Moonlight Melody
Chapter 12: Ashes
I looked between both Mary-Lynn (AKA Maria, apparently) and Jasper. They were like Apollo and Artemis in that their expressions were total opposites. Two very different pictures.
One of fierce bitterness.
The other of smug satisfaction.
And then, as if realizing that his emotions were displayed on his face, Jasper's expression shifted and become neutral and unyielding.
Jasper was a veteran of war and he knew the rules. He would not give the enemy satisfaction of knowing that he had been affected in any way. To do so, would be to give the enemy—Maria—confidence.
I had no idea what to expect next. But whatever had happened between the two of them had not been good. Whatever had went down in the past, however, had definitely not stayed down. Feelings brewed beneath the surface. It was clear.
"Jasper", I started tentatively, "What's…"
At the sound of his name, he started to move towards me and would have made it.
He would have made it had Maria not beat him to it. And then we were all in compromising positions and things became even more serious than ever. It was one of those moments were you didn't think about what you were going to do. You just suddenly didn't know.
I stood frozen in place with Maria's arm wrapped around me in a way that was far too intimate for my pleasure. Intimate in a way that was almost lethal. It seemed that Maria's aura radiated pure, twisted seduction.
"Major Whitlock, halt," she mocked.
And with her arm looped almost threateningly around my neck like some sort of choke collar, he had no choice but to do so. Though not without looking completely livid.
"Let. Her. Go," he snarled through grit teeth.
Maria grinned at him in defiance, "Why should I? She's such a pretty little thing, isn't she?" she trailed her long fingernails down my face, bringing a shiver down my spine.
"So pixie-like and delicate," she murmured, lost in thought.
We all stood there silently afraid to move. To breathe. It was all so calm. And at the last possible moment the tension snapped.
"So breakable," she hissed and tightened her grip on my neck. Suddenly my air supply was cut off and I gagged. My hands immediately flew to my throat, batting frantically at her hands.
I couldn't breathe…
Pain roared through my ears making even Jasper's own inhuman roar of fury dim to my ears.
I was about to pass out when she let go of my windpipe.
Greedily sucked up as much as would fill my lungs before she tried to pull another fast one. But it didn't look like she would try it again after a minute or so. I gasped in exhaustion and went limp. If it weren't for the way she held me around the waist off the ground, I would have surely collapsed in a pathetic little heap.
I felt my heart stutter and pulse with much more than pain and blood. My heart pulsed with fear and spread throughout the veins in my body, sliding down my back.
Maybe it was my nerves…
Maybe I was weak.
Maria was just as dangerous as I had feared. She wouldn't let Adrian's affection for me stop her from grabbing me around the neck, manhandling me. She would it let stop her from killing me, if it came to that, I was willing to bet.
What a stone cold bitch…
"Do you love the little pixie, Major?" she cooed.
My ears perked up even as I hung gasping for air. What would he say? Would he be prompted to tell the truth?
Would the truth kill me before Maria could?
Instead he curtailed the question diplomatically.
"I should have killed you the moment I'd found out you'd betrayed me," Jasper murmured, his quiet comment so saturated with venom and hate.
How had she betrayed him?
"Awww," she wrapped a red tendril around her finger, "Should have…would have…could haves. Don't look like you succeeded on that one now does it, sugar?"
"Not yet it doesn't" he retorted. "I won't have to worry about killing you after this."
"Me?" she grinned. "It wasn't you I came back for, Major."
Adrian, I realized. She came for his sake.
It took Jasper longer to grasp this, however. Maybe after seeing Maria have him a few moments of unclarity.
A sad known fact in life, Bella.
Humans and vampires alike are similar to bulls.
When their emotions get hold of 'em, they only see the target in front of them. They only see red.
Maria tittered and tapped a blood red fingernail to her chin primly. The kind of motion you made when you were thinking how much of shame something was. She was the spitting image of hypocrisy.
"What I should say is that it ain't me you should you be worryin' yourself about."
The sudden possibility that he could have focused on the wrong target dawned on him too late.
Adrian was suddenly standing in front of Maria, his face dark with hatred.
"I am."
And then he rushed at Jasper, a black blur in my field of vision.
It was so fast that the only way I was able to tell where they'd gone was from the way they'd barreled through yet another wall in the hospital like Jasper had done with Edward last week.
And pathetically enough, as I lay hanging, I couldn't help but wonder, 'What on earth would I tell the Cullens this time?'
"No!" I wheezed and started to struggle in Maria's grip.
When I finally landed a kick or ten she hauled me up to her face by one hand and shook me so hard my head flew back and forth on my shoulders painfully, "You're going to stay right here with me, little pixie or I swear to God imma break your wings!"
I briefly considered attempting further escape seeing as I didn't HAVE wings. Then I changed my mind upon realizing that this would not discourage her from finding some sort of substitute body part I would be only too fond of.
I promptly froze in mid-bite mode and reverted my gaze to the struggle currently taking place in the following room.
What I noticed there both astounded and confused me.
In a sort of roundabout way…the fight had churned to a shocking halt. Almost a resigned calm.
Jasper stood at the side of the room closest to the new entrance immobile. Just STANDING there doing nothing. Not throwing no punches or kicks or whatever vampires did when they fought. It was just stunning. What was wrong? What was happening to Jasper? Why was he just standing there?
Adrian, on the other hand, was completely mobile. It wasn't too hard to tell from the way he was walking around Jasper in a tight circle, spitting words at his opponent that I was too far away to hear.
"JASPER!" I called out.
Snap outta it!
In a desperate attempt to make some sort of contact with him, I sent towards him the most concrete form of question that I could: emotions. I took all the pain and worry that I felt for him and thrust it at him as hard as I could, willing him to feel all the love I felt for him. He could feel emotions, couldn't he?
He could. And the emotions that he felt coming from him most definitely caught his attention.
Jaspers' eyes quickly flickered to mine and held. The panic and anger and he felt was written all in eyes.
Adrian didn't like that. His face become a mask of resentment, "NO!"
He came back to face Jasper, "STOP LOOKING AT HER LIKE THAT!" he bellowed, causing the glass on my vanity to explode behind me. My own eyes widened in shock at such a display.
Yet Jasper's eyes didn't leave my own. He was trying to tell me something.
Desperately willing his thoughts to reach my own.
"Look only at ME," Adrian hissed and grabbed Jasper's face in his hands.
Jasper's eyes flared one last time and then he tore his gaze from mine.
"Get out," my childhood friend commanded.
Jasper stiffly did an about face and turned to leave.
I gaped.
What the hell? He would just listen to him? Why? Did Adrian have some sort of power over him?
Then a slow smile spread on Adrian's face and he held up a hand, "Wait," he said.
Jasper waited.
A sense of horror filled my heart. Oh no…I remembered that smile.
It was the smile he got when he was planning to do something bad.
Adrian's red eyes glittered maliciously. He issued his last command.
"Fly," he hissed.
And then there was the sound of glass breaking in the air as Jasper flung himself through the hospital window down twelve stories.
"STOP!" I shrieked hoarsely.
I threw my body forward out of the room and stumbled down the stairs after him. I was too frantic to be surprised that Maria had let me go. I didn't care about her. Who I did care about was the man who had just flung himself out of a 14-story building.
It seemed to take me forever to reach the bottom. With each flight I flew past, I kept hoping to god that he was okay. I kept wondering why it was taking me so long to get to him no matter how fast I was running. Why time never seemed to go fast enough when you were rushing to the one you loved. Why it couldn't go any faster.
I staggered out into the night air looking frantically from left to right.
It made no sense at all that I was screaming after him as if he'd hurt himself falling out of that window. Weren't vampire's indestructible? So why was I screaming after him like a heartbroken lover? There probably was no just answer to that question. No logic.
There never was any logic when it came to fearing for the safety of someone you loved.
I jus' plain ol' cared for him.
And then towards the end of the hospital property, I finally saw some one stirring near the end of the parking lot. Some sort of movement that spurred me into motion immediately. A tall and lean, masculine figure stood with its face tilted towards the sky.
"Jasper?" I whispered.
He turned expectantly.
I screamed his name and ran at him full force.
In a flash he'd caught me by my shoulders and for the second time that night, I was lifted up off the ground by my shoulders so that my arms seemed connected to my waist.
Though this time I didn't really mind.
I remained silent as he turned me around, looking me up and down. Inspecting me, I suppose. It was both a touching idea that he worried enough to look, but like any other idea that I might be so weak it made my annoyed.
"What? Wait, wait!" I squawked and batted at his hands furiously. "What're you looking for? I've still got all my body parts, yknow!"
Calmly he stopped my hand from connecting with his body and went about his inspection. When he was completely satisfied he lifted me up higher so that my face was close to his. Here I was, a girl about 4"3, dangling at his 6 feet off the ground.
"Who was that?" he asked with narrowed eyes.
"Who?" I squeaked back looking around hurriedly. Were they still nearby watching? Were we in danger? Maybe they were doubling back for another attack.
"They aren't here anymore so settle down," Jasper snapped. "Now pay attention. Look at me. Who was the boy?"
"That was my friend, Adrian! Jas--" he cut me off abruptly.
Jasper shook his head and dismissed my steadfast assertion, "It sounded to me like he thought he was more than that."
"He thought he was. It's gotta go both ways, darlin'. He isn't. I don't think of him that way, even if he does like me like that."
"What is this Adrian guy to you then?" he demanded.
"Key word, Jazz..."
The pet name made him wince.
"—fuh-reend," I enunciated the word and rolled it out to four syllables. "Which, by the way, is more than I can say about you and that MARIA girl."
"Don't change the subject," he retorted and brought my face closer to his, in a supposedly menacing manner.
Menacing for whom, however. It made the blood in my veins suddenly sizzle with excitement.
Of course he promptly ignored the spike in the atmosphere.
"Because that was not, what HE said," he went on. "The word that I personally recall the most vividly, was 'wife'," he spat. "What the hell does THAT mean?"
I curled my toes a bit anxiously. This brought his attention down to my feet. Then back up at me with a frown.
The taste guilt was fresh on the tip of my tongue like a little red flag. I cringed inwardly, knowing he would pick up on it like a bloodhound.
"Your guilt tells me you know exactly what I'm talking about and it FRUSTRATES you? How do you think it makes me feel?"
I sighed heavily, "Technically, we're married," I explained. Upon seeing the look of pain and outrage on his face I rushed to explain.
"When we were younger, as kids, we pretended to get married. Like playing house. But now that you mention it, it was more like we were more establishing a bond, I guess. I don't like-him love-him, if that's what you're askin', sheesh!"
Then my expression hardened when I remembered his end of the situation, "Which is more than I can say about you, Mister."
"What are you talking about?" he scowled at me and had the nerve to look confused. Like he didn't know what was coming.
Ha, so the tables turn.
"Mariiiiia," I drawled out. "What's she to you, hm?"
He turned his face away, effectively washing the right side of his face in darkness. Probably the more guilty side of his face, "There are no good feelings between me and Maria anymore. You don't have to worry about that."
My annoyance and suspicion immediately melted into nothing when I heard the tone of his voice. It was more than just bitterness. It was sadness as well.
"Anymore? You seemed to know her well enough." I pointed out gently. "What were you before then?"
A dark look that was filled with remorse and resentment came over his face, "She was the woman I loved."
But that was before she bit me and killed a few of the soldiers in my troops that I led during what you now call the Civil War."
Guilt and sympathy burned in my throat and I was opening my mouth to express my condolences when he forged onward past that, probably not willing to open up that can of beans with me.
"She isn't someone you should trust about anything," he commanded me burning a hole into the back of my head to make me get it, "Maria is very persuasive, Alice. She has ways of persuading a person regardless of sex that are similar to a…."
"Hussy?" I supplied helpfully.
"—seductress," he grimaced.
I shrugged. Same difference right? My word was better anyway.
"Your so-called friend is utterly enthralled by her whether he realizes it or not. He. Cannot. Be. Trusted. I want you to stay away from him Alice," he said firmly and unrelenting.
I opened my mouth to make a witty comeback.
But he expected that from me and shook me in the air once, "No, listen to me! The boy isn't the same person you knew as a child. No person who becomes what we are stays the same. They change, become someone completely different. He holds the same memories you have but he is only what's left of the boy you once knew."
"Ashes," I said faintly.
He nodded solemnly, "And he isn't the same carefree person he was. The boy is a damn mass of negative energy. Being in the company of….her, only serves to increase his confidence. That just fuels his power. He has the power to force his will on people with the negative energy they have in them. To make people to what he wants. The kid is surprisingly strong for his age," he added with a frown.
I finally understood what I had seen in the hospital. The way that Jasper had done everything he'd been told. Jasper was this big ball of negativity. He was the prince of darkness himself.
"Wait…""Look only at me…"
Of course he had been led along like a puppet on a string and done everything Adrian had told him to. I remembered how everything seemed to go Adrian's way.
How Carlisle's interruption of our first lengthy conversation together had seemed to just disappeared without even a trace of suspicion from the doctor. How I had come so close to kissing him. How Jasper had thrown himself out a window per Adrian's orders.
How I could easily leave the hospital and make myself disappear from the list of patients and simply leave as one of them. But only because he wanted me to.
The panic I felt after making this realization must have shown on my face.
Jasper stared down at me stonily.
"What do you want Alice?" it was a vague question but I knew what he was asking me.
Did I want to leave with Adrian? Would I have to be forced or would I go gladly?
"You," I blurted out and blushed.
I wanted nothing but him and would leave him for no one else.
A dark look came across his face. "That's something you can never have, you know that right?" he said softly now.
I tilted my head back and stared him down defiantly as a best a girl could while being held dangling 6 feet off the ground by her shoulders. He only stared back at me passively.
"I don't care. I don't want to be with Adrian. I only want to be with you. I'm not in love with Adrian," I declared boldly. "I'm in love with you."
"That's pointless. It will never happen," he said angrily now.
I lifted up my chin stubbornly and my eyes flashed. It would happen. I know it would. Not yet but…
"I'll take what I can get," I finished.
And before I could back down and lose my nerve I reached my head forward and swiftly but softly pressed my lips against his own. It lasted for a total of two seconds before with a soft groan he pulled my body away from his and broke our kiss.
He glared accusingly at me.
I swung my feet giddily from where they hung in mid-air and tucked my chin, blinking up at him innocently.
He was unsure of how to respond for a bit and only held me at the tops of my shoulders safely at a distance, the bold little human who had dared to kiss the big bad vampire.
"You shouldn't have done that," he growled.
I kissed him! I kissed Jasper!
In high spirits, I kicked my feet excitedly doing a little irish jig on air and chirped, "But you didn't hate it!"
At the even darker look on his face I added, "You loved it! It's okay," I said mock sympathetically. "You know I did too! You can have su' more if ya like!" then I stretched forward to kiss him again.
He was ready for me this time though and quickly thrust me out at an arms length. I kicked my feet furiously and strained forward feeling like a child's over amorous teddy bear.
"Come on, Jazz…" I wheedled him with my lip jutting out, "Just…one…more"
I craned in closer.
He held me out further looking away.
"…lil' kiss!"
Finally I gave up and went slack in his arms with my head down. My hair effectively covered my face like a velvet curtain.
"Y'know, if we can do this all the time, if I can just be with you forever or at least until I die knowing that you care just a little about me, then I don't wanna leave you ever," I whispered to him with a smile playing on my lips.
I don't why it happened, maybe it was just the thought of being taken away from him, but I felt the tears slip from my eyes to land on the ground with a soft plop. I was crying.
"It's not fair. He can't do that. Adrian couldn't take you away from me," I sniffed. "I don't want to leave."
He only watched me.
"And if it isn't Adrian that we have to worry about?" he asked softly. "We need to consider all possibilities instead of directly assuming that Adrian will be the sole area of concern. There is still Maria."
I blinked. Were we talking vampires in military strategy now?
Of course he was right.
"Then…Maria is a problem too," I agreed with a grim smile and finally looked up at him.
He nodded once, "We have to stop Maria," he said, his voice laden with a full and solid promise of death and something that I just barely recognized as the thirst for vengeance.
A light flickered on in my head.
He was still loyal to his troops. He still hoped to avenge the death that Maria had so swiftly brought to them.
The noble death that she had so unfairly taken away from them. One that should have been taken in the line of duty instead of having been stolen against their will by a creature ravenous for the very essence of life.
A soldier's true pride and joy in war second only to his beloved country is always the life he is willing to sacrifice for it.
"I'm sorry for your loss, Major Whitlock," I said morosely.
He nodded to acknowledge my sympathies.
"Thank you," he replied quietly with a now softer more properly grief-stricken face. "I appreciate that you understand my feelings toward Maria. But it won't happen again. She won't take away anyone else who means something to me," he promised.
She'll have to kill me before taking you."
I frowned, "You make it seem like it would be so easy and I wouldn't put up a fight when it comes to that. I wouldn't let her. Take me away with Adrian, I mean. Just….don't let them, okay? Not without you."
He regarded my face, silent and expressionless.
I didn't know what to think to convince him.
"Please?" I pleaded contorted with desperation. "Please don't let them make me leave?"
And then his face rushed down towards mine hungrily and he was kissing me.
"I said I wouldn't, didn't I?" he whispered against my lips, his voice hoarse with emotion.
"I won't. You're MINE, and I'm not letting them take you away."
A big smile spread across my face. I knew he cared. I knew he didn't always show it. But it was there.
That was fine with me.
I had no intention of ever letting go.
(Raises hands up in a classic gymnastic finish pose) Chapter finally FINISHED! My god! (falls over) I can't believe this thing is almost done! (all swirly-eyed in anime style) and I gotta say I like how it came out. Ha! Ha! He kissed her! He finally kissed her! lolz
As you can all see, Maria just loves to be in control. She takes pleasure from manipulating people and making them think what she wants them to think. When Adrian first became a vampire he was the perfect target. He had just lost his parents, had no idea what he was or what to believe. How he was supposed to live life. It was all very hard for him. Alice was gone too so he was even more emotionally distraught and vulnerable. She was one of the few things in his life he couldn't live without and just losing her and coming back to find she'd moved somewhere else had ended the life that he used to have (to see what kind of life that was check out my blog. There's a whole story on their relationship in there). That was when he knew his old life and everything he used to know wasnt the same anymore. How does someone deal with shit like that? You rebuild it and start over. Maria was the prime person who helped him with that and molded his way of thinking.
Basically the kind of person he is now as a vampire is only what's left of the boy Alice used to be friends with: ashes. It SEEMS like it's all still there but it's not really. He's the sad leftover of the past that is long gone forever. Which if you think about it is pretty sad. He's all charred leftovers. A big, sad pile of negative energy. A lot of the things in here are ashes. Jasper's feelings for Maria. How he once loved her and when she went behind his back and killed all his soldiers, that love for her died forever. All that's left is his hatred and grief. It's just more and more ashes and if you look closely enough you'll see a remnant of what used to be. Leaving all these emotions behind.
Well I gotta go for now. I figure ill post this chapter and let you read the rest of the stuff I posted on the blog. That loooong story about Adrian and alice when they were younger. Back in the good old days.
Til then! ( I swear im working on it lol!) Please review and lemme know your opinion. Give me your encouragement to keep going please! Anything is welcome at all!