Renee shopping for food, and Jacob is outside with Renesmee. I believe they'll be busy for a while longer, so it's safe to walk openly down the stairs. Everybody else has pretty much decided to go head over to Carlisle's office too."
"Let's go then." I said, "Maybe we'll be able to take out the aliens today. And all the ships are the same, so if we find out how to destroy one ship..."
"We'll know how to get rid of them all." finished Edward as we headed down the stairs. "And I don't think that anyone will miss them."
"Maybe those people who think that aliens are friends, not bags of blue gloop that need to be popped."
"I hope that lot kill themselves off first. I just spent ages sifting through all the false information on their website for a grain of truth. I am not happy with them right now."
"Agreed, let's go see what the rest of our family have found."
