Whumptober 2020 Day 24: You're Not Making Any Sense—Forced Mutism/Blindfolded/Sensory Deprivations
Word Count: 647
Author: Katie/Ally (aquietwritingcorner/realitybreakgirl)
Rating: T
Characters: Olivier Mira Armstrong
Summary: Olivier Armstrong refuses to break, no matter what kind of torture they're trying.
Notes: Connected to Day 1's story. It will be connected to Day 31, and Comfortember Days 1, 3, and 30 as well.
Deprivation
It wasn't the first time they had put her in this position. Geograg Sodeset was having a marvelous time, it seemed, trying to break her. Olivier wasn't sure how long she had been here anymore. She honestly had lost track of the days early on. Her cell was so deep underground that there was no way to keep track of the days, and she couldn't count her heartbeats when she was sleeping. If her estimation was right, it had been at least a couple of months, but she wasn't sure.
Right now, she was in her cell again, laying limply on the floor of it. He had given her the drug again, the one that made it nearly impossible for her to move. They had gagged her mouth so that she couldn't talk or make much of any noise. They had learned that she made noise to give her some sort of fixed point, and they had stopped it. If they didn't need her to talk later, she was positive that Sodeset would have already cut her vocal cords. A blindfold was tightened around her eyes, one that blocked out nearly all light. She knew by experience that any light that was left would be cut off when they covered her cell.
Her head was dropped on the ground, and she heard the sound of the Drachman soldiers climbing the detachable ladders. Not a moment later, the sound and the feel of icy water filled her cell. It splashed in, and she felt it starting to fill her cell. Her clothes started to absorb it, and she could feel what was left of her hair start to float in it. The coldness of the water cut through her, but it also numbed her skin. The water kept climbing, filling her ears and muffling the world around her. Just before it filled reached her face, it stopped. There was a scraping sound, and then all light was cut off and she was left alone.
She had read about this, years ago. Sensory deprivation. They had worked her up to it, with the gag and the blindfold, and then finally this. It was the third time they had put her in this position. She couldn't see anything. She couldn't hear anything. She couldn't say anything. The drug kept her from moving, leaving her hair, her limbs, her clothes floating in the water. The icy cold water stole all feeling from her.
Nothing. She could sense nothing.
It was maddening.
Olivier fought hard not to lose herself in this. It was harder and harder each time. Her eyes tried to play tricks on her, make her think she was seeing things. Her ears tried to hear things that she was pretty certain weren't there. Her nose invented smells, and her mouth tastes. She imagined things brushing up against her.
She fought against her own mind.
She ran through the names and ranks of every soldier that she had at Briggs. She ran through all of her family history. She recalled passages of literature and poetry she had memorized as a child. She mentally ran through her sword forms. She recalled all the songs she had ever learned. She ran through every scrap of information she knew, and then she ran through it again.
She wouldn't let Geograg Sodeset break her. She was an Armstrong. She was the general of Fort Briggs. She was the Northern Wall of Briggs, the Ice Queen. She wasn't going to let this break her—even as she started hearing the voices of the people she cared about the most, invented by her own mind.
It was hard.
It got harder each time.
She had no idea how long she laid there like that, how long she floated. But she knew that even if she did loose her mind—she'd never admit it to that man.