a/n: Hello out there. Welcome to Tapioca Tuesday, Chapter 21st edition.

Before we start, I wanted to let those reading GN know that it is on hold until Canon is over. I'm barely making it right now with the one fic. So when this is over Aubree will talk to us again.

And I also want to rec a new fic. I've been given the honor of betaing for the lovely and brilliant bririzzle, who started a hilarious fic titled "State of Delusion." Please go check it out. I'm putting a link in my profile.

Lastly, playlist[dot]com doesn't like the song for this chapter. It is 14 Arms by The Crash Kings. I have a link in the profile if you are looking for it.

Thanks now… to AZBella first, because without her, I would sound pretty idiotic. Thanks, 'hon.

Thanks to the wonderful women of Project Team Beta who are helping me sort out my second draft. : )

To the t20s gals. You know I love you, right?

Thanks to my friends at the Canon/Grace Note FB Fan group. You guys are too much fun.

I guess I should stop blabbing now. I can do more of that at the end.

Today I am Team Vast Secrets Club.

BEWARE OF CLIFF AHEAD! IT'S STEEP!

Please enjoy.

Chapter 21

This had better be worth it.

I was staring at a two-seat clean-runner. It was a flashy shade of red. All electric, but near full size, and, looking at the shine on the paint and the numerous buttons on the dashboard, I figured it was probably very, very expensive.

Because if we get there, and we're pointless bystanders, or worse still, if we're too late to do anything…

I sighed.

"Can you drive it?" Aubree asked, her hand on the hood.

It was locked, but because it was a convertible and the top was down, getting in wasn't a big problem. Starting it, on the other hand, that looked like it would be a little…complicated.

"This, I do not know," I replied. "I can try."

"We don't have time for try, Ethan," Aubree said. "Get in."

"You first," I replied, eyeing the driver's side of the dash. The display looked deadly in its intricacy. There was a spread of unlit panels in the middle, waiting for us to turn the car on. The gauges in the driver's side were all at zero. There were a couple touch pads by the gear shifter that I couldn't think of any reasons for. Heck, in trying to find the ignition I would probably wind up blowing us to bits.

Aubree rolled her eyes and moved to the passenger door. She braced her hands over the rolled-down window and hopped neatly inside. It took her a moment to get settled in the seat, but her buckle was done before I could even start worrying about how exactly I was going to mimic her.

"Ethan. Let's go already," she said. "It doesn't bite. It's a car."

Knowing this family, it probably does.

I followed her example and pressed my hands against the top of the door to launch myself over it, only I wasn't quite as graceful as Aubree had been. My feet hit the leather seat at a bizarre angle. My momentum didn't die into the landing, as it should have. I crashed into the center console instead, and my head bounced off Aubree's headrest. I got a bit of mud on the upholstery. I twisted my ankle and my hand thwacked against the gearshift; I was certainly going to have a very nice bruise for a very long while.

"Good job," Aubree said. "Now, let's go."

"Okay, okay," I said, repositioning myself so I was actually sitting. I buckled my seatbelt and reached for the ignition button. Luckily, it was exactly where it should have been. With a short, deep breath, I pushed it.

The car did not come to life.

You have got to be kidding me.

Instead, it spoke to us in an even-toned, female voice. "You are not Rosalie Hale. Please enter an authorization code to begin."

The screen in the middle of the dash lit up with a panel of numbers and letters. A blinking cursor taunted me at the top.

"Damn it," Aubree said. "What about…Emmett? They're close. Try that."

Somehow I didn't think it would be that easy. I obliged her anyhow, typing in the name and hitting enter. This time it was not the mechanical voice of the car's computer that replied.

"You think I'm that much of an idiot, dog? Right. I told you no," Rosalie's voice said.

"I don't think this is going to work, Aubree," I said.

She banged her hands against the armrests. "Shit, shit, shit!"

I had never heard her swear before.

"What about one of the other cars?" she asked, craning her neck around to the dark corner of the garage. There were four silhouettes of vehicles under cloths hiding from the rest of the world. If this car was allowed to be out in the open air, I cringed to think what kind of extravagances were underneath those white sheets. My mind couldn't fathom anything worth more than the one I was sitting in already.

"Probably not a good idea," I said.

"Then what do you propose we do, Ethan?" she asked. Her face was red. "We don't have a lot of time here. What happened to the guy from five minutes ago who was all gung-ho about helping them?"

"I still want to help. I just don't know how we can steal one of their cars to do it. Maybe we can catch the rail down to your house and get your bikes or—"

"It's like thirty miles," she said. "If we go by bike, we'll get there…tomorrow or something. And we don't have time to wait for the rail."

I looked back at the dark corner of the garage again, knowing she was right. "Fine. Let's go."

We climbed and clambered our way out of the car (I'll let you guess who did which) and walked back to the dusty corner where the four unknown cars sat. Aubree was already pulling the cloth off the first one, without worrying what it was. I held my breath, waiting for alarms to sound and the garage door to shut itself on us. Surely the police were already on their way…

Though, I guess vampires had little use for alarm systems. I couldn't imagine they were afraid of common thieves.

And who would ever want to come out here anyway?

"Ethan. It's unlocked, but…" She pulled the passenger door open and eyed the interior. "It's kind of old. Do you think it runs?"

"I'm going to say yes," I said. "I don't think the Cullens would own a car that didn't work."

The car was yellow; it had two race-style seats and actual dials across the driver's side dash. The buttons on the center console were like my mom's car, not touch sensitive, but actual buttons – square, retro. The upholstery was in excellent condition, and though it was certainly an antique, it still looked new. Very definitely worth more than the red car. It was a classic.

The ignition required a key, similar to my mom's, but also different. It didn't look like it was waiting for a magnet, more like a skinny metal something. I leaned in and examined the slot where the key went and tried to think of ways I could fake it. A stick?

No, that probably wouldn't work.

"Aubree, do you know how to start this thing? It runs on a key," I said.

She groaned. "Well, it has to be in it somewhere. Or around the garage. I mean, what are they going to do? Carry it around with them all the time? Yeah, right."

She had a point.

I crouched down and reached under the seat, feeling around for the little metal bit that would start the car. It wasn't down there. I sat in the driver's seat and began opening all the various compartments I could find. There was nothing in the glove box but an actual pair of gloves (weird). The center console was empty as well.

"Ethan!" Aubree shouted from the left side of the garage. "Over here!"

I almost jumped out of the car. I jogged over to meet her by the counter that lined the wall. She was standing in front of a metal box that hung above it. She pulled the door open to reveal four rows of hooks. Only the bottom row was occupied…with four sets of metal keys.

Bingo.

It took matching skills we learned in preschool to find the set that had the crest emblem that went along with the logo on the hood of the yellow car. As I grabbed it from the hook I realized my nerves were not aimed at our reckless thievery, but at what we would see when we got to where we were going. I didn't want to find what we were surely going to find, and yet—

"Stop staring at them. Let's go!" Aubree was already halfway back to the car.

The keys made a muffled clicking noise as my hand wrapped around them. I ran back to catch up with her. She was waiting in the seat when I got there, belt fastened, her right knee bouncing up and down.

I slid into the driver's seat and buckled my own belt. I admit, the curve of the leather felt good. There was a certain way it hugged my back that made me feel like: yes, I can go fast in this car. And when I put the key in the ignition and turned it on…well, the noise that came from the hood didn't hurt, either.

I couldn't help but think it had been too easy.

But it was about to be too difficult.

I stepped on the gas and we shot forward. My foot moved to slam on the brake, only I found that I didn't really need to slam on anything with this car. The tires squealed against the polished cement, and I was afraid we left marks on their perfect floor. I switched back to the accelerator and tried a different tactic – very little pressure, gradual, cautious. I had always been good at cautious.

After a few false starts, we managed to make it out of the garage. I was just happy I didn't crash into anything. The road was empty in front of us.

"You know where we're going, right?" I asked Aubree.

"Yeah," she replied. Her voice was hollow, wistful. She stared out the side window. "But I'm afraid to get there."

"I know exactly what you mean," I replied. And with that last world I hit the gas.

Because maybe it was time to leave cautious Ethan behind.

***

We drove in silence for the first ten minutes; Aubree only interrupted her still contemplation to give directions. We made pretty good time through the first stretch of empty highway, but as we turned for Lake Pleasant I had to slow down. I was a minor driving a flashy car. I needed no other excuse to get hauled into jail on that particular Sunday afternoon.

The tinted windows were a blessing.

We were twenty miles away, and while I still found myself preoccupied with all that we were headed toward, I had enough attention left in me to worry over something else entirely. I had a phone call to make. The brief thought crossed my mind that I didn't want to have this particular conversation in front of Aubree, but she and I were venturing on a new relationship. I had no word to define it as yet, certainly not really friends, but something more than we were before. The Cullens had trusted her to carry the secrets I had, so maybe I could survive her eavesdropping.

Even if Ava was her sister.

Either way, the call had to be made. I pushed the button on the side of my phone. "Call Justin Halifax."

After the line rang, he answered with a sigh. Probably not a good thing. "I shouldn't be talking to you."

"I know," I replied. "I am well aware that I'm most likely blacklisted. I don't blame her."

"What happened?" he asked.

He wasn't there to see it, but I found myself shaking my head anyways. "I…can't say. If she wants to tell you, that's fine."

"Okay…"

I stepped on the brake as we came to a stoplight. The car didn't have auto-brakes for intersections. Weird. "Listen, I need you to do me just one last favor."

"One last favor?" he asked. "What the hell is wrong with you, man? You're not going to do anything drastic, right?"

I almost laughed at the train of thought he was on. But he had a point. Perhaps it wasn't really a death wish that had me running off to a possible melee between vampires and werewolves, but that really didn't matter. For the first time that day, I accepted the idea that perhaps I wasn't going to come out of this whole thing unscathed.

"No," I said quickly. "I just mean…I know that it isn't fair for you to have to go between the two of us. And I surrender the choice. Be her friend, please.

"And so I have one last favor to ask, as a friend."

"What is it?" Justin asked.

The light turned green and I got the car going again. "When she gets into town, will you call me and let me know she made it okay? If I don't answer, just leave a message. I just…I have to know she got home safe, okay?"

His voice was low, somber. "Okay. Will do."

"Thanks, Justin. And I'm sorry for being an ass and ruining everything. Maybe some distant day we can be friends again. Maybe look me up at UMT. I'm probably coming anyhow."

"Really, Ethan, I doubt this is forever. Whatever it is, she'll get over it and—"

"We'll see. I'm not keeping up my hopes, though. Thanks for everything."

"Sure thing," he replied.

"'Bye."

"See you."

And I hung up the phone.

The sun was starting to set behind us and I gave a little more on the gas. I wasn't interested in arriving after dark.

"Does it ever get any easier?" Aubree asked. It was the first full sentence I had heard from her since the garage.

"What's that?" I asked. I glanced over at her for a second. She was sitting with her knees tucked into her chest and her head against the passenger window.

"Living with all this. I know Bella said you would answer my questions, but the honest truth is…I'm not really sure I want to ask them. I'm having a hard enough time coping with what I do know."

I nodded. "I had a moment where I…flipped out a little. Or maybe it was more than one." I chuckled. "But it's settling now. I'm getting better at it, I think.

"It's just a matter of time, and balance. And getting over it because you have to. The other option is to go insane, and I'm pretty sure that's not much fun.

"You'll live," I told her. "You're stronger than I am, that's for sure."

From the corner of my eye, I caught her smile. "Damn straight."

She borrowed my phone to call Will. From the pieces of the conversation that I overheard, it sounded like she was asking for him to cover for her. Apparently she had told her mother she would be with him all afternoon. It also sounded like Will wanted answers about the whole ordeal, but Aubree dutifully kept her mouth shut and told him to also do the favor of not asking why.

And then I asked myself a question that was most certainly blasphemous: Why can't Jules be more like Will?

When she hung up the phone she said, "This is a burden."

"Yeah," I replied. "I'm sorry you had to get all wrapped up in it."

"It's not your fault, Ethan. In fact, I feel a little like I'm dragging you along with me. But I'm not going to apologize for that." She took a deep breath. "Alright then. Fill me in. I'd like to be a member of the Vast Secrets Club."

I took a moment to try to figure out the best way to tell her. It wasn't something I had expected I would ever have to do, and I certainly didn't have any practice. Why did Bella tell her I would be the one to straighten her out?

"Well," I said. "Um."

"You can be blunt, Ethan. I'm okay with that. Just spit it out."

It sounded a lot more like a question than a statement. "Vampires?"

She didn't reply other than to tap her fingernails against the armrest.

I coughed. "The Cullens, I mean. And…and Bella, too."

"Right," she said. At least she sounded calm.

"Have you gone insane yet?" I asked.

"I don't think so," she said. She laughed. "It's not…well, is it weird if I say I still don't really believe it?"

"Nah," I said. "I can understand that."

"I mean, I know they run really fast and all…but…maybe it's just still a word to me. It's not really real, you know?"

I sighed. "Yeah. I know."

"But don't lose hope. I might still go crazy. I have a lot of time ahead of me for that."

I chuckled. "Fair enough."

We hit the end of Sappho, where the interstate rail station was, just as the clock on the dash clicked over from 4:59 to 5:00. The last stoplight ahead of us turned red and I tapped on the brakes.

"Last call for the five o'clock to points east.

"First destination is Lake Crescent and Ovington. Twenty minutes."

I sighed and adjusted the rearview mirror. The sun had found a small break in the clouds and was now shooting death rays into my eyes. The rain was gone. It would be back again soon, though.

A solitary girl sits in the third row on the right, I thought. She hugs a bag to her chest and hides the tears running down her face by letting her hair hang over her eyes.

I looked to my left. The rail track ran parallel to the highway. It didn't care about Sappho. It didn't stop there.

The light turned green and I stepped on the gas again. The clock read 5:02.

Her head is turned toward the window and she watches as the forests and tiny towns run together.

The last vestiges of the city grew distant, and I let my foot press down a little harder.

As fast as the rail goes, she thinks it can't get her out of town fast enough.

I spotted the little glint of reflected sunlight behind me first. It was very faint, just a tiny sparkle.

It gained quickly, as I knew it would.

The clock read 5:05.

She wipes her face and hair and tells herself to just forget it all. He wasn't worth it.

Except…maybe he was?

I hope he was.

The rail was breezing through Sappho, set to pass us in seconds. I stepped down on the gas, and the arm on the speedometer climbed higher.

Maybe she sees the yellow car. Maybe she doesn't.

The rail came into view in my periphery. I pressed the pedal to the floor, police cars be damned.

"The turn is up ahead," Aubree said. "You might want to slow down."

We ran parallel to the rail for a moment, matching its speed. I looked across to see if I could make out her face behind the glass.

"Ethan?"

But I couldn't find her.

Aubree shook my shoulder lightly. "Ethan, you've got to slow down. It's right there."

He will never know.

I almost missed the turn. About fifty feet before the small intersection, I switched from the accelerator to the brake, and the tires whined in protest. The car swerved slightly and then fell into the turn as I pulled on the wheel.

"Sorry," I said.

"It's okay," Aubree replied. "As long as we get there before…I couldn't care less."

The rail blazed past. I tried not to watch it out the rearview mirror.

She was gone. Officially.

It was time to get the show on the road.

***

The roads winding up the mountain combined with my speed made for a very quiet Aubree. When I looked over at her every once in a while she looked like she was going pale, or green, perhaps. She didn't talk very much, reverting back to directions only.

So it was weave, straightaway, weave, straightaway, for ten miles in silence. I was getting used to the car, its sensitivity, and the bizarre effort I had to expend on braking. I was no longer thinking about Jules, or I was telling myself I was no longer thinking about Jules, anyway. My new mental topic was Jeremy.

What did I really know about him? Aside from the stuff about rock climbing, which was sounding more and more like lies, I didn't have much information to go on. He seemed to hate school. If he went at all. And he didn't seem to much care for the town of Forks. Why did he even bother living here?

His dad. He mentioned his dad.

The part that bothered me most was…how could he be what I suspected him to be and also fly under the radar of the Cullens and their friends? If he had lived here all his life, had gone to school on the reservation as he said he had, he would have certainly crossed paths with them at some point or another. Right?

Maybe it was naiveté, but I really didn't want to think that everything he had ever said to me was a lie. Why would he care enough to tell me lies?

Because the truth was insane.

"Hi, I'm Jeremy. I'm a werewolf. I'm out to kidnap the local werewolves here in Forks for my own personal reasons."

Yeah. I probably wouldn't have spoken to him after that introduction. And even crazy people need someone to talk to every once and a while.

Aubree straightened up in her seat. She leaned a little more toward the passenger window, her eyes wide. She gripped the armrest on the door. "Turn up here. We should be getting close."

There was a sign that read "Hunger Mountain Campsites, Next Left." The pavement disappeared behind us as I turned. I could make out tracks on the dirt, bikes and cars gone by. Things looked promising.

Aubree couldn't figure out how to roll down the window. It took me a couple moments until I spotted the little lever-ish knobs on my armrest. I told her where to find hers and she lowered the glass.

We listened.

There was no noise but the tires on the dirt as we made our way past the first couple campsites. We wound through the trees and empty plots of land. There were patches of almost-snow and ice on the ground at our new elevation. The gray was rolling in again overhead, dimming the already low light. We passed some darker, denser forest and then came to a long stretch of dead grass that spread out on the driver's side of the car. It went on for miles.

Across the grass I could see the bended road we were headed toward and a row of abandoned vehicles next to a patch of woods.

"There!" Aubree said. Her arm shot across the car to point out my window. "They're over there!"

I picked up the pace, and a curl of nausea turned in my stomach. My heart began to race along with the car. The closer we came, the faster it went. Aubree's hair thrashed violently around her.

And probably before I was ready for it – though I would never be ready for it – we arrived. I parked behind the black sedan. Before I could kill the engine, Aubree was out of the car and running for the campsite around the corner.

"Aubree! Wait!" I shouted.

When I got out of the car I could hear muffled, far-off voices.

"Don't you dare!" someone shouted.

I ran.

Aubree was only yards ahead of me, turning around the bikes. I saw her profile for a moment before she vanished behind a row of trees.

"Stay back!" someone else shouted.

I ran faster still.

As I took the turn around the bikes, my eyes caught up with the voices, and I took in the scene just ahead.

Aubree was still running, almost halfway to the Cullens. They stood in a semicircle, spokes of a wheel that I couldn't see the center of. Edward and Bella took the middle of the group, and Renesmee was just beside them. Emmett and Rose, Jasper and Alice, they all stood flanking them. Carlisle was a step ahead of them; I could only make out the blonde of the top of his head. Esme hung back beside Rosalie. The wolves made a huddle closest to us, Logan at the point.

"Oh, God! Seth!" Aubree shouted. Emmett and Alice turned to watch us. Trip moved to intercept Aubree's path, hooking an arm around her waist to stop her from passing their perimeter. "No!"

I slowed to a jog as I caught up.

Aubree was crying. "You have to let me through. Please. Please."

"Shh," Trip said. "It's not safe. Not now, Aubree."

And then I saw what sent her to grief.

Just beyond the line that the family held, Jeremy was standing with a hunched figure in his arm. The person had long, scraggly black hair that was hanging over his lolling head. I couldn't make out his features, but I would have put good money on the fact that it was Jake.

Behind them both, Seth's crumpled frame was curled up on the ground. His eyes were closed, and I tried to see if he was breathing, but he was too far away. He was bound with rope by his wrists and ankles.

Good job, Ethan.

"It's alright," Carlisle said in a calm voice. "Like I said, we only want to talk…"

And if that wasn't enough to make me want to run away, there was Jeremy himself. His face was red, dirty, and shiny with sweat. His left arm was supporting Jake, while the right held a tiny transparent cylinder to his neck. It was a needleless syringe, and he held his thumb on the trigger.

Beside me, Aubree was sobbing and struggling against Trip's grasp. He was too much for her.

"God," I whispered. "What did I do?"

If I was going to do anything to help, now was the time. And yet, I had no idea how.

Jeremy's head snapped over to look my way. "Ethan? Is that you?" The twisting anger that once held his features died away. "Ethan?"

I swallowed and took a step forward. Trip pulled Aubree back; Logan and Jonah parted to let me walk through.

"Yeah," I replied. "It's me."

So I don't know if you've noticed, but we're nearing the end here, folks. We've got a couple more and we're out the door. I'm really kind of sad about it. :(

But GN will continue. So there's hope for me there.