In Which I Beg for Sweet Release From Breaking Dawn: Chapter 12 -- Some People Just Don't Grasp the Concept of "Unwelcome" · 10:52am Jul 3rd, 2018
Some authors just don’t grasp the concept of “unedited”.
It’s morning. Jacob and Seth have been patrolling off and on throughout the night, one of them sleeping while the other runs. Jacob’s wrenched from his fitful sleep by Seth’s howling; Leah’s also joined their pack. For some reason, Jacob and Seth both act like this is a bad thing.
«Seth, go let the Cullens know that it’s just your stupid sister-» I thought the words as harshly as possible. «I’ll deal with this.»
You know, it’d be really, really nice if we could actually see what Leah had done to earn such ire. Especially since Leah says part of the reason she defected was to keep Seth safe. The three of them bicker for a while and we get more pointless antagonism towards Leah.
«I’ve been helpful, haven’t I, Jake?»
«You haven’t made too much of a nuisance of yourself, kid, but if you and Leah are a package deal — if the only way to get rid of her is for you to go home… Well, can you blame me for wanting you gone?»
«Ugh, Leah, you ruin everything!»
«Yeah, I know,» she told him, and the thought was loaded with the heaviness of her despair.
I felt the pain in the three little words, and it was more than I would’ve guess. I didn’t want to feel that. I didn’t want to feel bad for her. Sure, the pack was rough on her, but she brought it all on herself with the bitterness that tainted her every thought and made being in her head a nightmare.
She brought it on herself? Her boyfriend was brainwashed into leaving her, she was forcibly drafted into a war she never knew existed, and now she has to take orders from said brainwashed boyfriend! No SHIT she’s bitter! Jacob, you’re doing far worse just because Bella VOLUNTARILY chose some other guy! Asshole.
Still, Jacob reluctantly accepts Leah into the pack, but then he notices Leah’s been trying hard not to think about something. He quickly grills her about her real reason for leaving; it’s not just about Seth, it’s about getting away from Sam.
As much as she disliked me, as much as she loathed the Cullens, as happy as she’d be to go kill all the vampires right now, as much as it pissed her off to have to protect them instead — none of that was anything compared to what she felt being free of Sam.
Leah didn’t like me, so it wasn’t such a chore having me wish she would disappear.
She loved Sam. Still. And having him wish she would disappear was more pain than she was willing to live with, now that she had a choice. She would have taken any other option. Even if it meant moving in with the Cullens as their lapdog.
And now I want to hug Leah. Holy shit.
Jacob figures that, since he’s stuck with Leah, she might as well be useful, and asks her to lay out what happened after he and Seth left. With their numbers lower, Sam’s pack had to rethink their strategy, and an immediate attack was out of the question. Sam was going to meet with the elders this morning. However, Leah doesn’t know how that turned out; when the pack split up for patrols last night, she asked for permission to tell her and Seth’s mother what was going on. Once she was human, she spent the night thinking things through, and decided turning her coat was the best idea. She left a note for her mom at her house and left.
Jacob sends Seth and Leah out for more patrolling and goes to the Cullens’. Carlisle greets him and they have a brief discussion on Bella’s status. Her body is rejecting all forms of nutrition, even intravenous ones, and that’s why she looks so terrible.
“I’m watching her — and not just her, but the fetus as well — starve to death by the hour. I can’t stop it and I can’t slow it down. I can’t figure out what it wants.” His weary voice broke at the end.
Hey. Carlisle. Paging Dr. Cullen. The baby is half-vampire, right? Have you considered that, maybe, given a vampire’s dietary needs, it might want blood? No, he hasn’t. And yet, in spite of the doctor not knowing this, Jacob gets it.
Since it wasn’t big enough to kill anyone else yet, it settled for sucking Bella’s life from her.
I could tell them exactly what it wanted: death and blood, blood and death.
And he doesn’t tell Carlisle, for some reason.
Carlisle starts thinking out loud. Part of the problem is that the baby is very well-protected and he can’t get an ultrasound of it. He’s not even sure he could get a needle through the amniotic sack to get some fluid and a chromosomal count. Jacob gets lost, so Carlisle explains: humans have twenty-three pairs of chromosomes, but vampires have twenty-five. What, does vampire venom also generate two extra pairs from thin air? Anyway, Carlisle says that he thought it meant humans and vampires were, biologically speaking, completely separate. Why? Vampires are formed by turning humans! And because he didn’t know they were compatible, he didn’t think to warn them. When Jacob wonders aloud what his genes are like, Carlisle guiltily admits that he took a blood sample from Jacob when he was recovering at the end of Eclipse (well, there go some more medical ethics, right down the drain) and that werewolves have twenty-four pairs of chromosomes. So where does the werewolves’ extra pair come from? Should the baby of a werewolf and a human have Down syndrome? And if you’re implying what I think you’re implying — and you better fucking not be — Bella’s and Edward’s baby won’t have twenty-four pairs of chromosomes. They’ll have twenty-three pairs and two half-pairs. Chromosomes aren’t mix-and-match, a chromosome from pair 16 has to match up with another chromosome from pair 16.
Their talk is interrupted when Edward comes in. He’s got an idea from Jacob’s thoughts: give the baby blood. Why did it take them so long to get to this angle? They’ve got a bunch of O negative blood lying around (for Bella after she got turned), so they might as well put it to good use. Where did they get the blood? Did he buy it? Did he steal it from the emergency room where it’d be desperately needed as the universal donor if there was no other option available?! They decide to have Bella take the blood in the “traditional” way, drinking it, rather than injecting it intravenously. You know, using the IV needles they already have in her. And I don’t think the human stomach is set up for accepting blood. Bella’s a normal human, it’s the baby that’s… interesting. Rosalie, being protective of Bella, is particularly enthusiastic about the idea. Jacob’s horrified, but decides to go along with it if Bella wants to.
I dragged myself up from the stairs and followed after them as they disappeared into the house. I wasn’t sure why. Just morbid curiosity, maybe. It was like a horror movie. Monsters and blood all over the place.
Maybe I just couldn’t resist another hit of my dwindling drug supply.
CM + 1
Once Bella hears of the situation, she accepts drinking blood, if only for the baby’s sake.
Clinginess Meter: 26 x 2
Yeah, I'm only tangentially aware of the whole Twilight mess, but I do know Leah Clearwater was selected to be that world's Anchor in the Infinite Loops project. A position that requires a whole lot of mental fortitude and stability.
(But as a perk she got pony therapy and had her werewolfism patched by Fluttershy.)
Anyway this isn't relevant to the review, just thought you ought to know.
Because this is Twilight, as grand a shitshow as ever graced this Earth.
Hmm, perhaps, on the subject of the blood, perhaps, like in Vampire the Masquerade, he bought some from an in-the-know blood bank proprietor?
Granted, if said propieter is anything like Mr. Vandal Cleaver here, he's probably got a vampire he feeds and drains from daily
lparchive.org/Vampire-The-Masquerade-Bloodlines-(by-gatz-and-TheMcD)/Update%2005/86-BL4-242.jpg
Wow. Wow.
Ms. Meyer, you fail biology forever.
Also, Leah needs hugs.