Carmine Jewels ║ Wanda Maximoff

Chapter 25 - Scorched Hauntings

"At least you survived."

She didn't sound like herself. Her voice was hoarse, and it felt strange to talk after so many hours of silence. The mask over the lower part of her face did nothing to aid her in speaking either. Its design was almost like a muzzle, warning the subject to keep quiet. But she didn't have time to linger. Even if they were out in the wilderness, someone, somewhere, had surely seen the flames licking the skies above.

She held on to the bear and fished up the key to open the padlock to the chain blocking the grandiose wooden door. It clicked open, and with one hand, she slithered out the chain from the handles. Opening the heavy double doors, she was forced to jump back as something tumbled out of the entrance.

Bodies. Dozens of bodies.

They were almost completely disintegrated by the fire. Some still had parts of their skin intact, others were just bare skeletons. They were piled on top of each other as they had tried to break the doors down in their attempt to escape the flames.

The skeletons were the ones that bothered her the most. The black abyss of their eyes was emotionless as their jaws hung open, their quiet screams echoing in the burning silence. Even without facial expressions, she could see the fear etched into their bones.

A few of them were grownups, the one closest to the door. The ones who had the biggest chance to get the doors open. But the majority were small, fragile bodies.

Children.

Judging by the size of the scattered bodies and skeletons, most of them hadn't even reached puberty.

She moved forwards again, carefully stepping over their bodies and trying not to look at the half-burned faces of her victims. Their ghostly screams echoed in her head, even as she tried to shut them out. Stray fires were still dancing in parts of the building, feeding off the last remaining scraps of furniture.

Already having studied the layout of the orphanage so many times that she knew it as well as the back of her hand, she had no trouble navigating through the broken-down corridors. More and more skeletons revealed themselves as she ventured deeper into the building.

Some of the kids were still in their beds, their faces melted off as the flames had devoured them completely. Their skeletons had blackened, being in the grasp of the dancing fire for too long.

Even if the big fire was already out, the heat was still eminent, and sweat was pearling on her forehead. She did her best to block out the stench of burnt flesh and hair, trying to keep her breathing to a minimal. Weaving through the hallways, she soon saw the place she had been aiming for. The main office.

No.

She didn't want to be here. She didn't want to relive this horrible part of her life. Not once had she gotten to hear the reasoning as to why HYDRA wanted her to burn the orphanage to the ground. She could have just as easily sneaked her way in, considering that she wasn't much older than the kids there. But no.

Instead, they let her doom sixty-three children to a fiery death.

Pulling the office door open, she suddenly stopped with her hand still on the handle. The metal burned her palm, but she didn't release it. This wasn't happening. This wasn't her. She had already lived through this, and looking at it now, it felt like a lifetime ago.

It was a memory.

With great effort, like pulling herself out of quicksand, the blackened corridors melted away. The smell of burning flesh and wood got replaced with a damp, cold, and stony scent. A woman, her face pale and her face scrunched up in what appeared to be fear met her eyes, and she realized where she was.