Bella MacLeod's Twilight Fanfiction

Claws

By BetterInTexas

Chapter 03:

Connolly woke to a familiar voice in the living room, one he had in his ears constantly until a year ago. He hadn’t been sure if she would come, much less this soon.

Seated at the couch next to Jack was the girl who had been their eyes and ears for years, Vivian. Jack had sent an encoded message to her on their back channel line and she never responded.

Now she had showed.

At least Connolly thought it was Vivian.

She no longer had multiple ear and facial piercings and her short hair was no longer dark purple. Instead she had sandy blonde shoulder length hair and wore blue jeans with no rips or holes and a light blue sweater.

Vivian was leaned forward typing away at the Organization laptop they had been given on the small coffee table in front of her.

“Vivian?” he asked to be sure.

“What other woman would bother coming to see you?” she asked without looking up.

“I’m just surprised to see you so soon, or at all.” he admitted.

The woman finally looked up at him, her annoyance clear.

“Jack sent me a message on a black channel saying you idiots were trying to shut down a worldwide organization that experiments on children and turns them into weapons to fight monsters. That was good enough for me. You guys would just screw the whole thing up by yourselves. Get me a coffee and I’ll tell you what I have found so far.”

Connolly shook his head. It was 7 AM. How much could she know?

“I drove in at 4 AM if you are wondering. I asked Jack not to wake you so I could have a few hours of peace without your face. Coffee now, then information.” she ordered.

Connolly did as instructed, pouring a black coffee and letting the sugar pour for about ten seconds. How she didn’t have diabetes he would never know. She preferred more sugar in her coffee than actual coffee.

Handing her cup he sat in an arm chair. “How bad is it?”

“Not as bad as it could be.” she answered. “I don’t know who controls this whole mess but every country in the United Nations chips in from black op slush funds. The leaders, directors, supervillains at the top are hidden.”

“As in more than one supervillain?” he asked.

“We have no idea right now.” Jack admitted.

“Luckily they didn’t count on me being around you guys anymore.” Viv told him. “Having one of their laptops is the same as asking me to walk through a large garage door. I am going to need some time to work through this but for right now here is what I got. They aren’t bugging you. They aren’t monitoring you but they can see whatever is on this system. They can find her GPS if they look but no one has since she left.”

Connolly shook his head. “That makes no sense. Why would they give us an asset and let us have free reign? How would they know if she would even go after targets?”

“Because she won’t be able to help herself. She is a predator. It has been hardwired into her since birth. She will go out and find these damn monsters that are going to give me nightmares when I finally sleep whether you want her to or not. I was happy not knowing this crap existed if you were wondering. From what I can tell they will wait for you to report kills, watch for patterns and when she is finally killed, send in a team to investigate and exterminate if she had run into a problem only a team could handle. They won’t waste time sending a full team after every supernatural threat in the Northwest until they know there is one that can kill her. She is basically on her own until one of them gets her. If you don’t send reports, they will get suspicious but no one is watching, not actively anyway.”

“We got that going for us.” Connolly mumbled. “You can secure our personal devices?”

Vivian rolled her eyes. “I really missed your dumbass questions. Can you throw a grenade? They seem to spend more of their money on their sick research than cyber security. They leave their assets activities to guys like you. By the way, one of the girls that survived Bella’s last mission? She was sent to Siberia with a support team and was killed two days later by three Lycans along with her support team. I think her chip had an alert notifying them of death. The Organization recovered her body, what was left of it, twelve hours later.”

Connolly exchanged a look with Jack, silently agreeing not to tell Bella about this. Bella had warned them that she considered her death was a forgone conclusion. She had already said goodbye to the girls she grew up with. There was no reason to cause her more pain.

“Okay,” he started, taking stock of the situation. “So they can monitor her from anywhere in the world but only pay attention if they are notified of her death by us or that chip in her head. We can’t remove the GPS without alerting them… yet. What about the kill switch?”

“Gone.” Vivian told him, smiling widely for the first time. “They don’t have a code to activate it any longer, no one does now. They would have to take her back to base and perform surgery to reset it.”

“And they won’t notice it gone.” Webb assured him.

Connolly thought on this for a moment. Bella was safe from being paralyzed by the Organization but they would always know where she was if they wanted to look. She would be driven to hunt so there was no reason to try and stop her for now. They could only make sure she stayed alive and send reports to their new bosses so they wouldn’t get suspicious.

So play this out for now, he decided. She would eventually have to go into hiding, probably their team as well when they had a plan to take down the entire Organization. He would need a way to get the chip out of her head and fake all their deaths in a believable manner so they weren’t chased while trying to form an attack plan.

“Just watch her back and do your job.” Vivian suggested. “The more fights she wins the less likely they are to take an interest in your activities. Now let’s get to business.”

Connolly waved his hand slightly, having expected this.

“I don’t work for you. I will stay here in this rain soaked dump but I am having my own place and you are paying for it out of your secret stash I hid for you a couple years ago. I may just take it myself. Agreed?”

“Absolutely. Whatever you want.” he told her immediately.

“I want to get this kid free and take down these bastards but this is big. Its going to take time, a lot of it. I am not going to be on 24 hour call listening to every need you guys require on a mission. You are going to be fighting Bigfoot in the forests so I doubt my skills will be useful regardless. I need my sleep.”

Connolly waited for more and heard nothing.

“That’s it?”

The woman nodded her head. “That’s all I want. Keep her alive, play the long game and please give this kid some kind of life. You wouldn’t believe the training regimen they have for these girls. I doubt she has ever watched a sitcom or been to a movie theater. She has only left that big complex to train in the jungle or for missions. Also you might want to listen to her in a fight. I know it is hard for you, but since she turned 16 not counting group kills, she has taken out six Yetis’ five Lycans, and eight vampires on her own. You should look closely at her action reports and learn. She is basically a superhero.”

Jack and Connolly digested those numbers.

“I thought they went out in teams?” Connolly asked.

“To hunt areas yes. When they find an infestation they spread out and kill whatever they find. You don’t want to know her group numbers. Those girls killed a lot of baddies and Bella was the top dog… or cat… you know what I mean. I’m going to find a motel, sleep, find an apartment and be back for dinner. Cook whatever as long as its tacos.”

Vivian left probably taking his car leaving him and Jack alone.

“This is so messed up man. Maybe we can just fake some reports? Didn’t they say burn whatever creatures she kills? They will never know if she actually killed them or even fought them.” Jack asked.

Connolly shook his head. “You heard Viv Jack and I talked to her alone. She plans to hunt. We just have to keep her alive long enough to figure a way out of this. By the way, she doesn’t want us to save her or get out, so we have that going for us.”

Connolly picked up his phone and dialed Ty.

“It is too damn early to be bothering me.” Gavin answered.

“Too damn bad. May as well get used to it Mr. Gavin. You need school clothes and so does Bella. Pick her up and take her to the nearest city with a mall.”

“Sounds good. I need to get out of this town. One day and I am already depressed.”

“You are never depressed. Listen man, Bella has probably never bought clothes for herself. She has probably never done a lot of things. Help her out today. Help her shop let her eat some junk food, whatever you do, don’t let her come back here until she has had some fun. I think you can pull that off, right? You understand what I am asking?”

Connolly could imagine the grin on the man’s face.

“Yeah, fun I can do. I’m also going to spend a small fortune. Count us out for the rest of the day, maybe tonight. Its time this girl got a crash course on life from Ty Gavin.”

Two hours later Bella sat up from her bed when she heard the car pull into the house. She recognized the sound as one of the sedans they had driven into Forks yesterday. The girl had barely slept that night, not bothering to change out of the clothes she had arrived in. Instead she lay on her back and stared at the ceiling, trying to think about anything besides Julie or her encounter with the man who called himself her father.

She was unsuccessful on both counts. Bella had been tempted to turn on the large television that had been provided in her room but dismissed the idea several times. She had never sat and watched television for that long. What she was shown at the headquarters on television were mostly social development productions, custom made for the experiments so they would have some social skill in the event they were ever released in the world or needed to play the part of average humans like they did in Italy.

The screen tempted her with a world she was not certain she wanted to face yet. Today she had planned to go to one of the team residences and begin research on pattern killings or missing hikers, perhaps strange or unusually horrific deaths in her patrol area.

The thought that her team may have found an enemy already both annoyed her and excited her. She had not been in a fight since Italy but also wanted a few days to settle in this new and strange place. The girl had not even had a chance to scout the surrounding forest which she planned to do tonight since her ability to sleep was failing her.

She moved downstairs quickly, however Chief Swan was already at the door, speaking to Ty Gavin. She had not seen Swan since she retired to her room the night before and was a bit thankful that another party was present at their second encounter.

“Ty.” Bella greeted the man. “Do we have a target?”

The tall man grinned and nodded his head. “You bet we do. The target is the mall. You need more clothes to blend in and so do I. Get cleaned up, changed since those are the same clothes you had on yesterday and let’s get a move on. Big day of shopping and whatever else we can find to do.”

Any excitement Bella felt was gone. She knew this was necessary when she saw the minimal civilian clothes she had been given. She was not looking forward to being surrounded by people and perhaps worse in an urban area where she her skills would be severely hampered.

But it was necessary and Bella always did what was necessary.

“I’ll be ready in ten minutes. Please wait in the car.” she told him politely.

“He can come in Bella.” Charlie cut in, voice quiet and hesitant. “I was going to cook breakfast and Ty is it? Ty is welcome…”

“We have a lot to do today and I will be gone most of the night. Thank you for the offer. Ty, I will meet you in the car.” the girl told him quickly, not glancing his way. Bella hurried back upstairs and was undressed and in the shower in seconds. Ten minutes later she emerged, dried her hair and dressed in her second set of clothes, a pair of faded blue jeans that were a bit tight for her preference and a red long sleeved t-shirt that had what she assumed was a musical group’s name on it. It could have been a sports team. Bella had never really paid attention to those instructional areas in social training nor did she have an interest.

On the way out, Bella nearly groaned when Charlie stopped her once again.

“You sure you don’t want something, maybe some toast?”

“No thank you Chief Swan. I only eat meat. It’s a Jaguar trait that seems to have stuck. Since I do not have a key to the residence, I have left my window unlocked. I assume since it is on the second floor it should be safe from intruders. If you wish to lock the doors tonight, I will have no problem getting in that way.”

Charlie shook his head, wondering how in the hell she would get into the second floor window before remembering her appearance yesterday and decided not to bring it up.

“I am sorry I forgot to have a key made for you. I’ll have it today.” he promised her.

Bella smiled at him, a polite smile that he knew was insincere. “Thank you, Chief Swan. That would be very kind of you and make access much more convenient.”

Bella walked out before Charlie called after her one last time.

“You can call me Charlie… if you want…” he tried.

Bella stopped, closed her eyes and took a deep breath before turning back to the man.

“In public I will call you Dad. In private I would prefer to address you by your formal title. Its best that we do not mistake what we are to each other. Have a nice day. You have the numbers of my team if you need anything.”

Bella turned before he could say anything else and slipped into the car quickly and was grateful Ty did not waste time pulling away.

Ty sensed her mood and decided to give her some quiet time.

Quiet time was over after two minutes.

“So how did the reunion go?” he started.

“He will provide adequate cover.” Bella answered shortly.

The man could tell she was in no mood to talk so he gave her more quiet time.

Sixty seconds later he asked what kind of music she liked.

“I don’t… know. We never listened to music.”

“You never listened to music?” he asked, disbelieving. Connolly said she didn’t know a lot but that was ridiculous.

“I… no I suppose we didn’t.”

Ty shrugged his shoulders. “Sounds great to me. Time to educate you. Since all your new little classmates are going to listen to music you need to know what they are talking about. Look at it as a training session.”

Ty turned the radio on and watched her out of the corner of his eye. Seeing her foot tapping he turned the music up slightly.

After a minute a grin lit up her face, a sincere one.

“Who is this singer?”

“Bruno Mars, Bells. You listenin to some Uptown Funk. Want to hear some truth? Let me introduce you to the true poets of the world. I think we will start with Dre. We can go cover some Tupac and John Legend before we get to this Port Angeles. On the drive back we can learn about R&B.”

Ten minutes into the drive Bella was actually smiling.

“I love this.” she admitted happily.

“Of course you do. You want to know how to have fun, just do what Ty does.”

“You want me to refer to myself in the third person constantly?” she asked.

The man watched her for a moment and was surprised she was being sarcastic judging by the twinkle in her eye.

“No, that’s reserved for me. What kind of movies you like? Comedy, horror, action? You don’t strike me as a romance kind of girl.”

Bella’s smile was gone.

“We were only allowed to watch certain movies for entertainment after successful missions. I have seen Predator, Aliens, Aliens 2 and Aliens versus Predators. Other than that we watched candid videos of humans usually from security cameras to learn how they interact socially and improve our language skills. Sometimes we watched videos of the enemies we would be facing, battles in the field, that sort of thing.”

Now the smile on Ty’s face was gone.

“I’m guessing television wasn’t big on the activity schedule either?”

“No, we did not watch television other than field videos. I almost watched last night but decided I wasn’t in the mood. Can we listen to the Alicia Keyes woman again?”

Ty changed the song on the playlist and shook his head. He would have a lot of work to do with this kid.

When the two walked to the mall Bella moved quickly, heading into the first store she saw.

“Stop! What the hell are you doing?” Ty asked, catching up.

“I am procuring school clothes. I should need six outfits, undergarments a pair of boots and a pair of sneakers. A waterproof coat will also be necessary.”

Ty actually laughed.

“Did I say something wrong?” she asked curiously.

“You said everything wrong. First, we got a credit card from your sorry ass employers with no limit. Second, you don’t even know what style of clothes you are going to like. The casual look is alright but there might be something out there you like better. Maybe you are a leather kind of girl, goth, peppy, skater, hood or maybe some mix. You need some skirts if you want, some high heels maybe or maybe some flat soles. You need sneaks to match every outfit, or at least four of them that can go with jeans and whatever color top you want. You need sweaters, blouses, fingernail polish, makeup if you decide you want to try it out one day. I need clothes that make me look like I know what the hell I am doing in a high school pretended to be a teacher. We both need a lot and we are going to look at every damn store in this place then when we go back around, we are going to buy whatever the hell we want to. Got it?”

Bella was shocked, not having expected this. “It seems like overkill.”

“Damn right it is. You also aren’t wearing long sleeves everywhere. You got a couple long lines on one arm and a bite on your left forearm. Tell people a dog bit you. Motorcycle wreck works for the arm scars. I get that you don’t want to walk around in a bikini on the beach but don’t dress like you got to something to be ashamed of that you need to hide. We also need toys so we gonna hit an electronics store later. Need some wireless headphones, an entertainment system for your room, maybe one that plays videos from YouTube and video games and Blu Rays. Then we got to get you some social accounts set up.”

“What is YouTube… social accounts?” the girl asked.

“Can’t be a high schooler without Instagram, Twitter, Facebook. Look every mission has its challenges, right? This is no different. We got a lot of work to do, a lot of stores to hit then we are hitting a movie theater and eating a bunch of junk food. You got me? Now follow girl. Mall closes in ten hours and we are going to use every second of those hours.”

Bella felt a lot of apprehension but followed the man. She was thankful for her advanced healing or she was certain her feet would have fallen off after the first four hours. Ty Gavin made her try on every outfit in the mall it seemed and had a comment about every single style.

Eventually by the third go around, Ty had what he called his professional threads and Bella had picked up enough clothes that a second trip to the car was needed and the trunk was full.

Ty finally had mercy on her. He forced her into Victoria’s Secret and stayed far away from the store until she came out with bags.

“I don’t understand this underwear. They are so small it seems like a girl may as well go without.” Bella mused, peering into the tiny bags.

Ty did not comment not sure if she was teasing him for once or genuinely curious.

Then again, he could imagine that lingerie wouldn’t be on the girls’ priority list in the middle of the damn rainforest.

“Hey, can we stop there?” Bella asked suddenly.

Ty followed her eyes a bit surprised but turned the car immediately.

Bella stepped out of the car and took in the large building with a picture of a giraffe on the sign.

“I saw one of these in a video. Its a toy store, right?”

“Yeah it is. Not many of these around anymore. Want to check it out?” he offered.

“You wouldn’t mind?” she asked, a bit of excitement in her voice.

“Nah, we can pick up a couple of those PlayStation systems while we are here. Got about an hour to closing time though and we got the late movie to watch.”

Bella practically ran in but stopped once she was inside, taking it all in. Ty told her he would find some game systems for their cribs and left her alone. Twenty minutes later she still wasn’t up front so he walked the aisles, hoping she hadn’t gone cat and found a mouse to chase or something.

The man found Bella in an aisle full of dolls and bears. She had a large stuffed dog in her hands and was smiling widely, stroking the soft fuzzy material.

“Hey Bells.”

She literally jumped back in surprise and blushed immediately.

“Sorry… I lost track of time. We should go now.”

Bella placed the toy animal back on the shelf where Ty retrieved it.

“You need some decoration for your room. Don’t you ever tell any of those guys I bought a teddy bear, got me?”

Bella quickly agreed and the two checked out her holding the stuffed dog in her arms.

“Hey, you think we could skip the movie, maybe do it next weekend? We haven’t eaten all day and I think my stomach may be trying to feed on itself.”

Ty agreed checking the time. She had to be tired if he was.

“Sounds good Bella. What kind of food do you like?”

“Cat food works.”

Ty nearly swerved into a car in the next lane. Bella began laughing.

“That was a joke. Too soon?” she asked.

Ty shook his head. “Nah, that was pretty damn funny. You had me for a minute but I knew. Just caught me by surprise for a second. I didn’t know you could be funny. Keep it up. Now where you want to eat?”

Bella thought for a second.

“Is McDonalds real?”

Ty grinned, not wanting to ask if she was kidding or not. She was getting too good at fooling him.

“Big Macs coming up.” he told her, searching for a drive thru.

“Great. I don’t want any vegetables on it… or condiments… or bread. If you could order six, maybe seven? That would be really great.”

Ty shook his head. “Hell no. I realize they probably fed you guys straight meat where you was but you are with us now. You gonna eat like every other unhealthy American. I’ll get you as many as you want but you are going to try cheese. We can work other stuff in as we go. I bought you a teddy bear so you are eating a cheeseburger, aight?”

An hour and a half later, they arrived at Charlie’s house. The Chief must have gone to sleep despite it only being ten PM Ty thought. Bella knew he was awake though. She could hear his heartbeat in his room and was grateful he hadn’t been waiting to make another attempt at communication.

After Ty helped Bella bring in her bags, she walked him out to the car.

“Ty, thank you. I don’t think I have ever had a day like today. I never imagined I would.”

“Don’t even sweat it. Tomorrow your Daddy is going to work and we are going to hook up this game system and find some shows you like. Next weekend I’m going to teach you to dance. Shooting bad things ain’t the only thing I’m good at.”

Before he pulled away the man rolled down the window.

“Hey since we a team and all that makes you family now. Family don’t lie to each other so in the spirit of honesty, that kill switch in your head? It’s gone. You are gonna have a life one day of your own so start living it now. We got each other?”

Bella shook her head. “You guys are going to get killed Ty.”

“Maybe.” he told her. “Everybody got to make a decision at some point about what’s worth living for and what’s worth dying for. We made our decision. See you tomorrow. I’ll bring some cat food for breakfast. Maybe with some tuna chunks in it.”

The man drove off leaving the exhausted girl to her thoughts. So much had happened today she had no doubt she would sleep well tonight. Instead of walking to the door, Bella walked around back to the tree by her window. Extending her claws she scraped her fingers over the rough wood leaving a three foot trail in the bark.

It was done. She had marked her territory and claimed it as her own. Now she could sleep peacefully.