HPOV
Jasper is very, very still. The last rays of sunrise have left the sky, and outside the light is warm and dusty, the promise of a hot summer day to come. He's barely visibly changed, but somehow he looks different.
"How long do you think it will be before I can get the needles into him?"
"About another six hours. Maybe seven. It'll be quick for him, but it will hurt."
"Do you think it's hurting him now?"
"Yes. I should think it is."
"You seem very calm."
"If I panic now, what can I ever do to help him? He needs me. He'll need for a while."
"How long do you think it'll take?"
"It says three days. But it'll probably be less for him, if he was already losing his power in the clearing. Two. Maybe a day and a half. It'll be bad. Esme might not want to hear it."
"We're staying. All of us. I'll be on hand when he wakes up."
"Thank you. I don't know what state he'll be in, although it should be OK. He wasn't ill, or injured, or so he says. So it should be OK."
"But you can't know."
"There's no way to know. You know how rare this is. I'm not going to know anything until he wakes up and I can run my own tests."
"Hermione, can I ask you something?"
"Sure."
"Will he wake up magical?" I nearly drop the glass I'm holding. Carlisle manages to right it before I throw juice everywhere.
"Jesus. I don't know, I didn't even think - I don't know. In the cases in my world, the vampires are magical creatures anyway. We aren't even sure how we are magical. If it's in the blood, then yes, it is very likely. If he is - well, then we'll have to deal with it."
"How will it affect your children?"
"With no other magical bloodline in the world, within two or three generations, it'll die out. And there's nothing to nurture it, so it's pretty likely that it'll lie dormant in everyone but us. It's fine. It won't affect any world events or anything like that."
It's almost lunchtime, and Jasper has begun to visibly alter. His former chalky pallor is now just a natural pale complexion. He just looks like an ill human now. Carlisle ducks in and out, preferring to leave us alone.
"He looks awful."
"I know. He's changing from vampire to human. His system is fighting the stuff making him exist. He's dying, Carlisle."
"Don't say that."
"But he is. He'll become a dead man first, which is what he is. When his system has fought the vampire cells off, he'll be dead. And then he's go backwards. You're a doctor - have you treated people with very late-stage cancer?"
"Of course."
"It's going to be like that, but backwards. He'll die, and then he'll recover, very slowly. His skin is getting softer. Do you think you could get a needle through it?" He bends over Jasper's still form, and takes a needle, pressing it onto the skin of the inside of his arm.
"No. Not yet. There's give - but not enough to break all the layers. And his heart needs to be beating before I can pump the morphine in. Is he hurting now?"
"I don't know," I say, desperately. "If he's suffering like the case notes say he should be, he should be screaming and screaming. Maybe it's because he isn't breathing yet. I don't know. I wish I did. We could pump his heart manually, push the morphine through. But I don't know how that would interfere, or if it would."
"We should wait."
"We should. It kills me, not knowing."
"Can't you cast a spell? Find out?" he asks me, and I can feel the same pain I'm feeling.
"Of course I could."
"What? Then why the hell don't you?"
"I get your anger. I get it. But think. If he's controlling the pain, forcing himself not to scream, he's doing that for a reason. I don't know what that reason is, but he has one. So I'm not going to invade his privacy like that, in the same way I'd expect him to do the same if our positions were reversed. So no, I'm not going to sneak inside his head and read all the hurt I find there. Because it isn't my business."
"OK. OK. I'm sorry. I just want to help him."
"You are helping. He probably knows you're here, and he probably knows you care. He's fine." His face is immobile, but he no longer looks like he's carved from marble. He looks softer. Carlisle puts a stethoscope onto his chest and listens.
"I think I'm getting something - but I've never heard anything like it." I yank the stethoscope out of his ears and put it in my own, placing the end on his chest.
"You're right, that is weird. Go to those notes over there, look at page ten, tell me what it said about the heart starting to beat, read it to me." He rummages and then seizes up a single sheet of parchment.
"Uh, it says - it says that 'The heart of the taker will begin to beat in the ways of the dying, with splutters and coughs.'"
"When, does it say when?"
"On the second day."
"This is too fast, Carlisle, it's too fast! We shouldn't be at this point, we really shouldn't. He shouldn't look like this, he should still be hard and cold. I don't know how this is going to be now, I can't tell."
"I'm going to get the morphine into him. If he's got even a tiny pulse, it can be pumped through him. I can stop him feeling this."
APOV
"This is too fast, Carlisle, it's too fast! We shouldn't be at this point, we really shouldn't. He shouldn't look like this, he should still be hard and cold. I don't know how this is going to be now, I can't tell."
"Something's wrong, something's gone wrong. We should be in there."
"And what can we do once we are, other than clutter up the room? Carlisle and Hermione can help him now. There's nothing we can do, apart from get in their way and piss them both off something chronic. We need to keep out of their way, that's how we can help now."
"I just want to be able to do something."
"I am aware of that, Alice," Carlisle says, coming downstairs. "But keeping out of her way will be doing something."
"What's happening up there? Why did she say it was going too fast? Is he dying?"
"Alice, I wish I could answer those questions. But I don't know the answers to them and nor does Hermione. This is all new. She thinks he'll be human by dinner. The whole thing over in twelve hours, but she doesn't know what it's going to be like. If he'll be OK. He has a pulse now, and it's gaining in strength. He's dying in reverse, he's being reborn. There's nothing more I can do. He's in Hermione's hands now, she knows what's best. If anything can be done now, she'll help him."
And so there's nothing left to do but wait. Wait and listen to one heartbeat going steady and one heartbeat getting a little stronger every hour until it's just as steady as hers, a vital beat, something so very, very strong. And there is a new scent, to accompany Hermione's slightly spicy, floral scent - a citrus-y and warm smell. There are two humans here now, instead of only one. It's happened. He's human.