Chapter summary: "I know what you are!" ... well, at least this time it isn't 'space aliens.' Humans are so uninteresting ... that is, until you push on that one thing, and then boring becomes ... something else entirely. Something unexpected.

I stood, staring at Bella for a while, watching her dig.

Humans are so ... stultified. They get caught up in the one thing that they are doing with their lives, which is usually nothing: going to their 'jobs,' being at their jobs, but doing nothing there, going home, and at home, they turn on their large moving picture devices and stare at them.

Or they go to 'Happy Hours.'

I've heard it called 'happy hours,' these things that they go to, which seems to be a bunch of humans standing around at a bar talking about work and about the people they work with: the people they can't stand.

That's a 'happy hour' for humans. I'd hate to see their 'sad hours,' but I do all the time: it's called them not being happy, it's them realizing how pointless it all is and how little they actually mean in the greater scheme of things. Very, very few humans ever get the awareness to reach their 'sad hours.'

I'm happy for those very few: at least, for them, their blinders are off. They see reality for what it really is.

Not like this little shit.

Does not have a fucking clue. Swear to God Almighty. Digging like this? She's digging like she's just ... digging. No sense. No purpose. Just digging because she was told to.

At least she's a little fighter: fighting me every step of the way, but so ... trapped in her humanity. She needs to be told what to do, even as she rebels against it, but once she logs her protest, she falls right in line and digs away without heart, nor spirit nor purpose.

Useless waste of flesh, just like the rest of the mass of humanity.

Bitch needed to hop to it if she would have any hope of making it by nightfall.

I cleared my throat significantly, signalling for her attention.

I got it, all right.

"Holy fucking shit!" She screamed, a little scaredy-cat caught being herself.

At the same time she jumped, just an inch, but she fell onto all fours funny back into the dirt, unbalanced, and, overcompensating, fell toward me, not away, onto her side, grasping her chest, panting hard.

"Don't do that!" she exclaimed finally after I watched her catch her breath.

"Eheh," I snickered, laughing at her pointless demand. I liked it, that I scared her out of her wits, but I wasn't really concentrating on what she had said, just that she had said it.

No. I was looking down at her ass.

It was a cute little butt, my Bella had, nice and rounded: womanly. Small, yes, but well-proportioned for her, the little twig of a girl.

Maybe I could call her 'twiggy.' I wondered if she'd like that. No. Not really. But I did wonder how much I'd like it, watching her squirm with embarrassment as I called her that.

I think I'd like that, watching her squirm in discomfort. I think I'd like that a lot.

"So," I said, casually, and reached out with my foot, hooking onto her shoulder and pulling her to face me.

I reflected I liked moving the little shit around. Payback was a serious bitch. She took my James from me, and I was going to take every shred of dignity from her in recompense.

Then, ... maybe then, I'd start in on working her over.

I pushed my foot down firmly into her shoulder, pinning her down into the freshly dug dirt, and I heard her bones shift in her shoulder, groaning in protest.

I wasn't even pressing hard at all.

Bella didn't think so. She bit her lip, wincing, and looked at my foot, then, in surprise, looked up, looked North, then she looked away quickly.

I had hung my jeans to dry. So, or as we used to say: ergo, I was quite naked. This seemed to bother my little Bella somewhat and more than somewhat.

"So," I said, "how long have you been digging?"

"Uh," she said, still looking away, but her brow furrowed in concentration. "Uh, I dunno."

"Uh, huh," I said dismissively. She had been digging for an hour. "How much progress have you made?" I demanded.

"Uh ..." She looked at the earth beside her, then glanced at me in embarrassment. "Not ... much?" she offered apologetically.

"Accurate," I said in clipped, displeased tones.

I took my foot off her shoulder and surveyed her work.

Accurate was an accurate term. If she were a farmer, her (dis)ability to till the Earth would have earned first a spanking, then the lash, then a full-on flogging with possible banishment, as noone would want to breed this one, if her offspring might be equally as unproductive.

She'd be put in the stockade, then put out of town to starve to death in a forest much like this one now.

The irony did not escape me.

But in my day we worked, all day and all night, without complaint nor apology, as neither did anything to halt the oncoming Winter and the inevitable starvation, no matter how much we prepared for it. Harvest was the bountiful time, Winter the lean time, and even nobility had to tighten their wide, leather belts and eat the same pickled cabbages and root crops and eat the same smoked meat, meal after meal day after day.

Not this one. Not anybody, these days.

Maybe an unfair, blanket statement. But I say was I see.

I felt her stand, cautiously, behind me.

"You are aware you need to be done by nightfall," I stated coolly, turning to her.

She was looking at me, but then quickly looked away.

"Yes," she whispered.

I looked back at the outline of the grave, then tsked. "So, what are you going to do to complete this by then?"

I looked at her again, looking away from me. "Dunno," she mumbled, waving toward the grave in futility. "I guess," she cleared her throat, "I'll work harder or ..."

"What?" I snapped angrily. "Speak up."

The tongue. It came out and touched her lips. Then she cleared her throat quietly. "I ..." she began, just a touch less softly.

"Look at me," I commanded.

I glared. She looked, blushing.

"It's rude," I snarled, "not to look at me when you're speaking to me or when I'm asking you a question. Remember that, Bella."

She bit her lip, nodding, then looked away.

An involuntary movement of her head.

Almost.

I sighed, walking right up to her, grasping her head firmly in my hands: her chin in one hand with the back of her head in my other, and I forcefully, very gently, twisted her head, so that she was looking right into my eyes.

"Bella," I said, my voice preternaturally calm, but my displeasure very evident in everything I projected to her.

I held her, glaring at her hard.

She looked like a little, tiny bird, transfixed by the stare of a cobra.

"Nnnnf," she whined helplessly.

Ah, I had picked her up off the ground. Her tiptoes barely brushed the (mostly) undug dirt.

I gently brought her feet to rest flat on the earth and removed my hand from her jaw, but my left hand bunched her hair in it, immobilizing her head, forcing her to face me, even against her involuntary wish not to.

"I tell you to look at me, and you do not," I said, a quiet anger in my voice.

"Urh nekkid!" she whined.

I swear to God! ...

Actually, I was doing that a lot recently I noticed, again with displeasure.

But I declare! Understanding these moderners and the way they spoke. It's as if I needed a translation from what they were saying to the English language.

"What?" I snarled.

"You're-h nay-ked!" she said.

Then, realizing what she said, she blushed hard, and tried to look away.

Her eyes managed to slide to my right shoulder.

I'll give her that. Her efforts were commendable.

I chuckled lightly. "Yes, I am," I said, "and that makes you uncomfortable."

She nodded, or tried to, wincing as she pulled her hair bunched in my hand.

"Hm," I said, "and you think I give a fuck about your comfort because ..."

"Yuh donn," she said.

I felt my hand just itching to smack her.

Furgesson. She spoke like a Scotsman. That was: unintelligibly.

I didn't smack her.

It took an heroic effort, for which I am to be commended, but I didn't smack her.

Not just yet.

But she saw my effort, and fear was in her eyes, making them shine, then a tear sped down her cheek.

"I know what you are," she said, gulping at her own daring.

I regarded her coolly for one second. "And ..." I prompted carelessly.

What would it be this time? Humans were so ...

I sighed.

Humans were so unimaginative! So repetitive, every single time, and each time thinking they were original. Each century it was something different, and for each century it was exactly the same. These days it was 'space aliens.' Boring!

Well, maybe this one would be different this time.

And maybe I'd shit sunshine out my ass, too.

I waited, unruffled.

"Well?" I barked, finally losing my patience as she stuck herself on working up on her courage to spit it out.

No spitting had commenced, and my patience was exhausted.

"You're a terminator!" she glared at me hard, daring and terrified at the same time.

I mulled over this word: terminator, pursing my lips.

I suppose if one were to look at the word, it was what I did. People had an origin, and I was their terminus.

But I'm not sure that's what she meant. Words in language twisted around until they no longer meant what they ... well, meant.

I blinked.

"A robot," she whispered in explanation. "When I hit you with my crowbar, it went clang!"

The last word came out from her in a close approximation of the clarion call of a bell rung.

But the first word?

"Robot," I repeated. Two syllables that didn't make any sense to me. What was this thing?

"Yeah," she said, daringly. "You ..."

She looked into my eyes for confirmation, but found none.

I blinked.

Then sighed. This was getting boring. Well, at least I wasn't a 'space alien' ... as I cared about that, either.

I was going to shove her back into the earth, and force her to be productive in this way, as she was thoroughly failing in being productive entertaining me.

But then she said. "I guess you don't call yourselves that, but if I say one name ..."

This got my attention.

This person. This girl I held by the back of her head, her resemblance to Bella Swan was uncanny, and not just in her looks, but in demeanor, comportment, and her modes of expression. If they had been twin sisters and grown up together, there would be a possibility of an explanation.

But the only explanation that made any sense, since she wasn't Bella Swan's twin, was that they were weird.

This is a word I do not expect you to know. Not anymore. What this word means is ... weird.

I can't explain it. The Germans have the 'double gainer' the monster that 'doubles' a person, and then eats them, replacing them, because there can be only one. But the English have the weird, and the weird is you, so much you, but your opposite, because where you are reticent, your weird is bold, where you are unsure, your weird is confident, but it is you, so much you that you are incomplete without her, after meeting her, your weird and you are one whole person and both of you are incomplete without the other.

Your weird unconsciously knows everything you know, wants everything you want, but honestly, cleanly, purely, and loves who you love, ... with her whole heart.

Did this girl know Edward Cullen, instinctively, via the weird?

My grip on the back of her head tightened.

"aaaahhhOOOOuuuuuwww!" she cried out in pain.

I ignored it. "What name?" I hissed.

"Ewwn!" she whined, "ewwn! I-if, if I say it you'll go crazy and kill me!"

I brought her face right up to mine.

She knew.

She knew Edward Cullen. She saw my James destroyed by that thing!

"You," I snarled, shifting my hand to her throat, "tell me, right now, the name or I swear I will tear you limb-from-..."

"John Connor!" she shrieked, "John Connor! Okay? Now off me, you fucking metal bitch!"

I blinked.

"John ... Connor?" I said, utterly confused.

Bella blinked back at me, confusion crossing her face, too. "Yeah," she said, looking at me. "John Connor, you know?" she asked.

"No," I said, letting my hand fall from her throat. "Somebody you know?"

She brought her hand up to her throat, rubbing it gingerly. "No," she said, "but you're supposed to ..."

She stood there, rubbing her throat, waiting, looking at me expectantly. I stood there, a stone, looking at her back.

She sighed. "John Connor?" she tried one more time.

"I'm supposed to know this person?" I said.

She shrugged, deflated and kicked at the earth. "Yeah," she said.

"So," I said slowly, "this was your theory? That I was some ... 'terminator'? And would kill you if you said this person's name?"

"That's what happened in all the movies," she said.

"Ah!" I said, understanding now, "the ... 'movies.'"

That's how people collected the sum-total of all their knowledge, they went to moving pictures and believe what they told them all.

Bella saw my scorn, and her eyes dropped. Her chin started to quiver. "Yeah," she said sadly. "You were suppose ta ..."

She bit her lip, waving toward me, helplessly.

I smirked. How ... juvenile! She pinned her hopes on another fantasy, hoping to best me with this specially-gained knowledge only to have her standing there, looking like a complete fool.

Her one ephemeral victory over me, and even that was taken away from her.

And her victory? She wanted me to fly into a rage and kill her? And that would be her victory?

I shook my head and chuckled softly. It could be a cruel chuckle, but it was relieved. She wasn't Bella Swan's weird. She wasn't anything.

Bella looked up at me at the sound, her eyes showing the hurt inside.

"Bella, come here," I purred, fully restored to my sense of superiority over this lowly, beaten creature.

"I donn wanna," she sniffled.

I smirked, looking at her. How could I have been scared of this? This poor, little thing?

"I don't carrah," I responded, lightly now, almost happily.

She looked at me, hurt at my teasing, and I waved her toward me, easily, but with the full force of my authority. "Come, come, Bella!" I laughed lightly. "I won't bite you ... yet," and then I snickered at the truth of my own little jest.

I could be easy, issuing my commands, but they were still commands. She had to obey.

She looked at me, seeing me for the first time it seemed, and fear entered her eye and pierced her heart, but she slunk up to me, reluctantly and so wound tight up in herself, tears falling down her cheeks. Her forehead, when her head was not bowed, was level with my cheek bones, her lips, shoulder-height.

I pulled her into me, and her lips pressed against my collarbone, and my arms wrapped around her, squeezing her tightly into me.

She was stiff as a board, but, bit-by-bit, she lost her stiffness as she lost her very will, it seemed. Soon, she was sobbing softly into my shoulder, her head, her whole body surrendering itself into mine.

Fuck, this little one was a keeper, the way she fought so hard, the way she surrendered so completely. If I were her Alan, I would've known what a Godsend she was, and would've counted my blessings, every day, and every night.

If I were Alan.

But I am not.

I am Victoria Sutherland, and I do not care about this little bird in my arms.

"It's okay," I cooed, and my voice sounded loving and tender. "Cry, cry, little one."

She cried, angry at herself now that she was crying and that made her cry all the more.

"Ooh, my little one," I cooed, "so sure of yourself, and so, so wrong, eh?"

"But, b-but," Bella cried, "y-you're just so ... cold an-and hard, ... an-an, an-and terminators are cold and they're indestructible, and you're ..."

She couldn't go on and cried some more.

"Yes," I said, "and you so wanted me to be this thing, didn't you?"

"Yes!" she wailed.

"Because it would explain everything for you, wouldn't it?" I said. "Everything would make sense now that I fit your nice, neat explanation."

She cried and cried. My words weren't helping her tears.

"But I am not this thing. I don't fit into anything you can try to fit me into. I am beyond your reason and ..." I said.

"Ih-it's just not fair!" she whined, interrupting me.

I would have glared at her for that. Or smacked her across the forest.

I just held her now. "No," I said, "it isn't. Life isn't fair. Nobody said it was."

"Yeah, but..." she said and sniffled.

I felt her snot and tears on my shoulder.

I waited for her to say more, but she didn't, so I let her cry herself out.

It took a while.

...

We were sitting on the forest floor. Or, I was sitting on the forest floor; Bella was sitting on my lap, facing me.

I pulled her, gently, off my shoulder, looking into her face.

"Better?" I asked lightly.

Bella sniffled and looked away, blushing.

I brushed her bangs out of her face, and smiled a lopsided grin at her. 'Better' was a relative term, to be sure, but she had been sorely in need of this cry out to relieve this built-up pressure, and so, yes, she was in terrible shape now, relative to the rest of her life, but she was, indeed, feeling better than she was feeling a bit earlier.

It's all relative.

But this begs the question of why I let her relieve this pressure whereas for everyone else, I relieved their pressures of life by ... relieving them of their lives.

And my answer to that is: fuck off.

Like I have to answer to anyone, even questions begged to be answered, even to myself.

I knew what the fuck I was doing; this was all just part of the game.

"Do you have a request for me?" I pressed.

Bella was in a very slight euphoria of the emotional release. This made her easy to manage, more malleable.

Her brow clouded as she puzzled out my words.

"I..." she said, looking at me full-on again, finally, "I don't know what you mean."

My lip twitched upward. "You're dehydrated," I stated. "I smell it in the salt of your tears. Do you have a request for me?" I restated slowly, easing my way through the fog of her emotions.

"Uh, ..." she said, "I'm ... thirsty?" and blinked a couple of times wonderingly.

"Yes," I said quietly, waiting patiently.

I wondered if Bella knew what a 'request' was and what it wasn't. 'I'm thirsty' is not a request, it's a statement. I had already stated this for her.

I wonder how school teachers did this all day, every day, with children in schools and children pretending to be adults in colleges and universities in this God-forsaken frontier country.

The further one distanced oneself from England, the more barbaric the natives became.

I've heard, for example, that in Australia, where England emptied its prisons, people drink copious amounts of beer from the can, of all things, punch each other in the face and wrestle with crocodiles ... and the men watch admiringly, selecting their mates from the most savage beer-drinking, face-punching, crocodile-wrestling women of the lot.

'G'day, mate,' indeed!

Bella looked at me expectantly, but I didn't move, either.

"May I ..." she tentatively asked, "may I go get a drink of water?"

She knew how to say 'may I'! Will miracles never cease?

I regarded her coolly. "You have bottled water in your tent, do you not?" I said.

"Yes," she answered carefully.

"One of which you drank earlier without permission," I added.

Bella was silent.

I pondered in this silence, searching her face.

She dropped her eyes.

I smirked.

"Go to your tent," I said brusquely; "bring a bottle of water here."

"Uh, okkkkhh..."

The word died in her mouth as she began to choke up. You see, her face had purpled as my hand flashed out to her throat, as I strangled the word in it.

I shook my head gravely at her.

Her eyes were bugging out, filled with fear.

"Go," I said. "Obey. Don't 'okay' my command, just do it, Bella, yes?"

I glared, strangling her.

She nodded slightly, her chin touching my hand.

I let her go, pushing her away from me, off my lap.

She went, staggering, gasping for breath.

But she went.

...

"Bella," I said, "put the bottle here." I patted the ground by my knee.

Bella bent to place the bottle there.

Unladylike, I remarked sourly to myself.

"Sit down, sweetie," I said gently.

"Oh," she said surprised, becoming vaguely aware that she was standing and I was sitting, or, not aware of that, but that this should not be.

She sat, facing me, and placed the bottle by my knee.

I was pleased to see it unopened.

"This bottle," I said, not indicating it with even a flick of my eyes, "did you fetch it for yourself, or ... for me?"

"Oh," Bella said, realization dawning on her face. "Um ..." the color rose up on her cheeks and her eyes darted away. "For you?"

I growled, low, in the pit of my stomach. I hate being lied to.

"Really?" I asked, perturbed.

Bella looked back at me in shock, her eyes widening. "Um, ... yes?"

"Bella, ..." I sighed. "What is your everything? What is your only concern from this moment, and every moment for the rest of your miserable existence?"

"Uh, ... you," she said, her hands twisting in her lap.

"And that's what your focus was when you asked for and brought me this bottle?" I prompted.

"But you said ..." she began.

I roared, and the smile on my face was pure evil, pure predator.

Bella's face went white with shock, and she leaned back in fear in her sitting position.

My hand on her knee stopped any movement, however.

"Was your focus. On me. Bella Swan. When you asked for. And got. This bottle. Bella Swan." I stated each phrase with emphasis and precision, so that even she could get it.

"Um, no...?" she gasped.

I smirked.

Keep 'asking'-out your defiance, Bella Swan, I snarled to myself. Keep thinking I don't observe this childish behavior.

I lifted my hand from her knee and patted her cheek affectionately.

Bella was absolutely rooted to the spot, waiting in terror for me to lash out at her.

"Good girl," I cooed.

I took the bottle at my knee, opened it, and poured the contents onto the ground. It puddled, but then began to seep into the spongy forest floor.

"Bella," I said. "Fetch me a bottle of water. Now."

"O..." Bella went white again. "Um," she added helpfully and stood to go.

But she did not go.

"Victoria, may I ..."

"Bella," I interrupted, "sit. Face me. Ask your question that way."

She sat. "May I," she said softly, gulping. "May I get a bottle of water for me, too?"

I glared at her.

"No," I said curtly. "Go."

"Ummmm,..." Bella said. She looked at my hard, hard face.

A tear fell. She stood and left.

She ... still ... wasn't thinking solely of me. Even as I worked so very hard to impart this valuable lesson to her. She just totally ... missed it! It was mystifying to me.

What a hard nut to crack, this Bella Swan!

I was having fun.

...

"This bottle of water, Bella," I said. "It is for whom?"

Bella blinked. "For you," she said.

"You sure," I demanded.

"Yes," she said.

She didn't waver. She didn't look away in shame.

This bottle was for me.

"Mine," I said, patting the bottle, verifying.

"Yes," she said.

I smiled, pleased.

I waved her to me.

Now she did bite her lip and blush.

She came to me, sitting on my lap, but she wouldn't look at me.

"Ooh, Bella!" I exclaimed, "this first hour, so hard!"

She still wouldn't look at me, and she blushed harder.

"You'll learn," I reassured her. But then I shrugged, "Or you won't. Mayhap."

I reached down at got the bottle of water.

"Bella," I said, "would you like a sip of this water?"

Bella bit her lip again. "Yes, please."

"I have a name," I said coolly.

Bella looked at me apologetically, "Yes, please, Victoria."

I smiled at her. "Thank you, Bella. It's been a long, long time since I have heard my name from another's lips, and it pleases me to hear you say it."

Bella look at me in surprise.

I shrugged. "Just an explanation, Bella. Don't get your panties into a twist about it."

She blushed hard and looked away at that.

I chuckled lightly.

Such a shy, little thing! I thought. She's just begging for it, isn't she? I thought.

She has the kind of sweet innocence that demands a good, hard, and immediate fucking to satiate the lust she enflamed.

Alan was a lucky guy to have her ... while he was alive.

I picked up the bottle. "Open this for me, my dear," I purred.

It took her a bit. Her hands were trembling, it seemed.

I took the bottle from her trembling hands.

"Bella," I said, "everything comes from me. This sip of water. The drink you had this morning. Everything."

I looked into her eyes.

She was really uncomfortable at the closeness of her face to mine. It was ...

How do they say it?

It was freaking her out.

I blew into her face.

She reeled back, embarrassed.

But then, confusion flooded her face.

"Strawberries?" she asked in an awed hush.

I smirked. "Yes," I said.

Our very close proximity was giving her the full impact of my scent, and she had been struggling, trying to be disgusted by it.

But now she was, despite herself, fascinated by it.

Soon, o-so-soon, she'd be enchanted. That's when, if I were to leave her side, she'd miss it, and, when I returned, even silently as Death, she'd know I was there, not even seeing nor hearing, nor knowing, not consciously, but she's smell me, and her blood would boil with the need to be near it.

"And ..." her face became puzzled. "Something else? Something ..."

She pursed her lips, chewing on the thought, trying to capture what she was smelling, what she was feeling.

"Ginger," I said, and then I giggled.

Strawberry and ginger.

I smell nice.

Very nice.

"Ah! Yes!" she said, triumphantly, "that's it! It's ..."

Then she looked at me, drawn back to the present from her triumph, and became very embarrassed.

"It's," she said, "yeah, it's ... ginger. That's it."

Her start was triumphant, but now her words were deflated.

"Yes," I said, primly, "it is."

She gave me a sidelong, shy look. "How do you ...?"

"Bella," I said.

How-do-you and why-questions; who- and what-are-you questions. None of these mattered.

Bella bit her lip.

I smirked. "Tilt your head back, sweetie; let's satiate your thirst."

She blushed again.

God! It was just so hard for me, even as I delighted in her blushes, her embarrassment. She painted a pretty picture, and all I wanted to do is wrap up this canvas, take all my colors, her red and mine, and see what art we could make of and on each other.

But it was just so hard, because she was an intoxicating concoction of coconut and coffee; nothing, ... nothing at all like that Bella Swan's scent that swept James off his feet, damn her, but still something you'd take at dawn and savour, languorously, throughout the entire morning.

But her creamy white skin and her chocolate brown hair, just like that Bella Swan, had me drunk with desire, just for a taste of her.

But there was no such thing as 'just a taste.' I had to watch myself, full as I was even now, burning with desire to suck her dry.

It'd be a real shame to kill her by accident. She'd miss out on all the fun! And then where would we be, eh?

She tilted her sweet, little head back, obediently, and exposed that neck of hers, her pulse beating out a siren's call to me as clear and as strong as birdsong, greeting the dawn.

And almost as inevitable. Beautiful, in its own way, but ...

I sighed, breathing more strawberry and ginger onto Bella's face, and she sighed, breathing me in.

I brought the bottle up, just about her lips and tilted just a little bit of water in.

She swallowed greedily, ... gratefully, her eyes losing focus for a second.

There is nothing to a human like water when she is thirsty.

Take this on faith from someone who knows thirst like no human ever will.

She regained focus and presence after she drank and gave me her big, big doe eyes.

"Good?" I asked, superfluously.

She nodded.

I saw we both were masters of the understatement.

"More?" I offered.

She nodded her head slowly, her mouth opened to receive more, her eyes both cautious and hopeful at the same time.

I smirked down at her, holding, resting her head in one hand, holding the bottle in the other. I brought it up above her lips again and poured in a bit more.

This was the thing with hope. So easy for me to crush a little hope, but so much more exquisite if I nurtured it for a while until it blossomed into something beautiful.

Something really, really awful to kill.

She, ... we, finished off the whole bottle in this way, in slow, small sips that she savoured with each thirsty swallow. A maiden lost in the desert, and I, her only oasis.

...

I righted her and put the bottle aside.

"Now," I said, business-like, "as to payment for that."

"Payment?" Bella blinked, surprised.

"Yes," I said, smiling lightly. "What do you have to offer in exchange for what I have given you now, this respite and the relief from your thirst ..."

I smirked at her. "Well, relief from a thirst..." and then I chuckled.

Bella looked at me in confusion. "I don't understand."

It took everything I had not to roll my eyes and sigh.

I didn't know what she didn't understand, either. The innuendo, or the demand for payment.

She's not that naïve, is she?

I looked at her and then actually did sigh.

Yes, she was that naïve.

'Twenny-six' and she needed me to tell her 'Now, Bella, this is sexual innuendo, this implies you want to be fucked. Do you understand?' Bella: 'Uh ... come again?'

I think she was the one torturing me, actually.

So I focused on the payment. "What's not to understand?" I snapped, a bit more impatiently than I wanted, "I gave you water. What will you give me?"

"Uh, I gave you the water," Bella corrected me.

She needed a good smack, didn't she?

"And whose water did you give to me, sweetie?" my voice dripped honeyed camaraderie. "Yours or mine."

"Well, it was my wa-..." She stopped, looking at my shaking head.

"Bella, you are mine. Everything you have is now nothing, because it is now mine. This water? Not yours. Mine. I thought we established this already." I picked up the emptied bottle. "Whose water did you give me, Bella? Again. One more time."

Bella bit her lower lip. "Yours."

I nodded. "Yes. You said so yourself. This water was for me. It is mine."

I'm glad we got this little point resolved.

"So," I said. "How will you pay me?"

Bella's lip worked as she thought it over. "I've got some money back in the tent. I can go get ..." She blinked. I was stone. "... it ... if you ... want."

My lips twisted up evilly. "Money." I said. "You want to pay me with money."

"Uh ..." Bella looked like a deer in the headlights. "Uh, yeah?"

"Tell me, Bella," I said, "what need have I of money?"

"Uh ..."

Poor Bella! This was a totally foreign concept to her, that someone would not want money, would not need it.

"You use money to buy things, yes, Bella?" I asked her. "What things do I need to buy, that I can just take? What need have I of your money?"

"Uh ..." She blushed and looked away. "Nothing, I guess."

"Yes," I said. "Nothing, you guess."

My hands wrapped around her, my right around her shoulders, my left around the small of her back. "I do not want money, Bella Swan."

"Uh..!" Now she looked absolutely panicked. "Uh! Uh! What do you want?" she squeaked, "'cause I can get, um ..."

"Yes...?" I purred, and my left hand reached down back into the crevice of her jeans, finding what I actually did want: that sweet, little ass of hers.

"Uh!" Bella panted scared. "Uh!"

I looked intently into her face, but her eyes were darting everywhere as she tried to squirm away.

But there was no squirming away from my iron grip.

My finger wormed its way toward her little asshole, and then ...

"No! No! No! No! Nonononono! Please no! No! Please! Please!"

Bella absolutely froze in my grip and then exhibited almost what appeared to be a seizure.

I stopped. I paused, looking at her.

Her face was white, pasty, turning green, and she was going into shock.

"Bella," I said soothingly, "relax, sweetie, this is ..."

"no," she whimpered, so tiny, so lost.

"This is going to happen," I affirmed gently, "just relax and enjoy it, because ..."

My finger quested again into her crack, seeking her tight, little, closed-off anus.

"Nooo!" she screamed, seizing again. "Nooo! Please! kkk-puh-kkk-please! Noooo!"

I hadn't even penetrated her anus, but she was exhibiting signs of severe trauma.

I took my questing hand out from her jeans. I moved my hand back up to the small of her back and watched her, monitoring her.

She was in shock, her eyes dilated and unfocused, her whole body stiff as a board, ready to break. She was trying to breathe but was hyperventilating so badly no air was going in at all.

"Please," she whimpered, after a moment, when she had partially returned from her shock. "Please, don't. D-don't. Please. Y-you ... I'll give you anything but please, don't ... not that."

"Bella," I said softly.

"Please," she whispered.

"Bella," I said, "I can have anything I want, because I already do. There is nothing you can offer me that I cannot take. There is nothing you can withhold from me. Do you understand me?"

I held her strong, firm. My hands did not move. They held her into me, but they did not quest over her. They held her, and that was all.

"D-dd-dd-tt-ttt but, ..." she stuttered, her eyes glassy. "But ..."

She was reeling, still very much in shock.

"B-but ..." she panted, "wh-what if I ..." She looked at me then quickly looked away.

"What if I give you anything you want?" she said.

I looked at her quizzically. "As opposed to ... what?" I asked, not understanding. "I can take anything I want from you, Bella."

"What if I give you ... anything you want ... wu-wu-willingly?"

Bella went white, forcing out the word. She tried to swallow, but was just too scared.

I held her, considering.

"Anything I want, huh?" I said.

"P-please, just ..." she began.

"Willingly?" I confirmed.

Bella shuddered. "Yes," she said, looking at me, then looking away. "Yes."

I smiled.

I slowly, slowly brought my right hand up her shoulder and brushed back her hair.

"I accept," I said.

Bella's whole body shuddered a sigh in relief.

"But, Bella," I glowered.

She tensed right up again.

"We, you and I, are going to talk about this. And we, you and I, are going to get to the bottom of this, understand?"

I glared at her.

"Talk," she said. "Talking's okay." she said.

She really needed a smack for saying 'okay,' again.

How come she was just too delicate to be smacked around now?

I looked at her.

"And after we talk, sweetie," I said, "I am going to fuck the shit out of your sweet, little ass, and ..."

"No! No!" Bella was shaking her head violently, stiffening up again.

"Because you are going to beg me to do it, sweetie; do you understand?" I said.

"No!" Bella said, so distraught. "No!"

"Shh! Bella," I said comfortingly. "Shh! Sweetie. Not now, understand? Not now."

"No!" she cried, so lost in terror.

"Bella," I said, "come back to me. I'm holding you." I brought my hand back down to her shoulder. "I've got you, you understand?"

"Puh-please," she whimpered.

"Sh-sh-sh-sh!" I whispered. "I have you, sweetie. I have you, and I'm not letting you go."

I don't know if this was she wanted.

No. Strike that.

I knew this was what she needed. She was in shock, and she needed to be held. She needed to give her fragile, broken body over to somebody strong, indestructible, who would care for her body so she could let go. I brought my right hand back up to the back of her head and pulled her into me, resting her head on my shoulder. Her body, so tight, shook violently once, and I held her through it, then it shook again, hard.

And then she collapsed into my embrace, and she cried and cried and cried.

"I have you, baby," I said softly. "I have you, and I am not letting you go."

A/N: 'Bella' ... was sure she knew what Victoria was, and she was wrong. Just ... wrong.

Victoria knew she could take anything she wanted from the little human, and she was right. She can do that. She's done that, thousands of times already.

So how come Victoria was ... just ... so wrong, now, too?

This was a really expensive bottle of water. For both of them.