Chapter 24 –Stopped–

Something hard, maybe a rock, hit me right across my face, followed by a nasty cracking sound.

"Jake!" Seth gasped in shock. "You broke his nose!"

"Should be glad it wasn't his neck," Jacob grumbled back, flexing his fingers.

I touched my crooked nose with my free hand –Jake had let go of my arm for a sufficient momentum to land a proper punch–, pulling it back into its original position with an annoyed groan. "Thanks," I said sarcastically.

"You should be," Jacob snapped back, shoving me forward. "Now move before I break more parts of your baby face."

The monster and I growled quietly in revenge. It growled about the hitting and I about the "baby face"-thing. I was so upset with Jacob that I only realized where he was leading me to when we were already well hidden in the darkness of the woods. The recent happenings crashing down on me like a tsunami wave.

Chime broken.

Chime's blood singing.

Chime's eyes begging.

Chime's voice crying.

Chime falling.

What had I done?

A warm hand on my shoulder pulled me out of my shock. Looking up I found Seth's soft dark eyes. "Edward's taking care of her," he told me in a slow soothing tone, as if he were talking to a shy animal. "He took the car and is now rushing to Carlisle with her. She'll be okay."

I remembered the screaming and resistance, remembered the red liquid of her life flowing freely, the tiny rectangular razor blade in her right hand, gleaming sliver in the moonlight.

"She fainted," Jacob said seeing the confusion in my face. "Lost too much blood, I guess."

My head snapped up toward his direction. My breath caught in my throat.

"Yeah, nothing Carlisle can't fix," Seth added in a tense voice and a meaningful glare at Jacob. "Right, Jake?"

He shrugged. "Sure, sure."

My world seemed to spin.

"Derick, wait!" Seth shouted but I was already gone, racing through the forest at full speed. Trees flew past me in a blur, the grass beneath my feet rustled barely audibly, birds and insects fled in panic at my sudden approach. My instincts registered all these things automatically, though neither my mind nor my heart were actually paying any attention to it. In front of my inner eye, the forest turned red, the leaves sticky and glossy with fresh blood. Chime's blood. Her ice-blue eyes melted into tears, extinguishing the flames in them, choking her angelic voice, distorting it to a screech of agony.

I must have raced home in record time, though it felt like forever until the bright lights of our huge mansion finally came into view. I practically burst into the house, almost pulling the double doors out of their hinges. At any other time Esme would have scolded me for mistreating her favorite creation, but tonight she just looked at me with pure motherly concern.

"They are upstairs," she informed me, her soothing voice stroking my stressed nerves. "Alice sensed something like this might happen. She and Rosalie went to the hospital right after you left and got enough supply from the blood bank. Carlisle is treating her now."

I turned to dash up the stairs when Edward appeared in front of me, blocking my way. "Don't," he said in a firm voice. "She lost quite an amount of blood and we both know what kind of effect her blood has on you."

As if his words had hit me like a brick wall knocking the air out of my lungs, I staggered back a few steps. Instinctively, I inhaled, only noticing now that I had been holding my breath, and drew in the deadly sweet scent of rich burgundy and forget-me-nots. The beguiling aroma of her blood was everywhere, coloring the white walls deep red. The monster inside of me roared back to life, charging my muscles with new energy. Ready to jump, ready to strike, ready to kill.

Instantly, Esme and Edward were at my sides, each grabbing an arm of mine and yanking me out of the house, back into the darkness of the woods, where I collapsed against a tree, panting heavily as if I'd just been saved from drowning. It was confusing, almost aggravating, how much Chime's blood affected me. I had always thought my abstinence was firm. Perhaps not as good as Edward's, and definitely not as perfect as Carlisle's, though still better as Emmett's or Jasper's. But it seemed like all my centuries worth of training were simply blown away by a tiny breeze of this little human girl's scent.

Light shaking at my right arm pulled me out of my frustrating thoughts. Turning around I found Edward still holding my arm in order to keep me in place. His body was vibrating with silent chuckles.

It was so nice to know that my misery had such a positive effect on my siblings' moods.

"It's not like that," Edward defended himself between his laughter; he could barely keep it down now. "It all seems like a déjà vu to me. Your thoughts – they were exactly the same thoughts I had when I met Bella."

I looked at Esme, who was shaking her head in confusion at her flagship son, then looked back at Edward, who was grinning back at us in return. I raised an eyebrow, waiting for the punch line. I was still miles away from laughing.

Seeing –and probably also hearing– our confusion, he finally continued explaining, "Well, and that reminded me on what you said when we were recording, you remember? You said, thank God I don't have that problem, when I told you about my struggles with Bella's blood."

"And?" I eventually demanded impatiently when he once again stopped with a stupid grin on his face.

"And you were right," he finally finished. "Destiny is a tramp."

I felt the corners of my mouth pull upwards involuntarily. "And karma is her little sister," I added.

"Language, boys," Esme chastised us, but she, too, was smiling.

Again the picture of the old lady stirring a pot filled with all kinds of nastiness came to my mind, only this time there was another old lady adding wood to the fire in order to keep the content nicely warm and stinky. Both of their eyes glazed with anticipation, waiting for the whole thing to finally boil and explode.

Edward pulled a face at my seemingly boundless imagination. "Disgusting, but nonetheless accurate, I have to admit."

"I assume, I don't even want to know, what you boys are thinking again," Esme sighed and rolled her eyes theatrically.

I chuckled, which quickly died down to a sigh though. Seeing the concern in my face return, Esme's hold around my arm softened to an embrace. "She will be fine," she promised in that soothing tone that only mothers had.

I pressed my eyes shut for a second, concentrating on her hand rubbing slowly my arm, easing the tension in my muscles and nerves a little bit. "Where is the rest?" I asked, trying to distract myself.

"On errands," Edward informed me. "Carlisle sent them out for food, medicine and other supplies that we might need."

I nodded, understanding the message beneath his words. That they had all fled because of the blood. I didn't hold it against them. We all knew where our limits were, and in the current situation, evasion was much more helpful than forced confrontation. We all knew that.

Well, except for me, of course …

"Don't be so hard on yourself," Edward then said. "Any of us would have done just the same, if they had been in your place."

"You didn't," I reminded him bitterly.

"Yes, I did," he negated stubbornly. "I did, back then in the ballet studio, when James tried to kill her. I did drink Bella's bloo-"

"But you stopped!" I cut him off, loosing my temper yet again. "You stopped though her blood called to you so strongly. You stopped, because you loved her enough to remember who you are. You stopped, and I didn't! Not forgetting, you only drank her blood to save her from turning into a vampire, and even then you only did it after Carlisle urged you to. I didn't, okay? I didn't drink her blood out of some noble reason. And I certainly would not have stopped if it weren't for you, Jake and Seth! I would have sucked her dry, until the very last drop! I would have killed her!"

All the frustration thrown out now, I felt strangely empty and hollow, like a balloon that had just lost all the air inside. I gasped, taking quick shallow breaths, as if I had just run a marathon, trying desperately to fill the emptiness. Only now did I notice that Esme's grip on my arm had tightened again. She probably feared that I would lung for my brother's throat or do something else, equally reckless, any second.

"But you did stop," Edward eventually said when my breathing had mostly returned to normal. His voice was soft but nonetheless serious. "When Jacob and Seth arrived, you deliberately inhaled their wolf scent in order to control yourself."

I didn't have a response on that. He was right, after all. I did try to distract myself with the terrible wolf stench. But that didn't change what I had done afterwards. That I had tried to get back to the blood; that I had fought my friends and brothers; that I had snapped at them, even tried to bite them!

Edward shook his head, as if all that were not important. "You did stop," he repeated slowly, his voice still quiet but earnest. "You stopped, because you love her enough to remember who you are."

His words echoed in my head, mingling with all the other words that had been said during the last few weeks and months. First they came one by one, so I could still understand them, but then the interval quickened, causing the phrases to fuse and melt into each other, making it impossible to tell where one sentence ended and where the next started. It sounded like the mindless chatter in the audience before the curtain rose.

I didn't know how long we had been standing there in the shadow of the trees, barely in sight of the house. At some point Jacob joined us, without Seth who had run off to find his Chloe. I wondered where, and more importantly how she was. What was she thinking about me now, after almost killing her dear friend? Was she angry? Disappointed? Scared? Disgusted? In a way, Chloe's opinion was the most important to me, for I saw her as my little sister. The idea of belying her faith in me was worse than dying ten torturous deaths.

"Sorry, for the punch," Jake grunted instead of a greeting, pulling me out of my miserable thoughts.

"Sorry, for the snapping," I replied absentmindedly, though still gaining a satisfied grin in return.

"Nah, anytime, as long as I'm allowed to beat you in return. Deal?" he offered.

You wish. "I'll think about it."

After that he walked a few steps further toward the house –still laughing quietly under his breath– and settled at the feet of a tree, leaning against its trunk. Ready to bolt in either direction when necessary.

Time seemed to have stopped when the four of us waited in the darkness of the woods. I wasn't even quite sure what we were waiting for. For a movement or some noise at the house, or for one of our siblings returning from their errands, for the sound of an angelic voice, or for the smell of fresh human blood? I didn't know. I just didn't know.

After what seemed like countless hours, the front door opened and Carlisle stepped out. Only then, when his blond hair reflected the first rays of sunlight, did I notice that dawn had already approached, ending this terrible night.

My first instinct was to run toward him and shake all the answers I wanted right out of him, but Edward, Esme and Jacob stopped me efficiently by slowly escorting me toward the house.

"She is stabile now," Carlisle spoke in his soft patient voice, lifting some of the weight off my shoulders. "She lost quite an amount of blood, but the transfusion went well. She is still unconscious though, due to the narcotics and perhaps also because of shock." He paused, gauging my expression, debating whether he should tell me more nor not. With a short nod from Edward, he finally decided to give me the last piece of information. "She is upstairs in Esme's and my room," he said, and stepped aside to let me into the house.

I didn't even wait for Jacob's hand to completely lift off my shoulder. I bolted through the door, up the stairs, down the hall, and-

Stopped.

The door to Carlisle's and Esme's bedroom stood ajar; a thin line of golden sunlight peeked through the gap and enlightened the otherwise dark hallway. Suddenly hesitant I took the last few steps slowly, cautiously. Just like all the teenagers did in those horror movies, sneaking to the door to check if the crazy guy with the chainsaw was still behind them. It was ridiculous. The chainsaw freak was always there, waiting for them, ready to strike.

But this was no horror movie, and there was nothing dangerous behind that door. Just Chime.

Okay, maybe not entirely harmless, my brain thought, hiding its fear with sarcasm.

It's just Chime, my heart replied softly, urging me on.

Maybe I should wait, ask Carlisle or Edward for support … just in case if anything happens, my brain tried to reason.

It's just Chime, my heart reminded me again. Just Chime.

Exactly, my brain returned bitterly. What if there's too much blood? What if I hurt her again? What if I won't stop this time? What if I am not ready for this yet?

But this is Chime, my heart only chanted back, coaxing my feet to close the last bit of distance. Just Chime.

Chime.

Chime.

Chime.

My hand lifted to touch the door frame, my fingertips barely brushing the smooth wood. Then I stepped into the stripe of sunlight, my eyes blinking a few times against the brightness to adjust. Through the crack, I could see one of the floor length French windows that covered the entire eastern wall of the room. It was opened slightly to let in fresh air; the white satin curtains billowed softly in the cool morning breeze. An old antique set of cupboards covered the wall to the left with dark walnut, decorated with little china vases and figures. At its feet lay a simple white rug, its long soft hair almost glowing in the sunlight.

Nudging the door further open, I could see the end of the bed. The simple orange and brown striped blanket lay flatly on the snow white sheets. Following the bed, the blanket eventually began to softly lift and dip, covering long legs and narrow hips. One arm lay on top of the blanket, a needle was plugged into the wrist, connecting it to the IV. The arm looked ghostly pale against the warm colors of the blanket and seemed sickly thin. After opening the door completely, I could see that her neck and face were equally pale and slim. The skin at her cheeks sunken, leaving me to wonder when her last proper meal had been. Her long black lashes looked like cracks against her deep eye circles, the thin blue veins scarily visible on her closed lids, coloring them blue with exhaustion. Her raven black hair was pulled back into a messy bun on top of her head –Carlisle probably did that to examine her better–, but still it was visibly less shiny than usual. Next to the bed stood a metal cart with a few machines on it, buzzing and peeping in strict time.

Finally, my eyes fell upon her stomach, watching it fall and rise slowly with each breath she took. It was the only comfort in this room. The only thing that kept me sane at the moment.

Without removing my gaze, I walked into the room and leaned against the wall, next to the machines. I just stood there, frozen to a statue, watching her breathe and listening to her heart beat.

And I waited.

Guess what? -I'm still around!

I just saw that the last chapter was updated March, 27th ... that's ... um ... a long time ago ...

I AM SOOO SORRY! .

I started this chapter ... omg, I can't even remember when I started it! xD But I still remember when I finished it: it was today, around 2pm, at work xD It was great because I could print it out immediately for editing - I should do that more often *laugh* (just don't tell my boss xD)

I'm really looking forward to the next chapter! If everything goes as I planned, you will learn the whole truth about Chime Winds! (don't get your hopes too high, we all know how the story sometimes just goes rampage on me xD)

So, 'till the next time and don't forget to review - they always encourage (and remind xD) me to continue writing!

-Mulan-