thinking about. AU where vermouth was not made immortal / frozen at specific age by elena and atsushi's drugs, but rather by some other way, and it is not something easily replicated, but the boss wants scientists to study vermouth to make what worked on her work on the boss as well and to guarantee the safety of that. he wants scientists to study vermouth and to use vermouth as a test subject to experiment on to get the better understanding of this unknown technology/drug/method. elena became the primary assigned scientist. who was interested enough in whatever this method is, want to study it, but also has sympathies for vermouth and want to make this as comfortable for her as the situation will allow for (which vermouth thinks is very fake of her and tells her so). she studies vermouth as instructed, noting every detail and trying to understand everything, not just about the method but also about vermouth herself, though sometimes it can be hard to separate the two. she tells herself the more she knows the more she understands the better she can help vermouth, to lessen her suffering, but at the same time she cannot fight back against every instruction from the boss, sometimes there are things she will have to run which she also is curious about the data as well. (vermouth calls the battles of elena's internal conscience a dramatic performance.) elena feels she has some obligation over vermouth, that she needs to protect her, as much as possible within her ability.
eventually the boss is pushing for things that elena no longer feels she can do, that she has to have a line somewhere that she won't cross, and she fights against that, and for a while that is looking like it's just going to make it worse for them both (vermouth: can your conscience not awaken at the worst time). but elena holds and refuses to continue and the boss is furious and vermouth is angry at elena for angering the boss which will surely make both of their situations worse, angry at the boss for a million reasons, and then angry at herself because she is somewhat touched by elena standing her ground and not yielding even though it's stupid at this stage, she is somewhat grateful for the attempts of protection elena has offered her and she hates herself for feeling these emotions towards a woman she is determined to feel nothing for, at most hatred and resentment.
things escalate out of hand and elena, in protest, burns down the research center with all the data in it, along with herself who knows most about the data, and it all turns to ashes, halting the whole project. one rumor is that vermouth survived that fire (although elena made sure that vermouth was not close enough to be hurt) and after that no one quite dare to experiment her again, none of the scientists the boss hired will continue the job. (another rumor is vermouth set the fire and burned that down as revenge). even the boss is stunned enough to back off. and vermouth has to continue to live with the knowledge that she was protected by the woman who burned herself and the research lab down for her. adding on top of her already complex feelings for elena.
