Sorry I haven't updated sooner. I had a REALLY bad week. Mostly emotionally but I have managed to pull an interesting chapter out of my imagination.

DISCLAIMER: The characters do not belong to me they belong to Stephanie Meyer's author of the wonderful book 'The Host'

Chapter 22: The Soul I Could Have Been

The sun was coming up when Jared shook me awake. "Mel. I need some sleep can you drive?"

I grunted it was too early, I was tired. I could wait till we got home and I could sleep on my mattress. Wish we had some 'Awake'.

"I'll drive." Landon said from the back.

I turned, he was awake. Jared and Landon changed places. And he started to drive.

I yawned, "Thanks. I don't do so good in the morning."

He chuckled, "Yea, me neither. Maybe it's something that runs in the family."

Oh yea. "Are you sure that Jeb is your dad? It couldn't have been some other Jeb?"

He shrugged, "Well if this Jeb doesn't remember my mom and doesn't recognize the picture I have then I'll have to keep looking."

"A picture?" I sat up a little straighter.

He nodded, "Yep. I found it in a box of stuff after my mom died. My uncle said it was a picture of my dad. She'd showed it to him once."

Maybe…. "Can I see it?"

He nodded again and pulled it out of his front pocket. He handed it to me.

I looked at it. It was a picture of a dark haired boy. He was grinning at the picture taker and was holding a gun.

I recognized it. I'd thought I'd saw it in the old photo album that had led me and Wanda to Jeb's caves. I smiled at the photo, "I think I know him." I said.

He took it back from me, "Really?"

I nodded, "Mhm. He was in my photo album." I paused, "I'm pretty sure you're my cousin." I smiled at him.

He smiled back but didn't reply.

We drove for a few minutes in silence. I wondered about this man. He looked about my age. And he was a soul. He was a soul but, so like Wanda, had been converted to the human cause. He hadn't joined any humans till now. He'd been searching for Jeb, ever since he had had a soul inserted into his mind. I tried, with my experience, to relate to him.

What if I'd been stronger than Wanda and instead of us working in harmony to find Jamie and Jared, what if I'd overpowered her? Kept my brief control over her. Would I have been able to maintain my soul cover while searching for them?

"So…." I said, "How'd you do it?"

"Do what?" he asked.

"Overpowered the soul inside you." I said. I felt some jealousy sweep over me. I was jealous; he'd overpowered a soul when I couldn't.

"It's not as easy as you make it seem when you say it like that." He said almost a little sadly. "When you live in the same body as a soul you start to understand them."

I nodded, "I know that but how'd you overpower the soul?"

He shrugged, "It was a process. I had to use the cunning nature I'd been raised in. My mother was kind of like Jeb, a conspiracy theorist. She said that she knew something was off. She tried to keep a low key after I was born. She was the one who'd tried to find Jeb originally. She knew he'd know what to do; he'd already have a plan. But she didn't know much about him and we were cornered when I was about 18. She grabbed me and told me to go after my father. Then she shot herself in the head."

He sniffed a bit and I patted him on the shoulder, "I wouldn't have been able to make it to safety if it wasn't for Jeb. He carved directions in the back of an old photo album that helped me get myself and my little brother to his safe haven."

Landon nodded, "Yea. Well I used some tricks I'd learned from my mom and got back to our place in the city. I went through her stuff looking for anything that could possibly lead me to my father. It wasn't till my uncle heard she was dead that he came over and brought a box of her stuff that I found the picture. See my mom had stayed with him while she was pregnant and had lifted the picture off Jeb. She kept it and left it in her things at my uncles."

I nodded, "She sounds like the type of girl Uncle Jeb would be interested in."

He smiled, "She was great. Of course I got a bit careless and got caught a couple months later." He paused then continued, "I started off as the prisoner that we all are at the beginning. People around me were disappearing after insertion. I was just lucky that I had a soul that was proud. He acted like everyone else, pretending I'd disappeared too. It was a process. I watched, observed, kept it secret from him. And little by little I gained control. At first I made it seem like I was just curious, like I was becoming a soul. He was happy about that and we kind of coexisted for a while. Then he let me take control sometimes. And before long I was always in control."

"And he's disappeared?" Landon shook his head, "He's still there?"

He shrugged, "Sometimes he's there but most of the time he's…. kinda dormant. It's like he hibernates in the back of my head until he wakes up for a few days."

"Has he woken up?" I asked curiously.

"Yea. He woke up once for a few hours."

"When?" I asked getting a little excited. I could almost imagine Jeb's curious look and wondered if that's what my face looked like. Maybe it runs in the family.

"Well he hears everything I hear it's just that things don't really interest him. The first thing that interested him in a long time was the other day with Wanda." He turned briefly to smile at me, "She told me about how she was implanted in a difficult host and couldn't get rid of her."

I smiled too. "Yea. Guess it runs in the family. Defiance." Except my dad. I added in my head sadly.

"Guess so." He said. "My soul was very interested how she got rid of the difficult host and when he heard that she'd simply given her back he sunk back into hibernation. He didn't like that alternative."

"We could take him out ya know?" I said, "Go out of state and grab a child or something. Wanda and Ian could raise the kid with the soul. Then you could have yourself back."

He shrugged, "Na. I like him in here with me."

I was shocked, "Why?"

He chuckled, "I guess you're the most qualified to understand my predicament." He gazed out into the darkness for a moment.

"I guess that's why I'm having a hard time understanding." I thought back, "And I guess I can understand a bit."

"Plus," he said, "I do have myself back. I haven't lost myself I just kind of added the soul."

I nodded, "I guess I just had a different experience."

We stayed quiet for what seemed like a half an hour. I was brooding how week I'd been. How…. Sympathetic I'd become to her. Too weak to push her to the back of my head and gain control of my body back.

"You're not weak you know." Landon said

"What?"

"You're not weak. That's what you're thinking right? That you were too weak to do the same thing I did with Wanda." I bit my lip. "Really I'm not even sure exactly how I did it so you have no reason to be ashamed that you couldn't."

I nodded. That wasn't going to make me feel any better.

"But it all worked out in the end." I heard Jared mumble, "For the better I might add."

I giggled; of course he'd been listening instead of going to sleep. I nodded to myself, "Yea I guess it did."

Instead of being stuck in my head with a soul as my prisoner I had a sister. Instead of having her there to witness everything I did, I had control and I was the only one there to be with Jared. And Jamie had another sister. And I was with the ones I love. Plus the wonderful soul I loved could have a human experience and had the opportunity to fall in love with a good man.

"Your right. It did turn out for the best." I rested into the seat. "And I'm not weak."

"You're a survivor." Landon said.

I nodded, "Exactly. I'm a survivor."

By the way if you haven't checked it out yet go and check out the side story called 'Mother of a Host' it's pretty interesting. It's from the point of view Wanda's biological mother, Britney.

Anyway, leave me a review and keep reading.