Author's Note: Hey, taking a few minutes off from another story to get this one out of my skull. It's my first Dollhouse piece. Hope it's not my last. Feedback always welcomed and encouraged. Much thanks.
She freely admits - at least to herself - that she's a complicated woman.
She is drawn to the innocence of idealism, but repulsed by the naivety of it.
She clearly knows right from wrong, but finds that she prefers neither. Instead, she is drawn to the grays on the palette.
A little bit lighter this one.
A great deal darker that one.
She's a woman who has never needed a man, but has also never minded having one near by.
Now, in the space of twelve hours, she is down the two most important men in her life.
Roger. Never real, painful in the same way that realizing that all of your dreams are just childish illusions. Letting him go hurts, but she knows she'll get through it.
She'll just harden up and move forward.
Forget about him.
Dominic is different.
Harder,,,no, impossible to forget about.
He was her…does she dare to say it? Perhaps. Only to herself then.
He was her colleague. Confidant.
Out with it then.
Friend.
He was her friend.
Only perhaps not.
She always knew Roger wasn't real, but she though Dominic was.
He challenged her, protected her and walked with her.
Three years.
None of it real.
She remembers his face now. How he looked at her, eyes wide, begging for mercy.
How she gave none. How she couldn't dare.
Because the others were watching.
Because he had done something to her that she hadn't thought still possible.
He had hurt her.
And for that, he had to pay.
Quietly, as the minutes on her clock tick past, she feels something. Remorse? Guilt? Regret?
She isn't sure.
It's a horrible thing; the attic. She has done everything she could to keep from sending broken dolls or fallen staff there.
She has always figured that even death was better.
She had given that to Hearn.
Dominic though, well no, this was too personal.
He had tried to kill himself, shot her instead.
Just a graze.
Her eyes had stayed on him. Locked on his. Seeing his fear.
Delighting in it even as her stomach convulsed with revulsion.
"Do it."
Signing his death warranty as if it were a business transaction.
His words, not hers, even if she had agreed to them.
She thinks about that now, thinks about what he must be going through.
Dolls, even in their blank states, are capable of communication and conversation. They're like child, fragile and uncertain, the big picture just out of their grasps.
Those in the attic, well they don't even have that. They can't grasp the where or when of anything. They know they exist, but have no concept of what that existence means. They spend forever trying to finish one single sentence.
One sentence that will make everything right.
"I am…"
They never get past "am".
She knows she can fix things. If she wanted to that is.
She can have Dominic brought down and put back in the chair. She can have all of his memories returned to him. The process isn't difficult. They do it each time one of the Actives completes their contract.
If she wanted to, she knows she could help him finish the question he's currently struggling with.
"I am…"
She could tell him that his name is Laurence Dominic and that for three years, he was her right hand man and the one person she allowed herself to completely trust.
She could tell him that she never saw his betrayal coming and that because of that, she doesn't think she could ever forgive him it.
She could tell him that she has spent many years making herself strong and what he did compromised that strength.
She could tell him that the only way she could put herself back together again is by tearing him apart.
It's cold. It's vicious.
It's a business transaction.
It's personal vendetta.
She thinks about his office, how's it's full of his things. She thinks she'll try to get in early so that she can clean it out herself.
She'll store everything away in neat boxes. She won't label them.
She wants to forget him.
She knows she can't.
She told Topher to lose his memories in the archive somewhere.
She knows exactly where they are.
She knows that she's the one person who could help him finish the sentence.
"I am…"
She thinks killing him would have been merciful for both of them. She could have just forgotten about him.
But now she thinks about how he's up there, trying to finish the sentence desperately.
"I am…"
It's her torture as much as his.
Her punishment as much as his.
She knows she let her guard down.
She won't make that mistake again.
But nor can she stop thinking about helping him finish the sentence.
It's complicated.
-Fin.