Hello, lovely people! I hope you're having a good day.

I'm so pleased with this chapter. It brings a lot of the plot points I've been brewing in my head to fruition, at last!

Enjoy!

LookAliveSunshine03

WARNING: Some strong language

Chapter 13:

Acts of kindness

What was the cliché? You may break my body, but not my spirit. Well, then, how did Beth know if her spirit was intact? Had she ever had one? If immortals like Edward, Carlisle, or Anna were to be believed, vampires didn't.

Michael grasped Beth's hand, clumsy with her limp fingers. He showed her the united gesture. "Alright, sweetie, alright. I've got you, okay? I've got you."

When had she started bawling again? In her broken body, Beth felt nothing. Her arm, her stupid, tiny fingers with the chipped nail polish, weren't hers anymore. In her heart, she still wanted to hug Michael tight. Go find your sister - oh, no, don't leave me, please!

Had Hazel planned to hurt her like this? Beth's thoughts gushed out in a wail she would cringe about later. "What if this is permanent? My glamour, my l-legs…?"

"We will avenge them." Michael's tone shocked her. It was soft but no-nonsense. "But we have to keep this up. Protect ourselves, and say nothing about the Volturi. Right?"

"Right," Beth stared ahead, lip trembling. All the while, the sky bled purple. Dawn and all its damning sunlight, it crept over the horizon, eager to swallow them whole. "But we need my glamour if we're going to stay secret."

"Beth, can you see any living humans?" Sighing, Michael said, "Never mind. I get it. When you placed your shield over me, it was…a real comfort after..." Michael's shoulders dropped. "What I mean to say is, thank you for being there, Beth."

Beth's eyes filled with more stinging tears. "Oh, Michael...you took the words right out of my mouth."

They smiled sadly at each other, and Beth was warmed. Not in her body…but in whatever fragment of her that counted as a soul. Perhaps the part of her that refused to kill humans, she didn't know.

But all her questions disappeared with the realisation: I have a friend here.

When Dana returned, the peaceful moment died. Unruffled as ever, she knelt beside Beth and touched her head to keep it still. "How do you feel?"

Like the world is ending. Beth gave a bone-deep sigh. "I still can't feel my legs, if that's what you mean."

The doors banged, and Hazel and Marek burst out. Jumping up, Michael shouted. "I - I cannot believe it! You two, together. Why didn't you kill him, Hazel? Stop blocking me out!"

Hazel did not answer. Her hair hid the long side profile of her face, but she walked rigidly as she threw Marek ahead of her. "Hurry up."

"Where are you going?" Michael demanded, running after them. He shoved Hazel even as she ignored him and kept on moving. "Not to the Romanians...what about Beth's glamour? Give her back some dignity, Hazel. Marek!"

Marek hesitated, blatant in deliberation. "I cannot help your friend."

"Oh, bollocks to that! Don't walk away from this!" Michael shouted.

But Marek did. He did not go near Hazel, twitchy and fearful of what she might do if he got too close. He followed her into the new morning, nevertheless.

The spurned husband and lover. Beth marvelled at the messiness of it, and her pleasure at Marek's misery was beautiful and cold. "Follow them, Michael..."

"What did you say?" Dana asked.

"N-Nothing." Beth hadn't realised she had said it out loud.

Dana was faffing about, checking her bones for more breakages. "Nothing else broken here," she muttered. "...We need power in numbers. The Volturi will not waver without it."

Beth gulped. She wanted to thrash, run away with Michael into the jaws of war and finish what she'd started. Her glamour was safer with her, not that smug vampire with crushed balls.

Yes, Beth hoped that was the case. She shouldn't be the only wrecked here. It was only fair. Beth imagined opening her mouth, watching rage slide out, take her place like a living shadow. Her temper had always been wild, but this was new. Concentrated.

Scary.

Demetri would have been proud.

"Beth?" Glancing back at her, Michael's eyes were shining. He scraped at his hair, and uncertainty was written across his face. "I – I have to, we can't just let them go like this –"

A lonely little boy. It wrenched Beth's heart to say, "You - You have my number. Go after them. Please."

Michael's eyes widened. "I will try to make this right."

"Your friend is safe with us, Michael," Dana said abruptly. "The Romanians will admire your bravery." She watched him go before clicking her tongue. "Boys like him are hungry to die, unlike us."

Beth's teeth creaked, keeping the sobs at bay again. She ground out, "He's not hungry for any of this. I am hungry for all of this to end, aren't you?"

Dana nodded, dropping her voice. "I never wanted this, child. But the Volturi have taken too much from me to change my mind at this time."

"I know how that feels," Beth said carefully. "My sister should be with me, but...she's gone."

"I'm sorry. My sister is gone, too. Burned before my very eyes." Dana shuddered, eyes sparking. "She was your age..."

"Reinforcements!" Radko's voice came first. Loud and too cheerful, this grinning, languid version of Demetri. Dana closed her eyes and the fire glowed low behind them.

Iona followed on, poised and radiant as ever…if a little less full of smiles. Perhaps she suffered with loss without Hazel there with her. "We…cannot fix you, Beth," Iona answered, genuinely apologetic. She dropped down to Beth's level so her hair spilt over one shoulder. Her smile was intolerably kind. "But I can make it better for you."

"Uh-huh," Beth's teeth ached. You wouldn't talk like this, if you knew who I was. The thought gave her a strange rush. Her head was still hers, at least. Still protecting her brain as it should. Physically unharmed but almost definitely fucked up in unidentified would have to ask Carlisle about that. If she made it out of here.

God, she missed the doctor's calm voice. She'd heard Alice in the background, too. The nearly normal family crowded together on the plane, coming to save her.

"Don't move her, Michael. Her body will try to heal itself, but I'll be there as soon as possible."

Fire was the definitive method to kill a vampire. Everyone knew that. But Hazel had only broken her, not enough to split her into two graceless halves, so there was...some hope. Beth wouldn't linger on it.

"I can make it more bearable," Iona was saying firmly.

Beth laughed, and it was almost hers. "Oh, can you?"

Radko scoffed, muttering something under his breath. Dana said, "Please, don't talk to Iona that way."

But Iona's solemn smile didn't budge. "Don't you want to know how I can help?"

Beth felt the urge to shrink away from her; simultaneously, she wanted to tear those pretty teeth out by the roots and crush them into powder. She spat. "Help, how? Why do you care?"

"It's what I do."

"Iona has a safe place," Radko said lazily. "You'll love it, Beth. Everyone is happy there. There is no pain –"

Immediately, Dana threw a volley of Czech at him, and Radko flinched away.

Yeah, Dana. Fuck him up. Beth fought to keep her voice steady. "Unless this safe place includes my glamour, I couldn't give a shit."

"Beth, my power is a glamour!" Iona insisted, beaming. "Try it for a little. You will enjoy it. Everyone does." Her hand moved to touch Beth's shoulder, and Beth tried to move away on instinct.

"I don't want this."

Shushing her, Iona stroked her hair. "Look at me. Yes. Yes."

"No." The rush of calm came, building like a relentless, warm wave. It threatened to pull Beth down, somewhere unknown and certainly not somewhere she wanted to go. She tried to struggle. "N-NO! I don't –"

Voices around her, falsely bright and still unfamiliar. Why was Radko holding her down? "Just relax. It's okay. Iona has you…"

"No, no, no, no..." Didn't he get it? Beth's body was gone, left behind, corpse-empty, yet Iona stared at her with a heavy expression of concentration, keeping her trapped. Helpless, Beth screwed up her eyes, as a child would, to try and hide from a monster.

If I don't look at her, she can't get me. "Please, don't do this -"

But her monster was dead, right? Christ, those memories still had teeth that cut her insides. Out of nowhere, how icy the air had been, oh, yeah, that old chestnut. Tuono's red eyes gleaming excitedly in the dark.

Silence. Beth was so lost deep inside herself that Beth didn't notice the footsteps. If Beth had heard, she would have noted two people were approaching her. Their steps were too light to be Michael's and not fast enough to belong to anyone Beth knew. Beth would have known them if she had opened her eyes – though only by name and second-hand memory.

She would have also realised she was no longer in the physical world.

"Oh, Benjamin. Another one." Tia clutched Benjamin's arm. As with all the others, the red-haired girl had appeared as if from the air. "I thought we were the only ones left here. Where do they go, do you think?"

"I'm not sure," Benjamin said thoughtfully. He recognised the stranger from the bar, though it was only in passing. The vibrant colour of her eyes had been a happy surprise in a crowd of mundane.

Except, right now, the girl did not look happy. Her eyes were tightly closed. She lay flat on her back and thrashed limply, whimpering, "I should have…died that night…no…"

Benjamin felt a surge of compassion. "What terrible thing has happened?"

"Benjamin," Tia startled as her mate bent down. "Be careful. We don't know who she is."

"Tia, look at her," he said. "Whoever she is, she suffers."

They watched as Beth grew still and gave a gulp.

"What's happened to you?" Benjamin murmured. "Can you open your eyes?"

Beth's forehead relaxed. She sucked in a steadying breath and found the air cool and sweet. Most significant of all, it was devoid of smoke. "W-What?" Tentatively, one eye opened.

They were a safe distance away from her, these pretty people. The creeping realisation of who they were was like catching sight of a celebrity. Was it really them? Beth had only ever seen them at a distance, and then they hadn't seen her.

Yet here they were.

Right in front of her.

"Christ!" Beth went to raise her hands – and gave a shriek when she realised she could. Benjamin jolted back in alarm, and Tia screamed. "Sorry, sorry! Oh – Oh, God! I really must stop scaring Renesmee's friends…" Beth found herself on her feet before she'd even finished the thought.

In her shock, Beth missed the delight fly across Benjamin's face. "You know Renesmee! Is she well?"

"I – I don't know." Overwhelmed, Beth gasped as hot tears sprang in her eyes. Her throat tightened. "What the hell…"

Tia threw the question at her. "Who are you?"

"Beth. M-My name is –" She took a long, shuddering breath. She could feel her face collapsing and pressed her lips together to keep it steady. "I'm sorry, I don't know what's happening to me."

I'm going to cry. How am I doing that?

"It's this place, it defies all logic. You get used to it." Benjamin's arms swung uselessly, like he wanted to comfort her, and the almost-act of kindness broke Beth. "What's happened to you?"

Her body belonged to her again…and four years' worth of pent-up emotion released like a sudden shower upon the cobbles beneath her feet.

To be continued...