The Burn of Life

Blaze POV

Please let me wake up and I’m in bed and this was all a nightmare, I thought. Letting my eyes flutter open, I groaned when I saw I was chained in the dark windowless room. Looking down at my arms in hope nothing happened; I saw the brands still there along with many cut marks. That’s going to scar, I bitterly thought while glaring at my arms. I couldn’t feel anything; my arms are numbed with pain along with my back. I’d be lucky if I could feel anything again besides pain.

Sitting in the room for who knows how long, wondering when Brian will come back. At least he feeds me, even if it’s only a stale piece of bread with half glass of water. I’m starving at the moment so anything will do. I can feel it’s starting to get dark because the walls are starting to get colder. Where is he? Did he leave me here to die? All these thoughts flew through my head, to the point I’m getting a headache.

Well if I have time away from him maybe I can find a way out of this nightmare. Reaching down towards the chain keeping me locked to the wall, I examined it. Solid cold steel met my hand, fingers tracing around the chain looking to see how it comes undone. Finally my fingers find a hole, a keyhole. Damn it all, I need a fucking key! There must be something else, I looked to see how much distance I’d get with the chain and it looked to be only a few feet. Shaking trying to stand up leaning against the wall for support I slowly made my way toward the door. The chain would only made me miss two feet from the door. Stretching my arms as far as I can reach I touch the door with the tip of my middle finger.

My only hope is if someone can find me. Please God help me, let someone finally find me, please, I prayed. I slowly made my way back to the corner, deciding to take a rest and hope for the best. “Faith I don’t know how you died, but please don’t let it happen to me. Lead someone here to save me, I promise if I make it out alive I will give your necklace to your family.”

Officer Matt POV

Once all tree groups returned back to base, I asked them to give me all the evidence so I can start my work as soon as possible. First I decided to get the blood sample over with since that would take the longest. Grabbing the q-tip, I cut the tip of it that has blood on it. Next I placed it in some chemical solution and placed it in a machine that will shack the contents together.
Once the machine let out a beep, I picked up the container then used my pipet to suck a little bit of the formula then finally placed it into the tester machine.

While waiting for the results I started going through the photos. First I organized them into three piles: Blaze, Faith, and mystery girl. Noticing that there are more photos of the mystery girl, I decided to look through those first. The girl looked to be about twelve years old, brown hair, and brown eyes. She looked just like Brian, maybe a sibling or relative. Going over to another computer I typed in Brian’s full name to look up family history. Getting the results almost instantly, I saw he had a younger sister. His sister’s name was McKenna; she died during a bank robbery gone wrong. Brian was with her, so he must have watched his baby sister die before his eyes.

Before I could look at the rest of the pictures the blood test came back. It was a positive result to Blaze Andersson. She had to have been at that house or Brian must have trailed her blood in by accident. Finally going over the pictures I notice that both Blaze and Faith had similar lives. They both were seniors in high school, walked to school, and even worked at music stores. That’s probably how he found them; he must have worked in those music stores too. To learn their lives and to be able to follow them home, even access their information from the store, I thought. They even looked alike, they were both redheads, blue eyes, and even heights were the same. This guy had his own preference to whom he wanted to stick with, if he killed Blaze then he is a serial killer. And by serial killer I don’t mean someone who loves to kill Tony the tiger or another cereal characters.

Finally getting out of those thoughts, I looked at the last evidence, the bill. The bill was for another house’s water. The address on the front was addressed to McKenna at 1313 Mountain Road. That’s why this address didn’t come up, it’s addressed to his deceased sister, I thought. The chance Blaze could be there are very high. Getting up, I walked out of my office in a hurry to get to Officer Robert.

Officer Robert POV

While working on making the file for the case, I noticed that Matt was speed walking my way. He looked like he had something to share to everyone, hopefully good news. “Hey Matt, you got anything for me?”

“Yeah I do, I just need to gather everyone together,” he said while walking towards the conference room. Once we both entered he was setting up the PowerPoint projector for his presentation of the evidence. “Now that everyone has finally gathered I’ll explain the findings I have found thanks to everyone in the room.”

“Can you start on the blood samples for me?” I asked, I truly want to know if Blaze might have a chance to live.

“Yes I can, as you all know one group found blood in a house. The sample you all gathered for me was a positive match for Blaze,” he started out. “This shows that Blaze was either there or Brian accidently dripped some of her blood there when he was a the house.”

“What about the photos?” someone asked for somewhere in the room.

“From what I could tell the photos of Blaze and Faith, was that they were followed for a while before the kidnapping. As for the mystery girl, I noticed that she looked like Brian. So I looked up his family to find out that he had a sister that died in a bank robber. So the photos were of her, I’m guessing he keeps them close so that was the house that he stayed at the most.”

“Now that you explained about the photos and blood. Can you tell me about the bill I found in that one house?” Sabrina asked.

“That was one of the weird things, when I looked up the address I thought it would come back to a place Brian owned. But it was instead in the name of his sister McKenna. Yet the house was purchased ten years ago, no one has been living there until recently. And by recently I mean that the water was turned on the day that Blaze disappeared. My guess is that she is being hidden there,” Matt concluded after showing us the last slide on the slideshow.

After hearing the results I decided I could use the information about Brian’s sister to maybe get him to talk. If he’s putting everything he owns in her name then maybe it will be a soft subject to talk about. I got up from my chair then proceeded to walk out the conference room to the interrogation room. “Hey Joe can you get Brian for me and bring him into room two for me?” I asked Joe.

“Yeah no problem Robert,” he stated back while walking toward the holding rooms. I only had to wait ten minutes before Brian was finally sitting in front of me.

“You wanted to see me sir?” he asked me sarcastically.

“Yes I did, I wanted to know if you could by chance tell me where Blaze is?” I asked

“No can do officer, you see it somehow escapes my mind where I might have placed her,” he smirked.

“Does a girl named McKenna ring any bells?” I asked while smiling at him.

“Where did you hear that from,” I could tell Brian is getting a little bit furious.

“We searched one of your houses and found pictures and a bill. Why would you place a house in the name of your dead sister?” I asked while leaning back in the chair placing my feet on the table in front of me.

“You keep her out of this! She has nothing to do with this!” he shouted back at me.

“Fine I will if you tell me where Blaze is.”

“No I will not do that, my angel needs her rest and I need to get back to her!”

“I will leave you this thought, we are going to be checking your sister’s house tomorrow. If we find Blaze dead you are going to get the death penalty. If she is found alive you are getting life,” I told him while slamming my chair back and rushing out for the room.

Once back where everyone is still gathered I sat down with everyone else. “He wouldn’t cooperate with me at all. So this means we will search the house tomorrow early in the morning. Be here by eight am.”

Kevin POV

Everyday is always the same; I’m always holding my mom while she cries. I really do hope the police can find Blaze in perfect shape. From what mom told me the other day is that the guy that may have kidnapped her has been apprehended. Also that he police are searching his houses today, hopefully they will call us with an update, I thought. After I thought that the house phone started ringing.

“Hello?” I asked.

“Hi, this is Officer Robert from the police station. Is Mrs. Andersson there?” he asked professionally.

“Not at the moment, but I’m her son Kevin.”

“Oh, ok then I’m just calling to tell your family about the search that happened today…”

“Did you find her?” I interrupted him quickly.

“No we haven’t yet, but we have found picture of her, clothes, and even another house to search. Sadly though we did find some of her blood located in one of the houses. But we feel confident that she is located at the final house to search. The search is going to take place tomorrow early in the morning,” he told me.

“Ok, thank you so much for letting us know. Is there anything we can help with?” I asked, I really hope he will say yes.

“No, we don’t want any civilians involved at the moment. But if we do find her we will contact you right away.”

“Oh, alright then. Call back when you have more information to tell us,” I said while hanging up the phone before he could say goodbye. Ever since this has happened I haven’t been able to say goodbye. Goodbye seems final, like you will never see the person again. I was never able to say goodbye to Blaze, and if anything happened to her I would never forgive myself again.

“Son who was that on the phone?” dad asked me while patting my back to let me know he was there.

“Oh it was Officer Robert, for an update on the case. He just told me that they searched the houses and only found some of her clothes, photos, another address, and blood. They are going to search the new house tomorrow morning and will call us if anything happens,” I told him. We both then headed into the living room where mom and him were previously located while I was talking to the officer.

“Kevin do you remember the time Blaze went to that concert with you. Who was it?” she asked while thinking of the bands name. “Oh yeah, Escape the Fate. How she wanted to go into the mosh pit with you and your friends, and she was only ten years old?”

Laughing at the memory, “Yeah I remember that she couldn’t see a thing so I decided to rise her onto my shoulders to see the stage. The band spotted her first thing and commented about it saying ‘wow we really have a tiny fan out there’. She had so much fun there, it surprised me that she knew all the lyrics to all the songs.”

“Yeah I remember how she called me telling me all about it. I was so glad to have brought you out here to take her to it,” dad said while smiling at the memory of the phone call. “What about he time we took her to the zoo for the first time?”

“Haha, I remember that. First thing she wanted to see was the lions and the wolves, those were always her favorite animals. Her thoughts were that she loved how they were always together in a pack and she always wanted that,” mom commented about the trip when Blaze was six years old.

“Yeah, if I remember correctly that was also the trip that the llama spit in her face. The look on her face was hysterical, she looked so shocked that she stuck her tongue out at the animal,” I said while laughing with everyone else. It felt good remembering all these happy memories and hear everyone laughing again.

Officer Jonny POV

It’s now eight in the morning and everyone is outside the station waiting to leave. Everyone is excited because this might be it, we might find Blaze at last. This is my first major duty on the force since I joined a week ago, so I’m pretty nervous. “Ok everyone, lets get moving so we still have light,” Officer Robert ordered all of us to get into our cars for the long journey into the mountains.

When we got there the house looks like a castle, and the backyard was full of woods and steep slopes. I had a feeling this is the house, this is the place Blaze is being hidden at. This time instead of going off into groups like at all the other houses, we have freedom of going off alone. I decided to look all around the bottom floor. As I was walking through the hallway I placed my hand on the wall and made patterns as I walked passed it. Suddenly my hand hit something, a switch that opened a trap door that opened to stairs. Glancing over my shoulders to see if anyone is watching me I followed the stairs down towards the basement.

Once there I saw many doors, maybe ten. But one door had a smell coming from it, a rusty smell. When I found that door, I got my gun ready and a flashlight, because of the dark. Opening the door I looked around; holy shit, this looks like something from the saw movies, I thought. Blood was everywhere, on the floors, on the wall, on the furnisher, and even on the ceiling.

This room was made for torture; the smell along made me gag. I could see a brander in the fireplace and a chair next to it, to brand his name on his victims. There were whips lying on the floor by a chain that hooked you up to the ceiling. This man is sick, I thought. I needed to get out of this room and fast. So I power walked out of the room and decided to check all the rooms around me.

Each room was empty, not even a piece of dust was in the room. But the last door I checked was locked, using my gun to shoot off the lock. When it opened up, I saw a body lying on the ground. “Guys! Anyone read me?” I asked in my headset. I was met with static before I finally heard a voice.

“Johnny that you?” a guy asked, I think it is Robert.

“Yeah Robert, you got to get down to the basement. I found a body, I think it might be Blaze,” I said.

“Really? How do I get down there, we haven’t found any stairs?” he asked.

“There’s a switch on the wall somewhere in the hallway, you just to feel around. I’ll be standing outside the door waiting for you,” with that I walked out the door waiting for someone to finally come.