The Jaguar Versus the Wolf
Chapter 25 - Flying
Orbiting Satellites Book Two, Chapter 25 - Finally companion
Brrnnnnng… Brrnnnnng… Brrnnnnng… Brrnnnnng
Argh! What was that noise?
The alarm clock? I don't remember setting it but Esme may have. She'd gotten worried that I had spent most of my days sleeping and not only bought it for me, but started setting it too, when I didn't do it myself, so that I would at least get up to eat breakfast.
Brrnnnnng… Brrnnnnng… Brrnnnnng… Brrnnnnng
Bosta! The sun wasn't even up yet. Grabbing the evil box I saw that it wasn't even six in the morning. Two hours! I wanted those two more hours of sleep. Instead of pushing the button on the top of the thing I crushed it in my hands. No more early mornings for me.
Brrnnnnng… Brrnnnnng… Brrnnnnng… Brrnnnnng
Why was I hearing that annoying sound still?
Oh, it must be coming from my phone.
Oops!
After searching for it for a minute I found the stupid thing in yesterday's pants. Normally the thing went to voicemail after four rings, so whoever it was must have been calling over and over.
"Hello," I groggily answered.
"What's wrong? Are you okay?" Jennifer's frantic voice screamed at me.
"I'm fine, I'm fine," I assured her. "I was just asleep. What's up." She normally didn't call me unless there's a specific reason.
"Oh, sorry. I ran into your Aunt, she asked me to get in touch with you. Christmas is coming up and you haven't been back for a while. She's hoping you'd go back and spend it with her and Roberto."
That sounded nice. I missed my Aunt but at the same time Joham was out there somewhere and I had no idea what his plans were. It could be dangerous. It could be deadly.
I gave my sister a vague answer to pass along, not exactly committing myself to returning for Christmas, but not telling her to say I wouldn't be returning either, however a trip at this point would most likely be impossible.
Esme caught the tail end of my phone call and after I turned off the phone she dragged the rest of the story out of me.
"What if Carlisle and I went with you?" she suggested.
"He's needed at the hospital, I couldn't ask that of him."
"But we're not," Alice skipped over to my room, dragging Jasper behind her.
"I thought you couldn't see hybrids."
She shook her head. "Still can't, I just happen to have been coming over anyway."
"You'd be okay with us missing Christmas here this year?" Jasper asked her. "It's the first one Renesmee actually asked us to celebrate. This is important to her."
"There's time for both," Alice assured him. "Come on, it'll be fun. We'll go with Nahuel, find his Aunt, and her mate, and then come back with plenty of time to spend Christmas here." Then she stopped looking at Jasper and turned towards me. "You'll be fine once you're with Huilen, right?"
"You're asking me? Aren't you supposed to have all the answers for future events? I'll only consider it if you suddenly learn to see me coming back." I could see her getting angry, so I amending my statement, "Or at least see my bedroom disappearing again." As much as I loved my Aunt I really didn't feel like risking my life to go see her. There would be other Christmases, hundreds of them if I could just get through this one.
She huffed, but said "You'll be fine," after a few seconds. "Trust me."
Hopefully she actually had a vision and wasn't just looking for an excuse to go on vacation.
"Are you leaving us?" Renesmee looked confused.
Jasper, Alice, and I were about to head to the airport and I had neglected to inform her of my plans. The only reason she knew was because she had walked out of her house just as I was putting my bag in Alice's Porsche.
I'm visiting my Aunt for the holiday," I told her.
"Is that safe? Isn't your father after you?"
Did she really care? Or would she be happy to get rid of me? I wasn't sure, but decided to give her the benefit of the doubt. "Alice and Jasper will be accompanying my down there. And I should be safe enough with my Aunt and her mate."
"Are you coming back?" She almost looked worried, but it was hard to tell, since she was staring at her feet instead of at me.
"You will see me again," I assured her.
"I know we've had our issues, but I care about you… as a friend," she quickly, yet unnecessarily, amended. "I wouldn't want anything bad to happen to you. Please be careful."
I assured her I would. Then it was time to leave, so we said our goodbyes and even managed an uncomfortable hug, before Alice rushed me into her car.
I'd never flown first class before but according to Alice this was the only way to travel.
She was right!
I put on one of the dozens of free movies available, while I tried to eat my steak. It looked amazing, smelled even better, yet I had no desire to eat it. It wasn't because I was craving blood; I hadn't in over a year. I should have been hungry but my stomach was doing flip flops.
Alice poked her head in between my seat and the empty one next to me, from the row behind that she and Jasper were sitting in. "Relax, you don't think your father is really going to attack you in the middle of the air do you?"
"I'm fine," I said brushing off her concerns. I didn't think I looked that nervous but, then again, her mate was the expert on all things emotional.
Suddenly I did feel 100 times more relaxed. Jasper was clearly using his gift on me, not that I minded. I decided to just sit back and enjoy it. There would be plenty of time for me to worry once they went back to New Hampshire.
"Thanks," I mumbled to him as I quickly devoured the meal then slipped an eye mask on and went to sleep in the most ridiculously comfortable airplane chair I had never sat in.
The next thing I knew Jasper was waking me up. We had landed. After getting our bags and going through customs the three of us began the second leg of our trip. Huilen and Roberto move around a lot, so Alice used her gift to see where to go. I had assumed after the luxury plane ride we would have been traveling by some means other than running, but as they took off into the forest I saw that I was wrong.
I should have figured when Alice insisted we each only take one backpack with us. Since they were planning on turning around and heading back to New Hampshire, once we located my Aunt, they probably only brought theirs to not seem strange to the customs officials.
"So, how do you normally do this?" Alice asked me, looking up at the tree tops, once we had run a couple kilometers, away from human eyes.
"Do what?"
"Swing from the tree vines. Isn't that how you get around here?"
"Never tried it," I admitted.
"Really? I could have sworn…"
"Why don't we just continue to run," Jasper suggested.
"The Amazons do it. I'm sure we can figure it out," she said leaping up to one of the top tree branches. There weren't any vines near her, but she spotted one twenty feet away and leapt for it.
Jasper chose to stay with me on the ground, but she just looked like she was having so much fun.
She had to come down as we leapt over one of the wider rivers with no trees in the vicinity. Once we were on the other side she zigzagged to the left. My Aunt must be on the move. The next time when Alice jumped up to swing from the trees I joined her, and so did Jasper.
Leaping from tree to tree, with nothing holding me to the ground, dipping and rising as I swung from vines, it felt like I was flying. The Amazons were geniuses.
Why hadn't my Aunt and I ever tried this before? It was amazingly fun. I was wrong before. THIS was the best way to fly!
All too soon it was over. Eighty meters ahead I could see Roberto. That meant that my Aunt was somewhere nearby.
Alice really needed to work on how she introduced herself to new Vampires. Just because she could see that her and my Aunt's mate would become friends didn't mean he wouldn't try to rip her head off, before she got the chance to explain who she was. Being a Full-Vampire she was naturally faster than me.
I tried going faster, but even running at top speed I was still too late as I watched her drop directly in front of him. He must have just reacted on instinct as he tried to rip off her arm. She saw it coming and he never even touched her. Jasper must have expected this, because he was there in an instant, tackling Roberto to the ground.
None of Alice's cries for them to stop were doing any good. Faster than I thought possible Jasper was behind Roberto, pinning his arms behind his back by one of Jaspers while the other had him in a headlock.
I thought Jasper was really going to rip his head off until he spoke. "Stop fighting. We're friends of Huilen."
"Roberto!" I screamed as I finally arrived. But I wasn't the only one. My Aunt appeared from the opposite direction.
"NO!" she screeched as she tried to pull Jasper off of her mate.
Eventually everyone settled down. Jasper released Roberto, Huilen introduced Alice and Jasper to him, and I gave my Aunt a long overdue hug.
I'd like to say this happened quickly, but in reality it was slow going. Even with Jasper's gift it took hours to get Roberto to trust them. But once we were all friends, or as close as we could be, before Alice and Jasper had to leave, they opened their backpacks. I thought they'd been full of clothes, but I was wrong. In true Alice fashion she had packed gifts from all of the Cullens for the three of us.
"Don't open them until Christmas," she said before the two of them took off. They would have to rush to make their plane. The fight with Roberto wasted the time we had planned for them to spend talking, visiting, telling stories, reminiscing… whatever. I wasn't sure exactly what they had planned. But it didn't matter anymore. Alice and Jasper were leaving.
A.N. Not the most exciting chapter (really just another filler, but necessary.) If you have any ideas how to spice it up let me know.
Special thank you to hbyrd28 for continuing to review. Thanks.
