I have opened up a new poll for this story, all contemplating writing 'sequels' to this if you will. I don't mean a continuation of Edward's early vampire years (Of course that may be a possibility) but more of the other Cullens' stories during their human life. You can vote on the poll on my profile and you can choose up to three answers. Thank you.

I know that I haven't updated in forever, but I got caught up in allot of things… But I added some things to this chapter and I hope that makes up for it.

Onto Edward, Elizabeth and Carlisle.

15th of June, 1918

Dear Diary,

Mother seems to be getting well again, her color had returned to her skin tone and it is making her look like the woman that raised me. Her pillow has been returned to her again, seeing as her neck doesn't hurt her so much any longer; she can move her neck now from side to side and even nod. Her smile graces us in this room on such a frequency that I always catch myself smiling because of it. Mother's smile shows me that she is feeling well again and she will hopefully be rid of the horrendous illness and be healthy again.

Edward reread his entry in his leather diary from the previous night, wondering if his recordings were worth the insufferable pain in his lower neck. Edward, of course, believed that it was well worth having his thoughts, feeling and observations written down on the paper forever; he would always believe that his writing of the simplest things of his mother was well worth the pain that he would live through afterwards.

Elizabeth was getting slightly well again, but that didn't mean that she wasn't still dying or fighting off the influenza. Her son had overheard Dr. Cullen speaking with a new nurse just about a week ago now, and he was explaining how the nurses act around the patients. Carlisle was speaking to the new nurse about how the human mind works; he told her that if they believe that everything is alright then the brain will be distracted from their own pain and begin to give the illusion that they are well again normal even. But, in order if this to work their environment needs to appear as if it's getting well again and not the other way around.

This got Edward into acting as if the influenza was not taking such a toll on him any longer, he was smiling and trying to blow off his symptoms as other things and even attempted to put ice on his forehead to make his fever go down slightly. His acting was causing his mother's body to play tricks on her and seem like her health is improving, and these tricks were horrible if not worse then the ones that Edward's body was playing on him. His only motivation at this point was to just to keep his mother going, for her to think that there was a chance for her to live through this pandemic. Edward didn't care if he lived or died any longer at this point, his mother was the only think that was keeping him going at this point.

"You doing this isn't helping you mother, Mr. Mason." A deep, smooth voice sounded from the foot of Edward's cot. The boy jumped at the sudden voice, not aware that a man had walked into the room when he was lost in his thoughts. Edward threw his worn leather diary back under his body once again, hiding it from the world's prying eyes. Edward's lightning green eyes snapped instantly to the man standing at the end of his bed, his eyes already to be guarded to keep the man's questions away from him.

"Pardon me?" Edward asked his tone curt.

Carlisle chuckled slightly under his breath, smiling ever-so slightly as he signed several sheets of paper; death certificates and bills. "You act as if the influenza affects you no longer as if you're getting well again. I know that it's all apart of your plan to help her, but it doesn't help her situation any more than it helps your own, Mr. Mason." Carlisle looked at his favorite patient, his golden eyes warm and comforting for the boy. Edward couldn't help but look into the doctor's eyes; any wonder how his eyes could have gone from slight a dark tone to a light a warm color; almost hypnotizing. Edward could remember that the night he had his episode Dr. Cullen's eyes were the deepest black that he had ever seen, deeper than his imaginings of what hell would be like; and now the doctor comes back and overnight his eyes are gold. Edward thought to before his episode, and he remembered that Dr. Cullen's eyes were once a golden shade as they are now and only a couple of weeks before that they were black. How strange for that… Edward wondered.

Carlisle blinked twice, trying to make Edward's gaze waver from his abnormal eyes just for a moment—it didn't work well. The doctor tried the action again, only this time he backed away from the bed slightly, hoping that this might create some form of a boundary between him and the lonely teenager in front of him.

"How so?" Edward asked, breaking the eye contact that he held with the doctor for several moments. The teenager gave the man an impassive look as he waited for the answer.

"Well, while you're off distracting your mother's mind and your own—both of your immune systems are weaker and the Influenza is hitting you harder than ever. Your mind us just too distracted to realize that you're even more ill than you are." Carlisle spoke, answering Edward's question without even thinking too deeply about it at all.

Edward sat in the bed and pondered in his mind for a moment over what Carlisle just told him. He wasn't a doctor so he couldn't list facts about how Carlisle was wrong that he was feeling worse than ever. To Edward, it seemed as if the doctor knew exactly what he was talking about, no matter how much Edward wished that it wasn't. The boy nodded slowly and thought about how he felt right at that moment when it came to his health.

His neck hurt like someone had replaced his thinner than paper pillow with a cinder block. His fever felt ever more sweltering than it was a few days ago, more perspiration sinking through his pores and tickling his neck. His stomach was twisted in so many knots that it seemed to be a shock the boy could eat.

Carlisle nodded. "I see that you now understand of what I am referring to." He spoke, looking at Edward carefully as he measured the boy's emotions.

Edward nodded slowly once again as he gazed at Carlisle, trying to decipher what the man was. He swallowed the massive lump that was building in his throat after the several moments. "I just want to help her… somehow." Edward said, his tone completely torn open and desperate for someone to tell him the way that his mother could be healed of this horrible disease. His voice broke twice when he was speaking the sentence, and his eyes began to sting horribly from the wells of tears that were threatening to break out.

Carlisle nodded in complete understanding of Edward's feelings, his thoughts going back several hundreds of years before Edward was born and his eyes training to the floor. The man thought of all the things that he could say to the boy, but all of the thoughts that came up in his mind were things that would reveal him for who he really is. "Trust me when I say this: If you want to help your mother, then just talk to her about the feelings that you have been feeling these past few months. Confide in her in her last weeks—maybe days—over your thoughts and feelings of love and isolation that has been sweeping both your mind and body. If you do that then your mother will feel do elated by that single action that you made, she will travel to her death peacefully." Carlisle spoke his words of wisdom to Edward, giving him his soul of what the vampire had gone through several times when his father fell ill in his final months—only Edward didn't know of the doctor's past life in London.

Edward did not respond to the doctor's words of advice, he sat in his dingy bed with his eyes looking down at hid hands as he thought.

Carlisle waited for the young man to say something, but no sound escaped outside of Edward's mind; the two stood there, waiting for one to say something or just walk away. Carlisle waited to speak his thoughts, to scream about how his life wasn't fair and that the world wasn't meant to be like this, that his mother shouldn't be the one that died while sitting in the infection filled hospital. Edward waited for Carlisle to leave so that he could pull out the worn leather journal that was stashed out under the thin pillow, to give out his feelings on paper and to not scream and bother his mother—despite the advice that Carlisle had given him. He wished to confide in his friend once again that night.

Neither one of the men moved.

Eventually Carlisle gave up and walked away from the bed, leaving Edward to his thoughts and friend; leaving the poor teenager alone, a prisoner to his own mind at this point. Edward bit back the sob that rose in his throat and even reached all the way up to his mouth—his just bit his tongue—and he fought back the ocean's worth of tears that were starting to swell in his eye. He pulled his bottom lip up to rest in between his teeth and he bit down on the flesh, hard. One single and solitary tear escaped from his eyelid and slid down his sweaty and flushed cheek, making its way to his chin and dripping off the tip of the strong line. The droplet of water fell with gravity and splashed against the skin of his adjoining hands.

A dry so came from his lips and went through the air, unnoticed and unheard by all others in the hospital.

Dr. Cullen took his hate and slipped it on his blonde hair as he put his coat over his broad shoulders, getting himself ready to head home for the night. The vampire stuffed his hands seep within his silk lined pockets of his trousers, pulling on the elastic suspenders slightly as he walked out of the lousy excuse of a hospital. The chilly wind seemed to break around his well muscled body, only rousing his clothes that lay limp on his body and the small amount of blonde locks that were showing under the brim of his hat. The pale man kept his head down as he walked along the sidewalk, ignoring the panicked stares that he was receiving from the people around him. The man was walking about in the open air and he was not wearing one of the many face masks nor was he holding his handkerchief up to his mouth to prevent the spread of the Influenza. Carlisle knew that he would never catch the pandemic—he would live until the end of time, unless a vampire is willing to rip him apart in the future.

The streets weren't nearly as crowded or filled as they normally could be if the city weren't under a deadly illness at the moment. The few people that were going about had their hands close to their mouths, and were taking in short, shallow breathes. Carlisle wanted to laugh at their foolishness that these humans had on their health.

The vampire continues to walk down the street, stopping only to wait for the trolley to take him outside of the condensed city. Of course he could just run home from the hospital, or just continue walking along the streets until he arrived home. But he knew that he had to keep himself off the radar for a few years, keeping a low enough profile so that his friends from Italy didn't decided to pay him a visit.

"Just three more months Carlisle, you can wait just three more months." He whispered to himself, trying to convince himself that he could and would wait that long until he packed up and moved across the country once again. He had set up and quick countdown in his mind of how many days he had until he was able to leave this city and no longer claim that he was in his residency in this horrid city.

The trolley slowed down to its last stop on the route, giving Carlisle the know that they were done and that he was to get off. Carlisle walked forward and tossed a dime to the driver, telling him to keep the change and he got off of the vehicle, wanting to go home.

Once he was off of the trolley, Carlisle stuffed his hands deep inside his pockets again and walked alongside the road, keeping his head down at all times and not looking up for more than a car passing by. He walked for only about ten minutes before he came upon his abode, the house being just the finest size for a family of three or four. He ran at his top speed to the door, opening it and strolling in his empty home.

A single leather arm chair was placed in his living room, a side table was set next to it—holding several stacks of books—and a tall, thin floor lamp right behind the set of two. Several book shelves were set up along the walls of the empty home; older leather bound books, medical journals, dairies, history books, and legend mythology books lined each shelf—each of the books being a different size, shape and color than the two that were sitting right next to it. A small wooden table was placed in the appropriate position in the formal dining room that was set off from the entry of the house; the table was only a prop to Carlisle and nothing more.

Carlisle removed his coat, taking the time to place it on one of the hooks on the coat rack that was set off to the left. He raised his right hand to grip the peak of his hat and removed that as well, setting it atop the coat rack.

The vampire spent his night reading his encyclopedias and medical journals that he had bought over the time that he has been roaming the earth. One thing, though, constantly occupied the man's mind: Edward Mason and his mother.

Just what is so different about that young man? Carlisle questioned, his finger tapping lightly on his left temple as he thought. The two of them are such a curious pair… Neither of them cares to live through this but they wish for the other to live more than their own… I wonder…

Carlisle pondered the thought most of the night, and his mind naturally going back to his times in London when he was only a boy, and his father having great expectations for him.

"Carlisle!" A man barked.

A young boy only in his late teens was outside in the garden tending to the vegetables that he and his father lived on. His shaggy blonde hair was drenched in his sweat, and his mud ridden shirt showed that he was working hard as well. He turned quickly and his grey blue eyes fell on the elderly man that was walking toward him, his long black robes from the church blowing in the late afternoon wind of London. His white hair was set in the most sophisticated style that his son could perform while under pressure. The black leather bound Bible was clutched closely to his chest, and the rosary that marked the page that the church was on dangled in the wind.

The young Carlisle wiped his forehead with his forearm, trying to look his best while working over the garden that his mother left behind.

"Yes, Father?" Carlisle asked, keeping his tone far from friendly.

"What do you think you are doing?" His father demanded, his old eyes going over his son and the pile of dirt that was lying at his feet.

Carlisle stuttered among his next words, trying not to sound like he was hurt with that fact that his father didn't like him tending to their only source of food. "I am trying to keep the garden healthy, this way we can eat better and—"

"We do not need this, my son. This is women's work, and men do not do it." He father held his chin high as he spoke of the way that society worked. "You are to help me plan the next witch hunt, the Smiths think that Juliet Taylor is performing rituals that lead others to sign the Devil's Book… and you need to learn this."

"I don't wish to hunt women when they're accused of witchcraft; I wish to heal those that are ill with the plague and—"

"Witchcraft!" The elderly minister gasped, holding his Bible even closer to his body now. "I will not hear of this from my own son! You will be Minister of the village, and you will not speak of such witchcraft! Do you understand me?" He shouted, his words slashing through Carlisle like a sharp sword.

The teenager hung his head in his disappointment of not being able to please his father in the way that he wished. Tears began to sting his eyes and he fought them back with all the strength that he had; he didn't want to be scolded by his father again for being weak. "Yes, Father. I understand; no healing." Carlisle spoke, the words stinging his throat like poison.

Just a few years later, in order to show his father that he was a man, Carlisle lead a vampire hunt. The fate of the man was far from what his father wanted his son to accomplish in his fight of approval.

"Let's go men!" Carlisle shouted, holding his torch high in the air.

The men behind him cheered and had their torches and weapons ready for when they came face-to-face with the creature of the damned that they were hunting for. The small mob of men and boys marched in the streets as the woman gathered their children about and brought them to their homes, locking up and dousing all of the candles in their homes.

Carlisle had spent weeks, and even months planning this hunt; he had stayed out of home late and went days without sleep in order to see one of the damned that he was to hunt. One night he saw a faint shadow crossing the mud roads of London and two others followed him. Carlisle knew then that he had found the creatures that he was going to hunt.

Now all of the men in the village were gathering around the spot where Carlisle has seen one of the creatures rise, waiting for it to emerge and to kill it. After an hour and a half of waiting, a silhouette came from in front of them—the aura around the creature glowing about the likes that of a ghost.

One of the younger men couldn't wait for the creature to turn, so he shouted and began to charge at the creature, holding his torch high in the air. Most of the other men followed him, despite Carlisle's urges to stand their ground and wait.

The creature seemed startled by the sudden charge at him. He turned quickly, much too quickly for that of a man, and he saw the mob of men barreling towards him—all of them intent on killing him. His eyes seemed to glow from his hunger, dark crimson eyes that showed anger and murder deep within their depths. "Run meus prosapia, effugio illa humanus! Run quod alieno super Ego!" He shouted behind him, and he turned quickly on his heel and began to run in the same direction that the mob of men was chasing him in.

Carlisle ran ahead of the others, trying to stay in the front of the hunting crew. The creature quickly turned on him and sprang at him, its mouth open wide and his eyes glowing from thirst of a millennia. It grasped his shoulders tightly, and Carlisle could hear his bones shattering at the touch. The weight of the vampire fell hard on the human and sent him towards the earth, helpless. Once the pair was on the ground the creature to the opportunity to bare its teeth and bite into his flesh, immediately drinking the hot, rich liquid that flowed into his mouth. Carlisle screamed and gasped in his sudden and began to try to fight off the feasting being, but his strength and energy was growing thin by the moment. The entire scene played out in less than two second of time.

The other men caught up, the vampire sensed their coming quickly. He released Carlisle's throat from his iron grasp and hissed at the other humans for interrupting his wonderful meal; then he let go of the man and began to run again—leading them away from his coven.

The men that was left in the mob continued on with their hunt, leaving Carlisle in the streets, bleeding and in an immense pain.

Carlisle snapped out from his memory and excused all thoughts of his past and of the Mason family, not wishing to think of the painful years that he had to suffer through.

I hoped that you all liked this chapter and I can't wait to see what you think of it!

Remember to vote on the poll on my profile!