Title: We Were Born To Die
Raiting: M
Disclaimer: 18+ This story depicts descriptive sexual acts and may contain adult content not suitable for most adults.
A/N: To ensure the progression of this story and to simplify and condense such long chapters I've gone back and reformated my story. I would like to apologize for the massive spam of alerts on my part for the reboot of this story. To clear any confusion what was previously "Shoot and Ladders" Chapter 14 is now Chapter 45 & 46. Any updates after that will be the continual of the tale of Tate and Nira. (Reviews Are Always Appreciated)
Nira continued to pound and kick at the door, she was frantic to get out of this room. She refused to be trapped in this grave. The room was alive with pain, fear, regret and torment she had never encountered in her short time in life. It pulsated in every crevasse, the walls vibrating to life. Nira was terrified, she was trapped and alone in the dark confines, no escape in site.
She collapsed to her knees, hand clinging to the door handle, as she continued to bang her head against the door. Her body shook from the sob building inside her, the utter torment she felt herself under boiling to a fever pitch about to explode from deep inside.
The hand was little and delicate that placed itself on her shoulder. Her heart stopped as fear took over from the unexpected presence in the dark room. She uncontrollably began to tremble as the shock overtook her system.
"Don't be sad." The voice was young and innocent.
"Angie?" Nira's word left in a shuddered whisper.
Another set of arms wrapped around her neck. "We miss you."
Nira wrapped her arms around the silhouette of the little figures that appeared before her. She began to cry uncontrollably as the shadows before her hugged and clung to her body. "I'm so sorry I wasn't there for you girls. It's all my fault."
Her sob echoed through the house, Tate could hear her crying and it broke his heart over and over he couldn't come to her and comfort her. He pulled against the chains, only to be left more fatigued and exhausted. Constance and Larry had left him alone in the attic, going off to do whatever. Leaving both Nira and Tate imprisoned in the house.
The movement from the corner of the room caught Nira's eye. The burned remains of her mother appeared before her. "There are many to blame."
Nira never let go of her grip of her sisters. The look in her eyes poured out the contempt and distaste she had for her mother. "How could you do this? You hurt the wrong people. Why not Larry or Constance? Why couldn't you take the two people who deserved it most?"
She was screaming now, her body consumed with the rage that poured out. "Why them?"
Her mother looked down at the daughters she had failed in the living and continued to destroy in the afterlife. "Someone had to feel my pain."
Nira looked into the gloss filled eyes. "How could you make them feel your pain? Why couldn't you wait for me, I would have taken their place."
The hand that reached out to caress Nira's cheek was that from a horror film, the bones clearly visible, covered with a thin burnt layer of flesh and tendons. The feel of the scorched flesh would have repulsed others, but Nira moved her cheek into her mothers hand. A warm feeling growing inside only a mother could invoke.
"I was much like you when I was younger." Her voice was coarse, filled with a resentment that the dead naturally held for the living. "I didn't have your strength though." Her fingers moved to Nira's hair, brushing the hair from her face. "I never encountered darkness until you were born and I saw it in your eyes."
Nira was taken back by her mother's last confession.
Lorraine continued to look down at her daughter. "I understand now, this house has a way of making you embrace the… darker things in life."
Nira felt repulsion towards the dark twist this had taken, she was always one attracted to it like a moth to the flame. But now she saw things in a new light. It clicked in her head, that was it. She was finally seeing light in her life, revealing just exactly what was hidden in the depths of the shadows.
"Was I really this ugly? Consumed with that much hate?" Nira's voice betrayed her, she was shaking, realization seeping in of the contradiction of her actions and her ability to rationalize everything to end in her favor.
"Only a mother can see the demons that battle inside the eyes of their child."
Nira snickered as she looked up at Lorraine. "In death you use the term mother rather loosely. Shame you couldn't be that when you were alive."
"Between your father's constant need to be in control and your dark desire to break and control people you both left me destroyed and the shell I died as."
Her fingers dug into Nira's scalp. "You say how I was never a mother to these girls, you never allowed me. The day they were born your scorned me in your mind as an unfit mother."
Nira began to see flashes play before her eyes, home movies of events she had buried long ago.
"You isolated me from my own daughters."
Each word stabbed deeper inside Nira's chest.
"You've taken lives before, I made the mistake of denying what you were, who you are."
Nira couldn't stop the malicious grin that proudly splayed on her face.
"I blindly accepted your messes and cleaned them up, sweeping it under the rug. The same way I pushed aside your fathers infidelity."
She paused looking at the mess before her that she had created. "Look at you, as much as you struggle with your own pain and the torment you have inflicted on others, you still marvel in it. Enjoying every moment of it."
Lorraine wiped away the stray tear that fell down Nira's cheek. "In death I have found the strength to forgive you. I understand how this invisible force takes hold of you, the rush it pumps through you."
"I've come to find I am the invisible force that controls the weak willed around me." Nira's words made Lorraine shiver in fear, even in death she couldn't stop herself from being scared of her own daughter.
Lorraine knelt down before Nira. "I have an eternity to decipher how I can love you, yet hate you so much. Even though you played your hand in my breakdown I can't completely condemn you knowing how amazing and loved you made these little girls."
Nira felt the familiar tightening in her chest, constricting her ability to breath and process. "How can something devoid of emotion and empathy make anyone feel loved?"
Lorraine just laughed as she hugged her daughter. "My poor naive daughter, when will you open your eyes and see that the only thing depriving you of emotions and happiness is yourself. You've become so accustomed to pain and sorrow for so long your not even capable to function with out it."
"Nira will you play with us?" The burned remains of hands tugged on her, pulling her over to a table that had appeared, set up for a tea party breaking Nira from the trance she was under from the conversation with her mother.