Few announcements- No, this fic is NOT abandoned. I am a nursing student getting a bachelor's degree. I literally have no life and have been working on this in ten or fifteen minute increments once a week or less. Two, expect more updates after break. Three, this will loosely follow the twilight verse but will have some major changes later in the work. Thank you for reading!


"I can't believe you would keep something like this from me," Ravi said for what seemed like the hundredth time. "Vampires actually exist. And apparently, mutant dogs too."

He was picking through the wound on my back while I lied on the bed of my truck. He was hunched over me, using a flashlight and some tweezers to clean me up. There was remarkably little blood, most likely because I had such a faint heartbeat.

I craned my neck to glare at him. "You're getting on my nerves, Ravi. And I think you are taking more time for this than strictly necessary."

"Well forgive me for being thorough," he shot back.

"Yeah, I'd hate getting an infection and dying," I said dryly.

Ravi groaned. "That was not funny," he in his most British accent said while taking his gloves off.

"It was kinda funny."

"No, it wasn't."

"Yes, it really was. I'm hilarious."

"Just get up and give me the garbage bag already."

"Shut up, Ravi. You're not the boss of me."

"Technically, I am."

I shoved the trash bag at him and he put the gloves that had my blood on them in it. I tied off the bag and climbed down from the bed of my truck to put it next to my feet. Ravi climbed in after a few minutes. "So," he said once we pulled out onto the road. "Do I have to worry about more dangerous vampire assassins coming after me?"

I laughed at the idea of Victoria as one of those legendary assassins then stopped. The idea might not be that far off from the truth.

"I don't think so," I said. "Laurent said that it was a coincidence that he found us there today. And now that he's dead, he can't exactly go blabbing to Victoria about finding me. And you were never part of the original plan anyway. She doesn't know that you exist. Of course, I'd like to keep it that way, so I'd really appreciate it if you called me right away if anything suspicious happens."

Ravi nodded. "Yeah, that won't be a problem."

I shook my head at the events of the day. "I can't believe those dogs though… they seemed somewhat intelligent so maybe they're not wild animals."

"Can we talk about this later, I'm just kind of tired of all this," Ravi said. "I just want to go home, do Call of Duty and sleep well tonight. This can wait until tomorrow. Or the day after."

I nodded. "Yeah, I understand, I've been there."

On the ride back, we just listened to the crappy radio of my truck while discussing our plans for the day. I had to cut back on shifts at the hospital because midterms were coming up. I needed a better GPA than last year if I wanted the University of Washington to even give me a shot. Calculus and physics were a struggle, but Ravi would help me when he could. I thought I had a good chance of doing well on both exams. Ravi was going on and on about this new video game he was planning on purchasing as soon as it was released by the time I pulled up in the driveway.

"Keep the wound clean, I'll drop by sometime tomorrow afternoon to check on it," he said. "Eat plenty of brain food."

I rolled my eyes as he got out of the truck. He took the garbage bag with the bloody gloves with him. He said that he would drop by the morgue and put it in the biohazard waste disposal to make sure the poor residents of Forks were safe from my virus.

Charlie was back from work an hour or so after I got back. I told him that I went on a short hike with Ravi but didn't mention where, or the fact that I saw mutant wolves that could apparently somewhat understand human (or zombie) communication. He gave me a look and then demanded why I was spending so much time with Ravi, reminding me that although I was 18 I was still his child and his responsibility, that Ravi was much older, and that I needed to tell him what exactly was going on.

I shot back that I could quit my job and stop talking to my boss if he hated doctors that much. He held up his hands in surrender, his worry gone for now. That night I snacked on a brain while working well ahead into my homework. The visions still happened occasionally, but with this person for some reason they were very faint and blurry. I noticed that I was somewhat detached emotionally but that wasn't really a bad thing. I could focus on important things rather than worrying, and feeling.

It happened around midnight.

I had long since given up on doing homework and was instead watching reruns of Ellen from a few years back. The small tap of something bouncing off the side of the house didn't quite register at first but around what had to be the third or fourth tap I turned off the volume and put the brain back under my bed. I looked out the windows cautiously and saw Jake sitting in the tree, throwing what looked to be pebbles of a decent size at my window. I unlocked it slowly. Jake was sitting on a branch, very relaxed despite the fact that he was about 20 feet off the ground.

"Nice to see you," he said neutrally, not moving. He tossed a pebble in my direction without any real power behind it. I caught it before it could hit the house. His eyes widened slightly at the motion.

"So we're talking again?" I asked. My voice carried far in the quiet night. The only other noise was the soft rustling of leaves outside the window.

"If you'll let me in, I'd like to," he said, moving to get up.

I backed away as he came forward. He leaned forward and pushed with his legs, catching his hands on my windowsill and coming into contact with the siding of the house with a dull thud. We froze, but Charlie made no move to get up. Jacob pulled himself up and then was suddenly in my room.

There was a long and awkward silence before I broke it with, "and what exactly are you doing here?"

He rubbed his hair self-consciously before putting his hands back in his pockets. "I hadn't really thought about what exactly I was going to say when I got here," he said.

"Well one, you technically just said something, and two, you put yourself into a lot of trouble coming here, so you have to have something important to tell me," I said.

He cracked a small smile that quickly disappeared. "I just want to know… Bella what happened to you?"

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"You've changed, and I need to know what happened," he said.

Wow, that was rich. "I've changed? Really? I'm not the one that goes from being my best friend to ignoring me to hopping into my bedroom window at 12:30 in the morning with this interrogation of crap! I don't understand just what the actual fu-"

"I was there," he said. "Okay? I was there, and I saw you!"

"Saw me where, what are you even talking about?" I tried to keep my voice calm as he became more agitated.

"Today, alright? I saw you today," he said.

"It's only been today for, like, 45 minutes," I said.

"Fine, then, yesterday. I saw you yesterday. I saw you kill the vampire. I saw you," he repeated the last part. My stomach dropped to the floor.

"I didn't see you yesterday," I said after a while.

"Yes, Bella, you did. I was there, in the clearing, and you killed that vampire in front of me," he insisted.

Obviously, he saw me kill Laurent. There was little doubt about that. I was caught red-handed, so to speak. But the one part that wasn't adding up was the fact that... "I didn't kill him in front of you, the only person who saw that was Ravi, and there were some…"

"Wolves," he finished my sentence for me.

I gasped. "But… how? What?"

Jake groaned quietly and sat down on the chair next to my desk. "I can't tell you everything. It's not allowed. But, if you already knew, that would solve everything. And you do already know. I've told you this before." He paused, looked at me intently.

While he was talking I had pressed myself up against my wall in horror at the implications of what he was saying. Jacob made no sudden movements, seeming to understand that I was having an extremely difficult time understanding just what exactly my life had turned into in a matter of minutes.

"I did tell you, Bella. It was that afternoon you and your friends came to the beach. We went for a walk, and I told you the stories. You were only interested in one, but the other one I told you, about my ancestors. You have to remember that one." He sighed while getting up. "Maybe when you understand you can trust me with what happened to you. I hope you can. But I would try to understand if you couldn't. But Bella," he paused. I met his eyes warily.

"Red eyes or no red eyes, you're still the most important person to me." With that statement and a small sad smile, he exited my room.

Once he was gone I moved to the window to close it. I saw him disappear into the trees next to the house, running at a suspicious speed. I tried to remember that day he mentioned. But my human memories were muddled somewhat. And the pain and misery of the last few months of my human existence made it easy to avoid thinking about. Then again, I didn't think it would be difficult to understand. Jacob was a human, but admitted to seeing me kill a vampire. Something he always claimed not to believe in, but now felt comfortable speaking about. He knew I knew about vampires. The only other… living entity, for lack of a better term, that had been there had been Ravi, who did not actually see the killing of Laurent. The others had been the wolves.

"Werewolf," I muttered to myself. Of course it was. Because my life had to be more complicated, right? Unwilling to deal with this added, completely uncalled-for stressor, I went to bed and plugged in my iPod. The noise of the music gave me something to focus on other than the fact that my best friend was a freaking werewolf. But, he was still my best friend. That had to mean something, even now among the insanity that I had suddenly been thrust into. I decided that I would go to Billy's house tomorrow morning- or in a few hours as it was already early on a Sunday morning.

Could Jacob and the other…werewolves be the ones killing the hikers? There had to be an explanation for what exactly was going on. Maybe they could be persuaded to learn a new way? I sighed too loudly and turned to my side. I punched my pillow in frustration, but that didn't actually help. My mind was spinning too fast for me to actually understand what I was thinking.

It was a miracle at least, that at this time the brain I had eaten was not unlike myself. He was another elderly person, introverted, and more interested in history and art than the daily happenings of other people. His mind was quiet, the only way I could actually tell I ate someone was the occasional visions I got of watching a documentary on the revolutionary war, or suddenly understanding how to shade an object to look three dimensional. His death came from a heart attack, and it was quick and painless.

When the sun started filtering through my blinds I decided to get up. I was earlier than Charlie, something that rarely happened. Realizing that it had been about two or three days since I had last eaten actual food, I made myself some toast with peanut butter, salt, sugar, and copious amounts of tabasco. It almost tasted like something. Charlie came downstairs while I was washing my dishes, and out of guilt for being such a terrible daughter the last few days I made him scrambled eggs with cheese and bacon.

"What's all this for?" he asked suspiciously, even though that didn't stop him from eating.

I sighed dramatically. "Well Dad, I guess you're never getting breakfast from me again, if this is how I get treated."

He took in my already dressed appearance. "Going to see Jake and Billy today?" he asked.

"Yup," I replied.

"Going to get that fight between you and Jake settled?"

"Let's see how it goes. Might take a few minutes, might take all day," I said. "I'll call if I'm going to be late."

Charlie nodded. "I did teach you how to throw a punch right? So if he tries anything… Billy is a good friend but don't let that get in your way, Bells," he said.

That actually did make me laugh. "Please, I could totally take him on and win."