Stephanie had long been one of Ms. Vik's girls. She came to Dr. Cindy Wong's office, her issue weighing long upon her. She had the other girls remove the dye in her hair, and wanted Dr. Wong to fix her. Her mutation was one of multi-colored hair syndrome (MLP hair) that one of her ancestors artificially took on as a beauty enhancement, now considered merely another mark of mutation, and somewhat looked down upon by other residents of most post-apocalytic 'villes. Dr. Cindy Wong was always professional and thorough, so she started to question her about her life history to date. She was a young mutant woman whose unmutated family members had kicked her out, into the cold, hard streets of Austin long ago, telling her that if she'd ever try to come back, the eldest brother would do her in with a shovel "because that's what parasite mutie rats deserved". She survived mostly by stealing, but when she came of obvious age more than a few were willing to offer her food, and a place to sleep, and she dropped her last name, because it was truly worthless to her and because Stephanie whoever-you-want-me-to-be paid the bills. When Ms. Vik found her, she already had "the skills". Vik always had a soft spot for girls that had similar experiences to her own, and took her in. Ms. Vik's education was cut short when her parents died, but she never gave up the reading habit, and taught the young woman the skillset of most educated people, a skillset that made her someone in high demand in this post-apocalyptic age. Stephanie took to it quite well. This intrigued Dr. Cindy as she brought out several medical texts for her to read, which she not only did with ease, but she could explain what the passages meant. In very plain language of course, but she understood their meaning clearly. Smart girl, this one. Unfortunately. there wasn't really anything that Dr. Cindy Wong could do about her minor mutation, as gene-editing technology was lost long ago. Dr. Cindy smiled. “This minor mutation doesn't lock you into anything, we've all got choices. I want you to make a choice, Stephanie. I want you to come work for me. I’ll train you as our nurse, you’re certainly smart enough. And you can wear your hair however you want. I don’t know how much you’re making working right now, but I can promise you this: learning to be a nurse, and doing it, well, you’ll see terrible things, but you’ve already seen those, and plenty. But you’ll never starve, or freeze, and you'll always have a place of your own to live in.” Years later she would find her old family in a terrible state, most were gone, with the last one terminal with drug-resistant "consumption", tuberculosis. It was a tough encounter, and in the end, her entire former family was gone and she the lone survivor of them all. She thought about it for a long time, and it troubled her. Should she shed a tear? Should she rejoice? A bike messenger pulled up to San Angelo clinic with the small package from the machine shop. The clean, clear clink of two pre-1969 silver quarters and it was hers. The tiny object dropped out. It was her name tag, "S. Jennings". After all, she had every right to it.