Title: The Day The Earth Stood Still
Author: Sare Liz
Disclaimer: The Twilight Saga belongs to Stephenie Meyer.
Continuity: Midnight Sun, RPOV, Canon pairings, Canon ontology, AU.
Rating: M.

Book Two: One More Year 'Til Forever
Chapter 3: Cinderella Awake
Beta: Colleen P., purveyor of Awesome Bitchcraft. Yes.
Author's Note: Hello. ::wiggles fingers in greeting:: I hope you enjoy the chapter. Know that there's a discussion forum on Twilighted (see my profile for the addy), and that there are outtakes to this story that you can also find on my profile page. Peace, and enjoy...

The modifications for the Tesla were coming along on schedule, but they didn't hold my attention like I had hoped. I kept on thinking about the kid, wondering if he was alright. I did a Google search on the Quileute werewolf/shape-shifter legends, but found nothing more informative than campfire stories. It had been a long shot at best. I didn't really think they'd let vital information like that leak so blatantly. I rang B one night, carefully timed with the aid of Alice to avoid Edward's notice, just to see if she could shed any light at all on the process of first transformation the Quileutes go through, but that was a dead end as well.

It was without grace or patience that I waited.

The first thirty seven and three quarters hours were filled with horrific what-if scenarios. What if he was forbidden to see us again? What if his basic personality was changed? What if he couldn't stand to be around us, on some sort of molecular level? What if, as a newborn, he wouldn't be able to be around us, even if he wanted to? What if I had irreparably broken the treaty and we were forced to move, never being able to return to the Olympic Peninsula? What if they were biding their time until more changed before they attacked? What if more were changing right now? Each situation was entirely plausible and came with a full set of details and implications. Most of the details were grisly. Few of the implications were lovely.

Emmett helped to redirect me.

After that my thoughts were consumed with memory. I remember the day in early May that he stomped into the garage, all arms and legs and puppy-dog ferocity. He accidentally knocked over a tray of tools and the clatter seemed to satisfy his rage and burn it out all at once. What followed was shame and embarrassment.

"Gosh, I'm sorry Rosalie," he mumbled as he retrieved tools on his hands and knees.

"Have another argument with Billy?"

His affirmative answer was murmured, but clear. So was his sotto opinion of his father's views on whatever subject in question.

"What was it this time?" As if I didn't know. But I said it because he was a boy, not libel to pick up on subtle cues and consistently insecure when it came to disagreeing with his father.

The boy snorted indelicately and sat back on his heels. As he spoke, his hands gestured wildly. He was like that sometimes, when he was upset. The wrench in his hand came awfully close to the Vanquish's paint job, but that could be patched up much easier than little boys could.

"He wants me to warn Bella off from Edward. Again. He says that the tribe is watching. But it's not like there have been any wolves in, like, three generations. I mean, what is he going to do, sneak up on you during the daylight that doesn't confine you, during sleep you don't take, in the coffin you don't have to try to shove a wooden stake through skin it can't pass? I mean come on!"

The boy had built up quite a head of steam. I just let him go off.

"And I mean, isn't there a treaty? Isn't that so we can both live peaceably? I mean, you guys let me come over here all the time, and you don't consider it an infringement of the treaty. And you guys are really cool. You're totally pro-human. We're pro-human. And, I mean, Dr. Cullen's like, saving people and shit every day."

"Language."

"Right. Sorry. But he is, right? But no, Dad doesn't care. Thinks I've been talking to Bella's dad too much - apparently he's very pro-Cullen, too. They got into a big fight when you guys first moved in, because Dad and the council decided that we shouldn't go to that hospital anymore, which is just, you know, like totally ridiculous. It's the closest one, outside of our pathetic clinic on the rez. But nooooo... The world's gonna end if it's a mythical cold one who sets my broken bone, right? Or not even, because he's not even the only doctor in the hospital - I mean, it's not that tiny. And he doesn't work all the time. What does he give off that they're so worried about? Cooties? Does he have cooties? Are we worried about vampire cooties, now?

"Rosalie, tell me straight. Do you have cooties?"

"No."

"See? See? Exactly. I ask a direct question, I get a direct answer, we move on. It works with vampire elders. It so does not work with Quileute elders. And Bella and Edward - I mean, come on. Give me a break. You'd have to be blind or an idiot to look at them and imagine that that guy would ever, but ever let anything bad happen to her if he could in any way, shape, or form stop it. I mean, come on. I mean, the two of them together - they're just... two... big... kooky... doofuses. They are like, stupid in love."

"Do you know the terms of the treaty, child?"

The kid nodded his head in jerky motions. "It's part of our songs. I've heard it lots of times; more often now, though."

"Then you know that the treaty is contingent - among other things - on our family not biting any human being. Not simply killing them. We could, by the strictest interpretation of the treaty, kill someone. But we cannot bite them."

The kid stared at me. I could tell he wasn't following along. I briefly debated how much to say.

The child would be on the council one day. He is in the patrilineal line to be an important elder, if not the chief of the tribe, but that would not be for years to come yet. He would have no political pull until he was forty, at least, but there was time to build better relations until then.

I decided.

"There is only one reason that one of our kind would bite a human, if not for food, resulting in the human's death. Can't you guess what it is?"

"Is that... how you..." I watched as he gestured is the same hand that still held the wrench.

I nodded. "It's hard. Very hard. Few have the control to do it. Carlisle does. Obviously. But then, so does Edward." I let that sink in for a moment. "He looks the youngest, and he was turned the youngest, but he's the oldest of Carlisle's children, and the strongest in many ways. Jasper is seventy years older, but has no where near his control."

The kid was looking at the wrench in his hands.

"You mean... Edward's gonna... bite... Bella?" He was whispering, but I don't think he meant to be.

"Not without her permission. But then, she's already given it."

"Seriously?" he whispered.

I nodded.

"What happens if a vampire loses their mate?" he asked, and clearly his mind was now working along the lines I had hoped it would.

"I've heard it's like having half of your soul, half of your body ripped away. Not many survive it."

"Do they just... die?"

"No. Left to our own ends, we won't die. They go mad and are killed, or simply go and seek out death. Suicide, in our case, means having someone take pity on you - to rip you up and burn the pieces."

"So if Bella stayed human and died, or if something happened to Bella..."

"It would kill Edward."

"Whoa."

I said nothing.

"And... she's... really okay with this?"

"She says she is. It won't happen for a little while, yet. There are other things to be considered. She has another year - or more - as is."

"That would totally break the treaty, huh?"

"So long as the treaty remains unaltered, yes."

"Well, good luck with that." He sighed. "Ugh. It's just so... shit!"

"Language."

"Sorry."

"Continue."

"I mean... he wants me to crash your prom. I know it's coming up. He'll buy me a ticket and give me twenty bucks towards parts, all so I can tell Bella to stay away from Edward. And to tell her that we're apparently stalking her, now. Totally stupid."

I was smiling, now, because I had the most perfect solution for the kid. I heard Alice from inside the house call to me, "I'm on it!"

"Well. If your father insists you attend our prom, I think you ought to. No harm in that. And you can deliver your message to Bella, for all that we know she won't be heeding it, neither will she hold it against you. Before you leave tonight, let's get you measured for a tux."

And he was measured. And an hour before the gentlemen were due to pick up the ladies at the Swan residence, per orders Jacob arrived wearing the one dress shirt he owned. He'd already taken a shower, but was forced to take another one and wash his hair with something that I had picked out for him. Edward helped him to dry his hair - not something that had happened to him since his sisters left town, and he rode with Emmett in the Tesla to collect us all. It was all perfectly on schedule. He stayed in the car - we didn't want further complications with Charlie Swan, but when we finally stepped out of the car at the school, I surveyed the handiwork Alice and I had wrought.

He was a very handsome boy. He might turn out to be a very handsome man.

I took the single yellow rose, still tightly in bud that was stowed in the glove compartment. I opened the plastic container and put it gently on the seat. Tugging him closer by his lapel, I pinned the flower to him.

With the love of my life and the child of my heart one on each arm, we entered the school and made our way to the gymnasium.

I danced the first dance with the kid. We had practiced the basic form of the waltz in the garage, but he was nervous.

I smiled at him as we danced around the room, fully aware of the attention all of our family was receiving, but particularly the kid and I. "Alice wants the next dance, then Bella the third. You can let her know that the elders are irked with her choice of mate, and then you can both laugh about it."

He nodded and blushed, his eyes not meeting mine.

"Jacob," I called to him quietly. I had his attention, then. "After that, I want you to square your shoulders, smile that quirky, lovely smile you have when you think you've one-upped me in the world of car maintenance, and pick out any girl in this room that you want to dance with. I promise you, they'd have to be already stupid in love with someone else to say no to you. Alright?" I asked, quoting him in how he'd referenced Bella and Edward's relationship.

He nodded, grinning, blush still firmly in place.

"If you're a good boy and dance and have fun, I'll give you the keys to my baby at the end of the night, and you can drive it back to the house, or... drive some girl home, if you need to."

I could tell he was on the fence of embarrassment and stunned awe at the prospect. I don't think the irony of the situation had dawned on him quite yet - I was using the same tactics as his father. But hey, if it works, it works.

He'd driven the Tesla home that night while Emmett and I ran. The sweet boy had driven a girl home, but he wouldn't tell me who, and I didn't hear anything about her after that time. I'd identified her by scent a few weeks later - she was mousy and quiet, not bad to look at, but nothing spectacular. She didn't look like the type to date in high school. It was never brought up again.

Beyond that, there had been no drama. He had been arguing with his father more frequently throughout the summer, but not because the Elder Black had realized with whom he'd been associating so frequently. Apparently, his father believed that all this time was being spent with Bella, and seemed to approve of that. Even Charlie Swan, who otherwise seemed like a human for whom integrity was most important, even he covered for the kid, so much did he approve of our family and disapprove of the seemingly irrational tribal prejudice against us.

I liked Charlie Swan. I wondered what kind of car he might like to drive when he retired. When it happened, I would take care of it.

I would do it, whether or not we were still in the Olympic Peninsula at that point. He was a sweet man, and I had the feeling that his life was going to be entwined with ours until he was buried in the ground.

It made me wish I was a better fighter, really. That's the problem with adding people to your life - you then want to protect them. Not from everything, mind. Not from the weather, or old age, or the slings and arrows of this life... but being associated, even peripherally, with our family meant dipping your toes into an ocean that had all manner of predator in it. And perhaps the sharks were far off the coast when you dip your toes in. And perhaps they're not.

None of us really knew what the future held, not even Alice for all of her talent, or Edward for his insight. There were things that did, in fact, go bump in the night. The shifters here were pro-human, as the kid liked to say, but not everything in this world that was sentient and not-entirely-human was. I never really cared much about nomads, or the Volturi, or real werewolves, or other shifters, or any manner of the fae that flitted in and out of the periphery of our world. I toed the line, I never did anything wrong, I minded my own business and lived my own life without bothering anyone else, and I belonged to a powerful family who all similarly toed the line.

Except we weren't toeing the line just at present.

The Volturi, so I've been told, thrive on this sort of paranoia for us to self-regulate. But then, I'd also heard they weren't the most altruistic or unbiased judges, however much they also served as jury and executioners.

It would have been easy to lay this blame firmly on Edward's shoulders. He was the one who fell in love with a human, then refused to turn her immediately. Not that I was complaining about that, but it did necessitate him breaking rule number one. Technically speaking, I could point my finger at Edward, but you know what they say about pointing fingers - three more are pointing back in your own direction every time you do.

Which brought me back to the kid.

Edward, at least, was excusable. You fall in love with the person you fall in love with. It was obvious that they were mates now, and they both had a clear plan to turn her in the way and time that would make the least amount of fuss and ripples in the pond in which we dwelt. Surely the Volturi could have no problem with that. We were absolutely preserving the secret in more ways than one with that scenario.

But what would they make of the Treaty that Carlisle had made not so long ago? Did they even know of the existence of the Quileute shifters? Surely not, and surely they knew nothing about their unique ability to hunt vampires. That would not be information that would go down well in Volterra. I can't see Aro sitting back on his hands once he knew about that.

And here I had adopted one.

Who was now one. Of them. A shifter. A wolf.

Hell, I needed to hone my fighting skills. Jasper would be my best bet. I could never fight like Emmett - his style would be useless for me as I could never boast the sort of strength my love had. Edward wouldn't be helpful either, even if he were available for training, as his style was based on the fact that he could tell what you were about to do the instant before you did it. Jasper used his talent to some extent when fighting, but he also had the raw skills aside from anything else. And he was used to training vampires in the art of warfare.

I was glad they were back, even for a few weeks. Unlike Alice, he wasn't consumed in any current projects. In fact, Jasper had been the odd man out this past week - now that Emmett had found his new calling as chef, seven of the eight of us were waist deep in work and projects and newfound love.

I spent the rest of the week waiting for the kid training with Jasper. For seventy-two hours going at top speed I had a crash course in the art of war. We never got much beyond theory, but I wanted a thorough education, which most certainly included the theory. Strategy and tactics certainly changed depending on your enemy, their ontology, age, experience, talents, numbers, and weapons at their disposal.

Jasper was certainly well-versed in the art of war.

He'd had first hand experience of human vs. human war in bygone days, and of vampire vs. vampire guerilla warfare. He knew how to train, subdue, lead, conquer and decimate a legion of newborns. He'd fought older, wiser vampires with various talents. He'd strategized, directed, and implemented the downfall of entire covens on their own territory. There was a reason there were no one but nomads left in the south of the States, no matter what Anne Rice liked to say, and it was due in no small part to Jasper Whitlock.

He'd killed an actual werewolf in Paraguay, not just a shifter, and he'd had a run in with human military soldiers in El Salvador. He'd saved a village that day. He cited it as his one selfless act, pre-Alice.

He even gave me the theory of war against the fae, and though I doubted the naiads were going to rise up in revolt against the vampires and shifters of the Pacific Northwest - you never knew. I listened. I drank it all in, absorbing it all, aware of Emmett flitting in and out, joining us occasionally.

I would have three more weeks of training time before the wedding in Vegas, after which Jasper and Alice would return to their South American search, for which they both had very high hopes. I was attempting to remain neutral - I really didn't want to get my hopes up that Bella and Edward would have a child, regardless of visions. Mostly I took this track because if it didn't happen, I'd be devastated, and I knew myself well enough to know it.

I had my hands full right now anyway. Jacob. Charlie Swan. The sleepy little town of Forks. The Quileute Tribe. All of these things meant something to me now, something they never did before. In general I valued non-violence over violence, but I also knew well enough to realize that if someone, some vampire, some self-righteous, egotistical, power-hungry vampire was going to threaten the people I cherished, well... then that would happen. I couldn't stop it. But they would have to take me, first.

I had no talent to speak of. I had beauty, and bitterness, a family who humored me, a hobby I enjoyed, a mate I adored, and a human-cum-shape-shifter upon whom I doted. I had nothing that would recommend me to this course of action, except, perhaps a long-dormant mothering instinct to protect and common sense enough to see the writing on the wall.

So I studied the art of war, and I waited.

End A/N: "Now, Cinderella don't you go to sleep; it's such a bitter form of refuge. Don't you know the kingdom's under siege and everybody needs you?" -The Killers, "A Dustland Fairytale" ...An excellent pair of lines from an excellent song that is most certainly added to my DESS playlist. What about you? What inspires you?

Have you heard? There's more to read! Go check out my wonderful original fiction, on sale at amazon author / sarelizgordy Thanks! You rock! (No, really. You do.)