A/N- All I've got to say is that I'm sorry for the long wait. I'm not going to make a list of excuses like I have in the past though. So, let's just get on with the story.

Disclaimer: Still don't own it. Darn.

Look After You

Chapter Eight.

"My guess is that she has been using the other power she has on her side. She changed another man recently that has exceptional power. From what I have observed, the power is weak and limited, but still very effective towards those that don't know what is happening. The man has the power of manipulation."

I froze in shock at these words, not knowing what to think. "What is that supposed to mean?" asked Jacob from the corner.

Peter looked over at the werewolf a bit intimidated. "He can put thoughts inside of your head."

Carlisle's Point of View.

The wall of sound erupted again. Everyone's mood quickly changed from the quiet monotony over the last few days, into this new sense of anger. Everyone, including Jacob to my own surprise, was angered at the fact that Maria had broken up our family. We all wanted Jasper back.

After a few minutes, everyone calmed down. It took longer than usual, seeing as we didn't have Jasper's subtle power to guide us, but nevertheless we all sat back in our seats. I looked around at the faces of my family, each of them showing a different reaction. Emmett sat with his fist clenching and unclenching, waiting for the opportunity to run straight to Texas head on and take Maria out. Edward seemed contemplative, trying to decide what the best plan of action would be. His demeanor was mirrored by Alice, whose eyes were far off in time. The rest of the family seemed stressed out to the extreme, eager to go and take Jasper back.

We were all waiting for one thing, a plan of attack. It took me a long minute to realize why this was taking longer than usual. Then it hit me. Whenever a vampire problem like this arose, Jasper was the one to take the first steps in planning our battles. Immediately after realizing this, I took my spot as head of the family and stood.

My family all looked at me expectantly as I began to speak. "Now, I know many of you want to go down to Texas right now and slaughter Maria," I paused to send a pointed glance at Emmett," but we must first come up with a plan of attack." Realizing that I had no idea where I was going with this, I turned to Peter, who had the most knowledge on this subject.

"First things first, we need to figure out what we're dealing with here. Peter, I'm going to have to ask you a few more questions on what you know about Maria's current army."

Peter, still looking uncomfortable at the fact that seven vampires, a half-vampire, and a werewolf all had their eyes trained on him, stood up to inform us of what we were currently up against.

"Maria's army currently stands at five newborns, and two older vampires. This is a dramatic drop from previous army sizes, but she does not feel the need for an excessively large army with Joseph and Christen by her side."

My eyebrow's pulled down in confusion, like most of the others surrounding me. Peter paused at this, to gage this reaction.

"Sorry, but who the hell are Joseph and Christen?" said Emmett, in all of his bluntness.

"Oh, my apologizes. Joseph is the man that can manipulate thoughts, and Christen is the woman who has the ability to temporarily shut off powers."

"Do you know how these powers work, so that we can gain a better understanding of how to fight back," I inquired, still confused on how this all could have slipped through our fingers.

"Well, Joseph can plant an idea into your head, sort of similar to Jasper's power, just with thought instead of emotion. It is exponentially more powerful when you face it unknowingly, but can easily be avoided with the knowledge of what you're dealing with. You see, he can place the idea of, say… wanting to eat cheesecake inside your head. Now anybody who didn't know what was happening would go out right then and purchase a cheesecake, regardless if they were a vampire or not. But, when one is prepared for this subtle attack, they can analyze this action and stop it, just by thinking, 'why would I want to purchase a cheesecake if it will taste disgusting and I'll just couch it up later?'"

We were all contemplating how we would avoid this type of onslaught in the future. Well, all of us except Emmett and Jacob, who were still giggling at the choice of example by Peter. Only they would find the word "Cheesecake" funny at a time like this.

"As for Christine," continued Peter, "she can shut off powers, which seems unstoppable at first, but as I said before, it is extremely limited. First of all, she can only shut off one power at a time and secondly, she has to have observed the person for quite some time, in order to gain the necessary information to tap into their power."

"But if she had to observe us, then why did we not realize that she was coming, " said Rosalie, from across the room.

"That's we Maria's power comes in handy," started Peter.

"Maria's power?" asked Bella, still in the dark for most of the things happening in the South, having not spent that much time around Jasper as the rest of us.

Peter turned his attention to Bella, realizing the same thing I had. "You see, Maria has the power to…sense where people are. She sort off puts her hand to the ground and she can pin point where everyone is by the motions the make. She figures out the lay of the land that way. It comes in handy around the battlefield a lot, you know, having the ability to know the enemy set up. It works in about a three mile radius."

"And how does this help Christen?" asked Jacob, his brow pulled down darkening his eyes. His look was of obvious frustration. He hated so much being in the dark with are strange vampirisms.

"You see," began Peter, finally beginning to relax around us, now that we were all on the same page, planning the same rescue, "Maria would have been able to scope out the area around the house and be able to observe Alice when she was the only one around. If Alice hadn't been watching for visions of Maria, then it would have been easy to slip through the cracks of her radar."

"So how could we possibly escape this power?" asked Edward, nervous about losing his crutch in battle.

"Well, we can't really escape it, but we can prepare for it," Peter's face became animated as we began to plan the specifics of the battle we were going to have to face. You can take the soldier out of the war, but you can never take the fight out of the soldier. "As I said before, Christen can only affect one person at a time. All we have to do is figure out which one she will go after, and then prepare them to fight without their power. Most likely, she will either go after Alice or Bella. Alice because she's so much attuned to her already or Bella because her power is most effective in battle."

My family was now all leaning forward on the edge of the seats, trying to gain as much out of Peter's lecture as they could while also adding comments now and again on the most strategical approach to the upcoming fight.

In the past, my aversion to battling with other vampires had not been kept a secret to those I love. But now, as we came closer and closer to going down to Texas, I couldn't help but justifying this one battle. Jasper was my son, my boy, and I would stop at nothing to get him back.

A/N- What'd you think. Please review with any questions, comments, constructive flames, unconstructive flames, suggestions, threats, etc. (I'm really not that picky when it comes to reviews.)