The new range of prey that was now spread out around them was the highlight of the trip so far. It was a different kind of hunt, a different kind of thrill that left them fulfilled and satisfied to the point of a free, clear mind.

Surrounded by such wonderful sounds, by such bright and clear sounds of nature and animals with light that filtered in through the tall, tall canopies that were alluring, striking in the intensity of their colour, the green a glowing roof over their heads. 

The trees were different, stretching and bending in ways that they didn't back home with vines that were thick and bundled close together. It was as if they had stepped into a nature documentary destined to see only the best.

It was the highlight of the trip, the only bright side so far since the Ticuna had nothing to tell them, or rather, were not willing to tell them anything. 

When they had arrived three days after leaving Forks, Roman had taken to hiding far out of sight. She hadn't gotten the chance to feed as fully as she wanted, and what's more, the small, condensed focused bit of their scent in the fresh air tainted the area -- the smell of human blood carrying deep into the soil, marking their land clearly as their own. Somehow it had been worse than the many flights they had taken and the airports. 

Alice and Jasper had taken Romulus down to the village. It was away from the Brazilian towns and centers that they had cut through on their way there. This was only one spot that the Ticuna had taken residence within the expanse of the rainforest and the easiest for them to reach. It did them little good when an hour later they had returned with the same legend retold to them. 

There was nothing more that they were either willing to say or could say, the extent of their true knowledge unknown without Edward to listen in on their thoughts. 

It was only another reason to miss her husband even more. He would have been far more useful here than she would have been. 

But he was needed at home to gather their witnesses, to gather their forces that were willing to defend their family. He would be a sturdy, calming presence at Bella's side, helping her to think clearly, to focus. Roman had always been more independent of her emotions, had always felt like there were two parts herself -- with and without, solo and united. She needed comfort and reassurance just as much as they did, needed that certainty to soothe her discomforts and doubts, but it was as if she could adapt herself to fit the moment. If Bella needed her, if Edward needed her, she was there, stable, but if all was fine, all was well, and she felt it safe to let herself sink into the depths of her mind, falling to the darkness that surrounded a girl lost in the woods, she could let herself be comforted and assuaged, vulnerable and weak. 

It was better for her to view the world this way when she could, decide which moments were meant to be drowned in emotion and which were meant to be times where she set them to the side in the box of important, urgent things to sort through later when she had the chance. 

Thinking that the new variety in animals was a bright point to the misfortunate setback they had come upon -- one that had been expected but hoped against anyway -- when Alice returned to her muttering about the importance of heading deeper into the wilderness. 

Now would have been a perfect time for those instincts to kick in, that I can find whatever I put my mind to sense. 

The plan for what came next was meant to be pretty straightforward. When that resource ran dry they would pick apart the possibilities that Roman had painstakingly worked over all those long hours of the night. They were meant to have all the time in the world to follow those leads, though, now, with time-pressed as it was, they didn't have time for her possibles and maybes. 

And as much as she needed them, she was needed here and that was fine. She was fine. 

Roman drew Romulus higher onto her lap, nose wrinkled as she held him out of reach of the nasty looking spider that he was reaching for, wondering idly how long it'll take for Alice and Jasper to return. 

She could hear them hunting, or rather, she could hear Jasper hunting as he stalked a howler monkey while Alice sat and searched the future as far away from her and her son as she was willing to go. She didn't want to be too far away from them just in case but she needed the clarity to see. 

They had been sitting here a while. Hunting for her was always straight forward, very direct and to the point as she got into the zone. She did only what she needed without delay. The thrill of the hunt wasn't the same when the animals were weak and defenceless against her. 

He reached for another bug as it flew closer, tiny hands perfectly still as he waited for it to grow closer so that he could snatch at it. 

Sighing, she sets him down so he could play as he wanted without having to pretend that he wasn't trying to snatch at bugs when he thought she wasn't paying attention. She draws a knee up, resting her chin atop it as she watches him dart around gracefully as he jumps and spins while reaching for some sort of moth. 

His soft laughter was the sweetest, loudest sound around her as everything drew into in tight around them. Foliage rustles, low branched leaves moving as leaves move and bent. 

She sees it a second before it happens, and Roman is on her feet and stepping forward in one smooth motion, spinning her son up and into her arm, holding him high and out of reach just as the jaw snaps open to snap down on where Romulus had been moments before. 

The snake wasn't anything that I recognized. It was green with a bright, almost sickly yellow tint with fangs larger than any other snake that she had ever seen. It had splashes of white along its scales, the occasional cluster randomly shown throughout. 

Hissing, it coils tight on the ground in defence. Romulus returns the sound, small teeth bared as he glares down at the animal. 

"Alright, calm down, love," she tells him, shifting him so that he couldn't see the snake anymore. "You just got too close, baby. There's no reason to be scared." 

"He was going to hurt me," he argues, writhing in her arm like a wild animal. "Nasty amphibian." 

She chuckles. "Relax, baby. You're too big for a snake like that. Boas like him eat smaller things like rodents and birds." 

"How do you know, mamma?" 

"Because... I'm not sure, actually, but I just know, Rom. Now come sit and wait for your Aunt and Uncle to come back," she says, strolling away from the snake to find somewhere else that they could sit and wait. She listens carefully to the world around them, not wanting to place him near anything else that might try to attack him or that he might accidentally antagonize. 

"I hate waiting," he complains. "Why do they take longer to hunt than we do?"

"We cheat, babe. I work to make sure that we're satisfied while being as fast as possible." 

"Why don't they do that, too?" 

"They don't have the..." Roman trails off, words clogging in her throat as a niggling sensation at the back of her mind becomes too persistent to ignore, pulsing with this persistent itch that makes her skin feel as if it's being covered in thousands of needles. 

Flaring bright, she blinks quickly as she searches for the feeling, this drawing feeling deep in her chest that pulls her one way, leading her off in the opposite direction that Alice and Jasper currently were. 

"Mamma? What's wrong?" he asks cautiously, stilling completely to press himself firmly into her arms. 

She shakes her head. "It's nothing, baby, it's just..." Roman squints in the general direction, picking out the way she wants to go instantly. It's almost like she could see the path written out vaguely before her, sketched out in a thin, dotted line that burned bright in her mind, glowing against the map that lay beneath everything else. "There's something out there." 

"What is it?" he whispers, making himself as small as possible. 

"It's nothing near. It's something far out there, babe," she says. "I think it's just... it doesn't matter." 

"But it bothers you." 

Roman doesn't answer right away, searching for the right thing to say that would explain away her concern when he quite obviously knew different. "It's bothering me a little," she admits. "Do you want to go looking for monkeys, baby?" 

"Is it what Aunty Alice is searching for?"

"It might be what we're actually searching for," she mutters, eyes narrowed in the direction of her instincts were screaming at her to do.

It was the one thing that she was hoping would truly happen was actually occurring. She wanted nothing more than for her abilities to present themselves, for her gifts to surface so that she could find what they needed opposed to pinning everything on Alice. It was the reason that they were here, the reasons that they persuaded her to come along. 

And now she was afraid of what she would find, or what she should do, and she didn't want to go after them unsure if she was going to lead them in the wrong direction or if it was just going to drag them all into so many different directions.

"The hybrid?"

"Oh, don't call yourself it, baby," she says with a wince. "It doesn't sound like a nice word and you're so much better than that." 

"But it's what I am, mamma," he says, big eyes blinking innocently. "Should we follow it?"

"No, we shouldn't follow anything. We should stay here and wait for Alice to tell us what she was able to see." 

Romulus tilts his head, cheeks puffing before he blows out a slow breath. "That doesn't seem right, mamma. What if this is our chance to help Ressie?" 

He was so bright, so impossibly smart, that she wanted to hide and smother his words because he was simply that smart. He knew what he was saying, knew how to flip things the way that he wanted all manipulative and suggestive. It felt so much like being scolded by a child, her child, that was only repeating the things that she had said to him. 

If Roman didn't feel like terrible before, she certainly did now. It didn't chance that they should wait for Alice.

Though... she had told them that they were always able to follow her scent if she caught onto something. It would be miserable if she was the reason that everything was screwed up, if she was the reason that everything was ruined and her mates and daughter and family and all of their friends died. 

Maybe it was simply that she didn't want that sort of attention focused all on her, didn't want so many people depending on her and her abilities, hoping that she would be able and capable when it was so much different than being a human -- most days she couldn't even bear to face her reflection because of how different she looked now. The face that she had fallen in love with, all the little quirks and marks that she had grown into that made her feel so human, so Roman, were all gone and she was suddenly this person that wasn't sure what to do with her own body. let alone these awesome tracking senses that made her the perfect hunter, a top predator, in a way that would have only been capable of in her wildest dreams. 

Roman wasn't the kind of person to take charge. She was the kind of person that spent her lunch doing homework because she worked so many shifts. She was the girl that knew more about the forest in Forks than the most seasoned of hunters. She was Roman Elders, the girl that rode her bike in the winter and split her lips more than she was willing to admit to anything. 

She was all this until Bella and Edward and then she was more, so much more as she came alive, as she blossomed into herself, became better than she was and just the same. 

And Roman knew that if she could do this, if she could believe in herself, then it would be for them, for Renesmee and Romulus and their futures together and everything that they could ever have. 

"Time to strap in," she says after a second of hesitation, turning him so that he was seated in the carrier and she was able to buckle him in safely. "How does that feel? You alright?" 

"We're leaving?"

"Yeah, we have things to do, you know?" she says, more to herself that to him. It was still a little weird that she could have such intelligent conversations with her son when he was only a few months old. "You were right, of course, so we have to get a move one because I don't know how long this will last for." 

"We get to go hunting like a real tracker?" Romulus asks excitedly. 

Roman laughs softly, tightening the straps around her middle. "Yes, babe, like a real tracker. I'm not sure how much fun you'll have with it." 

"It's going to be so much fun!" 

"We'll see, baby." 

Then she takes off, tearing forward into the rainforest as she chased after the trail that was laid out before her, paved both in her mind and firmly on the ground before her as her surroundings melded with the map in her mind. 

Roman followed the spot that reminded her so much of her children but didn't the spot that felt like a spot burning like a sun before her, drawing her into its gravity. 

She was aware of Alice and Jasper drawing closer, running to catch up from behind as she seemingly left them. 

But it would be fine, everything would be fine. They knew what to do now. 

Roman was going to find them. She always found what she was looking for. 

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i wanted this finished by yesterday but i didn't get around to it

unedited 

2020-04-26