The scientists looked down at the few boys they implanted with sea slugs. Little brothers, the newest attempt at creating a being that could produce Adam. They had yet to wake up which gave Tenenbaum time to start taking samples from their bodies and observe the reaction. Adults, teens, and children above a certain age couldn't handle the slugs directly in their body and quickly became overwhelmed by the sheer amount ADAM, deforming them and descending into madness. Infants and toddlers were killed by the infusion of the slug, but in small children it formed a symbiotic relationship without destroying their bodies.

It worked with children of both genders, but the Little Sisters were more effective at producing Adam. They managed to produce it at a rate roughly thirty times faster than the slug, Little Brothers only managed to produce it at a speed five to six times faster. For the sake of efficiency Little Sisters became the focus and the Little Brother project was thrown away. However those that were already created could still gather Adam from dead bodies as easily as the little sisters, so they were used as collectors. The little brothers were sent to the most obscure regions of rapture to gather Adam and were made relatively unknown. It made it easier for them to move about, the Little Brothers were left alone while people looked for little sisters as sources of Adam. Still there were only a grand total of five compared the many sisters and they were in reality slightly less valuable, but certainly not a waste to keep around.

Amir was the fifth and final attempt at creating a little brother, the original batch of three were still collecting Adam, but they decided to try once again with two slightly older boys. He was almost eight years old when they implanted him which was later than most little brothers and sisters. The experiment once again worked, but he was still was inferior to the little sisters in Adam production by a decent degree. So like the other brothers he was sent to collect Adam in some of the less traveled areas of Rapture.

Amir took off his helmet and rolled his head trying to get any kinks out, wearing a metal helmet for hours was fairly uncomfortable even with his Adam enhanced body. Before he could head to the bunk room he knew he had to report in.

"King Ryan," Amir greeted him respectfully dropping to one knee bowing before the king of Rapture. Most people were unaware of Jack Ryan's full story, but they were aware of his strength and that he stomped out anyone who got in his way. His power was something that frightened even the most far gone splicers into obeying him and if they did try to fight back his hypnotize plasmid was high powered and well refined, though he rarely had cause to use it nor did he like doing so, he had a distaste for mind control for reasons he chose not to share.

He even had his own group of Little Sisters, despite not being a true big daddy he exerted a pheromone that convinced them he could easily be trusted. His control of a large amount of the Adam supply was just another reason he had a choke hole on many Rapture's residents. He completely controlled a good portion of rapture, most of the rest was overrun by the Family and their leader Sophia Lamb, and there were areas untouched by both factions that stood largely as neutral grounds, run by rogue splicers.

Jack hated Lamb, but he did hold a healthy amount of respect for the woman and he believed she felt the same way. However he understood a war wouldn't help either of them so they stayed cordial to an extent. Sophia wasn't interested in Jack's land or people and Jack knew it would be useless to usurp her and try to control her group of fanatics. She had more or less brainwashed her followers into doing her bidding, he didn't want to use his power to do the same on such a large scale. Jack ruled by power, fear, respect, and his hold on the Adam. The idea of mentally controlling people still unsettled him, even if he acted like it didn't.

Despite his overwhelming power and heavy hand to most subjects, Jack did have a soft side and it lived within the Little Sisters he chose to save rather than: harvest, leave as brainwashed Adam producers, or those he just didn't come across in time to help. His daughters were very important to him, but he still treated all of the unpurified Sisters and Brothers better than what he considered the 'average rabble'.

Amir himself was a big brother he had never been cured as he didn't meet Jack until he was starting to enter puberty. It was too late now, but Jack used hypnosis to partially heal his mind and made a deal with Lamb to further cure his mental conditioning. It was incomplete, he still had a slight compulsion to find Adam and protect the sisters, but he was able to think independently and saw the world around him clearly. Jack relied on him and Amir was one of the few Jack seemed to implicitly trust in relation to his work and plans, but Amir knew not to cross Jack despite the familiarity.

The little sisters he rescued were completely normal for all intents and purposes outside of a few minor changes. Their bodies still produced trace amounts of Adam, but they were far more human than anyone else living in rapture bar the few completely unspliced people like Sophia Lamb or Grace Halloway. They would be able to live among normal humans on the surface should they be able to get there. They were his daughters and he truly did love them, but the rest of Rapture was aware of his wrath.

Jack glanced up from his book and set it on his desk. "Amir, relax we're alone you don't need to be quite so formal," Jack said leaning back in the large chair he kept in his office. Amir looked past him for a moment to look at the ocean and the buildings beyond it.

"Of course, sir," Amir replied standing back up. Informal meant more relaxed, but he didn't refer to Jack by name despite knowing he most likely wouldn't be upset.

Jack laughed in his rich deep voice, the Big Daddy vocal changes were able to be partially fixed, his voice was deeper than it had naturally been, but luckily he didn't sound like a moaning Big Daddy not that the Little Sisters would have minded.

Amir had decided long ago that it suited the king, it gave his words more weight. "Very informal Amir," he smirked and nodded to the younger male.

"Is there anything you require sir?" Amir asked keeping his tone neutral as it usually was.

Jack straightened up a bit, but luckily there wasn't any of the anger everyone feared present in his features. "Not much, I just want a quick overview of how things are looking," Jack's voice darkened only slightly when he added, "but I'm sure everything is fine."

"Yes, sir. The Adam collection and production is coming in normally, the rations are currently being sorted and the numbers will be brought in shortly for you to look over," Jack nodded and gestured for Amir to continued, "The family has kept their distance and their has been very limited in-fighting among the splicers. No damages have been found or reported anywhere and the leaks I mentioned last week have been repaired. Other than that there is nothing to report in your section of Rapture."

"Good, but you were very specific about the fact that nothing was happening in my kingdom, is anything happening outside?" Jack asked in a deceptively mild tone.

"There are rumors," Amir started slowly, "I was going to try finding evidence to confirm or dispel them before I brought it up, but word has traveled that the Little Sisters have been saying a new 'daddy' is rising."

"A new 'daddy'," Jack tapped his fingers on his desk lightly, "Normally I'd assume their talking about Big Daddies, but I don't know who in the family is technologically inclined enough to produce a Big Daddy of some new type, now that Gil Alexander is effectively out of commission." Jack paused as if mulling something over, "Another possibility would be that if some new daddy was being created it would be from our side. We do have the ability to reproduce them, but that's only because they've already been made and the technology exists we only need to follow the steps not completely understand them."

Once again Jack stopped, this time to gather some papers he had in his desk and look them over quickly, "I'm careful not to allow the Adam from people with important knowledge be given to the masses so nobody here should have the memories to rely on and anyone with anything near that type of intelligence reports directly to me so they couldn't be working on something I don't know about." Jack paused and sighed heavily Amir could see the anger started to rise to the surface, "If it turns out something is happening it's probably in Lamb's territory, worse yet I don't know the specific source and I don't want her to have any advantages on me."

"Would you like me to look into this further?" Amir asked hoping to mitigate any rage before Jack could take it out on anyone, least of all himself.

"Thank you Amir, I'll talk to some of the sisters to see if I can get anything substantial from them. In the meantime I'd like you to investigate the family, perhaps you can ask your friend. She is rather close to Ms. Lamb she may have heard something," Jack smirked and Amir froze. It shouldn't have been a surprise that Jack knew about his friendship with Eleanor, but it was still always disconcerting when Jack revealed he knew almost everything happening. He had eyes and ears everywhere, Amir happened to be part of the network that always kept him up to date on the happenings of Rapture so he knew that better than anyone else.

Before the conversation could go any further the door opened and a girl ran in her feet padding lightly on the floor. Jack's face immediately softened into a warm smile, the type he reserved for his daughters. "Hi dad," she greeted him with a wide smile and once she noticed Amir she gave him a smile as well, "Hello Amir."

"Hello, Brigid," Amir greeted her politely. "Sir, I'll be going now to handle the business we discussed," he gave a nod to Jack who dismissed him with a wave of his hand. "Goodbye, Brigid," he patted her head on the way out and she swatted his hand away good naturedly. He'd known Jack's children for years and they were all sweet girls just a few years younger than him. They were turned into Little Sisters before he was made an experimental Little Brother, but he was older than them when he was chosen to become the newest Little Brother.

He quickly set off to Lamb's land feeling slightly happy at the prospect of seeing Eleanor, but he didn't allow it to distract him from the possible danger of waltzing into, essentially enemy territory. His footsteps were deceptively light as he stepped out of King Ryan's base of operation into the place that used to be rapture. He could barely remember a time when it wasn't the dank dark underwater prison he now likened it to. He wasn't in a position to complain about the scenery so with a nod to himself he committed himself to focus on his task and ignore other distractions.

A/N

I was interested when I heard that little brothers, apparently they were considered to be part of the games, but never were introduced. I also wanted to write a story featuring Amir, who you might know if you played Bioshock 2 (Listen to the Audio Diaries). Even more so I really wanted to write about Jack after the events of Bioshock.

This Jack is going to be one who harvested a few sisters, but saved others. I found it ridiculous that if you accidentally harvest one little sister or didn't realize what you were doing when you harvested the first one, you were suddenly evil. So Jack is in the middle of the road, he isn't a complete monster, but he is a bit of a tyrant with a few soft spots.

Thanks for reading, let me know what you think