Lunar Awakening (A Twilight Saga Fan-fiction)

1. A New Moon

My fingers clawed through the damp soil with all the strength I had left. I pulled at the soil, wishing it were a hand to help me escape. With my good leg I dug the toe of my boot into the ground as well, pushing myself forward on the barren forest floor. The movement caused me to cry out in pain, but I muffled the sound in the dirt. I can't afford for it to hear me. Tears stream down my face as I push myself forward again. I don't know how long I can go on like this, and it's just a matter of time until it does come back for me. I ignore that thought and clutch at the earth with all that is in me. whoosh.

I stop dead in my tracks and whip my head in the direction of the sound. My heart rate accelerates as my eyes search frantically. The forest is too dark, the sun too far down behind the trees. But it doesn't matter if I see whats coming back for me or not, I realize. I don't stand a chance against the monster that ravaged my leg and crushed the left side of my body with incredible force. Except the monster did not look like a monster at all, but rather a statue in a renaissance museum, maybe even an angel. Wild, dark, curly hair, fierce dark eyes with a weird tinge of-what was it? red?, startlingly perfect teeth; all caught in glimpses from earlier when it attacked, and yet the most beautiful thing id ever seen by a wide margin. 

I don't even have time to scream as a dark figure appears out of the trees and to my intense surprise, those perfect teeth sink into my throat. 

***

A couple of weeks before: Forks High school

"Miss Corine?....Miss Corine are you listening?" I am snapped out of my reverie by the gruff voice of my Chemistry teacher Mr. Nanns. I look up from my drawing to see the whole class staring at me, some even snickering. I look to Mr. Nanns at the front of the room, he stands at the board with an exasperated look and sighs. I clear my throat. 

"Im sorry, yes I'm listening." I mumble just loud enough for him to hear. I straighten up in my chair. 

"Would you care to answer the question then, Miss Corine?" Mr. Nanns challenges me. I hear more snickering from behind me. I rack my brain as my face surly goes bright red trying to remember if I heard what the question was. When I don't answer after a minute Mr. Nanns sighs again and turns back to the board to finish the lesson. I slump in my chair trying very hard to tune out the whispers around me. 

***

I try to scream, yell, anything, but the sound never makes it out. Or maybe it does, I can't hear anything but the raucous pounding of my heart in my ears and a loud ringing sound. Every inch of my body burns, burns as if It were on fire. As if I were my own personal kiln. My vision is black, I can't make out a single shape. 

Where am I? I don't have a single memory of how or why I'm burning. If Im on fire, shouldn't I have stopped feeling it by now? But the pain intensifies if that is even possible at this point. I feel my body contort in odd jerking motions that I can't control. Where's the fire? This has to be hell. Damnit, I'm in hell! 

My body feels as though I am being grated over a bed of sharp razors. I don't feel even a second of relief from the pain as it gushes through me with a force I have never before experienced. I call out to anyone for help, but I can't even hear my own voice through the pain. 

***

Its been days it feels like. I have been immobilized as the fire slowly made its way up my hands and feet, past my arms and legs, and now resides in my chest. I have yet to open my eyes, afraid of what I might see. I have managed to keep my body completely still on the forest floor, no one has answered my screams so I have found that I can concentrate on other things when not screaming my head off. My heart hammers at a rate I know couldn't be normal, but the fact that I can hear it with such clarification startles me. In fact, I can hear everything within miles as if it were just feet from me. The wind whooshes in the trees and stirs up leaves on the ground. Large and small animals alike scurry through the forest, some stopping to drink at the river close by. I can feel the rare Washington sun on my skin that was once burning, its a nice replacement. While sensing all that is around me, my brain still has room to keep tabs on the pain in my chest that I have somewhat gotten use to, as well as rack my memories for information on how I got into this situation. My brain is a wide space, with much going on but not overwhelming. 

Hours pass, and the pain in my chest is becoming more and more dull by the second. My heart hammers at an inhuman rate. My eyes stay closed. With less pain overpowering my thoughts, I am able to think of more things and try to jog my memory. However, my memories are cloudy and hard to even succumb in the first place. My clearest memories being those of the fire licking through my body. 

Soon, I feel the familiar raindrops of Forks land on my skin, but the feeling is off. I can almost taste the raindrops, feel their smooth wet texture in a way I have never felt before. The rain starts off as a drizzle but soon becomes a full on storm. Thunder pierces the air, and lightning lights up my dark lids. I decide to open my eyes for the first time, my heart thudding even faster and the pain almost nonexistent. I slowly open them, and I am amazed at what I find. Every detail of every object I thought I knew so well is thoroughly intensified in a way my old brain would not be able to comprehend. With my back on the forest floor, I watch thousands of raindrops fall with an almost slow-motion like fashion, although they fall at the normal rate. I can see each individual drop with a translucent texture that captures the colors around them. 

Thats when I notice my heart stutter to a complete stop. I gasp, and flavors of honey and mint and others I've never tasted fill my mouth. Why has my heart stoped? What on earth has happened to me? I continue to lie still, trying to make sense of anything I am witnessing of my own body and my surroundings. I notice that animals keep a wide distance from me on all sides, how strange that I know their exact location. 

After a while of lying still in the storm with no progress in the memory department, I decide to try to sit up. I must be completely ravaged, who knows maybe I really am dead and my ghost life starts now. Haha, that would be fun. 

First I lift up my neck with ease to look at my ravaged body...to find it not so ravaged. My clothes are soaked from the rain and torn, but my body? Not a trace of blood. The real problem is my skin. My olive skin tone that always survived the winter was replaced by a pale, almost crystal-like membrane. I shockingly sat up to examine further, surprised to feel that the movement was rather abruptly fast, yet graceful somehow. I lift my hand in front of me to look at it. The pigment has been completely sucked out and the freckle I once had is gone without a trace. I bring my hand to my face to feel skin so smooth I know my products at home had nothing to do with it. Hey! I remembered something. But thats it, just something, nothing useful. 

Thats when I become aware that the burning that had overtaken my body had made its way to my throat where it now lives and thrives with a thirst that could make me go mad. I jerk to my feet in a fraction of a second, my hand clutching my throat. I whip my head around in a way that should have given me whiplash but instead lets me see my surroundings with perfect ease. What is this burning thirst? What is wrong with me?