Keeps Oxygen

Summary: Graduation has been known to separate people. But this? This is a little extreme.

Disclaimer:

One shoe
Two shoe
Don't own
Don't sue

Author's Note:

Warning:

This chapter is guilty of a constant perspective change.

Pay attention!

Enjoy!

Chapter 3: Join Me

Freesia: Bella.

Bella's blood.

Cover Me Up.

"Birdie, Birdie, Birdie..."

"It's been near 5 years, Alice. She has to move on eventually."

"Is it really so wrong that I find beauty in humanity?"

"She is what she is - no matter..she can not play God, not with the cards she has been dealt."

"Here's that favour you owed me."

Would you die tonight for love?

Bella's P.o.V:

I should have known.

Only I could look death in the face more than once.

It all happened extremely fast- Just as Carmen was to have reached me, I felt a slight breeze, a slight tear in my neck, and a soft murmur of some delicate music, far too fast for my human ears. Arms slid around my waist, and I was barely able to register what was going on when pain set in.

I -we- were gone.

And it was black.

Edward's P.o.V:

After all we had been through together:

That first fateful day in Biology;

The encounter with Tyler Crowley's van;

Port Angeles;

James;

Bella's eighteenth birthday;

The werewolves;

Victoria;

Volterra.

After everything I had done, after all I had tried to do to ensure my love a safe and normal (as normal as one could be) life, after everything, I was still going to lose my Bella.

I--

I failed her. I failed my entire family.

I could only pray that I would be taken shortly after my love- none of this life was worth it if she wasn't there to share it with me.

"After all, . . . ." I heard Carmen say, but my thoughts were with Alice, who was forgoing a vision.

Two tall figures, a man and a woman stood across from each other, their stances agressive, faces only vague outlines- The man and woman exchange words, all the while a screaming is in the background- two others with vague outlines for facial features join the image- the woman and man comment on a 'bird'

a bird. . .

Edward! I heard Alice call in her thoughts, Edward, the woman, it's-

Carmen lunged at my Bella, and before I could even think a change in the atmosphere occured that I'm sure made everyone's hair stand on end.

Relax, Edward, your birdy is safe with me. A crisp voice cut through the air seconds later. "To answer your question,mi madre, there is one thing better than a dead Cullen."

Without a moment's hesitation, they were gone, but not before the scent of freesia flooded the room.

Freesia: Bella.

Bella's blood.

The loss infuriated Carmen, who let her feelings be known by throwing the couch through the south wall (I could hear Esme curse in her mind - that window was extremely difficult to set up, even for vampires), with the scream of a banshee to match.

Carmen turned on her cousin. "You were supposed to have taken care of them, cousin!" She bellowed, yet Victoria did not flinch.

"Calm, cousin. You aimed well; a wound like that, the girl will not last long. The succubus is just that - a succubus. She is not God, nor can she play God. The temptation will madden her. It will only be a matter of time. She cannot fight what we were meant to do," She made a grand sweeping gesture towards us. "None of them can."

Carmen pursed her lips, furious with the twist in her heavily-detailed plot.

"The succubus does offer a fair point, though. . . "

Change

Somewhere on the East Germany border. . .

Late afternoon bled quickly into night as timezones were leapt across. Continents had gone by in a blur, and if one with a strong enough eye-strength were paying attention, they would have the slight possibility of seeing a leggy young woman cradling a smaller being protectively in the crook of her arm.

The tall angel could see that there was little life left in the girl - with a wound like the one obtained, she would be gone within half the hour, at best luck. As she came nearer to the town, she knew that she had no choice in the matter; what needed to be done needed to be done without haste.

With a near-silent murmur to no one ("Forgive me, Edward,"), she slid her teeth through the delicate throat of her 'passenger', deliberately aiming for the jugular (remarkably close to the area of the throat wound).

She could feel the smaller one's body go rigid, and clutched her closer. Time was of the utmost importance now - it would be seconds (minutes, if dumb luck existed) before she began to cry out, drawing attention to the pair.

With stealth-like stillness she slipped through the shadows, and arrived at a doorstep with tall doors and cracked stone steps. She pounded her fists on the door until finally it was opened a shade. Without explanation, she forced herself through the door, only muttering to the figure behind the door, "Here's that favour you owed me."

All this in a matter of 3 minutes.

"This is what you classify as a favour?"

The opener of the door exclaimed incredulously. He was a tall man with broad-set shoulders, a shaved head, and a nose that must have been broken, and never healed properly, not even with the change. His eyes burned a deep onyx at the sight of his intruder and the -now screeching- human.

"Given the circumstances, yes, I find this to be the perfect time to cash in my favour. Plus, you've owed me my favour for a great deal of years - think of the conversion rate."

The man snarled. "Irina, is this really the best time for humour?"

The woman called Irina chose not to reply, as she carried her 'load' into a spare bedroom. Closing the door behind her quietly, she shut her eyes.

"I need you to watch over her for me for a little while."

Were the man not already long-dead, it was highly likely that the words just spoken would've given him an aneurysm of some sort.

"What!?!" He sputtered. "You asked for a favour, Irina, and a favour I will repay, but I am not going to mother-hen this-this-"

Irina stepped away from the doorway and put her hands on her hips. "There was no question in that statement. You will watch over her for me. I know what I did was not the best idea, and I certainly wasn't thinking rationally, but you must realise the importance of her survival. The girl, she is one of Carlisle Cullen's-"

The man snorted. "Do I truly look like our dear Aro? I can't be bowled over with doting words of love for the good doctor like that foolish sac of bones. Just because Aro and the others preach the gospel of Carlisle Cullen, just because we are accquaintances in some forms, does not mean I share all of their beliefs."

Irina pressed on. "Yes, but Korso, you did get along with his surrogate son, Edward." The man named Korso folded his arms. "This girl, this little bird, Edward loves her. Even you, dead as you are, you understand love to a degree-"

Korso snarled angrily. "Don't you ever bring that up ever again!" A lamp down the hall from the foyer in which the pair stood shattered. He exhaled deeply through his nose. "Why don't you watch her yourself? Or is the lovely succubus above doing her own dirty work? Or those Cullens whom you love so dearly?"

Irina took a deep breath, and exhaled it. "Mi madre, Carmen. Something is not right with her. She isn't herself- she's possessed, almost. One day I went hunting, and returned the next to find the home we were living in in Alaska completely and utterly destroyed." She paused, as she tried to contain invisible tears. "Carmen's husband, Eleazar. . . My sister, Kate. . . I didn't make it back in time to save them." She looked away, and tried to re-compose herself. "My other sister, Tanya- I'm unsure of her whereabouts. If I'm going to be able to try and stop Carmen, I'll need her help. Carmen right now is with the Cullens in Washington."

She froze- realisation dawned on her.

"Carmen is still in the house."

Irina took several large strides towards the doors. "I have to return. I don't know if-"

"Go."

She turned to look back at Korso. "Korey-"

"Go." He did not face her. "We'll watch over your little 'birdie' for you. You have my word as a Bezraodka."

She nodded, and fled out the door. Korso followed behind her, and shut the door silently behind her fleeting figure. He rested his forehead on the door.

How to explain this to the others. . .

Okay, before anyone asks me in a review:

Irina's power:

Irina's power is teleportation. When she was human (way back when), Irina was one of those people who would constantly show up out of nowhere, which just happened to be an extremely strong trait of hers. Over the years, she's become more accustomed to the distance between places, particularly when she has seen the place she needs to go.

Why didn't Irina simply teleport to Korso's home in the first place?

Irina had never been inside of the house before. She had never been anywhere near the house (located in Hamburg, Germany), yet she had been through that region of Germany, so she knew a basis of where to start.

Also, I added the cast list for Keeps Oxygen to my profile, so go check it out!

And thank you everyone for the reviews, they mean tons!