She could feel the screams ripping from her throat, could feel the tears streaming from her eyes as her entire body ached as she continued to writhe from the pain she was in. But, for all the noise she made, no sound reached her ears over the voices resounding around her skull, all varying forms of her own voice.
"Shut up! Shut up all of you, just let me sleep!"
No joy as the voices of her clones continued to destroy what little of her sanity she had left. She needed her fix, needed the sweet silence that the cocaine could bring to her thoughts. Why was she being tortured like this? She had done no evil to these vampires.
Forcing herself up from the bed, she clutched her head, slamming it repeatedly into the headboard in a desperate attempt to knock herself unconscious.
"Stop it Hope!"
A strong hand took hold of her arms as she was forced to a stop and her eyes flew open in a crazed glare, meeting the horrified eyes of Caius. What did her want? She bared her teeth, too far gone into insanity to try and think rationally. The voices were beginning to grow more erratic, more frenzied as each clone sensed the madness of their creator, each wanting to exact revenge upon those that kept their 'mother' prisoner.
"Let me go, you fucking ass-hat! I'll have my clones kill you all! I'll rip your fucking head off myself!"
Caius gritted his teeth against the venomous words, not knowing the first thing about how to handle a woman so clearly drowning in pain and madness, a woman with more issues than any psychologist could handle.
"Let her go Caius… I'll handle this"
His head snapped round as Mercy stood in the doorway, Canna and Zeena both stood behind her as they looked upon Hope with anger in their eyes. Neither wanted to see their creator in this state. Caius let go of Hope's wrists, baring his fangs to her sister as he took a step back and watched mercy move forward, hating that the raven haired sister cared little for his silent threat. Why could he not help the woman fate had chosen for him?
"Hope, can you hear me?"
"Mercy make it stop, I can't do it anymore, just kill me. If there's a god that still cares, please, just let me die"
Mercy clenched her fist, teeth grinding together as she fought against the anger she felt building at her sister's words.
"You're a selfish bitch, you say that every time and then say you didn't mean it when you get your fix. What will killing you ever achieve? If you're hoping that you'll see mother again then you're wrong. Where ever she is now, we'll never go there. The lowest layer of hell is where we are destined for and nothing will change that. And what would I do without you? You are all I've ever had"
Her words were shouted, dripping with over a hundred years' worth of anger and misery, and for a moment, Hope became silent as Caius believed that maybe the harsh treatment had been what was needed to help the fair-haired sister. His optimism was dashed to the rocks however as Hope began to laugh uncontrollably, the very picture of insanity as she lunged at her sister and gripped her by the collar of her shirt, shaking her slightly as she began yelling back.
"I didn't choose to be immortal, I didn't ask you to do this to me! I was happy to die, I was ready to accept hell as my fate when you found the tumour on my lungs. It was you who waited till I was asleep and then made that botched attempt at removing it with your ability. It was you who failed and damaged my lungs so badly that I'd have died on the spot if you hadn't then halted me on a cellular level. If anyone is being selfish here then it's you for not letting me die in peace!"
Caius watched on in panic as the two seemed ready to beat each other senseless. Was this what Mercy meant by letting her handle things. But then the tension seemed to break as Hope simply began to cry, her head falling to her sister's shoulder as the other simply hugged her and fought against her own tears.
"I just want to rest Merc, I can't take these voices anymore, I just want to go back to when we had mama and everything seemed alright… I just want to go home"
"I know you do… So do I, but we can't and this is what we are now"
Hope only seemed to cry harder at those words, refusing to let Mercy go as Caius continued to feel helpless. Was there nothing he could do to ease her pain?
After what seemed like an eternity for both sisters, Hope seemed to give in to her own exhaustion, her sobs giving way to ragged breathing as the racket from the corridor also seemed to fade away, confirming to Mercy that Hope had fallen to sleep and her clones had vanished with her consciousness. Detaching herself from the sleeping doppelganger, she turned back to Caius with a serious expression, speaking low so as not to wake the other.
"Hope has a lot of pent up rage. When she gets like this, she just needs coaxing to let it out. Give her time to get over the only thing that's helped her over these long years and then maybe you'll be able to get close to her"
She was about to walk away, desperate for somewhere quiet and private to let out her own frustrations, but Caius' voice stopped her as he spoke to her back, annoyed that Mercy refused to turn to face him.
"What happened to you both? What caused you to become the people you are now?"
"Some questions are better left unanswered, and some memories are best left buried"
