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“It’s not a nice system,” Cleo says, voice clipped, “but it works. Fledgelings are at their sire’s beck and call until they mature enough to shrug off the compulsion. It’s why they’re supposed to stay sequestered for the first year.”
Legs makes a disgusted sound. “To serve?”
“Partly.” They look down at the table, covered in a spread of case notes the doctor brought along. Abolish features prominently in several photos, eyes dark and clothes bloodstained. “But it also ensures no one else gets their hooks in. They’re most susceptible to compulsions from their sires. Ignoring all the- the obviously terrible things, it is a way to practice a necessary skill.”
Cleo sighs, fidgeting with a thread come loose from their sleeve. Sometimes Legundo will catch a glimpse of the youth Cleo was stuck in for so long - movements that are awkward, gangling, halting. Physical signs of fear subdued and compressed into almost unnoticeable nervous tics. Then she looks up, and the illusion of youth vanishes; her eyes are so very, very old.
“Fledgelings are… at best, they’re vulnerable to suggestion. You saw what Pyro was like, and Scott was hardly trying. Abolish had training as a human to resist enthrallment, but that only does so much against compulsion, especially if…”
Cleo trails off, the strategies that might break a person well known to both of them.
“But Abolish isn’t supposed to-” Legundo breaks off, pinches the bridge of his nose. Not supposed to what- to be a vampire? Little wonder who he has to blame for that. He takes a breath he doesn’t need; in four, hold four, out four. The smell of overbrewed black tea and cat dander predominate, with a faint undercurrent of iron that makes his teeth itch.
“Well-” Cleo makes a shrugging gesture at a picture of Abolish ripping into another member of the Organization, before grimacing and covering it with a mug. “Option one: he’s gone off the deep end, which seems unlikely. Possible! But unlikely. Option two: he’s being compelled by a vampire.” They consider for a moment, and reluctantly pile a third, clearly Avid-inspired option to the top of the list. “Option three: he’s being controlled by something else.”
Legs is transfixed by the look in Abolish’ eyes, in each of the photos. Something cold burns in his chest at the idea of his- colleague? friend?- stuck in what has to be a personal hell. Not that he knows Abolish well; he’s not sure anyone does. But the man’s dedication to duty meant that if Abolish was at all aware right now, he was certainly suffering.
No, not duty, he thought with a flinch subdued with the ease of decades of practice. Duty had led the Doctor to places no one should ever go. Any suffering was squarely due to the man’s dedication to peace; Abolish always chose to help, even when it was undeserved. Qualities that stood in horrible contrast to the blood-soaked puppet in these files.
Gritting his teeth in a haunted fascimile of a smile, the doctor forces a laugh. “I’ve never actually tried to compel him before. Which I’d assume is obvious, given my head is still attached to my body.”
Cleo snorts, gaze vacantly directed at the middle distance. It’s not convincing.
He knows Cleo is intimately familiar with a very similar hell, as a thrall; if she can bear the telling, he needs to be willing to do what needs to be done. Abolish deserves the chance of whatever rescue he can offer.
Shoulders squared, voice shifting firmer and colder, Legundo says, “Alright. Tell me what I need to do.”
He’s in the forest, following like a dog after its master, when Abolish sees a familiar face again. His stomach lurches, because he knows what happened to the last half-dozen agents of the Organization he’s encountered, and- he doesn’t want to do this.
That hasn’t mattered for a while, now.
Fury rises like gorge in his throat, and it’s not - Abolish knows this anger isn’t meant for Doc. It should be directed at-
But he can’t stop advancing over the dirt and dead leaves, noticing with grim interest the shine of a blade in Legundo’s hand. He can’t stop moving closer, barely registering the ineffective, shallow slashes to his arms.
Roughly jarring an elbow he knows hasn’t worked right since Oakhurst, Abolish grabs the scalpel that falls from Legundo’s grasp. He flicks the knife into his left hand and lunges to the side, using the opening to lead into a flurry of cuts much more effective than the doctor had been delivering.
The man grunts in pain, snarls “Abolish, stop!” as if that will do anything. Mercy is never an option, in this new role he’s found himself in.
Still, he falters for a moment, and the pressure in his head redoubles, warps over his vision like a soap bubble. Perception wavering, Abolish pauses for a moment to squint. Is this the vampire that killed his parents? Scott? Pyro, Owen? The man who’s been holding him captive, the one who-
It hurts just to think about, so Abolish doesn’t. He’s pushed away from the thought with a feeling like he’s sliding on ice. It doesn’t matter. No matter who this is, he will kill them. Every bit of control has been stripped away and all that’s left is a brutal efficiency. Finally existing as the weapon he’s always been. Kept slightly blunted in the Organization, wielded by fools, but filed to a vicious edge during his time away-
“Stop.”
There is a moment where something sits bitterly in his mind, lingering sticky threads of control trying to maintain a grip. Pain shoots through his throat, up to his eyes, like there’s hands pulling his skull open.
And then there’s a pressure on his mind, heavy as the blanket that’d kept him company in that tiny crawl-space until Morcant found him. Safe. And in the space of a blink he’s on the ground, knees pressing into the dirt, thoughts echoing with the command down.
He can’t- Abolish stares up at Legs, and everything has been replaced with deference. He knows he’s- he's whining, making some crazy sound that echoes through his chest. It’s humiliating, and he doesn’t know how to stop it- which is at the very least a situation he’s had a lot of practice dealing with in recent months.
The sound of it makes the doctor’s legs stutter as he steps carefully between Abolish and the- the other one. The one that he doesn’t belong to, that never should have had him. And it should matter that someone has him at all, no one should ever- but. It’s so hard to hold onto that thought when his sire is standing in front of him, smelling of blood and cloves and chemical-sweet soap.
Legundo levels a stare across the little dirt-packed lot. “Why did you-”
The man runs. Legs doesn’t chase him. He doesn’t need to; hidden by the edge of the treeline, he can see at least a half-dozen members of the Organization waiting to pounce. The other vampire had never been the dangerous one, really; that was Abolish’s job.
Abolish watches as Legs turns, crouches in front of him. The other vampire looks exhausted, and is badly failing at hiding the horror on his face.
“How do you want- I’m so sorry, Abolish, Cleo said it would be safest if I don’t let go of the- the thrall-” he stumbles over the term, lip curling in disgust, “until we’re back to a safehouse. Is there anything I can do, to…”
The question hangs limply between them. Abolish fights past the stupid, needy sounds his throat seems to be producing entirely of its own accord, and forces out a quiet request. “Sleep?” If this isn’t going to stop, he’d really rather be unconscious than- whatever dreadfully embarrassing thing is currently happening to him.
Brow furrowed, Legundo digs through his pockets to pull out a syringe. Uncertainly, he says, “I can do that, if that’s what you want?”
The hesitation, the asking, feels so foreign that Abolish has to force himself not to start laughing. He’s not sure he’d stop once he started; or that he wouldn't start sobbing instead, something he thought he'd trained himself out of long ago. “Please, Doc.”
There’s a pinch in his arm, and a sensation moving through his veins like cool water, and Abolish falls into something like sleep.