Hey guys, I'm back, thankfully not after three months this time. I have most of the next chapter written, I just need to tweak some things and then it'll be posted. It's somewhat short, like this one, but it'll be up hopefully before Thursday of next week. Thanks to everyone who stuck with this story despite my inconsistent update schedule!

"Who's Booker?"

Elizabeth stops, her heart racing at the name as she turns to look at her companion. "What?"

"Back at Cohen's," he explains, not quite looking at her as he steps over another dead Splicer. "You called me Booker when you tossed me that EVE capsule."

"I…" she sighs. "Yes, I did. Booker...was a friend of mine, a long time ago. He helped me in more ways than one...you kind of remind me of him, actually. He-he died, a couple of years ago. Drowned in an accident. I'm sorry, I-I'd really rather not talk about him. Please." It wasn't a lie, not exactly. She'd promised to stop lying to both herself and to Jack after they'd reconciled, but in order to fully explain the situation to him a lot of backstory would be needed, and that would mean revealing more of her past than she'd really care to. For now, the half-lie is enough.

To her surprise, Jack doesn't pry any further, simply nodding. "I'm sorry for your loss. I...I shouldn't have asked, sorry-"

"No, it's okay. It's-I've made my peace with it. I'd just rather not discuss it any further."

Jack nodded again. They continue on in companionable silence until they reach the entrance to Apollo Square. The gate has already been pried open, so entrance into the area itself is easy as pie. All that's needed now is to find Suchong's lab in the next thirty minutes before Jack's heart stops beating and kills him. Simple.

They make their way past various dead Splicers and piles of rubble before coming upon an overturned trolley car, which, while a nice change of scenery, doesn't actually hold many valuables aside from another first aid kit and a couple of dollars. They continue on their way, avoiding a Big Daddy without a Little Sister (Jack wants to follow him to a vent so they can rescue another girl, and Elizabeth, though she sympathizes, has to put her foot down). After a couple of minutes they come across a scaffolding of some kind, and it takes Elizabeth but a minute to realize that it's meant for hanging. She gulps loudly.

"Dear God…" Jack whispers, equally disturbed. "What happened to this place?"

"Apollo Square, or Rapture?"

Jack shakes his head, turning away ruefully. He doesn't grace her with a response.

It doesn't take them too long to reach Artemis Suites. Tenenbaum had said that Suchong's lab was on the second floor, so that's where they head. They fight a few Splicers here and there, but aside from that and the occasional low rumble of a Big Daddy somewhere far off, it's smooth sailing...something that endlessly worries Jack.

"This isn't right," she mutters. A quiet "hm" from Jack doesn't do much to soothe her nerves. "I'm serious, Jack. Something's up. All this time we've been in Rapture, it's been a constant fight for survival. We haven't had a moment's rest since we got here. But now everything's easy peasy? It doesn't add up."

Jack takes a moment to genuinely think about what Elizabeth is asking him. After a moment or two, he narrows his eyes and cocks his shotgun for emphasis. "Shit. You're right. It can't be this easy, not when we're so close. Something's coming, something big. We've got to be ready."

Elizabeth nods in agreement, glad she's finally gotten her partner's attention. She readies her own shotgun and notices that Jack is pulling out an EVE capsule to replenish himself. Elizabeth lays a hand on his arm, squeezing firmly.

"Wait, not so fast," she says. "I don't think we're in any immediate danger, and you refilled your EVE only thirty something minutes ago, which means that you have more than half left. We should save our supplies; we don't know when we'll be able to restock. If worst comes to worst, we'll have enough to defeat the bad guys but have none left over. Be on the alert but don't waste our ammo."

Jack nods again, frowning slightly. He lowers his weapon by the tiniest fraction, noticing that Elizabeth does not do the same. He wonders briefly what happened in her past that instilled into her the belief that she can't let her guard down for one second—but maybe it's just the nature of this place. He avoids the question for now, instead focusing on the uneasiness emanating from the both of them and the tension in the air; the anticipation and dread that usually accompanies surprises in Rapture.

He doesn't think he can take another Rapture surprise—after Big Daddy's, fire-wielding drug addicts, and lying, manipulative egomaniacs, he doesn't know what else this city could possibly throw at him, but he knows it won't be good.

He swallows the bile in his throat and follows Elizabeth through the endless tunnels and winding, abandoned hallways of Rapture. They walk in silence once more, letting the various sounds of the forgotten city fill the air—the occasional roar of water pouring in from a crack in the walls or ceiling, the deranged muttering and snickering of nearby Splicers, always hidden in the shadows, just out of sight. The only sound coming from themselves is the clacking of Elizabeth's high heels on the algae-infested floor as they make their way past another Big Daddy, who doesn't even spare them a glance as he bangs his fist on one of the Sister vents. Jack and Elizabeth stay for a second or two to see if a girl will emerge, but after the big, hulking creature moans pitifully and lumbers away, they shake their heads and continue on.

They come upon Suchong's lab soon enough, the place seemingly both unguarded and abandoned. The door hangs off its hinges, the bottom and middle singed black from fire-no doubt, before they knocked it off its hinges the splicers trying to get in tried to burn the door down. No such luck there, Elizabeth notes with a tiny amount of amusement as she realizes that despite the fact that the door is in danger of falling on them and has more than a few scorch marks, it's still mostly intact.

They pass through the threshold, careful to not disturb the door should it indeed fall. Elizabeth holds her shotgun in front of her, her finger already resting lightly on the trigger as she does a quick survey of the area. She doesn't find anything unusual-there's a security camera right around the corner which she's quick to shoot. Two shells from her shotgun make quick work of it, sending it skidding across the empty hallway to land in the far corner of the opposite side of the room. Other than that, aside from a Gene Bank hanging off the wall, the lab is almost completely bare. Elizabeth and Jack make their way through the halls, scouring the hallways and rooms for the last dose of the cure. They don't find it, but they hadn't been expecting too-it was a precaution, nothing more. They come across a couple of Splicers, something with oddly enough relieves Elizabeth-she had been getting far too uncomfortable with the silence of Rapture and the sense that something big was coming. They were only a couple of Thugheads, so the battle doesn't last long at all, but it still does wonders for her nerves. She confides as much to Jack, who nods and says, "Same, actually. But don't let your guard down. No doubt Fontaine has cooked up something particularly nasty for us. Whether that comes now or when we finally go to confront him is to be determined, obviously, but due to the lack of Splicers I'd say that he's ordered them to draw back for now. Probably rallying them for a boos fight of some kind."

"Well, naturally. I'm just saying it's a relatively good thing that it's not totally quiet, you know? Helps to kinda relieve the tension, shooting people in the face."

Jack raises an eyebrow. "There's a story there, I'm sure."

His partner rolls her eyes in exasperation. "Save the banter for later. We've got work to do in the present. We have about twenty minutes before your heart stops beating and you fall over dead. We need to find that cure. Come on."

"Such a buzzkill," Jack mutters as he follows her through the clinic. "Where's your fun side?"

A quick but sharp poke in the abdomen with her elbow is enough to shut him up.

They stumble across Suchong's lab not more than a minute later. The sight that greets them is one Elizabeth has seen before, and remembers well (and one she secretly and somewhat guiltily relishes). In light of recent events forcing her to return, she's mentally prepared herself for the sight that would greet her once she stepped into Suchong's lab. She had, however, neglected to mention this to Jack, who upon seeing the former doctor's corpse pinned to the desk by a rather bloody Bouncer drill, turns away and vomits on the floor next to an overturned chair.

Elizabeth winces, sympathizing, but steps back. The putrid smell of stomach acid fills her nostrils and she recoils, pushing down the contents of her own stomach at the smell.

"Come on," she says to him once he's finished. "The dose should be somewhere in this room. Let's start looking."

Jack nods wearily, slowly standing straight again and wiping the back of his hand across his mouth. "Right. The dose. Gahhh….what the hell did he do to invoke the wrath of a Big Daddy?"

Elizabeth doesn't even glance back at the unfortunate doctor as she helps to steady Jack. "In my experience, it doesn't take much."

They stop talking and split up to search various area of the room for any indication of any kind of vial of liquid that is hopefully the antidote to the mind control Plasmid. After about forty seconds of searching, Jack calls Elizabeth over to the far side of the room, where Suchong's workspace is. In his hand he holds a half-full vial of some sort of red liquid-no doubt it's exactly what they've been looking for. Elizabeth grins, coming to a stop next to Jack as she waits for him to down the thing.

He does so, although with some hesitance on his part, which she understands-after all, neither of them have any idea if this will be painful or not, or what it's going to do to his body. It turns out that some minor convulsions and a quick bout of screaming as his entire system is shut down and rewired is all that happens, something which the both of them are grateful for. Jack is leaning against the counter on his hands, recovering from the shock and pain when he feels it.

A slight breeze whispers past his forehead, cooling the beads of sweat that had gathered there. He looks up in shock, eyes wide as he looks for the source. Elizabeth starts next to him, putting down the notes she had been examining and looking at him with concern.

"Jack?"

"Do you feel that?"

"What?"

"Do you feel that. Over there." He points in the direction he thinks the breeze came from, and notices for the first time that there is a slight crack in the wall. No, not a crack, he realizes-it's a hidden doorway. "There's a breeze coming from that wall. There's a hidden door there."

Elizabeth pales, body going rigid. Jack doesn't comment, too preoccupied with his discovery to notice. "I...Jack, are you sure we have time for-"

"No. Probably not. But just a quick look, alright? One peek. I want to see."

His partner groans loudly, pushing her long hair out of her face-the ponytail was coming loose, Jack notes absently. "Do you remember the last time you said those words?"

"I do. But I promise I mean it this time, Liz. Just a peek. I won't touch anything, and the second you say we're going, we're gone."

"Jack," Elizabeth tries to protest, but even as the words leave her mouth, she knows it's a lost cause. When Jack wants something, it's hard to argue with him, especially when the two have already argued so much because of their stubbornness and pride. She sighs. "Okay. Okay, just one look. I...I already know what's back there, though," she admits quietly, turning her face away so Jack can't see.

At this, he stops, head snapping sideways to look at her. "What?"

"I've been there, here, before. Just…just one look. Then we're gone." She doesn't elaborate in the silence that follows, and after a few seconds Jack decides that she doesn't need to. He'll find out in a few seconds anyways. He nods and goes to open the crack further, digging his fingers into the opening and pulling to reveal a long hallway that leads to a giant window overlooking Rapture.

As they walk along the hallway, Jack notices Elizabeth growing more and more nervous. Whatever she's hiding, he thinks, whatever happened here...it must be bad. Really bad, if she's acting like this again. He shudders at the thought. He isn't sure what could be worse than what had already happened between them, but he doesn't really want to find out, either.

They reach the end of the hallway and come into a wide, open space that looks as though it used to be occupied by a bunch of smugglers. There are crates over in the corner of the room, stacked upon each other to make a pyramid of some sort, and there are discarded candy wrappers and food items scattered across that side of the room. Clearly, though, whoever had inhabited this area-smuggler or otherwise-has long since cleared out-upon further inspection the pair can see that most of the crates have been pried open and emptied of their contents, some of which have been discarded carelessly into a small heap at the bottom of the stacks. Oil cans, records, paint tubes, and various other household items that previous scavengers had deemed useless combine to make a pile no bigger than one of the ground level crates. Elizabeth kicks the pile for no particular reason, sending its contents scurrying out from beneath her vengeful heel.

Out of the corner of her eye, she spots Jack close by, gingerly lowering himself onto a crate and out of her line of sight; the crate is one of the few that had not had its contents pilfered, no doubt because it was labeled HOUSEWARE GOODS, and is thus mostly intact. He seems content to just sit there, watching as Elizabeth tries and fails to climb the mountain of crates to see if there is anything worth salvaging at the top. A comfortable silence fills the air as this continues for a few more minutes, and Elizabeth is just about to give up and suggest they head back when Jack makes a surprised little noise, like he's just realized something. Elizabeth stops, turning her head to look down at her partner curiously.

"Liz. Over there."

"What?"

"Over there. Look."

Elizabeth, belatedly, realizes that he's pointing at her-no, not at her, something past her-and she follows his finger to the middle of the room where, slumped against the window, the outline of a body no longer there can be seen in a puddle of blood. Her stomach sinks at the sight, and for once, she does not try to hide her face or her disgust from her companion.

"What do you think? Splicer? God, I hope it's not a Spider-wait, why...why are you looking at me like that."

She doesn't say anything, knowing that by doing so she's damning herself even further. But what else can she do? If she tells him, tells him everything he wants to know, then there's no going back. She's not sure she can make that commitment just yet. Not now. Maybe not ever. But she knows that that choice has already been made for her, and so she braces herself.

"Liz."

"I...Jack."

A pregnant pause. Then, "...Elizabeth. What else are you hiding from me?" He looks terrified now, as terrified as he had looked when she had told him about Sally. She doesn't want him to be terrified. Maybe he's not terrified for him. Maybe he's terrified for you. He shouldn't be. She doesn't deserve that.

"There's no Splicer, Jack. It's-there's no need to worry. Nothing's coming. We're safe for now-"

"-What...what are you talking about? There was clearly a body there some time ago. It's got to be a Splicer-can't be a victim, Splicers wouldn't bother with those unless they contained ADAM."

"Jack, it wasn't a Splicer. It was a corpse, and…" She braces herself, taking a deep, steadying breath. This is it, she thinks. No more hiding. No more lies. If you do this, you tell him everything. "It was a corpse, and the body's right here."

"...Elizabeth. Just tell me what you've hidden this time," he sighs, pushing his hair back from his face with an exasperated sigh. She winces at the bitter tone in his voice, but she can't help it-she had of course expected that he'd sound so resigned after finding out that she still hadn't told him everything. She would have felt the same way.

She's so weak. She can barely stand, let alone move, and if this whole adventure doesn't wrap up soon so she can get some rest she's going to collapse. Still, she summons up enough strength to climb down the mountain, stand in front of Jack (or somewhere in that vicinity), and weakly gesture to herself. At Jack's obviously confused expression, "Me," is the only thing she says. It's the only thing she needs to. Jack's face morphs from confused and oh-so-done with her bullshit to horror and disbelief.

There's silence for a long time, so long that Elizabeth wonders if this is it, this is what it's going to be like from now on-with him staring at her with this mix of utter disbelief and abject horror at the revelation that she-that she-

"You died."

Yeah. That.

"You died?" Even after being confronted with the evidence, Jack still doesn't seem to have wrapped his head around it. "But...but you're here. The Vita-Chambers? Wait, no. Those were tuned to my and Ryan's genetic frequencies. But then how-how…" He looks at her, confusion slowly replacing the previous look he'd had. "How?"

"I…" No more lying, she reminds herself firmly. No more tricks. Just tell him the truth. What you know. "It's a long story...I'm not sure where to begin," she admits, looking at him with remorse. Thankfully, some of his unease and general wariness has dissipated-no doubt because of Elizabeth's willingness to tell him the truth, and her obvious unwillingness to bullshit him any longer. "The beginning...it's a long time ago, and I'm not sure you would quite understand. It's...it's like I said before, when...when I was telling you about Atlas. About how I helped him. That's a part of it, actually. Jack…" she looks at him, seeing him bristle at the name Atlas and the mention of the situation. She'd rather not think about it either, but if she and Jack are going to make it out of this alive...if he's going to trust her completely, he needs to know. He has to know. "Jack, you are not going to understand one bit of this. And that's okay. I wouldn't either-to be frank, I probably wouldn't even believe it. But you need to know, that what I'm about to tell you...what you're about to hear? It's all real. I'm going to tell you everything, just like you wanted. But you have to listen. Okay?"

Jack is silent for about a minute before he looks at her again, and it takes her a moment to place the look-it's the same look he gave her before, when he had originally wanted to hear her story. She shudders just thinking about it, and for a brief moment wishes she had told him all this in the Sanctuary...or in the beginning. "Okay," he says, nodding, seeming strangely aware of her plight. "Okay."