Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or its characters. Stephenie Meyer does.
Bella's Point of View
I sneaked out of my window – I knew that Edward would argue with his family about letting me go after the vampires who'd killed my sister. I knew that I had a little time before e came up to my room. How much time, though, I wasn't certain of. So I ran as fast as I could, which meant that I had to use my Cat form. But I didn't mind that – I wanted to use my Cat form to kill the vampires, anyway. I wanted them to make the connection between Sarah and me. I wanted them to know that their actions had caught up with them. I lost some time because I had to go back to the meadow and find the trail from there, but then it was easy work to track them.
When I could tell I was getting close – their scents were very fresh – I shifted out of my Cat form. My panther body was very large, and therefore had a very large heart, which, consequently, had a very loud heartbeat. To their sensitive ears, it would sound like someone pounding on a drum, and I didn't want to tip them off. I eased forward, low to the ground, in my In Between form, the form that didn't need to breath and didn't have a pulse.
When I saw them, for the first time in person, a red mist painted my vision. My jaw and fists clenched, and I heard Sarah screaming in my mind. My whole body screamed for release, screamed to attack the ones I had hated for so long. I almost charged them then and there. It took all my self-control to keep myself hidden, to keep waiting, to assess the situation. The three vampires were in a clearing about the size of a football field. They were grouped together for now, but I could hear the black-haired male ask the brown-haired one – the one who had killed Sarah – where he wanted to meet up; they were about to go their separate ways to hunt. My every muscle tensed, and I could feel my canine teeth and fingernails extending as my body, anticipating the fight to come, started to shift. I tightened my hold on myself. Wait.
The brown-haired male decided that they would meet in Vancouver. They all stood. My lips curled up over my long, sharp Cat teeth. Wait. I leaned forward. Just a moment longer. The three broke apart, the female heading East, the black-haired male going North, and the brown-haired male turning to the South. They moved the perfect distance apart from each other.
NOW! I exploded from the trees, taking on my Cat shape instantaneously in midair, a panther's war-scream tearing from my throat. The black-haired male didn't have a chance to turn around before I landed on his back. As I landed, I dug my front claws into his shoulders, my hind claws into his back, and sank my teeth into his neck. Then I pulled in every direction – down with both sets of claws, and up with my teeth, dismembering the vampire in one motion like Brian had taught me. He didn't even have time to scream.
All of this passed in a millisecond – I had been trained to be fast. I was on to the female before she could turn around toward the sound of tearing vampire flesh. I ripped her apart in the same way. Then it was just me and the true murderer. I'd killed the others first, quickly and painlessly, because they hadn't touched Sarah. They just hadn't stopped him. A growl rumbled deep in my chest as the male whirled to see the fate of his coven. I scrutinized his face, the look of shock that quickly changed into fury. I crouched low, coiling to spring. I had killed the others quickly – this one would not be so lucky.
He bolted into the forest, and I charged after him. I rather liked the idea of chasing him down – just like he had chased my sister. It was his turn to feel the fear of the prey. He wasn't as fast as Edward; definitely not as fast as me. I caught up to him easily, and swiped his right leg with my claws, drawing four deep gashes from his knee to his ankle. He stumbled, then righted himself with a snarl and crouched defensively.
I started to circle him, the fur on my back and shoulders bristling. I wished that I could have spoken to him. How does it feel? I would have asked, to know that something's going to kill you? How does it feel to be the weak one?
He tired of my circling soon – he lunged at me. I skipped aside and tore off his arm with my teeth, ignoring his piercing scream. He hissed at me and tried to snap at my neck. I rewarded his effort with a vicious slap – which gave him four ragged slashes down the left side of his face to match the ones on his leg. While he was distracted by the pain, I took his other arm.
Then, off in the distance, I heard someone scream my name. Reflex reaction – my eyes flicked in the direction of the sound for just a split second.
But a split second was all he needed. I had torn off his arms, but he still had his legs, and he used them to propel himself at my neck, and buried his teeth in my throat.
I felt his razor sharp teeth slice into my skin, and I felt his venom enter my bloodstream. I felt cold – I needed to end this before the venom could make me loopy. I managed to hook my claws in his stomach and pried him off. His teeth slashed my neck from my throat up to my chin, but I got him off. I didn't waste any more time – I gripped his neck in my teeth and decapitated him. And not a moment too soon – I could feel the side effects of the venom already. I had been bitten several times before, and my body had developed a resistance to vampire venom, but his bite had deposited a lot of venom into my bloodstream. So much that I was already starting to feel dizzy.
So I gathered his remains in my mouth and carried them back to the clearing where I had dismembered the others, heaping all the pieces into a pile when I got there. I was starting to see double, but I had to start the fire. Luckily, I found a rock after only a quick stagger through the woods. It was ridiculously difficult to drag one of my claws across the rock to create a spark – probably because the rock kept blurring and moving in my vision – but I got the fire started.
I turned away from the fire and started to walk back to the tree line, but when I was about half-way there, I realized that I couldn't feel my feet anymore. But that was all right, my woozy mind concluded, because I couldn't see straight anyway. If I went into the forest, I'd probably run face-first into a tree. I shook my head – there was this annoying roaring in my ears, and it wouldn't go away.
That was about when I lost my Cat shape. I stood, in my most human form, swaying dizzily on my feet. The trees blurred and swam into a green mess before my eyes. It was hot, I realized. Was I standing too close to the fire? It was really hot. The roar in my ears became deafening, and then I passed out.
Edward's Point of View
She was gone! I'd left her alone for one minute, and she'd disappeared. Well, at least I knew where she was going – sort of. I could still help her. If I could get there in time. I didn't go back downstairs. "Jasper! Emmett! Carlisle!" I shouted as I jumped out of Bella's bedroom window and took off into the forest, following the trail Bella had left behind. I heard everyone start running after me. It took us only a few minutes to reach the point where Bella's scent crossed the scents of the nomads.
"Bella!" Alice shouted. She barely got the word out before Jasper's hand clapped over her mouth.
"Quiet!" he hissed. "If she's fighting them, we don't want to distract her!"
Alice's eyes widened – she'd forgotten about that. Then we all started running along the combined trails of Bella and the nomads. We hadn't gone far when Jasper lifted his head and sniffed the air. He cracked a smile, but before Alice and I could scream at him – why was he smiling when Bella was in danger?! – we, too, noticed the smell that hung in the air. Sickly sweet and cloying – the smell of burning vampires.
Looks like Bella didn't need help after all, Jasper observed, a smug hint to his thoughts – he'd been right earlier.
I felt the tight coil of nerves in my chest relax. Bella was safe. But then my family and I broke through the trees surrounding a clearing – and saw Bella's crumpled form lying on the ground, smelled the blood that had painted her throat and chest red, and soaked the front of her black tank top. No one needed to hold their breath – her blood smelled good, but had an animal edge to it that wasn't appetizing. But thirst was the farthest thing from my mind.
"NO!" I roared, and ran as fast as I could to where Bella lay. "Bella," I gasped, noting the sound of her heartbeat with some relief. But it was fast and erratic, and her breath came unevenly and shallowly. I reached out to look for the source of the blood, but when I touched her neck, I hissed and automatically jerked my hand back.
Edward? Carlisle's calm, methodical voice asked as he knelt beside Bella and me, What's wrong?
"She's burning up," I breathed. Her temperature had to be over a hundred and ten. At least. My voice shook. "Carlisle, her temperature's so high."
Carlisle also started to examine her neck, but, having been warned, he only flinched slightly when he felt her impossible temperature. Carefully, he turned her head, and we both felt a fresh wave of shock when we saw the healing bite marks on her throat. Twin, parallel, raw, pink lines ran from the base of her throat to the bottom of her chin, but they were practically healed already, as if weeks had passed. However, before Carlisle and I could feel relief over that, we remembered something else. "The venom," I choked out in horror. Not that. She couldn't change – couldn't lose her soul like I had. Oh, God, no.
Edward! Carlisle's voice whipped out, distracting me from my personal Hell. Listen! Her heart doesn't sound like a changing heart. It's too slow, too shallow. I don't think she's changing – but I don't know what is happening, either, he admitted. I don't see any injuries – since we can move her, we need to get her home.
His reasonable voice cut through my panic. He was right. I nodded once, and scooped Bella up into my arms, ignoring the sting of her hot skin against my much colder skin.
Alice gripped Bella's hand, wincing at the heat, and met my eyes. "I still can't see her," she breathed. "I don't know what's going to happen."
"Nothing," I snarled, "is going to happen. She's going to be fine." I started the run back to my home so I wouldn't have to face Alice – or anyone else, for that matter.
Even while carrying Bella, I was faster than he rest of my family. I made it back to the house before the rest of them, and ran Bella up the stairs and into Alice's room, where I laid her gently on Alice's king size bed. I looked down at my Bella's face, realizing anew just how flushed her skin was with her fever. Since I was momentarily alone, I started to panic again. Human bodies could only bear a certain amount of heat. Would this fever kill her? Could it kill her – was her human form as fragile as the average human body? Or was it stronger, strong enough to stand this fever that raged through her?
Bella's eyes moved restlessly under her eyelids. I stroked her hot cheek, but could not make my mouth form words of comfort. How could I give her a promise of recovery, when I didn't even know myself if she would live? She'll be fine! a voice in my mind insisted. I hoped so – if she didn't survive, then neither would I. She couldn't die without killing me – we were linked now. If one perished, then so did the other. I personally didn't plan on living much longer if.....
If, I repeated to myself grimly, and I gripped her hand tightly in my own, as if that would keep her from slipping away. "I won't let you go," I vowed softly in her ear. There – that was a promise I could keep. I would cling to every scrap of hope while she lived, and..... if she didn't, then I still wouldn't let go – I would follow her, wherever she went, even if that meant leaving the realm of the living with her.
My family arrived. Carlisle darted up the stairs and into Alice's room, with Alice, Esme, and Emmett right on his heels. My mother had her mouth covered with her hands, and her eyes were wide with terror as she looked at her youngest daughter. Please be all right, she thought. Please. I can't loose another. Her son, Theodore, who had died of a lung infection days after his birth, was fresh in her mind.
Emmett's normally jovial face was paler than normal and hard with worry. Come on, he begged Bella. You're the best fighter I know – nothing beats you! You gonna let this be the first thing to get the best of you? Come on, little sis, kick it into the middle of next year.
You're my best friend, Alice told her silently, her mental voice small and frightened in a way I had never heard it before. You can't leave now – you just got Edward, for Christ's sake! It'll kill him, if you die. He needs you – I need you!
She's not going to die! I wanted to shout at them. But I knew that I wouldn't be able to handle the sympathetic looks that would follow such an outburst, so I turned instead to the blessedly medical thoughts that Carlisle had. "What do we do?" I whispered
We need to bring the fever down, came the prompt reply. Carlisle put a thermometer under her tongue, and we watched in horror as the digital number started to climb. One hundred degrees Fahrenheit. One hundred and ten. One hundred and fifteen. Finally, it bottomed out at eighteen degrees Fahrenheit, high enough to kill any human. There was dead silence in the room and in the minds of my family members as we looked at the number. Carlisle's face had not been this pale in a long time. Fear had put lines around his mouth and eyes.
We have to bring this temperature down – now! I could hear in his mind that he was trying hard to keep himself calm for me, and I reached out and squeezed his shoulder in silent thanks. I saw what he intended to do in his mind, and I picked Bella up again before he could ask, and carried her to Rosalie's bathroom, which had a large jacuzzi bathtub in it. I carefully let Bella down into it, and turned the cold water on full blast.
"Alice," Carlisle's calm voice said from the hall, "Get ice, as much as you can, and bring it to Rosalie's bathroom." He was beside me in an instant, his hand on my shoulder. She'll be fine, he promised me. We'll take care of her. But I could still hear the fear he had shoved into a distant corner of his mind, the fear he was attempting to hide from me. I decided not to mention it – I wanted to believe him as much as he wanted to believe himself.
Alice and Jasper appeared in the doorway, their arms full of all the ice that had been in the freezer, which they dumped into the bathtub. I'm going to the nearest gas station to get more, Alice told me and disappeared. I heard a car start, then drive away.
We have to keep her hydrated, Carlisle said. Wait here with her – I have to get my bag, and I might have to make a quick drive to the hospital.
I nodded, but Carlisle was already in his office, looking through his medical bag to see if he had what he needed. He had an IV, but, he realized, he needed to go to the hospital and steal some sterile saline. He knew that I knew what he was thinking – he didn't bother coming back into the bathroom to explain before he, too, drove away.
I stayed with Bella, holding her hand and praying that she would be all right. The cold, icy water we had placed her in was starting to warm quickly thanks to her fever – the ice was melting, fast. Within two minutes, the ice had vanished entirely, and steam was staring to rise from the water's surface. Nervous, I took her temperature again, and nearly dropped the thermometer – rather than going down, Bella's fever had risen to one hundred and twenty-one degrees. Luckily, at that very second, Alice came in holding five bags of ice, two of which we poured into the tub.
Alice's frightened eyes met mine. How is she?
I couldn't look her in the eyes and answer. "Worse," I breathed. It was true – her lips were chapped and slightly parted as she drew in breath after raspy, rattling breath. I could see that her tongue and throat were starting to swell – her fever was dehydrating her, burning up her from the inside out. She needed to get moisture into her system, sooner rather than later.
Alice took Bella's other hand, flinching when Bella's fever burned her, and waited with me in silence. I could see Bella through her eyes, could see that she loved Bella, too, that her condition hurt her, as well.
After what felt like too long, Carlisle returned and inserted the IV, hooking Bella up to fluids. He had an unusually hard time inserting the IV – Bella's dehydrated state made her veins harder to find. But I felt better when he sat back, finished. Carlisle did, too, until I told him that Bella's fever had gone up while he'd been gone. Then his eyes tightened again, and he felt Bella's forehead with the back of his hand. When he felt that Bella was indeed hotter, he leaned back and rubbed his eyes with his hands. I don't know what else to do, Edward, he told me. I could give her medicine to bring down the fever, but this fever is so high, it would burn the medicine off before it even had a chance to work. He sighed. The only thing we can do now is keep the fever from overwhelming her entirely, and wait.
We waited for eight hours. Bella's fever kept rising steadily for five of those hours despite our efforts until it leveled out at around one hundred and thirty degrees. Then it stayed like that, no matter what we did. We kept adding ice to the water Bella was in, and Bella kept melting it. Her body heat was so high that the water around her began to steam if we didn't constantly put more ice in it. Once, when we ran out of ice and Alice was still driving back from the gas station where she was buying more, bubbles like the bubbles that form on the bottom of a pot that is filled with almost-boiling water started to form on Bella's skin.
After eight hours, we were all frantic – even Rosalie. In desperation, Alice went to Bella's room and started looking through her pack, looking for anything that might help us. After she'd gone through Bella's clothes and notebook, she finally resorted to turning the pack upside down and shaking it. Bella's weapons, a raw diamond, and an ebony panther fell out – and a small piece of paper fluttered through the air toward the floor. Alice caught it before it hit the ground. On it, a phone number was written in small, tidy handwriting, along with the words Just in case.
Alice stared at the scrap of paper, stunned, for a second, and I stared at it, equally shocked, through her eyes. Then thoughts broke through the wall of shock. "Jasper!" she shrieked. "Get me a phone!" She dashed back to Rosalie's bathroom – she knew that I wanted to be the one to make the call.
Jasper was confused, but, after feeling the wild, desperate hope and excitement coming off Alice and me, he knew to do what Alice said first, and ask questions later. He brought a small, silver cell phone to me, and I dialed the number as fast as I could. While the phone rang, I handed the piece of paper to Jasper in a silent explanation.
The phone rang four times, and I grew more anxious with each ring. What if the person we were trying to call didn't have the phone with them? What if they didn't want to answer because they didn't recognize our number? But before I could worry too much, someone answered the phone. "Hello?" a woman's voice said.
I spoke quickly, rushing through the words. "Bella needs help!"
Whoever had answered the phone was silent for a moment, then the female voice said pleasantly, "Bella? I'm sorry, but I don't know a Bella. You must have the wrong number."
I panicked. The woman was my last hope, and she was about to hang up. I had to make staying on the line worth her while – I had to say something that would make her want to listen. "I know what you are," I blurted out.
"Really?" the voice said after a beat of silence. I could tell that the woman was starting to realize that she needed to listen to me. "And what am I, exactly?"
"You're a Cat," I replied, still talking fast. "Bella's hurt, and she needs help!" That was the point. I had posed a threat to their secret to get their attention – now I needed help.
The woman snorted derisively. "Oh, I don't doubt that. If a vampire's calling me and knows about our kind, then, yes, I'm sure Bella's in lots trouble. Have you killed her, or are you trying to hold her for ransom?"
"No," I gasped, appalled. "She's a friend! But there was a fight, and she was bitten, and -"
The woman laughed. Laughed! "I highly doubt that she would find you a suitable friend. But, either way, what my daughter gets herself into isn't my concern anymore," she informed me coolly.
I felt like I'd been plunged into ice water. "Renee," I said flatly. I was really talking to the wrong person if I wanted help. But I had to try. "If that were true, then why did you give Bella this number?"
Renee made an annoyed sound. "I gave Bella that number a long time ago, and only at the insistence of a friend. But," she added, for I had drawn in a breath to shout at her, "just for fun, let me see if I've got this right. My daughter is your friend, but there was a fight of some kind, and she was bitten by a vampire. Now she has a terrible fever, and you want to know what to do. Have I got that about right?"
"Yes," I growled. I was practically vibrating with tension and impatience – what was Renee playing at?
"Well," Renee began, "how about this? I'll tell you what you can do for her – on one condition."
"Name it," I said swiftly, feeling weak with relief. Renee was going to help. I would do anything.
"Tell me where you are."
The relief vanished. "What?" I snarled.
"Tell me where you are, and I'll tell you what you can do for Bella."
"No!" I hissed. "You're out of your mind!" Oh, yes, she would tell me what to do – and then she would find my family and kill them.
Renee's voice was smooth, calm, and cool, totally unaffected by my refusal. "Then I won't tell you what to do, and Bella will die."
My heart felt as though it had been encased in ice. "You would let your own daughter die?" I whispered through unmoving lips.
Her voice was very certain. "Like I told you, she isn't my problem anymore. So, if you're not going to tell me anything, and I'm not going to tell you anything, why don't I hang up, hmmm? Save us both money on our phone bills."
"Wait!" I shouted. I shot a desperate look at Alice and Jasper. Jasper's mouth was pressed into a tight line. Don't you dare, he snarled mentally. I could tell that he would reach out and crush the phone in my hand if I tried to tell Renee our location.
But Alice's eyes met mine. She looked once at Jasper, and, though she didn't speak, her gaze was fierce enough to make him back down. Alice looked back at me and nodded curtly once. We don't have much of a choice – as she well knows.
Renee was waiting. "Well?" she demanded.
I pinched the bridge of my nose between my thumb and forefinger. I couldn't believe that I was about to endanger my entire family like this. But, as Alice had said, I didn't have a choice. So, my voice no more than a whisper, I gave Renee our address. "Now," I snarled – I wasn't very happy with Renee – "I kept my end of the bargain. Tell me what I can do for Bella."
Renee chuckled darkly, and my stomach dropped. I didn't even know what she was going to say, but I knew that, whatever it was, it would be of no use to me or Bella. Renee had scammed us. "Nothing," she said lightly, confirming my worst fear. "You can do absolutely nothing."
I roared in fury and threw the phone at the wall, shattering the plastic device and cracking the plaster of the wall, but I knew that Renee had hung up – in the split second before the phone hit the wall, I'd heard a dial tone. I returned to Bella's side, fuming and hopeless. That was it, then, wasn't it? We hadn't been able to bring the fever down in any way we knew how. And the only person who could have helped us didn't want to. There was no hope. Feeling as though I could have wept, if that were possible, I reached down and took Bella's hand again.
And I felt the shock through my entire body. Her hand was cooler. Not its normal temperature, but not blazing hot, either. I gasped, and Alice was at my side in an instant. "What happened?" she whispered.
Carlisle, who had heard my gasp, darted into the room and placed his hand on Bella's forehead – and gasped, too. "Her fever has gone down!" he rejoiced. "I don't know how or why, and I don't really care, but it's gone down!"
We waited on pins and needles for forty-five minutes, listening to Bella's breath and heartbeat even out. Her fever continued to drop.
And then Bella groaned, and opened her eyes.