Family Meeting

The Cullens ran as a group through the deep forest, Alice leading the way. Carlisle had just returned after six months in Virginia. The family was eager to hear his report. Likely the ubiquitous government satellites tracked their movements. But at least in the wild they could have a genuinely private conversation. A hundred miles from Forks they separated for an hour to feed, then regathered in the thickest growth they could find.

Carlisle's time away had been a nightmare for Alice. So much of the future had become obscured. And every path she could see ended in eight dead Cullens - or worse. Much worse. The visions had also taken a toll on Edward, whose mind saw everything Alice saw. And Jasper was exhausting himself trying to keep up Alice's spirits - an unusual task given how cheerful she normally was. But now, at last, Carlisle was home. The leader of their family was a lifeline, a light, a sure foundation. He would know what they should do.

"I knew a number of hunters before I was turned," Carlisle began, "and I've interacted with several more in the centuries since then. This Owen Wheeler isn't like any of them. His motives are complicated and obscure. In some ways he just hates us and wants us exterminated. But he's also fascinated by our kind. I don't think he can really imagine a world in which we no longer exist. That's where our opportunity lies, for although his plans are logical, his most basic decisions seem based on emotion. If we can get him to feel what we feel, I think he will spare us."

"I want to meet him," Edward said.

"There's no way he will let you near him," Carlisle replied, "and if you ever did get close enough to hear his thoughts, I'm pretty confident he would kill you. He knows a lot about you, Edward. I'm guessing that after Marcus talked to you, he made some sort of arrangement with Owen. That's the only explanation I can come up with for how he knows so much about us, and for how he was able to kill the Volturi."

"You're really certain it was him?" Emmett asked.

Carlisle nodded. "I am certain. And he hasn't stopped. The amount of venom delivered to my lab likely means he is holding a number of vampires prisoner. Pieces of newborns also keep coming."

"How could he hold vampires captive?" Bella asked, her voice incredulous.

"I think he has at least one of our kind helping him," Carlisle answered.

"Jane," Edward said, exchanging a look with Alice.

"I keep seeing images of her," Alice explained. "She seems bound up with our future, although I can't tell how."

Carlisle frowned. "A Volturi survivor would explain a great deal. But why would she help him? The shadow-feeder helps him, too. I wish we could get you near him, Edward. It would be so helpful to know what he's thinking."

"But you've already figured out what he's thinking," Esme suggested.

"Partially. He has something personal against Bella. Considers her a traitor for choosing to become one of us. But Bella's not his focus. His absolute priority is humans not getting eaten. His assistant, Lucy - she can only consume human blood. It can't be banked, either. They have to get her fresh donations. It's her kind Owen's used to hunting. The shadow-feeders have to eat humans, so his goal has always been extermination.

"But our kind can eat animals, and some of us do. He seems especially impressed with me, frankly. He says I'm too interesting to kill. I can still create new vampires, however - vampires who might choose to feed on humans. He wants to guarantee that we don't reproduce, or at least that our offspring will only consume animals. That's why he's had me researching venom. I finally convinced him that rendering our bite venom-less is not possible. Now he's looking for other options."

"I try to watch him," Alice said. "It's impossible. It must be Lucy."

"She's part of it," Carlisle granted. "But part of it is him. He hasn't made any decisions. He doesn't know what he's going to do. I think he's hoping we'll make up his mind for him. There are a number of choices we could make that would effectively spare him the trouble of making a decision himself. I think that's why he let me come home. He's hoping we'll force his hand, one way or another."

"Maybe he's just afraid of Alice," Bella offered. "If he knows she saved us from the Volturi, then maybe he doesn't want to mess with her."

"Regardless," Carlisle said, "we still have to figure out what to do. One option, of course, is simply to do nothing. We hunker down and wait."

"And go crazy," Edward said. "How is that an option?"

"It's an option because it's what we've been doing."

Rosalie finally spoke up. "We can run," she said.

"And spend the rest of our lives as fugitives," Carlisle replied. "Is that the life we want for Renesmee?"

"At least she'd be free," Rosalie noted.

"Let's attack them," Emmett suggested. "Kill this Owen."

"That's what he's daring us to do," Carlisle explained. "He made no secret of where his offices are. He even had me to his house for dinner one night. Don't you understand? We kill him, or any human for that matter, and they lump us with every other vampire. Besides, is that who we want to be, Emmett? There are people in this gathering who've never killed anyone. Do we want to ruin that? And even if we did kill him, it wouldn't solve anything. Another functionary would take his place - and likely someone not as inclined to be sympathetic toward us."

"Sympathetic," Rosalie snorted.

"Think about it," Carlisle pressed. "Five of us have fed on humans in the past, and the United States has no statute of limitations on murder. You don't like the monitoring, and I understand that. But given our prior deeds and the constant risk we pose, couldn't it be argued that we're getting off light?"

"We steal a nuclear weapon," Jasper declared. "We destroy Washington D.C. That kills Owen plus whoever might replace him, and wipes out his entire agency."

"The government has continuity plans in case the capitol is destroyed," Carlisle said. "To eliminate the federal government for real would require nuking enough sites that the entire country disintegrates. In the end that's no different than building a newborn army and declaring war on modern civilization. Which is the very fear driving Owen. What we need to do is convince him vampires won't do these things."

"Have you ever considered that he might be right?" Edward asked. "Maybe we're not going to go to war against humanity, but others might. If Owen backs our race into a corner, if vampires begin feeling an existential threat, he might cause the disaster he says he's trying to prevent."

"What if we went public?" Esme offered. "We declare our existence to the world. What's stopping us, now that the Volturi are gone? Owen would lose control of the whole situation. We wouldn't have to deal with him anymore."

Carlisle shook his head. "We feared the Volturi so much, it's easy to forget the service they provided. How they kept us all alive. If humanity learned of us, the majority would try to annihilate us. But that wouldn't be the real problem. The real problem would be the minority who would want to become vampires themselves. Powerful people who would want to stay in power. Sick people who would want to be cured. Our kind would multiply exponentially. Humanity really would be destroyed. That's what the Volturi were preventing."

"Can it be reversed?" Bella asked hesitantly. "Can we be turned back? Back into humans?"

"I can't even figure out how to eliminate venom from our bite," Carlisle said. "What you're asking would be much more difficult."

"But if it could be done," Bella pressed, "if every vampire on earth could be rounded up and turned back into humans, surely that would satisfy him. No one would have to die."

"Vampires would still consider that an existential threat," Edward said.

"Exactly," Carlisle replied. "And that's what we really need to decide. What loyalty do we have to ourselves as a species? Do we insist that vampires continue to exist, to reproduce? Or is it enough for us that our family survives? Do we help Owen, or do we fight against him? At the end of the day, whose side are we on?"

Alice had had enough. She glanced at Edward, who nodded. Then she jumped into the middle of the conversation. "You just don't get it," she declared. "Join Owen. Fight Owen. It doesn't matter. We all die. Why can't you see? Why can't you understand? The destruction of the Volturi has set such things in motion...there's no stopping it. Every path's the same. Every path's the same." She began to grow hysterical. Edward and Jasper tried to calm her down. She pushed them away.

"There has to be some choice we're not considering," Edward said. "Something outside the box. If the Volturi were preventing the mutual annihilation of humans and vampires, if they were really that important, then maybe we should take their place. We could enforce the law like they did."

"Owen would never accept a return to the old status quo," Carlisle said.

"So new laws," Bella suggested. "No one eats humans. We force all vampires to follow our lifestyle."

Alice shook her head. "Our kind won't accept that kind of control. They'll fight. Owen wants us to stop eating humans. We don't want to stop eating humans. He pushes. We push back. If only they didn't care! If only the humans would just let us eat them."

"Maybe you can change our tastes," Bella said. "Maybe with enough time you could do it, Carlisle. Alter us. Make it so that we prefer animals. We used to be shadow-feeders, right? So we can change. We can change a lot. Make us change."

Alice collapsed on the ground, desperate. She felt pathetic, a child incapable of making decisions: her visions had always made her decisions for her. But now her power was useless. There was no path to follow. And in her helplessness she suddenly realized Edward was right. There was a choice she had never considered: she could make a choice without using her gift at all.

"This is what he wants," Alice declared, the pieces suddenly clicking into place. "He wants my vision so choked up I can't use it. He wants me to...grow up." But why would Owen care?

"Carlisle," she said. "He has Lucy and Jane. Could he be a collector like Aro?"

"Aro collected pawns," Carlisle said. "He's not interested in pawns."

No, Alice thought. Not pawns. Queens. He wants me to be a queen!

"He wants to collect me," Alice said. "But he doesn't want my gift." He wants me! she thought. He wants me to learn how to function without my gift. He wants me to grow up.

A new path opened in Alice's mind, but it wasn't a vision-path. It was a hope founded on sudden faith in the man who had been leading her these past six months - though she had not known it. Respect burst from her heart for this mysterious hunter who desired her rather than her ability, who wanted her to become something far greater than she had ever been. A human who demanded nothing less than her transformation from a vampire into a goddess.

There was Owen's hate for Bella, though. Nothing could be accomplished until that was dealt with. It was a problem Alice had no idea how to fix. She considered her blind uncertainty, her darkness, her doubt - so many decisions to make based exclusively on experience and wit and love. She couldn't help herself: she smiled. Whatever you're doing to block up the future, Owen Wheeler, please keep doing it!

Alice stood. "Bella and I are going to Virginia," she declared. "We are going to form a new coven. And a human will be our leader."