A/N: Chapter three! This chapter is action packed. You meet a new character and you get some good action.

Disclaimer: Twilight belongs to Stephanie Meyer. No, I am not Stephanie Meyer….. Yet. Haha just kidding xD

"Like a breeze to the flame,
My everything has been blown out."
-Unknown

Chapter 3: Sweet Sacrifice

So red, I hate that color. Why is everything so red? And cold, its all so cold, its always cold. I could feel shivers running up my spine. The image of my mom smiling up at me while laying down on the cold, red ground flashed through my head. Her words lingered in my ear drums, You'll love it, the three of us will all be together again, and we'll laugh, yes we'll laugh. I could feel pressure over my neck, something was choking me.

No, no, please god, no more.

My eyes shot wide open and it took me a while to realize what was going on. Edward was before me, his hands wrapped around my wrists. My hands wrapped around my neck, I was unconsciously choking myself. I slowly let go. I looked at Edward, he was looking at me, well staring at me. Our eyes locked and we held each others gaze, it was the first time I was able to look him in the eye. His eyes were two pools of emerald, full of concern, confusion, and some other emotion I couldn't put my finger on.

"How could…?" he trailed off, "But I can't… why? You don't " he looked at his hands "it doesn't bother me.. Why?" I looked at him, confusion written all over my face. Maybe he's crazy, I thought to myself. I mean, he is coming from prison, he could be crazy. Yeah, he must be crazy, but who isn't?

"I'm sorry, its nothing. Forget that. I'm glad you're fine." He looked away, that's when I remembered James. Holy shit, James! I shot up and looked around. We were no longer in the auto shop, we were in the forest, I was laying on the grass, a tree was giving us shade.

I wanted to ask him what happened to James, I really did, but I was tired, too tired to speak. Fuck, why am I always too tired to speak? I looked down at my wrist that were still bandaged with his shirt cloth. I looked at him and realized he was wearing a black sweater now. Figures, he probably ripped his whole shirt just to bandage me.

He turned around to look at me, "Can you move? We really need to move, we can't stay in one place, they'll find us." I nodded and he picked up our bags, it was funny because I trusted him. I really can't tell you why, because I don't know, but I trusted this man. I trust that he won't kill me, I trust that he'll try to protect me, I trust that we could make this out alive. He didn't promise me any of this, hell, we barely spoke, well he spoke, I haven't said a word. Somehow, I trust him and I'm not sure if that's good or bad, it's probably bad, yeah it has to be bad. Nothing good comes out of trust, mainly when you didn't really even know the person you're trusting.

I stood up and wavered a little, I was a bit dizzy but I was fine. We walked and walked until we heard some footsteps. Edward turned to me and put his finger over his lips, telling me to be quiet. I stood still, he leaned over to me and whispered, "I'm going to see who it is, I want you to stay here with the bags, there's a taser inside my bag, and two knives inside yours. If I don't come back soon, run away immediately."He grabbed his gun and before jumping into the bushes he gave me one last glance. I wanted to protest, to tell him not to go but I didn't. Instead I watched his back as he jumped out of the bushes and into the sight of the enemy.

He pointed the gun forward and a shadow was lurking towards him. The shadow had short spiky hair, dé·jà-fucking-vu, I thought to myself. A girl with jet black spiky hair popped out, she was pointing a gun at Edward, her eyebrows were scrunched up. Her face lit up as she saw that it was just Edward, she sighed in relief when he lowered his gun.

"Ah, I thought that was the end of it for me, I just heard the footsteps and thought it wouldn't be you, I mean the chances of running into an ally are really slim." She looked at him and then raised an eyebrow, "Where's your bag? Why do you only have a gun?"

"My bag's back there," he said pointing to the bushes where I was peeking through. "You're not playing this game, right?" he asked, gun still in his hand, finger still on the trigger but pointing the gun towards the ground.

"No! no! no, of course I'm not playing this stupid game, I know what they want. They want us to kill each other, they make it sound so perfect. They know people will go around killing for the money, they know it." She said, shaking her head furiously.

I decided Alice was safe and I jumped out of the bushes, she slightly jumped in surprise and raised up her gun, pointing it at me. My eyes widened and I lifted my hands up in surrender. Edward ran in front of me and covered me, "She's with me! I had her hiding behind the bushes with the bags." Alice lowered her gun and sighed again.

"Isabella, you have to warn me before you jump out like that! I could've shot you on pure instinct." She rubbed her eyes with her hand. "So how'd you guys pair up without me?" She joked, I looked away not wanting to touch that subject. She must've realized because she changed the topic.

"So where are we headed to?" She asked, looking at her compass.

"South, we're going south. Just going to try to get by for the next two weeks." Edward answered, he took the bags from my arms, "Lets get going, we've made enough noise, we might draw attention." Alice nodded and we began walking south.

x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x

We'd walked for an hour and a half and I was growing tired. I tried my best to hide it from them but I guess my best wasn't enough because soon Alice spoke up, "Edward, Isabella looks tired. Maybe we should rest for a little bit, I mean we've been walking for almost two hours. I say we go inside the next building we find." Edward looked at the both of us and nodded.

We walked for another 10 minutes before we reached something that looked like a hospital. We walked cautiously inside, with Edward ahead of us. We heard a loud groan and we immediately froze. My heart began to exhilarate and fear was clouding my mind. What if it was James? What if it was someone worst? Like a sadistic killer who'd have fun by sickly torturing us before killing us. I was broken out of my disturbing thoughts by Edward who took the safety off his gun and pointed it forward, Alice walked up to him and lowered his gun. She shook her head and pleaded him with her eyes.

She walked inside a room and lifted her hands up in surrender. Edward and I exchanged a confused look. "We're not going to hurt you, we just want to rest. We're not playing this game and I'm sure you're not either." Alice said, she looked trusting and I wondered if she knew the person inside.

I walked up next to her and saw a man half sitting, half laying on the floor, his head resting against the wall. His honey blonde hair was stuck to his forehead, he was sweating. His muscular but lean body was covered in blood, there was some blood running down his mouth as well. He was holding a machine gun in his right hand while his left hand clutched tightly around his torso, when his eyes landed upon Alice they softened and he lowered the gun.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare… you, just.. self-ddefense." he stuttered, and I realized he was injured, there was blood oozing down his fingers, I gasped and covered my mouth, shutting my eyes tight.

Not the crimson, don't look at the crimson, its just his blood, it won't suffocate you, this is reality not the nightmare.

I bet Alice just barely realized too because she ran over to him and kneeled in front of him. "OMG!" she wailed, gaining my attention, she turned to look at Edward, "Edward you have to do something, he'll die of blood loss." Edward stared at her, I suppose mentally debating whether he should help the stranger or not. After a moment he reached into his bag and pulled out the leftover cloth from his shirt.

He opened cabinet after cabinet searching for something. Meanwhile Alice was reassuring the guy, she was caressing his face with her hand, I stared incredulously. Why was she acting like she knew him all along? Did she? How could she trust someone so easily? I dropped the subject because I remembered that I trusted Edward just as easily.

Edward walked over to them with a bottle in his hands, he opened it and poured some into a piece of cloth. "I already cleaned the w-wound," the man stuttered.

"Then I'll clean it again, just to make sure." he kneeled on the opposite direction of Alice, beside the guy. He began cleaning his wound, it looked like a stab, not too deep but a stab nonetheless. The guy's eyebrows would scrunch together every time the pain became unbearable. Alice had his hand on hers, she was rubbing soothing circles on his hand. The moment was intimate so I looked away and focused on the place we were in.

It was definitely a clinic, there was cabinets full with bottles and some med beds. The clinic was pretty small, probably only two rooms, this being one of them. By the time I brought my attention back to them, Edward had already bandaged the man's wound with the remains of his shirt.

"So, Edward, were you a doctor or something?" asked Alice, pointing at how he effectively stopped the bleeding.

"Not really, I spend quiet some time in the clinic of the prison I was in. I was good friends with the doctor there, his name was Carlisle. I would help him every now and then when injured prisoners would come in." he shrugged as if it were no big deal. I admired him, he was stuck in prison and he was helping others. While I, I just holed myself up in my cell, I refused to speak or see anyone. My cell mate, Angela, tried speaking to me a couple of times, I never spoke back and after a while she quit trying.

"Wow, so you're a good guy, I mean not that I didn't trust you to be, that was just kind of unexpected." Alice explained herself to Edward before turning back to the injured man, "I'm Alice, this is Edward and she's Isabella," she said pointing my way, I just dropped my gaze to the floor. "so what's your name? I don't believe I've heard it yet."

"Jasper, Jasper Whitlock." He flashed her a smiled and Alice cheeks flushed a very faint light-scarlet color. "Nice to meet you Alice, lovely name." This made Alice smile and blush even more, I snickered under my breath, this caught Edward attention and he turned to look at me. I slightly blushed and looked down, okay, karma's a bitch, point made, I thought to myself.

"So obviously more than one person is playing this game. The person who attacked Isabella, and the person who attacked Jasper." Edward said, Alice flashed a concerned look down my way, I gave her a reassuring smile and she nodded.

"We have to be careful, it's probably not that safe to stay inside this building for too often." he looked outside, the sun had already went down, it was much darker. "We should stay here for tonight and tomorrow morning we'll begin walking again."

"You will come with us, right Jasper?" Alice asked, I could tell she wanted him to come. Something about Alice was so… knowing? Yeah, her voice was knowing she asked things as if she already knew the answer to them but wanted them confirmed.

"Of course," I had the feeling that jasper wouldn't deny anything to Alice. An unknown and unpleasant emotion shot through, what is this.. jealousy? No way, what would I be jealous of?

"Then it's settled, you guys should sleep, I'll keep watch." Edward turned to look at me, "You should get some rest, we have a long day of walking ahead of us tomorrow." I nodded, I felt like if I was a nuisance. Edward brought down the med beds and placed three of them side by side. "You can sleep on this, it should be more comfortable than the floor."

We all nodded and laid down on the beds, Edward helped Jasper on his bed. I curled myself into a ball and turned sideways so my back was facing them. I sighed, I was afraid of this game, I knew there would be a lot of blood spilled soon. That knowledge scared the shit out of me. If there's something I can't stand its blood. I hate everything about it, the color, the smell, the feel of it, but most of all the memories it brought to me. I shook my head and after a little while I started slipping into slumber.

I was awoken by the sound of gun shots, I flung myself into sitting position, I looked around and Alice just woke up as well, Jasper was trying to get up but Alice and his wound were interfering. "No, you stay here. You're already injured, I'll see what's going on." She was about to get up but Jasper was holding onto her hand, she turned to look at him.

"No, stay here don't go out there. They're merciless, you'll get hurt." Alice looked like she wanted to protest but all it took was one look from him and she caved in.

Something inside my stomach churned, I realized Edward wasn't inside the room with us. Alice didn't go check, because jasper stopped her but nothing's stopping me. With that, I got up and peeked out the window. I couldn't see anyone outside, but I could hear the gunshots on the opposite direction.

I was about to get up and go outside but I wanted to take a weapon with me, I looked for the gun but it was gone, Edward must've taken it. I very well couldn't use the machine gun so instead I grabbed the taser and took the bags over to Alice and jasper, I handed them the machine gun and knife. Alice, looked at me curiously and gave me a 'oh, no your not' look, I shook my head and ran straight across the room and outside of it before she could stop me, I could hear her yelling my name and telling me to get back inside.

I walked down the hall, to say I wasn't scared would be a huge lie, I was petrified not only for myself but also for Edward. I convinced myself I was only worried about Edward because if he didn't come back to us we'd be in more trouble, but a little voice told me that wasn't the only reason, i shook my head and ignored that little voice.

As I started getting closer to the outside door, I could hear grunting. I ran outside and saw a man was wresting with Edward, the man was holding a knife and had it pointing towards Edward neck, Edward was pushing his hand away so he wouldn't stab him. The man had black hair and was fairly muscular, he looked stronger than Edward but I wasn't sure.

Oh god, he'll stab him in the neck, that's bad I can't let that happen, but what can I do?

I looked around, the gun was laying on the ground, apparently neither Edward nor the man had noticed me yet. I tucked the taser in my waist band, I walked slowly and carefully towards the gun, my sudden movement caught the strangers attention and he whipped around to look at me. Edward used this moment to slap the man's hand, making him drop the knife. The man ran to the gun and took it before I could, he pulled me by the arm and placed the gun in my temple.

"Don't move or I'll spill her guts." He warned, my eyes widened and Edwards face changed from shock to rage. The stranger chuckled, "Yeah, that's more like it." I could feel his nasty breath blowing against the back of my neck and ear, it made me shiver. "You know, I haven't been this close to a woman for six fucking years, and I'm really missing it." He cooed in my ear, I closed my eyes in disgust but I shot them open when I heard a loud growl emitting from Edward's chest.

"Let. Her. Fucking. Go." he spoke in syllables. His voice was full of menace and authority, it was enough to even scare me. His fists were clenched so tight that his knuckles were white. I tried not to cry, I honestly did but I could feel the tears welling up in my eyes, I hated crying in front of people, I didn't want Edward to think I was this weak. I wasn't whimpering or anything, no I wouldn't give this man the satisfaction of hearing me scream. I wasn't sobbing either but my eyes betrayed me and a single tear slid down my cheek and hit the mans hand that was wrapped tightly around my waist.

He looked at me and chuckled, "she's crying! Haha I made her cry, don't cry, I promise to be gentle." he laughed again and I felt humiliated, disgusted and a mixture of other emotions. He lowered his mouth to my cheek and licked where the trail of my tear was. I closed my eyes, completely and utterly appalled. Why the hell do i always get into these situations? Why am i so friggin useless? When I opened my eyes I could see Edward glaring at the man, his jaw was clenched so tight I thought his teeth wouldn't be able to withstand the pressure.

It all went to fast, Edward crouched down while the man was distracted licking my cheek and he grabbed the knife he had earlier slapped out of the man's hand. He ran up to us and was ready to stab him when the man cocked the gun and Edward stopped.

I closed my eyes again, is this it? I knew I wouldn't last that long in this game, I'm really not that strong but I wished it could've ended better. It hurt to think I wouldn't be able to see Edward again, to get to know him, to talk to him, to actually fucking talk to him, I'm so stupid! I should've talked while I had the chance. I looked up at the sky and two heads starring out the window of the clinic caught my attention.

Jasper and Alice were starring down with horror stricken faces. And in that second it hit me, I had the taser! I had the fucking taser, I just had to pull it out of my waist band. Damn, how would I do that without him noticing my intention? I felt a bulge poking me in the back and I shuddered in disgust, his erection was poking me in the back, wait, I could use this. I could try to seduce him and tase the shit out of him when he least expected it.

I took a deep breath and slid my hands to his waist, I closed my eyes and tried not to give myself away. I snaked my hand lower and lower until it hit his belt buckle. His breath hitched and he let out a low moan, Fuck, this is so gross. I thought to myself, focus, bella focus. It will be worth it if it all goes according to plan, focus! I encouraged myself.

"mmm, I like where this is going." purred the man in my ear, I creased my eyebrows and suppressed the need to gag. His grip loosened around my waist and he turned me around so my chest would be pressed against his body, I tried composing my face. This is good, it'll make it easier for me to grab the taser this way. Edward growled behind me, and I tried my best to ignore it.

I snaked my hands from his chest down to his stomach and lower. He tried snaking his free hand to my chest but I shook my head and gave him a forced wink. I lowered my hand to his belt buckle, my taser was just a few inches away, seeing as how he pressed me against him. Instead of reaching down his belt, I reached into my waist band and took out the taser, with much force I pushed him away from me and just before he pointed the gun at me, I shoved the taser into his stomach and pulled the trigger to tase him.

"You bitch!" he yelled at me, as he shook from the bolts of electricity I'd just given him. "You.. Tricked." He said and winced as he bit his tongue. He fell to the ground and his eyes rolled behind his head. I stood still for a second before I felt my knees buckle and give in. I felt a pair of strong hands scoop me up before I hit the ground. I buried my face into the crook of Edward's neck and sobbed uncontrollably, I was shaking with fear.

"shhh, shhh.. It's okay, it's over. You were brave and smart. It's okay now." he comforted me and it actually worked, my mind focused on his sweet breath, and the way his neck vibrated as he talked and his voice, so velvety and smooth. He turned us around, I was still in his arms and my head was resting on his shoulder as the tears were falling, but I was no longer sobbing.

Through tears I saw a blurry figure stand up, my eyes widened in horror. I kicked and thrashed off of Edward's strong arms, I could see the intense hurt in his face immediately being replaced by shock. I ran in front of him as the man pointed the gun in Edward's direction, I got in the way just as the bullet was shot and I felt a huge pang of pain on my right thigh. A strangled scream escaped my mouth and I accidentally bit my bottom lip, drawing out blood, in an attempt to muffle the scream.

I fell to the floor with a thud, I hit my head pretty hard on something. I saw as Edward threw the knife he was holding straight at the man, it punctured him right on his neck. The man fell on his back, his eyes wide open and glazed over.

My own eyes widened and I swear I could see my mom's glazed eyes. I could hear her laugh's and promises.

Bella, we're going far away sweetie, you'll love it. It'll be just like the old times…

We'll laugh, laugh, laugh, laugh, laugh..

I brought my hands up to my ears in an attempt to shut her up, it proved to be futile. I screamed and sobbed, and the crimson began clouding my sight.

"No, no, no! Don't let her take me! She'll choke me, I know it! Stop her laugh! Stop laughing! Stop…" I narrowed my eyes and I could see Edward rush to me as I began screaming hysterically, his face was contorted in a sickly mixture of pain, shock and sympathy. "Edward.. I can see the red, don't…" I couldn't finish my sentence because the crimson took over my eyesight, but I was glad the last thing I could see was Edward, although his expression was full of pain. Soon the crimson turned to darkness, and I was swallowed by unconsciousness.

Review! As much as I'm flattered with all the story/author alerts and the couple favorites, I'd like some reviews as well. Tell me what I'm doing wrong, if anything. I'll reply to every single review, no matter how small. Thanks.