This one is an imagined S6 dollhouse fic.
Chapter 13: Monster
Character: Hanna
Quote: We are all monsters in the end. (Victor Frankenstein)
She's so tired of being a puppet to a madman.
At night when she turns away from the camera and pretends to sleep, she imagines killing the puppet-master. It would be difficult, but she could claim self-defence, defence of herself and her friends. They would back her up, she is sure.
(it's happened like this before, one of them killing in self-defence and the others protecting her)
She wishes she could consult the others, ask Emily and Aria how it felt to take a life, wonders what it'd be like to watch the life drain from someone's eyes.
Wishes she could ask Mona and Spencer, the cleverest of them all, how she could feasibly do it. There's probably no poison lying around, or if it is then it's stashed where only A can use it. It rules out stealthy food tampering and ruined coffee.
After a while she gives up plotting murder and falls asleep dreaming of a masked figure lying crumpled at the bottom of the stairs.
Instead, she begins trying to analyse every situation she finds herself in, tries to see where a fatal accident might occur and regrets that she didn't shove A down the stairs the night of the prom.
Now, she watches for the potential fatality, tries to figure out how thin the line between manslaughter and murder is, tries to see how self-defence would shadow it all. Problem is, she can't consult with the others because there are so few opportunities for them all to be alone without the extra watchful presence. She can't ask about murder and killing, because she's certain A is just that paranoid.
(probably A is expecting assassination attempts, that's why there's all the cameras and intercoms set up. there needs to be a safe space for A to be a lunatic)
Instead, she moves through the time in the dollhouse as if in a dream. Alone she shuts herself off, puts away her thoughts and stops reacting because A thrives on her reactions, loves it when she loses her temper. It's all a taunt: she can thrash around and stomp, scream and yell but at the end of the day she can do nothing because A still has all the control.
When she's with the others she focuses, brings them into her mind a bit – only just enough to get a sense of how she's supposed to react.
It seems this may be how Mona faked her own brainwashing, going along compliantly in front of the cameras and then putting away the persona when the electricity is down. She follows suit, tugs on the dull blonde extensions she's wearing, and returns to her dorky persona.
They can't communicate. After the first few times they tried to outwit A, and the first few punishments, they all fell into line. She sees it in Spencer, who bows her head and doles out tasks as needed. Emily, whose defiance burns out and the only embers that remain are in her eyes. She watches Mona, who has been here longest, and expertly flickers between her two personalities,
(sometimes, watching Mona, it's like watching some magic at work, the way her features smooth out and go blank and then her voice takes on a different lilt)
and Aria who gripes quietly about the madness that is their existence but does nothing to act out.
She feels like they're all doomed and she's pretty sure they all feel it too.
They drag on, re-creating various life events: A seems to have unlimited budgets to put up a barn, to recreate forests and outfits and whole days in their lives. It's unsettling and creepy and there are so many other words she doesn't know, but she doesn't want to know.
Eventually though the opportunity comes. They're recreating the time they went to the Ice Ball, A placing Mona in Alison's role and the other four flanking her.
She's not quite sure how long they have all been here, recreating Alison's life with Mona in the role of Alison, but it's been way too long.
They all walk down the steps, one stair behind Mona, and she makes sure she teeters on her overly tall thin heels. (The shoes became too tall when she realized they're a liability, when she realized that she can't run in them, but right now they're an asset)
Spencer, walking to her right, steadies her briefly. As she thought, A is waiting midway on the staircase, evidently intending to escort Mona the rest of the way down.
It all happens as if choreographed: her ankle gives out, the delicate heel snapping under her foot. She pitches forward, directly into A, reaching out as if to steady herself.
Instead, the combination of smooth floor and smooth-soled shoes, and the impact of her jolt sends A tumbling backwards, down to the bottom of the staircase. It isn't a long fall, but she's sure there's a snap.
The others pull her from the floor, brushing the grime from her dress in an old habit. A quick scan of her legs reveals scrapes and already-forming bruises.
She begins to shake as below her, Aria checks for a pulse and shakes her head.
Mona joins Aria, checking for a pulse – just in case.
She clings to Spencer and Emily, musters up a few horrified whimpers, and they smooth her hair back, promise that it wasn't her fault.
Hands linked, and clinging to the rails, the three of them descend to the others. There is no pulse, no sign of breath – no rising and falling chest. The five of them stand over a body with a twisted neck and already it seems death has set in.
This person, the one they've all been thinking of as Charles, lies at their feet like a rag doll, or a puppet whose strings have been cut. A looks smaller, pathetic. They step back, as if expecting a sudden awakening, but it doesn't come.
She hugs herself, stares at the ground as if repenting. Only she can't quite muster the guilt she needs.
(it doesn't matter. this was an accident, one that frees them from the shackles of this A, and anyway, she might just be in shock right now.)
There's really only one thing left to do at this point. They start to make their way out, trying to find the best way out that won't get them all electrocuted or killed in some other painful way –
But first, Mona lingers. She brings up the rear of them, then returns to the body. They follow her, watch as she checks to make sure A is really dead
(he is)
and then she lifts the mask.