A/N: I know I definitely annoyed some of you for the ending of the previous chapter, but I knew I couldn't keep you all waiting that long. I'm thinking weekly updates are going to be a thing now; what d you all think? Weekends are less chaotic so they'll probably go up Sundays.

It was not intentional for this chapter to go up the same day as it supposedly happens in the chronological timeline (I've already mentioned that this universe happens in present day, not 2005; however, this is much calmer 2020, as who needs extra plot points?)

Just a PSA for any healthcare people: I am no expert in the protocols/procedures of human hospitals; I did the best I could but forgive me :)

Thank you for your patience and enjoy the chapter!

Chapter 19: Beat

Archie stepped back as he admired his work. He admitted he rather liked the navy blue streamers paired with the grey balloons, even more so than when he had seen them in his self-proclaimed vision. He glanced around at the rest of the main floor, adorned with various party decorations. There was a moderate pile of elegantly wrapped gifts on the crystal table besides Edythe's piano—a large ornament, at this point—and a small two-tiered cake already displayed by the main entrance. Archie knew Beau would not be happy, but he would be too polite to put up a fight.

"I thought Beau made it clear that he did not want any celebration?" Carine asked as she stepped into the room, looking over the decorations with a mix of mild disapproval and amusement. Archie grinned back at her, but Eleanor was the one who responded, leaning over the banister to call down to the living room.

"Yes, but Archie never listens to intentions, especially when they impact his own plans," she snickered. Archie surreptitiously sneaked an inappropriate hand gesture behind his back as he turned to Carine.

"Beau doesn't know that he wants it; you'll see, he'll be…" Archie trailed off, his mind turning like an axis as the vision overtook him.

"NO!"

The word ripped up Archie's throat in a strange scream and snarl; all Cullens whipped their heads to watch their prophetic brother and son as his face took on a mask of horror. Jessamine was in front of him a quarter of a second later; she placed her hands on either side of his face, her eyes narrowed and asking Archie what he was seeing. She was the one that could get the most out of him, but he didn't respond. His expression was frozen in terror and rage as he watched. The horrific images came to him without being able to stop or control them: Edythe and Beau on their way home, the black asphalt with a single dashed white line nearly blending with the darkness, the curve of the road as it bent around, the familiar face that launched himself from the trees, aiming at the passenger side of the truck, the truck careening across the road, hitting the metal guardrail with a sickening clang, the frame of old Chevy bending to the supernatural hit.

Archie's mouth twisted in a loud growl at the chalky complexion and lengthy body, the wild fiery red hair superseded only by the excited, enraged scarlet eyes. But beyond the adversary's actions, the accident caused by a simple kick, was the more unspeakable result: the blood across the driver side window, caked across the dashboard from the shattered windshield, the heartbeats, one loud and panicked, the other weak, struggling.

"No! No! Carine!"

Archie's eyes finally found the coven leader, whose honey eyes were wide with confusion and terror. He wrenched himself out of the vision, and the subsequent visions that followed, as his mind began to work at a hundred miles a second.

"Go! Three miles northwest on the two ten, right before the Tanque exit," he ordered her. She didn't question him or hesitate; she turned and immediately started running toward the place he indicated. She moved as fast as her legs would carry her, not understanding completely but already fearing the worst.

Those fears were realized as she came on the scene; her eyes took in the crumbled truck against the guardrail that bordered the thick forest with the paved roadway. The Chevy lay with its right front tire on the low guardrail, the back tire on the ground at an unsafe angle; the windshield was shattered into a million small pieces that made the blacktop sparkle like a diamond for fifty feet behind where the truck had impacted, the tire marks making it clear where the initial hit had been.

Besides the typical smell of trees and the gasoline leaking from the car, she could smell adrenaline in the fresh human blood that was marked on the inside of the cab. And a smell, the scent that she had only encountered once before.

Victor.

Forcing her mind away from the implication, Carine moved toward the driver door, where she could hear the effort from the inside accompanied by two drastically different heartbeats. She called Beau and Edythe's name, hearing the hitch in the one breathing pattern she could hear as a response. She climbed halfway up the truck, automatically not putting the pressure needed to force the truck over the other side of the guardrail. She dug her nails into the hinges of the driver door and pulled slightly; immediately, the metal buckled, releasing the catch and the frame around where it had been knocked off and unable to open from the inside.

Beau's face turned to her from just the other side; it was covered in blood and he was holding his shoulder and neck at an abnormal angle but she didn't have the time to notice more as he half lifted Edythe from the van, handing her to Carine. Carine' s medical mentality stuttered for a second as she took in Edythe's condition; after an eighth of a second's hesitation, she took her from Beau, moving away to lay her on the asphalt. She could hear Edythe's heartbeat, stuttering and weak. Carine positioned her on her back and began compressions; she had had to do CPR on humans many times before and learned to modulate her strength to provide only the necessary amount of pressure. Her mind was filled without nothing but counting her compressions and listening to Edythe's heart, her mind blanking as she worked to keep the organ beating.

Carine didn't hear the rest of her family arrive; though the purr of the Mercedes was far louder than Edythe's heartbeat, she could hear nothing but its low but still attainable, though struggling, rhythm. In the smallest corner of her mind, she registered Archie pointing Royal, Eleanor, and Jessamine after Victor's scent, the three of them disappearing into the forest at top speed to try in vain to catch up to the vampire that had a more then excessive head start.

Archie pulled Beau down from the truck and he and Earnest worked robotically and quickly to add to the scene, adding multiple deer carcasses and blood on or around the truck to emulate a wildlife accident. Beau stood motionless, his eyes on Carine as she worked without stopping, his mind in a blank haze that wasn't completely attributed to the brain trauma.

Just as Archie and Earnest finished and came to stand beside him, the loud piercing sounds of sirens filled the silence. The ambulance screeched to a halt a few feet from where Carine knelt over Edythe's body, continuing CPR relentlessly until the EMTs reached her. They were shocked to find Dr. Cullen in the midst of the horror, but quickly fell in step to follow protocol; she moved with two of them as they transferred Edythe onto a gurney and into the back of the ambulance. Another technician went to Beau, pulling him with them to the emergency vehicle. Carine's work did not stop; she did not allow the humans to take over CPR, instead giving clear monotone instructions as she worked. They obeyed immediately, setting up an IV line in one of Edythe's arms, pushing the medications Carine relayed to them without comment. The third technician worked on the blood pouring from Beau's wounds, pressing on them to stop the bleeding.

The ambulance arrived at the hospital within minutes, and Carine did not stop to acknowledge that they were there, her mind focused only on one thing, keeping Edythe's heart beating. But, as they wheeled her into the emergency room, she knew she would be forced to remain there; she looked up as hurrying steps came toward her, immediately locking eyes with a familiar set of hazel irises.

"Paul," she murmured at the older doctor. Dr. Paul Vernetti looked over his colleague briefly before assessing the situation. His eyes widened as he recognized Edythe, glancing up at Carine.

"Carine. What happened?" he asked in shock, moving quickly besides the gurney as the EMTs pushed it toward the operating rooms at his signal.

"Car accident, a herd of deer," Carine explained quickly, "Hit the passenger side door and spun out, ended up suspended over a guardrail." Carine gave quick, further details to her own observations just as they reached the entrance to the operating rooms and stopped. Dr. Vernetti's hands replaced hers and he met her gaze.

"We've got her," he said before the gurney, and Edythe, disappeared behind the folding metal doors. Carine stood motionless, her hands empty as she focused on Edythe's heart beat until she couldn't hear it any more beyond the quick footsteps, metal clang of hospital machinery, and the beeping monitors in the nearby rooms. She was frozen, unable to move, unable to think clearly, her eyes glued to the point where Edythe had vanished beyond where she could go. The haziness in her mind was unfamiliar; she couldn't ever remember not being so hyper aware of the sounds and sights around her; but they were blocked.

The hands on her upper arms seemed to break through the haze; she turned to face Earnest, making out Archie and Beau behind him. She did not know what expression was on her face, but she didn't have the ability to control it. Though she worked to keep a calm demeanor for all situations, she found she could not suppress her emotions enough to compose herself. She moved toward the plastic chair in the emergency waiting rooms, feeling the intense need to sit, as if she were so weak she would fall.

Earnest followed her, and Archie and Beau stepped forward. Carine could feel her body trembling slightly, and she never remembered feeling so weak, so vulnerable, so human before. Not since she was human, probably. It was disconcerting, but she couldn't force herself to do anything other than sit and stare, waiting for her senses to come out of the dull pool they had been immersed in. She could first smell the blood and she glanced down to see she was coated from her fingertips to her elbows in Edythe's blood, as well on her shirt and pants. Earnest sat besides her and she met his gaze; his ocher eyes were wide, horrorstruck and terrified, not unlike how she felt. She sat there for a long time, Archie and Beau standing besides the elder vampires, all still too shellshocked or too distressed to speak.

With the arrival of her older children to the ER came another wave of reality to pull them out of the clouded film thy were wrapped in. Eleanor spoke first.

"Where is she?" she demanded, looking around as if expecting Edythe to be sitting in a chair not far from them.

"She's in surgery," Archie responded dully, looking over to meet her gaze. Eleanor looked taken aback; neither she or the other two had not been on the scene long enough to get an idea of the extent of Edythe's injuries.

"How bad is she?" Eleanor asked, turning to Carine, who hesitated, eyes casted down.

"I don't know; I felt at least five broken ribs, probably more, internal bleeding, possibly a punctured lung…" she cringed at the list she had unintentionally made in her head.

"Why aren't you in there?" Eleanor demanded. Carine looked up to meet her gaze.

"I can't; family cannot treat family," she said simply, looking away. Eleanor didn't respond; she could see the pain in her mother's eyes that she couldn't be in the room, working to save Edythe's life. But she was right; the EMTs were gracious enough to ignore the stipulation until they arrived at the hospital. But she couldn't force herself into the operating room, as much as she may like to. And she knew, if it was anyone other than her that had to treat Edythe, she would want it to be Paul Vernetti. Second to Carine, he was the best surgeon Forks Hospital had; she trusted him, and he knew she had entrusted him with saving her daughter's life. She only hoped he could do it, that she wasn't too late.

Jessamine could feel the desperation, the despair leaking from Carine and reached out to her with her gift to soothe it; though her gift was unnaturally potent, it did not seem to reach the matriarch, her emotions closed off from even where Jessamine had no power. Concerned, the blond vampire stepped closer to touch Carine's shoulder physically, providing emotional support in the old fashioned way when her gift proceed useless. Carine considered reaching to take Jessamine's hand, but remembered she was still covered in blood. For a long moment, she battled between not wanting to move from the place she saw Edythe disappear, to wanting to do something, anything she could.

Carine finally stood, moving briskly down the far hallway; her family watched her retreating back, only vaguely wondering where she was going. She moved a little too quickly to her office, unlocking the door and moving quickly to one of the side cabinets behind her desk. Taking her spare supplies, she cleaned her hands of blood and changed into her spare set of clothes, ones she always kept on hand for situations similar to this, though without the involvement of her own family; she cringed as she thought about it again, forcing her mind to think robotically, to avoid the emotional turmoil that was clamoring at the back of her mind. She returned to the emergency room minutes later, scanning her ID card as she signed in before moving to Beau. She ushered him to the nearest empty exam room, ordering him to dress down. He hesitated, partially unsure and partially still out of it.

"I'm fine," he tried to say, but didn't continue when he saw the expression on Carine's face. He wordlessly pulled the shirt over his head and allowed her to examine him. She catalogued the injuries mechanically, automatically; once she was done she began to clean the wounds on his face and hands from being sliced open from the windshield.

"Judging by your eyes, you have a moderate concussion," she told him as she worked, "But that looks to be the worst of it. Your neck and head is tender, naturally, and you already have some bruising on your side."

"She collided with me," he mumbled, his eyes refusing to meet hers. She didn't say anything.

"It was Victor," Beau said, glancing up at her eyes. Her teeth came together audibly, but her eyes were full of pain, rather than rage. "He attacked us." Carine nodded once.

"Will she be okay?" he asked her in a low, desperate voice after a moment. She met his gaze, the light blue contorted by pain. He was hurting as much as she was and she couldn't find it in herself to lie to him.

"I don't know," she admitted. Beau expected that answer, but seemed to accept it.

After Carine had finished doing what she could, they returned to the waiting room, Beau sitting on her right while she sat besides Earnest. She gripped his hands tightly and ducked under his arm, pressing her face into his shoulder to provide and receive comfort. The Cullen siblings stayed standing, ramrod straight, eyes focused on the door to the operating room, willing there to be a change.

Finally, there was; an hour later, Dr. Vernetti pushed through the door, scanning for Carine, who moved from her seat swiftly to meet him at the entrance. He was still donned in a surgical gown and cap, so she knew it was far from over, not that she expected anything else.

"We've got her heart rate steady, so she's stable in that regard," he told her first; Carine nodded. "She has seven broken ribs, six on the right, one on the left, as well as a severe single spinal fracture between the L2 and L3. She had a lot of internal bleeding and a punctured right lung, but we got it on under control. Her right rotator cuff is completely torn, not to mention many contusions and lacerations. But her lower extremities appear mostly fine, save for the expected bruising."

Carine added the tally to the list as Dr. Vernetti confirmed, the number and severity of the injuries surmounting. But she forced herself not to focus on that; Edythe was alive, and that was all that mattered at the moment.

"As you know, the best option is to do a spondylosyndesis and an arthroscopic repair for her spine and shoulder. She'll probably be on a ventilator for a few days as well." Dr. Vernetti informed her; a part of Carine's brain drew the same conclusions but found she needed to hear it from him audibly to get confirmation. Dr. Vernetti waited as she considered for a moment.

"Do it," she said simply, nodding at him and finally meeting his gaze fully. He nodded in response then placed an hand on her shoulder.

"She's going to be okay, Carine; I'll make sure of that. And so is she; she's fighting," he told her earnestly. She smiled a very small smile in response; she could tell from the vehemence in his voice that it wasn't just the words doctors used to make their patient's families feel better. He believed it, and it was true as far as he was concerned. She nodded and he turned to return to surgery, while she moved back to her family.

"What does that mean?" Earnest asked when she had settled next to her. Carine relayed what had been said to Beau, who had been out of hearing range before she answerd.

"It means she's alive, but she has a lot of injuries," she said.

"But she'll be okay?" Eleanor asked anxiously.

"She's not out of the woods yet, and with what they're about to do to her to fix the damage…it's going to be a long road." Carine said sadly, but with new vigor. Now she knew Edythe had survived the first hour of surgery, she felt more confident the anesthesiologist and surgeons would be able to keep her stable during the surgeries to follow.

As she and the Cullens settled in, Carine watched as many of her colleagues moved toward the operating room; as far as she knew, there were no other procedures going on, and as the doctors she knew were on-call walked through the double doors on the ER and then behind the metal doors to the operating rooms, she knew Dr. Vernetti was pulling out all resources at his disposal, including the entire clinical team of Forks Hospital.

Her colleagues met her gaze as they made their way to the surgical suites, nodding at her or giving her silent reassuring expressions. She acknowledged them each with a small smile or nod in return, feeling endless gratitude as they came in to help where she could not. She heard the announcement over the intercoms, summoning all available surgery nurses; she knew that the relatively small Forks Hospital was not used to such extreme emergency cases.

But they were stepping up to the task, to work to save Dr. Cullen's daughter, who was fighting for her life.