Everyday Moments Of Perfection

A/N: Sorry about the wait everyone! But finally, after much procrastination and sickness (which is still with me unfortunately)... I AM ONLINE! It is official. I have broadband. Yay. Thanks for bearing with me, everyone, and also thanks to everyone who reviewed.

This is just a little vignette-type thing of Jasper and Alice's feelings before the battle in Eclipse.

Jasper felt a cold trickle of fear run through his system; combined with excitement and a raw anticipation. The excitement was for the upcoming fight. The fear was for Alice. Jasper couldn't help feeling excited, even though the fight was probably one of the most important fights of their immortal lives. He had once lived for fighting, every day filled with it, even in his mortal life. Even though he wouldn't give up Alice and his family for anything, sometimes he did miss that rush of vampires fighting vampires, the extraordinary display of inhuman strength and power. But he wouldn't admit that, and as they stood in the woods just waiting, he was glad he was the only empath present. Everyone else felt a mixture of worry—for Bella and Edward, and ferocious determination. Emmett, of course, was flexing his muscles, his face serious for once, even though Jasper was wryly amused to find he was also rather excited.

Jasper feared, however, for Alice. While he had enjoyed some of the fights he had been in, Alice had never been present as someone for Jasper to worry about. He wasn't concerned for his own safety, just hers. Alice had reassured him time and time again that he had nothing to be concerned about—even demonstrated it at the show for Bella—and Jasper had to admit that she really had beaten him. But still he was anxious. He didn't know what he would ever do if he lost Alice. He had watched their family fall apart as Edward left Bella—he had been a shell of his former self. Jasper knew that if Alice died, he would be worse. He couldn't go on without her. Even to see her wounded would rip apart his soul. So he couldn't help but protect her from anything and everything, even though he could sense the faint annoyance emanating from her. Buried within the annoyance was a small, but very potent, strand of fright. That made Jasper more determined than ever to take care of her.

He loved her with a passion that he could not explain. And so he would keep her safe from harm. To Jasper, it was as simple as that.

~oOo~

Alice was anxious. She felt even more anxious because this was the first fight she had been in where she was completely blind. She couldn't use the method of fighting she was used to—anticipate the opponent's moves, and get there first to block them and retaliate. Here, she would have to rely on her vampiric senses alone, and even though she was fast, she was unused to fighting in that way. She was also scared because it was not just her own life at stake. It was Jasper's, and her family as well. That scared Alice, though she tried her utmost not to show it. If Jasper felt that she was scared, it would completely undermine all the work she had put in to convince him he didn't need to protect her.

It wasn't that Alice didn't want him to protect her—on the contrary, she thanked her lucky stars every day that Jasper did take care of her, and always had—it was just that if he was watching out for her, he wasn't protecting himself to the fullest of his abilities. She was a distraction, and if Jasper was distracted, he might make mistakes. If he made the wrong mistake in this battle, he would end it as a pile of ashes.

Alice couldn't let that happen. She wouldn't.

She heard Carlisle's smooth voice cut through the tension that had been building ever since the night before, and while Alice had been thinking about Jasper, it had grown to almost unbearable heights. Alice could see Jasper minutely gritting his teeth with the suspense in the atmosphere, and watched his jaw muscles relax slightly as Carlisle smothered it with his words.

"The werewolves are coming. They're moving fast."

Alice and Jasper's hands connected, drawing strength from the other, before they released them.

The battle had begun.

Well, I hope you guys liked my 'official return to the Internet' chapter. Hehe. I'll probably do another one that continues from the end of this one, that actually shows the battle, but when I was writing this, my Eclipse was in a box, so I couldn't have verified all the details of the battle.

Love you guys!

Raven. x