Chapter 27

I've lived a thousand years in darkness

Banished all alone

Inside my mind with just my madness

Behind these walls of stone

I was falling apart at the seams

Holding my breath just to breathe

Tasted the sting of my tears,

I was wakin' up stuck in a dream.

Ran out of air couldn't scream

Wasted away by my fears.

Alice lead an unresisting Isabella away from the tree Edward remained partially embedded in. She didn't take her eyes away from the blackness of Isabella's eyes. She kept her hand on Isabella's arm, ready to retract it at any sign of anger or distress. Alice didn't care about the stares that followed them, her only concern at the moment was the girl in front of her.

For her part, Isabella let Alice guide her away, she was numb. Though rather than head back into the clearing Alice followed Eliza's advice and guided her away from the stares and prying eyes, deeper into the forest. Isabella followed without protest. Alice wasn't even certain Isabella was aware of her surroundings, except Isabella never left her.

Several minutes elapsed as they moved deeper into the forest, Alice finally stopped, and Isabella stopped with her. Alice didn't say anything for several long moments. She knew that whatever had calmed Isabella was tenuous at best. Finally she asked very softly and gently, "Isabella, are you okay?"

Isabella blinked several times, as if waking from a deep slumber. Alice watched the black of her eyes recede, slowly giving way to white on the outer edge of the eye, and then further inward as scarlet began to show again. When the black pupils finally took shape Isabella focused on Alice for just a moment before turning away, "Y.. yeah. I'm okay."

Isabella took several steps away and kept her back resolutely toward Alice as if by instinct. "You should go back... it's not safe."

Alice tilted her head, but she kept her voice mild, "What do you mean?"

Bella tensed, clenching her fists, but kept her back to Alice. She didn't know why, but stepping away from Alice seemed to intensify her emotional turmoil. "You saw what just happened. I'm dangerous. I lost control. It's really not safe for you to be around me. Not when I'm like this."

Alice slowly shook her head, she making no move to step closer to Bella. Instead she crossed her arms and lifted her head. "I'm not going anywhere."

Isabella's entire body tensed again and she clenched her fists for several long moments. Her voice was deceptively soft. "You don't understand…"

Alice's voice was gentle, she didn't demand or even try and coax, just voiced her request plainly. "So help me understand."

Isabella's form hunched slightly. She was of two minds about Alice's request. Part of her didn't want to reveal any side of herself. Something about exposing herself, laying her soul bare, made her very hesitant. For some strange reason she found herself fearing rejection by Alice. But losing control like that. .. Alice had to be made to understand.

"'I'm a monster'. Eddie used to say those words all the time. He had no fucking clue what a true monster is." Isabella said far more harshly than she'd intended, but wanting to get it out into the open.

Rather than reply Alice slowly walked closer to Isabella, circling round her slowly.. Alice made sure to move sanguinely enough Isabella was able to track her movements with ease.

Alice moved until she was facing Isabella, who was still shuddering. Isabella slowly noticed Alice coming into her view. Somehow the fact Alice wasn't immediately trying to placate her with meaningless platitudes made it easier. This was Alice. She could at least talk to her.

She spoke louder, "I'm a monster. You saw what just happened. I almost killed him, I could have killed you. You need to go and stay as far away from me as possible." The belief in her statement was reflected on her face. If Edward had been any slower, or Eliza hadn't leapt in, Edward would be dead now. Isabella doubted it would have been all that great of a loss. She hated the idea of losing control. Isabella slowly lifted her eyes from the ground until she was staring into Alice's eyes again. She started to shake, obviously agitated.

Alice met her stare, showing no reaction to her pitch black eyes. "I'm not leaving you. It's okay. We all lose control sometimes. You know that better than anyone. Far better than me." Her voice was soft, soothing, though she winced slightly after the words came out of her mouth. Great, let's just remind her about us leaving.

Fortunately, that wasn't what Isabella focused on. She shook her head slowly. "No, you don't understand. With me… it's different. I'm not just another vampire with an impulse control problem. I'm different."

Alice kept her voice calm, "Talk to me. How is it different? I mean… I hate to tell you, wanting to rip Edward's face off is not exactly different. Hell, for once I'm willing to bet it puts you in the majority… and that's usually before he opens his mouth." Her voice turned teasing, trying desperately to instance. encourage, some sort of emotion besides anger from Isabella.

Isabella's mouth quirked very slightly at the joke. It wasn't much but it was something, then she seemed to sink back into habitual self-loathing, hanging her head, letting her hair fall forward to obscure her face. "I meant what I said last night. I'm not the Bella you knew. So much has happened. I've… done so much."

"Tell me what happened to you." Alice said, the words more of a plea than a demand. Alice wanted nothing more than to reach out with her hand and push Isabella's hair back from her face, but she restrained herself.

Isabella hesitated for a moment that seemed to last far too long before she looked up and met Alice's eyes once again. "Are you sure?" Isabella's voice was soft but utterly cold.

Alice nodded slowly. "Yes, talk to me. I'm here for you." Isabella's voice had set off all sorts of warning bells in her head. It had a dangerous quality to it, one that Alice was never sure she'd heard before.

Isabella started speaking slowly, looking down and closing her eyes. "It started right after you left. Something… inside me broke. I missed you so much. I didn't even care about myself at that point. You were gone. It was like my entire soul was excised, and all that was left was a shell. I was already dead, I was just waiting for the rest of my body to die."

Alice nodded, not denying any of it. "I'm so sorry we left-"

Isabella's head shot up and her, her brow furrowing in anger. She whirled away from Alice and began to pace, gesturing with her arms vaguely in the direction of the clearing. "Not them. You! I missed your family of course. And I thought I was in love with Edward and I missed him. But god… I couldn't stop thinking about YOU."

Alice was stunned, as Isabella continued her pacing.

"I sent an email to your email address every goddamn day. Every fucking day dearie. I know you deactivated it. Believe me, I got plenty of 'address does not exist' messages back. But I hoped and prayed that you'd see the messages because I made the decision and I sent them. You have no fucking clue how much I missed you. That was the hardest part of Edward telling me goodbye. God… you were my best friend, my sister, my confidant… my…" Isabella faltered momentarily before continuing "My… everything! All rolled into one! Then I'm told that I'm not good enough for your family. That you don't even want to bother saying good bye?"

Alice reached out to touch Isabella as she paced back and forth. She wanted to wrap Isabella up in her arms, but felt she needed to get through this. Ashamed she could not touch her.

"Oh I tried to make friends. I reconnected with Jacob Black and convinced him to help me build motorcycles because I found out that if I did stupid things I could almost see you. Any of you. Telling me I was being dumb or warning me against doing something stupid... like loving vampires. Let me tell you how fucking messed up that is. To do something stupid just so I could hear one of you telling me I was being stupid. For awhile there I tried anything. motorcycle riding, walking through dangerous parts of town at night, But you know what? Karma must seriously fucking have it in for me. Because… come to find out. My new best friend is a wolf. And not only that but he's spending his spare time protecting me! And he fucking failed!"

"Protecting you from what? We were gone. That should have been all the protection you needed…" Alice frowned in confusion, wondering what she was saying.

"Oh yes, you were gone. Edward's 'chivalrous' move to protect me, a family that claimed to love me disappears. Of course that meant I was fair game to any other vampires. Such wonderful protection leaving me 'for my own good' ended up being." Isabella said sarcastically, stopping her pacing to lock eyes with Alice.

"Laurent…" Alice trailed off, the pieces from earlier finally clicking into place. Her eyes grew wider after a moment as she realized the further implications of what Bella was saying. They had only discovered when they returned a few months earlier the wolves caused blank spots in her visions. Until then Alice hadn't made the connection between the greying out effect the wolves had, and the graying out which occurred with greater and greater frequency in Bella's life.

"And Victoria." Isabella practically hissed out the name, oblivious to Alice's revelation. "Once Jake mentioned that she kept trying to get to Forks, but they weren't certain as to why. I told them. I mean it was obvious. She was coming after me."

Alice's hand covered mouth. "She... came after you? … but we were gone… Why would she...?"

"A mate for a mate." Isabella said with a bitter laugh.

Alice flinched.

"That's right. I ended up practically living at La Push. My dad was just happy that I was no longer borderline catatonic so he never complained. I was practically surrounded by wolves twenty four hours a day, seven days a week. But she kept trying. But Jacob wouldn't abandon me. They protected me like a member of their pack. But it doesn't mean they couldn't be tricked."

"Tricked?" echoed Alice, her voice cold with dread.

Isabella nodded. "Victoria created a couple of newborns and set them loose on one part of the reservation, no one realized it was a distraction. I mean how could they? It's not like I knew anyone at the time who would recognize the strategy. Jacob and his packed attacked the newborns. Victoria seized me. Knocked me out and spirited me away. I woke up in a cabin in the middle of nowhere." Isabella glanced up for a moment, this is where she usually whitewashed things. But something inside her made her want Alice to have the full impact.

"When I woke up she wasn't around. I bolted out the door immediately. I had no idea where I was, but I thought maybe I'd woken up sooner than she expected, so I just ran in a direction. Victoria let me get about two miles before she pounced. She threw me to the ground and I thought she was going to kill me. I should have been so lucky." Isabella's voice had gone utterly stark and devoid of emotion as she recalled the events.

"Instead she laughed, reached down grabbed my hand and then crushed the bones in my pinky. When I stopped screaming she whispered in my ear. 'If the Cullens cared at all they could have stopped this.' she said. Then she grabbed me by my hair and dragged me all the way back to the cabin." Isabella shook her head a little bit

Alice face was horrified, but she didn't say anything. She let Isabella continue, seeing every description with her mind's eye.

"That was a game we played for days? Weeks? She'd drag me back to the cabin by my hair and leave me. I would run, sometimes she'd let me get miles away, other times no more than a few hundred yards. Then she'd show up. Break a few bones and drag me back. If I didn't run, she'd randomly show up, break a bone or two and then leave. She went from my fingers to my hands, to my feet to my legs. When I couldn't walk I had to try and crawl out that door. That just amused her even more. And all the time I heard variations on the theme. 'If they cared they'd be there.' and 'I deserved this for what I'd done to her mate' I finally broke down one day and told her exactly why you left. I wasn't good enough. I'll never forget that expression on her face. She glared at me as if she thought I had any reason to lie. I didn't... I knew... or rather thought I was good as dead eventually. Then she laughed at me. She laughed. Said that I was pitiful. She wasn't surprised. and that you were absolutly right. I was wasn't good enough. This was all I was good for now" Isabella was trembling again, her fist in front of her shaking in anger, as she remembered it.

"After she'd broken nearly every bone possible, save for the spine and skull of course, she didn't want to risk me not feeling anything. Then began the cutting. She starting just cutting random parts of my body. Sometimes small cuts. sometimes large cuts. But she could only do it a little at a time. she didn't want to lose control and end my torment too early. When she finished with that, it was time for brandings. All of these spread over the course of weeks? Months? I don't know. I lost track. She was very skilled at hurting me while keeping me alive. I deserved it all. The family I was with killed her mate and then had abandoned me." Isabella's voice was full of hurt and anger, dropping to a hoarse whisper near the end.

Alice was shocked as she listened to Isabella relate the story. Her expression was one of horror that she couldn't even try and hide.

"I thought that at least I would eventually wear out. She could only hurt me so much. I tried to hurry the process along, not eat or drink only to have her alternate between force feeding me or promising a few hours respite. Show's how much I knew at the time. She had me within an inch of my life when the tortures stopped. She just left me there. I don't know how long. I couldn't even move, laying on the floor utterly broken, drifting in and out of consciousness in my own waste and filth. Then she came back and picked me up, and carried me outside. I assumed it was for some final indignity. I wasn't far wrong. She told me to open my eyes and look at the sun, because it would be the last time I would see it. I did. I thought she was going to kill me. I saw her and I saw a deep deep hole." Isabella closed her eye and shuddered a little bit, not able to even look at Alice now.

"Her face was the last thing I saw as she whispered in my ear. 'I'm going to give you an eternity of hell. While you're there I want you to know. I'm going to kill everyone you've ever cared about. Your friends. Your parents. Everyone. Each one will die slowly and die knowing it's your fault. If you had died instead of my James they'd all still be alive. They'll all die hating you.' Then she wrapped me in barbed chains. Then stuck me in this box. The last thing she did before she closed it was bite my neck. Then she closed the lid. I remember the venom coursing through me, adding a whole new dimension to my pain. I remember hearing her welding the box closed save for a small hole she left at the top. Then when my breathing stopped, she filled the box with cement. Then she dropped the box into the hole and filled it with cement and then buried it." Isabella shuddered again remembering the pain she was going through as light completely closed off from her world.

Alice was absolutely speechless, a look of sheer horror on her face at the details Isabella related robotically.

"When I woke. That's all there was. Hunger and Darkness. I couldn't move at all. I was completely trapped Nothing but the unquenchable thirst for blood and the darkness that surrounded me. The pain was complete and total. Solitary confinement and sensory deprivation are common in many prisons. But even they can move around a little, and have an hour of yard time a day. They've done experiments locking people in dark rooms without sound. All of them experience hallucinations after within 48 hours. I later found out that I was down there for nearly a decade. I was filled with hatred for Victoria. Hatred for your family. Most of all hatred for myself, for daring to rise above my place. For being so selfish as to cause all of their deaths. I had my hunger which became nothing but pain. I had the darkness. I would dream of being free. I would dream of life or the sky or people. But that's all they were was dreams. Nothing but dreams. I went insane. I won't deny it. But my imagination wasn't that strong. Complete sensory deprivation and I didn't even have the refuge of sleep that humans have if they're in prison or solitary confinement. I only had what I had. Hate. Darkness. Pain. I wished for death with every fiber of my being. I was all alone. The hatred, the pain, and the darkness my only companions." Isabella's voice was getting more and more desolate and her pacing getting more frenetic.

Alice forced herself to listen, not wanting to interrupt and not wanting to stop her as she talked through it. If Isabella experienced it, the least she could do was listen to it. Then her eyes widened once again. She understood. That's why her visions had gone completely dark. Not because Bella was dead, but because she was... in darkness. In Hell.

"Eventually in my madness… I embraced the pain, and the rage and the darkness. It comforted me. And something happened. I was filled with a darkness deeper than the tomb she had buried me in. It filled me. It surrounded me. I snapped and my world exploded around me. I was free. It took me awhile to realize that I was really free and that it wasn't just another hallucination, and I was thirsty. I killed and drank everything in my path. Animals at first, it didn't matter what it was. Deer, squirrells, rabbits, moose, bear. I drank and drank...until I found people. A family. Parents. Children. I don't know how many… I drank them too. That's when I sort of woke up. The whole campsite destroyed. A whole family dead." The depth of Isabella's self hatred obvious.

"How did you end up with the Volturi?" Alice asked, more to try and get Isabella away from the memory she was so clearly reliving than a burning need to know.

"It took awhile for me to figure out what I should do. I didn't know where I was. I barely knew who I was. I'm not sure how long it took to come up with an idea. But I remembered that I'd been told about the Volturi in Volterra. So that's where I went. I'm not sure if I went there because I was hoping for help, or because I was hoping for them to kill me. I'm not even sure I could tell you reliably how I got there. I think I snuck on a plane?" Isabella's voice was confused and uncertain, the photographic memory of the vampire marred by the state of madness she was in at the time. She struggled to recall.

"They took me in. Had me shower, the first I'd had since Victoria knocked me out the first time. I asked them to kill me. But... my ability interested them. Instead they offered to take me in. To train me. It was the best and worst thing they could have done. I would never be weak and helpless again. But they were helping make a better murderer. When I was ready, they allowed me to do what I do best. Inflict pain for all sorts of transgressions. Kill." Isabella snarled at the end.

Alice's mouth opened and closed several times. Responses she had in mind, protests, comforts, all flashed through her mind's eye. She wanted the whole story, so she forced herself to ask. "Victoria did all this... turned you into a vampire... where does Eliza come into the story?"

Isabella chuckled. She outlined in brief terms for Alice the story of her meeting Eliza. The mutual bite. The changes it caused in both of them. The bond the two of them shared. Alice listened with great interest, but without commenting throughout the story. As she talked, the black faded from her eyes, returning to their normal red.

"Now we work together. I still wonder if Aro should have destroyed me all those years ago. But he didn't. He was too curious about what we were. He even stopped others from executing us both, as if they could. Too much value in us. And he's been right. We've been good and effective. I think tonight's work speaks for itself. Two more members to make his coven more powerful. He even adopted us. Official 'Princess" of the Volturi and all that." Isabella's voice became more calm as the story got easier. Finally she slumped her shoulders and looked down at the ground.

Alice took a deep breath, looking at Isabella's forlorn form. Her story made her anger make so much sense. It also made that first acceptance of the possibility of friendship seem like so much more of an olive branch than Alice had initially realized.

When she started to talk, her voice was soft, and soothing despite being filled with a deep sadness. "Isabella... I... I don't even know where to start. What you went through was... horrible. Horrific. You know better than I ever could. I imagined you a vampire so many times when... I mean... I wanted to be there for you through the transition. I wanted to be there when you woke. I wanted to be there through those first years as a newborn. I wanted to be with you through it all."

Alice reached out with her hand tentatively, she slipped her hand around Isabella's and gripped it lightly, leaving plenty of room for Isabella to pull back. Alice was gratified when she didn't. Her voice seemed to trail off on the thread of the idea before she picked back up, "God... the idea of you... alone... and what you went through... it... hurts me in ways I never imagined. Because all these years... it's... all my fault. I left you."

"I feel horrible about that. It's my fault and I can't even begin to describe the level of guilt. But do you know what makes me feel even guiltier?" Alice asked, and then she waited until Isabella's head lifted to meet her eyes.

Alice's golden eyes met Isabella's crimson ones intently. "I can't help it that a huge part of me is... so unbelievably happy you survived. Far more than you know, perhaps more happy than you will ever know." Alice paused, biting her lower lip and then squeezed Bella's hand gently more to reassure herself than to reassure Bella.

"Maybe that makes me a bad person. But I don't care. You're alive. What happened to you, it's the most horrible thing I've ever heard...but. Victoria did those things to you to show she had power over you, power to make you hurt, power to make you still hurt, power to hurt you forever. Your escape was a partial victory over her. When you can hate her for what she did...without hating the world and most everyone in it, your victory over her will be complete."

Isabella's eyes narrowed and she shook her head. "Victory? You don't get it. It's not about empty moralistic victories. There's no game here. It's over. She won. When I had enough presence of mind to check… I found out Victoria did exactly what she promised me she would. My father disappeared and was never heard from again. Phil and my mother were identified by their dental records after a fire consumed their house. No word on why the bodies looked like they had been attacked by wild animals before getting burnt to a crisp. Angela Weber disappeared from college and was never seen again. Eric Yorkie's car mysteriously ran off the road on a night without a cloud in the sky. Again, his body was so badly damaged had to be identified by dental records. And I have some idea of just what she subjected them to. All of them… dead because of me."

Alice nearly broke down, although she was unable to cry, a huge wave of sympathy rose up inside her at the utter self-loathing in Bella's voice. Alice gathered herself with an effort. "B… Isabella…that wasn't your fault. I can't tell you it doesn't suck and it doesn't mean I don't hope you made her pay… I know it won't be easy, the cliché goes nothing worth having ever is. That isn't always true but it applies in this case. You say you are a monster, I say you are wonderful. Defying and beating odds no one else could have hoped to. I don't know how but I do know this. Unless you stop me, you will never face anything alone again, I will be the friend I should have been all along..."

Isabella pulled her hand away from Alice and turned away taking three steps away as she set her shoulders. She didn't see how her stinging rejection hurt Alice's face. Her voice, when it finally came out, was a seething mix of rage and hurt. "You can't… it's not safe…. God… you don't understand…"

Alice took one step forward and said in a protesting voice, far more demanding than she intended, "Damnit! then help me understand!"

Far faster than Alice could react, Isabella whirled around and Alice felt a grip around her neck and then the impact as her body was slammed into a tree. Her eyes widened in surprise as she found herself staring into the pure blackness of Isabella's eyes, only inches from her own. Isabella held her throat as she kept her pinned to the tree, her voice was a snarl. "I'm dangerous. I'm faster. Stronger. More dexterous than any vampire except my daughter, who's physical abilities equal my own. I've got a monster inside me screaming to get loose. You just saw what happens if I lose control."

"I could kill you right now, with no effort. " Isabella squeezed Alice's neck slightly with her hand for emphasis. "The only thing that keeps you and the world safe is my nominal self-control, and my daughter. I could lose control at any time for only a second and it would be over. If I fly off the handle, there's no telling what it would take to stop me. It's not safe for you to be around me. You should be terrified. Being around me is like sitting in the chair under the Sword of Damocles. At any time… I could snap." Isabella squeezed Alice's neck briefly once more for emphasis. Her black eyes locked on Alice's only a scant few inches from hers.

Alice answered, with her heart. "I don't care."

Alice's eyes had never left Isabella's during the entire speech, though her face was surprised at first. She didn't display fear, and while her reply was soft, it was firm. "I'm not going to leave you. Not again."

Isabella's face contorted into a sneer as a snarl of rage escaped her throat. Alice didn't understand. Why didn't she understand? She stared into the beautiful face in front of her and between one moment and the next slammed her lips against Alice's.

Alice's eyes went wide and she had a giant intake of breath through her nose as fireworks went off in her brain and someone had jammed a live wire into her body the instant she felt Isabella's lips on hers. All of her nerves jumped alive and exploded with sensation. The smell of Bella, filled her senses. The feel of Isabella's hand on her neck, the rest of her body so close all making Alice's body feel alive. There was nothing gentle or sweet or romantic about the kiss. This wasn't a light, exploring kiss, nor was it tentative in the least. The few times that Alice had allowed herself a brief fantasy their first kiss had been nothing like this. This wasn't worshipping and tender. This was a rough and almost punishing kiss.

It was also the hottest fucking thing she'd ever felt.

Isabella was alive. Isabella was kissing her.

For the life of her Isabella couldn't remember how she ended up doing this. She remembered being so furious with Alice and wanting nothing more than to smack some sense into her, so she'd be more concerned with her own safety.

And now she had Alice pinned against a tree in a lip lock, her hand still wrapped around Alice's throat. Holy mother of pearl Alice was a good kisser. It was more intense than anything Isabella had ever felt and she didn't… want… to stop. It felt so right… and … she wanted more.

It took an inhuman amount of will but Isabella pulled back with a gasp, turning away and inhaling deeply, desperately trying to get something besides the scent of cinnamon and lilacs from her nose. She didn't dare look at Alice for her reaction. But when she tried to pull away to get more distance between them she felt a grip on her wrist.

Isabella braced herself, turning around to stare at Alice. She found herself staring into Alice's eyes. The irises were completely black as she stared intently at Isabella.

Alice's voice was slightly deeper than normal, and she stared at Isabella intently. "You will never be alone again Isabella. I will be the friend you've deserved all along and what... I should have been. All the excuses don't change that I screwed up. I'm sorry and I will never leave you again. I will spend the rest of my life showing you, proving it to you. I will be what I should have been in another life. I will be better. I will be what you deserved all those years ago and what you deserve now. If you let me... I will be."

Isabella's eyes slowly faded from black to red as she stared back. Very slowly, as if she knew she were dooming them both to disaster, she nodded. They both stood there, eyes locked on each other, Alice's fingers still wrapped around Bella's wrist. Finally one of them spoke, though neither one could have told who spoke up first.

"We'd better get back."

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Author's notes

1) YAY another chapter. (Seriously don't keep expecting them night after night. This is alot of words to bust out.)

2) This chapter was... unique.

It was originally not going to occur until much later. Then DarkBella got all homicidal with a spork. And after i got past my stubbornness i realized that she was right. This chapter is all because of her. She's... so amazing in how completely she helps and supports me. Even if it takes sporks and nerfbats to get it going. She is the Zen Mistress and my co-author and this story would be so much less without her.

I knew it was going to be emotional but I had no idea just how emotional I'd get while doing it. I think we both ended up in tears at one point or another.

I did not expect everything to come out like it has. Even after i started writing it, I did NOT expect them to end up kissing in this one. But Alice and Bella's character's hijacked the chapter from the start. And well... there's the result. Needless to say I've got about 30k words of text written that needs to be revised. But I wasn't going to bend the character's personalities just to make it easier on me. I hope you all appreciate the personality consistency.

Whoda thunk Bella and Alice would kiss before Eliza and Leah? O_O wtf! It just is a testament to their different personalities. But it ought to make things interesting going forward.

3) Shoutouts to Neb87 and Bellice Fan who were the first two who guessed Bree. I have a pretty good idea what I want to do with her character. So hopefully she should add some more flavor. :D

4)DarkBella's author's notes: After this chapter Kathryn will move past my highest reviewed story ever. I was really proud of how well that story did but I am even happier with what Kathryn is accomplishing here. I am so happy for her I'm about to burst. She's on to something really special and I only hope I can stay on for the ride :-) She surpasses me in every way.

5) I really don't surpass her. This is a team effort and it's awesome because she and i work together. And I couldn't be happier with the arrangement

6) The amount of reviews the last two chapters have been AMAZING. THANK YOU.

Please let me know how you think we did on this chapter. It was a major challenge for both of us, and all you readers have waited a long time for this. I sincerely hope it was worth the wait and it didn't disappoint. Please read and review.