Everything Falling Apart (Brooke, Marcelo, Mansion Folk)

[pyroprincess]

WHEN: One week after the Hellfire Club soiree
WHAT: Stephanie is a complete mess, guys.
WHO: Could be a variety of folks, honestly. This is just laying the fields of awful.
WHERE: The Mansion.

The first day she'd just been angry and confused at Marcelo for insulting her friend, a man who had done so much to help the family. She'd felt a strange feeling of pride in her father, and she'd wanted more than anything to keep him on that path he'd drawn out for himself. She just figured she needed a night of time out, and Marcelo would apologize and she'd probably feel like she was a bit too hard on him. He'd always done nothing but support her, and he was probably wary. And it probably wasn't too bad that he was wary. Her father had hurt her in the past, he really had.

The second day, she'd called Xavier's and, revealing as little as possible, indicated that she needed, if possible, to stay with them for a time. They'd been supportive enough. She felt a little bit better, she swore, though she still couldn't quite reach out and call Marcelo or Reginald. In fact, Crane had called. The picture of solicitude. He came off a little cool and reserved to people that didn't know him, but he'd always been warmly supportive of her. She'd convinced a very skeptical board that she should succeed her father. It was only right and natural. Sebastian was a king, and they could all agree she had the talents. With Sebastian returned of course, that complicated things, but Crane had quietly let it be known that he expected Sebastian would eventually hand the reins to her. Managing the global Hellfire Club was a full-time job, more than, and Shaw Industries would be in good hands.

She'd listened to the message, but she hadn't called him back. Something felt wrong and she swore the voice seemed more cold and distant on that messaging machine than it ever did in life.

Naturally, they didn't believe that at the school. Marcelo had contacted Tessa- no, not Tessa, Sage now, and she'd contacted the others. She was understanding enough when they spoke to her, but she wasn't fully convinced. It didn't quite add up. They hadn't been there. They didn't know Reginald. And yet, he had sounded cold and distant and almost inhuman on the phone.

The third day, she'd felt numb, so numb that she'd actually intentionally nicked herself while shaving her legs. It hurt. So at least there was sensation, if there wasn't feeling. There was blood too, so she was actually alive. Everything else felt so strange and greyed-out, though. She couldn't bring herself to cry, even though she knew she'd probably feel better if she did. She only spoke to people when she was spoken to, or when she absolutely needed to talk.

On the fourth day, she'd asked to participate in one of the training simulations, to keep her skills sharp if nothing else. She suspected Logan agreed to it because that's how he would deal with trauma or pain or frustration. It had felt good at first, distracting, but then a horrifying inchoate rage had crept up and they'd had to shut down the lesson, and then shut her down, before she either destroyed the Danger Room or killed someone. Despite the hard-light technology, there were still some ugly burnmarks and even molten gashes in the walls of the Room itself. When spoken to about it later, she had no recollection of anything other than a rage so all-consuming that it blanked out all sense of reality.

She'd spent the fifth day in a sobbing mess, refusing to leave her room, apologizing profusely and apparently sending out such disturbing emotional messages that they'd actually gone in and ensured nothing sharp or poisonous was in her room. What she hadn't told them was that she wasn't going to kill herself, because firstly, she felt like she was already mostly dead, and secondly, because she didn't deserve the peace that would come with that. She'd betrayed everyone she cared about.

It was on the sixth day that she'd formally given permission to look inside her mind. What they found was a complete scabbed mess, parts twisted in a way that was not compatable with telepathy (much more insidious and cancerous) , but also evidence of finer telepathic manipulations. Ones that could not easily be undone, even by Rachel. One that had clearly been slipped into her mind like a computer virus. Others that had been slipped in, despite an anti-telepathic implant that, if removed and looked at, would show signs to be calibrated to allow telepathic manipulations from a single individual. Sabotaged, perhaps, or specifically designed for that purpose?

It was a week later, before she was able to contact Marcelo again- shamefully, it was by text message, because she didn't trust herself to talk. She needed to say it before some insidious programming broke out of her head and onto the phone.

I'm sorry. I love you, but I'm not myself. You were right about everything. I have to stay here until my mind is sorted out. Please visit soon, with Sancho.

I'm so sorry, Marcelo. Please forgive me.

Comments

[hellfire_empath]

There was a basket loaded with carbs and sparkling alcohol, BluRays of every Audrey Hepburn hit, Diptyque candles for aromatherapy, and one of Brooke's favourite cashmere throw blankets, all for Stephanie.

She's even brought along her favourite mutant manicurist/pedicurist from Saks, Tanya Roberts.

Brooke knocked on the door, waiting for admittance. It simply wouldn't do to barge in on Stephanie in her current state of mind.

[pyroprincess]

"Come in, Brooke." Stephanie's voice sounded somewhat strange from the other side of the door. There wasn't the overwhelming exhaustion from before, nor was there the desperate emotional turbulence that had been so bad, Brooke had actually been barred from seeing her.

She managed a small smile, but it was fairly transparent and it never met her eyes. When she saw the other person, though, she frowned slightly.

"Can we be alone, Brooke?" It was phrased as a request, but it wasn't one to be denied or taken lightly. She had no desire to have some stranger in the room right now.

[hellfire_empath]

"Oh," Brooke turned to look at Tanya and snapped her fingers. It didn't matter, work or not, Tanya was going to get paid. The trashy-but-immensely-talented Jersey girl nodded her head and left, leaving Brooke alone with Stephanie. "I'm sorry, I wasn't sure if you'd be in the mood for a manicure and pedicure to help you relax," she said, gently placing the overstuffed basket on a side table. She walked deeper into the room, worry marking her face. "Sorry I couldn't stop by earlier. Rachel wanted me to stay away for a little while." Probably an empath thing? "How are you feeling?"

[pyroprincess]

Stephanie looked up at Brooke for a moment. "I doubt Rachel's told you any details, but my mind has been interfered with, in multiple ways, very, very seriously. It's going to take weeks to clear that out. My emotions, my thoughts, my very sense of self has been systematically violated over a period of months at least." Her eyes locked with Brooke's.

"I'm not feeling very good right now." At least, though, she didn't have thoughts of hurting herself. That cold anger was moving outwards, to other people.

[hellfire_empath]

"The emotions I can feel," Brooke said softly as she lowered herself onto a chair near Stephanie's bed. Waves of cold anger washed over Brooke, and she absorbed the emotions without letting them affect her. She understood now why Rachel had sent Topher Summers away.

"This was because of the soiree, wasn't it? Something happened there that night?" Because what else could it be? That was when Stephanie had suddenly started acting differently. Towards Marcelo, at least. And perhaps towards her father, a little.

[pyroprincess]

"Yes. Something happened there. But this goes way beyond that, Brooke." Stephanie took a deep breath. She was just about to say something about how Marcelo was right about Crane, but that would bring up things that she didn't really want to tell Brooke.

"Think about how you felt after the speech. Play back a recording of the speech, or see it on YouTube or something. It won't feel the same way." Stephanie spoke carefully, gauging Brooke's response. "Something happened to everyone at the party."

"Brooke." Stephanie took another breath before going on. "Can I trust you not to say a word about this to anyone else?"

[hellfire_empath]

Brooke thought back to the speech. She very clearly remembered being on board with everything announced there, but then it was hard not to be. Mutants were a superior species, and they should rightfully rule.

She very much believed that.

But she had felt those things rather intensely. Far more intensely than she normally did.

She looked up from her lap to meet Stephanie's gaze, twisting the carnelian ring that she always wore, feeling rather unsettled.

"What's going on, S?" It went without saying that Brooke wouldn't say a word of this to anyone.

Not that anyone would listen to her, anyway.

[pyroprincess]

"Crane did something at the party to manipulate everyone. And he's been doing it to me for months. And ... I think other people have been inside my mind as well. Essex, probably, judging by the fact that even Rachel's been having trouble getting rid of all of it." She met Brooke's gaze evenly, a steely look on her face.

"I'm done with this, Brooke. I am finished with this Hellfire bullshit. I am finished with being manipulated and used to suit other people's evil agendas. I am finished with my father and I am done with the Hellfire Club."

[hellfire_empath]

Brooke was silent for a long moment. Those last words, they were not words that she particularly wanted to hear. After all, Brooke had been groomed from a young age to take a place in the Hellfire Club one day. Preferably as one if the club's many queens.

And she was a rook right now, so she was clearly (hopefully) moving up in the world.

There was a second where Brooke was honestly tempted to use her powers on Stephanie and have her feel differently.

She stifled that impulse immediately and swore never to speak of it.

"I'm not sure how to react to that news," she said, in a moment of startling, unmanipulative honesty for her.

[nohoundsallowed]

Rachel rubbed her temples momentarily. She hoped today would go better than the previous ones. Her hands dropped away as she huffed out a soft breath. Her schedule had been cleared for the day. She would fit in what she needed to if and when Stephanie wanted a break.

She knocked gently on the door and waited to see if Stephanie would answer. If not, she would walk in, but it was more helpful to Stephanie if the distraught young woman answered the door.

[pyroprincess]

"Come in." Stephanie sounded and projected a certain careworn voice, but it seemed like things had settled at least slightly since the disastrous last few days. Indeed, Stephanie felt a crystal clarity about things. She knew she wasn't ready to do what needed to be done, not yet. But she knew what had to be done. Or at least, she thought she did.

Truthfully, she wasn't quite sure how much she should trust herself, even when what she was thinking was contrary to the will of those who had tormented her thusly.

[nohoundsallowed]

Rachel entered Stephanie's room and quietly closed the door behind her. She gave the young woman a calm smile.

"How are you today?" She stepped in from the doorway as she glanced Stephanie over. Assess first since things changed from day to day.

[pyroprincess]

"I'm starting to realize just what's happened to me." Stephanie replied. "I'm not feeling good at all. I feel like a puppet, like a pawn. And I never, ever, want to be used like this again, by anyone."

Stephanie was currently holding a fragile equilibrium between deep self-loathing and rage.

"I know I can't do what needs to be done right now. I'm not strong enough. And that's a very hard thing for me to admit. I like to help other people. I don't like accepting help, but I need it. Desperately." She managed to hold Rachel's gaze while saying all of this.

[nohoundsallowed]

"Asking for help is usually the hardest thing a person has to do," Rachel assured calmly. She moved over to right in front of Stephanie and then sat on thin air to be at the same eye level with her.

"What happened to you is not your fault. I will give you all the assistance you need. As will all of the staff at Xavier's. You're also stronger than you know at the moment." She offered her hands, palms up to her.

[pyroprincess]

Stephanie nodded. It was ... not as bad as realizing your mind wasn't entirely your own, but it was hard. It was also harder to recognize that you'd made a horrible mistake. That you thought you could balance something, enjoy the benefits of corruption while staying relatively clean of it yourself. That it wouldn't just chew you up and spit you out.

That, maybe, deep down, she had value to her father as something other than a tool. She'd nearly forgotten that hope, just to have it brought back and snuffed out again, even more cruelly.

She reached out and took Rachel's hands. "I need my mind cleared. I need to find a way of making sure this cannot happen to me ever again. I'll have to cut any links, ties or benefits I ever received from my father or the Hellfire Club." Not that she'd directly done much with the Club, but she'd indirectly benefitted from those associations several times. But it was becoming manifestly clear that those connections were not at a price she was willing to pay.

"I know Sebastian Shaw has never been, in any measure, a good man." She deliberately eschewed the honorific of 'father'. "But he's become worse, I think, since he's returned. Perhaps that's another illusion too and he's always been like this."

She frowned and struggled not to lower her head in shame, but she kept it up. "They need to be taken down."

[nohoundsallowed]

"I can help undo the mental and emotional damage. What I can't get, I know of someone who can help." Despite her power and skills, Rachel knew there was one woman with skills more honed than hers and with intimate knowledge of the Hellfire Club. She just had to work up her own nerves beyond her personal reservations to approach her.

She noted Stephanie's hands felt warm. It was unusual for Rachel since she regulated her own temperature to the warmer side. Freezing in mutant camps made her unconsciously use her greater power and control now want to stay warm.

"I have a... very colored view on the man. So, I couldn't give you an untainted answer. But there's one thing for certain. You do know what a good man is." It was a gentle prod. Something to get Stephanie to not dwell on the darkness of the moment. Ray needed her anchored to something that could pull her beyond vengeance. Something or someone who could give Stephanie a future.

[pyroprincess]

Stephanie nodded. She knew exactly what Rachel was getting at.

"I do." She said quietly. "I love him, and it hurts to be away from him now, but I can't go out there yet." Of course, she wanted to see him and she felt like she would be able to see him now, but home wasn't safe. Too close to social connections. Too easy to accidentally pick up the phone and have Crane rope her back in. Or to pay her a visit.

This was about as safe as a place could be from them.

[vesper_verde]

Marcelo has almost wept at getting the text message. Nearly a week of pretending everything was fine to the outside world and spending his time inside the penthouse not really living in it. He played with Sancho and mostly kept to the third bedroom. The rest of the large domicile looked not lived in since they had left for the party.

It had been rough since the first night back. When the alcohol he had drank the night of the Hellfire Club party reacted with his pain meds. He had vomited and smacked his head against the side of the bathtub. He spent the night sleeping in the tub after he had washed his suit off the easy way.

He had started going back to work early. If for nothing else than to work with Sage to figure out how to take Sebastian Shaw down. He was trying hard to hold himself together during this meeting. He managed to last almost to the end before he excused himself. He went back to his office to pull himself together and cut out early.

He needed to go home to grab Sancho, shave a week's worth of growth off his face, and dress to impress. She had said she loved him, but he desperately needed to hear it. To make sure it was true. If he had to dress to impress to do it, he would.

After loading up Sancho and all the supplies so the cat could stay with Stephanie, he stopped to pick up flowers. He got a dozen roses as he called Xavier's to let them know he was coming.

Even if he got there and Stephanie turned him away, he needed someone to take the cat and maybe the flowers to Stephanie. Whatever it took. He would wait. And he would get more reason to take down the people who had harmed her most.

His hands were shaking by the time he got to the school. It took him a few minutes once he was parked to get himself together. He grabbed the pet carrier and the flowers.

Here went everything.

[pyroprincess]

They'd told her that he was coming, to give her enough time to get dressed herself, in proper clothes and not the T-shirt and yoga pants she'd taken to wearing in the last little while, because they were comfortable and she had no particular reason to dress to impress anyone. She waited for him in her room, having done her best to make everything look normal.

She'd even shaved her legs, which had meant convincing Rachel to let her have access to sharp objects again.

And now she waited, every moment seeming like half an eternity. Waited for him to knock or come in or text her to say he was here or something.

[vesper_verde]

He had been shown where Stephanie's room was. He thanked the nice red-haired woman and set the pet carrier down by the door. He swallowed and adjusted his clothes. As if looking slightly rumpled would make Stephanie send him away. But he wasn't sure if months of manipulations left any room for him.

Marcelo took a breath and gripped the flowers tighter. The paper they were wrapped in crinkled. A sound slightly out of place to jar him into remembering to knock on the door. He raised his hand and gently knocked.

[pyroprincess]

"Come in." Stephanie answered softly, setting down some of her things and getting ready to go to the door. She fidgeted a bit, unable to keep still. She hadn't seen him in a week and it hadn't been on the greatest of terms. She missed him desperately and it was all she could do just to go over to the door and not break it down to go see him.

[vesper_verde]

Marcelo let out a breath he hadn't known he had been holding. Her voice. He'd missed hearing it. He held up a finger to tell Sancho to be patient. Not that he knew if the kitten was paying attention or not.

He grabbed the doorknob and turned it.

"Querida?" He remembered to relax his grip on the roses before he got thorn implants.

[pyroprincess]

The moment he had that door open, she was on him, arms wrapped tightly around him and her head buried in his shoulder. "Mi amor." She pulled away just enough to look up at him. "I've missed you so much." She pulled him down just a little so she could kiss him. It'd been the first kiss they'd shared in far too long. "You look good."

[vesper_verde]

He couldn't help but smile when he suddenly got Stephanie-crushed. He wrapped his arms around her and held her as tightly as he could. The rose paper crinkled again. He didn't really care.

He kissed her back with as much longing as this hellish week had given him.

He chuckled at her comment on his appearance. "I have to. Meeting the world's sexiest Spanish señorita. And these are for you."

He finally remembered to give her the red roses.

[pyroprincess]

"I don't feel that sexy." Stephanie had to reply candidly, but she smiled when he offered her the roses. She took another kiss from him.

She took a deep breath and looked up at him. "I'm sorry. This isn't even remotely fair for you. But ... my mind is a complete mess, Marcelo. You were right about Crane, but Essex has been working in my mind too." She leaned her head against his chest. "I feel like I've been nothing but a puppet."