Edward POV

The run back to Forks had taken just under two hours; I went home and quickly changed into a new set of clothes and then Carlisle and I drove in his car to the hospital. I have never in my life been more terrified than I was at this moment. I came close last year when James took her and tried to kill her, but I saw through Alice's vision that this time was monumentally worse. And unlike last time I was nowhere near, I felt like a useless human having to call an ambulance in order to save Bella's life.

I'd also never been so angry with myself, how could I let my entire family leave Forks at the same time? I had foolishly trusted Bella's life with Jacob Black, a werewolf. I knew better but I went against my better instincts and trusted that… dog. I trusted him with her and he almost killed her, he almost killed her and then he left her for dead. Or at least that's what I assumed happened; Alice couldn't see anything until after Jacob left her. I'd be finding out exactly what happened to her and soon.

Because of Bella's delicate condition Alice's visions were constantly flickering and changing, she lives in some futures, she dies in others. She survives but is disabled in some futures and in others she makes a full recovery. I couldn't have her come with us, her visions were exhausting and I needed to concentrate on Bella right now, I told her to call me if she saw anything concrete.

All that we knew was that the ambulance was currently on its way to the hospital and we had to get Carlisle there to perform the surgery on her- he was her best chance at survival. We flew into Carlisle's parking spot after what could have only been minutes.

'I can hear Charlie's thoughts, they're already here.' I said as we ran into the building.

'Edward you have to stay in the waiting room.' Carlisle said to me as ran towards the emergency department.

'Carlisle-' I started to object but he cut me off.

'You know I'm right Edward, you can't come with me.' He said.

'Carlisle, it's Bella.' I almost pleaded.

'Exactly, and she will be expecting you to be waiting for her in the waiting room when she is out of surgery.' He said and I sighed knowing that there was no excuse we could give to the other surgical staff as to why I was in the room.

'I'll be listening, please give me constant updates.' I said to him, my voice breaking.

'You know I will, son.' He said putting his hand on my shoulder and then parting ways with me to find Bella and take over her care.

I made my way slowly to the emergency waiting room feeling more helpless than I ever had before. I heard Charlie's thoughts before I saw him, quick chaotic and panicked. As I walked into the room filled with humans waiting to be seen by doctors and waiting for news on their loved ones I saw Charlie. He was wearing his police uniform and he was pacing back and forth across the length of the room.

'Charlie.' I said to him quietly. He looked up at me and the look in his eyes was that of a very lost man, a man who had lost everything and it absolutely terrified me. Even though I knew Alice would tell me if something happened to Bella, the look in his eyes made my stomach drop.

'She's not…' I half whispered unable to finish the sentence.

He shook his head trying to fix his features into something more stoical 'No, Edward, she's not. But she's not… well. I honestly don't know what will happen.' As he finished talking he collapsed into a chair and put his head in his hands.

I went and sat next to him 'My father is here, he will do everything he can to save her. She'll be okay Charlie.' I tried to reassure both of us.

He shook his head, it was still firmly embedded in his hands 'You didn't see her; I don't know how she didn't bleed out. She certainly looked like she had no blood left… she was barely breathing by the time they took her away.' This time his voice broke and I had nothing to say to him, no words would suffice. All we could do was wait.

Turns out we didn't have to wait long. About 60 minutes after I sat in the chair next to Charlie a nurse came to get us and brought us back to Bella's room where Carlisle was waiting for us. I wasn't prepared for what I saw. Bella looked dreadful; her skin was paper white and almost translucent, eyes sunken in with purple shadows around them. She was in a hospital gown and it just seemed like she was swimming in it, she had never seemed so insubstantial before to me.

I went straight to her side and took her left hand in mine; it was all that was visible aside from her head. Her hand was still warmer than mine but just barely, her heart and respirations were also dangerously low. In the back of her hand was an IV pumping saline into her dehydrated body.

'How's she doing Doc?' Charlie asked my dad.

He shook his head 'Not good, we're about to take her upstairs to the surgical floor where she needs at least two units of blood, but I think it's more likely that she will need three. She's not stable enough to perform surgery on right now, I'm keeping her lightly sedated to save her the pain and keep her still.' As he said this as two nurses came in to move her bed upstairs.

'One thing I did manage to do was an MRI to make sure that her spine was okay. That's the one bit of good news I can give- even though the cuts are so deep, the wolf's claws seem to have done minimal to no damage to her spine. Thankfully her bones are strong and I think the worst of it might be a scratch to her T7 vertebrae and to her right humerus. I'll know for sure once I have performed the surgery though.' He explained to us.

'They're ready with the blood upstairs; we have to bring her up immediately. I called you two back here so you can follow her upstairs and wait with her until I clear her for surgery.' Carlisle said gathering up her paperwork and walking with us as we followed Bella down the hallway.

Two hours later the first unit of blood was done transfusing and the second one was being switched in. Her pulse rate and breathing rate had increased but were now slightly elevated, Carlisle wasn't concerned, there were so many things that could be contributing to it so he told us not to worry too much about it. Just like the time that she had a transfusion in Phoenix she just smelled wrong to me, remarkably un-Bella.

Time creeped by with Charlie and I sitting in silence with nothing to distract us as we watched the blood slowly drip into Bella and saw the colour start to return to her face. Carlisle and various nurses came in and out of her room over the next few hours to check her vitals. I held her hand over the four hour period and I noticed the warmth slowly come back to her skin along with the colour.

Once the donor blood had finished transfusing into Bella, Carlisle came and assessed her again. 'I think that she is finally ready for surgery, I have a surgical suite prepared and a full staff on call and ready to go.' He said after checking how she had reacted to receiving the transfusion.

'What are you going to do Carlisle?' Charlie asked him.

'First I'm going to make sure that there isn't any internal damage that I'm missing and make sure that her bones are relatively unscathed then I'm going to knit the muscles of her back back together. Her arm will be a little trickier- the MRI confirmed that along with her triceps muscle, the tendon of that muscle has been severed as well as with the posterior cutaneous nerve. I can repair the muscle and the tendon but likely not the nerve.' Carlisle explained to Charlie.

'Will she have permanent nerve damage?' Charlie asked sounding as exhausted as I felt.

'With any luck- no. Nerves regenerate on their own but unfortunately they regenerate very slowly- over years and years. While it's possible that the nerves may regenerate it's probably equally as possible that they won't. Worst case scenario is that she won't have feeling in the back of her arm anymore which won't impede the use of her arm.' Carlisle said, leaving out what would happen if he was unable to repair the muscle and tendon in her arm- with any luck Charlie wouldn't have to consider this possibility.

Charlie nodded 'Okay, thank you Carlisle. Please take good care of her.' Charlie's voice cracked on the last part.

Two nurses dressed in full surgical garb came into the room and started to unplug the vitals machine Bella was hooked up to as well as the IV pole and began to wheel her from the room.

'I love Bella like I love my own children Charlie; I promise I will do my absolute best for her.' Carlisle told Charlie sincerely.

Both Charlie and I were forced to relinquish Bella's hands as she was wheeled from the room, I couldn't help the pit that formed in my stomach as I watched Bella's unconscious body being wheeled from the room to another situation where I couldn't help her.

Before Carlisle could follow Bella out of the room he clasped me on the shoulder and thought to me I've got her Edward, she'll be okay. I'll let you know as soon as I have news. For now go to the waiting room, the family is waiting for you. I nodded at him in silent recognition and he turned to Charlie.

'I'll send news as soon as I have any information, the surgery will take at least a couple of hours.' And with that he turned and left the room. Charlie quickly collapsed into his chair and put his head into his hands again, elbows on his knees. I stood there frozen for a few moments before pulling my cellphone out and seeing a myriad of texts messages that confirmed that indeed the rest of my family was out in the waiting room.

I walked over to Charlie and mimicked my father by putting my hand on his shoulder. 'My family is out in the waiting room, I'm going to go and update them on what's going on.' Charlie looked up at me and nodded with almost no recognition in his eyes. 'Do you need anything?'

He blinked at me before slowly shaking his head 'No thank-you Edward, I'm alright. I should probably call Renee and tell her what's going on. She's going to kill me for not calling her sooner.' I squeezed his shoulder in support then let go.

'Try not to worry too much Charlie; Carlisle really is a fantastic surgeon. I wouldn't trust anyone with this but him.' He nodded at me again.

'Thanks Edward, make sure you follow your own advice.' He said to me and I smiled at him then walked from the room. I was a few yards from the room when I heard the sound of his phone ringing and the unmistakeable voice of Bella's mother Renee answered the phone. I kept walking and as I tuned out their conversation that I didn't want to hear I began to hear the thoughts of my family. It seemed everyone was here except Jasper which was probably for the best given the overwhelming aroma of blood circulating through the entire building.

After a few moments I could see them within the glass walls of the waiting room. They all stood as I walked through the door and I barely made it past the doorway before Alice's tiny form slammed into me embracing me in a hug. I hugged her back a little bit more weakly. The rest of my family hugged me in turn and then I half collapsed into a hard-backed arm chair.

Over the next several minutes I told them the entire story as far as I had pieced it together, that Jacob had lost control, gravely injured Bella and taken off. She had been picked up by ambulance and taken here, then everything that had happened since up to her being taken into surgery. They knew most of it from Alice but wanted all of the details.

'Will she be okay, Edward?' Esme asked gently.

I nodded 'I believe so, she will have extensive scarring and might have decreased use and feeling in her right arm but overall I believe she will be okay. We're lucky she got here when she did and was able to get the blood she needed.'

'What about Jacob?' Emmett asked barely concealing his anger.

I shook my head and closed my eyes; I didn't even have the capacity to consider what this meant with the wolves 'I don't know.' I said simply.

'They've attacked one of our own, as well as a human. This cannot go unpunished.' The anger Emmett was trying so hard to conceal had bubbled over and I could hear the ice cold venom in his voice.

'Emmett, this isn't the time.' Rose admonished her husband putting her hand on his arm.

'I know, I'm sorry but this is so far from okay. We trusted him to protect her and he nearly killed her, does the pack know where he is?' Emmett asked working to calm himself down.

I shook my head again feeling numb 'Not as of last I heard, we need to contact them to find out but I just don't have it in me.' I said.

'Sounds like we need to pay them a visit.' Emmett said; the threat in his voice obvious.

'No Emmett.' Esme said firmly. 'We need to go about this the right way, if we don't we could have a war on our hands.'

'Maybe that's what we need.' Emmett said. 'We've dealt with them being the self-righteous ones for too long, acting like we're the dangerous ones then they go and do this!' Emmett's voice had steadily risen in volume till he was almost shouting.

'Emmett, enough!' Esme hissed at him in warning. 'We've been working towards the pack becoming our allies and if we play this correctly we can come out of this with a better relationship which would be much better for us than a war.'

Emmett went to speak but Esme cut him off, it was rare that she would scold one of her children like this, she rarely became so incensed. 'We will wait to speak to Carlisle, he has the best relationship with the pack and he will need to be a part of the talks that need to happen.'

Emmett had some rebuttal but I didn't hear it. Alice had come over to me and gently taken my hand pulling me to my feet and leading me from the room. I had been so checked out during the whole argument and she must have noticed. Emmett and Esme had briefly paused their argument to watch us leave but then continued it after we had disappeared from their view.

Alice led me wordlessly down the hall back to Bella's unoccupied (aside from Charlie) room, opened the door and pushed me gently into an available chair. She went over to Charlie and gave him a tight hug. 'Oh Charlie, I'm so sorry that this happened. If anyone can make it through this though it's Bella.'

Charlie looked stunned like he hadn't realized she was there until he had been forced into an embrace. 'Thanks Alice.' He said after a moment, composing himself.

'How's Renee?' I asked him, my voice sounding hollow even to me.

'Hysterical, as expected. I just barely convinced her not to put a plane ticket on her already maxed out credit card.' He said with a half laugh.

'How'd you manage that?' Alice asked him.

'By telling her that I would call her as soon as Bella was out of surgery and have Bella call her the moment she woke up.' He said with an eye roll.

'That's good, hopefully there's no reason for her to come down here.' Alice said and Charlie nodded sinking back into anxious silence.

Alice pulled a chair up next to me and pulled one of my hands into both of hers whispering silent reassurances in her mind. The time passed agonizingly slowly, Carlisle sent me the occasional update to reassure me, no intervention was needed for any of the affected bones, both her vertebrae and humerus just had a scratch to them which was great news.

He contacted me after he closed each wound in her back, he contacted me to tell me that the wound on her left hip was deeper than he had thought but he was still able to stitch the muscles and skin back together. When he got to her arm the updates came further apart, I took it to mean that he was having a harder time with the tendons and smaller muscles of her arm.

He confirmed as much at the three hour point since the surgery started to say that he had been having a bit more trouble than he thought with her arm. He wanted to make sure that she would get as much use out of her arm as possible. Finally at the four hour mark right as Charlie had started to doze off in his chair Carlisle sent the news that the surgery was over and Bella had done incredibly well and he was sending a nurse to give us the news.

Five minutes later a middle aged nurse with her hair still up in a surgical cap came quietly into the room, the gentle squeak of the door being enough to wake Charlie from his very light nap. 'Family of Bella Swan?' she asked the room and we all silently nodded.

'Dr. Cullen sent me to tell you that Bella pulled through the surgery with flying colours. She will be in recovery for the next hour or so, then we will bring her back here and the doctor will be here as soon as he can.'

'Thank you very much.' Alice responded dismissing her.

A collective sigh went through the room with the breaths we didn't realize we were holding. Charlie's shoulders visibly slumped as he rubbed his face in relief and Alice hugged both of us before running out to the waiting room to tell the rest of our family. Charlie and I sat in amicable silence as we waited for Bella to come back to the room.

Just after the 45 minute mark, Bella's bed was wheeled back into the room. She was now lying on her stomach and was naked aside from her heavily bandaged back and arm and the bed sheets. My throat burned at the smell of the new bag of blood transfusing into her corrupting her smell even further while it also gave her life.

Her head was turned to the right, towards her injured arm and towards Charlie's side. Charlie sat by her head and I walked around to stand behind him and looked into her pale still sleeping face. I was satisfied with what I saw and went back to her other side content to let Charlie have his time with her while I held the hand of her uninjured arm.

Carlisle came in shortly after they wheeled Bella back in. He had clearly used the time he was away to clean himself up and get dressed into his blue dress shirt and black pants that he wore earlier in the day.

'Bella did amazingly well.' He said beaming at us and breaking the (what felt like) eternal silence. 'Her back was fairly straightforward, it only took as long as it did because of how large the wounds were. Her arm was a little bit more complicated, the tendon was more damaged than I thought. I repaired it to the best of my ability though we will see what kind of movement she gets back in it. I am hopeful that she will get most of her movement back, but if she doesn't then there are surgical options in the future we can explore to fix it.'

'Thank you again Carlisle. We owe you an awful lot; I can never thank you properly.' Charlie said, sounding much more cheerful than the last time he spoke.

'Nonsense Charlie, it was my pleasure, you owe me nothing.' Carlisle responded, brushing him off.

'Why isn't she awake yet?' I asked, not feeling as relieved as mine and Bella's fathers seemed.

'She's slightly sedated with pain pills, and she will be for the next couple of days. This has two purposes; one is obvious, for pain. Without the medicine she would be in agony, the second though is that I don't want her moving around too much for the next couple of days, I want to give her back and especially her arm a few days immobility to give it a head start on healing. I will start trying to reduce her pain pills enough to get her more alert the day after tomorrow and we will play it by ear.'

As much as this saddened me that Bella was being kept in a sedated state, I couldn't miss the intelligence behind it. Any movement on her part could reopen her newly stitched and healing back and arm and plus I couldn't stand to see her in the amount of pain she'd be in without the medication.

I nodded 'Thanks Dad.'

You're welcome Edward. He said in his mind as he went over to check Bella's vitals to make sure that she was well.

'Has there been any progress in finding the wolf that did this Charlie?' Carlisle asked not looking at Bella's father.

Charlie cleared his throat clearly unprepared for this question. 'Um, no, not yet. A few of my guys have been out looking but haven't found anything yet. We're worried for Jacob as well; Bella said he wasn't there at the time but she was there to meet him. Last I spoke to Billy he still hadn't heard from him. It's been some hours now since I last talked to him though so I hope that he's been located.'

I had stiffened at this but Carlisle continued on smoothly as if he didn't know that Jacob was the one who caused this and wasn't missing but had run away.

'You should make some calls soon and find out. I hope he's alright.' Carlisle said looking directly into Charlie's eyes his face painted with sincerity.

He nodded 'I will now that Bella is out of surgery and things are looking up.' He pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and started 'Is that the time?' he rubbed his face in exhaustion- it was just after 1am. 'I guess I'll wait until morning.' It was as if finally realizing the time he realized how exhausted he was and let out a huge yawn.

'You can go home Charlie, Edward and I will be here all night, me to monitor her and Edward doesn't have school in the morning.' Carlisle said to him gently, he really did look exhausted.

'No, no. I'm fine.' His body betrayed him and he failed to stifle another huge yawn.

'Charlie, she's fine. I will be here all night to watch her and will call you if anything is amiss. You're still wearing your uniform, you need to go home and get some rest. I'm sure you'll be going out tomorrow to help with the search.' Carlisle convinced him.

Charlie sighed 'You're right. You'll call me if anything happens, right? If she wakes up or gets worse or… anything?'

'Of course Charlie, I promise. I can all but guarantee that when you get here tomorrow she will be in the exact same position having not woken up.' My father explained.

'Okay.' Charlie said rising slowly and what looked like painfully to his feet after sitting for so long. He leaned over Bella's sleeping form and gently kissed her on the forehead. 'I love you sweetheart. I'll see you in the morning.' He murmured to her, stood and shook Carlisle's hand seeming lost for words, turned and walked out leaving us alone.

'We need to discuss what to do about this situation tonight Edward, this has to be dealt with as soon as possible.' Carlisle said a few moments after Charlie left when we were sure he was out of earshot.

I had gotten up and walked around to where Charlie was sitting on Bella's right side where her head was turned. I sat down in the recently vacated chair and gently stroked Bella's pale sleeping face and nodded at my father's words knowing that he was right. Our family had gone home shortly after Bella came out of surgery and I knew they needed to be present for this conversation. 'We should call the family so we're all on the same page.' I responded and I heard him pull out his cell phone and dial Esme's phone number.