Sophie woke up to an unfamiliar sound, and for a moment, she didn't know where she was. A part of her wanted to panic, but then she began to remember where she was and how she got there.
She was in her best friend's apartment. Around the middle of the day, after what was apparently a friend of her friend's showed up, she'd confronted the dirty blonde about her "sudden" appearance into Rachel's life and she learned the strangest tale she'd ever heard. She still wasn't sure that she believed it, but the way they'd each said the exact same tale with different words said that it wasn't rehearsed, and the look in their eyes said they actually believed what they said.
Rachel never believed her when she said that she saw something in a person's eyes. Said it was always something about their face, the way it tightens or loosens to make the various expressions rather than some change in the actual eye itself, but she saw something there. And when she saw them remember, there was a haunted look to them as they spoke, a pain in their eyes that was all too real for her.
The light in the apartment told her that it was probably early and her back told her she was lying on an unfamiliar couch and it took her a moment or two to remember that she'd brought Rachel home, as well as her friend Lizzy. As she remembered more of the day before, she decided she still wasn't sure about how true their story about how Rachel and Lizzy met was, though the fact that Rachel had never lied to her, and the fact that she'd pointed out that the story Lizzy had told her after her own disbelief (though, without details as if this sort of thing happened all the time, giving further credence to their story) was a complete and utter fake before backing up the earlier story from her own perspective made her really question whether it was truly true or not. Yeah, she didn't really believe it, didn't want to believe it, but they both at least appeared to believe it, and Rachel had never lied to her. Well, once or twice when they were younger about sensitive topics, and a few times when they were just joking around, but nothing even slightly close to as serious as they were making this out to be.
But then there was the oddness of Lizzy. That generalized thought brought up how odd Rachel had been the entire past week and with it all together, the idea made Sophie sigh deeply as she plunged into depression. Something had changed Rachel, that much was certain.
Back when they were growing up, Rachel was such a nice, air-headed girl that she couldn't possibly do anything but love her and love on her. She'd bought the other girl lots of little things, bars of candy, bottles of soda, the occasional thing that she really, really wanted (though that sometimes involved begging her parents to buy it for her so that she could give it to Rachel). When they got older, and she got a credit card all her own, and the two began to exercise together and often with her father, that had expanded to some video games, art supplies and the occasional meal from a fast-food place or a good diner (they'd found a lot of good places that way, though they did sometimes find places to warn others away from, whether bad or simply mediocre) and Rachel had slowly become less air-headed and more simply airy. And then came high school where they both started working at the same time to start getting money all their own and Rachel had confessed (well, blurted really. While she may act completely aloof at times, or really usually, she's really self-conscious and more than a bit of a worrier. She'd been afraid that Sophie would reject her, which in general is not an uncommon or unfounded fear, but one that was ultimately pointless - in this case at least - because Sophie hadn't been raised to be so judgmental, among other things) one day that she had figured out that she was actually bisexual, but leaning more towards girls.
After a second of thought, she had done what she felt was the correct course of action to help her worried friend: be encouraging, supportive, and tease the heck out of her best friend! After a day or two, of course, to keep from being mean about it. So, she'd replied with a simple and happy, "Alrighty. Just don't start flirting with me unless you tell me beforehand." Which had set her friend at ease so much that they hadn't stopped smiling about their solidified place in each others' lives until calculus. High-level algebra had been one thing, calculus was something so completely different that her mind hurt just thinking about it, and she was really lucky to have Rachel, who just instinctively knew just about everything about math once it was explained to her. So Rachel finished her homework in class and then taught her after school and life worked out well, especially when she ended up teaching Rachel about biology. I mean, come on, it's easy! Just remember that this is called that and they live here or there. And yet, Rachel's impressive memory failed her every time, and it was actually an honest thing, she wasn't purposefully forgetting just to be able to spend time with her, and that thought still put a smile on her face.
And then the smile faded as Sophie remembered how Rachel had acted the past week.
College was fun. It was like a better version of high school sometimes. Way harder at times, but also more fun at times. For her, it wasn't the stereotypical movie college experience, here she was learning to be a career fashionista, and it was so much fun! Rachel wanted to be an artist, and they got lucky in that their college offered both degree programs. Rachel was going for a minor in math, just for fun and so that she'd have something marginally useful, and they still held their previous jobs. But two weeks ago, they'd been given a break by the school. Spring break, which came at the same time as last year, and was just as cold then too. She'd agreed with Rachel to go look for someone to date for awhile, on the condition that Rachel did the same. 5 days away from each other to search and begin, and after that they'd keep each other apprised of how it went.
When those five days were up, she came over and visited, anxious to see what progress her friend had made. Rachel was happy, but shook her head when asked about prospects. Sophie had smiled and said that that was okay, as she hadn't actually found anyone either. They spent the rest of the day just hanging out in relative silence. They didn't have much to talk about that day, and just spent time in each others' presence, Rachel drawing something amazing-looking (though Sophie hadn't a clue what it was) while Sophie looked through a fashion magazine. Then they went to their jobs, Sophie at a lingerie shop (where she occasionally bought something in leather, because that stuff felt good) while Rachel went to the docks for her shift, afternoon till midnight.
Rachel's job of choice had surprised Sophie at the time she found out about it, but in hindsight probably shouldn't have. She was a stevedore, just another dock hand that helped the various ships unload cargo. For some reason, even in college selling underwear was still fun for Sophie, and Rachel said the harsh labor left her with a good feeling, a happy exhaustion at the end of the day.
But then the next day when she came over to visit, while Rachel's smile was bright, her eyes were dark, moody, and tired. Something happened to her, and Sophie didn't know what it was. And she knew that such a thing, if it's powerful enough, could change a person completely. The thought disturbed and scared her, that the woman she'd known her entire life could have been wiped out in a sense, could be destroyed and replaced without physically damaging the body that housed her.
Shit, she was getting metaphysical. She must really be tired, and very, very worried.
Today had been the first day back from break. As much of an effort Rachel put into acting normal, Sophie had seen right through it, and tried to give her friend the space to overcome it. She knew that just a week was not nearly enough to deal with whatever it was that had hurt her, but it had been enough to get her back into working shape, enough that most of their friends and teachers at school wouldn't notice.
But in that first day especially, and all the other times before class she'd checked on her best friend, she'd seen a look in her friend's eyes that reminded her of several of her father's friends. Mostly military men who'd gone through the Army's boot camp and then been thrust onto the battlefield. They had come back from that with scars she never saw with her eyes, except in theirs. To see them remember, to see those, often expressive, friendly eyes grow hard and pained always hurt her deeply. Part of the reason she'd begged Rachel not to go through even Reserve Officers' Training Corps to get the money for college, even though she already had a good job going for her, when she'd expressed her lack of personal opposition to the idea. Sophie hadn't wanted her friend to be put into such a position that could cause such pain.
And yet, she'd been there anyway. And there was nothing Sophie could do about it.
There was a knocking at the front door and Sophie jerked up straight. Who would be knocking on Rachel's door?
Before she could do much more than blink at the thought of someone knocking at her best friend's door, and the follow-up surprise thought that anyone other than her might knock on Rachel's door was unlikely, Lizzy had breezed in and opened the door in a rush, an oddly flustered look on her face. She opened it and asked, "Who is it?" Then she saw who it was, and her entire body language shifted, darkness chasing away the frenetic mood she'd had before. "Oh, it's you." Then it shifted again as a thought struck her. "You're a doctor! You can help!" And then proceeded to drag whoever it was off to (presumably) Rachel's room as Sophie was getting up. She didn't manage to see who it was, as she'd been standing up while Lizzy took off, so she sleepily shuffled over to Rachel's Room.
The scene before her (which was preceded by a shout of "Fix her!") was not quite what she expected to see when she got there.
Lizzy was gesturing in Rachel's general direction, who happened to be on the room's three seat hide-a-bed couch (for some reason, Rachel sometimes found it easier to create art with something solid against her, like the back of a couch or her own self reading next to her best friend), sleeping soundly, while the person she assumed to have been at the front door, a woman who appeared to be middle-aged, like late 30's, with brown hair and a severe, though tired and exhausted expression, stood next to her, on the opposite side of Rachel from Lizzy. She wore a simple outfit, brown jacket over white dress shirt and an ankle-length brown, slightly plaid skirt. When she spoke, she had a solid German, maybe Austrian, accent that didn't obscure her solid grasp on English but did flavor it quite a bit. "And what, precisely, am I supposed to be fixing? I am not a doctor."
"You are a doctor, Mama Tenenbaum." Lizzy said, a plaintive note appearing in her determined voice. "Just the kind of doctor I need right now. She won't wake up!"
Wait, what? "Mama" Tenenbaum? Wasn't her last name Silvesterson? Like Spots?
"And why is it that you assume that I can help you?"
"Because she's a Protector!" She said with finality, as if that made all the sense in the world.
Maybe to them, it did. And that was apparently all this Tenenbaum woman needed, as comprehension dawned on her face and she began her examination.
Sophie just watched impassively - 'Well, passively,' her sluggish mind corrected. 'Impassive means not passive, which means active... sort of' - as the woman's face became less severe and annoyed, less like an overtired mother dealing with a demanding child, and more like a person with a curious mind provided with a challenge. She was still annoyed, but she bent down to examine Rachel anyway. After a few moments of going through the basic checklist every doctor she's ever met go through, checking pupil dilation, pulse rate, and relative temperature, she straightened and said, "She is just asleep."
"Then why won't she wake up?" Lizzy asked impatiently.
"How long has it been since her Little One has been away from her?"
Lizzy had an annoyed look on her face and opened her mouth to speak. Then she paused, eyes narrowed a little in worried thought as her lips settled into a small frown. "I, I don' know. A week, maybe?"
"That would be enough." "Mama Tenenbaum" said, whatever adrenaline that had been there draining as she became tired once more, though satisfaction did show on her face at having found the proper conclusion. "She has fallen into a coma. A little bit of ADAM should wake her, though," She paused, regret coming over her face. "I do not have any of my reserves on my person, having neutralized them years ago." She gave a rueful smile. "I thought it best, considering ADAM's effects, and my personal grievance with the substance and what it can do."
"Well, that's okay." Lizzy said, relief coming over her face with a sunny smile. "I'm her Little One. That means that I have ADAM. Especially ADAM tuned to us." From somewhere behind her on Lizzy's person, she produced a gigantic needle filled with an oddly glowing red substance that really should have surprised Sophie a whole lot more, just as her stabbing Rachel in the heart should have surprised her more. A little bit of the red substance was injected into Rachel, and a moment after the needle was pulled back, Rachel's breathing changed. A moment later, a yawn was produced and the other woman stirred, a smile coming over her face as she began to wake up. Some days she woke up instantly, while others she took some time to warm up and get moving. Sophie knew this from their numerous sleepovers, and other times of being neighbors when she'd had to come over and physically pull her out of bed. Today seemed to be one of the latter days, where Rachel would need a little time to wake up, but she would be waking up soon. Since whatever crisis was happening seemed to be over, why not ask what's going on?
"So, anybody wanna explain what's going on?" Sophie asked drily.
They went from their relatively relaxed positions to stock straight at the sound of her voice. Lizzy suddenly looked guilty, like a kid with her hand caught in the cookie jar, while the Tenenbaum woman simply looked mildly surprised. She got the feeling that she wasn't only "mildly" surprised, but that she'd had a good deal of self-training in keeping a straight face.
Made her wonder what the woman had been through.
Lizzy was the first to react. "Oh, uh, Sophie. What are you doing up so early?"
Sophie gave a deadpan look to hide her further confusion. "Early? Isn't it, like, 6 PM?"
"Actually, it is six in the morning, friend." Tenenbaum said faux-casually.
Sophie blinked. "Wait, what?" She shook her head, willing herself to not be distracted. "What is going on? Who is she?" She asked, pointing at Tenenbaum.
"Doctor Brigid Tenenbaum." Lizzy said succinctly. "Highly gifted geneticist with a brilliant mind for puzzles and experimentation, who wanted to find out how DNA worked. She's here to fix Rachel." She finished just as professionally short as she'd started.
"You didn't tell me what's going on." Sophie pointed out angrily. "And what's up with the whole 'Mama Tenenbaum' thing anyway?" Sophie asked, really starting to wake up now.
"Because," Rachel said, obviously still very much asleep, but conscious as shown by her moving her legs to sit up and prepare to stand, eyes still closed. "Doc Tenenbaum is the one who created the Little Sisters in the first place." She started to stand, but then crumpled onto her face with a thud as her still unawake limbs refused to hold the weight of her body. "Ow." She said deadpan into the carpet.
Now, the thought occurred to Sophie that she could probably learn more about whatever was going on by asking Rachel directly, but by the time that thought actually happened across her brain, she was already shaking her head and moving Rachel back onto the couch and sitting next to her, whereupon Lizzy sat on the other side. The next thing she registered was Rachel gently shrugging her off so that she could get a better look at Tenenbaum.
Which, given her blearily tired state, took awhile, both to get Sophie to stop hovering in a touching way and to get a proper look at the haggard older woman. But once she managed it, she sucked in a near-silent gasp and looked very much awake and sympathetic.
"Jeez, Brigid, what hell'd you go through?" She asked tiredly.
"Rapture." She said succinctly, a slight smile tugging at her mouth as if she'd mentioned an inside joke. "The Germans were much better hosts than the Splicers ever were." A tired smile appeared on her face, small but there. "At least I made up for my sins slightly, as I rescued Doctor Porter before Minerva's Den's destruction."
Rachel smiled back at her. "Good on ya then."
Sophie looked at her best friend with a very confused and lost look on her face. "Who-?"
"Doctor Charles Milton Porter, PhD." Rachel said in return, looking her friend in the eye. "He was an electrical genius who actually managed to design a living, working, almost breathing AI using 1950's technologies, plus a little extra. However brilliant the man was, he also had an unbuyable conscience and thus occasionally pissed off the people around him for being so unwilling to sell out one way or another. Mostly just his coworkers, like Reed Wahl, who happened to be his partner, and a devil of a psychologist named Sofia Lamb." She gave a slight shudder at the mention of the woman's name. "Never liked the woman, she was spiteful and thoroughly manipulative. Even managed to create a cult based upon her daughter, who was unwilling to fill the post the woman had created for her." A dark and dangerous look appeared in Rachel's eyes for a moment before she shook her head, casting such thoughts far away.
"How'd you know that?" Sophie asked. There was something in Brigid's eyes that told her that she didn't expect Rachel to know that.
Rachel shrugged. "I knew the guy. And his cat Turing, and his project, The Thinker. And, to a certain, distant point, his partner. Reed wasn't a happy guy, he was greedy and jealous." She stretched her arms straight up until a "pop" sound came from her back and she let her arms drop to her side limply with a sigh. Then she shook her head tiredly, trying to wake herself up as she wiped at her eyes. "Man, I still..." She said as she tried fighting off a yawn, though she gave in in the end.
Brigid came over and steadied Rachel's woozy head before pulling out a penlight and shining it in and out of her eyes for a few seconds. She hummed, and then declared her prognosis.
"You have a severe case of fatigue." She said with an authoritative nod.
What?
Rachel apparently echoed her sentiments as she asked with a rather confused look on her face, "Um, how, exactly, does that equate to 'near-coma state'?"
"Because you have completely run out of EVE. You have been operating off of nothing but fumes, and that has contributed to how close you are to succumbing to your coma." Brigid said, sympathy creeping into her voice.
Sophie looked at the 'doctor' with a look of utter confusion. What did she just say?
"Well if that's all!" Rachel said, suddenly looking very relieved. "I should just go take a swim." She finished with a smile. "So! What's for breakfast?"
Now Sophie was looking at Rachel like she'd grown a second head. She couldn't help it, she just didn't know what the hell they were saying!
"I'll go get some Taco Bell." Lizzie announced as she stood up. Then she pointed at Rachel with a severe expression. "But you get to clean up my mess."
Rachel looked surprised at that. "But it's your mess."
"Made around your friend." She pointed out reasonably. "I don't know her well enough to clean it up properly."
Rachel shot her a dirty look. "You make too much sense sometimes, you know that?"
Lizzie smiled back brightly in an "I know" kind of expression before she bounced out, and Sophie heard the door open and shut. Then she turned to Rachel who was currently shaking her head.
'One of these days.' Rachel swore vaguely to herself. 'One of these days, I'm gonna get my revenge on that girl properly!' She thought about nodding in affirmation of her oath, but then decided against it. Part of it was that she had a good friend she hadn't seen in a long, long while to see too, and any questions she might have as well.
And after what Lizzy just pulled, knowing full well that Sophie was likely listening to most of it, there would be a lot of questions.
She turned to her friend and paused for a moment, just drinking in the sight of her one friend that she'd always had for as long as she could remember.
"What?" Sophie asked agitatedly, obviously unnerved by her lack of talking.
"I'm sorry, it's just..." She paused, hesitated, then plunged forward. "It's just been so long. I know it doesn't seem like it right now, but I haven't seen you in ten years." She tried to hold herself back, but gave up and lunged to grab her friend in a very close hug, and succeeded. She didn't care that the world was swirling like a whirlpool right now, or that she might crush the other woman, she just cared that her friend, sometimes only confidant, was here in her arms once more, after so very long.
She took in a slow, shaky breath, and let it out slowly as she buried her face in the other woman's neck, breathing in her scent and glorying in her softness. "I missed you Sophie. So much." She breathed out. A part of her mind said that she was probably close to tears. The rest of her said "go to hell, this is Sophie. She deserves our tears. She is ours and nobody else's!"
The next thing she knew, she was blinking water out of her eyes, listening to drips hitting wooden floor. She looked up and saw Sophie's relieved face and gave an inquisitive one of her own.
"You fell asleep after you grabbed me." Was Sophie's response.
Her eyebrows shot straight up. "I had a nap attack?" She asked incredulously.
"It would appear so." Tenenbaum's amused voice came from her left.
Face burning hot enough to light her on fire (though part of her wished she was on fire, easier to deal with), she buried her face in Sophie's neck and shirt for a moment longer, breathing it in before she eased up on her grip and slowly let go, leaning back to allow the other woman her own freedom.
That's when she noticed that Sophie was glaring at her (not very powerfully, but still), and her shirt was soaked. As was her hair.
Then it hit her that she was soaked, and what probably happened to cause that, and her smile turned really sheepish. "Sorry Soph. I just," She paused, trying to find the right words.
Sophie cut her off with a hesitant smile and patted her on the shoulder. "It's alright."
"Your choice in weapons seems to have been fortuitous, Little One." Doc Tenenbaum said, the way she spoke confirming in her mind that the 'good doctor' knew that Lizzie had been a Little Sister, while praising her for some as yet unknown reason. "Seeing how much color has returned to her face, I'd say that some of her EVE has returned, enough to survive her the entire day, at least, but the food you've brought back should help as well."
Rachel noticed as Sophie's face went edged and a little angry at her own confusion. "You said that earlier, and again just now." She noted out. "Just what, exactly, is EVE?"
"You remember that horror story back in High School about that middle schooler who nearly killed himself on a few energy drinks?" Rachel asked. She knew Sophie would know the one. There weren't that many stories about energy drinks, and this one she'd heard from Sophie.
A look of concentration came onto Sophie's face as she tried to remember. Hesitantly, she nodded. "Yeah, he was a friend of one of my friends. A full can of Monster and a half can of Spike before classes, the first class of the day had a five minute run at the beginning, and when he emulated a few nearby girls and got the teacher to check how his heart was beating, you could see it practically leaping out of his chest faster than a Leopard's land speed, and sent him to the nurse's office. End of class, he was still there, so he went to his next class. It also had a five minute run, but this one he ran for awhile, then crashed in the middle. Practically gave himself a heart attack from the crash, and I think he was sent to a hospital."
Rachel nodded. That's the one. "Now imagine a drug that could give that same energy, but safely, and over the entire day rather than in an hour-long burst. That's EVE. It allows for stronger and more efficient mental structure-" She cut herself off. Took a breath, and started over. "Okay, let's be honest here, I don't know enough about it to continue there, other than 'it works'." She looked Sophie in the eye. "Here's the basic gist of it, in proper Layman's Terms:
"EVE is a superdrug. Steroids are a very mild version of a superdrug, because they help encourage strength, but not directly. They are artificial hormones, Testosterone in particular. The more testosterone you have, the more muscle you can easily produce and use. They don't actively increase your strength, but they do help build muscle size and density, which does increase strength and durability."
"Yeah, we know that from Health Ed in Middle School." Sophie mentioned, nodding, though obviously confused as to where exactly this was going.
"Well, a powerful superdrug version of a powerful steroid, one that can do things for muscles the way EVE can for mental alacrity and activity, would do that instantly. As in, you take it, and you can feel and watch as your muscles grow big and hard in minutes or even seconds."
Sophie's eyes went wide. Rachel casually leaned over and eased her mouth shut with a near-inaudible click from her teeth coming together. Then she thought about it for a second, before deciding, and then opening it back up, letting it stay slack, and then shoving one end of a quesarito into her friend's mouth before picking up a smaller chicken quesadilla for herself.
Sophie jerked back, startled at having the burrito/quesadilla shoved into her mouth unexpectedly before giving her friend a dirty look and grabbing it before she began to chew.
"You see Sophie," Lizzie began, and Rachel smiled. She knew that when Lizzie explained, it was always either highly thought out and scientific, or entertaining. Often both. "EVE was made in a place where Superscience, as Rachel called it, ran rampant. It may have been 1959 to them, but they still had automated doors in an underwater city where the only rule of measure was how much you could make with your own two hands. Given how happy energy drinks made people here, it was only logical that someone would come up with something to make waking up to coffee easier and more efficient." Lizzie said, very much acting the part of the disinterested scientist like Tenenbaum was once or those strange Lutece people were. Simple, efficient, and as if what you were saying had absolutely no affect on the local reality. She took a bite of her own burrito before setting it down and then specifically waiting until Rachel took a bite of the Quesorito she'd provided for her protector. Then Lizzie grabbed her shoulder, and then slammed a hand into the middle of Rachel's back, creating a near-horrifying grating/popping sound coming from the bigger woman's back as her chest popped out, and Sophie's eyes tried to follow.
Lizzie was then given a slightly dirty (but mostly hurt-ish) look by Rachel as she swallowed and said, "Lizzie! Not while I'm eating, remember?"
"Yeah, well, you know you don't like it when your back locks up, and how easy it is for that to happen when I do not do that often enough."
"And did we ever figure out when 'often enough' actually is?" Rachel asked, mouth full of food.
Lizzie pretended to think about it before sunnily shaking her head and saying, "No, I just like the sound."
Rachel gave a low, food-filled grumble that sounded suspiciously like "bitch" before tearing back into her food.
"One of the odder things about EVE is that it can be generated by our bodies." Lizzie continued. "I mean, yeah, 'most everything in Rapture had it somewhere in the chemical makeup once it was discovered, which added an odd taste to it, but after awhile, once we'd had enough of it, we started generating it while being like normal people and simply collecting calories from the food and drink to use. It even happened when food brought in from outside of Rapture was eaten, so it's quite a thing. Heck, it even happens when we smoke!"
"Actually," Rachel pointed out around a mouthful. "I think the smoking EVE was a completely different process."
Lizzie paused, pulled a large sip of caffeinated soda from her cup, swallowed as she made a thoughtful face, and nodded. "Yeah, probably." She then munched a large chunk out of her burrito.
For a moment, there was silence as everyone, including a bemused doctor Tenenbaum, munched on their brunches.
Then Sophie spoke up. "Okay, I get most of what you said." She began. "Well, sorta. But, what I don't get is how a bucket of water would be fortuitous?"
"Oh!" Lizzie exclaimed before swallowing the food in her mostly-full mouth. "See, EVE was made with a whole bunch of other 'superdrugs', some marketed as active weaponry, called 'Plasmids', while others were more passive in nature, like the ability to move faster or have a sport-y physique or be smarter, and those were called 'Tonics', and Mama Tenenbaum assumed, and correctly I might add, that Rachel has one of the rarer tonics in her system. It's called 'The Fountain of Youth', and what it does is, whenever you're in water, be it rain, or under a leak, or just soaking in the tub or a puddle on the ground, you're generating EVE. If you're underwater, that means you basically have an unlimited supply of EVE, which can then be used to activate a Plasmid with little regard to conserving EVE for later use or to battle fatigue." She said sunnily, smiling as if she were a ray of sunshine suddenly broke through the grotto to Rapture. "And that is just absolutely super useful, especially down in Rapture after it started leaking."
Sophie nodded for a bit, then the motion caught a little, as if she'd thought of something. "Wait, Rapture?"
Rachel nodded. "Yeah, that's the name of the underwater city. Supposedly made after world war two, but there was never a mass disappearance of scientists in our history, so I think it's safe to say it happened in a different timeline or universe-thingy." She added parenthetically. "Also, you never want to go there. Too 'laissez faire' for ya, and the later years are zombie-level insanity."
"Okay, I know we learned that in U.S. History, sort of, but what does that term mean again?" Sophie asked, looking only somewhat more informed than she was some minutes before.
"'Laissez Faire' is french for 'Free Market'." Rachel started simply. "In business, that is essentially the law of the jungle, the strongest get stronger, and the weak don't get any help, and there wasn't much in the way of market regulation, and monopolies on individual lines of business were common back in the gilded age. Now, while being self-sufficient is not illegal, buying out everyone else and making it impossible for anyone else to sell what you're selling is illegal, in this day and age at least. Back in Rapture, however, there was zero governmental regulation, of any sort. Which means, as long as you didn't go beyond the basic rules of cordiality, you basically had free reign within what your money allowed."
"It also means that stuff established after world war 2, like human experimentation, with or without informed consent, was also a perfectly legal business practice down there." Lizzie chipped in before wolfing down a huge bite from a taco.
"If it worked, it was used." Rachel finished the thought before eating an entire quarter of her "fake taco/pizza" (which was actually small enough that she could do that, and was surprisingly tasty). Then she paused and savored the bite while they allowed Sophie to absorb and reconcile all the information they'd just thrown at her. Then she looked over at Lizzie and asked (after swallowing), "How'd you even pay for all this?"
Lizzie took a moment to swallow before saying, "Oh, I just stole your credit card and ordered most of the stuff on the menu."
Rachel snorted and smiled as she playfully hit the younger and smaller woman on the shoulder. "Scamp." she said affectionately, remembering the fact that things had never really gone in a way that would allow Lizzie to have a wallet of her own without serious questions until well after the two had met, so she'd always had their money in her wallet and other hiding places, and was usually the money person of the pair even after she'd gotten Lizzie her own wallet and camel purse, much to their shared amusement, and she had explained the concept of credit cards to Lizzie (as well as the drain that her best friend had put on them, which was as much a reason to have a job as 'most anything else she had). And so they resumed to contented silence.
After a few more moments and bites, Sophie spoke up again. "So how does Miss Tenenbaum fit into all this? And what does she do?"
"Okay, quick background." Rachel said around a burrito bite, before thumping her chest to try and clear any blockages before swallowing. "Now, this is mostly my assumptions based off of what I've heard, but she survived Nazi Germany by being a worse monster than the monsters who cowered behind Hitler, like Tuskeegee and Mengele, and that's a big part of what got her noticed in Rapture. Eventually, she got contracted by a real Bronx Sewer Rat by the name of Frank Fontaine. She worked for him awhile, and then she saw a guy at the docks playing catch when she knew he'd had his hands crippled sometime world war 2. That gave her ideas, and one things led to another. Human experimentation followed after all that science on the slugs themselves, which were shown to secrete a substance they later called "ADAM". See, ADAM was the basis for the biggest stuff everywhere in Rapture, and I do mean everything, as it influenced every single part of the place after it's discovery and distribution. In the human body, it created stem cells, you know those basic building blocks of cells everywhere in our body because a muscle cell is just a muscle cell, but a stem cell can become any cell at all. And those ADAM-created stems tended to replace damaged tissues, thus creating a healing effect, like on the guy I mentioned a little bit ago. In the lab at the beginning stages, it gave rise to EVE, which was quickly incorporated into pretty much everything edible or used in the digestive tracts, or just injected straight. In other experiments, it showed ability to influence machines, though I am still unaware of the process there, as it's a liquid, and those don't tend to mess with data directly. That's how The Thinker came to be, by the way." Rachel mentioned parenthetically.
"But the real stuff that ADAM inspired was Genetic Manipulation." Lizzie said, a serious look coming onto her face.
"How does that have anything to do with Tenenbaum?" Sophie asked, looking very confused.
"I believe they are getting to that." Brigid said, tired face looking amused.
"And why aren't you telling the story?" Sophie rounded on the scientist.
"Because I am amused at their way of telling the story." She said simply. "And it is not exactly a tale I like to repeat."
"And part of that is because her specialty in the Death Camps was to try and figure out the mysteries of Human Genetic Code, so technically she has a PhD in the subject." Lizzie added in. "And the less said about those the better. I may have a screwed up mind from the Little Sister Orphanage, but I am still intelligent enough that my brain can come up with those images on its own without help."
Sophie made a face, and then paled. Rachel nodded. "Yeah, just as bad as Tuskeegee and Mengele, or whatever sci-fi mad scientist you can think of, but in real life. However, that is not what we're going to talk about. See, in the Camps, Tenenbaum thought the scientists there were basically mindless brutes, similar to how a proper, mind-expanded scientist might think of a guy who specializes so completely in plastic surgery and the related sciences to the point of complete exclusion of everything else to be completely plebian." She grimaced at her word choice, then decided there was no helping it without a better word supplied by her resident dictionary (Lizzie). "Or something like that. See, the guys there were only focused on Aryan features. So, blond hair and blue eyes with a side-order of specific shapes and facial features, along with flawless pale skin. But Tenenbaum had the right idea, especially in that she focused on the bigger, more important picture, from a genetic standpoint at least." Rachel straightened. "Now, we here in the twenty-first century know that this is basically a bunch of hocus-pocus, but she wanted to see if there were genetic markers to differentiate whether a person is born strong or weak, smart or stupid, that kind of thing. She researched it pretty extensively, and I neither want, nor need, to know her findings or how she found them. But that work got her noticed."
As Rachel picked up a taco for a big bite, Lizzie took up the narrative. "When she got to Rapture, Life and Science both happened. Due to her being about as heartless as the rest of the people picked up for Rapture Sciences, she got along relatively fine, and found work relatively quickly. A while after that, she found out about a slug that can help heal."
Rachel swallowed and added in her two cents worth on that subject. "It was a guy, a dockhand she knew had crippled hands from the war, and he was happily playing catch with his buddies, even though it should've been impossible."
"So she asked him if he still had the slug, which he did, asked him if she could have it, which he agreed to, and she began to study it." Lizzie finished. "After that, it was working for a guy who never cared about anyone but himself and what others could do for him, who knew how to appear to care, that led to the rest. The creation of the Little Sisters was Fontaine's idea." Lizzie paused for a second, then fixed her statement. "Well, the 'human host' idea was Brigid's. The idea of only using young girls, maybe aged about 10 years old, that was Fontaine's. Add in some brainwashing, and you have mobile platforms for producing and, to certain extent, refining and reprocessing, ADAM."
The sick look on Sophie's face was pretty much expected, but she toughed it out and swallowed it before asking, "And the genetic manipulation?"
"Splicing in Plasmids and Gene Tonics, which were all made from ADAM." Rachel said simply.
"Of course, there were problems." Lizzie added in.
"Well, I think we can agree that near-instant addiction, leading to numerous attempts, and successes, to cannibalize the Little Sisters, walking ADAM Factories that they were, is something of a problem, wouldn't you say?" Rachel added in slightly sarcastically.
"Hey, it wasn't near-instant addiction." Lizzie disagreed.
"Oh?" Rachel smirked, a questioning eyebrow raised. "And how so?"
"It depends upon multiple factors including how much you spliced that first time, psychosomatic reaction to the rush, and how often you spliced." Lizzie said matter-of-factly.
"So, it could have been instant addiction." Rachel pointed out reasonably, smiling smugly.
Lizzie gave Rachel a dirty look before sighing, defeated. "I suppose, yeah, if you had a powerful enough dose for your first splice, then yes, you could become addicted on your first splice."
"Why would you want to 'splice' in the first place?" Sophie asked, looking very sick and reminding the duo that their friend was still in the room.
Rachel put on a thoughtful look. "Well, plenty of reasons. Some obvious stuff for criminal reasons, Plasmids for self-defence or to actively attack someone else in a world without professional-made weapons other than stuff smuggled in, Tonics for various reasons, including affecting a look of physical fitness with SportsBoost or getting smarter with Brain Boost, getting tougher and stronger with SportsBoost and Armored Shell, getting what seem to be supernatural defenses like Electric Flesh to cut damage from electricity or Electrical Storm to let out a shock when hit with a melee attack of some kind like getting punched or hit with a pipe or a wrench or a flashlight. And that's not even counting the more esoteric splices, like getting cat DNA to have cat eyes, which I've seen, or Anti-TB, which is a Tuburculosis inoculation tonic." She paused to think of some of the other tonics she'd heard of or seen ads for. "Slim-Down is pretty self-explanatory, while ReJuva is basically Botox, but full-body, and Fresh Hair is basically Rogaine. And then there's the drug-related reasons, like the incredible high that comes with splicing, or the occaisional idiot junkie like you'd see in that newer game, Remember Me, who gets addicted to memories."
"How do you get addicted to memories?" Sophie asked confusedly.
Rachel shrugged. "Not sure. In Remember Me, it's probably something to do with the wiring and the way the data of Memories interacts with the human brain, especially with outside memories that don't belong to you. For Splicing, I'm not sure there either. Maybe it's the exact same reason through a different medium, as the way it does it is, when Adam is recycled, it pulls along the memories of the person it was in at the time, latent chemicals imprinting on the ADAM, I think, and that carries those memories over to the next person to use that same ADAM."
Before she could go any further in her explanations, her phone went off, blaring an alarm sound, which startled everyone there. Rachel turned off the alarm, but then her eyes widened near-comically when she saw what it was saying. "Shit! Gotta get to work!" She rushed off to grab her leather jacket and work boots from her room and then sped out the door before anyone could say anything else, somehow not slamming the door on the way out, her footfalls fading rapidly from the ears of those in the apartment, which is partly because of natural stealth, and partly because of the Wrench Lurker Tonic she'd had spliced once. As she reached the street, she was about to jump into her car but realized two things: She didn't have keys on her person (or maybe she did and didn't realize it), and that wasn't her car in her spot, but Sophie's.
With a slightly aggrieved sigh, she set herself to running as fast as she could to the docks without working up too much of a sweat. Oddly enough, or perhaps not so oddly, given the SportsBoost and SportsBoost+ in her system, she made it just in time to clock in and get to work.
Meanwhile, back at the apartment, Lizzie looked at the door with amused bemusement clear on her face. This peaceful reverie was broken moments later when Sophie, who was finally coming out of her horrified funk from the implications of what Rachel had said at the end to try and wrangle one last piece of information before her brain gave out on her.
"Lizzie, why did you splice?"
Lizzie was understandably surprised at the sudden question, but did her best to answer truthfully. "I never actually spliced. Not intentionally anyways." At Sophie's inquisitive look, Lizzie reluctantly continued. "I'm a Little Sister, or I was. The job of a Little Sister is to collect old ADAM, reprocess it through methods best left for another conversation, and then give it back to the people who sold it in the first place, thus recycling it effectively. In the process, however, the remnants of memories and splices in the ADAM I extracted were left behind, especially in the bits of ADAM that never came back out properly. So while I never actually spliced, technically speaking, I still have a few Plasmids and Tonics at my disposal. Incidentally," She continued as an aside. "I am actually smart enough, and a big enough producer of ADAM, to create my own useful Plasmids and Tonics, drinkable or injection-based. Meanwhile, as for Rachel..." She paused, a sad look coming over her face. Then she sighed and finished her thought. "I just, I just didn't want her to die. So I kept her from dying as best I could with whatever Tonics and Plasmids I thought would help her stay alive, like Armored Shell to allow her to tank the damage she wasn't fast enough to dodge, SportsBoost to keep her fast enough and agile enough to dodge in the first place, Wrench Lurker to keep her quiet and stealthy, an old homemade one I call Anti-Hypnosis to stop Plasmids like Hypnotize Big Daddy and Enrage from affecting her or stuff like Lot 185 from Suchong's work, basically making it work like Lot 192 from Suchong's work, which is an antidote to the Mind Control Plasmids designed by the chinaman and both were commissioned by a con man named Frank Fontaine. Other than that, I just gave her the weapons I thought were appropriate to defend herself, which, if I'm honest with you, was also meant to protect me as well."
"What do you mean by that?"
Lizzie sighed once more. "As Rachel mentioned, Little Sisters were heavily predated upon. Yes, there were a few pedophiles, as she once called them, hunting around, but mostly they were ADAM hunters, splicers crazed enough by their addictions and withdrawals that they were willing to brave a Big Daddy's wrath to try and steal some precious ADAM from a Sister. Big Daddys, they were basically heavily spliced with things like Armored Shell and were huge hulking tanks encased in leather diving suits, designed to soak up damage in the defense of their bonded Sister. I outlived at least three or four Big Daddies assigned to me, the longest living almost 4 months protecting me, but Rachel? She was never actually bonded to me, but chose to protect me and did so for close to a decade. The first few splices I gave her were to make her into a psuedo-Big Daddy, basically living only to protect me, but later, I just wanted her safe and happy." She stopped herself, knowing Rachel probably wouldn't want her to break her best friend.
But Sophie had one last question for her before her mind gave out. "That time, yesterday, where you and her were in a bad part of town, that was all your time in Rapture over the course of the past week, wasn't it?"
Lizzie looked over at her possible new friend, inquisitiveness sharp in her eyes, and nodded. "Yes, we were together in the Rapture Civil War, and if she didn't have my back, I'd be dead. And so would she."
With that, Sophie paused for a moment before standing abruptly, saying "I need to think about this." and heading out the door after putting on tennis shoes for a walk.
So, sorry about the info-dump, especially to those of you who have actually played the first and second Bioshock games. But some people haven't played them, and there's at least some info here that is Rachel-&-Lizzie-specific. Plus, it helps to keep those uninformed (as mentioned) and Sophie in the loop!
The part about Sophie's face being passive, because it's not active, is a slight grievance I've had for awhile about Teal'C's face being called "Impassive". That was my logic about the whole thing, which was actually spawned from the difference between a passive and active camera from playing The Legend of Spyro: Year of the Dragon.
Also, before you ask, no. I do not know where I put them. All I know is New York City, in College. And kinda near a set of docks, which means a waterfront district is nearby.
The nap attack was inspired by rocking my coworker on his skates back and forth during a slow period, which he turned into a little thing that "put him to sleep" and he said it would be funny if that kind of thing happened and he fell asleep multiple times. Like, rocking him back and forth, he falls asleep, then wakes himself long enough to be cut off, like "I'm awa-" and fall asleep again. And that sentence has a few too many "Likes".
Like if you liked that. (Sorry, had to put in a stupid Facebook joke)
The thing about the middle schooler who crashed (and crashed hard) because of energy drinks? that actually happened. I'm not sure if Chris was sent to the hospital, since it's been awhile since it happened, but I do know that they had an assembly to let everyone know what happened. And it actually was a full can of Monster and a half can of Spike before classes.