Chapter Text
Chapter six: Too Far for Comfort
“So much for staying calm am I right” Emmet chuckles at Jasper while keeping the volatile vampire pinned to the floor face first.
Jasper smiles not wanting to talk anymore as his body is still in pain from the earlier fight and the continued use of his ability while he was still so weak.
“Ow! Dammit.” He says as Felix gets a good kick to his leg, which now has a deep crack going straight through his knee cap.
“Jas, can you up the ante a little more?” He says beginning to struggle more with the hissing vampire. He feels a little foolish tumbling around with the hulking brute. Although he’d be lying if he wasn’t thinking it was a little bit funny. At least it will remain that way until Jasper can’t keep it up anymore. Then he’d probably panic as Felix will likely try to tear his head off too.
He nods and rushes over to the blood storage and takes another bag to tear into, reclaiming his seat on the floor again. Emmet eyes it longingly.
Felix growls and takes in an impossibly deep breath.
“I’ll kill you all!” He screams with a surprising amount of coherency for someone who was being incapacitated by a gift as strong as Jaspers.
Emmett rolls his eyes. “Yeah, yeah pal, we know.” He says struggling to grasp Felix’s kicking legs.
“Do you really think it wise to goad him Emmet?” Edward says as he returns to the room.
“Bella?” Emmett asks him while struggling.
“I sent her to Renessme. She’s too upset to be here right now.” He says leaning against the wall.
“You just gonna stand there?” Emmet grumbles after a particularly painful punch to his stomach. “I thought you liked fighting?” Edward says trying not to smirk. Felix is in distress; it wouldn’t be right to find humor in his pain.
Seeing the near indestructible Volturi guard so vulnerable, so confused and feeling such palpable fear reminded him of a time where he felt just as powerless. He mentally reels for a fraction of a second, it felt like so long ago when he himself was struggling to save Bella when she had given birth to his daughter, then again even further back when she had been infected with James’ venom, how hard it was for him to stop pulling at that small gash on her palm. Had she not said his name then… he shutters to think that he could have lost her. The pain it would have caused so many, her family and his alike. He knows had she died that day he wouldn’t have had any other choice but to ask the Volturi to end his life.
Edward walks closer to the two struggling vampires and tries to decipher his thoughts for a moment. “His mind is hazy, it’s like he’s lost. All he can think about is getting her back into his arms, except he doesn’t remember where she is. He just knows she’s hurt very badly.” He says frowning and crouching down near him.
“Turn his head this way.” he tells Emmett. “Ugh.” He winces as Felix bites a chunk of his palm off. He grimaces and grasps his chin roughly and turns him to face Edward.
“Felix?” He says trying to get his eyes to focus to no avail. He snarls in response and nearly takes a bite out of the leg kneeling closest to him on the floor. “Felix, I can help you.” He says, “but you’re going to have to listen to me.” Felix pants in exertion but is still confused as to why he is on the floor. He tries even harder to buck the other vampire from his back.
“Jasper, little help.” Emmet says with a strained voice as Edward interrupts, “No. He needs to start to reduce his effects on him. I need him to listen to me, but he won’t while he’s under the influence.”
Emmet looks at him alarmed and slightly worn out. “I don’t know if you noticed but he’s trying to kill us all kid.” His voice shakes with effort, the carpet having long torn underneath them.
“Jasper.” Is all he says in response. Said vampire looks on unsure but does as Edward asks.
“Emmet, let him go.” He says. Emmet lets him go but crouches near Edward incase this doesn’t go as planned.
Felix bolts upright as the haze slowly lifts and rushes to grasp as many blood packets out of the small cupboard as he can fit in both fists, bringing them to his mouth and drops one in his haste. Unaccustomed to feeding from artificial packaging, he makes a mess. The blood that doesn’t end up running down his chin is drained quickly. His chest is heaving when he finishes the last bag in his grasp, he tosses the packages to the floor and brings a messy hand up to his face licking the sticky the blood off his palm with a sigh.
Once his bloodlust is slightly lessened, he frantically looks around and crouches low in response to the vampires observing him.
“Where is my mate?” He gasps confused, his throat still burning from his unquenched thirst.
Emmet grabs the unopened bag he dropped and quickly brings it up to his lips, Edward sends him a questioning look but he only shrugs and tears it open, quickly draining the inside.
“On her way to safety.” Edward says.
“I can keep her safe.” He hisses back offendedly. Edward nods at him, “I’m aware, I meant she’s on her way to the hospital to be tended to.” Felix takes a shaky breath and looks to his blood-soaked shirt. He grimaces, ‘Just like a newborn’ He thinks to himself slightly repulsed by the waste of blood. He grips the shirt and tears it off, throwing it on the ground.
“Take me her.” He demands.
“You sure you don’t want to clean up first? Ya know, so you don’t scare every single human in town.” Emmett says sarcastically while motioning to the hazy reflection in the large metal cabinet behind him.
Felix turns and gazes at his reflection startled. His hair is ruffled and has quite a bit of carpet fluff and wood granules imbedded into the erratic strands. His chin down his neck to his bare chest and stomach have a sheen of red from the spilled blood while the denim covering his thighs and knees holds a violently darker shade. His eyes are still pitch black and he has dried flecks of mud all over. He begins plucking some debris from his hair in vain.
Jasper looks to Edward, ‘I don’t think he should go into the hospital; he will definitely cause a scene.’ Edward nods in agreement as Emmett turns to him, ‘Maybe we should make Dimitri and Jasper deal with him at the tree line behind the hospital, he’ll still be able to hear her at least and it will keep him from exposing us all.’ He nods again.
Jasper quietly tears into another packet and Emmett scoffs, “Don’t you think your well enough now Jazz?” he says mockingly to his brother who looks back and smirks in response. “Jealous?” he drawls with a rasp after a moment and Emmett rolls his eyes. “Shut up.” he says gulping while Jasper mockingly motions to the fridge with his arm.
“I don’t think Carlisle meant for you both to completely decimate his supply.” Edward chides.
“Don’t be a snitch Eds.” Emmett scoffs while tearing open the small door, he groans. “Damn.” He whispers at the empty compartment while Jasper chuckles. Emmett frowns, not knowing when or if this opportunity will ever present itself again.
“Let’s go.” Felix suddenly turns, he looks like a nightmare, and they all look to Edward pointedly. “Follow us.” He says, ignoring the looks and running out of the room as his brothers follow close by. Felix is a few paces behind them when he whispers the plan to his brothers to keep him at bay once they arrive.
The drive to the hospital was a quick one with Esme driving the Police cruiser alarmingly over the speed limit into town. They decided to take her to the local hospital instead of the larger one in Seattle like they had originally planned. Most of the decision a result of the drastically weakening health of the poor girl being cradled by Carlisle in the back seat and because it made more sense with Charlies local connections.
Charlie sat next to him, watching him tend to the frail girl to the best of his abilities at that moment. He hastily wipes tears from his eyes at his sadness for her state and the stress he went through not so long ago. His throat is tender and no doubt bruising. He looks to her again while running over his side of the script in his head. She begins to tremble without the aid of the blanket he saw her with before. Carlisle cups the back of her head to keep her from jostling around too much while Charlie grips the door handle with a death grip.
Esme takes the back roads once they hit the welcome sign back into town where they eventually drive side by side with Carlisle’s car which was currently being driven by Rosalie.
Carlisle turns to Charlie when they are a mile out. “I need you to take her. Leave your car door unlocked so when Alice is done creating the decoy crime scene, she can make one in here on the off chance they try to verify your side of the story.” He shifts her into Charlie’s trembling arms who now uses his legs to brace himself in place. He only nods and widens his eyes in shock as Carlisle flashes out of the back of the car and into the night, all while Esme keeps a consistently dangerous speed.
She’s freezing. The rain that was getting colder by the second is falling at a constant rate. He slips off his police jacket as smoothly as he can and slips it over her. He wonders where her family was and whether or not they were even looking for her, or if they ever were at all. His mind already running through things he can do to help further. He had no time to look through any data bases as they were shorter on time than estimated. He decides that is something he can do once he goes back in to work the day after tomorrow. Until then he’ll offer as much help as he can. The car finally slows in the darkened tree line at the edge of the forest, the hospitals bright lights not quite reaching this far back.
Carlisle opens the back door for Charlie to make it easier on him as they all hop out, it was decided that Charlie will carry her inside since he was supposedly the one who found her in their fabricated story. “Ok, I already called ahead and told them to expect us. The trauma nurses are on standby as well as a few more of my colleagues.” Charlie only nods as they rush at his human pace to the front doors of the building, he begins shouting for help and the three of them are immediately swarmed by medical personnel. Dimitri who was already there decides to stay in the tree line to listen to what is happening to the human inside.
Esme turns to Rosalie and takes the keys to Carlisle’s car as they wait for Alice to arrive. They stand under the meager protection the trees provided from the rain. She pulls her in to a hug, “How are you dear?” She asks her quietly rocking them both side to side. Rosalie hugs her back just as tight and huffs, “I don’t know yet.” So much has happened so fast that she doesn’t know how to process the similarities between her sudden death and the girl suffering inside. She decides there and then if the fragile girl pulls through and if it came to it, she would vouch for her so she would have a chance at the life that was stripped away from her so suddenly. Just then Alice shows up in a flash, covered in mud and soaking wet from the rain. She immediately goes to the cruiser and curls up in the back seat to create the illusion that Charlie put Felix’s mate in the back seat before he sought emergency help from Carlisle. Crime scene completed, she decides to wait in the tree line with Dimitri for Jasper to arrive and tells him of the plan she’s seen to keep Felix outside.
Esme and Rosalie head inside just in case they want to question them about witnessing Charlie’s arrival to their home.
Alice was lost flickering through the complicated web of the many possible outcomes of her visions when she startles at the hand placed on her shoulder. She turns when she hears her mate chuckle. Relief floods through her when she sees him. She runs a delicate finger over the new but violent silvery scar over his throat where he was nearly decapitated earlier, leaving a trail of mud behind. He smiles and she knows talking will only hurt him now, so she contentedly snuggles into his chest while they turn to look a few feet behind them, neither minding the muck sticking to her. He playfully tries to remove some of the mud from her hair, an impossible task from the start. They watch as Emmett and Edward try to convince Felix to wait deeper in the tree line out of fear that a human might see him. She looks at him and represses a chill. He looks absolutely terrifying, his appearance will no doubt cause unneeded distress to a human if they were unfortunate enough to catch a glimpse of him in this state (or any for that matter as he is quite unsettling to even the toughest vampires on a good day).
Jasper squeezes her affectionately and gently releases her as he flashes over to Felix while she races back home to clean herself up. She still had to pack their bags for their temporary stay at the quaint cabin in the woods. He quietly places the tips of his fingers to the back of Felix’s back to better concentrate his ability as he sends waves of calm to the beast of a vampire.
Dimitri nods at him appreciatively and they guide a now calm Felix deeper into the forest.
They join Edward and Emmett in the trees, he looks toward the former in question, who was currently making sense of the chaos occurring around Felix’s mate as they race to save her life.
Felix who is still slightly confused is thankfully unaware due to his hunger and the now strengthened calming effect of the freshly nourished empath. No doubt those were the only reasons he wasn’t currently tearing through the building. Now there was nothing left for them to do but wait. The four of them looking toward the manic sounds coming from the hospital staff, each one now as frozen as the fresh flurries quickly turning to snow at their feet.
A long while later Carlisle, a few colleagues, as well as two other officers look over the x-rays of the currently semi stable girl in the hospital bed a few feet away. She was now under a hopefully temporary medically induced coma. The ventilator and heart monitor working in tandem, providing background noise to the somber room. The pain she must have constantly been in… he couldn’t understand how someone, anyone could harm her at all.
She looks deceptively peaceful thanks to the care she was currently receiving. He sighs as he realizes that her collarbone will need to be operated on due to malunion as well as her eye for the now confirmed detached retina. Those will have to be scheduled for when the worst of her pneumonia was over. As for the rest of her broken bones… He wasn’t sure if it was worth it at all to correct them, it would mean her undergoing many painful procedures. Either way she would need to be on painkillers for the rest of her life. He would need to discuss this further with his fellow physicians. He was sure if he were human, he would be sick. The amount of hymenal scars alone…. He doesn’t know how Felix will react to the list of injuries she suffered, a list he will no doubt demand to see once he is thinking rationally. If he were to date the oldest scars, he could estimate that she had been living in a virtual hell for most of her life. He shuttered at the implications of her as a child having to be forced to endure those types of horrid injuries. He lifts a shaking hand and continues to read every injury he can see to the colleagues behind him and the few officers filing their report.
Charlie, having been questioned by hospital staff and some of his own brothers in arms was sitting in the waiting room with Esme, Rosalie having left a few hours prior to help Alice rebuild the damage to their home. He had a prescription to painkillers and a now violently purple bruise on his neck that he miraculously and disappointedly managed to pass off as nothing. Disappointing only because now he’s left wondering how many questionable things his fellow officers let slide because of their ignorance or complacency. He’d have to enforce stricter training for the future officers to prevent any future slip ups.
He decides to wander around the hospital, planning the many things he’s wishing to accomplish when he gets back to work. He’d have to get her fingerprints soon so he could see if she was in the system.
The next morning (so early in fact that it was still considered twilight) the Cullen household was busy working on finishing the last few touchups to their home. Esme having decided that she would offer the two Volturi guard Edwards spare room for the duration of their stay, was busy making space for any clothes or other knickknacks they might bring along with them. She tries to remain positive and brings in extra blankets for when (not if…when) the human girl comes to stay with them. She decides to ask Alice and Rosalie to buy her some clothes while she goes to buy her some bathroom necessities she will eventually need.
Carlisle, having left an hour ago almost as soon as he had arrived home from the hospital, decided to head over to smooth things over with Bella and the pack (and to check if anyone needed him to check on any discomfort they may be feeling from their run in with the guard). He found only one of them needed a few ribs repositioned, the only other being Seth’s no longer visible bruised neck. Since he was left with only the memory of discomfort, he decides to go help Edward reassure Bella that Charlie was safe now. She was understandably upset over almost losing the only parent she still had contact with. Bells being the reasonable and understanding person she was took less time to see reason and decided that she would go to see her father and help him try to find out who their Jane Doe was and hopefully see if they could find her family. Edward says a temporary goodbye to Renessme and decides to go keep Emmett company. His brother had decided to stay behind in the forest just in case Felix tried to bolt into the hospital. Dimitri had been spending his time trying to convince Felix to go feed.
Further away in the woods Dimitri stares at a motionless Felix, who was currently sitting cross legged on the forest floor collecting an impressive pile of snow atop himself. He had been still the moment he learned of her being put under by the staff, quietly waiting for any changes to her wellbeing. He had been starving for quite a while now and as a result, hasn’t breathed since. It would do him no good to massacre the hospital full of humans on the off chance that he got carried away and hurt her or one of the other healers who could be useful to him and help his mate.
Dimitri sighs and sits next to Felix in the snow. “You know, I don’t think she’d like it if she knew you were starving yourself.” He says quietly. At that Felix gives him a perplexed look. “She doesn’t know of me, at least not yet. How do you know she won’t be repulsed by me, or afraid… what if she decides she doesn’t want me at all.” He mumbles turning back to look longingly to the hospital in the distance.
“Why wouldn’t she?” Dimitri asks confused.
Felix thinks his response through, not wanting to say too much and needing to take another breath in soon.
He settles for a quiet, “Were monsters.”
Dimitri shakes his head, “I don’t think she’ll see you that way.” He tells Felix. Watching his unconvinced look, “You saved her, because of you she’s getting help. Now she can get better and be safe, who knows if she was even ever safe to begin with.”
Felix looks sad at that and Edward steps closer, having just arrived but having heard everything.
“She’s dreaming of you.” He says simply and all three of them snap their heads in his direction, silently asking him to elaborate.
“She’s replaying you saving her over and over, she thinks you can fly, like an angel.” He says smiling and Felix feels his heart soar.
“She thinks I can fly.” He says using the last of his air and smiling.
“See! Good things so far. Now let’s get you something to eat.” Dimitri says standing up, hoping that Felix would follow his lead. He does and Dimitri takes a relieved breath in. Felix silently asks Edward to watch over her and when he receives a nod in response, him and Dimitri run deep into the forest heading a town over to feed.