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  • Early Life
  • A Major Discovery
  • Research And Development
  • An Unfortunate Awakening
  • Return To Rapture

In the story of BioShock and the city of Rapture, one of the most vital and influential individuals is Dr. Brigid Tenenbaum. Tenenbaum was the one who originally discovered ADAM, engineered the Little Sisters, and in time, sought to undo all of it with the help of Jack, Subject Delta, and Subject Sigma.

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But what propels a geneticist toward that kind of human experimentation? And perhaps more importantly, what propelled her to get out of it? Let us trace back the history of Tenenbaum and her role in the BioShock series, from her younger years to her last known location.

Spoilers for BioShock and BioShock 2 Ahead.

Early Life

Tenenbaum was born in a small village near the city of Minsk. From the beginning, she was naturally curious about the world around her but didn't really have any outlets to channel that curiosity into her. That changed in her teenage years with the rise of the Nazi regime in Europe. Both Tenenbaum and her family were imprisoned in the Auschwitz concentration camp, but while her family and countrymen were subject to unprecedented cruelty, Brigid found an opportunity.

Tenenbaum would observe the Nazi scientists conducting inhumane experiments on the other prisoners, and when she noticed they made some manner of error, she would openly correct them. At first, she was punished and chastised, but as her observations continued, the scientists began to deliberately seek her aid, realizing she had a natural aptitude for the scientific method. Because of her role in these experiments, Tenenbaum was the only member of her family to survive the concentration camp, with the Nazi scientists giving her the nickname of Das Wunderkind: The Wonderchild.

Following the end of World War II, Tenenbaum gained credentials as a geneticist and began experimentation. She was naturally curious about the human genome, wondering what aspects of our DNA made us predisposed toward intelligence or athleticism. However, one day, seemingly out of nowhere, she completely vanished from the public eye. The few who knew her assumed she had been abducted by another country's government for her role during the war and thought no more of her, but in actuality, she had received an invitation to Rapture.

A Major Discovery

Thanks to her strides in genetics, Tenenbaum was among the scientific elite who were brought into Rapture and encouraged to pursue their vocations freely. Of course, morality was never one of Tenenbaum's concerns to begin with, so Rapture didn't offer her much new. Eager for a new project, Tenenbaum would explore Rapture in search of inspiration.

One day, as she was walking through the fishing docks, she spotted a couple of the Fontaine Fisheries workers playing catch. This was bizarre, as she knew one of the workers there had his hand injured in the war, and yet it seemed perfectly fine. When Tenenbaum asked the worker, he told her that his hand had suddenly healed after he was bitten by a sea slug on the job.

With help from the dockworkers, Tenenbaum obtained several of these sea slugs and studied their innards. She found a bizarre material within that could be used to resurrect and rewrite DNA. With a bit of tinkering, a human being could use this substance to alter and evolve themselves in all kinds of miraculous ways. Tenenbaum had discovered the ultimate genetic keystone, and so she named it after the first human: ADAM.

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Research And Development

Tenenbaum needed more ADAM to conduct her research, but even in a city like Rapture that prided itself on its lack of moral guardrails, human experimentation was a step too far. None of the city's prominent laboratories would give Tenenbaum the time of day, which left her bereft of the necessary capital to continue her studies.

Luckily, thanks to her contact with the dockworkers, news of Tenenbaum's discovery had already reached the ears of Fontaine Fisheries owner Frank Fontaine. Being a savvy businessman (i.e. a crook), Fontaine saw many potential applications in genetic manipulation and offered to fund Tenenbaum's research in exchange for having her on retainer.

With funding secured, Tenenbaum got to work developing the first line of commercial ADAM products but hit upon another roadblock: not enough materials. On their own, the sea slugs couldn't produce enough ADAM for extended experimentation. However, Tenenbaum realized that they could boost ADAM production by embedding a slug into a host body and having it co-opt the host's bodily processes. After a bit of trial and error, she discovered that the only hosts that could safely facilitate this process were little girls. Thus, the Little Sisters were born, and ADAM production hit a hot streak.

Tenenbaum became one of the most prominent scientists in Rapture, and a very wealthy woman besides. As she continued her experiments, though, she came upon the fact of ADAM's addictive and degenerative nature. Even so, a few Splice-happy citizens were immaterial in the face of her research. Her skill with genetic manipulation became so great, she was able to effectively "code" a new human being from scratch, which just so happened to be exactly what Fontaine wanted in his long-term plan to take down Andrew Ryan.

An Unfortunate Awakening

Tenenbaum's experiments necessitated regular contact with the Little Sisters to ensure the proper production of ADAM. This meant she would regularly watch them play, chat, and generally behave as children do. At first, this didn't mean anything to her, but as she watched them, something began to stir in her. The reality of what she was subjecting innocent children to was beginning to weigh upon her shoulders. At the worst possible time, Tenenbaum awakened to something she hoped she never would: maternal instinct.

When Fontaine realized that Tenenbaum was getting cold feet, he promptly fired her and handed her responsibilities over to Dr. Yi Suchong. Shortly after this, Fontaine staged his death, and his ADAM businesses were absorbed by Ryan Industries. Tenenbaum was invited to work for Ryan, but her protests against ADAM development ended with her being blackballed from the industry and withdrawing from the public eye.

Without anyone else to rely on, Tenenbaum took to the shadows, covertly abducting Little Sisters and utilizing an experimental Plasmid to kill the sea slugs within them without harming them.

Time passed and the Rapture Civil War came and went. Years later, thanks to Fontaine, now Atlas' activation, Jack arrived in Rapture and did his bidding. However,though he was a bioengineered assassin, Jack still possessed a conscience. When he approached his first Little Sister, Tenenbaum appeared and gave him the curative Plasmid, begging him to save any Sisters he found.

Jack kept his word and ensured no harm came to the Sisters, and so when Atlas turned on him, Tenenbaum came to his rescue, using her genetic skills to undo most of his Plasmid-induced brainwashing. After Jack defeated Atlas, he took the rescued Sisters to the surface, while Tenenbaum left Rapture separately.

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Return To Rapture

Years passed, the rescued Sisters grew up, and the terrors of Rapture and memories of Tenenbaum faded from their minds. For Tenenbaum, this was a mercy, an atonement for her past actions. She was content to leave it at that, but soon a new problem made itself known. Young girls began vanishing from shores around the world, and it didn't take a genius to figure out what for: someone in Rapture had coopted Tenenbaum's research and resumed ADAM production.

Obtaining a submarine, Tenenbaum returned to Rapture to find it in the clutches of Dr. Sophia Lamb and her "Rapture Family." Using her old tactics, Tenenbaum began rescuing the new Sisters, but Lamb quickly grew wise to her and had her Splicers destroy her sub and corner her.

Tenenbaum was swiftly running out of options when she received a sudden message from Lamb's daughter, Eleanor. Thanks to her psychic connection with the Sisters, Eleanor could communicate through them, requesting Tenenbaum's help in reviving her "father," Subject Delta. Tenenbaum and the Sisters succeeded in retooling the Vita Chambers, reviving Delta and sending him off to rescue Eleanor and the new Sisters, serving as a convenient cover from Lamb's wrath.

Tenenbaum knew that the only way to end the threat of ADAM for good would be to find a cure for its dependency, but calculating genetic vectors for such a thing would require an incomprehensibly advanced computer. However, she remembered something that could work: the Rapture Operational Data Interpreter Network, AKA The Thinker.

Tenenbaum made contact with the old manager of Rapture Central Computing, Charles Milton Porter, who suggested reviving another Alpha Series Big Daddy, Subject Sigma. Unbeknownst to Tenenbaum, the "Porter" she spoke with was actually the Thinker itself, seeking to escape from Rapture and bring Sigma, the real Porter, with it.

With a copy of the Thinker's code in hand, Tenenbaum and Sigma escaped Rapture together. Using the code, Tenenbaum was able to rebuild the Thinker above water, and with its help, she successfully created a cure for ADAM mutations and restored Porter to his former self.

We don't know if Tenenbaum ever returned to Rapture to cure the Splicers or destroy her remaining research, nor do we know what the canon outcome was of Delta and Eleanor's encounter with Lamb. Presumably, though, if any Splicers or records of ADAM made it to the surface, she would make it her mission to see them cured or destroyed, respectively. After all, ADAM is her cross to bear, and in her own words, she will bear it, even if it kills her.

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