Who: Seymour, Isobel and Gwen What: Healing Gwen Where: Beneath the bank When: During the blackout Warnings: Mind control, dub-con, forced healing, etc. Typical Seymour being Seymour.
Upon arriving at the bank, still under the safe cover of darkness, Seymour had Gwen carried into a cell in the hidden area below the building. For her, he’d laid out a comfortable cot, along with blankets and a pillow. It was sparse, but he wanted to make her as comfortable as he could. Eric, who was in the car with the healer, had been instructed to keep the girl quiet and calm until he had her below ground, at which time he had a syringe of Seymour’s serum with which to inject her. Seymour wasn’t willing to risk her disobedience, nor was he willing to risk everything on his Mockingbird’s ability to pretend, not yet, not even with the collar around her throat. Her legs, giving them back to her, was too important to him.
And so, hours had passed by the the time Seymour lowered the stairs to the cells. It was, you see, time.
To say Isobel was upset was putting it lightly. Eric had been none too gentle with her from the moment she started to realize there was something more going on than she had been made aware of initially. Her ribs ached where Eric had shoved the barrel of his handgun, and that had been enough incentive to mind her tongue. It lasted well after he had deposited her in her very own cell below the bank, an uncomfortable arrangement that she was resisting the urge to complain about. The floor was bare, nothing to speak of in the cell, so she had pulled off her sweatshirt and balled it up into a makeshift cushion to sit on. There had been no conversation between the pair in the basement; what was there to say?
The sound of footsteps drew Isobel’s attention, however, and she rose to her feet quickly, striding over towards the bars, winding her hands around them as she strained to catch sight of whomever was coming down. “Please tell me you’re letting us out,” she said even before she could see the person, face pressed to the bars, craning for a look.
Gwen was silent when she saw Isobel, one baleful look for Eric and an apologetic one to the blond woman and then nothing more. She could offer her regrets but without any hopeful words or promises to fix this, she thought silence was better for the both of them. Her mind was turning over what she knew about the bank building but there wasn’t anywhere they could go. They were secure down there, that she had seen in both of her observations of the bank, and she wasn’t in any shape to escape.
The sound of footsteps interrupted Gwen’s thoughts, though it wasn’t as if he couldn’t do that without the noise. She sat up on her cot and glared in the direction of the stairs. “Let her go, Bishop,” she called out firmly, using the only name she had for him. It wasn’t like she ever expected to leave, not after all he had done to take her. But Isobel didn’t have to be here. “Let her go home.”
Eric preceded Seymour into the cells, the injection in his hand as he entered Isobel’s cell, and Seymour turned his attention to Gwen. “She won’t be here long,” he told her truthfully, opening the door to her cell and leaving it open. He sat on the edge of her cot, and he smiled down at her. “She has only to do my bidding first,” he said, glancing over to watch Eric inject the blond woman. “And then she is expected elsewhere.”
Seymour waited a moment, knowing how long it took for the injection to kick in, and then he smiled. “Isobel, is it? Come here to me,” he said, the order an undeniable one in Isobel’s mind.
As Gwen spoke, Isobel looked over towards her, mouthing a quiet ‘thank you’ in her direction before the two men entered. One was familiar to her as the man who had fetched her from her apartment, and almost immediately, she retreated to the far corner of her cell, eyeing the hand with the hypodermic warily. “What are you doing with that? What a-” She didn’t get a chance to say anything else as Eric approached without hesitation, grabbing her arm. A sting of pain and he was retreating, leaving her to rub her arm, skin tingling in answer. “Asshole,” she muttered under her breath, casting a wary look back towards Gwen and the other man.
As he spoke, Isobel’s world seemed to go slightly fuzzy around the edges, and her feet were already taking her in his direction without any instruction from her. It was a strange feeling, like sitting behind the wheel of the car, but having it driven by someone else, a feeling she quite disliked already. “Gwen?” Isobel said, worry and fear making its way into her voice as she exited her cell despite her efforts to stay put, going so far as to grab the bars on her way out, but her fingers simply wouldn’t grip the bars to give her any sort of real handhold. Her heart was pounding hard, another step, two steps, and she was in front of Seymour, hands balled into fists at her sides.
“It sucks,” Gwen agreed to her unspoken assessment about Seymour’s power. She knew all too well how it felt. To not be in control of anything, not even yourself. “Fight it but...” The words died in Gwen’s throat as she saw Isobel move towards them and she cast a look of unbridled frustration and fury in Seymour’s direction. “You’re not doing this,” she spat. He was not doing what she thought and dreaded he was going to do. He wasn’t going to make Isobel heal her. He wasn’t. And to make her point clear her hands shot out to grab him by the front of shirt. She hadn’t physically fought someone in a very long time and she knew it was futile - laughable, even - but she was at her wits’ end.
Seymour just grinned and wrested Gwen’s hands from his shirtfront. “No more fighting, my Mockingbird,” he told her, raising a hand once he’d loosened her grip and brushing her hair from her face. “It will be better soon. You’ll see.” He turned to Isobel, then, using the full extent of his ability on her, something he’d not done with Gwen yet. He liked Gwen quite a deal, and he wanted to leave her herself. That didn’t matter with the healer. “You will do as I say, and you will be nothing but what I tell you,” he told her, watching her carefully until her eyes unfocused and sharpened again, a telltale sign of her mental acquiescence to his whims. “Heal her,” he said, moving back.
Mockingbird? The question rose unbidden, and she was about to voice it, to look for some explanation to this, when Seymour turned his attention to her once more. Isobel didn’t blame Gwen for what was going on, and indeed, she was grateful for the defense, for the effort she had put into fighting for her freedom. Before Seymour spoke, she looked over towards Gwen, a whispered “Thank you” escaping her lips before something inside of her promptly shifted.
The disconnected feeling was frightening, and Isobel tried to scream, try to resist, but nothing she did worked. Her body was no longer her own, the controls no longer in her hands. She fought, oh she fought to stand still, to resist Seymour’s orders, but her body did as she was told, an experience that was more frightening than anything else she had experienced in her life.
Moving towards Gwen, Isobel approached her cot and knelt silently, her gaze focused on something past Gwen, looking through her. “Please lay on your stomach,” she said, her voice lacking emotion, the words flat.
Gwen let out a frustrated noise as his command immediately made her grip on his shirt slacken, and her hands fell to her side in angry fists as he moved away from her. She watched with a curious and critical eye as Isobel changed. She knew how it felt to be under Seymour's control but not how it looked, and while she wasn't aware of the extent that the woman was being controlled, she still took the time to observe.
Only when Isobel knelt before her did Gwen snap out of it. And while she wanted to be defiant, Seymour's command was still in place and she obediently laid down on her cot, on her stomach with her arms curling under her pillow. Her eyes were back at Seymour though, and she couldn't disguise the fury. She'd make him pay for this, for all of this. "Why are you doing this? It'll just make it easier for me to kick your ass and run."
Seymour merely smiled. “Your mind is mine, too, healer. Stop your fighting,” he told her, slightly impressed she required the order to quiet the internal fight. Perhaps he needed to increase the dosage of the drug in the future; he would see to it. He smiled at Gwen a moment later. “To give you freedom,” he told her. “My goal is always to make you free, to make you mine, to let you leave behind those binds that hold you in a chair, always serving others, always watching them do what you can no longer do. They have made you their slaves; you deserve much, much more than that,” he told her.
Isobel moved automatically as Gwen rolled onto her stomach, fingers pushing up the hem of her shirt to reveal her back. She said nothing more, the inclination to do so stopped in its tracks by Seymour’s last command. Instead she worked silently, hands laying atop Gwen’s spine, over the source of the old injury, and then she closed her eyes, sinking into the healing trance needed to achieve results.
It would not be done quickly, the nature of Gwen’s injury both old and severe; there was damage to be repaired, to be reversed, and Isobel would be quiet until it was done, occasionally moving the placement of Isobel’s hands, the only outward indication that anything was happening. For Gwen, she would feel that same warmth that she had experienced when Isobel had worked on her eyes, though the heat would be more intense this time, and as sensation and feeling returned, a tingling would come in its wake.
"Free and yours," Gwen scoffed and rolled her eyes, folded arms tightening below the pillow under her head. "I can't be both. And I'll never be the latter." She turned her head away and frowned, intent on not saying anything. That idea was dashed aside the moment she felt Isobel's power work it's magic. It wasn't painful and bordering on pleasant, and if she had to describe it she'd say it was warm. Like a beam of sunlight while everywhere else was in the shade, though even stranger since she felt it working beneath her skin.
It felt like an eternity had passed, wondering what would happen next. The warmth tingled at the base of her back for so long that she almost was sure it wasn't going to work. There was a small smile at the corner of her mouth, not because she wanted Isobel to fail but in that she hated Seymour succeeding in anything, especially matters that concerned her. So when she felt the heat drift down her legs, she almost started.
Words couldn't describe how strange it was, the awareness returning after so many years. Gwen shifted slightly and let out a shaky gasp as she realized she was moving, even slightly. Knees tensed and calves flexed and toes, god she felt her toes curl and it almost made her cry. This was a miracle and should've been a wonderful occasion, and all it made her want to do was scream.
“Please be still.” The words came out monotone and soft, weakness tinging the edges as Isobel pushed herself in ways she had not yet experienced with her ability. But it was working, and if she had the mind to do so, she might have smiled, rejoiced in some manner, but there was still work left to finish. Isobel’s lashes fluttered slightly against her cheeks and she moved her hands once again, heat left in the wake of her fingers, touching here and there, the finishing touches to such a severe injury. She could only repair the damage; it would take work to build the muscle tone back up, to gain full mobility, but with the damaged repaired, healed, there was nothing to stop Gwen now.
Finally, Isobel pulled her fingers away, hands hovering for a moment in the air before they fell limply to her lap. Her breathing was weak and shallow, and she remained upright for only a moment before she simply toppled to the side, quiet and still on the floor of Gwen’s cage.
Seymour motioned for Eric to take Isobel. “Walter is expecting her,” he said. “Move her along with the dreamer,” he said, turning his attention back to Gwen. “Sleep now, my Mockingbird. Tomorrow we will begin your training.”
Eric had been waiting off to the side as all this had transpired, and no sooner did the healer fall to the floor, he was there to heft her up in his arms, taking her away and leaving Seymour and Mockingbird to their own privacy. He would see to the transport of the healer and the dreamer come morning.
Gwen started to sit up once she saw Isobel begin to fall but Seymour got to her first. Sleeping didn't seem at all possible, not now that she was energized and awake and healed. But just like that, his suggestion was taken as an instruction and she felt her eyelids grow heavy and her body fall back onto the cot. She did muster enough energy for one more sleepy and suspicious question. "Training?"