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whatiswhump · 2 years ago

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Silas Sevieller

I have probably posted snippets of this before. But now doing it in one fell swoop.

CW: Mention of past child death, psychiatric whump, needles, manhandling, possessive whumper.

A grin flickered across his smug face, begging the question, how was he enjoying this?

Sydney adjusted the grip on his gun, no less determined but certainly unnerved by the psychopath.

“What’s the matter Syd? Had enough?”

“Just give up, back up is almost here. You’ve done enough.”

There was that smile again, “Ohhhh, enough? I was only getting started before you interrupted me.” The young man, lackadaisically threw a knife so that the simple flick of his wrist sent it hurtling towards Sydney.

If Sydney were any slower he would be on the concrete with a serrated dagger in his forehead.

“Jesus, Silas, what gets you off?” This was the end game, now Sydney just needed to distract. Silas Sevieller had narrowly escaped already four times this year and it was only March. He had made it to the top of nearly every list.

Silas betrayed no emotion to the question, he also knew Sydney’s game… yet it seemed he was interested in playing, “If that's the most interesting question you have to distract me than I've underestimated you. I'm dissap-"

Suddenly the room was flooded with noise, there was yelling from every direction. Black armored figures trained rifles all on one target.

The target only grinned a toothy grin and kneeled with his hands behind his head, he knew the drill.

Sydney narrowed his eyes at the young man, where was the fear behind that vicious facade? Irritatingly, he saw no spark or inkling of anything resembling fear. So he looked at the men holding him and gruffly ordered, “Go ahead, get him out of here.”

The first time he caught him it was out of brute force, Silas fought the fight but Silas won. Silas had never been much for physical prowess. As a child he would orchestrate the fights in the orphanage yard rather than engage in them.

The second time Silas escaped, Sydney caught him by wits. He realized Silas was so delighted by- so caught up in the game, that he could be lured in more easily than someone of his intellect would expect. Silas wasn’t entirely surprised this time, he had seen the signs, the telltale queues but Sydney was right, he was having too much fun. In the moment he couldn’t help himself. And anyway he had slipped out of their prison once, what would stop him from doing it again? Surely not the imbeciles that ran it.

But those same imbeciles weren’t very pleased with him when he was dragged back in chains. They cut his rations and put him in solitary. Guards started looking for excuses to force him back into place. The blood spilt hardly deterred Silas at first. And anyway he had spent most of his life alone, he appreciated the time to think and formulate. Being alone was comfort, not being forced to rely on someone else, being alone was safe. He could trust himself and no one else, he had known this for a very long time. So solitary suited him just fine.

But the third time it wasn’t so easy, he had become ragged and thinner, more desperate with every bruise until at last he stole away in the night, leaving chaos in his wake. Sydney had caught up to him a few weeks later… on that awful day. Almost the whole city block was levelled, Silas hadn’t wanted that. God, that was the last thing he wanted. Sydney found Silas standing alone in the wreckage, horrified.

“Silas, it’s done. You’ve done enough.” Silas rested a hand on his hip, poised over his weapon.

Silas whipped around, instantly disguising his lost expression into a coy smile, “Sydney! I missed you! You never came to visit.”

Silas couldn’t help but smirk, “Yeah well I knew they were taking pretty good care of you there, they held onto you for over a year this time!”

“Did they? Huh, didn’t get to have a calendar in solitary, figured it had only been a couple of weeks.”

“What did you think about in all that time?” Sydney was stalling for back up and Silas knew it once again. Sydney didn’t want to pummel him again like the first time. Something about it had felt… wrong? If that made sense. It was better this way, to outmaneuver him, mitigate the damage.

Silas glanced around himself quickly, almost imperceptibly, scanning for others. He didn’t spot anyone, it wasn’t too late.

“Well I guess I’ll just have to tell you next time we meet won’t I?” Silas wiped some of the blood of his forehead with the back of his sleeve and winced, “Until next time.” He turned to leave.

“SEVEILLER HANDS UP!” The order rang through the smoldering air and caught Silas in his tracks.

They really were faster this time.

Men in tactical suits emerged from different directions, all equipped with rifles trained on Silas. Sydney glanced back at Silas and flashed a grin.

“Silas, No!” Silas realized then what he was going to do.

But the gun had already been pulled out of his back waistband, he was holding it up, trained on Sydney.

“Don’t shoot! Or I’ll take him with me!” Silas yelled.

Did Sydney see a quiver in Silas’s hands? He wouldn’t actually shoot him would he? He had never intentionally killed anyone right?

Sydney didn’t have time to debate this, this had to end, before someone got hurt, or worse, they shot Silas.

“Silas, what would Julie say?” He had recently uncovered it in a file, in an interview someone had mentioned someone named Julie and that she had died. He was grasping at straws but he hoped it might distract him but for some inexplicable reason it felt embarrassing to drag some random woman's name into their standoff, like he shouldn't do it.

But perhaps it was the right thing to do because after a brief moment Silas’s face devolved into horror as he stared at Sydney, he immediately lowered the gun and then dropped it like an afterthought.

"You know about her?" He asked in shock.

The SWAT team members surged in and tackled him to the ground and he didn’t fight it. When they pulled him back up, wasting no time in getting him to a more secure location, his eyes were empty, like he had seen a ghost. He went away with them quietly not looking back up at Sydney again, now lost somewhere else.

Who was Julie? Another victim?

The coffee was shit today. Did anyone else agree? Sydney didn’t even feel like making a joke about it though, he was too distracted with his previous night’s dream. Not one to overanalyze the weird shit that his subconscious made a hobby of coming up with, he didn’t normally let his nightmares take over his days but last night’s still tugged at his mind.

He had had this hair-raising vivid vision of Silas Seveiller in his bedroom... to murder him. But right when Silas raised his knife, he stopped and whispered, This isn’t what I want.

Sydney didn’t understand it but it kept playing on a loop in his head throughout the whole morning. By noon he decided the only way to prove to his subconscious that the maniac hadn’t escaped to murder him was to go see him. Seeing Silas locked up would put him at ease again.

But Silas wasn’t in prison this time. They had finally decided that he wasn’t mentally fit to be kept there... Syd wondered if it’s because the Powers that Be thought the prison guards might actually kill him this time.

Now Sydney would have to go to a very different place to see his nemesis.. one that he did not look forward to.

“Rise and shine Seveiller. You gonna take your meds today?”

The young man squinted to see two men towering above him, instantly making him feel nauseous. One pulled his sheet back while the other pressed a paper cup into his periphery.

“Because of your little meltdown yesterday, this is your only chance.”

“Well I don’t want it,” he croaked with a voice still heavy under the sedation of the previous night’s dose.

And then they were gone. He curled back into a miserable ball not bothering to pull the sheet back up.

A door far away buzzed. The sheet was gone again. The sheet was already gone? There were hands on him. Strong grips pulling him off the bed, he struggled. He even tried to land an elbow but he wasn’t strong enough and they too easily pinned him down. His face was forced into the mattress and his backside suddenly felt colder. Then there was a prick of a needle and he felt the elastic waistband of his pants being pulled back up. Someone was guiding him back onto the bed.

“This is for your own good,” he heard.

Time passed... he thought.

“Won’t you eat?”

“Time for meds. Are you gonna take them?”

No, he thought.

Where was he?

“Silas?”

Who was that?

“Well he’s been amazinigly uncooperative, worse than most. Most patients start to behave and submit to treatment after a few weeks, once they learn the alternatives if they don’t. But not Mr. Sevieller, however you would probably know that better than anyone since you are the one that caught him.” The doctor spoke over his shoulder as he strode down the blue linoleum hall.

Sydney picked up his pace to keep up, “In what ways? -not cooperating, I mean.”

The doctor looked back at him for a moment, Sydney suddenly felt as if he were another specimen under the microscope before the doctor returned his attention in front of him again.

“Well the boy is very sick. He used to attack the staff often at first when he came into our care. Before we started to learn how to uh- take care of him properly. He’s broken multiple noses and plenty of other bones of the orderlies. He refuses medication, thinks he doesn’t need it. Consistently refuses food out of insubordination, attempts pithy escapes… won’t engage in therapy nor submit himself willingly to any kind of treatment.. The list goes on and on. However, recently, I’d say the rules seem to be breaking through to him.”

Fitz wasn’t surprised, it all sounded like the young man he had worked so hard to bring in. He still wasn’t sure if psychiatric care was what Silas needed but he felt relief every time he had thought of Silas in here rather than out on the streets causing mayhem…. But the one thing that gave him pause was the word attack… Silas could through a punch but normally not unwarranted, he might’ve fought them but he found it hard to believe that Silas himself was the physical instigator…

He pushed down this puzzlement though as they buzzed through yet another door and reached the end of a hallway. The doctor peered through the window in the door first and then moved for Sydney to see for himself.

What he saw was not what he anticipated. There was a young man in there alright but he barely recognized it as Silas, the only indicator being that shock of dark hair. A much thinner version lay curled into himself and lifeless in the thin iron bed fastened to the floor. His pale eyes were open but his gaze didn’t move from where it was trained on the floor. Silas’s unruly hair had been shaven which made the hollows in his cheeks and eye sockets stand out that much more. A fresh looking bruise bloomed over his right eye creating a sickly mirage of yellows and blues. His arms were folded into his chest and his mouth hung slightly open.

“What the hell happened to him?”

The doctor looked slightly offended for a moment, “Were you listening? He is on heavy sedation while we train him to willingly take his medication. A lot of our patients require … proper motivation.”

Heavy-handed then. Sydney didn’t try to probe any further nor apologize for his harsh tone, he just turned away from the window.

“His responses will be delayed or he may not respond at all. It’s nothing to be worried about.”

“Well, I’m not worried about him.” Sydney shot back a little too quickly, bordering on defensive, “This is just a visit to ensure that he was still here- no offense. Er just a peace of mind thing. We both know what he is capable of.”

“Yes, sure, well if you have any trouble knock on the window. The orderlies are close by,” The doctor instructed curtly and took his leave.

“Silas?” No movement.

Sydney stared a for a moment before suddenly feeling like he shouldn’t be there. He was raising his hand to knock and to be let back out when Silas spoke.

“I don’t want it.”

“...Want what?”

His eyes pressed tightly together, “Please- I don’t want anymore.”

His voice was so small, such a stark contrast to the last time Sydney had seen him. Visions of that grin flashed in his head.

“Silas, it’s Sydney Fitz, do you recognize me?”

His eyes opened and he slowly looked up, his eyes were so red, it looked like he had been crying. Silas... crying?

“Syd? What are you doing here?” There was recognition but it was subtle and it looked as though he was having trouble focusing on him. He tried shifting to sit up but it was a poor effort.

“Here in an official capacity. Sent to make sure you’re still here. I’ve heard about your escape attempts, you forget that we know you too.”

His eyebrows came together but he didn’t say anything at first, then at last he muttered weakly, “Ya, I’m still here.”

“They treating you alright?” Sydney didn’t know what else to say.

Silas shrank back and looked up at the window of the door like he expected someone to be looking through it. He ignored the question though and instead responded with, “Why am I here?”

“You’re sick, Silas. You’ve committed countless crimes that you were convicted for, you need treatment and care.”

“... Do you believe that?”

“I’m not a psychiatrist, but I do know you did what you did and now people are dead.”

Silence.

“Where did you get that bruise?”

He stared back with no response.

Fitz pointed to his own eye in explanation.

After a prolonged moment Silas seemed to comprehend, he reached up to his own and winced when he found it with his fingertips, “.... You know me, I can’t help but fight it.” An attempt at a smile flickered across his lips but his tone lay flat.

Then the lock turned over and two very large men strode in. Silas shrunk back into himself, again. It was the quickest reaction Sydney had seen out of him yet. He pulled his sheet up further, a barrier.

“Please, please no. I don’t need any more.”

“Sorry sir, but he is on a strict medication schedule.” the nurse or orderly was addressing Sydney to apologize for barging in the middle of the visit.

“Silas, are you going to take it or are we going to have to give you another shot?”

“No- no I won’t. I don’t need it.”

“Alright get up.”

He didn’t move except to flinch when the orderly stepped towards him and pulled him off the bed and in one move deftly pinned him down so his face was pressed up against the hospital linens.

One of the orderlies looked back at Sydney, “Sorry sir.”

Silas was struggling and doing a poor job of it. “No! Please don’t!”. It was almost too easy for the single man to hold him down as the other one uncapped the syringe that had been in his pocket. Then the first pulled down Silas’ thin hospital trousers. The other quickly injected the medication. Silas watched with considerable horror. And before he knew it the pants were back up, Silas was being lifted back on the bed.

He squeezed his eyes shut, cheeks burning with humiliation.

“Consider taking your pills next time.”

Then to Sydney, “Sir, let us know if you need anything.”

“Uh sure, yes”.

Silas looked back up at him with tears welling but he didn’t say anything. Rather he just pulled up his sheet a few centimeters and then trained his eyes down.

Silas stood speechless for a few more moments, unable to reconcile the brute force so deftly performed with a man he considered so impervious.

“...Silas, why don’t you just take it? It would be easier for you.”

He only shook his head, anger just barely visible through the misery.

Sydney couldn’t get rid of the feeling in his stomach all week. The fear of that grin had collapsed into images of a small frame in a small bed breaking down into itself, eyelids fluttering. It was sickening.

Against his better judgement, he found himself back at the institution the next week. That pit he was feeling in his stomach, he couldn’t decipher it. At last he decided that it was intuition, that maybe Silas had been faking it, planning another escape of some sort. To visit him again was the only foolproof way to keep an eye on him.

“We’ve had to start force-feeding him this week, it is not our ideal course of action but while he refuses to eat, it is the only way. Maybe you can knock some sense into him.” The doctor seemed like he couldn’t care less as he was once again briskly leading Sydney down the hall.

This time Silas was asleep when Sydney was buzzed in. His face was peaceful again, almost innocent if it didn’t have all the bruises.

Unused to approaching sleeping people, he lived alone after all, he cleared his throat first in an attempt to wake him. When it had no affect, Sydney uncomfortably muttered his name.

“Hey, Silas, you there? It’s me again,”

He only stirred slightly, so he tried again. This week, there were no sheets on the bed, instead it was bare and Silas donned only a straight jacket and thin cotton pants.

After the third time, Silas opened his eyes, he looked like he was trying to rouse himself from the grave. What the hell did they have him on?

“Syd?” he whispered as he found Sydney with his dazed eyes.

“Ya it’s me again, I came back.”

If Sydney didn’t know any better he could’ve sworn that tears welled in the corner of Silas’ eyes, after a few more moments he said, “It’s good to see you.”

Sydney scoffed, Silas would never say that without dripping with sarcasm, “Haha, I bet.”

At this moment, Silas seemed to become more aware of himself and remember the straight jacket he wore, he shifted uncomfortably.

Sydney gestured at it, “They’re really giving you the all-exclusive vacation package huh?”

Silas grimaced at first but found a bit of a smile tugging at the corner of his lips, “Yeah, they treat me like royalty here. They love me so much they don’t want me to leave.”

“Now that’s the Silas I know,” Sydney chided back.

Silas shifted himself to sit up on the bed, it took longer than it should have and Sydney could swear there was an almost imperceptible groan at one point. How did struggling create so many bruises? He wondered.

“I heard you’re not eating?” Sydney had meant to interrogate his arch enemy on escape tactics, etc. but now that he was here, for some unexplained reason, he just couldn’t bring himself to.

Silas wilted a bit, but then breathed in again and responded while cracking another smirk, “The food is shit, worse than what they make over at the prison.”

“Silas, you never stayed there for more than a week before you escaped every time,” Syd chided back.

His grin curled a little tighter, “Oh ya, almost forgot,”

“Well don’t go killing yourself so soon, otherwise who am I going to fight every goddamn day?”

Silas didn’t respond as quickly, “I don’t know but hopefully the next fella has better aim.”

“Yeah maybe make it a little more interesting,”.

Silas had a coughing fit, it was deep and heavy, it sounded painful. The pallor on skin greyed significantly by the time he finished.

“...You okay? That sounds nasty.”

He straightened himself up a bit, “It’s nothing, the doctor already saw me, just some bug they said.”

Sydney wasn’t convinced but Silas was getting more drawn by the moment, clearly he was getting tired. His eyelids drooped further.

Sydney inched towards the door, unsure why he was feeling something foreign and uncomfortable in his own chest, “You seem like you’re getting tired so I am going to head out, let you get your rest.”

Silas’s eyes opened fully again, “Are you going to come back?” that small, small voice again.

“Um, yeah, sure, I’ll stop by again soon if you want.”

Silas nodded forward a bit and then slowly lowered back down to the mattress, his eyes were closed before the door had locked behind Silas again.

“Um, Silas. I have to ask you something. That day… when I caught you-”

Silas wearily smiled and flicked his eyes up to the man standing above him, “Which one? You’ve got a few lucky breaks under your belt.”

“The day you threatened me with a gun.”

The small quirk of a smile dissolved as his face paled.

“I didn’t know who- it was just a blind attempt to stop them from shooting you… Who is Julie?”

Silas looked back up at Syd revealing glassy eyes with a grief torn expression, “Was- you mean was.”

Sydney watched his... enemy- deflate, his shoulders caved in and head hung low.

He blinked the heavy welling tears out of his eyes, not bothering to wipe them away, “She-” He closed his eyes for a moment, flushed with emotion, “She was my little sister.”

He looked back up to Syd with large dull eyes.

Something panged deep within Sydney, jesus. All of the blood drained out of him, “Oh god, Silas, I’m-”

“I -I was supposed to protect her. I was all she had.”

Silas choked on his tears that started to come quickly, “But I couldn’t- I couldn’t- save her.”

Blind grief consumed his face. He had never- Never- spoken about it. Not to anyone.

“She never doubted that I would keep her safe. I was ten and she was seven, we were sent to a new foster family. We were just happy to stay together. The father.. He was a monster. He would lock us in the basement for days at time, beat us. One night he came down and he didn’t want to hurt me like he normally did- he went after her-” Another involuntary sob tore its way out of him, “I tried to fight him off- but you know I was a kid- he was too big. He beat me until I couldn’t stand- She was so small- all it took was one hit in the wrong place. She suffocated slowly- I couldn’t do anything for her, I kept thinking that if I knew how to hold her or how to fix it- I held her down in that basement for all night- He didn’t come back down until the next morning. By then she had-” been dead for hours.

Sydney listened in horror as his arch enemy broke down in front of him. Before it occurred to him what he was doing, he sat down on the bed and pulled the agonized man into his arms. Another sob escaped him but he didn’t fight it, he went limp into the strong hold, sobbing into his chest in anguish.

Then the door buzzed, Silas jerked away from Sydney, a panic and crazed look on his tear soaked face.

Two orderlies and a nurse came stampeding in. Silas bolted to the further corner of the bed holding out an open palm, “Please no-” with a strangled sob.

“Silas, you are overwhelmed. You know how this goes, it’s for your own good.”

The nurse looked at Sydney who had also jumped up, “Sir, please get behind us- he’s unstable- not safe like this.”

Sydney’s confusion fell into anger, “He wasn’t going to hurt me- he-”

Another strangled sobbed escaped Silas as the two men grabbed him, forcing him down onto the bed. A third orderly appeared out of nowhere, he immediately began fastening the five point restraints that were previously tucked under the thin mattress.

Silas struggled like a trapped animal, tears still streaming down his face. When each limb was tethered, the nurse approached with a syringe held aloft as the men held his arm still.

“Shhh- it’s okay Silas, this will make you feel better.”

She administered the syringe quickly and the men stepped away.

Silas turned his head, “Syd-” his expression crumbled again into raw desperation when his gaze landed on his face. But just as quickly as they had tackled him down, his expression began to soften and his eyes emptied.

Sydney was left standing there feeling like someone had wrenched his heart out of his chest.

Sydney found himself back at the gates of the hospital with a lump in his throat the next week.

“Mr. Seveiller requests that he receive no visitors at the moment, unless this is official business?”

By the time he got back into his car he thought he might throw up.

Against his better judgement, he went back the next week and was met with the same response. It became a ritual, showing up only to be denied. If he had really wanted to see Silas he could easily feign some official matter and force his way in to see him…. But Silas didn’t want to see him anymore. And could he fault him for that?

And then those tapes landed on his desk one morning, a few months after that awful day. Sydney hadn’t bothered to stop by the hospital in over a month. It didn’t stop him from thinking about Silas. He felt a pang in his stomach when he read the name on the file.

“Hey, Fitz? The loony bin sent over copies of the reports on Sevieller. You wanna see them?”

“Isn’t there patient doctor confidentiality?”

“Not when the patient is a real threat to national security, no. Although I doubt he’s much of a threat anymore… Someone finally figured out how to put that psycho in their place.”

“I’m surprised he talked to the doctors,” Fitz responded in a trained tone of apathy.

“Yeah, I guess they gave him something to get him going.”

A jab of… was it guilt? hit Sydney. They were drugging him defenseless? Even when dealing with someone as dangerous as Silas… it didn’t seem right.

“Sure. I’ll give them a look.” He sighed and tossed the flash drive on his desk, attempting to seem disinterested still.

“The bastard’s really a wreck, crying like a baby.” The cop gave one last imperious chuckle and picked his coffee mug back to sidle up to another desk.

Syd’s eyebrows creased slightly as he plugged the flash drive in, nervous about what he would see.

First file was a video.

Two men were guiding a drowsy looking Silas into a small plain room. He stumbled clumsily and they pushed him into chair and cuffed his hands to the table in front of him and his ankles to the floor. It struck Sydney as a bit excessive.

“Mr. Seveiller, are you ready to cooperate with therapy today?” A voice from out of frame addressed Silas.

He resolutely shook his head no once, a fire burning in his eyes. Sydney recognized the smoldering flicker, he had seen it so many times before.

“If you don’t begin to cooperate, it means the medicine is not helping your condition and we will have to up the doses.”

Silas glanced at the camera before responding, “The drugs aren’t doing anything but giving me side effects. You and I both know that’s because I didn’t need them to begin with.”

“We’ve been over this Mr. Sevieller, you are in denial, we are only helping you here. If you can’t begin to see that, then your condition is worse than we thought.”

“I am not in denial, I am not sick, I am just a very bad person.”

The voice hummed slightly and Syd could hear pen scratching.

“Write as many notes as you want, you won’t figure me out and I won’t bend.”

Silas stared down the anonymous man on the other side of the camera with unreserved confidence. He wouldn’t be tamed quite so easily.

The next tape was dated a week later. The men were guiding him back in but they walked more slowly. This time Silas held out his wrists to be fastened down. Then he regarded the other side of the camera with an annoyed grimace.

“Good morning, Mr. Sevieller. How are you feeling?”

He subtly rolled his eyes but elected to hold his tongue settling for, “Peachy, doc.”

“Have the new levels done anything to change your mindset?”

“Other than sleeping through meals? No. But you know, I enjoyed being showered by two burly men this week. An unexpected new perk,” Silas smiled saccharinely, daring the doctor to press further.

“I am afraid you can’t be trusted in the showers after… Monday’s incident.”

Two men were dragging him into a bare room kick and screaming. The wrestled him into a chair and attached his wrists and ankles to it like a goddamn animal.

“Do you want to be a good boy today?”

Silas wearily picked up his gaze to look across the table, a solid “fuck you” written over his expression, but he didn’t speak back.

“Well I have something to help you do that. Lucky you.” For the first time, Sydney could hear amusement in the voice behind the camera.

Silas’ expression wasn’t mirthful and ready to strike back like Syd had come to expect, there was frustration and exhaustion instead.

Someone else came out from behind the camera, they held a syringe aloft as they approached they tethered patient.

“No no no, get away from me. Don’t come near me with that-” Silas looked… scared?

“You don’t even know what it does yet,” the voice said from behind the camera, “If we agree not to use it, will you behave and talk with us?”

Silas aimed a look of pure hatred bore through the camera lens and to the person owning the voice. It looked like it took strength to shake his head no, just a millimeter. But it was enough.

A sigh, “Okay, inject him. And remember you had an option.”

Silas began to writhe in his restraints, desperately trying to create space from the syringe bearer. More people came in and attempted to hold him down to the table. Silas violently resisted throwing himself aas far within the restraints as he could, likely seriously injury his wrists and ankles in the struggle. At one point he managed to bite an arm and the headless body jumped out of the shot. Another nurse? Orderly? Slammed his head against the table then, temporarily stunning him.

“Do it! Now!” A voice rang out.

Whatever it was didn’t take long to begin working, Silas stayed limp on the table no longer moving, a stark contrast from the scene moments ago.

“Okay, rouse him now.”

Someone took smelling salts for fainting victims and cracked them under his nose, a faint flinch was visible from his now still body. A strong set of hands then manhandled him back into sitting, pressing him against his chair again. And then checked his eyes with a pocket light.

The kid squinted in annoyance but didn’t resist.

“Silas, are you feeling more agreeable now?”

Silas looked back across the table as if just seeing the speaker for the first time.

“Yes sir?” He answered uncertainly, quietly. Even through the camera the dazed look in his eyes was visible.

“Will you answer my questions and be a good boy?”

Silas remained locked on him, his eyes wide, “ Yes- yes.” He spilled out with uncertainty, as if part of him still knew he didn’t want to do this.

“We just gave you a special medicine that releases inhibitions, forces you to tell the truth, a truth serum if you will. You’ve been very bad but I think you can behave better now.”

Silas just stared at him.

“I want to start from the beginning. Your history. You had a drunken father and a promiscuous mother who didn’t take care of you, yes?”

“She tried to-”

“Yes?”

Silas nodded with his eyes wide, “Yes, she was out a lot. They both died by the time I was eight though.”

“And that’s how you and your little sister ended up in foster care?”

Silas suddenly looked confused as if he didn’t know how this man knew these things.

“Do I need to repeat myself?”

“No- yes, the state took our custody. No other family.”

“And that’s how your sister died, in foster care. Did you do it? So angry at the world you had to take it out on someone else?”

Horror made the tenuous expression on Silas’s face drop, “No- no. I didn’t- I couldn’t- I couldn’t protect her-”

“From yourself you mean?”

Tears began to roll down his cheeks but he seemed to not perceive them.

“No, I didn’t- he did it- he-” He was tripping over his words, clearly horrified but mysteriously stuck in a dream where he couldn’t reason, couldn’t fight back and couldn’t stay silent instead of engage.

“You seem to not even understand yourself- sometimes the brain locks away trauma, things it doesn’t want to believe… maybe you need a higher dose next session to get the real truth.”

“He killed her- I didn’t- I didn’t-”

Sydney’s heart clenched so deeply or gut wrenchingly that he didn’t know if he could keep watching. He knew for a fact that he had never discussed with any one else other than him. Now to have it torn out of him… but worse… accused? It was sickening.

“It sounds like it could have been the beginning of your misanthropic reputation, after that you went to the Pelham Boys’ School, where you spent most of your time in solitary confinement for infractions.”

Silas was full on sobbing now, well beyond wondering how a childhood file could be unsealed, beyond the injustice of the forced interrogation they were trying to call psychotherapy… now in a completely detached state of agony.

“Silas, stop it. We are not done. Listen to me-”

But Silas wouldn’t stop, he was completely departed, sobbing and unreachable.

“Fuck, you dosed him too high for the first time. Fucking waste of time. Take him away, sedate him and let him sleep it off.”

By the time the staff members were around him again, Silas’s tears had stopped but his head was at an odd tilt downwards and his eyes were hauntingly vacant. He didn’t notice when his wrist were unlatched, or his ankles (although Syd could see the angry red welts around each limb) he didn’t even respond when they began to drag him out.

The voice swore a few more times and then the camera switched off.

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amarriageoftrueminds · 3 months ago

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Since it came up recently, link to that therapist on twitter 👆 who was discussing Bucky's terribile therapist in TFATWS and how they should’ve been.

Transcript:

"As a therapist myself I've had a lot of feelings about Bucky's therapist on TFatWS, and have decided I need to rant a little to let it all out. I've worked w/active duty, trauma survivors, and court ordered clients, so here's some therapeutic conjecture on Bucky's therapy:

Aesthetically her office and presentation don't fit for someone who has been through the trauma that he’s been through. A client like this would need something non-threatening and safe- the whole vibe is overly formal and official in an office building, not at all therapeutic.

6 months working together she calls him Mr. Barnes and then James-he has identity issues and is struggling with who he is, so I think that one of the 1st things they would have done is figure out what he is comfortable being called, by whom and what that means for him.

He is still full out lying to her about pretty much everything including PTSD sx—I’m not saying clients never lie if they have good therapists, but if after 6 months he still doesn’t feel like he can be truthful at all then they haven’t built any trust/ solid therapeutic rapport

The pen and notebook thing-that’s clearly a trigger for him, there’s no reason to antagonize him and take notes in session like a punishment, it’s a power play on her part and it only emphasizes his lack of control in being forced into therapy (she should know his hx w/notebooks)

The whole little arm motion she made when she said “they need to make sure you don’t…” – that made so much light of what has happened to him, he probably feels like his arm is only good as a weapon and things like that will not help him accept it as part of his body

The rules, UGH the rules—from how they were talking about them clearly not something he actively created for himself, more like directives that he’s been ordered to adhere to—something fed to him and reinforced, feels like a way to sign off on liability only

THE AMENDS—this is probably my biggest issue. Amends are for people who need to take accountability for their actions and the repercussions of those choices. He had NO choice. He was a victim of horrific crimes against him, and framing it in a way that he needs to make up for

the crimes that others used him for is abhorrent. The lack of trauma informed care as astounding in the way it is being framed that he has to atone for sins that weren’t his. Its clearly reinforcing the idea in his head in ep 2 when he says “HYDRA were my people".

NO, HYDRA were your captors. They were not your people. That type of thinking needs to get deconstructed and challenged. He can dedicate himself to bringing good into the world and righting wrongs that happened WITHOUT taking on the responsibility of those actions.

Her whole attitude and demeanor were condescending and demeaning. I know some people have said “I love how she calls him out on his bullshit!” That’s not what I see happening. I call my clients out on their shit all the time—this was not that.

And I can only do that with clients ONCE we’ve built the type of relationship where it’s going to be therapeutic for them to hear it, and it’s done intentionally and with purpose. She just came off shaming and mean because they don’t seem to have any form of therapeutic rapport.

She said “you have no history, no family”- there is no therapeutic reason for that, and she’s wrong. He most likely has family alive (he used current tense when talking about his sister) and he was close to Shuri and TChalla, his history is vital to understanding him

When she said “Look, I know that you have been through a lot, but you’ve got your mind back. You are being pardoned. These are good things. You’re free.”—Yeah this feels really dismissive and like toxic positivity. “I know you’ve been through a lot BUT BE HAPPY!!??”

He certainly doesn’t seem to feel like he’s free (especially having therapy mandated), and you can’t just tell someone they’re free. I felt like she was pretty much just like, “shake it off, look to the future!” which feels really shitty when you’ve experienced excessive trauma.

HELLO breach of confidentiality, just introducing herself to Sam as his therapist and confirming it to Walker and the whole police station, it doesn’t matter if they know he’s in therapy you do not break someone’s privacy like that, he still deserves some control over his tx.

Ordering Sam into a session, NO, he’s not your client and you don’t know him well enough to know if that’s appropriate or if it would be harmful to either, and you haven’t asked your client for his consent to have another person in his session

Forcing a trauma victim who was stripped of his bodily autonomy for 70 years into a physically intimate exercise with a coworker that he’s barely interacted with in the last several months? NOPE, just reinforcing to Bucky she has control over him the way his handlers used to

To me, I think she is more focused on signing off on his psychological eval that he isn't a liability rather than any actual healing or attention to his trauma. This unfortunately isn’t unusual in the military where “mental health treatment” is focused on being mission ready.

They are making sure he’s ready to be an “asset” w/ mandated therapy, which he shouldn’t even be forced to do as part of his pardon because he shouldn’t have needed a pardon at all because he was a victim of horrific war crimes, brainwashing, and dehumanization for 70 years.

I’m just saying, if that was me he would be on my big squishy couch, bright open windows, bowl of Hershey kisses, random fidget toys, and two therapy dogs laying all over him while we work through that trauma and he builds back his identity and finds the calm he wants so badly.

And yes he would probably need someone who would see through his BS, call him out when he needs it, not be overly "touchy feely", but only if he feels safe and there is trust, where he gets to work on what HE wants, not what others think he needs.

Anyway thanks for coming to my TEDTalk, I❤️my work and I think being a therapist on retainer for the Avengers would've been a fucking trip, they all needed a team of mental health professionals at their disposal 24/7 and things would've been so much better🤣

ps. They can be a good therapist and just not be a fit for the client, that happens regularly. We know when to make it part of the conversation and when to refer out. Nothing good is going to come out of a contemptuous therapeutic relationship, mandated or not.

pps. That whole situation and the scene with Zemo was so rough. I can't imagine how much it brought back the violation, humiliation, anger, and helplessness of when he was the WS. I'm just imagining him having a therapist he trusts and being able to process that afterwards 😭😭😭"

#NOTE: THIS IS NOT ME I AM JUST TRANSCRIBING THE TWITTER THREAD #long post #antitfatws #bucky barnes #bucky meta #meta #mcu #mcu meta #dat's me #bucky's recovery meta #medical stuff #bucky's medical stuff #raynor #ref #writing #therapy #tl;dr: bucky is a victim should be in a soft room with therapy dogs and chocolate #also note: this depiction of therapy is NOT a critique because neither the characters nor the narrative calls her out for her crappy therapy #my theory: bucky's nightmares are not memories they are caused by his therapy...#he has to read winter soldier casefiles in order to make the List mandated by the terms of his pardon #(only files could give him the kind of details / intel he is shown as having about eg. yori's son)#he is being forced to cross names off the List (the Rules of his pardon) as monitored by his therapist...#but it's making him worse (giving him nightmares) ...and she knows but dgaf #as usual mcu writers blunder into a 'this would make more sense if the character was actually just hydra' subplot 🙄

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