All right, all right, I know I marked the story as "complete," but all day long I felt terribly guilty because I know what happens to Jasper Nine and you guys don't. There simply has never been enough drama between Alice and Jasper to make a proper sequel, and I had a couple of universes I rather loved that ended up on my cutting room floor, so to speak. So here it is…

I do not own Twilight or any of its characters.

Epilogue

(A Stitch in Time)

Five years later…

Ugh.

Edward had told me that shifting universes was "unpleasant," and had gone on to explain that shifting was second only to the pain of transforming. Somehow, I still hadn't been fully prepared for what I'd been facing, day after day, month after month, year after year. A lesser man might have given up. Laid down and died. I, however, had already spent entirely enough of my life laying down and dying. I was a soldier, for Christ's sake. Whatever else I might have become, whatever Jasper Hale had been, Jasper Whitlock was a soldier. I could tolerate pain, if it was for a greater good.

It was with all of this in mind that I shifted once again, part of me wanting to give up, but the soldier in me pressing on. This was going to be just like every other place. No reason to get my hopes up. I'd get to the house, Alice would be there with Jasper, and I'd move along.

Once again, I cautiously approached the house, sniffing the air to determine the number of vampires inside and checking the emotional state of everyone in the house. Unfortunately, it seemed to have been abandoned for quite awhile. It shouldn't come as a huge shock. This wasn't the first time I'd had to go searching for them. Soon, my family in each universe would be moving out of Forks. They'd already lived there for ten years, and it was time they packed up and left. Finding them would start becoming the biggest challenge, and I was not looking forward to that. A true soldier doesn't run from a challenge, but easy paths still tend to be preferable.

So far, whenever I'd gone looking, they'd been in Cleveland or Toronto. I headed to Cleveland first, getting lost in my own ponderings as I ran.

I really hadn't had the foggiest idea where to begin or what to do when I'd gotten started. Edward had gone over the rules with me, and I'd gone over them in my mind at every stop, despite the fact that I wasn't exactly prone to forgetting things. Don't get caught. Don't do anything suspicious. Don't eat humans. Don't involve anyone outside the family—avoid involving even the family if you can, to keep the Volturi from ever learning about the device. Most of what he'd said had been common sense, but I had to admit, I probably wouldn't have thought about the Volturi angle. I'd been mildly insulted that Edward had felt the need to tell me not to eat people, but after the first six months, the temptation had started to dawn on me.

It was no secret that the dietary restrictions of my family didn't exactly sit well with me. The funny thing about it is, I never really liked killing humans either. I had to feel their agony, their despair, and their pain every time I took a life. I tried to ignore it, tried not to be a slave to it. Still, I was excited when Alice found me and told me about an alternative. Hell, I was just excited when Alice found me. From that day on, I'd have gladly followed her to the ends of the Earth. If she'd told me that she wanted me to eat a whole pizza that I'd have to regurgitate later, I'd have done it without question. If she'd stood up one day and announced that she really wanted to eat people and join the Volturi, off to Italy we'd have gone. Alice was my world, my light, my life.

That all changed the day that God-forsaken wolf girl killed her.

I was never the same after that. I knew, on some level, the suffering I was inflicting on everyone around me. Unfortunately, that only made me feel worse, which made it even more impossible for me to control my gift, which made them suffer more, which… Let's just say it was a vicious cycle. And through all of it, Alice was gone. She would never, ever be back. I would never again spend five minutes in her presence, never have one moment's relief to my suffering. I could have gone on, if only I could see her one last time. Too bad that wasn't possible.

Then one day, suddenly, it had happened. Alice had been there, and she'd been so cheerful, talking about a "big naked guy." I didn't really care what she was talking about. She could've been reading the back of a shampoo bottle, and her voice would have still been the most amazing sound I'd ever heard. I knew it was short-lived, that she'd be gone soon. Then Edward had given me the device, had shown me how to use it, and had set me off into the world—or worlds—to find my own Alice. He'd told me it could take years.

I'd known that was a possibility, but I still hadn't expected it to be the case.

The first time I shifted, I had nervously approached my family's house, sniffing around, trying to gauge how many vampires lived there from a combination of scent and feeling. Once I found Alice inside, I couldn't stop myself from bursting in. It had been a disaster, mainly because apparently being in a universe with two Jaspers had made Alice's head hurt so much she started wailing like a banshee.

And of course, I could feel her pain.

The pain I'd caused her.

After that, I tried not to get involved unless I couldn't tell for certain where Alice and Jasper were. I couldn't stand the idea of causing Alice that much pain. Frankly, I was rather perturbed with the Edward who'd given me the device I used, because I was pretty sure he was subjecting her to it anyway.

That wasn't the only reason I was perturbed with Edward. Every place I visited, it was like the Edward and Bella show. It made sense. He was the only one of us who had been involved with someone while they were human, at least for a significant amount of time. The five minutes Carlisle spent with Esme and Rosalie spent with Emmett before they were turned hardly counted. Plus, Edward was kind of a bonehead. He made a lot of stupid decisions and ridiculous mistakes. Every time he didn't make one of those mistakes, the universe changed.

One place I went, Edward had never left Bella after I'd tried to attack her. He'd had to go on the run with her when he found out Victoria was trying to kill her. The rest of the family had split up to look for her, and only Carlisle and Esme were still at home. That had been a fun one to explain, since they'd assumed at first that I was their own Jasper and that something had happened to their Alice. Of course, he could've just avoided the entire mess by changing her so she could fight Victoria off herself, but my brother was never really one for thinking clearly where Bella was concerned.

In another place I went, I felt so much despair in the house I absolutely had to investigate. After all, what if it had been Alice who was so distraught? But it hadn't, of course. Right after Edward had met Bella, he'd been so hot-and-cold with her. One minute, he wanted to be friends. The next minute, he was telling her to go away and leave him alone. A few days later, he wanted to be pals again. I never understood why Bella hadn't gotten pissed off and given him his walking papers then and there. Well, in this universe, she had. She'd told him he was a creep and she thought it would be best if he'd just leave her alone forever.

At first, he'd tried to stay away from her, but of course he couldn't. Sometimes I thought Rosalie might be right about him being a dimwit. In the end, he'd snuck into her window to watch her sleep, and she'd caught him at it one day and screamed her head off.

This had resulted in Edward's stupidest decision yet. Edward had slipped out the window at his true speed to evade Charlie. Charlie had assumed his daughter had been dreaming when she saw Edward in her room and told her to chill out. Bella had confronted Edward about what she'd seen, and for some stupid reason, he felt compelled to tell her everything while he apologized. Well, he'd started to tell her everything, anyway. As soon as he got the word "vampire" out, Bella had hightailed it to live with her mother.

Alice would check her visions periodically. At one point, she'd sent Bella a letter which basically said that she understood why Bella hated them and was terrified, but she really needed to see a doctor about a serious medical problem. Apparently, Bella had complied and it had saved her life. Not that it was much of a life. Every time Alice looked at Bella's future, she was holed up in her room at her mom's house, wearing a crucifix, clutching a wooden stake, surrounded by garlic and holy water. It would have been funny if it hadn't been so sad. Bella had no idea that those measures were completely worthless if a vampire actually wanted to come after her, since she hadn't taken the time to listen to everything Edward had tried to tell her.

Every time Edward had decided to go talk to her, Alice had visions of Bella flipping out and trying to kill herself, screaming about how she didn't want to live in a world where the mythical creatures were real. So he got to spend the rest of his existence knowing he'd ruined the life of the girl he loved. Certainly explained the bad feelings around the house neatly enough.

On and on it went like that. Sometimes Bella was with that damnable wolf, and I really wished I could rip his throat out. That would have fallen under "doing something suspicious" though. Besides, that particular Jacob hadn't killed Edward, hadn't driven Bella mad, and hadn't sent his wolf-girl after Alice. Most of the time though, she was with Edward, and seeing them together reopened the wounds of my own world.

After a few weeks, I began to get the distinct impression that a lot of the human Bellas, in fact, all of the ones who hadn't ended up involved with our family in some way, had fallen ill and died. I managed to spare a tiny corner of emotion for my poor brother and the hopeless task he was out there facing. But in truth, I didn't care that much whether Bella was alive or dead in the universe I ended up in. Sure, she was a nice girl, and I liked her well enough. That didn't mean I had any specific qualms about living in a world where she didn't exist. Not if it meant I could be with Alice.

Every time I went to a new universe and I could tell that Alice was inside and she was all right, it was a mixed bag of emotions for me. Alice was happy. Alice was alive. That made me feel good. But I couldn't see her. Couldn't touch her. Couldn't hold her.

I had just shifted yet again, having just left a universe where Bella had, for some reason, left Edward for Jacob after he was injured by the newborn army. But then she'd gotten sick, and Jacob hadn't been able to bear to watch her die, so he'd brought her to my family, pleading with them to help her. They'd changed her. After that, she couldn't stand to be around him because she could finally smell his wolf stench, and both Edward and Jacob were basically following her around nonstop, begging her to take them back. Now that had been funny.

Still, I was getting tired of the Edward and Bella show. It had been entertaining at first, but by now it was just old. Five years and I was still roaming around seeing the results of Edward's various lapses in judgment. It was like being stuck in a horror movie where the girl kept running upstairs and locking herself in the house with the killer, over and over again. All you could do is watch helplessly as the action unfolded, when you just wanted to scream at the hapless idiot for being such a moron.

Before long, I had arrived in Cleveland, and I already knew where my family's house was here, or at least, where it had been in other universes. It was on the outskirts of town, and of course it had been mildly ostentatious with huge windows everywhere, a garage as big as most peoples' houses in town, and its very own Olympic-sized swimming pool. I approached, preparing to take my mental inventory and run back to Forks again. I supposed the one upside to the time that had lapsed was that I wouldn't have to keep going to Forks soon enough.

Everyone seemed happy enough. Quiet contentment and loving nature, that was Esme. Curiosity and compassion, that was Carlisle. Self-absorption with just a hint of caring, that was Rosalie. Good-natured and up for anything, that would be Emmett. Self-conscious and worried, could only be Bella. Edward was happier than I'd ever found him in any other universe. It was like he was constantly reminding himself why his life was great. And Alice and Jasper… Yup, there they were, happy as always. I sighed and tried not to think too much as I started back toward Forks. Edward would have been able to hear my silent inventory, but normally he wrote it off to his own Jasper being in an odd mood. Every once in awhile, he'd come out to investigate and I'd be forced to tell him the whole shebang. I didn't sense any confusion from Edward before I turned around though, so it didn't look like this was going to be one of those times.

And yet, I heard the door open before I had taken even three steps.

"Jasper," Edward called out calmly.

That was definitely a first. Normally, Edward would get all frazzled and worked up when I'd show up, seeing as there was another Jasper inside the house already.

Well, regardless, I was caught. "Hi Edward," I said, working to the best of my ability to maintain the calm atmosphere. It was hard to do when I really just wanted to scream at him about what a fool he was in universe after universe.

"Yes, I'm aware of what a fool I am in most places. I was a fool here too, once."

Upon closer inspection, Edward was covered with scars.

"It's you!" Boy, I wished I'd been able to stop myself before blurting that out. It's you was such a ridiculous sentiment. No matter who you said it to, it was true. They were always them.

Edward chuckled quietly, having a direct line to my thoughts on the topic of my own idiocy. "True enough, but I knew what you meant. And you're correct. I'm the very same Edward you met five years ago. I'd hoped you would be finished by now, but I assume from your presence here that you are not," he said sadly. "Still, you're looking better than you did when last we met."

That part was true enough. Hope was a pretty powerful thing. Being able to occasionally see Alice, and yes, even Edward, was nice too. I felt guilty for how terribly I'd treated Edward when he'd visited my universe. I'd ignored him at first, then when I realized Alice was with him later, I'd assaulted him.

"I'm sure I would have done the same in your position," Edward replied to my thoughts. That was an obnoxious habit I hadn't especially missed. He chuckled again.

"The reason I'm detaining you, Jasper, is because I can help you."

"I'm listening," I replied, not willing to get excited yet. Besides, Edward had already helped me plenty.

"The device I gave you was a sort of prototype. After that, an enhanced version was made. It has a few new features, such as storing the last few universes that were visited. As luck would have it, I stumbled upon a place which will suit your purposes. It was the fourth-to-last universe I visited, and so it will be stored in the device's memory. It can easily be the next, and final, place you visit."

I stared, shocked. Long ago, I had begun to give up on the idea that my journey would ever be over, but I was content enough to keep searching throughout the years, decades, centuries. I had assumed it was the meaning of my existence to continue searching for as long as the world continued to live and breathe around me.

"Wait here," Edward said calmly. He returned a moment later with a device that looked like the one he'd given me five years ago, but with a few extra buttons. "I don't think you'll really need to worry about implanting it, since you'll only need to use it once." He showed me which buttons to press to take me to the fourth-to last universe he'd visited, the one where I should stay. I wondered exactly what the circumstances were in that place, but Edward didn't seem particularly inclined to talk about it. He did tell me, though, that he'd left me a note under a rock, which struck me as being the most hilarious thing anyone had ever said.

Edward held the device out for me to take, which I did gleefully. "Thank you. Again." I paused, feeling as if I should say more. I owed everything to this Edward, native to this universe, who had no special reason for wanting to help me except that he understood my pain as no one else could.

"Not quite 'no one else,'" he said quietly. There was something ominous about his words.

"Things seem to have worked out well for you in the end though," I commented.

"Yes, quite well. The first couple of years were difficult. I had to re-adjust to the differences between this Bella and the one I… lost." Edward choked on the last word, but brightened, presumably because of the Bella he had now. "She's quite remarkable. She's been through much in her relatively short life. Occasionally, she still surprises one of us when she says something a certain way or speaks of a memory of her human life that our own Bella never had, but at the end of the day, she is still Bella, and I will love her always. She didn't argue with me a bit about getting married. Her views on the topic were quite different, due to her altered upbringing."

I noticed the ring on Edward's left hand and smiled. It was almost identical to the one that my own Edward had worn for only a month before he'd been torn apart. His taste in jewelry was the same, at least. The corners of my scarred brother's mouth turned up slightly at my last thought.

"I'm glad things worked out for you. You deserve it. You always did."

"As do you. They will work out for you as well."

The next thing I knew, I was back in the clearing outside Forks once again. I had barely paid attention to where I was going as I ran, so excited was I to finally be reaching the conclusion of this five-year journey. Edward and I had said our goodbyes quite cordially. I hadn't asked whether I'd be seeing him in my final home. It hadn't occurred to me to wonder. Alice would be there. Nothing else mattered.

Nervously, I pressed the buttons Edward had told me to press, and I was off once again.

Pain was nothing.

Alice was everything.

The clearing appeared again, and I immediately searched for the rock Edward had left for me. It was there. No note; it had decomposed into the earth over the last five years, but it was clear that the rock had been deliberately placed here. It was a large rock, and it was normally at the base of a tree where it had probably sat for a century or more.

I ran, faster than I'd ever run in my life, to my family's home in Forks. They were there. Excitement filled me, and I could scarcely contain it. I could smell only five vampires in the house: Carlisle, Esme, Rosalie, Emmett, and…

Alice. She was so sad. She was like I'd been five years before. I tried to send her soothing waves before I knocked at the door, to let her know that everything would be all right, but my efforts couldn't penetrate the shell of despair that surrounded her.

I wouldn't need to ask anyone what had happened. It was plain that Jasper had died.

I knocked at the door, and Carlisle came to open it.

"Jasper? What? How?"

Apparently, Edward had somehow managed to find out the details of this universe without actually paying the Cullens a visit. I had no idea how that was possible, but it didn't matter. All that mattered was the small, downtrodden girl with the gorgeous dark hair who sat forlornly on the couch behind Carlisle. I didn't bother to greet my father. I shoved past him and rushed to her side.

"Alice, Alice honey, it's all going to be all right from now on," I told her, reaching for her hand.

She stared up at me with her blackened eyes, and I got the distinct impression that she hadn't really seen anything clearly in a long time. "Jazz?" Her mood was gradually shifting, her features slowly changing from desolation to delight. She reached out to touch me, to make sure that I was real, and I clutched her hand in mine, silently wondering if I would ever be able to let go.

She threw her other arm around my neck and leapt up from the couch, wrapping her legs around my waist and clinging onto me like a child going for a piggyback ride. "Jasper! It's really you!" I held onto her firmly with both hands, even though I knew I would never need to release her from my grasp for long. Alice lapsed into frantic giggles, inhaling my scent deeply as I did likewise with hers.

We had found one another. Life could begin again.

After several minutes, I remembered that there were four other vampires in the room staring at us. "Um, hello," I said sheepishly. "I don't suppose you have room for a sixth?"

Esme smiled broadly. "We'll have to move. I'll call Bella and Edward in Toronto and see if they have room for six more. If they don't, we'll just have to find a house somewhere with room for eight."

I settled down onto the couch, Alice curled up in my lap. I had quite a long story to tell, but it could wait just a little while longer. I'd been to so many places and seen so many things, but nothing had been as beautiful as the sight before me now.

I didn't need Alice to be psychic to see that my future was clear. As long as she was in it, happiness would follow me wherever I might go.