Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyers owns all rights - no copyright infringement intended. I also don't own any songs by Lord Huron or Cigarettes After Sex.

END OF US

Got the music in you baby, tell me why...
-Apocalypse by Cigarettes After Sex

(EPOV)

"Dad? Where are the batteries?"

A pale-blonde head pokes out of the stairwell closet door and voices out, "in the garage, next to the nail gun," before disappearing again.

I walk over towards him with an amused smile and cross my arms, leaning against the door-frame. "Thanks. What are you doing?" It kind of looked like he was sorting through boxes and in the process of breaking down empty ones. A piece of his fine hair clings to the sweat on his forehead and he brushes it back with the back of his hand before looking up at his only son with a grin.

"Clearing out this clutter for your mother." He snorts at his rhyme and I roll my eyes. "Some of the stuff in here hasn't been used since before you were born - so out they go."

Nearly half the boxes are in a designated trash pile. The mountain of crap nearly touch the ceiling with how much there is, so I offer to take some to the garage to give him more room to work with. My dad thanks me kindly and I make a couple trips to and back until the space is clear of cardboard. On my last trip from the garage, my mom strolls through the front door with a smile on her face and what looked to be a clear, plastic suitcase in her hand.

She kisses me on the cheek and then ducks into the small area where my dad is to give him a quick peck in greeting. "Looking great in here, boys."

We grin at her almost identically before dad gestures to the thing in her grip. "Whatcha got there sweet tits?"

I instantly cringe at the nickname but my mom giggles and swats at his shoulder. "It's an emergency kit. For, well… emergencies."

My dad hums. "Looks more like a doctor's briefcase."

His wife rolls her eyes, probably where I get it from, and then sets the kit down against the wall. "You would know. Leave it in here when you're done, please? I have to go freshen up for my dinner date with Emily." Dad gives her a pout face and she swoops in to kiss him on his pushed out bottom lip. He immediately pulls her closer, like a magnet. A groan rumbles through my chest as I cover my eyes and complain loudly about PDA and my dislike of it - but on the inside, I'm warm from the at the obvious love they still share after a whopping twenty-two years together.

Mom's tinkering laugh follows her as she slides by me and practically skips up the stairs. My dad watches after her with a silly smile on his face and then looks down at the plastic case. "The doctor in me is upset she thought to bring home an emergency kit before I could."

I chuckled at that one. "Didn't you know mom wears the pants?"

"Oh, I've always known that." He's still looking down at the emergency kit and eventually he brings it into his lap to inspect the contents. He stares inside for a weirdly long amount of time. I'm about to ask him if he's okay when he asks, "Edward?" Then he lifts his eyes to mine and I nod for him to continue. "Have we ever told you what to do if there ever is an emergency?"

What, like an earthquake? "Uh... get out of the house and go to safe ground?"

Dad's brows crease. "Well, yes, if it's on fire. But what I'm trying to ask you is if the country ever goes into a state of emergency, do you know what to do? Where to go?"

He's kind of concerning me with these questions but I humor him and try to answer truthfully. "Get as far away from the country as possible?" That would be what I'd do. I couldn't imagine it ever happening, though.

"If you know you're not safe where you are, then yes. You have to be smart about it though, pack things that will help you in the long-run but not slow you down. And then once you're sure you have the essentials for survival, you need to escape the country as safely and as fast as possible."

"Mexico?"

He shakes his head. "No, not Mexico. It may be closer, but it's also highly populated. Whatever is happening in America could hypothetically be happening there, as well." Dad chews on his cheek, something I've seen him do all my life. He only does it when he's seriously thinking and it makes me wonder what's going through his brain. "I'd say Canada would be your best bet. Even though it's pretty far away, it's relatively safe and there are many parts throughout the country that have little to no people."

"North?"

"Yes, go North."

Okay? "Why are we even talking about this?"

"You asked me the same thing when your mom made me talk to you about sexual inter-"

"Alright, I get it! Jesus! You and your filter today," I grumble, cringing that the words mom and sexual were used in the same sentence.

Dad laughs outright and reaches from his sitting position to lightly punch my leg. "You're too easy, son." Then he sighs. "But honestly, I just thought I'd give you guidance in the event I'm not there and something does go wrong. God forbid if that ever happens, but if it does, just promise me that you'll do one thing above all else."

I nod and listen.

"Stay calm."

My dream of a memory wakes me immediately once it's over. I catch my breath for a second, my emotions whirling at seeing both of my parents. It all seemed so real, like I could reach out and touch my dad's arm. I swear I felt the warmth of mom's lips on my cheek, felt the weight of the cardboard in my hands as I carried it to the garage. It was a sheer mind-fuck waking up and expecting to see the dark blue of my room but instead seeing the dusty grey walls of the cabin. The sheets I'm wrapped in smell nothing of home, more like old man, and for some reason that causes tears to form in my eyes.

I scrub a hand over my face and into my hair. The dream wasn't real, but the advice my dad gave me was.

Four little words had kept me breathing through this all. If him and I never stopped to have that random talk, it's very possible that I wouldn't be here in this tiny cabin.

With all the commotion going on in the last couple of days, I hadn't had much time to sit and think about where the two of them were or if they were safe - alive, even. I shake my head violently at the thought of never seeing them again. Sweden was thousands of miles away from the HO8 outbreak, and though the virus does spread quickly, I assume it would take weeks for it to reach that far East. And that's what I repeat to myself over and over, but of course, at this point, I know anything could happen.

My eyes sting with tears that I struggle to hold back and I press the heel of my palms roughly against my face to smother them.

My parents were okay. They had to be.

My hands lift away from my cheeks, and I sigh, deep and long, before looking over at the only window. Sunlight streams through in large pockets, and I know I've slept until noon at the earliest. My muscles are sore and taut underneath my bruised skin; even moving my arms causes me to flinch from the strained pull I feel from doing so. Taking another breath, I slowly shift the blanket off of me and swivel my legs around to plant the balls of my feet on the floor.

It was pretty cold last night, so I had fallen asleep wearing sweatpants and a ratty t-shirt. The sun being out today was unexpected, and now I was fighting a sweat from the heat emitting within the room. God, it was stifling in here. Though my tired arms protest, I tug my shirt over my head and rub it against the perspiration gathering on my forehead. My legs protest just as much when I walk over to the window and shimmy it up halfway, easing the near suffocation I feel as a cool breeze wafts inside.

I breathe in the fresh air and turn towards the duffel bag for breakfast.

Just as my fingers wrap around a can of sliced pears, I hear it.

A noise.

No - not just any noise... singing. It was sweeter than a bird's song and so muffled it was basically a hum. My breath catches as I listen, something about it hauntingly familiar, like I've heard it once before. But no matter how hard I try to remember, I can't exactly pinpoint when or where.

I'm still bent over my bag, frozen in position as I concentrate on the soft sounds. Not once do I think to grab the gun underneath my pillow, but instead I'm full of buzzing curiosity. Where was it coming from? Did the last inhabitant here leave a music player somewhere?

Suddenly the melody stops, and like a curse being broken, I'm able to move again.

My hand gently places the can back down in the bag as I swivel my feet around to check out the room more closely. I silently walk over to the small kitchenette, opening and searching through the tiny cupboards, and then closing them in defeat when I don't find a thing. Damn. There was nothing else in here except the rug and the bed. There isn't a single explanation for the singing I heard and it further adds to my confusion. Could someone possibly be outside?

This time I stare at my pillow in thought for a second before reaching for the gun hidden under it and tucking it into my waistband. Better safe than sorry. And it isn't until after I've unlocked the front door and taken a quick trip around the perimeter of the cabin that I can answer no, there was no one outside. No footprints, no car tracks, nothing.

I walk back through the threshold and seal the door shut once more, gripping at my hair nervously.

Was I going insane? Was this the first symptom of the virus - hallucinations?

I take a huge breath and as I'm releasing it, the tinkling melody starts up again. It sounds slightly louder from where I'm standing next to the door and I strain my ears to locate where it's coming from. It sounds real enough, not like I'm imagining it, and I squeeze my eyes shut to focus solely on the soft tune.

Is it... was it coming from... below me?

My hand releases it's abuse on my hair as I stare down at the large, green rug adorning the floor.

Impossible.

There's no way...

Yet as I lower myself to my knees and bring the side of my face parallel with the ground, I know that my train of thought is leading me in the right direction. The singing seems more pronounced here at this level than when I'm standing upright.

My breathing becomes labored when the song stops again, like it knows I'm listening, and it's in that moment that it finally clicks in my brain.

There has to be another floor to this cabin. A basement, maybe.

That's the only plausible explanation.

Rising back to my full height, I quietly move to the corner walls nearest me and reach down to finger the edge of the rug. My heart rattles within my chest like loose coins inside a dryer, sporadic and loud. I don't why it's acting like this, considering all I've gone through to get here, so I try to get my shit together and mentally pump myself up. Come on Edward, don't be such a pussy. Slowly, I bring my thumb to join my pointer, clenching the raggedy material between them and holding my breath as I bunch it upwards and away from the corner. The rug is so damned huge that I have to keep pushing areas of it away as I search the ground underneath it for... for what, I'm not exactly sure.

It's when I lift away the flap of the rug near the kitchenette that I find it - it being a small hidden, flat door seamlessly blending in with the wooden planks which make up the flooring of the cabin. The rug still clutched in my grip falls to the ground as I stare down at what basically looks like a square trap door. The fuck...

There's no lock on the inverted handle and temptation calls to me, urging me to discover what's on the other side.

"Do I...?" Do I open it? I definitely want to, evident by my fingers twitching with intent. But for some reason, I felt like Indiana Jones in Raiders of the Last Ark when he's standing at the alter with sweat running off his brow, just about to switch out the precious Golden Idol for a bag of sand. There's no statue here in this shitty little cabin but the sentiment is the same - do I risk it?

When the word risk filters through my thoughts, I get a flashback of Emmett and I at some random senior party. Like clockwork at events such as those, he had been trying to get me to talk to some girls gawking at us from across the room. He would say, "risk it to get the biscuit," and then wiggle his bushy eyebrows. I would usually roll my eyes and ignore him. But now, his stupid phrase was all that I could hear and it was inching me on, my hand getting closer and closer to the handle dipping into the floor.

My fingers curl around the wood and though my heart drops, I tug hard. It's heavier to lift than I originally thought, and I actually have to bring my other hand in to pull on it, grunting with the effort of heaving the door open. Once I have it as far back as it will go, I carefully peer behind it.

Huh. That's why it was so heavy. A solid foot of concrete is attached to the belly of the wooden door. And as I look down, I'm stunned to see a human-sized steel tube going about a dozen feet into the ground. A metal ladder is attached to one side that follow it all the way to the bottom.

I'm silent for a moment, absorbing my findings. Did I just discover a fucking underground bunker?

"Shit," I mutter, keeping one hand on the concrete door and the other shooting up like a rocket to tangle into my hair and pull pull pull on the tresses. My thoughts jumble quick from one to another, imagining all the possible actions I could take. There's really only two. Go down the ladder, or shut the door and leave.

The second option just doesn't seem like it's a feasible prospect for me at the moment, as my legs are frozen crouched next to the open hole in the floor. My curiosity has always been insatiable to say the least, and I knew without a doubt that I was going down that ladder. I had to see where it led to.

I had the means to protect myself if it came down to that. Another person may have left once they saw that hidden door. But what I pictured in my head was an old man sitting in his favorite chair inside the bunker, listening to feminine lullabies to make him feel not so alone. And for some reason that image compelled me to lift my foot and twist my body so I could place myself upon the first rung of the ladder. I felt an unwavering need to thank whoever lived here for supplying me with shelter for the night, even if they did so unknowingly.

I really hope they don't mind a visitor.

With each step down, the lower I go into the cylinder tube. My eyes eventually become parallel with the floor, getting a bug's eye-view on the room, before I take another step down and it's gone from my sight completely. There's a small button embedded in the wall on my left, and I'm not sure what it does so I leave it alone and keep moving.

I'm over six feet tall so it doesn't take very long to get to the bottom, and when I do, my feet find purchase on the floor softly.

I turn around to face a short, narrow hallway leading to a steel door enclosing a very small, square window. I glance at it for a second before looking up at the circle shaped outline of the cabin ceiling. It feels like I'm in a completely different world, and a strong part of me loves the sensation while the other half is quiet and cautious. I'm still very aware of the gun in my waistband and the fact that I may have to use it if things turn ugly.

It's bloody hot in this little area and sweat begins to form on the back of my neck. I swipe my hand at it, afterwards rubbing the moisture on my sweatpants, before heaving a sigh and shuffling quietly towards the metal door. I get close enough to see through the thick glass of the window, peering left and right, but only seeing plain, white walls in return.

My heart feels like a herd of galloping stallions when my hand finally reaches out for the handle.

It turns easily when my fingers grasp it, surprisingly unlocked, and the thick door swings open with little effort.

And as I'm thinking should I really be doing this, a sweet voice croons out from further inside the bunker. I'm in an immediate trance; the music so hauntingly beautiful that goosebumps scatter across my entire body. My feet seem have a mind of their own, and before I know it, I'm taking silent steps past the threshold and walking towards the familiar melody. It's gorgeous and thick with emotion, and the words start to shape as I get closer to where it's coming from.

"I had all and then most of you,

some and now none of you.

Take me back to the night we met."

The hallway I'm slowly walking down opens to a large room. And though there's two couches and an enormous flat screen TV that takes up most of the area, all of my attention zones in on a slender girl, a young woman of the petite variety, swaying back and forth to the rhythm she makes with her voice.

"I don't know what I'm supposed to do...

Haunted by the ghost you.

Oh, take me back to the night we met."

Her long and thick, maple brown hair rests just below the middle of her back and sways alluring over the swell of her pert ass. The sight literally stops me in my tracks, one foot paused in front of the other. If she were a painting, that southern part of her would be the focal point - and she would, without a doubt, be more popular than Mona Lisa ever was.

I feel bad ogling a stranger though so I avert my eyes conveniently at the same time she turns her head to the side.

She still hasn't noticed me, a probable result of her eyes being closed, so I take a couple moments to observe the soft slope of her forehead and the gentle curve of her small, feminine nose. And when her mouth opens slightly to hum a couple more notes of the song, I'm drawn to the motion of her lips parting and then closing together. Even from across the room and viewing from the side, I could tell how supple and invitingly kissable they were.

Fuck.

Suddenly, she gasps mid-verse and whips her head in my direction.

Shit shit shit, did I say that out loud?

Eyes drowning in a mixture of whiskey mead and swirling chocolate catch hold of mine. I see pure alarm reflecting back as she takes an unsteady step towards the wall behind her, and I raise my arms in the "I mean no harm" gesture to calm her. I'm not sure if it works though because her cheeks ignite with a fiery blush and she narrows her almond-shaped eyes at me. It's kind of adorable, like a kitten pretending to be a tiger.

"Who are you? How did you get in here?" Her voice sounds strong and unfazed on the surface but I can catch the underlying tone of terror that she tries to hide. I could only imagine that this was every woman's nightmare - being caught alone and unaware by a strange man.

Hoping to ease her discomfort right away, I give her my full name to hopefully emphasize that I have nothing to hide.

"My name is Edward Cullen, " I announce, still holding my hands above my head. "I'd been driving yesterday and found your cabin by accident. At the time I didn't think anyone was home, so I slept upstairs for the night."

She stares at me in silence, her eyes taking on a sort of glazed look.

Concerned she may be going into shock, I rush to explain myself further. "I was going to leave once I woke up, I swear. I just heard... noises, and couldn't help but investigate. And then I found this bunker...but in my head I saw an old man all alone, not a..." When I realize how idiotic my babbling must sound, my jaw snaps shut, sealing my vocal chords from embarrassing me any further as I wait for her to respond. She doesn't though and I have to fill the tense silence between us with something.

I settle on saying, "I just wanted to thank you, I guess."

This time her lips part as her eyebrows crease. "Thank me?"

"Yeah," I answer, lifting one side of my mouth into a tiny smile. "You obviously weren't aware that I spent the night up there but even then, I appreciate it... so thank you."

The girl swallows and the red blush that had bloomed on her face settles to a dusty pink. "B-but how did you get in?"

I frown. "I didn't damage anything, if that's what you're worried about. I used my debit card to unlock the front door."

She considers that for a moment and then her eyes flicker down my body. "A-and that?" She nods her head at me, her tone hitching higher like she was nervous.

Confused, I look down at myself and inwardly curse a million times at myself. Why hadn't I put a shirt on before I came down here? No wonder she had been so fucking scared! "Uh... the sun came out," is my brilliant response, and I can feel the tip of my ears burn in embarrassment. I'm awed to see her blush come back full bloom, mimicking mine.

"No, not that... the -um, the gun," she mumbles and then bites down on her bottom lip.

My entire body instantly reacts to her doing that. It surprises the hell out me with it's intensity. I've been attracted to girls before, sure, but this was a whole different feeling than what I'm used to. I've seen girls bite their lips in an attempt to be attractive, but almost every time it would look overdone and fake because they tried too hard. This girl does it naturally, like it's something she does when she's nervous, similar to how I fuck with my hair when I'm frustrated.

Her teeth release their hold on her lip and her small, pink tongue darts out to swipe over the indentation. Damn. I curl my fingers into fists and think about Emmett after eating Mexican food to distract myself from the slamming attraction I feel towards this stranger. It works the second I hear his gassy farts echoing inside my head.

I don't realize how silent it is in the room until she takes a shaky breath in, and it's then I realize she'd asked me about the gun.

"It's not mine," I say, mentally groaning and wanting to smack myself once the words are out. "I-I mean it's mine, but also not mine. Some guy tried to steal my shit and shoot me with it so I... took it from him." Giving her the PG rated explanation wasn't lying, right? Isn't that what they call sugar-coating? Regardless, I finish by assuring her that, "I'd only ever use it to defend myself." And to put action behind my words, I very, very slowly grip the gun by two fingers and shimmy it out of my waistband. Once it's out, I bend at the knees and deliberately place it on the floor away from reach. We're holding eye contact with each other the entire time and to solidify my honest intentions, I side-step carefully to the other wall and then lean against it, crossing my arms to cover up some of my bare chest.

She remains as silent as a winter night, and I wished more than anything to be able to read her thoughts. It almost feels like she's assessing me with her eyes and it's making me increasingly nervous, especially since I'm sans shirt. Do I leave or stand here until she says something? Did I even want to leave if she doesn't? I assume she has this bunker to herself and that she is aware of what's going on in the world - at least some of it, anyways. Maybe she's still in shock from it all.

Not that women are defenseless, but somehow taking off seemed all sorts of wrong to me, like I'd be abandoning her if I did.

I know I'd be lying if I said I wasn't interested in talking to her a little more. I have never once in my life gone this long without talking to another human being, and a large part of me yearned for that normalcy of having an ordinary conversation. In fact, I craved it. From her. But she's being stubborn and not saying a word and the silence was near killing me.

"What's your name?" I eventually ask.

She opens her mouth to speak and I perk up until she closes her lips again and gives me a steely look. Okay... But then she throws a pointed glance at the gun laying on the ground and then looks back into my eyes, drawing her eyebrows together so a tiny 'v' appears between them. My thumb twitches to smooth it out. I try to put two and two together, and the best I can come up with is that she doesn't want a weapon like that in her home. Actually, I'm fairly sure that's what her pseudo sign-language meant.

"Okay," I concede. I take a couple measured steps to the gun and unhurriedly pick it up, murmuring, "I'll be right back," and then half-jogged down the hallway, finding my way up the ladder quickly. It makes perfectly good sense why she wouldn't want a loaded weapon between her and a stranger. If I were her, I wouldn't trust me either - not that I'm not dependable, this situation was just unique.

And that's what I tell myself when I place the gun back under my pillow. I double check that the front door is locked and then reach into my bag for a clean shirt, pulling it over my head before walking over to the hole in the ground. I get down the ladder in seconds and as I walk down the hallway, I try to make myself appear not as anxious as I feel.

She's right where I left her, leaning against the far wall with her hands clasped in front of her. She looks distracted in her thoughts and I want to take a quick second while she's unaware to admire the heart-shape of her face, but apparently I'm not as quiet as I think because her head raises the second I step into the room.

"Isabella," she says quietly, stunning me as the answer to my earlier question rolls off of her lips. "But call me Bella."

I smile widely. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Bella."

A/N: Hope we enjoyed this chapter! The song B was singing is The Night We Met by Lord Huron. Thanks for reading :) -sondor