Follow The Flame

It started long back. I did all I could to stop it. These Headaches. Could Kill me. They tried their best to treat me, scanned my head, I ate pills as if they were cigarettes (To tell you the truth, I even got addicted to it). It never stopped. It just got worse. It was no migraine. Neither was it brain tumor. In medical terms, I was sound.

Every now and then I would wake up. With this pain in my head. Never knowing what to do. Until I found it…My destiny…

I really don’t remember how I reached that alley. By profession, I am a journalist, one of those stylish investigative kinds who carry huge cameras with adjustable lens. I wouldn’t mind even carrying a tripod but it doesn’t exactly fit my job profile. On that day, something took me there. Anyway that headache was gone for some while. By instinct, I hid and was ready with my camera... That is when he came out. I had never seen him before. Never knew that he was for real. The Flame or rather, Flame. You would have never heard about Flame. It is ‘classified’ information. Often in nights, you might have seen a figure looming around in the darkness. You might have even felt a sudden flash of darkness across the road when you are out there driving. It must have been Flame.

Flame, a superhero who fights crime in the shadows of the night. One who keeps our city clean. There is just one Flame between the good and the bad, the saint and the sinner.

So was this the headache all about? I had been chosen by destiny. And I guess it was my destiny to be the one who tells the world who Flame is. The crime fighter, he is.

The pain would just take me to Flame. I was to be a witness for all his deeds. I was to tell the world what happens behind their back. To tell them what happens when they sleep. To tell them what happens in the darkest of the alleys.

I was drawn into the scene every time Flame was in action. I could see him jump over bridges. I could see him fly. I could see him staring down from the tallest building hiding in his hood. I could feel him. I could smell him. I had never met him but I could sense him. I wonder whether he senses me too. He never says cheese when my camera flashes. But he must know me. For God sake he is a super hero.

My headaches never stopped and it kept me drawing towards him. He became a drug to me. To relieve my pain. In return, I was to witness everything. I used to sleep with my headache but peacefully knowing that my city is in safe hands.

Then one day it happened. No, the headaches didn’t stop. It was Flame. He disappeared. I couldn’t find him again. The pain would take me somewhere but Flame won’t be there. I wandered alone in the darkness without a ‘Flame’ He was nowhere. It was as if he never existed. My pain had no purpose anymore.

That night my pain took me to a car wreck. I waited and waited there for Flame and help those hapless victims inside the car. I was just not able to accept the fact that it was fate to bring their very existence to an end in that very moment inside the car. I was just not able to accept the fact that there was no longer a Flame. So I stopped waiting, took matters into my very own hands. I didn’t wait for a second more. I moved the car. I became the ray of light for those poor souls in the pitch black night. Rather I became a glimmer.

After that day, I never had a head ache……

Flame has found a successor to keep the city clean. I found Him. Inside me. I found my destiny too. Now I do not sleep in the night. In the night, I fight. As I stand here pondering about the true purpose of me and my old headaches meanwhile narrating my story, I see my new friend waiting down there. Since the last few days, this photographer has been chasing me taking my pictures. He is my friend now .My only friend. Still, I never say cheese when his camera flashes and I never talk to him as I don’t want to scare him off.

He must be having headaches. Very bad headaches…!!