Disclaimer: I own nothing...

A/N: Right only one update today... I am going to attempt a little of my 'Fifty Shades Abandoned' or 'A Grey Heart Epiphany' today so I'm going to lay off this for a day... I will be back tomorrow and back on track... Plus after my shift tomorrow evening I am not in work at all until two weeks time! Expect some writing to get done without interruptions ;)

Right... enjoy, beware and know I am thankful!

Beauty and the Beast – Chapter Fifteen

Taylor looked up as he saw movement in the corner of his eye and only just saw Ana look him dead in the eyes before running off down the hall way. It wasn't fast but she was running. "Ana!" He called out and pushed passed both Christian and Sawyer and ran after her.

The other two quickly followed.

Christian's panic magnifying and taking command of his entire being. He was not prepared to let her go too far. He wasn't prepared to lose her. He wasn't prepared for her to escape and do this alone. He loved her. This was his battle as well as hers.

She could hear them behind her, chanting her name, trying to get her to not run but, she just had to get away and if she didn't get out of the hallway soon then she would find herself caught and captured. She couldn't let that happen. She couldn't let this life continue any longer. She couldn't continue feeling like her life was ebbing away from her. She had to end it before she was left living as a mere shell of herself.

Looking over her shoulder she saw her time was nearly over and she had to do what she had to do. Seeing a room advancing towards her, she knew she could duck in and find some way to kill the voices in her head and the world around her in one go.

Like a feral animal, Ana just ran into the room, not caring about what it was only to be confronted with an operating room. She just ran in and felt herself panic even more. She had been in one of these having her life saved days prior. Except she felt like her life ended that day and nothing else and that wasn't the gratitude she should have.

She heard the door open and she ran further in, looking for something to help her with her cause. Hearing her name leave Christian's lips she turned and stepped backwards. She hit the bed in the middle of the room and looked up to be cast within Christian's worried glare. Why was he so worried? If she did this then he wouldn't need a way out. He would have it and he wouldn't have to live with any of the guilt that came with it.

"Back away!" She shouted at the three men, heaving against her panic and fears. The tears were now streaming and as she felt the tape to her face loosening with the dampness she tore the gauze away and discarded of it. "Leave me alone," she said as she backed up and hit a metal table covered in surgical equipment. She tripped on it and both her and instruments on it went flying. Everything falling to the floor in one shrill ricocheting sound that bounced off the walls and added to the drama unravelling.

Christian immediately wanted to swoop in but, she pushed herself away from him, edging closer to the furthest side of the room. "Ana, please," he began to speak like a beggar. "What are you doing?" He watched as she slowly rose to her feet and Taylor hit his arm and pointed to Ana's hand. "Baby, what are you going to do with that?"

Looking down to her hand, Ana didn't entirely know right now but, the feel of the scalpel in her hand felt right. She tested it in her palm a few times before she raised her head and looked to Christian, ignoring Taylor and Sawyer.

"Call this your get out clause," she whispered at him menacingly and swiped the bandage from her throat and allowed her neck wound to be on show. She then raised the scalpel carefully to her throat and pressed it against her jugular.

"Don't do anything stupid," Christian put his hands up at her, showing he met no harm and took a step forward but as he did she only pushed the blade more into her already scarring neck. "Ana, please, I'm begging here."

"If I dig deeper than the bastard did that night I won't have to suffer any longer," Ana spoke with smirk on her face as if to taunt Christian. "If I just cut my throat now I won't have to worry about anything anymore. This will all be over! This life will be over for the better!"

Her words were killing him. "Ana," Christian cried out to her again. He wished her could just run to her and capture her in his arms but, he knew the moment he moved even an inch forward then Ana would plunge that scalpel so far into her neck she would bleed out within seconds.

"You want to know how to fucking end this, Christian?" She asked and she saw realisation dawn in the eyes she had fallen in love with. "Want me to tell you how you can get free of this?" She asked him, her voice near enough vehemently spraying from her vocal calls, "You can get free by me ramming this fucking knife so far into my throat that you never have to look at me again!"

"Ana, no," Christian was grieving already for the words he had spoken.

Ana prolonged a blink but, she found the knife against her throat was the best feeling she had had in far too long. "I won't need to be locked up and hidden and no one will have to so much as think of me looking this if I just end it now!" She pressed the blade a little, feeling it slice her skin and she lavished that one trickle of blood that escape. "You can move on and be happy and I will be nothing but, a fucked up memory for you to replace!"

"That wasn't about you!" Christian tried to argue but, he could see the damage was done and he couldn't take it back. It just didn't stop him trying. "You overheard the wrong thing."

Releasing a mirthless laugh, Ana shook her head. "If I died today no one would care," Ana spoke the truth that was torturing her heart. "Why would they?" She asked and felt a shuddering sob fall from her lips. "Nobody wants me and you proved that the most. Sticking your head in your phone, barely talking to me, allowing me to just withdraw and then to want to see me locked up and hidden away. That really finished this hell off."

They always say you'll burn in hell for your killer sins but, if anyone asked Ana, she would passionately tell everyone that hell was the coldest place in this life. It tortured your soul, stole your happiness and made sure you feel the loneliest person to ever walk the earth. There was no fiery heat here, or flaming bowels that she had grown up believing in. No, this place was long and dead and never ending.

Christian was crestfallen at that claim. She had heard him? She had heard everything he had said and she knew the truth now. This was not how she was supposed to find it out. This was not how he wanted her to know!

"What we were discussing was Kaitlyn," he tried to get her to see sense. "She contacted me and I think she did this Ana. I want that bitch locked up and personally tortured. I want her dead for bringing you to this point." He could see Ana try to contend with that information and he realised it would take more than this to win her back. "If she did this Ana I will make sure no one finds her body! I just need to find proof that she did this. "

"I don't care who did this," Ana whispered at the man that she loved with all her heart and soul. "I don't care who did this now it's done! Finding who did this is the least of worries because it changes nothing!" She shouted at him and looked at Taylor and Sawyer, "You can't do anything either but stare at me!"

"We will get who did this and we will fix everything," Christian was once again grappling at straws.

Ana took in a deep inhale, feeling the knife pushed against her already painful neck. "We are not living a fairytale, Christian. This isn't some fucking spell! This is for life. I am like this for life! Finding the person behind this doesn't change that!" She shook her head in disappointment at Christian's hope. "I will always be the beast in this story. Why can't you see that? I am nothing more than that anymore!"

"Never," Christian whimpered as his own pain began to exceed their boundaries. "You'll never be that when I want you to live with me, Ana. I want you to grow old with me. Ana, I want my life with you. I don't want you to end your life. I want to show you off as the woman I love," Christian tried to bargain with her using his hopes and dreams for their future together as his tool to do so.

"Don't even bother trying to cover it up and make me feel better," she tried to get him to stop, her sarcastic wit catching on evilly. "I know what everyone is thinking. What everyone wants to say to me. I know what I look like, Christian!" She shouted at him and her hand began to shake even more violently as he stood against her jugular. "I know I am a beast now and I know that no amount of surgery is going to change that!" She slumped against one of her sobs, "I'm nothing but, a laughing stock and I won't ever establish myself in my career. I won't be beautiful enough for that! I won't fit in anywhere! I'm not made for this life anymore, Christian. I don't think I ever was."

"Please," Christian begged, crying himself. "Ana, don't do this. You've got it all wrong. You heard something that isn't about you and you are taking it too far now."

"Taking it too far?" She asked him, her eyes going wide with the panic that he was guilt tripping her. "My best friend won't come near me. My parents have just stopped coming by. Your mom doesn't even come near me either and you," she sobbed out and heaved on her inhale, "You want me to be locked up in Escala. No one wants to see me," she cried out as her legs buckled and her hand just tightened on the handle of the sharp blade. "No one wants to look at me anymore so why don't I just make it easier for them to live with?" She asked, her question empowered by her raw emotions. "If I die no one has to have a guilty conscience for making up reasons to not look at me!" She gave a few short breaths, "I don't see it taking it too fucking far!"

"You are," Christian argued back, hating that it had gotten to this point. He had been so consumed by Kaitlyn he had neglected Ana and guiltless done so. "I don't want to lose the only woman I want to marry and have a family with."

"No," Ana took that comment hate. "I won't be a beautiful bride," she cried out, pressing the scalpel closer into her skin drawing yet more blood, "I won't be someone's gorgeous mom. I'll be a monster! I can see it now, my own child crying at the sight of me and claiming me to be one of the monsters from under its bed! It'll grow up ridiculed because of me." She was letting her woes come unravelled now and she didn't care about anything, "I'll only ever love it but, I can tell they'll suffer because of me, because of the mess I am!"

"That won't happen," Christian disagreed with her profusely. "I wouldn't let it."

"I won't ever be beautiful again," she sobbed and felt her legs bend as they weakened under the weak of her body and her misery. She began to sink lower to the floor.

"Baby," Christian took a step forward but, he saw that Ana just pressed the scalpel closer to her neck. "Please, Ana."

"Just let me do the right thing," Ana begged him and pressed harder. "Just let me do this for me, for everyone. Let me go."

Christian felt like his heart had been torn from his chest, ripped through his ribcage and was being torn to shreds by the wild animals that were Ana's grief and sorrow. He wanted to save her but, she was too far gone for him to do so. He apparently could beg, cry for her, try and give her hope of a future with him but, it didn't work. It was no good. The moment he saw the blood begin to fully trickle down her neck he knew he was too late to save her. Even as she cried against the blade that she felt was her key to exiting her pain, she still pressed it harder and harder.

Christian couldn't cope anymore. His last sight of her was her ending her life and his and the last noise was her sobbing as life allowed her to get lost.

Dropping to his knees, Christian felt like he couldn't breathe. She wanted to die, he wanted her to live but, his love didn't seem to work. How could he make her unhappy by just loving her? She couldn't see what he wanted with her and she thought it was all a lie. His truths were her lies and he had pushed her further over the edge. His life was ending alongside hers.

Even more so as he heard the scalpel finally fall and clatter against the floor.

Ana was finally silent.