Chapter Text
Mia had been asked.
She wanted nothing to do with raising Rosemary Winters. With Ethan gone, and no one left to play ‘happy family’ with, she had reverted almost immediately to her old behavior. She had said that the baby would remind her too much of Ethan, but Chris knew. Chris knew that she really meant that the baby would remind her too much of Eveline.
Poor little baby Rose, who was not yet even capable of doing wrong, had been forever tainted in the woman’s mind. Knowing her origin. Knowing who she really was. Knowing what had been done to her.
Mia wasn’t motherly at the best of times.
So now Chris was the closest thing to a family that the helpless little baby had left.
He didn’t feel qualified.
An old soldier. A man who had lost everything again and again. A man who never felt like he could protect the people who needed protecting no matter how hard he tried.
Well.
He didn’t feel qualified when his parents died and left him, a preteen, with the only family his six year old sister had left either.
But he had made it work.
Like always, he would just have to make it work.
Rose deserved a better parent than he’d be, he knew. But he also knew he sure as hell deserved better than whatever would happen to her if he didn’t keep her close. If he didn’t take custody of her.
This was for Jill. For Sherry. For Claire, as much as it was for Ethan and Rose.
Chris held the small, squirming baby up carefully in his gloved hands, and looked her over again for what felt like the millionth time already.
“Can’t believe you don’t just start crying when you see my face,” he grumbled, a low chuckle escaping his lips.
Little baby Rose, who’s hair was just growing into the same pale dirty blonde as Ethan’s, looked up at him with innocent eyes. She didn’t cry. Quite the opposite. Her little face lit up in a wide smile, as she reached little hands out towards Chris’ hand.
Chris held her gently along the crook of his arm, the way he’d been shown, and offered her the finger of his free hand as she grabbed out. That was supposed to be good for babies, right?
“Cute little banana, aren’t you?” he mumbled at her.
She grabbed his finger, giving it a firm squeeze, a good sign of healthy development…which was a miracle considering what had happened. Between her unusual biology, and MIranda’s experiment, it was a wonder she seemed healthy and stable as she was.
She goo’d and gaa’d in response, childlike babble in a happy tone. Perhaps, even if she couldn’t understand it yet, she got the compliment.
Rose was growing fast. Chris had known that since just about the beginning. The BSAA doctors were monitoring her; checkups every week for poor little Rose. Chris didn’t like it, but he did like taking the guesswork out of the equation.
“There’s a way to stop it, right?” Chris demanded of doctor Hamilton. “She’s not just going to– like Eveline?”
Hamilton put a hand on Chris’ shoulder. “Calm yourself, Chris. It can be easily, and permanently stopped. We already have the solution on hand.”
“And you’re going to give it to her, right?” he demanded, challengingly. There was no way in hell he was going to let the docs use Rose as some kind of bio weapon experiment. Even if she was. He wasn’t going to let it happen like it had happened to Jill, and Sherry. “Now?”
Doctor George Hamilton glanced down at the baby that was currently laying sprawled quite contently on top of the medical cot.
“Not now, Chris.” He put up his hands as Chris scowled at him. “Please understand, this is for Rosemary’s sake. You mentioned Eveline– you understand that in a very real way she and Rosemary are connected, yes?”
“Well…” Chris grumbled, thinking about it.
Rosemary seemed to orient towards the sound of voices, head lolling to the side to stare at them as they spoke. It was clear, in her eyes if nothing else, the resemblance to the countless photographs of E-001…Eveline…before her degeneration.
The girl was a bioweapon designed to kill or enslave unsuspecting civilians in fungal mind control during times of crisis, a walking dirty bomb The Connections created in the shape of a little girl. Chris had seen stacks of documents, videos, and heard Rebecca’s analysis of the mutamycete samples relating to the Dulvey incident after the BSAA got involved.
Upon breaking containment, Eveline sought the one thing she’d always wanted…a family, and in doing so caused one of the more brutal outbreaks since the calm left by The Family’s apparent dissolution.
It was the only way it could have ended. Things had simply gotten too out of control. That didn’t make it any easier to see the photographs taken from Lucas Baker’s files. Photos of a lonely little girl locked up like an animal, treated like a lab rat, and referred to as a weapon.
Ethan Winters pulled the trigger, ending a rampaging Eveline’s life…and shortly after Rosemary was born. A little girl born with a deep connection to the very same fungal network that Eveline had been a part of. And one who Miranda had tried to awaken the soul of her Eva within. Eva, who was Eveline…
“As we’ve discussed before, Chris,” Hamilton reminded gently, “half of Rosemary’s genetic material was from Ethan, Ethan, whom I believe you colloquially refer to as having been ‘all mold’ by the time he sired her. And, as we have discussed, because of the way the mutamycete provably holds the neurological data of those who are entwined with it. We have the brain scans from the E project. Rosemary’s brainscans are very similar.”
“I know all this, doc,” Chris said impatiently. “Where are you going with it?”
Hamilton glanced at the baby again, and then wiped his glasses. “We can stop her body from developing, but there’s no guarantee that would stop her neurology from doing the same. Personally, I think it would be cruel to lock a mentally developed person in the body of an infant or toddler, don’t you, Chris?”
“Well, I–” Chris paused, his brow furrowing.
It was true, of course, so far Rose’s neurology was proceeding alongside her body, developing rapidly in accordance to the old records salvaged from The Connections. Eveline hadn’t gotten a childhood. She hadn’t gotten affection during those critical stages that passed in the blink of an eye. And it left her desperate and feral.
Would the same happen to Rose?
Hamilton’s assistant , Dr. Suzuki bustled around the baby, hooking a little cuff to Rosemary’s arm, taking a moment to gently poke the child on the nose with a smile. “Just a little blood sample, it won’t hurt a bit” she murmured, as she jotted some numbers down.
Was it a product of her environment, or of the accelerated growth that damned her?
Chris sighed. “Has Rebecca– doctor Chambers– said anything about any of this?”
Hamilton gave Suzuki a smile as she worked and turned back to Chris. “Doctor Chambers and I are in agreement. Her aging should not be slowed until she’s developed to pre-pubescent– an approximate destination of ten years old. Which, at her current rate of development, will be in about two and a half. Years. At that time, Doctor Chambers suggests that we ask Rose herself what her preference is. And I concur.”
“Ten years old. In two and a half years,” Chris mumbled, looking at the helpless little baby as the doctor took her blood. “So, she’ll have some time to be a kid. If that’s what she wants.”
“Exactly, Chris,” Hamilton nodded. “I know you’re very protective of her. And I know it’s hard to see children grow as fast as they do even normally, but we believe that in this case, it’s what’s best for Rosemary herself.”
Rosemary barely made a sound, not even a cry…she rarely did anymore…as the blood sample was taken through a thin tube.
Maybe it was best…in two and a half years, Rosemary Winters would be able to decide for herself if she wanted a childhood. In two and a half years. It was so hard to believe, even if he saw the evidence firsthand.
Chris sighed through his nose, and nodded. “Alright. I’m going to ask Rebecca myself about it, but assuming she does agree- we’ll play it your way.”
Six months later, baby Rose was as developed as a three year old. Chris was in awe of how fast she was outgrowing her clothes, and how fast she was already learning how to speak in full sentences.
The two of them were living in what was technically a BSAA facility, but it was disguised as an apartment building, and as cozy as possible, though Chris worried how long the current situation with the group would last. For now at least, he shared a little set of rooms with his adopted daughter– he had absolutely insisted– and she had plenty of toys, and practically all of his attention.
He leaned his chin on his hand, as he watched her playing.
Rosemary currently had some dolls arranged before her, a big smile on her face as she lifted one up so she could fly above the rest like a bird.
In only a handful of months, here she was in her newest dark green dress, her pale hair tied back and out of her face with a bow, far from the baby she’d been only the blink of an eye ago. As the doll soared over the others, she dipped it down so it landed by Chris’ feet.
“Daddy!” She said eagerly, wiggling the doll back and forth like it was waving for his attention. “She wants to say hi!”
The doll was one of her oldest…which wasn’t saying much given her rapid growth…but its appearance was far more worn than any of the other toys. Between Rose’s insistence on taking the doll everywhere, and the constant cleaning against the growth of pale fungal roots along its surface, stemming from the white mold that Rosemary’s body generated in times of strong emotion, the doll had seemingly aged as rapidly as her owner.
Chris grinned embarrassedly– he felt like he couldn’t get that look off his face when she called him that. He leaned over and waved to the doll obligingly.
“She wants to say ‘hi’,huh? Hey, how’s the weather down there?” He knew he was no good at talking to kids, but he did his best.
“Cold!” She whined, wiggling the doll. “Flying around is cold, ‘cause the air is colder when it blows!”
Rosemary looked down at the doll with a pout “oh no, Evie needs a jacket, Daddy! But she’s too small for mine!”
The doll was Evie. Chris always tried not to worry about that.
He leaned his elbows on his knees toward her and the doll. “Well, we can’t have her catching cold, now can we? Maybe we better get her a jacket– think a shawl will do for now?”
With an innocent smile, Rosemary nodded. “uh huh. Shawls are nice, they look like wings when you go like this!”
She spread her arms like a bird, holding Evie up again before placing her back down by his feet.
Chris hopped up from his seat, and put a hand on top of Rose’s head for a moment, smiling down at her. “I’ll bring her a shawl then, just a sec.”
He headed into the bathroom, and a moment later came back with a plaid patterned washcloth just about the right size to be a shawl for ‘Evie’.
“Oh!!” she pointed “Perfect!”
She held the doll up for Chris to put the shawl on her shoulders “now she won’t be so cold flying around over her friends!”
Chris carefully and indulgently draped the washcloth around the doll’s shoulders. “There, now she can fly around and still stay warm.”
“Evie likes to fly.” Rose nodded, lifting the doll up again to swoop her and her shawl over the people below. “‘cause it means she can go to all the places , everywhere.”
She shook her head “but it gets too cold ‘cause of …ah..” she reached for a word, but settled on “the cold.”
Chris knelt down beside Rose and put a hand gently on her back. “We’ll keep her warm, okay, Rose? And no matter how far she flies, she comes back home, right?”
Rose smiled up at him with a nod of her head “always! ‘Cause home is the best place to be!”
She hugged the doll to her chest tightly, her little brow briefly furrowing in thought, before she smiled up at him. “Evie won’t fly too far away without taking you and me, daddy.”
He reached over and rustled her hair. “Glad to hear it, banana.”
Rosemary giggled, looking for all the world like any other happy little girl. Even with the pale white fungal slime slowly creeping its way up the doll’s dress as she hugged it tight.
“You won’t go ‘neither, right?”
“That’s a promise.”