(Dollhouse) Secret
Title: Secret
Fandom: Dollhouse
Author: jackiejlh
Rating: PG-13
Character(s): Adelle DeWitt, Mike, November, Oscar, Echo, Topher Brink, Claire Saunders, Victor, Sierra, Alpha
Pairing(s): None
Warning(s): None.
Summary: Adelle has a secret.
Adelle DeWitt has a secret.
~*~
She met Mike when he was known only as Gregory, a tall, handsome blond man who she couldn't seem to imagine being exactly what her sources told her he was. She didn't believe the things she'd heard about him until he invited her to his apartment to talk, and she found that he lived in a one-room hovel with tin foil lining the walls, where he yelled at her for turning on the overhead lights because aliens could see into his brain more easily that way.
"I can offer you a world without fear," she told him a week later, once she'd confirmed with Topher that his delusions could be gotten rid of with a treatment. She added, "A world without aliens," when he looked skeptical.
"They're everywhere," he told her, and refused. Two weeks later he was admitted into a psychiatric ward of the local hospital for the eighth time in his life and she appeared at his bedside, and she only smiled patronizingly when he asked her if she was working with the aliens to steal his brain. Even though he told her again that he wasn't interested-the very idea behind what she was describing was mind-control, and he'd spent a lifetime trying to avoid that-he left the hospital that day in the back of a van.
"I'm trying to help you," she told him as he was sedated and coaxed into the chair. "Your life will be better this way."
When Topher was done with him, Mike was not delusional or paranoid. He never would be again, even with his own personality. At least, that's what Topher claimed. But a gift so large could not be freely given. "Five years," she told him, and he stared at her blankly and asked if he should go.
~*~
Well, she has many secrets, more than most people will ever have in their lives, but this one is particularly damaging.
~*~
Nolan was a long-standing client, and even though Adelle really couldn't stand him, she was rather fond of his patronage and the regular, dependable payments it provided. When he asked her for a favor, she didn't see it as taking away the life of a young girl. The girl's life would be ruined anyway-at least when she left in five years, she wouldn't remember Nolan at all. She'd be a wealthy woman, free of bad memories. This is what Adelle told herself as she ordered Topher to imprint Mike and Romeo with the skills and mindset required to kidnap Priya from her apartment one night.
She arrived crying, fighting, screaming, and they sedated her before bringing her into the House because she'd scare the other dolls. They wiped her before they started the tissue mapping, and once her franticness had been replaced with bland complacency, Adelle went back to her office.
~*~
This secret is so terrible that it would bring her Dollhouse crashing down around her head, so she doesn't say a word.
~*~
Nathan was a would-be referral, the acquaintance of a man who frequented Adelle's office on his trips to Los Angeles. He thought he was visiting a high-priced whorehouse, and when he found out the truth about what the dolls really were, he wanted no part in it, and he intended to tell anyone who would listen exactly what he'd learned.
Adelle never intended to keep him. Just like everyone else who had been a threat to the secrecy of the Dollhouse, she had him brought in for 'reprogramming'. Topher was to scan him, wipe him, edit out the memories in his brain that pertained to the Dollhouse, and then imprint him with his own wedge. The Dollhouse would have another brain scan to add to its collection, and Nathan would walk away unharmed and uninformed, and all would be well.
Except. Except he really was quite attractive. Except he was exactly what Adelle always looked for in potential dolls. Except he was already in the chair.
"Hello, Victor," Topher said an hour later, and Victor blinked at him and asked if he had fallen asleep.
~*~
Laurence Dominic not only knew what evil could be done with technology such as the Dollhouse wielded, he knew that some evil was already being done, and long before she found out that he was an undercover spy, Adelle had begun to doubt him.
~*~
Rossum and its exploits have supplied more than a few Actives. Echo, obviously, after her run-in with them. Caroline was strong-willed, though, and fairly well known after the death of her boyfriend put her on the front page of the local papers. She had to be coaxed. The fact that Rossum was bringing legal action against her hadn't hurt. Getting her to sign her life away to the Dollhouse was perhaps the moment when Adelle felt most accomplished in her powers of persuasion and manipulation.
Sam was brought to the Dollhouse in much the same way. He made a wonderful Oscar.
~*~
Despite how much she really did care for Laurence Dominic, Adelle found herself relieved the day she sent him to the Attic.
~*~
Carl was a psychotic murderer sitting in a prison cell, left in solitary confinement. He wasn't fit to be around other people, they said. Adelle believed differently-he could be reformed. After all, if he wasn't himself, then he wouldn't be dangerous.
Later, she considered Alpha to be her biggest failure, and wondered where, exactly, she'd made her misjudgment.
~*~
Adelle's secret doesn't make her feel guilty, per se, and it doesn't make her feel like she has to justify her actions, even if she does justify them to herself inside her own mind.
~*~
Echo has never really made her nervous. Caroline worried her once, for a few minutes, but never Echo. The one who had begun to scare her was November. Once November was just Madeleine, a woman with more aliases in life than she had as a doll, a woman who killed her baby girl. Adelle sat across the table from her in the dim, dreary prison and saw a broken shell of a person, someone who had learned from her mistakes only once it was too late for it to make any difference.
Adelle had offered her a new life, a removal of the painful memories of her daughter in exchange for five years, and Madeleine had declined. She said that she didn't deserve to forget. That she'd earned her pain, earned her time in prison. And she wanted to remember her daughter because someone had to; such a beautiful and innocent little girl should never be completely forgotten.
The contract had already been signed for three inmates to be handed over to the Dollhouse. Adelle chose Madeleine first, and kept her promise-when she was released, much earlier than had been originally intended, she remembered her daughter, but not that she'd been the one to kill the child. She mourned for her loss, but didn't hate herself as much, and she walked out of the Dollhouse a whole person despite entering it a shattered one. Adelle didn't watch her leave.
~*~
The secret is that no one has ever actually volunteered to become a doll. Not really. Some have signed the paperwork, but only because they were given no other option. Topher believes most of the dolls did volunteer; he needs to believe that. Dr. Saunders knows only what she needs to, and most of the handlers are unaware of how their dolls arrived in the Dollhouse. A few truths have been hard to hide, or have come out-Sierra, Alpha, Oscar-but others have never been told. The other Houses run primarily on volunteers only, but that's so… limiting. The very best dolls are usually the ones that had to be manipulated, tricked, forced. It's what makes her House the most popular, and what keeps her out of trouble despite the problems that have cropped up as of late. With the exception of Alpha, Adelle has never been wrong.
She's kept her secret well, and she refuses to think that she's really harming anyone. After all, she's providing them all with a better life, when it's all over, and most of them weren't living what she'd really call a life anyway. This is giving their lives meaning without providing the opportunity for them to mess it up. This is better. This is merciful. And she doesn't feel guilty.
But she doesn't sleep all that well, either.
Fandom: Dollhouse
Author: jackiejlh
Rating: PG-13
Character(s): Adelle DeWitt, Mike, November, Oscar, Echo, Topher Brink, Claire Saunders, Victor, Sierra, Alpha
Pairing(s): None
Warning(s): None.
Summary: Adelle has a secret.
Adelle DeWitt has a secret.
~*~
She met Mike when he was known only as Gregory, a tall, handsome blond man who she couldn't seem to imagine being exactly what her sources told her he was. She didn't believe the things she'd heard about him until he invited her to his apartment to talk, and she found that he lived in a one-room hovel with tin foil lining the walls, where he yelled at her for turning on the overhead lights because aliens could see into his brain more easily that way.
"I can offer you a world without fear," she told him a week later, once she'd confirmed with Topher that his delusions could be gotten rid of with a treatment. She added, "A world without aliens," when he looked skeptical.
"They're everywhere," he told her, and refused. Two weeks later he was admitted into a psychiatric ward of the local hospital for the eighth time in his life and she appeared at his bedside, and she only smiled patronizingly when he asked her if she was working with the aliens to steal his brain. Even though he told her again that he wasn't interested-the very idea behind what she was describing was mind-control, and he'd spent a lifetime trying to avoid that-he left the hospital that day in the back of a van.
"I'm trying to help you," she told him as he was sedated and coaxed into the chair. "Your life will be better this way."
When Topher was done with him, Mike was not delusional or paranoid. He never would be again, even with his own personality. At least, that's what Topher claimed. But a gift so large could not be freely given. "Five years," she told him, and he stared at her blankly and asked if he should go.
~*~
Well, she has many secrets, more than most people will ever have in their lives, but this one is particularly damaging.
~*~
Nolan was a long-standing client, and even though Adelle really couldn't stand him, she was rather fond of his patronage and the regular, dependable payments it provided. When he asked her for a favor, she didn't see it as taking away the life of a young girl. The girl's life would be ruined anyway-at least when she left in five years, she wouldn't remember Nolan at all. She'd be a wealthy woman, free of bad memories. This is what Adelle told herself as she ordered Topher to imprint Mike and Romeo with the skills and mindset required to kidnap Priya from her apartment one night.
She arrived crying, fighting, screaming, and they sedated her before bringing her into the House because she'd scare the other dolls. They wiped her before they started the tissue mapping, and once her franticness had been replaced with bland complacency, Adelle went back to her office.
~*~
This secret is so terrible that it would bring her Dollhouse crashing down around her head, so she doesn't say a word.
~*~
Nathan was a would-be referral, the acquaintance of a man who frequented Adelle's office on his trips to Los Angeles. He thought he was visiting a high-priced whorehouse, and when he found out the truth about what the dolls really were, he wanted no part in it, and he intended to tell anyone who would listen exactly what he'd learned.
Adelle never intended to keep him. Just like everyone else who had been a threat to the secrecy of the Dollhouse, she had him brought in for 'reprogramming'. Topher was to scan him, wipe him, edit out the memories in his brain that pertained to the Dollhouse, and then imprint him with his own wedge. The Dollhouse would have another brain scan to add to its collection, and Nathan would walk away unharmed and uninformed, and all would be well.
Except. Except he really was quite attractive. Except he was exactly what Adelle always looked for in potential dolls. Except he was already in the chair.
"Hello, Victor," Topher said an hour later, and Victor blinked at him and asked if he had fallen asleep.
~*~
Laurence Dominic not only knew what evil could be done with technology such as the Dollhouse wielded, he knew that some evil was already being done, and long before she found out that he was an undercover spy, Adelle had begun to doubt him.
~*~
Rossum and its exploits have supplied more than a few Actives. Echo, obviously, after her run-in with them. Caroline was strong-willed, though, and fairly well known after the death of her boyfriend put her on the front page of the local papers. She had to be coaxed. The fact that Rossum was bringing legal action against her hadn't hurt. Getting her to sign her life away to the Dollhouse was perhaps the moment when Adelle felt most accomplished in her powers of persuasion and manipulation.
Sam was brought to the Dollhouse in much the same way. He made a wonderful Oscar.
~*~
Despite how much she really did care for Laurence Dominic, Adelle found herself relieved the day she sent him to the Attic.
~*~
Carl was a psychotic murderer sitting in a prison cell, left in solitary confinement. He wasn't fit to be around other people, they said. Adelle believed differently-he could be reformed. After all, if he wasn't himself, then he wouldn't be dangerous.
Later, she considered Alpha to be her biggest failure, and wondered where, exactly, she'd made her misjudgment.
~*~
Adelle's secret doesn't make her feel guilty, per se, and it doesn't make her feel like she has to justify her actions, even if she does justify them to herself inside her own mind.
~*~
Echo has never really made her nervous. Caroline worried her once, for a few minutes, but never Echo. The one who had begun to scare her was November. Once November was just Madeleine, a woman with more aliases in life than she had as a doll, a woman who killed her baby girl. Adelle sat across the table from her in the dim, dreary prison and saw a broken shell of a person, someone who had learned from her mistakes only once it was too late for it to make any difference.
Adelle had offered her a new life, a removal of the painful memories of her daughter in exchange for five years, and Madeleine had declined. She said that she didn't deserve to forget. That she'd earned her pain, earned her time in prison. And she wanted to remember her daughter because someone had to; such a beautiful and innocent little girl should never be completely forgotten.
The contract had already been signed for three inmates to be handed over to the Dollhouse. Adelle chose Madeleine first, and kept her promise-when she was released, much earlier than had been originally intended, she remembered her daughter, but not that she'd been the one to kill the child. She mourned for her loss, but didn't hate herself as much, and she walked out of the Dollhouse a whole person despite entering it a shattered one. Adelle didn't watch her leave.
~*~
The secret is that no one has ever actually volunteered to become a doll. Not really. Some have signed the paperwork, but only because they were given no other option. Topher believes most of the dolls did volunteer; he needs to believe that. Dr. Saunders knows only what she needs to, and most of the handlers are unaware of how their dolls arrived in the Dollhouse. A few truths have been hard to hide, or have come out-Sierra, Alpha, Oscar-but others have never been told. The other Houses run primarily on volunteers only, but that's so… limiting. The very best dolls are usually the ones that had to be manipulated, tricked, forced. It's what makes her House the most popular, and what keeps her out of trouble despite the problems that have cropped up as of late. With the exception of Alpha, Adelle has never been wrong.
She's kept her secret well, and she refuses to think that she's really harming anyone. After all, she's providing them all with a better life, when it's all over, and most of them weren't living what she'd really call a life anyway. This is giving their lives meaning without providing the opportunity for them to mess it up. This is better. This is merciful. And she doesn't feel guilty.
But she doesn't sleep all that well, either.