The Ocean On Their Shoulders

Chapter 1

A Bioshock AU

She had heard about Rapture, accidentally, but at a point in her life where she didn't need to hear more to join the flurry of those diving into the depths for a better life. That's what Rapture was promising her, all that the surface couldn't anymore. A job, a career, a new start, and a chance to escape the mysterious disappearance of a man she once loved. However, as the days go by in the underwater city, sacrificing her years of grad school for a simple secretary job at the city's most feared tycoon's company; she finds that her new boss won't stop scratching at her memory. Is he her lost lover, or is his facade just a trick of the lens?

~*~

Good days were hard to come by down in Rapture. Lately, Ryan had him by the throat in hopes of squeezing the life out of his business interests. Squeezing the ambition and plasmid line out of the tycoon by inviting him to his fancy galas; pretending to put on a face that would have any broad swoon. But, he was no broad; and found himself laughing in Ryan's direction, mocking his pathetic hopes of getting some sort of scratch out of him. Fancy galas and watered-down whiskeys weren't enough to get him to cough up his plans to the king of this city; this dump. Ryan had to try harder, and he was more than willing to put up a challenge.

What would Ryan do with a plasmid industry anyhow? The man worked in electrical engineering, not genetic sequencing. It would be like putting a butcher in a shoe department, which he had the pleasure of owning as well as his Futuristics. Ryan was industrial; Frank was inventive, cunning, and adaptable. All characteristics that Ryan would stutter with and fumble over as he so dared to try down in this city.

He made a show of straightening his tie as he came upon the labs, the red silk sliding along his fingers as his posture straightened. His labs, his genetic experiment, his money, his orphanage, and his...receptionist?

Fontaine quirked an eyebrow at the figure sitting at the previously empty desk. She had her head down, writing and scribbling something in a journal as she seemed completely oblivious to the world around her.

What the hell was a secretary doing sitting in front of the labs? Sure he had the desk originally installed for the purpose of welcoming and funneling visitors, eventually getting to the task of hiring someone for the position. But this? This was not his doing, and it was starting to piss him off. If not him then who took the liberty of hiring someone without telling him? Without notifying him what he'd be paying them?

Suchong and Tenenbaum. Had to be either one of 'em.

He cleared his throat and leaned against the desk, elbow resting atop and his shadow looming over the woman. She jumped at the noise and lifted her head to the source of the shadow, eyes widening slightly at the presence now in front of her.

"Mr. Fontaine, sir!" She closed her journal rather forcefully and extended a hand for him to shake.

He chuckled to himself and took it, borderline surprised at how strong her grip was. "The slant didn't tell me they's was hirin' a secretary." He smirked and released her hand once noticing a touch of red creep across her face.

"Oh," she paused and led the same hand to smooth out her hair, "they didn't tell you? Miss Tenenbaum said they would notify you about it before hiring me."

"Musta gotten lost in translation." Fontaine tilted his head to get a good look at her.

She surely dressed the part of a secretary, he'd give her that. Nice velvet pencil skirt, fitting cream-colored blouse with a matching kerchief tied around her neck. Looked like she was rather catering on a plane than manning the front end of an experimental genetic laboratory. Course, the only woman he saw in the lab was one to wear the same lab coat and a stained jumper all day, every day; this was refreshing.