A/N: Written for HSWW (Challenges & Assignments)
Assignment #6: write a witch/wizard being trapped. (Interpret this however you want, just be creative)
Extra Prompts: Word: soap
October Event: Around The World in Thirty-One Days
Country 134: Paraguay: Word: Pressure
Word Count: approx. 1k
The whistle of a tea kettle tears through the silence. Confused, he looks around to find the source of the sound. It stops.
Then it starts again – the shrill scream of steam which flees its prison after the pressure became too much. He closes his eyes to listen, really listen. He moves his head from right to left and back again but the volume stays the same. It stops.
He's ready when it appears the next time. Listening hard, moving with caution. That's when he notices that the sound escapes from his own mouth. His lips are perfectly formed to press the air out and produce the high note. Why is he making that sound again? Oh yeah, that's right, it's because he is a tea kettle.
~oOo~
It takes a while until he doubts his existence as a kitchen object, it takes a while until he registers other people. Images are flying through his head and try to come to the fore but they are too fast and slippery to really catch. Each one leaves him in a different state though. There are those images which warm his body and leave him content and then there are those which frighten him even though he doesn't know why. It's all sluggish but nevertheless, his hair stands on end and something cold runs down his spine. It's those moments in which he starts whistling again.
A woman enters the room. She's kind, he thinks. She enters and leaves and enters and leaves. He doesn't know why she doesn't just stay but as long as she comes back it's fine with him.
One day she calls him Broderick and he smiles. Something is right about this word and he holds firmly onto it lest it slips away again. His lips move to form the word and though no sound escapes them it feels familiar. Afterwards, the images don't move so fast anymore.
~oOo~
'Get it, now! Stretch out your arm and take it down! NOW!'
He wakes up bathed in sweat and fear is clawing its way into his mind. Heart racing and hands shaking he tries to move away from it all. He knows the inevitable pain is just seconds away because he can't, he mustn't touch the glowing orb. But he can't move, he's not allowed to unless the voice tells him otherwise, he's trapped, trapped inside his own body.
Fighting against the force that's holding him in its clutch, he rocks his body around, the strength needed to move an inch is enormous but he grits his teeth to assemble the energy. The panic makes sure his muscles react and then - he falls.
The woman is there in an instant. He wants to tell her about the voice and warn her that danger is coming although he doesn't know which kind of danger and so he tries, tries with all his might to form the words. A sound escapes his lips but it's just noise and he notices with horror that her mouth stretches into a smile, a genuine smile. She doesn't understand. She's talking about how great it is that he has moved on his own accord and how wonderful it is that he's found his voice. Nevertheless, he mumbles on and on and hopes that someone will understand what it is that is happening.
The image fades away though, like water running through his finger. This time however, he is sure that it is a memory rather than a nightmare because there's something profound in the way he feels. It's not really like water running through his fingers more like a piece of soap, solid but slippery, escaping his desperately grabbing hands.
~oOo~
Broderick gets better. He can feel it. Every day that passes the images become clearer, more explicit, his voice gets stronger and his muscles listen to his own commands. He's still not feeling right, the nightmares still pester his dreams, his mind is still sluggish but he almost doesn't think of himself as a tea kettle anymore. Every day. A timestamp he wasn't able to grasp a few months before.
The woman, Miriam, comes into the room with a thing in her hand. A magic thing - it can spit water. She shows him how to care for the green plant next to his bed and leaves. Broderick is excited about the task as he noticed that his movements become more exact whenever he concentrates on something, his mind becomes clearer. He's almost resembling himself again.
When the plant's tentacles snake around his neck he's a bit surprised. When it takes control over his arms he gets scared and angry. Angry, because he worked so hard to become the master over his own body once more, scared because the feeling is so familiar. The thought is yanked away from his mind quickly, though, as everything goes black.
~oOo~
Broderick Bode had been a peculiar man with a peculiar job. Early on, Broderick had noticed that he disliked boundaries. As long as one's mind searches for more there is more. This had been his opinion and one of the main reasons why he decided to become an Unspeakable. Also, he had been claustrophobic which seemed just to fit in. No, Broderick Bode hadn't been fond of limitation.
It is tragic, really, that in the last months of his life he had been trapped in so many ways.
First, by an Imperio, which left him with no control over his thoughts nor his body. Then by the prophecy's protection spell. A spell which let him believe he was a tea kettle of all things. Pressured into insanity. Trapped inside an illusion, trapped inside his mind. Not even in his final moments was he granted to die as a free man. Bound by a plant he had cared for, its tentacles squeezing the air from his lungs, choking him to death.
Ironically, Broderick Bode's body had been found smiling. I like to think it's because he's free at last.
