Chapter Two: Gay París!

I awoke just as the pilot of the private jet informed us that we were landing at the airport in Roissy-en-France, a suburb of Paris. Edward and I quickly showered before getting dressed in our new clothes to greet the swarm of reporters that were to come to meet us at the gates. I felt secure as my parents stood with us, but soon became uneasy when they urged Edward and me to walk out first. The sunlight blinded us briefly before stepping onto Parisian ground, and soon shouts of reporters and fans took up all of our attention.

"Bella Swan!" shouted a particularly effervescent reporter, dressed in a red suit jacket and black suit pants. "Blaire Beauvier from Paris Pitch! Can we please have a word with you and your beau?" she asks.

I plastered a smile on my face. "Of course, Blaire," I replied.

"What's your man's name?" she asked.

"I'm Edward Cullen," Edward replied politely.

"And how long have you two been together?" Blaire asked.

"Two wonderful months," I replied with ease, "but we've known each other since we were very young. Jasper's girlfriend, Alice, is my best friend and Edward's younger sister."

"Ah, I see you like to keep it in the family," Blaire replied. "You've got three shows here in Paris in one week. Where do you all go next?"

"Rome," I replied. "Then Milan, Lisbon, and Warsaw," I tell her. "It's going to be one heck of a tour!" I say, squeezing Edward's hand.

I'm pleased that Edward wraps it up with Blaire Beauvier on my behalf so we can get into the other limo and head to the hotel. Edward and I have our own suite at Hotel the Peninsula; it is called The Historic Suite and is probably one of the most gorgeous examples of architecture that I've ever seen. Edward decides that he wants to take a nap and I start to join him, but am interrupted by a text from Jasper, which sends annoyance charging through me.

Mom and Dad still need you to write a new song for the tour. Better hurry. We practice at the studio at six. —Jasper

I sigh, informing Edward of what I have to do, and am so pleased that he understands my lifestyle now—although I think he enjoys the perks that come with it a little too much. I leave him in the master bedroom before walking out into the dining room to get to work. I sit with a stack of papers in front of me, wondering what I can possibly say. We've got plenty of lover's duets, which will be performed by Mom and Dad, so I think that something more soulful would fit the bill for the rest of the line-up.

When you went away from me

I couldn't even begin to think

What my life would be like without you

My life seemed to be over in half a blink

Clawing my way through what life could've been

I was lost and alone in a world full of strangers

And something told me that I couldn't win

I was lost and alone in an unforgiving world

Crippled were my thoughts as I thought of you

Stumbling, barefoot, was I in my search for you

All I really wanted was for you to come back to me

Because we were past due

To come home again

We were empty inside without each other

And despite the fact that I'm no perfect ten

I knew that you saw me that way

And in this world full of strangers

I just couldn't bring myself to see

That we had to go back home again

And that I had to go back to being me

Secrets and lies will consume you

And I'm so tired of not telling you

In this world full of strangers, I can't get a clue

Of how you really feel for me

I was empty without you

And you were my vessel

That I put my heart in

A feeling I could not wrestle

And I know that when you were gone

That I could not survive without you there

Though I'm just a great big pawn

We'll always be lost in a world full of strangers…

"Wow. That's really good."

I turn and look to see Edward standing there, and I feel my cheeks heat then, as they always did when his eyes were on me, as I lower my gaze. "Thanks."

"That's about 1982?" he asks, coming to sit with me, leaning over my shoulder and pressing his lips to my neck.

I nod, biting my lip to prevent myself from unwinding completely at the sensation of his lips caressing my flesh. "Yeah."

He scans my lyrics. "Secrets and lies will consume you?" he asks, turning to look at me. "Is there something you want to tell me?"

I bite my lip. "I don't know…"

He reaches out and takes my hand. "Bella, you know I love you. Please. We agreed when we started dating that there'd be no secrets. Please. Tell me."

"Well, I…"

There's a knock on the door then, and I give Edward an apologetic look before reluctantly getting to my feet to answer it. "Emmett," I say in a voice of shock, almost forgetting the existence of my twin. "Hey. What's going on?"

"Didn't you get Jasper's text?" he asks, borderline annoyed.

I blink, taking out my phone. "Yeah, I… Oh, wait a minute, not this one." I unlock my phone and see that Jasper had asked to meet at five instead. It was now five-fifteen, and I would need to get a move on. "Sorry. Let me just tell Edward about the adjustment and I'll be right there." I turn and hurry back and pick up the lyrics before giving Edward a quick kiss. "I am so sorry. Jasper wanted to meet at five and now I'm late."

Edward nods. "I get it. It's fine." He grips my hand before I leave. "But, Bella... We will finish this conversation later?"

"Edward…"

"Please."

I rush out of the room and hand over the new lyrics to Emmett. "Be right back," I tell him before rushing back to Edward. I put my fingers around the charm of my necklace—I'd since reverted it back to its old form—and twisted them three times around it, my hand proceeding to tremble ever so slightly at what I was about to do. Taking Edward's hand, I said softly, "Let him know everything. I need Edward to know everything. I did something terrible, and now it must be undone. I wish to allow Edward to know the information I kept from him."

Edward's eyes widen as silver smoke issues from my necklace and goes into his temples, giving his mind a whole new understanding at my deception. "Africa," Edward whispers to me then, his eyes widening. "The hotel room… Us… We…" He turns and regards me then with new eyes, and I fear I have lost him. "You kept this from me…"

"Yeah," I whisper.

"Why?"

I feel my eyes fill with tears. "Because I wanted you to have a choice. I mean... I was under the impression that the sex didn't mean anything…"

"Didn't mean anything?!" Edward demands. "How could you say something like that to me?! It meant everything…"

"It meant everything to me, too," I cry out, my voice shaking. "I just didn't think that it would mean anything to you! How in the hell could someone as wonderful as you ever be interested in someone like me?"

"Someone like you?" Edward replies bitterly. "You're a liar, Bella Swan. A big, fat, liar, and I was a stupid idiot not to see it before."

"Hey!" Emmett says, stomping into the room and getting in between us. "You're not allowed to talk to my sister that way, you ass hat!"

"Shut up you half-existent twerp!" Edward yells. "Your sister's necklace actually grants wishes and guess what? This is a fake dimension that we're all suddenly a part of."

"Bella, what's he talking about?" Emmett asks.

"Emmett, I—"

"Oh, you didn't tell him?" Edward asks, cutting me off completely and chuckling bitterly, and suddenly it feels as if I don't know him anymore. "Oh, of course you didn't—it's you we're talking about here, Bella, how foolish of me... Emmett, in the original dimension, your parents are overworked doctors who never see their family! Jasper lives in a frat house and Bella is always home by herself!"

"Home by herself? Wait, what are you talking about here, Edward? I don't..." Emmett whispers, eyes widening as he quickly looks from me to Edward in shock. "You mean, in this other 'dimension'… I don't… I've never…"

"That's right," Edward goes on. "You were never born."

"Edward!" I shout.

"And your mother and your aunt Marie knew it too," Edward continues, crossing his arms in a rather triumphant manner, although his eyes retain no emotion whatsoever, and I truly feel as if he is a total and utter stranger to me, one that I did not know and had no wish to know. "They knew all about and told you nothing!"

"I don't exist?" Emmett whispers, still in shock.

"No, Edward, don't..." I whisper, dropping to my knees.

"That's right! Jasper is still adopted, of course, but—and here's the tragic part—your parents are so overworked that they were under this constant amount of stress to conceive a child of their own that only Bella got conceived. Oh, and in the original dimension, your poor Aunt Marie was the only woman in Washington State to be on death row for murder! Does that about sum everything up, Bella? All your lies?"

I have since reverted to a fetal position when suddenly it seems as if I cannot hold anything back any longer. I am suddenly pushed upwards by this invisible force from far away and I let out a scream. "Let us all go somewhere far, far away from this time where we can live as we were meant to!" I scream, hardly knowing what I am talking about.

The river vortex suddenly breaks a wall of the hotel suite, and the sea salt smell suddenly fills the room. The purple clouds suck the three of us into them like a vacuum and never want to seem to let us go. We are pulled through time and space, it seems, and pale blue lights threaten to come forth from the purple clouds all around us. I turn and try to look at Edward and Emmett, but they both look just as scared as I am.

I try to speak, but it feels as if my mouth has been super-glued shut and I cannot move anything below my neck. We are pushed further and further into what seems like a never-ending vortex of time, space, fear, and the unknown. I feel tears falling from my eyes, knowing that there will be consequences as to what I've just done to my boyfriend and my brother.

And then, suddenly, almost as instantaneous as the river vortex sucked us up into it, we are thrown, roughly, as the tornado did to Dorothy's house, onto the ground. I feel my head hit something hard and jagged, and I feel something warm seeping from my now-open forehead. It comes down my face as a tear would come from my eye and I briefly taste copper. I try to turn my head, but once again, something prevents me from doing so.

When I finally am able to move somewhat, I push myself from my lying down position so that I am kneeling. I am wearing some flimsy sort of mini skirt, a flowing peasant blouse, and knee-high boots. I turn and see Emmett and Edward nursing their own forehead wounds before getting a good look at me. They wear peasant-looking shirts themselves and wear skin-tight black pants and standard-looking shoes. I turn slightly to get a look at the terrain, and I feel a thick braid—one on each side of my face—that is inexplicably the same kind as Leia's were after Han Solo was frozen in carbonite.

The terrain is flat, sandy, and very dusty. We look to be in a humid area of the world, and I wonder if we are even on the same planet. Several dilapidated shacks dot the land around us, but they look far too dangerous to house anyone. Slowly, I get to my feet, a bit of sand blowing into my wound and irritating it. I wince slightly, but force myself not to cry.

Then, what sounds like some method of transportation can be heard from above, and I shield my eyes from the hot sun to see what it is. It looks to be some kind of airship, and I bite my lip as I try to figure out if the strangers within it are friend or foe. The ship finally lands a few feet away from us, and then there are a few intense moments of silence, almost as if its occupants are unsure whether or not to come out. Finally, the door comes down so that it is a platform for the captain or whatever the ship's commander wants to call him or herself.

It is a young woman—probably no older than the three of us—who steps out of the ship and looks us over. She has beautiful brown eyes and dark brown hair, and she looks quizzically at the three of us. She says something to the guards around her, and then steps forward on her own, while the guards remain several feet behind her, their guns poised in their hands.

"English?" she asks.

"Fluently," I reply.

She nods. "I am Tia Nimr," she says before turning at the sound of an annoyed groan from one of her guards. "I will not have them be obligated to call me by my title."

"You're titled?" I ask.

She sighs. "I'm a princess, that is true." She gets a good look at my forehead, and turns to see Emmett and Edward's as well. "Seems as though you've been hurt. Come; my guards and I will do you no harm. My kingdom welcomes many outsiders. We love to compile the Earth's history of when it was so long ago…"

"So long ago?" Emmett asks, speaking for the first time.

"What are you talking about?" Edward asks.

Princess Tia smiles pleasantly at us. "My dear friends, the planet Earth was once a lush, bountiful and plentiful place, full of life and wonder. Now, only very few locations have such plenty. My kingdom is one, and we try to send out search and rescue parties to other, harsher terrains, but some people are quite resistant to our assistance, it would seem."

"Wait—the planet Earth was once a lush, bountiful and plentiful place?" I ask, still not fully understanding her meaning. "Princess Tia…"

"Just Tia," she says with a smile.

"P— Tia, exactly what year is it right now?" I ask.

"Why, my dear friend, it is the year 4013," she says, almost as if we all three were hit harder than she initially believed.

"4013?" I whisper, looking around. "This isn't just some detailed Star Wars movie set or something?"

Tia chuckles. "Oh, no, dear friend—"

"It's Bella."

"Oh, no, Bella," Tia tells me with a smile. "It is truly 4013, and these are dangerous parts. You must return with me to Raymore at once! They will soon take us if we do not flee!"

"They?" I demand as the three of us follow Tia back onto her ship.

"The Volturi," Tia says in a harsh whisper as the doors close quickly behind us. "If the Volturi were to see me here, all hope would be lost. The Cullen-Swan House has dwindled to a few, and I am one of the last."

"Cullen?" Edward asks.

"Swan?" Emmett and I whisper.

"Yes," Tia says, and looks us all over carefully. "Are you…relations of mine?"

"We are ancestors—must be," I say softly. "Emmett and I are twins and are Swan's. Edward here is a Cullen."

Tia claps her hands. "Splendid! Perhaps you can help us!"

"Help you?" Emmett asks.

"How can we do that?" Edward wants to know.

Tia sighs. "Ten years ago, the heir of the House of Cullen and Swan was taken to some unknown place and hidden, and we don't know where."

"Who was taken?" I whisper.

"My twin brother, Crown Prince Benjamin," Tia said, as a lever was pushed and soon we were surrounded by a great many stars and going at warp-speed to where, I presumed, was the Kingdom of Raymore.