EPOV

"Well, how was it?"

I smile at her, pleased that she feels comfortable enough to ask me outright. I treasure the little things with her. But today's events weigh heavily on me, of course, everything does these days. She makes it better, though.

"It was really fucking cool actually. Hard at times. I don't know. They had good snacks," I smile at her out the corner of my mouth. "Great sandwiches on fresh bread."

She groans, rolling her eyes back. "What I would give! The food here is…" she grows hesitant again, searching my face for anger at her complaint. I patiently leave my expression open and interested, and she gains confidence again. "Well, it's not fresh bread."

"Guess you missed out." I shrug, looking away from her, but I can't keep a straight face.

She smiles at me, I can see it from the edge of my eye. "Yeah, I did. Why are you smiling like that?"

I look up at her quickly, whipping the bag from behind my back. "I brought you one!"

She flinches violently when I bring it out, but self-corrects just as quickly. She forces a smile first, but it grows genuine when she realizes that I saved her one of the sandwiches. She doesn't stretch out her hand for it, though. Too many men have played these eating games with her before, so she is still strange about showing interest in food. I hand her the bag, which she takes gently, setting it down on the half-table attached to her bed. It's permanately swung out on its arm away from the bed, since it can't go around her front like it's supposed to. Nothing can, it seems.

Every time a nurse comes in, or any staff not extremely familiar with Bella's condition, I can see their face slip into a professional mask. Her appearance really is that startling. While I didn't imagine she could grow any bigger, she has only in the past three days since our reunion.

I hadn't left her side until this morning. Alice had brought a cot to the hospital for me, though she didn't meet Bella when she did so. Carlisle and I thought it best to restrict her contact with people until the babies were born. As frustrating as it was to restrict her as the police and medical staff had before we intervened, we had to draw the line somewhere. And we did so after consulting with Bella herself, who agreed her anxiety was not in control around new faces.

The medical staff does not seem to bother her, though there is a pretty wide rotation of people. Their uniforms are comforting to her, she says, it helps her to know they aren't a threat.

Something unique to Bella's case is that she will be fighting through this bullshit we've gone through with the added stress of two babies. I've been reading while she sleeps, which is a lot of course, given her emaciated state and advanced pregnancy. Something that is essential for new mothers is maintaining a sense of self, keeping up old hobbies, etc. Not losing yourself in the new baby. But Bella… Bella doesn't have any hobbies. Bella was held by a fucking psychopath for a year and a half. Before that… we haven't discussed in any detail. Suffice it to say that I don't think Bella collects antique coins or has a favorite running route.

I am hoping that my parents can help in this way. Carlisle, by extending the invitation for us to move into the West End house, has dramatically improved our situation. My house is so great, but something strange in me does not want Bella there. I want things to be as easy as possible. With the West End housekeeper, cook, driver, and a new nanny, she won't have to lift a finger.

And we can work on her not dissolving into panic around anyone who isn't me, and who isn't part of the hospital staff.

Carlisle made the mistake of coming into her room when I had ducked into the bathroom, the same day they met. He had run to get us some coffee, and by the time I had burst back into the room from the connecting bathroom, it was splattered across the floor. He had leapt out of the room immediately, leaving her.

I rushed to her side, since she was screaming and shaking. Her eyes were closed, her hands pressed over her mouth. Those horrifying animal noises burst from her mouth in ear-splitting shrieks and half-formed sobs. I took her into my arms, rocking her from my awkward position to the side. There was no room for me on the bed, but I did my best to apply pressure to her fragile shoulders.

Carlisle was absolutely distraught when I had her calmed down, and stepped out to talk to him. He was being so hard on himself because as a doctor, he had trained to work with victims of abuse before. However, since she had been introduced to him by a "safe" person, and he believed that I was in the room, he just entered without thinking.

Carlisle is one of the most caring individuals I know, which makes it hard for him to see her like this and not know how to help. That is how so many people tied to our case (the whole of the Warehouse 14) feel, since the depth of our trauma is unprecedented.

Listen to me, speaking about fucking trauma and victims and safe people and whatever.

Bella snaps me out of my recollection of the past couple days. "Edward," she gasps. A hand flutters to the mountain of her belly. I place mine on top, threading my fingers in hers. "Thank you." She winces, breathing carefully and measuring each breath.

"Bad, huh?"

"Yeah." She smiles, looking up at me with some effort.

"Not long now, bunny."

"I know." She sighs. "I… I just feel like it went by so fast." Her eyes are flooded when she looks to me again. "We were so drugged so much of the time, and I just feel like I haven't… I feel like I've barely been pregnant."

I decide against trying to lighten her mood with a joke: no one could ever say this poor swollen girl has barely been pregnant. "I know. I know. He stole so much from us." I think carefully before telling her what's been weighing on my mind since the meeting this morning. "Today, Charlotte told us about a baby that she lost."

Bella's eyes widen in fear, but I continue my hopefully soothing circles on the thin skin of her hand. "Breath, baby girl."

She blows her air out like she's supposed to, but her eyes are so intense on mine, I'm not sure if she is thinking of anything else other than listening to me.

"In the meeting today… Well, the raid came too late for a lot of people. We knew that. But only two couples had been there long enough to conceive, give birth, and lose the baby. As far as I know… I mean, maybe some people haven't opened up…" I fall silent, trying to think of how to say what I want to.

Hot tears come into my eyes, which I blink back in embarrassment. Something about hearing what Charlotte told us today just destroyed me. Maybe it's just that the babies have gotten so real, since Bella told me we were having a little boy and a little girl. A little girl. Bella was someone's little girl. Bad things happen to little girls, in my experience…

I begin telling Bella exactly what Charlotte told me, told us.

"Hello," she begins nervously, smiling at all of us, pushing her near-white hair behind her ear. She has the most startling grey eyes, and they seem to lock onto each of us as they pass slowly round the room.

We are arranged in a rough circle, so that we can see one another. We all had a slightly different nightmare, though, so this format is very difficult for some. You can see it in pose, in averted eyes, in shallow breathing and nervous movement. We have no proctor for these meetings. The powers that be told us that one could not be arranged on short notice, so at least this first meeting would be run by us.

We have total privacy- no loved ones in this session. They thought it was best that way. The room has only one exit, with two posted armed gaurds. So there is a helpful semblence of safety, especially for the women. I appreciate that the room is not a yawning space, it is fairly close quarters so that our circle touches close to the wall. Something in me, some product of my years captive, seeks out the edges of the room. I push against that urge, but the nausea keeps me in line…

"My name is Charlotte. I've met some of you by now…" she studies her hands, suddenly bashful. A thought comes to me, unbidden. The voice would tell me to fuck her. Or the voice would tell me to pick up the knife and cut her. Open up that perfect skin. I wonder how the blood would change the color of her hair. I try not to throw up.

Once the words begin to pour from my mouth, they don't seem to want to stop.

"So, there's no easy way to talk about what he… what they, I guess, did to us. But I just wanted to tell the girls here, especially, something." She chokes back a sudden sob that takes me off guard, and everyone else in the room seems to stiffen as well. Peter sits next to her, and pushes off with one foot to slide closer to her. He grabs her hand, winding his fingers through hers. I feel even sicker seeing that, knowing I would have an identical reaction. Her knuckles go white, she's squeezing his so hard.

"He took something from us. He took someone from me." She has gotten quieter, and she studies the floor. "The police told me that Peter and I were captive the longest of any of the survivors, likely because we… we were such good, um, producers."

Elizabeth, the leggy doe of a girl, leaps to her feet. Her legs shake as she makes a quick break for the door, presumably to collect herself. Her lovely, perfect caramel hair bounces gently as she sweeps from the room.

Charlotte acknowledges her departure by holding the moment, until she is free from the room. Then she continues. "I had three babies in the warehouse."

We are frozen. I watch Peter's face. How, how is he still sitting there… Still existing after this loss. Experiencing only my girls' miscarriages, willful abortions, deaths destroyed me. But he saw his living, breathing children delivered into the world, and they were stolen from him.

"The police are searching for them as well, but they are not optimistic. They think that the records were taken from the warehouse before the raid… they think they must have had records, it just makes no sense otherwise…" she is almost stuttering now, the words come out so roughly and with so little pause between.

Peter looks away from her, at all of us. He is literally supporting her now, with his arm. "What happened to us in there… none of us got lucky, or got off easy. Each of us had our own personal hell. And what I think we're forgetting is that we're all still living in it."

Charlotte nods, taking her face out of her hands. "I just want to know…" her voice breaks again. "I just want to know what happened to them. Where they are, if they're safe."

There is a voice, deadly quiet. It comes from Emmett McCarty, the beast of a man who looks almost comical sitting in an identical chair to those that dwarf all of the girls. "Did he let you keep them? After each delivery."

Charlotte frowns. "Yes." she says, carefully.

Emmett nods, still not meeting her eye, blinking his own rapidly.

The reality of what Charlotte's answer means begins to sink in, for me. Charlotte and Peter were raising three children in the warehouse. I speak up. "When did he take them?"

"We're not sure, but just before the raid. We were still drugged during it, and had to be revived at the hospital." Peter speaks easily to me, but I can see in his eyes that on-edge-animal-wildness that each of the men has picked up from our ordeal. I can feel him sizing me up, and not liking what he sees. Each of the men are over six foot at a minimum, and we all pose a serious challenge to one another. Not that we should be thinking in these terms, but…

"He was tipped off, that fucker. They all were."

But I finally do finish. I meant to only relay Peter and Charlotte's story, since it would be too draining for me and for Bella to discuss all that we spoke about.

The same people attended this morning's meeting as did Mercer's gathering the other day. Rosalie does not appear to be out of the hospital yet. I was confused as to why her counterpart, Emmett, was not with her, but then remembered my own identical choice.

The easy thing (none of this was exactly fucking easy, but…) would be to take solace only in your counterpart. To lose yourself in comforting them. But by being around the others… I was able to force myself to my edge, and build myself up without doing so only to spare Bella my emotions.

I hate how much I overanalyse my own behavior these days, but thinking through all of this shit is the only thing that seems to be keeping me sane. I've compartmentalized so much of this for so long… although right now, my priority is Bella and the babies, of course.

Bella's response to my account of the meeting is difficult to understand. She doesn't panic, though she seems to have absorbed what I told her.

She finally begins to speak. Her voice is tiny, is careful in this small hospital room. "Why were they… what was the point of the babies, then?" She wonders.

"What do you mean?" I want to hear her thought process, though I know exactly what she means.

"Why force the women to get pregnant? I thought… I thought he, or they… I thought the babies would be taken after they were born."

I nod. "What I've been thinking is, why pay someone to care for them, when you have the free labor held up in your fucking warehouse? Why pay for food, when the girls can feed them themselves?"

"But… if they were being sold, if they were for infertile families or something, wouldn't they want them as young as possible?"

I shake my head. "Bella, I don't think that's what they were for."

She gives a sudden little shriek of frustration, then clasps her hand over her mouth. She averts her eyes from me, cowering. She cowers by accident, but it still pisses me off. I bring my hand to her chin, turning it towards me. "Bella. Bella."

She looks up, eyes burning. "I'm not mad at you, bunny. I know, it's fucking frustrating. None of this shit makes any sense."

She bites her lip at all of my cursing, but I can't help it. It just feels so good and natural to talk with her, finally without the voice listening in- I want to talk to her like I would talk to anyone.

She thinks for a few moments more, rubbing a slow smile across the bottom of her belly, back and forth, back and forth. She nibbles on her lip in concentration.

"Listen, just focus on these two, alright?" I smile at her, and she finally brings her attention back to me. "Can you focus on you, and these babies, and let's just leave all of that to the police."

She shakes her head furiously at me, and is scolding me before she realizes how insubordinate she is being. "Edward, I don't want to leave anything to anyone. This… this warehouse, from what you've told me,… he," she still cannot say his name, "has been running this operation for over ten years. Ten years, Edward! And they had no idea!"

She stops her rant quickly, eyeing me from the corner of her eye. She is frozen, total deer in the headlights. I wait for this panic to be over, watching her cooly with only a neutral and friendly expression. Usually, if she panics because of me, they roll over her like the tide and she can bring herself up for air.

"I'm sorry, Edward."

"Don't be."

"I am."

I bend to her, giving her a soft, chaste kiss. Her lips are healing and pillow soft to mine. I pull away just enough to see her eyes, eyelashes curling up at the edges as a petal does. "Don't be."

She smiles, a relieved smile, a weight-of-the-world smile, and I sit back again. We spend a bit more time talking, but she falls asleep and I spend the afternoon watching our babies move and stretch their little limbs against her skin.

AN: Well, it's a quickie but hopefully short and sweet! I thought I wouldn't have a chance until this weekend but I snatched some free time just for y'all. Lots of love, feel free to review or PM me w questions, thoughts, theories, whatever! Scold me for my dialogue, I feel like it's just awful. We are in quite the eye of the storm, here.