A/N: After this, I'll go back to posting on Sundays. As always, thanks for reading!


Catalina


The jaguar froze and Jasper heard Maria gasp above him. Ignoring his sire's shock, he pulled his phone out of his pocket and unlocked it. "Please, just look. I'm telling you the truth."

He quickly scrolled through until he found a picture of himself and Leah in her wolf form, then held it up for the stranger to see and started rambling again.

"Her name is Leah. She's nineteen and only became a protector this year. She's the only woman in her pack and it was hard on her in the beginning. She's always wondered if there might be other female shapeshifters out there so she's going to be really excited when she hears about you," he said, not entirely able to smother a smile as he talked about his mate. "If you're willing to let her know about you, that is," he quickly added. "If you'd rather keep your existence a secret, that's perfectly understandable."

The cat stopped growling and took a single step forward and Jasper only debated for a second before setting his phone on the ground so she could see it without having to get closer to him. He stepped back and nudged Alice to do the same.

"I won't get any closer if you don't want me to, but I can also show you a picture of her as a human," he said, feeling the shifter's curiosity trying to break through the rest of her emotions that all screamed CAUTION. "I have photos of the rest of her pack also."

The cat backed away from the phone and nodded, so Jasper slowly stepped forward and pulled up a picture of him and Leah sitting on her front porch with Sue. At the same time, Alice pulled out her phone and looked for a photo of the pack. Finding one of herself and the three Whitlocks with Leah, Seth, Paul, and Jared in their wolf forms - a picture Rosalie had taken on a day they were all letting loose and having fun running around the forest - she carefully set the phone on the ground next to Jasper's and then took a few steps back.

The jaguar lingered over the photo with the four wolves, and Jasper tipped his head to the side as he felt her emotions shift. She wasn't sad exactly, but there was some melancholy inside her, along with some… longing? He honestly wasn't entirely sure how to describe what he was reading from her. His best interpretation was that it was a bit like someone who missed what they'd once had. Something they'd lost.

"Do you have a… well, not a pack, I suppose. A pride?" he asked. "Is that what you'd call it?"

The jaguar shook her head and her melancholy increased.

"But you did have one at one time?" he asked quietly. She nodded and his heart went out to the animal who'd found herself alone. "Were they killed?"

The cat's anger came flooding back and she looked up at the top of the cliff where the four red-eyed vamps were watching them. Her eyes narrowed as she started feeling some confusion, and then she looked more carefully at the two vampires in front of her.

"Our eyes?" Jasper asked, gesturing to himself and Alice. The stranger nodded. "They're gold, rather than red, because of our diet. We don't hunt humans," he explained. "We survive on animal blood."

And boy did that animal's anger skyrocket.

"Not shape-shifting animals," he quickly clarified. "Just… you know, regular animals," he added with a little bit of a wince. Saying it that way didn't really sound any better.

"We have some letters from his mate's mama vouching for us," Peter called down with an amused smile. "She's an elder of their tribe and the other elders signed it too."

Jasper rolled his eyes. Peter thought the whole thing was hilarious, even though he was secretly touched that the elders vouched for him and Charlotte.

"It's true," Jasper told the stranger. "One of the reasons we're down this way was because we were hoping to find some other protectors. Leah's mom thought a letter from their tribal council might be helpful if we managed to find them."

When Maria opened her mouth to say something no one wanted to hear, Charlotte's hand darted out and she grabbed her wrist in an iron-grip. "Shut your mouth. You don't get to talk now," she growled. Maria scowled and opened her mouth again, so Charlotte moved her hand from her wrist to her throat in a lightning-fast movement. "I mean it, Maria. I'll end you right here, right now, and I won't feel an ounce of remorse."

Everyone was silent for a solid minute, waiting to see what the jaguar was going to do, how she was going to respond. Jasper had the best insight, obviously, and he knew she wasn't feeling much anger in that moment. She was more baffled and bewildered than anything.

"May I?" Jasper asked, gesturing to his phone, figuring a little more reassurance might help them move past their stalemate.

The cat took a few steps back and nodded, so he picked it up and looked to see if he had service where they were. When he saw that he did, he looked at Alice. She shrugged and nodded for him to go ahead, so he called Leah on FaceTime.

"Jas?" she answered with a surprised smile. She was standing on the back porch of the house in Texas and there were two smudges of paint on her cheek and one on her forehead.

Jasper thought she was too cute for words. "You painting?"

Leah shrugged. "The back railing was peeling. Finding the same exact color was impossible because you're all older than dirt and they last painted it before I was even born, but we found something that was a close enough match. Want to see?"

"I do, but maybe in a minute," he laughed. "I've got a small favor."

"Alright. Shoot," she nodded.

Jasper hesitated because he realized he hadn't actually found out if the jaguar was okay with him spilling her secret. He pressed the phone to his chest and looked at her. "Sorry," he whispered. "Would you like to talk to her? Or at least let her talk to you?" he clarified because she didn't have the power of speech.

Her emotions were all jumbled up for a few seconds before she nodded once, only a little grudgingly.

Jasper nodded and looked back at his phone. "So we've just met someone who isn't sure she can trust us, so I thought maybe you could talk to her. You know, just to tell her how wonderful we are."

Leah snorted a laugh. "As wonderful as I might think you are, I'm not sure my opinion is going to hold much weight with anyone you come across down there. Why would any vamps care what I think?"

"It's not a vamp," he explained, watching her expression carefully. "She's a shapeshifter."

Jasper wasn't sure he'd ever seen his mate look so shocked, not even the day he'd met her. Which was saying a lot. She'd found her imprint in a vampire, and then found herself naked in front of that vampire and most of his family in the very next second.

"What?" she asked a little breathlessly. "You actually found another protector? A female protector?"

Jasper nodded. "It's probably more accurate to say she found us, but yeah. She's understandably wary, so I thought maybe talking to you would go a long way towards keeping her from trying to kill us."

Leah was stunned silent and when she didn't answer him right away, Jasper heard Paul sigh and then he grabbed the phone out of her hand. "I'll talk to her."

It took Jasper a second to work out the best way to do it, but he eventually managed to get it so Paul and the stranger in front of him could see each other. It would be a hell of a lot easier if they could convince her to go human, but he knew that was incredibly unlikely at the moment.

In the very next second, all of their lives changed dramatically. Paul and the stranger both inhaled sharply in shock at the same moment. Then Jasper nearly dropped the phone as he did the same half a second later, while Alice gasped as she was pulled into the future.

"What?" Jasper heard Leah ask Paul through the phone. "What's wrong? What happened?"

There was silence for another few seconds, then Leah huffed and Jasper heard a heavy thud. If he knew his mate and her best friend at all, she'd gotten impatient at the lack of an answer from him and had shoved him a little too hard. His shock meant she caught him off-guard and she'd knocked him straight off his feet.

Hearing a quiet growl from the shapeshifter on this end of the phone, Jasper immediately jumped in. "She didn't hurt him. They're best friends, siblings really, so she'd never hurt him," he quickly explained. "This is just how they are with each other."

"What the hell is going on?" Leah snapped. Before anyone could say or do anything else, the penny dropped. "No fucking way!" she shouted with a little bit of an excited squeal. "Are you his imprint? His mate?" she asked the big, tawny cat who was looking back at her.

There was a scuffle on the other end of the phone, and Jasper heard another heavy thud as Paul growled for her to give the phone back.

"Hey!" Leah exclaimed. "What the hell was that for? I'm just happy for you, asshole. Quit being rude or she might decide she doesn't want you," she snarked as she got to her feet and wiped the dirt from her clothes.

The jaguar was getting more and more bewildered by the second, not having the slightest clue how to react. Jasper belatedly realized that some of her confusion was coming from the fact that Leah and Paul were speaking English and Jasper was automatically switching back and forth depending on who he was talking to.

"Would you like to go human?" Jasper asked her in Spanish. "It'll be easier to get them to shut up if you have the ability to talk directly to Paul," he explained. When she tipped her head to the side, he realized no one had introduced her yet. "This is Paul," he said, shaking the phone in his hand back and forth a couple times. "Paul Lahote. The girl he just knocked on her ass is my mate, Leah Clearwater."

"Jasper," Peter called from above them. "Heads up."

Jasper looked up just in time to catch the backpack he'd been carrying and Peter reminded him that he'd brought along a sweater of Leah's. It was tucked in a plastic bag in the secret compartment where the letters from the council were to ensure Maria never caught any traces of her scent. He'd wanted to have something with him that smelled like his mate for the moments he needed at least one tangible connection to her. He'd left behind a shirt for her too, because it helped soothe some of that ache from the distance between them, even if only for a moment.

Jasper pulled the sweater out and held it out to Paul's imprint. "This is Leah's. It's been sealed in a bag so it shouldn't have much vamp smell on it. We'll give you some privacy if you want to go human."

The cat's uneasy eyes quickly darted to the vampires at the top of the cliff again, and Jasper immediately turned around to look up at them.

"Could y'all give us a few minutes?" he asked. When Maria scowled with a heated glare, Jasper cut her off before she could argue. "Please. She won't be comfortable phasing if you're all standing up there staring at her. She just met her mate, Maria. Even you can acknowledge what that means," he reminded her. "So please. Just give us a few minutes. Alice and I will come find you shortly."

Peter and Charlotte both nodded. "Come on," Peter said, looking at Maria. "While they're doing their thing, Charlotte and I can catch you up on what we found out from the nomad."

Maria gritted her teeth and growled under her breath, but after shooting one more glare at Jasper, she turned and stalked off, pulling Sebastian behind her. Charlotte took a moment to smile at the jaguar and congratulate her before following them.

As soon as they were far enough away, Jasper carefully set Leah's sweater on the ground in front of the cat. "I don't know how tall you are, but I imagine this will cover all the most important bits. If not, you're welcome to rummage around in the backpack to grab something else," he told her, then he and Alice walked a little ways away and turned their backs to give her some privacy.

It was only a throat being pointedly cleared that reminded Jasper he still had two impatient wolves on the phone. "Sorry," he laughed, looking at the screen to see Paul was holding the phone while Leah was trying to peek over his shoulder.

"Do you know anything about her?" Paul asked him.

Jasper shook his head. "Not much. She seems to be on her own," was all the explanation he gave, figuring it wasn't his place to tell him that she'd lost the rest of her pack - pride? - somewhere along the way. "And she doesn't understand much English."

Paul just nodded, so lost in his thoughts that he barely noticed Leah pulling his phone from his pocket. Jasper thought she was probably opening the app Charlotte had found for him to use as a translator. He turned and looked at Alice with a smile when she started bouncing on her toes in excitement. He honestly felt a little like doing the same. Paul's life hadn't always been the easiest, and outside of her biological family and Jasper, he was the person Leah loved most in the world. Jasper was thrilled he'd found his other half, even if who she was brought some additional complications.

There was a nagging in the back of Jasper's mind as he watched Leah type away on Paul's phone, but it took him a few seconds to work it out. "Spanish," he said suddenly, turning to Alice, who gave him a little bit of a weird look.

"I think I'm going to need more to go on."

"Sorry," Jasper laughed. Alice was often about eight steps ahead of him, but he wasn't really giving her much to work with. "She speaks Spanish, not Portuguese."

"Oh! But what does that mean?" she asked with a little frown of confusion. "She's not what was keeping me blind in Brazil?"

Jasper just shrugged. "I'm not sure. There's a chance she was down there and then traveled all the way up here for some reason, but that's an awfully long way. It's got to be at least four thousand miles."

Another throat-clearing brought Jasper's attention back to the phone to see Paul giving him a pointed look. "What did I do now?"

Paul rolled his eyes. "Could you maybe speak fucking English so I can understand you?"

Jasper apologized, because he hadn't even realized he was speaking Spanish. But before he could say anything more, a quiet voice said a very nervous hello behind him and he and Alice spun around to see that there was now a very beautiful young woman standing where the jaguar had been a few moments before. Jasper was a little surprised by how long her shiny, black hair was. He would have thought it would be shorter and much lighter based on how she looked in her animal form. She was a couple inches shorter than Leah, and she looked to be in her early twenties.

Jasper smiled at her, careful not to show too many teeth, and the young woman started the conversation by asking what their names were.

Alice beamed one of her brilliant smiles at her, too excited by this twist of events to even think about how toothy that smile was. "I'm Alice Cullen, and this is Jasper Whitlock."

The young woman nodded and did her best to push aside her uneasiness at the situation she suddenly found herself in. She wanted to talk to the young man on the phone, and the two vampires in front of her were currently the gatekeepers. "My name is Catalina."

Jasper and Alice both tried, they really, really did, but Alice giggled a little and Jasper laughed a single laugh. "So you're… Cat?" he asked her before he could wipe the amusement off his face.

Fortunately for everyone, Catalina had a sense of humor and rolled her eyes with a smile. "I know. It was pure chance that I was given that name at birth."

"How old are you?" Jasper asked her curiously.

Catalina looked at him a moment before answering. "I transformed for the first time when I was twenty-one," she said carefully. Jasper just nodded and waited for her to continue. "I was born in 1863."

Jasper's eyes went wide with surprise as Alice laughed beside him, making Catalina tip her head in confusion. "Sorry," Jasper quickly apologized. "It's just that that's the year I was changed," he explained. "And you were born in Mexico?" he asked, and Catalina nodded.

Even as the coincidence made him smile, he couldn't deny being shocked by that news. That made her over a century and a half old, and she'd been born and grew up during the very worst of the Southern Wars. Fighting had been particularly vicious and had touched nearly every corner of Mexico.

But that was a topic for another time. Catalina was trying to stay patient and calm but she was getting more and more edgy internally with every second. And Jasper didn't need the advantage of his gift to know Paul was just about at the end of his rope with how long it was taking to get his imprint back on the phone and that he couldn't understand what they were saying.

Seeing that Catalina was very deliberately keeping some distance between herself and the two vampires in front of her, Jasper set his phone on the ground and then took a few steps back, guiding Alice to move back with him. "Paul knows very little Spanish so I can translate for you," he offered.

Catalina nodded her thanks as she picked up the phone.

Alice and Jasper sat on the ground and helped the new imprints speak to each other for the first time. Catalina looked at them a little nervously when she asked Paul if she could truly trust the vampires, but Jasper was unbothered and just translated for her. When Paul assured her through Jasper that she could, Catalina had a moment of uncertainty and doubt.

Because she didn't speak much English, she didn't know if Jasper was actually translating Paul's words or just pretending to.

Not entirely sure how to reassure her that he was giving her an honest answer, he looked at Alice to see if she had any ideas. After only a moment of thought, she took her phone back out and pulled up the translation app. She quickly explained to Catalina how it worked, then slid her phone across the ground to her. Jasper, meanwhile, spoke in the direction of his phone, explaining the problem to Paul and Leah and asking them to also use the app on their end so Catalina could see their answer was genuine.

While Jasper and Alice took turns translating when needed, they also had a quiet conversation between themselves about how to move forward. Knowing how strong the imprint bond was, they both anticipated that either Paul was going to want to come down to Mexico or Catalina was going to want to go up to Texas. There was also Maria to deal with, of course. Not just the situation with Matthew, but also her apparent knowledge of shapeshifters.

"How do you think she knows about the wolves?" Alice whispered.

Jasper just shrugged. "I'm not sure. She didn't mention it when you and I first met with her, so my best guess is that she somehow learned about them when she was in Seattle."

"What do you think she'll do now that she knows you've found your mate?" she asked worriedly. "Do you think she'll try to cause trouble?"

Jasper took a moment to think back to everything Maria was feeling when he told Catalina about Leah. "I doubt it. She was definitely shocked, and there was a little bit of jealousy in her, but she was more focused on the fact that I said we had another reason for coming down here, rather than coming strictly to help with finding Matthew. She might have been thinking we'd abandon the search before she was ready if our goal was to find other protectors."

"And she never said anything about shapeshifters when you were still in the army?"

"No, never," Jasper shook his head. "She either didn't know they existed back then, or she did and kept that information to herself. And I'm inclined to believe the latter. She was determined enough to keep me right where I was that I think she would have warned me if that level of a threat existed."

"What do you think happened to Catalina's pack?" Alice asked quietly, changing the subject.

"Going purely off her anger when I asked her and she looked up at the others, I think they were probably killed by vamps."

Alice nodded a little sadly. It was what she'd already assumed. "Do you think it's called a pride instead of a pack?" she asked. "I know that's what lions are but I'm not sure if it applies to other big cats."

Jasper just shrugged again. He didn't know either. "We can look it up when we have one of our phones back."

Jasper and Alice both turned their full attention back to Catalina when they heard Leah ask in halting Spanish if she had been in Brazil in the last few months.

"No," she answered, looking at Jasper to translate. "It's very rare that I ever leave Mexico."

"Do you know if there are other shapeshifters in that part of South America?" Alice asked Catalina.

"I don't believe so, but as I said, I rarely leave Mexico. It could be that there are and I've never heard word of them."

Alice hummed in acknowledgment and then tried to search in that direction again. It was slightly harder than usual because there was a shapeshifter only a handful of feet away, so she stood up and told Jasper she'd be right back before running off to an appropriate distance.

"I still can't see anything," she told him when she came back a few minutes later. "And before you ask - no, Catalina isn't what gets in the way. I can see snippets of us traveling down there, but she isn't with us. It's only when we close in on that same area near Brazil that it fades to black."

Jasper wasn't sure what to make of that. Either there were more protectors in the world than any of them thought or there was something else making Alice blind. She'd never come across anything that interfered with her visions before the Quileute wolves, so he couldn't imagine what that might be.

But again, that was a thought for another time. There were more pressing concerns at the moment.

"I'm not sure I'm comfortable with Leah and Paul coming down here," he whispered when Alice was sitting beside him again. "But I also suspect Catalina is hesitant to go that far north."

Alice agreed with him, but she also knew how stubborn Paul could be when he set his mind to something. Leah too, for that matter. And she could absolutely understand why this might be one thing he really dug his heels in about. Catalina was his imprint, after all.

Alice, Jasper, and Catalina all jumped a little when they heard what sounded like an extremely loud crack of thunder far to the east of them. Maria and the others were far enough away that they were out of hearing range at their typical volume, and they were even out of range of Jasper's gift, but the sound of one vampire trying to tackle another at full strength was loud enough to travel much farther.

Jasper rolled his eyes and shook his head. "Sounds like Maria knows about the Volturi," he sighed.

"I can't really blame her," Alice grudgingly admitted. "It's just about the worst possible scenario. Even worse than Matthew finding his mate."

Jasper just nodded his agreement.

In the next second, Alice's phone rang, and Catalina nervously brought it over to her. "Hi," Alice greeted Leah with a grin when she saw it was her on FaceTime from Paul's phone.

"What the hell was that?" Leah asked with no preamble, though she did wave at Jasper when he popped his head into view.

Now that Catalina didn't have the app to act as an interpreter with Paul, Jasper went back to focusing the bulk of his attention on their conversation while Alice got Leah caught up on what they'd learned from the nomad and the conclusion they'd come to.

"So what was that I just heard? Or who I heard, I guess," Leah corrected herself. She'd been around her imprint and his families long enough to recognize that storm-like thunder for what it was. From Emmett, in particular. He forgot sometimes that he shouldn't use his full strength all the time.

"My guess is Peter and Charlotte have told Maria everything," Alice explained. "She's probably throwing an epic temper tantrum and one of them is having to restrain her."

Jasper debated what to do, then hauled himself to his feet with another sigh. "Can you hang here to translate for them?" he asked Alice. "I should go give Peter and Charlotte a hand but I don't want Catalina to have to be around red-eyed vamps if she's not comfortable with that."

Alice nodded her agreement and then answered Jasper's next question before he asked it. "We'll try to come up with a solution for her and Paul to meet," she assured him.

Jasper smiled that she knew him well enough to be able to anticipate what he was going to suggest without needing her gift. After telling Leah he loved her and assuring her he'd talk to her in a little bit, he took off to find his irate sire.

Which wasn't that hard, honestly. Maria was making enough noise to raise the dead.

When he came into view of them, he found Peter pinning a hissing, snarling, thrashing Maria to the ground while telling Charlotte and Sebastian to stay back. Feeling the level of anger in Charlotte, Jasper's eyes narrowed and he looked Peter over from head to toe.

When he saw a rip in the shoulder of his shirt in a much too familiar shape, he growled and dashed into the fray.

He reached down and grabbed Maria's hair, twisting it in his fist hard enough that it yanked her head to the side. He snapped at Peter to let her go and then dragged her - kicking and screaming and reaching up to claw at his hand - to the small river he'd crossed a hundred yards back and threw her straight in. Before she could get her legs under her to stand up, he threw himself on top of her and pinned her under the water.

When Sebastian appeared at the bank, Jasper growled at him. "Stay the fuck back or you'll join her."

Sebastian knew that what Jasper was doing wasn't actually hurting their sire, so he just nodded once. He was uneasy with the whole thing, but he did his best to push that aside. The last thing any of them needed was for even more vamps to loose their shit.

Jasper flipped Maria over and pulled her head out of the water while still keeping her restrained. "Do you not remember what happened the last time you fucking did this?" he hissed. Jasper had only used violence against his sire a few times in all his decades with her, and nearly all had happened shortly after he'd woken up before he had control. But when she'd intentionally and maliciously bitten Peter during what was meant to just be a training session, Jasper had lunged for her and bitten her in the same spot.

He'd been punished for it, of course, but he'd refused to apologize.

He leaned down and dug his teeth into Maria's shoulder exactly where he'd seen the rip in Peter's shirt, making sure to pump a little venom into the wound so it really stung. Before she could try to retaliate, he shoved her head back under the water.

"Don't," Jasper growled, his eyes blazing as they snapped back to Maria's second, who'd taken a step forward. "I like you so far, Sebastian, but I'll kill you where you stand if you take another step in my direction."

Peter and Charlotte came running over then and Peter put a restraining hand on Sebastian's shoulder while he gave Jasper a glare that had precisely zero heat behind it. "I'm fine," he huffed, pretending to be offended that Jasper had stepped in and retaliated against Maria.

Jasper ignored him and looked at his shoulder to see that Charlotte had ripped that portion of his shirt away and licked the wound closed. Where Peter was feigning irritation, Charlotte was just grinning at him, absolutely loving the fact that Jasper had gotten his teeth into the woman she hated.

All the while, the water beneath him was churning as Maria struggled against his hold. He growled in irritation and yanked her head out of the water again.

"If you'd calm the fuck down and shut your fucking mouth, I'd let you up," he snapped. "We're less than a hundred miles from Gabriel's territory and the last thing we need is for someone to get a little too curious and track us down because you can't control your goddamn temper. I get that you're pissed, I get that you're frustrated, but please, for the love of god, shut the fuck up."

Maria's surprise was great enough that she stopped thrashing. She'd seen Jasper angry, enraged even, but it was very, very rare that he'd ever unleashed that rage on her.

"Thank you," Jasper nodded, his voice slightly less harsh. "If I let you up, can you stay calm so we can talk like rational adults?"

Maria glared at him but kept her mouth shut. She'd only bitten Peter because she was trying to free herself, not because it was Peter specifically. If she'd been thinking even a little more rationally, she would have kept her teeth to herself. Not that she'd ever admit that out loud. Jasper could tolerate a lot, she'd seen him tolerate the worst punishments a vampire could suffer without a word, but one thing he wouldn't tolerate was her hurting Peter. He'd made that very clear to her a century ago.

Jasper helped Maria to her feet and then took Charlotte's outstretched hand. When she pulled him from the water, she gave him a quick hug and kissed his cheek. "Thank you," she whispered.

Jasper just nodded and went to look more closely at Peter's shoulder. He scowled at the fresh bitemark, guilt twisting in his gut that the two freshest scars Peter had were his fault. He'd been bitten during the fight with the newborns and now this.

Peter rolled his eyes and pulled his brother into his arms. "It's not your fault," he quietly reassured him.

Jasper huffed, not believing him. Before he pulled back, he gave the irritated skin a quick lick in apology, which slightly soothed that feral part of him that still lurked in the back of his mind even after all this time away from the south.

Satisfied that everyone was sufficiently calm, and only slightly irritated that both backpacks with dry clothes were back where Alice and Catalina were, Jasper took a seat on the ground and gestured for everyone else to do the same. Just as he started internally grumbling about the small puddle forming underneath him from his soaking wet clothes, he felt two sets of emotions approaching.

When they came into view, Catalina was still in her human form in Leah's sweater, and she'd apparently grabbed a pair of his sweatpants for the run. She stayed back a ways, but Alice skipped straight over and handed Jasper and Peter their backpacks, along with giving Jasper his phone.

Because Jasper had been carrying Maria's clothes, he rooted around in his bag and handed her something dry to change into, then pulled out clothes for himself. Although he'd gotten used to having privacy after he left Maria, it had been in short supply while he'd been in the army and he'd learned early on to be unbothered by other people seeing him half-naked.

But when he wrestled his wet shirt over his head, he immediately felt some slight fear and wariness from two sources and glanced up to see Sebastian and Catalina looking at the scars that covered his upper half. Interestingly, where Catalina's other emotions were back to screaming CAUTION, Sebastian had a little bit of sadness bleeding into his emotional palette. Maybe it was more sympathy than sadness. Sebastian had plenty of scars of his own, so he knew exactly how much suffering Jasper had gone through to look the way he did.

Pushing those thoughts aside, Jasper quickly changed his pants and sat back down. It was time to get back down to business. Their circumstances had dramatically changed and there was a lot to talk about.