CHAPTER 11

(I'm) Stranded – The Saints

When one has lived for over a thousand years, there's hardly anything that can surprise them. Solutions to mysteries are always disappointing. There are wars, but those always end the same way. There's inequality. There are revolutions. Culture shifts become de rigueur in a few years. Groundbreaking progress in any field will soon become obsolete. New technology becomes widespread, then outdated within a decade.

Everything new and shiny becomes old and rusty. And when one is an ageless immortal unruled by time, to whom a year is a second and a decade is a minute, the rust tends to settle before the shine could fully come through.

In other words, Demetri is bored.

For what was far too many a time, he was laying on his bed staring at nothing in particular on the ceiling. Now, a vampire can stare like no other creature. Unblinking, unmoving. He's counting time by the tik tik tik of the grandfather clock in the corner. It's older than any human in the world and some vampires, too. It was, in fact, one of the first ones created in the 17th century. He was younger then, a little more than half of his millenium age. He was excited to procure such a lovely item. Just as he was excited to procure a necklace that belonged to Marie Antoinette, and the illuminated manuscript by Franciscan monks in the 1200s. Those two items are now in a trunk, somewhere in the castle. He doesn't care anymore.

The confrontation (if one could call it that) with the Cullens about a decade ago was stimulating for the short few minutes that it lasted. For once in a long time, it really seemed like something interesting will happen. Then it all deflated like a balloon.

He had spent the following days crafting battle plans on how to win.

They could do it. He was certain. The Cullen side had gifts and they had heart, but they had no experience. Battles, supernatural ones especially, are horrifyingly gruesome. The first experience, which it would have been for many on the Cullen side, is always the hardest, overwhelming and frightening. Demetri would not have survived his, if it had not been for Felix. In fact, many comrades did not.

The Volturi knew that the Cullens were gathering allies. They knew because of Demetri and his gift. None of the ones that showed, with the exception of Benjamin, were unknown.

This may have been an advantage, but from everything they have learned since, Benjamin seemed untrained in his abilities. Shielded from others of their kind by Amun, he had even less experience fighting than the Cullens who had at the least fought against Victoria's newborn army.

Afton can take him. Just be sure to shield him from the mind-reader.

The mind reader himself was never a match for Felix during that embarrassingly melodramatic visit to Volterra, even with his gift.

Demetri himself can take out Zafrina. Her illusion won't matter against his tracking gift. He can close his eyes and find in his mind where everyone is standing exactly. It was, in fact, his first training with his gift when he was still with Amun.

Jane can take out Kate.

Anyone can take out Bella, who had even less control over her shield. And it did not protect her from a physical assault. She had a newborn's strength, but it was matched with a newborn's recklessness. And no fight training. Nor the personality for ruthless violence.

And without the shield, Alec's gift will come into play.

Jasper's experience was primarily from newborn wars. Big deal. The Volturi had fought newborn wars, lycan wars, vampire wars (both talented and untalented), immortal children wars… Whatever strategy Jasper could think of, they had already done multiple times, perfected, mastered, and dismissed. They had lost and won more battles than the former Texan major had years. In fact, the strategy of using newborns in vampire warfare was started by the Volturi.

It wasn't as if they were humans that could forget war strategies they had used or faced. They didn't lose stamina or strength or agility even if they had not fought close combat in centuries.

They could have brought humans with them. Like how the Romanians, in one of their multiple wars, used blood from human slaves to scatter and decimate the then Volturi army. The Volturi, the small force that remained afterwards, began picking the Romanians off. As soon as one separated from the rest, Demetri's gift would alert him. There would be an ambush to take them out. Tedious and time-consuming, but effective. They could have used either of those strategies on the Cullens and their allies.

Or broken apart the alliance. Chelsea's specialty. As soon as the allies were no longer under Bella's shield, if she were killed or incapacitated in some way, possibly from watching her mate killed, the others can be brought to heel. That was how they defeated the Chinese, hundreds of years before Demetri's human birth. It was a deathless battle. The deaths came after victory was achieved, when the leaders were executed by their own subordinates whose loyalties had been turned at Chelsea's bidding.

Alice's sight is crippled by the wolves.

The wolves...

They were perhaps the only wild card in the chess game that Demetri played in his mind. Unlike Caius, whom Demetri despised, he never made the mistake of underestimating supernatural creatures of another kind.

Lycans were immune to most psychic gifts. At least they were to Demetri's, Alec's, Jane's, Aro's, and Chelsea's. They had to be hunted, fought, and killed the hard way. The hard way. Thankfully, they were rarely in large groups. But much of what Demetri knew about battle strategies came from the lycan war, which was the longest war the Volturi had ever fought, flaring intermittently over the course of seven centuries.

It would seem that these Quileute wolves were not exactly the same. They had control over their transformation. They retained their human consciousness even in their animal form. Demetri could track them in his mind, unclear, but they were there. They didn't get a chance to test the others' abilities on them, but they may very well be vulnerable to them as well, just not as much as vampires.

So much about them was a mystery.

Of course, the Volturi had already known about the tribe. Aro pulled that piece of knowledge from Edward's mind during the latter's pathetic suicide attempt. The Volturi had resolved then that the tribe would be studied and observed. This was before the Cullens claimed them as allies. Now Aro wants to collect them as soon as possible.

Demetri could not understand why there had been no action taken against the rebels. Certainly, they hadn't been the first and only group of upstarts that the Volturi had encountered in its three thousand five hundred years of existence. Why the hesitation?

He couldn't fathom. The only thing for it is to continue to plan. And research.

He was the best tracker in the world. His gift had a lot to do with it, yes. But he was also persistent in researching his targets. He can predict all their possible decisions while they are still making up their minds.

So when one of their enemies suddenly disappeared on his radar, he had to find out why.

NOTE:

I am so sorry for taking this long to introduce Demetri to the story. I really wanted Leah's state of mind, where she and the others are, to be on solid ground first. I promise all the themes I introduced (Sue, Charlie, Bella, Renesmee) will be revisited. There's a purpose to them in this story. I have the outline of this story planned out. I have up to Chapter 17 written (plus about three chapters that are 'floating' because they don't belong anywhere yet). I like to stay ahead so I can read back and edit multiple times as I go along. I hope you will stick with me despite the (very) slow burn.

Thank you for reading! Thank you for all the encouraging words and reviews! I LOVE reading your comments, and I'm always happy when I see a new one :)