A/N: So, uh… it's been a while. I'm sorry for the massive and spontaneous hiatus, but quarantine, man. It's been doing things to me. Anyways, to make up for it, I finished up the fic and I'm just going to give you the whole thing all in one day. Enjoy!

Bella

No one is a fan of my plan.

I thought it was clever. Wear Beau's clothes and pretend to be him. Line the car with a protection spell. Lay another protection spell around the mirror room, which was clearly where Beau was supposed to go. We could trap the tracker in, and then blow up the whole thing, or something else to kill him. I really hadn't thought beyond trapping him.

Beau protests—albeit a little weakly—while Alice and Jasper yell at me for even entertain such an idea. I've never had so many people yell at me all at once before.

"Fine!" I interrupt. "Anyone else got a better plan?"

"If it's just the tracker, I could probably take him on my own," Jasper offers. Alice snarls at him, a clear no. I groan. We're not going to get anywhere if we won't let anyone take a risk.

"How are we supposed to kill the tracker?" I demand. Jasper gives me a sharp look.

"We are not doing anything," he says. "Emmett and I will do it."

"Come on! We have a whole spell book and no one's going to let me use it?" I protest.

"It hurts you," Beau interjects. "Every time you do a spell, I can see how much it costs you."

"It's because I don't have the practice. That's my fault—"

"This isn't the right time to practice," Alice says. "Beau's right. Any spell that you could do now would only hurt you."

"The first thing we have to do is figure out the mirror room," Jasper says, pulling out the drawing Alice made.

"I know that place," Beau says with a frown.

"What?"

"It's a dance studio," he explains. "My mother used to teach here, right after she left Charlie. She came up here to stay with her parents for a while before we moved to Arizona."

"Your grandparents live here?"

"Not anymore," Beau says. "My grandma Elyse moved to Florida, right after my grandpa passed away. I think it was in elementary school."

"Where is it?" Alice asks.

"In the suburbs," he says. "An… hour outside of downtown Seattle. It was called Seven Steps." Jasper looks it up, scribbling down an address onto the picture.

"He's there," Jasper says, lips curling back in a gruesome smile.

"If he has my mom, he'll kill her the second he realizes I'm not alone," Beau points out. "Even if he doesn't, he'll bolt."

"That, and you guys are weak," I point out. Both Alice and Jasper scowl at me, but I can see it on their faces. Their eyes are coal black. They haven't hunted in a while. They were supposed to go after the game, but that got derailed.

"Most likely, he's watching the hotel," Beau points out, uncurling himself. "If you guys leave, I don't think he'll attack. I think he'll expect me to get to the car. If you guys wait for the others to come, he'll assume I told you the plan."

"I…" Alice falters, clearly torn between her need to hunt and her need to keep us safe. "I don't see him attacking the hotel… the visions… are shifting I think."

"Shifting?"

"Beau's not in the mirror room…" she says. "But it doesn't look right."

"Go hunt," Beau says. "We'll stay right here. Plus, you'll need to speak to the others, come up with a plan. Best to do that while his attention is on the hotel, and me."

"You're being sincere," Jasper says to Beau. "I… could use a little air."

Alice and Jasper look at each other, a silent conversation clear on their face. Alice sighs.

"Put down a protection spell," she says. "We'll be an hour tops, probably earlier." She produces a bag of garlic from one of the duffel bags, as well as a bowl. I do the spell, outlining the whole room. Satisfied, Alice and Jasper head out, promising to back as quickly as possible.

I slump back on the couch, trying to catch my breath. I grab my grimoire, flipping through the pages. Maybe there are offensive spells in here.

"Bella," Beau says, catching my attention.

"Yeah?"

"Make a decision." His eyes are blazing with determination, and to my surprise, anger instead of fear. I assume there's plenty of that in there anyways. It clicks. I have to call it because Alice won't see it coming. If I call it and Beau goes along with it, she won't be able to see Beau.

"They'll know exactly where we're going," I point out, adrenaline already coursing through me.

"I'm counting on that," he says. "If you make this decision, we might have enough time to save my mom. Five on one sounds like good odds."

"What?"

"The tracker would see me coming, but not know the rest were there," he explains. "My best guess, he's going to drag this out, keep me alive for a while, to… I don't know, but I don't think he'll end the game so easily. If I go, maybe I can persuade him to get my mom out, and you can be there to get her out. By that time, the cavalry will get here."

"Beau—"

"My mom's in trouble," he says. "I have to do this. It's either that, or you can try and beat me to the car. I have longer legs than you do, just a reminder."

I size him up. Beau's bigger than me, and while he's much less coordinated, he has weight and height on me, plus my exhaustion from the spell. I consider the options. The tracking spell had narrowed down Seattle, though Beau could've confused the spell. I could understand him not want to take a chance. If it were my mom, I wouldn't risk it either.

"Let's go," I say firmly.

"I'm making the decision to follow you," Beau says with a grim smile. We're careful as we leave, holding hands like lifelines. I try desperately not to shake. We make our way downstairs and around the hotel. Sure enough, the car is there, and I stare at for a second before grabbing the door.

"Beau, you're going to drive," I tell him. "I'm going to be in the back. He won't see me coming this way."

We take our seats and sure enough, there's a card on the passenger seat with an address. Beau looks at it for a long moment before sighing, pulling up the car's navigation system, and entering in the address. I focus on laying a protective spell on the car. There's a spell that allows me to will a stream of liquid to maneuver how I choose, so I concentrate hard on outlining the interior of the car with the spell.

Surprisingly, I'm only sore after I finish the spell. Of course, I'm breathless, but there isn't that omnipresent ache that usually accompanies magic use. Score one for practice.

Beau stares straight ahead and I try to catch his gaze in the rearview mirror, but it's like he doesn't see me, like his mind is a million miles away. It doesn't take a genius to figure out who he's thinking of.

It doesn't take long to leave Seattle proper, and the cityscapes bleed into the suburbs. Houses get bigger and more spaced out, and more greenery is visible. It makes me ache for home, for the safety of the green that surrounds Forks.

It's strange, that even those these rouge vampires invaded our territory and started hunting our own, I still think of home as safe. I've never felt that way about a place before. I sleep full nights in Forks, and my magic is less chaotic. I don't think I've blown apart the house in years.

I lean my cheek against the cool glass of the window and stare out, watching as the sun begins to set. Any moment now, Charlie Swan will wake up and find his son gone, left only with a hastily written, flimsy excuse for his absence.

I think about my own parents, about Dad leading Emmett and Edward in the search for the tracker. I know what he's capable of, but he's not strong like Emmett, nor is quick and superpowered like Edward. In a fight, my father has no real advantage, save for the safety net that is our family.

My mother is the same, no superpower to her name, not even the sharp fierceness Rosalie carries like a sword. She is the antithesis to a fight, and even thinking about her in one hurts me. I swallow hard and force myself to think about something else, anything else.

"Did you get that essay for English done?" I say, breaking the silence. That's one thing I don't have in common with any member of my family, including Beau. They're all content to sit in comfortable silences, but they only wig me out. I can't stand the quiet, especially where there are other people in a room. Beau hasn't even turned the radio on.

"I don't think it really matters now," Beau says softly, the edge of his lip quirking up in a weak imitation of a smirk. A lump lodges itself insistently and suddenly in my throat and my breath hitches.

"You are not going to die," I tell him sharply. Beau finally catches my eye in the rearview mirror. His brown eyes are expressive as hell, filled with the strangest mix of fondness and sorrow.

"Do me a favor," he says, ignoring my near-command. "Text my dad? The spell will probably wear off soon, and it has to look like I at least tried to tell him where I was." Fear closes my throat even further. I try to swallow, try to speak, but I can't. I have never felt like such a weak little child, desperately wishing for my parents and siblings.

"Text him yourself," I finally grind out. My tone is petulant, and it softens Beau's eyes even further. I look down, unable to take it.

"I can't text and drive," he says. How can he be so calm?

"You are not going to die!" I repeat more forcefully.

"Bella," he says, forcing me to look up. "I know. Just text my dad, will you?" I nod, grabbing his phone, but I don't know his passcode.

"0304," he says, anticipating my question.

"Who's birthday?" I ask, pulling up the messages app. Seeing Edward's name at the top of the list, followed by own gives me pause, but I ignore it. The message to Chief Swan is pretty vague, but I really can't think of what to say. Hey, dad, all good over here! Just riding off to my imminent death! Yeah, probably not.

"My mom's," Beau's says, and with that, the softness of his eyes fades and only his fiery determination remains. It's strange, but I understand him completely. Throwing yourself on the fire is terrifying, but the very idea of losing someone you love is much more horrifying.

"This is all going to be okay," I say, but I don't know if I'm talking to myself or to Beau.

"I know," he says. "Everything is going to be okay." I'm too scared to ask whether Beau includes himself in "everything."

Finally, we reach the dance studio. It's in a pretty rundown neighborhood, the lone building still in operation. The others are boarded up and falling apart, and there really isn't anything else near by. It's pretty much the perfect place to kill someone.

"What's the plan, Bella," Beau asks. I sigh. It feels almost pointless to be making decisions. Alice and Jasper will surely be back at the hotel and be making their way over here. They'll probably have left messages with Dad, Edward, and Emmett too.

"Just… wait a minute," I say, even though I know Beau won't. His knuckles go white on the steering wheel, but he doesn't say anything. I look back down the road, hoping beyond hope my family will be there to save us, and Beau's mom.

Of course, there's no one, and no sounds of cars anywhere close to us. It is just us, the decrepit building, and possibly Beau's mother, terrified out of her mind. We are her only hope. I take a deep breath and reach out my hand. Wordlessly, Beau takes it, squeezing tight. He's scared too, but I can feel him shove his fears aside. Here I am, leeching comfort from a boy who's got everything on the line, his family, and his life. He's more selfless than I could ever be.

"Okay," I say finally. "Here's my decision. You're going to go into the studio, and exactly five minutes later, I'm going to line it with a protective spell. That'll buy us hopefully enough time for everyone to get here."

"Bella, listen, if Edward gets here too late—"

"He won't!"

"Please, just if he does, I need you to make sure he lets this go. Just tell him I love him. So much."

"Okay," I concede, my voice cracking. "Okay. Just… be safe."

With that, Beau squeezes my hand tight, and climbs out of the car, heading determinedly into the dance studio.

A/N: Rapid fire update one complete! Let me know what you thought!