The Cause of his Grief

Disclaimer: As always I make no money from this or any other story that I write on this site as I do not own the character of Tig from the SOA universe he is the property of his creator Kurt Sutter.

Summary: Tig is having a bad night; it is the anniversary of his daughter's death.

A/N: A Halloween present for you all, due to a bit of swearing this will be rated M.


Shaking and wishing for oblivion to his surroundings more than he had ever wanted in his entire life even more so than the other time when he had partake in the use of magic mushrooms and had confessed to the night sky of his involvement in the mistaken shooting of Donna, Opie's first wife, Tig slammed his front door shutting it tight before he stumbled into his lounge and collapsed on his couch.

It felt like the cold of the dead were seeping into his bones and he began to shake even more, dragging a thick woven throw off the back of his couch he tried to stop his teeth from chattering and the shakes that were wrecking his body by wrapping it tight around himself. Wondering forlornly in his mushroom induced hallucination if he would ever feel warm ever again.

It took him several moments before he was able to move from the couch to kneel in front of the open fireplace, lighting it and placing a few more logs on to it somewhere in his addled brain he knew it was dangerous to have the open fire burning tonight but he was too cold to care and craved the heat that he knew the fire would provide. Indeed it took several moments for the flames to burn brightly enough to create sufficient heat to penetrate his body through the thick throw that was wrapped tightly around his torso.

He almost jumped out of his skin when something thumped loudly against his lounge window and he crept cautiously towards the sound gripping his gun securely in his hand.

BANG!

Again he almost jumped but this time realised somewhat sheepishly what the noise was, a tree branch being tossed around by the ever increasing wind that was howling outside his property. Tig breathed a deep sigh of relief at knowing what it was that was making the noise but he was jumpy still despite the knowledge and his heart was racing, he wanted so desperately to not feel anything. He wanted so badly for this fear to go away, to be nothing more but the figment of his own tortured imagination.

He stumbled back to the couch returning his gaze back to the fire, the feeling of regret and loneliness causing him to feel more isolated than he had ever felt before. Wishing just wishing that one of his brothers were there to comfort him like they normally comforted each other in their times of need, as he continued to stare into the fire.

As a rule, that was something that he had never really learned to do, to show his weaknesses in front of his brothers, to be nothing more than the cold blooded sociopathic killer that most in the club took him for. Sometimes he thought it would be nice to be something other than that, something decent but he knew it was not to be.

His resolve sharpened as he got control of his breathing and emotions as he banked the fire and headed towards the comfort of his bed where he managed to get a few hours of almost blissful oblivion, waking a few hours before sunrise.

He drifted slowly awake something catching his attention as sleep departed from his mind, he thought he could hear a sound. Something that sounded like someone calling his name, moaning alongside of the wind that was still blowing quite viciously outside.

Getting out of his bed and moving down his stairs towards the front door he could also hear a scratching sound. The eerie sound of something scratching, like nails on a blackboard and as he listened he realised the scratching noise was at his front door but worse than that the door knob was rattling like someone or something was trying to get in and it froze him to the spot.

There was that sound on the wind again this time sounding again like a voice as it moaned but this time he could clearly make out different words it was moaning.

"Da-ddy…Da-ddy, let me in."

It was Dawn, his daughter at the door but that was impossible, it could not be his baby girl, he had watched her burn before his very eyes a year ago this very night. She was gone, dead, burned on the orders of that psycho Damon Pope. Whatever or whoever was at his front door begging to be let in was not his little girl of that he was sure.

Tig backed away from the door as the door handle rattled again, he would not listen to the plea of something he was certain was not his daughter, at the back of his mind something niggled in his train of thought as he tried to ascertain what it was.

BAAANNNNGGGGG!

A crashing noise against his living room window made him jump again and he swung around in the direction of the sound, his gun already cocked and waiting to be used. Laughter from the direction of the door had him swinging the gun back in direction of the front door as more and more banging noises could be heard from outside surrounding the house.

Tig could take it no more and he snapped peppering the wood of his front door with bullets desperate to make the unearthly things outside his door disappear. From outside he heard a distinctly human sounding yelp as one of the bullets shattered the glass in the window of the door and someone or something else shouting his name.

" TIG…STOP!"

The sound of another voice brought him back to a degree of consciousness as other voices joined in, his front door flying open and had there been any bullets left in his gun he would have peppered the figures that burst through it.

"Tig put that gun down."

"Get him."

"Get the gun of him, laddie."

Tig felt the gun wrenched from his hand as he struggled to keep ahold of it as it was pulled forcibly from his hand and he blearily looked into the eyes of three of his brothers as they tried desperately to unarm him.

Despite his best efforts to continue fighting it did not take long for Chib's, Happy and Bobby to disarm the former SAA and making sure the gun was on safety Happy placed it inside his Kutte for safe keeping and to stop him from shooting anyone else.

Wrestling with their struggling brother the three men forced Tig to sit back on the sofa while Chibs took a look at him, checking his eyes and slapping him around the face to get his attention.

"Tig….Tig….Look at me, can you hear me?"

Tig irritably pushed back against the Scotsman, shoving his hand away when he tried to slap him again to get his attention once more.

"Cut that out mother fucker, I'm fine."

"Cause you are Tig, which is why you just shot Phil. I mean if you weren't alright you probably wouldnea have done so but as you seem to know that you are alright I guess you dinnae mean to fucker."

Tig stared blearily at Chib's and in some small way absorbed his words as they filtered through the still drug induced layers of his mind.

"What the fuck yea talking about?"

"Phil yea shot him just now in the shoulder yea fucking arsehole. We came out because we was concerned about yea and thought we would check up on yea but now I think it would have been better if we had left you to stew."

Tig leant forward hiding his face in his hands as he realised with horror the mistake he had made, he had shot a brother, not intentionally obviously but he had. Shaking his head at the horror of what he had done he raised his head out of his hands.

Chibs watched his brother as he tried to comprehend his shooting of another brother, shaking his head as he understood the horror that he saw on the other man's face as it dawned on him what he had done.

"Oh come ere."

Chibs pulled the older man up off of the couch, pulling him towards the door where the others were waiting for them and out towards the van in which Phil and Rat boy waited for them. Phil sitting in the back, holding a rag against his shoulder as he tried to stop his blood from rushing out of it, grimacing as throbbing pain hit him again when the van moved slightly with the opening of the side door.

Tig was shaking his head and muttering 'sorry' as he was pushed into the van next to him, Chibs also getting into the back. The van started and moved off down the road, travelling as fast as it could without arousing the attention of the neighbours or any law enforcement officers who just happened to be in the area at that moment but with enough speed to be able to get Phil back to TM so that Chibs could properly examine him not that there was much damage, the bullet had only grazed Phil but with his size it just seemed like more blood was coming out than it should have been and really Chibs thought 'Phil really should have stepped to one side of the door as he tried to open it, Tig was well known for shooting first and asking questions later.'

As the van pulled away into the glowing light of the morning in the shadows of Tig's house a figure remained. A figure that was shimmered in an eerie supernatural way in the half light of the morning, the image shimmering in and out of existence and as the van disappeared around the corner, a sad mournful single word was heard.

"Da-ddy!"