AN: I blame the Twilight TikToks. That's my defence.
Edit: I forgot to say this at first, but I'm mainly working on what I've seen in the movies and read in fanfiction. I've tried reading the books and nearly fell asleep.
Bella had always seen shadows walking around in the corner of her eyes. They'd either zip around or lumber after big masses of people, but they disappear when she meets the Cullens. Her world is shadow-free after so many years keeping an eye out for them, but they slowly fade back into existence as they leave.
It's a cold January afternoon, the snowfall so heavy she can barely see the trees across the street. A black form stops on the street, seemingly unnoticed by the people rushing around them. Their head is topped by ginger hair so vibrant, it's almost orange. They merely glance up at her windows, then they're gone, making her jump up in surprise. Was that a hallucination or a vampire?
Angela drags her to Port Angeles a week later, hellbent on spending some time with her, with Charlie ready to back her up. She spots the same head of bright ginger standing in front of the movie theatre, talking to someone, the people clearly noticing him now. They are giving him snide-glances, and maybe his hair is not the only thing noticeable about him.
She's left alone and without after the movie ends, an urgency pulling Angela away from her after Bella reassures her that she'll call Charlie to come after her. She waves at the departing car, then turns towards a random street, her phone still in her bag. She wanders seemingly aimlessly, with a vague idea of finding the ginger-haired man again, or even one of the Cullens maybe.
Something rustles behind her, the buzz of the masses and cars muffled against trees that seem to go on for eternity. She turns around, half it to be her imagination, but all she can see is red eyes and glowing skin. Bella is transfixed, like a deer caught in the headlights of a car, staring at the vampire in frozen shock. Clearly a nomad, judging by the state of her clothes, mouth open and posed to strike and...this can't be it. This is why Edward left her? To leave her to die by another vampire's hands?
A tentacle reaches out from the woods before any of them can move, snatching the vampire up and pulling her in and Bella is snapped out of her shock. Then a lumbering figure shuffles onto the path, its 'face' turned towards Bella, saliva dripping down from its grinning mouth. There are tentacles moving towards her, and she falls onto her ass when trying to move away from them.
There's another presence behind her, and before she can fully register it, the creature howls in pain, the tentacles aimed for Bella falling to the ground, smoking and charred. Her saviour moves again, and the thing disintegrates in front of her, the halves never meeting the snowy ground.
Another woman, clad in black with brown hair in a pony-tail appears in front of her, a curved blade held loosely in one of her hands. Bella swears, feeling trapped when the other woman crouches down in front of her and her eyes are not red or gold but purple.
"I thought you were a vampire too..." Slips out before she can kick her filter back online, the stranger's confused face etched into her brain before her world turns dark. She's very pretty.
She comes to in the backseat of a car. Did Charlie come after her? Is she being kidnapped? Had Edward returned for her?
She slowly sits up, turning towards the voices talking softly over a nameless song on the radio. The ginger man is driving, the purple-eyed woman talking to him. She's the one who notices Bella sitting up, turning back towards her with a kind smile and warm expression. Her eyes were really purple, so she hadn't imagined that.
"Glad you're okay, love. You gave me a scare when you fainted in the park." She has a British accent, and the man only grunts along, eyes trained onto the road.
"Where are we? Who are you?" Her eyes widen and the man snorts, pulling up a driveway.
"I'm Ichigo and she's Lilly, my wife with no impulse control." She can't exactly place his accent, but judging from his name, he's Japanese. He turns to look at her when the car's finally parked, and Bella lets out an undignified little squeak. With sharp features and warm brown eyes, he looks just as beautiful as his wife. "And we brought you home with us since we have no idea where you live, and leaving you at the hospital would have been a bad idea since a Hollow might have found you there." So that's what the monsters were called.
"And we wanted to talk to you. Only a few, gifted people can see Hollows and the form we use to defeat them." She literally bounced out of the car, opening the door closer to Bella. "Come in and warm up. Ichigo can make a mean hot chocolate that'll warm you right up."
"I'll call Kisuke while I'm at it. See if he can find out something interesting."
"Maybe Kūkaku too. She does look a lot like her." Bella was lost. She got pulled into a cosy and bohemian home that looked lived-in. There were dirty shoes near the entrance, a faint trace of smoke in the air and an open box of sweets on the coffee table in the living room.
"My name is Bella. Bella Swan." She told Lilly, her hands clenched into fists. The woman freezes, then spins towards her, smiling.
"Lilly Blackmoor-Kurosaki. And I apologize for effectively kidnapping you. After we tell you everything you need to know, you're free to call someone to pick you up." Her hands are raised in a placating gesture, but she stays there, waiting for Bella to respond.
"Will you tell me about everything I want to know?" For a moment, she sees golden eyes and copper hair, telling her that 'no, she shouldn't know so many things about their dark world', then Lilly laughs and they're alone, with no Edward in sight. The woman curls up in one of the armchairs and Bella takes that as her cue to sit down on the couch.
"As much information as you want and as much as I can provide. I've only known about this side of the world for seven years. And my dear husband, as much as I adore him, is not the best at explaining things when they don't concern Shakespeare." A hand appears in the doorway leading to the kitchen, flipping of Lilly, to which the woman only shot back an overly cheerful "Love you too, darling."
"The world is divided into multiple fractions, based on who lives in them. Humans and the like live in what is officially called the 'Transient world'; Hollows, that was the creature that attacked you, live in a land called Hueco Mundo and Grim Reapers, someone with powers like Ichigo and I, usually inhabit Soul Society. These are the main three, connected by what happens to the human soul after the death of their body. They can either be damned to Hell, where they will suffer for eternity(unless Ichigo doesn't kill a significant chunk of them again); or sent over to Soul Society by a Reaper; or they can become corrupted and turn into a Hollow. Then a Shinigami has the duty of purifying the Hollow, so the can cross over to Soul Society."
"What about vampires? Ed...someone told me they have no soul."
"That's impossible. A body can't function without a soul. They are those sparkly people, right? Riiight. I've seen one get devoured by a Hollow last week. My best guess is that vampires are stuck in a state between human with a soul fully in their body and a dead one, so they can still be affected by the stuff that crosses over. And this may be just me theorizing, so don't take this to heart, but I think their souls are already corrupted, so when they finally pass, they turn into lower-level Hollows instantly."
Lilly's explanation was relatively short, intermixed with sarcastic remarks from both spouses when Ichigo was not talking in rapid-fire Japanese with someone. Eventually, he walked in with a tray of three steaming mugs topped with whipped cream and what looked like a tray of cookies.
"Are there any Higginbothams in your family?" She nodded in thanks when he handed her a polka-dotted mug.
"That's my mother's maiden name. Have you found something?"
"One of the Shiba's had a mission in California a century or so ago. And he had requested a few more months of absence before returning, mentioning a possibility of expanding the family into this world. Kūkaku, at the time, thought he was full of shit, but turns out, we still have family here."
Lilly jumps up in joy, clapping her hands together with a small giggle, and Bella has to blink to remove the image of Alice doing the same. There's no pixie cut, no golden eyes and no diamond-like skin, just a mane of curls, purple eyes and skin red from the heat.
"I'm so happy to have someone new in the family. And so near!"
"Are you sure that we're related?"
"If Kūkaku and Kisuke are sure about it, then sure." He told her, Lilly nodding along enthusiastically from his lap, almost falling onto the ground. "Easy, love. Don't give our cousin the wrong impression from the get-go."
"I think my first impression was her defending me." She shared a smile with Lilly, feeling content again after so long.
She calls Charlie after that, explaining that she dumped into Renée's distant cousins that invited her in for a chat and to warm up. They make plans to meet up again during the wait, Lilly promising to start training her, and Ichigo starting up a discussion about Shakespeare that has his wife groaning and hurrying off to do the dishes.
Lilly greets Charlie when he arrives, and Bella swears she can feel the air shift around the woman, her eyes gaining an ethereal glow that seems unnoticed by her dad. Ichigo just rolls his eyes and mouth 'Friday' to her, disappearing upstairs to finish his work. She's almost choked to death by Lilly's goodbye hug, and the scent of magnolias and hot chocolate clings to her like a vice. Something finally feels right, at last.