A/N:If you don't like the characters or plot, then don't read. This is slightly AU as fair as Lana and their ancestry and stuff like that. But the main premise will not change.
DISCLAIMER: I only own my OC, nothing else.
WORD COUNT: 2, 114
Chapter 23
Back in Town
Silence fell heavily between them as Bella ceased her nervous chewing.
The pen clattering on the floor and her dark eyes became stony- the walls slowly building up once again.
"Lana." Bella sighed, carefully closing the English textbook as she did so. The youngest Swan knew that tone, it was the one that meant she didn't want to talk about it and was closing herself off. Anger and frustration colouring her inflections as her jaw clenched ever so slightly.
Lana had to do something before it blew up in her face.
"Look," Lana leaned forward once again, catching Bella's hand and she held it gently in her lap in appeasement, "I get you're hurting. I know it's been hell on you how they just disappeared, but we still have no idea what happened. I know you won't tell Dad, but this is me." Lana sighed, her head dropping as she looked at their joined hands and Bella's remained unresponsive. "I know you think I don't approve of what you're doing, this whole adrenaline rush thing," Bella's eyes slowly began to soften, the walls cease in their ascension as she listens to her sister's words, "and you're right, I don't." Lana lifted her head to meet Bella's gaze, "but I know I can't stop you. No matter how much I try, I know I won't be able to- you're too damn stubborn." They both shared a chuckle at that, Bella's hand slowly beginning to curl around Lana's until their fingers were entangled.
"So are you, little sister." Bella teased softly, finally squeezing Lana's hand.
"I'm not denying it." Lana agreed with an amused huff before slowly becoming serious again, "but maybe I can help lighten the load on your shoulders."
Bella's shoulders heaved with a heavy sigh, chest hunching as she expelled lungs worth of oxygen through her lips. Her silence was almost deafening but Lana remained patient as she watched Bella's lips curl soundless words, hesitant and afraid of the events that would suddenly become a reality.
Memories that would be solidified by the weight of her voice. "I was opening Esme and Carlisle's present when I cut my finger on the wrapping paper," her eyes darted around the room and dread course through Lana at Bella's next words, "Jasper lost control."
"Oh, God." Lana hid her face in her hands, resting her elbows on her knees.
"Jasper attacked and E-" Bella cleared her throat, the words acidic in her mouth as she breathed life into the events that shook her world to the core, "he stopped him and pushed me out of the way. I guess he forgot to regulate his strength and he sent me into the wall and that's how I got the gash in my arm."
Lana remembered changing the wrappings on that gash, spending so much time wondering how it happened. Her sister was clumsy, that was common knowledge but something this bad had to have happened to her, not because of her. The fact that it was already treated and stitched only solidified her belief that the Cullens had been involved. "I'm guessing that was when he went AWOL for a week and then all this crazy stuff happened?"
"Right." Bella inhaled deeply, her breath trembling and she quickly dashed away the oncoming tears, "he came to the house a week later, told me to go with him into the woods. We walked for what seemed like hours." She sniffled wetly, angrily fighting the watery onslaught but she soldiered through, "and he told me that they had to leave. People were beginning to notice that Carlisle wasn't aging anymore and they had to move again."
"I didn't even know people were noticing Carlisle. They didn't say anything about it." Lana was dumbfounded, it had to be an excuse.
It had to be.
"I was going to go with them," Lana's jaw ticked but she remained silent. Now was the time for her personal feelings to get in the way, "and he said to me he didn't want me, and then left me in the woods alone."
"And that's where Sam found you."
Bella nodded quietly, her fingers slowly encircling over Lana's and she sniffled but quickly attempted to mask it with a loud clearing of her throat, "and now we're here."
"And now we're here." Lana parroted back, her thumb slowly runing along the back of Bella's hand.
Bella took a deep trembling breath, "Lana, I just want to say I'm sorry," the tears thickening Bella's voice made Lana's head snap to her big sister in shock and she was suddenely pulled into a tight, bone-crushing embrace, "I'm so sorry for heaping everything on you. I'm sorry for falling apart and leaving you and Charlie to pick up the pieces."
Lana remained silent for a moment, too stunned to speak. Slowly, her arms raised and curled around Bella's shoulders, clinging to her sister tightly, "you don't have to apologise, Bells."
"Yes, I do." Bella insisted, one of her hands coming up to cup the back of Lana's head, smoothing down her drying her in comforting strokes, "I let myself break and I didn't think of what it would do to Charlie or you. Neither of you deserved that." Bella pulled back to look into Lana's eyes, beginning to brim with unshed tears, "and I was so selfish for just taking over your safe place with no regard to how you felt. I know you and Jake aren't in a good place right now and I'm not stupid enough to not notice that it's because of me." Lana bit her lip to stop from sobbing and her head dipped down, sniffling wetly as she struggled to grasp her emotions in some sort of control.
With a heavy, trembling sigh, Lana raised her head, "Jacob made his bed and he needs to lie in it. He made his own mistakes and not all of them were because of you. I'm finally happy where I am, I just want you to be the same and I'll always be there for you."
Bella watched her sister carefully, eyes taking in every microscopic feature before finally nodding with a small smile, "and I'll always be there for you."
Lana reutrned her sister's smile and Bella carefully took her hand, their fingers weaving and she squeezed once, "now help me with this stupid prompt before I literally go insane."
"Pretty sure that ship has sailed, but sure."
Lana barely avoided Bella's binder being swung at her head with a yelp.
(..)
If Lana hadn't have known what was going on, she would have been terrified.
It was only through Paul and the pack that she even knew there was another vampire in town and on that particular day, Paul had begged her at her back door to stay home and to get Bella to as well:
"Little one, please try to stay home today. Don't go out." Paul's hands curled around her waist, dark eyes gazing imploringly at her as he shielded her from the bracing wind with his large frame.
Her hands reached up to curl around his biceps, the tips of her left fingers stretching to gently brush over the Quileute tattoo to signify his initiation with the pack. "What's going on?" Lana's voice was soft as she stared back up at him, grasping at theories that flitted around her brain at light speed. Why didn't he want her outside?
"We spotted a leech not far from the treaty lines. We thought it might have been the Cullens but the scent was different. . . we found a trail of human blood."
Lana physically recoiled at the information but her hands remained on his arms, tightening ever-so-slightly as a sweat broke across her neck, "w-who's the vampire?"
"That we don't know. We've been hunting for it and we think we might have finally gotten the angle but it's all theory. We don't know how long it'll be in the area which is why we're in full force today. But for your safety. Yours and Bella's. Please stay home today." His hands slipped up from her waist and cupped her cheeks, "if anything happened to you. ." he leant forward, his forehead brushing against hers and he held himself there, "if anything happened to you, I don't know what I'd do."
"Paul. ." Lana whispered, her hands slipping up, one curling over his shoulder as the other cupped his jaw, "I can try, but I can't make any promises."
"As long as you try, little one, I'll be happy."
And she tried, oh did she try.
Which was exactly why they were trudging through the woods once again.
"Please explain to me why we need to find this meadow that you and Creeper liked to lay in?"
"Lana, please stop calling him that." Bella argued a few meters ahead of her and Lana simply rolled her eyes.
Lana raised her arms before letting them fall back to her sides with a snap, "well, I can't say his name, this is the best alternative I have." She took a few more steps in silence before pitching her voice to an annoyingly high-pitched tone that always grated on her big sister, "now, can I know why?"
Bella sighed, raising her head to the sky before turning back to Lana who simply stood there, "you'll find out when we get there!"
"Oh, come on!" Lana did her best to seem unbothered as they travelled deeper into the woods, but the fear prickling at the back of her neck was incessasant.
She had texted Paul that his plan didn't work and she'd received nothing back. She'd been sending updates periodically even with no responses.
He was on patrol and he had told her that they were actively hunting him but she knew that Bella's scent was somewhat of a . . . delicacy for vampires. Catnip would be the more correct terminology if Edward and his family's descriptions had any factual evidence behind their theories and seeing as she was what Carlisle called a 'blood guardian' she was the closest thing to a detterent there could be for someone in Bella's position.
They reached a gap in the trees and Bella's harrowed gasp had Lana running forward, "what is it?! What's wrong?!" Bella didn't answer, her broken expression remained on the clearing.
Lana's heart pounded in her chest as she slowly turned her head, gazing swivelling to where Bella was looking. Every muscle coiled in her body, ready for anything when she noticed the landscape around her.
Everything was dead.
It looked so out of place from the lush greenery surrounding the barren-like wasteland you'd see more in a desert or a hotter climate than Forks. Forks was such a wet place, constantly raining and only seeing a drop of sunlight every few months or so. There was no way that this place would have dried up so quickly with the amount of moisture in the air and the constant downpours they had been experiencing. "This doesn't make sense." She surveyed the area once again, bending to feel the dead grass, dry as a bone and there was no residue in the soil. 'Even with the few dry days we've had, there's no way this entire field could have dried up so easily.' Lana pondered to herself before flicking her gaze up to Bella
Bella walked deeper into the clearing, looking over the dead area with a look of heartbreak that tugged at Lana's heart, "I'm sorry Bells. I know this place must have been special to you."
She watched as Bella looked further into the field and her whole body tensed, her breath hitching and her hands began to shake. Lana snapped her head forward and noticed the figure watching them. 'The vampire.'
"Bella."
