When it all goes down *down*
Whose gonna be the last one standing
When it all goes down *down*
Ask yourself will I still be around
When it all goes DOWN
Whose gonna be the last one standing
When it all goes DOWN
Ask yourself will...Stand Up!
- Stand Up, Neverset (just an awesome battle song)
Bpov
I turned around to face Edward and Rosalie, "I have a plan," I told them. They both stared at me expecting me to continue on with it, "Carlisle and Emmett should be here." Rosalie nodded and flickered out of the room. Edward stepped towards me and ran his hands down my arms.
"Are you ok?" he asked, tilting his head to the side slightly.
"No," I answered honestly, "I will be once we save Alice and Jasper though." Edward smiled slightly, and I looked at him questioning the sudden smile. "What?"
"You included Jasper, I expected you to just say Alice." He explained pulling me closer to him so my head was resting against his chest.
"I'm worried about both of them Edward. Neither of them deserves to be hurt because of me."
"And they won't be, love. We will save them, everything will work out. I won't let anything happen to them." He ran his hand comfortingly across my back. He held me like that until Rosalie flickered back into the room with Carlisle and Emmett. "You ready to tell us what you are thinking?" he asked softly. I raised my head from his chest and pushed myself away from his embrace, though I did feel safer and more confident there.
I turned to face everyone. They were all staring at me encouragingly; it was as if they knew I just needed a little faith in myself to find the answer. "I…I think I have somewhat of a plan, but if you have a better idea or something to add feel free to jump in at any time ok?" Everyone nodded signaling me to continue, "Ok, clearly with Jasper and Alice he now has bait. He hasn't come after us at all even though we have been using our powers all day and I am sure even if Jake didn't tell him that we are all working together he figured something out with the fact that Alice went willingly with Jasper." Everyone looked confused that I was just stating the obvious, "My plan is to take the bait."
Before I could continue to explain everyone was shouting at me at once. I couldn't hear any voices clearly, I think I caught the words "insane," "what are you thinking," "stupid," and "ridiculous."
Carlisle held out his hands to quiet the room so he could speak on his own, "Isabella, I believe we have been over this numerous times when Alice was here to inform you that by doing something like that we would get a result that could be very detrimental. I would like you to seriously reconsider."
"Well," I started, "I would like you, all of you to let me finish explaining my plan before you jump down my throat about it." None of them looked convinced that by listening to me they would agree anymore than they did at that instant but they shut their mouths and looked warily at me as I continued on explaining my plan to them.
"Like I was saying, my plan is to take the bait. Show up and start just making a scene, maybe cut my hand or something just in case he doesn't recognize the powers, he will at least know the scent. But you will all be there. Carlisle, I am thinking that you can change everyone's appearance to look exactly like me so he has no idea which one is which. To confuse him more I can keep changing what he is seeing, where he is and even increase the number of me's he is seeing. We have to convince him that I will hand myself over to him if I know where Alice and Jasper are. Once we know that, we attack him. The only way to kill him is fire and ripping him apart. The problem tends to lie in the fact that, well, he is strong, his skin is like rock and no one wants to attempt to get close to him because he can bite you and a. steal your powers and b. drink your blood." I took a deep breath, "Luckily I am pretty sure he only wants my blood and even though everyone will look like me he doesn't really want to just kill me and be done with it. He wants to 'savor' me" I made air quotes with my fingers as everyone in the room flinched, "to do so he needs to capture me and make sure he has the right me so he will use his sense of smell. If he gets too close to any one of you I will make him see nothing and you run, blink, flicker, fly or I will throw you out of the way. Em, I think you and I should be strong enough to do damage to him everyone else work on starting a fire somehow. DON'T do it until we know where they are. Edward, if he thinks it let us know. Please just try and leave most of it to me though, I would much rather he attack me than any of you. Especially since it is my stupid idea…" I trailed off.
I knew it was a lot of information but they seemed to have been following me so I continued talking letting my thoughts pour until my brain was empty. Emmett was the first to speak, "Sounds good except I am not letting you have all the fun, I am going to get at him every chance I get. Also, you shouldn't have an open wound; he would automatically know which one of us was you because your smell would be more potent."
"Good point," Leave it to Emmett to catch something like that. I really didn't give him enough credit sometimes. "Any other ideas, suggestions or concerns?"
"I think we all have concerns, but I don't have any ideas. It sounds like a good plan. Everyone just be careful and look out for one another as well as themselves. We don't have Alice to freeze everything or see if one of us is in severe danger so we are going into this blind. Just please be careful." Carlisle added. Everyone nodded in agreement and started getting ready to put the plan in motion.
It took about an hour for everyone to be ready; the hardest part was changing everyone's voice to sound exactly like mine; then telling everyone apart once they all looked like me. It was really weird seeing 4 more of me, especially seeing Edward as me because he would bring his head close to mine not thinking about the fact that he now looked exactly like me and he would try to kiss me and I just couldn't, even though I knew that it was really Edward. I mean honestly, do YOU really want to make out with yourself? I think only Rosalie might say yes.
Once everyone was ready we all headed to Mount Olympus, Emmett's choice for our battle since he has always wanted to fight there and since we are choosing the scene of this 'throw down,' he wanted to chose his favorite mountain in the Olympic mountain range. Originally we had planned to start a commotion in some town but realized that we would be putting people in danger so we decided to go with Emmett's idea. Uprooting trees and throwing them against the mountain and other trees can cause quite a stir.
We got in out positions, everyone hiding while I stood in a mainly open section of the forest covered mountain. Everyone had a couple of small viles of my blood so they could use them to deter the tracker from me if necessary. I had a couple to draw him here to begin with.
I started just playing with already fallen branches and trees, using the power that he already knew I had. I threw them forcefully against the base of the mountain. The more force, the more power being used, the stronger the scent. I broke one of the viles as I was slamming a fallen boulder against the ground shaking the ground itself. I heard crunching of some sticks behind me and an unnerving chuckle.
"Well, well, well, what do we have here?" the Tracker said smirking at me as I glared back at him. I felt a cold chill run down my spine and every instinct in my body told me to run as fast as I could as far away as possible from him, but I didn't. This wasn't about some stranger who he decided to attack, this was personal…and he was going to pay for what he was doing. I wasn't running, I was going to fight.
"Took you long enough," I said, my voice sounding surprisingly strong. I hoped that I looked as daring as I sounded.
"Well you have kept me waiting longer than I would have liked so I thought I would repay the favor." He stepped closer to me. I was now almost within reaching distance and I knew my heart was beating faster but I wouldn't let the fear take over. "And I am not stupid enough to think that you would just hand yourself over willingly, I know this is either a trap or you want something in return, either way you may find yourself disappointed." I noticed he didn't say 'you may leave disappointed'but I tried not to dwell on that.
"I am here to make a deal with you," standing as tall as I could, I noticed Emmett moving behind him, I knew it was him because of where he was standing, and immediately used my power to make the Tracker see exactly this scene but only me in front of him, no one else, just in case. Nothing would seem different…yet. "You need to tell me where my friends are, and guarantee that they are safe" he smile, "and alive."
"This doesn't sound like much of a deal to my ears, what do I get in return?"
I swallowed but he couldn't see that, the me he saw stood confidently in front of him, "You get me. Once they are back safe and sound you can have me and do whatever you want kill me drink my blood take what's left of my powers, whatever. I won't put up a fight or anything."
He smirked and stepped closer to me, I backed up but in his mind I didn't and he thought I was right in my face and I stood there trying to look confident. As long as he didn't try to touch me I should be ok. "And you brought your friends here to help you turn yourself in willingly?" He then had a confused look on his face and raised his hand to touch me, or where he thought I was. When his hand touched nothing he growled and I moved him to darkness, he could see nothing but black. "I don't like games."
I chanced standing behind him for a second, "Well, you should have thought about that before kidnapping Hourglass and Hailstorm. If you tell me where they are I will think about letting you live." I quickly pushed myself back so he couldn't grab me.
"I might not be able to see, but I can smell you, and you are going to be punished for this little stunt Swan." He inhaled deeply through his nose then turned and faced me my heart started racing as he started taking slow deliberate steps in my direction. Suddenly he stopped.
"Ouch, damn it," I heard in my own voice, and I saw myself step out from behind a group of trees, the trees Edward was supposed to hide behind. He opened a vile of blood and poured it on the ground and on the tree he was near. The Tracker turned, inhaling again and started making his way toward Edward who blinked over to where I was standing frozen in place.
He entered my mind, I can't do this, I thought, this was a mistake.
Yes you can I heard him respond in my head, you are stronger than you are giving yourself credit for, just try to stay calm, you are doing great. I took a deep breath, why don't we all come out now and confuse the crap out of him. Think about who you want out when and I will tell them. I nodded and he blinked back into his spot
"Having fun sniffing that tree?" I asked calling the Trackers attention back over to me, his head snapped back over to me, I let him see what he was supposed to again.
"That's a funny little trick you can do now," he said as he stepped closer, "I bet it tastes really good too." Rosalie I thought have her say: too bad you'll never know.
"Too bad you'll never know, that is of course, unless you tell me where my friends are," The Tracker looked from Rose to me and back and sneered. He tried smelling but clearly Rosalie had a vile of my blood open so he would smell me when he smelled in her direction also. Carlisle I thought, this would make a triangle around him.
"Unless you want to do this the hard way, and I can force it out of you, I have picked up a few new…talents since I last saw you." Carlisle picked up a branch and made it burst into flames while staring straight at the Tracker. Way to Go Carlisle, who knew he could be so intimidating, who knew he could even do that? The Tracker flinched a little but overall did not seem to be phased, he seemed to be studying the three of us deciding which of us was the real me and which were illusions. He seemed to be spending a lot of time studying Rosalie, maybe she seemed most convincing…or least.
"What's wrong? Is all this a little too much for you to handle? Not sure what to do?" Emmett stepped out without me requesting him to, "It can end now if you just tell me where they are." The look he gave the Tracker was a challenging one, he was daring him to make a move, Emmett was tired of waiting, he wanted to fight.
Edward was the only one still hidden, so I told him through my thoughts that he might as well come out, "What, nothing to say? Swan got your tongue?" Edward asked stepping out from behind the tree; the confused look melted away from the Tracker's face and was replaced by a satisfied smirk.
"Now you," he said pointing toward Edward, "are not her, you should have really stopped the mind reading before you showed yourself, that power is distinctly yours…it had a very distinct smell." The Tracker lunged at Edward and I picked Edward up and altered the Tracker's vision so he wouldn't notice that he had moved.
Edward blinked to my side though the Tracker still saw him standing in his spot, smiling at him, he ran right through him into the hard rock that made up the mountain. Emmett flew above the Tracker, "seems like your aim is a bit off," he taunted then flipped himself around kicking the Tracker in the face hard sending him back hard against the rock.
"Mastermind and the Protector…" the Tracker mumbled. Rosalie glared at him and he flinched but not much before lunging in her direction, "Surprised to find you here Black Rose, I don't see how this is benefitting you."
Emmett was about to lunge at him, "Stop!" I yelled, and he froze in his tracks looking at me, "he is trying to get us to reveal ourselves so he knows which is the real Golden Swan so knows who he can kill and who to take for later."
The Tracker looked at me curiously, "hmm…your speech would hint that you could sense my actions or thoughts except miss Hourglass is in an undisclosed location and Mastermind is right there," he pointed to Edward, why was he still using his power? "That leaves X-Ray or the Golden Swan…" he stared at me for another second. "I'll take my chances." He sprung at me but Emmett took off at the same time colliding with him in mid air from behind tackling him to the ground. When he tried to get away the Tracker held him back twisting his leg, successfully snapping a bone. I looked at Carlisle who was already concentrating on the wound, I jumped into the pile grasping at the Trackers hair and throwing him across the wooded area taking out a few trees before he finally collided with a sharp pile of rock as Carlisle healed Emmett.
I put the Tracker back into darkness as he headed back towards us, "Where are they?" I yelled as I picked him up with my powers and slammed him down against the hard ground. He just laughed.
I decided to change my tactic, I mentally told Edward to start a fire, he wanted to argue but I just focused on the Tracker, I changed his location, I placed him in our location but all of us were around him holding burning branches like Carlisle had earlier and I was standing at the same distance I was now. "Tell me where they are, I am not playing this game anymore."
The Tracker smiled, "This would be very intimidating, if it were real…" I was growing impatient, and worried that Alice and Jasper were not ok, he had not given any signs that they were even alive. I noticed from the corner of my eye that Carlisle had started a fire and I used my power to throw that branch at the Tracker. He screamed, "real enough for you?" I asked standing over him, "Tell me where they are! I am not asking you again!" I yelled.
The Tracker grabbed me and wrestled me to the ground. I fought back and Emmett came over to help try and get him off of me. He scratched his nails into my skin and rammed me against the mountain I had thrown him against earlier. Some of the others were coming over but I yelled at them not to. The Tracker pushed Emmett too hard that he hit his head and was knocked unconscious. I had my hands at his throat keeping his face away from me when I remembered my power I got from Rosalie and I shocked him full force. To my relief he fell to the ground releasing his grip on me.
When I looked over at Emmett I saw that he was bleeding and in bad shape I lost my temper. I started kicking and beating the Tracker using my power to move objects to try and rip his limbs off, I managed to get part of his leg ripped open before Carlisle came and stopped me reminding me that we needed information out of him still. He had turned back into himself feeling no need for the illusion of being me since the Tracker had caught on.
I was watching Carlisle heal Emmett when Edward shouted my name; before I could react I was grabbed from behind. Pale cold arms were holding me tightly and he was breathing deeply into my neck. He his fingers into my sides picking me up, crushing my ribs then took off running, leaving my family far behind.
We stopped in the middle of nowhere, and he didn't let go of me, "you want to know where your friends are? I might as well tell you so you can feel that last bit of uselessness before I kill you." He brought his mouth close to my left ear, "you should have looked in the cave Hailstorm delivered you to me in, they have been there the whole time, and will be out of oxygen soon, thanks to you." A tear rolled down my face and he forcefully brought his teeth down into my neck, I cried out in pain…it felt worse than before…maybe it was knowing that I should have been able to save them…
I heard a growl and we were both knocked forward. I fell to the ground feeling weak and the Tracker tumbled with the attacker. I managed to push myself up to see who it was, I couldn't make out a clear form but I knew that fur…that reddish-brown fur. I forced myself to my feet and wobbly made myself move toward the fight, Jacob however kicked me away when I got too close. I noticed that he was doing some damage to the Tracker biting and ripping his skin off with his claws. If Jake wasn't going to let me fight maybe I could start a fire, I hoped I still had some power left and I focused on making lightening, it worked! It struck a tree and lit. I immediately stopped the storm and made it dry out. I then heard a sound that stopped my heart.
I heard a cry of pain come from Jacob and he fell to the ground, the Tracker came at me slowly but I was so weak that he could have been walking backwards and still caught me, he sunk his teeth into me again and I was almost willing to give in when my eyes fell on Jacob, he had phased back to his human form and I saw his chest rise and fall…he was still alive. I used all of the strength in my body to push the Tracker away and throw him into the fire and hold him there, screaming.
I collapsed to the ground and was trying to pull myself over to Jake when Edward and Carlisle blinked in front of me. They tried to help me but I refused, making them go to Jacob, he was hurt, he needed help. I laid there trying to figure out how he even got here, why he wasn't in the hospital where I put him when I looked up at Carlisle who was just staring at Jacob, not healing him. Carlisle looked up from Jake's still form, his sorrow filled eyes meeting mine and I knew my answer even before he slowly shook his head, "he's gone."
I shook my head, unwilling to accept this. I had seen his chest rise, I saw it! "No, no, he was breathing, he saved me, he…he has to be ok." I argued, unable to control the tears pouring out of my eyes, "What was he doing here? Why was he out of the hospital?!" I yelled, "Carlisle you have to fix him, he can't be gone, he…he's my best friend…we...please…just…you have to…." Edward pulled me into his arms but I refused him.
Carlisle left Jacob's side and came to mine to try and heal the wound in my neck that was bleeding badly, I could feel myself getting weaker every second but I didn't care…I should be gone… not Jacob. I pushed Carlisle away, "We have to go get Alice and Jasper before they die." I said staring at Jacob. I didn't want him to have saved me just to let me let Alice and Jasper shortly follow after, I am already feeling hollow just hearing that Jacob isn't going to wake up, I can't handle knowing that Alice isn't going to come home either. I didn't want to leave Jake but maybe if I left for a little I could pretend he was just being treated or in the hospital still…oh God…the last time we spoke…I can't think of that now.
"Let Carlisle fix you and we will get them," Edward reasoned.
"No," I said sternly "We are going now, I thought of the cave and grabbed onto his arm."
Edward was hesitant but he blinked us to the cave and we moved the boulder s trapping them inside and ran in. Jasper looked scared but was relieved when he saw it was us, I was so happy to see he was still alive that I literally threw my arms around his neck and hugged him as Edward untied him, "I never thought I would be happy to see you." I admitted sniffling back the tears that were threatening to fall. "Where is Alice?"
"Behind the wall," he said motioning to the huge wall of boulders that separated us from Alice. I pulled at the wall but it didn't budge.
"Back up," I told them. Edward warned me to be careful but I didn't pay any attention. It was my job to save her, I couldn't save one of my best friends, and I had to save this one. I used all my strength to pull on the wall and it came crashing down on top of me pushing more blood out from where the Tracker bit me and trapping me underneath. Everything started going fuzzy and sounded really far away.
"Bella!" I heard in Alice's voice from a mile away, "oh my God, Edward go get Emmett and Carlisle, we have to get her out of here! Quick!"
Alice was ok. That's all I needed to know and I slipped into the darkness…
A/N: This chapter is FINALLY posted. Sorry it took longer than intended. First I was moving then Fanfiction screwed up then as I was re-reading it a little it was just sounding a little ehh if that makes any sense...I don't know if I am 100% happy but if you like it (which I hope you do) then I will be happy.
I will admit, unashamed that I cried openly about Jacob so if you did, I am sorry to make you cry...
umm..so yeah..one chapter left? jeezz scary... I am really sad about that, I am going to miss you guys! (I had to leave a cliffy just to please all of you since it was the last time i could do it...though i could end the whole story in a cliffy couldnt i?..hmmm... ha ha)
any predictions? Comments? Questions? Hatred? Suggestions? Love?
would love to hear from you in the form of a review!