Behind It All : A Dollhouse Fic (One-Shot)
Title: Behind It All
Pairing/characters: Topher/Claire, mentions of Alpha, Adelle, Victor, Caroline, Paul and Echo
Rating: PG (for language, nothing more)
Warnings: None.
Spoilers: references to "The Target", "True Believer", "Haunted", and "Briar Rose"
Word Count: 2302
Challenge: "Alpha" challenge 012
October 10, 2008. 3:48 PM.
The moment he saw Claire again.
His watch had stopped at that exact moment, the moment Alpha had thrown him against the bookcase and broken that wonderful Star Wars timepiece. Topher remembered looking up and seeing Whiskey beside him, her head cocked to the side, her smile as bright as always.
And for that one moment, she was his Claire, his sidekick again. She was the girl he had loved, the girl he hadn't seen since the accident that had sent them both here, her a doll and him her programmer. In that moment, Topher Brink saw both their lives all over again and how exactly it was that they came to be in this house of lies.
It all started in college. Alan Saunders had been his best friend all through MIT, the funny, popular whiz kid whose knowledge of quantum physics was only matched by the power of his quirky laugh. Topher was the sarcastic charmer, the brilliant computer programmer who always managed to catch everyone off guard. Alan's sister, Claire, completed their trio, the beautiful, tomboyish hacker-turned-biology-major. The world was wonderful back then. Life was filled with battles on EverQuest and episodes of Battlestar Galactica on TiVo. It was always the three of them, the way life was supposed to be. They were the golden trio times ten and at times, he felt like he was Harry Potter, boy wonder, post Voldemort and on top of the world.
They hadn't seen it coming.
Alan had been driving that night. They were just driving to their graduation and talking about their futures. Alan had just accepted a job offer from NASA. Claire was heading for England on a Fulbright scholarship. And Topher was going to Stanford on a full scholarship for his masters in computer science. They were splitting up for the first time in their lives and they were just beginning to figure out how to go through life without each other. But they were happy because they still had the summer and they still had each other. And it was their graduation. It was the beginning of life itself. And they were excited beyond belief.
The other car had come out of nowhere.
The next thing Topher knew, he was in a hospital with a piece of metal permanently trapped in his chest and a severe concussion throwing his entire world off. Alan was nowhere to be found. And Claire, beautiful, sweet Claire, was in a coma. The doctors couldn't explain it. All her vitals were normal. She should have been awake for hours. She just...wasn't.
They discharged him after two weeks. He stayed for another three, watching and waiting for Claire to wake up. There was no one else who could wait. Her parents had abandoned her and Alan when she was four and Alan was the only relative who cared that she was alive. With him gone, Topher was the only one who could wait for her. No one else.
So he watched over her....and he prayed for a miracle.
Four weeks and three days later, the doctors came to him with the option of shutting down life support. There was almost no chance of her waking up now, they said. Let her sleep. Let her story end.
Topher almost said yes. Almost.
But then, he remembered her smile, the one that his whole world revolved around. And he remembered everything that was wonderful about her and everything that had made him love her and he remembered Alan taking him aside on her birthday and telling him that Claire had loved him for years and was just too shy to admit it. It was enough to make him wait for her. And it was enough to make him take a second look at the Dollhouse job offer.
Adelle DeWitt had come to him three weeks after the accident. The british woman had expressed (seemingly) genuine sympathy for Claire's condition and had offered a solution that woudl help both Claire and the Dollhouse. Apparently, Rossum Corp had heard word of his gift with computers and was in need of a programmer. Their new sub-company had just gotten off the ground a few weeks ago with their first doll (stationed in Tokyo) and was branching out to the US. And since the Los Angeles branch was in need of dolls, it made Topher's case extra special.
They wanted Claire.
He had to have been desperate, foolish even, to accept such an offer, especially without Claire's consent. But she had listed him as her emergency contact.
She had trusted me to make the right choice.
So he said yes for the both of them.
Claire had been the first one he had used the imprint chair on. Topher remembered how light she was in his arms, her body motionless save for the sigh that escaped her lips when he brushed her hair out of her face. Like she knew it was him. Then the blue light and the gasp of pain. And when she opened her eyes, he was looking at Whiskey, the calm, peacefull doll who knew Topher as nothing more than an acquaintance. Not a best friend. Not a soulmate.
It broke his heart.
He knew that Adelle could have found another girl to play god with. After all, there were plenty of other people out there who, for some reason or another, would have written their lives away for five years in exchange for a new start. But Claire was part of Rossum's plan to control Topher. If he gave them his all for five years, they would work on a permanent imprint that would give him back the girl he loved. It was a leash, a chain. But it was the only way to see Claire again.
And so he did it.
A few months later, Alan was brought in. According to Adelle, he had shown up without his memories weeks beforehand in Tokyo. There, Topher's old friend had signed his own five years away to the local dollhouse in exchange for his memories back at the end of the deal. Headquarters had made the connection between Alan and Topher easily and sent 'Alpha' to LA to complete their hold on their favorite programmer. Alpha, the first. Alan had been the dollhouse's very first doll.
Man, his life was fucked up.
And so he signed away his soul for his best friends to come back to him. After all, who else did he have in this world? No siblings, parents who drank themselves to death, no one. Claire and Alan had been his world since kindergarten. Alan was his brother, his best friend, the one person who knew the ends of his sentences before he had even begun them.
And Claire...
Claire was his everything.
The months passed like hours, him changing Alpha into Adam, Whiskey into Rachel, Alpha into Peter, Whiskey into Laura, and so on and so forth. For the most part, Topher was alright with just seeing Claire and Alan again, even if they didn't recognize him. But in the back of his head, he wished for nothing more than to set the right imprints to bring his best friends back, if only for a short while. But Adelle said no every single time. And so he offered a slightly different option, combining Claire and Alan together into one imprint that he'd put into a doll (other than Whiskey or Alpha, unfortunately) each year on the one day that he needed his best friends back. His birthday.
This time, Adelle said yes. And this time, he knew the sympathy was real.
Two years passed that way. And then things went oh, so wrong.
October 10, 2008. 3:48 PM.
Alpha was just coming back from an assignment and Topher was prepping him for the chair. It was a normal procedure, one he had done hundreds of times already. But just as the imprint wipe was happening, Alpha had looked straight at him. And for one moment, his eyes were Alan's eyes and his smile was Alan's smile.
The next thing he knew, the world was spinning around him and Whiskey was there beside him, her smile confused and her concern genuine. Topher whispered for her to run. And then her face was bleeding and her eyes were wide, and Alpha, Alan, her own brother was above her, his gaze cruel as he prepared to make the final slice.
Topher had tackled him to the ground. Best friend be damned. No way in hell was he about to lose Claire again.
They had wrestled for the knife for a few minutes before Topher had sent Alpha crashing into the wall, his head cracking against it neatly. Topher didn't bother to check whether or not Alpha was down for the count. He just took Whiskey and ran.
Topher locked them into Adelle's office and called security. For minutes, the only sounds were his panicked words into the receiver and Whiskey's quiet sobs against the wall. Then, they sat there, her in his arms, him running his hand through her soft brown curls and whispering soothing nothings in her ear. But try as he might, Whiskey was gone, her gentle nature destroyed by yet another fucking accident.
Adelle found them hours later. And she offered a new option.
And so Doctor Claire Saunders came to be a member of the staff. Topher had created this imprint months ago during one of his moments of missing Claire to the point of insanity. Crazy, yes. But it was the Claire he thought would have existed had he and Alan not been a part of her life. It was his fault after all. He had lived and she, in some ways, had not. And this imprint was all he could do to tell her how sorry he was for everything.
This Claire was a different Claire from the original. It was Claire with all the knowledge she would have gained from Stanford and none of the memories of the accident or Alan or even him. Claire with the perfect life. A Claire whose life had taken an about face the second Alpha's knives had scarred her forever.
It hurt him even more than when he had lost her the first time. But in a way, it was a blessing in disguise.
He was with Claire again, albeit a slightly altered one. This Claire didn't know a thing about computers but still glowed like the sun when she laughed. This Claire took him seriously, far too seriously, but still had the gentle touch that set his whole world on fire. This Claire had no idea that Charlie had drowned in the Looking Glass Station to save the people on the island. But this Claire still had that warmth in her eyes. This Claire was still his Claire. It was part of the Claire that he was hoping to see again in three more years. He could wait for this Claire.
So they lasted another year like that. And every so often he felt his mask fall apart. The time when they had researched Victor's "man-reactions". The time he programmed Sierra to be Claire, his Claire, for his birthday. The arguments that made her eyes burn and brought out the flecks of gold in her brown orbs, setting them on fire. And those little moments that no one knew about. The cupcake and Star Trek keychain he had found waiting for him on his birthday. The smiles reserved for him and only him. The times he could coax a laugh, a real Claire Saunders laugh, out of her. Those were the moments worth living for.
And once again, it all wasn't meant to last.
Alpha came back. And yet again, Topher hadn't been able to save Claire (damn FBI agent). Her brother had left her unharmed yet damaged, her mind racing with hints of Whiskey and her life before her imaginary medical degree. She was in the infirmary when he found her, her gaze sad as she traced the stitches on a sleeping Victor's face. And her eyes spoke the whole damn world to Topher.
Claire was terrified.
Topher was at her side at once, his arms wrapping around her small frame as though it was the most natural thing in the world. Claire was sobbing in an instant.
She was crying again. And yet again, he was too weak to prevent it.
That thought brought an epiphany of sorts. Alpha was Alpha and Alan was gone, stolen from the imprint library along with Caroline, all of Echo's other personalities, and that southern belle who Alpha adored. Maybe he could see Alan again someday. Not likely, if Alpha had anything to say about it. And with Alan gone, there was only one person Topher cared about in this world. He didn't give a damn about Echo, Victor, Adelle, anyone in this sorry place. For two more years, he would be Topher Brink, sarcastic lonely bastard who cared only for his computers and nothing for the real world. But behind the scenes, he would renew work to put the real Claire back in her body. And he would find out how Alpha became so damn self-aware just so that he could rip the secret out of him, along with all those fucking imprints. He would win the war and make sure that the Alpha personality knew every bit of pain he had inflicted on Claire for the past year. Maybe with a bit of luck, he could even bring Alan back as a bonus. But no matter what, at the end of it all, he would put the real Claire back in her body and he would take her out of this place of monsters and mayhem.
He would be Topher again, Lost addict and future Microsoft CEO (eat your heart out, Bill Gates), and she would be his beautiful Claire, future surgeon general and 2006 laser tag champion of Cambridge, MA. She would be his and he would be hers.
And nothing else mattered more than that.
A/N: When I started writing this, I originally was thinking of writing an Alpha/Whiskey (if dear Claire bear is indeed a doll) fanfic. But then, I thought of my normal OTP, Topher/Claire, and how they've suddenly fallen through the cracks in the world of fan fiction. So I started to write...and I came up with this (and six days later, it's finally on livejournal because I had to retype this onto LJ (2302 words!) because my internet stops responding everytime I copy paste something...RAWR). Mind you, I think it's utter crap and if I write another fanfiction about Claire and Alpha or Claire and Topher, I'll never write her as Alpha's sister again (WEEEIIIRRDDD). But it seemed to fit for this fanfic. So I'll leave it alone.
XD, also on another note, yes, I put Alpha's real name as Alan. In my defense, I had no idea what name would actually fit him so I stole Alan Tudyk's name. Sue me.
Hope you enjoyed it! Comments are much appreciated. Ja ne!
Pairing/characters: Topher/Claire, mentions of Alpha, Adelle, Victor, Caroline, Paul and Echo
Rating: PG (for language, nothing more)
Warnings: None.
Spoilers: references to "The Target", "True Believer", "Haunted", and "Briar Rose"
Word Count: 2302
Challenge: "Alpha" challenge 012
October 10, 2008. 3:48 PM.
The moment he saw Claire again.
His watch had stopped at that exact moment, the moment Alpha had thrown him against the bookcase and broken that wonderful Star Wars timepiece. Topher remembered looking up and seeing Whiskey beside him, her head cocked to the side, her smile as bright as always.
And for that one moment, she was his Claire, his sidekick again. She was the girl he had loved, the girl he hadn't seen since the accident that had sent them both here, her a doll and him her programmer. In that moment, Topher Brink saw both their lives all over again and how exactly it was that they came to be in this house of lies.
It all started in college. Alan Saunders had been his best friend all through MIT, the funny, popular whiz kid whose knowledge of quantum physics was only matched by the power of his quirky laugh. Topher was the sarcastic charmer, the brilliant computer programmer who always managed to catch everyone off guard. Alan's sister, Claire, completed their trio, the beautiful, tomboyish hacker-turned-biology-major. The world was wonderful back then. Life was filled with battles on EverQuest and episodes of Battlestar Galactica on TiVo. It was always the three of them, the way life was supposed to be. They were the golden trio times ten and at times, he felt like he was Harry Potter, boy wonder, post Voldemort and on top of the world.
They hadn't seen it coming.
Alan had been driving that night. They were just driving to their graduation and talking about their futures. Alan had just accepted a job offer from NASA. Claire was heading for England on a Fulbright scholarship. And Topher was going to Stanford on a full scholarship for his masters in computer science. They were splitting up for the first time in their lives and they were just beginning to figure out how to go through life without each other. But they were happy because they still had the summer and they still had each other. And it was their graduation. It was the beginning of life itself. And they were excited beyond belief.
The other car had come out of nowhere.
The next thing Topher knew, he was in a hospital with a piece of metal permanently trapped in his chest and a severe concussion throwing his entire world off. Alan was nowhere to be found. And Claire, beautiful, sweet Claire, was in a coma. The doctors couldn't explain it. All her vitals were normal. She should have been awake for hours. She just...wasn't.
They discharged him after two weeks. He stayed for another three, watching and waiting for Claire to wake up. There was no one else who could wait. Her parents had abandoned her and Alan when she was four and Alan was the only relative who cared that she was alive. With him gone, Topher was the only one who could wait for her. No one else.
So he watched over her....and he prayed for a miracle.
Four weeks and three days later, the doctors came to him with the option of shutting down life support. There was almost no chance of her waking up now, they said. Let her sleep. Let her story end.
Topher almost said yes. Almost.
But then, he remembered her smile, the one that his whole world revolved around. And he remembered everything that was wonderful about her and everything that had made him love her and he remembered Alan taking him aside on her birthday and telling him that Claire had loved him for years and was just too shy to admit it. It was enough to make him wait for her. And it was enough to make him take a second look at the Dollhouse job offer.
Adelle DeWitt had come to him three weeks after the accident. The british woman had expressed (seemingly) genuine sympathy for Claire's condition and had offered a solution that woudl help both Claire and the Dollhouse. Apparently, Rossum Corp had heard word of his gift with computers and was in need of a programmer. Their new sub-company had just gotten off the ground a few weeks ago with their first doll (stationed in Tokyo) and was branching out to the US. And since the Los Angeles branch was in need of dolls, it made Topher's case extra special.
They wanted Claire.
He had to have been desperate, foolish even, to accept such an offer, especially without Claire's consent. But she had listed him as her emergency contact.
She had trusted me to make the right choice.
So he said yes for the both of them.
Claire had been the first one he had used the imprint chair on. Topher remembered how light she was in his arms, her body motionless save for the sigh that escaped her lips when he brushed her hair out of her face. Like she knew it was him. Then the blue light and the gasp of pain. And when she opened her eyes, he was looking at Whiskey, the calm, peacefull doll who knew Topher as nothing more than an acquaintance. Not a best friend. Not a soulmate.
It broke his heart.
He knew that Adelle could have found another girl to play god with. After all, there were plenty of other people out there who, for some reason or another, would have written their lives away for five years in exchange for a new start. But Claire was part of Rossum's plan to control Topher. If he gave them his all for five years, they would work on a permanent imprint that would give him back the girl he loved. It was a leash, a chain. But it was the only way to see Claire again.
And so he did it.
A few months later, Alan was brought in. According to Adelle, he had shown up without his memories weeks beforehand in Tokyo. There, Topher's old friend had signed his own five years away to the local dollhouse in exchange for his memories back at the end of the deal. Headquarters had made the connection between Alan and Topher easily and sent 'Alpha' to LA to complete their hold on their favorite programmer. Alpha, the first. Alan had been the dollhouse's very first doll.
Man, his life was fucked up.
And so he signed away his soul for his best friends to come back to him. After all, who else did he have in this world? No siblings, parents who drank themselves to death, no one. Claire and Alan had been his world since kindergarten. Alan was his brother, his best friend, the one person who knew the ends of his sentences before he had even begun them.
And Claire...
Claire was his everything.
The months passed like hours, him changing Alpha into Adam, Whiskey into Rachel, Alpha into Peter, Whiskey into Laura, and so on and so forth. For the most part, Topher was alright with just seeing Claire and Alan again, even if they didn't recognize him. But in the back of his head, he wished for nothing more than to set the right imprints to bring his best friends back, if only for a short while. But Adelle said no every single time. And so he offered a slightly different option, combining Claire and Alan together into one imprint that he'd put into a doll (other than Whiskey or Alpha, unfortunately) each year on the one day that he needed his best friends back. His birthday.
This time, Adelle said yes. And this time, he knew the sympathy was real.
Two years passed that way. And then things went oh, so wrong.
October 10, 2008. 3:48 PM.
Alpha was just coming back from an assignment and Topher was prepping him for the chair. It was a normal procedure, one he had done hundreds of times already. But just as the imprint wipe was happening, Alpha had looked straight at him. And for one moment, his eyes were Alan's eyes and his smile was Alan's smile.
The next thing he knew, the world was spinning around him and Whiskey was there beside him, her smile confused and her concern genuine. Topher whispered for her to run. And then her face was bleeding and her eyes were wide, and Alpha, Alan, her own brother was above her, his gaze cruel as he prepared to make the final slice.
Topher had tackled him to the ground. Best friend be damned. No way in hell was he about to lose Claire again.
They had wrestled for the knife for a few minutes before Topher had sent Alpha crashing into the wall, his head cracking against it neatly. Topher didn't bother to check whether or not Alpha was down for the count. He just took Whiskey and ran.
Topher locked them into Adelle's office and called security. For minutes, the only sounds were his panicked words into the receiver and Whiskey's quiet sobs against the wall. Then, they sat there, her in his arms, him running his hand through her soft brown curls and whispering soothing nothings in her ear. But try as he might, Whiskey was gone, her gentle nature destroyed by yet another fucking accident.
Adelle found them hours later. And she offered a new option.
And so Doctor Claire Saunders came to be a member of the staff. Topher had created this imprint months ago during one of his moments of missing Claire to the point of insanity. Crazy, yes. But it was the Claire he thought would have existed had he and Alan not been a part of her life. It was his fault after all. He had lived and she, in some ways, had not. And this imprint was all he could do to tell her how sorry he was for everything.
This Claire was a different Claire from the original. It was Claire with all the knowledge she would have gained from Stanford and none of the memories of the accident or Alan or even him. Claire with the perfect life. A Claire whose life had taken an about face the second Alpha's knives had scarred her forever.
It hurt him even more than when he had lost her the first time. But in a way, it was a blessing in disguise.
He was with Claire again, albeit a slightly altered one. This Claire didn't know a thing about computers but still glowed like the sun when she laughed. This Claire took him seriously, far too seriously, but still had the gentle touch that set his whole world on fire. This Claire had no idea that Charlie had drowned in the Looking Glass Station to save the people on the island. But this Claire still had that warmth in her eyes. This Claire was still his Claire. It was part of the Claire that he was hoping to see again in three more years. He could wait for this Claire.
So they lasted another year like that. And every so often he felt his mask fall apart. The time when they had researched Victor's "man-reactions". The time he programmed Sierra to be Claire, his Claire, for his birthday. The arguments that made her eyes burn and brought out the flecks of gold in her brown orbs, setting them on fire. And those little moments that no one knew about. The cupcake and Star Trek keychain he had found waiting for him on his birthday. The smiles reserved for him and only him. The times he could coax a laugh, a real Claire Saunders laugh, out of her. Those were the moments worth living for.
And once again, it all wasn't meant to last.
Alpha came back. And yet again, Topher hadn't been able to save Claire (damn FBI agent). Her brother had left her unharmed yet damaged, her mind racing with hints of Whiskey and her life before her imaginary medical degree. She was in the infirmary when he found her, her gaze sad as she traced the stitches on a sleeping Victor's face. And her eyes spoke the whole damn world to Topher.
Claire was terrified.
Topher was at her side at once, his arms wrapping around her small frame as though it was the most natural thing in the world. Claire was sobbing in an instant.
She was crying again. And yet again, he was too weak to prevent it.
That thought brought an epiphany of sorts. Alpha was Alpha and Alan was gone, stolen from the imprint library along with Caroline, all of Echo's other personalities, and that southern belle who Alpha adored. Maybe he could see Alan again someday. Not likely, if Alpha had anything to say about it. And with Alan gone, there was only one person Topher cared about in this world. He didn't give a damn about Echo, Victor, Adelle, anyone in this sorry place. For two more years, he would be Topher Brink, sarcastic lonely bastard who cared only for his computers and nothing for the real world. But behind the scenes, he would renew work to put the real Claire back in her body. And he would find out how Alpha became so damn self-aware just so that he could rip the secret out of him, along with all those fucking imprints. He would win the war and make sure that the Alpha personality knew every bit of pain he had inflicted on Claire for the past year. Maybe with a bit of luck, he could even bring Alan back as a bonus. But no matter what, at the end of it all, he would put the real Claire back in her body and he would take her out of this place of monsters and mayhem.
He would be Topher again, Lost addict and future Microsoft CEO (eat your heart out, Bill Gates), and she would be his beautiful Claire, future surgeon general and 2006 laser tag champion of Cambridge, MA. She would be his and he would be hers.
And nothing else mattered more than that.
A/N: When I started writing this, I originally was thinking of writing an Alpha/Whiskey (if dear Claire bear is indeed a doll) fanfic. But then, I thought of my normal OTP, Topher/Claire, and how they've suddenly fallen through the cracks in the world of fan fiction. So I started to write...and I came up with this (and six days later, it's finally on livejournal because I had to retype this onto LJ (2302 words!) because my internet stops responding everytime I copy paste something...RAWR). Mind you, I think it's utter crap and if I write another fanfiction about Claire and Alpha or Claire and Topher, I'll never write her as Alpha's sister again (WEEEIIIRRDDD). But it seemed to fit for this fanfic. So I'll leave it alone.
XD, also on another note, yes, I put Alpha's real name as Alan. In my defense, I had no idea what name would actually fit him so I stole Alan Tudyk's name. Sue me.
Hope you enjoyed it! Comments are much appreciated. Ja ne!