Thank you so much IamTheAlleyCat for beta'ing and Ncsupnatfan for pre-reading.

With the UK now joining the list of countries in lockdown, I would like to repeat my words from before. If any of you are on lockdown, in quarantine, or self isolating at the moment, drop me a PM/Review as I have something I'd like to offer you.


Chapter Twenty

Edward

I could have cursed.

It wasn't that I had thought these issues wouldn't rear their head eventually, but I had hoped to have a little longer period of peace before it happened. Emmett's poorly timed question and Rosalie's part in it had ruined what would have been a good day.

If I didn't know better, I would say that Rosalie was trying to drive us apart. But I did know better. She actually thought she had helped me by bringing these topics out into the light. She thought the sooner we decided our future, the happier I would be. She didn't care for Bella's happiness other than that her happiness was to remain with me and, therefore, keep the family together. It was harder to love my sister unfailingly when she couldn't love my Bella.

When Bella had left, so had the rest of my family. Carlisle and Esme had gone hunting, Alice and Jasper went to their bedroom, and Rosalie and Emmett were talking in the garage.

Rosalie was defending what she had said, and Emmett was trying to make her see why it had been a mistake. He was fighting a losing battle. Rosalie believed it was for the best, and no amount of retrospective thinking was going to change her mind.

I got to my feet, thinking I would go to my bedroom and perhaps listen to some music. I drifted slowly over the staircase, in no hurry to do anything, and then froze with my foot on the bottommost step when Alice's cry of, "No!" drew my attention.

"Alice!" I shouted, racing up the stairs and into her room. Jasper was kneeling in front of her, his hands gripping hers as he waited for the vision to pass so she could tell him what she had seen.

I searched her mind, too, and was bewildered by what I saw. It was the same old vision that had haunted me years ago and confused me now—Bella as a vampire.

"Alice, what did you see?" I asked harshly. Now I knew it was connected to Bella, I was panicked.

Alice opened her eyes and looked into mine, her perfect features twisted with regret as she opened her mind to me. It was a flash of an image, nothing more, Bella at the foot of the stairs in her house, her eyes closed and a small pool of blood under her head. I was on my feet and racing out of the house even as I shouted to her. "When, Alice?"

"Now!"

I ran even faster, pulled on as if by a magnet to my Bella. I could hear people behind me, Alice and Jasper, and Emmett's footfalls coming up behind them.

"Get Carlisle back!" I ordered, not caring which of them obeyed as long as one did.

I heard dialing and then Carlisle's voice through the speaker, sounding confused. "Jasper?"

"Something's happened to Bella," Jasper said quickly. "We're on our way to her house now."

"I will meet you there," Carlisle said and hung up.

I had never blessed the fact that Bella's house was close to the edge of the forest more. I raced through the trees, hearing my siblings slowly falling back behind me as I ran as fast as I was capable.

When I reached her house, I leaped over the fence that separated her land from the trees and yanked open the back door. The smell of blood was strong, but I felt no draw towards it. The pull to Bella was stronger.

In the instant I reached her, I saw what had happened. She had not been attacked as I had feared; she had fallen down the stairs.

Her right leg was at an unnatural angle where it had broken, and her arms were torqued as if she had tried to break her fall but failed. I took it all in within a fraction of a second as I dropped to my knees beside her.

"Bella! Bella, love, open your eyes," I pleaded.

She gave no sign that she could hear me. Her eyes remained still beneath their lids.

"Oh shit!" Emmett gasped behind me.

"There's blood," I warned. "Keep Jasper away."

"On it," he replied.

Alice appeared at my side, and she held the phone out so I could hear Carlisle's voice. "What's happening, Alice?" he asked.

"She's fallen down the stairs," Alice said. "Broken leg for sure. She's bleeding from her head, and she's not waking up."

"Is she responding to painful stimulus?"

"Is she?" Alice asked me.

I hadn't even checked. Cursing quietly, I rubbed my knuckles over her sternum. There was no reaction. My panic ratcheted up a level. "No, Carlisle. I've tried," I said desperately.

"Pupils?"

With tremulous movements, I pulled back Bella's eyelids. Her pupils were dilated, and they didn't respond to the burgeoning of light.

"Nothing, Carlisle," I said. "She's not responding."

I heard Carlisle's harsh sucked in breath.

I looked down at Bella and noticed something new. There was a small pool of red-tinged, clear fluid beneath her left ear. I fell back on my haunches, listening as though from the bottom of a well as Alice spoke, "Carlisle, there's stuff coming from her ear. It's bloody."

"Edward!" Carlisle called me back from my panic. "Son, you know what this means."

I knew. It meant Bella would be lucky to not be left braindead from this stupid, human accident.

"Yes," I rasped.

"Alice, how's her heart rate?"

For the first time, I listened properly to the sound that was the center of my universe. It thudded slowly and unevenly.

"It's slow," Alice said. "Missing beats."

"Edward, I am ten minutes away still. You need to decide what to do."

"I can't," I moaned.

I didn't know whether I meant I physically couldn't or morally.

"You can!" Alice said firmly. "You have to, unless you want to lose her."

I snarled in response.

"It's the only way, Edward," she went on. "See?" She held the image of Bella in her mind, the red-eyed and happy Bella.

Between us, Bella lay unmoving, with that slow, weakening heartbeat thudding erratically.

"You have to decide now, Edward," Carlisle said, his meaning clear—I had to decide before it was too late, before her heart failed.

"She doesn't want this," I said desperately.

"She doesn't want to die, either!" Alice snapped. "It's still there, don't you see? She's one of us." She showed me the image of Bella as a vampire again.

My hand cupped Bella's cheek, it was cool from the floor, as if she was already gone.

"Do it, Edward," Emmett said where he waited outside with Jasper. "It's the only way to keep her."

"Oh, Bella," I moaned.

"Now, Edward!" Jasper hissed.

"Please," Alice said in a small voice. "Don't make us lose her again."

And that was the crux of it. I couldn't lose her. None of us could. And Alice was right, Bella didn't want to die. She wanted to live her life to the full. She needed to be alive in some form to do that.

I lowered my face slowly to Bella's throat and kissed it.

"I'm sorry," I whispered, then I opened my mouth and sank my venom-coated teeth into her neck.


Carlisle

I burst out of the forest, jumped Bella's fence, and ran into the house to where my family waited, leaving Esme still following through the forest.

Emmett and Jasper stood in the kitchen, their faces solemn. I barely paid them a moment's attention before rushing through to the hall where Edward, Alice, and Bella were.

Edward was bent over and crying in tearless sobs, and I felt a moment's panic—No! Please, Lord, do not let me be too late—before I heard the sound that filled me with relief: the racing of a changing heart.

Alice sat back on her heels, her eyes wide in her pale face and one hand on Edward's back while the other held Bella's.

"Edward," I said softly.

He looked up at me, and I thought of the last time I had seen him devastated, when I found him in Rio. He looked worse now. "She's so still," he said. "So quiet."

"The venom hasn't healed enough yet," I said softly. Her brain had been catastrophically damaged and even venom healing would take time.

Alice set Bella's hand back on her stomach gently and then moved back to allow me room beside my son.

I patted his shoulder and thought, I am here now.

Edward nodded, and I turned my attention to my daughter, where she lay on the floor.

I could see the fullest extent of the damage in the blood beneath her head and the cerebrospinal fluid that had leaked from her ear. It was a miracle she had lived long enough to be bitten at all. I thanked God for her strength.

"We need to move her now," I said. "Take her back to the house."

Edward nodded mutely.

I turned back, "Emmett, can you clean up for us?"

He nodded. "Yeah, we need to grab a few things, too. Jazz and I have an idea to cover her disappearance."

I hadn't even considered that aspect of it. I was thankful for my sons' forethought where I had failed.

"Ready, Edward?" I asked.

"I'm afraid to move her," he whispered.

"Alice?" I asked.

She closed her eyes, and Edward glanced up at her. I don't know what the future she had shown him entailed, but he seemed calmer because of it. He gently scooped his arms under Bella and lifted her against his chest, cradling her close to his body. He got slowly to his feet, careful not to jostle her.

He made for the back door, and Alice and I followed in what I refused to compare to a funeral cortege. As he passed Esme, she reached up and touched Bella's cheek.

I saw the sadness and fear in my mate, and I felt a surge of love for her.

"It will be okay," I promised her.

She smiled slightly but didn't answer.

When we were free within the forest, we began to run, Edward keeping pace with us. He seemed to be taking exceptional care not to jostle Bella, though he and I both knew she wasn't feeling anything yet. I yearned for the venom to heal enough that we could comfort and feared it at the same time as it would mean she would feel the burn as well as hear our words.

Though it had seemed to take forever to reach Bella from the forest, the run back to our home seemed laughably fast. Soon, we were within sight of the house. Rosalie was pacing the front porch, and as we came into view, she stopped and stared, her eyes widening.

"What did you do?" she growled. None of us answered, and her voice rose. "What did you do to her?"

"Saved her life," Esme said in an uncharacteristically cold voice. She swept past her first daughter and followed Edward into the house.

Edward carried on up the stairs to his bedroom in silence. I reached him in time to see him laying her gently on the large leather couch. He traced a hand over her cheek and then said to Esme, "Do you have a blanket?"

Esme flitted from the room and came back with the cream woven blanket that usually lay on the armchair in our bedroom. She draped it gently over Bella and smiled down at her.

"She likes to be warm," he said.

I wondered at my son's state of mind. He must know as well as I did that she was beyond awareness of feeling warm or cold at the moment.

"May I examine her now?" I asked.

He looked up at me with dark eyes. "She's okay."

"I just want to be sure, Edward."

He nodded and moved to sit on the head of the couch, his hand coming up to cup her cheek.

I moved to the couch and bent over Bella. I saw the leg that had been broken was now straight. The venom had done its work there. I wondered how much longer it would be before the more complex part of her healing would be over.

I traced a finger over her arm, feeling for the minutest change in the pliability of her skin. I ran a hand over the back of her head and felt the smoothness of her scalp and skull beneath. That healing was over, too.

Soon, she would feel, and then the real trauma would begin.


Edward

I waited for her to cry out in pain. I felt almost sickened that I wanted it, but want I did, because when I heard that, I would know she was going to be okay.

But her cries didn't come. She lay perfectly still under the blanket, her shallow breaths and her heart racing the only sign of life. Sometimes, I lay my head against her chest just to feel the beat of the vital, racing organ against my cheek.

We were never alone. Carlisle stayed at the foot of the bed, Alice and Esme stood by the window, and, when they returned from setting the scene of Bella's death, Emmett and Jasper drifted in and out.

Conspicuous by her absence was Rosalie.

I had heard her shrill remonstrances to Emmett and Jasper about what had happened, but for all the care I gave her words, she might as well have stayed silent.

Bella was changing—being 'saved' as Alice thought of it—and it was too late to take that back now. She was going to be one of us.

I wasn't sure how I felt about it, truly. I wished for Bella to be human, but as that had been an impossibility, I had chosen to keep her with me, denying her a chance at heaven. But heaven was only necessary after death, and I would make sure Bella never died now. My eternal life would be dedicated to keeping her safe.

It wasn't until the second day of Bella's change came that I began to think I had been too late to do even that.

The sounds of pain never came.

She stayed still and quiet, and I feared I had hesitated too long to bite her, that the brain damage had reached the point of irreparability. I worried I had created a vampire that would never wake.

I had never heard of it before, and though I feared to question Carlisle or Jasper, I didn't think they had, either. I was terrified that I had lost her.

I tried to bat away the fear, telling myself the change could last days and there was still time, but fear pervaded me, regardless.

Some sliver of good news came to us in the middle of the second day. As Alice and I cleaned the blood from Bella and dressed her in fresh clothes, Carlisle shared the news that Bella's death was assumed by the humans. Emmett and Jasper had laid a good scene for her.

They'd set some of her clothes and purse on the small beach Bella was known to frequent and her car in the lot and then called in to the coastguard saying they'd seen someone in trouble in the water. The coastguard had launched into action, searching the water, but of course, there was no sign of a body.

We listened to the news coming in via the police scanner Emmett had purchased, and some of us breathed a sigh of relief. The rest of us were too scared to feel anything like relief.

When the news broke on the local news station, the believed death of a well-known police officer, we knew Charlie had been informed.

Carlisle had called in sick at the hospital, but he received condolence calls that Esme ferried from friends at the hospital that knew Bella and her friendship with Carlisle.

Some were mourning, too, and that made it all the harder for Esme to put them off, citing the fact Carlisle was too upset to talk. It wasn't a lie. Carlisle worried about Bella's inactivity as much as I did. Though he reassured himself with the fact she was physically changing to a schedule he had seen before. Her skin became less pliable and her heart sustained its fast pace.

We were edging into the third day when my world broke apart. Alice was searching Bella's future for signs of when she would wake when the vision blinked out completely.

"No!" I cried. "Alice, no!"

Alice turned stricken eyes on me. "I don't understand."

My cry drew Emmett and Jasper into the room, and Jasper went straight to Alice while Emmett added his voice to Carlisle's demands for information.

"Her future…" I said in a choked voice. "It's gone."

"No!" Carlisle hissed, his eyes finding Bella on the bed. "It can't be. She's still alive."

But was she, in the truest sense? I was not alone in watching her chest rise and fall, listening to the racing of her heart in hopes that it would comfort. It didn't.

Was it possible that the vision we had held so long of Bella as a vampire had disappeared because the venom had failed to save her mind, meaning she couldn't make decisions to set her path anymore? Was she lost to us?"

"Look again," Emmett demanded.

Alice's eyes became blank as she searched for something. "There's nothing," she whispered.

"Look for me," I said. "I will be with her."

Alice obliged, and I watched with her. There was nothing but black. She searched Carlisle, Esme, all of us, but there was nothing.

We stared into each other's eyes with horror. "All of us?" I asked.

"All of us what?" Rosalie asked from the doorway.

"All our futures," Alice said. "I can't see anyone."

Rosalie started to speak, and then she stopped as the sound of a howl tore through the air. It managed to sound as menacing as it did mournful.

The wolves were coming.


So… We have a changing Bella and werewolves descending. I have done supernatural life changes for Bella before, as well as a life-saving natural one in Out of Sight, Out of Mind, but I went as ordinary as you can in this one. Did it work for you?

Until next time…

Simaril xxx