darling it's better down where it's wetter

[did_unkindly]

It's been a day, it's been a day, it's been a whole damn day -- as near as it's possible to tell in this soggy excuse for a city. It's been a day since he killed Fontaine. And Jack is no closer to getting out. He's still down here. He did everything he was supposed to do and he's still down here.

All he's found is locked-down bathyspheres. Broken submarines. Even the goddamn boats are out of service. Where's Tenenbaum? Where's his fucking rescue?

Jack stares about into the greenish gloom, checks the ammo in his pistol, and then kicks and yanks off the rusting panel of a vending machine. His hands are soon full of little wires and pipes. A few seconds later, he straightens up with a grunt, and the machine gives him a tidy discount on a couple glowing hypos of EVE.

With his visit extended indefinitely, he's begun to wonder how many of them are left.

Now arbitrarily divided into chapters!
Part One: A Scene at the Rapture Adoption Agency ~or~ You Found [Pot of Ham]!
Part Two: Come On-A My House, I'm Gonna Give-A You Candy ~or~ Sinclair? More Like Sin Pantalones!
Part Three: Dream Sequences are a Fresh New Concept in Fiction ~or~ It's My Existential Trauma and I'll Cry if I Want To
Part Four: Southern Education Jokes ~or~ Engineer, Engifar, Engiwherever You Are ~or~ The Grave Escape
Part Five: Golfing Accident Memoirs ~or~ Mom... Dad... I'm Immortal ~or~ How To Make Friends And Immolate People
Part Six: Is It A Pie? Is It A Plane?? ~or~ Two's Company, Three's a Row
Part Seven: Escort Missions! In Rapture! Council's In An Uproar ~or~ Bioshock: Cheesecake Edition
Part Eight: Bread, Milk, BATTLE! ~or~ Pleasant Conversations, How They Bore Me
Part Nine: Choices, Schmoices ~or~ Baby's First Moral Philosophy ~or~ Go Away I Want To Take A Damn Bath
Part Ten: A Man Snoozes; A Slave Delays ~or~ The Four Second Rule Applies To Drugs
Part Eleven: A Hearty Meal ~or~ Skeletons In The-- That's Not A Closet
Part Twelve: We All Live in a Secret Submarine ~or~ Plasmids: Not Even Once
Part Thirteen: Paging Dr Tenenbaum To Surgery ~or~ Bribery And Deduction
Part Fourteen: The Prodigal Son Returns

Comments

[modestman]

What is that, like a nervous tic or something? Sinclair just washed that sweater, stop that.

He ignores it though, too hazy from sleep still to bother questioning him about something as unimportant as why he keeps sucking on his sleeve like a toddler.

"That's alright," Sinclair says over his shoulder as he puts on the water. "You rested earlier, least you got some sleep." Then, turning back around and leaning on the counter, "What is it you need to talk to her about so desperately, son?"

[did_unkindly]

Whoa whoa whoa asking him a clear, direct question is cheating. Jack opens and closes his mouth like a fish for a second or two, while battle rages between honesty and secrecy.

A truce is reached:

"She knows some things I don't know."

[modestman]

"...You're sure it's nothing I could answer? Doctor Tenenbaum and I have a lot of knowledge in common, we shared some business for several years although we never worked together directly."

Really though, if he can put Jack out of his misery that would probably be beneficial to both of them.

[did_unkindly]

Jack shakes his head. If Sinclair knew, he'd know he knew.

He takes his sleeve out of his mouth and turns the wrench over in his hands some more, eyes back on the radio. Says helpfully: "It's okay. I'll make her talk to me."

[modestman]

Sinclair shakes his head and turns back around to pull down some coffee mugs, laughing.

"Good luck to you, kid. She's a tough one to crack."

[did_unkindly]

Wow, unnecessary, he's not going to crack her open.

"...What would you say to her?" Jack recognises Sinclair to be the local expert in conversations. "To make her talk?"

Pray contraband God that the question isn't more correctly 'what DID you say' and let's just leave that thought at that

[modestman]

"Well for one, it helps if she's not predisposed to ignoring everything you say," he says with another laugh. "But it's good to stay patient, even if it looks like she'll never say anything. Don't pressure her. Make your case, maybe ask a question or two, but if you don't keep your temper in check you'll shut her down in a heartbeat."

And even if he follows all of that advice, it's still extremely likely she'll never talk. If she even agrees to stand in front of him long enough for all of that to happen.

"If it still doesn't work," he adds, "let it go. You can try it again another time, and maybe if you prove to her that you can walk away without getting all up in arms about it, she'll start to see things a little differently."

...There's no way Jack's gonna remember all of that. And Sinclair wouldn't even bother, but the kid has no conversational skills and if he runs out the door to track down the doctor and ruins everything for himself, at least Sinclair can say he tried.

[did_unkindly]

Jack feels like he should maybe be writing all this down in a quest log.

"Okay," he says, and this whole time he's been looking at Sinclair attentively. Jack does try to be a good student, you know. Or else he gets the hose again.

"Try again," he mutters, and yes he is attempting to commit this all to memory. "Don't lose my temper, no... armaments..."

[modestman]

"Just don't let your emotions get the better of you. Number one thing to remember, you'll do okay as long as you don't forget that."

There's no way he's going to remember that, this mission is hopeless. But he can't stop Jack from talking to her. He can try, but it's only going to make Jack try and sneak off to talk to her and that's a lot more effort than it's worth. Tenenbaum already doesn't want to talk to him, Sinclair thinks he can't sink much lower than he already is in her eyes.

A few seconds later, the coffee's ready and Sinclair pours them both a cup, taking it back and sitting across from Jack at the table.

[did_unkindly]

"Alright," says Jack a touch uncertainly. Usually his missions are something like 'go to Area A and find Parts B through E to assemble Item F'; this sounds a little more involved.

Well, he'll give it a try. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

When the coffee arrives he starts to drink it straight away (I'm sure you're surprised and shocked) -- then puts it back down quickly when it scalds his lips. Apparently he's way too accustomed to coffee that's been hanging out in a thermos for like a year.

"Hot," he explains.

[modestman]

"Boiling water'll do that," Sinclair laughs. He sips his own coffee cautiously, not wanting to make Jack's mistake.

"I'm still hoping Doctor Tenenbaum will help us out. It'll take some convincing, but I believe there's some common ground between us that we can work on. Now, I can't stop you from talking to her, chief, but just. ...Be careful of what you say, alright? If she gets all bent out of shape because you started pushing the wrong buttons, we're never gonna get anything out of her."

There, now that's on the table. Nobody can say he didn't try.

[did_unkindly]

Hey be nice.

While Sinclair's talking, Jack blows on his coffee to cool it. He's paying attention, though. His eyes are still on Sinclair, and he's nodding. "I'll be careful," he promises.

Remembering the talk he wasn't privy to, though, is making him uneasy.

"What did she... talk about with you?"

[modestman]

"A whole lot of nothing," Sinclair huffs. "I know she wants her girls out of here, I was gonna attempt to combine our efforts. But she won't talk."

Oh yeah, and there was the whole first three quarters of the conversation where they talked about whether or not Jack was trustworthy. Just a minor omission, no big deal.

[did_unkindly]

Oh hey well it's good that that first part didn't happen because that was totally going to be his next question!

"...Did she talk about me?"

He figures that if she'd said... you know. anything big. Sinclair would've mentioned it by now -- so it's not as intense a question as it could be, but it's still something that's been weighing on his mind.

[modestman]

"Well..." he says, nodding his head as he tries to pick his words. "In the sense that you would be a person involved in the escape."

And the less he says on that, the better.

[did_unkindly]

"Oh," he says, not sure how to feel about that. It's not a declaration of love and acceptance, but it's not the opposite either, he guesses.

"...You said she doesn't hate me," he adds. He's not even sure why. He just wants to hear Sinclair say it again.

[modestman]

Sinclair exhales, setting down his coffee after another sip.

"She doesn't understand a lot of your choices, sport. But no, she doesn't hate you."

[did_unkindly]

Jack manages a small smile.

"I'm gonna show her she should like me."

[modestman]

Sinclair's initial reaction is to object, whoa there, slow down. I said she doesn't hate you, but asking her to like you might be a liiiiiiittle overkill.

But he doesn't. He smiles.

"She'll get there eventually."

Yeah. Of course.

[did_unkindly]

The coffee is cool enough now for Jack to gulp the whole thing down in one.

He doesn't feel as positive as he'd like about his chances. Let's be brutally honest here, he's feeling more down on this whole situation than he'd like to in general. But, you know. Jack has muscled through worse crises; this relationship stuff is weird new territory but he should be able to master it.

In fact he's already sent the first white flag!

"Is it okay if I take the radio with us today, mister Sinclair?"

[modestman]

When Sinclair was just a boy, his mother let him adopt a stray dog as long as he promised to train it and feed it. And he did, for a while, until one day they came home and the gate was open and the dog was gone. Every day for at least a week, little Augustus would tell his mother to make sure she left the gate open in case the dog came back. She would always smile at him and agree, this small, kind of sad smile.

The smile Sinclair gives to Jack now. "Sure, son. If you've got a place to carry it."

[did_unkindly]

Jack is firmly determined to believe that the smile is not sad.

"I carry it over my shoulder," he says in the spirit of free information. He taps the long leather strap, much beaten and weathered and mistreated by his journey through Rapture.

[modestman]

"Well as long as it's not in your way," Sinclair says.

It's still pretty early in the morning, and he would feel inclined to go ahead and start thinking about making their way to Hephaestus before the sun comes up, but splicers have no sense of time. 4am, 10am, 6pm, midnight, it's all the same to them. It's only ever going to be ADAM o'clock. There's no rush here, but since they're both awake and there's not really much else to do...

"When do you feel like heading out?"

[did_unkindly]

"Soon," says Jack. He's kind of achy and headachey again, but that's probably down to sitting in the dark staring at the radio for so long. All the more reason to get out and active in the fresh ---- uhh, in the stale underwater air.

Even if it does mean going back to Central Control.

The more he thinks about it, the more he's kind of perversely curious to see if anything's changed there. If anyone's moved the body or even looted, or if Ryan is still lying there, forgotten by his own city.

It's just one of the many thoughts making Jack look contemplative on this fine Rapture morning.

[modestman]

Not the most definitive answer, but it's a-okay by Sinclair. He still needs a moment to wake up completely, and as ready as he is to be out of this town he's not exactly looking forward to exposing himself to its citizens again.

His leg is feeling considerably better, though every once in a while it'll hit him with a sharp twinge of pain. But that's just the healing process. It's stayed clean and there's no sign of infection. Should be smooth sailing from here on out, at least on that front.

Meanwhile, Jack wears kind of a dark amusement on his face. Or maybe it's more of a nervous trepidation. It's hard to tell, but Sinclair assumes he's thinking about their plans for the day. Hephaestus. The Office of Andrew Ryan. If Jack were a long time friend, now is when Sinclair would take the opportunity to pick his brain about what happened up there, all the gorey details. But any questions would probably be pointless. It's obviously something Jack doesn't want to talk about; pressing it would only upset him. And Sinclair thinks he's seen enough of Upset Jack to last him until they part ways topside.

"You don't remember seeing any hints of where a sub could've been kept down there?" he says after a few more moments of comfortable silence, Sinclair nursing his cup of coffee and Jack staring absently at his radio. It's the closest Sinclair thinks he'll come to asking Jack about his previous experience in Hephaestus. A shot in the dark, but maybe it'll lead to something. Or maybe his question will actually be answered with something other than no! That's not to much to hope for, right? That's a realistic expectation?