6.30 Great Expectations

#sims3challenge #sims3legacy #sims3story #thesims3

Sawyer shocked the entire family by his attentive fatherhood. He checked on her frequently, jumped when she whimpered, spent hours talking and cuddling with her.

In fact, he offered more gentle physical contact to his strange little plant creature than he had to anyone in his entire life, especially when he was a child himself.

While he certainly made sure that Andria saw him, it wasn’t fair to say that he was doing it to spite her. His passion for his baby was clearly both real and intense, though he couldn’t have articulated it.

For Gamora’s part, she was very baby-like, despite her oddly textured plant skin and luminous yellow eyes. She cooed, waved her limbs, and grabbed her daddy’s finger like any baby would. But it was hard to imagine an easier baby. She didn’t need to eat and needed no diaper, which everyone found unnerving. She could go days without crying.

Winston was a normal baby enough for both of them.



Victoria and Edmund were not the ideal roommates. Victoria had no interest in Edmund’s stark decorating tastes and insisted on putting up color everywhere.

Edmund pushed back, but no matter how he argued, he always seemed to find that he’d agreed to whatever Victoria wanted to do.

Their room became more and more a clash of styles.

Sometimes Edmund had to let off steam and sleep in the treehouse.


Andria’s farming started to get noticed. She was called to Camelot Hall and offered an award grant to further agricultural development in Avalon. The grant came with a nice trophy, and Andria couldn’t help herself — she was bursting with pride.

Abby was at a crossroads.

She looked at herself in the mirror and saw an aging actress. She wouldn’t be able to sustain her career on a pretty smile much longer. If Anton Pierce’s movie was well-received by the critics, she hoped to be able to be able to build her reputation for artistic roles.

And then there was her boyfriend, who didn’t exactly bolster her reputation on the silver screen circuit.

With her salary from her recent movie, Abby decided to catch attention a different way.

As status symbols went, she had to say that this one moved like a dream.

She rang up Chaim when his shift ended. “You want to take me out for a romantic dinner,” she told him.

Chaim laughed. “I did? Of course I did. You read my mind.”

“Meet me at Vetinari’s in an hour.”

“Yes ma’am.”

Chaim’s reaction as Abby stepped out of her new ride was even more satisfying than she’d hoped. “Holy Watcher!” he cried. “Is that yours?”

“It is now,” Abby crooned. “Would you like me to take you for a spin later, big boy?”

Chaim gave her a shy smile. “Only if you stay under the speed limit. I’m never really off duty, you know.”

Sawyer walked nervously out to meet Manisha.

“I suppose you’re wondering why I called you over,” he began.

Manisha gave him a perplexed look. “Why would I wonder? We always meet at your place.”

“Oh,” Sawyer said. “Well, I guess today is different.”

“Sawyer, are you all right? You’re acting really weird.”

“I’m not weird,” Sawyer said. “I’m exhilarated. You will be too. I want to introduce you to the greatest triumph of our lives.”

He beckoned her into the house.

Manisha gasped. “Sawyer, what is that?”

“I took the liberty of naming her Gamora,” Sawyer said. “I know I should have asked you first, but I didn’t think you’d object. I know that character is your favorite.”

Gamora gurgled. Manisha stared. At last, she said again, “What is it, Sawyer?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Sawyer said. “She’s our daughter.”

“Our daughter!” Manisha said. “What did you do? How could you do this without asking me?”

Sawyer was stunned. “But- but I did ask you,” he said. “You gave me a sample of your DNA. We were going to make history together.”

“You were going to merge our DNA with plant DNA to see what happened. I was expecting a hybrid slug, or maybe a puppy.”

“Why would you want to share your DNA with a slug?” Sawyer asked.


“That’s beside the point!” Manisha said. “You didn’t say you were going to make something sentient! I wanted groundbreaking research, not motherhood!”
“I didn’t know the seed I spliced would grow a baby either,” Sawyer said. “In retrospect, it’s obvious. Gamora is the perfect synthesis of sim and plant DNA. This is the logical form she would take. Don’t you think she is amazing? Aren’t you proud that we made her? I don’t understand.”

Gamora, always preternaturally quiet, squirmed in Sawyer’s too-tight grip and whimpered. Sawyer murmured apologetically to her and laid her down gently on her play mat.

“Manisha,” he said, “she’s our daughter. It doesn’t matter how she got here. She’s ours to raise.”

“You’re talking crazy!” Manisha said. “Stop pretending she’s a sim. She’s a plant with some sim DNA who happens to look like a baby. Just send it to the university lab for analysis and write your research paper.”

The raised voices attracted Dylan and Andria. “Is there a problem I can help with?” Dylan asked.

SMACK!

“Sawyer!” Andria shrieked.

“I am not crazy,” Sawyer shouted.

Andria dashed forward and grabbed Sawyer by the arm. “You are coming with me,” she hissed.

“Are you all right?” Dylan asked Manisha. “Can I help? Can I take you home?”

Manisha stared at the floor, too stunned to do anything for a moment. “I-I’m fine,” she stammered. She tried for a weak laugh. “Sawyer isn’t that strong. I don’t need help. I’ll just go now.”

Dylan escorted her to the door and watched her walk away. Then Gamora’s lonely wail drew him back to the den. He cradled the baby in his arms and took her up to her crib.

“I’m sorry, little one,” he murmured. “It’s not your fault.”

———

Abby’s midlife crisis rolled a wish for an expensive car, and that sounded like just the kind of status symbol she’d enjoy, especially now that she’s given up on a high-status boyfriend.

Sawyer and Manisha…. oh my. I had Sawyer call Manisha over to introduce her to Gamora. They didn’t have a maxed relationship, but it was close. Sawyer seemed to be doing pretty well with her; I assumed his Socially Awkward trait was less destructive with a high relationship. I thought that I might move Manisha into the house at this point. I left them for a couple of minutes unsupervised. When I came back Sawyer was slapping Manisha, and their relationship had been trashed to 0. I can only assume that Manisha was not as happy to meet her genetic daughter as Sawyer assumed she would be…. :(.

I know that male sims hitting female sims doesn’t have the same ooomph that it does for real humans, but dang. I can’t say that Sawyer wouldn’t do it, though. He follows his own social rules.

10 thoughts on “6.30 Great Expectations

  1. I'm so glad you explained at the end about their disagreement. While I was reading it I was very curious if they had this argument on their own or if you had Manisha disagree with him. So you are chalking the gameplay aspect up to his Socially Awkward trait? It is pretty awkward to make a sentient being out of someone's DNA without discussing it first in depth. (Although it sounds like he was taken by surprise too, just had a different reaction than Manisha).

    Are you disappointed about not moving in Manisha?

    And even for sims' weirdness, him hitting her is extreme given their high relationship.

    The car is too cool. And poor Edmund having to share his room with a sister who wants to brighten things up! I love that treehouse in Sims 3, it is awesome!!

  2. Abby's car is from the Movie Stuff set. I love it. 🙂

    Yeah, I'm providing a story justification for an autonomous fight. By the time he slapped her, they'd had several escalating negative interactions, and they were "Very Angry." It just happened so fast. I flashed away to another character for a few actions, and by the time I came back they'd trashed their relationship.

    I'm sure that it was started by some flub Sawyer made because of Socially Awkward. That trait leads some positive interactions to have randomly negative results. He's also more likely to choose interactions that are a bad idea. And he's *also* a Diva, which leads him to randomly complain. Poor Sawyer is a timebomb for relationships, but I didn't think he could damage a relationship that quickly. Manisha must have been quick to get angry.

    For story purposes, Sawyer didn't know he was making a baby. He and Manisha designed the experiment together, so she's also responsible for the results. It just didn't occur to Sawyer that anyone would be anything but delighted.

    I'm sort of disappointed that Manisha isn't moving in, but I like it when the sims take the reins of their story. Sawyer's social life was never destined to be easy.

  3. Poor Sawyer and poor Gamora. Although, anyone who would send a leaving, breathing baby to a science lab for testing isn't someone who should be around children! I think she's crazier than Sawyer! I know he shouldn't have hit her, but in this case it's warranted!

    Despite her unconventional arrival, it seems that Sawyer cares about her, and with Dylan and Andria around to pick up the pieces, it looks like she'll be ok.

    Good explanation for the fall out, though I can't help but wonder what it was really about!

  4. Hello! Welcome!

    Yeah, that was a huge twist in Sawyer and Manisha's relationship that I wasn't expecting. I'm sorry for them, but I also like it when my sims are unpredictable.

  5. Yeah, Sawyer's turning out to be a devoted Dad. Kind of surprising in itself :).

    As for whether she'll be OK, Gamora has also rolled a troublesome set of traits. I've been wondering when I/if I should warn the readers :). Troublesome traits can make the most interesting characters, but it's yet to be seen whether she'll be a sympathetic character or not. I'm going to have to see how she plays out.

    I totally missed the start of Sawyer and Manisha's fight, but I'm going to guess that Sawyer said something offensive, Manisha got offended, and then she rejected all of his other attempts at conversation until the negative interactions stacked up. So maybe not so far off from what i wrote.

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