Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.

Based on the characters created by Stephanie Meyer, in her Twilight Saga series of books.

WARNING: This story will contain scenes of domestic violence, strong language and other forms of physical violence, up to, and including death.

Chapter 25

Prelude to War – 1934

"I'm telling you," Alice hissed through her teeth, "this will lead to another war!" She folded the newspaper then slapped it down onto the table. She was pretending to drink coffee with Hazel, a human friend from one of the night clubs she frequented.

"Really Alice!" Hazel huffed. "The World War was the war to end all wars. Remember?"

"Mark my words, Hazy. We have not heard the last of this new-Fuhrer. Hindenburg wasn't dead but a few hours before this Hitler took over. It's not going to be good. Believe me." Alice looked around the swanky hotel restaurant, remembering her vision from the evening before. She had seen the beginning of World War II, while she bathed and prepared to go out the previous night. Now, as her eyes passed over the faces of the restaurants patrons, some of the men's faces blurred and turned into skeletal death masks. Alice gave her head a shake, as her friend's voice broke through her odd vision.

Hazel laughed at Alice. "He was voted in, Ali. The people of Germany must believe in him for some reason." She sipped at her coffee. "I hate politics. I mean-what's the big deal? It's Germany. The other side of the world." Hazel became bored with the conversation. "Really, Alice, what does it mean to us? It's just too far away to have any impact on us here, in the United States of America. Forget about it, Ali. It's just more political rubbish."

Alice sighed deeply. She carefully, and quickly, poured some of her coffee into the potted plant, next to her, while Hazel's head was turned. She looked out at the other patrons of the stylish restaurant, and tried to relax with her friend. The two women chatted through a second cup of coffee, avoiding anything political, then parted ways. Alice stood at the hotel's entrance and watched her friend walk away. Hazel's carefree attitude refused to stick to Alice. The vision of the coming war and it's devastation refused to leave her in peace. She left the hotel, as cloud cover passed over the sun and blocked it completely.

Alice watched Hazel until she was out of sight, then walked across Oak street and onto the shores of Lake Michigan. She pulled her shoes off and felt the sand as it surrounded her tiny feet. The hot sand felt warmed her feet, causing Alice to smile and hum in pleasure. "Hmmm. Warm," she whispered to herself, as she began to walk north along the shore of the Great Lake. It was a short mile and a half to Lincoln Park and the thickly wooded area she needed. Deer were plentiful, and, with the threat of rain, people were sparse. Alice fed and buried her kills, then wandered the park and beach until dark. She loved Chicago, but it was time to move on.

The visions of war haunted her. As she walked, specters of emaciated prisoners superimposed along the beach and treeline. They appeared to hide behind the trees, only to peek out at her as she passed. Alice shook her head, trying to dispel the vision. She very nearly lost the blood she had just consumed, at the sight of the horrific treatment of the thousands of prisoners. As the chimera expanded, she was knocked to her knees as she realized the true number of emaciated and murdered prisoners. "Millions," she sobbed. "Not thousands...millions."

Alice remained on her knees at the edge of the treeline as the sun poked out briefly. Her hands momentarily glittered in the bright afternoon light, but the clouds slid back in place before anyone could identify anything out of the ordinary. She remained in the slowly altering shade of the treeline, as she sobbed for the loss of life she envisioned. "Innocent lives," she murmured. "Not soldiers...Innocents." She sat back on her calves and let the visions roll through her. The images had never been this strong before, and she prayed for tears to acknowledge the loss of each life, but that was simply not possible for a vampire. She knew that at least two hours had gone by as the roll of the dead and dying passed through her visual field, before they took a turn for the better. Images of bravery and rescues started to replace some of the images of the dead. As the ghosts of the future began to slow, more visions of Jasper and other vampires, fighting German soldiers and vampire sympathizers, became more prevalent. A smile slowly returned to her face, and she began to lift her head. "Yes," she whispered to the sky. "Yes, my Jasper." She smiled while the images of her heroic Jasper filled her with hope. "Soon, my love" she hummed repeatedly. As long as she still saw them meeting, she had no fear of his fighting. As long as they still had a future life together.

1937

Lakehurst, New Jersey was a small town, but Alice was partial to the smaller towns...as long as there was a city, with the latest fashions, within running distance. The Naval Air Station gave Lakehurst a boost in population, but not enough to keep it from being anything but a cozy small town. Alice sat in the diner, slowly pouring her coffee into the potted plant next to her, and hiding bits of her sandwich to feed to the birds when she left. She listened to the excited conversations of those that were in Lakehurst to catch the next flight out, as well as those that were waiting on loved ones to arrive. She sat by the large plate glass window and watched the clouds gather. It was going to be a wet afternoon, but, for now, it was still dry. She was still glad for her men's pants and warm sweater under her peacoat. It was a great day for her. After her coffee, she visited a few of the town's shops to purchase an umbrella, and found Xander a beautiful handmade quilt. He had kept one for years, a gift from a former lover, but he had lost it in some fire in Chicago. Alice tried to remember when he said he had lost it. "1871!" she finally remembered. "Before my time" she mumbled as she took the quilt to the counter.

"A beautiful choice," the woman behind the counter said to Alice.

"It seemed to be the most sturdy, and had the brightest colors," Alice smiled at the counter clerk.

"Angelina Morgan makes the best quilts in the quad-state area," she replied with a big smile. She looked at Alice through her eyelashes and asked quietly, "For a lover?"

"Oh no," Alice laughed. "Just a good friend. He lost a treasured quilt in a fire some time ago. He's coming in on this next flight, and I thought it might make a nice coming home gift."

"How sweet of you," the counter clerk smiled big again. "Angelina's quilts have been known to last. She made her first when she was just a teenager, and she's well into her 90's now." The clerk chatted as she completed the sale, and carefully folder the heavy quilt. "I still have that quilt...her first. It still looks like new. And this may well be her last. Her hands are not what they use to be. So you're probably giving a gift that will last several lifetimes, if properly cared for."

"Let's hope." Alice placed her purchase over her arm and left the small store. It was early afternoon and Xander's flight wasn't due until about 4pm. Alice began to slowly stroll through the rain, toward the Naval Air Station. There were several buildings on the NAVAIR property. The area with the mooring mast was only a small section of a much larger facility. Alice was just glad that this time she didn't have to sneak in to see a famous airship. Her mind wandered back to the Pride of St. Louis, then suddenly morphed into a new vision. "Damn storm," she muttered. "Flight's going to be 3 hours late!" she huffed in frustration and leaned against the side of one of the small white buildings.

"How late do you think it will be?" A female voice whispered. A vampire's whisper! Alice thought the voice sounded vaguely familiar, but she couldn't immediately place it.

"Shut up you fool. You never know who's listening," a male vampire's voice said, again, sounding familiar.

"Xander, that patriotic pussy, will be on board. He has to be stopped. We can't have the United States looking too hard into things."

"God, Camile, watch your mouth."

Camile and Everett. Alice knew she recognized the voices, but she was surprised by the way they talked about Xander. After all, he was their friend long before Alice had met all of them in Alabama.

The other side of the building went silent, so Alice quietly slipped into the small crowd of people waiting for their loved ones to arrive. The delay in the flight was finally announced over a loud speaker. A unified groan rose from those waiting for the arrivals and the field crews that were there to tie off the giant airship when it finally did arrive. Alice just smiled sweetly as she positioned the quilt over her head and around her body, in an attempt to keep the drizzling rain off of her.

"At least three hours," moaned a burly gentleman standing next to Alice, with his arms crossed over his chest. He huffed in frustration. As he looked down at the ground, he gave it a small kick with the toe of his well-worn boot. "Well, I've waited ten years to see my father again," he said with a mild British accent. He smiled sadly. "I guess I can handle another three hours." He glanced at Alice, then looked toward the cloudy sky again. "You waiting for family too?"

"No," Alice looked to the sky, mimicking the man next to her. "A friend is returning from Italy."

"I visited Italy as a child. I remember it as being a beautiful, almost magical place."

"Almost?" Alice chuckled.

"Well," the man smiled sheepishly, "I was a lad of five...no...six." He chuckled a bit before he continued. "At that age, anything outside the city was magical to me. We lived in London. It was crowded and dark. If I remember correctly, our trip to Italy was my first experience with open hills of tall grass." He paused for a few moments, lost in the memory. "We were visiting my grandparents, on my mother's side. They lived in La Serra, a small village in Tuscany. Just a short walk from Volterra. They would tell us the most horrible bedtime stories." He chuckled as he reminisced. "My grandparents were convinced there were vampires in Volterra." He continued to smile, but grew quiet. "To be young, and believe in the magic of rolling hills and vampires again."

"You must have left home at an early age?"

"I came over to work for a distant cousin, on my father's side, when I was but 16. They needed strong men to work at a shipyard in Brooklyn. I thought it would be a great opportunity...and it has been."

"It must have been hard to leave your parents. You were so young."

"But it has been well worth it. I've prospered. Married a woman I love madly, and don't deserve. Now, with my mother gone, it's time to share it all with my father." Alice heard a quiet call, and her conversation partner turned toward the sound. "That would be my wife," his accent all but disappeared when he spoke of his wife. "I'd best get back to her. It was nice talking to you..."

"Alice."

"I'm Collin Grant. If you should ever need a strong hand, look me up at the United Shipyards in New York." Alice watched as Collin raced into the crowd with a broad smile on his face.

After her conversation with Collin, Alice wandered the crowd. Sometimes she engaged in conversation, sometimes she simply listened, but she always smiled and said "Hello" to anyone she passed. She also kept an ear out, and her eyes peeled for any sign of Camile or Everett. Their behavior baffled her. As 7pm approached, Alice searched the eastern sky until she spotted the airship. And as her eyes landed on it, a fiery vision burst into her mind. "NO!" she sobbed, as she raced as fast as her human watchers allowed, toward the edge of the airfield. As she ran, she twisted the colorful quilt and tied it around her body, as if it were a bandoleer. When she felt she was out of sight of the humans, she jumped to the underside of the large airship, as it slowly descended toward the mooring mast. She clutched at the ropes and mooring chocks as she worked her way up the gondola. Alice climbed spider-like, as she worked her way to the top of the rigid airship. She was careful not to rip the sides of the behemoth; the material of the sides was very fragile, considering her great strength. At the top of the airship, she found the observation port, and quickly slipped in to the interior of the huge vessel.

As Alice entered the top of the airship, it took a sudden turn to the left. Alice clung to the ladder and listened intently. She could feel the ship losing altitude as she slid down the ladder to the axial corridor that ran through the large airship. The sharp turn had thrown many of the crew off balance, so they were still down as Alice ran through the interior of the ship, to the stern.

"Three of them came in over New York," Alice heard from ahead of her.

"Kill'em and get'em outta here," a husky male human voice of authority said. "And find the third one."

"Out where?" asked the first male voice. "Somethin's not right. They climbed down on the gas exhaust pipe."

"Yes. We did." Alice recognized Camile's voice immediately, this time. "We've come to help you." Alice could tell her attempts at seduction were not working.

"You have a passenger...Alexander Deerborn. Calls himself Xander." Alice recognized Everett's voice. "He has documents that the United States government must not see. Not if the Fuhrer is to succeed."

"Let us handle him," Camile crooned to them. "He's one of us. We have the...skills to deal with him." She smiled at the two men, one with a gun trained on them. "Xander!" she yelled down the nearly hollow airship. "Come to the back of this marvelous ship! I simply must talk to you!" Alice was now close enough to see the four of them. None of this made sense to her. Why did they want Xander?

"You said three came back here," the authoritative man said. "Where's the third?" he gestured for Camile to answer him.

"He went to look for Xander," she responded. "He will bring him to us, if Xander refuses to come to my call."

"You should not be here for this," Everett told the two humans. Alice watched from behind the gas exhaust shaft as a massively large third vampire, unknown to her, pushed Xander onto the axial corridor from the corridor below, 15 rings farther back on the ship. "Max, take him back to ring 20." As they passed, Max handed a leather packet to Everett.

"You won't get away with this," Xander spat at Everett and Camile.

"But we will, Lover," Camile slid her hand along Xander's cheek, as she smiled seductively at him. "We will not allow the United States to interfere with the Fuhrer's plans. He envisions a world where the strong rule over the weak. In such a world, we will flourish. Our population will grow and control the weakest of the human population." Alice stepped to the side, sliding her hand along the exhaust shaft, to get a clearer view of the proceedings.

"Who's there?" Everett yelled, as his head jerked in Alice's direction. The human with the Luger turned and fired at Alice. The bullet completely missed, but the four vampires didn't wait to see if it hit her or not. Max holding Xander, and Everett and Camile all turned and ran farther to the stern of the airship.

"What are you doing?" the commanding human yelled. "You can not shoot a gun in here." He grabbed the Luger from the other man, and shoved it into the front of his pants. "Now, go catch the girl, and bring her back to ring 20," he ordered. Alice didn't wait for the humans to move. She calmly walked toward them slapping them hard enough to knock them off the corridor as she passed them.

Alice approached the three Nazi vampires cautiously. Her eyes momentarily locked with Xander, as she skillfully hid her shock at the change in them. She could also tell that it had been far too long since he had fed. She gave him a small nod before acknowledging the others. "Camile?" she smiled. "Everett? It's been a long time."

"Well, if it isn't the goody-goody vampire girl." Camile mocked Alice. "I didn't know you were on board."

The airship suddenly made a sharp turn to the right, and the tail dropped knocking them all off their feet. Scrabbling for balance, Alice immediately launched herself into the air. She grabbed Max by the head, and gave it a sharp twist. That sound of stone grinding against stone shrieked through the tail of the ship, as Max's head came away from his body. Alice grinned in triumph, as Xander, now free of the massive vampires hold, leaped on Camile. Everett had momentarily disappeared from sight, but Alice quickly found him. He had dropped down the shaft to the lower corridor to set a match to the packet of papers taken from Xander. Alice grabbed for the bundle but Everett was faster. He hurdled himself passed Alice and threw the burning pouch forward up the axial corridor. All of the vampires had smelled the slow gas leak that the gunshot had caused. But Alice's main concern was the traitorous Nazi vampires scattered around her. Not the flammable gas, or the burning couriers pouch. She jumped and landed on Everett's back. In a moment, she held his severed head in her hands, and was turning to see how Xander had faired with Camile. Alice watched as Everett's body fell to the floor. She didn't see Camile, as she pitched Xander's head directly at hers. When his head landed in her small hands, rage took control of Alice. She threw herself at Camile, the evil pixie grin spreading wide across her face. Her hatred for Camile redoubled, causing her strength to increase exponentially.

The severe angle of the airship caused the fiery bundle to slide back down to the bodies of the headless vampires, and ignited their motionless corpses. Alice, however, was too involved in her battle with Camile to pay any attention to the growing flames, and pungent purple smoke.

"You killed Everett, you bitch!" Camile screeched at Alice.

"You bet your ass I did, you Nazi whore," the enraged Alice fired back. "And you're next." Her evil grin monopolized her face, as she calmly walked a few steps toward her opponent. "You are going to burrrnnn." Alice hummed the last word, then laughed and grabbed Camile's wrist. Camile had expected Alice to go for her head, as she had with her other two kills, so when Alice grabbed her arm, she was surprised by the change in tactics. It was only a momentary lapse, but it was enough for Alice to throw Camile off balance and fling her into the blazing pyre that was her friends, and Xander. Camile screamed as her body began to burn. She jumped from the fire, and reached for Alice. Alice leapt into the air, and kicked Camile in the face. Before she settled back to the floor, Camile's face and head shattered into the flames that consumed her body. Alice smelled the gas fumes moments before the flames ignited them. She jumped to the laddered shaft that ran to the top of the zeppelin at the 20th ring, and hurried up the shaft to the top of the airship. The flames climbed the ladder nearly as fast as she did. As she neared the end of the shaft, she launched herself through the top of the zeppelin, ripping the skin of the ship, leaving it to flap around in the wind. She threw herself from the ship, as the flames became visible through the opening she had made.

When Alice hit the ground and she rolled to a stop, she turned to look at the giant airship, as it was erupted in flames and settling to the Earth. She sat in the tall weeds that surrounded the airship landing site, and watched the frame of the Hindenburg lying in the dying flames, like a mighty beached whales skeleton. She heard the screams and cries of the living and the dying. As the smell of the blood of the injured reached her, she was forced to run from the disaster site. When she had reached a safe distance, she stopped and turned back to watch as the chaos of the scene began to organize itself. Tearless sobs wracked her body. The loss of her friend. The loss of the passengers and crew of the mighty Hindenburg. It was too much loss for her to accept. And there was nothing she could do about any of it. No one she could save.

"Why would they start a fire?" Alice asked herself. "The human fired a gun. He had to know that it would cause a gas leak. Why would he start a fire?" Her confusion mounted, but Alice had no answers. "Why?"

Alice wandered away from the scene, and back to town. She stopped at the small boarding house where she had been renting a room, and gathered her things. There was no one at the boarding house; everyone was at the landing field, helping with the injured. Alice left a short note announcing her departure, on the dining table, before she headed out the door. As she stood in the doorway, she was facing west. She stepped down the front steps, and continued in that direction, completely in a daze. She walked aimlessly in a westerly direction for longer than she could remember. She had no plans on where to go next. She had no desire to change directions. She just walked.

A/N: How do you thank an angel for coming to the rescue? After some horrific reviews on a contest submission, I was really worried/terrified about posting anything, again. Thank you Nyx'sReincarnation, my new Beta, and the only angel that came to my rescue when I whimpered for help.

I've been sitting here looking at this page, for about 15 minutes, afraid to just hit the button and post it.

God, I am such a chicken-shit!