Part 13
Jasper eyed his wife. They were in their own room now that Carlisle had been called in to work and had to leave discussion of Bella's news for the morning. Edward had stormed out of the house soon after no doubt to once again keep vigil over Bella. Jasper also had to consider that perhaps his brother was afraid to be around this Bella for any length of time.
"You know...I can't feel you anymore." He said stepping closer to Alice.
Alice paused mid-step to her wardrobe and turns to him with a perplexed look. "What do you mean?"
Jasper tilted his head and closed his eyes as he concentrated on searching for her with the use of his gift. He could feel Emmett's confusion, Rosalie's anger, his mother's mostly concealed worry, he even felt something from Bella, not much, but she was there. Unlike Alice who just wasn't, not to his power.
He opened his eyes to meet her curious gaze and lifted his hand to take in her figure. "It's as if you aren't in the house. I can't feel anything from you. You're not there." He said his feelings ranging from annoyed to fearful. Alice was his grounding point when it all became too much for him, to not have that, even if it was just temporary, scared him.
"Oh." Alice blinked in surprise. She shifted as he moved closer, she didn't know how that made her feel but she could see Jaspers upset over it. "I don't think she did it on purpose...if she did do something."
Jasper calmly took her hand a guided her over to the bed and sat them down, their arms touching. He studied his wife. "You've never hidden you feelings on Bella before, even Edward is aware of them, but for Bella to use her gift in this maybe she thinks there's something there that needs to be hidden."
Alice couldn't think properly, she hadn't known Bella had done something to shield her emotions from Jasper. She turned her head to gaze out at the fading light. She'd just been told her entire family was set to be killed in a few days time, an event that she apparently would not be able to foreshadow and prevent. She was angry, very angry. Not just at Edward or the wolves but at herself. She was disheartened at being faced with such a failure. She'd faced a great many things as a vampire but her gift allowed her time to change them. Sometimes her visions gave her months to work out a solution, sometimes she had minutes between a vision and watching it play out.
But now Bella was here.
And it had taken her hundreds of years to travel back to this point in time. A feat that was still almost impossible to believe was true.
But it was, and she was here to ultimately save all of their lives.
Alice let her pain shine through as she met her husbands golden eyes. "All I feel right now is useless, I don't save anyone, not Bella and not our family. Why would Bella need to hide that from you?" She asked still wondering why Jasper felt the need to bring this up. Hadn't he heard what Bella had said down stairs? She eased her hand from his hold and went back to her clothes. She wanted to shower and change, she quickly rifled through her options before picking a dark coloured blouse and black pants. They reflected her mood. If Jasper was having trouble sensing her then she'd make it more obvious for him.
Jasper sighed as Alice closed the door to their bathroom.
"That could have gone better." He muttered quietly as his hearing picked up the sound of the shower being switched on.
He eyed the closed door as he chewed on his lip. As much as he was concerned by Bella's news, he was more pragmatic about the whole thing. It hadn't happened yet and Bella had good knowledge of the chain of events that had led to his family being hunted by the wolves.
He knew Carlisle would want a more detailed retelling from Bella once he returned home. That would give them more understanding of what had caused their demise and would enable them to hopefully stop it from repeating.
He was confident they'd succeed. Bella's plan to send the human away was a good one, and despite what his brother would think of it Jasper was sure their father would agree to doing it. That just left them to deal with Victoria, something they should have done before now in any case. Leaving the redhead alive was a mistake, one they had paid for with their lives. That wouldn't happen this time.
No.
What had Jasper worried was the look in Bella's eyes as she watched his wife leave the living room. There was an ache in them that had his beast demanding he step in and remind the other vampire that Alice belonged to him. He'd managed to keep from growling but he'd given her a long look before following his wife from the room.
He'd have to watch more carefully from now on.
xxxxxx
Emmett's hands were busy trying to keep his little soldier guy from being killed yet again as his eyes strayed once more to the vampire sat on the floor beside him.
"You're getting shot again." Bella muttered as she navigated her own soldier around the second floor of a building looking for more people to kill. She'd never been a game player but she did enjoy killing things. This wasn't close to the same thing but there was a small amount of satisfaction gained as she beat Emmett. She smirked as she watched Emmett's solider pause on the screen again and felt more than saw his eyes on her.
"So they just like...burn the house down, with us all inside?" He asked softly. Rose was sat nearby and could clearly hear him but he was willing to risk it.
Bella sighed. She'd explained as much as she knew to the Cullen's but when she'd admitted her information had come from Jacob she had to agree that she couldn't be one hundred percent sure of it being entirely factual. At least that was what she wanted them to think. The truth was she'd heard the exact same tale from every wolf she had hunted down, the ones she didn't kill outright that was.
But that wasn't something she wanted the Cullen's to have knowledge of.
The wolves, lead by Jacob, had only enlisted the help from another wolf pack to seek revenge over the death of Bella by Victoria. Strangely, the fact that she had died while in their care never seemed to be mentioned. But then Jacob was as bad as Edward was for taking responsibility for his actions.
"Yes." Bella replied in a clipped tone. Her eyes darkened at how stupid it had all been. Her change into a vampire, however horrific at the time, wasn't something she regretted happening. It was the fallout that she couldn't prevent that tore her apart inside.
Jacob blamed the Cullen's for it and demanded war, Victoria had been their problem, one they abandoned Bella to yet again. He'd won over his pack members and Sam, as alpha, had made the call to a group he'd heard the Elders speak of. A wandering pack that lived for the kill of every vampire they came across.
Emmett grunted and went back to his game with a frown on his face.
She wasn't sure how they Cullen's had been told of her apparent death or how they had taken the news, but what was made crystal clear to her was that other than a last ditch attempt made by Emmett and Rosalie, the Cullen's had accepted their fate as their home was torched by the surrounding wolves that laid in wait for anyone that tried to escape the rising flames.
"That sucks."
Bella smiled as the vampire sat beside her pouted. "It's not going to come to that this time Emmett." She said to him.
"Better not." Rosalie muttered. While she hadn't thought much of finding out how her life as a vampire ended, she was also disgusted over how easily it had all happened. To think that not more than a few miles away a group of mangy mutts lived that with one call managed to destroy her family? That was a kicker, especially given how often Carlisle had assured them that the wolves would never be a problem.
Bella's eyes twinkled and she let her fangs show as she turned to the riled up blonde. "You feel the need to pay the dogs a visit, you let me know." She said in a whisper quiet enough that only Rosalie and Emmett could hear her.
Rosalie's eyes narrowed as she studied the other vampire. Eventually she gave a small but significant nod of her head. The wolves had been given too much respect in the past. They should have feared the Cullen's. They will fear us, this time.
Emmett's eyes widened and his mouth dropped open. "Are we like, going to-"
"Shh!" Rosalie hissed at her husband. She took a moment to listen to see if anyone was going to come down and see what was going on down here, but there was no movement in their direction. She looked to Bella again. "We have a couple of days still?" She asked.
Bella nodded. "Maybe more."
Happy with that news Rosalie got up from the couch she was sitting on. "Come on Em, let's go see about getting something to eat."
Emmett watched Rosalie's retreating form before shifting nervously and eyeing Bella. He'd begged her to play with him and after giving in he felt bad about leaving so soon when they had all night.
Bella rolled her eyes. "Go on, rematch tomorrow."
Emmett grinned and hopped up. "You're on sis." And with that he was off.
Bella shook her head. But his easy acceptance of her was precious to her he'd always seemed to want her to be part of his family even when his own wife disagreed. Sat there as she was she could almost believe this was how things would have been, should have been, for her, had Edward not backed out of his promise.
xxxxxx
Alice paused as she spotted Bella sat alone in front of the large flat screen TV. She was struck by how easily she could be stood there watching the human girl she had befriended. But while they may look similar after having spent time with both of them recently it was easy to tell them apart, they both had a different 'feel' to them. The human girl was sweet and light, she had spirit, unlike the Bella sat across the room who wore a cloud of darkness almost constantly. It was so entwined that even when she grinned and laughed it didn't seem to lift.
Alice wondered just what Bella had been through to cause such a thing, but she didn't think it was her place to delve too deeply into Bella's past. The older vampire had already said she was blocking Alice's ability to see into her future, and after experiencing Bella's changing it was obvious there were things Bella did not want Alice to see.
It saddened Alice to think the older vampire felt she had to hide part of herself from them. Alice knew no one in her family was without fault, not even Esme, she would never think badly of Bella no matter what she had done.
But does she know that?
"Hey." Bella said as she felt the other girls company and twisted her head to look at her. She gave Alice a warm smile and held up the controller she'd been using as she played against Emmett. "Fancy a game?" She asked.
Alice returned the smile and gave Bella a shrug and approached to take up Emmett's place on the sofa. "Sure."
Bella smirked and focused on the game for a bit, she wasn't very good, not compared to Emmett, but it was clear neither was Alice so they both had a reasonable chance of winning.
Alice frowned as she turned her character on the screen the wrong way and ended up being shot at. She pouted as she listened to Bella chuckle. She didn't like playing because she couldn't use her gift to her advantage because moves were made too quickly for her to see the outcome.
Alice watched her character being shot to death with a pout. She scowled at Bella as the other vampire giggled beside her.
"You know the objective of this game is to kill the other guys not get yourself killed." Bella reminded her.
"Like Emmett wasn't kicking your butt before I came down." Alice muttered as her character faded back to life and she carried on.
"Well I haven't played in hundreds of years, what's your excuse shortie?" Bella asked with a quirky grin.
"It's like that is it?" Alice asked then tried to focus more on the game this time in an effort to hunt down Bella's player, if she win the right way she'd simply join the opposing side.
"Uh...that's, Alice your shooting me!" Bella protested.
Alice laughed. "I know."
Bella's eyes narrowed as she manoeuvred her character out of the way. "Fine, but just remember, I was willing to play fair now all bets are off." She warned. She got her soldier out of the factory and found a good spot to hide behind as she waited on Alice's character following her out.
"Ha! Take that." Bella whooped as she bombed the solider that had run out.
Alice groaned as Bella's character stood waiting for her to come back to life again just to kill her once more. She wasn't having that and made a move to snatch Bella's controller out of her hand or at the very least distract her long enough to get her soldier to safety.
"Hey, stop that. Alice!" Bella giggled and tried to bat Alice's hand away. She shook her head as Alice sat back satisfied now that her soldier had escaped off somewhere. "You're worse than Emmett." Bella muttered with a frown, but her lips twitched as she set about finding Alice once more.
They sat there laughing and giggling as they continually sought out each other to kill over the bad guys. More than once they got so caught up in attacking each other that they got killed by other characters in the game.
Bella watched her soldier fade back in with its last life. "This time you're going down." She said with determination and quickly raced her guy into the building Alice had taken her soldier. She was so caught up in shooting Alice's soldier that she didn't notice for a moment that it wasn't returning fire.
"Alice?" Bella turned to see her friend in the midst of a vision, her eyes clouded over as she stared unseeing at the TV.
Alice blinked and turned concerned eyes on to Bella. "You need to go."
Bella frowned, her eyes catching Jasper's arrive as she stood. "What's wrong?" She asked her attention back on the smaller girl.
Alice swallowed her eyes flitting from Bella to Jasper. "She's coming."
"Who?" Bella asked tensing. Alice having a vision of Victoria returning didn't make sense. Not with this much time to go before Edward postpones the wedding and her attack on the reservation.
Just then all three of them heard the sound of a car arriving out front.
Alice glanced towards the front of the house with a worried look.
"Bella's here."