Foreword: So, to explain a bit about the origin of this fic, I recently stumbled upon the Twilight movie (Eclipse) by chance, where Jasper talks to Bella about his Confederate past, his involvement in the vampire wars in the South, and plays the role of a mentor for the Cullens/the Quileutes by teaching them to fight the newborns. I didn't have a very precise memory of the Twilight books (read once about ten years ago), but it seemed to me that Jasper's past was much more detailed in them, and that he and Alice were nonetheless the characters with the most interesting and original background in the saga. It made me want to reread the books. After rereading the book with the army of newborns (Eclipse), indeed, Jasper's past and his encounter with Alice are a bit more detailed and highlighted, but it's undeniable that it remains very light in terms of the reactions of the main character/narrator (Bella, of course :p) who, apart from a little nightmare featuring Jasper, has no relevant thoughts/questions about everything that has been told to her.
Anyway, I don't know exactly why, but I got stuck on this detail, which led me to read a bunch of fanfictions - something I hadn't done in a very long time - centered around Jasper and Alice (clearly the couple I find most sympathetic in the fandom), and I came across some gems that gave me food for thought (especially Tales of Year: 1950 by Jessica314; The History of Alice by LyricalTwilight, and most of the Jalice fics by WingsofTheDamned). There are very few fanfictions dealing with this aspect of the saga, and I haven't written anything in a very long time.I wrote this text a few months ago (I believe I started drafting it at the end of September), but I was waiting to have it corrected before publishing it, as I felt a bit rusty in writing. Anyway, all of this made me want to write my own version of Alice and Jasper's arrival at the Cullens (and a bit more...): here is the emergence of this fic that will cover the main highlights of Jasper and Alice's early years with the Cullens. This story should end with their marriage. Enjoy reading ;)"
Beta: Many thanks to KillerNinjaPanda for their careful proofreading of this text!
"You always get exaggerated notions about things you don't know anything about." The Stranger - Albert Camus
It was a hot and sunny afternoon, and the Cullens were scattered throughout the various rooms of the mansion, going about their activities, when they felt them approaching.
The scent of two unknown vampires nearby hit them, and they all emerged at once onto the patio to meet their visitors. Visits from unknown nomads were rare but always a more anxious than entertaining moment in their immortal existence, as some of their kind could be impulsive and aggressive towards their unique clan. Carlisle made a brief denial gesture to answer Rosalie's stiff question and positioned himself protectively in front of Esme. No, he definitely did not recognize the smell of the strangers.
A deep growl escaped from Emmett, and Edward's entire body tensed. At the edge of the forest, less than a kilometer to the North, stood two vampires, motionless, offering a striking contrast. The girl was tiny, less than five feet, perfectly relaxed with a warm smile illuminating her delicate features. She was very beautiful, like all the immortal women he had met, but she had a peculiar physique that he did not think was common for female representatives of her kind: she was young, had a gentle and confident expression completely out of place on the face of a nomad in unknown territory. She had a delicate silhouette, extremely slender, all angles, with short jet-black hair falling into wild strands. She wore a pale blue dress, a bit too big for her, giving her an ethereal look, and she seemed to overflow with joyful energy. One could believe in the embodiment of a magical and benevolent creature straight out of the imagination of children's fairy tale authors: a nymph, a sprite, or a Seelie from Gaelic folklore. And above all, what disturbed Edward the most, she had large golden eyes that sparkled with amusement as she repeated in her mind some phrases clearly meant for him.
"I know you can hear me. Nice to meet you, Edward. This is Jasper, and I'm Alice. We're delighted to meet you, and we have no bad intentions. Everything will be fine. Don't be so nervous!"
The voice in his head was clear, singing, and high-pitched. And her mind seemed strangely open and joyful: besides the repeated words, he perceived strange flashes that made no sense, depicting the two nomads within the Cullens' home. Sitting on the couch and chatting with a smiling Carlisle... Esme offering clothes to the girl and showing her around the house... the girl leaning against his piano, watching him play... Rosalie running her hand through the stranger's hair affectionately as he read sprawled on the garage floor while she worked on the Chevrolet's engine... The images in Alice's mind were all the more unsettling as they were surprisingly accurate: she did not imagine random interactions in any living room or any house. The rooms, the objects, the arrangement of the spaces, the cars in the garage... everything was in the right place as if the girl had lived through these scenes and had a precise memory of them. None of it made sense, and Edward felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand as he tried to focus his attention on the man's mind without success.
Already, he could hear his family's thoughts bursting in all directions, merging into a messy jumble of worried questions and reflections.
"Who are they? [...] My God... the scars... [...] They have golden eyes... vegetarians [...] Carlisle looks surprised... do they know Eleazar? [...] We should be cautious... those marks... it's not normal, he's dangerous [...] How old is this girl? [...] I can't see her face well from here, is she a teenager? [...] What do they want? [...] Who is this guy? [...] They are only two, and the woman looks fragile, but this man... his scars."
If the fairy-like woman was the most astonishing vampire he had ever encountered, appearing remarkably frail and harmless, the man by her side was undoubtedly the most frightening vampire he had ever seen: he was very thin and tall, taller than Carlisle and all the other nomads they had met, just a bit shorter than Emmett. He had a much less broad build but seemed infinitely more threatening. Something in his demeanor screamed danger. His expression was not aggressive, his teeth were not bared, he did not growl, and he did not have an agitated posture as other vampires feeling outnumbered might have. No. His face was completely expressionless, and he seemed perfectly calm, hands clasped behind his back, frozen like a statue and towering at his full height, assessing them all. His ochre eyes distinctly leaned towards gold and swept them with a cold and piercing gaze, while the rest of his expression was strangely composed. His medium-length blond hair cascaded in thick curls under his jaw and had the same coppery highlights as his eyes. One could guess from his fine and perfect features that even as a human, he must have been of striking beauty. He wore a dirty, worn-out shirt buttoned up to the collar and a long, worn gray wool coat, revealing only a small part of his neck.
The little that was visible was enough to awaken the instincts of the entire Cullen clan and put them on edge. Silver scars... bite marks, they all realized in a collective shiver, crisscrossed all the visible skin from the lower part of his chin to the base of his throat. His neck was so mutilated where the shirt collar ended that Edward involuntarily took a slight step back as the question of "what was hidden under the clothes" crossed several minds.
Carlisle questioned him silently.
"I have never met a vampire with these kinds of wounds, Edward. He must have been horribly tortured or engaged in dozens of battles to get so many marks caused by venom. Perhaps a vampire who survived the wars in South America or the Viking invasions of the 9th century. Do you know if he has been a vegetarian for a long time? Do he and his companion have bad intentions?"
Even though his father tried to moderate his enthusiasm, apparently skeptical of the man's appearance, Edward could read in the background intrigued and optimistic thoughts about this curious couple of strangers who apparently shared the same dietary habits as them. Carlisle's insatiable curiosity, combined with his belief in the redemption possibilities of those of his kind, was his greatest weakness: apart from the Denali clan, he had never met other vegetarian vampires, and his nomad friends judged their lifestyle with disdainful indulgence, refusing to spend more than ten minutes of conversation per century on it. Meeting not one but two vampires, one so visibly marked by a brutal past, who had chosen to feed on animals long enough for their eyes to turn gold, was unexpected and triggered a wave of happy excitement in Carlisle, who barely restrained himself from imprudently approaching them to drown them in a flood of questions.
"I don't know, Carlisle" Edward murmured in a tense voice. "They know I'm a mind reader; the girl knows my name. She says their names are Alice and Jasper, and they're happy to meet us. She doesn't seem hostile, but some images I see in her mind don't make sense, and she seems to know the exact layout of the rooms in our house, as if she had seen it and they had already stayed there. She must have some kind of power, but I don't understand what it is. The man shields his thoughts in a very... effective way. Perhaps she also shields them in a more subtle way, causing everything I perceive to be confusing."
Above all, it was their apparent knowledge of his gift that made Edward suspicious. If, between incomprehensible flashes, a certain Alice continued to repeat, like a mantra, that she was happy to meet them and that everything would be fine, Jasper's mind was as unreadable as his expression. Edward had to focus to read the man's thoughts, which were covered in a kind of thick fog as if he had tried to lock them. It wasn't the first time Edward faced someone trying to conceal their thoughts—Rosalie regularly made it a point to block her gift as long as possible to tease him—and he usually managed to pass through such a "barrier" by concentrating.
However, focusing did not help unravel the current situation. The thoughts hidden behind the fog seemed strangely erratic, a mixture of Spanish and a language he had never heard before. The few Spanish terms submerged in the curious, deep, and melodious dialect—perhaps a kind of Native American jargon—some consonances sounding like the terms the Quileutes used among themselves when they had encountered them in 1936, did not allow him to have the slightest idea of what the nomad had in mind. The use of Spanish, combined with the myriad of scars, tended to validate his father's assumption that the boy was a survivor of the Southern wars. Definitely dangerous.
"I think he comes from the South, Carlisle, but I can't understand his thoughts."
As if they had decided to end the suspense, the two strangers exchanged a brief glance. The man nodded, seeming to have finished assessing them, and they began to approach at an almost human speed. The boy had taken the girl's hand and stood protectively beside her, his tall figure ready to leap at the slightest sign of danger. The man's hands, now visible, were less scarred than his neck but still cruelly marked, silver traces gleaming ominously under the zenith sun. It was as if hundreds of vampires had tried to tear him apart and had failed. The alarm echoed again in their minds, especially in Carlisle's, Rosalie's, and Edward's, but Carlisle and Edward immediately regained their composure, an strange sense of trust invading them. The strangers were only two, and they were five on their own domain. No matter how violent the nomad was, he couldn't face them all while protecting his delicate companion. The combination of Emmett's strength and Edward's speed alone would be enough to easily master them. There was no need to be so worried. They could calm down. Only Rosalie's mind remained tumultuous, filled with mistrust and defiance toward this intrusion onto their property by two strangers who seemed to know too much about them.
When they were less than a hundred meters from the patio, they stopped again. The girl gave them a happy smile and waved her hand in a very human way, while the man bowed politely towards Carlisle and Esme. Edward could feel his family's thoughts clearing even more in the face of the apparent civility of the couple. There was no visible danger; a wave of serenity seized them—they could relax. Even Rosalie's anxiety became a bit less intense.
"Jasper Whitlock, sorry for the intrusion on your territory, Ma'am, Sir." A rough Southern accent rolled off his tongue as his voice sounded strangely gentle for someone so imposing, and his humble posture suddenly made him appear younger.
"My name is Alice, and I am really happy to finally meet all of you, Dr. Cullen!" The girl exclaimed with a melodious voice.
Now that they could observe their faces more closely, they could see that the girl, although young, did not seem to be a teenager, and the boy was younger than the conquering attitude he had displayed earlier when he eyed them from the edge of the forest. He couldn't be more than twenty.
"Carlisle Cullen, delighted. This is my companion, Esme, and my three children, Edward, Rosalie, and Emmett. Although you seem to know a lot about us, I'm afraid I have no idea who you are. Are you acquaintances of our friends from the Denali clan? I have never had the pleasure of meeting other vampires who do not feed on humans."
Carlisle smiled casually at the strangers, but Edward could hear the suspicion in his thoughts. Eleazar would never have sent two nomads to their lands without informing them beforehand; his father advocated deceit to know the truth, offering false openings to allow them the opportunity to lie and assess whether they were trustworthy or not.
"No, we have never met your friends, even though we know they are also vegetarians and live in a snowy place," replied Alice lightly. "Thanks to my gift, I know a lot about you and your family. I've been waiting for this for almost thirty years, years of observing you. I was so eager to meet you!"
She chuckled lightly, and Edward saw in her mind that she was holding back from rushing to Carlisle to embrace him. A flash briefly blinked in the girl's mind; her eyes seemed to cloud as if she couldn't see them anymore, and Edward was amazed to see the upcoming events unfold with a delay of a few seconds.
"Alice..." there was a warning in her companion's tone, and he abruptly positioned himself between her and the Cullens, hiding her from their view. A low growl escaped him, his eyes becoming dark and wild, while Rosalie emitted a threatening hiss in their direction.
"Years of observing us... what is that supposed to mean?" Rosalie spat out her question in what sounded like the growl of a wounded lioness, and Emmett jumped by her side at inhuman speed, ready to pounce on the nomad at the slightest sign of aggression.
"Rosalie, calm down. Emmett," Carlisle snapped in his coldest tone.
Jasper still stood between the clan and his companion, his body stretched to the extreme, rigid, his eyes shining with a murderous gleam and fixed on Carlisle, a speculative expression on his face. What he found finally seemed to satisfy him, and his shoulders relaxed a bit as he let his arms. His voice was low, and a thick Texan accent was now unmistakable. His tone was strangely convincing, as if pure sincerity enveloped each of his words.
"We warn't tryin' to spy on y'all. We ain't lookin' for no fight. Please, I just ask you to let us explain. We mean y'all no harm; she didn't consciously watch you, her gift is..."
"She has a precognitive ability; she literally sees the future" Edward breathed out, partly incredulous, partly amazed.
"Exactly!" Alice reappeared in a flash from behind Jasper's back and seemed nervous for less than a quarter of a second, shaking her head and firmly taking her companion's hand in a comforting gesture. She chose to ignore the tension that had erupted a few seconds earlier, her eyes sharp, and she gave Edward a sincere smile.
"Precognition?"Carlisle's tone was cautious.
"Are you sure about that, Edward? Even in my time in Volterra, I've never heard of a vampire having this kind of gift."
"Absolutely."
He had seen the slight clash between Rosalie and the nomad occur exactly the same way a few moments before it actually happened in Alice's mind. Like an echo. It was the most fascinating power he had ever witnessed.
"Not convinced, huh? I know, Carlisle, think of the first three questions you'd like to ask me, and I'll answer them as best as I can!"
Seeing that Carlisle was about to speak, Jasper vaguely raised the hand that wasn't holding his companion's, as if to stop him. He looked a bit amused, the corners of his mouth lifting in a half-lazy smile, but his eyes remained cold, and his posture remained rigid despite his false nonchalance.
"I'm afraid the fortune-telling session will be less convincing if you ask your questions out loud, sir."
Carlisle had a slight incredulous smile but nodded his head and seemed to think for a few moments before gazing at the stranger with curiosity. Alice's gaze was again absent, her eyes staring into nothingness. After a few minutes of silence, during which Edward let out an admiring whistle, her eyes lit up again, and she gave Carlisle a mischievous smile.
"Her gift is real, and it's astonishing to see," Edward whispered, shaking his head.
"So, the first question, which is actually a double question: where do we come from, and what is our age? I can't give you my exact age or birthplace since I have no memory of my human life, but I think I'm around eighteen or nineteen years old. As for the location, I woke up as a vampire in a forest near Biloxi in 1920. Jasper, as you might have guessed from his charming accent, comes from a village near Houston, Texas. He's nineteen and was transformed in 1863."
Alice smiled calmly at Carlisle, who observed her with interest.
"Your choice for the second question would have changed because of my answer to your first one. You would have asked me what I mean when I say I have no memory of my human life, and you would have wanted to know why my creator didn't give me any details about what my life was like before the bite. I really know nothing about my life as a human, and I don't know who my creator is. I woke up alone in the forest without knowing what I was and without even knowing my name. The name Alice comes from my first vision, but I don't know if that's really what I was called as a human."
She made a slightly sad pout at this mention, and Jasper intertwined their fingers without looking at her, keeping his eyes fixed on Carlisle as if he were still trying to assess him.
"Which brings us to your third question, I suppose: my gift works a bit like snapshots of a situation, like photographs or small films. The future I see is not fixed; whether my visions come true usually depends on a multitude of decisions. The choices of individuals can alter the outcome of events, even though some things seem destined to happen... call it fate if you want. The first vision I had upon waking as a vampire was Jasper saying my name. I knew I would have to wait for him in a restaurant in Philadelphia on a stormy day, and then we would have to look for you together to meet you in Minnesota in 1950. I've had these visions since 1920, but it was only in 1948 that I could meet Jasper; if I had decided to hasten things to join him earlier, my visions told me that our future together would have been compromised, and I probably would never have found him..."
She remained smiling as she spoke these words, but the grip on her companion's fingers seemed desperate, and Jasper's expression softened a bit as he turned his head slightly in her direction, a curious blend of affection and melancholy illuminating his features as he released his intense scrutiny of the Cullen patriarch for the first time to look at Alice.
"The same goes for my visions of your family; I've had them for almost as long as those concerning Jasper. I didn't really want to spy on you, but I was bored and very lonely for thirty years, so I couldn't help but occasionally glance to see if the future I had perceived was still there and if all of you were well. I've learned various things about you through my visions: I know your first names, I know you're a doctor and you've never killed a human, that Emmett likes to eat bears and invent strange board games, that Esme is a very loving person who cooks for all the local charities, that Edward, your first companion, is a telepath and excels at the piano, that Rosalie likes to fix cars, buy clothes, and is suspicious of strangers but fiercely devoted to her family. I know you have vegetarian friends living in a snowy place; I know you form more of a family than a traditional clan and that you try to stay close to humans to not consider them prey and stay in touch with reality. I feel like I've known you forever, and I apologize if I'm too exuberant. I know you don't know us, and you have no reason to trust us and welcome us, but the truth is, I saw us joining your family years ago."
Alice's voice became less cheerful, and she seemed to become more serious and nervous as she explained. Jasper watched over her, gently caressing her hand as if he could calm her with this simple touch. She gave them all a trembling and hopeful smile.
"Because, Carlisle, to answer your last question, the one you had decided to ask before changing your mind. It's thanks to you. Thanks to you, we no longer kill humans, and we feed on animals. It's you who taught me the vegetarian lifestyle through my visions, allowing me to introduce it to Jasper. And for that, I will be eternally grateful to you."
Ending notes: Note that there will be quotes from Albert Camus at the beginning of each chapter, and this story will directly reference several other novels classified as 'absurdist movement.' Most chapter titles will be playful twists on titles of other novels. It's a deliberate choice that I'll justify later :p The title "Waiting for rain " is a reference to "Waiting for Godot" of Samuel Beckett.
This text hasn't been proofread in its English version... Since English isn't my native language, feel free to point out any grammar or syntax issues. Very gratefull for feedback, whether positive or negative and see you soon! :)
