-Chapter 19: A Change of Plans-

Demetri cursed under his breath as he hung from my arms five hundred feet off the ground. I hadn't stopped smiling since we took off toward the hotel Angela was staying in, only managing not to snicker as my passenger continued to complain. I could have put the tracker on my back for the journey, but the way the nearly-indestructible vampire clung to my arms for dear life was too much fun to pass up.

I had been gone for over two days, so Angela should be around the mid-point of the HLV sickness – which also happened to be the worst part. I wondered how she would react to meeting a very-recently-former Volturi guard member. She hated them just as much as I did, of this I knew from her thoughts. I only hoped she wouldn't try to attack Demetri; I would hate to have to kill him to keep from harming her.

These were petty concerns, in the grand scheme of things, though. The more pressing issue was the complete and utter fucking kink in my 'slowly destroy the Volturi' master plan of mine. My first move was to acquire followers and abilities, which was why I was a little ticked off that Maria was dead. I could have found other means of collecting power, but that was neither here nor there – not anymore, at least.

Everything had changed.

My grudge was against the leaders of the Volturi – Aro, Marcus, and Caius. Mostly Caius, who I wanted to slow cook over a low flame; but that was just my bottled-up, murderous rage talking. This new enemy – the one Aro had probably thought would replace me in his guard – now took precedence. Nadia seemed to have no qualms in killing and assimilating other covens; I had little faith she even planned on keeping vampires a secret.

My guerilla-warfare strategy was completely void at this point.

So far, my family was intact and well – and would be for the foreseeable future. But that could change with a single decision, and I needed to figure out what to do – who to go after and how to go after them. A thought came to me suddenly, and I glanced down again at my flying companion.

"Demetri?" I called. He looked up at me. "Why didn't the Volturi destroy the Romanians?" It was odd that they weren't one of the few who weren't destroyed, but I could see their futures, so they were still alive. They weren't making any concrete decisions; mostly, they were holed up in a mountain region somewhere – there was a lot of snow from what I could see.

"We did try, at first," Demetri replied. "But neither of them have any special abilities that Nadia can utilize, so they were soon forgotten. If Aro ever saw them again, he would probably kill them, but I doubt anyone is still hunting for them."

"How did you figure out Nadia was running the Volturi?" I questioned abruptly, speaking the thought as it occurred to me. "You said almost no one realized what was really happening, so how did you figure it out?"

"Nadia's powers don't work over a distance," Demetri explained. "Chelsea's gift…lingers, but Adam's gift of mind control has a limited range. I am the best tracker they have – or, had, rather – and so it was during one of my tracking assignments that I was able to recognize how differently I behaved and thought outside of the castle."

"Why would you stay, then?" I asked, furrowing my brow. "If you knew this was happening, why did you wait for me to free you?"

"Alec and Jane," he replied, as though it explained it all. And really, it made sense. "My thoughts were suspicious, but not rebellious – though they continue to grow that way as Chelsea's gift fades – and so I was always assigned to work with one or both of the witch twins. They were fiercely loyal and I wouldn't have been able to run from them if I wanted to."

I nodded, but didn't reply or ask another question.

After a few more minutes, we touched down on the balcony outside the hotel room as the sun had begun to fade from the sky. We entered through the sliding-glass door and I removed Angela's invisibility cloak, bringing back our full senses and allowing the scent of sickness to invade our senses.

Demetri followed hesitantly over to Angela's sleeping form, who was radiating heat as she slept cocooned in blankets. On the table beside her was a lukewarm glass of water and an empty bowl, which had contained soup, by the smell of it. I took both the dishes and moved them to the table next to the microwave, since the room didn't come with a kitchen.

"I don't understand," Demetri said as he looked on at Angela.

"Her life was demolished at the hands of the Volturi," I replied. "She and her boyfriend were collected and held in a cattle pen for the hybrid lab in Mexico City."

"This does not explain why you brought her with you," Demetri looked at me. "Does she know?"

"I brought her with me because I knew her – I had met her at Bella's wedding – and because she's a meta-human. Of course she knows about vampires, Demetri; she was abducted by them and she watched her fellow inmates get dragged away one at a time to be eaten."

Demetri's thoughts swirled with accusations, not able to shake his Volturi conditioning. His first thought was to hold me responsible for not disposing of her as soon as I realized she knew vampires existed. His second was of hypocrisy – it was the Volturi who had caused this damage. He wouldn't try to dispose of her with me around protecting her, anyway.

"Meta-human? You mean she is gifted?" Demetri questioned, looking back at the girl.

"Gifted, special, talented, super, meta-human; call it whatever you'd like. Her gift allowed her to survive the filth she was trapped in. She hasn't yet mastered her ability, but I've been helping her."

"What is her gift, if you don't mind me asking?" I chuckled at his question, remembering how useful it had been in sneaking up on the barn-full of vampires.

"You've seen it in action, yourself," I grinned at him. "I'm calling it sensory cloaking, but really, it's just an advanced form of invisibility." The tracker's eyes widened as memories of me appearing out of thin air and disappearing just as fast flashed through his mind.

"Aro would have enjoyed such a prize as her," Demetri shook his head as he leaned in closer, pulling back abruptly. "She is…ill?" His hand hovered a foot away from her skin and I could nearly feel the immense heat he felt through his thoughts.

"Yes," I nodded. "She wanted to become like I was – stronger and faster, to be able to even the odds, even if only slightly."

"I am afraid I don't understand," Demetri stepped back and glanced at me in confusion. "Like you were?"

"Aro has kept much from you," I frowned. "I developed a serum that could…enhance a human's physiology to the point of being nearly superhuman in nature. It was nowhere near the levels of vampires, but I could have easily beaten a shape shifter in human form in a fight as a human, without using any of my acquired abilities."

"How much greater are the enhancements?" Demetri asked, truly interested. I chuckled at his unexpected enthusiasm for my science.

"They have the capability to live forever; like vampires, they do not age. They are not changed so much as to become a separate species, but their strength, speed, stamina, mental processing, and cell regeneration are significantly increased." Demetri didn't say anything else, so I continued.

"When I was still human, I could lift nearly a thousand pounds and run at about…forty miles-per-hour," I paused, remembering all the tweaks and changes I had made in both HLV and its successor, HLV2. "But those were just bonuses; the real advantages were the rate at which I healed and my massive intelligence boost.

"Angela," I nodded at the girl in question, still sleeping. "will be able to heal at a rate that is forty times of normal. Cuts and bruises will fade in an hour – maybe two – and she'll be nearly invulnerable to most diseases. The speed at which she'll be able to process thought will be as fast as any vampire's mind – faster, even." I grinned again at the disbelieving emotions coming off the tracker.

"Impossible," Demetri scoffed.

"No," I said, my grin widening. "She won't be able to multitask like a vampire and she won't have a perfect memory – that's still unchanged – but she'd be able to beat a supercomputer at most calculus equations."

"I will have to see this for myself; it seems a bit fantastic," Demetri said. "May I ask you a question, Ms. Ambrose?" I nodded. "Why did you conceal your identity when you confronted us at that farm?"

"I wanted the Volturi scared and the leaders burned," I answered. "But I wanted to do it slowly. I wanted them to see their guards fall one by one and know that someone was coming for them. I wanted to put the fear into them before they left this world.

"I couldn't do that if Aro knew who I was; he'd go straight for my family. I was dead to them – to everyone – so no one would suspect me; not even the Cullens."

"Surely Alice would have seen your decisions," Demetri countered, mentally recalling the reason for the small hybrid army Aro had collected.

"I'm different," I said. "I'm a vampire, and Alice should be able to see me even more clearly than she could before, but I found a way to block her from viewing my future."

"That is quite impressive," Demetri nodded. "How did you manage to do this without the creation of a hybrid?"

"Purely by accident," I smirked. "Some of my experimentation paid off in bunches."

Demetri wanted to ask more about me, and why my eyes were silver instead of red or gold, but he held his questions back, not wanting to bombard me with an inquisition. I appreciated the thought, and we lapsed into a comfortable silence as Angela's heart beat loudly in the otherwise still room.

"How long until she wakes?" Demetri asked after an hour. My mind went blank at his question as a vision washed over me.

"She will wake up a little after sunrise tomorrow." The tracker nodded and I glanced at his eyes, which were nearly completely black. "You should go hunt before she wakes up; we'll probably be leaving as soon as she's up to it." He nodded, his thirst flaring at the mention of hunting, even as he eyed me with hesitance.

"What shall I hunt?" he asked formally, as though I were his master. I chuckled out loud. I suppose I was his master now.

"Anything but Angela," I replied with a smile in my voice. Demetri nodded, visibly relieved at not being forced into an animal diet. He wasn't sure what my eyes meant in regard to my diet, so he assumed I followed Carlisle's example. How thoughtful of him.

The tracker swiftly opened the door and disappeared into the night, leaving me alone with my new charge.

"How do you feel?" I asked as Angela sat upright in bed, her eyes half closed as the fog of sleep began to fade.

"Horrible," she moaned, putting her head in her hands. "Everything hurts and I can barely keep my eyes open."

"Give yourself a chance to wake up," I rolled my eyes as Demetri chuckled under his breath. The tracker had arrived not long ago, his eyes shining a brilliant red and his thirst nearly gone.

Angela gasped as she caught sight of our new team member, pressing her back up against the head of the bed and flickering out of sight. I sighed and stood up in front of Demetri, whose eyes were wide as he stared at the body indent Angela's transparent body made on the mattress.

"It's alright," I held up my hands in her direction. "He's on our side – down with the Volturi and everything." Angela faded slowly back into sight as she squinted at Demetri. I grimaced as I remembered we still needed to get her some glasses; maybe we could get them when we went back down to Mexico City.

"Where did you find him?" she asked.

"He was a part of the group of Volturi that were planning on destroying a small army of newborn vampires." I answered.

"But I thought you said he was with us," Angela eyed Demetri with pure distrust and suspicion.

"He surrendered, more or less," I moved out of the way, giving her a better view of the red-eyed vampire. "I made sure he was genuine – you know he cannot lie to me." Angela reluctantly nodded and changed the subject, though she still wouldn't fully trust Demetri – I didn't blame her.

"How long am I going to be sick?" Angela asked, her shoulders slumping. I let the vision come, seeing Angela up and active in two days.

"Less than two days," I answered. "Your fever will probably break in ten hours or so, and you'll slowly get stronger." Angela sighed and nodded, letting her eyes close as she rested against the wall.

I got up and refilled her glass I had set down with water out of a bottle. I remembered from somewhere, though I wasn't sure where, that it wasn't entirely safe to drink the water in Mexico. I handed the glass to Angela, who smiled her thanks as she grasped it in her hand and promptly broke it, sending deep cracks up the side and letting water spout out and onto the carpet.

"Oh, no!" Angela exclaimed as I deftly snatched the somehow-still-intact-but-ruined glass from her and returned with a water bottle.

"Don't worry about it," I smirked, holding out the bottle. "You're a lot stronger now, so be mindful of your surroundings, would you?" Angela nodded and looked around the room, mentally running through objects she thought would easily break under her superhuman strength. I laughed.

"We'll find you something heavy to lift when you feel better," I told her and she smiled at me, excited at her new 'superpowers,' as she called them.

"So, what's the plan?" Angela asked as she took a drink of water, eyeing the tracker. "Where do we go next?"

"I'm not sure," I shook my head. "Things have changed, Angela; the Volturi have pretty much been taken over by someone…well, not exactly worse than Aro, but apparently more direct. Entire covens are being wiped out."

"What about-"

"The Cullens are still fine," I interrupted her. "I always keep an eye on them." I turned to Demetri. "How many covens have they hit?"

"The Japanese sided with us willingly, as did the southern African coven," Demetri answered. "The Irish, Mexican, and Egyptian covens were taken by force. The group of newborns you found me with was a separate group Maria had been training. While we were taking care of them, another team was set to assimilate Joham's hybrids."

"What was the next coven to be hit?" I asked, though I already suspected which it would be.

"The Amazons," Demetri answered. "Zafrina's illusionary power is quite disorienting; we were supposed to combine with the group dealing with the hybrids to take them down."

"I'm going after the Amazons, then," I said. "I have to warn them."

A vision hit me, showing smoke streaming from between the dense canopy. Vampires running and fighting, screaming as they were pulled apart. Robes of black could be seen as bare-footed wild vampires dodged and struck back against their attackers.

I clenched my eyes shut and forced the vision to fade.

"I'm going with you," Angela said with determination, sitting up as straight as she could in her condition.

"There's no time," I shook my head and started to pack away what little we had brought with us. "We're going to Henry's, where Demetri will stay with you and make sure the both of you are OK."

"Alright," Angela deflated, feeling how wiped out she still was. "I'll stay with Henry this time, but…wait, are we leaving right now?" Angela seemed to just now realize the backpack we had brought was packed and the HLV2 serum was securely wrapped up inside the hotel's ice bucket. I picked her up, still bundled in the hotel's blankets, and walked to the sliding glass doors.

"Like I said, there's no time," I replied. "The Amazons will be ripped apart by the Volturi if I don't get down there as soon as I can." Angela nodded and closed her eyes, curling up as tightly as she could in my arms as I prepared to leave.

"Follow me," I said over my shoulder to Demetri, as I leaped over the banister and blurred into the thick forest.

End notes: This chapter is slightly shorter than the last one, but it felt like an ending, so I stopped it where I did.

In about one or two more chapters, we'll switch back over to another Ryan Ambrose POV to check in with the Cullens and see how they're taking the situation.

When I'm finished with this story (which could be quite a few more chapters until the end) it will probably be over 100,000 words if I add the first story (Immovable Object) to it. Not bad for my first story arc.