long mad science lab au setting ramble tho
For like the second time in all the iterations of Val I’ve made in the last 12 years, they get to start Normal with minimal childhood trauma. They work in a shoddy coffee shop owned by their family and are maybe in school to study business or whatever to improve the business and expand into a nicer space. Normal dude, fairly small ambitions.
Down the road is a vague industrial lab looking place that’s been around forever and no one ever really thinks much of it…it’s probably pharmaceuticals right? the businesses nearby see a fair number of white coats taking lunch breaks. A lot of them are regulars, even.
Obviously this is the less than ethical lab, also kind of family run (although this is less of a marketing point for the Nilssons than the Khourys), with the head scientist taking his daughter on as his protege, though with a good handful of other scientists who currently outrank her, at least technically.
Nilsson either developed some plot fuel chemical or hijacked it from aliens, and it does Weird Things to organic material and he’s spent decades experimenting with it and the after effects. He’s refrained from using it on people as even he has some morals. Phoebe, in all her clumsiness and inexperience, is less careful and accidentally exposes herself to it.
Big monster time! It obviously transforms her physically, but it messes with her intelligence/mental state as well. She gets out of the lab and becomes a problem for Everyone.
Despite her not really looking human at this point, Val recognizes her as a regular when cornered, which stuns her into pausing the rampage. Lab security shows up to get her back, she decides she’s going to take Val with her and security is like, hm, well if it makes this thing come back peacefully, we can kidnap a guy for a bit, sure.
Once they (believe they) have her properly Contained, val is released and told to get lost. They leave for the time being, but their shop has been destroyed and they now know there’s a bunchhh of shady shit going on over there (and have a billion questions about why this woman has been turned into a monster???), they aren’t going to walk away for good.
And downstairs, Phoebe is dying to know more about what’s happening to her, occasionally slipping into bouts of madness, and realizing the majority of the lab might just be okay with her dying to suit their curiosity.
