No Salvation In Damnation
Yet another look at the destructive (but ultimately loving) relationship between Captain Elliot Spencer and my OC, Nadine Jones. As you may all be aware by now, I find Elliot much easier to write than his demonic counterpart, and have always felt the good Captain doesn't get enough love in the HR-verse.
Anyway, this will be short-I'm struggling with insomnia and depression at the moment too, so the story may reflect that. If you would like to know more about Nadine, plase check out my stories, Hellraiser: Break The Silence, Hellraiser: Unleashed, Forbidden But Never Forgotten, and A Temper Like My Jealousy.
This takes a little bit of a dark turn at the end, unexpectedly. It just wrote itself.
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For Laura.
/
'Down the dark decades of your pain,
This will seem like a memory of heaven.'
-Pinhead, Hellraiser: Hell On Earth
'We are each our own devil,
And we make this world our Hell.'
-Oscar Wilde
Before Elliot acquired the strange little puzzle box, things were relatively normal between he and Nadine. Well, as normal as two people who loved hurting as much as pleasuring each other, could possibly exist. They were a couple, but not an exclusive one, neither of them willing, perhaps, to admit their feelings went beyond mere sexual excitement and bloodlust.
Not willing to admit that maybe, they actually did love each other.
But the war had scarred Elliot's soul, left him, while not quite wholly incapable of feeling, certainly incapable of expressing his feelings. Consequently, his relationship wiith Nadine was in equal measure casual and violent. Nadine herself, having lived through the horror of an abusive marriage, which had left her reconciling love with physical violence, was no better, or more whole.
They were soulmates, really. Or, at least, they would be...if they had any souls left to mate.
Yes, before the box, things were relatively normal.
She wished things had been different, that they had met at a different time, before the Great War, when they had been happier, healthier people. Not these shells of humans, who tried to hit and cut and screw away the pain and never could.
And now, all Elliot seemed able to concentrate on was this blasted puzzle box, this box, within which, he seemed to have decided, his salvation lay.
Nadine knew different. She knew that whatever lay beneath its lacquered walls and intricate design, it was not salvation.
'A gateway to unknown pleasures.' the man who had sold it to Elliot at the market had told him.
Nadine had, initially, found the very notion of a box containing 'unknown pleasures' highly amusing. Until she laid eyes on the thing, and knew in the very core of her being, that if Elliot were somehow to solve the puzzle and open the box, something terrible would happen to him.
And she didn't want to let that happen, even though she knew her newfound circumstances would ultimately change nothing of her and Elliot's situation, would not soften his heart, because poor damaged, soulless, Captain Spencer, would care nothing for the life he had placed within her.
She, who was as damaged and callous as he was. And yet loved.
Loved this broken man with every fibre of her being.
And now, she was pregnant.
And the worst thing was, she knew that wouldn't be enough to convince him to stay. The moment that box was placed in Elliot's hands, it became his obsession. He was fixated on it, determined to discover its pleasures.
Or die trying.
/
In the days following Elliot's disappearance, Nadine was beset with the strangest dreams. Dreams that did not quite include Elliot, but she swore she heard him whispering to her in a voice that was his, and yet not his, darker and more sinister..
'We have such sights to show you!'
She dreamed of long, dark hallways, cold, dank walls, the screams of people in agony, and all the time, that voice called out to her:
'We have such sights to show you!'
She saw blood and broken flesh and faces contorted in the most unimaginable pain.
And on the final night, the night before Nadine's transformation into a vampire and the loss of her child, and her humanity, she dreamt of one person.
He was torn to shreds, his bloodied, dismembered face peering out at her pitifully. His limbs lay in pieces beneath him like some sort of perverted jigsaw puzzle, his mouth moving, but no sound emitted from it. He was clearly in the throes of anguish.
And she laughed, even as she slept, laughed and laughed, at the sight of the monster who had, in turn, made her a monster, reduced to nothing more than scraps of bloody meat.
The late Captain James Winters. Her husband.
A movement, as a hand came down to offer yet more torture , and she caught one last glimpse, of another face, familiar, but not, a face studded with pins.
Elliot?
'Oh, he suffers beautifully.'
Then darkness, and the clink of chains.
Fin.
/
Wow. Ok, that last bit came out of nowhere. I really didn't intend to write that, but Nadine's husband was an abusive ass who got what he deserved...who's to say that he didn't open a Lament Configuration too, right? I would say that maybe Elliot pulled a few strings (or spinal cords) down there, but this was only a few days after his journey to Hell and transformation into a Cenobite, so he probably didn't have that much authority yet. Either way, I hope you enjoyed-keep in mind that I wrote this on 3 hours sleep and while I did a spellcheck and grammar check, there may still be some mistakes, so apologies in advance. Please review, thank you! :) Ellen