A/N:::: So I'm hoping that as this story continues you will all get a better idea of where I'm going here. I know this is kind of different and maybe a little strange, but boy am I having fun with it. I would LOVE it if you guys told me what you think. I'd really like some help with this story. And yes... the narrator of the last chapter was Bella. And yes, she was a vampire. You'll get her story more as I continue. This narrartor is different, and will be revealed earlier on in the chapter. Oh yeah, and this chap is MUCH longer. Hope that's a good thing. Thanks again for reading you guys. --Teek.

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Monsters.

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"Disarm" by Smashing Pumpkins

All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another. ~Anatole France

Those eyes. They were the makings of most men's nightmares… but my dreams. If I were to have dreams, that is. They were watching me unwaveringly as I washed in the moonlit brook. I could feel her red, haunting gaze on me as I crouched on the rocks and splashed the glowing water onto my face and chest. I smiled slightly to myself as I bathed, my back turned as she watched me hungrily, lovingly, protectively from her place in the tree on the bank. I could feel her emotions on the wind—the longing, the pride, the lust.

Crimson streams cascaded down my muscles and fell into the water. I watched the river carry away my sin.

"I love watching you hunt," she purred behind me.

I turned at last to see her smiling at me from the branches and returned the expression. In the flash of a second, she was standing on the rock beside me. Her eyes were at my nose level and I touched the tip of my nose gently between her eyebrows with a chuckling grin.

"The way you bathe in their blood is so beautiful to me," she continued. "You're like a shaft of lightning, delivering the end and restoring your light." Her smile flashed in the moonlight as she looked up at me. "You're my Zeus."

I gave a throaty chuckle and touched her marble cheek as she brushed a hand through my wild hair. "Watching you hunt is the only thing I enjoy more than hunting myself…."

"I love you," I replied softly.

Her smile widened. "You're just saying that because you're full of blood," she teased. "Because your eyes are scarlet and because there's a fight looming on the horizon."

"I'm saying it because I'm your husband," I grinned, leaning in to kiss her. But with one finger she stopped my advances, pressing it to my lips with a mischievous grin as she reached up with the other hand and swiped it gently across my chin.

"You missed a spot," she cooed, her hand coming away with human blood. She sucked on her fingers with laughing eyes, then drawing nearer to me once more wiped another smear of blood from the corner of my lips and held it to my mouth. Now it was my turn to watch like a predator as I sucked on her fingers and met her burning gaze. I swear I was purring. That woman could do it to me. She was now so near to me that our lips were just touching.

"Say it," I commanded huskily.

"I love you, Jasper," she whispered. "And you better come back to me in one piece when this night is over."

"Maria," I breathed her name and pressed my lips firmly against hers. My deadly fangs were nothing to her as I passionately bit at her tongue and lips, my chest rumbling with desire. Maria's fingers became tangled in my hair as I pulled her closer and listened to her purrs over the tumbling water that surrounded us. I was thinking back to the first night I'd ever seen her… smoky brown hair tumbling down her back in a white dress that seemed to glow almost as much as her skin. I was dying under the full moon on a battlefield in Gettysburg, thinking of my sister who was waiting for me back in Texas. The field was empty of everyone except the dead and the soon-to-be dead. Their moans were like dull sirens in my ears. I can remember watching a cricket as it sang on blade of grass beside my head. I focused on its song, trying not to hear the cries of my brothers and enemies and trying not to feel the hot blood still pouring slowly from the hole in my gut.

I started to hear the cries of the wounded worsen in a strange way. They would scream out suddenly, and then become lost in the chorus of night bugs. I lifted my head as high as I could, and could see nothing at first… only the distant glow of a fire somewhere on the horizon beneath a starry sky. That effort alone was enough to pass me out. When I came to again there was a strange and horrible slurping noise coming from just a few yards away. Again I attempted to lift my head, and this time I saw her.

She was crouching over a fallen soldier of the North, her hair hiding her face as she buried herself into his neck. I watched dumbstruck as her fingers flexed in sheer euphoria on the dead soldier's chest. I couldn't stop the gasp from escaping my lips. She lifted her head, staring at me with eyes that burned like embers. The face was the most beautiful I'd ever seen, pale and oval with lips that were bright red with fresh blood. I watched as she stood and glided towards me, bare feet stopping right beside me. I let myself fall back down exhausted onto the dirt, my chest heaving. I was now choking on my own blood. I knew I had only moments left. To be honest, I thought perhaps I was already dead, and my angel had come to take me away.

I know I should have felt afraid. But I wasn't. She was smiling down at me, wiping the back of her porcelain hand across her mouth. "You're not scared," she noted in a melodic voice.

"I'm just ready," I sputtered, trying to speak clearly through the bile in my throat.

She cocked her head in an inhuman way. "Ready? For what?"

"To… die."

She then crouched beside me, and placed a hand upon my forehead. Her fingers felt like ice against my feverish skin. "You're lovely," she whispered.

If my mouth wasn't practically brimming over with blood, I would have laughed. The thought of that stunning creature finding me attractive was enough to send any dying man into hysterics.

"What's your name?" she asked, bringing her hand to my open wound and gently letting my blood drip onto her fingers.

It was almost impossible to speak, but I managed. "M-major Jasper Whitlock… ma'am."

She put her bloody fingers to her face and smiled like an angel. An angel of death.

"I really hope you survive, Jasper Whitlock," she purred as she leaned towards my neck. The last thing I recall of that night was her whispering in my ear, "I have a good feeling about you."

And now here we were… over 150 years later, and she was mine. I was her Zeus. And I had to leave.

I know she sensed it. "I really hope you survive, Jasper Whitlock," she murmured into our kiss, then once again whispered in my ear, "I have a good feeling about you."

I don't know if I was feeling her fear or my own, but suddenly I couldn't think about the possible outcomes of this night for another second. I pressed my lips with heated passion to hers once more, shutting my eyes so as not to see or reveal any fear, before I flew away from her with speed that made me invisible even to a vampire.

As I sped through the forest towards the city I tried not to picture her standing alone in that brook, and instead focused on my mission. Someone was coming for the prisoner, the human-lover in the tower. I had been fearing this night for many years now, fearing the moment when I would have to stop pretending to be someone else… stop pretending to have a heart when I didn't. The only form of a heart I had was to that goddess standing in the brook. Not the beaten voice that filtered through the crack in the tower wall. The one I had spoken to on lonely nights for the past fifty years. Sometimes I don't think she even knew we'd been talking that long. My visits were spread thin, and time plays tricks on the immortal prisoners of the Volturi.

I slipped into Volterra like a ghost, scaling and hurtling the city walls and landing softly on the cobblestone street. I stopped running for a moment, probably against my better judgment, and instead chose to walk briskly through the maze of buildings. The city was dead-silent beneath the night sky. Despite my allegiance to the Volturi, I spent very little time within its walls compared to the rest of my coven. I didn't like the stone… the streets, the alleys, the buildings. I didn't like to constantly smell the people I wasn't permitted to constantly consume. I didn't like walls. I preferred the open. I chose the forests, the grassy hills, the cliffs that overlooked the tumbling sea. I needed room to run. I needed air. Marie understood and respected these wishes. She was quick to join me, to spend weeks at a time away from the walls of Volterra, running alongside me through the trees and across the hills. She knew she owed me; I smiled to myself as I walked. It was almost a hundred years ago that the Volterra sought out my wife and me in Texas. They had heard of our talents… of our uncanny teamwork within the Southern Covens. My wife was ambitious when it came to power. She'd been a vampire for near two hundred years when we first met, and in that time had developed a keen and militant mind. She was determined not to wander the world as a nomad. She envisioned herself a part of a great clan… a coven that could control an entire population of humans, where we would feed, breed, and live without fear, without cowering in the shadows. I had to admire her drive, her vision….

And then she found me…. With me lay the answer to her success. With her strategy and experience, she was able to use me to clear the way to her victory. It didn't take long for her to realize my potential. I was born to kill. Not just the way any vampire kills, but almost as an art form. I could destroy anyone—size, skill, and numbers were all irrelevant.

Maria would laughingly say that it was because of how I almost died. "You were taken down once in battle my love," she teased, "And now you're determined to let the world around you fade before that ever happens again."

I snickered. Perhaps she was right, but I looked at it as a service. I was ridding the world of more of our nightmarish kind. We were all monsters… what did it matter how many I killed? But for all the vampires I killed… I also created them. Maria and I had been in the process of forming the greatest army of newborn vampires the world had ever seen when the Volturi finally interceded. Normally, anyone who dared attempt such a risky maneuver would be killed on sight, but the Italian coven had other plans for us. They were interested in our services. They had heard of Maria's ambitious skill, and were impressed with her constant victories over the other Southern covens. And they'd heard of my training ability… my strange gift to sense and affect emotions that enabled me to skillfully train the unpredictable newborns. But mostly… they wanted me to kill. That's what I was to them… an assassin. The best there was.

My wife had been more than eager to become a part of the revered Volturi. I had not been so keen on the idea. I liked life the way it was. I loved my small coven… my army… my hot Texas nights. But more than anything I loved Maria, and so I followed her once more—to Italy.

I smelled blood, and immediately the venom was pooling in my mouth. I snapped my head towards a lamppost, where a single woman was enjoying a cigarette. It smelled awful… how could humans enjoy such an activity? She wasn't much older than Maria was when she was changed… probably in her late twenties. I paused to look at her as she watched me with a gaping mouth and smoke curling from the cigarette dangling between her lips. Her deep brown eyes were like saucers as she watched me. I could feel the emotions shooting from her.

She was scared shitless. I wasn't armed. I wasn't walking towards her. I was just watching her. But I guess I'm enough of a nightmare that humans can just sense it somehow. And I'm sure my eyes were scaring her, the red irises glittering in the streetlight.

She was filled with desire. Lust radiated from her as she took in the moonlight shimmering on my bare ivory torso. I snorted to myself. My kind really had it too easy. I stared at her for a moment more. Her blood was calling to me, even after the others I'd already fed on this evening. I was never good at saying no. But tonight I had other blood to spill.

I ducked my head politely. "Buona sera," I muttered, before stalking off once again. I took to a run once more the moment I was around the corner. I suddenly found myself outside that familiar tower. The one without windows. I could smell them all in there. I could feel them even more. Their despair, their bitterness, their intense desire for a death that would never come. It made my bones shake. Once again I found myself torn. I knew they were coming… Aro had told me they'd be coming. I knew I needed to kill them… but that one aura of emotion was calling to me again. The one that was slightly different from the others. The one that was overflowing with love. The passion in that emotion was like river water, and all the sadness and bitterness were like the rocks it ran over. I could see them, but the water was more beautiful. The water was refreshing.

Once again I went against my better judgment. I scaled the wall in an eye-blink, up to that tiny crack in the stone. Her smell was pouring out… clovers and rain, which hadn't vanished even after all these years locked in stone.

"I was wondering when you'd come again," she whispered.

"I can't stay long," I told her, trying to hide the disappointment in my voice, and trying to keep her from feeling it. Whenever I was clinging to this wall I tried to project nothing but peace, despite all the torment from the other prisoners that was constantly assaulting me. It was painful to be out here… yet somehow worth it.

"Duty calls?"

"My coven is on high alert tonight," I explained. "They won't explain why, but I know they need me." It was mostly a lie. I knew why we were on alert. I just didn't know how they knew to be. Mostly because I just didn't care. Aro told me they were coming. Probably tonight… or soon. And I knew that I needed to kill them. And I didn't dare tell the prisoner that they were coming for her—that I was planning on stopping them. I didn't want to. I had to. But she wouldn't understand.

"The Volturi guards did seem a bit on edge this morning," she mentioned. "I wonder if they're worried about the same thing."

I grimaced. She had no idea. No idea who I worked for. I had told her long ago that I belonged to another coven. Right at that moment, I wished desperately that I did. I lied to her again, telling her that my leader wouldn't tell me anything. I told her that my skills were needed. At least that was the truth. "I probably shouldn't even be out here tonight, if the Volturi are indeed on alert. I could be spotted." That was the truth as well. I would be killed if they heard me speaking with the prisoner. Sharing thoughts with her, even if most of them were lies. Keeping her company… they would surely execute me. A century of service… all irrelevant with one betrayal. I grinned dryly to myself—they would try to kill me.

"Then why are you here?" she demanded, suddenly a bit sharp.

"Sometimes I just have to be," I replied honestly. I wish I had a better answer. But I didn't. I truthfully didn't know why I came here. Why I subjected myself to emotional turmoil pounding into my system just so I could share a few moments with a traitor—a human-lover. I was the last one who should be speaking to her actually. My body shook with chills that didn't come from the other cells.

The conversation was uncomfortable after that. It was a bit more tense than usual. Perhaps this was a sign of things to come—a sign that things were changing. Our walls were crumbling, and we weren't speaking the way we used to. Had our uses for each other worn out? It felt like the end of something. Had time run out for one of us?

"I killed three humans tonight alone," I told her bluntly after she asked my name once more. I was feeling bitter, and I'm not sure why. Was it because of the woman who had been watching me helplessly this evening? Or was it because of the disgust I felt radiating from the other side of the wall? Or was it just out of fear of losing her… the prisoner who smelled like fresh laundry. "Do you really want to know more about me? The one who loves humans as you do?"

Her response tore at my heart… the one I thought I no longer had. "Why are you doing this?" she asked.

Panic. I felt it like a blow to the head. It was spreading like wildfire in the city below. I belonged to my coven. "They're coming!" I hissed, more to myself than her.

"Who's coming?" she asked, and I felt her fear spike through me. I glanced despondently one last time at the crack in the wall. Took in her scent. It felt like goodbye. That scared me.

"Be ready," I warned gruffly. "And you may yet survive this."

I didn't wait for a response. I just threw myself from the tower wall, tumbling in the air before landing in a ready crouch below. Confidence. Smugness. I sensed it and it turned my stomach. I knew who it was before he spoke from the shadows behind me.

"Nice of you to show," Demetri's sneered as he came to stand beside me. "I thought you were supposed to be fast."

I didn't look at him; my eyes were searching the shadows. "And I thought you were supposed to be a tracker," I replied. "Where are they?"

"Down boy," he whispered darkly. "They're coming."

"How do you know?"

"Already killed Alec," he replied without emotion, void of regret. "He was patrolling the outskirts."

I winced. I should have been there… and I was guessing Demetri knew that. Bastard.

"They must have caught him by surprise," I noted. "Really the only way to kill Alec."

"Either way, I think it's safe to say our boy's little parlor tricks didn't work." He leered at me. "Let's see if yours will."

I snarled, glaring through the hair that fell in front of my eyes. He always hated me. Demetri was a skilled hunter… perhaps the best. The vampire could find someone in any corner of the globe as long as he had a taste of their "mental current" or whatever shit he sensed. All I knew was that I hated he knew mine. And I knew that despite his hunting talents, the guy was about as useful in a fight as a hole in the head. That's where I came in. I was the Volturi's favorite soldier… and that pissed him off all sorts of ways. It had been this way for a hundred years—the tracker versus the killer.

Compassion. Concern. Revenge. Fear. Love. I felt it coming at me from all directions. It didn't belong to anyone I knew.

"They're here," I muttered. "Five of them. They're surrounding us."

Demetri crouched beside me. "Where?"

"Go in the direction of the clock tower," I commanded, sending him a wave of passiveness to urge some cooperation out of the bastard. "Three of them are headed for the back entrance."

"And you?"

"There are two who will be waiting to cover their escape," I replied. "I'm going after them."

"You're taking the smaller number?" he scoffed, and I eyed him darkly.

"Trust me," I said dryly. "I'm doing you a favor."

I could feel the determination in the one aura. The one who was projecting love. There was also a frightening about of darkness there—an overwhelming desire to succeed. The one seeking revenge was nearby too. I waited until Demetri was gone, neither of us wishing the other luck, and then took off towards the emotions I was feeling. The streets were emptier than I had ever seen them. It was like the humans knew to stay indoors tonight. I felt the emotions getting stronger as I drew closer to the outskirts of the city. They became almost like my own, which meant I was getting closer. I sniffed the air as an autumn wind hit my face. Paper, fog, and deer. There was one. I hopped up on the wall, my eyes scanning the city as I crouched in the shadow of the clock tower that eclipsed the moon. I sniffed again. Snow and peppermint. There was the other one.

Then there was one I did recognize: driftwood and berries. She was beside me before I could even turn my head.

"Miss me, handsome?" Maria giggled, kicking her feet over the edge of the wall. The thought of hunting always made her giddy. I smiled anxiously.

"What are you doing here?" I asked. "This is my job."

"There are two of them."

"I know that," I replied, perhaps a bit smugly.

She ignored me. "One small female. Blonde. And a boy. Fast. Faster than you. Be careful, Love."

"We doing this together?" I sighed.

She smiled again. "Just like the old days."

I kissed her quickly, wishing I could give it more time. "I'll see you when they're dead," I said, and vanished.

I went for the one that smelled like snow. I wasn't entirely sure why… something to do with being a child, and seeing it for the first time. Someone had thrown it into my hair with a laugh… I could hardly remember. Someone with straw-colored hair and blue eyes.

OH GOD!

I dropped like my strings had been cut. The most excruciating pain coursed through my entire body. I thought of all the times I'd been bitten by the newborns I'd fought and killed. I remembered how they would swarm me, biting and clawing, covering my marble skin in crescent marks. I recalled the pain the venom would inflict. This was ten times worse.

My body quivered as I scratched at my skin, trying to get the burning sensation off of me. I grunted and growled like an injured animal, kicking up dirt and leaves as I writhed. Through the haze of pain, I saw a lovely young girl standing over me. She was smiling.

"My my," she purred. "Aren't you pretty?"

I snarled, snapping my teeth and unable to speak as the fire traveled in every inch of my body.

"My name's Jane Cullen," she continued sweetly. "What's yours?"

I was scared. Scared that Maria would hear me and come looking. Scared to watch her fall to the ground in pain like this. I couldn't stop myself from writhing, but I was determined not to scream.

"Don't be shy," she said, and I could feel the desire for revenge radiating from her. Her emotions became my own. And suddenly I realized that was the key. It's amazing the power emotions can have. I think she noticed my eyes change just a split second before it happened, because that stupid smile was suddenly wiped from her face.

I blasted everything I had at her. Every ounce of pain I was feeling, every fear, every piece of anger, every emotion I was still carrying inside me from those poor souls stuck in the windowless tower. It was like throwing a dumpster at a rat. Jane crumpled instantly to the ground, a strangled gasp escaping her lips before her entire body began to shudder. The pain instantly vanished, as if it had never been, and I stood to walk to her side. I continued to blast her as hard as I could, letting the blizzard of emotion cripple her. I held onto the pain I'd just been feeling, letting her experience every ounce of it.

"My name is Jasper Whitlock, ma'am," I growled. She managed to look up at me, her strange golden eyes meeting mine of furious red, before I fell upon her. I could feel every bit of her… each piece of her fear, her anger, her desperation, as I tore her to shreds. Just like always, it was like a kick in the chest. I waited until it was all over, until her pieces lay strewn about me, before I let it affect me. I was on my knees, trying to let the scent of the night wind to clear my head as I listened to Jane's limbs twitching on the ground. The crickets helped.

"Well look at the mess you made," Demetri's voice was back, and it was the last thing I wanted to hear. He was standing over me, shaking his head with a nasty smile.

"If you're here," I muttered almost inaudibly. "It better mean you've taken care of your job."

"The prisoner's gone," he shrugged, and I snapped my head up to glare at him.

"You couldn't stop them?" I snarled.

"Tried to. But there was this really nasty fellow with them."

I gave him a quick once-over. "You look fine," I noted. "I don't see an arm missing… or a head. So what was the problem?"

"He had other ways of stopping me," he answered cryptically.

"Wh—" Then I smelled it. My head snapped back around towards the hills surrounding the city. It was just like that night in Gettysburg for a moment: the bugs chirping, the stars hanging in the sky, and a fire burning in the distance. But this smoke was purple and black.

"No…." I breathed. "Take care of the pieces," I told Demetri, leaving him with the remains of my victim as I flew off into the distance. I completely ignored his calls for me to return. If my heart could beat, it would have been hammering as I sped across the hillside to where the smoke was rising. My legs were pushing me as fast as I could run.

He's fast. Faster than you.

I paused for one heart-breaking moment at the top of the hill, looking down into the clearing. The fire was still blazing, sending brilliant embers scattering into the night. The wind lingered with the terrible smell of ashes, along with a mingled combination of paper, driftwood, fog, berries, and deer. I didn't run. I walked slowly to the fire's edge. Something was glinting in the firelight in the grass.

A milky-pale hand was still twitching on a bed of moss. On one finger shone a ring of dazzling white gold. It was almost as smooth, white, and beautiful as the skin of the hand. I felt numb as I bent to pick the hand off the earth. I was trembling as I clutched the hand and wedding band to my chest.

Vampires often don't sound human. But I don't think any creature has ever sounded as demented and wild as I as I lifted my face to the moon and howled into the night. My chest was shaking as the sound flew from my throat. Even more carrying than the sound of my grief was my emotion. It took flight into the air and burned like the fire's embers as the wind passed over the hills.

I swear every creature in Italy felt the chilling sting of my hate on that night in October.

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