Midnight Solstice

Chapter 19

Picture: All of the newborns (my edit)
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   Oh, the time flies. How long has it been since the newborns first got here...I don't know, I think about eight months total. Everything is so crazy right now! Caleb has a vision of Michael nearly every day, giving us more information to try to line up with the flash drive. We are through with most of the information on their, but there is so much more that we don't know.
The flash drive gives us enough information to figure the basics out, like locations and accomplices. That's the bear minimum. We still have no idea about his two main accomplices, Samuel Goodrich and Adam Quimby. We suspect that they are his head goons, but the main thing we lack is a motive! 
    We don't know why Michael is doing his experiments. We know he escalated from doing simple research about the limits of supernatural people, to trying to break those limits, which he succeeded in with Fern. Michael helped Fern discover more abilities like her mind erasing gift, and Katerina can do that freaky-sensing-when-people-are-coming thing (I don't know what else to call it, these special abilities don't really have names...) when she chooses to do so.
   But there is no motive!!! He went from helping people discover special abilities, to experimenting on humans (we have no information for that), to Katerina and then to any full species! But we can't figure out why.
Felix thinks that this whole this was personal, which is why Michael is trying to gain control over the situation by inviting us to the "fun house." His guess is as good as mine. We still have Pauley's theory about Michael wanting to take over the Volturi but there isn't a reason why! Jane's theory makes the most sense to me right now. She believes that Michael has ulterior motives for what he's doing and doesn't want anyone to know about it, which is why he's had the fae that are working for him put up mental blocks. 
  All of the fae can put mental blocks over their own minds if they choose to do so. The fae mental blocks on others come from the air fae. They can either be set up in a person's mind (like Andi's block, only except hers adds fake memories to fill in the gaps) or set up over a certain thing or event. Michael had someone set up this mental block for him but we can't figure out who. Alucard thinks that whoever set up the block was a recently marked fae, since the mental blocks were apparently all over the place (I thought that was the point of them, but apparently I was wrong).  
  Not all fae are natural born. Some of them were marked, which means that they were originally human, but a fae marked them. When a fae marks a human, the fae allows the human to drink a small amount of their blood. Once the fae blood is in the human's system, they start to go through a change, similar to that of the vampire change. Both happen over several days, only except with the fae change, it isn't painful until the last day, and the marked human can function normally and notice the mental changes occurring within them, such as improved eyesight, in the first few days. The last day is when the human goes through the physical changes, like increased speed and strength. Once that is done you have a new fae.
Alucard thinks this block is the work of a new fae because he gets notified of all of the marked humans, and he hasn't gotten any notifications of a new air fae in a couple of months. But Katerina has another theory about who put up the block, and I don't like it one bit.
    She says that her mother marked a human named Hunter Laine who she found dying on the side of the road. Fern died about a month after that, but Hunter stayed to help support the family. Her father molded him into his little "Mini Michael" and they have been almost like partners ever since. Katerina says he is an air fae. She also told us that Hunter can set up blocks on places to cause the abilities of others to act up so it gives him the upper hand. And here is the part I especially don't like about him, he is her ex-boyfriend.
Am I jealous of that? No, I'm not...okay, maybe a little but only because he's already been with her and I haven't. But I'm making progress. She and I have been spending a lot of time together these past few weeks. She's been helping me understand more about her father's work but after that we'll go out to the gardens or go to the library when it's raining.
We also have uncovered a new factor of our bond. Apparently we can get inside each other's heads. Katerina says that she was working on a dance or something with Caleb, and all of a sudden she was somewhere else, talking to Felix and Demetri about the Morgynstein case, but she couldn't control anything she was saying. But then she figured out that it was my voice speaking and she snapped out of it. When that happened, she came and told me what had happened and repeated my whole conversation with Felix and Demetri back to us which really freaked them out. I haven't tried to get inside of her head yet, but I think she would like her privacy anyway.
   Unfortunately she's "at work" right now, which means that she's fooling around with Lorne, Gracie, and Jayden at the bar. I'm glad she has her job, but it isn't really a job. She rarely works the bar, but she does preform a lot so I guess that counts as working. I have to pick her and Jayden up in a few minutes because the bar closes at ten o'clock on Fridays and that's already past Jayden's curfew. Right now, I'm sitting in the lounge for the upper guard members, watching Caleb and Fred tease George about Andi. I have no idea why they are here, but they are current standing on the furniture singing a ridiculous song to George.
"Andi I love you..." Fred sang.
"Andi I do..." Caleb added, ruffling George's hair.
"When we're apart, my heart beats only for you!" They both exclaimed loudly, as George teleported out of their embrace and over next to me.
"Very funny guys..." George told them, rolling his eyes and smoothing his hair as he smiled.
"Hey don't worry man, you can do that to Demetri too." Santiago said. He was a dark skinned man who was extremely strong, like Felix, but he wasn't as strong. But his strength earned him a place with the upper guard. "Brynnlee, I love you; Brynnlee I do..."
"When we're apart my heart beats only for you!" He finished, accompanied by the other three boys.
"She's going to flip out on you when she figures out you called her Brynnlee." Demetri said with a smirk.
"You and Brynn, what a surprise..." Felix joked sarcastically.
"Yeah, that wasn't expected, especially after we found you two snogging in the hall before training." Caleb told us.
"Yeah, but at least I'm getting somewhere with my woman." He retorted, shooting me a glance.
"I'm getting places..." I told him.
"I don't think Kit Kat knows that." Felix whispered loudly to me.
"Oh, you and Kat! Spill the beans bro!" George said, appearing on the seat next to me.
"Here you go ladies." Fred told Heidi, Jane, and Chelsea, as he made a handful of tissues appear. "This is going to be a sob story and a half." They all laughed.
"Please Freddy, I highly doubt that I'm going to be crying. Vampires can't cry." Chelsea informed him.
"Yeah, and I'm going to be to busy laughing at my brother's pathetic behavior." Jane teased. I rolled my eyes at her and smiled. It was nice to see her warming up to the newborns. But she's still a little bit jealous of the fact that I get to be in charge of the missions.
"I'm not saying a word." I told them.
"Aw, come on! We are lacking excitement around here! I would love to hear about all of your girl drama dude!"
"Santiago is right! There is nothing exciting going on right now! The Morgynstein case is having a dry spell, and the only thing I get to do is talk to annoying humans all day! Hearing about your "girl drama" as he put it, would be the highlight of my day." Heidi exclaimed. I glanced at my watch. In a couple of minutes I had to go pick up Katerina and Jayden.
"You know, unfortunately, I can't right now. I have to go pick up Jayden and Katerina." I inhaled sharply as I stood up. "Oh well, maybe next time." They all groaned.
"You aren't getting out of this that easy." Caleb told me with a smirk growing on his face.
"Yeah, you got lucky this time." Demetri added.
"Well, maybe you could enlighten them with your own girl drama. I'm sure you have lots." I winked at him and waved a quick goodbye to everyone and walked off.
"Alec, wait up!" I heard Jane shout. I stopped walking and waited a few seconds before she was by my side.
"What's up?" I asked as we started to move again.
"Nothing. I just wanted to walk with you." She interlocked her fingers into mine and smiled. After a while of silence, she spoke again. "Are you stressed out about the Morgynstein case?"
"Who isn't?"
"True. But I figured it would be worse for you because of your bond with Katerina."
"Why would that make things worse?"
"I don't know, I just figured that it may put additional stress on you. I mean you've been pretty focused on making her fall in love with you or whatever it is you are trying to do."
"Is there an issue with that?" She groaned.
"Yes there is. Alec you don't need to make her fall in love with you, she can do that on her own. And what are you going to do if she does fall in love with you? Do you even love..."
"Yes, of course I love her." I interrupted. "You don't need to even ask me that! I have since the day I met her."
"Then why haven't you told her yet?" She questioned.
"Because I don't know how Jane! I don't even know if she feels the same! I don't want to ruin what I have with her now!" She stopped walking and turned me to face her.
"Well, you better hope you know what you are getting into before history repeats itself."
"What are you talking about?"
"You know, that girl you were engaged to that sent us to our human death! Lilian was an evil vindictive bitch who just used you so she could get the bounty for turning us in!"
I flinched at the name. Lilian was my lover when Jane and I were still human. She and I were engaged. When the villagers came to put us on trial as witches, she lead them right to us and pretended that one of us was trying to possess her. After that, we were sent to be burnt at the stake. They didn't even bother with a trial.
"Katerina is different Jane!"
"Is she? I can remember that Lilian was all nice and sweet until those damned villagers came. Just like Katerina. When her father comes, I bet she'll betray us just like Lilian did." That statement angered me so much that I couldn't think straight. I pushed Jane up against the wall and put my forearm across her neck. I ignored the look of shock on her face.
"Don't ever say that! Katerina is nothing like her! You are just saying that because you are jealous because Aro put me on this mission and not you!"
"Wow, after all we've been through, you think I would be jealous of you...well I'm not."
"You and I both know that's a lie. You've been acting like this since the mission first started."
"Acting like what Alec? You think you're the only one who's been having relationship issues, I've been having them too!" She blurted before she realized it. I took a step back from her in shock and let my arms fall to my sides.
"Forget I said that!" She began to walk away. I grabbed her wrist and pulled her back to me.
"What are you talking about!" She was quiet. "Jane, you know you can tell me anything." I told her softly.
   "You have to go get Katerina and Jayden."
    "They won't mind if I'm a couple of minutes late." She sighed.
  "Come back to my room with me then, I can't tell you out here." She grabbed my hand once more and we ran to her room. We arrived moments later at her door, which was right next to mine. She opened the door and we entered. The two of us sat down at the two person table that was wooden and painted black with chairs to match.
   "Jane look, I'm sorry...there's just a lot going on right now..."
   "I know. You don't need to apologize to me. I understand. The day that you figured out Katerina is your mate started this whole frenzy with you thinking that you have to make her fall in love with you...but you don't need to, she's your mate, she's going to end up loving you anyway. And if she doesn't, it's her loss."
   "You're right I guess, but we aren't talking about me, we are talking about you." She sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose.
   "I cannot sugar coat this, so I'm just going to put it out in the open...I made a huge mistake Alec, I didn't mean to, it just sort of happened. But it only happened once, I swear!" She bit her lip.
   "Jane...what happened."
    "I...it was his idea!" Jane shouted, putting her face in her hands.
    "Who's?"
     "Aro's...he and I did something..."
     "Jane, whatever happened, I'm not going to judge you. I just want to know what's going on." She was silent. Her eyes filled up with tears that would never spill. She sobbed quietly. Jane hasn't cried since we were turned. Whatever happened must have really upset her.