Authors Note:

On to chapter two! Hope you guys enjoyed the last chapter and I hope to be updating every other day due to a hectic work schedule. Any reviews and criticism is appreciated and welcome. If you feel you have lots of say feel free to shoot me a pm. I am currently open to the idea of submissions. If anyone has, any ideas that they would like to see incorporated into the story there is a chance it could very well be used. However, I cannot guarantee that everything submitted will be used. Those who leave ideas in reviews will be looked at first to avoid spam.

AND THANK YOU Neverthrive and He23t for the kind words! –Kazuma

Chapter 2. Extinguished

He was outside again. Albeit without his gear, he had left the tree house to walk around and collect his thoughts.

No point in staying without Jake anyway… too many memories in this house… he thought as a frown found its way onto his face.

It seemed so foreign to him to feel this way. For years, the only things important to him were adventures, Jake, and being a hero. It was not until he began to hit maturity did his thoughts even begin to dwell on the idea of being alone and feeling the desire to be loved. To be completely honest he could not even come up with a good excuse why he felt he needed to be loved. It was not as if his life prior till now was bad. Heck, it was downright mathematical! The times when all he needed was his best bro by his side to help kick monster butt was what he was all about.

"You're too young Finn…" he mimicked PB's almost matter of factly manor of speaking almost perfectly, no surprise how many times she shot down his advances over the years. It wasn't her affection and refusing to give him a chance that bothered him anymore. No, he had come to terms with the idea that she would probably never view him as anything more than a friend. No matter how much older he would get she would always be five years older than him. He did not want to admit to himself back then that he was doomed from the start, but he was stupid. He also had hope.

"I was… I am…really blind when it comes to this stuff aren't I," he mustered a small laugh trying to play it off, but it only proved to turn the stinging to a burning pain within his heart.

Because it's true…

He couldn't deny that what was exactly what caused him his most recent source of grief.

"Flame Princess…" was all he was able to get out before he choked on fresh tears.

His disheveled blonde hair began to peak its way from his now drooping hat, as if it too could feel the pain and distress the rest of him did. He pulled it off, wiped his face, and sat down under a tree in one fell swoop. With his now exposed neck now receding mark was viewable, a mark much looking like a healing burn.

"It's all Jakes fault for trying to mess with my p biz anyway!" he yelled, as if raising his voice would numb the doubt and guilt that was overwhelming him. He tried to keep this resolve hoping that shifting the blame onto his pal would somehow fix all this gunk that was gumming up his heart. It didn't work. He could never blame his bro for trying so hard just to get him over his depression over PB. And no matter how much he would like to think he was a great hero, it was Jake who gathered the courage to not only find Finn another love interest, but risked his life in the fire kingdom to do so. It wasn't Jake who ruined his and FP's relationship.

He trailed off once again as he absent-mindedly rubbed the healing burn on his neck and closed his eyes to relive it.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU DON'T THINK WE WILL WORK OUT?" a furious fire elemental demanded. Her flames rising to the point where even the air escaping her mouth blurred with the heat waves it created with her fury.

"F-Flame Princess j-just here me out," he was only able to stutter unable to come up with a good enough excuse to explain why he chose their anniversary as the perfect time to speak to her on the matter. "I-I've been having nightmares," he struggled to find his voice as visions flooded into his mind. "I keep watching you die over and over cause of my foolish decisi-"

"SO IM A FOOLISH DECISION AM I?" she butted in cutting him off. "So what you're telling me is this entire year I dedicated to you was some sort of fool's errand?" she managed to stop screaming but her flames still blazed about and was beginning to catch onto the nearby trees.

Why did I choose to take her for a walk in in the forest to talk about this? He immediately regretted not thinking that through as much as he did on the conversation he felt they needed to have. It had been eating away at his insides ever since she had almost burned through to the center of Ooo.

"Y-You aren't foolish… I am for thinking that loving you could ever end in anything… but this" he managed to get out before a fiery hand slapped him hard across the neck. He figured it was aimed for his face but in her blind frustration, she could not hit her intended mark.

"THEN WHY DID YOU EVEN LET US GET THIS FAR FINN YOU LIAR!" she was screaming again, but he could see through the rage and fire. In those dark coals she had for eyes, a glimmer that soon evaporated that he could only think could have been a tear. She was beyond angry, beyond sad, beyond anything. She had been betrayed.

And I am the one who betrayed her…

"B-because I wanted to love you…" He felt his own tears forming from his aching neck to the built up emotions he had bottled up so well for the past year. He could barely hear his own words as he said them, for they all came out in amongst sobs and pleads for forgiveness. "I-I let my own selfish desires…could my judgment on what was f-fair to you," He could tell from the way her flames only grew brighter that his words were not reaching her.

"I am supposed to be the h-hero…the one who thinks of everyone else first," he cried out as he tried to hide his face with his hat in shame, and to avoid making eye contact with the person who he essentially manipulated for a year to keep his spirits high.

"WHATS YOUR POINT FINN?"

"The point is I knew that romance would cause you to burn through the earth ever since that day we almost died. I stayed with you. I stayed with you not to keep you from being evil. Sure that was a side plus and that's what I tried to convince myself into believing my true intentions were FP…but deep down I know that I really wanted to stay with you because you're the only one that wanted me." He felt his pride, his spirit, his whole sense of self begin to shatter as he forced himself to say what he knew deep down was true.

"I wanted you because I thought you loved me…"

He was busy staring at the dirt, wishing how he could stick his head in a whole and run away from this, from her, from wanting to feel special for reasons he was unsure of himself.

"I stopped loving you when I saw that by doing so…I would destroy you and everyone in Ooo. I am still a hero first FP. To lo- loooo- to like like you would mean that eventually I would kiss you. To kiss you would mean killing you and everyone else."

He clenched his hands into fists as he spoke. "So, I had to stop. I just like you. I thought I... I thought I could like like you. Listen, when I looked at you my brain went all stupid, and I just wanted to hug you. I cannot explain why, but I never felt this way and I wanted us to stay together. I tried to convince myself that we could be together without being intimate, but denying you affection while living off yours is wrong. Risking the planet to feel affection isn't math at all. I can't let anyone get hurt from my act-"

"WELL YOU MANAGED TO HURT ME FINN! GOOD JOB," she let out hiss as she said his name. "I-I was willing to fight, I was willing to defy nature for you Finn…I-I hate you…don't ever talk to me again or I will leave nothing but ash. Like my heart," and with that she turned around and began to leave. A trail of scorched earth and death forest life left behind her. She did not blaze away like when they first met. He could tell she was angry and had the ability and right to rush away with speeds uncatchable by him.

But I broke her spirit…