BIOSHOCK DOES NOT BELONG TO ME. MESSING WITH SPACE AND TIME IS SOMETHING I ONLY DO IN MY OFF HOURS. BE GRATEFUL I DON'T DO IT MORE OFTEN.

So… wow, it has been a while, hasn't it? I can almost hear you shouting at me that it's about bloody time I started this story. You're right. However, other stories had my attention, and the idea for this sequel underwent many idea changes. Just know that I never forgot about this, I promise.

Anyway, enjoy!

Bioshock: Constants and Variables

Chapter 1

Booker and the Sort-Of Unexpected Trip

Enemy on the left, aiming a shotgun. I fired twice, catching him in the throat, and he went down.

"Booker, that one's got a grenade!" Elizabeth pointed in the direction of said grenadier.

A three-round burst from me, and then there was no more grenadier. Then a rocket sailed overhead, and I ducked. I traced the rocket's path back to its origin and saw a guy reloading his launcher. I didn't have any ammo left for my rifle, so I pulled out my pistol and fired until the poor sap stopped moving.

"I think there's one behind you," Elizabeth warned, hands clenched tightly from her position next to me.

"Yeah, I know," I said, not even looking as I reloaded my pistol; switching back to the rifle and reloading it would take too much time.

I never saw it coming—one second, I was about to turn and look for the guy who got away, the next, I heard a bang, and it was over.

"Son of a bitch," I groaned, watching the instant replay show the guy who'd snuck off put a bullet in my head. "Stupid snipers!"

"I know, I know, they're the bane of your existence," Elizabeth said, not sounding the slightest bit sympathetic. "Now hand me the controller, it's my turn."

I sighed, but dutifully gave her the controller for the Xbox One. The deal was to switch off every time the other died, but it annoyed me that my turns were always shorter than Elizabeth's.

"You'd think I'd be better at this," I muttered as Elizabeth respawned. "I mean, I've fought people to the death in real life."

"Maybe you're not as good at this as you think you are," Elizabeth said, then proceeded to kill four enemy players in as many seconds.

"You're lucky I love you," I told her, then got up off the couch. "You want anything from the kitchen?"

"Some water," Elizabeth said, then glanced at me and smirked. "Keeping you alive as long as I have is murder on the throat."

I stuck my tongue out at her, then headed for the kitchen.

…

Nearly three years of peace and good times. Honestly, I think Elizabeth and I were both surprised it had lasted so long. After escaping Columbia, we spent a few weeks traveling Europe and, er, 'decompressing' with each other. It wasn't until things calmed down that we started wondering if our relationship was more than the heat of the moment. Thankfully, after spending time together that didn't involve running for our lives, killing people who wanted to kill us, and traveling through time, we found that we really enjoyed being together.

Without a place to call her own, Elizabeth moved in with me in my nice apartment in New York City. We'd have fun in the city, or sometimes travel overseas, usually to Europe. For anyone else, it would have been a storybook ending.

Too bad there was a catch. You see, in order to have a life with me, Elizabeth had to promise two time-traveling twins—or something, their very existence confused the hell out of me—to do a favor for them. We didn't know what that favor was, or when it would be called in. With that hanging over our heads, we had to prepare.

Elizabeth wanted to know more about her powers, and what she was capable of, but without a way to safely test her ability to open holes in space and time—not without getting the government involved, something neither of us were comfortable with—she settled for the next best thing. She'd been taking online classes about advanced quantum mechanics, and basically a dozen other subjects that went way over my head. Apparently, her understanding of the concepts was better than some of the professors, so she was earning her doctorate in record time.

What both of us did, however, was physically prepare. We went to the gym three times a week, and I called in a friend of mine from the Columbia incident, one of the Marines who'd helped me, to teach us how to really fight. We took shooting lessons, and though Elizabeth was reluctant to use a gun, she was a damn good shot.

Still, it was only when we were actually training that we thought about what would eventually happen. When we were home, all we cared about was being with each other. It's sappy, I know, but after all the crap we went through in Columbia, and spending almost three years living together, it was hard not to be a bit devoted.

I know I didn't mind, at least.

…

"Here you go," I said, handing Elizabeth her water.

"Thanks," she said, managing to kill a guy with a grenade while taking a sip.

"Show-off," I muttered, then sat next to her.

"I got that from you," she said, then scooted onto my lap. "You're a bad influence."

I didn't dignify that with a response; besides, Elizabeth's hair was in my face. After Columbia, she had let her hair grow out again, and now it reached just past her shoulders. You would not believe the night I had when I told her that I thought her long hair was sexy.

Despite growing up in the early 1900s, Elizabeth had adapted to modern life quite well. Technology had been easy for her, but it was the rest that threw her off at first; she had been scandalized when she saw what women wore in America these days. Thankfully, she'd gotten used to it; at the moment, she was wearing a pair of short shorts and a t-shirt, things she had openly stared at when she first saw them.

Elizabeth huffed in annoyance; after I moved her hair out of my view, I saw that someone had finally killed her. Wrapping my arms around her, I grabbed the controller and put my chin on her shoulder.

"You're going to play like this?" she asked. "Won't I distract you?"

"Eh, it would be worth it," I said; that got me a quick kiss on the cheek. "I love you too."

We switched back and forth for a while, but it was getting late. Finally, Elizabeth started dozing off on my lap, so I shut down the game and carried her to the bedroom. It wasn't long before we were both asleep.

I keep wishing that what happened next was all a dream.

…

The first sign that something was wrong was that Elizabeth wasn't next to me when I woke up. I had had a nightmare about Columbia—even after three years, one of us usually had one every few nights—and sat upright, panting heavily and drenched in sweat. Normally, the one who had a nightmare was immediately wrapped in the arms of the one who didn't, but Elizabeth's side of the bed was empty.

"Elizabeth?" I looked around, and for one horrible moment, I thought that maybe everything that had happened had been in my head, and that I was living alone. A quick check on my hand, minus the x-shaped scar that my parents had given me and Elizabeth had removed, proved that I wasn't crazy.

"She is no longer here, Mister DeWitt," a familiar, and unwelcome, female voice said.

I reached out and turned on the lights; standing just beyond the foot of the bed was Rosalind and Robert Lutece, the twins who had set up my insane journey through hell. I briefly considered pulling out the pistol I had hidden behind the headboard and shooting them, but dismissed it. As much as I hated their intrusion in any part of my life, they weren't evil. Just dicks.

And then Rosalind's words registered in my semi-awake brain. "What are you talking abou—oh. Oh, shit, why wasn't I woken up for this!?"

Robert gave me a sympathetic look—or as close as he got to sympathetic, anyway. "Our task for the both of you requires that you start at different points in the story, Mister DeWitt. Rest assured, Miss Lamb is capable of defending herself. You, however, must first reach her."

Damn it. I had always known that this day would come, but I had assumed that Elizabeth and I would start this mess together. Now she was who-knows-where, and I had to find her. I didn't like the idea of her being somewhere dangerous without me; the last time we'd been separated, she'd been tortured.

I took a deep breath. "So… what do I have to do?" There was no point trying to get out of this. Elizabeth was alone, and I wasn't going to abandon her; besides, trying to back out of a deal with people who were basically Time Lords wouldn't be the smartest move of my life.

There was a bag on my lap that wasn't there a second ago. "You'll need these clothes to fit in," Rosalind said. "Find the man named Jack—"

"And keep him alive," Robert finished; I hated when they did that.

Without speaking, I grabbed the bag and went to the bathroom; thankfully, the shield that I had acquired in Columbia—that the twins had given me, in fact—still worked, and wiped away the sweat. By the time I was in the bathroom, I looked like I'd taken a shower.

The new clothes were… interesting. There was a pair of dark-blue pants, black shoes, a grey button-up shirt, and a dark-blue jacket. If there had been a fedora and a tie, I'd have almost looked the part of a detective from a few decades ago. They were also comfortable, and were more durable than I'd first assumed.

I came back out wearing my new clothes, and grinned. "So, how do I look?"

"Like you will blend in," Robert said.

Rosalind smirked. "Or perhaps you won't, and then you'll die."

"There's a good chance that he'll die either way," Robert pointed out.

At that point, I started to tune them out; I was used to this crap from them by now, and they'd focus on me when I was relevant to them again. While they yammered on about stuff that made my brain hurt, I fished out the pistol; it was one of two things I'd kept from Columbia, along with some ammo. It wasn't much, but I also had my skyhook, which Elizabeth had modified to be collapsible, and all of my Vigors. I'd done more with less.

"Oh, it appears he's ready." Rosalind actually looked impatient.

"Hey, I was waiting for you guys," I said. "So, how's this going to start?"

"Well, I would recommend that you keep your weapons hidden, at least for the moment," Robert said.

"You know, I'm actually okay with that, because it means people probably aren't going to kill me five minutes in." I sighed. "I'm giving it ten minutes, tops."

The twins actually had the decency to look sheepish, if only for a second.

"It will help if you close your eyes," Rosalind said, and held out her hand.

I hesitated for a moment. I was about to leave my home, the place I'd finally felt safe, all to go somewhere that would likely involve everyone in a fifty-mile radius trying to kill me. But Elizabeth was already there, which meant that I had to go too.

"This is the last time, right?" I put my hand in Rosalind's.

"That's entirely up to you," Robert said.

"Wait, what—"

And then everything went white.

…

Ow. Ow, ow, ow! Why does time-travel/whatever-the-twins-did have to be so fucking bright!? I thought I'd been blinded!

Okay, first things first, I couldn't see well. I was sitting on a cushioned seat, which might have been… vibrating? It was also fairly quiet, though I could hear a hum somewhere. A mechanical hum, not the musical kind.

Finally, my vision cleared. I wished it hadn't, because I just realized that I was on a plane. I hate planes. I hate flying. I have hated those things ever since Columbia shot me out of the sky, and all the other height-related near-death experiences I'd had. And now I was in a… oh, crap, it wasn't even a modern plane, if the décor was any indication. This thing was decades older than what I was used to.

Okay, no big deal, I could do this. All I had to do was stay calm, wait for the plane to land, find this 'Jack', help him out, and find Elizabeth. Oh, and make sure we make it home alive. Easy.

And then everything exploded.

I don't know what happened, really. One second, everything was fine; the next, I was falling out of the sky and into the ocean below. I hit the water hard, though my shield took the brunt of the impact. I swam to the surface, trying to get my bearings, only to see a large chunk of the plane falling towards me.

"Oh, shit!"

I'd never tried to use my Charge Vigor in water before, but I didn't want to test my shield against a giant chunk of metal that had gravity on its side. An instant before the debris hit, I flew through the water like a torpedo; all I got was a face full of water.

Okay, immediate danger was over, but I was still in the middle of the ocean. I needed to find out—oh, look, a lighthouse! That was convenient. It took me a minute, but I made it to the shore.

"That's it," I said to myself, "no more plane rides. Ever."

I heard someone coughing, and my first thought was that it might be Elizabeth, but I realized that it was too deep, nothing at all like her. Is it weird that I know her quirks so well, even the sound of her cough? Probably, but I don't like to think about it too hard.

"Hey, buddy, you okay?" I asked as I hurried over to the guy that was dragging himself ashore.

Other than being soaked, the guy looked unhurt. He had brown hair, decent features, though that jaw looked like it could cut glass. He wore a grey sweater and brown pants; call me petty, but I thought my outfit was cooler. He seemed pretty normal, but then again, my standards for normality were different than most—after all, I'd seen steampunk old people and guys who could shoot flocks of crows from their arms.

"I'm—" the guy coughed up more seawater, then tried again. "I'm fine. How… how did we survive that?"

"I'm still working on what 'that' was," I admitted. "Any idea what happened?"

"There was an explosion… I think." The guy rubbed his head. "Ugh, everything hurts."

"That'll happen when you fall out of an exploding plane and smack into the ocean." I didn't have much light, and I didn't want to freak him out by using my Devil's Kiss, so I had to make due and look at his eyes. "You might have a mild concussion, can't be sure. What's your name?"

"Uh, Jack."

Well… that was fast. No last name, though, huh? Okay, I'll let that slide for now. After all, I found the guy before I had to kill anyone, so things were going faster than the last time. "What's the date?"

"May ninth, nineteen-sixty."

Well, it was better than 1912, but it was still before the age of Star Wars. What a sad time that was.

"All right, Jack, my name is Booker DeWitt. I don't know about you, but this is turning into a really shitty day, not helped by the fact that it's cold and wet outside." I hoped he didn't notice that my shield kept me nice and dry. I'd answer that question later, but I didn't want to do that now. "Seeing as how it sucks out here, I suggest we head for that lighthouse."

Jack looked up and, apparently, noticed the lighthouse. "Maybe we can call for help from there!"

"Maybe." But my luck has never been that good.

After making sure that Jack could walk on his own—actually, he probably didn't have a concussion after all, because he was walking it off rather quickly—we headed for the lighthouse. It took exactly two seconds for my 'something is horrible' sense to go off.

For starters, the outside of the lighthouse was too nice. It looked like we were going up marble stairs, not concrete, and the lanterns were of really high quality. I didn't even see seagull crap anywhere. Then, when we got inside, it got even creepier—gold and red velvet are not what I think of when I picture the interior of a lighthouse.

Then there was the giant gold statue of some guy, with a red banner underneath that said 'No Gods. No Kings. Only Man.'

Wait a minute. Haven't I seen this before? I thought about it, and only the fact that I was already walking kept me from freezing up.

I remembered this. Near the end of our escape from Columbia, we'd briefly visited an underwater city. I vaguely remembered this statue, and the banner. Oh, shit; I'd only been there for five minutes, and it creeped me out, and now I had to go back!?

"This is… intense," Jack commented. I noticed he was looking at the statue.

"Yeah, let's get going before it gets too intense." I knew it would, of course. There would be shooting and blood and death and—

"Hey, are you all right?" Shit! I nearly jumped when Jack spoke. "You froze up."

I am not talking about my PTSD with a guy I'd just met, even if I had to keep an eye on him, thank you very much.

"I'm fine, just thinking about stuff." I looked around, and noticed something. "I don't see any stairs leading up."

"What?" Jack looked up. "You're right. I don't think that's how lighthouses are built."

I pointed. "There are stairs leading down, though."

"And I still think that's wrong."

I shrugged. "Look, we either follow the stairs, or sit here and starve while we wait for rescue, and I have a feeling that that's not happening for a while."

Jack looked like he wanted to argue for a second, then sighed and headed down the stairs. Heh, point for Booker.

We headed down the stairs, and I was faced with another familiar sight—that weird submarine-looking thing that Elizabeth and I had used to get out of the underwater city. I guess I'd be doing things in reverse today. Tonight. Whatever.

"After you," I said, gesturing to the open hatch.

Jack gave me another dirty look, but didn't argue. "Fine, but if you stab me in the back—"

"What would be the point?" I asked. Besides, I wouldn't stab him, I'd just shoot him, or electrocute him, or set him on fire, or sic a flock of birds on him. Stabbing was just so barbaric.

I know the twins said to stay with this guy, but I honestly didn't care too much about Jack's safety, and not just because he'd survived an exploding plane with barely a scratch. I wanted to find Elizabeth—she was my priority, nothing else. I had to find her, see that she was safe with my own eyes. Then… well, we'd kick ass until we got home, and then maybe we'd be able to live normal lives.

Once I got into the sub thing, Jack pulled the only lever in there, and we began to submerge. It was around this time that I noticed the music. Don't get me wrong, I liked 'Beyond the Sea', but there's only so much Bobby Darin I can take in one sitting. Besides, if we were going underwater, then the song was too ironic, and I'd have to hit someone.

Jack started looking distinctly uncomfortable once we were completely underwater. "Don't tell me you're afraid of the ocean. Or are you claustrophobic?"

"Neither," he muttered. "I just… this is really strange, that's all."

I couldn't help but laugh. "Dude, we both survived an exploding plane, hit the water, survived that, just happened to find a lighthouse in the middle of fucking nowhere, and now we're going underwater in a submarine that has velvet seats. 'Strange' doesn't begin to cover it."

"Then why aren't you freaking out?" Jack asked.

I shrugged. "I'm already fucked up in the head. One more crazy weekend isn't going to change how much therapy I need."

Probably not the nicest thing to say, but I wasn't in the best mood. I was sure I'd feel better after someone tried to murder me again. Dear god, I am fucked up.

I was finally a little surprised when a projector emerged from behind us and started a little slideshow, complete with sound. First, there was what looked like an ad, showing a guy lighting a cigarette with fire from his fingertips. 'Fire at your Fingertips!' it said; it called it the 'Incinerate Plasmid' by Ryan Industries. Huh, maybe they had something like Vigors here.

"I am Andrew Ryan," a refined voice said, "and I'm here to ask you a question: Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow? 'No,' says the man in Washington, 'it belongs to the poor'. 'No,' says the man in the Vatican, 'it belongs to God'. 'No,' says the man in Moscow, 'it belongs to everyone'.

"I rejected those answers. Instead, I chose something different. I chose the impossible. I chose… Rapture!"

The projector switched off, and lights turned on, showing us… whoa. It looked like New York City, only underwater! Buildings dozens of stories high, neon lights, what kind of looked like roller-coaster rails and transparent tunnels connecting everything. It would have looked almost normal, except for the coral everywhere, the schools of fish, and—holy shit, that was a whale!

I wasn't sure whether Rapture was more impressive than Columbia; I think both required a certain level of mad genius in order to pull off.

It was shame that I'd probably destroy half of it, knowing my luck. It was actually kind of majestic.

Oh, wait, Ryan was still talking.

"A city where the artist need not fear the censor." Not necessarily bad. "Where the scientist would not be bound by petty morality." Uh, that sounded a little twisted. "Where the great would not be constrained by the small!" And I'm sure only 'great' people actually built your city, right? Ayn Rand was alive and well here. "And with the sweat of your brow, Rapture can become your city as well."

Blah, blah, blah. Same shit about paradise, just prettied up in different packaging.

"That guy is crazy," Jack commented, though he looked a little more rattled than me.

"Of course he is." I pointed at a tunnel, where some big guy in a diving suit was repairing a leak or something. "There's no way a place like this can last, even with constant maintenance. Where the hell did he even get the money for all this crap?"

If anyone asks, I'll deny it until the day I die, but even I jumped when the radio next to me suddenly came on.

"… but the lighthouse is all lit up like hellfire…" Whoever was speaking had a pretty thick Irish accent. "Looks like some kind of plane crash…"

Another voice crackled as it spoke. "We're in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean! How could it—"

"Dunno. You'd best get over there, and be quick about it—the splicers are coming." Shot in the dark here, but I'm guessing that 'splicers' are bad, and I should kill them before they kill me.

"You've gotta be kidding me," said Voice Two. "How do you know someone's even coming?"

"We got a bathysphere on its way down," Irish Guy said. "That means we've got company."

The bathysphere—apparently what they called these things—had apparently been on rails this entire time, and we were headed into a large tunnel. I caught a glimpse of more ads for those 'plasmid' things as we started to surface.

"All right, here we go," I said, and calmly drew my hand cannon. "Hey, Jack, you might want to stay behind me for a while."

"Wait, why do you have a—"

"Shut up, I'm probably about to do something cool."

Hang on, Elizabeth. I'll find you soon.

All right, here we go! You might be wondering why it took me four freaking years to get around to this sequel. I really don't have a reason. I was writing the next chapter for my book, and then this popped into my head. It's short, just like most of my opening chapters, but hopefully I kept the same tone as the predecessor.

Also, something I want to let you all know about this story: Booker won't be the only one telling it. That's right, multiple points of view! It'll rotate between Booker, Jack, Elizabeth (when she eventually shows up), and another surprise addition to the story. However, I should warn you now that this story, like my others, will have a very sporadic update schedule. I could do two chapters in a week, or take months off, because I'm writing my own book, and I like to stay in my own universe these days.

However, just because my fan fiction isn't updated frequently doesn't mean you'll have nothing to read! As I've just said, I have my own story, on my own website, which will be updated far more often than anything I do here! Just go over to my profile page and enjoy a high-stakes tale of war and intrigue in the far future! I promise that you'll enjoy it!

Next Chapter: Jack tags along with Booker, but he'll soon find the power to stand on his own!

Would you kindly take this Muffin?