A/n: Beta'd by dorothysrubyslippers and loss4words

Sorry I'm late posting this week! I meant to post yesterday.


Bella

April 2010 Atlanta GA

Carlisle Cullen was an attractive man. He reminded me of another Cullen that I'd once met. It didn't seem like a common name but I didn't really want to know if this man was related to the infamous Edward Cullen. The Cullen clan had to just share good Scottish genetics. I wondered if all of Scotland was inherently beautiful. His picture was the one I'd seen in Dr. Banner's office.

"Miss Swan." He smiled and shook my hand. He had a fatherly presence about him but I refused to believe that this gorgeous man had anyone calling him 'daddy' at home. It would have ruined my preconceived notion of what he should be like.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Cullen," I said.

"Would you be terribly offended if we went straight to the point of my visit?" he asked.

"Of course not. I understand that you're a busy man, besides I have quite a bit of reading to catch up on." I smiled warmly and held up the novel that Angela brought by earlier in the day. "I'm told that I won't be doing much else until they can stop monitoring me." I indicated the EEG leads attached to my head.

"That's part of what I want to discuss with you. Did Dr. Banner inform you of my profession by chance?" he asked cautiously.

"I can't say that he did. All I know is that you're an expert on the kind of seizures that I've been having," I said and dog-eared a page of the book in my lap.

He grimaced. "They're not really seizures in the strictest sense of the term. Your brain is entering a theta wave state, which is enabling your consciousness to detach from your body."

"My consciousness is doing what?" I asked, confused.

"Miss Swan, have you ever heard of Remote Viewing?"

"Uh, no."

"That's alright," he laughed. "Very few people would be able to define it. This theta wave state that your brain is slipping into enables you to do extraordinary things. You can use your mind to visit other places and even go backward and slightly forward in time."

"What?" I knew that I understood what Mr. Cullen was telling me, but it didn't make sense. It didn't sound like something that was possible.

"If trained properly, you can travel in space and time without ever leaving your chair," he said with a raised eyebrow.

Where was Jake and why did he think that a practical joke was appropriate?

"Mr. Cullen, while that's certainly an interesting story you've told me, I have a novel to read," I said, dismissing him. I picked up my book and waited for him to go.

"Miss Swan," he said, pulling down the edge of my book so that he could see my face. "I'm offering you something here. You can learn to do things with your mind that other people can only imagine. My organization can train you, we can help you learn to control this… or Dr. Banner can prescribe massive amounts of anticonvulsants, which will complicate your life needlessly."

He dropped a manila folder in my lap.

"What's this?" I stared down at it.

"Case studies, will you read them?" he asked.

"Mr. Cullen…"

"Just, please read them. If you read through the folder and you're not interested, then you don't have to have any further contact with me." He took a deep breath. "But if you want to try it, I can offer you a job."

I eyed him speculatively. He really didn't seem like he was joking. He looked serious.

"What would I be doing?" I let out a breath of air that I didn't realize I'd been holding.

"You would be gathering information for various government and private organizations, reporting back with it. There's a possibility for field work as well…."

"What do you mean by field work?" I interrupted him.

He pinched his nose, and I was reminded again of Edward. He used to do that whenever he was exasperated. He'd pinch his nose, rub his face, and sigh. The second I thought it, Carlisle Cullen rubbed his face and then sighed, before looking at me. There was something that he didn't want to tell me.

"Sometimes, due to the unique abilities of the people in our employ, we're contracted to handle certain situations personally. We work in teams, generally one or two viewers work with other specially trained individuals to achieve whatever goal has been set before us," he explained without actually explaining anything.

"What kind of situations?" I pressed.

"It would be better if you read the file. All of the operations in that file have been declassified, some of them are training exercises. You'll have a better idea after…"

"You mentioned training." I interrupted him again. If I could throw him off, I had a chance of getting a straight answer out of him.

"Yes," he sighed.

"What kind of training would be required for the job?"

He did the thing with his nose again. He really did look a lot like Edward Cullen when he did that.

"Specialized training?"

"I understand that, Mr. Cullen, but what kind of specialized training?"

"Well, initially, you would have to learn the basics of Remote Viewing, and learn to control your ability. After that you would receive training specific to other facets of our business." He stopped short of giving me the answers that I wanted.

I raised an eyebrow at him. Was he going to leave his explanation there?

"You're not going to drop this are you?" he asked.

"I don't like surprises," I answered.

He muttered something under his breath that sounded a lot like "Alice," before looking at me in earnest. He studied me for a few minutes.

"You'd receive training in combat, defensive driving, and some specialized training in areas like recruiting," he said. "Most of your job would entail what's covered in the case studies." He gestured toward the folder.

"I've already pulled as much information out of you as I can, haven't I?"

"I hope so. I only intended to get you to read… Viewer or not, I think that you could be useful to us. You'd make a good interrogator," he chuckled.

"I'm a reporter. I get answers," I smirked at him.

The EEG machine next to me started to beep. Mr. Cullen stood and looked at the wave pattern on the screen. He glanced back at me.

"Do you feel it?" he asked.

"Feel…" My body slumped and I felt myself pulled toward the ceiling again. I groaned.

"I'm going to go out on a limb and assume that you're still here," he said. "I want you to concentrate on what it feels like right now, the sensation. You may or may not be able to tell the difference between how you're feeling right now and your normal state."

I couldn't say that I really felt much different. I was just kind of floaty.

"Concentrate on your body," he said softly. "I want you to try and feel your toes, feel how relaxed they are."

I tried, I really did, but I couldn't feel my toes. I wasn't attached to them, how could I feel them? It seemed impossible.

"I know that it feels like you're not connected, but you are. As long as you're alive, you're still connected. You can't separate from yourself completely. You just have to find the connection. Try moving your fingers," he suggested.

"I can't," I heard my own voice from below me.

"You can talk, very good, very good indeed. Try to focus. Your body is right here, you are in control, no one can take that from you," he said softly. "Try to move."

I tried, I honestly did, but I couldn't get my muscles to function. After several attempts at lifting a finger or a toe, I became very frustrated.

"This is pointless!" I shouted and brought my fist down onto the arm of the chair. As my hand touched the faux leather armrest, I seemed to zoom back into my body. "Whoa."

"Odd that anger should make that work… better?"

"As a matter of fact, yes."

"But you're tired?" he guessed.

"Very," I yawned.

"Rest and read, I'll be back to discuss this tomorrow." With that, Carlisle Cullen walked out of my hospital room.

He'd talked me back into my body. Whatever mojo Carlisle Cullen had, I wanted. If he could teach me to make this work without doping me up on drugs constantly, I was sold. I opened the folder, pulled out the first case, and started reading.

X

Date: 3/5/2008

Target: 2-3-5

Summary:

Monitor 9-5:

The viewer shows advanced aptitude for jumping and identifying the target. In addition, he is able to thoroughly sketch his surroundings in detail. Surprisingly, he seems able to sense thoughts in the ether. My recommendation is to set up a test of this aptitude as soon as possible and develop it. It is my understanding that this viewer has been previously trained and used in operations; as such it is my recommendation that after his aptitude for telepathy has been tested that we allow him to hone it on tactical jumps.

Monitor 9-5: Viewer 1-5-9 please proceed to target 2-3-5, Let me know when your jump is complete.

Viewer 1-5-9: Jump is completed.

Monitor 9-5: Please describe the target.

Viewer 1-5-9: Target is a hotel, five stories, in a city.

Monitor 9-5: Can you identify the city?

Viewer 1-5-9: Not from this position.

Monitor: 9-5: Shift position 90 degrees North.

Viewer 1-5-9: New York City, before the year 2001.

Monitor 9-5: Please verify

Viewer 1-5-9: I have a visual on the World Trade Center, no further verification needed.

Monitor 9-5: I will repeat, please verify the date.

Viewer 1-5-9: I have a newspaper stand in sight, date verified as August 13 of 2001.

Monitor 9-5: Thank you. Enter the target location through the South entrance.

Viewer 1-5-9: Entering location.

Monitor 9-5: Your objective is to discover the occupant in room 237.

Viewer 1-5-9: Moving to room 237. Occupant is a white male, age 53, medium build, blond hair, blue eyes. He is writing a letter, but is thinking about calling his children.

Monitor 9-5: Viewer please verify, can you read the occupant's thoughts?

Viewer 1-5-9: Yes, I can.

Monitor 9-5: Thank you, please return jump. I will meet you in the conference room for debrief at 1400 hours.

X

I could barely understand any of it. The next case studies were much of the same. That was until I found a missing person's investigation at the bottom of the pile. It wasn't a summary but notes from the viewer, sketches of a little girl. She'd been kidnapped from a department store right under her mother's nose. I noticed that the handwriting looked vaguely familiar, like it wasn't the first time I'd seen it.

The viewer jumped to the actual abduction and followed the child. There were dozens of drawings of her. He'd been able to pinpoint where she was being kept rapidly, resulting in her rescue. A news article accompanied the drawings. The viewer remained unnamed but the family thanked SpecInt in their statement. The father had employed them against police recommendations.

I knew that Carlisle had included the story to tug on my heartstrings. He was manipulating me, and I was surprisingly at peace with that concept. I had, after all, manipulated him a bit. It was a game that we both played, and was apparently necessary to both of our professions.

There was no way that I could do my job medicated. Dr. Banner had given me a dose of anticonvulsants so that I could rest and it completely knocked me out. I couldn't see functioning like that. There was no way I could cover the stories that I wanted doped out of my mind. If Carlisle Cullen had another option, even if it meant giving up everything that I'd just earned, I'd take it.

How much different could the job really be? It was simply information gathering of a different sort, with a different purpose. It might even be nobler, like in the case of the little girl. I could help people.

I was reaching for the phone before I even thought about it.

"Miss Swan?" he answered.

"Mr. Cullen, I've considered your offer, and I accept."

"Good. I'll get the paperwork for your release underway," he chuckled. He sounded relieved. "The sooner we can get you to Maryland, the better. I'll inform my people. Can you be ready to move next week?"

I briefly considered my apartment, Jake, and my pathetic excuse for a social life. I didn't have much in the way of things, and I was more of a liability to Jake than anything else… it was time to make a change, take a leap of faith and see where my life went.

"Absolutely," I yawned involuntarily.

"Get some sleep while you can, Miss Swan. I recommend taking the offered medication at night for the next week. We'll wean you back off of it during training."

"Thanks, I will."

The line was dead without a goodbye.

~V 2-5-8~

Jake was pissed. Actually, pissed was putting it lightly. Jake was livid that I'd been released from the hospital, and that I had Angela drive me home. In addition, he felt betrayed that I'd resigned from the radio station and started paring down my life into a few small boxes.

As it turns out, a week is an awfully generous timeline to give a girl who has no life to wrap up her life and move. I was ready to go.

"You're not thinking this through!" Jake shouted and removed the dishes I'd packed from their box.

"I assure you, that I've considered every angle," I huffed, and wrapped a cup, placing it in another box.

"You can't just jump into something like this. Moving halfway up the Eastern seaboard is a big decision, and you've only slept on it one night," he argued, sounding slightly calmer.

"I need a change. We need a change."

"I don't need anything changed," he growled.

"Jake," I sighed.

"Bella." Jake rolled his eyes, but he'd stopped unpacking the boxes that I was packing.

"This is something that I need to do," I reiterated, staring into my box of coffee mugs. I felt weak around Jake, like I couldn't take care of myself, like a child. "I need to spread my wings."

"Oh, that's rich," he spat. "It's not me it's you, is it?"

And there it was, confirmation. I officially had positive proof that he was just hanging on, waiting for me to come around. That was why he didn't date. He wanted me to come to my senses, settle down, and have 2.5 kids with him. That was never the life I'd wanted.

"Even if I stayed, even if I wanted it, this," I gestured between the two of us, "can never work."

"It can't work because you won't give it a chance," he snapped. He was stepping toward me; I could feel him getting closer, looming. I turned to look at him and found that we were too close. He was in my personal space. I took a step back; he encroached on my space again. I backed into the fridge without realizing it. "I'm good for you. I love you," he said, getting way too close again.

"But I don't love you that way, and you deserve so much more than that. I could stay, take the drugs, be a mediocre reporter, force you to shuttle me around everywhere because I can't drive. I could give in and live the life you want for me, the one where we're together and have the house out in Metro-Atlanta sprawl. We'd drive an hour into work every morning just so that we can afford a house with a backyard for the kids to play in, and a dog." I stood straight and poked a finger into his chest. "I could settle, but it's not what I want."

"There's nothing wrong with settling down, having a family…"

"Only if it's what you want," I whispered, watching the hurt cross his face.

"It's what I want," he said, reaching for my hand.

"It's not what I want," I cut him loose like I should have before I misled him. I slid the ring that I'd continued wearing even though we weren't officially engaged anymore off my finger and dropped it on the counter. I watched the emotion on his face as he felt the crushing blow, and I pushed past him to head off to my room. I could feel my brain about to disconnect. "This might be goodbye, so I want you to know that I'm sorry. This never should have been drawn out this far. You can see yourself out."

With that, I lay down on my bed and felt myself fully disconnect. I took a few moments to pull myself back to my body, and drifted off to sleep with wet cheeks and a heavy heart.


End Note:

That was kind of heavy. I think a lot of us have had that kind of break up before, you know the one where you still really like each other but you're going completely different places in life…