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Adelle wakes up with an electric hum-buzz-hum, eyes opening to meet Topher’s. She blinks.
“Did I fall asleep?”
“For a little while.”
It’s only at that response that she snaps out of her daze, the familiarity jarring. She knows what this is, where she’s sitting, and the position is all wrong. She looks at her hands worriedly, sees the bones and veins that should be there as usual. Her legs look right too—the pants are odd, but they're hers. But then, she could be programmed to think that, couldn’t she? Even if she were in someone else’s body—Victor’s, maybe, or…
“Ms. DeWitt. Please focus. Look at me.” Topher’s voice is earnest. “You are having a panic attack. Breathe deeply. Inhale…now exhale…”
She summons herself back from the edge of the abyss.
“You know who you are?”
It’s Boyd’s voice. She gets up from the chair and turns. “I am Adelle DeWitt,” she says, “proprietor of this Dollhouse in Los Angeles.” She hopes it’s true.
“Yes. You are.” His voice has always been so comforting. “We have some startling news for you, so you may want to sit down.”
“Not in that chair.”
Topher pulls out one of his flimsy plastic chairs and she sits in that instead. It’s not exactly comfortable but on the other hand it’s not trying to steal her brain. She sits down and runs a hand through her hair. It's shorter than she remembers, and cut ragged. But that's a good sign. If you recognize the changes in your own body, you're probably not a doll.
“What is the last thing you remember?”
“I…” she thinks back. “I was doing a scan of my memories. But that seems like a long time ago, somehow.”
Topher says, “It’s been five months, a week and three days. Don’t worry, you’re still in your body. But it took us three months to retrieve it, and the imprint was already two months old.”
“Topher,” Boyd says. “Let’s tell it in order. I’ll tell it.”
Topher backs off. “Fine, boss-man. I’ll just be sitting here. As back-up. In the back.”
Boyd begins the story. “Three months ago, Echo had another…incident.”
They’ve been on the road for weeks. They only stay in a town for a couple days, ever. Sometimes they find a room through an online network. Sometimes they book a hotel room—Carol has a lot of money. Adelle sometimes asks her where she got all this money, since she never knew Carol was so rich before, even with her less than legal habits, but Carol always shrugs it off and says “Trust me.” Which Adelle does.
They’ve been on the road for weeks because one of Carol’s old enemies is after them. Carol has a lot of enemies—that’s what she gets for working as a drug dealer—but this one is one of the worst. So bad they can’t stop moving, not even now that they’re far away from L.A.
“I was dealing with some top-notch people,” she tells Carol. “This is what you get for dealing with the rich. They have resources.”
And this is what Adelle gets for throwing her lot in with a girl like Carol.
(She can’t remember why they got together in the first place. Something with a bar, maybe, or was it a business meeting? She brushes over it. There’s no point thinking about the past. Carol is her future, and the future is bright bright bright.)
They’ve been driving for days and sometimes Adelle gets tired. But Carol always knows how to cheer her up. Knows what snacks she likes, how she drinks her coffee, what songs she likes. Or, at the worst, can make her feel better with a single kiss.
“Oh, baby,” she says, when Adelle is getting grouchy after a long day on the run, “cheer up. You know you’re still lucky with a girl like me.”
And Adelle always must acknowledge that yes, she is lucky.
“When she took you hostage we thought she wanted to bargain. Instead she commandeered the computer room and wiped and imprinted you. When you came out you pulled some Bonnie and Clyde stunt and ran off. Only she’d removed her tracker.”
“Like the Alpha incident,” Adelle notes. She has calmed now. Boyd has sent for a cup of tea and this is her house, her body and her brain: there is no reason for her to panic.
“We always knew Echo had the ability to learn.”
“And in this case she learned from the worst influence possible. Even when the incident occurred she fought against him. I can’t believe she would do something like this.”
Boyd places a hand on her arm and she realizes she is trembling. Not so calm after all. “Glitching dolls are unpredictable, ma’am. You can never know what she would do.”
“Why me?”
“You were her hostage. Because you were the most powerful person in the building, perhaps.”
“No…she would have planned it out ahead of time. She’s very smart.” Adelle spits out the word. “So why not someone else? She could have taken someone physically stronger, who might be more useful to her. She had the abilities to take them down, so it’s not that she couldn’t take them hostage instead. You, for instance.” She gestures at Boyd. “Why wouldn’t she take you?”
“I’d rather not talk about that right now.”
“I’m still your superior.” She was, wasn’t she? Had things shuffled in her absence? Time to clarify matters. “Don’t act like I’m a child. I can handle it.”
“I think it would be because she respects me,” Boyd says.
Adelle chokes on her next words. Then, after a moment, “That may be so, Mr. Langton, but she doesn’t respect every single dumb muscleman in this building.”
“No,” Boyd says bluntly. “But she probably doesn’t hate any of them as much as she hated you.”
“Echo doesn’t hate me. Caroline did, but Echo…”
“Echo doesn’t like people who keep people locked up. You’re the head jailer,” Topher says, hands twitching. “So we think she fixated on you and just sort of decided that if she changed you, the one in control, she could do anything. Sort of a challenge.”
“I was sort of a challenge.” Adelle narrows her eyes.
“We think so, maybe. It’s hard to parse the actions of someone out of control.” Boyd takes Adelle’s arms again and looks her in the eyes. “We should focus on the facts. That would be easier on you.”
“Facts without explanations are pointless.”
“Then, explanations later.”
“Fine.” They might as well get on with it. “We…pulled a Bonnie and Clyde. What next?”
They don’t have enough clothes with them.
They ran out of L.A. in a hurry, after all. No time to stop in their apartment. So they don’t have their clothes. Adelle is unfortunately wearing an outfit that doesn’t even suit her, some ruffly neutral colored blouse and a pencil skirt. Why did she even pick up that outfit?
But they change clothes soon enough. Carol laughs at her. She’s wearing a yoga outfit, which is not completely her speed but a bit closer. At first Adelle just puts on jeans and a hoodie, a change of clothes to throw their pursuers. When they’re a few cities away, Carol says they can relax for a day. And Adelle finally has a chance to go shopping.
“Anything you like, baby,” Carol says. “It’s on me.” She grins and murmurs in Adelle’s ear, “You want a name-brand dress, a Gucci bag, a pair of Louboutin heels…”
“Don’t be silly. They don’t carry Louboutins in stores like these.” It’s only a Sears—up-end but not that up-end.
“Anything you want.” Carol puts an arm around Adelle’s waist. “We can go to a classier store if you want. I can afford it.”
“Let’s not waste your money.” Even if it seems to be limitless.
She picks out a nice pair of heels but also some practical flats—can’t drive well in heels, now can you? The tightest pair of jeans she can still carry off at her age. Some blouses that fit a little tighter, with a lower neckline—it’s been killing her for the past couple days, being unable to show any cleavage. A leather jacket because why not, you can always do with more of those. Some new makeup in darker shades. The sexiest dresses she can find that actually suit her curves.
And, most importantly, new underwear. She needs thongs like she needs air to breathe. Dark and lacy is best, a couple light and silky as well. She thinks about how Carol’s fingers will hook around the edges and pull them down and shivers. Also some push-up bras that roughly match. Can’t get it perfect but she can get it close enough.
Carol hums in appreciation when she sees Adelle’s choices. She’s already done her own shopping. “That’s a couple hundred dollars you want me to throw down, baby.”
“You said anything I want. Are you going to take it back?” Adelle raises her eyebrows.
“No, I’m just messing with you.” Carol pays for it with a card. She seems to have a new card every day. As they walk out to the car, she says, “I don’t know why I love spoiling you, Adelle.”
“Because you have weird kinks,” Adelle says drily. There have to be only a couple women as hot and rich as Carol is who just want to buy things for a failed businesswoman nearly twice their age. It works for them, though.
“I didn’t plan on being so nice,” Carol murmurs. She stares off into the distance.
“You can’t help being nice.” Adelle leans on Carol’s back, absorbing her warmth. “Such a good little girl.”
Carol laughs shakily, the way she does when she’s just gotten her drug rush and she’s not quite up in the cloud yet but just starting to feel it. “Yeah, I’m nice, aren’t I?” She steps into the car. “We should get you a haircut, baby. Me too. Make it harder for people to find us.”
“Good idea.” Adelle runs a hand through her bland, dignified curls. “I could do with a change.”
“Then…you vanished.” Boyd shrugs. “Off the map. We searched for you and searched for you. Rossum appointed me as temporary director here. We’re lucky they didn’t send someone who would have wanted you gone for good and terminated the hunt.”
“I am a valuable asset,” Adelle says. That might be all she is to Rossum, or to anyone, but she is at least that. “I was worth the retrieval.”
“Very much so.” Boyd is placating. “We’re all glad to have you back. I don’t make a very good director.” He chuckles lightly.
The tea has arrived. Adelle sips it. She wonders if she drank tea during the time she was gone. She feels like she drank this blend of oolong only yesterday, but no—that at least can’t be true, she has a local source and it’s hard to get. She pictures herself sitting at a café drinking a bitter London Fog. Would Echo have trusted her to even drink tea alone? Or would she have been constantly at Adelle’s side, knowing how easy it was for dolls to glitch from personal experience?
Dolls. She was a doll.
She looks down at her legs, swathed in yoga pants. Her cup shudders in her hand, but she doesn’t spill. She never spills.
“Rossum recognized the priority of catching Echo because she’d somehow worked out a way to drain money from the company, too,” Boyd said. “Funds drained randomly from one bank after another. If nothing else, that kept them on the chase.”
That, not Adelle. In a way that makes more sense. Adelle is a valuable asset, but she is replaceable. And with her imprint in storage, they could have made a new version of her if they really needed to. She wonders why they didn’t just do that instead of appointing Boyd.
Maybe they did and Boyd is just protecting her. She wishes he wouldn’t. How can she know what the truth is, if he won’t tell her everything?
“How did you finally find her?”
“She got involved in an engagement in San Francisco. Apparently trying to ‘rescue’ Victor, but of course he didn’t cooperate. Seems she was counting on him glitching.” Boyd shook his head. “You have to acknowledge she’s an optimist.”
Carol calls Adelle baby all the time, but never in bed. In bed she is “Adelle Adelle Adelle.” Gasped, moaned, choked, begged. Sometimes rapturous, sometimes piteous. Adelle can’t get enough of it. She can’t quite remember how they met but she knows this is why they stayed together. Years into their relationship, the passion is still there.
“Adelle.” Carol sucks a bruise onto Adelle’s neck.
“Adelle.” Carol shifts her legs to accommodate Adelle’s manicured fingers.
“Adelle.” Carol breathes out worshipfully as she unlatches Adelle’s bra.
“Adelle.” Carol whispers into Adelle’s ear as they huddle together on the verge of sleep.
“I don’t regret you,” she tells Adelle defiantly one evening, after nearly an hour of making love. “I guess I’m a hypocrite but you don’t deserve better than me, anyway.”
“Carol,” Adelle says. “I think you need some sleep.”
“I deserve something nice,” Carol says. “I deserve something soft and good. I never had a chance to get that, did I? Never when I could remember it, or when I actually wanted it.” She puts her hands on Adelle’s shoulders, but they twitch, as if she’d like to squeeze them around Adelle’s neck.
“I’m sorry,” Adelle says. “Your life has been hard.” Not that Carol will ever talk about her past, but Adelle can get the gist of it: a tough childhood, some brief work in the sex industry, and then finally the drugs which should have made everything worse but ironically made everything better. Knowing that is enough to know that Carol really does deserve more. She’s a good girl, really. Such a good girl.
“And you don’t deserve better than me,” Carol says.”You don’t deserve shit. You corrupt, bitter bitch.” Her hands are trembling. Trembling. Trembling.
Adelle reaches up and removes them, and kisses her knuckles. Carol is in one of her moods tonight. She will be insecure and hateful until the morning. But Adelle knows she only acts like she hates Adelle because she loves her and sometimes hates herself.
“I love you,” Adelle says. “I don’t want anything more than you. Ever since I met you, I never have.”
Carol casts her a wild look. “Stop. Stop!”
Adelle pulls her close and hugs her, and feels her beginning to sob.
Adelle gulps down more tea until the cup is empty. Luckily, they have an entire kettle. She refills and sips with a little more control.
“Your imprint at the time refused a debrief when we brought her in. She was out of control fighting us.” Boyd steeples his fingers. “We wiped her and brought you back without further questioning. Accessing those memories could be difficult—we can’t simply read them, and it’s likely any doll imprinted with them would refuse questioning as well.”
Adelle says, “Surely she would be open to persuasion.” She needs to know what her body was up to.
“We can’t damage the dolls, if that’s the kind of persuasion you’re thinking of. It’s doubtful even that will help.”
Adelle turns to Topher. “You will try to slightly alter the imprint, to make her agreeable without adjusting many memories. Then we’ll see.”
Topher nods hurriedly. “Yes, ma’am! You’re back in charge and I am ready to follow!” He turns to his computers and starts whispering to Ivy, already back to work. It’s good to see that. God knows she doesn’t need Topher hovering over her, of all people.
“More worryingly, I’ve lost two and a half months of memories of work here.”
“More worryingly than what your body may have been up to with Echo? Running around the country?”
“This is important work we do,” Adelle says. “I can only hope the records are complete.”
“The records are fine.” Boyd smiles. “I used them, didn’t I?” He nods. “Good to see you taking this in stride.”
She has to. Can’t start thinking about what Echo may have had her do, other than London Fog in a café. Echo is a vigilante. Maybe she had Adelle blow up Rossum buildings or assist in assassinations. If something like that comes to light, it won’t matter that Adelle was imprinted with a foreign personality; Rossum is unlikely to be all that understanding.
“I’ll look at the records,” she says. She stands.
“There’s one other thing you can do,” Boyd says. “You can talk to Echo.”
“Echo?”
“We haven’t wiped her yet. We were using the machine for you—besides, she has useful information. She’s in a holding room.”
Adelle considers it. “She’s unlikely to be intimidated by me if she was holding me hostage for three months. You’d better have someone else go at her.”
“That’s a very mature reaction.” Boyd nods. “I’ll have someone assigned. You can watch through the cameras.”
“I’ll look through the video recordings tomorrow. Tonight I’m leaving.”
“Ms. DeWitt, you are not authorized to leave. You still are a risk factor. Rossum is sending a specialist to examine you and make sure there are no implanted triggers in your system, or any other anomalies.”
“What kinds of anomalies?”
“Any sort.”
“Echo wouldn’t have had access to the technology—”
“Do you want to take the risk?” Boyd cocks his head at her. Before she can answer, he says, “Rossum doesn’t.”
She agrees to stay in her office with a three-man surveillance team. At least there she knows there’s vodka. She needs something stronger than tea.
Echo straps Adelle into the chair. Adelle says, “What good, exactly, do you think this is going to do you?”
“If I’m running, I thought I’d like some company. It’s lonely on the road.” Echo tosses her a grin. It’s almost a snarl.
“You’re vindictive.”
“A little bit, yeah.” Echo is still messing with the computer, selecting the specifics of the personality. Where she got these skills, Adelle has no idea. “Honestly? I just want you to know how it feels.”
“How what—” feels, Adelle is about to say. But Echo flips the switch, and all Adelle can think of is pain.
When she wakes up, she’ll be lucky that Echo has let her keep as much as her own name.