A/N: Thanks to all of you for your patience in getting this chapter out. My post-Thanksgiving-induced coma severely limited my writing abilities haha! Long-ish chapter, FYI. Enjoy!
Oh yeah and abacus is to snapcrakklepop as TI-89 is to Stephenie Meyer concerning all things Twilight.
Chapter 12: Desolation
The next day passed uneventfully. We had cleared a small area of trees in some places, and placed a few strategically set up as a deterring barrier in others. The brush piles we set up were hardly a true block, but it would buy us some time if she decided to head deeper into the forest and take to the trees. As the night fell and the crickets began to chirp, we re-organized our original plan of a trap. Given what seemed to be Victoria's instinctive sense of danger, we had to be sure our presence wouldn't give too much away. We agreed that staying close to one place would help minimize our scent in the area and as soon as Alice gave us the go-ahead, we'd spread out to try and take her down. Alice and I were to close in from the sides and Jasper from the rear in a sort of triangular formation.
We passed the night discussing strategy and possible outcomes. By daybreak, I was so tense with anticipation that I wasn't entirely convinced I couldn't have taken Victoria down alone. The morning was uneventful, however, and Alice's once-certain visions became clouded with doubt as the day wore on without any sign of Victoria's arrival. By the time dusk had begun to settle over the land, I was so agitated I was unable to stand still. I was dimly aware of my siblings' growing discomfort but every scenario resulted in the same fashion: Victoria must have changed—and still be changing—her plans. Where she could have gone from here, I had no clue, and Alice was getting irritated with the random, intermittent images of a red-haired female launching herself through treetops. It was possible that the best new strategy would be to split up sooner than we had originally planned…
Barely had the thought crossed my mind when I heard a gasp, and turned to see Alice's face slide into a familiar blank mask.
"What's going on?" Jasper asked me. I tuned in to see what was going on and gasped myself.
It was Alice. Human. Or at least, someone resembling Alice so strikingly it was startling.
"Alice!" I exclaimed softly.
"What is it?" Jasper asked again.
"It's… me!" Alice choked out, shocked. "It's ME! But human!! I don't understand…" Her voice trailed off in a whisper and Jasper shot a look at me.
"What she's seeing… It's… It's her!" I explained in a dazed rush. "She looks just like Alice, but with longer hair. And she's human!"
In Alice's mind, a woman, possibly in her mid-to-late thirties, was pushing a key into the lock of a third floor apartment. The resemblance to Alice was uncanny! Fair skin, same height, same cheekbones… The only immediate differences were shoulder-length hair and of course, the eyes. The young woman in Alice's vision had eyes that were such a dark blue they were almost violet.
I knew almost instinctively that whoever she was, she was obviously a relative of Alice's. The similarities were too much to deny or ignore. And in that instant, I knew I would be fighting alone. I was not about to let this chance for Alice to find some link to her past slip by simply due to my selfishness, despite her feelings on the matter. Alice had to find this girl, and maybe not interact with her, but at least find her.
Before I could voice my thoughts, however, Alice whirled around to face me with iron in her gaze.
"No, Edward," she said flatly.
"Alice," I sighed patiently in response. "You need to go. But I just can't go with you."
"We're not letting you do this alone!" she threatened.
Jasper's eyes flashed to mine, his mouth set in a grim line. "Absolutely not, Edward," he growled.
"There's no way I can let you pass this up, Alice!" I argued.
"Edward," Jasper said with deliberation, "what you're talking about is out of the question. We can't leave you alone here to fight her!"
"Where is she!?" I burst out. "She's not even here! All our planning, all our strategy, it's all been for nothing this whole time!" Alice's face registered shock, and then hurt as she took my words to mean doubt in her abilities. I felt almost childish, but the sudden frustration was overwhelming and I felt closer to a temper tantrum than I'd ever been in my existence. The whole situation was just too much to bear at the moment; if I didn't get my space I felt I would explode from some coiled-up ball of tension that had suddenly taken up residence in my core but did nothing to fill the gaping chasm in my chest. I inhaled deeply and turned to my siblings.
"Alice. Jasper." They eyed me warily.
"Edward, don't—" Alice began.
"No." I declared. "I'll check in with you, but it's obvious Victoria is not coming here. And frankly I'm not entirely sure I'm willing to have company at the moment." I leveled my eyes on Alice. "I've been screening your thoughts almost as diligently as you have, and she's not coming," I said dully.
Jasper attempted to calm me down, but it only frustrated me more. What was the point? I was as hopeless at tracking Victoria as I had been at protecting Bella. I felt as though I were being suffocated. I had reached my breaking point.
"Go, Alice." I turned to leave.
"Edward!" she called out in a panicked voice. "Edward, wait! What are you doing? Give us more time, I'm sure—"
"I need to be left ALONE," I said blankly, and turned on my heel into the undergrowth.
The sorrow at the thought of me leaving was at war in Alice's mind with the desperation at the thought of uncovering what promised to be a very important clue to her past. She was so hopelessly torn, but before she could speak Jasper reached for her hand.
"Let him go, Alice," Jasper murmured as I stalked away. His thoughts seemed to quietly flicker with the reassurance that once I'd gotten over my temper tantrum I would return with fresh hope.
I didn't know how to tell him otherwise; I didn't know how to explain to them I had no hope left. I wasn't even quite sure where I was going, I just needed to get out, get away, and get up from under the sudden, weighty despair that had settled on my mind and threatened to crush me. Everything I'd ever attempted- from fitting in right with my family to trying to keep Bella safe to tracking Victoria- seemed doomed to failure. Memories of my rebellious vampire adolescence away from Carlisle, of stalking people who were monsters in their own right yet still earned my unjust judgments, flashed in my mind and made me cringe. Memories of Tyler's van, spinning uncontrollably across the ice; of the men in Port Angeles whose intentions went far beyond the border of harm while I foolishly let myself get introduced to Bella Swan's world, constricted my throat and caused my chest to ache. And now, after all this long time of searching, waiting, preparing, pursuing—now, it was all for naught.
What would I have done once Victoria was out of the way? I thought for the two hundred and sixty-fourth time. I found both hands twisted in the mess that was my hair, and for the first time in weeks actually took in my disheveled, dirty, rumpled appearance. There was no way I could return to Forks now… Bella would no doubt sneer in disdain at the sight of my lying, selfish face. I was nearly three miles away when I heard the roar of the Hemi engine and was somewhat relieved to hear that Alice and Jasper were quickly making their way back to Mississippi to observe from a distance this woman who appeared to be Alice's kin. Their thoughts were a tandem whisper of acceptance and comfort, and an unspoken offer to join them when I'd taken enough time so that we could resume the hunt together, but I knew there was no way I could start this from square one again. I would go mad. I was going mad.
I don't know how many hours went by that I wandered aimlessly around the coastal marshlands before a familiar scent crossed my path. I blinked rapidly, making my way to a small clearing, and looked up in surprise to see the last person I would have expected to see come barreling through the shrubbery.
"Tanya," I breathed. I winced slightly as I saw myself through her eyes. She stood not ten feet away, hands on her hips, lips pursed, as she surveyed my torn shirt and muddy trousers. She crossed her arms over her chest and stared in silence for several moments. Her thoughts were mercifully blank; purely speculative.
"Your family sent me," she finally said, breaking the stillness. "Alice called on the way to Mississippi and told me exactly where you would be… What's going on with you? Why don't you come home?"
By "home" I knew she was referring to the house she shared with her sisters, Irina and Kate, and their friends Eleazar and Carmen. I swallowed thickly.
"I just need to be left alone, Tanya," I said wearily.
She studied me, resigned. You could start over in Denali, she pleaded in commencement. Give us a chance to fix you. All of us, she emphasized. Her mind flickered over Carlisle's concerned eyes, Esme's strained smile, Emmett's sullen expression, Rosalie's irritated face… So they were all gathered there as well. I wondered idly what had happened when Emmett had returned, and if Rosalie seemed so put out as a continuation of her former jealousy or if she simply had something new to feel insulted by. "We're your family too, Edward,"she said softly, breaking into my thoughts.
"I know. I just need… some time. Some space. I don't know where to go from here and until I figure that out I just need to be left alone. Please."
It's not healthy, Edward! she argued. Wandering around like this in this…. wilderness is hardly the ideal situation for mental recovery.
"What if I'm not ready to heal?" I demanded. And I had to admit to myself in that instant that perhaps the pain was all that was tethering me here. Perhaps if I suffered enough at my own hands the way I had made so many others suffer—Bella included— it would count in some small measure either toward my despicable past or my bleak future. The pain was the only thing that consoled me now.
Declaring you're not ready to heal is practically proof of just how much you need to heal. You can't do this much longer. Ambling about ALONE in this humid, pathetic excuse of a wood should be a clue, you know. Despite her best efforts at shielding her thoughts from me, I still caught glimpses of daydreams- us walking hand in hand in through the towering Alaskan pines, and her complete contentment of my arms around her shoulders.
I shook my head back and forth, back and forth, mutely, before answering.
"Tanya," I managed to say despite my aching throat, "I can't just replace her." She shrank back and lowered her eyes in embarrassment. "And I wouldn't expect you to shoulder the weight of my emotional baggage." I turned a crooked smile in her direction and attempted to lighten the situation.
She sighed. And I came all the way down here, she thought wryly. She seemed to have abandoned her efforts at convincing me to return with her to Alaska, for which I was grateful. The pressure of Tanya's advances, despite her good intentions and pure desires to strictly comfort me, were more than I could already not handle at the moment. The least we could do is hunt together, hm?
I shook my head again, smiling gently this time. "Please," I repeated softly. "You can tell my family I'll check in as much as I can, but for now… I just need to be left alone."
She took a deep, thoughtful breath as she considered the idea of leaving me to wander aimlessly around the southwest in my current emotional state, but she wasn't one to push. I was grateful it had been her and not all of her sisters; there was no way I would have escaped the pressure from all three of them. Eventually she nodded in acceptance and embraced me briefly before wordlessly vanishing into the trees.
I was surprised to notice the sun had set several hours ago; my and Tanya's exchange must have taken longer than I'd realized. I sank to the ground in complete desolation, somewhere on the northwest region of Houston, and tried to tune everything out but the song of the crickets and night wind. My earlier desires to let the earth bury me were back in full force now, and I considered the idea of digging a hole to entomb myself in. I dismissed the idea almost immediately, however. At least being out in…wherever I was… gave me the distractions of small rodents and insects to focus on, instead of the angry, aching feelings that tumbled through my mind.
What was I really doing here? For the first time in several hours, my thoughts began to take on direction again. So Victoria had never come—what had changed her mind? If she hadn't come here, where had she gone? I stood up abruptly. Perhaps… and I knew it was foolish of me, but perhaps I could catch her scent somewhere.
I made my way back south and farther east to where Alice, Jasper, and I had set up our initial "base" area. Nothing, no traces of her on the wind or trees or surrounding grasses, so I branched further east. Nothing, not within a twelve-mile distance anyway, and I knew if she'd been anywhere within a radius of that distance I would have heard her. So I returned to the west side of our meeting grounds and kept going farther west. Still nothing. I sighed but wasn't too disheartened; after all I hadn't expected much to begin with. As I made a wide arc to the south in my return to our former location, I sensed another presence. Someone whose thoughts were fuzzy, as though they were almost too far away to hear, but the feeling of extraordinary stillness achieved by my kind was unmistakable. Vampires were near, two of them, and I had no desire to get caught alone in my weakened state. They, however, had other plans, and I could hear their thoughts turn to curiosity as they caught my scent and came to investigate.
I cursed myself mentally for not taking Tanya up on her offer to hunt earlier. The half-a-buck I'd drained two days ago had already faded into the barest remnants of nourishment, but there was no time now. I stopped in my race back to the clearing and waited for them to catch up with me. They were nomads, but with a strong attachment to their New England roots; hunting this far from home was simply a semi-vacation for them.
The dark-haired male came into view first, but it was the female who intrigued me.
The male's mind was easy enough to read as he took in my height, my muscular structure, my strange eyes, and an attempt at my age. The female, however, seemed to have some sort of mental block. There was only the barest revelation of her thoughts, and even then they were more like the representation of images rather than images themselves. I could make out no words, just the meanings and feelings behind them.
I decided to break the silence. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to disturb you."
"It's quite alright," the female with the sandy-brown hair said. "We were quite finished anyway and were running simply to run. My mate here is only 22 years old; still experiencing the thrills of vampire life for the first time," she smiled her scarlet eyes at him.
The male, in turn, was bewildered by my eyes more than anything.
"I was just passing through the territory," I attempted to explain.
Once the male seemed convinced I was no threat, he relaxed visibly. "It's fine," he said, and his voice was surprisingly deep for his slight frame. He cracked a smile.
"This isn't our territory either," the female announced. "We didn't want to step on any toes. I'm Linda, and this is my mate Matthew."
I let the briefest grin touch my eyes as well but was so intently focused on the female's thoughts that I was only half-paying attention. A brief flash of red hair in Linda's memory peeked through whatever mental fog she had in place as a defense mechanism, and it made me catch my breath. They both heard the intake of air and stepped back, glancing around as if threatened.
"No, no," I gasped. "I'm sorry. I just… caught the scent of someone I hadn't seen in a while," I lied. "By any chance… would you have happened to see a red-haired female… passing through perhaps?"
They exchanged glances. "Ye-es," the female finally spoke, drawing the affirmation into two syllables. "It was back when we were near Duncanville; closer to Dallas, actually. She mentioned she was headed south- quite far south, and a little ways east. She seemed intent on finding a male whose description actually matches you."
"When?" I had to fight to keep the anxiety from leaking into my voice.
"Earlier…" Linda mused. "If I had to be precise I would say late yesterday morning. Matthew was hunting on the other side of the valley so he didn't see her," she said apologetically.
"Did she say—specifically—where she was headed?"
Linda studied me briefly, and the conversation replayed in her mind but I could only catch bits and pieces, and indistinct ones at that. A flash of pale skin, and the barest hint of red to her hair, but the height seemed right. Perhaps she had dyed her hair as a distraction? It wasn't unheard of for some of our kind to make cosmetic alterations to their physique in an attempt to blend in for short periods of time.
Linda finally shook her head and shrugged. "All she said was south. She'd made a joke about going to Rio if that's what it took, but other than that I couldn't tell you."
"Rio," I repeated.
Linda nodded. "She was quite clear on that. I'll go to Rio if I have to," she'd said. I don't know what she was after, but she took off in a hurry anyway."
I barely called back my thanks as I took off for Houston's George Bush Intercontinental Airport. Perhaps she'd caught our scent after all and had headed to a more densely populated area to hunt from. If we were using up nourishment to catch her, no doubt she'd be working up quite a thirst in trying to avoid us. I paid no heed to the airline workers and flight attendants who glanced over my untidy attire and lack of any luggage whatsoever. My eyes seemed crazed to them, and scared them off enough to let me be. Once aboard the plane I tried to take several deep breaths. I knew it did no good to waste time in impatience. It was far better to plan what I could do once I found her in Brazil.
I knew one thing- I had no intention of contacting my family. I had finally come to grips with the fact that if I was going to do this, it needed to be just me. Enough had happened over the last month that convinced me I was meant to take her on alone. Perhaps it was karma, perhaps it was simply coincidence, but after being taken away from me for very valid reasons- except perhaps, Rosalie's childish fit- I wasn't going to bring my family back into this.
We made our connection in Atlanta slightly early, and it took every ounce of my concentrated will to simply sit back and wait to land. First class was mostly deserted; with the exception of one man and one woman on business trips I had the cabin to myself.
I tapped my foot impatiently, humanly, and fought against the idea to burst into the cockpit and simply fly the damned plane myself. When we were three-fourths of the way over the Caribbean Sea, I leaned to look out the small window and was startled by a small lump in my pocket. My phone. I had all but forgotten about it, honestly, and was only slightly annoyed to see Alice's number on the screen six times from missed calls. I promised myself I would contact her once the plane landed, but not before I got a lead on where Victoria had headed.
The plane finally landed at Galeão International Airport, north and slightly west of the Rio's city limits. I fought my way carefully through the teeming sea of humanity once my plane got to the gate. Thankfully my sleeves were long enough to hide my arms, and I quickly paid for an inexpensive pair of sunglasses at a kiosk in the terminal before stepping out into the swarming hustle and bustle of warmth, commerce, travel… life. The scent of salt was in the air from the ocean, less than a mile away, but nothing else.
I knew it was foolish of me to feel disappointed, but I couldn't help it. It was stupid of me to have expected to find Victoria waiting for me once I left the airport. So I focused my energy on heading south towards Rio and testing the air along the way.
For the rest of the day, I searched. And searched. And searched. On my second pass from the airport all the way down to the famous statue of Cristo Redentor, I decided to go by sea and swam back south. Still nothing. At various times I sensed out three other vampires, none of whom had any affiliation with another, and their minds were simply focused on the hunt. The night slowly gave way to morning, but I was no closer to finding any hint of her than when I'd started.
I finally stopped after my eighth sweep through the city and a 25 mile radius around it, and found myself forlorn and frustrated. I was literally alone in this place, and I was beginning to doubt Victoria had even come here. None of the vampires I sensed had any idea she even existed, and the humans were even less aware.
I gazed up at the massive statue of the Redeemer Christ, his arms outstretched to embrace the lost. His stone arms and hands reminded me of my own, yet his stood as a symbol for redemption and mine for death. I sought out the hooded eyes carved into the reinforced concrete and soapstone, but there was no warmth in them for me. They stared out blankly, across the city and harbor, searching to rest on others more worthy than I. It was there, under that statue of a Redeemer that had no business or desire of redeeming me that I physically felt the void where my soul should have been-- and its name was Bella Swan.
As the sun began to rise and I stood in the shadows of one of the city's many buildings, it dawned on me too late that Victoria wasn't here. There was no other explanation for it. Perhaps she had been here, but there was absolutely no trace of her now. If she had been pursuing me as actively as I'd been led to believe, it stood to reason she would have found me by now, in an attempt to settle her old score. But there was nothing. I had nothing. And I had no one.
I don't know how it came to pass, but I found myself wandering down a crowded street that was bordered on both sides by tenement projects. Most people gave me wide berth, hurrying to various enterprises, but some were still in their dwellings and their thoughts and voices carried to my ears.
- Ei Natalia, Lava roupa?
-Sim Mamã.
-Ei! Paulo!! O aluguel!
-A semana que vem, Juan!! Por Favor!
-Sempre "a semana que vem", Paulo…
-O sótão desperdiça… Ay, Envelheço…
The conversations of the four-story structure on the corner were typical of any big city tenement building- a mother asking her daughter about laundry, demands for rent with promises of payment "next week", the landlord's old mother complaining her age was hindering her from getting to the deserted and dusty attic- and I would have drowned them out were it not for the thought that I would need some place to hide among all these people, and soon. I leaped with some difficulty through to the roof; the structural integrity of the building was a far cry from the regulated and standardized architecture of the United States, and the roof itself was broken in several places. I dropped gingerly to the rickety floor and glanced around wearily. The idea of a forsaken attic appealed to me, if for no other reason than I knew I would be left alone. Not that I had anyone to bother me in this city anyway…
As if on cue, my phone buzzed. I sighed despondently as I noticed Alice's number. I flipped the phone open, and, without giving her a chance to speak, asked, "Please- just leave me alone. Please?"
The hollow despair in my voice frightened even me. I snapped the phone shut and tossed it unheedingly to the floor before she could answer. The reality of my predicament hit me full force as I found myself curling up on the creaking floorboards of an abandoned fourth-floor attic. Whatever breaking point I'd thought I had earlier was a far cry from how low I was now. I realized I had completely and utterly failed at nearly everything I had set out to do. I was suddenly lost to grief, and whatever emotions I had left came bursting out of my body in wracking, shuddering gasps.
What was I but another unnecessary life form on this planet? My family was obviously surviving without me; surely I could afford to go missing for a while. The emptiness of mind I craved eluded me, as Bella's face was brought again and again to the forefront of my thoughts. What she would be doing, and with whom. How the weather must be in Forks. The solitude of the meadow I had once claimed as mine and allowed Bella to share with me… I stifled a cry and turned my thoughts upward, outward, anywhere but inward. I let the rush of voices and thoughts and nameless emotions wash over me, and I made no effort to stop them. I simply curled up on the floor with my heart still and broken beneath the heavy weight of so many others thoughts, and without the desire or intention to resurface.
[[Translations]]
- Ei Natalia, Lava roupa?
-Sim Mamã.
(Natalie, did you do the wash?/Yes Mama.)
-Ei! Paulo!! O aluguel!
-A semana que vem, Juan!! Por Favor!
-Sempre "a semana que vem"com você, Paulo…
(Hey! Paulo!! The rent!/Next week, Juan!! Please!/ It's always "next week" with you, Paulo…)
-O sótão desperdiça… Ay, Envelheço…
(Oh, that attic is going to waste. Ugh, I'm getting old…)
For those of you who were wondering, the "red-haired female" in Linda's memory wasn't Victoria, it was Tanya, looking for Edward. Victoria had long since gone back to Forks (duh) and to Linda, they both got lumped together in the category of "redheads". With her mental block, Edward was unable to see who she meant and took Tanya's joke that she'd go as far south as Rio as fact that Victoria had indeed gone there. By the time he gets there & figures out he was mistaken, he's already so broken that he just gives up. He's at a place of complete and utter hopelessness. You should review & tell him to cheer up! Remind him the story does have a happy ending! (=