Chapter Thirteen

Annie's POV (This is a first, so bare with me.)

Mommy kept making a fuss over how sick Esperanza, one of Auntie Ella's new babies, was but I knew they would be okay. I knew this for a fact and I would swear on my imprinter's life that it was the truth. I had seen it, you see.

I have a unique gift that I've kept hidden from as many family members as possible; not even Max and Fang knew and they were my parents for crying out loud. Angel knew about it because she was better at breaking through mind berriers than Two-Two or even Edward. My Will knew, but that was because I couldn't keep a secret from him (and I wouldn't want to anyways). Alice was the only one who even guessed at what I could do, and that was only because two weeks ago she caught me using my power.

Flashback

I was standing in the Ride Room, as the bedroom that Max and Fang picked out for our minature family Flock is called, bored out of my mind when I felt a headache coming on. Uh-oh.

See, my headaches are sort of like Max's (and my birth mother, Max II's) brain explosion headaches, only completely different at the same time. Whereas they get pictures of things that the School wanted them to see in order to A) save the world or B) track the Flock, my headaches lead to something much, much different. It always starts the same, a dull pain in the back of my eyes; then it spreads forwards on to my forehead until it finally envelopes my whole head in an unbearable pain.

Then the real fun begins. As much as I hate the pain of the headaches, if I didn't have them, I wouldn't get to use my power. And that would kill me.

Alice walked in on me just as I was about to pass out. I knew she would call for help if I didn't stop her so a second before I lost consciousness, I looked her straight in the eye and said, "vision."

That instantly calmed her nerves, I could tell. And when I came to later, she was by my side, looking down at me hopefully.

"So, what did you see?" She asked excitedly. "How often do you get visions? Did that hurt? Have you always gotten visions or is this your first one?"

I looked up at her from my innocent eight year old eyes and smiled weakly. I was trying to get my body back to normal. My throat was burning, my lungs were working in overdrive, and my heart was beating like crazy, but I was used to this.

"Annie, speak to me." Alice said at last when I made no attempt to answer her questions.

I held up my pointer finger in a 'wait a second' motion and the dark haired pixie nodded half-impatiently. I could tell that she was used to getting her way quickly or already knowing what was going to happen due to a vision (which she could barely see wolves or experiments in anymore so she was blind 70% of the time now) and this was bugging her to not be in on the loop.

When my breathing steadied and the room stopped spinning, I looked up at her again. This time, I forced my stiff voice to speak. "I saw them." I said quietly, half in awe, half scared.

"Saw who? The Volturi? The School?" Alice said with panic in her high soprano voice, but I just shook my head.

"I need to go lie down." I said weakly, ignoring her questions. Using my power always drained me like nothing else.

"Just tell me what you saw." Alice said desperately. I knew it had been a while since she had had an important vision since we came to live with the Cullens, but I just didn't have the energy to explain how my power worked or what I saw.

"I saw my parents." I lied, hoping she would just think I was tired or sick and making the whole vision thing up.

She bought it though and that was the last Alice asked about my so-called vision. When I woke up from my nap, Max was checking my temperature and Angel was on the other side of the room monitoring my thoughts with a half grin. 'I know you have a power.' She thought to me smugly, but I ignored her.

"You feeling okay, sweetie?" Mommy asked gently. It was hard to picture her as the kick-butt, back-talking teenager who took down the School and saved the world when she was talking to me or Arian, or even Angel, her "baby," for that matter.

"I was just tired, Mommy. Sorry I lied to Auntie Alice." I said quietly, not sure how much she had been informed. "It's been a long week and I'm just not used to not sleeping all night." I looked away at this; I had been having nightmares about how my birth parents died for some time now and Max knew better than to bring it up.

"It's alright, Annie. You rest, we were all heading to La Push to visit with the Cullen-Blacks, but I can stay here if you want me to?" Mommy asked senserly.

"I'll be fine." I said to ease her fears. "I promise."

"Ella is on bedrest in the next room if you get too bored." She said with a smile as she ushered Angel out the door with her. I listened until I heard all of the cars pull out of the driveway before I made any attempt to leave the comfort of my warm twin sized bed. But I needed to talk to Ella, and soon.

I pulled my throw blanket on the ground behind me as I made my way to the room next door. Sure enough, Ella was propped up in bed, her round pregnant stomach unable to be hidden beneath the blankets she was bundled in.

"Hey, Auntie Ella." I said, standing in her doorway awkwardly.

"Come on in here, Annie." Ella said with a big smile. Though she was stressed from being close to her delivery date, she tried not to show it as she patted the small empty space next to her on her bed. "Collin stepped out to get me some Animal Crackers and chocolate pudding, but he won't mind if you keep me company until then." She said sweetly, her eyes twitching as she winked at me climbing on her bed. "I've been craving them like nothing other."

"Ella...I have something to tell you." I said in a whisper, half hoping that she didn't hear me so I wouldn't have to actually tell her what I knew.

"Uh-oh," she teased, "this must be serious if you didn't call me 'Auntie.'" Her laughter turned to concern when she noticed the tears streaming down my face though.

"Shhh, honey, it's okay. Whatever is wrong, it can be fixed." She said gently, reminding me of Max.

"No-oo it ca-an't." I blubbered into my throw blanket. "I had a vision of the babies."

"Babies? So I deliver them both?" Ella asked with a grin, still not understanding that something was truly wrong. "I didn't know you had visions, Annie, that's great."

"They're headache visions, kinda like Max's," I explained, trying to control my sobbing. "But it wasn't a good one."

"What happens to my babies?" Ella said, finally realizing that I was being serious.

"My vision started when the twins were celebrating their thirteenth birthday. A boy and a girl, who we call Alex and Hope by that time." I explained. "The Flock was there and the Cullens and all the wolves and Collin looked so proud, but he was sad too." I said in a rush of words.

That made Ella frown. I knew from being an imprint that it didn't make us feel good when our wolves were upset or sad or anything like that.

I took a deep breath before I said the next part, "He was sad...because you weren't there."

"Where was I?" She asked, truly worried now. I could see the realization in her eyes though.

Collin walked through the door then and I panicked. I jumped off of Ella's bed and ran straight to my room and locked the door. I refused to come out even when the rest of my family came home.

End Flashback

I just didn't have the guts to tell them what I knew and I was a coward but I don't have the guts now, either. I didn't want to tell them that I knew without a shadow of a doubt that Auntie Ella wasn't going to see her kids grow up because she would already be dead by then. She wasn't going to make it through the next day.