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When The Psychic Didn't See

04 February 2009

Summary: This is a story about Alice not seeing what happened to Bella through Edward's POV.

AN: This was going to be a one off, but right now, as I'm writing this, I'm actually thinking of further chapters to add later. What do you think? Let me know at the end of this.

Failed Vision

(04 February 2009)

The first day my heart stood still.

I put so much trust in Alice, so much faith. I had even told Bella, 'not a wise person would bet against Alice'. I had said that before Alice decided to tell me that I would end Bella's life, one way or another. It was that day, that I knew I had to prove her wrong. I would defeat the visions. I would not harm one more hair on my Bella's head.

I would protect her from everything, myself included. That's why I sent her away with Alice and Jasper. I knew Alice could protect her from Jasper if he lost control, he wouldn't with Alice's help, and she would see it, or at least I hoped. It wasn't something he would decide ahead of time, it would just happen, and then it would be too late. But I had hope that he would listen to his mate over his blood lust. I had to believe it, I couldn't be worrying over my brother's inexperience and troubles. I knew he would stay as far away from her as he could, all on his own. He had been doing so as it was, and I knew he would continue out of my presence. He had no intention of hurting her, not only because it sat wrong with him, but he also liked her, and he didn't want to hurt me in anyway or have my reaction.

So I trusted them with her as Esme donned her clothes and tried to lead James on a different path. We had the advantage, we had a head-start and a believable lie.

Carlisle and I stepped off the tarmac and followed the path to the baggage claim, where we were to meet with the others. I had called to confirm yesterday with Alice. She had told me she'd seen a vision of James in a place with mirrors. That Bella had also told her that it was her old dance studio. James knew Phoenix and came to check it out. He wouldn't catch Bella's scent. It was trapped up in a hotel room and in Carlisle's car. She'd only be in the public for a few minutes at most. I was going to take her away. We had lost James, and we wouldn't know for sure when he would get here.

I could see Alice's thoughts before I saw the girl in front of me. I scanned the remaining area for Bella, but not only couldn't I hear her, that was expected, but I didn't see her or Jasper either. Alice gasped almost inaudibly and my head swiveled to her as she became blank, seeing something only she could in her head, and me as well, as I had entrance into it.

The ballet studio again. This time, James was standing in front of Bella, a video camera in his hands. They had both made a decision, and it would lead Bella straight to him. I had to convince her otherwise. I pushed my way towards Alice. "Where's Bella?" I ask as she looked around frantically for her other half, and her best friend.

I spy Jasper hurrying his way towards us, his thoughts in a jumble as he went from one thing to another, all pointed to a clear assumption though, Bella was gone.

"How did you loose her?" I snap as he nears, and he slides to a halt.

I see it all in his head before he could think to put it into words, just instantly replaying his memories for me. I growl and turn out to the parking lot. I steal a car and before I can close my door, the others enter as well. Emmett and Rosalie had driven to the East Coast before angling back to meet us, and they knew when the flight was to get in. We had made sure our flight status wasn't tracked, using fake names and taking several connecting flights with more names attached to the tickets. They stayed behind my car as I raced to Bella's childhood house. Alice remembered she had been given a letter to give to Bella's mom. "That should have tipped you off!" I snarl as I read through her what it said.

Alice looks at me with an apology in her eyes. "I couldn't see her doing this, if I did, then I would have stopped her. I wasn't watcher her that closely either though. Trying to pinpoint James, I forgot to pay attention to Bella's actions. This should have been noticed though, which leaves me to believe, she only planned out part of it. The rest was pure impulse on her part."

We get to Bella's house in only minutes which should have taken longer, but I am out of the car before it was even fully in park. Then I am in her house. I could smell him, James' scent lingered in the air, he had been there recently. Bella's was non-existent. Only faded scents from the clothes she left behind and would have no use for in Washington.

Alice then has another vision. "No." She whispers, as if she could change either of their decisions and I have to watch despite trying to turn my mind away, as Bella goes flying through the air and hits a glass panel before it shatters and rains down around her.

My heart stops, or it would, if it beat.

I was out of the door and running, she'd said it was close. I just have to get close enough to hear James, or to smell her. I wasn't in-tuned enough to James to hear his thoughts as far as I would like at this moment, but I would take anything if it meant saving Bella, even if it meant hearing all his desires towards destroying her. All because I had protected her.

It didn't matter that if I hadn't, he would have killed her instantly, I had saved her long enough only to prolong her death, making it worse, and drawn out. Scaring her more than she would have, if she hadn't even known what was coming.

That's when I hear it. It isn't his thoughts or her scent. Those would come second. No, I heard the sweetest sound I would ever know. The one thing that I would miss more than even her blushes if Alice's visions did come true, either of them. It was faint, and much too fast, missing beats as she breaths in deeply, and is hit by pain with every time she expanded too far, but couldn't stop it. The dull, thud-thump leads me straight to her. It was the only noise like it in the entire block of forgotten houses, left empty for the daylight hours.

Then I hear his thoughts as I race towards them. I will beat that strange Vampire at his own game. Saving a snack for himself, without wanting to share. Hmm.. Then I heard his real voice as he taunted Bella. I was getting closer, so much closer. "There was only one other vampire who had managed to elude me for as long as your precious Edward." He says. "He took away my prize, turning her into a vampire before I could reach them. Yours was too weak, couldn't do it, could he? Don't worry, I got mine in the end. I took his life. Just like I'm going to take Edward's once he sees your pitiful body in a heap. He will fight for you, and it will be fun."

"No!" I hear her scream, and I falter only a moment in wonder, what was she thinking? "Don't fight for me Edward, walk away, save yourself. I'm not worth it!"

Did she know I was near? Why was she talking to me? Then I understood. Do you think that's going to have any effect? James' head voice asks smugly, and then his thoughts turned to me. Come save your precious human, if you can. Are you even close enough? Bella did know I was near. I am praying for her to hold on, stay with me, I know her heart is pounding now, but it is only the adrenaline, soon she would go into shock and could pass out, if not worse.

"Oh, he will fight for you, and loose." James' voice held a lash of viciousness through it. "I will ensure it." I knew too late what he was going to do, and I saw through his eyes as he stepped on Bella's shin and snapped it. "That will be great." His voice took on a girlie pitch. "Oh Edward, please fight for me, look at the pain he put me through!"

I see her trying to crawl away, knowing each movement causes her pain, but I pray she'd get far enough. I am almost there, I am rounding on the building now. I don't know why it took me so long, I swore I was running faster than I ever had before. It isn't until I am inside that I realized that 'close-by' was code for a drive.

"I picked my stage well." I flew at him as the words echoed around the room, and his teeth bit into the back of Bella's hand. I was too late. NO! I growl to myself as I knock him off of her, I'm not too late, Bella would live, and be human! Her soul would be safe, even if mine wasn't, I would ensure hers. She is too precious to become like me, a monster. This monster would save her humanity, would save her life and give her a chance when it naturally came, for her to be allowed entrance into Heaven. She wouldn't be damned for all of eternity like me. I wouldn't allow it, and this first thing to do, was stop James. He would die tonight, right now.

I shoved him away from Bella, following him and pushing him up against the glass. He returns the gesture and somehow manages to catch me for a second. You've lost. "All alone? When you have a coven your size? Ah, that's right, all alone, because your the fastest. But not the strongest."

"Strong enough to defeat you." I reply and used my gifts to maneuver myself out from underneath him, I have to think clearly if I am going to fight, I couldn't be clouded in anger or fear for Bella. I have to save her, and to do so, I have to concentrate. He shot out an arm to attack me, but I knew it was coming, and knew he kept his right arm up to defend his weak side, I use that to attack his left, and he instinctively protects that one instead and then I attack his right.

I had my teeth bare and ready to sink into his neck when Carlisle landed beside me and rested a hand on my shoulder. I snarl towards him, snapping at the offending limb. "Remember your humanity, who you are." He whispered out loud, my anger had taken over, I was furious at James, and anyone who would get in my way from gaining my revenge for Bella.

Carlisle's words filtered into my head, but I still couldn't pull away from James, to destroy him in an instant. "The others will take care of him, you must attend to Bella. She needs the both of us. The others- can't do it." I don't know if you can either. The thought slipped through his mind before he even knew he was thinking it and then he winced as I looked at him, my mind censoring James, to see if he would fight back, but I had rendered him mostly useless by now. I hadn't meant that, you're the only one whose been around her long enough to hold back, and your love for her. Jasper is outside, he's getting anxious, he can smell her blood well. Carlisle stated calmly as I slowly gave up my hold on James and let Emmett, Rosalie and Alice take care of him. I wondered vaguely how Esme was holding up on her own. She was only to watch Charlie once we had known James was no longer following her. She was to get him out if any trouble arose but not to fight. Though she probably could handle Victoria on her own, if she was still around.

I was still in lock-down mode, my only thoughts were to ensure Bella's safety and health. I swore to myself then and there, I would kill anyone who even thought cross about her, it wouldn't matter who, or exactly what, I would kill them before they got the chance to harm her. "Help me." Carlisle pulled and I followed his trusting, truthful voice. To my Bella, she had passed out, but it seemed that she was going in and out. Right now she was out.

I dropped to my knees and all my guards fell down as I looked at Carlisle fretfully. "What do I do?" She can become one of us. "NO! I will not let that happen, she will walk away from this as she walked into it. She will survive."

"You need to suck out the venom in her blood while I attend to the head injury. As it is, she won't survive the transformation unless I get this closed. Listen to me carefully son, if you want her to become one of us, let that happen but see to the other wounds. If you want her to survive tonight as a human you have to make sure you don't take to much blood, just enough until its clean. Can you do that?"

My eyes must have betrayed my insecurity because Carlisle's thoughts briefly panicked, he was concerned how I would take it if she died or if she would be like me, and thinking neither would turn out well. Both conclusions had me doing something uncharacteristic, but I knew only one would have deeply profound effect. If she died. If she became like me, I would mourn for her, but in the end, I would accept her as my mate, and love her just as fiercely as I do now. He also didn't know how to save her from both sources at once. So I nodded, I would try my best.

I didn't know if the fire coating my throat would allow me to let her go, if the monster wouldn't take over completely. I steeled myself against her scent and didn't breath in. I had hunted recently, and I didn't approach this as if I was hunting, I kept as much control over myself as possible and imagined I was kissing her instead, needing to keep control as so not to hurt her more. She was writhing in pain, screaming at the burning sensation. I vaguely thought, that if I ever did let her become one of us, that she'd have to go through this twice, the worse pain imaginable. I ignored it, knowing I'd never let her become like me, nobody would be able to convince me otherwise. I would never be prepared to take her life from her, her beautiful rose colored cheek life. It was enough that she loved me.

I lowered my teeth to the same grooves James had, so as not to further the scar, because it would, scar, and to attack the source directly. The moment her blood coated my tongue, the monster roared to life and rejoiced, sucking greedily at the sweetest nectar it had ever tasted. The smell had only been the tip of the iceberg as the only slightly tainted blood flowed through my teeth, over my tongue and clogging my throat as I drank deeply. The closet thing to describe it as, was pure deliciousness, if I had been human it would have been like a nice big, juicy, perfectly cooked piece of rare steak with only the best flavoring on top of it to enhance its natural flavor.

My eyes fluttered close on their own accord, savoring the sweet flowery taste, my only wish at the moment was that I could drink from her slower, so as to prolong the pure desire coursing through me. I think I would have come if it was sex, but it wasn't, I'd only felt two things more wonderful than this sensation.

I was coming to that realization just as Carlisle was shaking me and whispering fervently. "Stop it Edward, you're killing her." He shook me again. "Her blood is clean, stop, she needs it."

I pulled away, gasping and dressing myself down in the worst ways possible. I was truly a monster, I took more than I should have in trying to save her, I almost killed her. I don't know if I would have been able to stop, I didn't know before I bit her, and I still don't now. I still wanted her blood, I could still taste it and my eyes rolled back in the desire to drink more. I could still smell it, intoxicating me, drawing me nearer.

As my eyes landed on the best desert anyone could ask for, they adjusted and focused on my meal. I tore myself away and went to join the others outside, only Calisle could be that close without fearing hurting her.

I allowed my own images to replay in my mind over and over again. Bella completely devoid of color- I had caused that. I hadn't been able to think about anything else but the pure basic satisfaction I was receiving from drinking her blood, of smelling her scent. I even forgot that she was a human at all, and I forgot how much I loved her, how much I never wanted anything to happen to her. I was worse than any kind of monster, at least monsters still understood what was going on around them and got pleasure out of the torture, I was solely focused on one thing, satisfying a need. I was worse than a monster, I was an animal, void of anything human related.

Don't blame yourself. It's James' fault. Emmett's thoughts entered my mind and Jasper sent me a wave of calm and reflectiveness, trying to get me to see everything.

I nodded at the both of them and turned my head curiously to Alice, I hadn't been paying attention to any of them, still wrapped up in that place of neither human nor monster, just beast. Unthinking predator. Alice's thoughts were running in circles but I couldn't under the time or place of them, or what it meant. There was a lot of pop culture and shopping magazines in there, enough to distract and confuse me from her intentions and I narrowed my eyes at her. Nothing bad, even by your standards. She warned me and I turned away from her, I would ignore that for now. You would have stopped on your own in time. You were coming to a realization, I could see it on your face.

The realization? I didn't understand what she was hinting at. I tried to control my thoughts as I went back to the cleansing, trying not to think about the feel or taste, but rather to the thoughts I did have before Carlisle pulled me away from her.

Two things felt better than the monster being completely satisfied. I fought to remember what I had been thinking about. No one's blood I did feed off of tasted better, when I couldn't control myself as a newborn, not killing all of those evil men. It had only confirmed that I couldn't play God, that I really was a monster for even trying. I would forever be punished by the fact that I took lives, on purpose, and not to survive. If it had been for that, then I would have only been an animal, not a monster, because I had enjoyed killing them, not enjoyed, but satisfied that they could no longer hurt anyone else. I had used my unique gift to accomplish that, deciding who would live and who wouldn't. Their thoughts and hearts were beneath my notice, but I couldn't do it anymore. I had deviated from my path and returned but I wouldn't get away with it again, and frankly despite moments, I didn't really want to anyways, not unless they put me, my family or Bella in harms way.

Bella. I thought for a moment, how could I have even not think solely of her for even a second? She was the reason I was out here and not in there with her, she was the reason I still lived and breathed. I would not still be standing here without her being alive, and I knew she still was, with her chugish heart beat from inside. There was smoke rising as Carlisle worked on her, burning James' limbs to ashes. He'd have to move her soon or else we would need to worry about her lungs as well.

That's when everything clicked. What I had encountered to beat back her blood and smell to the end of the Bella list. One thing that beat it was kissing her, it sent electrical impulses through my entire body just holding her, but kissing her was like magic, like I could finally breath again and my haert would start to move like hers. Yet that was nothing compared to the swelling and joy in my heart, knowing she loved me and I loved her, and she would be in my life. Now more than ever, I was thankful for the fact that she was still alive, she was going to make, Carlisle assured me. Each day I fell more in love with her, each day it made it more impossible for me to leave her side if only for a moment, and to have that love, was far better than anything else she could give me, or anyone else. Her love would keep me from feeding on her again, because my love matched it if not over-rode it. I loved her more than anything and I would gladly lay my non-life on the line for her, to ensure even one more day on this planet, and to see her shown to the pearly gates as I get dragged down and burned in hell. The parallels do not escape me as the only way to kill a vampire is to burn their body and that's why was going to happen to my soul as well, only for now, Bella was there to lift me out.

We finally got to the hospital, and as I sat, pretending to be asleep while she chatted with her mother, I realized, that my heart, if it could beat, had stopped several times today, and if I had been alive and human, I would not have been able to walk away from the still heart and Bella might not have been there either, if I weren't a vampire. Either in James' clutches or in this hospital bed, and again, I cursed my existence for it only put the only thing that could start my heart again, my love, in grave danger.

I promised myself one more time that no matter what I would protect her from all things. But mostly, and on top of anything else, I would protect her from myself.

EAN: SO what did you think? Should I continue? It wouldn't be the prom or anything. Probably New Moon actually... Let me know.

Ean2: I'm moving and I don't know when I'll have internet again, but I do plan on updating sometime soon. I wanted to give you this and a chapter of Shadow before I left.

EAN3: These would all be shorts, not necessarilly need to read the previous, but in chronological order.