~~Young~~

Chapter Twenty Two

   All Gage could do was watch from his own personal piece of Hell the goings on around him. He tried to focus on that and not the constant pain the fire offered him. He watched the new souls as they were dragged by, tossed into nearby flames and forgotten for ever after that. He tried to catalog their faces, noting the differences in their appearance. Male or female, hair color, body shape, he did whatever he could to keep his brain …with it.

   He couldn’t give in to the pain; he had to stay lucid for Sera’s arrival. He cringed at that, and for not the first time the flame paused in confusion. It didn’t seem to understand that Gage’s true pain wasn’t physical, that whatever it offered would be a mental vacation for Gage. It would be so much easier to just disappear into the pain, let all thought go and let it consume him. How quickly though he would be lost to it. He had seen it thousands of times before, those who couldn’t remember anything of what they once were after time in the flames. And if he couldn’t remember who he was then he wouldn’t remember Sera either…

   His former brethren came and went, pausing to point and laugh, maybe try to inflict more torture on him. It felt like an eternity already even though he knew not even a day had passed. There was no time here but there was routine, and it was by the changing of the guard he knew the intervals that had passed. Once, only one change of shift so far. It wasn’t the pain that was the worst but the waiting, waiting for Bane’s return and to see the broken soul of his beloved tossed into the flame before him.

   A moan escaped his lips and again the flame pulled away as if to look him over. By Gage’s guess the thing was growing frustrated. Tiny sparks would break from the flame knowing it wasn’t the reason for his suffering. Then it would come back at him, stronger than before, trying to up the agony and get Gage to react in some way. Was it a failure otherwise, would the flame be looked down upon by its own peers as if it wasn’t good enough? Gage thought so. They weren’t alive by any means, just things, elements, but there was some conscious thought to their masses.

   Another soul was dragged by. Male, late thirties early forties, thinning brown hair, somewhat of a muscular tone to his form- Gage sucked in a sharp breath as the flame buried inside his head through his ear. It was brain freeze on epic proportions. Finally Gage had to groan as the flame undoubtedly tried to figure him out by the most basic of means.

   He couldn’t do it though; he couldn’t let the flame win. A distraction, he needed a distraction!

   He looked for the demon that had dragged the last soul in. There he was, walking up the ice ramp leading to the entrance. He was a dark grey, maybe he had been human at some point-err­- but he had been in hell too long- ahh­- he had begun mutating…

   His head was thrown back and the flame vacated through Gage’s eyes. Now it crackled and popped on top of the sparks. It didn’t like being ignored now did it?

   It expanded and blanketed Gage in its aching chill. He gasped and its icy tendrils slid inside his mouth and to his throat. Like hands they then clamped around Gage’s lungs and squeezed. It was trying to suffocate him from the inside out. It was an odd sensation, not being in control of your own breath. Something your mind just couldn’t understand, the signals got where they needed to be but Gage’s lungs couldn’t expand. Right on cue the edges of his vision began darkening. It wasn’t going to kill him, the flame, no that would be a waste. It would let him pass out though just to wake him with a shot to his nuts, or maybe another romp through his head.

   “Would d’u look at dat,” a voice chuckled before Gage lost it completely, “I have nevah seen ‘im turn blue before.”

   Gage forced his eyes to focus on the figure before him, the one grinning in satisfaction.