Disclaimer: All characters belong to Darren Shan and Stephanie Meyer. I own nothing.

What has happened so far: Darren and Mr Crepsley get sent to the Twilight world where they meet Edward and Bella in the woods. Edward and Bella bring them home and Carlisle treats them. Mr Crepsley explains to the Cullens that they are vampires and who the vampaneze are, he explains who Mr Tiny is and that he sent them there.

Song Suggestion: Sick Cycle Carousel by Lifehouse
Chapter 4: Feverish
Third Person POV

All of a sudden there was a dull thud coming from upstairs followed by a particularly Darren sounding groan.

"Darren." Whispered Mr Crepsley, his eyes flicking to the ceiling followed by the others apart from Bella who looked up in confusion after noticing everybody else was.

Mr Crepsley was the first to start running upstairs and the first to reach the top despite his injuries. Carlisle and Edward were the next to arrive soon followed by Jasper and Emmett in case back-up was required. There were multiple thuds coming from the room now and sounds of a struggle.

Larten flung the door open almost ripping it of its hinges in his haste. Darren was lying on the floor tangled up in the blanket from the bed. He cringed into the flooring and shook wildly rolling around and convulsing on the carpet. It looked like he was having a seizure of some sort. The strange smell from before was there again but much stronger.

Mr Crepsley surged forward to kneel beside his thrashing assistant. "Help me restrain him!" He called to the others. The other four did so, rushing forwards to help. Carlisle took the boy's head between his hands, Darren's eyes rolled around inside his open eye sockets, his mouth opened and closed and vague sounds would emerge as if he were suffering extreme pain.

Edward took Darren's left arm, Mr Crepsley his right and Emmett and Jasper each of his legs. Still Darren struggled against them as he tried to twist and turn; his hands clenched into fists, clawing at the carpet and ripping shreds of it with his long sharp nails. His skin was boiling and sweat covered his forehead. Carlisle rested a cooling hand there. "Thirty nine point nine degrees. He has a fever." He announced accurately.

"Do you smell that?" Asked Carlisle.

"Yes, it was here before too but I thought it was just the anaesthetics." Larten replied.

"That isn't anaesthetics."

Mr Crepsley thought for a moment as he restrained Darren's arm from destroying anything else. No, it could not be!

"Hold down his shoulder." Instructed Larten to which Carlisle did immediately. Larten was now able to lift and straighten out Darren's arm without his body being able to move. He made a small incision in Darren's right forearm with his thumbnail. A thin line of blood trickled out and the smell got stronger. Larten raised the blood on his finger to his mouth to taste, he rolled it over his tongue once, his face contorted in disgust at once and he spat it out.

"Charna's guts!" He bellowed. "Stupid boy!" It was vampaneze blood and, if he weren't mistaken, he could have sworn it tasted off, bad, remarkably familiar but unable to place.

Alice arrived at the open doorway a minute later as Mr Crepsley's thought's raged with theories.

"Two more minutes." Announced Alice from behind them. Darren lashed about on the floor. Odd yelps and half screams of pain would emerge from his mouth as his body jack-knifed wildly in their grasp.

The wait passed torturously slowly and in that time Bella had arrived at the door also. Eventually Darren's convulsions slowed till he was only shaking lightly. The shaking continued to diminish and then Darren was fully still, his head lolled to the side and after another moment in their wary restraint, he started snoring very softly. There were seven identical sighs of relief.

"We should probably move him back to the bed." Said Carlisle quietly.

Larten nodded. The others stepped back to allow him to lift Darren's now very limp body to the bed.

A shallow gasp came from Alice as a vision took hold of her. Edward's brow furrowed at what he saw inside her mind. "Edward!" She warned as soon as she came out of it. The warning was too late.

Jasper caught Edward's body as he collapsed onto the former's shoulder. Was it possible for vampires to collapse?!

Jasper Edward out on the carpet carefully. Bella tried to rush forwards to her fallen fiancé's body but Alice held her back with a restraining arm. The visions she was having were confusing, she couldn't make sense of anything.

Edward started tossing and turning on the floor. They were in perfect synchronisation with Darren's slight movement on the bed but more pronounced. "Darius!" Edward suddenly mumbled. "Vancha?" He continued talking under his breath but it was low and contorted, no words could be distinguished.

"How is he doing that? What is going on?" Demanded Larten. Before Carlisle could answer Alice did.

"I don't know, I think he's reading Darren's thoughts. His dreams. Do you know this Vancha and Darius?"

"I know of Vancha only."

"Shancus!" Edward moaned this time as if in great pain. A small whimper came from Darren on the bed. All eyes flickered in question to Mr Crepsley who just shook his head. Jasper's unnecessary breathing became laboured as the emotions rolling off the pair increased. His face contorted, his fists clenching and unclenching as he got the full force of the pain and anger and fear from them both.

Edward continued to toss and turn on the floor for another ten minutes or more as the others tried to restrain his movements, beings of their strength and power could do some damage if let loose. Jasper sat further away, hands shaking with the overload of emotions from both of them. He attempted frequently to send out calming waves, he could feel them working on the others but not on the ones who most needed it. Alice crouched down on the floor next to Edwards struggling form, rubbing her temples at the headache that built painfully in the back of her mind.

In the ten minutes, the last four had arrived at the door to see what was going on. The lights had been turned on and there was a small circle that had formed around those either involved or restraining the involved.

The mumbling and tossing slowed till it had all but stopped then without warning Darren and Edward sat up at the exact same moment and Edward hissed "Steve!!!"

Edward blinked repeatedly as he came back to himself and Bella was finally released to catapult herself into his lap worry incessantly about his wellbeing. Darren on the other hand flopped backwards, his battered body unable to hold his weight. He coughing and retched horribly at the last of the river water left in his lungs came up and trickled out the side of his mouth. He moaned, hands instinctively going to his sided where it hurt the most. He blinked bleary eyed at a ceiling he didn't recognise, realising, despite the pain, that he was lying on something far comfier than he should have been. He tried to focus his fuzzy vision then panicked when he could see his spectators. Where the hell was he? Who the hell were these people?!

"Darren!" Said Mr Crepsley being the first to his side.

His voice was hoarse, "w-where are we?" and with that question, Darren eyes slid closed and his head lolled to the side in sleep. Mr Crepsley fussed over him much like the father figure he was pretending to be. Cherries of blood were beginning to show on the bandage at his abdomen.

Jasper sat in his corner, unthought-of yet by anyone other than Alice. He gulped large breaths of unnecessary air, the attacks on his senses now over. Alice sat cross-legged on the ground, continuously rubbing her temples though the headache had subsided after Edward and Darren woke. Edward was the one everyone else was worrying about.

Edward was sitting up by now, holding a sobbing Bella in his arms because she had been so overcome with the fear and shock of the whole experience. He calmly reassured everyone of his wellbeing as they crowded him on the floor.

"Enough." Said Carlisle as his entire family bombard him with questions as to what was happening, like he had anymore answers than they. He looked between his ruffled family members – they were fine with any outside disaster until it affected one of them. He studied Larten fussing over the boy, Jasper, Alice and then Edward and his onlookers.

"We need to talk." Carlisle announced loudly and briskly to get their attention. Darren stirred at the noise. "Downstairs." He announced and promptly walked over to Darren, assessing his condition, medical persona firmly in place. The others followed their head-of-family's order and shuffled out the room to wait downstairs.

Carlisle replaced the Darren's dressing with the medical kit that lay beside him. He took a syringe and small vial from one of the pockets of the green box, showing the bottle to Larten before extracting a little of the clear liquid. "It will help to ease his pain." He reassured as he found a vein in the forearm and pushed down the plunger without hesitation.

Esme was busy in the kitchen when the last two descended to the living area below. Silence fell on the usually lively room. "I hope you like spaghetti!" Esme called from where she worked over the a humungous bowl of sauce, she wore a cheerily fake smile to mask her tension. "I mean, if you eat…"

"That would be very nice, thank you." Replied Larten, ever polite.

Edward saw sat with a sniffling Bella in his lap, her faced buried in his neck whilst Alice sat beside them, rubbing her back with gentle pats. Jasper and Emmett rolled their eyes at each other, finding the petting of the only human in the room highly amusing and Rosalie smirked at Emmett's and Jasper's antics. Edward glared at them all.

Nessie sat in front of Jacob who was brushing through her hair gently with his huge fingers.

Carlisle went to join Esme in the kitchen as they all tried to pretend like they weren't stifled by the tension. Larten did not quite know where to put himself. He was so alienated from them, he didn't belong here. Physically, he seemed much more human than they; but they acted so much more human than he. Larten wasn't a human, he didn't know how to handle the family type atmosphere – his family had died so long ago.

Esme placed four plates of pasta on the breakfast bar but only two others stood. Jake was the first to the table, pulling two plates in for himself which explained the extra one. Bella was next and then Larten paused for a second before sighing and going to join them. The meal was delicious and it was only once he began did he remember how long it had been since he'd last properly eaten anything.

He slumped in his seat which was hard to do since he was sitting on a stool. It had been a stressful day and he needed to feed. The blood would give his repairing body the sustenance that human food couldn't.

Edward came to join them at the table once they'd finished. "I've been thinking." He announced. Larten looked up warily. "About the mind reading: what about a sort of 'mental wall'? So to speak." Larten furrowed his eyebrows but said nothing. "What if it was like a subconscious barrier around your thoughts? Which when you fall asleep drops?"

"It is a possibility." Said Carlisle from behind.

Mr Crepsley scratched his scars whilst thinking. "Possibly. But what happened upstairs? Does that happen every time you read minds?"

"No. I've been thinking about that too. What if, going with the wall theory, when Darren's mind came open, mine somehow got caught inside?" Edward messed his hair as the others watched him. "I know that sounds far-fetched but that's what it felt like, it was like I was stuck inside Darren's head."

"Would you like something to drink Larten? A cup of tea perhaps?" Asked Esme suddenly.

"Yes please. What did you see inside his mind then?" He addressed the latter part to Edward.

"It was confusing. There were many people there; it looked like some sort of…battle. Everyone was standing in an arena and the people across had that purple skin and there were some human there too with rifles. Could they be your vampaneze?"

"It sounds like it."

"But the humans? Why would they have humans with what you said earlier?"

"Vampets." Mr Crepsley answered after a sip of his tea. "The vampaneze use them as a disposable fighting resource. Vampires and vampaneze are fiercely honourable – most of us anyway – and we believe hand-to-hand combat is the only honourable way to fight. This does not apply to humans and the vampaneze simply do not care about human wellbeing so they prove useful."

Edward nodded before continuing with his story. "There were all these people that were rounded up who looked like…performers or something?" The cirque! Larten digested this new information with growing worry for his friend Mr Tall though little did he know the truth. "And then there was a boy hanging. He was covered in…green scales…?"

"Evra!" Larten's eyes were wide with sadness for the dead snake boy who had travelled with Darren and him years ago.

"Not Evra." Interrupted Edward looking confused. "Shancus." It was Larten's turn to be confused.

"That's where it got hazy." Continued Edward. "There were flashes of a boy, about ten or eleven by the looks of it: Darius. And then there was…a river…?" He was having difficulty holding onto the fragments of the dream. "And there was this man who'd been stabbed, odd looking bloke, red skin, green hair and-"

"-Purple animal hides as clothes." Larten finished whilst rubbing his face with his hands. "Was Vancha dead? Still conscious? Did it look like he would survive?!"

"Yes he was conscious but…it was a large sword."

Larten's hands shook as he took a gulp of tea. "But this was a dream. It is not certain. It is not definitely the truth." He pressed.

Edward only meant to comfort when he agreed with this stranger sitting across from him. He decided not to mention how vivid the dream was. Vivid like a memory.

"What about the seizure?" Asked Carlisle. "The smell and the blood?"

Larten rubbed his face for the fifth time in as many minutes then scratched his crop of ginger hair with sharp nails. "The blood of the vampaneze. I do not know how it has happened but there was vampaneze blood in Darren's veins. Their blood is poisonous to vampires and vice versa, it causes convulsions like those although I am sure the purge was not helping either."

"Purge?"

"Blood?"

"Poisonous?"

All were spoken at once and each from more than one person. "How would the blood get into him?"

Larten sighed and got ready to explain. Why not let them know everything about us? "Vampires – and vampaneze – are converted by pumping the blood of an existing vampire/vampaneze into that of a human through small cuts on the fingertips," he held up his hands to show the ten little scars, "every vampire and vampaneze have them hence the name, War of the Scars.

"Darren is only a half-vampire, made by not putting as much blood into him as you would full vampire but he is going through the purge for the second time. It is where the vampire cells turn on the host's human cells, like a battle going on inside your own body. If the human cells win, you stay a half-vampire and live to go through the purge again at some later state. If the vampire cells win then you become a full vampire. It is a short process, about four/five weeks, your body goes through many changes and you age quickly over that process especially if you have not reached full adulthood yet like Darren. It can be very painful – growing pains and the like.

"The cells go hyperactive: the ears become supersensitive as well as the eyes which can cause headaches and such. The host experiences flashes of great energy then suddenly no energy at all. By the end of this, Darren will be a full vampire, he will be stronger and tougher and faster, his eyes and ears will stay so sensitive and instead of ageing one year every five human years, he will age one year for every ten human years.

"It is possible to convert someone from half-vampanism to vampirism, or the other way, but it is a dangerous and painful process. If the conversion if successful, there will be many seizures like we saw upstairs and both hosts will experience many changes in their body before it finally rids itself of the poison and the functions regulate again. If the conversion is unsuccessful, both will die.

"My guess as to what has happened is that Daren has tried to convert another and it has worked though he has to now suffer the consequences. That or somebody has tried to convert him to vampanism and Darren's hyperactive vampire cells are fighting a slowly loosing, excruciating battle at the end of which, he will die."

Carlisle with the rest of his family stared openly at the man who sat calmly in front of them sipping at his now lukewarm cup of tea.

"Do the rest of you not eat?" Asked Larten, motioning to the other vampires in the room. "Only Jake, the girl and Bella have heartbeats but only one is human. Though I suppose you already knew that."

Carlisle answered. "Indeed Bella is human, Nessie is a half-vampire, she can eat but chooses not to and Jacob here is a were-wolf."

Mr Crepsley cocked his head to the side studying Jake. He was huge with impressive muscles, dark skin and a strong whiff of animals and trees about him. "I take it you do not spend your entire time in your wolf form then. Full moon?"

Jake snorted. "It's actually shape-shifting into the body of a wolf. And yeah, I can control it. Please don't go spurting any bull about the moon or silver bullets and I won't about sunlight or coffins."

"Coffins are not 'bull' and nor is the matter of sunlight!"

"Whoa dude! You actually sleep in a coffin? That whole burned by sunlight stuff?" Emmett piped up from the back.

"Yes we do sleep in coffins. Stepping in sunlight will not kill full vampires or anything equally as dull, but we burn easily and exposure of anything longer than a few hours could be potentially fatal. There is also the matter of our eyes being so sensitive, the light is painful. Working by night is much more practical and it helps to cover our movements. Half-vampires are able to move freely in the sun and their eyes are not as fine tuned so they are able to live more human lifestyles. I suppose this is not the same for you…?"

"We don't sleep," answered Edward, "there is no need for coffins if we do not sleep. Sunlight will not harm our bodies or our eyes but the light makes our skin sparkle." Larten scoffed internally at the mental image of him sparkling. "And no, we don't eat. Our kind typically drink human blood though our family decide to only drink the blood of animals out of compassion. We call ourselves vegetarians as a sort of insde joke."

"Why do you not just feed a little at a time like my kind?"

"It is impossible. Once the feeding frenzy starts nobody can stop it." Alice answered. Bella reached for Edward's hand below the table and gave in a small squeeze.

"You should try living off animal blood, it is difficult at first but it gets easier. It stops you from hurting humans." Esme placed a soothing hand on his arm.

"I could not. Without human blood we cannot survive, anyway we do not harm people when we feed." Replied Larten whilst moving his arm from under her grasp subtly, too many memories. "How would one become of your kind then?" Larten asked, confused. If they do not have blood…

"Our saliva is venomous; all it takes is a bite." Emmett answered first. He chomped his teeth together with a sharp click that would have been menacing it he hadn't laughed.

"Fangs?"

"No just sharp teeth."

Larten nodded, taking in all this information in.

"But the girl...Nessie? How would that work?"

"It's complicated how it happened but my dad was a vampire and my mom was a human. I was born in this kind of in between state."

Larten regarded the child with the look of a man surveying a rabid dog. He yawned and scratched his eye. His brain was sluggishly tired with the pain meds, the content of a full stomach and a headache brewing like a thunderstorm about to strike from not feeding in such a long time.

"I think I shall have to retire for the day." He announced without the intent of going to bed straight away. The clock on the wall showed 5:15pm. "It is far too early for anyone to be awake."