Chapter Fifty
Jasper
I wanted to kill them for dragging me out but as I went I felt Bella's emotions, she was trying to tell me that she loved me. It was her idea to have our friends ready if I couldn't take any more. She'd probably known I would break down before this was through but I still fought for my freedom, for the ability to go back into that room if I chose to. They wrestled me out into the garden and across to the trees only stopping when we were out of sight and hearing of the house and Bella.
"If you promise not to try anything we'll let you go, Major, no one wants to hurt you."
"Actually, Darius I do, I'd like to break a few limbs if it's all the same to you."
We all looked at Garrett who was cradling a hand leaking venom to the ground and I vaguely remembered snapping at a flailing hand and feeling my teeth sink through a digit or two.
I nodded unhappily and their grip lessened but I knew they were ready should I try something so instead I sank to the ground. I was away from my mate who was suffering, possibly even dying and there was nothing I could do to help. My attitude and reaction had if anything made matters worse as I disrupted Carlisle's treatment of Bella, therefore possibly endangering her life even more. I felt wretched, a fool, but no one said anything in criticism of my actions in fact Emmett came to sit down at my side.
"I don't know how you stood it, Bella going through all that, it would have sent me crazy thinking of what they were doing to her even if I knew it was for her own good."
"But it's not for her own good Em, it's for mine. She's doing it all for me, so she can be a real wife to me."
"Ah, Major, I think we might be doing it for both of you really. I think Bella's as keen to be with you as you are to be with her."
Darius was right of course but it suited me better to think she was going through all the pain for me, unselfishly.
"Well, I'd be going crazy if she were my mate and I couldn't get her into bed for a tumble. She's rather delicious, or she was before they started pumping her full of that fish shit."
I saw red and threw myself on Garrett, more as a way of relieving the tension and guilt I felt than at his words. The others left us to work it out by ourselves which we did eventually and I felt a lot calmer although I had a nasty bite on one shoulder and a finger that needed fusing back on. Garrett, however, had come off worse, he was missing an entire hand and three fingers off the other. Emmett went off with him to locate them while Darius and Peter sat down with me.
"You finished fucking about now? Acting like an ass hole is not helping Bella, she's gonna need you more than ever when she gets over this. I reckon the girl will need a long holiday somewhere peaceful…...with a huge fucking bed."
Peter's grin that accompanied the final part of that statement made me smile momentarily,
"I think you're right Peter, I should be thinking positively, just like her."
"Yep, so get your head outta your butt and fucking do it."
His words had me thinking but Bella's thin white face kept intruding on my thoughts and I slipped into a silent reverie surrounded by my friends all willing things to go well for Bella and for me.
Rose
Time seemed to slow and the room seemed to shrink until Bella's bed filled it, the only important thing in the world to us was her survival. She was fighting, every now and then she would twitch and open unseeing eyes. The only sounds the hiss of the respirator and the sound of the suction machine clearing her airways of mucus and bile. How could she possibly recover from this? She was no more than a slip of a thing worn down by weeks of fighting the radiation we had bombarded her with and the drugs we had been pumping into her. Now her organs were failing, the heart monitor showed this only too well in the thin line that snaked less, getting closer and closer to a flat line. Her lungs no longer worked and even the convulsions that had racked her body almost continually had slowed as if her brain was too tired to spark any longer.
Esme put her head around the door and the room expanded so we became aware of the outside world.
"How is she Carlisle?"
We didn't need to answer in words, expressions were enough,
"I think you'd better get Jasper quickly, he'd want to be with her and I'm afraid we are in danger of losing her Esme."
Esme gasped in horror and disappeared while Carlisle picked up a hypodermic and hunting for a vein took some blood.
"Why bother Carlisle? It hasn't worked, you can see that. Do you want to know how close we came? It won't matter to anyone, just that we didn't succeed, that she didn't make it."
Carlisle put the hypodermic down and turned me until I was looking straight into his face.
"Rosalie, there is one thing I have learned over the centuries, one important lesson. The situation is never hopeless until a patient dies and anyone who can't understand that should not be in medicine. Bella is still alive and until her body gives up the fight I certainly will not, to do so would be a dereliction of duty and would be letting down my patient, a patient who put her trust in my hands."
His words made me feel suddenly very small, a traitor to Bella, my sister, and my friend. With a nod and quiet apology, I went back to holding her hand and wiping her sweaty face with a cloth dipped in iced water. He might be willing to accept that he couldn't win every fight but it didn't mean he would stop trying.
Carlisle hadn't been gone long when Jasper appeared looking worn but composed. He bent over Bella whispering to her, telling her he was here, that he wouldn't leave her side again no matter what happened. Seeing she was in good hands I joined Carlisle in the next room where he was bent over a microscope and suddenly he looked very old, his shoulders hunched, as if this fight had somehow aged him just like Bella's blood would have done. I joined him putting a hand on his shoulder for comfort though whether for me or him I couldn't say, perhaps for both of us.
Jasper
I didn't need Carlisle or Rose to tell me how close to death Bella was, I could feel it for myself. Her emotions were weak, like a candle guttering before plunging a room into darkness. When the light went out I would be the one in darkness, there would be no fresh candle to light my world again and I determined to follow her into the velvety blackness so we could be together at last.
I was aware of the monitor behind me, the hiss of the respirator inflating her lungs. Was she already gone? Was it just the last vestige of her brain activity I could sense? No, I would know when the flame truly flared out and my wife was no more.
I was aware of the door opening and Carlisle's quiet presence behind me and I stiffened waiting to hear the terrible news put into words, that would make it real and concrete. I picked up the cloth and dipped it into the cold water before placing it on her forehead, purely for something to do, to delay him speaking,
"Son."
I shook my head thinking don't say it, Carlisle, please don't say it, don't make it so.
"Son?"
There was a strange tone to his voice and I turned slowly to see him staring at me.
"Come with me, I want you to see something."
Was he mad? I couldn't leave Bella's side, leave her to die alone. But he took the cloth from my hand and gave it to Rose before steering me into the other room, over to the microscope.
"Look."
I did, unable to understand what I was seeing.
"Think son, you just picked up, a cloth soaked with Bella's sweat without wearing gloves. Do you really think I would have allowed that if I had thought doing so would kill you?"
Then I understood what I had seen, Bella's blood was being attacked by strange cells, vampire cells, my venom. Bella was becoming a vampire and she was no longer lethal to us, to me. I felt my legs go weak with relief and Carlisle's hand under my arm to steady me, my wife would live.
