CBWR? Chapter 39

Well, at least at this point, FFN is still working! Keep your fingers crossed, and I'll have another update out later today.

For those who have asked, I don't know anything about guns, personally. Never even fired one. Google is a lovely tool, though. I do play a lot of video games. :)

A shot rang out from the hallway.

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Chapter 39

Debris was everywhere in the room – wood, glass, and God knows what else. There was at least one guy down and screaming to my left, and bullets began to fly in all different directions.

With the assault rifle's strap wrapped around my shoulder, I riddled bullets throughout the left half of the room, noting two more of Aro's entourage as they went down. Sam yelled out a battle cry and began hammering at the two attempting to take cover on the far side of the room.

Aro was behind his desk, partially masked in the smoke from Alice's percussion grenade and the firefight. As my FN rifle emptied its load, I pulled out the H&K; and aimed at his head as he started to stand.

Yeah, the problem with all the super hero movies and comics? All the fucking yak-yak-yak right before they'd finally decide to off someone. I don't play that shit.

Aro dropped over the desk in a pool of blood with his long black hair spread out all over his desk calendar. Goal for the day to go down in a shootout – complete.

Sam yelled and dropped to the ground beside me, and I felt the sting of shrapnel on my left thigh. Alice appeared suddenly – jumping through the window with two of her guys and screaming bloody murder, in every sense of the phrase. She took out the guy standing next to Aro's desk.

Within about a minute and a half, it was over.

"No Demetri," Alice growled. "He must be on the other side of the house."

"Or not here," Sam groaned from his place on the ground. He was holding his side, and blood was starting to seep through his fingers.

"How bad?" Alice asked.

"Had worse," he replied.

"Edward, your leg is bleeding."

"Yeah." I looked down and noticed the top part of my pants was shredded. It burned, but not too badly, and I could still put weight on it. "It's all right."

A shot rang out from the hallway.

I'd heard that expression about having your blood run cold before, and I always thought it was just an expression people used. But I would have sworn my actual blood dropped in temperature and I could feel it freezing my veins. I raced into the hallway, the tightness in my chest beginning to feel familiar, with two guns drawn.

Bella was sitting with her back up against the wall of the hallway, facing down the corridor. Her eyes were wide and glazed, and she wasn't moving at all. Not even breathing.

In her hands was the Beretta, the end still smoking from its recent discharge. Her Pack member accomplice was face down on the floor, and I could see the thick, wavy hair as it cascaded over another body lying several feet away from them both.

"Bella?"

Her mouth opened as if to speak, but her eyes remained transfixed on the body before her. She began to breathe, at least, in short sharp pants. I checked the hallway quickly, found it empty, and dropped to her side as Alice took off down the hall to further secure the area.

"Bella? Look at me."

Her eyes swiveled to mine, and the gun dropped from her shaking hands.

"Edward." My name escaped as nothing more than a breathy whisper.

"Are you hurt?"

She looked down at herself and seemed to take mental inventory at the same time.

"I don't think so."

I holstered both guns, shoved the Beretta into my pants, and slipped my arms under Bella's legs and behind her back. I lifted her up off the floor, and her hands reached for the back of my neck. I followed Alice's trail down the corridor with two of The Pack close behind, carrying Sam. We congregated in the large open foyer, and I placed Bella on one of the chairs. I had to reach up and pull her hands from my neck so I could stand, but she gripped one of my hands and wouldn't let go.

"I killed him." Her eyes looked up at me, and I saw tears starting to form. I shook my head.

"Don't you cry for them," I reminded her. She took a deep breath, wiped at her eyes and gave me a quick nod. I kept her hand in mine as I turned back to Alice for her report.

"Emmett reports Laurent is on his knees and bawling, expressing his undying loyalty to whomever will let him live," Alice said. "All the top members of his organization have been eliminated. Emmett's still debating on what to do with him."

"Kill him," I said into my communication piece in my ear. "I don't want any leftovers."

I heard a gunshot sound out in my ear.

"Done," Emmett said.

A couple of Pack guys started dressing Sam's wounds, while the others tied up the one and only survivor – a grunt guy who surrendered to Alice outside the building. Alice went through the rest of the listing. All of the big guys in Aro's group were accounted for except for two – Aro's idiot nephew, Demetri, and James.

"According to the layout Rosalie had, they must keep all the slaves on the lower levels. They could be down there."

Alice tapped on the touch screen of her phone, enlarging the maze-like structure underneath the mail part of the building.

"It looks like honeybombs down there." One of The Pack bobbed his head up and down a few times, looking every bit like the Mortimer Snerd he was. One of his "brothers" whacked him on the back of the head.

"It's honeycombs, not honeybombs, stupid!"

"Nuh-uh," the first one argued. "That's what I had for breakfast."

Alice stepped up and knocked both of their heads together.

"It's catacombs, you fucking idiots! Now shut up and go find someone to shoot!" She sighed heavily and placed her hand on her hip as she looked over to me. "Ya see why I make them wear the stripes?"

Yeah, I did.

We were close now – so close. The entire upstairs had been destroyed, with only one survivor, and that guy was trying to negotiate with Sam. He was marginally more with it than the others, but his negotiation skills didn't seem to go past his wrists. Fortunately, I didn't care if he had the guy beat to death. I had two last people to locate and kill.

Two more couldn't be that hard, right?

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Chapter End Notes:

Mortimer Snerd - I can't remember where that comes from. Bill Cosby, maybe?

See - Doofus knows what he's doing...sometimes! Scooby snack for him!