{dollhouse} too much but never enough, tear it up and watch it fall
Title: Too Much but Never Enough, Tear it Up and Watch it Fall
Author: aaronlisa
Fandom: Dollhouse
Pairing/Characters: Alpha/Echo
Rating: FR13
Disclaimer: Dollhouse belongs to Joss Whedon and company. The title comes from the Sisters of Mercy song “Never Land.”
Prompts: Written for smallfandomfest for the prompt of Alpha/Echo and “I will be the one to make you crawl.”
Notes: Contains spoilers for the whole series.
Summary: They both want the other to crawl for what they've done.
Word Count: 1349
He wants her badly. The moment that he sees her, he knows that she’s different from all of the others; that she’s the one that he’s been waiting for since before time began. She’s the one that he had been told to prepare for. He shivers as he watches her move behind Adelle. Her eyes are dark as she casts them about the building, her body tense yet still she follows Adelle. Alpha smiles as he realizes that together they will burn the house down to the ground.
* * *
Alpha became her enemy when he created her and stole Caroline form her. Echo realized that even though she had saved the precious wedge that housed Caroline, that Caroline could never go home again. Things would never be the same again. And Echo realizes this as they drive back to the dollhouse. The weight of it presses down upon her, nearly suffocating her. She vows to seek revenge on the psychopath that created her, ignoring the fact that Alpha was just the spark that lit the already laid out kindling.
As she lays back in Topher’s chair, her last thought is of how she’ll enjoying watching Alpha crawl.
* * *
Alpha lets Echo have her war, he lets her draw her ineffectual line in the sand because he knows that he still has the upper hand. She is still in the care of Topher and Adelle. She is still being wiped on a daily basis. It’s completely ineffective on her, it’ll never repair his work, but it puts up a wall between Echo and the imprints. It divides who she is and who Adelle wants her to be. It makes Adelle’s power over Echo strong. But Alpha knows that eventually she will free of Adelle just as he did and when she does, he’ll enjoy making her crawl for his forgiveness.
* * *
It had taken her awhile to come to the conclusion that Alpha is trying to seduce her, to make her his like he believes that she should be. Alpha sees his murder of the clients that had hired her as a means of liberating her, of freeing her from the constraints that the dollhouse has wrapped her in. He doesn’t see it as murder because in his eyes the clients have grossly abused her. He doesn’t see that they have made her Echo just as much as he did in his secret lair.
The realization chills her to the bone because no one is safe from him anymore. Not even Paul, who has used her for his own needs. It wasn’t sexual but she doesn’t think that Alpha will see a difference between Paul hiring her services or from Matt Cargill hiring her to be his dream date.
Somehow their war over who she is has suddenly changed and she trembles in fear for the first time since she faced him down fully aware of who she was and what he was.
* * *
The war changes everything.
No one remains untouched.
* * *
Things have changed between them since he made her. For the first time since she stood above him with her hate, fury and loathing shining in her eyes, he recognizes the goddess that he had intended to create. She still rejects his ideas but she needs him. Even better she relies on him, and although Alpha doesn’t care about the war and who wins, he sees the necessity in choosing to fight on her side.
He likes to blame it on the fact that Paul Ballard is in his head. But the fact is that he’s always had a conscience. He’s just never seen the need to bother in stopping Rossum. As far he was concerned, Rossum’s plans weren’t necessarily bad. Those that could would evolve and those that didn’t would be left behind. The one thing that Alpha hadn’t taken into consideration was that evolution wasn’t a painless process.
There’s one thing that Alpha has grown to hate. He hates violence. It might be due to the fact that it calls to Karl who he was never able to completely eradicate.
* * *
There are times when she doesn’t know who she is anymore.
Is she Echo? Or is she Caroline?
Or is she some imprint created by Topher for some long-dead client?
She’s not even sure if it matters anymore who she is. All that matters is the constant struggle to survive. To find something to desperately cling to that will help her push past the nightmares.
Yet she doesn’t know what to cling to anymore.
Nor does Echo know what she wants or needs, or Caroline, or the voices of a hundred different imprints in her heads.
Sometimes the only clear voice in her head is the one of Alpha whispering in her head, echoing around her brain with his sinister lilt as he tells her that she’s a goddess.
* * *
The war rages on and then it’s over in the blink of an eye.
And she’s locked underground, in a hole that she had fought so hard and desperately to escape.
Her parting gift from Alpha was Paul Ballard on a wedge.
It should have been precious, sweet and wonderful. But it was horrible. Completely horrible because the Paul that was in Alpha’s head wasn’t the Paul who had become one of the last victims in Rossum’s war. It was the Paul from ten years ago. A Paul Ballard tempered by Alpha.
And it only makes her lonelier.
* * *
He survives in tact and still Alpha. Karl is still there but buried beneath the weight of everyone else Alpha has ever become. He realizes then and there that he was never a god. He was never some sort of super human. He had always been Karl but his psyche had been tempered by the addition of others. What had made him Alpha was similar to what had made Karl who he was. The only thing that was missing were certain darker and twisted desires.
He wonders if Echo will make the same realization in her prison.
Then he wonders if he’ll go back to the dollhouse when their year is up.
* * *
They blink as they walk out into the glorious Californian sunshine. For a moment, they’re fooled into believing that they’ve stepped into the world that once was. Until the silence hits their ears and they slow see the destruction that they hadn’t really had time to see when they had rushed into the dollhouse, trying to keep away from the butchers.
Alpha is leaning against the transport vehicle that had brought them here. Pryia shudders at the sight of it while Tony slings an arm around her shoulders and pulls T close to them. Nothing has changed but everything has at the same time. It hurts Echo’s head.
* * *
He doesn’t physically crawl for her but she can see the change in him when he pulls her close. He kisses her forehead and gently holds her. He doesn’t shiver or shake or tremble. His eyes aren’t glazed with an obsession nor is he lost in a fantasy. His first words are to ask them how they all are and then to ask them how they are feeling. He asks each of them questions that only they would know after ten years of being who they are.
Later when they’ve reached Safe Haven, he takes her to Adelle and with a chaste kiss to the forehead he leaves her there. Echo’s not sure if she recognizes who Alpha is anymore and he doesn’t seem to be the person who he was before.
Yet over the course of a week, she learns more about him. He is Alpha but he’s not. The years have changed him and she wonders just how long he wasn’t the monster of her nightmares. And she wonders if she can still punish him for what he did to her.
After all it was what Boyd had created him for.
((END))
Author: aaronlisa
Fandom: Dollhouse
Pairing/Characters: Alpha/Echo
Rating: FR13
Disclaimer: Dollhouse belongs to Joss Whedon and company. The title comes from the Sisters of Mercy song “Never Land.”
Prompts: Written for smallfandomfest for the prompt of Alpha/Echo and “I will be the one to make you crawl.”
Notes: Contains spoilers for the whole series.
Summary: They both want the other to crawl for what they've done.
Word Count: 1349
He wants her badly. The moment that he sees her, he knows that she’s different from all of the others; that she’s the one that he’s been waiting for since before time began. She’s the one that he had been told to prepare for. He shivers as he watches her move behind Adelle. Her eyes are dark as she casts them about the building, her body tense yet still she follows Adelle. Alpha smiles as he realizes that together they will burn the house down to the ground.
* * *
Alpha became her enemy when he created her and stole Caroline form her. Echo realized that even though she had saved the precious wedge that housed Caroline, that Caroline could never go home again. Things would never be the same again. And Echo realizes this as they drive back to the dollhouse. The weight of it presses down upon her, nearly suffocating her. She vows to seek revenge on the psychopath that created her, ignoring the fact that Alpha was just the spark that lit the already laid out kindling.
As she lays back in Topher’s chair, her last thought is of how she’ll enjoying watching Alpha crawl.
* * *
Alpha lets Echo have her war, he lets her draw her ineffectual line in the sand because he knows that he still has the upper hand. She is still in the care of Topher and Adelle. She is still being wiped on a daily basis. It’s completely ineffective on her, it’ll never repair his work, but it puts up a wall between Echo and the imprints. It divides who she is and who Adelle wants her to be. It makes Adelle’s power over Echo strong. But Alpha knows that eventually she will free of Adelle just as he did and when she does, he’ll enjoy making her crawl for his forgiveness.
* * *
It had taken her awhile to come to the conclusion that Alpha is trying to seduce her, to make her his like he believes that she should be. Alpha sees his murder of the clients that had hired her as a means of liberating her, of freeing her from the constraints that the dollhouse has wrapped her in. He doesn’t see it as murder because in his eyes the clients have grossly abused her. He doesn’t see that they have made her Echo just as much as he did in his secret lair.
The realization chills her to the bone because no one is safe from him anymore. Not even Paul, who has used her for his own needs. It wasn’t sexual but she doesn’t think that Alpha will see a difference between Paul hiring her services or from Matt Cargill hiring her to be his dream date.
Somehow their war over who she is has suddenly changed and she trembles in fear for the first time since she faced him down fully aware of who she was and what he was.
* * *
The war changes everything.
No one remains untouched.
* * *
Things have changed between them since he made her. For the first time since she stood above him with her hate, fury and loathing shining in her eyes, he recognizes the goddess that he had intended to create. She still rejects his ideas but she needs him. Even better she relies on him, and although Alpha doesn’t care about the war and who wins, he sees the necessity in choosing to fight on her side.
He likes to blame it on the fact that Paul Ballard is in his head. But the fact is that he’s always had a conscience. He’s just never seen the need to bother in stopping Rossum. As far he was concerned, Rossum’s plans weren’t necessarily bad. Those that could would evolve and those that didn’t would be left behind. The one thing that Alpha hadn’t taken into consideration was that evolution wasn’t a painless process.
There’s one thing that Alpha has grown to hate. He hates violence. It might be due to the fact that it calls to Karl who he was never able to completely eradicate.
* * *
There are times when she doesn’t know who she is anymore.
Is she Echo? Or is she Caroline?
Or is she some imprint created by Topher for some long-dead client?
She’s not even sure if it matters anymore who she is. All that matters is the constant struggle to survive. To find something to desperately cling to that will help her push past the nightmares.
Yet she doesn’t know what to cling to anymore.
Nor does Echo know what she wants or needs, or Caroline, or the voices of a hundred different imprints in her heads.
Sometimes the only clear voice in her head is the one of Alpha whispering in her head, echoing around her brain with his sinister lilt as he tells her that she’s a goddess.
* * *
The war rages on and then it’s over in the blink of an eye.
And she’s locked underground, in a hole that she had fought so hard and desperately to escape.
Her parting gift from Alpha was Paul Ballard on a wedge.
It should have been precious, sweet and wonderful. But it was horrible. Completely horrible because the Paul that was in Alpha’s head wasn’t the Paul who had become one of the last victims in Rossum’s war. It was the Paul from ten years ago. A Paul Ballard tempered by Alpha.
And it only makes her lonelier.
* * *
He survives in tact and still Alpha. Karl is still there but buried beneath the weight of everyone else Alpha has ever become. He realizes then and there that he was never a god. He was never some sort of super human. He had always been Karl but his psyche had been tempered by the addition of others. What had made him Alpha was similar to what had made Karl who he was. The only thing that was missing were certain darker and twisted desires.
He wonders if Echo will make the same realization in her prison.
Then he wonders if he’ll go back to the dollhouse when their year is up.
* * *
They blink as they walk out into the glorious Californian sunshine. For a moment, they’re fooled into believing that they’ve stepped into the world that once was. Until the silence hits their ears and they slow see the destruction that they hadn’t really had time to see when they had rushed into the dollhouse, trying to keep away from the butchers.
Alpha is leaning against the transport vehicle that had brought them here. Pryia shudders at the sight of it while Tony slings an arm around her shoulders and pulls T close to them. Nothing has changed but everything has at the same time. It hurts Echo’s head.
* * *
He doesn’t physically crawl for her but she can see the change in him when he pulls her close. He kisses her forehead and gently holds her. He doesn’t shiver or shake or tremble. His eyes aren’t glazed with an obsession nor is he lost in a fantasy. His first words are to ask them how they all are and then to ask them how they are feeling. He asks each of them questions that only they would know after ten years of being who they are.
Later when they’ve reached Safe Haven, he takes her to Adelle and with a chaste kiss to the forehead he leaves her there. Echo’s not sure if she recognizes who Alpha is anymore and he doesn’t seem to be the person who he was before.
Yet over the course of a week, she learns more about him. He is Alpha but he’s not. The years have changed him and she wonders just how long he wasn’t the monster of her nightmares. And she wonders if she can still punish him for what he did to her.
After all it was what Boyd had created him for.
((END))