"Do you know what really drew me to you? What it was about you that called to me, as soon as I saw you for the first time?"
Jessica Jones's nails cut into the palms of her skin from her balled fists, and every muscle of her body held taut with her apprehensive fury. She kept her eyes on the slender man across from her, loathing every detail of his purple-clad figure, every cell of his body down to every particle of his DNA. She was antisocial by nature, but only Kevin Kilgrave had ever inspired such levels of hatred from her- equal also to her level of fear of him.
"Probably your penis," she said caustically. "It seemed to lead the way every time you raped me."
"Oh, always back to that, you just can't ever let that go," Kilgrave scoffed, waving a dismissive hand, as though she had brought up a small, petty matter of disagreement rather than repeated violations that still left her unable to sleep without nightmares or get through a day without panic attacks and excessive drinking, over a year later. "I seem to remember you enjoying yourself very much, at the time, and I also seem to remember that I put plenty of effort into pleasuring you, penis-free, quite often, not that you have much gratitude for it now."
"Don't make me vomit- or rip your tongue out," Jessica bristled, unable to suppress the shudder that came over her at the unwanted flicker of memory or the bile that burned the back of her throat. "Why can't you ever just shut the fuck up? You say you're so into me, seems to me what you're really so in love with is the sound of your own damn voice."
"I do have a soothing cadence to my words when I put a mind to it," Kilgrave said breezily, seemingly unoffended. "And a decent singing voice, as you well know. Better than yours, but you have your charms all the same."
Jessica suspected sometimes that half his enjoyment of his pursuit of her was the verbal and mental sparring she forced him to engage in. Her resistance to him, something he was so very unaccustomed to in any other, must be both maddening and exhilarating to him, like a puzzle he was not quite able to solve.
She turned her face away from him, a muscle flexing in her jaw, but her lack of response did not discourage Kilgrave from continuing. Instead he stepped closer.
"I was drawn to you, Jessica, because I could see that you were like me."
"The fuck I am!" Jessica sputtered, her head whipping around with such force that strands of her hair slapped her own pale cheeks as she directed a glare any sensible being would have withered under in Kilgrave's direction. "You're not just a raping, kidnapping, murdering sadist-"
"Ah, ah, I never murdered anyone, Jessica, please be accurate- I'll have you recall that the only one of us to ever lay an assaulting hand on someone was you," Kilgrave interrupted calmly, but Jessica was seeing red and barreled over his interruption with her continued onslaught of furious words.
"-Sadistic psychopathic bastard, you're delusional too! Under what warped mindset do you figure being so-called fucking "lucky" enough to also happen to have have supernatural abilities makes me anywhere near being like you?!"
"I'm not referring to your strength, Jessica, or your endurance, or even that falling trick of yours," Kilgrave clarified calmly, shrugging his shoulders. "Of course those are part of your appeal, it isn't exactly common to meet people with our abilities, and certainly not ones with your beauty. But even if those things caught my attention, they aren't what held it."
He paused, making certain Jessica was listening, that her eyes were on his, before continuing.
"What mattered to me, Jessica, is that I could see you were like me in who you are. You might deny it, but a part of you knows you could be me, with a few changes of detail. You are like me- you just won't let yourself give in to it."
"I could never be like you, Kevin," Jessica spat out, her jaw twinging with pain at how hard she was clinching her teeth. "I never will be. You saw what you wanted to see."
"Oh, aren't you, though?" Kilgrave challenged, eyebrows lifting. "You try so hard to play the hero, Jessica, as much as you deny it, but somehow, it always fails. Your helpless victims lose their lives or livelihood, their sanity or self-respect. You never really help anyone, not how it matters, and you never really make a difference or change. The only thing you've been able to do with any level of permanence is kill people."
She started towards him, her blood heated with aggressive intention, but her body refused to respond to her brain's commands, keeping her motionless, arms still taut at her sides. Jessica fought with her own limbs, attempting to force herself to walk, to hit out, but they refused to respond to her, refused to acknowledge her attempts of control. Stunned, panic rising up her chest, she tried to speak, but her voice too seemed beyond her ability to utilize.
This shouldn't be happening- she had been immune to Kilgrave's power, he could not force his will on her. He hadn't even commanded her- at least, she hadn't heard it, or couldn't remember hearing it. How was this possible, how had this happened?
Even as she struggled, Kilgrave was smiling, self-satisfied as always, nodding as though she were somehow giving evidence to his claims.
"Well, isn't this fun?" he remarked. "I have you where I want you- polite, present, and entirely focused on me. You know, Jessica, you could see for yourself what it's like to have this power, how easy and enjoyable it really is to have someone so fully under your control." He paused, dramatic and deliberate, before saying in mock surprise, "Oh, right, you do know, don't you? You do the very same thing, don't you? You draw control with your fists and your threats, I draw control with words and mental overtaking- it all comes to the same end, it's bending another person's actions to your will for them, however you go about it. We both get what we want, and we both get a thrill from it, whether you admit it or not. We both know, every time, that it's only proving that we are stronger and smarter and better than others."
He leaned in closer still, his breath stirring the skin of Jessica's cheek.
"And yet you tell yourself, Jessica, that you are not like me?"
He was speaking out Jessica's darkest, most deeply buried fear, putting words to what she could rarely let herself even acknowledge in thought. She had spat out in defiance to Kilgrave on multiple occasions how very different she was from him, how she abhorred his way of engaging in the world- how she hated him.
And yet Jessica hated herself too, more often than not. How could she deny that her presence in the world had probably made things worse for more people than it made better? How could she deny that her actions had ruined so many people's worlds?
She didn't want to be like Kilgrave. But desire didn't necessarily equal reality, and this was what Jessica dreaded to be true.
She could feel tears scald the backs of her eyes and fought not to let them free, not to allow Kilgrave to see the depth of fear and emotion in their surface. She could tell from his smug smile that she was not successful.
Kilgrave's finger reached out, lightly tracing the curve of Jessica's cheek. She wanted to bite the offending appendage off of his hand, but could only manage to blink.
"You could try it out, you know. Being like me, putting me on like an expensive suit and strolling around in my ways, just to see how it makes you feel. Come on, Jessica- what could it hurt?"
It would hurt whoever was unfortunate enough to cross her path, of course, nearly as much as it would hurt Jessica herself to do it. But Kilgrave never had possessed even a modicum of empathy.
"Go on, Jessica, try it out," he insisted, laying his hand flat against her cheek, looking into her eyes and speaking with the gentle croon of an affectionate lover- as he no doubt perceived himself to be. "Go out on the street, take some useless bloke by the throat, knock him around like you would any other ponce who got in your way, and drag him off to some empty warehouse. Tie him up and torture him a bit, or get someone else to do it for you, whichever you prefer. Do it, Jessica, and then tell me- aren't you getting off on it, just a little bit? Just like me?"
He twirled a strand of her hair around his finger, giving it a light tug, and then pressed a kiss against the lobe of her ear, letting his lips drag up its curve before whispering directly inside it.
"Do it, Jessica, and then try and tell me we aren't one and the same."
His sharp white teeth nipped at her ear's shell, and finally Jessica managed to summon the strength to force air up and out from her lungs, releasing it in a sharp scream of protest. Her head spun, a strong jerking sensation tugging through her skin, and her vision dimmed, her thoughts blanking out along with it.
88
Jessica's body twitched, a muscle in her neck sending out a spasm of pain directly into her skull. Dark red spots pulsed in front of her closed eyes, and although she didn't attempt to move immediately, she was aware of feeling nauseous, dizzy, and unsteady on her feet. She sensed rather than knew with certainty that she was standing; nevertheless, she kept her eyes closed for several more seconds, waiting until some of her initial vertigo began to fade in intensity.
Before she opened her eyes, she could already tell that she was somewhere unfamiliar. She could smell a musty, stale odor in the air, mingled with gasoline, rust, and a smell similar to pennies. The latter made her suck in a sharp breath, swallowing in dread, for she recognized it as the smell of blood.
She knew even without the assistance of vision that she was not in her apartment, nor Trish's or anyone else's she was familiar with. The ground beneath her feet was hard, likely concrete from the feel under her boots, and the air was cold and empty in a way that even older apartments didn't feel. This was not a place that someone had been living, or at least not for longer than an night or two. And yet she was not outside, returning to consciousness after a night of binge drinking in an alley or on the streets.
So where the hell was she?
Opening her eyes slowly, Jessica took in her surroundings, seeing that her assumptions had been correct. She was standing in what appeared to be some sort of warehouse or garage, one that was rarely utilized or accessed, from the filthy, rundown look of the place and its contents. It was not a place she remembered having been before, and she still could not place what sequence of events would have lead her there- or even how much time might have passed that she could not recall. Had she been unconscious? But then how had she been standing?
She felt the back of her head, then her forehead gingerly, finding no wound to indicate that she had injured, and noted that no other part of her body appeared to be either. So that meant she had either developed dementia at a very early age, or else she had experienced some sort of blackout, likely from drinking.
Exhaling, Jessica turned around, scanning the building for its exit or for however it was that she had gained entrance.
She almost missed seeing the other figure in the room, misinterpreting his outline to be mere shadow rather than an actual human being's form. When he twitched, then lifted his head to look directly at her with bloodshot eyes, Jessica's breath sputtered in her throat, and she barely managed to bite back a scream.
Someone else was in the building with her, someone that Jessica was sure she had never seen before. He was a man approximately of her own age, white, slim to the point of frail, with uncombed greasy hair and patches of stubble on his cheeks and chin. He stared at her, chest heaving without rhythm to his breaths, eyes wide with fear, but made no move either to attack her or flee. He couldn't have. The man was chained against the wall, arms stretched out uncomfortably over his head so his muscles were pulled to strained limit to support him. His face was marred with cuts and bruises, and Jessica could see blood drying on his torn shirt.
Heart galloping to erratic speed, Jessica's head swiveled back and forth, eyes scanning the room's interior for any other previously unseen inhabitants- especially those of the man's tormentor. She hurried to check all areas that an assailant could potentially be hiding behind, ready to catch her by surprise in an attack. When no ill-intended would be assassin revealed himself, she whirled back to the man against the wall, hands up in unconscious fists still as she looked him over, assessing his injuries without touching him. He didn't look as though he were about to drop dead any time soon, but he was definitely in need of medical assistance.
The man appeared to be watching her warily, not bothering to speak, perhaps too much in shock to make the effort. Jessica's thoughts tumbled over each other in her hurried effort to make sense of what was happening, of what insanity she had just found herself inside of. Had they both been kidnapped? Or had the man kidnapped her, drugged her or rendered her briefly unconscious, and she repaid him by chaining him against the wall when she came to? That could explain her disorientation. But who the hell was he, and what would he want with her?
"What the fuck is going on?" she asked him, her words harsh and abrupt. "Where the hell are we?"
"Wh….what?" the man stammered, pupils dilating further. When she took a step towards him, he flinched visibly, turning his face away from her. "How the hell do I know that?"
"Who are you?" Jessica demanded, not backing off, despite registering his fear of her. "Why are we here?"
"Why are we here?!" the man repeated her question with disbelief, staring at Jessica as though he found the question to be somehow unreasonable. "Lady, again, I don't have a clue!"
As Jessica lifted her hands up in a frustrated gesture, the man cried out, shutting his eyes and twisting his head and body as much as he were capable in an effort to shield himself from an anticipated blow. Seeing his genuine terror, Jessica made herself take in a breath and release it, attempting to force her body to ease the tension if emanated, even as her muscles remained tight with her strain.
"Okay, okay, let's back this up," she muttered, as much to herself as to the man she was speaking to. "Try this one. Just tell me who the fuck you are, then, all right? What's your name?"
"Nolan, Nolan Watts," the man answered, seeming relieved to finally have an answer to give her. "Listen, I don't know anything else, please, if you just let me go-"
"Are they still around here?" she interrupted him, not recognizing the name and so dismissing him as being anyone she could possibly have somehow involved in her life.
When Nolan blinked, not seeming to understand, she clarified.
"The person, or people, who did this to you. How long ago did they go? Could they still be nearby?"
Nolan's mouth opened, but no words came out from it initially. His reply to Jessica was slow in coming, and very careful, as though not quite certain that he was speaking a language she understood.
"They- they didn't go. They're still here."
Heart leaping to her throat, Jessica spun around, again searching the perimeter of the room with her eyes. She could not see even the smallest movement to indicate the presence of another person, but she couldn't see the benefit Nolan would get from lying to her.
"Where, Nolan? Are they outside?"
"What? What- no," the man said incredulously, shaking his head. "What is this, some kind of game? A test? What is it you want me to say here?"
"The fucking truth would be helpful!" Jessica ground out, jerking her head back towards him to get a glimpse at his expression. "Who did this to you? Where did they go? Tell me, so I can protect us!"
"Are you serious- you want to protect me?" Nolan sputtered, his words punctuated with a faintly hysterical snicker. "You really are crazy, aren't you? You're literally fucking insane."
"Nolan!" Jessica barked, and the man's laugh halted. He looked at her with his mouth pressing into grim line, no humor left in his voice when he answered her previous question.
"Lady, you did this to me. You dragged me off the street, beat me up, and tied me to this wall. And before you ask me why, I don't have an answer to that, because I've never seen you before in my life. You seriously don't remember?"
Jessica felt nauseous, her leg muscles growing weak and shaky as the man's words and his own conviction of their truth sank in. All she could think of in the next several moments was how very accurate the man's scalding words to her must be- that she must at last have lost her mind.