Disclaimer: Twilight belongs to Stephanie Meyer, I'm just having fun with her characters.
Beta: No beta for this version, and as a reminder, I'm not a native English speaker, so feel free to point out any major grammar/punctuation issues.
Foreword: Here's the direct continuation from the previous chapter (which was originally a long chapter that I split in two for easier reading). Jasper continues to tell his tortuous story to the Cullens and finally speaks about his empathic talent and his role as an 'executioner'... I hope you enjoy this part. Happy reading :)
Journey to the End of the Day – Part 2.
Jasper had no desire to fight. Not with these people, nor with anyone else: eighty-seven years of battles and two years of tranquility with Alice had shown him that peace was one of the only things worth preserving in this absurd world full of cruelty.
« True despair is not born when facing a stubborn opponent or in the exhaustion of unequal combat. Instead, despair comes when we no longer know why we are struggling—or, indeed, if struggle is necessary. » The Rebel – Albert Camus
But how could he confess the nature and extent of his power without them all jumping to the conclusion that he had been manipulating them since his arrival and was capable of bending them to his will?
"Outside of strategic plannin' sessions where I managed to keep my calm and battlefields where I was a naturally skilled fighter, lettin' instincts take over, I struggled to appreciate my vampire status. I was constantly anxious, always in a strange state of fury, fear, or sadness, which might be logical given my new condition but still fundamentally divergent from my human character. I had always been quite phlegmatic, and I couldn't explain how my personality had taken such a radically different turn simply due to the transformation. I quickly noticed that my character was more changeable when I was in the presence of several people and that I regained more control over myself and serenity when I isolated myself... I finally understood that the unstable mood didn't entirely come from me or even the oppressive context we were in but from my 'gift.' What Maria had perceived as 'captivating' in me the night of my death was, in fact, a hidden talent.
Edward's shock had crossed Jasper before he had time to elaborate, and he could feel the realization and anger from the telepath that he now had a very accurate idea of the nature of his gift.
« Let me finish, please. I'm nearin' the end of this very long explanation. »
Edward nodded sharply, restraining a growl. He struggled to control his temperament. The nomad had probably been manipulating them all since he and Alice arrived.
"When I was still human, I had always been good at reading others' emotions and calmin' them if necessary. I was also very persuasive, often findin' the right words or attitude to make my point and get what I wanted. My father called it charisma; after my transformation, it turned out to be a bit more than that. I became able to instill my state of mind in an entire assembly. My talent, as you may have now understood, is of an empathic nature. I don't just understand others' emotions; I feel them on a physiological level as if they were mine, hence my confusion during my first months as a newborn, where I had great difficulty distinguishing my own emotions from those of my surroundings. It's, in truth, a gift that can be quite overwhelmin' when I'm in the presence of a large group of people or in an environment where some have very hostile emotions. And the environment in which I evolved durin' my time in the South, at war and surrounded by anxious, angry, and thirsty newborns, was extremely hostile. This resulted in a persistent... I guess the best term is melancholy. "
Jasper glanced briefly at Rosalie, whose stifling hatred seemed able to increase by another notch. Her violent emotion made him pensive and nervous; it wasn't a conventional feeling towards a stranger. There was a very dark edge beneath the girl's hatred, a hidden terror at the edge of rage. And a disgust towards him that seemed oddly misplaced, even considering all the atrocities he had already confessed. He raised his arms in an involuntary defensive gesture. The Cullens, except for Rosalie, were generally wary since his initial explanation of his power, but, aside from her, he couldn't feel genuine hostility from them. On the contrary, he could even sense a strange compassion from Carlisle and Esme. Even Edward's fury seemed to have dulled a bit without him trying to calm it.
"I can feel your mistrust, and I won't pretend it's undeserved. I used my gift on you several times since Alice and I approached your property. I didn't do it to manipulate you but to try to ensure our safety. I feared that my appearance might prompt you to attack us. The only emotion I tried to impose since the beginnin' of this conversation is calm, and please believe me, I didn't do it for ill purposes. While it's true that I can act on others' emotions, it's also true that I'm very sensitive to the emotional climate. Others' emotions influence me as much as I can influence them, and even after years of mastering this ability, I can sometimes not prevent others' feelin's from slightly alterin' my perception, which can make me behave inappropriately. If I hadn't pacified the room's atmosphere by startin' my story, it might have been more challengin' for me to express myself. If your fear and mistrust had been at their highest, I would probably have become nervous and frightened in response and would have had difficulty tellin' my story without losing the thread or becoming agitated. Contrary to what you might think, my gift doesn't really allow me to alter your judgment of us. It's very complicated to create emotions out of thin air; usually, I just act on existin' ones, amplifyin' or diminishin' people's emotions around me. If an emotion is purely artificial, the person I send it to can easily notice it, making the effect less effective. For example, when he discovered my empathy a few moments before I talked about it, Edward was furious: even if I had sent him a feelin' of serenity, it wouldn't have changed his anger towards me, and it might even have amplified it.
Jasper continued to look Carlisle in the eyes, hoping the man could perceive his sincerity. He had already gone on for too long and lost himself in the twists of his story; it was time to face the most atrocious part by discussing his role as an executioner.
"In the South, it was an endless war. Skirmishes followed one another indefinitely; it was always about takin' one more town, losing a stronghold in favor of another, establishin' ourselves in a region by driving out other clans, and defendin' it. I fought almost every week for eighty-three years as Maria's army's sub-commander. From 1865, she herself no longer took part in battles, leaving me in charge of training the soldiers and eliminatin' them once their usefulness was over. My gift made it easy for me to manage up to fifteen individuals, and over the wars, we gained influence and made the entire Mexico Maria's territory. As I mentioned earlier, my victims durin' this period number in the tens of thousands... I killed around twenty thousand vampires during the wars. More than a thousand were my own soldiers. After the first year had passed, the strength of the newborns diminished, and I was tasked with instructing them, leadin' them into battle, and when human blood no longer saturated their tissues and their strength and speed had waned, I had to eliminate them so that my creator could replace them with 'more efficient' recruits. I was much more a grave'igger than a leader of the troops. This life disgusted me; I saw no sense or end to it, but I continued to lead Maria's battles and act as an executioner for decades without ever questionin' the orders given to me."
Horror and shock were everywhere; Edward made a choked sound, probably perceiving abhorrent mental images. Esme buried her head in her hands, Rosalie and Emmett growled in unison. Alice's emotions had a sad and desolate tone, even though she continued to radiate gently toward him, likely trying to transmit some calm and comfort. Jasper refrained from physically recoiling and lowering his gaze in the face of Carlisle's painful expression. He felt his throat tighten and the sensation of a stone at the pit of his stomach. He had to put an end to this. He forced himself to continue his story, annoyed and ashamed to hear the slight tremor in his voice. His Southern accent, seemingly, to his own ears, thickening as he compelled himself to speak.
"Le… less than ten years after my transformation, the fights had worn me out... My gift made it painful to be around sufferin' people, but I was still as skilled on the battlefield. The others' fighters' anger infiltrated my own emotions... makin' me more savage and murderous. The executions of newborns were the worst part of my job, no matter how fast I was to proceed or how much I tried to use my gift to calm them; there was always a fraction of a second at the moment of death where their rage and terror engulfed me. Maria had assured me that getting rid of recruits too old and without any particular talent was an unspoken rule for our kind, and even if it doesn't excuse anythin', I believed that all clans operated this way. She told me that vampires were everywhere in the world, engaged in eternal wars... that's why, even though I could no longer stand havin' to fight, I never thought of desertin'. I was born in the South, and I would die there a second time. I thought I had no choice."
He genuinely seemed defeated as he spoke, his words carrying the tone of a man confessing on the scaffold.
"After more than seventy years of an infernal cycle of fightin' and executions, Maria inadvertently disrupted our morbid routine by creatin' a newborn named Peter: he was intelligent and had a strange sense of humor, his emotions were more controlled and positive than those of other immature vampires, his presence calmed me, reducin' my melancholy, and somehow, we became friends during his first year of service. He was an excellent fighter, and when his execution time came, I managed to convince Maria to spare him. We continued to fight together for three years, and I came to consider him as a brother. In 1941, he met a newborn named Charlotte and became attached to her. When his time was up, he begged me to let her live. I tried to persuade Maria but failed: Charlotte was a gentle person, not a fighter, and she had survived her year of service only with a lot of luck and protection from Peter. Maria ordered me to proceed with the execution. Until then, Peter had managed to hide from me the depth of his affection for Charlotte. When I announced that her sentence was sealed, he became furious and... devastated. I realized they were in love with each other, and I felt he would confront me for her without hesitation, even if it meant dying. I couldn't bring myself to harm him. So, I helped them escape.
Jasper remembered the flash of furious rage, the sense of betrayal, and the despair from Peter as he confirmed his intention to eliminate Charlotte. Sometimes, he wondered what would have happened if he had simply decided to obey Maria, and they had to fight each other. Would he have let Peter kill him, or would he have destroyed the only person in the world he considered a friend? The thought made him nauseous.
"Maria never forgave me for allowin' their desertion, and our relations deteriorated over the five years that followed. Let's just say she found an imaginative way to punish me after their departure, and I didn't exactly accept my punishment. For the first time, I used my gift on her offensively, and she became uneasy and frightened in my presence. Although I didn't defy her orders and continued to maneuver her troops, I felt she no longer trusted me and was plannin' to kill me without actually deciding to act on it. She was still hesitating about my fate when, in 1946, Peter risked his life and returned to Monterrey to see me. He told me that Maria had lied, that there were no vampire wars in the North, no armies of newborns. He said life there was peaceful... he asked me to accompany him to West Virginia, where he lived with Charlotte. I accepted without hesitation and finally left the South after more than eighty years of massacres."
Jasper sighed and had a strange, joyless smile.
"I traveled with them for a little over a year, but while I thought my state of mind would improve, my depression only deepened. Peace left me with too much free time to reflect on my crimes, and feeding became unbearable. Drinkin' blood had never been particularly enjoyable for me, but the diffuse emotions of other newborns nearby dulled the sensations from my victims and allowed me to feed fairly easily when I was still in Mexico. Now, alone with my prey, their despair and terror hit me full force. A deserved backlash, I suppose. I was barely functional at that time, and control over my power tended to elude me. I unintentionally projected some of my sadness, and I quickly realized I was makin' Peter and Charlotte unhappy. After more than a year with them, I left to continue my journey alone. I continued to wander for some time between Maryland and Pennsylvania. For what it's worth, I tried to feed as little as possible durin' this period, but I'm ashamed to admit that I never once thought that animal blood could be a source of sustenance, and I never managed to abstain from killin' for more than a month."
Thinking back, his pathetic attempt to space out his meals had been a total failure and had caused more human losses than his standard feeding routine. After two weeks without feeding, he was thirsty, irritable, and angry. After three weeks, the hunger became unbearable, obliterating his rational thoughts and gripping his gut, each day delaying the inevitable becoming a battle against himself that he knew he had no chance of winning. After a month, his sanity wavered, and invariably, the predator took over, and he massacred the unfortunate group of humans crossing his path at the wrong time when his body reminded him that he was no longer human and physically incapable of starving. A lesson that Maria had tried to instill in him in the worst possible way.
Jasper seemed to lose himself in thought for a moment, then suddenly had a genuinely sincere smile, completely incongruent with the total devastation he had shown a few minutes earlier. The smile lit up his face, making his golden eyes shine with a strange glow as he leaned slightly over the couch behind which he was still stationed to place a hand on Alice's shoulder.
"In 1948, I crossed Philadelphia on a stormy evenin', by chance. I took shelter from the rain in a diner and met Alice. Of course, she had seen me coming. She reproached me for making her wait... she was a frightenin' and cheeky little monster. She wasn't afraid of me at all and drowned me in a pile of wonderful and incomprehensible emotions. I followed her without thinking when she insisted we go for a walk in the downpour. I listened to her all night talking about herself, her visions, your family, and the 'vegetarian' diet. I was genuinely relieved to learn that there was another method, to know that a vampire could survive without human blood. There was somethin' extremely sweet, joyful, and pure in Alice's emotions, and I felt unable to detach myself from her. In my existence, I had never felt so happy and at peace. I knew I didn't deserve these feelin's and that I had to let her go; so when dawn broke, I told her my past, as I just did for you, including the maximum sordid details, worse than what I just shared. I thought she would be terrified and run away. Instead, she stubbornly clung to me, without a word, and she held me in her arms until the rain stopped."
He could never forget the raw emotion that had engulfed Alice, this tiny and joyful girl he had just met. This stranger who should have been frightened by him and by the weight of his countless sins but who burned with compassion and love for him, holding him tightly as he collapsed and hesitated to flee. Holding him with all her might as he trembled and his gift splashed the surroundings with his sadness and self-loathing. This feeling that emanated from her, beyond her despair, sweeping away her regrets; it was beyond forgiveness. Beyond absolution. It was like a whispered oath.
Like coming home after years of wandering. So he had abandoned the idea of fleeing, desperate to take everything she offered him, and he had held her close until the rain stopped. And when the rain finally stopped, she gave him a bright smile, shaking the earth on its foundations, and he kissed her. And he found himself hoping for the first time since he was sixteen.
"For the first time since I was sixteen, I felt hope."
Hope was a complicated feeling to explain. Jasper tried to remember as faithfully as possible the sensation he had felt that day and pushed it toward the Cullens. Trying to convey something true about his motivations.
"We ain't splited us since. And here we are today. We are here."
They were here. Full of hope.
Hanging on the judgment of Carlisle Cullen.
Notes : Alright, that's the end of Jasper's long discourse on his history... I've tried to keep as many canonical elements as possible and embellish around them to better understand the characters' progression, especially Jasper. I hope fans of the fandom find these developments believable so far ;) There will be other rather dark passages in this fic that will reference slavery, torture (particularly a chapter centered on the relationship between Jasper and Maria), and other 'heavy' subjects, but there won't be any truly 'graphic' descriptions of past violence if that reassures some.
In a comment on the previous chapter, I mentioned that Jasper adhered to a racist ideology before meeting Maria and that it must have helped shape his appreciation for the 'natural' vampire diet. For those questioning this element: Jasper no longer holds the same prejudices at the time of this story. To clarify, he is not racist in the context of this fic. And by the time he meets Alice, he no longer - for a very long time - holds the same beliefs regarding the value of human/vampire lives. It would be too complicated to properly develop this element in the main plot of this fic, but I have a related long one-shot in preparation (which I may divide into chapters if it's really too long) where I'll try to recontextualize and detail the thought system Jasper subscribed to and explain how several events and years of reflection may have evolved/overturned his opinions.
The title of the chapter references the novel 'Journey to the End of the Night' by Céline. I acknowledge that it's a somewhat dubious choice to title a chapter that discusses racism - considering the author's ideology - but well, from the perspective of 'separating the man from the artist,' I allowed myself. It remains one of the major novels of the 20th century in terms of writing, and it's arguably one of the most poignant books ever written about the horror and absurdity of war.
The next chapter will be a bit lighter... well, I think, but lightness isn't really my strong suit! See you very soon for the next installment! ^^