Numb But Moving

Chapter 6: Victoria's Revenge

BPOV

I kept moving for days. I wasn’t thirsty and knew I needed to put as much space between the Cullens and myself.

I did have a few spots where I could stop and hunker down for a few days. You could almost call them homes; that is if you call abandoned shacks that have been equipped with the barest of necessities, homes. I headed for one such place.

I hadn’t allowed myself to think of anything but what was going on under my feet or in my immediate surroundings -- quite a feat for a vampire -- but now I needed to sit down and think. I needed to decide what I was going to do.

I had forgotten just how much my heartache hurt. I had kept myself numb by letting nothing touch my heart, no true amusement, no true pain. But now that it was back, it reminded me of when he left.

I was useless for a week. Charlie was scared he would have to put me in a mental institution. It was only when my mother, Renee, finally came to remove me to Florida that I snapped out of my semi-catatonic state. I couldn’t leave Forks, everything that reminded me of Edward and our time together was there. If I had left I knew I would have eventually convinced myself that it was all a dream, and I didn’t want the love of my life to be a dream.

Months of barely being a person led to Charlie once again contemplating “sending” me to Florida. I couldn’t have that, so I forced myself to interact with others. Jacob Black came to be a savior. He was a small personal sun in all the darkness that was surrounding me after Edward left.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t too long before he got tired of my aversion to being anything but friends. He began ignoring me and when I, finally, practically cornered him, he shunned me. He told me he no longer could be my friend; he was no longer the Jacob I knew.

Heartbroken once again, though not nearly as bad as before, I took my truck out to First Beach. It was a place that held many memories for me. I cried my eyes out sitting on the cold rocks. I didn’t want to go back to barely living, being a zombie, but I didn’t know how not to without Jacob or Edward by my side.

Darkness fell and it was then I was broken from my own self-pity. A rock tumbled toward me. Startled, I looked up. I was shocked to see the dripping person in front of me, but that soon turned to a feeling of relief. I didn’t have to go on in this pain; here was the one person who would enjoy ending it.

I smiled at her, meaning every one of my words. “Hello Victoria. How nice to see you.”

An emotion flickered across her face: shock. She took in my appearance: dark shadows under my eyes, dramatic loss of weight, lank unhealthy appearance, and fresh tears still on my cheeks.

“Yes, yes. I do mean that. I presume you would enjoy killing me? I won’t stop you.” I almost laughed.

She seemed angered by either my appearance or words, I’m not sure which; she hissed. “Did he leave you?! I’ve been taking my time to fulfill my sweet revenge and he leaves you!” Victoria seemed uncertain for a moment. This caused a bit of panic to course through me.

I begged. “Please…” She looked slightly sick, “please kill me. I just can’t take it anymore. It hurts so much without him.” Even I flinched inwardly at the pathetic sound of my voice. Seeming to make a decision, Victoria laughed; her face was full of triumph.

A loud growl sounded from behind me. Victoria’s head snapped up as the back of my neck prickled. It was those wolves once again--I knew it from that one sound. Maybe they would kill me, if Victoria decided to leave.

Letting out a growl of her own, Victoria, faster than I could see, grabbed me and leapt back into the water. Before I could even take a breath, the wolves on the shore were nothing but little dots. I laughed, slightly manically, in the clutches of the one vampire I knew wanted me dead. I was happy because I didn’t know what was waiting for me. Laurent was right: Victoria didn’t want to just kill me.

When we hit the shore again I was still laughing. Victoria slapped me—hard—but that only caused me to laugh harder. I think I may have had temporarily lost my sanity, but that didn’t matter to me – I was finally going to be released from all this pain.

Victoria grabbed the front of my shirt, putting her face inches from mine. “This isn’t funny!” I only giggled harder.

Obviously disgusted, she let me go again. Turning her back on me for a moment, she seemed to think. When she looked back at me, there was a glint in her eye telling me that what she did next would be painful. I didn’t care, I didn’t think anything could be more painful than the emotional pain I was in, and I was right.

After breaking both my legs and getting nothing more from me than a slight gasp, Victoria seemed to rethink her torture methods. Changing her tactics she bit my hand, perfectly mirroring the bite mark her mate had given me on my other one. She was careful not to taste any of my blood and seemed to not be breathing; obviously she wanted to watch me suffer slowly, not taking any chances that she may lose control and suck me dry.

I was horrified when I realized she meant not to kill me. I would have to spend forever in this kind of emotional pain?

When I begged her to kill me, she seemed to have seen it as a sign that the venom spreading throughout my body was painful. She smiled sadistically and continued to bite me, injecting more venom at regular intervals.

The transformation had been painful, but it was nothing to the empty feeling in my chest. I had focused on the physical pain in hopes it would diminish the hold the emotional pain had on me, but all it did was let me know exactly what was going on.

I had realized it wasn’t a fire that was settling through my body, it was ice. The chill of the venom was so cold, it burned. I had felt like I had had liquid nitrogen injected into my veins and then everything was being broken, only to be reconstructed into perfection.

Whenever I would drift towards unconsciousness, Victoria would either slap me or bite me once again. I obviously didn’t scream as much as she had been expecting or hoping, because by the second day her biting had become more frequent.

As the second day came to a close I began to feel something shutting down in my mind besides my consciousness. I guessed that my mind had been overloaded with the pain I was suffering both physically and emotionally, because it seemed to lock down.

When Victoria had slapped me awake, I felt no pain. I don’t mean physically, that pain was still there, although it had a certain distant feeling to it, as if it was someone else’s pain. No what I meant was there was not emotional pain. Actually, there was no emotion. I knew I should hate Victoria for what she had done to me, I knew I should be upset for what had happened over the last many months, but I didn’t feel anything like that. I just felt, well, numb.

My transformation had come to an end with Victoria standing eagerly over me. I had known she was planning something, probably involving more torture, but I had wanted to leave and I didn’t care whether that involved killing her or not.

It was obvious she was going to refuse me leaving when I sat up. She leapt at me, probably thinking she would enjoy tearing me limb from limb, but I had the upper hand. I twisted out of her grasp, taking an arm with me.

I had been rather surprised when I looked at the lone appendage in my hand. I hadn’t even meant to take that with me, but apparently newborn strength was what the Cullens had described. When Victoria lunged for me again, I very smoothly took off her head, almost businesslike. Deciding it would be better for the world if she didn’t return, I had burned her pieces, enjoying the warmth of the flames.

From the burning in the back of my throat I knew I had to hunt. After scouring the nearby forest for animal life, I was surprised when I felt some new huntress instincts taking control. I killed my prey quickly, drinking its blood slowly, thoroughly enjoying the sensation. I had known then that I was a monster and although I was numb, I still didn’t want to exist like that, alone and forever.

I started from my meditation position. I knew at least one day had passed since I began reliving my transformation in my head. It was strange to think of my period of no feeling, now knowing how I would have felt in the situation if I hadn’t been so numb.

I had been reminded once again for the reason I had begun fighting. I did enjoy the battles, in a way, but the main reason I fought was because I had a strong hope that I would eventually come across the one that would beat me; then my eternity would end.