Thank you to everyone who has reviewed so far, and to everyone who has put this story on alert. I appreciate you taking the time to not only read this, but to give me feedback as well. Please review again and continue to enjoy Family Ties. :)

PS: Thank you, Mel Cooley, for being my test subject ;)

Disclaimer: If you recognize it, it's not mine. If you don't recognize it, it's probably still not mine. Alex is mine. All things Twilight belong to Stephanie Meyer. Now on with the story!


Before:

Dr. Cullen wrote a note or two on his clipboard, smiled, and stuck his pen back into his pocket before stepping toward the door.

"Like I said," he answered, "I want to keep you overnight for observation. If you're still doing well in the morning, you can leave."

I sighed in defeat and looked back up to the TV as the doctor reached the door.

"Oh." He paused, turning back to me. "One more thing."

My eyes rolled away from the TV just in time for me to see Dr. Cullen pulling his hand from his pocket, and catch a flash of silver whizzing straight toward my head.

Now:

It took me a second to process what was happening. With a flick of his wrist, Dr. Cullen had flung… something at my head. It was a blur of shiny silver. If I squinted, I could make out the object, quickly rotating end over end, sailing straight toward my right eye. I reflexively reached out and wrapped my fingers around the slim metal handle, right before the blade pierced my skull.

A scalpel. He'd thrown a scalpel at me. I stared at the offensive, sharp little blade in my hand and forced myself to start breathing again. I looked up at Dr. Cullen, who looked somewhat cocky.

Then something occurred to me. He couldn't have thrown this at me. Not with that speed. He'd have to be… super human. Like me? Is that what I was? There was something off with this town, that much was certain. Giant wolves, possibly superhuman doctors… What next? A band of rogue aliens looking to colonize the planet via swarms of bees? Or maybe a band of vampires sucking the blood from the population while the town sleeps. Or how about a shape shifter changing into women's husband and impregnating them with babies born with tails? No, I know. A cigarette smoking mackerel snapper, leading an army of zombie snipers hunting for tofurkey. Yes. That was it.

I realized I was still staring with my mouth gaping open like a dying fish. I snapped my jaw shut, and then anger began to replace the shock.

"What if I hadn't caught it?" I demanded. I threw the scalpel to the floor and jumped off the bed. "What if it had lodged in my skull?"

I stalked toward the doctor. He raised his hands, in a placating manner, but didn't step back from my advance. At barely five feet and trying to keep my hospital gown closed, I probably didn't look very intimidating.

"I figured out what you are as soon as the charge nurse told me you were running a 105 fever and said she had trouble getting the line in," he explained. "I knew you'd catch it, and even if you didn't, there would be no long term damage, probably not even a scar."

I was back to staring again. "What I am?"

He lowered his hands, presumably taking my confusion to mean I wasn't going to attack after all.

"You share a number of characteristics with my granddaughter," he explained.

His granddaughter? But he looked so young. Late twenties at oldest, if I had to guess, and that was being generous.

My mouth opened and closed a few times, not really sure what to say. Not only was he apparently much older than he looked, similar to myself, but he had some kind of insight into what I was.

"Your grand… What characteristics? What do you know?"

"You mean you don't…" he cut off his sentence and stared back at me. "You don't know," he said. "Look, Alexandra, I'll make you a deal. You want to be discharged, correct?"

I nodded enthusiastically, ready to agree to almost anything if it meant getting out of here.

"I'll discharge you, if you agree to come home with me and meet the rest of my family," he said. "We could probably enlighten each other on a few things."

I hesitated. Yes, I wanted to know more about myself. And yes, I definitely wanted out of this too-bright, too-clean building of doom. But it bothered me that he might know more about me than I did. It felt weird, being handed this information. Almost anti-climactic in a way. I felt like this was information I should have found out on my own, in a kind of cop-movie unauthorized investigation of sorts.

Maybe he was even making the whole thing up. But why would he do that? Maybe he was a serial killer and was trying to lure me to his underground lair deep in the woods to dismember me and do other unspeakable things. Not necessarily in that order. Or, maybe I was over thinking the whole situation. I took care of those wolves, didn't I? If I could handle mutant, giant wolves, I could handle this guy and his so-called family.

"Okay," I said finally. "Deal."

He smiled a friendly smile. "Good. Get dressed, I'll push the paperwork through, and the nurse will take you to the discharge office."

Twenty minutes later, I was signing the fourth form of four, and Dr. Cullen walked in, on the phone.

"Okay, I'll be there soon. Love you, too."

I looked up as he slid the phone in his pocket.

"Ready?" he said to me.

I handed the stack of papers to the woman at the desk. "Yeah, I'm ready," I said, and followed him out of the building out into the parking lot, to a shiny black Mercedes.

"Nice," I breathed.

I heard a chuckle of agreement before the headlights flashed and he got into the driver's seat. I followed suit and sat in the passenger seat.

It was dark outside, so there wasn't too much to see on the back country roads. A couple deer ran along the road for a few seconds, but we quickly passed them. After about 15 minutes of awkward silence, the doctor turned onto a barely perceptible road in the trees, more like a camouflaged driveway. A few more minutes of driving on the windy dirt road and the trees ahead of us suddenly opened up, revealing a large white house in the middle of a clearing. House? More like mansion. Three stories high with a wrap around porch, it looked like we'd just stepped back into the turn of the century. I might even have believed that, had we not been riding in a 2012 Mercedes. I gaped in awe, and then shook my head and closed my mouth.

Dr. Cullen parked the car in the garage, in between a bright red BMW and a yellow Porshe. I stepped out of the Mercedes and gaped at the collection of cars. I seemed to be gaping a lot today. There was also a silver Volvo, a white Jeep, and if my eyes served me right, an Aston Martin. Damn.

Dr. Cullen just chuckled at my expression and led the way into the house. I followed him through a door that opened into a large kitchen.

"Everyone, I'm home!" he called out softly. "Family meeting in the dining room, now!"

I felt my brow scrunch as I followed him into the next room, a large space with a large antique dining table and ten matching chairs. There was no way anyone could have heard his declaration from the next room, let alone across the house or upstairs.

I had just set one foot over the threshold when I felt a soft breeze blow by me. I turned, but saw no one. I turned forward to continue on, but a small, black-haired figure blocked my way.

"Gah!"

She giggled at my startled outburst.

I caught my breath. "What- Where did-?" I spun around, looking for another entry, but the doorway I stood in was the only door to this room, and she definitely had not been in here before.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you," she said grinning. "I'm Alice."

She stuck a hand out, and I hesitantly shook it.

"Al-Alex," I stuttered.

"Alice," Dr. Cullen said, a slight warning tone to his voice. "Let's wait for everyone to come."

"Sorry, Carlisle," Alice said. "Come on, Alex, sit next to me!"

Good lord, she reminded me of a hyper little pixie. As she asked, though, I took the chair next to Alice and watched as one by one seven other people entered the dining room and took seats at the table. There were now ten of us total, and I noticed immediately that they all, with the exception of me and one other girl, had striking similarities. They all shared the same deathly pale skin tone and yellowish eyes. This was in addition to being abnormally beautiful. The girl who stood out had more of a healthy skin tone and chocolate brown eyes, and looked like a mix between the man and woman sitting on either side of her, across the table from me. I wanted to say that she was their daughter, but it couldn't possible. They had to be siblings. She looked about thirteen, while they couldn't be older than 20. Although, Dr. Cullen had mentioned he had a granddaughter and looked barely over 25.

On the left of who I would guess to be Chocolate Eyes' mother sat a great hulk of a man with dark curly hair, and dimples on either side of his mischievous smirk. At the end sat a stunning blond, with full lips, curves, and a beautiful face. I knew that face. How could I not? Grandpa Richie had had that face in black and white, sitting in a frame hanging on the living room wall throughout my entire childhood.

I gasped and my hands flew to my mouth. "Rosalie," I breathed.


Can I just say, it is a pain in the butt to be writing a scene with ten characters in it.

Honorable Mentions:

Allthenuts1013: Thanks miss! You know the rest ;)

Skyeblue5565: Keep checking back for more! I try to write and update as often as possible, but my hectic schedule likes to thwart those attempts just for fun.

Lestri: Aw, you make me blush! Thank you very much, and I hope the rest of the chapters live up to the first!

IKNOWIMWEIRD117: More blushing! *big grin* Thank you very much! Keep reading and enjoying!

Zerandomness: Thank you, and I'll keep writing as long as you keep reading!

Me: I know exactly who you are, miss! Thank you for reviewing, read the beginning and do it again! And come back for the rest!

I had intended to make this longer, but I thought that would be an AWESOME place to end it and leave you hanging! No worries, the next chapter is already written and should be up quickly.

Thank you for reading. I hope you enjoyed! Please leave a review, even if you hated it but especially if you liked it! I won't hold you hostage, but reviews do encourage me to write faster.

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And yes, that was an X-Files reference up there. Kudos if you caught it.

Keep reading!

Ren