Authors Note: Hey guys. So, I almost had a total break down a few days ago. Why, you ask? My laptop has a virus or something screwed up with it. I didn't have ANY of my files backed up, which was my mistake . . . so when EVERYTHING started to disappear I FLIPPED.

But it was okay, because I did a system recovery and got all the important stuff I really needed back, which is why you have a story that will thankfully be finished. If I were to have lost everything, I really don't know if I would have been capable of re-writing and such.

Yeah, so continue.

Chapter Twenty Four

Mourned

To say all hell broke loose after that would be . . . wrong. In fact, everyone remained completely silent after the doctor's announcement. It didn't seem like any of us could find the words to respond. Eventually someone was going to have to say something, though. It might as well have been me.

"You're trying to say that . . . that Aunt Val . . . isn't really my aunt after all? That it's the other way around?" I inquired monotonously, loosely summarizing what he had just proposed. It was like I had two ends of a wire, and they just wouldn't fuse back together to get the current running smoothly again.

"Biologically, yes. We can do more extensive DNA testing . . . but I honestly don't think it's going to make a difference. You aren't Rebecca Ride's daughter. You're Valencia Martinez's," Dr. Lawrence said, sounding completely and genuinely truthful.

This wasn't a joke. Nobody was kidding here.

"There has to be . . . some mistake," Mom, or Aunt Rebecca, I suppose, insisted breathlessly. She looked like she had been hit by a two ton block of bricks; pale and swaying like she was dizzy. To further prove this she stumbled to the nearest chair, sinking into it like her legs had turned to jelly and couldn't hold her weight any longer.

"I . . . I guess we do have the same eyes," I muttered, my voice cracking slightly as I looked at Dr. Valencia Martinez . . . my mother.

With those words tears welled up in her said eyes, turning the dark brown a puddle of glistening moisture. Her hand found mine once more, gripping it tightly in hers. I could feel her fingers shaking as the weight of the situation finally began to crash around us.

Behind her I could see my not-so-much-mother's shoulders beginning to quake, her head buried in the safe confines of her hands. If I squinted close enough I could probably see the droplets of tears starting to climb through the cracks in her fingers.

Even I was finding it hard not to become overly emotional in light of this recent feat. I mean, it couldn't be possible. Maybe there had been a mistake. You don't just randomly find out you've been calling the wrong sister your mother for your entire life. How was it even possible?

I didn't realize I had said the last part out loud until Valencia's voice sprung up in answer.

"Did anyone ever tell you Rebecca and I were pregnant at the same time?" she asked, letting go of my hand in favor of planting herself in a comforting, protective stance over her younger sister. She draped an arm over Rebecca's shoulder, hugging her.

I shook my head. That was a negative.

"Well we were. The babies were even due on the same day. Nobody thought it would actually work out that way, but we both went into labor and were admitted into the hospital within a few hours of each other. It was nothing short of a miracle."

I bit down on my lip, wringing my hands slightly. I glared down at my intertwined fingers, unable to look anywhere else. Vaguely I could sense Fang hovering nearby, ready to step in if I needed him.

"You and your cousin were delivered within minutes of each other. About three, to be exact, if I remember correctly." At the end of this claim, I could hear Rebecca humming in agreement, the soft hiccuping of her silent sobs beginning to fade.

"That doesn't make any sense, though. Ella's younger than me, so you didn't raise a daughter my age."

There was a beat of solemn silence, then: "Yes she did," Rebecca said, her voice sounding strangled and waterlogged. "Well, she didn't raise a daughter."

"Then what did she do?"

"The baby identified as mine seemed perfectly healthy at birth . . . but they discovered she had some breathing problems almost immediately after. They put her on a machine for the first few days, but her lungs just weren't . . . they weren't equipped for living on her own." I could tell she was getting choked up, but I didn't know what to do about it. I was stuck, strapped to this hospital bed while my family mourned.

"What happened to her?" I was almost afraid to ask, but I knew it had to be done.

"She passed away on the fourth day. There was nothing anyone could have done. The little thing just wasn't ready to be brought into the world. On the outside, yes . . . but on the inside, she just hadn't grown enough."

It took me until the first tear leaked out of the corner of my eye to realize the source of my blurred vision. After that it was like a flood gate had opened, and the tears ran endlessly; dripping in a torrent down my face.

Fang was instantly at my side, pushing my head against his shoulder as his arms wrapped tightly around me. My silent cries were lost even more in the muffle of fabric the corner of his black, cotton shirt provided. I clung to it, my nails tearing into the cloth.

"Except it wasn't your baby," Rebecca spoke shakily, taking deep, heaving breaths between each word. "Somewhere along the way they got mixed up. You should have been taking home a clean, healthy infant. Instead you mourned the loss of a child while I basked in the life of mine. But it was my baby. It was my baby that died. Not yours."

They both dissolved into tears then, and there was nothing I could do but cry harder. Cry for the family I had lost. Cry for the past I could have had. Cry for the uncertainty of the future now that this secret had been unlocked and brought into the open.

"I stole everything from you," Rebecca sobbed.

"No. No. Don't you ever think that," Valencia insisted vehemently, her voice thick with tears. "This wasn't your fault. You couldn't have possibly had any control over it. Neither of us could. It just happened."

It just happened. Didn't everything? Things . . . they just happened. You didn't have any control over them. The universe and fate and destiny and all the nonsense . . . they worked in ways they wanted to work. No actions or feelings on our part could influence that in the end.

It just happens.

"So . . . Rebecca isn't my mother." Not a question. Just a fact. A small, simple fact.

"No. No, Max. I am," Valencia said, smiling through the liquid still drizzling over her chin.

"And Jeb . . . he isn't my father?"

"God, I'd hope not," Rebecca gave a snorting laugh, dabbing at the corner of her eye with a tissue she had magically conjured up.

"Angel and Gazzy . . . they . . . they aren't my brother and sister then?" This had the full potential to knock me right back into hysterics again. To even so much as consider those two children anything other than my siblings almost made me physically sick to the stomach.

"I . . . no. Not biologically."

I pressed the heels of my palms into my eyes, sighing repeatedly; as if that would stop the conundrum of emotions whirling inside me. Everything, which was previously so black and white, was suddenly transforming into a kaleidoscope of colors; and all it was doing was blinding me.

Blinding me to everything.

- }{ -

Facing Angel and Gazzy after this whole ordeal was going to be the hardest part, but I knew I was going to have to do it eventually. Might as well get it over with as quickly and as painlessly as possible.

I found I was truly at a loss of words though, sitting in front of the two curly, blond-headed siblings. The boy and girl I had risked my life for countless times, and would always do so for. Yet the mirror looks of sadness and bewildered confusion on their faces was enough to stop me dead in my tracks.

"So I'm assuming Aunt Va- I mean . . . my mom, told you guys?" I asked, collapsing heavily onto the chair adjacent to the couch. Their eyes followed me, wide open and endlessly blue. I had practically raised them, and now somebody was trying to tell me they were just my cousins? No. I wouldn't settle for that.

Their nods met my words.

"And how do you . . . feel . . . about that?" What was I even saying?

They glanced at each other, passing some brother and sister sort of telepathy between them. I observed closely, waiting for one of them to break the silence that had settled over our little trio. It took a few minutes, but Angel finally spoke up, her voice small and quivering.

"You aren't really our sister." She sounded so wilted and close to tears. It broke my heart, in a totally cliche way.

Immediately I felt myself standing, taking a few steps until I was at the edge of the couch. I kneeled in front of them, taking one of their hands in each of my own.

"Don't ever think that, okay?" I said sternly, narrowing my eyes at them. "You will always be my siblings, no matter what some stupid doctor says. What does DNA really mean? We may not be directly related by blood, but that means nothing. Do you think I'm just going to give up on you guys after everything we've been through?"

"But won't you kind of, I don't know, love us less then?" Gazzy inquired, bowing his head sheepishly. I disentangled the hand that was holding his, smacking his cranium to the side lightly. He and Angel laughed a bit, and I couldn't help but smile.

"Of course not. In fact, I love you two more than ever. None of this matters. It's the past, and what's to come in the future that counts. I don't care what my blood says. I don't listen to anybody but myself," I joked, moving to sit in between them. "And what I'm saying is you are my brother and sister, just like you've always been, and always will be. That I can promise you."

Our bonding moment was broken by the entrance of Ella, the space around her eyes red and barely dried tear tracks still winding down her cheeks. The grin on her face and utter look of elation told that they were for a happy reason, though.

"Can you guys give us a minute?" I asked Angel and Gazzy, shooing them from the room. They scampered away, probably going to go involve themselves into some sort of trouble.

After that I turned to face Ella, giving her a tender smile as she stared with a slight look of awe and wonder at me.

"You're my sister," she whispered, her lips stretching up even more at the sound of it out loud.

"It appears that way, yeah."

"I've always wanted you to be my sister . . . and now you are," she murmured, shaking her head like it was completely incredible and unbelievable; and please oh please can somebody just pinch her now before she got too used to the idea?

"I don't know why you'd want that. In case you didn't notice, I'm a little bossy and controlling," I pointed out.

"Yeah," she said with a shrug, rubbing at her eyes. "But I like it that way."

It was about then that she noticed the bag in the corner, and realized there was something going on in this situation that she had yet to learn. My smile lessened at her inquiring look, turning into a minute frown. Her expression soon followed suit.

"You're leaving, aren't you?" she demanded, though she didn't look much surprised, like it was to be expected.

"Yeah, I am."

"Why?" She looked sort of defeated, like she knew it was no use to argue. Once I made my mind up on something, you'd be hard pressed to get me to change it.

"I just found out the mother who put me through hell for years and then managed to bounce back into a semblance of normal isn't actually my mother. That my aunt, who apparently isn't my aunt after all, is. I can manage a lot of things, but this is something I need a little time and space to cope with."

"So where are you going, then?" she asked with a sigh, running a hand through her dark hair.

"Back to New York."

"What about Fang?" Wasn't that the golden question?

"Fang and I . . . we'll work things out."

She smiled sadly, her eyes wide and luminous. "So that's it then? You're just going to pack up all your things and go back?

"Yeah, pretty much," I acknowledged with a nod.

"I'm going to miss you."

I was going to miss her, too. I was going to miss everybody, but there were some decisions that needed to be made, no matter how hard their conclusions were.