Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It didn't happen all at once.

It started with headaches. Little ones, easily managed by some acetaminophen or a good nap. Gradually they developed into a consistent ache that Jacob tried his best to ignore. Shifting made them evolve into head splitting migraines that made him want to scream.

Safe to say he’d been sticking to human form since.

Everything was going fine. Jacob had it handled.

Then he had a nosebleed and Renesmee flipped out.

“What’s wrong? Are you sick? What’s going on?” The questions came at a rapid pace, her voice becoming more concerned with each one.

He wiped away the blood and shrugged. “Don’t worry about it. I’m alright.”

“You don’t seem alright. You’ve been acting weird.” She said and now she looked at him like he was Charlie after a long coughing spasm. “You should get looked at. Why don’t we go find Grandpa and-”

Anxiety surged in his chest. If Carlisle knew then there was a chance they’d take him away from Renesmee. Jacob could imagine the excuses already. He couldn’t let it happen. She needed him.

He grabbed her arm hard. “I don’t need to see him. I don’t need to see anyone. Trust me, I’m fine.”

Renesmee bit her lip, eyes downcast. “But-”

He gave her his patented smile, bright and wide. “Hey, all I need is to sleep and maybe a vitamin. I’ll take better care of myself so you don’t worry, ok?”

“Ok Jacob.” She tugged at her arm, and Jacob let go with a mixture of guilt and annoyance. 

“You know, you never say ‘my Jacob’ anymore. I never stopped being yours.” He said, “I’m always going to be by your side.”

Renesmee went quiet, her face unreadable. Jacob could feel his anxiety spiking again, accompanied by a fresh spurt of blood dripping from his nose. He went to wipe it away when she handed him a tissue.

“I know.”

Jacob didn’t understand why she sounded so goddamn sad, but he had to make sure she was happy. That’s what she needed him for. 

So Jacob would smile when he didn’t mean it. He’d tell jokes or do things he didn’t care for. He’d reinvent himself to be exactly what she needed.

“Skyrim?” he asked, and she readily agreed.

Because really, he was the one who needed her. 

His headache flared.

Usually when Jacob self corrected, any improper thoughts or feelings were erased. This time the annoyance persisted. It felt strange and illicit. He turned it over and over in his head like a stone.

Maybe there was something wrong with him. Maybe Jacob really was dying.  Or maybe he just had to get worse before he got better.

Things did not get better.

Jacob started forgetting things.

Memories kept falling right out of his brain. He misplaced things, found himself in strange places and lost track of conversations mid sentence. Jacob didn’t know what to do about it, so he didn’t do anything. What did it matter anyway?

None of the Cullens said anything to him about it. It seemed like as long as he was pretending to be ok, so would they. They were actors on the same stage dedicated to interacting as little as possible with each other.

Maybe Bella would have said something if she hadn’t been off with Edward on Isle Esme.

Meanwhile things started to change between him and Renesmee. He couldn’t explain it, but he didn’t feel the need to be near her always. The anxiety still lingered, but it was muted. Jacob didn’t know how to feel about it.

Renesmee took advantage of it. 

“You don’t have to stay, I won’t be lonely.”

Or,

“Have you spent much time with your Dad lately?”

And,

“You’d have more fun fixing up a motorcycle than hanging out with me wouldn’t you?”

Everytime she succeeded, she looked so relieved and guilty.

Jacob needed her, and she kept on sending him away.

Maybe bit by bit he was forgetting that too. Maybe that’s why when he argued with himself about staying or going he rarely convinced himself to stick by her side.

Jacob did like working on bikes in his garage. Jacob did miss his dad. Jacob began to enjoy being alone for the first time in five years.

Maybe his brain was breaking.

Then why did he somehow feel better?

The day it happened wasn’t special.

Renesmee and him were on the couch taking turns playing a game. They’d moved on from Skyrim to Bioshock.

Jacob had been enjoying it so far, even if he kept forgetting key plot points. The visceral pleasure of electrifying people or bashing them upside the head with a wrench kept him engaged. He kept getting lost and after the third time he’d asked Renesmee where to go she’d pouted and said, “Why don’t you let me play then if you don’t know how?”

Which made Jacob grip the controller tighter and dedicate himself to not dying for the rest of the game and therefore making sure Renesmee never got her turn.

The progress was slow, but steady. Eventually Jacob could sense the end of the game approaching. Enemies swarmed him. His hands suddenly spasmed and he dropped the controller. In the few moments it took to scoop it back up, he’d already died.

“Finally,” huffed Renesmee. She took the controller out of his shaking hands with a callousness he didn’t think she’d had.

Jacob tried to hold his hands still. They continued to tremble ever so slightly. He shoved them in the pockets of his shorts.

He watched Renesmee effortlessly beat the scenario that killed him and proceed to beat a man to death with a golf club. He turned from the television and studied her.

Jacob couldn’t deny her beauty. He also couldn’t deny her strangeness. Before his brain decided to break down, he didn’t care about it. She could have been ugly, scar covered, and alien. All that would have mattered was that she was his.

Now he looked at her and didn’t see a single thing he cared for. He couldn’t remember why he’d ever cared for her. There’d been a girl he’d loved once, and it wasn’t Renesmee.

Once upon a time she’d been the center of his gravity. A million chains bound him to her. 

Now most of the chains were gone. The few that remained snapped under the weight of a single thought.

I don’t want to be here anymore.

He stood. Renesmee glanced up at him.

Jacob smiled, fake and wide. “I'll be right back.”

Then he turned and walked away, through the house, and out the front door with no signs of stopping.

Chapter Text

He didn’t get far.

Two steps outside, and Jacob was on the ground, a dozen rhinos wearing steel-toed boots having a fucking disco in his brain– oh god –

And then, next thing he knew, he was staring at a blank white ceiling. From the smell, surrounded by leeches, still .

“Oh good, Jacob, you’re awake,” said Carlisle, and Jacob forced himself to move, propped himself up on what must’ve been the giant table at the center of the library.

The table Bella had died on.

And suddenly, there was something stabbing at his chest, twisting up his heart from the inside because it was like losing her all over again. Fuck, how had he forgotten that? How had he gotten over it, over her choosing literal death over him?

Jacob cast his eyes around, trying to find something else to focus on, to distract–

His gaze landed Renesmee first – at this point, it was a habit. And it was Renesmee, was the girl he’d watched grow from newborn to teenager, except somehow, it wasn’t.

Her skin glowed , in the bright white lighting, like she’d swallowed a fucking lightbulb, and it was perfect, too perfect, not a freckle or blemish or scar to be seen. 

Her hair was still a curtain of brown curls, except it wasn’t – wasn’t hair , that was. It was too smooth, too glossy, like a silk cloth draped over her head. 

And her eyes. God, her eyes. They were brown, of course, the same shade as Bella’s had been, but comparing the two was like comparing a pebble from a riverbed to a diamond. They were too brown, too deep, too damn much .

He remembered thinking, days or hours ago, that it was a strange kind of beauty – but no, she wasn’t just strange, she was downright alien .

And her scent. It was almost overshadowed by all the vampires standing around her – and of course, it was practically human, when compared to all of theirs – but it still burned.

How had he ever liked it?

How had he ever liked her?

“–Jacob?” he tuned in to hear Carlisle say.

With an unfamiliar ease, he dragged his gaze away from Renesmee to meet Carlisle’s, noting Rosalie and Esme’s presence in the background. “’Sup, Doc?”

And, hey, Jacob really was curious for what he had to say, how he would explain it all – the migraines, the nosebleeds, the spasms, the memory gaps, the broken imprint–

Brain cancer.

Figured.

It might not be lethal, Carlisle offered. With the super-healing, apparently, most of his brain was fighting hard to bring him back to normal, to keep the tumor from spreading and fucking up everything. 

It was just that the cancerous cells, 24 pairs of chromosomes and all, also had that extra bit of wolf superpowers. 

And the good doctor didn’t know for certain which side would win out – or what would be left in the aftermath.

Something about his tone reminded Jacob of catching dragonflies to pin them up and dissect them – like Carlisle wanted to slice open Jacob’s skull to see exactly how his jacked-up cells were fighting, and helping, the cancer.

He wouldn’t, of course.

Jacob thought he could trust that. Because among all the bloodsuckers, Carlisle was the one that seemed most… human.

Even when he included Bella in that count.

Because as much as he’d loved her – or maybe it was, because he’d loved her – Bella wasn’t the girl he remembered. The Bella he remembered hadn’t been so distant, like nothing in this world could touch her or change her or make her any less– happy .

That Bella was gone, was dead , just as much as the Jacob who’d loved her, who’d been erased for five years and replaced with someone who wore his face and used his name but loved a leech’s spawn, a creature who’d held him as her thrall, enslaving him with some twisted mockery of love –

He’d wanted to kill Renesmee, he remembered – it’d been, maybe, his last conscious thought. No, not just wanted, he’d been about to, before he’d imprinted. And now–

And, really, it would only be justice , an eye for an eye and all of that shit – killing the one who’d killed his love and Jacob himself. It'd be so easy, too, to get her alone–

–with Renesmee, running through the woods, in human form for once because he'd noticed–

"What's that you've brought, Nessie?"

The girl who was his universe turned towards him, still skipping along, to show a bottle labeled "Soy Sauce" and tube labeled "Wasabi," cradled in one arm.

Jacob stared. "You… do know we're going hunting, right?"

Renesmee giggled. "I know!" And then, like she was just realizing the problem, "Oh– I know the container is glass, but I promise I'll be careful!"

"No, but we're going hunting," Jacob repeated. "For blood."

"Oh," she laughed again. "Right, but blood is so– it's just sweet, you know, with no variety. And soy sauce and wasabi taste so good with sushi, so I thought–"

And there was a smile ghosting his lips at the memory – but she was a fucking murderer , but she needed to die –

But she'd thought that calendars were just a strange kind of decoration until she was two because the passage of time really didn’t have any meaning to her.

But she'd refused to wear anything that wasn’t a floor-length dress for a week because she’d gotten her hands on a Victorian-era etiquette handbook and thought all those rules still applied.

But she'd wormed out everyone’s birthdays once she realized no one else got the sort of party she did, and now faithfully hand made a gift for each and every date as it passed.

But her favorite color was chartreuse mostly because of the name, but her favorite instrument was the clarinet even if she couldn’t play it, but she was five years old and–

God, this would've been so much easier five years ago, when she was just a faceless demon!

And Jacob had to kill her – wanted to kill her, for himself and for Bella–

(Oh, but who was he kidding, this wasn't for Bella – not when Bella had chosen him over Jacob, not when half the reason he was so angry was because he was angry at her . No, Jacob needed, wanted, to avenge himself , for those five years a fucking slave – he could be self-aware enough to recognize that, he was no Renesmee but in those five years he had gotten older.)

And he could kill her now, now that she was no longer his gravity whose loss would send him catapulting into the emptiness of space. Now that she meant nothing to him–

Except that wasn’t true, that couldn’t be true, not when he could remember her smile brightening up his whole day, not when he could remember loving her.

And then the rhinos were back, this time with knives and a thirst for blood (get it?), and somehow he found himself wondering if this was the trade-off. Pain, or the imprint.

Jacob thought he preferred this. Sure, his brain was tearing itself up from the inside, but at least it was his brain, you know?

Chapter Text

Jacob bit into the burger and wondered, not for the first time, how someone like Esme could make something so good when she didn’t even eat real food. It boggled the mind. Or at least his anyway, but he guessed that was a low bar these days.

After explaining the whole brain cancer thing Carlisle had switched to discussing treatment. He spewed out a bunch of  nonsense words like CT scan, MRI, morphine drip, respiratory depression, cerebellum, and dexamethasone.

Jacob said, “Doc, I just want a burger and to get off this fucking table.”

Which sent Esme off into the kitchen, apparently happy to have something to do, and made Carlisle smile.

Now he sat on the couch in their living room enjoying the best burger of his life with an IV of the good stuff hooked into his arm. 

“I thought you might want this back,” Carlisle said, handing him the phone he’d lost track of from who knows where. The screen was completely fucked, but it seemed the good doctor had taken it upon himself to wipe it down since it was a good bit cleaner than the last time Jacob had had it. By the time he thought to thank him, Carlisle had stepped out the front door with Renesmee in tow.

Well, whatever then.

Jacob checked his notifications. A missed call from his dad, and a text from Bella asking how he and Nessie were doing. He stared at his dad’s contact. He should probably call. Definitely more like.

What the hell would he even say?

‘Hey Dad, it’s me. Really this time. It’s actually me. The imprint’s broken.’

‘How did it break? Well that’s a funny story-’

‘Actually it’s not really funny at all, sorry.’

‘I’m back, but only for a little bit. I woke up, but only because I’ve got super cancer. You get me back, but you have to lose me all over again.’

Jacob swiped away the missed call and replied to Bella.

‘ dont worry, everythings fine here… except Im dying! LITERALLY! LOL ;) ’

And maybe he should be more positive. There was a chance he could make it, but Jacob’s luck had been rotten from the start. What was he except a collection of tragedies, stupid mistakes, and resentment?

He fell in love with the wrong girl and nothing had went right afterward.

So the chances of him surviving ranked somewhere between abysmal and impossible.

This was it. He was really going to die.

Jacob considered this. He finished the burger he had and the next one Esme brought out along with a pile of french fries. At least whatever his last meal ended up being would be absolutely spectacular.

The concept of death hovered over him like a pillow in some soap opera. He didn't like thinking about it. He didn't know where he'd end up or if it would be like someone clicking off a light and then-

No more Jacob.

Instead he thought about what he was going to do before the end. Because if he wasn't careful his final moments were gonna be spent surrounded by leeches instead of anyone he actually cared about.

And he can't help but hate them. If the Cullens had never showed up there was a good chance none of the werewolves would have ever shifted. If they'd never shown up then Bella would never have met Edward. If Bella didn't meet Edward then she'd still be alive. If she was still alive then maybe he and her could have been something.

And Jacob was angry. He was terrified. His hands started shaking and didn’t stop. He didn’t want to die. He didn’t want to die like this.

He wanted to die on his feet. He wanted to die before he forgot who he was. 

What was stopping him from going on a rampage and taking as many leeches as he could with him?

Good food? Medical care? Five years of reluctant tolerance on both sides?

And it would be stupid, selfish, and pointless. But it would be better than a life chained to a hybrid. It would be better than slowly rotting away on a hospital bed until tumors consumed his brain completely.

It would be on his own terms.

Jacob would have gone through with it if not for two things.

One, the rhinos occupying his brain were on break and sleep was not only possible, but unavoidable.

Two, the morphine had begun to make him feel less like a person and more like a slug.

So Jacob drifted off into dreamless sleep without murdering anyone despite his best intentions.

When Jacob woke it was dark outside and he had idea how long it’d been.

He stretched and winced when the IV jabbed into his arm. He tore it out and when the blood started dripping from the spot it’d been, he let it run.

He rose to his feet.

“Jacob?”

He whirled around to see Renesmee standing behind the couch, worrying at her lip. He came to the unsettling realization that she must have been watching him sleep. 

She looked abjectly miserable. Red rimmed around her eyes, and she kept nervously fidgeting with her hands. Her eyes only met his for a moment, before dropping to the blood on his arm, and then to her own wringing hands.

Renesmee should be the first one to go. Her being here was a product of fate. A final balancing of the scales that governed Jacob’s luck. It would be easy .

But for some reason ( she’s only five years old ), Jacob couldn’t help but ask, “What’s wrong Nessie?”

Her face crumpled.

“I- I…” Tears welled up in her eyes as she stuttered.

Jacob,  who was angry, afraid, and dying, found that he had enough patience to wait for her to find the right words. 

“It’s all my fault.”

“How’s that?”

Renesmee shrunk in on herself. “Because I knew you weren’t well. I should’ve done something. I should’ve said something to Grandpa even though you didn’t want me to. Then you changed and didn’t want to come over all the time and I… I didn’t want you here .”

She looked at him now, tears streaming down her face, “I wanted you gone. I didn’t want to see you again.”

She took half a step toward him and Jaocb realized she wanted to use her gift on him.

And by this point Jacob should have already killed her. Her mere existence had eclipsed his own for five long years. 

Still he offered her a hand.

She touched him gently like he was made of glass and not at all like a boy who had wanted to murder her the day she’d been born.

Jacob choked back a sob as he was hit with a truckload of pure grief. God it made him want to weep. 

Renesmee showed him what he looked like in the days beforehand. A reel of deterioration accompanied by waves of guilt. Then it transitioned to before, when the imprint was still around and everyone was ‘happy’.

Wherever Renesmee went, Jacob went too. He’d already known that, but seeing it from her side was different. Jacob under the imprint was an anxious mess lapping up at whatever attention Renesmee would give him. Whenever he hovered around her there was an undercurrent of unease.

If she wanted to be alone, Jacob made as many excuses as he could for him to be with her anyway.

If Renesmee insisted, he saw his own face twist into something blank and terrifying for a brief second.

His presence in her life like a physical weight she was forced to carry, no matter how it threatened to crush her.

It wasn’t her fault that Jacob imprinted on her, and it wasn’t his fault that he’d become an inescapable shadow threatening her future. And maybe he could never forgive her, and she should never forgive him, but he finally understood that he wasn’t the only one who’d suffered.

They were no good for each other. 

Renesmee took her hand back and wiped at her eyes. “I don’t want you to die.”

Maybe it was half whatever was left of the imprint, and half basic decency but Jacob decided then and there that Renesmee didn't deserve to die.

He said, “It’s not your fault.”

She shook her head, but Jacob kept going. “You didn’t give me super cancer. It wouldn’t have mattered if you’d let me stick around or not. It would have happened one way or another.”

If Jacob had walked away after Bella had died on that godforsaken table then neither of them would be here right now. If he left now…

The front door slammed open. Bella rushed toward him with Edward a step behind.

He supposed she’d gotten his text.

“Jake.”

Staring at the girl Jacob had once loved felt like stepping on a bear trap, big metal teeth tearing into his flesh and promising that he was going nowhere he wanted anytime soon.

Chapter Text

“Jake,” Bella said again, “Carlisle told us everything, about the cancer – but you don’t have to worry! There’s a solution, we can fix it!”

Jacob stared at her blankly. “Fix the cancer?”

And… this was something she’d come up with? And not the trained medical professional with three hundred years of experience?

Bella nodded furiously. “If you think about it, essentially, it’s the same problem as when I was pregnant with Nessie.”

“Where Nessie is the cancer,” Jacob said slowly. Not that he was disagreeing (not that he would’ve disagreed?), but–

“No, no, obviously not,” Bella said, waving her hands dismissively. “What I mean is, there’s something going on in your body, and you’re not going to survive it human. So we use the same solution as we did back then: emergency vampirisation!”

Complete, apparently, with jazz hands.

Fucking jazz hands.

Jacob couldn’t help it. He laughed, probably sounding more than a little unhinged, but this was some next level kind of surreal bullshit, okay?

“What?” Bella said, frowning.

“You’re crazy,” Jacob chortled, “You’ve gone off the fucking deep end – you’re not joking, are you?” With anyone else, he would’ve been certain that they were, that this was some twisted attempt at humor – but this was Bella.

“I’m not,” she confirmed, now looking affronted, of all things. “What? I don’t see anything wrong with it.”

“You don’t see anything wrong with it,” Jacob repeated. God, this felt like a fucking dream, except he was certain that it was really happening, because this was just classic Bella. “You don’t– okay, how about we start with the obvious? I’m a werewolf – remember that? Growl, growl, howl, bark, poof and I turn into a giant wolf–”

“Get to the point, mutt,” Edward muttered under his breath.

Jacob graciously chose to ignore him. “Which means that this–” he gestured to himself, “is not exactly compatible with that,” he pointed to Bella.

And then he fought a wince at the other kind of compatible he and Bella no longer were.

In the corner of his vision, Edward frowned, eyebrows furrowed like he was trying to figure something out.

“But that’s the thing!” Bella said. “We can’t turn you into a vampire, now – but that doesn’t mean we won’t be able to. Because you guys can turn human again, right? If you stop shifting, eventually you’ll stop being a werewolf, you’ll start getting older again.”

“That’s supposing I’ll actually stop,” Jacob pointed out. “For all we know, being a wolf is what’s keeping me alive right now – who says the cancer will turn human if I’m human again? Who says I’ll give it all up for the chance–”

“Except you don’t have a choice, do you?” Edward interrupted.

And hey. What did he mean, Jacob didn’t have a choice–

“I mean, you can’t shift anymore, can you?”

Said who? Just because it hurt a little – okay, a lot – didn’t mean–

“Prove me wrong,” Edward challenged. “Shift right now.”

Jacob glared at him – he didn’t have to follow the orders of a fucking leech, and especially not the leech who’d stolen Bella from him!

Except. Well.

He could feel himself worrying, in the back of his mind. Could he still shift? Was he trapped in this form – trapped to feel the wolf be slowly sucked away from him, to grow weak and useless and human again before he died?

Almost without thinking, he tried, feeling that bit of wild otherness that stalked the corners of his mind and pulling it forward–

And his head was screaming, knives stabbing and hacking and gouging at the space between his ears, behind his eyes, and it felt like his brain was about to fucking explode–

Eventually, slowly, after some unknown amount of time, the pain stopped – or, at least, faded enough to let him actually think.

Shit.

He opened his eyes. Bella was hovering over him, and Jacob hated how his heart lightened to see how worried she looked. 

God, he was fucking pathetic.

He tried to look somewhere else, anywhere else – except that was just Edward, looking smug off to the side, a smirk on his face that made Jacob’s skin itch, made him want to claw it off with his bare hands.

“Still–” Jacob started, except his voice was raspy, voicebox sore like he’d just been screaming – which, come to think of it, considering how many times worse that migraine had been than the usual ones that were terrible enough already, he probably had been. 

He cleared his throat, then tried again. “Still doesn’t mean it’ll work. No one’s ever tried it before. For all we know, my body’ll still be wolf enough to know that magic vampire juice’s no good for it.”

“But, for all we know, it might work ,” Bella insisted. “And there’s no harm, not if you already can’t shift anymore–”

“No harm?” Jacob interrupted, incredulous. “How about the fact that I’ll be a fucking bloodsucker? How about the fact that I’ll be the kind of monster I was born to kill?”

“Don’t say that, Jake,” Bella said immediately. “It’s not like that. Being a vampire is wonderful – and at least you’ll be alive.”

“And what if I’d rather be dead?” Jacob asked her. “What if I’d rather die, of cancer, or whatever? Not everyone’s like you, Bella–”

“Which we get,” Edward said. “Jacob, of all the vampires I’ve met, I may be the one who understands your perspective the most. I was convinced, like you, that we were all soulless demons for the vast majority of my lifespan, what with the thirst for blood, the killing – but we’re not. We can choose, by being vegetarian, by living like humans do, not to be.”

“And you know we’re not monsters, right, Jake?” Bella added, now looking fucking pitiful, of all things. “You know I’m– well, I’m still me. Right?”

Jacob wasn’t so sure.

His heart still fucking ached after she’d broken it – but he couldn’t see the girl he’d fallen in love with in this marble statue in front of him.

Edward sucked in a gasp of air, drawing both of their attention towards him as he stared at Jacob.

“The imprint broke,” he said – he must’ve just realized.

Jacob spared a moment to wonder what had taken him so long.

Bella turned back towards him. “It did?” she asked, eyes wide with emotions he didn’t recognize.

Or maybe it was, emotions Jacob didn’t want to recognize. Because, if he really thought about it, he could see – see that it was disappointment.

She was disappointed that her daughter’s unnatural hold over him had snapped, unhappy that he was, for the first time in five years, free.

Because she’d been happy to see him as her daughter’s slave, glad that he was out of the way of her and Edward’s happily ever after but also not so far away that they couldn’t still hang out.

And just– 

Fuck her.

“I’m out,” Jacob said, ripping the wires and tape that remained off his body, throwing the blanket that had at some point appeared out of his lap.

Bella reached out towards him. “Jake, don’t–”

“Fuck you,” he said, out loud this time. “You do not get to say anything–”

“Jake, please – I just don’t want you to die–”

“Newsflash, I was dead! For five fucking years, everything that made me Jacob was dead and gone and buried so that I could be a fucking thrall to your daughter – and you wanted me to stay like that. No,” he said when her mouth opened, “don’t deny it. You–” he laughed. “You’re a real leech, you know? Not just literally. A leech of happiness, of friendship – all you do is take, take, take, giving nothing back. You two,” he gestured to her and Edward, “you two really deserve each other.”

And her eyes were wide, wide but dry, because she’d chosen a monster over him and vampires couldn’t cry.

Just more proof that the girl he’d loved was gone.

“Well, isn’t that something,” Edward said, before Bella could speak.

Wasn’t what something, Jacob wanted to ask, but he wasn’t falling for what was no doubt a trap on Edward’s part. “No,” he said. “Don’t follow me. I don’t ever want to see your – either of your – fucking faces, ever again.”

This time, no one stopped him, as he got off the couch, made his way out of the house.

It took more than an hour, running at the much slower pace his human form could manage and with splitting headaches interrupting every so often, but eventually he’d run enough, he was far away enough that he could slow down. Think.

Jacob had hurt her, with his words, he knew, but it was only enough to shock her, to make her let him go for now. And he knew Bella, knew how stubborn she was – knew this wasn’t going to be enough.

With a sinking sensation in his stomach, he could picture how the next few months, maybe years, would go.

He’d get sicker. He wouldn’t be able to shift, and his body would eventually forget how to, as he turned back into something fully human. And then–

The moment his scent turned human enough, they would turn him. Edward, or Bella, or maybe Carlisle if they could convince the good doctor – they’d bite him, fill his veins with their venom, and it might fail, and they might just end up killing him faster, but they might succeed.

He might wake up one day with a demon’s eyes and a thirst only ever soothed by blood.

They weren’t going to stop at something as ineffective as him saying no – because he was Bella’s best friend. Because she’d always wanted to have her cake and eat it too, to choose Edward but also keep Jacob.

And Jacob–

He really hated Bella, right now.

That killing spree was really sounding all the more tempting now-

Except, he realized, he couldn’t.

He didn’t stand a chance, not against eight vampires and one hybrid – not when he couldn’t shift.

Fuck.

Okay, so what else could he do? Could he ask the packs? Quil, Embry, Leah, even Paul, Jared, and Sam, he knew, would be just as upset as he would, over the Cullens’ determination to turn him, especially since vampirism wasn’t something he wanted. It was even part of the treaty, as twisted up and mangled as it was now – but no biting humans, that was one of the provisions.

They’d go to war over that.

But they’d also – at least some of them would – wind up dead.

And– god, it was fine when it was just Jacob, he was a dead man walking anyway, but he couldn’t find it in himself to think that taking half of the other wolves with him would be right.

Not when there was another option.

Really, it was the only logical option, to spare everyone more suffering and sorrow.

He could end it, himself, first.

Then there’d be no more chance of being turned, no more possibilities of war – not even that slow decline he’d feared as the cancer ate away his brain.

Jacob had no idea where he was, but it was relatively simple, all the same, to find a store – some state park souvenir shop filled to the brim with useless trinkets that he usually wouldn’t have been found dead in, but, well, he was already dying.

And it sold pocket knives, with little wooden handles and names laser-engraved into them.

Out of spite, he chose one labeled “Bella.” It was massively overpriced for the cheap little blade that it was, but it was sharp enough.

He was out of the store, making his way to some deserted patch of forest, the moment the knife was his. 

He found a meadow, a little clearing full of flowers and surrounded by trees.

He got to his knees.

He could slit his wrists, he thought, or maybe the throat would be a good option?

His hands were shaking, but he forced them to still.

He flicked open the knife, tracing the letters on the handle with one finger. B-e-l-l-a.

He’d do the throat, he decided, so he wouldn’t have to cut multiple times. Plus, what with the whole vampire thing, it felt– ironic.

His hands were shaking. 

The knife was in his lap, and he couldn’t bring himself to grab it, to bring it up to his throat and cut, because he–

He didn’t want to die.

And then Jacob was sobbing, taking in huge gasps of air as something wet slid down his face, and fuck.

He was such a fucking coward.

Minutes or hours, and another head-splitting migraine, later, he’d calmed down enough to think.

So he couldn’t kill himself, couldn’t get up the fucking nerve to just do it– he needed another option.

What if–

What if he left?

Like the time he’d gone to Canada, before Bella’s wedding, but this time for real, no mental connection to the other wolves, no nothing. It’d be like he’d died, for everyone else, just he’d still actually exist, for however long it took the cancer to finish him off.

Yeah. That could work.

He had a credit card connected to the Cullens’ account, he could pop over to some ATM along the way and withdraw some cash there – because, after everything, he thought that they owed him, at least a little. Then catch a flight, whatever took him the farthest away–

And then he’d be gone.

It’d be like a fresh start.

Twelve hours later, sitting on some airport bench with his head in his hands at yet another migraine, Jacob vaguely registered someone sit down in the seat beside him.

Someone horribly familiar.

Chapter Text

So, Jane was smarting a bit, she'd admit it.

Just imagine you were her, okay? Imagine that you had a kind of terrible childhood, that everyone you grew up around hated you and thought you were a demon and eventually burned you at the stake, yadda yadda – but then! Imagine you were then saved, and given a brand-new life, so that you (fine, and your brother) were some of the most important vampires in existence, using your special talents to help save the world. Imagine you had been able to do this for hundreds and hundreds of years, until!

Suddenly, there were these new guys in town, who didn’t respect you and your coven or, you know, the law. One of them even used to be close friends with your boss, so much so that your boss still had an entire wall back home dedicated to him, except obviously that friendship meant nothing to him because he and all his family and friends then plotted to murder you all! And for the first time since you were burned at the stake, for the first time since you were human, there were suddenly people out there who could hurt you, because of one stupid vampire and her stupid gift that was given to the absolute worst person in existence and you just hated her stupid face and–

Deep breath, Jane.

Okay, so now imagine that it’d been five years. Things were tense, no one was attacking yet, but obviously things couldn’t go on like this forever. This was simply the calm before the storm, and one day they might be there, at the doors to your home, ready to kill you all and, oh did she mention, doom the entire world, and you just had to hope something would change between then to tilt the odds ever so slightly in your favor.

And then imagine, one day, you were on a mission, dealing with some shenanigans in New Jersey. You know, normal stuff. But then, totally out of the blue, as you were sitting back and watching the smoke drift up from the pyres, your coworker – the one with the tracking ability – was like, something’s going on. We need to call the boss.

Imagine that this turned out to be weird movement from one of your enemies, the totally-not-a-werewolf werewolf dude with a thing for the baby totally-not-an-immortal-child half-vampire-and-therefore-immortal child. (Though, thinking about it, she probably wasn’t a baby anymore… Wasn’t she supposed to reach adulthood at age seven? Wow, Jane wondered what that was like.)

Anyway, so imagine this was going on, and everyone was on the phone trying to determine if this was some sort of trap, but apparently the werewolf was doing loop-de-loops through Washington state and all the other important players were not shielded (by the worst vampire ever), but mostly clustered around the home base on the peninsula.

Imagine it was finally decided that this was mostly likely not a trap, and also an absolutely incredible opportunity if it was real, because your boss said (that your other boss said this, but you would believe it once you saw it – which was looking to be, oh, never) that this werewolf was either the second most important person in the stupid shielding vampire’s life. Apparently, she cared about this werewolf even more than her own daughter, second only to her husband, which fit with Jane's general experience with mothers. And either way, that made this guy one of the best possible hostages they could take, with the only possible complication being that these werewolves were kind of unstable rage monsters (which Jane definitely believed), and therefore possibly violent.

But that was what Jane was for! Because she was intimidating.

So imagine you’d then gotten on the private jet, headed at first to southern Washington, but then detouring further south and across the border into Oregon because this werewolf dude just kept heading south and away from all his allies, eventually stopping at, of all places, some regional airport in Oregon! So that being absolutely perfect, after you landed at that very same airport, you followed your tracking coworker through that building, which on the plus side smelled like nothing except faint wet dog, as he led you to the land-side area outside security where: bada bing, bada boom. There he was.

And like. You even had the perfect opening line to say. You'd sit down next to the werewolf, your target, playing at nonchalant, and then as he registered your presence and processed everything about the fact that you'd shown up now, you'd speak.

Something like, We'd prefer not to attract attention, but if you insist, we could always pass it off as a stroke. You suddenly seizing up and collapsing, that is.

It'd have been perfect!

Then your target would’ve been like, oh no, I’m really screwed – except he wouldn’t have actually said that, obviously, but he would’ve thought that, and you would’ve been able to see it on his face, and it would’ve been so satisfying.

(And your brother would’ve been so jealous.)

Except your target was ruining everything, because. He. Was. Laughing.

Why was he laughing?

“Oh my god,” he was saying as he gasped for breath, clutching his stomach. “Oh my fucking god, I can’t fucking believe this. I can’t believe I didn’t think of this! This is an even better option! You guys will kill me–”

Jane let her eyes dart quickly around, keeping most of her attention on the enemy but sparing a small amount to check – but no one around them seemed to be paying attention, yet.

“–and then I won’t have to worry anymore! And then we’ll have a leech-on-leech fight, because of course fucking Bella won’t be able to let that go unanswered! And at least some of them will die, and I’ll be avenged! And–”

He lurched unsteadily to his feet, swung his arms out wildly, and continued: “And, I’ll be dying on my feet!”

Which. Um.

Jane glanced uneasily at Demetri and Felix from where they stood, behind her.

Demetri shrugged. Felix uncrossed and recrossed his arms, but didn’t say anything. 

Great. Thank you so much for the help, guys.

(Also: ‘fucking’ Bella? As in, Bella Cullen? And ‘leech-on-leech fight’? Had something happened – did he suddenly hate his allies now? Was he now a bad hostage to take?

…It was probably better to still take him back to Volterra, and let Aro figure this out.)

“So,” Jane started. “We’re not planning on killing you. Or at least, not yet. We will if we need to, but we’re taking you hostage.”

“Not planning on killing me?” the possibly-deranged werewolf repeated slowly, like it was taking a while to process in that tiny little brain of his. “No.” He huffed out another laugh. “No, you have to kill me, that’s the best possible solution!”

“You do realize that what you’re saying is making me want to kill you even less, right?” Jane checked. “Because we’re enemies. What is best for you is, by definition, not what’s best for me.”

“Right, right,” the wow-that-wet-dog-smell-was-so-bad dog-man said, his head nodding up and down like one of those bobbleheads. “You don’t want to kill me, but, see, I know your weakness! Edward’s told us all, so many times – you fuckers are so obsessed with that law of yours, with keeping your fucking secret, and you’ve got to kill anyone who breaks it – those are the rules, you made them for yourselves! You dug your own grave – lit your own pyre, hehe – which means if I go–”

And he was screaming, “Vampire! They’re–”

Jane activated her gift. Her target seized up with a shout.

“Oh no! Uncle!” she cried, purposefully loud to all the onlookers whose eyes she could suddenly feel on her. “My uncle has been suffering from postictal psychosis, which is a symptom of temporal lobe epilepsy that affects between 6 and 10% of sufferers! He’s been having seizures and also strange delusions, where he can no longer tell what’s real and what isn’t! Quick–” Oh, what was a normal modern American name? “–Dimitri, we need to take him to the hospital!”

“Of course,” Demetri said, actually being helpful for once as he approached them in quick strides, to where the what-even-was-his-plan criminal lay, collapsed and twitching on the floor.

Though then, as he crouched beside them, too quiet for any of the humans around to hear, he whispered, “Dimitri?”

“I was on the spot, okay?” Jane hissed back. “Just pick him up, come on, and let's go!”

With one last raised-eyebrow look, he scooped up their target, bridal-style, in his arms.

Jane wrapped herself around his arm, peering at the satisfyingly-writhing-in-pain werewolf’s face in a perfect portrayal of a concerned niece, but really keeping her gift centered on him. She'd release it once they were back on the plane. Probably. If he decided to cooperate, and if not, the only downside would be having to deal with his cries of pain for the rest of the journey home.

Pity they couldn't tear him to pieces to incapacitate him, like they could a vampire – but no, Aro had specifically told them that that was lethal to these not-werewolves, and therefore not allowed.

And they left, in what was overall a pretty clean no-kill disablement and extraction of a dangerous target, if Jane did say so herself.

Until–

“Hold on – shit, is he dead?” Felix spoke, for the first time in a while.

“What?” Jane frowned.

“There’s no heartbeat. Listen.”

“That’s impossible,” Jane said reflexively. “My gift doesn’t kill people. Or maybe, like, humans, in extreme cases, but he’s not human!”

If she strained her ears–

It was impossible. But there was nothing.

And also, she wasn't using her gift anymore. It hadn't even registered in her conscious mind, but it had released a few moments ago, it must have. Which must've been when he died. But–

“My gift doesn’t kill people,” she repeated. “He can’t be dead. Aren’t these not-werewolves supposed to be sturdier than the average, too? With quicker healing and everything?”

“You’ve never actually used your gift on one of them, though,” Demetri pointed out. “Might’ve been some sort of unknown reaction – you know, like an allergy.” He shrugged. “Disappointing, I suppose.”

“That makes absolutely no sense,” Jane told him. But… anyway you looked at it, it wasn’t her fault, right? Because she couldn’t have known that a werewolf would just die from exposure to her gift – you couldn’t blame her for not knowing.

“So,” she continued, “I guess he’s dead. What do we do now?”

They called Aro.

It was rare, Jane thought, to see her master so confused. (And yes, she did mean ‘see’, video calling was really a rather remarkable invention.)

“Well,” he said at last, after multiple attempts to clarify what’d happened, since his gift didn’t exactly work through video call. “I suppose we’ll just have to keep that in mind, that Jane can possibly kill one of the Quileute shapeshifters with a single use of her gift. Unfortunate that we had to find out with this particular one, but quite unforeseeable – so you needn’t worry, my dear, no one could hold it against you.”

Jane felt her shoulders relax slightly. “Thank you, master.”

Something that sounded awfully like a snort from a nearby Caius, but he didn’t argue. Which was a win in Jane's book!

“I wonder if this would extend to Alec as well? Hmm, that would likely depend on whether the death was a primary or secondary effect to the use of your gift, the former implying some cause inherent to use of your gift itself, which might be shared with your brother, while the latter would likely be specific to you and the actual effect your gift has on your targets. But of course, to determine that, we would need to know the mechanism by which it killed him…”

Personally, then, Jane was hoping for the latter. What? Surely she didn’t have to share everything with Alec.

“It wouldn’t be because he’s more human, though, because – well, firstly, he’s not. Carlisle has done some studies into the unique biology, determining, for instance, that the number of chromosomes is off. Which is rather miraculous, by the way, that these shapeshifters can just spawn an extra pair, throughout all the cells in their bodies, with only what, a few days’ fever? But regardless.

“And we have conducted tests on this, Jane dear, remember? Your gift doesn’t kill humans either – not unless they have underlying health issues, which the elevated stress and other physiological reactions could exacerbate. Oh, but that’s an idea, could this Jacob Black have had underlying health issues? It seems unlikely, given the advantages to physical health present in his kind, so–”

He gasped excitedly.

“Could we? If you brought the body back, we could conduct an autopsy! Oh, this could be an incredible opportunity to study their unique physiology – and of course, determine some of their weaknesses in combat – and to examine the exact mechanism by which he died. The only problem would be if Carlisle and his coven, or the other members of his pack, came looking for him. But I suppose your scents would be all over the body, regardless.”

“Or,” Caius said from off-screen, then looking deeply unimpressed as Aro swiveled the camera to show him. “We could just announce that we’d killed him. Do away with this uncertainty, once and for all.”

“Caius,” Aro chided, camera whirling sharply back to his face.

Jump cut back to Caius. “Fine.”

Which Jane was, secretly, in her heart of hearts, kind of glad about. On the one hand, it was pretty cool that her gift could now, maybe, kill these werewolves without her even having to lift a finger. But on the other hand, the thought of facing the Cullens and their allies now, and having been the one who started it, by accidentally killing this werewolf–

Well.

“I think we should be able to bring the body back,” Aro declared, after a moment’s pause. “Though we may need to do something to disguise the scents… perhaps a small fire?”

“Will do, Master,” Demetri agreed.

“Oh, and as for the possible rift among Carlisle’s allies– well, it’s unfortunate that Jacob Black is dead now, and cannot provide us with further explanation. Especially as to why he would want Bella Cullen dead, but she would still avenge him– but any guesses we make now would be just that: speculation. The best thing to do may be to simply wait and see.”

“Wait and see?” Caius repeated incredulously. “Should the Cullens and their allies be arguing, this is the best opportunity for us to strike!”

“We don’t know any details of such an argument, however,” Aro countered. “Regarding their relationships with us, Marcus has seen– Marcus, would you like to share?”

Marcus, of course, said nothing – Jane wasn’t sure what Aro was expecting.

“Or I can, as well,” Aro said after a pause. “The thing is, there has been no significant change in the views of Carlisle and his allies towards the rest of us, so it’s more than likely that any threat from us will simply result in the overcoming of their previous disagreement to fight us. If we leave it alone, on the other hand, who knows? Their situation was always– precarious, would be one word for it – and it could possibly get worse.”

Which seemed like an awful lot of ‘maybes’ for Jane, but then again, she wasn’t the one in charge.