WHO: Clio, Martin [NPC] WHEN: Friday Night WHERE: Martin's apartment WHAT: Clionapped WARNINGS: Drugging, kidnapping, some slight shocking.
It took Clio a moment, after she woke up, to remember what happened. She could feel the cold weight of something around her ankle, and when she shifted it, she could hear the dragging of something metal. Her head pounded, and it felt like spikes had been shoved into her eyeballs when she fluttered her eyelids open. Clio let out a groan, and a blurry shape appeared suddenly in her peripheral vision.
“Professor?”
That’s right. Martin. Latte. Drugs. Oh god, where was she? What was going on?! “Marrrr-“
“Shhh, it’s going to take a bit for you to wake up,” she heard Martin say. She heard footsteps retreat, pause, and come closer again and a second later she felt the mattress she was lying on dip as another body sat on it. “Here. Drink-“
As if Clio wanted to drink literally anything else that came from Martin ever again. Her mouth felt like cotton wool and her throat felt glued together, but she clamped her lips shut, refusing. A groan of annoyance echoed in her ears and Clio turned her head away from the blurry shape of him.
Slowly, she tested her body, wiggling her toes, tensing her muscles, curling her fingers. Everything seemed to work, it was just that her body felt mired in mud. She lay like that for what seemed like ages, letting her vision clear, trying to shake the cobwebs off her mind. When she turned back to him, he was still sitting there, water glass in hand. “Why?” she managed to grit out of her sandpapered throat. It was the only question in her mind right now. Why had her trusted TA drugged her and dragged her…somewhere…?
Martin’s eyes darkened in a way she had never seen before, and fear coiled in her belly. It was like the mask he usually wore had dropped now, and she was seeing the rotten, terrifying core within. There was nothing in his eyes. No humanity, no civility. Nothing. “Our time was almost up,” he explained evenly. “And I couldn’t have that.”
Clio blinked at him and then she said, “where-?”
“You’re at my place,” he filled in. “And I can’t let you leave. While you were in Ireland, it was- I was-“ Martin shook his head. “I can’t let you leave,” he repeated.
As foggy as Clio’s mind was, she recognised this situation. It hadn’t happened in ages to her, but it happened to Melpomene all the time because of course it did. Some people got too attached to the feeling of inspiration being around a Muse caused. Some people couldn’t stand to be away from it once they had had it. Clio had thought she had been careful. She enjoyed teaching history and she had tried to keep her inspiration to a minimum. Martin was with her all the time though, of course-
Of course-
And now she felt awful. Dreadful. She tried to sit up and her head swam. Her ankle caught on something and she looked down at it, realising that the metal dragging she had heard earlier was a chain. Oh god. Chained. To the wall.
Like Marian.
“No, nono-“ Clio gulped in a gasp of air and she turned to Martin. “I did this to you,” she explained quickly. “I didn’t mean to, but it’s my fault. It’s okay, Martin. Our time doesn’t have to end just because the semester is over. Alright? We can- We can arrange something? Just let me go and we’ll set something up?” It was lies, of course. The second she was out of here she was calling Michael and having this sorted.
Or…if he hurt her…she was calling Apollo…
Sometimes she could talk sense into people. Sometimes they had taken her without thinking and if she just promised not to go anywhere… Sometimes she could appeal to their better natures- “I have a kid,” she whispered quietly. “She will be so scared- She's at school-“
“It’s nine pm,” Martin explained, not seeming moved by a single thing she said.
Clio’s stomach swooped again, and she glanced out the window across from her, suddenly realising the light she could see was a streetlamp and not the sun. Right. If anything had happened to Ella-
“I’m sure your kid is fine,” Martin said, dismissively. “You need to drink this. It’s just water,” he added. As if to prove it, he took a sip first and then held it out.
Clio wanted to keep refusing, but she was so thirsty, and maybe if she had some water, her head would clear a little, and she could figure out what to do next- She reached out and downed the water in one gulp, gasping afterwards, water dripping down her chin. “Martin-“ she said, her voice lower now. “Look, I- You don’t understand what you’re doing-“ she said, even as she realised he had thought all this out. The chain. The buttering her up with coffees so he would accept it without a second thought. So she would trust him- This was a meticulous plan, which spoke to the kind of person Martin was.
So often when this had happened to her, it had been a spur of the moment, panicky thing when someone had realised they needed the feel of her. Martin had been working on this for months. Maybe since she had arrived back from Ireland. The dreadful need he felt, that was her fault; the way he was going about it was alllll Martin.
But he didn’t know who she really was. Who her friends were. She was a goddamn daughter of Olympus. “You don’t know the kind of trouble you’re bringing down on yourself. If you- If you let me go then I can protect you.”
Martin lifted the corner of his mouth in a smirk. “I don’t need a woman to protect me.”
Hate curled around Clio’s heart like a vice grip. Apollo then. She was going to let her Musagetes rip this man’s throat out- “You’re going to regret all of this.” Not for long, but he would for the brief moment in time Apollo allowed him to live.
“And I don’t even need you to speak,” Martin said with a shrug. “I don’t know why, but I need you close. I can’t even think without you near. My writing when you’re nearby-“ Martin shrugged. “I can’t do it without you. With you, I’m going to be famous. A best-seller. But I don’t need you to speak.”
“Fuck you,” Clio growled, her body feeling more like her own now. She glanced around the room, surveying it. It was a goddamned studio, so small. There was a kitchenette off to one side, and a door to what was probably the hall right beyond that. Clio had a feeling her chain wouldn’t reach, and she wasn’t going to test it until Martin wasn’t there. She seemed to be in an apartment building though. If she could yell and get someone’s attention- She took in a deep breath, and Martin seemed to know what was coming next.
“I said-“ Martin growled, rising off of the mattress, “I don’t need you to speak. And you definitely shouldn’t yell.” He went to the oak desk that rested in the corner of the open space, and he grabbed something. A small remote with only one button. And then he pressed it and Clio felt like her entire body was going to come apart.
Electricity coursed through her, bending her spine like a bowstring. Her teeth ground together as the pain overwhelmed her, and then it was over and Clio rolled to the edge of the bed and emptied the meager contents of her stomach onto the floor. Oh god. He had electrified the shackle around her ankle. She groaned and Martin shoved her in the side, rolling her back over and showing her the remote. “So here’s the deal. You speak, you scream, you misbehave, you make a fucking peep, I push this.”
Clio didn’t dare make another sound. The agony of it- She had never felt anything like it. It had felt like dying. She glared at him, and if looks could kill he would be on his way to hell right now. “Good girl,” he said, his voice low and condescending. “Now I’m going to write and you are going to lie there. Don’t move. Or clicky-clicky. We can discuss your feeding schedule later.”
Like she was a fucking zoo animal. Oh she was going to see him torn limb from limb. Silently, she let her eyes fall closed.
She didn’t need to make a sound to pray. Nor did she need to make a sound to strip every last bit of inspiration from him. It would take time, but it would happen.