The Life and Crimes of Liv Amara

Olivia Amara had done more by age 23 than most people had done in their entire lives. She'd graduated early from High School and College and started her own small BioTech company that quickly catapulted her into becoming the youngest billionaire on the planet. Sycorax started out as a place that was researching a cure for the common cold, and along the way made multiple breakthroughs and was vaulted into one of the largest privately owned companies in the world. Despite have billions to her name, Liv poured all of her funds directly back into Sycorax to help fund more research, which then generated more cash, which then made more discoveries possible. For a time, it seemed that nothing could stop the company and that the key to unlocking immortality might have even been in reach. But then she hit a snag.

The scientific community at large began objecting to a few of her theories and hypotheses. She'd chosen San Fransokyo as the new headquarters for her company because she felt the minds there would be receptive to her ideas. She'd been wrong, though. They were all brilliant in their own right, but much too timid. They said some of her ideas were dangerous, that years of testing would be required for some of her projects before they could move onto the next phase. With a company as large as Sycorax, she could certainly allow some of those projects to sit stagnant for years and be quietly worked on until they were ready while other projects took the forefront, but these were the projects that Liv most believed in.

So, she worked on them herself, dictating the other projects to her various scientists under her employ. She basically locked herself down in the sublevels of Sycorax and hardly emerged, becoming a recluse. Finally, she had a breakthrough, but when she presented her findings, the warm reception she'd been expecting had been more of the same. Her work was impressive, everyone admitted it, but to do what she wanted was rash. It would be "unwise" to continue on at this stage, and instead focus on more viable projects for the company. Liv ignored all of them. If this worked out, then there wouldn't need to be any other projects. Vaccines would be rendered obsolete, sickness and disease would go away, and a new healthier planet Earth would be left in Liv Amara's wake.

So with everyone against her, Liv decided to do the unthinkable. She tested her theories on herself. She was confident that the parasynths would work, she'd done all the trials necessary and followed all the proper procedures as any good scientist would. When she then showed the scientific community what she'd done, they'd have to relent and admit that she was a genius and one of the most important minds in human history. She would singlehandedly jumpstart the next evolution of mankind. She smiled as the needle poked through her skin and the parasynths entered her bloodstream. They'd see. In a week's time, they'd all see. The parasynths worked.

And indeed they did. All too well. After a week, instead of feeling healthier than ever, Liv felt worse than she had ever felt in her life. Something had gone wrong, and when she drew a blood sample and examined it, she was shocked at the results. The parasynths were doing what they were supposed to but were a little overzealous. Instead of attacking diseased cells in the body, they were attacking all cells in the body. The parasynths were destroying Liv Amara's body at a cellular level, and they were doing so very quickly. So she got to work on finding a cure, but as the weeks went by, her condition continued to deteriorate. She soon realized that despite how close she was to finding a cure, she needed help. But she couldn't trust just anyone with this. Someone else might try and take the company from her, or might not be up to the task.

No, the only person she could trust with this secret was herself, so herself would have to do. At this point she'd ignored enough laws and codes of ethics that breaking a few more didn't bother her. So she cultivated and grew the first human clone in the history of humankind. And in just ten days too, that was pretty impressive. It took a day or so for Diane to fully gain consciousness, but when she did, she was better than Liv could have ever hoped for. Genetically identical down to the very last genome, and even retaining her memories and personality, Diane was a wonder of science, and Liv's last hope.

With the instructions set and Di ready to take the reigns on the project, Liv donned her medical fatigues and climbed into the stasis chamber on Sublevel 9. As the door closed and the suspended animation process commenced, Di placed a hand on the glass and looked inside.

"I will find a cure for you, I promise."

Then Liv Amara fell asleep.

When she woke up again, there was shouting and the sounds of struggle. Her legs were weak, but she managed to hobble her way out of the cryo chamber. What she saw confused and then horrified her. A beast of a man was locked in combat with a green scaled monster, both wearing shredded clothes. A white mass of something was lying prone on the ground, not moving, and Diane was chasing what looked like a teenager around with a sticker. When Diane explained herself, Liv shut everything down as fast as possible. The beast of a man lost his powers and shrunk down, making him easy pickings for the other monster in the room. Then she managed to fix that one too, and the monster turned into a teenage girl. The boy ran over and cradled her before she could fall on the floor. He rocked her back and forth softly as she fell into unconsciousness, and the door was cut through shortly afterward.

Big Hero 6 had just made their appearance when Liv went into cryosleep, so she knew she could trust them at least. And the police officers that arrived shortly afterword were very interested in why there were two of her. Liv was taken to the hospital along with the girl (Karmi, she learned her name was) to be checked over. Di and her mutant assistant Chris were taken straight to jail. The clone hadn't even tried to defend herself, simply repeating that she did what she did to save Liv. And that was thankfully the last she ever saw of them in person. After a night's rest in the hospital, Liv was feeling well enough to answer the many questions that Chief Cruz and the police had, and she divulged everything.

The parasynths, creating Diane, going into cryosleep, everything. While Diane had created the horrific monsters that Liv couldn't bear to watch on the news, the police regarded her the same. A scientist that saw herself above the laws of nature, playing God and not caring what the consequences were. Well, Liv supposed they had a point when she looked back. She had bent the rules because she thought herself above them. She had done what she'd thought was right, despite knowing it wasn't. When she'd seen what Di had done, she'd been mortified and couldn't fathom doing the same. But she and Diane were the same person, and while her actions weren't near as egregious, it was a small wonder where Di had gotten her will power from. And that rocked Liv to her core, knowing now that she was capable of doing what Di had done. She wasn't surprised when her assets were frozen, or she received a report that the Sycorax employees had been told not to return to work for the time being. She'd have done the same if she was on the other end.

The months that followed were a blur. She was never technically under arrest, as her experiments had been a bit more on the unethical side rather than straight illegal, but she'd been encouraged not to leave the city. She'd been allowed to keep her penthouse apartment in the city as a place of residence, but Sycorax was liquidated and most of her fortune with it. At 23, Liv Amara had done more than most people had done in their entire lives, and that included losing her fortune and being called to testify in court when the lawyers were done rifling through mountains of Sycorax paperwork.

Courtrooms usually weren't as full as this one, with large crowds of bystanders usually only showing up for high profile murder cases. In Liv's case, it seemed like half of San Fransokyo had shown up to hear the final testimonies in the case against her. Liv sat down in the witness box as the prosecutor asked her incredibly detailed questions about her company, some of which she didn't even know because she'd had people to care about some of the more mundane details.

They'd asked her various questions about Chris, none of which she had answers for, as he was Diane's creation and not her's. Finally, after a lengthy amount of time on the stand, she was allowed to leave. If she was honest, she was surprised that it took a whole two days for the jury to come back with a verdict. Liv assumed that the jury would find her completely guilty of everything involving the Sycorax incident and the book would be thrown at her. Surprisingly, she ended up only being held responsible for Di's creation.

Part of what caused the trial to take so long to get started in the first place was because of the debate on whether or not Diane would be tried separately. While she was genetically identical to Liv, it was eventually decided that the clone was her own independent person and could be tried as such. So for most of the issues that Sycorax had caused in San Fransokyo, Liv was only being held responsible for creating Di, and not her actions. She wasn't totally sure how to feel about that, as part of her was relieved, but the guilt that she caused everything by creating Di still ate at her.

The judgement was surprisingly lenient. Liv would be under house arrest for the next two years, where she'd serve as a remote consultant to any company that might need her assistance. Her work would be monitored closely, but she was too valuable a mind to just throw away behind a cell. After that, she would be free to leave or accept work wherever she pleased, but whether or not anyone would take her was a question that hung in the air.

Liv was allowed a very few escorted excursions outside of her apartment should important matters come up. In October, one did, and Liv was escorted to the San Fransokyo hospital. In early September, Di and Chris had struck at Big Hero 6 and the Karmi girl in a bid for revenge after they'd escaped from prison in the August earthquake. Di had mutated herself into various forms Liv had been told, and she'd spent the past month and a half in intensive care ever since, her body being unable to handle the rapid changes. Now, the hospital said that Diane didn't have long to live, and her genetically identical sister was the closest thing she had to family. The police escorted her into the room but were polite enough to give the two some privacy, and a nurse made sure Di was sitting comfortably in her bed before leaving.

Di's head rolled to the side slightly, trying to focus on her visitor. The doctors had told Liv that it was a miracle Di had managed to live this long considering what Big Hero 6 had described happened to her. One of the side effects was that Diane was now legally blind, her eyes having never really recovered from one of the various mutations. Her hearing was still fine though.

"Hello, Diane." Liv finally said.

"Liv!" Di said, a smile breaking out over her face. "I knew you'd… come for me… eventually."

Liv grimaced. Physically, Di looked fine, if a bit worn out, but internally must have been a different story. Her chest heaved up and down irregularly, clearing finding it difficult to breathe. Liv grabbed a chair and pulled it up to sit next to the bed. "I had to see you. You're me, after all."

Di smiled as she leaned her head back on the pillow. "Did you… see me? On the news?"

"I did, yes." Liv lied. The news had only covered the rampage in downtown, and then reported on Di's capture after the fact. The battle in the lair had been a private affair, so it seemed.

"We did it… for you." Di said, being interrupted by a cough. "So we could… rule this… city. Just like… you always… wanted."

Liv didn't have an answer for that one. A report from the doctors noted that Di's brain chemistry was slightly off, which Liv deduced to be a side effect of the growth acceleration formula she'd used to cultivate Di so quickly. The brain hadn't fully developed as intended, which skewed her thought processes. All the intelligence of her creator but trapped inside a warped mind. After a moment of silence, Di spoke again.

"Where's Chris? They haven't… let me… see him."

"Oh…" Liv had forgotten about the chimera. "The doctors say he passed on not long after you two were brought in. Something about his organs just giving out after he overexerted himself."

"Mayfly…" Di said, nodding. "He was never… supposed to… be around… long. At least… you're here."

Di slid her hand across the bed and found Liv's, clutching it as tightly as she could. Liv couldn't bear to look at herself this way and turned away. They sat that way for close to an hour, not saying anything, and finally Di's breathing slowed and then stopped altogether as her grip went slack. Liv spared a look at the creature she'd bred in a lab and sighed sadly. Her eyes were closed, and she seemed peaceful at least. Liv removed her hand from Di's and patted it once, regretting that this had ever had to happen in the first place. She stood up and walked to the door, opening it up, getting a nurse's attention.

"She's gone." Liv confirmed. The nurse nodded solemnly and walked in. One of the officers that had escorted her in removed his hat and cleared his throat.

"You ready to go, ma'am, or do you need a minute?"

"I'm ready. Let's go."

In the weeks following Di's death, Liv strangely found herself not sure what to feel. There was remorse, there was relief, but there was also this strange nagging feeling that it wasn't over, like she'd forgotten something. In a break between consulting gigs, Liv caught a brief snippet of the news showcasing Big Hero 6 stopping a robbery or something, which caused the anchor to note the recent change in roster. As usual, the video and pictures were all from a distance, but Liv recognized one of the newest members, even behind the armor she now wore. Liv had done enough research on Karmi to know who she was; a great sense of guilt at the knowledge that she'd been partially responsible for almost ruining this girl's life. That guilt got her to start writing an apology letter, but she eventually abandoned it. The girl was one of the one's who had been affected to worst by Di's actions. Would she even accept a letter from someone she thought she'd known for months and looked up to?

But with Di gone, this was the one door left open, the last thing she needed to do to feel closure about the whole situation and really feel like she was on the road to properly make amends. So, Liv finally sat down and began writing again, typing out her thoughts and retyping until she got it right. Then with that done, she pulled out a pen and a sheet of paper and wrote everything down. She had to request an envelope from the police, as she wasn't really allowed to send mail without permission, and the letter was sent off. It didn't matter if Karmi ever responded or not, Liv had finally properly apologized, and with that done, she sat down at her computer and got back to work, knowing that of all the crimes she'd committed, there was at least one bright shining thing that she could look back on and realize that she wasn't all bad.