A/N: Hello again friends! Here is the conclusion of the cliffy I left last time. I hope that you enjoy. More at the bottom!

Chapter 19: The Color Red

Edward

I suppressed the urge to roll my eyes for the hundredth time since I'd gotten back to the meadow. Sam's pack had only been here for a couple weeks and they were driving me crazy. The conversations in their heads were driving me to distraction; I could barely hear anyone else in the meadow. I knew that Alice's vision showed Victoria and her army not getting close to us soon but I was still worried. I hated that this would all be so close to Bella.

I hated being away from her, and I'd told Alice that. But because the wolves were so stubborn, I needed to be here to help translate now that all of our friends had arrived. I just wish they hadn't had such an annoying inner monologue going while I did it. I wanted to greet our friends, but Jasper had asked me to stay so I could translate for the wolves.

Just a couple days from when the army was supposed to arrive, I was half listening to the maddening dogs when I heard Alice gasp. Quickly, I turned toward her and focused my thoughts away from the pack, concentrating on the vision she was having. I almost dropped to my knees. Swirling colors, including the bright red of Victoria's hair, standing right in front of Bella. Victoria had an evil grin on her face.

That evil vampire shouldn't be able to get that close to Bella! Something had gone wrong!

Before I even registered the thought, I was off and running toward the cabin. I burst through the door, hoping to find Bella sitting down looking at me like I was crazy, but she wasn't in the living room. I searched through the whole house only to find it completely empty.

Now I was near panic as I ran out the door. I smelled the throat burning scent of my love, heading in the opposite direction of the meadow. I ran at a slower pace, just to be sure I didn't miss it. I heard Jasper and Emmett behind me, but I ignored them. I was solely focused on finding Bella. I followed the scent through the trees, and finally came to an opening in the forest.

"There were other vampires here," Jasper said, walking up beside me. He placed his hand on my shoulder. "Edward, we have to assume that she's been taken."

I closed my eyes. If I could have cried, I felt sure that tears would have been pouring down my face. "Jazz, what did she do? Was she kidnapped and we didn't see? Did she run out of the cabin?" I started to panic again, but I felt Jasper pour calmness over me. I wanted to struggle away from it - I didn't want to feel calm right then! I turned to him and Emmett. "Go back to the meadow; Victoria has to be around and will most likely be making an appearance. Get back to the family; let me find Bella."

They looked at me like I was crazy. "Please, guys. Just go. We have no idea if it was just one or more, but I don't want anyone else to be injured. Please get back to the fight; the rest of the group needs you right now. When it winds down, if I'm not back yet, come and find me, ok?"

"Edward, you'll get yourself killed fighting them by yourself," Jasper said, his eyes narrowing. "Are you...why would you put yourself in that kind of danger? We have no way of knowing where they took Bella, or if she's even alive."

I flinched, but stood my ground. "Jazz, go, please. I'll find her. But come after me as soon as the fight is over, ok?"

They didn't move for a second, but I pushed on them to get them to go. Before they even turned to leave, I was sniffing around the clearing trying to find the scent again. Bella's was masked heavily by the odor of other vampires; I had to assume they had her. I couldn't even think about them killing her. It couldn't be real or true, so I decided to focus on finding her.

As I kept the scent in my head, following it throughout the clearing and back into the woods on the opposite side, and realized that Jasper knew exactly what I was doing. We had spoken a few weeks ago and he had worked out of me how I felt about her. I told him that Bella was everything to me, that I couldn't live without her. We had spoken about her eventual change into one of us, which he supported, but I explained how hard it would be for me to watch her in pain. And what if I couldn't stop and killed her?

"Edward, it's the same for Alice. I'm thankful I never had to watch her go through the change; I know how hard that would have been on me," Jasper had said. "The fact that you are obsessing so much over this means that you will be able to stop. You have already done things with her that haven't killed her like they should have; your strength is incredible! You can absolutely do this, brother."

His words had only sort of dimmed the inner monologue in my head, though. I still obsessed, as he put it, over the future and how it would all play out. But right now, I was focused on the present. And finding Bella as quickly as I could.

I rounded the bend in the forest and I could hear someone's thoughts in my head. I focused on them, trying to determine if this person had my Bella.

I may just have to take her. The smell is driving me insane; I don't know how Victoria does it. She's sitting right there, smelling like that, and Victoria just ignores it. There's fresh blood, damnit! I may go crazy! And I have to sit here and smell it, knowing that there are no humans close by at all. The burning is so painful!

I pulled out of the thoughts as fast as I could, trying to block them. The burn I heard them describe wasn't helping me, considering it had been a few days since I'd hunted myself. Based on their thoughts, I had to assume that Bella was close by, and apparently injured to some degree if they were smelling fresh blood? Or maybe it was just because the person was a newborn and they couldn't help but want blood that close by. Who knew; and I certainly didn't want back into those thoughts.

I crept closer, my guard up as I neared to them. I was hoping to find other thoughts to listen in to, but somehow, I couldn't find anyone else. Before too long, I found the vampire that I'd heard. They were alone, a mile or so away from a very remote cabin. It looked similar to ours, though smaller. I approached anticipating a fight, and was able to take the vampire out fairly quickly. That person must have been a sentry or something, considering they were all alone.

By that time, I could hear other thoughts from the direction of the cabin. There were three others, and from what I could see, they had Bella locked up in a back room. Victoria was with her while the other two were in the front room. Through Victoria's thoughts I could tell that she was keeping Bella alive for now because she was waiting for me to show up. She wanted Bella to die right in front of me so that my pain would be what she experienced watching me kill James.

Her thoughts were vile – evil. And I struggled to pull myself out. I didn't want to, because I had a direct line into watching Bella. She was on the floor against the far wall; I didn't see any blood, so I was thankful in assuming the newborn was only talking about Bella being a human so close, rather than injured and bleeding. I realized that if she had been bleeding the others would have gone crazy – even more crazy than they already were with her being so close. I was thankful for that much.

I listened to the others' thoughts, but got back to Victoria several times. I just wanted to check on Bella and know that she was still safe. The others were newborns also, of course, and one of them had some kind of power. It was not a large gift, more of a minor one of fire starting. He was scared of it though because Victoria had warned him that fire was the one thing that could kill us. He was thinking about trying to use it, see what he could do with it, but kept hearing Victoria telling him that he would kill himself or them if he used it.

I didn't think I could take all three, which was the only thought keeping me back from busting in there. I needed to wait for my brothers to return. I was too far away from the fight to know if it had even started, let alone how it was going. I knew that we had amassed many to fight with us, so I was sure of our victory, but because I couldn't hear anything, I didn't know the status. I decided to hide and stay within thought sensing range and keep an eye on the three guarding Bella.

It was almost two hours later before I heard someone approaching from behind me. Luckily, I heard their thoughts before I reacted. I calmed when I realized it was Mother, Carlisle, Esme and Charlie.

Son, the battle is winding down. Jasper sent us here to help you, since Alice saw that you needed us. We tried to convince Charlie to stay back, just in case they had injured Bella, but he refused. He wants to help save her, and honestly is very distracted as a result.

As they neared, I turned to look at them with a grateful glance. "I assume we are winning?"

Esme looked up at me. It was worse than Alice thought. There were almost 50 by the time they got there. Jasper hasn't seen that many newborns in one place since the wars he was involved with, and we don't know why or how there were that many. The vision Alice had was right, the wolves took out a little more than a quarter of them. The rest of us were able to surround the rest and take most of them out. Jasper and Sam's pack are finishing up with the ten or so remaining.

There's something off about this, dear. My mother thought, putting her arm around me. Alice can't put her finger on it, but something was weird. Like it was a diversion or something. Whatever it is, we cannot see without you. Let's focus on getting Bella and then we need you to help.

"I haven't heard anything from the ones in the cabin. If something else is going on here, other than trying to kill Bella to get back at me, I haven't heard it." I said as quietly as I could.

"So, Bella is in that cabin? How are we going to get her out?" Charlie said, using the same tone of voice I was. His thoughts were still muted, as they had been when he was human, so I really couldn't hear him that well. The others were used to thinking at me, instead of talking, but he was different. It was almost like he repelled my abilities. I knew he was a shield, similar to a mirror according to Eleazer, so I just assumed that's what was going on.

We took a few minutes to discuss our strategy, knowing that we would only have seconds to take out the three in the cabin without hurting Bella in the process. I thought about making a noise to see if I could draw the two newborns outside, but Mother said that was the worse choice, because Victoria would kill Bella immediately.

"We have to do it this way," Mother was saying. "You and Charlie go in through the window on the far side of the room Bella is in. You get Bella, he will take out Victoria. That's the only way I can see this working where she is safe."

We all trusted Mother – though Charlie was still new to the whole thing, he trusted Esme, who assured him Mother was always right – so everyone agreed with the plan, whisking around the side of the cabin to get in place. We had to time it exactly right. Charlie and I would go through the back window a split second before the rest came crashing through the front door.

Charlie and I were in place, and I could hear Esme telling me they were ready also. I glanced at him, his eyes fierce, and nodded toward the window. He and I both jumped in at the same time.

Bella

I ran until I was exhausted and had to slow my pace. I continued to go, though; I didn't dare stop my progress away from the cabin. As I came into a semi-large opening in the trees, I saw a burst of red fly by me. I stopped short, staring into bright red eyes.

"How lovely? Bella, I assume?"

I tried to stop shaking as she walked slowly toward me. I knew what I was doing when I left the cabin. This is exactly what I had expected. Then why was I so damn scared? I took in her fiery red hair, the matching red eyes, and the evil smirk on her face. She was the scariest damn vampire I'd ever seen. And I realized, as she kept getting closer to me, that she was probably the last thing I was ever going to see. I closed my eyes and tried to remember how Edward felt when we were close. How his hands had felt on me...his lips. How he had told me that he loved me. I pushed through the memories and felt myself calm down.

"I think that you aren't scared of me," she whispered, her face right next to mine. "How interesting. Let's see what I can do to change that."

And in a flash, she had grabbed me and we were running. I couldn't tell what direction she had taken me in, because I couldn't open my eyes. I was nauseous and the terror was creeping back up into my throat, trying not to scream. She wanted me to be scared? She'd succeeded.

I felt her slow down, so I opened my eyes carefully. She was walking up to a cabin that looked similar to ours, just smaller. There were three other people standing next to it, all with the same bright red eyes that she had. They looked at me like I was their next snack. Maybe I was? I had no idea why this crazy bitch hadn't just killed me already. I tried to focus on the cabin, and around it, just in case I needed to make a run for it. Then I laughed at myself internally. There was no way I was getting out of here. I was screwed; which is exactly how I thought today would go.

She carried me into a back room, screaming at the others to keep guard. She slammed the door and threw me against the far wall. My head cracked against it, and I slid down, pulling my knees up to my chest as I leaned against the wall. My eyes lifted to hers and she sneered at me.

"Your little boyfriend brought this on himself, you know. We were totally innocent. We just wanted to meet the new vamps in town, and they attacked us unprovoked!" She walked over to me, running her hand down my cheek. "And now you have to pay his debt. I had to watch my mate get killed, and now he will have to watch his little pet go through the same thing. Though, my dear, I fear it will be much more pain involved for you."

I didn't say anything, but I met her eyes steadily. The anger and amusement in her face was a whole other level of terrifying, but I held my ground. I knew that they couldn't find me right away, and I hoped that Edward wasn't stupid enough to try and take on four vampires on his own.

"I'm going to keep you alive for now," she whispered again. It was interesting how her voice was so child-like while the words and her demeanor were so challenging and evil. "He needs to come here first so he can enjoy the show."

I hugged my legs tighter as she straightened up and moved away from me, standing against the far wall. I knew that she was plotting how to kill me, and somehow my terror vanished. I had just taken four vampires out of the fight; that was something, right? Maybe that was the edge my family needed to defeat them. Maybe I had just given them all a good chance at winning. That was all I had wanted.

She sat there staring at me for what felt like forever. Could have been hours, I wouldn't have been able to tell. When the sun was starting to get low, I realized that I must have been there for at least four or five hours; maybe more. She hadn't said another word, just stared at me with a sneer on her face. She could have almost been a statue at that point. I never said a word.

Out of nowhere, her head whipped to the side, staring at the window to my right. I didn't even have time to turn to look before I heard a crashing sound. I threw my arms over my head as debris rained down on me. I didn't look, but I felt strong, familiar arms wrap around me.

"Bella, hold on to me, love. I'm getting you out of here," Edward whispered. I reacted, throwing my arms around him. I heard a screeching noise, and Victoria screaming, but I didn't even look. The crashing around me was nothing compared to the dark black eyes of Edward. He grabbed me and took off through the hole he had made in the wall. He kept running as fast as he could, and I kept my eyes closed the whole time.

Finally, he stopped, sitting down on the ground. "What were you thinking? Why did you do this?"

I opened my eyes and stared into his. They were filled with concern and frustration. "I wanted to help. I wanted to do something to deter the fight a little. She was after me, so I decided to give myself to her. Then you would be safe."

He raised his hand to my cheek. "Don't you know that I can't live without you? Do you have any concept of how lost I would be if you'd died?" He almost choked on the last word. "Bella, you are everything to me. I can't live in a world where you don't exist. You nearly gave me a heart attack, and that's a very hard thing to do!"

I almost smiled at him. "I love you, too, Edward. You have to understand that I had to try and do something to keep you safe. I wanted to help my family; our family. This was the only thing I could think of."

He lowered his forehead to mine. "Stubborn human. You are going to kill me one day, I swear." He brought his lips to mine, and I sank into him.

Esme

We waited for the signal from Edward, making sure to wait until it was the right time. We couldn't have the two vampires inside go to Victoria's aid, so we slammed through the door and jumped on them as fast as we could. Jasper's training on fighting newborns had been extremely helpful. Elizabeth and I jumped on the one closest to the door, while Carlisle rushed to the one at the far end.

The one we were after threw her hand out, hitting me so hard I slammed into the back wall. Liz was closer and was able to grab onto her arm. I bounced off the wall and rushed over to help her, punching the vampire in the stomach. She bowed and I pulled her forward, moving to the other side so that I push her to the ground. I kneeled on her back as she went down. I started pushing on the back of her head, as Liz bent down and took a giant chunk out of the neck. Because of the chunk missing I was able to push the head off, kicking the body over to the far wall, separating the two pieces.

Liz and I stood up glancing over to Carlisle, immediately terrified. The vampire he was after had grabbed him around the neck, fire glowing in the hand that wasn't around Carlisle. Fire was the last thing I had expected to find, and Liz and I froze. This crazy newborn could kill us all if we weren't careful.

I was aware of the fight in the back bedroom. Now that I was quiet, I could hear Victoria screaming, and Charlie grunting with effort. I just had to hope and pray that he was ok, because I really couldn't think anything else. I knew he was stronger than her right now, and that had to work in his interest.

Liz stepped forward, slowly, her hands raised. "I know that you are scared," she said, in her best calming voice. "I know that you don't want to be here; don't want to be what you've become. We can help you. Please, let us just talk and we can get through this together."

"You came rushing in and killed my friend!" he jeered at her. "You aren't here to talk!" He grabbed Carlisle even harder, and Liz's breath caught a little. "I can kill all of you with my power. In five seconds, I can have this entire cabin up in flames."

I shook my head, taking a step to stand next to Liz. "I don't think you want to do that, though, do you? You want to live. You want to run and never look back. Isn't that right?"

His face fell for a moment, before sliding back into the sneer. "You are scared. I can kill all of you, and you know it." He laughed and I noticed that he had shifted his hold on Carlisle ever so slightly. Carlisle looked up at Liz and smiled a little. She and I readied ourself, understanding that he was about to break free.

I knew we could only have seconds at this point. Carlisle shifted fast, sliding out of his grasp, and Liz and I took off toward him. He threw his arm out to try and cover his eyes, which released the fire in his hand. It flew toward the kitchen area and almost erupted in a wall of flame. I screamed, kicking him right in the stomach as Liz grabbed Carlisle and moved him out of the way of the fire. I had dazed the newborn, and I took advantage of it to kick him again in the chest, harder this time.

As I watched him stumble into the flames in the kitchen, I heard another scream from the back room. I took off running, knowing that Liz and Carlisle were fine; I had to help Charlie. I got to the bedroom door and I burst through it, right as Victoria was kicking Charlie in the chest. It didn't have as much of an effect on him as she had wanted, though. Charlie smirked, lunging at her, his teeth on her shoulder. She screamed as he yanked her arm clean off, severing it at the shoulder blade.

I jumped at her then, my teeth on her neck, just like Liz had done with the other female. Charlie did the same thing on the other side, and Victoria's screams were gone in a second as her head fell ungracefully to the floor.

Charlie turned to me, love in his eyes, and lunged at me next, his mouth fused to mine. "Damn that was a rush," he said. "Killing that evil witch for taking my daughter felt damn good."

For a moment I forgot about the scene around us; then I smelled the smoke again. "Charlie, we need to get out of here. The one in the front was a fire starter, and this place is going to burn down."

His eyes were wide; he reached over and grabbed my hand, pulling me toward the hole that he and Edward had made coming into the room. We ran out of it, circling back to the front, hoping to see Liz and Carlisle. They were just coming through the door as we got there.

"He didn't want to stay still after you pushed him into the fire," Liz explained. "We had to convince him to stay in there." She smirked at me then looked at Charlie. "Victoria?"

He grinned. "Headless and about to be burned."

"Excellent. Let's go find Bella and give her a sound talking to then. Scaring us half to death." Liz's face was fierce, but there was a smile there. I knew as well as anyone that she was impressed with Bella. The strength that human had was incredible, and Liz knew it.

We followed Edward and Bella's scent for a few miles before we finally spotted them. He was leaning against a tree, holding Bella, their lips fused. I cleared my throat and they broke apart, Bella's face reddening. Charlie walked up to her and pulled her out of Edward's arms, hugging her tightly.

"Don't you ever do that again! You scared the hell out of us!" He leaned back and kissed her forehead. All of us tensed when he did that, but Charlie wasn't fazed at all. "When we tell you to stay in the damn cabin away from a group of mindless killers, listen to us next time, damnit! You could have died!"

"I just..." Bella stammered. "I wanted to help. I felt so useless just standing around in the cabin while all of you were risking your lives for me."

"Bella, we were not risking our lives for just you. If this newborn army hadn't been stopped, think about the decimation they could do to an entire town of humans!" Liz walked closer to her, wrapping her arms around her. "You are important. To all of us, not just Edward and Charlie. We can't lose you! It's too high a price to pay to stop them, do you understand me?"

"Yes, I understand." Bella looked down. It looked like tears were streaming down her face. "You have to understand from my point of view, too, though. All you mean a lot to me, and I didn't want to lose you. I thought if I turned myself over to her that I might be able to pull some of them away from the fight...or, or, prevent some of it maybe. I don't know...I just...I had to do something."

Carlisle walked over to Bella then, and I walked close behind him. "You mean more to us than you think, Bella. Please don't ever think that any of us would be ok losing you just to save us having to fight a few newborns."

She bit her lip, glancing around at all of us. "I'm sorry. I was just trying to help."

"We know, dear. Just please let us handle things like this in the future. At least until you are one of us." Liz smiled at her. I glanced at Edward, who's mouth was in a firm line at his mother's comment. Charlie didn't say anything, but I could almost feel the tension rolling off of him.

"Come on, let's get back to the cabin. I want to know what's going on in the meadow," I said, taking Charlie's hand, leading him to the east toward our cabin; the others started to follow us, and we didn't say anything more until we got back.

A/N: Phew. That was an interesting one to write. So, couple things. We only have 5 more chapters left in the fic – which is crazy, right? Man, I feel like I just started it! Anyway, more this weekend. We'll continue the twice a week updates going forward. I'm still debating on one additional chapter – so, if I do that it may be later. There are 25 written and beta'd at this point. We'll see if I end up doing one more.

LOTS more to come, too. This is only the beginning, my friends!

Thanks to everyone reading, reviewing, liking, etc. for my little story. I really appreciate each and every one of you! I also see lots of the same names commenting on my other fan fic Consuming Love, so thank you for making it over there.

Much love to my sister and my beta, zombified419, for your help with this story! I really appreciate you both so much!

Until Saturday...just wait, should be a good time! :)