And then everything happened so fast, a human would have seen nothing but a blur.

Rosalie lunged at Jasper and they crashed to the frozen ground, then rolled around once or twice until she managed to get the overhand. Jasper had been too distracted to anticipate her attack, but he also didn't try to fight her.

She had him pinned to the ground with one of her knees painfully boring into his back, right between his shoulderblades. One hand was pressing down on his left shoulder while her other one took a fistful of his hair, shoving his head deeper into the snow. Rosalie's teeth were bared and hovered just half an inch above his ear while she growled menacingly.

Emmett didn't have time to react to what his wife was doing to Jasper, because his attention fixed on the girl his brother had just slapped. He ran over to her and without thinking he placed his hands on either side of her face. "Are you all right? Did he hurt you?" he asked, looking at her with wide eyes, a panicked expression on his face.

But she was still in shock.

Jasper had calmed her with full force so that she would unhook her teeth from his hand. Then, when Rosalie had pounced him and thrown him on the ground, his influence over her had abruptly ceased and this sudden lack of influence left her feeling nearly emotionless, even though an overwhelming flood of emotions was washing over her. But they were just too strong and too many at once to process.

These sudden changes were heavier than any regular newborn mood swings and her young mind was overburdened.

„Maddie?" Emmett said and softly stroked her cheek while checking the side of her face that had been struck for any trace of injury. With his thumb he wiped the streak of fresh venom away and was relieved when he saw that it was from the wound on his brother's hand and that he hadn't injured her.

Her eyes were still oddly vacant-looking, but she slowly started nodding her head before directing her gaze to Rose who was still on top of Jasper, snarling at him like crazy.

Emmett figured that seeing this must unnerve her and so he let go of her face and took a step back. Yes, at that moment he also realised that he had been dangerously close to a young newborn and with his hands on her face she could have easily bitten his fingers off or attacked him.

"Wait here, everything's all right," he said in an attempt to reassure her while holding one of his hands up in a soothing manner, before he hurried over to his wife and his brother.

"Rose, come on." He curled his fingers around her upper arm, but neither his words nor the grip he had on her made her stop growling or move away from her honey-blonde brother.

"Rosie, let go of him," he spoke softly and gently pulled her up - luckily this time she did not resist.

She got to her feet and took a few steps backwards while wiping her hair out of her face, all the while glaring at Jasper as though she couldn't stand him at all.

Looking her over to make sure she was unharmed and that she would not attack their brother again, Emmett then turned back to gaze at Jasper and offered his hand to him to help him get up from the snow-covered ground.

The former soldier blew a strand of his hair out of his face, then took his brother's hand and let him pull him up.

The moment he was back on his feet again however, Emmett roughly shoved him. "What the hell, dude? She's a child, how could you?!"

Wiping with his thumb at a cut on his bottom lip – his sister must have somehow injured him while tackling him to the ground - he then looked in between Rose and Emmett, his eyes still cold and dark, and he retorted, "She needs to learn her place."

Emmett groaned. "We're not planning a war, Jasper, and she is not one of your newborns."

Jasper clenched his jaw and his eyes narrowed.

"Snap out of it, bro," Emmett warned.

He knew that Jasper had only ever dealt with newborns that were supposed to fight for their army, and he had trained and punished them to shape them into proper, obedient fighters before he would rip them apart and burn them as soon as they were outgrowing their strength. That was all he knew when it came to newborns, and so apparently he did not understand that that wasn't the right way to deal with young vampires who barely knew anything about what they had turned into - especially when you only had one of them and weren't going to turn that one loose on your enemies.

"Don't you ever touch her again, don't you even dare think about it." Rose was suddenly back in her brother's face, sputtering threats like she had never done anything else.

Jasper just raised an eyebrow at her like he couldn't really take her seriously as she was getting worked up about him treating the girl just like she should be treated.

And by doing so, it became obvious again that Jasper had no experience with a newborn that young and wasn't used to showing them kindness and compassion. He couldn't see Maddie as the child that she was - she was just a worthless newborn to him who had to be beaten into submission or killed if she wouldn't yield.

After growling at him once more, Rosalie felt that Jasper had been threatened enough for now. She snapped her head around to look for the girl.

"Where is she?"

"She's -" Emmett started to say but then broke off and turned his head from one side to the other while looking around hectically. "She was right there. Just now," he told his wife and his face scrunched up in confusion.

"I swear I'll rip your head off if we don't find her," she whispered to Jasper in a low, threatening voice before checking the snow for Maddie's footprints and sniffing the air in order to pick up her scent.

Then she suddenly took off, Emmett right behind her.

"We'll find her, don't worry," he called to his mate, hoping his words would calm her.

She only gave him a curt nod and ran even faster.

Jasper was such an idiot, she thought and gritted her teeth in anger. During the last few days they had succeeded in convincing the girl of staying with them for a while and had taught her how to hunt. It had been great to see that she was slowly starting to relax around them. She maybe even trusted them, or at least was close to trusting them, they hoped.

And now he had hit her across the face and she was nowhere to be seen - he had ruined everything. They had spent so much time showing her that they could be trusted, and now she had decided to run away and it was his fault.

They ran as fast as they could and Rosalie was oddly scared as her thoughts revolved around how they had failed the girl. She was scared what this slap would evoke in her and she was scared that they wouldn't be able to find her again. It was just too dangerous for an inexperienced newborn to be all alone... what if she would run into nomadic vampires? What if she would start killing humans and expose their kind because she wasn't careful enough? The Volturi would kill her in an instant and then pay them a visit - they couldn't let that happen.

After a short while Maddie's smell got stronger, and they sighed with relief when they could detect her in the distance.

She wasn't alone.

They got closer and saw that Edward and Alice each had one of her arms in a tight grip and refused to let go, no matter her protests or her threatening growls. She was struggling and trying to twist out of their hold, but with the advantage of their gifts on their side they could predict her movements and didn't let up.

"Let go of her!" Emmett shouted at his siblings while sprinting towards them - they only shook their heads in response.

As soon as they had reached them, Rosalie immediately pushed Edward away so he would let go of the girl's arm.

He did, because now with the four of them here she wouldn't be able to get very far in case she would try to run away again.

"Alice," Rose growled and glared at her petite sister, who was reluctant to let go of the newborn, but eventually sighed and uncurled her fingers from Maddie's forearm before she took a few steps back.

"She wanted to run away," Edward told them, never taking his eyes off the snarling newborn who still seemed to be very unhappy about the fact that she had been restrained.

"Just don't touch her again," Rose hissed and narrowed her eyes at him.

"What were we to do? I saw her heading for the nearest town," Alice explained, which earned her a sharp look from Rose.

"That doesn't give you the right to-"

"Fuck you, fuck all of you!" Maddie yelled at them and backed away, her chest heaving from her quickened breaths. Her head was spinning and she didn't really know what to do - all she knew was that she wanted to get far away from them.

"Ssh, it's okay, they won't come near you again," Rose said, hoping her calm and even voice would help in calming the girl down.

"Leave me alone!" the newborn snarled in response, then spun around and ran off.

"Don't worry, Jasper will catch her," Maddie heard Alice say. Her voice was faint as she was running away from the group, but her words immediately made Maddie wonder. How would she know where Jasper was or that he would catch her?

Oh right, she was a seer.

The one that had doomed her to this life and bound her to these people - people she hated more than anything.

She would be better off on her own - yes she was a freak now, but she could stay hidden in the forests of Alaska or some other state and eat bear... or have some human blood. Nobody would ever see her again and nobody would ever hurt her again.

A fragment of an apparently lost memory suddenly flooded her mind while she was running, and she had to continuously shake it away so she could concentrate on putting as much distance as possible between her and them. It entered her mind again and again, and it almost made her stop fleeing and just let them catch up with her.

This was her fault... she has had the chance but did not seize it, and now there was no way out anymore.

The sound of a twig snapping caught her attention, and as she looked in the direction it came from, someone pounced on her.

She hit the ground hard and immediately started slashing around herself, fighting for all she's worth.

"Stop that," she heard being barked at her and combined with the smell, she knew immediately that it was Jasper. The asshole who had dared to slap her.

She really wanted to rip his face off and shove it down his throat.

"Calm down," he ordered and she felt how her struggling ceased. She didn't know why, but she calmed gradually while she could hear a few pairs of feet heading for them.

She could smell that the hand that pressed down on the back of her neck was smeared with blood and dirt and something that was even stickier than blood - venom.

"Jasper, I swear to God-" "Stop sputtering threats, Rosalie."

"Don't get involved, you jerk."

"I think we all should just calm down. Jasper, let go of her and take five steps back. Hm... maybe seven, just to be sure," Alice said, her sweet and melodic voice sounding oddly out of place for Maddie as she lay there in the snow, feeling strong hands press down on her shoulder and her neck. The pressure increased for a second and then it was gone.

Immediately she jumped to her feet, her teeth bared and her hands formed into claws, ready to attack.

"Just look what you've done," Rose snapped at Jasper, then took a step toward the girl. She halted when Maddie made to lunge at her - the poor thing was influenced by Jasper's calming gift, but her fighting instincts were still struggling to push through.

The newborn felt cornered even though she could just turn around and run... but she knew they wouldn't let her get very far. Having so many people around, and knowing that all of them were here to try to compel her into submission was enraging and frightening at the same time.

"What do you want from me?!" she queried, her wild eyes darting from one to the other, trying to keep all of them in her field of vision at the same time.

"They want nothing from you, because they were just about to go home," Rosalie stated and gave her siblings pointed looks before she turned her attention back to the fuming newborn who was still breathing rapidly.

"You cannot stay close to an enraged newborn, Rosalie. Let me -" "You've done more than enough already, don't you think?" Rose shot at Jasper. He had slapped her and now she wanted to get away from them - all of them.

Rose had actually thought that she and Emmett had been able to build a little bridge of trust between them and that she would choose their presence over being alone. But thanks to Jasper hitting her and then Edward and Alice restraining her, everything seemed to be in shatters now.

The poor thing didn't know whom to trust or where to go, all she knew was that she wanted nothing to do with them as all they ever seemed to do was trying to overpower her. What kind of a message was that supposed to send?

"Rosalie, you cannot be serious. That is ludicrous," Edward - the copper-haired boy - said.

"Just do it," Rose growled, immediately sending Maddie into a defensive crouch with her instruction. To the girl it sounded like they were about to attack her and beat her up.

"Sshh," Rosalie soothed her as she noticed that. "I want them to leave so we can talk."

"I don't want to talk, I want you to leave me alone," she growled out, "forever."

The last word left her a little unsure, because it was weird speaking about something as forever when she hadn't yet been able to really understand that now she had a different body, had a different future awaiting her and would be living a different life that would never end.

She couldn't quite wrap her mind around that idea... living forever. She had no one left, so that would be a very sad forever. But one thing was for sure - she would definitely not spend that time with these fuckers here.

She was so caught up in her thoughts and musings that she barely noticed how her emotions turned from defensive to sad again, but suddenly she heard someone hiss.

"Leave her alone, Jasper," Rose's eyes were still unusually dark as she glared at her brother.

"I don't think so," he shot back before focussing his pitch black eyes back on Maddie.

A thunderous roar emitted from Maddie's throat at that moment and she wanted to dash at him to hurt him before he could hurt her, but two arms that had quickly wrapped around her waist were holding her back. She hissed, kicked and thrashed around in the restraining hold, trying to free herself, when suddenly a loud crack could be heard and the person behind her yowled in pain and fell backwards after letting go off her as if burnt. She jumped to the side, putting some distance between herself and her attacker, and then saw Edward sitting on the ground holding his foot.

"Leave, all of you, right now," Rose commanded and the look she gave her siblings was so mad that they decided to grant her her wish and let her handle the raging newborn by herself.

Thank you for reading and reviewing, guys!