The calm they had returned to was to be a short lived one.

Personally, Atlas would have preferred a barrage of splicers or maybe another concussing knock to the head over the interruption he was actually graced with. Unwelcomed, his radio came crackling to life. "Looks like EDEN doesn't agree with you," Sinclair noted the bleedingly obvious and Atlas sighed. Looked like Sinclair was up for chatting again.

Perhaps a 'concussing knock' was a bit over dramatic but it still seemed vaguely more appealing than a chat with Sinclair.

"Say, Atlas, how about you stop by the train for a spell. We're about to disembark regardless, so how about you and I grab a drink." Sinclair's voice suggested, and Atlas was sure he could hear something under the seemingly innocent request. But then again, Sinclair almost always sounded like he was playing a con and admittedly a drink sounded right heavenly to the sore Irishman.

"Sure, why not." Atlas drawled in return. He had a few questions he'd like to throw by Sinclair himself. "Does seem awful cozy in there while we're out here doing the heavy lifting." He noted, already making a beeline for the stationary train.

In answer to Atlas's jab, Sinclair only laughed. A cheerful, wholly unrepentant sound. "Wouldn't be much use out there." He pointed out and Atlas believed him. Sinclair wasn't a fighter; he was more useful on the safe side of the radio. Didn't make Atlas any less irritated by his nonchalance.

Atlas had not yet been on the train and found himself almost surprised when the door slid open for him with unexpected ease. He'd thought it would scream in protest. Despite this relatively intact design, the thing was a wreck. Inside there was rust and dust gathering. Some of it had been kicked up by feet passing back and forth but only enough to push the dust bunnies into corners away from the main pathways.

As the doors opened up to welcome him in, Sinclair was standing there. To keep Atlas from having an unfortunate run in with Tenenbaum he'd assume. The crooked smile sitting on the businessman's face was like a fresh wave of nostalgia and for all his frustration with Sinclair – Atlas welcomed the feeling.

"You've aged." Atlas remarked as he passed the threshold into the train, peering around for any more signs that it was untrustworthy to travel in.

Certainly, Sinclair's years showed. The stress of the fall of Rapture had clearly left its mark and Atlas almost found a spiteful sense of satisfaction seeing Sinclair had outgrown his youthful handsomeness. It had gnawed at him in the past though he wasn't sure why. He was happily married so Sinclair's popularity with the ladies had no effect on him. Yet somehow he still felt irritated thinking of Sinclair pursuing them.

Granted, for all his years, it still wouldn't have taken much work to clean him up into something presentable once again. He was always resilient like that. Atlas liked to believe he was just the same and considering the number of knocks he'd taken recently and that he was still standing – it seemed like he had a right to that belief.

Sinclair let him pass by before responding. "And you haven't." The words were given so casually that for a moment Atlas failed to process the validity of them. He hadn't taken the time to really study his looks in regards to his age but…well Sinclair seemed right. His hands seemed to look exactly the same as he recalled before falling from the vita chamber. The only change to be noted was the scars and while they were horribly jarring to see, under them he looked no more worn.

"Who knew, being dead was the most effective beauty product." Turning back towards Sinclair, Atlas offered up a snide smirk of his own. "Think you can bottle and hawk that, Augustus?"

The laughter he got in answer to that quip was genuine and startling. More startling was the fact that Atlas was so pleased to have gotten that reaction. A swell of pride that was completely unfounded passing through him.

Fortunately before it could manifest into something more substantial, Augustus clapped his open hand down on Atlas's back. With a cheerful quip. "Still got that sharp tongue. If there's anything age should have mellowed I'd have hoped it would be that." He chuckled though Atlas was no longer focused on his words so much as the hand planted between his shoulder blades.

It was admittedly a very firm, near antagonistic, pat but the resulting cringe and hiss of pain seemed to startle Augustus judging by how his hand recoiled a few inches. Atlas's pride made it impossible to meet Sinclair's gaze after the sound of pain had jostled loose. There was absolutely nothing to be ashamed of, anyone would be sore in his position. Yet Atlas's pride continued to bristle as if having taken a blow itself.

"You might just be a little too worse for wear to sell." Augustus ventured and despite the intended snide tenor to the remark, Atlas got the distinct impression that Sinclair actually meant it as some sort of consolation.

Slowly he glanced back at the other, expression guarded. Something about 'friendly' conversation and the offering of alcohol from Sinclair set him on edge. He knew a trap when he saw one. It was just a matter of what it was Sinclair was actually after. That he was still unsure of.

Better he get what he wanted first. "That drink?" He prodded and to Sinclair's credit he was quick to take the lead, taking Atlas into the train that had become something of a children's home in lieu of a true house. It's current status as an ill-fitting child's shelter took Atlas a bit by surprise even after having acknowledged what it was to himself.

The surprise came in the form of Sinclair opening up another door and immediately having a set of tiny bodies rush on past him. In his dumbfounded alarm Atlas nearly missed Augustus's offhanded call to the kids that had practically taken his feet out from under him. "Now I know the doctor told you girls not to run in the train!" He called after the two but they were out and gone into the next cart with little more than a giggle.

Where Sinclair had barely batted an eye, Atlas was left almost panicked. Children. He decided then and there that he was never going to willingly occupy the same room as any child below the age of eighteen for as long as he should live. Christ.

Almost betrayed Atlas looked to Sinclair with an openly scandalized expression. He knew Sinclair was the last person on the planet that wanted to be around children, but he seemed to have left Atlas alone in his unease. Clocking the look Augustus merely tossed him an unapologetic lopsided smirk. "Adapt, old boy." He advised, turning his back to Atlas in that overtly casual way of his. A show of confidence and indifference that irritated Atlas to no end.

'Adapt', Sinclair said. That was just like him wasn't it? Impossible to pin down no matter how people tried. How he'd ever gotten swindled by Lamb was beyond Atlas. He was almost resentful of her simply for having the pleasure before him.

Unfortunately, he and Sinclair weren't the same. Sinclair didn't have to 'adapt' to all that blood on his hands.

Or, Atlas thought with a faltering step, maybe he did.

Questions were brewing in his mind. Some innocent, most not, but all were kept on his tongue for now. Knowing the game Sinclair would play. Plie him with alcohol before putting out probes for what he actually wanted. Fortunate for Atlas it was a two-way street and he knew how Sinclair loved his scotch.

Personally, he would have preferred a memory of his God damn wife over Sinclair's fucking taste in liquor.

They both bottled up their questions, the walk to whatever hole in the train Sinclair had squirreled away for himself a silent one. Atlas had to watch where he put his feet. Dodging collected children's toys and oddities they had passed off as play things. Even now his timeline wasn't matching up right.

Little sisters weren't in production anymore but the girls he'd seen couldn't have been that old. He'd been 'asleep' for so many years but it seemed Rapture hadn't had the good sense to die in his absence. Rather than that it seemed the city had dragged new life in, using those little girls to stave of stagnation for a few heaving gasps longer.

No more children rushed them by, having returned to wherever it was the mother hen was lurking. Atlas was in no great hurry to see the woman face to face again. One of them was liable to pull a dirty punch on the other and so he stayed at Sinclair's heels where the attacks were, for the most part, kept to their words.

Sure enough Sinclair had found somewhere for himself. His little slice of paradise resided at the far end of the train cart, looked smaller than the rest, a control room that the rest of the train goers would never see. It was in this smaller space that Sinclair had placed what few items he still had to his name and as Atlas stood against the entry frame, watching the man reach through a cluster of bottles that made his mouth water, he noted these dwellings must have been painful for the once proudly affluent Sinclair.

The larger compartments of the train were left to the girls. Toys and what little bedding they could organize strewn around, creating a look that was not all that different to the poor houses Fontaine set up had looked like. Atlas snorted at the thought, those poor houses had done nothing besides funnel men into his cause. They'd practically been begging for a stronger voice to speak up and shape into words their grievances where they could not.

Who could blame them? Atlas made them feel like they were worth a nickel in Ryan's Rapture.

If he made them foolishly believe themselves to be worth a nickel in Rapture, then Sinclair was the one to prove they were only made of wood. They both sold lies when it suited them, Atlas was just unsure as to who sold the better con. Augustus never seemed to fall for his own lies, Atlas was still reeling as he felt his own beginning to unravel.

"The city sinks, and you find the time to stash away booze?" Atlas remarked dryly as Sinclair pulled free, what else, a bottle of scotch.

The bottle came free with a little sound of satisfaction from Sinclair and then a crisp pop as he opened it up. Unfussed by Atlas's comments. "That," Sinclair asserted with a self-assured smile plastered on his face and the bottle in hand as he sat back against the train wall, leaving Atlas to stand against the doorway, "is what we call jealousy, my good man."

Given his stomach turned over and all but tore itself apart in sheer longing the moment the sickly scent of the alcohol reached Atlas, it was quite true.

Being blind drunk was a bad look but one hell of a pastime and he thought he could distantly recall indulging in it plenty. If that foggy memory had more to do with his unreliably memory or just how stupidly drunk he'd been was anyone's best guess. But he distinctly remembered raucous cabaret music at a bar and mad dancing into late nights before crashing somewhere safe and warm. That felt like a very far away memory and he couldn't perfectly recall with whom he'd shared those nights. But he liked to keep them in mind where he could.

If he tried to recapture a snippet of those memories by grabbing the bottle that carried a familiar scent held out to him by Sinclair now, that was no one's business but his own.

Chasing memories in a bottle now after finding them in a needle last time. What a sad sack of shit he was turning out to be.

There was no pretenses of good manners of etiquette between them currently. No discussions of getting glasses or not sharing a bottle. The world had gone to hell and they both needed a good drink. Needing to split a bottle was hardly the peak of their problems. And if Sinclair let him take the first swig then Atlas didn't have any complaints to put forward.

That first gulp of burning liquor almost caught him by surprise.

It seared as he took a mouthful in. The agony of it felt extreme after being without a drink to burn his throat with for so long could do that. He wondered idly if this body was fresh in a way. Sure as shit didn't look it, but he drank booze like a first timer who overestimated how much they could take in one go and nearly hacked at the unexpected novelty of it.

There was no taste he took care to notice, it was easily overpowered by the sting of it as he forced the liquid down his unwilling throat. Despite all this even he could tell the drink was watered down considerably. Sinclair must have been nursing it for some time, stretching the drink as much as he could. Worked just swell for Atlas, he planned to drink half of it anyway. Regardless of how that might burn his stomach and throat.

Fuck, if that wasn't the best pain he'd felt since waking up.

And God did Atlas still hurt.

His body ached, the burns on his arm throbbed in protest as if to react to Atlas willingly burning his throat now too. There was blood drying in his hair, on his skin and it had started flaking off in such volume that he actually felt pieces dropping off. Might have imagined he felt lighter with each one.

"Don't remember you being this gung ho about it." Sinclair mused, watching almost lazily as Atlas choked the drink down and then just as casually plucked the bottle from his hands, taking a drink of his own. His sip far more conservative than Atlas's had been.

"Yeah." Atlas grit out roughly with a growl to try and clear the throat he'd just irritated. "Well if you remember anything fucking useful, feel free to speak up."

That seemed to give Sinclair reason for pause. "You really are out of sorts, aren't you?" The question needed no answering. Sinclair only spoke it aloud as if to help cement the idea in his own head. "What do you know?"

To this, Atlas snarled unpleasantly. "The sky still blue?" He asked sharply, spitting the rhetorical question back at Sinclair who for once likely didn't deserve his derision. Not that Sinclair had ever shied away from giving questions that required no answer one to his own liking.

"How would anyone know down here?"

He'd hand Sinclair that if nothing else.

A small silence fell between them as Sinclair took another drink and Atlas allowed him to have two only because they were smaller than his own had been and perhaps because he was actually the one being given the drink so 'generously'. Once Sinclair finished his second swing he didn't hesitate in handing it back over to Atlas, and while he did take the cool glass back into hand he did not immediately bring it to his lips.

Instead looking down the neck of the bottle as if to seek out a perfection in this as well. God forbid even his drink go without poisoning with the current state of his life.

While Atlas stood and stared into the bottle he would take as a lifeline, Sinclair seemed to do just the same, knees drawn up as he started into space. Anyone else would have thought it was a blank, mindless stare but Atlas knew the cogs never stopped turning with this one.

One of them had to speak.

They both knew it. They both had their own questions and less than subtle agendas. It was only a matter of who went first. Atlas felt he'd waited in the dark for everything long enough.

"Did you know?" He asked abruptly and for once it seemed Sinclair was not keeping pace with him, or perhaps lingering one step ahead. He offered up no immediate question of his own to seek clarity, didn't need to. The look he passed Atlas was not a difficult one to read and so he went on. "Valery. Did you know when you sent me up there?"

For a split second there was fire in Sinclair's eyes.

Something vicious and barely controlled. Atlas knew that look as one he wore frequently but he had never seen it in Sinclair before. It hit him for the second time that time had indeed passed. Sinclair was not quite the man he'd once known. Nothing felt like how he'd known it before.

However, the heat dulled quickly. If due to Sinclair's own fatigue or a force of will, it was impossible to know. "Wouldn't waste time if I had." He replied with a sort of nonchalance that Atlas didn't fully buy into. Regardless he took a drink while watching for any more lies in Sinclair's eyes.

He found none when the man went on to say somberly. "I thought if anyone were stubborn enough to survive Rapture it'd be that mule."

Despite himself, Atlas found he echoed that sentiment. Even the strong died in Rapture, it all came down to luck and just how far someone was willing to go. Valery was a steely, imposing bitch that he wouldn't engage in a physical fight if given the choice – but unlike the two old dogs currently reflecting on her passing – she had a moral or two left by the end.

But they weren't here to reminisce over ghosts. "The kid told me something at least. The old girl got those Vita-Chambers up and running again…how long have they been dead?"

Business was easier, and it showed in how quickly Sinclair provided this answer. No flash of emotion or hesitation. "Since about the same time you clocked off for a while. Seemed like dear ol' Andy had them all shut down just before he croaked. Can't say he was the sanest of minds before the end. Who knows why the he did it."

There were pieces missing, but at least Atlas was getting pieces one at a time. He took another drink before looking for the next one.

"Had her hands in everything by the end, didn't she?" He remarked tiredly. "Ryan's little death-cheat chambers and Fontaine's 'power to the people'. You two certainly had no lack of business opportunities." That was a low remark. He knew it as he said it. Sinclair was about as low as they came, but Valery had never taken action without some intended kindness behind them. Yes, and just look at what good it did her.

"Hand this point to Ryan." Sinclair drawled and the sheer look of insult on Atlas's face caused the man to laugh as he snatched the bottle back into his hand. "Those Vita-Chambers brought our good sport Delta back from behind the pearly gates. I'd challenge a soul to find what good those power to the people machines did besides kick up more tension."

Then they'd served their purpose. Atlas thought viciously though found himself surprised by the level of anger behind the thought. Well, anyone would be angry after having it be suggested Ryan get a point for anything.

For once he managed to swallow down some of his spite and focus a bit more. "The girl also seemed to think Tate had a hand in killing her."

"Unsurprising." Sinclair replied flatly, taking a drink before he chose to go on. "Bet the old girl knocked the ditzy bitch down with her." There was a pause and then a look of derision on Sinclair's face as he lifted the bottle for Atlas to take back. So the cycle continued. "Just in time for that loon to step into the role."

Stanley. Now there was another headache Atlas tried to quell with a drink.

Sinclair filled in for his silence."That little fink was bad news from the start, keeping that override key to himself just to send us on a wild goose chase. If you felt like bleeding him for the trouble, I certainly won't gainsay ya. He brought it all onto himself." Sinclair's opinion was clear. A clean-cut certainty that Atlas had felt seconds before Delta stepped into stop him from bashing Stanley's head in. For what little good it had done them all. Atlas privately wished for that same certainty back.

It was almost cathartic in a sense.

Covering the worst of the landmarks they'd encountered in the past few hours over a drink. If things were less blood covered it might have been akin to taking a trip to the pub after a long day of work. Fighting Mcdonagh's used to be a fine place to get a drink, Atlas wondered how ruined that was as well. Better not to consider it and just remember it in better days.

If he ran his mind over the broken mess that had been the day prior he could put together the world just a bit more. He no longer wondered how sane he was for seeing ghosts nor did he wonder if Ava was truly alive. The answer to most of these questions seemed to be that they were all dead.

Anticlimactic sure, but rather all-encompassing an answer.

As he drank down another gulp of burning liquid his mind idly ran over the names and fit them neatly into a box where he could seal them up like coffins and let them die. Valery. Ava. Stanley-

Eleanor.

"What are we doing here, Sinclair?" He asked abruptly though his tone shifted none. Unwilling to let on how sharply his attention had focused.

When Sinclair scoffed and merely answered they were all stuck down here and trying not to die before reaching for the bottle, Atlas pulled it just out of reach. "What are really doing here, Sinclair?" He asked more slowly, letting the words settle. "I've never known you to be charitable, barely a team player at that – what are you doing cooped up in here with a bunch of brats and the icy broad?"

There was a small pause between them both, sizing the other up. Always waiting for the other to lie to them. "I know what you stand to gain." Same as Atlas really, freedom from this death trap. "But I don't know much else. What are you lot looking for?"

Again there was a shift in expression that seemed more guttural than he'd known Sinclair to be in the past. He dragged his fingers back through his hair, it was clear he'd been going to great lengths to try and keep it neat despite the circumstances. The struggle in the man's eyes was not looking for the clever words he needed to lie with, but seemingly the strength to say an honest word.

Much to Atlas's genuine disbelief he felt Sinclair was telling him the truth when he did find the words.

"It's a deal. A give and take. I get Delta to where he needs to be and he gets us where we need to be. Can't exactly do it alone." He was under no illusions as to how dead he'd be out in the open. Atlas could give credit to Sinclair for not being delusional. "Delta is an old model. Stanley's rantings were right about that much. He's a real old boy and those lot? They got one kid."

Atlas felt uncomfortable.

"They only get the one and if that kid dies or wanders off too far…"

Atlas felt sick. He stopped Sinclair from saying anymore, giving up information he usually would have clung to. "Eleanor."

The name seemed to take Sinclair off guard who fell silent for a beat. Then slowly understanding settled in and he sighed. "Yeah. Eleanor. The girls do like to talk about her, don't they?" He offered with a thin smile. "Yes. Eleanor is his little girl. Unfortunately, there's a minor dispute between who the kid actually belongs to. Her tin man or-"

"-Lamb." Atlas concluded with a heavy sigh. Slumping back against the train cart wall and pinching the bridge of his nose. "Yeah I fuckin' know her ma."

He just, shockingly enough, hadn't recalled Lamb had a daughter until Sinclair started down that path. He didn't much feel like thanking him for freeing up that memory.

Distantly he recalled the debate over what would happen to Lamb's child once she was locked away. If he really strained he remembered some sort of argument of his own.

Perhaps it was Moira.

She always cared so deeply for the wellbeing of children even before having her own. Perhaps she'd been the one flinging accusations around the treatment of the girl. How she would have loathed to see the things he'd done.

But he did it for them. For his family.

And it seemed Delta was doing the same. It wasn't hard to fit the pieces together. This Eleanor was connected to him. Delta needed to get her back.

Idly Atlas thought of the sub and the explosion. It felt strange to find himself genuinely wishing Delta would never experience anything like that.

They wouldn't get out of here till Delta was ready to go, so they had to find the girl. "Marvelous, a rescue mission. You must be so pleased, Sinclair. The closest you ever got to charity."

"It's strictly business."

"Sure." Atlas didn't bother pressing the matter. Say what he will, Sinclair didn't seem quite the same.

For a time there was silence between them. The bottle was getting dangerously low and Atlas did not fancy his chances getting Sinclair to open up a second time. Despite the animosity still crackling in the background between them, the silence was not an uncomfortable one. They were both equally tired and arguably terrible men taking a second to just breathe.

Then finally Sinclair asked a question Atlas barely had a response for. "You really aren't yourself, are you?" There was a stiffness behind the words that Atlas did not understand. "You really don't remember anything?"

"Pieces." Atlas responded on reflex. "It's coming back. Slowly." Really, agonizingly, fucking slowly.

Sinclair thought this over. Then sighed. "I ain't no doctor and I sure as hell won't be a shrink either but…I find it doesn't sit well with me laying blame on a man who don't remember what it is he did."

After a beat Sinclair growled under his breath, scratching his chin and cringing when he found himself in need of a shave. "Tenenbaum has been murmuring about it under her breath since you showed up. If it is right to hold someone accountable for crimes, they don't know they've committed. If they're still that same person."

Atlas wished Sinclair wouldn't speak but he made no attempt to stop him. Partly because the words settled deeply in his mind and offered some reprieve. He'd wondered all this himself. "Memories make us, don't they?"

"You always were more prone to spitting poetry weren't you, Augustus?" Atlas finally broke in with a snide smirk that he needed to force.

Sinclair took the hint and grunted as he sat forward, elbows propped on his knees and weary smirk that showed his age a bit more earnestly. "And you ought to be, 'voice of the people'."

"The voice was supposed to be strong, not poetic."

"What a tragedy. All those ladies swooning for good ol' Atlas fighting for them and he's not the slightest bit romantic."

A bark of laughter left Atlas that truly surprised him. A small bloom of amusement and maybe even a sort of sociability accompanying the words. It felt nice to laugh again. Even if it was with Sinclair.

No. his mind corrected easily. Sinclair has always amused him. In equal measure to how much he irked him. Atlas took this to be a good thing. Though that might have just been the scotch speaking for him.

Once his chuckling tapered off he heard Sinclair laughing too. It was nice that he did not find that annoying. Finally, he spoke again. "I don't suppose you intend to give me a crash course then?"

"Well, I don't have any good things to tell you about the past. So, I think I'll let it lie and see what you are like now."

Sinclair had secrets. Atlas knew that much. But he didn't press for the time being. However, he was…comforted. In a way. Augustus knew him and yet was willing to know him in a new light.

Atlas wanted that. A fresh start did not sound so bad.

And yet he started by drinking the last gulp of Sinclair's scotch that could have easily been split between them. He heard Sinclair make a sound of alarm and great displeasure only to smirk down at the man as he pulled the mouth of the bottle down, gulped with purpose and then licked his lips. Just to really nail it home.

"You're still an asshole." Sinclair accused in an irritated huff, snatching back the now empty bottle, and Atlas's smirk only widened.

Yes. A lovely new start to their partnership.