[Fallen 2.5] Blood and Flame

Blood and Flame

Warning: As I suppose there should be a warning, just in case. Spoilers… but this includes topics such as self harm and attempted suicide. Proceed at your own comfort.

    It was amazing, how a small spark could lead to so much damage done. How a single spark, even a small flame from a candle, could burn a room down and with it, destroy the hopes and passions of so many people. It was rather unfortunate, that only two managed to die.

    Where once, Chava Roku found solace in the pouring rain, slick on her skin, now that euphoria came from the flames licking at her fingertips, the smoke burning her nostrils. Those days of running in the rain barefoot were much simpler times than these, for then, the only death Chava thought of were those of other people. Suffering, squirming, screaming by her hand. Now, the one at the receiving end of the pain, was herself.

    When she wasn't looking into new ways to hurt herself or other people, she was drunk. Not just drunk, but utterly blind. It was a miracle she lasted as long as she did in these hotel spaces. And the first hotel was where the flame started. It was just… so… easy to start, that she really could have laughed. She probably did, in her insanity ridden stupor. The candles were lit so precariously throughout the main room, each one a different scent to help “calm the nerves” as the Muggles said. And the poor boy’s car had been absolutely dripping with fluid as he stood outside trying to fix it, a girl waiting for him in the passenger seat. All it took for her was to pick up the wax candle as if smelling it and walk outside before- oops! Chava had dropped it. The flame built instantly.

    Her own screams had mingled with those of the Muggle man and woman as the fire melted at their skin, burning them alive… Chava was close enough to the scene and drunk enough for the whole affair to be let off as misfortune. Nobody had even seen her take the candle, and she had her own burns to show for it. But she knew she couldn't stay much longer at that hotel, and she fled not long after. She wished she could have ripped the hearts out from their charred, burnt flesh.

    Or at least, that's what Chava wished had happened. In reality, the fiery dual murder was only a fantasy. Yet, a very strong one. It was getting harder and harder to tell reality and fantasy apart.

    Of course, she blamed everything on Damien Thorne. How could she not? The pain that coursed through her at the thought of that man was worse than anything physical. She preferred death to hearing his voice everyday, in her ear, whispering gently to her… “Chava… you left me, Chava… Why…?”

    The third hotel, she sat in her room quietly, when she heard his voice. And he was more and more upset every time he spoke. He hated her, for leaving him, after he had just done all he could to break her out of Azkaban. But she hated him, for leaving her there in the first place. “You deserved to rot there, Chava… I should have left you there to rot…” Emotion swells up in her, and Chava screams, dirty fingernails clawing down her throat until little beads of scarlet blood made their way to the surface. It was then she realised how good the physical pain felt. How it hurt enough to keep her mind of the betrayal, the emotional pain eating away at her heart and mind…

    So of course, she reasoned, there was only one solution to her problem. If she inflicted pain unto herself everytime she heard Damien’s voice or saw his face… eventually he would go away forever, right? So instead of sitting on her hotel bed, she spent her time in its bathroom, her dagger by her side. She waiting until it would start…

    “I hate you, Chava… You're leaving me to die… Should have died in that rotten cell…” Another loud scream, and the next thing she knew the blade of her dagger had pierced into her abdomen, her own blood pooling over onto her hands. The voice had momentarily stopped, while Chava was left whimpering and shaking, hunching over herself. She tears the blade from her skin, a strangled sob escaping her lips. She deserved this. Every second of this pain she deserved.

    “FUCK DAMIEN!” she screams equally as loud, fist flying into the mirror in front of her. This time, the blood stained her knuckles as the glass of the mirror shatters around her. She couldn't escape him… everywhere she turned he was there- haunting her, screaming at her, stabbing over and over again at her heart… It would have been so much easier if Damien really had just stabbed her in the chest, instead of sending her to Azkaban. Death was much more freedom than whatever this hell was. And that's when the voice returned.

    “Harder, Chava. You didn't stab hard enough. That was a weak attempt… it wasn't even buried to the hilt. You are weak.” Plausibly, these were not things Damien would ever say to her. It was her own guilt, her own self conscious, in Damien’s voice… and he wouldn't leave, no matter how badly she scarred herself. “Leave me alone, please leave me alone…” she sobs, gripping the edge of the sink. Her own blood stained the marble tops. She would cry until she was red in the face, and every sob was really more of a scream. She would cry until she couldn't breathe, and every gasp was a struggle, a raspy, heaving sound pouring out from her lips. Hurting herself was getting her nowhere. The guilt and the heartbreak followed her no matter what she did to herself or where she went.

    “You deserve to die, Chava Roku.” And so she did.

    The fifth hotel room was where she tried her worst. The fifth hotel room and she longed for the smell of fire again. She supposed blood and flame would make a lovely couple of their own. Maybe that was what she and Damien were. Blood and flame. Each dangerous alone, and a recipe for destruction put together. Like they were made to fit… but they came from far too different standpoints to truly belong. But it was that destruction she craved then.

    She'd burn herself alive and at the stake if she could find a means to do so. But this was the Muggle world, and getting away with that here was an entirely different manner all on its own. And simply stabbing herself was getting far to dull and predictable for the likes of her. She had almost forgotten about her wand, her magical capabilities- and there were so many options behind just that. It was then she realised what she had to do.

    An explosion spell. An explosion for the flame, tearing apart at her flesh and bones for the blood. And placed in the right spot would lead to a quick death- and Chava would really stop her suffering. After all, she couldn't feel guilty if she was dead. She knew this would have to be her fate from the beginning. And whether Damien could admit it or not, he knew it too. He was more of a fool than she thought, if he expected her to stay alive after she had fled from him in the middle of the night. Chava had always fantasised and toyed with death. The only difference was this time, she wasn't messing around.

    She deserved this. Damien knew she deserved this. Lucedio wanted this. Hell, even Aeron probably figured she would end up dead left to her own devices. And oh, Chava wished to please.

    She stood up against her hotel room door, figuring it would be marked off as gunshot wounds, the final to the head. Confringo was such a nice, lovely spell… “You're wasting time, Chava,” Damien growled at the forefront of her brain. “Get it over with so the rest of us can move on with our lives.”

    A deep breath in. “Whatever you say, my love,” she whispers to him, before her own wand is pointed at her torso. The safest place for the first shot. “Confringo.” Even though she knew it would hurt, she didn't quite expect this level of pain, as she collapsed into herself, her throat burning raw as she screams. She was regretting it. She really shouldn't have wasted time like this- goddammit, why couldn't she have just made this quick and hit her own head first?!

    “Holy shit!” A scream from outside her door made her pause, her wand tip falling from her temple. “Oh my god, someone screamed, that room, THAT ROOM!” Oh. So she was too loud. Apparently her self destruction was too noisy for her hotel neighbors to concentrate. Such a shame. She lay on the carpet floor in a small pool of her own blood. As it turned out, her mental prowess was so terrible even casting an appropriately dangerous spell was hard to achieve. But she knew she had to get out of there- before the Muggles took a different means of dealing with things.

    Apparation was painful, but she managed. Chava was starting to get used to pain, after all. It was something that she knew would never leave her. She healed herself using magic, if only for the sake of getting a fresh start on the procedure in a different manner. It was simply too difficult to do on her own. She was only human, and she kept wanting to stop herself.

    “You weak, pathetic bitch,” Damien hissed, and for once she could wave him off. She would have to find someone else to do the job for her. Aeron was looking a pretty good option.