Broken Adventure: Arc 3: Jumpchain Chapter 2, a x-overs fanfic

Sarah flinched as she stabbed her spike into the wall... and blinked as her hand hit the wall.

And lost her grip.

And the spike kept going. Into the new hole.

Glowing with blue fire or not, she froze in horror at having lost her brand new weapon only seconds after... oh.

Stunned, she looked at her hand... and the spike that had returned to it.

...With far less terror, she stabbed the wall again. NOT losing her grip this time.

It couldn't slash or cut, but stabbing something solid was now effortless!

...So it would probably be good to test that 'Comes back to the hand' thing.

Carefully, she placed the spike on the floor... and flexed her hand as it reappeared in her grip.

Sarah grinned at her new friend. 'Alright. I can work with this.'

Trusting her very short testing session, she gave the bone a flick... and it hurled in a blue streak through a wall.

...What?

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam had continued spreading his crystals into the Warehouse's back systems when the alert went off.

And he blinked.

Apparently, her drawbacks were so dire that actually killing something (ANYTHING) earned her a massive bonus. A single kill (In this case, it was a very unlucky young 'Alien' crawling on the wrong wall) would normally extract somewhere between 0.03cp and 0.08cp, depending on how 'important' that single creature was.

Considering the other drawbacks made these things respawn should have lowered the reward even further.

His (currently non existent) eyebrows rose however at the next alert.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

}}Impossible Flames have consumed a foe.{{

Sarah blinked as a distant crackling suddenly began to whistle, feeling the air being pulled into what was probably a new bonfire.

...Huh.

Looking at the crack she was hidden in, she focused.

This planet, wherever it was or whatever it was called, was a death trap of course. The entire thing, or at least the local area she had covered, was a maze of tunnels, hallways, dead ends, and (thankfully) areas to hide and random boxes of equipment.

And while she hadn't found anything USEFUL in those many containers, she was pretty sure that whatever she had killed (And then incinerated) was close enough to some crates to keep the flames burning.

Seeing her cp progress bar inch up again as something in the distance screamed in pain... she turned back to Mr. McStabberson.

And held back a laugh as she launched it through the OTHER wall as hard as she could!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam blinked as cp began flowing into her resource pool.

A quick glance at the logs... Huh.

Blue flames make a VERY good penetration enhancer.

Some of the girl's throws were delving five or six floors away, leaving small pillars of flame and screaming victims. Who then became pillars of flame.

...It was a DAMN good thing she was immune to this stuff, considering how much fire she was spraying in all directions.

With a glance at her bio stats... Adam decided to slow her progress slightly. Her rate was so fast, she could easily afford to lose a single cp or two if he was careful retrieving them.

Because Vault Hunters exploring Pandora couldn't find safe food or water, the ECHO systems would normally ensure small things like that or using the bathroom were handled through minute changes when using the teleportation systems or during resurrection... options Sarah didn't have.

So instead, Adam was going to 'waste' a few cp by directly using them to help her recover. Long term wise, this was not the best option when using something so valuable as 'Choice Points'... but Sarah didn't have long term options yet.

Cp after cp were slowly spent as Adam reached through the Avatar connection... and tried to get her body to a more stable condition.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Her arm jerked in an odd direction, destroying her throw attempt, when Sarah got another popup... and a surge of warmth down her spine.

Temporary Boost:

~Health Recovery

~~1cp Purchased! May be recurring until Recovered!

}}INSTALLING{{

A glance at her HUD's health bar showed the number (And related red color bar) slowly regenerating even as her various pains began to fade and her joints relaxed.

Even the constant thirst seemed to fade, as she let Mr. McStabberson aim downwards.

A glance at her fingers showed the tiny knicks, the older scars, and the torn skin all slowly fading away, showing new (and clean) skin for the first time in what felt like forever.

With a raspy chuckle (How long had it been since she felt safe enough to make noise?), Sarah stood in the blue flames that hugged her tiny (But now growing) room... and prepared to throw again, keeping her attention on her ever growing CP Bar.

After all... now she had goals!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

So.

Turns out, throwing spikes through all the walls (And the floor, and the ceiling), while filling the resulting holes with unnatural flames?

Not good for structural integrity.

She got out safely with Mr. McStabberson, but even with the entire hallway glowing with her blue lines of flame etched on each surface, she still felt less safe.

Sarah kept her spear sized spike aimed forward as she cautiously moved to find some dead end, a safe place to go back to spear fishing some monsters.

Her progress was slowed by having to use her weak connection to shift the flames, by moving the almost silent inferno forward with her steps... But the advantage of being surrounded by a blue lattice of prepared fire was too useful to give up.

And when she used it in this strange marking form, it was much easier to see and manipulate than when she simply filled the hallways and tunnels with an inferno.

It was like a leashed puppy. Happy to be here, but eager to prance about and 'meet' new people!

Another sudden scream of pain and rage showed that another monster (Or the same one? Hard to tell.) had managed to get within the range of her markings.

Of course, the bright blue flames flaring up was a solid hint as well.

*DING!*

THE FUCK!?

Sarah jerked her weapon in several directions before noticing the alert window.

Skills, Abilities, and Powers:

~General

~~{Looter Shooter: -200cp, free for the duration of the jump} Purchased!

}}INSTALLING{{

What? Oh, she had 'Leveled up', It now listed her as a 'LV 1 Jumpchain Child'. A thought had her bring up the full interface from her ECHO system.

Seeing a new tab, 'Skills, Abilities, and Powers', she opened it and selected 'Looter Shooter' to see the details.

[Bandits, dangerous animals, ancient alien constructs and just about everything in this world that will put up a fight with you seems to have something at least semi-usable on its person that just falls off of them the moment they die... Or you could just start checking inside random Portable toilets, dumpsters, and just about anything that's unlocked and find something. The quality of the med kits, bullets, grenades, grenade mods, firearms, shields, class modifications (etc.) that you get from your scavenging varies wildly with better and more loot or even unique and powerful drops often coming from those that are the most dangerous in the area. Of course since you're paying for the drops here each piece of equipment is guaranteed to work via benefactor Fiat for as long as you own it.]

She blinked as there was a set of notes listed below it.

[Due to Drawbacks, no currency will be available from any drops.]

[Weapons are most commonly found, followed by single use items, with rare items like shields and grenade modifications least likely. This ratio may change next Jump.]

...Did she NEED more weapons?

Remembering the hours of near silent crawling from each hiding location to the next safe area, Sarah nodded.

Yes.

Yes she did.

Going back to the top of 'Skills, Abilities, and Powers', she examined 'Next Upgrade', currently set to {Legendary Luck: -400cp, Drop-In: -200cp}.

Selecting it opened interesting details.

[Probability works in strange ways around you. You seem to find a lot of loose change on the ground and always find the necessary part to repair that broken thing in a very timely manner. If there's a fork in the road you always seem to guess the one that leads to your destination. Shrapnel from explosives seems to fly "around" instead of "through" you. Patrols that hear you might discount the sound as the wind or a mouse. An enemy with a perfect killshot on you might even have their perfectly clean gun jam. Beware though, as Luck has only so much power over the world around you. If you get surrounded by a horde of enemies with guns, they won't all jam, and there's sure as hell no lucking your way out of getting incinerated by a nuke.]

With more notes:

[Due to Drawbacks, no currency will be available from any drops.]

[Note, Mission Objective: Survive.]

...Still. "..."

Cough, how long had it been? "H...Hello?"

No response. Not surprising, really. "Can... Can I choose something else instead?"

The blue flames etched into the surroundings pulsed slowly.

She looked at the display. "I just... I don't want to trust luck. Never went well enough for me. Could... could I pick something else?"

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Shit.

Right, Don't just dump everything in there, poor girl has enough on her shoulders already.

Adam grumbled as he rewrote the 'Skill Tree' subsystem normally used by Borderlands to show information from the Jumpchain Document.

Obviously, tiers weren't needed... if you had the cp, you could pick anything you wanted really. Instead, he had set up sections:

'Skills, Abilities, and Powers', 'Gear and Supplies', and some read only parts that showed the previously made choices for this Jump, and finally! The selected Drawbacks that currently apply to her. That one was disabled for now, even Adam wasn't sure about what was on there.

Dump in the data, clean up the text, make the prices a bit more obvious... there.

...Adam wasn't sure how to feel about this really.

Normally he just had an idea, went with it, and handled anything that came along in the process. Having someone flat out reject his opinions hadn't happened in a long, LONG time... but all this WAS her life.

He was just worried she was about to destroy it.

What if she picked something powerful but expensive? And he would be unable to use the cheaper options to hopefully bend the rules a bit?

What if only the 'fun' and not practical items were chosen?

In the end, he needed to trust that she knew best, despite his abilities and history and, well to be honest, Adam's ego usually said that his way was the best way.

Could he do that?

...Well, best find out.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah looked at the long list of options in awe.

Not just new abilities, but vital equipment and potential skills impossible to imagine at her fingertips!

Tempting was the {The Basics: 100cp, Vault Hunter: 0cp}, which would give her two guns, some grenades and an energy shield... well, that and the {Storage Deck: 100cp}, which would let her ECHO system access an inventory... with her new 'Looter Shooter' skill she would need something to hold all the junk she would find.

But right now, her focus drifted to find something that was less physical. Items could come later, abilities couldn't be taken away so easily... she needed to know that if her situation changed again, she would still have options.

Her breath caught. What was {Bad Ass: 200cp}? For that cost it couldn't be something stupid like an unlimited supply of suits and sun glasses.

Selecting the option, she checked its features:

[You are a particularly imposing specimen of... whatever you are. You're in peak physical condition, or maybe a little bit farther, and your pain tolerance is MUCH higher than normal. Expect to be able to run around in truly heavy armor, or win fistfights against even Pandora's animal life. Alternatively, any creature you summon with the Phone A Friend skill is much tougher than it should be.]

Her finger shook as she read the text.

...This was it!

Years, decades, Jumps of pain!

Never able to retain all those hard earned muscles and well worked bodies, never able to build up reflexes and skills to an intuitive level!

Her kidnapper would shove her somewhere, and she quickly learned that if she didn't gain technical knowledge it would be a waste at the end of the Jump. Her body was discarded, and she wasn't allowed to gain any Perks or Skills or Abilities that would allow her to retain all that hard effort.

In desperation she had spent lifetimes studying mental tricks for memorization, learning languages, strategy... as information was all she could gather, she collected everything!

But now!

Now she could learn how to fight without being trapped in the weakened body of an untrained young woman! Weapons and tools that she had to forgo or abandon due to being unable to adapt, unable to truly train... All within her grasp!

Luck might let her find an extra bullet or dodge a bad blow, but a peak body? One that would allow her to dominate rather than resort to only trickery and strategy for every fight!?

She couldn't confirm her choice fast enough, seeing the 0/200cp 'Bad Ass' now listed on her Choice Points progress bar as the next goal!

Well, it was actually at 13/200cp, thanks to a few more screaming bonfires. Or maybe a single Alien monster too dumb to learn from previous mistakes.

With a vicious grin, she stabbed the ground again. Her spike continued pumping flame markings into the surroundings again, her guiding attention tightly focused.

First, find another safe, dead end corridor.

Next, trap the hell out of it with these strange flame marks. Odd things, able to instantly incinerate a monster but not even char wooden boxes or melt rock... they were the safest delaying tactics she could deploy.

Hide a bit, get a body that could actually fight... and then. THEN.

Then... she would hunt!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam watched what seemed to be a mentally challenged 'Alien' creature run right back from the 'New-U' station... and mindlessly jump RIGHT BACK into Sarah's flame rune minefield.

And burst into flames.

And die.

Again.

It seemed to be one of the 'Undying Foe' drawbacks, ones that were supposed to always survive, always find you, and never be reasoned with or able to be trapped.

But... this one had so many drawbacks pushing it to attack that it was nearly brain dead.

It wasn't able to plan. To set ambushes. To gather allies.

Instead, reality itself was forcing this stupid thing to just... jump in the flames. Again. Because that was the fastest way to get to its target.

No wonder this moron was worth so many choice points, it was INTENDED to be an unstoppable, adapting, immortal foe.

Not just... experience fodder.

Adam sighed as his crystals went through another cycle of expansion, connecting to more esoteric sections of the Warehouse, then contraction as 'Purification' scanned the setup to 'Research', cleansed that area from taint and corrosion, and then scanned it again so 'Research' could suggest modifications and optimizations.

This was why there were limits on 'Drawbacks' and 'Flaws' normally. They could interact badly (Or if you were clever (Or lucky), in a beneficial way), and cause all kinds of odd effects.

Case in point, offering respawning to the Aliens AND the Predators on this planet.

From what Adam could tell, when this world was set up (A massive laboratory like expanse covering a whole planet, full of tunnels and traps and random items and stuff to make it easier for monsters and harder for the Jumper), things started normally.

A massive number of monsters, those psycho hunters that had arm nukes and grenades and spike launchers and stuff.

Then the Hunters found out that suicide attacks didn't end the hunt. Their ammo and bombs ran out quickly soon after that little note.

And the Monsters found out death was temporary too... So why be clever?

No reason to ambush and be stealthy and smart when you could just run screaming at a target, slaughter it or die covering them in massive sharp body parts and acidic blood, then return after respawn to eat the whole mess.

Adam felt a low level of humor that the effect of granting immortal, never ending combat was a bunch of lazy fighters who were not bothering to improve themselves.

Definitely good for Sarah though.

Speaking of which, Adam was not exactly sure why the girl was able to not only convert his Blue Flames into runes but manipulate them. Why exactly could she control those marks, move them, or set more like explosive candy?

No idea.

But it certainly took a heavy weight of stress right off HIS shoulders. Gave him more time to just slowly integrate into the Warehouse systems and hopefully begin stabilizing the big mess.

Ironically, the dickish nature of the Sponsor helped here.

She had no items nor advanced features selected for her Warehouse already... and that means none of those portions were damaged when the bastard took everything and scarpered.

Unlike 'Choice Points', 'Warehouse Points' seemed to be generated naturally over time with a portion being awarded to the Jumper after each Jump they complete, the rest going to the person in charge. Adam in this case.

He paused... and sighed.

Right, he had to have Sarah involved in this part too. It was HER Warehouse after all, and it wouldn't be right to spend her collected energy on stuff unless it was a life or death situation.

Which, from what Adam could tell, this no longer qualified as.

He smirked as the monster, again, sprinted from the New-U station to immediately commit suicide on Sarah's traps.

Yeah, she could handle this.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah blinked at her first 'Loot Drop'.

Well, the first one that survived being in the bonfire of her defeated foe anyway. The 'Item Summary' box listed it as a Dahl brand shield:

Wide Eyed Booster Shield

~Chance to drop a shield Booster when damaged.

Reaching out to pick the strange object up... it vanished.

Wide Eyed Booster Shield:

~Adjusting and Equipping selected item!

}}INSTALLING{{

A hand movement brought up her current status, the new shield shown there... but no longer physically on her body. Neat.

A quick glance ensured nothing was sprinting at her down the long, trapped hallway. "Uh... Jumpchain? Sir?"

Nothing.

Not unusual. "Right. Uh. Shouldn't I be finding more stuff than just this? I mean..." She looked at her cp bar, which continued to slowly fill. "Yeah, I have a bit of an ongoing kill count at this point."

Clarification:

~Item Drop Rate

~~Until a 'Storage Deck' option is purchased, loot can not auto collect into the Jumper's inventory.

~~~Consider less fire for more items!

...Huh.

No, on second thought, that was entirely reasonable. And she may have been just a little distracted while laughing maniacally and watching her foes burn... who knew how many bullets and guns got slagged by the flames.

In fact, it was likely the shield only survived due to its innate toughness, as required by such a product. They also were supposedly resistant to fire, though she wasn't willing to test it with her 'impossible flames' at the cost of a bit of protection.

*Ding!*

The flickering shield around her suddenly spawned several white balls that sort of... bounced to the floor.

...Were these shield Boosters?

But. Why?

A second look explained it. Damn. "Hey, Jumpchain? JC? My shield is activating because of my fire. Which doesn't seem right."

Wide Eyed Booster Shield:

~Adjusting selected item!

~~15cp Spent! Shield heavily changed!

}}Modifying!{{

Sarah blinked. Huh.

That was 'service with a smile', or something like that. Assuming that, like the other recent changes, nothing nefarious had happened. A glance in her interface had her Item Summary function examine the new shield.

Blue Burning Booster Shield, Legendary

~If Fire is the problem, you ain't using enough!

~Chance to drop a Blue Booster when damaged.

...The item was colored orange now, instead of blue. And this was the first (and only) legendary item she had heard of or seen... which wasn't saying much sadly.

But this shield had clearly earned it!

Not only would it no longer drain power fighting off the random fires she exploded everywhere, but now? Now it would actively help her recover from attacks if she was burninating the everything!

Tapping the 'Designated Targets' portion of the comment, a small list showed up: All, Not Me, Not Party, Designate.

...Well, she had no 'Party' to protect yet, everything here wanted to kill her, and there was no reason to waste time with 'Designate' since she could just go with the obvious 'Not Me' option.

Something about this ability to choose future landmine contestant winners did feel off though... it was likely that before the expensive modification, such a feature was impossible.

That said, she was perfectly happy slowing down her beloved body upgrade by a few hours if that meant she could no longer be headshot by the hunters anymore.

She hadn't seen one yet, and this moronic monster was driving away most of the creatures in the area due to its constant death screams and so such, but her kidnapper had been happy to explain just how screwed she was before it dumped her into this world of nightmares.

Something tense inside relaxed as she watched the flickering shield shimmer, the bar in the bottom left filling up with energy and the low level flames calming down now that her new protection wasn't setting them off.

Still... she looked at the hallway full of flames.

...Might not be able to gather anything until she unlocked an inventory and turned on autocollect. Unless the drops were fire grenade mods, flame based guns, or more shields.

A distant frustrated scream made her blink as another 2cp dropped into her hands.

Right, she was messing with the monsters by creating 'safe paths' with hidden flame mark surprises.

Best get back on that.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam blinked, having been messing with some of the stranger parts of the Warehouse.

He hadn't been the one to approve that shield modification.

Not directly.

Apparently, the more integrated he became with the Warehouse, the more 'automated' the various processes developed.

Oh, he could override anything, and he could set rules for his systems to follow... but some part of his nature saw Sarah's request, made some design choices, determined the cp cost, and made the sale... all automatically.

Thankfully it went alright THIS time, but just in case Adam put an alert system in place. Any attempts at using cp in the future would need direct approval if it wasn't a level up from the ECHO system.

Sure, it seemed to pull from his own concepts of what would be a good idea to try... but he wasn't fully incorporated yet. Who knows what strange stuff could happen if he let his subconscious automate this whole mess!

...Probably more peanuts, Baku, and silly things.

Best keep on top of that.

For now, he approved a daily expenditure of one cp to ensure she was fed, hydrated, and didn't need biological issues like bathroom breaks or showers. A stopgap until she earns the 'Bad Ass' body modification, which should be enough of a change (and loophole) for him to ensure her ECHO system properly took over her basic needs.

It shouldn't be a problem as the cp continued to roll in, the girl's never ending bonfire keeping the night stalkers exploded and easily harvested.

He also hoped they could get some dialogue going. There were some emergency options in the Warehouse that might let them bug out of this death world earlier than the mandatory 10 year stay listed. Or was it longer? The drawbacks argued on the issue.

Downside, the Warehouse was shafted. Badly. The longer she stayed here, the more wp he could get together to make this place stable, maybe set up some needed upgrades, and so on. The energy sort of built up the longer this place was stuck in one reality... like a weak solar panel or something exposed to sunlight.

The topic would only be brought up if she managed to find a safe and secure methods to harvest this murder pit for profit. Adam wasn't going to risk her life just to make his repair job easier... but she would probably enjoy a bit of time to adjust to being super powerful and enjoy life on the winning side for once.

Hell, she might insist on staying to earn more of these Perks, Abilities, and Special Skills. More than a few would be useful in other worlds, and even more were rare... only available in a place messed up like this one.

At least she was now stable. No longer was the risk of the Warehouse cracking open to the Void a significant issue, and the Warehouse seemed stable enough to endure at least two more jumps instead of near fracturing with each action.

Adam meanwhile was focused on the Warehouse itself... and what to try and fix first.

Ignoring some of the fancy things for now (Such as 'Second Reality' and 'Adaptive Inactive Storage'), Adam examined the bare needs listed. Obviously, the jerk in charge didn't spring for the 'Personal Reality' option.

So Sarah was left with the 'Warehouse', which came with 'Starting Space':

{Starting Space: 0wp} [Your Personal Reality starts out with a volume of 80 x 80 x 10 meters, so 6,400 square meters of floor space or 64,000 cubic meters of storage volume. In the archaic and silly 'Imperial' measuring system this translates to 262.5 x 262.5 x 32.8 feet, so 68,889 square feet or 2,260,138 cubic feet.]

And that was it. Looking further down confirmed Adam's suspicion.

{Access Key: 0wp} [This is a special key which lets you access your Warehouse and its contents. When inserted into any door with a lock, the door can be opened to reveal a gateway into your Warehouse at a predetermined location within it. You are the only person who can take the key out of the lock, the gateway remains open as long as the key is in the lock, and if key is ever lost or stolen you will find it in your pocket a few minutes later. You cannot close the door as long as you are inside the Warehouse.]

Yep. Free. And of course the asshole Sponsor didn't 'Purchase' this free option. Not sure it would be useful, but on the buy pile it goes! No need to buy additional keys or the upgrade 'Portal' generation yet, not unless Sarah can't find ANY doors with a lock on it.

Which uh. Might be an issue. This planet was mostly trap filled hallways with passages, not so much locked door security warren. Didn't matter much yet anyway, the Warehouse would be deadly if she tried to show up right now... Stuff to look over later. Moving on!

{Security System: 0wp} [Anybody coming in and out of your Warehouse is now checked for any authorization you've given them to access it; and should anything about said authorization (or a lack of it) raise any flags in the system, then you will receive a warning about it. This allows you to define just what sorts of authorization different individuals can have to access your Warehouse, anything from No Access through Temporary Access and Limited Access to Unlimited Access is possible. All this does is notify you. It does not stop them on its own. A Keyholder's Access cannot be limited by the Security System. Only hand out Keys to those you trust implicitly.]

So... a needed freebie that let later purchase options work properly. Fair enough, but even the JUMPER couldn't survive in the Warehouse right now... no need for security until THAT was fixed first. Obviously.

Add a loft? A basement? Not now.

{Environmentally Neutral: 0wp} [By default, the temperature in your Warehouse is never too hot nor too cold, the air will always smell faintly musty but scent neutral, and the air will always be breathable... even if two different species with different atmospheric requirements are present in it at the same time... Well, as long as both species are there with permission. This won't protect breathing invaders.]

Wait, what!? Why wasn't THIS chosen!? That would fix HALF the stuff Adam's Purification was slowly extracting out of the whole structure! And it was damn free too. The enhanced 'Environmental Controls' could be picked up later, the free option would be good enough for now.

{Neutral Lighting: 0wp} [These lights are nothing special, It's a color-neutral, source neutral ambient lighting system. It's not really that bright... think early twilight gloom, but if you want better, install it!]

Useful, better lighting could be done later. Did this mean it had been dark in here in the past without this though?

{Who's Got the Powa: -100wp} [This provides enough electricity to power a city the size of New York City or London, forever, with nary a brown out or power fluctuation ever! It also comes with all the basic wiring hookups, surge protectors, outlets, circuit-breakers, routers, etc, that you might ever need... but you'll probably want to get a qualified electrician in at some point... or pick up a companion who does that kind of thing. Purchase of this supplies all facilities inside your Warehouse with electrical hookups.]

...Sarah had nothing electrical for now. Looking down further, the next power upgrades went pretty insane pretty quick... matching the energy of a star or providing conversion for whatever alien energy requirements might crop up. Neat.

Oh, here was something needed!

{Pipes Pipes Pipes: -100wp} [Purchasing this provides your Warehouse with enough plumbing fixtures to turn the entire volume of your Personal Reality into one massive pool... or anything below that. This provides clean running water with any reasonably common additives you like (chlorine, glacial milk, fluoride), but does not provide a limitless supply, nor does it heat the water. By default, the amount of water this system can produce per day is 1 billion liters or one megaton of water or a block of water 100 meters on a side, and the default temperature of this water is 25 degrees Celsius. It can support any civilian infrastructure on the same scale as Mexico City or Tokyo. Comes only with the basic hookups. You'll need a plumber to do the actual piping. We hear Mario's very good. Bathrooms not included. Purchasing this supplies all facilities inside your Personal Reality with water feeds, and if you've Got the Powa, it will supply hot and cold running water as well!]

Did he have enough wp for this yet? Barely, only 113wp so far. It would have to do. Any other freebies?

{Shelving: 0wp} [Basic metal shelves to keep your goods on, the kind you find in industrial big box stores, sized for pallets and numbered for sorting. You'll get up to as many as will suit your initial space allotment, but if you don't take all of them, you'll need to buy more on your own... they sell them at most business supply warehouses, ironically enough.]

...Fine, why not. Free was free after all.

Looking down the list, the internet stuff, maintenance systems, cell phone service... Was there something for food?

Ideally, you wanted to give the girl water, food, and shelter first. Maybe a good medical station too... you were fixing what you could, but spending cp on keeping her alive and 'healthy' wasn't the best way to spend points really.

Ah, here they were:

{Basic Nutrition: -100wp} [This option provides a basic (if minimalist) food delivery for you and all companions (metered for a normal human dietary requirement). This delivery comes once a week and is the kind of thing you'd buy on a very strict budget; Ramen, Peanut Butter, Generic Cereal, Dry Beans, Fresh Common Veggies, Canned Veggies, Dry Pasta, Salt, Pepper. (Note, you cannot sell the Salt or Pepper for money.)]

{Basic Accommodations: -50wp} [This provides minimalist accommodations for you and each companion. Essentially the same thing you'd get in Basic Training in the military. A barracks with a bunk and a locker and a camp toilet. If you bought Plumbing, this improves to include a communal shower and toilets. In fact, someone need not be a companion for this to work. Anyone you allow into your Personal Reality will be allotted a similar level of basic living quarters, thus allowing you to turn your Personal Reality into a refugee center if you like. If you have Basic Nutrition, this will provide any such guests as you may invite into your Personal Reality with very basic food equal to 1200 Kcal a day, totally vegetarian. This can support up to a maximum of 1 person for every 4 cubic meters of space in your warehouse per day.]

Right, those two together with the plumbing would give her a safe place to sleep, water, something edible, and even usable facilities! Eventually.

For now, with only 113... no, 114wp now, he would have to prioritize.

Let's see... 100wp for the plumbing, the Warehouse should be stabilized thanks to some of the free options, next would be Basic Accommodations for safe sleeping areas and somewhere to relax enough to actually recover. She could last longer without food as long as she could sleep and rehydrate.

Adam quickly looked over the other free items that (thankfully) had no issues since the Sponsor apparently ignored EVERYTHING available here.

{A Week & A Button: 0wp} [You may, at the end of each jump, take 7 Standard Earth Days off before entering your next jump. A button is provided so you can end this down time whenever you so desire. Dying in this period is still dying and will burn a 1-up from the jump you just finished if possible, then from the next jump if available]

{Entrance Hall: 0wp, -50wp*X} [This is the room your Access Key opens a door to. It starts off as a 5 meter cube with blank white walls, floor, and ceiling, as well as a couple of doors, one leading outside, the other into your Cosmic Warehouse, with additional doors appearing leading to other extensions as these get added to your Warehouse. Feel free to customize this Entrance Hall as you see fit. Additional Halls can, at your discretion, be linked only to certain keys or only to certain extensions. This allows you to have an entry hall just for skiing if you want.]

{The Benefactor Lounge: 0wp} [This installs an optional special room in your Warehouse that exists for the sole purpose of meeting with your Benefactor. It has a limited wet-bar and the furnishings keep changing depending on where you're going next. Head into Generic Western and it might be a Saloon, Head into Star Wars and it might be the Imperial Throne Room. Head in Monty Python and it might be a fish tank. This room exists for you to make builds or ask questions. Your Benefactor is not guaranteed to be in all the time, but you could leave a note. They might even get back to you!]

Adam paused... Huh. Looks like the bastard actually bought these two and the Lounge free options already... all the easier to mock his victim no doubt.

Well, at least Adam would get a chance to say 'hello!' with far less difficulty than expected!

This list though was... very long. Had everything from Garages to Pools to Meditation rooms and Gyms... Most were just convenient methods to organize data gathered from past Jumps, far less needed than food and water and such.

He WAS going to get the 'Greenhouse' for 100wp later though, redundant food sources for the win!

Nope, no, maybe later, uh... maybe? Damn this was a huge list. Oh, another free option! Not exciting though.

{Cleaning Supplies: 0wp} [Infinite supply of any cleaning supplies you might need for cleaning your Warehouse. By default placed into a specific closet, but can be placed elsewhere. These have no actual chemical properties. No using this to get an endless supply of brooms or bleach. Completely safe for all complex lifeforms. Very not safe for viruses, bacteria, amoeba, or household pests.]

Could help with cleansing victims or something to help them survive issues, but hopefully by THAT point Sarah would have access to the 'Medical Bay' and its amazing upgrades.

Adam paused again. There were several items no longer possible due to unnoticed damage... no doubt who was responsible. No 'Pod Rack' to bring people from world to world, no companions, no bringing family or kids gained along the journey... Ouch.

Maybe he could fix that later, but that whole section of code was a massive mess. Best hand it off to 'Research' to see what it could do with the scraps.

And as for using the long 'Limitations' section to earn extra wp? Nope!

Sarah had enough limitations and drawbacks for an army of Jumpers, Adam wasn't going to make her life any more terrible than that, especially not on purpose. Oh, he read them of course... but all were terrible, none were worth the annoyance (or in several cases) danger involved.

Adam made a quick listing of the related items and double checked carefully.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah was trying to dig out a larger room at the end of her secured hallway.

It was slow going.

Her bone spear could pierce the walls easily, but not slash or carve well... so she was treating the side walls like a very large 'Connect-The-Dots' puzzle, slowly punching a line of dots until she could create a pathway.

The blue flame traps were earning her cp on their own easily enough, and didn't need constant oversight... She just needed to spike the floor every hour or so and ensure a new wave of blue landmine markers were carved into the surface.

Each blue, metallic looking scribble contained enough compressed blue flames to instantly kill one of the random creatures trying to hunt her down... and the used up symbols were easy enough to replace.

Her progress was paused by a silent mental alert, now that she had disabled that annoying 'Ding!' sound effect.

Warehouse:

~Utilities and Structures

~~{Starting Space: 0wp} Partially Damaged!

~~{Access Key: 0wp} Purchased!

~~{Security System: 0wp} Purchased!

~~{Environmentally Neutral: 0wp} Purchased!

~~{Neutral Lighting: 0wp} Purchased!

~~{Pipes Pipes Pipes: -100wp} Purchased!

~~{Shelving: 0wp} Purchased!

~~{A Week & A Button: 0wp} Partially Damaged!

~Personal Reality Facilities

~~{Entrance Hall: 0wp, -50wp*X} Partially Damaged!

~~{The Benefactor Lounge: 0wp} Partially Damaged!

~Items and Equipment

~~{Cleaning Supplies: 0wp} Purchased!

}}INSTALLING{{

~Utilities and Structures

~~{Starting Space: 0wp}, Restructured!

~~{A Week & A Button: 0wp}, Reconfigured!

~Personal Reality Facilities

~~{Entrance Hall: 0wp, -50wp*X}, Restructured!

~~{The Benefactor Lounge: 0wp}, Under New Management!

Sarah stumbled back against the wall, fully distracted as she carefully examined the unexpected mountain of text.

As she automatically began analyzing each line for whatever secret trick would screw her over this time, her attention was caught and entrapped by the most important line: 'Under New Management!'

She broke out into a growing smile as she mentally selected the 'View Change Summary' option, even as the Jumpchain updated in the background.

Her ECHO system was going to get a new section separate from her 'Jumpdoc' store, one specifically for her 'Warehouse' purchases... a feature she was unaware of entirely. Unlike the taunting her Kidnapper enjoyed undergoing between worlds, the bastard never even hinted that she could improve that dark storage place trapped between existences!

And unlike previous updates, this 'Change Summary' had small notes, obviously added to the details. Advice, it seemed. From a guy, or someone or something that identified itself as male.

'He' was trying to fix 'her' Warehouse.

Hers! Not his, but HERS!

Sarah's eyes devoured the notes. She now had a separate progress bar or 'account' listed in this menu section for 'Warehouse Points', easy enough to see. Filled up based on time, not combat... unfortunate but reasonable.

As for the results of these purchases? A safe and secured water access point, actual light to see where she was going, a location that would warn her of intruders, not be too hot or cold, and not allow a creature to chew through the walls or floors or whatever and ambush her at night!

Her next Warehouse upgrade was listed as {Basic Accommodations: -50wp}, with a note to follow it with {Basic Nutrition: -100wp} afterwards... suggested because the 'Basic Accommodations' would stabilize the Warehouse faster and allow her to have a good retreat point.

The flame covered woman chuckled... wait a while longer for food? No issue, especially after those new 'Health Recovery' temporary boost purchases... Though the temptation to just take the food option first and live in the dirty hallway covered in flame landmines was still there, her willpower was stronger than that.

It would be MUCH easier than carving more and more tunnels with only Mr. McStabberson's assistance... and a long nap in an actual bed? More than that, access to a god damned SHOWER!?

She absently tossed her bone weapon through a distant shadow, already envisioning a whole day wasted under running water. CLEAN water!

Sarah WOULD say she'd kill for that, but at this point she was killing just to keep herself entertained until the cp reached enough to earn 'Bad Ass', so that measurement scale was a bit off at this point.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah had retreated to the most secure section of corridor she had found so far and watched the last few cp tick up her progress bar.

198/200.

199/200...

Skills, Abilities, and Powers:

~General

~~{Bad Ass: -200cp} Purchased!

}}INSTALLING{{

Her spike of joy was instantly followed up with a wave of pain!

From the tips of her fingers and toes and the top of her head, a wave of cringles and tingles and cramps and fire washed through her senses.

As her body stopped twitching, she just... lay there for a few moments.

Painful burning shifted to warm heat.

Stings faded into memories...

And something tight inside seemed to finally relax.

She felt her body nearly fall over as she tried to shift... how long had she been curled up, twisted while weighed under far too many feelings? An hour at least, no doubt.

Regardless... her fingers were now scratch free, her arms no thicker but somehow far more solid and refined. Movement was smooth and assured.

...And she had tight muscles. Everywhere!

Each movement flexed her tuned body, a swimmer's grace displayed as her slightly taller, far more flexible, and stone solid body slowly moved through absent memories of long distant martial arts. Years of futile drills and forced habits now accessible!

Her old muscle memory instincts obviously didn't come back, and every movement felt new... but as she stood and began moving smoothly from stance to stance, the feeling of a warm friend coming home from a long absence filled her thoughts. Unshackled, her body only felt rusty, not fully weak and untrained.

It didn't quite match her history of practice though. After all, she had NEVER reached this level of physical excellence in her life before, some adjustment was to be expected. Had the healing changed her body ratios? Were her arms slightly too long, her legs more slender?

No... she wasn't actually taller. She was just automatically showing proper posture, even as her absent minded impulses had her hands twirling Mr. McStabberson through complicated loops and spins.

With a snap, Sarah felt her mind focus with razor sharpness. Her body shifted into a balanced stance, her right hand loosely but reliably holding her bone spike for any needed thrusting.

Best assign the next goalpost before that moronic Alien exploded itself again on her landmine field and wasted choice points. At least she had spent time waiting to pick her next option early so she knew what to go with.

{Storage Deck: 100cp} [You gain a basic storage deck, an extradimensional container able to hold a small room's worth of stuff, as well as space for four active weapons and some ammunition in single hotkeyed containers! Plus, if you have any allies that don't need to breathe, you can stick them in here when you're not using them (though they may complain about the view)!]

A glance... yep, 'LV 2 Jumpchain Child', with a 0/100cp 'Storage Deck' marked as her next goal.

Then she would have the glorious joy of auto looting!

Which was important. Up till now, she had been too weak to do anything but trap the hell out of the area and burn everyone. On one hand, that was a thousand times better than her previous situation and she was VERY appreciative about it... But now she had more options!

With a dark grin, she began moving through dodge drills from a past life, oh so long ago... for once, she was benefiting from those years of abuse! Damn instructors. 'Why bother learning to fight with a spear/trident/staff/glaive, you haven't even achieved a solid body foundation!'

Not like she could convince those (Admittedly helpful) bastards that any physical conditioning would be lost in a decade or less... the amount of stolen cash needed to bribe the less honorable teachers was paying of now, wasn't it!?

After all, she had multiple lifetimes learning how to get her terrible body into the best possible shape as soon as possible. Especially considering all her work got reset every Jump! When it came to forcing her civilian corpse into fighting shape, she was THE subject expert.

Even with all the improvements altering her base state, her years of never ending experience would have her adjust to the changes far too rapidly compared to a normal person.

A few hours of practice and then she could start hunting things more personally than through explosions five or so hallways away.

A few days however should let her begin harvesting these bastards!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam sighed.

He had cheated, slightly.

Right now he SHOULD be racking in the power considering how many Drawbacks this Jump had activated... but he was dumping nearly everything into something Sarah could use.

These systems could get by for now with the stuff that was considered incompatible with her growth pattern by the Warehouse, and those odd energies were being 'Purified' and passed through 'Growth' in a way that 'Research' claimed would let Adam stretch their utility as far as it would go... and that was desperately needed.

But back to the cheating... he was using this purified batch of power to increase the girls Warehouse Points. An hour ago, she had finally earned 'Basic Accommodations' for 50wp, and (thankfully) had set the next one to 'Basic Nutrition' for 100wp... which is, again, very good.

Problem was, he had spent so much time forcing what little utility out of his supplies that he could that he had missed a tiny (But important!) issue.

...This world was covered in a sprawling mess of offices, hallways, tunnels, and so on. A literal deathtrap and hunting ground meant to be as unhelpful as possible while punishing Sarah for exploring by having all the resources in overly loud hiding places (Wooden boxes that collapse loudly into splinters when opened, that kind of thing).

It did NOT have convenient doors with locks. Or keyholes.

...How was she supposed to USE her warehouse key, now that this stupid place was stable, sealed from the Abyss, and mostly safe!?

He knew he could just convince her to aim for the 'Portal' upgrade option, but she needed food NOW. Especially since her 'Bad Ass' upgrade increased her dietary needs now that she was in peak physical condition.

Oh she could also survive with less water and food than anyone else of her species, but Adam didn't want her to suffer like that. Not if there was any other option, at least.

With a glare, he re-read the 'Access Key' section... and paused.

It needed to be inserted into a door with a lock. But. But!

With a shift in the internals, he attempted to recode just the smallest thing... only a small alteration... come on...

'...into any door with a lock or keyhole'!

There! And what was a keyhole? Any hole for a key!

Adam ignored the dozen or so warnings and issues he would have to fix now in the systems after having 'bent' the rules so harshly. This was worth it!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah slid with silence into another form, her memories of spearwork training showing their worth as the white bone with blue flame highlights pierced the darkness... and froze.

Warehouse Clarification:

~Utilities and Structures

~~{Access Key: {Purchased}} Modified!

~~~Key to Warehouse can be inserted into any door with a lock OR a keyhole!

~~~AKA: A hole for a key.

~~~PS: Ask Mr. McStabberson for hole creation assistance!

Huh.

Now that she thought about it, when HAD she seen a door with anything more than a handle? Some had small windows in them, broken or otherwise, or opened with pressure only (Can't risk those black armored acid monsters having issues getting around, can we?), but actual secure doorways had been blatantly missing so far.

A second thought had her consider... could she then just make a door? A small, hinged one tiny enough to let her crawl through? Stab a keyhole, and even without more purchases for her Warehouse she would have an area secured from the larger monsters in the dark.

She started to shift as something moved in the dark... and felt her body tense in anticipation!

Let's see if she can stab the monster before it dashes directly into the explosion tunnel again. Already, her throwing speed was MUCH higher and her accuracy asstounding with each toss... Or she could use the spear length setup and see how an Alien-Kabob burned.

Decisions, decisions!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

They didn't think in English, and honestly? As a hunting based culture, they had few easily translated mental thought processes easily understood by people from earth.

But if it could think in that language and with easily understood mental constructs, the heavily armored Predator leading its team would have been cursing.

Not only was there no air support for resupply or for returning home with their growing mound of Alien trophies, but something BAD was going on in quadrant U33D298L3. Or at least, that whole general area.

Constant explosions felt over five sectors away, unnatural flashes of light that matched NONE of their equipment, and some seriously disturbing sounds that never seemed to rest.

Not just the screams of battle and the hunt, those were nearly a restful lullaby for his teams at this point... no, unusual and unending torturous sounds ripped from those hallways, mostly the sound of one Alien clearly tearing its body apart in a self degrading effort to commit suicide and bring anything down with it.

Considering that this planet seemed to unnaturally prevent a worthy death... that was leading to some very disturbing mental effects for the hunting squad.

While its language was untranslated and communication obviously secured, if one could see the many teams of Predators combing the darkness for the never ending hunt... they would notice the patrol patterns spreading a bit.

Nothing was willing to get close to the ghost fires and the death screams. At least, not for now.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Slide to the side, the sharp claws slicing a bit too close that time, twist, thrust and DODGE THE BLOOD!

Stupid acid blood.

If she wasn't literally beyond human reflexes and reaction times at this point, not to mention coated by this awesome shield, she would have SO many holes in her body by now.

Though she did have to disable the more explosive and fiery features of her shield... killing things with her super sharp bone spear was a bit pointless if the messy blood set off a cleansing fire storm.

The benefits and improvements were obvious though... Sarah was almost 100% sure some ammo for some sort of assault rifle had dropped a few fights ago!

It was a bit hard to tell, by the time she got to the area it was a blob of melted metal, but at least the material hadn't evaporated like the other stuff! Maybe she wouldn't even NEED her storage deck to keep the rewards from liquefying!

That's right, who got skill!? SHE got skill!

Absently flicking her bone spear so the acidic goo would fuck right the hell off, her gaze caught on a door just visible thanks to the new corpse fire.

Right!

It was basic, had a small hand bar style door handle, and like ALL these damn doors was unable to lock. Honestly, the thing looked fragile enough that a lock would have been pointless anyway, this whole area had an unclean, slightly rusted vibe to it.

But that wasn't the point.

A thought had Mr. McStabberson shrink down enough to act like a thin spike rather than a useful conversation penetrator and with some caution she poked a round hole just above the door handle.

Absently dropping the weapon (She could grab it from nothing if needed later), she reached and with a thought an old key appeared in her hand. It was a dull steel thing, with two basic teeth... more the kind of thing one would use to open a cheap box rather than a home or car key.

It slid into the perfect circle in the door.

Even though it was too large, too oddly shaped, clearly unable to fit... it clicked as she turned her hand and carefully opened the suddenly far more solid door.

Her first thought was a mix of confusion and caution... for within was a very small room with another door.

Sure, the second door seemed FAR more sturdy and secure, and the room was almost offensively clean and new. Without light the whole area was bright, without seams it was joined, and without reason it felt... patched. A bit rough.

As she stepped into the room, the sudden air change nearly had her slump against the nearest wall.

The air was crisp.

Clean.

Hours of breathing in rust, mold, and recently ashes and fumes... to be suddenly breathing something so light and pure... her lungs clenched as she began to cough, impurities and so such being expelled as her body frantically absorbed the needed atmosphere.

By the time she had recovered (When had she felt so warm? So cool? Such a lovely temperature...), Sarah made a quick check... yes, the way in was still open, and hadn't closed on her like some sort of horror story.

Forcing herself to find some sort of inner calm, she stood a bit shaken and walked to the only other door... this one made of matte metal and conviction.

With a confidence she didn't feel, the door was jerked open...

Sarah paused.

It was beautiful.

A cavern. The harsh steel walls that she suffered under for so many years was torn into patches and strips, while a slightly glowing blue crystal was growing like moss over the structure... and now that there was light?

No longer a pit of shadow with a black fog of a tormentor on its fire coated throne taunting her, not now.

It was a column.

The entire room was a massive vertical tunnel, with blue glowing crystals stretching up into the air, so far up, so distant... her eyes could only see a distant blue mist far above the room.

The walls had a few more doors like the one she had just entered from, the curved metal shelving adding a glitter to the entire structure as light reflected off their edges...

Her spear of bone was already pointed to the 'voice' as her body shifted down and to the side, ready for more movement and battle!

...The sounds were both in her mind AND from a blue glow on the crystal wall, the same area where her kidnapper had its golden throne.

She let the spear dip slightly. It would still be useful from that angle, but if this was her 'New Management' she wasn't going to DELIBERATELY piss it off. "Hello?"

With a series of crackles... the wall shifted.

And a twelve foot tall crystal skull formed.

{{Did that do it?}} The skull shifted unnaturally as two blue flames focused on her... and blinked. Sort of. Dimmed and returned at least. {{Huh.}}

They looked at each other.

The skull squinted. {{Are all humans as small as you here?}}

What? "Are all talking skull rocks the size of a bus like you!?"

It paused. {{Maybe? I've been larger and smaller than this, and I admit my sense of scale is all kinds of messed up at this point. Oh, here! Have a seat.}}

A beautiful throne rose up before the bone face, double stairs and a hand rail leading to what seemed to be a beautiful resting spot.

Well whatever. "Sure."

She kept an eye on the rock face just in case on the way up... but the seat was almost perfect for her to relax on. And was that a crystal jug filled with water!?

The first sip was heaven!

A chuckle some time later made her realize she had tossed all that caution out the window after having a chance at pure rehydration. "...Sorry."

The skull seemed relaxed. {{No problem, take your time. I just wish we could have gotten you access to {Basic Nutrition: -100wp} already... it will probably need another 18 hours before I can get you access to the damn food.}}

Sarah winced. It didn't really hurt to hear the skull talk, but some terms sort of vibrated inside her mind like the purchase options. Still... "So... Hi! My name is Sarah. Not be rude... but who are you?"

The skull somehow made a wry smile. {{Lovely to officially make your acquaintance Sarah, and technically my official name is now ###$#$$$ $###$##.}}

They BOTH flinched.

The skull frowned. {{Crap! There are literally NO warnings in ANY of these damned systems!}} It gave a sigh. {{I was a fragment of one called Adam before binding to your Warehouse, just go with that for now. But the longer I bond to this place, the less of that I will be him and the more of... that name... I will become.}}

Rubbing her throbbing head, she still squinted. "Are... are you going to be alright? Were you kidnapped too, like I was?"

The wall snorted. {{No. And if I ever meet the asshole who was tormenting you, they won't have very long to try and apologize before I consume it.}}

The skull frowned, blue flames floating in the dark. {{I do NOT approve of abusing children, and you are basically a child godling... it BETTER not come back if it knows what's best for it.}}

She blinked. "Are you saying you are stronger than that monster?"

A dark chuckle. {{I am but a Shard of a Whole. You are under our care now... so at this point, no one else's opinions matter anymore. Except yours.}}

Sarah felt something unclench. "...Really?"

The stones nodded.

If she started crying, no one judged her for it.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

The grunt whispered. "No, really. Why is literally everyone trying to find and kill some random bitch? This is like our eighth patrol, and I ain't seen nothin of this chick nowhere! Is she even ON Pandora!?"

The Hyperion dispatcher flinched and waved him silent. "Not. A. Damn. Word. You say nothing, you heard nothing, just shut up and get ready for your shift."

He grunted. "A waste of our damn time is what it..." *BANG*

Dispatcher smiled with a wide grin at the massive robot and its smoking gun. "Good day Security Unit 3223!"

The droid didn't say anything of course. The intercom however did beep with upper management. "Choose a better squad leader or save us time and space yourself. Cleaning the floors will be deducted from your paycheck."

Dispatch nodded. "Sir! Thank you for the opportunity!" Damn it, low level grunts need to learn from the bodies of the PREVIOUS 'I got an opinion' morons.

With a sigh, he smiled to the robots and began dragging another moron to the corpse chute. Damn paycheck wasn't worth this.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Explaining the situation was clearly going to take a while, so Sarah appreciated Adam's attempts at making her feel more secure.

First, he modified her {Entrance Hall: 0wp, -50wp*X} so that the small room led to a reinforced hallway... one that narrowed down to an inch square in size and then twisted around. It was technically still attached to an 'open' door... but basically Adam had managed to lock her door so nothing but gas could enter her new safety haven.

The atmosphere was covered to be safe by fiat, so even someone pumping poison into the entrance would find the substance neutralized by the time the fumes passed down the 'long' 'hallway'.

He (And how was a rock skull a dude?) would have to undo the setup when she was willing to leave again, but for now Sarah felt safe. REALLY safe, for the first time in maybe years.

Secondly, {Basic Accommodations: -50wp} was supposed to supply basic accommodations for her and her 'companions'... but the kidnapper had screwed up a LOT of those systems. So no pets, companions, slaves (Why!?), or sentient servants for her.

On the positive side, her new skull friend was able to modify the basic barracks by purposefully breaking it further. Theoretically fixable later, for now?

The original barracks was to supply a bunk, locker, communal shower, and toilet.

That's it.

But all the extra bits needed to make that automatically expand was still there, just normally out of reach and stored away... so Adam made some cautious, deliberate 'errors'. Best option from a list of rough choices.

She flounced out of her massive shower with multiple shower heads, heading straight to her redesigned massive bed in her small apartment complex.

Yeah, her new 'Benefactor' had to sacrifice four hundred 'barrack quarters' to get enough material to set this up, and would be easier to buy a massive upgrade later on than ever try to fix this mess back to the way it was SUPPOSED to be...

But she was warm, in a safe 'house', had access to a shower AND a bath... and in less than a day or so she will have clean, healthy, not moldy food! Not to mention the drinks, as she absently picked up the never empty mug of far too delicious and pure water.

Apparently Adam had done something similar to the plumbing, crippling it slightly so that it was improved for one person if not more than a little impractical for its original purposes. This stuff not only had needed minerals and stuff, but through some shenanigans the showers and baths were warm and the drinks were cool (Neither of which she had purchased yet).

Basically, the two had a bit of a discussion about her situation, and she had always been a practical girl.

Shit was broken.

Sarah sighed as she dove into her covers.

ALL the shit was broken.

Basically, those many threats aimed at her just before this jump had not only been serious... but had been partially applied as well. This whole place was held together with gumption and whatever the hell Adam the massive stone skull was, and lots of 'her' Warehouse and the Jumpchain it supported was damaged in the process.

And she agreed, if letting Adam break some already damaged stuff FURTHER to make her life better NOW, especially if he can undo it all at some point in the future?

Totally worth it.

With a sigh, she rolled herself up like a burrito and thought about her current problems.

Her kidnapper had left a few big issues: Stabilizing her Warehouse, her next Jump, and future Jump restrictions.

The Warehouse was apparently not just a place to torment your victim, it was Sarah herself. She was... here somehow, the whole place... and her current body was like a game avatar that let her interact safely with other places and get stronger.

So it being damaged? A big deal. A VERY big deal. Adam was working on it, thank everything... but it led to hard choices like 'Cripple damaged options further to make yourself safer and more stable'.

This did lead to the second problem... her next Jump.

According to the skull, the kidnapper had to work hard to get her here... to this death trap.

Why? Places like this were almost pure profit for those bastards... if the Jumper survived. Or if you decided to harvest them like a monster and left them to die. Either or.

Anyway, if the Jumpchain worlds were a massive quilt with each square a mountain or divot based on danger? Her kidnapper had been pushing her up death hill.

EVERY optional Jump choice was dangerous nearby. She was going to have a rough couple of trips no matter WHAT she desired... which wasn't too big an issue because her new 'Benefactor' (Fire Bestie Friends Forever!) was more than willing to just cheat.

For example?

Technically, she shouldn't be earning ANY wp in here at all right now. Warehouse points were collected by using her Avatar like a small drain, sucking out ambient energy from the worlds she was exploring on her adventures.

Thankfully, her new 'Benefactor' (Boss?) was able to access more energy types than expected and somehow purify them to an unusual degree... Sure, her wp gain rate had dropped significantly since coming here, but not stopped.

And unlike her tormenter, Adam was fine letting her just do... nothing. Just sit here, get some sleep, take five or ten baths and a dozen showers, and wait for food.

She was going to eat ALL the food! As soon as the skull mentioned crippling the water to improve her situation by giving up support for a nonexistent team, she was ALL for doing the same thing to get better food quality and quantity!

Anyway, point was she now had support. In the future? Food, water, and safe shelter! And based on the crazy stuff her Jumpchain Sponsor did with her shield and weapon, even more cheating was very probable in the (no doubt dangerous) future.

And finally, those future Jump restrictions.

Her kidnapper had managed to screw with almost everything EXCEPT the Warehouse. Mostly because it had chosen to ignore the place since it didn't care about her in any real meaningful way. That said? There were still issues... ones hopefully fixable by Adam at some point.

The 'No Companions or Pets' one sucked, but considering how damaged the place was Sarah wouldn't want to risk someone she cared for anyway in this death trap, even WITH Adam's best efforts. And the knowledge that (At least from now on) her journey would be logged and she would eventually be able to visit them again in the future with no time passing soothed a lot of her concerns and issues on the topic...

But the biggest issues related to harvesting Choice and Warehouse points in the future.

Adam was cludging together a mess of systems and doing his darndest, but at the end of the day the point harvesting, collection, and cultivation systems were pretty trashed. If they were working as designed, Sarah would have earned thousands of cp and wp, a river of power pouring in per second just for surviving this hell hole... and the issue wasn't likely to go away in the future either.

This meant no 'free' points per jump.

Every jump would require her to pick flaws and drawbacks or choose challenges if she wanted to get points... either that or continue to use Adam's workaround and manually earn the various energies by defying fate or achieving greatness DURING a jump, which was more risky.

Again, the pair were planning to cheat on this, obviously. And there were examples in what little documentation Adam had recovered from the systems where Jumpers were able to balance drawbacks with perks to gain benefits with little cost, or even transform major issues into benefits with some clever work around tricks.

And Sarah's mind was her primary focus after years of trial and error.

She could handle this.

Finally finding a comfortable angle, the enhanced woman burrito fell into a deep, soft slumber... the best rest in literal years, really.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

DANG IT!

Adam managed to keep everything together until able to purchase {Basic Nutrition: -100wp} at least, but now? Sarah could gain Choice Points easily enough by using her Blue Burning Booster Shield to encode some more flame landmine scripts outside the Warehouse, that would be easy enough...

But Warehouse Points? Until she spent time outside, it would have to be knocked down to a single point every thirty hours or so.

He had bent a few too many rules, and a lot of the instability those rules were supposed to prevent had to be manually fixed now by him, 'Purification', 'Growth', and (Thank everything) 'Research'.

He could handle it, but not without keeping all the units of power that he had been shunting into constructing Warehouse Point modules. The fact she could still earn them in here was only thanks to the advancements discovered and improved by 'Research' at this point, if he was stuck with the original mess she would be LOSING energy.

With a heavy grumble, which thankfully Adam could do now that he had a face (Mostly), he spent the night away keeping the Warehouse safe for Sarah and doing the system repairing equivalent of repetitive paperwork.

He paused... and groaned.

The destruction of the Companion options meant that for once? He couldn't shove this job on anyone else either!

Adam was going to have to be... responsible.

Damn it.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah jerked slightly in her warm blanket as sleep vanished, a mental alert waking her up!

Warehouse:

~Utilities and Structures

~~{Basic Nutrition: -100wp} Purchased!

}}INSTALLING{{

~Utilities and Structures

~~{A Little Less Basic: -200wp} Delisted!

~~{Recyclotron: -200wp} Delisted!

~~{Fabricator: -200wp} Delisted!

~Utilities and Structures

~~{Basic Nutrition: -100wp} Modified!

...That was uh. A lot of broken stuff.

She wondered what exactly she would have to do to save up 6600wp to both repair all those options AND purchase them at some point... but maybe she should check the summary first.

Also? Her habit of waking silently, ready for a fight or to flee?

Didn't work well when she was wrapped up like a burrito.

'Oh no! Beware the danger of the woman caterpillar! She may roll out of bed and wiggle on the floor at you!' Woot.

Thankfully, there weren't any obvious witnesses. Her new Patron probably saw it all, but Adam was likely cool enough not to mention her awesome accidental bondage skills.

After FAR too much wiggling, she was able to escape her comfy enclosure, get a shower (And a bath, and ANOTHER shower... just because she could!) and sit at the newly provided table in her apartment.

Right. The Change Summary Log. Let's see what the damage is!

...Ouch.

A lot.

{A Little Less Basic: -200wp} would have drastically increased the food variety and so forth available, eventually. Maybe. It and many other support features were previously damaged, apparently.

Which was fine. One day she would get that all fixed, or at least Adam assumed they could get to that point.

No, Sarah was REALLY wincing at losing the options for purchasing {Recyclotron: -200wp} and {Fabricator: -200wp}, two obscenely powerful features that would basically have moved her to a post scarcity society level of independence.

{Recyclotron: -200wp} before being harvested (But her new boss said he can fix it! Eventually!) was able to transform anything into compost, basic compounds, or elements. As well as cleanse water and so forth. At a rate powerful enough to support modifying the waste of a major city like Paris. All of it.

Even more desirable, {Fabricator: -200wp} upgraded that powerful feature to be able to auto build anything she had collected or built a schematic for! Basically, it would be able to recreate anything she had recycled in the past, minus any magical, spiritual, spatial, or conceptual features.

Now, that was very, VERY desirable... eventually. And thankfully, she could one day pay enough Warehouse Points to fix all this. One day. For a heavy cost.

Right now though?

"Adam, show me something edible!"

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam was bending some serious rules, or to be more accurate, HAD bent some serious rules.

Technically, salt was a crystal, right? And if he made unnaturally perfect crystalline structures, like say plates and stuff, then that was still just salt, right?

So now Sarah had cups, bowls, plates, and so forth. And it only took a tiny bit of unrealistic manipulation to prevent the things from 'seasoning' the various drinks and foods placed on it. For a while.

If Sarah left soup in one of the new bowls for around two hours or so, the stupid thing WOULD still start to dissolve though.

...He would sell it as a feature. 'Environmentally friendly! Easy to recycle!'

Anyway, {Basic Nutrition: -100wp} opened up a lot of 'strict budget' food elements... common (Not Cultivational) vegetables and herbs and fruits, basic seasonings, pasta, cereal, and so forth. Plus the odd item here and there, like milk (for the cereal), bread (Not amazing artisan stuff here, more the kind you can buy from a gas station, for the peanut butter), and so on.

And while the enhancement Adam had to sacrifice, {A Little Less Basic: -200wp}, would have upgraded both the quantity and quality up to 'middle class working family' tier, he had some (odd) workarounds.

With Sarah owning {Basic Accommodations: 50wp}, it unlocked an odd synergy with 'Basic Nutrition'... offering 1200 Kcal a day worth of a balanced, vegetarian only food substitute. By harvesting chunks of those other purchases, combined with {Basic Nutrition: -100wp}?

He now had access to most seasonings now, not to mention nearly all well known plant based products from twenty first century industrialized Earth.

The only non-plant products were some of the seasonings, milk, and (thankfully) honey... though that last one required some aggressive 'negotiation' to get it included under the {Basic Nutrition: -100wp} umbrella.

Adam ended up arguing that 'Peanut Butter and Honey Sandwiches' were part of a 'very strict budget' menu to get it allowed, and he could almost FEEL the non-amused reaction from the Warehouse systems.

Still worked though.

Anyway, he was now able to easily supply his Jumper with 'Nutrition Bars', which were nearly tasteless thumbnail sized compressed bars of basic needs. All the carbs, nutrients, vitamins, yadda yadda... then Adam stuffed in triple the amount of honey, a selection of dried or candied fruits, and a good coating of chocolate(It is a plant! Shut up systems! It counts!).

The things were... alright. Even with all the extra junk added, it merely brought up the taste from 'blegh' to acceptable.

Sarah was eating them like candy, and seemed equally thrilled to be doing so!

So... good.

He added some cups with the various drink options. Milk (Where did this stuff come from without animal access?), fruit juices (His favorite was still 50% Orange and 50% Pineapple, stuff was awesome in the morning), chocolate milk (So what if he had added sugar! It was from sugar cane, that was a plant, shut up you stupid systems!), and his current experiment: tea.

Because tea leaves were NOT provided. And he wasn't sure why.

Something was broken somewhere, probably. Because he could access OTHER plant leaves, like cabbage and even banana leaves... but not tea leaves. At all.

So he had cheated, like you do.

Seaweed.

Heavily modified, 'dried' seaweed.

...Based on the girl's expression, it still needed work.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah hummed happily as she headed to take another shower, pleasantly full and maybe a bit overly optimistic. But she had not only filled her VERY empty stomach, but had a whole bowl of blue and black berries! How long had it been since she had fresh fruit?

Easily two jumps ago, so... what, a couple of decades? Depending on how long she had been sneaking around this death planet or so.

Sarah also noticed her new wardrobe which was, as far as she could tell, woven from vegetable fibers made out of corn husks. It was... unexpectedly soft.

Maybe she just felt spoiled now that she could wear underwear again. And even if it wasn't the height of fashion? It was clean, soft, and sturdy enough to withstand a good tug.

Safety, clean water, good food, fresh clothing...

She slid into the hot bath with a satisfied groan.

Most importantly, hot showers and a huge bath.

True, eventually she would have to buckle down and return to that death planet. Kick everything's ass and earn some cool new talents. Back to the daily grind and all that, be a responsible multiversal adventurer now that she had the actual options to gain power...

She slid further into the steaming water, making tiny bubbles with her mouth.

...Maybe tomorrow.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

As far as Adam could tell, Sarah was having a blast! So far she had spent a week just relaxing, exploring the (currently limited) area, and trying out the various attempts at new food and food related non-food items.

Clothing? Worked! Paper? Well, it was rice paper, unnaturally thick and sturdy. Charcoal was eventually obtained because it was used in some 'health drinks' and oxygen starved burnt trees were technically vegetarian, right? Anyway, bars of charcoal wrapped in bamboo got something close to pencils.

Point was: Sarah was taking her time before heading back to the hellscape of black hallways, moldy and rancid smells, and endless combat and hunting on a death planet full of acid blood monsters and nuke wielding maniacs.

This gave Adam more time to try his current project: Moving the Warehouse Portal.

First attempt! Just willing it! Trying to use the internal modules to push it! Pretending to be Sarah, trying to build 'walls' that extend outside the exit, even an unlikely try to convince everything that the Warehouse was inside out and things should shift a bit!

Lots of failures, so uh... no.

His current attempt? Convoluted Rube Goldberg machines.

A complicated, dense 'wall' that was really a hooked lever with an unnaturally sharp edge on the tip, 'damaged' so it disconnects from the surroundings for manipulation. Floor rollers, levers, wedges, and ropes. Barrels, tubes, and more than a few domino shapes and balls!

Adam watched as the heavy weight fell from the infinite height of the central Warehouse, landed on the seesaw, pushing the bars, lifting the edges of the 'wall' tool to move forward out the exit, the next steps hopefully able to carve out above the door frame as a first step to disconnect the entire structure for ease of movement!

...Twenty four steps in, and the second spring moved the wrong way. Again.

Damn.

At least it was fast to modify the area back to a starting position by 'deleting' the changes and 'building' the modifications again.

It was several tries later when Sarah wandered in. "Are you still doing that contraption stuff?"

Adam's rock skull glanced at the tiny woman. {{Yeah... but progress is slow.}}

She moved to the seating area he had made a few days ago (having felt her 'throne' a bit pretentious) and continued to eat her bowl of chocolate ice cream. THAT had been a bit tricky, boiling and frozen food required some complicated water pipe works. "What are you trying to do anyway?"

Adam watched the pulley system be rebuilt. {{If I can disconnect the entrance from the stone wall, then hopefully I can aim the door towards the floor and begin drilling downwards. Move everything closer to this planet's core.}}

She licked her spoon. "Why?"

...Maybe he should get rid of the musical sections? Just until it all worked? {{This planet is not natural. There is literally no actual ground or nature, just endless hallways that were never constructed by mortal means. An impossible place that likely formed from all the energies being shoved into this area when your tormentor was harvesting stuff.}}

Yeah, at least without the drums and stuff his failures wouldn't be so loud. {{To support itself, the hallways and walls deeper down are made out of very rare and very strong materials, stuff we can harvest and hopefully use to speed up repairs and lower some costs. After all, building a death maze in the literal core of a planet can't be done with normal rock or concrete.}}

She took another bite. "Huh. Neat." Her thoughts had a new bowl of dessert arrive at her table, this one seemed to be strawberry caramel flavored. "Why all that stuff though?"

The skull glanced over. {{Because at least my failures are more interesting for me at this point. Anything that fully leaves the Warehouse formed from itself, like my wall tools and floor hooks, they destabilize and return here unless I fully disconnect them from the inside surfaces. The Jumper is not supposed to be able to build Warehouse structures outside of the Warehouse, after all.}}

Adam paused. {{On an unrelated note, there may or may not be a sizable pile of stuff outside the exit right now...}} He sighed. {{Said pile may be complicating my additional attempts.}}

She swallowed another spoon full. "So you can make stuff, disconnect from it, and it works fine outside?"

He adjusted the thirteenth and fourteenth spring. Probably should rebalance the entire wire network, really. {{Yep.}}

Sarah waved her spoon around in the air. "So can't you just make a tiny door with a keyhole and let me carry it around?"

...Oh.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah checked on the 'Doggy Door' as she stepped carefully around more debris.

After a bit of teasing, Adam made her this tiny, foldable square door frame with a cloth 'door', a hole acting as good enough for the Warehouse Key. Light, collapsible, and honestly the worst 'door' she had ever seen before... but good enough for her new home to connect to, so whatever.

Trying to travel downwards had actually helped her outpace her Alien pursuer, as she had to dig holes on each level... and it only took a second to surround each new pathway with even more explosive flame runes.

It had only been a few days of travel, yet her friendly foe was so far behind at this point that she could barely hear the explosions as the moron launched itself at another death mark.

Didn't mean this trip was easy though, mostly due to the annoyance of travel rather than waves of enemies.

At this point? Each layer took a dozen stabs to reveal the next. And while that also meant her acid filled follower was having real issues at this point while trying to follow her... it was getting frustrating.

At some stage she would have to just set up the foldadoor at the next surface and let Mr. McStabberson slowly erode a path. And instead of taking minutes like now it would eventually require hours, days, or even weeks!

On the positive side, she finally earned {Storage Deck: 100cp} two days ago after some LARGE group of something ran into her landmine trail. At least, that was where she ASSUMED all the points came from, it had jumped a massive amount in a few seconds after days of slow progress.

Anyway, this meant that she had FINALLY unlocked the Inventory! The random crap her victims dropped on death would no longer explode into flames and slagged metal!

So far she had gotten two Medkits, some ammo, a couple of shields and a couple of guns.

Both shields were low quality compared to her Blue Burning Booster Shield, Legendary, so she 'sold' them to Adam, a new feature that let him receive junk from her storage, scan the stuff, and break it down for resources. Earned her a few more cp, so at least it wasn't a total waste to get vendor trash.

As for the guns... well. One was a fairly strong Jakobs Revolver, high damage and no semi-auto fire mode, the other a Bandit submachine gun with a massive bullet capacity and almost no accuracy.

Low rarity, and not useful in these dense corridors and dug tunnels... she didn't sell either of them, but honestly? If trouble came calling, Mr. McStabberson would be answering.

Nothing says stopping power like a hole in the face and soul purging fire!

At this point though, she was fairly sure there was some additional drawback neither Adam nor her were aware of that was drastically reducing the drop rate of equipment. She was still slowly building up ammo supplies, since her Storage Deck had no problem with keeping that stuff separate and it didn't seem to have a limit so why not stock up a little... but anything other than ammo was rare.

Damn rare.

She twisted her spike into the next floor, watching the material slowly erode.

At least she had a safe place to sleep and great food to try out. Mostly great, some 'dishes' Adam had chosen had... not gone over well.

Loot woes aside, she had decided her next level up target would be an Action Skill, specifically {Phase Pierce: -300cp, Females: -150cp}. It required a tiny amount of species changing, but would not only provide an extra method of detection... but if she found a gun that wasn't crap she could safely harvest more points from behind heavy defenses.

{Phase Pierce: -300cp, Females: -150cp} [As with the Phase Scream, you're now a Siren, with all the weirdness that entails! Now though, you can partially fade out of normal space entirely. For a brief period, you're able to selectively see through obstacles! From crates to mountains... targets up to a thousand miles away are laid bare to your sights. With practice, you can even bring a weapon with you and get off a single shot that will similarly pierce through all obstacles on its way to a target.]

She knew Adam was pushing the luck option, and she might go for it eventually... but trusting luck really wasn't her style.

Killing something trying to hunt her with a sniper shot from miles away while sipping on a latte?

That was her style!

Well, that or stabbing some flaming bones into their face.

So extreme range, either close or far. And if she can see friends and foes in any situation, she can MAKE her own damn luck!

Eventually.

Right now though, she was only half way to her new goal of 150wp and had a well to dig through depressing hallways and monster filled tubes... and there was an issue.

The deeper she traveled, the smaller the scale of the hallways.

Fifty or so layers above, she had a foot or more additional headroom! if this kept up, the 'floor' would be layers of honeycomb like thin tube networks, a mesh of toy sized hallways and rooms for her to try and harvest!

Sarah sat back, wiping her brow as she sipped from a small canteen. "Hey, Adam?"

She poked the ground, wisps of smoke slowly swirling into the air. "How are we going to collect this stuff after we get deep enough? I mean, into the Warehouse? Am I going to have to dig it up with just my spear?"

Her interface felt... embarrassed and frustrated? {{... Crud. Good point.}}

A pause. {{...I know!}}

{{First, we need you to kill enough things to find a Grenade Modification Module for us to alter... and earn some cp to work with... I had that restructuring module here somewhere, I can get that to interface with a transfusion grenade probably...}}

She felt a wry smile as she ignored Adam's grumbling and went back to ground stabbing.

Somehow she didn't feel shocked that Adam's solution would require a significant application of explosive notifications. And probably fire.

It always seemed to involve fire.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam grumbled at the recent loot.

Guns were tossed, mostly useless. Sarah had asked him to save a good sniper rifle or two, preferably a Jakobs since they had great damage and accuracy. No luck on that either, yet.

True, the Jakobs line didn't allow elemental effects and had a low capacity... but Sarah explained that she preferred high impact, high accuracy shots to get a fight started... and then clean up the rest with Mr. McStabberson.

Not to mention that her new soon-to-be-bought Action Skill {Phase Pierce: -300cp, Females: -150cp} would really benefit with something powerful at range to reach out and touch someone.

Not that it mattered, most of the weapon loot was junk pistols or submachine guns. All got recycled for material stock.

After a while, the raw ammo itself filled up a bunch of shelves and got added to the recycle pile... as did the grenades.

Grenades from Borderlands were a bit fun, really. They were able to mutate heavily based on the user's grenade mod to do all sorts of interesting things... if he could find the right one, damn it!

They needed a Maliwan brand Transfusion Grenade, a nasty piece of work that would seek out targets, consume organic material, convert the mess to 'life orbs', and heal the wielder.

The 'life orbs' were blobs of basic medical nanites with some harvested red nutrient slurry for fuel, which the target probably didn't appreciate... but the concepts of 'Hunt, consume, return resource' was good enough for Adam to modify into a harvesting grenade.

If they could get one to drop.

Adam glared at the tiny doorway that Sarah would occasionally stab more explosive runes through.

His other idea? Destabilize the doorway, have it fall onto a pillar of material to bring it inside the warehouse, and try to harvest it!

Simple! Safe! Smart!

Failure.

Not because Sarah couldn't dig out a column for collection, not because she was unable to situate the door frame with some weak supports for destruction (to then fall and get ready for profit!), no.

The problem?

When she opened the door frame to the Warehouse... HER side was unsupported, ready to fall on the pillar of 'loot' for collection.

HIS side however was built from solid Warehouse material.

Didn't matter if the other opening was underwater, in midair, in space... HIS side was structurally sound, supported by some sort of deity fiat, and happy to just... float there.

All they had achieved was making a very tricky area for Sarah to exit from.

So now?

Grinding.

The door was just a few inches off the floor, facing down.

Sarah could sit with comfort near the exit, stabbing the place to fill the outside with rune grenades of blue flames.

Random things (Mostly her monster stalker) would then blow up.

And their inventory was slowly filling... with lots of crap white loot drops.

Not super surprising, really. This wasn't dangerous. Nor was her foe impressive. And it wasn't a 'named' enemy, or a 'critical' character. And her stalker had exploded countless times by now, if that mattered.

But... while they had gotten pretty darn deep into the death planet, the rare stuff these tiny ant sized hallways and tubes were now made of to support the planet?

It wasn't just rare and useful, it was near unbreakable and annoying to try and collect.

Sarah could spend a few days chipping fragments off for collection, which considering how valuable this stuff was, might be a good idea if everything else failed, but that was frustrating, boring work. Still worth it, a thumbnail of radioactive gems converted into a lot of potential energy, but boring.

So instead, they were trapping the hell out of a wider and wider area with soul flames and waiting for R. to bless them with a holy hand grenade that Adam could mutate into a useful harvesting tool.

Eventually.

At least Sarah was visibly improving. Her {Bad Ass: 200cp} perk was loving the excessive availability of food and water... while her initial improvements were obviously breathtaking, better resources meant her systems were still improving.

The purchased Perk was not a one time deal after all... given access to better food, more powerful concepts or energies, and stronger D.N.A. samples? Her perfection could only be improved over time. Depending on what she considered to be perfect at least.

So while bored, she WAS benefiting from these lazy days stabbing rocks and pigging out.

Much less stressful than hiding in muddy holes and hoping to live a few hours longer.

Another mental ping... nope, another Medkit. Useful, but she had dozens of the things now and Adam didn't see her needing one soon since even her customized shield didn't see much use with these methods.

Adam sighed mentally and went back to the mess he made of her Warehouse. At least this method of improvement was easy and safe, if not exactly thrilling.

'The amazing tale of poking landmines at people for a month!' Tell your children, share with your friends!

At least Adam was being kept busy while waiting.

Now that Sarah had a safe place to sleep, clean water, food, and even clothing and entertainment (Explosions!)... Adam had put a pause on her ability to gather wp.

All Warehouse Points were being redirected because of the 'issues' that needed addressing, most of which fell into three categories: Broken, Breaking, and Fine.

Fine covered everything that wasn't touched or damaged, and was currently being ignored. This was the stuff Sarah could theoretically spend wp to purchase right now with no issue.

Broken category included all the damage that had been duct taped and gummed together, as well as the options Adam destroyed for parts and material. They would need wp eventually to fix all the new issues and become usable again, but could be safely left alone for now.

Breaking though? This included all the components that were actively falling apart. Even now, Adam was using all incoming energy and excess loot material to 'handle' the situation...

He couldn't fix any of it, they were too unstable and the incoming wp was not nearly enough at this point. No, Adam was deliberately using Sarah's earned income (Except for her cp, of course) to overload chunks of code and material deliberately.

Sure, it may LOOK like he was causing massive explosions everywhere (Because he was), but there was a POINT to this.

'Research' was helping him set up her incoming wp to destabilize these structures in strategic places, causing the massive unstable 'towers' of upgrade options to collapse with the least amount of additional damage possible.

Basically? Adam had hijacked Sarah's Warehouse Points to hopefully destroy all the Breaking purchase options into something stable and secure, so that she could safely Jump to the next link in the Chain without catastrophic consequences.

This process however would go much FASTER and with fewer long term consequences if they could just find that damn transfusion grenade mod and let his Jumper harvest the center of this death world for materials.

As Sarah poked more landmines into the tunnels and Adam exploded places outside of reality for stability purposes, the unusual pair tried to settle in and relax.

After all, it likely would take a long time for loot this bad to actually pay out with a decent sniper and the needed grenade mod... and until then, they might as well enjoy the fireworks.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah was safe.

She had nearly doubled her weight over the last week or so, most of it going to muscle growth and bone density from what she could tell... not so much height, but she was used to being this short.

Sarah was gainfully employed.

A lucrative job of planting explosive symbols by poking a floor panel, one that provided all kinds of interesting stuff that she mostly tossed to get recycled.

Sarah was very. Very. Bored.

She absently tossed some pistol ammo from hand to hand.

Ammo from this Jump was odd, probably from having so many companies making guns without killing each other off financially first. There were guns that shot fire, acid, rockets, or even harpoons or explosive swords... such a wide variety of needs couldn't be handled by basic ammunition.

The compromise was the ECHO system. It held all raw ammunition types, with similar categories sharing material, and then registered each gun being used by the owner and ensured accurate magazines were provided as required.

That way, your corrosive guns get the right charges and propulsion gel and so forth needed to fire, while your electric and explosive rounds are provided when needed as you switch which weapon you are working with... hopefully WITHOUT filling your grenade and missile launchers with liquefied metal or something.

After all, in this Jump businesses made money from selling guns... NOT ammo.

Ammo was almost free, just like raw grenades were, and the guns offered variety, a 'one size fits my needs when needed' solution... such a concept doesn't work if your clients die from buying the wrong elemental bullet for their submachine gun.

Seeing another item showing up in her inventory... Nope, not a sniper. Toss to the recycle pile.

She absently checked her purse... uh. Her personal carrying bag. Reinforced hemp strands wrapped in cotton, and totally combat ready and NOT a weak purse. Yeah.

A check... they were still there.

If nothing else, the fact Adam didn't seem to know she had already hid away three of the transfusion grenade mods already showed that he respected her privacy.

And yes, she did feel a bit of guilt due to how disappointed the giant rock face seemed that she hadn't looted one of these things yet... but her dream of a powered up Jakobs sniper rifle demanded she try to keep this process going a bit.

Even if it was boring.

An alert made her blink as a new item showed up with details!

Firefly Class Mod

~Increases Ignite Damage.

Firefly Class Mod:

~Consuming selected item!

}}CONSUMING{{

Undefined Class Mod:

~Adjusting and Equipping selected item!

~~101cp Spent! Class Mod heavily changed!

}}Modifying!{{

}}INSTALLING{{

Backpacking Class Mod, Legendary

~We travel, some of us forever, to seek other places, other lives, other souls.

~Interfaces with Jumper Warehouse.

{{Enhanced sorting, filtering, and recycling of inventory materials.}}

With a brief flash of blue fire, she felt things shift. The shield on her hip and Mr. McStabberson's weight vanished, although she could still feel its presence... and suddenly she felt lighter.

Some unknown weight was no longer holding her down, so to speak. The random items, ammo, raw grenades, and the food and water she had been keeping in her storage deck within her ECHO system... they were still 'there', but an unnoticed strain had lifted.

A thought had all the ammo stored within 'reach', sorted, and just known without checking.

Several mental lists of food and drink favorites began to fill her reserves, ready for a snack at any point later on, while a thought had a massive inventory list display itself so she could watch the numbers adjust as it began indexing her collection.

With a motion, she examined the new 'Automation' page and all the features within. Set minimum 'reserve' ammo, health, and grenade stocks. Set overflow to recycle. Set production to restore anything below reserve amounts from raw materials.

Sarah was still grinning as she flipped from screen to screen when she heard a light cough. {{Sarah?}}

Hmm... No, don't auto cook collected meat. She didn't want to eat Alien gunk, no thank you! "Yes?"

Adam's glare caught her attention. {{How long have you had three... no, four Transfusion grenade mods?}}

...Oh. She had accidentally moved her purse and the hidden items into the system while organizing stuff. "Heh... uh. Surprise?"

He didn't look amused.

She winced. "I... might have been waiting for a really cool sniper rifle? You know, before we move on from getting lots of free stuff? I mean, I want to have a good damage option for {Phase Pierce: -300cp, Females: -150cp}."

The giant rock face grumbled. {{Well, it's your Jump. I'm not the only one who is going to be stuck here longer, waiting for some damn better luck. However!}}

He glared at her. {{You DO know that if you had handed those over earlier, I could have modified one for collecting the materials outside... and the others for faster hunting?}}

Adam harrumphed. {{The basic Transfusion grenades already seek out organic targets for conversion. With a bit of enhancement, we might have killed enough death beasts to get you a dozen awesome snipers or whatever by now. Instead of stabbing a rock and hoping for the best.}}

She paused. Oh.

Glancing at the grenade mods, she hesitated. "Can... Can we still do that?"

Adam sighed. {{Yes. Eventually. If I hadn't just used all that cp to build that class mod you harvested into something useful. Not to mention the additional time it will take to earn your Action Skill now.}}

...Oh.

Sarah sighed. "So back to stabbing?"

He seemed to sag. {{Yes. Back to stabbing.}}

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

A hand signal had its squad move to the walls, getting what little cover they could.

The explosions had gotten quieter, more suppressed days ago. Which was frustrating, because its hunting team began silently suggesting they go 'check it out', when the SMART thing to do in this situation is 'Wait for the obvious trap to hit someone else.'

So hallway by hallway, floor by floor, its team had been getting closer to the 'Fire and Explosion' sectors... and what little evidence they found along the way did NOT make this seem like a wise idea.

Burn marks covered the corridors they stalked through, marks that it was unable to duplicate with its arm torch. Which was bad.

Choke points were filled with creature parts, what little was able to exist after being exploded and melted so many times... one corridor had so many fragments that it implied over a hundred of the acid filled monstrosities had died here, although not at the same time considering the few claw marks where the dying had tried to dig FURTHER FORWARDS.

Prey didn't act like this.

The monsters had intelligence. They could set traps. They DID set traps, as the many revived teammates demonstrated. They could wait, they could plan, they could create their own tunnels through the endless hallways and cross sections.

But they hadn't displayed any of that here.

No, this was a near mindless horde that had thrown away everything in desperate attempts to gain one more inch of progress. And failed.

The leader examined the hallway of flesh and gore... and once again lamented the situation on this damn planet.

Anywhere else, and the team would retreat. Find a way around this obvious trap, resume the hunt.

Here?

Here, death was an annoyance rather than an ending. If the leader attempted to enforce 'reason' or 'planning', then they risked a revolt by the less mature members of the hunt.

With inward dissatisfaction, the leader waved forward the youngest (And most reckless) member to act like a damn stick poking the explosive... and the moron rushed forward with glee.

No hesitation, no suspicion, no caution of any kind.

What was becoming of the youth today? When the leader was young... well, no. They also did such stupid things. Luck and planning had allowed them to avoid the worst of their own consequences.

A massive BANG! A white light suddenly flashed... and fragments of the youngest blew backwards down the hallway.

The team stared at the chunky results.

This. This is why one didn't go first.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah grinned as she glanced at her new grenade mods.

Transmogrification Central, Legendary

~You're changin', You're changin', You're changin', all right! I hope you're satisfied. But if you ain't, Don't blame me! You can blame my Benefactor on the other side!

~Converts targeted flesh to collectable energies.

Much less effort than her flame marks, now she could toss one of these every so often while gathering resources and let the explosion create tiny blue shards of flying death to keep the area safe!

And by 'Toss One' she means 'I wonder if I can fill the digging hole with these?', which is close enough.

For now, it was set to hunt 'Unallied Flesh' with the energy for conversion marked 'Choice Points' to keep things moving.

As for her actual collection tool, that grenade mod made things FAR easier!

Company Store, Legendary

~You load 16 tons, what do you get? Another day older and deeper in debt. St. Peter don't you call me, 'cause I can't go... I owe my soul to the Warehouse store.

~Collects targets as collectable materials.

{{Volume and rate of material collection scales with users power.}}

{{May set collection method as whole, convert into units, or collect maximum raw amount.}}

Set material to 'all' and method to 'units' and the formerly impervious ground was vanishing into bars that flooded her inventory.

Not that she could recognize any of the materials being collected, especially considering how deep they were getting. Some chunks were glowing now and seemed to change shape when you weren't looking.

Apparently, for a planet like this to exist? Impossible things were required.

This deep down (And even more apparent when looking down the deep pit the grenades were evacuating into collectable materials), the 'floor' looked like sponge... microscopic hallways and intersections with stairways and tunnels and such.

The same design as above, just vastly reduced in size... the size of this death world would have required some valuable stuff to withstand its own weight anyway, but with EVERYTHING full of these tiny holes and tubes and such?

Well, to keep it shaped 'correctly', this stuff was made out of some just bizarre stuff.

'Metal' that seemed to glow without giving light. Something that felt like bone but could flex slightly. A glass like gel, and some sort of rock substitute?

Her new Benefactor loved this stuff, and that was all she cared for at the moment. The more her new boss focused on this stuff, the longer she had for her terrible luck to hopefully send her a good sniper rifle as loot!

Any time now!

...Waiting sucked.

Sarah tossed a Transmogrification Central grenade and a few dozen more Company Store explosive surprises into the (Now very deep) hole.

Maybe this would speed things up!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam glared at nothing.

Four months.

They had been stuck here for four. Damn. Months.

After Adam had shut down the upgrade menu and Sarah had earned her active skill power, he had assumed they would be on their way to the next stop.

How naive!

Since most of the skills were not available (What few were undamaged by her jerk kidnapper had been compressed for secured dimensional travel), the young woman decided to use up the incoming Choice Points on her new hobby: Upgrading equipment.

She had a dozen sniper rifles now, doing everything from firing explosive rounds to spewing fire, hurling acid, and so on. One acted like a submachine gun, another launched ROCKETS, and her favorite was a Jakobs that could only chamber a single shot at a time... but had the stopping power of a massive truck.

Oh, and the Vladof sniper rifles that had explosive rounds AND drum magazines.

She loved explosive rounds.

While it wasn't exactly a waste of time (Neither of them had expected that adding too many Choice Points to a single item would cause guns to break down into powder, for example), for ADAM it was frustrating.

Sarah on the other hand was having the time of her life!

Hotel quality food, served in unlimited amounts. Unlimited water, warm for bathing and cold for drinking. Near unlimited grenades for protection and sniper rounds for fun.

At this point she had moved the Warehouse Door to point outwards, and in between throwing a few hundred grenades she would activate Phase Pierce, choose a fun victim within a thousand miles, and terrorize the creatures around it by using one of her fun new guns.

Since her bullet could transfer directly to her designated new friend, there was no worry about calculating the effects of wind, gravity, materials within the intervening walls... just pick a target and 'Pop'!

It was apparently cathartic, as her desire to flee the planet dropped significantly now that she could surprise-a-monster from a safe location while sipping wine.

Adam on the other hand was getting decidedly bored.

Within the Warehouse, which was a useless phrase since the thing was in multiple dimensions, had recursive concepts, and all the non-damaged areas were in shutdown while the rest was reinforced by Adam's stopgap fixes for travel... he was rapidly running out of things to secure and prepare for leaving the area.

His attention left the massive issues (Mostly addressed) in the Warehouse, focusing on the modified liquid pipe systems.

...Could he manipulate the pipes to simulate rain?

Half way through designing a passable weather simulation system, something shifted.

Something IMPORTANT.

The girl paused mid throw. "What?"

Adam frantically forced everything to secure itself for an emergency Jump. {{No time!}}

Closing the Warehouse exit, he had the floor around the confused and alarmed woman reform into something like a padded cell... and rapidly surrounded it with layers and layers of metal, impact distribution foam and slurry, and when THAT ran out filled the rest with rock.

{{Sorry, sorry, but we got to go! Like... Shit, hold on to something!}}

In a layer of reality that was connected to this Jump but unreachable by mortal means, an odd egg like structure vanished.

Less than an hour later, it was MUCH more obvious that reality was corroding and crumbling away as this destabilized Jump began to rapidly fracture!

Some small part of the fleeing Adam was regretful that any sensors left behind wouldn't survive to record what was probably an amazing explosion... but the rest of him was freaking out and gibbering as unreality started to slip through the Jump pathways and follow along.

...It would be fine. Probably.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

On one hand, Sarah appreciated being secured.

Something soft and padded ensured that the intense vibrations and shaking barely affected her, which was good. Some of those movements would have caused bruises at best, so not being rattled in a metal room or whatever was good.

And the material was interesting in itself. Super soft and squishy, felt like some sort of pillow. Was warm enough, but still cool to prevent sweating. Trying to move would slowly be resisted, keeping her stable but allowing her to fidget.

And the area around her nose and mouth had pure, cool clean air... no obstruction.

On the other hand, she was locked up.

Her emotions had ramped from surprise, to fear, to concern, to boredom, to anger, back to boredom, and uh... well, it was stuck there.

It had been hours by now.

She wasn't hungry, she wasn't tired, she didn't need to use the restroom.

But. SO BORED!

At this point, she had tried to not bother Adam as he tried to handle whatever had happened... but she had reorganized her ECHO system inventory, studied all the options, set up some automated procedures, undid them, made more, and so on.

Bored. And talking was annoying with all this padding.

...'Adam?'

{{No, that's fine, it wasn't needed. Good thing I moved all the important stuff to the middle of this place, and those parts were pretty much scrap anyway...}}

'Adam.'

{{Shit, it's still following us. Should I try changing to a closer Jump? Would that Jump be able to handle this amount of conceptual decay being injected into it? Maybe.}}

That... sounded disturbing.

{{If she tried inserting as an existing character, it could create a pathway for this stuff to expose that area too... and most Earth's can't handle a sudden black hole the size of Jupiter showing up in New York.}}

Yeah, that sounded bad.

{{Then again, if we show up at the relevant coordinates as the last planet it would be in the middle of nowhere, probably... But she would be stuck there too if I did this wrong. A thousand year commute to somewhere useful? That would be bad.}}

'What happened?'

{{...I could redirect this stuff to somewhere evil or annoying. See if the Borg like being unmade or how the Grimm enjoy some existential issues... Wait, no, the Grimm tend to be around people, people like existing.}}

...Yeah, we do.

{{God that kidnapper was an asshole. No wonder it wasn't worried about all the evidence it left behind or Sarah being contacted by another Jumper, it had destroyed most of her communication units and destabilized the whole damn Jump.}}

Sarah's eyes widened. 'WHAT!?'

...

'Adam?'

She idly listened as mental sounds of things being pushed around and quiet crashing filled in the silence.

{{Ah. The hibernation module was 'secured' for emergency Jump evacuation. And will have to be done manually for a bit. So... Good! It isn't broken!}}

'Adam?'

{{Cause if it was broken you would have to be awake for the entire transition, and most people break down after a few thousand years traveling mostly alone.}}

'Adam.'

'What happened.'

Sarah considered that. 'Alright. Why did the Jump collapse?'

She felt a sigh from her Benefactor. {{You know how that Jump had three Jump docs enforced on reality? The 'Borderlands', 'Alien', and 'Alien vs Predator' ones?}}

No. Sarah had probably been told, but had been focused on other things. 'Yeah?'

He was doing... something. {{Most hybrid Jumps are either natural, formed by combining several nearby Jumps, or created by enforcing a document onto an existing Jump. I assumed this last Jump was an example of the first or second options.}}

Adam grumbled. {{I was wrong. That Jump had three thousand, four hundred, and fifty four Jump Documents being crammed into one. Single. Jump.}}

...What?

He agreed. {{There were so many conflicts and issues that only the last three were even visible. So many drawbacks that most of them collapsed just trying to implement the changes. Reality was heavily damaged.}}

Well. Yeah, it would be. Good grief.

{{That was why you were able to earn Warehouse Points and Choice Points so easily, even after your Kidnapper ripped out most of the collections systems and harvesting engines while stealing your stuff.}}

Sarah paused. 'What do you mean?'

Adam sighed. {{You do know that most Jumps don't require or even encourage killing, right? Yet somehow you were able to earn thousands of cp while exploding one mentally challenged Alien monster a bunch of times.}}

...Yeah, that did seem odd, now that she thought about it.

Her mental companion continued. {{After investing a certain amount of cp into a Jumper, the Warehouse can gain energies based on one real criteria: How much you alter the reality being visited. Changing Fate and Destiny creates potential energy, some of which gets returned to the Jump systems and the Benefactor running the thing.}}

Huh. 'So what, I have to be a hero or something and save the day to earn points?'

A mental shrug. {{Meh, the actual changes don't matter. Be a god, a demon, save a million, kill them all... they all change reality, they all earn points. I assume that is why most Jump Benefactors don't care what you do, just that you do a lot of SOMETHING while traveling from world to world.}}

Fury! 'Then why the hell had HER kidnapper treated her like shit!?'

A growl. {{Because it was abusing the system, and needed you to survive a certain number of Jumps to unlock the really unreasonable stuff it pulled at the end there. If you did too well, other Benefactors might have checked in... so it was sabotaging you while trying to work its way over to one specific region of reality, where a bunch of Jumps were near destruction and being ignored.}}

Adam grumbled as she felt more things shift in her Warehouse. {{If you had a full repaired Warehouse, you would have been earning millions of Choice Points per second just standing around. The trickle you gained was literally a tiny fraction of the 'changes' that 'you' were causing by existing.}}

The room shook slightly. {{Even so, from what I can tell while fixing stuff and storing things, there was a 13% chance that all the stuffed Jump Documents and Drawbacks into one instance would instantly collapse everything before the Kidnapper could run with its loot. That's why it wasn't here when I showed up, and why I was able to take over so easily when we bumped into each other.}}

That dick! 'Asshole!'

She felt something soft and heavy press her mind. {{Yeah, I'm going to eat it if we meet up. Now go to sleep... while the Warehouse is able to 'travel' back to the moment you left from previous jumps, it needs to travel a damn long time in this place without time to do so. Even longer when heading to a new one.}}

Her mind slowly fell into stasis as a soft voice hummed a tune.

{{I'll watch over things... good night Sarah, I'll be there when you wake.}}

It was nice.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

They were lucky.

VERY lucky.

Basically, way off in the distance, the place where Earth had been had been crushed into non-existence due to all the Jump documents. Most of them were Earth focused, after all... and that scar was made worse by the Kidnapper stealing all the energy and points that collapse created.

In a way, Sarah was LUCKY to be on that newly created Death World, specifically one that shows up on NO other Jump documentation. Even Pandora likely had a few extra surprises that she dodged by being 'off the map', as it were.

That said, the corrosion of the Jump had been exponentially increasing... by the time the Warehouse noticed the danger and Adam dodged out of there, the damage so far away that he could barely detect it had nearly caught up and smashed into them!

Sure, Adam would have been fine. He had been through much worse.

But the Warehouse, and therefore baby Sarah, would have been destroyed.

Very. Very lucky.

Now Adam had an issue where a spike of unreality was following the Jump path to the next target, and had some choices to make.

Guiding this death sentence was... tricky. Especially since he wanted Sarah to have contact with other beings after arrival, not waking up on a plant devoured by unreality.

He felt through the nearest exit points he could force the Warehouse to make.

The problem is that MOST of the time, a planet or space station had both good AND bad people. And killing everything in the area didn't let you pick and choose who explodes and who escapes.

The WORST groups tend to also have hostages. Slaves, either knowingly or not, or host species being puppeted by evil that didn't deserve the same fate as their overlords.

Ideally, Adam needed a group that was cartoonishly evil. Not just evil from cartoons, many times those guys are just annoying rather than 'eating children' murderish... but over the top, two dimensional, non-redeemable evil.

Even then, sometimes a Jump can vary from Adam's knowledge. Borg cells that rebel and fight for good, Team Rocket secretly resisting an oppressive Gym Leader Crime Ring, a Zerg swarm controlled by a guiding intelligence or whatever.

...Also, Adam's knowledge was a bit unreliable.

From what he can tell, he only learns things about a new Realm when arriving. Thus, he now knew a little about all these Jumps because they were part of this 'Jump Realm' he had fallen into... a sort of miniature version of what he had learned to do by brute force.

Hopefully that wouldn't be an issue, but he had to work with what was available, not what he wished for.

So, the best option was to pick a Jump that let Sarah (Or in this instance, Adam) pick a drop in option that would be NEAR something disposable, but not ON something disposable.

Ideally, stuff her in a spaceship over an uninhabited planet or solar system.

Because this death void was coming, period. The best Adam could do was mitigate the upcoming damage, hopefully in a way that Sarah would be mentally able to accept.

'Oops we destroyed Planet KOI-5889.01, no sapients hurt' would cause MUCH less complaining than 'we popped the moon'.

Which was bull, because everyone loved movies and songs and stuff about the moon but it barely DID anything! But NO, Narwhal wouldn't let him mess with theirs and the Cultivation Realm didn't really have moons or planets as an infinite plane with conceptual heavenly bodies, and the death planet they just escaped from didn't have anything orbiting it (And was now popped, so it was a pointless lament)... sigh.

Right, so somewhere destructible it is.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah woke up.

Instantly.

She was sitting in a very comfortable chair, there was a glass of hot chocolate to her right on a table, and Adam's grim skull was covering the wall in front of her. Huh. "Hello?"

Adam sort of nodded without moving. {{Good morning.}}

Ouch... he looked super serious. "So... we escaped?"

A hum. {{Mostly. Though a trace of nothingness is following our path, and we need to handle it... so I have a choice for you, before we exit this journey to the next Jump.}}

...Just great. "What are my options?"

A sigh. {{Three, two of which I HIGHLY suggest not picking.}}

Then was it even a choice?

She sipped her drink. "Go on."

Adam brought up a document screen in her ECHO system Heads Up Display. {{First option is this Star Wars jump, having you be a Sith, and letting the chasing anti-reality consume planet Exegol entirely.}}

...Damn, how long ago had she seen ANY movie, much less a version of the Star Wars Trilogy? "And... why not choose that? Sith are bad, right?" She vaguely remembered something about raw anger and red flashlights or something.

Adam grumbled. {{Depending on WHEN you choose to enter that Jump, the planet is either undefended (except a few evil ghosts), FULL of Sith apprentices, or covered by a starship fleet. Worse than having a massive army of people angry at you for blowing up their evil Mecca? Star Wars features the 'Force', a unifying and BALANCING energy that would instantly broadcast your arrival and actions to an entire multiverse.}}

He sighed. {{The Force might declare you an invader to BOTH sides, sending an evil political regime and the 'holy protectors of the balance' after you at one time. Or even act directly, though that is unlikely.}}

...Yeah. No. "The next option?"

A hum. {{Ironic to me at least, the nearest alternative is a Star Trek universe. I... I try to avoid those, mostly because of one species. The 'Q'.}}

She blinked. "The what?"

Adam had her ECHO show details. {{A race of unknown number, greater than three, with each member being immortal, near all powerful, and only restricted by their own internal guidelines... when they choose to be so. They can alter reality, control time, manipulate souls, and Star Trek mostly continues to exist because most of the Q are not interested with them or other third dimensional beings in general. A baby deity popping up might get FAR too much attention, especially if you explode a planet in the process.}}

Well shit. "And the third, hopefully NOT horrible option?"

A hum. {{Strangely enough, it is set on Earth. But because of how it is connected to a near infinite combination and variety of itself, I can spread the changes and damage over that whole network, rather than having the planet implode. It will alter things in many ways, but everything and everyone should continue to exist. Constants and Variables, and all that.}}

Adam grinned. {{Tell me, have you ever played a game called 'Bioshock'?}}

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah sighed, as she read over the documentation about this 'Bioshock' Jump.

A dream that collapsed when faced with reality, a world (Part of a never ending series of such) where one person attempted to remake society with science, art, and madness as a guide. A near magical sea creature that generated a mysterious substance called 'Eve', which granted powers.

She would be starting in a place called 'Fort Frolic', in the underwater haven of Rapture... a metropolis that was built under the Atlantic Ocean and filled with dreams and disaster. Fort Frolic was the main entertainment district, with casinos, theaters, and expensive shops... hopefully a few places that would purchase the odd items she had gathered as well, so she could buy a few things later on.

Anyway, thanks to Adam dumping a wave of nothingness into reality... she actually had some budge Choice Points to spend! Only 850cp instead of 1000cp, but considering she had feared starting with zero, it was a huge improvement!

Let's see... Free option has no memories, low pay. All the other options cost 100cp, but would make it easy to blend in... and had other benefits.

{Soldier: -100cp} would grant combat training, good pay, and a promise to be there when things go wrong. 'Go wrong' in this case only being some gunfire and minor human superpowers, not acid filled murder aliens. Her shield would not only cover this, but respond with fire surprises!

{Specialist: -100cp} should however grant her something she really wanted: A degree! She could just instantly gain an early Earth's specialty as a general scientist, doctor, inventor, artist, or musician... and not only would she gain a lifetime of memories and talent, but it would be high tier top notch talent! Only the greatest were invited to Rapture after all!

Compared to that, {Businessman: -100cp} seemed pretty shabby. It was basically a desk job.

Maybe it had some awesome perk discounts that made up for not being an instant inventor?

Hmm. Might be worth the {Adam Pack 1: -150cp, Soldier 0cp} skill, since it gives two tonics and plasmids for free (The things that gave humans superpowers here). And since she was probably going to go {Specialist: -100cp}, she would get {Specialist Training: -100cp, Specialist 0cp} for free anyway!

What were the perks for Businessman? It had to be good, since the base option seemed so bad... Learn how to handle money and run a business for free, be charismatic for 250cp, and be really rich for 300cp?

...No! That was TERRIBLE!

Ignoring that tree, she took her 850cp budget, locked in the 100cp Specialist choice, and looked to see what discounts she got for the rest of her 750cp options.

Hmm. {Intuition: -500cp, Specialist -250cp} literally made it easier to get ideas. If she had far more USEFUL Jumps under her belt? Maybe. But it seemed too vague for such an investment.

On the other hand?

{Savant Genus: -600cp, Specialist -300cp} [You are a mastermind, one of the most brilliant women in all of Rapture in your field of choice {See Specialist identity}]

...Tempting.

All the Soldier perks were about getting free plasmids and tonics, and she could buy those. The Laborer perks were about handling pain, withstanding hard work, and quick thinking... she had that.

So... potentially a 300cp purchase, bringing her down to 450cp if nothing else was amazing.

Moving to the page listing some awesome plasmids, Adam interrupted. {{By the way, avoid taking any drawbacks or items while we are here.}}

She blinked. "Why?"

He opened the pages. {{Drawbacks might pull the empty energies I deposited back to you, which would be bad. Should be safe next Jump. And all the Items here suck for some reason... one gives you $300 for like 50cp, non-renewable, only for one stupid jump. A few can be set by me to auto-refill, but even then they are expensive and we can get most of it far easier by finding an asshole or two in Rapture and robbing them.}}

Sarah looked through the list. A French Coat for 100cp? It didn't heal itself or anything, just looked French. "Are you sure we can find people like that?"

Adam paused. {{Assholes? In Rapture?}}

He snorted. {{Yeah, we'll be fine. Finish your Jump build and we can get started.}}

Shrugging, she went back to the superpower perks. And screw it, she was taking the Specialist background and {Specialist Training: -100cp, Specialist 0cp}, focusing on being an Inventor. She had a collection of strange near magical high tech sniper rifles, and learning how to maintain and theoretically IMPROVE them was ALL her jam!

That said? Getting {Savant Genus: -600cp, Specialist -300cp} was likely to be a necessity at this point. The guns from Borderlands were WAY beyond Earth Tech, especially this older stuff that Rapture seemed built on... But first?

Powers!

And... they were surprisingly cheap.

Adam hummed. {{Make sure to pay double so you get free upgrades, I think I can cheat that to help you modify things in future Jumps. Maybe even combine compatible options with future perks.}}

Her eyes widened!

Yeah, screw being a Savant back when lasers didn't really exist, more superpowers please!

A speed enhancer? No. Decoy? Seemed to create a mental effect and visual illusion... maybe. Didn't fit her fighting style, or at least not the one she wanted to aim for... if someone got close enough to see a decoy, she was not using enough sniper rounds.

Electro Bolt? Meh, she was more a fire girl.

Geyser Trap... limited deployment options, needs to be in a place with good levels of humidity, can backfire on unexpected bystanders... yeah, no.

Gravity Well! Maybe!

Houdini for 75cp? So 150cp to get an escape option? Seemed to be only visual, but as a sniper visual was normally the only option her opponents would have. Good luck sniffing her presence from a mile away. This was a strong maybe.

Hypnotize was a no. Adam pointed out that it would fail on more conceptually powerful people, get her labeled as something called a 'Master' and hunted on some worlds, AND it automatically compelled SUICIDE after the victim was done being controlled. A waste of a good mind control minion, and god help her if she accidentally hit a child or something with it.

Incinerate! Burninating the countryside! Flaming all of the peasants! But... well. She LIKED fire, but she liked sniper rifles more. A vague maybe. If no other powers stood out.

Insect Swarm? No. Nothing was going to crawl inside her skin. No.

Scout? Her special ability was better, could see further, and needed no consumable Eve to use. No.

Telekinesis? Yes. Even doubled, it only cost 100cp to suddenly ALWAYS have what she needed in reach! To create distractions! And Adam says it was strong enough to move a person with no issue, so she could even control the battlefield!

Life itself was not made to handle a woman with telekinesis. Doors could be opened from outside without damage, wires and levers could be held shut or forced open, hell she might even get flight out of this! Heck yeah!

And Teleportation!? Screw 'Aero Dash', why be 'faster' when you can just TELEPORT! It was a bit limited to line of sight, but HER line of sight was measured in kilometers!

Yeah, compared to that the 'Winter Blast' option wasn't worth considering.

So {Telekinesis: -50cp, Updates -100cp} and {Teleportation: -75cp, Updates 150cp}, that would bring her down to 500cp, with a potential 300cp going to making her a Savant.

Since she was going to skip items, she had a bit to spend... but since she also had to skip drawbacks, it would be best to check Tonics first.

Armored Shell: Impact resistance. Meh.

Bloodlust would regenerate Eve when she tore into people. Didn't work with snipers, so no... but getting access to Eve outside this Jump might be an issue. Best look into that.

Booze Hound: Convert alcohol into minor Eve recovery. She didn't drink enough to take advantage of that, and years of being at deaths door made her feel uncomfortable at the idea of getting drunk in battle.

Cure All was a YES. It was only 25cp, 50cp doubled, and had her regenerate Eve when her body was being healed. She checked, and Adam was sure it would work with medkits and her natural regeneration as well as this Jump's Health Stations.

Electrical Storm would shock people when they hit her... so no. She was a sniper, being hit was for other people.

Elemental Sponge was a yes. If she took esoteric hits, it would partially convert to Eve, worth the doubled cost of 50cp! Seriously, why was this only 25cp!?

The next three seemed VERY complimentary.

Eve Link, again 25cp or doubled for 50cp... and it stacked with Cure All to gain Eve when healing.

Eve Saver, another double 50cp option... made ability use SUPER efficient, so less Eve was needed.

And Extra Nutrition, 25cp (50cp doubled), food and drink boosts natural health and Eve recovery.

Hell yeah! Who needs to buy lots of Eve for future Jumps?! Not this girl!

And why not, let's pick up Fountain of Youth for the double cost of 50cp and let ALL water be used to heal ourselves, which would trigger our Eve to regenerate. Sheesh.

Honestly, compared to that stuff? Vending Expert was pointless (Hack old Earth machines for cheep prices!) and Walking Inferno sounded neat, but she was basically fire proof as it was.

So, {Cure All: -25cp, Updates -50cp}, {Elemental Sponge: -25cp, Updates -50cp}, {Eve Link: -25cp, Updates -50cp}, {Eve Saver: -25cp, Updates -50cp}, {Extra Nutrition: -25cp, Updates -50cp}, and {Fountain Of Youth: -25cp, Updates -50cp}.

So her 500cp budget would be hit by 300cp for this mess... so much for old earth Savant, we hardly knew ye. Still, that left her 200cp to spend on stuff... Let's go with {Gravity Well: -75cp, Updates -150cp}.

So three powers: Telekinesis, Teleportation, and Gravity Well. Followed by six Tonics: Cure All, Elemental Sponge, Eve Link, Eve Saver, Extra Nutrition, and Fountain of Youth.

And after all that? She still had 50cp.

...Shit. "Hey, can I save this stuff for next Jump?"

Adam grunted. {{Not really. The Choice Points from each Jump are basically incompatible with each other. Some Benefactors can convert points from one Jump to the next, but those modules are damaged right now. Along with a bunch of other stuff.}}

His focus drifted away. {{Best use it all up, even on something as stupid as those random items.}}

She shrugged, having the ECHO display go over the item list again. She had 50cp to burn, baby!

First, free stuff!

Formal Attire: Three sets of gender specific, high quality clothing! Sweet! Adam's attempt at clothing was adorable and all, but she could use some comfortable underwear.

Anything else? Not really, not for free. Not unless she changed to being a musician Specialist, which would get her a a free instrument and some sheet music.

Moving on!

Wallet with $300, a Welding Torch, a Wrench (+25 left over cp!), a... Baton? Oh, not a musical one, one for beating civilians.

And yes, it specifically mentions 'Subduing Civilians'. Great.

Sheesh.

Sarah took a custom made wallet with $300, because non-renewable or not it was still cash. Right, points spent and she was good to go!

Adam was busy doing... something.

Sarah coughed lightly, and the skull refocused. {{Ah, ready? Right, when you remember who you are in Rapture, make sure you hide yourself BEFORE making any decisions. The place may not be the... safest of locations.}}

As her vision blurred she heard a distant thought. {{Also! I'm not sure when you are going to show up there! It should probably be fine. Good Luck!}}

That... could be an issue.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Another 'pop' made Adam flinch hard. Metaphorically.

As he integrated deeper into the 'Egg', his point of view became less 'I am part of the wall and in your computer' and more 'Ghost Boss!' Which was useful. His mental avatar of himself could now shrug, wink, and so on and so forth. Physically, not much was going on... and mentally he was everywhere that Sarah was.

So everything in the Warehouse was right here, in front of him. As for Sarah, he was waiting to finish inserting her into the wonderful world of 'Rapture', home to some... pretty messed up stuff. Eventually.

Right NOW it was home to a bunch of optimistic assholes, mostly. And rich people, because while Andrew Ryan wanted the artists and the scientists and all that to escape the 'leeches' of society, it is really hard to be at the edge of 'art' when you are homeless and poor.

So most of these people come from wealthy backgrounds unless they were the minions or 'help'.

Which was good! Lots of people who didn't know how to understand 'worth' would make it easy for Sarah to get all kinds of stuff for a profit really. Especially with Adam in her corner.

But... the issues.

Adam looked over the Warehouse... and how much damage remained. Thankfully, he had managed to scan almost everything before frantically salvaging all he could and fleeing reality... because this was bad.

First of all, the obvious: Everything broken and destroyed was still broken and destroyed. Duh.

Second, the expected: Everything fragile and forcibly secured was heavily damaged and would likely need to be dismantled.

Third... sigh. The worst, most unexpected issue: Many 'properly secured' and 'stored' modules were not able to unpack themselves correctly. Because the unpacking module was considered 'non-essential', and thus was in the second, frantically packed away category.

It was a setback. Not an unsolvable issue, thanks to Adam having entangled 'Research', 'Purification', and 'Growth' into the systems on a fundamental level.

He had all the schematics of all the modules... or at least the broken state they had been found in.

He had a LOT of materials and resources to work with! And the ability to kludge a method to increase both while trying to fix stuff! Not to mention a history of learning how to get stuff done despite setbacks.

There would have to be compromises however.

Sigh.

The Warehouse Point system, all currently inactive modules, AND all related resources... they all would need to be scrapped.

Adam absently adjusted Sarah's ECHO interface, removing the upgrade trees and Warehouse shop list. For now, he replaced them both with a transaction tab instead.

It would show raw energy and material stock, a list of items Sarah might need based on prediction software and contextual clues, and so forth. She could pick from the menu or ask for something, and either trade for it through the Warehouse systems or set the item as a 'Quest' listing anything she needed to gather locally to complete the product.

For now and... Eugh, probably for a while, she could only make purchases when entering a Jump. Too unstable otherwise. Period. Damn it.

At least Sarah's Avatar was stable.

Her core, her self within the Warehouse, was the most central and secured component of the whole system... especially after Adam had rebuilt so much of it. Layers after layer of not just the needed modules, but resource caches, repair subroutines, and (badly needed in his opinion), armor.

The new system routine that Adam was honestly still working on would no longer randomly build stuff on this god egg, but instead construct reinforced layers and segments around her core with each new Jump. Each layer and segment would include the ability to repair itself over time, and tiny units spread throughout the entire Warehouse would store some god damned backups!

Schematic backups, system backups, log backups, planned improvements, planned changes!

And if his girl got hurt again in the future? These segments and layers would be sacrificed FIRST, protecting her core and (hopefully) be rebuilt eventually thanks to having some damned backups!

Yes, it would make all future Choice Point purchases more expensive. Which sucked.

But at least NOW she wouldn't be using the cheapest option for growth while building a massive tower just waiting to fall down from some more powerful jerk wandering around!

He checked... good, she was still distracted by looking around for new job. Or just sight seeing.

Right, let's try and update some of these modules then.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah twitched as her inventory screen started glitching rainbow colors. "Adam?"

She closed the display and checked for any passerby that seemed TOO interested. Which was more than she was used to, as 'Bad Ass' had made her very healthy... and that translated into 'Near Drop-dead Gorgeous'.

Sarah liked her improved looks of course, it just was a much more obvious issue now that she wasn't on an abandoned planet full of murder beasts.

Keeping a blush off from the appreciative looks (Men AND women) was harder than expected.

{{Look, I need to change a few things, just call if you need something. Or shoot someone. Or whatever. I got this!}}

...It was probably fine.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

WHY!? On the outside, the new layer of Sarah's Jump power was beautiful and perfect!

Inside? Inside was horrible!

These portions and that code acted like libraries, these units acted like tiny tools or boosts, those over here were... a fifth of a single power!?

Adam held back a growl.

Right, even if the Jump Powers were awesome... they had been harvested from the local reality as part of the process. Nature created some amazing treasure, but most of the time this organically created stuff was a gooey mess... 'I built this to do that but those broke so these parts were added' and so forth. Over and over again.

Yeah, never again.

Adam destroyed the 'Jump Acquisition' module entirely.

First, send the power analyzation section that was used to 'build' the Jump Document over to 'Research'. Might as well send the parts for reality copying over too. Let 'Research' play with all that automated stuff while Adam tried to fix this... mess.

First, organization.

Memory module, for actual memories gained per jump. Storing them seperatly like this would ensure her core identity wouldn't be overwhelmed or something stupid like that.

And it would ONLY be for inherited memories. No reason NOT to take advantage from having a fresh start!

Another Memory module cluster, one for each purchased power. Many came with memories and reflexes so the Jumper or her companions could use the new skills properly, and there was no reason to just slop all this stuff on the brain pile like a lazy kid.

Stupid previous system. Or maybe these Warehouses are actual eggs? Naturally born from gods, rather than built?

Meh, it could be done better.

Skill clusters, one for each power, with sympathetic links to their related memory module... Hmm. Yes, just the ability itself! No power at all!

After all, Sarah would probably get magic and psychic skills and who knows what eventually. Best to move the Power units closer to the Core, and then store Conversion units with the Skill so they can translate it into whatever energy was needed to work optimally!

A bit more finagling restructured the 'Bioshock' Jump layer around the Core with only a few explosions. Below its original position was a layer dedicated to resource management... mostly energy Acquisition modules, Purification modules, and room for future generic Generation modules.

True, Adam had to create the Purification modules with 'Research' from scratch. The original methods didn't care if the user was sucking up evil souls or solar power or whatever, just trusted each Skill to know how to safely handle shit.

Yeah, no.

And just for extra safety? Below the resource management (Power?) layer was a nice new enhanced memory and thought layer. Places for future data to be merged from all jumps, and a bunch of Thought units that would create a bunch of automatic 'metadata'. Indexes built for quick searching, comparison between similar information clusters for later review, easy tagging of conflicting data, and so on and so forth.

Stuff that would be backed up and easily restored, junk that was mostly automated 'Neat!' data, and most importantly? A layer that could be destroyed by a disaster, protect Sarah's core, and easily be fixed later. One between her and all that power generation and storage.

Best be safe.

While writing the new 'installation routine' into the 'Jump Acquisition' module, Adam examined the new layout.

The Specialist background had memories split into data and reflexes, properly stored in Memory units. Sarah's core already had its own units, ones he wouldn't dare touch, but now she could access this data without ever being confused about WHERE the memory is coming from!

She could combine the useful stuff internally like normal, without losing or corrupting the purchased history and background... it was like always having a cheat sheet to review, rather than segmenting away a part of her brain or whatever. And she could CHOOSE which reflexes to activate... turn them on or off, with her preferred settings set to easily apply through each new Avatar she gained in the future.

Because sometimes having a warrior's reflexes was a disadvantage. Or in this case, being an inventor might have a nasty habit or two she may wish to ignore. The important part was to make sure it was her CHOICE, not just hard coded into her brain like this was trying to do.

There were also a few units here that would act like tools to her mind behind the scenes. Obvious stuff like calculators and such, but also odd things like this one that helped make random thoughts jump to related concepts... neat!

Right, best move those modules over to the Skill clusters. And split the Skills into Active and Passive, as powers shouldn't be mixed in the middle of 'inspired thought' units. Much better!

Might as well toss all these new designs and schematics over to 'Research' as well. Sarah's 'Free Upgrade' choices meant that he might be able to radically improve her powers after some experimentation... though he could just rebuild them? Maybe.

Sigh... What about the other passives? Those Tonics would fit there, most likely.

The Eve stuff could be better handled. She, right now, had a mess:

Cure All (Regenerate Eve when being healed), Elemental Sponge (Converts some damage energies to Eve), Eve Link (More Eve when healing), Eve Saver (Efficent Eve use), Extra Nutrition (Boosts HP and Eve recovery when eating/drinking), and Fountain of Youth (Water heals).

It only took a bit of examination to crush them all into two new Tonics:

Eve Generation and Eve Conversion.

Now Sarah with her new Skills would use food, drink, and excess energy from healing to construct new Eve supplies using Eve Generation... and then send that power to her resource management layer. Meanwhile, if hurt or trying to use a Bioshock Skill? Power would be sent to Eve Conversion, and be transformed into healing nanites or the needed Eve for ability use!

Much less messy.

Right, move onto the active stuff! Telekinesis, Teleportation, and Gravity Well... with the power needed pulled from Eve Conversion via the resource layer, it was much more stable and compact than before. Not much could be improved directly, not with what little Adam knew about these things so far.

But... there was an alternate possibility. From his past. From a beautiful planet woman shard.

Queen Administrator knew quite a bit about power management.

A bit of work and each Skill now had an experimental Mind unit.

These were not full brains, not even separate parts from Sarah... more like a series of pointers. They would watch the woman use her skills... and point their parts to the segments of her mind that operated that one particular ability.

Then? Optimization.

It would act as if Sarah had dropped everything she was doing, and only focused on careful use of that one skill while knowing inherently what she WANTED to do. But the fiddly bits? The exact pattern of energy manipulation, the specific pulses needed for efficiency, the perfect area to target for the best results? These Mind units would handle that.

So sure, Sarah could actually tell you all the 'thoughts' she had while using her Skills... but behind the scenes? It would drastically improve her Skill use while severly reducing her mental work load.

Though compared to the insanity of Queen Administrator creating a copy of her partner's brain for EVERY DAMN INSECT FOR BLOCKS, having a single brain assistant per skill seemed pretty basic.

Meh. Hopefully Sarah would appreciate it anyway.

And that was it. Well, along with a bunch of material stuff that was tossed into the girl's inventory.

Meanwhile, most of the perks and skills from before this jump were... well. Integrated. Or gone.

Adam had enough of her 'Bad Ass' perk to rebuild that thing, so she would stay biologically in peak shape. And (thank goodness) her special skill of seeing through walls for sniping was fixed in time!

But the corruption of the last Jump had been... vile.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah tugged her suit sleeves, feeling... very snazzy.

The 'gender specific high quality clothing' thankfully had more than the feared dress option... it was clearly matching her ideal outfit, something easy to move in without standing out too much, rather than some ideal 'Beautiful woman' cliché.

That said, the suit hugged her curves VERY nicely, and was a stunning and snazzy gray color that she just loved! Not sure why her hair and eyes were silver now though... it didn't seem a common local color either.

Probably her new Benefactor's fault, but she internally admitted that it was a NICE look.

Her thoughts jerked as she felt something... slip into place.

Memories!

A lifetime! Years of classes, of study, of her labs, of her work... of people getting in her way, holding her back! She was a god of invention, and those mortals who couldn't understand her glory should BOW before... before...

And Sarah blinked.

Now it was... distant. Not gone, but more... a favorite movie, one she had obsessively watched a million times, that she could quote without error from any part. But with feelings and taste and smell and thoughts.

She could immerse herself and become, once again, Sarah Killgrave. The inventor of some pretty amazing materials and gadgets, but unable to gain respect because of her gender and the time period.

She had come to Rapture for freedom, and now her life continued through Sarah the Jumper.

The woman couldn't help showing a small smirk. While the new memories were easy to view or dismiss, the feeling at the end... the pure joy of becoming more free than ever expected?

It was a rush.

{{Right, Avatar is stable, new data is not pulling any errors... Everything good on your end Sarah?}}

Memories of being bitter and alone flashed through her mind. From both her pasts.

She glanced in the nearby glass at her now far more familiar face. "Yes. Yes I think I'm very good."

{{Great! If anything explodes or turns purple or something, let me know. Oh, and I managed to hook your new Teleportation Skill into the Warehouse, so we don't have to bother with that door mess anymore.}}

Sarah blinked... and held out a hand. Instincts flashed as one of Adam's fresh apples plopped into her open palm.

It was easy. Almost thoughtless.

She could just...

Step.

...and she was within the Warehouse. "That is... amazing!"

The massive skull was now made from some sort of metal on the wall. {{Yes, and luckily it hooks into the basic 'Warehouse Portal' defense protocols. People and electronics won't notice, care, or record you entering or leaving here for a few minutes. A really good escape method!}}

Sarah just walked between places, each step easier and less stressful than the last. Her visual interface showed her new 'Eve' energy bar... and how every step through nothingness cost less and less power even as her reserves refilled rapidly. "No really!"

Step.

She grinned from her new seat. "This is BEYOND amazing! And no one will see me if I teleport around?"

Adam shrugged. Well not really, but he thought about doing so. {{Only when entering and leaving your Warehouse. All other teleporting will be noticed.}}

Aww. "So I won't be invisible or something?"

He did not nod. {{When coming and going from here? Everyone and everything can see you. They just... won't care. Memory around the event will naturally fade. Electronic records will somehow glitch, or duplicate previous frames, or whatever. But only then.}}

Wait. "...Can I still use my key to make a door portal leading here?"

Adam grinned. {{Got rid of the key! Now to return here you can make a portal within a certain distance of yourself or via a designated opening. Door, hole, window, whatever. It costs some energy to keep them open though for too long, so if you want something permanent connecting two places or something you need an actual Portal Construction Skill or something.}}

She grinned. "So, could I teleport here and then teleport somewhere else? Use this place like a Hub for travel?"

Her mind expanded somehow. {{There. Use this to mark places and you can teleport there later or open portals there. Still can't connect two unrelated points without a closer Skill though.}}

Huh. It wasn't coordinates or text, more like a full memory snapshot of a place... by default it had a separate list showing her most recent outside teleportation jumps too! This would be SO much better than the frantic days of her past.

A thought tickled her mind. "So when I enter or leave here, I am basically in stealth mode?"

Adam paused. {{...Yes?}}

She thought about the obscene wealth her short journey outside had already exposed her to, and some of the less friendly new faces. "And you said Rapture had more than a few jerks in it?"

The skull sighed. {{OH yeah.}}

She nodded. "I'm going to steal like... ALL the things. All of it."

He hummed. {{A Robin Hood thing? Give to the poor and all that?}}

Sarah sighed. "No. I tried that before, it can get people killed. Or blamed for my actions. Some times worse. This place gets pretty corrupt, right?"

Adam continued doing stuff while her screens flashed and changed. {{At the worst of it, a mobster ends up drugging the homeless and tries to turn them into an army. I think someone also poisons the air and all kinds of stuff... yeah, corrupt covers it.}}

Well, THAT wouldn't do. And she DID need something to do while waiting for the next Jump...

Fuck it, she was going to build a homeless shelter. "Hey Adam? How good are you at hacking stuff?"

Her memories quickly reviewed the process for setting up a private business, purchasing real estate here in Rapture, the many forms and documents she had read before coming down here.

He grumbled. {{I can do it, but some machines here are programmed with like... plumbing. It is beyond confusing and stupid.}}

Her mind jerked. "Plumbing!?"

A mental image of a... a turret? On an office chair!? That can use tubes to somehow determine friend, foe, and... someone climbing the walls!? "What is WRONG with Rapture!?"

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah felt suspicious. Like... beyond suspicious. "These terms are... very generous."

The two 'businessmen' were all smiles and sparkling honesty. The oily feeling one on the right was the loud partner, the other man gazed with greedy eyes silently. Hadn't said anything the whole visit.

Unlike this shady asshole. "Of course! With such a prominent new arrival with such large plans?"

Large funds were more like it. Clearing out some junk from her inventory and using it to craft some small and expensive stuff in the local stores? Even sold at half cost she quickly gained a great starting point financially.

But not this great. "If I am reading this correctly, you have quite a few deeds being offered here... for far less than I expected."

Slime ball oozed a grin. "Ah, but this is Rapture! Opportunity knocks for those willing to take a small bit of risk."

She felt Adam mark her vision, highlighting unrelated lines in the heavily confusing contract. "And these clauses?"

The man hummed. "Well, we want to ensure our past investments are recouped. A few requirements here and there... nothing too strenuous. The largest issue? You will be required to clear out any small debris that might have built up. Can't let a bit of mess cause a safety hazard!"

Sarah didn't even flinch as Adam showed her security camera images... and the massive amount of trash and blockages in that entire location. Unlike the lovely pictures displayed on the table. "Hmm... well that seems reasonable I suppose."

The man was trying to be sly. "Of course, we at Fontaine Inc. have a wonderful cleaning service for a very low price... Clean and Safe, satisfaction guaranteed!"

Adam snorted. {{Yeah. And the seven or so morons who agreed in the past ended up paying for these bastards to not show up. Jerks claimed failure of their victims to keep a 'basic level of cleanliness', and repossessed the properties AND kept all payments. Dicks.}}

Sarah smiled. "Oh I'm sure I can find someone to handle that! It doesn't look like it will be an issue." Not that any third party people were allowed to work in this area. Fontaine's people had... opinions, when it came to competition.

The sleeze ball seemed to nearly sparkle. "Of course! A woman with conviction, right after my own heart!" With practiced ease, he pulled another few folders over his desk. "In fact, I shouldn't be offering this really... but you remind me of my past when I first starting out working for the great Mr. Fontaine himself!"

Sarah glanced at the new documents as he continued. "As you can see, many places in this same neighborhood might be willing to have a new landlord or backer thanks to the amazing growth that the area is about to undergo! They need a bit of spending money to spritz up the joints, as it were."

He seemed to be so innocent. "Maintenance Junction 17 was originally just housing for the fine people at Rapture who helped build the train networks and our amazing city... But now that they have time to really enjoy the fruit of their labor? It's going nowhere but up!"

Adam helpfully showed the details about this 'boom town to be', more commonly known as Pauper's Drop. Badly maintained and constructed housing, a last resort for the poor, almost a second city for the lower class hidden away below the glamor of Rapture.

A con job.

A scam.

Even the actual businesses and such down there were barely turning a profit, and several of the owners in that area seemed awfully willing to 'cooperate' with Fontaine's people. Like this current scam, which Sarah got shoved into when a woman with disposable wealth showed up looking for 'affordable property'.

Her smile filled the room. "And you offer even more discounts if I invest in more properties?"

Lies had a smile too. "Of course! In fact, we could even offer a discount if you decided to go a bit bigger... to really seize this chance!"

Oh look at that! The cost for most of the property, ownership of the local businesses, and the rights to set policy for that area was JUST a bit more than the amount of funds she disclosed to these fine gentlemen!

Sarah looked interested... and sighed. "Oh I wish I could just take them all."

Damn, she deserved an award for this level of 'acting'. Or at least a trophy for not punching these morons after treating her like an idiot.

The goon in a suit ignored his STILL STARING perverted partner as he showed some documents he just 'happened' to have handy. "Are you aware that we have a very generous short term loan policy?"

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah barely left with her new paperwork before she found a nice out of the way spot and...

Step.

...Sat at her lunch table before Adam's skull. "I can't believe this is real!"

Adam grumbled. {{Which part? That they actually DID make you owner of all that stuff or that the related contracts are over the top cartoonishly evil?}}

She ignored him and thumbed through her new purchases.

The Sinclair Deluxe, a cheap hotel. The Fishbowl Diner, which looked lovely in the (WAY outdated) photos attached. The 'Town Square Market', locally known as 'Skid Row' according to Adam... and far closer to a slum market than a flea market. At least it had a few nice places... like the Limbo Room jazz and blues venue and the Reliable Pharmacy!

The market was to pay her rent per stall, theoretically. She doubted it had ever happened in the past though. And she technically owned a massive apartment complex that was technically unnamed and theoretically was responsible for the 'Atlantic Train Station' entrance to the area on top of it all.

On the other hand, Harold Parson's Bookshop and Marlene's Flower Emporium only had to pay rent to her. Theoretically.

In reality though?

These evil damn contracts made all this pointless.

First, she wasn't allowed to make any policy changes for one month. At all. On any of those properties.

Second, she had a list of requirements... minimum requirements, that if she didn't achieve them at specific points and on certain due dates? All funds and properties revert to Fontaine Inc.

How fortunate that those nice, honest, not crime lord people in the property real estate office had already submitted the paperwork.

Again.

Just like the last seven or eight times that 'investors' were suckered into this deal.

Though none of THEM had invested as heavily or widely as Sarah had this time. The loan she accepted was ALSO much larger than the others expected her to fall for... and had great terms and conditions too! How kind of them!

And when (Oh shock!) she couldn't handle those impossible requirements? Well, the heavily armed and fully legalized security team of Rapture would make sure to enforce those contracts to the god damned letter.

Didn't matter how rich she was, who she was, or her background.

In a way, Andrew Ryan's dream of equality was really put on display here!

It was legal, it was done by official people, it was unchangeable as of thirty or so minutes ago without a LOT more paperwork.

But...

But what if she COULD achieve those impossible markers?

Sarah hummed as she headed to Maintenance Junction 17.

Impossible sounded fairly nice right now!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam hummed as he prepared a new area Sarah had called the 'Reclamation Room', which would be used for raw material collection.

Well, to be more accurate? The room took less than a second to set up.

He was working on the automatic sorting, dismantling, and reclamation routines that would ensure some basic safety standards.

Like not harvesting people by accident, and ensuring pattern collection as material is scanned before destruction in case it was needed later. All that stuff.

And now that he had access to Skill templates, he was trying to program some fake ones... automated processes that would apply her other abilities in useful ways. Some pseudo skills. Sudo skills? Ha!

These were going to be mostly cleaning related, honestly. With several Mind units tossed in to ensure these more complicated macro Skills didn't do something stupid by accident. All for one big reason!

The contracts had a few hurdles that, for normal people, would ensure a quick scam and some free money for the assholes involved. Again, for normal people.

First, the trash issue. Fontaine's people were ACTIVELY DUMPING CRAP into this area. Even if someone had lots of funds and found some actual workers willing to risk the danger of cleaning the contract zones as required? BAM, more junk just before inspection day.

Or, in Sarah's case? Free basic resource material! Adam gonna nom nom.

Secondly, the market manipulations. Part of the reasons this area went along with the scams like the one Sarah had been targeted with was due to Fontaine's people having an iron fist on the market.

Unofficial taxes and fees on any food, drinks, and building supplies? Oh yeah. Or your people come down with a sudden case of a broken leg. Even basic necessities can sometimes spike in cost because of this... especially when a new moron (That's us!) tries to organize some repair work down here.

If only Sarah had the ability to teleport anywhere she can see. And if she could see through walls for kilometers. And if she could have Adam auto transfer material to markers on scheduled drop times. Yeah.

That would be nice.

Not to mention Adam's ability to generate a LOT of these materials himself. Suddenly fresh fruit and milk could cost nearly nothing down here in the slums and still earn her a profit! How lovely!

Third, and the issue that was going to require some wet work... keeping the peace.

Adam glanced at his Jumper, giggling to herself as she checked her favorite sniper rifle. Again.

Yeah. It would be a bad idea for outsiders to start stuff on inspection day in her territory. BEST case scenario you would just vanish and reappear elsewhere... because teleporting is far less scary to outsiders than unseen, unblockable, intangible bullets.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah stepped off the train, now one body in a stumbling crowd of overworked and dreary people. Heading down here to Maintenance Junction 17 was a real eye opener.

First, not every junction had a train stop like this one. As bad as it looked now, covered in filth and with piles of waste junk and excess material shoved aside... it was still a full train stop.

That said? Each stop on the way here had an obvious drop in quality.

You could taste the increase in misery and depression with each new pause on the journey. Every stop had wealthy and high class nobility leave while tired and disappointed rabble climbed aboard.

Now? The entire train was emptying here. The last stop... Pauper's Drop.

For a city that normally runs at near all hours, it took very little time for the train station to empty out and the worn out tunnel to feel like a ghost town. Even the shifty people who had tried waiting for her to move on for likely unkind reasons had decided to move on from stalking the strangely acting silver haired woman who stood like stone in the darkened tunnel.

Holding a sharp bone spike.

Survival instincts. Good for them!

Sarah glanced at the few working camera systems. "Adam?"

{{Already altered the network to ignore your territory, but stay out here while changing stuff for a few hours... I need more footage from the internal systems to make convincing fake output.}}

She nodded as her vision began highlighting damaged sections of the bulkhead, stolen or sabotaged equipment like the cameras and lighting, and electrical issues. "Let's fix the lights last, it will be the most obvious change."

Sarah absently shifted through space as she walked to the edge of the 'Territory' her contracts covered... and an additional 10 yards or so, to avoid claims of confusion later. Technically it wasn't safe for people to be down here in the train tunnels on the tracks... but most people couldn't use powers like her.

For background's sake? The Bioshock Jump had two major empowerment methods: Plasmids and Vigors.

First, both power ups needed raw ADAM: a green genetic goo that altered cells in the body in damned magical ways but with a heavy risk of addiction and insanity. Improperly processed it acts like an odd cancer, replacing the body with more powerful and yet unstable replacement cells.

The stuff was used here in Rapture via 'Plasmids' to both grant new abilities and modify the genetics of the body in general. One shot and BAM! You were stronger or smarter! But the drawbacks were massive.

It was addictive, at least the initial products were... the body broke down physically as well as mentally if not given a stable supply. Worse, the creators saw this as a positive feature and didn't bother to improve the product further.

Why bother when your customers couldn't (and didn't want to) quit? Better sales meant better profit! Not to mention the need for your customers to get energy boosts via a glowing blue liquid called Eve, raw power refined from ADAM and used to keep people from cannibalizing their own systems when trying to use their new skills.

So here in Rapture, getting more powers? Using them often? You better hope the Plasmids didn't conflict with each other or your DNA. And you CERTAINLY need to be able to afford enough Eve to keep your body running safely.

The other big drawback was the source of this stuff. Sarah's Jump purchase of Skills generating Eve wasn't normal, even before her Benefactor improved her ability to use the stuff. Especially after 'Bad Ass' kept trying to improve the material introduced to her Avatar.

Everyone else had to collect ADAM from the source: A mutated Sea Slug. It was researched by Brigid Tenenbaum, after a dock worker had his hand healed after getting bit by one... but the stuff was impossible to replicate with current technology levels artificially. So everyone now had to farm Sea Slugs for superpowers.

The doctor had managed to increase the yield of ADAM per slug by many times after some hard work, enough to make them available to market as a consumer product! ...Although she went via the normal way while working in Rapture.

Unethical human experimentation.

Long story short? The slug could be slightly modified and embedded in a host's stomach and yield twenty to thirty times the amount of ADAM one got from the slug farms. And again, that was 'good enough', no need to find a better way, sell sell sell!

Oh, this breed of mutated slug only works on young girls? Meh, there are lots of orphans! Create a whole brainwashing torture company and raise 'Little Sisters' to give us product! Why bother wasting time breeding more slugs for something better or more ethical, that takes time and children are cheap!

Sarah was... not happy with any of this.

Especially as harvesting ADAM the 'most efficient way' would kill the child by removing the slug entirely, rather than just filtering out the materials safely but at a lower (More Costly!) rate. This wasn't an issue yet, thanks to concerns about bad public relations… but the way ADAM was used right now was addictive and likely to increase far beyond manufacturing capacity.

The other method of gaining power was via another reality connected to this Jump, where Adam and Eve was further refined into much safer Vigors and Salts. While affecting the mind to a larger extent, they didn't need injection into the bloodstream like Plasmids and could simply be drunk… though there were still problems.

True, the safer alternatives were due to an early prototype accidentally killing hundreds of people working to produce the product and the public's demand for something less deadly to handle... but once it was 'good enough' that other reality ALSO stopped trying to fix their Vigors and just went to market.

Morons.

Anyway, back to powers.

Adam (ha!) had made sure she just needed to drink some milk or have a biscuit and BAM, Eve for days. So while powers already existed and were spreading like a disease down here, it at least meant her abilities could be hand waved away at some level... even if no one suspected how MUCH she could do compared to a local.

Such as this.

Her hands waved down the tracks back towards HER train station, a wave of portals opening flush on the tracks and floors... coating the walls and tunnel like a skin tight film with openings into her Warehouse. What a rush!

A virtual screen informed her about the filth and trash filling her reclamation room even as she felt for the new 'sudo Skill' Adam had designed.

She waved her arm. [[Sweep, Clean, Polish.]]

The back of her mind flared into thoughts as she felt... something... herself? Her mind could just feel the missed dust and webs and so forth before her, telekinesis dislodging even specks of grit and rock embedded in the materials. The world subtly shifted.

An orb of intense gravity floated in the tunnel, wrapped in a bubble of Teleportation Gates leading to reclamation! All the floating dirt, filth, paint flecks... dislodged via telekinesis and floating up for vanishing to be recovered later... even as a light breeze was pulled in from the vanishing air.

A thin layer of water was teleported to the surfaces, moved via her mind in complex patterns, with chemicals Adam added quickly removing hydrophilic and hydrophobic oils and grease.

She stepped forward as the air was compressed to unreasonable levels using gravity and used to polish the remaining surfaces dry in moments... It was so odd.

Because the entire process was easy to understand if she focused, but standing away from it all?

It was happening simultaneously, and with each step. As simple as doing a twirl.

Sarah tried to keep her grin small as she began sauntering down HER subway tunnels towards HER station, the worn and dirty path sparkling behind her steps as her vision highlighted and judged every damaged area while trying to order the new repair list via priority of importance.

Absently she activated 'Phasing Pierce' while spinning Mr. McStabberson and felt her glowing eyes help her abilities by reaching INTO the walls and the outer edges under the ocean, areas that clearly were not being maintained as often as they should be.

She frowned as a fairly damaged section was only a few feet away and a dozen or so to the left... It was fine for now but could collapse into a massive issue at some point. "Adam?"

Her eyes twitched as more information and 'sudo Skills' entered her mind. "Thanks." [[Dismantle. Scan. Duplicate. Install. Drain.]]

The pressure of the sea couldn't resist her mental reach as massive bolts unscrewed, panels were forced apart, and welds disturbed through raw force directed at incredibly small points.

Tossed for recycling, the missing parts were either scanned from nearby duplicate parts or extrapolated from the removed scraps. A few pieces were just redesigned... No reason to use substandard materials or low quality production methods here!

Sarah kept walking while her metal stockpile was consumed to create new parts, they were each teleported into the outside darkness, and her mind forced individual massive rivets and bolts into place. Thankfully Adam had apparently adjusted a few things and added a sap like material to some of the edges so the welds wouldn't be needed (No idea how she was supposed to weld underwater with her current abilities).

The soaked area within the newly sealed section was then drained into her warehouse. Free salt, free water, and... lots of tiny bugs and things and who knows what. Probably some junk and pollution too, Rapture wasn't built by environmentalists after all.

Her mind idly reviewed each section as she strolled down the tunnel... best do this in more than one pass. Adam wasn't entirely sure the sap stopgap was as good as liquified metal anyway, even if it WAS better than a hole in a wall layer...

Best just to steal the junk, toss the trash, clean the inside and mark what needed fixing on this run.

Her grin was a bit too large as she mentally reviewed the contracts. She had the time, after all!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Dave tried not to wince as he paid the last of his emergency fund. "And this will work for now?"

His friend sighed. "Not long... I can get us another two weeks of food and basic medication for this though." His eyes looked into the dark. "Look man, you got kids. Maybe it would be best to just... go on a trip. Take the family and try your luck somewhere else."

Not... not really an option anymore. He gave the strongest smile he could. "Ha! And leave our crew on their own? Our construction team helped build this city, any day now I'm sure we can build ourselves right up with it!"

Dreams were all that could be afforded right now unfortunately. "Little Amy has a bit of a cold right now anyway, so it wouldn't be the best time to move about. Let me know if you hear about any of the good meds moving about?" He could get more money... somewhere.

Jim cringed. "Dave, I know you are basically holding the complex up at this point... but this IS with me keeping an ear out. Anyone else wouldn't be able to get half this much through the blockades."

Those damned 'protection' rackets... and those damned morons who 'helped' report others to get a few extra scraps! "I know, I know... just, keep your eyes open? An ear out?"

The worn man sighed. "Yeah. Anything for Amy. She's gonna be smarter than both of us, you know that right? I saw her grip too! That little one is going to build the world someday!"

God he hoped so. "You know it! And hey, if you need a place to stay you know you can stop by. I've always got at least a free couch or two."

Jim chuckled as he scuffled into the shadows.

This damned place.

Dave remembered the end of the major projects... and the shock when almost everyone NOT on the maintenance squad got shafted by the 'cost saving' assholes above.

Those who could leave did, those who couldn't tried to work together... and Dave had his people to protect. Not just his love, Susan. No, his crew and their families... they had to stick together.

Things would get better.

His 'office' door was thrown open! "Dave, I'm getting some bad vibe messages!"

He stood. If the 'Rat Catcher' heard whispers on THIS level, it was best to handle it now. "More of Fontaine's men?"

Not going to fall for THAT snake's poison. Never again!

How kind for that slimy asshole to offer a helping hand while stabbing everybody in the back at the same time. Dave knew men like that, and he should have recognized the trick before it all fell apart.

Surprisingly, the Rat Catcher shook his head. "No, it's about your replacement!"

His heart dropped.

Someone ELSE had fallen for the same scam? "How much did they invest?"

It was only through luck and the work of dozens of his team's families that he had kept control of the Complex apartment buildings... and even then he was barely the manager at this point, not the 'land owner' like this poor sap.

The man winced. "Damn about everything. Even took loans."

He... what? "I'm sorry?"

Rat Catcher squinted. "The poor woman somehow slipped by all our people who could have warned her. Nearly appeared right at the office, nothing we could do."

What... how!? "Can we stop it!? Is there time to..."

"No."

Shit. "We only needed a few weeks... enough for that damned real estate office to show some loss... Fontaine nearly shut it down twice already..."

The shadow man passed some paperwork to Dave's weak hands. "It made them desperate. They made it a MASSIVE honeypot. Never offered so much for so little, even gave a fair loan to the woman. Actually fair too!"

He felt cold. "Fair if you ignore the actual contracts the loan will pay for."

A nod.

Can... could he do something?

His attempts at improving the area had already harvested nearly everything he had.

Those with the youngest kids had managed to escape, minus his family who refused to leave. But together his crew had at least gotten the future of their people out of this damn slum.

But this woman? "How much of a loan?"

Rat Catcher handed a slip with... far too many zeros.

What? How... "Holy. Shit."

The other snorted. "Yeah, shocked the hell out of me too. They must have drained their own accounts to help fund this scam... but after it all falls down, it will artificially boost their profits into the black for months. Trading actual profit for good numbers to stay on Fontaine's good side."

With a loan this huge... "She can't run. Even if we smuggle her out, it would be worth it to hunt her down."

The Rat Catcher gave a heavy nod. "I talked to my mice, and they met with a few rats. She's a genius, but this is the city of the talented... it won't be enough to tilt the scales in her favor. The only edge she has is how strangely slippery she is."

Shit. Was there nothing he could do? "Slippery?"

He nodded. "She showed up at the train station here a few hours ago. No idea how, no one saw her get on, no one saw her pass my checkpoints." The rag-covered man winced. "She... might have been in shock when she saw her new 'investment'. My mice say she just... stood there."

That brought back dark past memories. "I've been there."

That poor woman... At least he should offer what little support he could.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

This was awesome!

Sarah flung her arms around, metal plates ripped from walls and replaced with new material as portals opened and closed to the rhythm. "You don't need experience... to turn me out!"

SLAM! BANG! Rivet rivet rivet! "You just leave it all up to me!" BANG! "I'm gonna show you all it's all about!"

New cameras were teleported in. {{You don't have to be rich, to be my girl!}}

BAM! "You don't have to be cool, to rule my world!" Smack BANG!

New segment of train track rail, {{Ain't no particular sign I'm more compatible with!}}

BaBOP! "{{I just want your extra time and your}}" SMACK! BANG! PING! "{{KISS!}}"

Fixing stuff rocked!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

It was odd walking down the train tunnel again after the previous passes.

BaDum. BaDa Bang. Bam.

At first the corroded metal and saltwater damage gave the area a green and rusted effect.

Screach! Ping ping bang.

Now most of the internal panels were replaced and had a thin but resistant translucent layer of plastic protecting the material. Also cut down the shine and glare so the lighting wouldn't blind someone when it transitioned from the local 'Meh good enough' area to Sarah's 'Sweet Jesus So Clean!' property.

However double checking stuff and ensuring secure replacements were created and installed? Well, it took more passes than she had expected earlier. Adam had suggested she finish for tonight, but there had been so much progress!

Sarah stifled a yawn. BANG!

...Oops? "I… I should probably take a break or a nap or something."

Adam helpfully ignored the nearly misplaced panel. {{Probably for the best. Plus this whole thing was pretty loud and we scared off everyone. I think. At least a few of the working security cameras suggest so.}}

Stretching her shoulders, she moved…

Step.

...Into her bedroom. "Yeah, I wasn't going to hide my abilities from the locals much anyway. Both because personal power is respected and I can escape really easily."

Adam hummed as a list showed the changes accomplished. {{Respected? Personal power is nearly worshiped here! That and fixing the place secretly is going to be impossible. Workers have shifts at all hours… no real unions or labor rights so people are moving about all the time. Only reason you had so much free time in the tunnel tonight was that you sounded terrifying.}}

She blinked. "What?"

He chuckled. {{Yeah, construction and repair isn't normally quiet at the best of times.}}

Whatever. "I'll deal with scaring the locals in the morning."

Adam helpfully dimmed her room's lights. {{I'll review the schematics to help plan tomorrow's repair work.}}

Mmm, pillow! "Sleep now."

She was out in minutes.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam reexamined the ACTUAL schematics of Sarah's territory.

He had stolen all the official stuff hours ago, and even checked it against the cameras in their territory to adjust what he could… but now he had memories from his girl as she used her Skill 'Phasing Pierce' on the area.

Full rendering of all material, with raw data about many wavelengths of light and sound available for 'Research' ready to be processed!

So now her maps would be able to show hidden passages, maintenance tunnels, wall modifications, hidden caches, and internal issues with the support structure and hidden areas.

This had a few expected issues (Some areas down here hadn't been fixed or maintained in months at LEAST and others had substandard parts), but on the pleasant side a few unexpected upsides!

First, standardization wasn't mandated. Too much government interference, according to Andrew Ryan. Thankfully for everyone with a brain, part standardization and equipment modularity was enforced because of profit driven motives: scale.

Rapture was HUGE. Far, far larger than the parts that most people would ever visit, with over 80% or more composed of foundation or structural material depending on which area you are visiting. It was needed so that the machinery keeping stuff dry and breathable could have redundant backups… and everything needed to be easy to work with, modular, and durable.

Why?

Because the people building it and maintaining it were low level workers. Like the people down here in Pauper's Drop.

If every part was a master work by a genius, who would waste their time ensuring part 1,322 was delivered with units 32 and 44 to area B332? When the guy or woman installing the panel couldn't read well or had physical issues due to your unsafe working conditions, can you expect them to actually get the work done without having to oversee it yourself?

So basically Rapture was designed to be built, expanded, and repaired by the lowest common denominator. To 'safely' allow someone at the bottom of the sea to build a train tunnel without having to construct it above the waves and sink it when ready. Because secrecy was a needed thing for a hidden society like this.

Thus Adam now had a massive number of part schematics that were modular, durable, easy to install (Especially with Sarah's telekinetic talents), and of many varying qualities levels due to faulty issues during construction and transport.

There was a REASON why so many issues occurred down here… not all metal work was of the highest standard, especially in areas hidden from the public or down here with the lower class. People like Fontaine Inc. were saving coin by ensuring the exposed areas were given high quality polish while leaving these low priority areas to collapse.

Thankfully, this meant that Adam had lots of examples. Parts that failed, parts that withstood the ocean, and most interestingly… what internal flaws existed that either caused the catastrophic failure of certain materials or allowed something of low quality to withstand a mountain of stress!

'Research' loved it. Just before Sarah had fallen unconscious the new parts being installed were made of thin layers of material, with failure points built inside so that if something DID go wrong it would fall apart in the safest way possible.

Leaks would be smaller, panels easier to replace, and the destruction of several segments should manage to contain any issue without accidentally creating a cascade of worse issues!

Probably.

Anyway, all the new designs were better than the corroded mess and fractured materials being replaced at least. Some parts were not just low quality… A few panels clearly were designed with internal flaws, ones that would REQUIRE more money to be damaged like that than they would need if constructed correctly with the appropriate materials.

Adam would be examining future parts arriving in this territory for this shit in the future. At least, if he ever let outsiders build materials for Sarah's area again, at all.

Still, the area down here was in better shape than either of them had expected. Sure Adam had ended up replacing nearly all the surface material anyway, with coatings to resist filth or corrosion and what not… but many sections were done just to match the other materials being replaced rather than due to construction issues.

They could work with this!

Adam kept an eye on all the local area (MUCH easier in the train tunnel now that cameras were fixed and a bunch of new ones added hidden in the replacements) as he designed and tested some pipe and electrical manipulation units for the walls.

Can't have any areas connected to Sarah's property suddenly changing the reported electrical stability levels or water pressure rates! A few parts along the perimeter would ensure that the recorded rates would stay nice and stable for the whole territory.

At least until the various contracts ran out of time to try and shaft his Jumper.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

He should have been home hours ago, and had used his runners to send an Audio Diary to his wife Susan. Little Amy's fever would be keeping her up anyway, so she would understand… although he wanted to help settle Emily in bed for once this week.

But this was more critical. "Nothing?"

Paul was the head of the construction crew's 'Spider Squad', the guys who needed to examine the walls and upper areas of the work site even when management wouldn't spring for the good stuff like safety equipment, ladders, or even construction frameworks.

Closest thing his people had to scouts now.

Paul always seemed too thin, a little too tall and with a bit more reach than expected… but he could move up a wall with no hand holds like a stroll on the beach. "Went silent boss. Over an hour now."

Dave sighed. "Did you get the recording?"

The man placed one of the more dirty Audio Diaries on the desk. These ones were used to gather evidence by Rat Catcher's mice on the various rats… or to send messages like his own to his wife. "Yeah… strange shit though."

He pressed play.

~"Can we fix it?"

~"{{Y̵̖̺̪̊́̀ė̴̡͎̬̹͛̕͠s̸̥̫̯͕̏̊̎ ̸͓̥̠̀w̴̛̘̟͇ḙ̴̦̙̊̈́̾̍ ̵̠̄̀̈́c̸͕̓͐ä̸̩̜́͜n̵̹̼͙̄͋̽͜͠!}}"

He twinged. "What the HELL is wrong with her voice!?"

Paul shrugged. "Don't have any clue. Some of my spiders say they can't hear anything off about it, yet it made poor Jake faint."

Dave waved it off. "Jake faints over anything all the time." Weirdo.

A nod. "Well yeah, but this time it was extra faintly. Real dramatic."

He sighed. "Well, it's been almost what… 45 minutes or so? With no sound?"

Another nod. "Yep."

The 'boss' glared. "You guys are going to make ME go talk to her, aren't you?"

Paul placed a heavy hand on his shoulder. "And we respect the hell out of you for it."

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Dave didn't even make it to the safety 'air locks' leading to the train station when his path was blocked by Rat Catcher. "Don't bother."

He blinked. "What?"

The man led Dave to the side. "She gone. No idea where, or when, or god damn HOW. She didn't leave by train, by walking, or by any path I know of… and I don't think she used one I don't know of either."

The hell!? "Well… shit. We need to contact her soon at the VERY least to warn her about how bad her situation is."

Shifty eyes looked away. "Yeah… maybe not."

Dave paused. "Catcher?"

Rat Catcher hunched over. "Look, I've heard something from the mice near the less safe research areas. Some whispers near the cutting edge stuff. You heard about Derrick and his crippled hand being fixed? The others about magic drugs?"

...Well. "Not from anyone who managed to stay alive six hours later."

The other man slumped off. "Go look in your tunnel boy. See why we are out of our depth here." He snorted. "And then get some damn rest. I'm going to be up for the next few days at least looking into this shit, at least one of us should get a nap."

Dave watched the raggedy man fade into the background… and reluctantly turned to the Atlantic Train Station. Which led to something looking like a young beautiful woman with silver hair and eyes. In a suit.

Welp.

One override code had the air locks slowly shifting open.

Dave stared blankly at the glistening train station. The polished metallic walls, bright happy lighting, and hotel quality flooring with clear safety markings and directions.

There was even a 'You are Here' directory sign now near the entrance. For 'Pauper's Drop', not the public relation 'Maintenance Junction 17' bullshit he fell for way back when.

No more graffiti. No water damage. Even the constant smell of brine and slightly rotten fish was pretty much gone… Did he smell vanilla? Holy shit.

This was impossible… But impossible was something people in Rapture had gotten used to long ago.

He felt something unusual stir inside him. It might be hope.

Dave turned away from the (literally) picture perfect (empty) station to head home.

With work like this, he could put up with a LOT of creepy singing.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah woke early, had a VERY satisfying breakfast, and then joined the crowds confused by their new train station stop. As she was the one of the only few heading INTO Pauper's Drop rather than off to the daily grind, it was a bit easier to get through the herd… though it could be that people were unwilling to push her around while she was twirling a hilariously sharp bone spike with a wide grin as she sauntered.

She was damn close to whistling! Maybe skipping!

Why?

Because Adam had managed to enhance the Warehouse a bit after messing with the schematics related to scanning and recycling and resource generation and fabrication and what not… and had made some big improvements!

First! By reducing the distance she could observe by default when using the skill, 'Phase Pierce' was now active at all times (Sort of) with no strain or limit!

Sure she couldn't FOCUS on all the raw data at one time, her brain didn't work like that (Yet?), and if she tried to use her long distance ability for sniping or whatever her local resolution would vanish for the duration, but the benefits were big.

For example? Blinking or not, she could innately understand everything's position and status within a few feet or so of herself. All that was being sent to her Warehouse where Adam had something set up to analyze color, temperature, distance, acceleration, velocity, electrical fields, yadda yadda yadda. Subconsciously she would just… know things about how hot her coffee was behind her, for example.

This was in ADDITION to Adam getting data from wherever she focused her attention to visually… So he could watch her back for an ambush or whatnot while she got stuff done!

And anything that she was near or where her attention focused on? Her warehouse would attempt to construct and record schematics for the whole mess!

This was tied to the second, and in her opinion, MOST important enhancement: Fabrication.

Case in point: Her new bright blue business suit!

Yep! Adam could now scan schematics (Like her awesome suit) and dynamically modify them before construction!

Now, unlike the original Jump Chain Warehouse versions she couldn't just… mass produce materials or whatever to silly levels. Like, the original recycling systems could apparently (theoretically) carve up a city, harvest it for materials, and build a massive fighting robot or whatever in seconds. Or feed a planet of people in minutes, or flood a mountain, or whatnot.

Adam's fabrication and reclamation attempts were way lower in scale by comparison due to transaction rate.

Eventually? One day she could dump a moon into the Warehouse for harvest, or produce a copy of Rapture itself or whatever.

But until she was powerful enough to just wave her hand and rewrite existence, Adam managed to find a workaround by slowing the conversion and production process and the mass manipulation production per minute.

Basically, his new method was very efficient, and she could use it NOW rather than in thirty or forty jumps (400 years was a LONG wait!), but in return she could only make a few tons of product at a time. Oh no, what a travesty. It is to despair.

She held a snort at Adam's {{Woe is us!}} in the background.

Anyway, this would hopefully make repair work easier… far easier. Sarah still had to harvest material for reclamation, energy generation, and construction fodder… but at least she had basic conversion capability now!

No steel left? No problem! Adam's new system could convert a few tons of sludge with a ton of energy, and BAM! Back to work! Mostly.

Downside, matter conversion was expensive. Like… REALLY expensive. It was cheaper to salvage a dozen tons of trash into usable scrap than it was to convert a few pounds of something energy dense like Osmium into something useful.

And if she was trying to convert something basic, like sand or water as a supply resource? It would not just require a long time and a lot of power, but the conversion ratio was terrible! Thousands of units to get one unit of product was not an uncommon ratio.

For now, anyway. Adam set her new system to experiment as she used it, to enhance itself and refine its own processes… theoretically just using the system would one day improve her abilities BEYOND the source Warehouse features he had replaced. Especially if they could get their hands on more esoteric Skills or materials.

One day.

For now? Far easier to just steal trash from the city and filter crap from the ocean. Adam was designing some sudo Skills specifically for filtering, as he apparently had a history of using sorting to achieve great stuff at some point in the past… at least he seemed to be having fun.

With a good amount of recycled material, she would hopefully only need tiny amounts of mater conversion when needing some really rare materials or whatever.

Yeah it would suck to waste her resources tying up her energy and matter to convert something needed like that… but some stuff was just near impossible to find. Like praseodymium or neodymium, which was useful in some glass mixtures to cut out damaging flame glares or whatnot.

Also, theoretically? Adam was hopeful she could convert stuff into conceptually strong or magically esoteric products. They wouldn't know of course until she could get some schematics, but hope springs eternal and so on.

For now though?

Snazzy blue suit! Who's hot? She's hot!

Her skin had a healthy yet pale look (Unlike the fading memories of all the skin care products past Sarah Killgrave had tried to fix her stress wrinkles and bruises from work accidents), her hair was silky smooth silver to match her piercing eyes… Uh.

Shit!

She paused and checked a nearby window.

Whew, not glowing! She hadn't thought about whether or not her Siren based ability would cause her body to become a lightbulb. Especially when keeping her vision power active like this.

...And why hadn't she used her strange local omnivision to see her own eyes?

Sigh. Sometimes she felt like a moron.

Anyway, minor 'Did I just out my special eyes' crisis aside!

Sarah was sexy and she knew it!

Absently she followed the path to the office of her new housing manager, the directions obvious thanks to Adam creating ghostly blue color paths for her to follow. This guy, Dave Grinder, was the last poor sap to fall for the scam she was currently jumping headfirst into… but from what Adam could tell he was one of the rarest of breeds: A non-asshole in Rapture.

She'd believe it when she saw it.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Dave blinked as he woke, bleary and confused.

Someone had knocked? But his office hours didn't start till noon today.

His weary mind told him to ignore it and his warm wife in his arms made a compelling point…

Snuggling into Susan's embrace, he drifted back to sleep. Little Amy hadn't gone to sleep till very late, and the two adults were nearly completely out of it.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

"Daddy?"

Her daddy groaned… and was snoring again.

"Mommy, there's someone at the door."

"Mrmple."

...Well. What was she supposed to do?

The door knocked again.

Even at her age, Emily had developed certain instincts. This knock wasn't loud and scary, like something bad had happened that daddy had to go fix and spend days on. It wasn't angry, like those druggies or that drunk guy who tried to get in once.

That had been scary, even if mommy had used 'Loud Retort' (Daddy's favorite shotgun) to make them go away. This didn't feel like that.

And it wasn't sneaky sounding, like when the rag man came by to talk to Daddy.

…Curiosity was a flaw she had. "Daddy, can I go answer the door?"

"Flsss."

Close enough!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah blinked when the door opened.

And looked down.

A little girl with curly brown hair was peeking around the door, looking up at her with wide eyes. And pointed. "You're blue!"

...Daww!

She couldn't hold back a smile. "And you're blue too!"

The little one had a worn but clean blue dress and slightly damaged blue shoes, which was just adorable!

Sarah paused. Right, focus. "Good morning, young lady. My name is Sarah Killgrave, and I'm your father's new boss. Is he in?"

The little girl pouted. "Daddy's sleeping right now."

Suddenly the little one vanished with an 'EEP!' and a tall man with a soul of steel and muscles forged through turmoil was blocking the door. "One moment please."

The door closed.

Sarah blinked. "Huh."

The man looked nice in boxers. His wife was a lucky woman.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah gently sipped the 'coffee', if this could be called that, from the well cared for mug and smiled. "This is lovely, thank you Susan."

The flustered woman still looked more than a bit rumpled. "No no, I'm just sorry I can't offer anything nicer."

It was clear the cute girl from the door got her beautiful brown curly hair from her mother. "It's fine… but did I come at a bad time?"

The muscled man seated on the other side of the table absently rubbed his bald head with a weak smile. "More that we had a late night. Our youngest has a bit of a cough, been having trouble sleeping."

She blinked, looking over at the child sneaking looks into the room from the distant doorway. She looked fine.

Her mother chuckled. "No, not Emily. Our youngest Amy is finally getting some rest now, so we should keep it a bit quiet."

The 'Apartment Manager' Dave, who looked far more professional after wearing a shirt and (unfortunately) pants, looked a bit grim. "And onto more dangerous topics… are you aware of your situation?"

Sarah glanced at Susan, who seemed uninformed. "...Maybe? Are we talking about the people stalking me, the scam contracts set up to steal my money and possibly sell me as a research subject for profit, or the scheduled sabotage targeting my new properties?"

The couple blinked before Dave coughed. "Uh. Mostly the second part... And the first part might be my fault, because I sent people to try and warn you. Didn't know about the lab rat stuff or planned sabotage, though I suspected something scummy when it came from the claws of Fontaine's people."

The mother seemed pale, so Sarah gave her a reassuring smile. "Don't worry Susan, I have it handled."

The beauty sniffed as she stared into her own coffee. "I… I hope so. Please excuse me."

Dave watched her head off to check on Amy. "You'll have to forgive her, some rough stuff can happen down here." He searched Sarah for something. "I assume you came to me for a reason?"

She nodded. "As far as I can tell, you mostly lead this town… Hell, even the scum spying on you left reports on file about how surprising your ability to adapt and respond to shit was. So, not being a moron, I'm going to involve you while I fix things."

Folders were 'pulled' from her jacket (Inventory) and placed on the table. "Here are the contracts I am liable for, in the original format. It is deliberately horrible to read or even parse out."

Damn paper was over five inches thick too. Jerks. Sarah handed over the second binder. "Here is the delegalized English version. I've split it into sections."

Nope, she had been sleeping… but Adam did quick work. "The first chunk is the territory I now own, full stop. Property, maintenance sectors, wiring tunnels, constructed facilities within, the works. Thanks to Rapture being REALLY hands free when it comes to the market, I could burn that down to the ground right now… although I can't sell it to someone else or ask for any existing contracts to change for a month."

Dave whistled. "Holy shit! When I heard you went big I didn't expect it to be THIS big! You even own that expansion area on the seabed, that whole planned tunnel was canceled due to budget issues WAY long ago!"

She chuckled. "Yeah, we'll get back to that. Someone thought they were damned clever… anyway." He turned the divider as she watched. "THAT is the property that I am now 'managing'. Their rent goes through me, and then I supposedly pay fees to Rapture for consumed water, electricity, needed sewage, potential repair work, and of course the air purification costs. Again, can't change much of it in a financial sense, and I can't mess with who is in charge of those places until a month later."

He nodded. "When the shit hits the fan." He examined the map Adam had constructed… and blinked. "Damn, you even got the supply tunnels marked on this thing." He frowned at the image, tracing some suspicious paths. "...Actually, more than that."

Sarah passed another image. "Here is the public map I will be displaying around the area. Far less illegal and dangerous stuff shown on it, less risky to hand about. Anyway, here is the last chunk… property and locations nearby that I do not own but still have responsibilities that require addressing."

Dave stared at the list… and stabbed at one line. "This. THIS right here is the trick they used on me. I had to burn a lot of funding and call a lot of favors because that whole electrical generation grid had an 'unexpected local fire'. Lost two men and the whole area ended up flooding."

Yep. "I'll be honest, from what I can tell this town is one of the few residential areas to even HAVE its own generators, filtration systems, and air purifiers. Mostly to keep your people alive and working while building other sections of Rapture down here."

He snorted. "Yeah, what an honor. And I can't prove nothing about this, but I do know that Fontaine Inc. was ready to offer 'emergency repair rates' to hook us into the overall grids of Rapture after our power center burned. They were ready awfully quick, and prices jumped."

Sigh… yeah. "Might as well get into the second binder then." This one was thinner but MUCH more enraging. "Behold! The 322 tricks, misleading phrases, and technically correct jargon designed to ensure I fail to uphold my contract requirements. Each page has the relevant text quoted, marked, then actually translated and followed by analysis."

They looked at the thinner but still thick binder.

She sighed. "If it helped, I sorted them by category?"

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam chuckled as the two humans alternated between reading the bullshit and ranting about criminal oppression. They seemed to be having fun!

Meanwhile Adam was 'borrowing' useful schematics… and, since his Jumper wasn't using her remote viewing ability for anything right now, why not let him borrow it instead?

Like, he asked permission to do this and stuff. And she could override his control of her power's trick to see through stuff and enable long distance focusing features at any time… but for now?

Mmm, data!

In a layer of Sarah's memory was a rapidly growing database as Adam scanned things in an ever growing sphere as she enjoyed a breakfast meeting with her new coworker.

A lot of canned food down here… not surprising, getting fresh stuff was tough even for the wealthy of Rapture if it wasn't farmed down here like some of the seafood and hardier plants. Powdered drinks, of various qualities. Drugs, because this was VERY low income housing and some people turned to outside 'help' in times of hardship. Drinks were popular, and one woman two floors down had somehow gathered an entire collection of some amazing cigars… high class all the way, really!

Weapons? Oooh boy. Not just clubs, knives, hand guns, shotguns… there were god damn Tommy guns and flamethrowers in some secured locations! Like, why!?

Many of the pieces were not being maintained well or were damaged of course, but still! Holy crap!

More pests and vermin than desirable. Easy to fix when Sarah gets around to it.

...Food might be a big issue though. He was NOT seeing enough of it. And the water seemed to be a bit tainted. Bad pipes?

Idly Adam followed the metal water pipes down walls, through flooring, past the bulkheads, around the… the…

Oh shit.

She was NOT going to like this.

He examined the other little girl in the apartment, the 'sick' girl Amy.

...Sarah was not going to like this at ALL.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Dave grumbled as he turned the page. "I can't believe there are a dozen different sections requiring you to keep areas clean that are actually flooded! Like, you could almost argue that they expect you to BUILD the damn side tunnel that was previously canceled just to ensure you can properly sweep the stupid place!"

He didn't hear the expected response. Or any response. "I mean, this is just crazy, right?"

Silence.

What? He looked up. "Sarah?"

"One moment."

His muscles clenched as he saw his new boss shimmering. Silver hair was moving in a non existent breeze, her eyes were unfocused… and full of RAGE.

Blue smoke curled from her lips.

That… that's not normal. "Everything alright Sarah?"

"No."

...Oh.

Well. Alright then.

Slowly, not trying to startle no one, no how, no way… he put down the document. "What is wrong… And can I help?"

Her eyes were staring down at one of his walls. "I can handle it. On a side note, when exactly did little Amy get sick?"

His stomach dropped through the floor. "A couple of days ago?"

She held out a vial. A blue liquid seemed to burn slightly inside. "Have her drink this. She'll be fine."

The woman was suddenly wearing her suit jacket again and was at his door, opening it.

"I'll take care of this."

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah felt raw rage in her blood over a little girl she hadn't even met yet.

What kind of fucktard poisons the water supply of a WHOLE TOWN!?

The only reason everyone wasn't dead yet was due to the incredibly poor quality of the plumbing near this apartment complex. And the convoluted pipe system. By the time this junk hit the main water supply it was too diluted to hurt most people.

Except for the old, the sick… and the young. The weak.

Sarah felt Mr. McStabberson twist in her right hand as she…

Step.

...Entered the underground shafts supporting the complex.

Right, first of all: Block off all interactions between the building and the rest. [[Seal. Drain. Sever.]]

The horrible hodge podge of piping was filled with capping material, had the liquid in the pipes vanish into her resources, and then were cut off at the points where they exited the building towards waste handling. Same for the incoming pipes.

Should she replace the pipes in the walls too? They were contaminated.

Adam sighed. {{No, don't just replace it. This mess was clearly made over time, chunk by chunk, as needs grew… this whole city was organically expanded rather than planned. We can do better.}}

She watched as memories of her schematics mutated, her vision shifted as pressure levels were marked and measured, pipe bends and joins and splits began vanishing within the walls themselves… Adam took it all. {{Faster, MUCH faster, to just start over than fix this mess. Here, which design do you like best?}}

Hmm. Sarah looked at the suggested options. "Go for the water tower idea. I know water pressure is almost TOO easy under the sea, but I don't trust outsiders to not pull this shit again. And quality control has been a mess from step one already."

A massive section above the buildings began to silently undo themselves like a ghost army getting work done. And silence was fine, neither of them were in a happy singing mood right now anyway. {{Sure. I'll build a maintenance room up here, a big water reservoir, and some filters to ensure clean water goes in and cleaner water goes out. It'll match the standard stuff Rapture uses so Dave and his people can keep it going with normal parts.}}

She ignored his work and the rapidly vanishing mess of pipes to begin following the path away from the building.

Stepping into the wall, segments of past reinforcement unfolded. Massive metal flowers of steel and rust opened out of her path to allow her to stride forward. "What was this stuff anyway? I don't see anyone really benefiting from killing the town down here while all these scumbags are so busy trying to rob them blind."

Adam hummed as he worked. {{I think this was an attempt at using a chemical method of sterilizing the locals. Or at least forcing all the workers to basically have a chemical contraceptive so 'fun' at the workplace wouldn't create problem kids slowing down the schedule. It's been here a long time, I just think the thing finally fell apart a few days ago and massively increased the dosage.}}

Reaching the sealed off abandoned workman's shaft, Sarah stared at the odd, certainly off schematic device attached to the pipe in front of her. "Will Amy be alright?"

{{Yeah, that stuff we gave her family was basically a liquid version of the goo I used to fix you up when I first found you way back when. Full health recovery, all energy levels topped off… downside though, that kid is going to be energetic as hell for hours. The mother of ALL sugar rushes.}}

Well that didn't sound too bad. Unlike this thing. [[Harvest.]]

The tube, strange additions and all, vanished into her supplies. "I just… why would someone do this?"

Adam absently replaced the nearby wall panels with new replacements even as he ran the new pipes through the top of the building behind her. And of course, rerouting all the electrical wires at the same time. Because why not? {{If it was just an attempt at free contraceptive doses, it might be a profit thing. If it was an attempt at sterilizing minorities or the poor, it could be a classist or racist thing. Though Rapture tends to be more against the poor and homeless than minorities, depending on where you are and who you talk to and so forth.}}

This place sucks. "Right, so what's the plan?"

She'd go back to Dave's after calming down a bit. No reason to scare anyone.

{{Probably should save time and go rebuild the electrical generator, water purification machines, and air scrubber devices in that burned out room. If we are going to rebuild this part of Rapture we might as well do it right!}}

She snorted. "Hard to imagine doing it more wrong. Yeah, why not? Let's go fix some shit."

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Dave sighed. "If she wanted to hurt us… there isn't much we could do about it."

Susan bit her lip… but nodded. "The medicine wasn't helping anymore anyway, even before we ran out. It just helped her sleep… the cough is getting worse."

He carefully passed her the strangely warm and delicious smelling container. The slight blue glow from within even felt comforting, somehow… probably the only reason he was willing to consider this.

Desperate times required some… questionable choices. Sometimes.

As he watched his smallest child prepare to drink the strange substance, he mentally made a note.

Overpowered mutant woman or not, if his girl got worse from this? Sarah would die.

Somehow.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

So. Bored. "Adam."

Another panel replaced itself subconsciously. Her skills could do this without effort, which just made the never ending process seem to take longer. "Entertain me."

Adam sighed. {{Sarah, I need to seal up the generator room before I can drain it. The explosions and fires didn't make this stuff resist the ocean spray flooding everything at ALL, and it is tricky. Let me focus.}}

Bored. "And… Upgraded another panel. Again."

A loud crumple and water surging sound came from the other room. {{Damn it. Well, it was all going to be replaced anyway.}}

Well if there were going to be explosions… "Come on… please? Something neat?"

He grumbled. {{Note to self, being able to support one's self in water does NOT mean it can handle the pressure after draining the interior.}} Another crumple… but no gurgle? Probably progress!

Adam focused on her again. {{Can't you be fascinated by all this crazy science in there? This stuff is amazing!}}

Meh. "After I ran out of self righteous rage, I sort of got emotionally tired."

Her benefactor sighed. {{Fine. Lean against that wall so I can modify your local scanning to cover this area and you can do something more useful.}}

Ooh! "Can do, boss man! Whatcha need?"

A chuckle. {{Use your peepers and find us some sea slugs. Or other interesting sea life, everyone stopped looking around down here after finding artificial magic slug organs… could be an Octopus or something that shoots lasers or whatever.}}

Hunting! Sort of!

More importantly: Not staring at more identical panels getting replaced while Adam does his science stuff! "Can do! One seafood selection coming up!"

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam had felt Sarah's annoyance grow since her current anger target was something not fightable. A pain caused by past corruption or maliciousness, rather than something to break or someone she could snipe.

Which was fair enough.

At least she could keep herself busy while he did… something… with this mess.

Historical documents were a bit tricky to get for this period of Rapture's construction, but Pauper's Drop had been one of the older areas set up, a foundational component. And unlike many other segments, this place ended up becoming the home of the lower class workforce… and thus needed to be repaired and rebuilt many times.

This was especially true for the generator room.

Initially, this area was selected for construction because of the seabed thermal vents. The generator room would pipe chemicals down into the vents via thermal pipes, get them super heated, then cycle the goo up here to power a steam engine. Probably. Everything was heavily modified and damaged now, but 'Research' seemed confident.

Expensive to set up, this mess was projected as nearly free to run in the future if he was reading this right.

Before all that, while building the steam engine and piping, that area was used to set up an amazing oversized generator that ran on a different chemical sludge. Expensive to supply, but fast to get going and a helpful stop gap measure while the better options were put in place.

Then somehow these pipe sections going into the thermal vents collapsed, and someone else managed to make some sort of algae solar panels? Had it connected through the ceiling over there via a modified cable. Because they ran out of fuel maybe? Or due to the downed thermal energy system? Either way, something had hit the entire solar panel system setup and now there was an umbrella of algae up there somehow supplying energy to those wires in that section, but lots of energy was lost and it wasn't going anywhere anymore.

Meanwhile there were… a big mess of a thing near the heavy shielding. Some sort of nuclear engine? That ironically wasn't the source of the fire or the explosions, no, someone had seen that the radioactive containment was breached and rather than fight the fire, fix the reactor, OR repair the place… they just caused even more damage to the wall and flooded the place.

Out of air, out of mind. Or whatever.

Adam blinked. Was… was that a pedal powered generator? Damaged as all hell, but uh. Yeah.

Why? That thing wouldn't have powered a lightbulb, forget anything else!

Sigh. Rapture was an odd place.

Like, imagine a bunch of mad scientists deciding to out mad each other.

Half of this stuff shouldn't work. More than half DIDN'T work, at least not as implemented… then another genus would apparently show up, fix whatever symptom was going on at the moment, and make everything more complicated.

That biological solar panel for example? It was brilliant!

Thing was so efficient it could generate USEABLE power even this far down, where the visual light level was near zero.

But 'Research' says that over thirty people worked on that one device. And based on how much the act of 'sharing knowledge' was looked down upon in this city, Adam would make a large bet that half the reason this option (Or half the others) was not fixed in the past was due to no one actually knowing how to even try anymore.

Probably why all the new devices kept being added. 'We can't remove gadget X! No one knows how to turn it off!' Heh.

Right, what was best for this mess?

Probably nuclear power. Properly set up it was stable, could fail into a safe state, and no one would have to come down here for years depending on his design.

But did Adam trust anyone in Rapture with enhanced nuclear power generation?

No.

SO, which choice was best for this mess… in a hellhole like Rapture?

Algae solar panel.

Even when it catastrophically fails like this example, it just… kept producing power. Even helped to feed the local fish too, apparently. Better than a fuel spill, or whatever the hell they were pumping down into the thermal vents.

Because that sludge wasn't water, and while (thankfully) the design didn't involve directly poisoning the sea… it was one leak away from that reality.

And the sea currently had his Jumper (And her stuff) in it.

So yeah, eco friendly option. Half of Rapture would probably avoid stealing his work just because there was no random torture, poisonous substances, or surgery involved.

Adam had samples taken, then began collecting… damn near everything.

No, screw it. Taking it all!

Sarah's supply levels jumped as layer after layer of metal, plastic, wood (WHY!?), ceramic, rocks, moss, a plastic fern (Double why!?), and a never ending stream of ocean water began to vanish behind the wall they sat against.

In fact, this whole area was going to be something useful. Oxygen recycling. Hell, he might be able to use a version of this same damned algae to do it! For now, tear it all down and build a modular extension, a massive empty room that can be altered later.

Right, better absorb those tubes and pipes heading down into those thermal vents. Not going to trust Rapture to have not effed THOSE up too at this point. Sheesh.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Dave lunged and caught Amy mid-jump. "Careful!"

The tiny hellion was near vibrating! "ButI'mBored!" And she was off. "IWannaGoPlay!"

Dave whined. "I just need to make sure you are… NO! No climbing!"

A distant 'Aww' was ignored as he turned to his wife. "Help!"

Susan's sparkling eyes showed she was FAR too amused at this. "Of course dear. Amy?"

A blur had his (literally) bouncing baby girl in front of them. "YesMom?"

She tried to pat the girls head between hops. "Don't stress your poor father, or you'll have to take a nap in time out."

Emily wearily raised an arm from where she had collapsed from exhaustion earlier. "Daddy! Feel stress!"

The similarly exhausted but happy couple looked at the sweaty older sister… who paused. "No, carry me to bed, then be stressed."

Daww. "Do you need a nap sweetie?"

"I'm too tired to nap."

"ICouldNapAHundredTimes!"

Damn it Susan, stop laughing!