Call Wolf

Chapter Five

InfernO

Maria woke up to the smell of smoke. It was everywhere, cramming within the bedroom and stinging within her nostrils. The smell brought along a familiar panic that settled into her chest as if it had never left.
She must have had an episode while sleeping and started a fire.
Her eyes shot open to a terrifying black and had she not felt the toxins licking her skin she would have wondered if she'd gone blind.
She screamed as she shot out of bed, tumbling to the floor and catching herself on palms flailing helplessly before her. Her eyes went ahead, saw the amber glowing in the slit between the bedroom door and its threshold. There had to be a minor inferno in the rest of the cabin to emit such smoke and she knew that she was supposed to be affected by the toxic whirls - for the first time, she thanked God she wasn't.
Getting to the door wasn't particularly challenging even though she was virtually blind but as she gripped the handle she realized the metal was searing. Despite knowing she wasn't supposed to, Maria held on, felt the painful ecstacy rush to her head. For a second it settled her deathly anxiety and she tore the door open.

Charles had been reaching for the handle just as Maria came tumbling out the door. She held on to the frame, her wide eyes meeting his blood shot ones. At first she didn't recognize him since the lower part of his face was covered by some kind of fabric and his body was stained by soot and sweat.
The cabin was being eaten alive. Flames had gotten ahold of supportive beams as well as curtains, creating a sea of thrashing fire behind Charles. Somehow he'd managed to get to her room through it all and Maria felt heavy, sticky self-hatred reach for her alongside the flames as Charles grabbed a hold of her wrist and guided her through the cabin. He dodged the worst danger as he tried to get to the front door but the cabin was small and the fire particularly vicious.
"Watch out!" Maria yelled and pulled him backward just in time as a significant part of one of the beams upholding the ceiling came crashing down. They took cover the best they could as the charred wood spewed cinder and heat. It was almost staged, the way it landed just before the doorframe. The outside air blew onto it and further fueled the flames.
Charles cursed but readied himself, cracking his knuckles and taking a deep breath despite the smoke. He reached for the beam.
"No!"
Maria stopped him once again. She pulled him beside her and took his place, letting her hands hover above the glowing wood as she readied herself. She felt Charles try to stop her but he was too weak and, as much as she hated herself for it, the cabin fire only made her stronger.
Her heart jolted as she placed her palms on the wood. Heat flushed her system, made her blood boil and breath steam as she exhaled violently from the shock. She was a living boiler pot. The pain was indescribable but the pure strength entwined with it was addicting.
It could have been seconds or minutes before she let go, leaving the beam a charred skeleton, cool to the touch.

Maria fell out into the night. She briefly felt something she guessed as grass but her arms soon buckled under her, making her hit the ground straight on. Her body heaved and spasmed as smoke emitted from her pores. Fresh air replaced its dark cousin in her system but her lungs hated it, hastily pushing it back out.
She was suffocating.
Somehow she managed to tumble onto her back and Maria saw the sky above, disturbed by bulbous smoke rising up from the cabin. And she hated herself. She couldn't even mourn as she feared she was dying.
"Well would you look at that?"
Maria's eyes shot open, a different kind of panic setting in. She tried to get her legs to do their job. Her body wouldn't listen to her and soon Buck's maleficent face replaced the sky.
"I knew you were here, but gambled a little when setting the fire."
"Charles," she got out in the midst of her greedy breaths, barely lingering on the fact that she wasn't the reason for the fire. Her eyes flickered to what ever she could find.
"He's not here, must still be caught inside. Now come on, get up, that act won't work with me."
Someone pulled Maria up by her upper arms, indelicately keeping her upright as her knees gave out. She threw her head back, drew a few deep breaths interrupted by her stomach contracting painfully.
She looked back to the barrel of a sawed off shotgun between her eyes.
"I'm afraid this is the end for you, Maria."
But it wasn't.
Not two seconds later the shotgun was gone along with Buck. Then Neal was gone. He must have been judging by the way Maria fell to the ground. Her arms ached but she managed to get to her knees. She looked around the meadow. It was uncomfortably silent save for her own erratic breathing and the wood's crackling.

Someone kneeled before her and she almost cried with relief.
"Are you okay?" Charles asked, skimming her body for wounds.
"Neal and B-Buck... they just disappeared, I don't know what happened - I swear it wasn't me."
He nodded slowly, looked around but didn't seem too concerned by her words. He grabbed her arm and hauled her up beside him.
"We need to get away."
"The truck," Maria said, so relieved they were both alive that she felt her muscles relax slightly, only plagued by a dull ache instead of the slicing pain of a few seconds ago. She nodded to the red pickup only a few dozen metres away. "B-But maybe they'll come for us then."
"They won't."
"How do you know?"
"Because I killed them."
Maria quieted. Through her hazy mind she recognized that she should be alarmed, but then again she wasn't completely harmless herself. "How could you kill them both?"
They'd made it to the truck. Charles opened the passenger side, the old metal wailed loudly as if knowing he wasn't the owner, and maneuvered her into the seat. He remained standing beside her, giving her an indecipherable look. "I assure you," he said, "that we will both answer for questions. Later. Now we have to go."
Maria couldn't have agreed more.

A/n
Officially a part of the Wattys! Please, please let me know if you like it, it helps a lot.