Something Meaningful

Chapter 6

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight.

A/N: I know that I have been MIA… but, hey, what can I say… I've been enjoying summer… Happy reading!

RPOV

"Bella," I say softly, reluctant to disturb our intimate moment, "as much as I am enjoying holding you in my arms, I think time is of the essence right now. We need to make a run for it before those disgusting, poor excuse for a humanoid, come back. Do you feel strong enough to walk?"

"Yes. I am so ready to get out of here that I will crawl if I need to," she replies.

Chuckling, I say, "You won't need to crawl, Bella. If I have to I will carry you out. One way or another we are both getting out of here." I peel myself from her body, standing up while extending a hand out for her to grab and help her get up. She seems a bit clumsy at first, losing her balance, but I quickly take a hold of her supporting her with my body while she works at regaining her balance.

"I'm good… I'm good, Rosalie. I can stand on my own," she says irritably as she extends her arms out to push me away.

I roll my eyes, moving away from her and start to walk cautiously toward the entrance that was made by the Humanoids blasting the boulder that had us trapped inside. I turn back to Bella extending my hand for her to take. She looks over at me, smiles, and slips her hand in mine as we proceed together toward the entrance of the cave.

As we neared the opening, I could see artificial lighting coming through. I motioned for Bella to stay put while I inched my way up to the entryway and peaked around the corners to make sure it was clear before we crossed the threshold into the cave hallway. I couldn't see any movement or smell any scent coming from either direction so I proceeded forward motioning with my hand to Bella to come forward. As we stepped into the hallway, the walls were made of some kind of steel frame.

"Rosalie, how are we going to know in which direction to go to get out of here?" Bella turned her head to the right then to the left letting her eyes scan down both corridors. "Those military guys could be right around the corner;" she whispered.

I stood quietly, closing my eyes trying to pick up some kind of air current to guide me toward an opening that would lead us outside of this underground facility. "This way…" I motioned with my hand. I turned left leading us down a hallway. Bella hurried up to me and grabbed my hand in hers. I looked down at our intertwined hands and then I looked up at her, a smile forming on my lips. She noticed and returned my smile.

At that moment, as our eyes locked, I wanted nothing more than to lean in and kiss her precious ruby lips. But I held myself in check; reminding myself that the priority was to get Bella to a hospital to get the rabies treatment before it was too late… for a split second my smile faltered as fear set in over the thought that I could lose the love of my life just when I finally found her.

I shook all negative thoughts away replacing them with the conviction that one way or another, my Bella, would live; even if I had to do the unthinkable… It hit me as we walked together down the hallway that I would do anything… and I mean anything… to keep Bella alive. If I couldn't get her out in time, I was prepared to face the dark night of my non-soul and go against all my principles and arguments that I believed in regarding not turning a human into a vampire.

It finally dawned on me that all my previous arguments against being turned into a vampire held no sway or power over my overwhelming need for Bella… perhaps it was my own selfishness that was coming through but I didn't care. My NEED to have Bella in my life was all that mattered to me. And so, Love really does trump all…

As we neared the end of the corridor, I could see what looked like the door to an elevator. There was a panel on the side of the door. "Great! We need a code to work the elevator door," I yelled, slamming the underside of my fist against the wall beside the panel.

"What if we start pushing buttons randomly on the panel," Bella said. "We could get lucky and hit the right code to open the door." She looked over to me, grinning sheepishly, knowing that I would find this method ridiculous.

I responded with a stern gaze. "Bella, I don't think - " Suddenly, a noise could be heard from the elevator. It sounded like the elevator had just kicked on.

"Rosalie, the elevator! It's functional… their coming back! Bella screamed." Her face displayed pure terror.

"Calm down, Bella!" I quickly considered my options. Either I wait for whoever is coming and fight my way out of here – which I would do in a heartbeat if it was just me – or I seek cover so I can assess the level of danger to us. I decide to be cautious as I don't want to risk any harm coming to Bella. "Okay, we need to find cover." My eyes scanned the hallway we had just come down. Then I saw it. "Look, there's a vent in the wall."

Bella looked over to where I was pointing. "OMG, I didn't notice that vent when we were walking down the hallway," she says. "Will we both fit in there?"

"Yes. Quickly, I need to get the vent cover off." I said. I took a hold of the rim of the cover and pulled it off. I looked inside the vent noticing the aluminum tube or tunnel which led inward. "Bella, I know I said you wouldn't need to crawl but I need you to get in the vent shaft and crawl forward. I will be right behind you. I just need to close the vent cover back up." Just as I closed the vent cover, the elevator door opened. I saw two men in white lab coats walk out of the elevator.

"That was just plain freaky!" The blond haired man yelped.

"I think the human-dog hybrid beats all the freakazoids in this place!" The red haired man responded excitedly as they both headed down the corridor laughing.

I frowned as I heard their conversation trying to decipher what was so funny about the hybridization of a dog & human. If anything, it was disgusting to even visualize such a thing. I turned around crawling through the vent shaft to catch up with Bella. When I found her, she was displaying a similar face that I had just expressed when I was visualizing the dog-human hybrid. "Bella, what's wrong?"

She pointed to a vent in the side of the tube shaft we were in. "What in the world is going on here, Rosalie? That thing… it looks like a cross between a human and a dog!"

As I looked through the small vent, I could see a room that resembled a lab with tables. There were humans in white coats standing over the tables which were occupied by covered bodies. My eyes scanned the room and saw the "hu-dog" hybrid Bella was pointing at. The head of the body was human but the rest of the body was canine.

Bella grabbed my arm leaning her body into me as she buried her face in my neck. "Oh Rosalie, how horrid! I can't look anymore. Those military scientists are doing repulsive genetic experiments with humans and animals!"

"So, this explains all the disappearances… they have been abducting humans for experimentation," I said. I scanned the lab again noticing an area in the far right corner of the lab which contained large cages with humans and other species in them. "Bella, we have got to get out of here, NOW! I need to get you to a hospital to get treated for the rabies and then let your Dad know about what is going on here so we can rescue these humans."

"And the animals too!" Bella said.

"Of course, my love." I responded softly, placing my head on hers. I closed my eyes momentarily breathing in her wonderful scent. I knew we needed to move on and proceed further down the vent shaft but I urgently needed to take a moment to feel her warm body close to mine. I didn't know if we would get another chance at intimacy any time soon.

As if she could sense my need, Bella lifted her head from my neck, locking her eyes with mine and grabbing my wrist as she pulled me with her further down the vent shaft, never taking her eyes off me. She pulled me into her body as she caressed my cheek with her hand, our faces now so close, I could feel her warm breath against my skin, sending tingles down my spine. The air around us was electrified as we slowly closed the gap between us; our lips touching for the first time.

Our lips moved slowly, tenderly against each other's, savoring the taste and feel of the other's lips. I licked Bella's lower lip, hearing a low moan emanating from her. She opened her mouth slightly allowing our tongues to meet. Our gentleness turned more passionate. I could feel the heat rise in my body as I furiously kissed her mouth; our tongues fighting for dominance. We finally broke apart so Bella could breathe. "Wow… that was incredible," Bella says huskily.

"That it was…" I whispered with a smirk as I took this moment to kiss her neck, my teeth gently scraping over the pulsating throb in her throat and licking her pulse point. My eyes no doubt having turned pitch black. Hesitantly, I pulled back from her needing to take some control lest I accidentally bite her while in the throes of such exquisite pleasure that kissing her was giving me. We sat holding each other for a while longer wanting this moment to last.

Of course, reality seeped in when we were sucked out of our little world as we heard a blood curdling scream emanating from the lab. "Rosalie, someone's being tortured! We have to go get help for those people."

"Let's go Bella. Keep crawling down the vent shaft. This shaft has to lead out of this facility at some point." We followed the shaft down further. As we approached an area down ways, there were these light fixtures on the shaft wall that I didn't notice until we passed its threshold and suddenly the lights started blinking and a loud alarm started going off.

"Oh no, Rosalie! We tripped some alarm. They're going to be looking for us now!"

"Look, up ahead, there is another vent cover. Let's get out of the shaft and look for somewhere to hide," I said. We got out of the vent shaft and walked down another corridor.

"We don't know our way around this place. How are we going to know where to hide?" Bella asked nervously.

Just at this moment, someone opened a door … I moved at vampire speed toward the man as he was coming out of the room. I was too fast for him to see me but he did spot Bella as he stepped out into the corridor. He pointed a gun at Bella and was about to pull the trigger when I grabbed his head and broke his neck.

Bella hadn't realized that she had been holding her breath the whole time as she let herself take in some much needed air. "OMG, Rosalie! He almost killed me…"

"This way, Bella. This room is as good a hiding place as we are going to find at the moment." I dragged the man's body into the room with us. I looked around the room and realized it was the man's bedroom. There was only one bed in the room so he must not share the room with anyone else. There was a small refrigerator in the room. "Bella, look inside the refrigerator for some food for you."

"To be honest, I haven't really had time to feel hungry; what with fearing for my life and yours and all," Bella said. I gave her one of my stern glares until she finally gave in and looked inside the refrigerator finding bread, sandwich meats, and cheese. She made herself a sandwich and took out bottled water that she also found in the refrigerator.

While Bella ate, I concentrated on coming up with a plan. "I need to venture out on my own, Bella, to check out the landscape. You will be safer if you stay here in the meantime."

"No, Rosalie! You can't leave me here alone. I need to be with you in case you get into trouble, I can help."

"Bella, I haven't fed for several days. I am getting weaker. A vampire can go without blood for only so long; becoming weaker the longer one doesn't feed. A vampire doesn't die without blood but will not be able to move a muscle without it. I will be no good to you if I don't even have the strength to move."

"Rosalie… I'm not feeling too good… my head is hurting and suddenly I'm feeling disoriented." Bella started to lose her balance.

I grabbed her in time to help her lay down on the bed. "Bella, you need to rest. The rabies symptoms are going to be getting worse. We need to get you out of here before the virus completely invades your brain; shutting down your organs. This is another reason why I need to go out in search of a way out of here."

"Okay, Rosalie. If you think it is best for you to go out on your own. I realize now that I am too weak to go with you. I would only slow you down."

"Bella, I am not abandoning you. Please know that. I will come back for you once I have found the way out and fed." I leaned down and kissed her gently on the lips. She returned my kiss eagerly.

I broke from the kiss and our eyes locked. Bella opened her mouth as if to speak, then hesitated, as I watched her with a curious expression on my face, "what?" I finally asked.

"I… I just wanted you to know… I love you, Rosalie."

I smiled at her. She smiled back. "I love you, too, Bella." I walked toward the door turning the knob and looked back at her one last time, "always and forever…" I said as I walked out the door.