Falling into Twilight

Lightning_Skies

Story Spoilers/Warnings/Disclaimer can be found in the first chapter. Warnings for chapters will be posted in each individual chapter.

Warnings - None

"Dialogue"

Thoughts

-Unreadable Thoughts-

NOTE – YES! THIS IS SUPPOSED TO START EXACTLY THE SAME AS THE LAST CHAPTER!

=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*= Chapter 7 – The Joy of Reading =*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=

After Xander left the Cullen's household it was took him the better part of the afternoon to make it to the nearest high traffic road. Well, the 101 was as high traffic as roads could be in a place like Forks. He picked a direction randomly, trying to remember which way Carlisle had taken to the hospital and started walking. What felt like an eternity later, he was still going, no cars had passed, in either direction and he had resigned himself to walking the whole way to Forks. He was pleasantly surprised to hear the purr of an engine coming up behind him, heading in the right direction to try hitching. He spun himself around to walk backwards and flung out a thumb hopefully.

He turned in just enough time to see an eye-searingly bright yellow Porsche come into view. It was a car that would have fit right in back in sunny So-Cal, but was glaringly out of place in the watery light filtering through the endless sea of dense forest around him. He wondered what kind of driver chose a car like that and lived somewhere as dreary as Forks. It was probably either someone desperate for some small splash of color in their life or someone whose time amongst the too quiet forests had driven them to eccentricity.

With that thought fresh in his mind, he wasn't all that surprised when the car pulled up to stop next to him and it turned out to be Alice grinning at him from the driver's seat with a smile as bright as her car's paintjob. Jasper, who had been sitting placidly in the passenger seat, climbed out and pulled his seat forward, pointedly and non-verbally telling Xander that he was all but captured and he was expected to come quietly.

With a mental sigh, he plodded up to the car and winced when he realized that it only came up to his chest and had a back seat sized perfectly to give him flashbacks to the time Larry shoved him in his locker in junior high. He looked pleadingly at Jasper, but even his best pathetic Do-I-Have-To? face only got an un-sympathetic raised brow in return. In that moment the Southern vamp reminded him strongly of Oz and as he clambered very ungracefully into the car (managing to bang both shins and an elbow as well as catching his duffle on something, nearly strangling himself with the strap before composing his limbs comfortably) he wondered idly what the short, quiet and occasionally furry musician had been up to the past few years.

As it turned out, Alice really was incredibly tiny and with her seat moved far enough forward for her to reach the gas pedal, he had plenty of room in what should have been a terribly cramped back seat. He luxuriated in the unexpected comfort for a moment as Jasper latched his seat back into place and sat down. He looked up from contemplating how delightfully un-smooshed his knees were to see both vampires had turned around and were considering him thoughtfully. He stared back for a long moment, feeling more and more like a bug under a magnifying glass, hunching his shoulders a bit and adopting a guilty look under the pressure, until Alice finally broke the tension.

"Hi!"

"Yeah, um. Hey." He returned lamely, not really sure what they wanted. He was already regretting getting in the car. He was helplessly trapped in a too-small backseat (no matter what his earlier thoughts to the contrary) and totally surrounded. He just knew that any second they were going to start in on the interrogation, shining a bright light in his face, asking him all sorts of uncomfortable questions and forcing him to talk by threatening to make him listen to polka- or something. -Probably something more alarming and less incredibly stupid.-

"If you needed a ride somewhere you should have just said something, silly. We don't live near- Well, anything really, and we aren't horrible enough hosts to make you walk all the way back to civilization by yourself." Alice's smile hadn't dimmed even slightly and he was glad for her sake that her facial muscles were vampire strong, because for any mortal to hold that expression would have been agony after the first minute or so. If she weren't so adorable it would be kinda creepy.

"Sorry." Xander looked away sheepishly. "I guess I just got used to walking everywhere while I was in Africa." It was a lame excuse and he knew it. From their faces they knew it too, but were obviously willing to let him get away with his blatant lie. –Plenty of denial to go around.-

"Well, don't do it again." Her mock chastisement done, Alice turned back around and gripped the wheel, choosing to relieve the pressure of the conversation a bit by looking at him indirectly through the rearview mirror. "So, since we've already come all the way out here to track you down, where to?"

-I can't just say that I was going to hitch to the nearest large city and not look back- Xander thought fast. "I was thinking of heading into town to check out the bookstores, maybe find something on interplanar travel or magical communication. I do need to get home eventually. My friends will be looking for me soon if they aren't already."

"We know the locations of the local bookstores." Jasper offered, finally turning around to face forward again, relieving Xander of the weight of his scrutiny.

"We'll give you the whole grand tour." Alice chimed in cheerfully, glad that initial contact had gone so smoothly. Now they just needed to find a way to keep Xander from running off again.

-/-/-/-\-\-\-

"We'll bring him home."

"Jasper and I will go." Alice told Carlisle. "I know where he is and Jazz can help me figure out what he's thinking and feeling."

"I'll come too." Edward was anxious to avert the horrible futures he could still see playing out in Alice's mind. He wouldn't wish those events on anyone, but Xander was a special case. He had a vested interest in keeping this particular human close and safe. Edward tried not to think too deeply on the emotional reasons he wanted the human safe. He spent even less time analyzing why he felt the need to bundle the one-eyed mystery man up and hide him away from the world so that nothing could ever hurt him. He smiled a bit at the thought of the reaction he'd get if he ever tried.

"Actually, Edward, it would probably be better if you all stayed here." Jasper spoke up; finally shaking off the effects of the emotional deluge that had swamped him. "He's much more mentally fragile than any of us suspected. All that negativity and pain is right under the surface. The last thing we want to do is give him the sense of being cornered or coerced."

Despite the surge of protective jealousy he felt sluice through him at Jasper's words; Edward reluctantly acquiesced, seeing their truth and not wanting to scare Xander off. Jasper met his eyes steadily, knowing exactly how he was feeling.

"We'll bring him back, Edward. Alice and I won't let anything happen to him."

Alice laid a hand on Edward's arm, smiling up at him gently. "Can't you see? It's already changing."

Edward met her sympathetic eyes as he looked into her mind, searching through the fading and changing images with a growing sense of relief. Finally satisfied, he smiled at Alice. She returned it with a brilliant smile of her own and vanished with Jasper.

-/-/-/-\-\-\-

"So, what do we do?" Alice whispered to her mate as they watched Xander disappear into the stacks at the local bookstore. "We know he's not going to find anything. How do we keep him from breaking down?" She fought down a feeling of helplessness.

Their plan hadn't consisted of much more than tracking the human down and fixing him emotionally. She could see all the possible futures she wanted, but human emotions were never her strong suit. She couldn't remember her life before she was turned and felt very little connection with mortal wants and needs. Luckily, with his gift Jasper was an expert in this particular field and could take the lead.

"The easiest thing to do would be to distract him." Jasper replied after a moment of thought. "It would only be a diversionary and delay tactic, but it will give us enough time to come up with something else." With a small nod to himself he wandered off, getting lost among the books and leaving Alice staring after him. He seemed to have a plan, but she couldn't see the outcome of it yet.

"Distract him? With what?" She questioned, calling after him in low tones, "Jasper?"

His only response was a near silent, "You'll see." that floated back from beyond the shelves.

"I don't see though." She pouted, before following him.

-/-/-/-\-\-\-

Xander was flipping quickly through "The "Supernatural" Book of Monsters, Spirits, Demons, and Ghouls." He had thought it was promising, but it was turning out to be a monster guide to some TV show. Looked fairly cool, two hot guys in a cool car fighting evil. If he was home he might think of watching it, but ultimately the book was not all that useful here in the real world. He was startled out of his perusal when a giant stack of books was dropped on the table next to him.

He looked up to find Jasper watching him with an unsettlingly mischievous look in his eyes. Deciding he didn't want to know what that was all about, he turned his attention to the stack of textbook sized books on the table. He poked one of the books warily, as if it were planning to sprout teeth to ravage his delicate extremity. "What's this?"

"'World History: The Human Experience' 'The United States: A History of the Republic' 'US History for Dummies' 'Europe: A History' 'The Complete Idiot's Guide to European History' 'Modern History: From the European Age to the New Global Era' 'The History of the Ancient World: From the Earliest Accounts to the Fall of Rome' 'History and Society'…" Jasper pointed to each book in turn as he listed them off, burgundy eyes glinting merrily.

With each name Xander's face grew more horrified. Hoping he was just interpreting this whole situation wrong he looked back at the walking Civil War tribute. "…And, what? You're shopping for doorstops?" -And that smile isn't scary at all. Nope. Not one bit.-

"You are temporarily stranded in a completely unknown place. It is important that you make sure that events have progressed the same here as they did in your home. You will need a thorough education of the world, and these books will provide a good start."

"Start?" Xander squeaked, staring at what had to be over three thousand pages of textbook. Xander looked helplessly at Alice for help. "I thought you said you weren't evil?"

Alice giggled merrily at Jasper's successful plan of distraction. "I never said we weren't evil, just that we were vegetarians."

With a groan Xander buried his face in his hands, slouching down in his chair. The Supernatural book dropped to the floor, forgotten as Jasper and Alice shared a brief smile over his bowed head.

She couldn't resist poking fun at his obvious dismay, "Don't worry, Jasper's a bit of a history buff. He can help you study."

Her answer was a further slumping of his shoulders and a muffled. "Great, that's just fantastic. I'm so glad to hear that he'll enjoy torturing me."

-/-/-/-\-\-\-

Xander stood up with a stretch. "Well, thinking is hard work. As fascinating as it is that Sacagawea founded America in 1968, I can't read anymore. The words are just floating around on the page, taunting me. I think it's just about time for the pet human's din-din and walkies." He turned to look at his impromptu history teacher pleadingly. "Please, please, please- let me be done."

Jasper frowned a little at the horribly incorrect fact Xander had made up, "Well, if that's the only information you absorbed, I don't think we should stop. History is important."

"Yeah, yeah. Remember lest you be cursed to repeat it. Sacagawea - Louis and Clark, 1968 - Martin Luther King Jr., Vietnam stuff Etc. Etc. C'mon Jazz. I can't take anymore. I'm dying here. I think my stomach is eating itself."

The stoic Texan cracked a smile at the beseeching whine in the human's tone. Although fact checking and comparing the history of the world had started as an excuse to distract the human, he had found it surprisingly refreshing to take on the role of teacher; being able to share his love of history hadn't hurt either. Despite his flippant tone and near constant quips Xander had applied himself diligently for several hours straight without asking for a break.

"He's right you know." Alice looked up from her book, curiously on the subject of dream interpretation, to join in. "You've been studying for over two hours and he's starting to look a little wilted around the edges. I hear humans need plenty of food and sunlight to flourish."

"See! Even Alice thinks you're taking bad care of me. You should be ashamed." Xander waggled a finger at Jasper disapprovingly, Alice matching his expression perfectly. The mortal blushed scarlet when his stomach growled out its agreement.

With a brief laugh Jasper gave in, "I see I'm outvoted. Alright, since you're giving me lessons in the care of humans, where are we going for dinner?"

-/-/-/-\-\-\-

"MMMMM. Grease." Xander salivated over his burger and fries. "I'm so glad you have fast food here. It's been too long."

Alice looked at his tray with an expression of total disgust. "I don't think you could pay me enough to eat something like that, even if I needed to eat and was starving to death."

Jasper nodded his agreement, adding more diplomatically. "It's not very appetizing."

"Well, then, it's a good thing I'm eating it, not putting it on display." Xander bit into his huge bacon cheeseburger, dripping with melted cheese and bacon grease, over exaggerating his enthusiasm with a moan. "It may be a heart attack waiting to happen, but I was never gonna live forever anyway."

A dark look crossed his face and Jasper's attention was immediately drawn by the swirling emotion he exuded. In an instant masks and guards fell back into place and the pain leeched away as if it had never been there. It didn't go far, with a light push the empathetic vampire could sense it lurking behind the mortal's haunted eye and façade of humor.

Dipping a French fry in his ketchup and biting off the end, Xander chewed thoughtfully for a moment before waving the stubby bit he was still holding at Jasper. "Ok, I have a question. Why are you so uncomfortable around me? I can see you relaxing a little whenever I move away and tensing when I get closer. What's up with that?"

Jasper's ever-present frown deepened noticeably as Alice spoke up for him, as was apparently her habit, she must have been the unofficial Cullen family representative. "Jasper's the newest to embrace our unique... lifestyle."

"Hmm? Oh! You mean the vegetarian thing." He stared at the quiet man for a long moment, watching as the Texan's eyes flitted to rest on everything in front of him that wasn't breathing and pumping blood through its veins. As Xander watched him focus on the salt and pepper shakers he spoke, "Jasper, look at me. Do you want to bite me?"

Startled, those red-gold eyes locked on to his, before falling away quickly as the Southerner admitted quietly, "…Yes."

"Why?"

His shock at Xander's straightforwardness gave way to confusion as he tried to understand what the mortal was asking him. "I don't…"

Taking pity on the vamp, since he'd pried into a sensitive subject with his questioning, Xander elaborated. "Is it because you know I'd taste good? Is it the thrill of holding power over my life or death? Is it simply because you're hungry?" He held his arms open in invitation, still holding his half-eaten French fry. "I'm right here. What's stopping you?"

"I don't legally exist here. No friends or family to come looking for me, so if you screw up and I end up dead. So what? No one knows I'm here. The only thing you'll really have to worry about is getting rid of the body. This is the Rockies; bodies disappear rather easily, so no worries Jazz. It's not the end of the world; take it from an expert on Apocalypses. I'm touched you care though. Real warm and squishy inside, or maybe that's just the blood still flowing through my veins that you've admirably restrained yourself from so far."

Jasper glanced at Alice hoping to get her thoughts on this bizarre turn to their conversation. She looked as surprised and mystified as he felt.

"Don't look at Alice. Her food is her choice. The many special diets and salad-only binges my friends went on never once discouraged my Twinkie eating. Do you think she'd leave you if you killed me? That any of them would? Why do You, Jasper, hold yourself back? Why do You put yourself through the pain you're obviously in? What's Your reason?" He emphasized each question by leaning forward a little more and poking his half eaten fry at the vampire.

"I couldn't stand to feel them die anymore." Was the quietly defeated response.

Xander sat back, ruminating on this new fact, turning it over in his head and thinking it out. "So, it's not that you don't want to drink human blood, it's that you don't want to kill. If you could drink your fill of human blood without hurting anyone would you be okay in public or would people be at risk? Is it an alcoholic type thing where one sip ruins all your hard work or more of a drug withdrawal thing where going cold turkey dooms you to failure without a massive amount of willpower?"

"Why are you asking me this?"

"I do have a point, I promise. Please just answer." Xander watched the perfectly still vampire carefully.

"I think I'd be alright if I fed. Animals just leave me hungry. Being around humans- it's like they all walk around with the one thing I want the most but cannot have."

"Well," Xander smiled. "That's easy enough to fix." He finally popped his pointer-fry into his mouth and grimaced a little at how cold it'd gotten.

"What? We can't feed without loosing control, to drink human blood someone would have to die. And even if he did manage to control himself the venom from the bite would turn them. Are you suggesting he just go kill or turn someone?" Alice definitely wasn't following his train of thought. It was a good thing he was used to explaining himself and his huge leaps of logic and intuition.

"Not at all. Why don't you just have Carlisle bring you home some medical blood from the hospital? Spike always said that it wasn't as good as straight from the vein, but still infinitely better than animal. Except otter. For some reason he really liked otter blood. You don't even have to drink it cold; just stick it in the microwave for a bit to get it back up to arterial temp."

The two vampires just stared at him in shock.

"What? No-one gets hurt, no-one dies. No fuss, no muss- and can I just say, what the hell is muss? Anyway, if Carlisle takes the stuff marked for destruction, the stuff that's got sickle cell or expired or has drugs or infections or whatever- then not even the people needing transfusions suffer. Jasper can wean himself off of it or keep drinking it as he chooses. It upholds the sentiment if not the specifics of your lifestyle. It all works out. The only thing you need to worry about is explaining the red eyes, which I'm assuming you already have a cover for."

With that last sentiment, Xander stood and carried his tray to the trash mourning the cold fries and ignorant of the bemused looks sent his way by the grateful couple behind him. He had quickly and efficiently seen through their biggest heartache to a solution they'd never thought of. If they had expressed their thanks, he would have told them it was just part of who he was to try to fix things for people. It was their fortune to have found him and his good luck that he had finally found people who could see and appreciate that aspect of who he was without him even having to say anything.

If Xander could have heard their thoughts in that moment he would have smacked himself. Despite his plans to leave, he was making connections left and right. It had started when he intrigued Edward, teased Carlisle, humored Esme's mothering instinct, joked with Emmett and held his own against an angry Rosalie. He had just earned the eternal loyalty of Alice and Jasper. He didn't know it yet, but he'd been officially accepted by all the members of the Cullen clan and they were more determined than ever to mend the cracked and broken spirit of their human.

=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*= TBC =*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=

A/N:

Really short chapter here- or short for me anyway. It's only half the size of the last one.

The Porsche was taken from the official list of Twilight vehicles from Meyer's website.

All the books listed are real, I googled for them.

-Xander complains about CH 6-
X: "You killed me off, turned me into a vamp, made me kill the Cullens, made the Cullens kill me, killed me off again and then it was just 'Oops. It's not real?!'"
LS: "Pretty much, yeah."
X: "Do you know how many nights I cried myself to sleep? Do You? And it was all for NOTHING?!"
LS: "Um, I'm sorry?"
X: "You're sorry? You're SORRY? Do you know what the worst part was?"
LS: "Being turned into a vampire?"
X: "No. The absolute worst part is that you stuck me with an OC based off of your least favorite uncle for FOUR HOURS! You've had to sit through those damn fish conversations, why would you do that to me?"
LS: "Sorry. It was an angsty, torturous chapter and I couldn't think of anything worse than being stuck talking to him."
X: -Pouts- "You're evil."
LS: -Pats his head- "Better get used to it, it's probably not going to change anytime soon."

Distribution: FFN (Lightning_Skies), Twisting the Hellmouth (LightningSkies)

Author has given no other permissions.

3,597 Words - 7 Pages - 09/22/09