She could see that he was trying, bless him, but Carol wasn’t about to turn over a new leaf just seconds after being given a Dr. Phil-worthy monologue by her childhood friend. If she was, then she would have been cured years ago, maybe during those few visits that she and her parents made to him and his dad. She was only half-listening by the time he was taking her along with him, and for a brief moment, her heart skipped a beat as she rose higher and higher in the air until she was level with him. “You’re a good man. But being a good man isn’t always enough. You’ll see.” There was too much evil in the world for him not to bend the rules a little. The time may come when he would be forced to choose between keeping his conscience clear and saving someone, and she wasn’t sure if he was going to make the right choice. For now, he was stuck with her – and vice versa – and maybe there was a trick he had up his sleeve that would break through the mental and emotional trauma that made her who she was. Then, there was that tiny voice in her head wondering why he couldn’t just accept her for who she was and who she’d become. By him doing this, by the rest of society doing this, it was like they were trying to mold her into someone they wanted her to be. Or maybe, they care about you.
The whispers, the conflict…everything was giving her a headache, and she said nothing for the rest of their trip to wherever he stayed. Was he always Static even at home? Or would he shed that superhero persona of his and become Virgil Hawkins? By the time they arrived, she was already tired from being tugged along mid-air like some rag doll, and the shackles on her wrists and ankles were biting into her skin. Since they’d deprived her of everything sharp and pointy, she hadn’t been able to try and pick any of the locks, and even if she did, she might end up plummeting to her death from a hundred feet. “Nice place,” she said flatly, but she hadn’t even seen all of it yet.
when they made it back to his apartment, he knows that he’s going to have to let her get comfortable. she was his responsibility and not his prisoner and he wanted his former friend to know that he thought that way. so the second they had a moment, he walks up to carol and uses his powers to undo the lock that was holding her shackles together, giving her a chance to remove them and have that weight lifted from her. he didn’t need the chains to keep track of her. the tracker that was imbedded in her body would provide him with real time information about her location if he ever decided that he needed it. but that wasn’t important right now.
right now, all virgil was focused on was establishing ground rules between the two of them so she knew what was acceptable and what was not. “ alright. so rule one, no murdering. period. rule two, i’m not going to babysit you. you’re an adult and i’m going to treat you like it. three, you have scheduled therapy sessions and you’re going to go to them. four, and probably most important. you’re not my prisoner. you want to go out and do stuff, then do it. i’m giving you trust until i don’t. but you betray that trust and you’re going back, “ virgil explains calmly as he looks towards carol, a certain sternness in his tone. but it was obvious that there was care there, just as there was much thought to what he was saying to her. once that was done, he tilted his head to show her where she would be staying, a little attic overhang in his studio apartment that was designed to be storage space. it wasn’t much but she could have it.
