"No gods, or kings. Only man." The words echo in Andrew Ryan's mind for the nth time that night, as they had every night for the past year. Ever since Atlas had started his uprising and Rapture had fallen.
Again, he considered praying, and again he knows he would find no escape from fear in prayer. "No gods, or kings. Only man." Man and monster. He was only one man against the monsters just outside his door. The door gave some reassurance. It was nearly impenetrable against small arms. A group of loud splicers wouldn't be able to break through. They set his teeth on edge, though. Every scream and beg of insanity cut through the air like a bullet.
They screamed for Steinman to fix them. For God to save them. For Ryan to leave his safety and be killed. On this particular night, Ryan thought about answering their begging. But he still had his own splicers, and hope that his were giving Atlas just as much hell as Atlas' were giving him. If not more.
He left his bed to golf. Rolled out the turf, planted the tee and mounted a ball on it, all while desperately trying to focus on the task at hand and not the pounding and screaming just outside. The turf felt good under his feet. It had been more than thirteen years since he had last felt actual grass under his feet, and this was as close as he could possibly get.
"Unless I go out and stand on the algae" he muttered to himself, chuckling at his private joke.
He stared at the hall as he lined up his shot. He wished he could actually golf. But it was too confined in his small, underwater office. He took two practice swings before getting ready for the actual shot. He realized how much thought he was putting into simply putting and chuckled to himself again.
Just as he was ready to make the shot a particularly loud shout came from outside.
'Ryan! You son of a bitch! Come out." It was a woman's voice. She sounded familiar, but he couldn't tell if he recognized her voice from the deterioration her throat had endured. "I'll get in there and I'll be the one to tear you apart!"
The surprise of the shout ruined shot. Way too strong, and way to the left. It hit a window and bounced off, landing somewhere near his desk and rolling away.
He cursed under his breath as he began to panic for his life. It took a few seconds for logic to kick in. The windows could withstand the pressure of 150 meters of water. A golf ball wouldn't even chip them. He decided golf may not have been a good idea. He decided instead he'd listen to some music. He found one of his records and put it on.
"Somewhere, beyond the sea," the lyrics began. They did nothing to cut out the screaming and pounding coming from outside. Ryan stood up to raise the volume.
"Somewhere, waiting for me," they came out, much louder now. "My lover stands on golden sands, and watches the ships, that go sailin'."
He lay in his bed as the song continued for a minute or so more. It was interrupted by an explosion. More splicers were coming, and with bigger, better weapons. He only had one choice left if he didn't want the splicers to break through and tear him limb from limb. He jumped from his bed to grab his gun. He hesitated before pulling the door open. Maybe he did want them to break in and give him a slow, painful death. Tearing him to pieces with blazing hot hooks as he screamed. Maybe the pain was worth the end. It couldn't have been worse than the pain he already felt.
No.
He would not give in. Not tonight. Tonight, he would pull the door open. He would ignore the cold sweat he would break into as he saw the mass of splicers outside his door. At least ten. Tonight, Andrew Ryan would fight. He shot the first one almost as soon as he had seen her. Perhaps she was the woman who had yelled his name. He shot her and found a sense of perverse joy as her body crumpled in front of the others. He tried his best to get the head only, but the recoil made it impossible. A male splicer began to pull a pistol from behind his back, but Ryan saw him and killed him before he was able to fully raise his weapon. Another female splicer reached for her weapon, but Ryan killed her before she could reach it. Ryan noticed a fourth splicer towards the back of the group just as she threw a bottle. It had a rag protruding from the neck and was arcing straight at him. The rag was on fire. He threw down the gun and raised his left hand to catch the Molotov coming for him. He was glad that if he had taken any Plasmids, he had taken this one. The bottle stopped inches from his left hand, and he hurled it back to the oncoming crowd of splicers. Of course, none of them expected it, their senses being so corrupted by what would save Andrew Ryan now. He turned his head as the explosion went off. He felt a small amount of blood hit his front and shuddered. This was what his paradise under the sea had become.
It was hours later and Andrew Ryan was still on his knees sobbing outside of his office. His hands were bloodstained from him collapsing into the ruin of bodies strewn around him. He wiped them on his shirt to hold his face. He knew now was the time. He hadn't prayed in over thirteen years. He wasn't even sure if he believed in a god anymore. He begged for minutes, which quickly became half an hour. Through his tears he asked for someone to find him. A person that was so filled with hatred for Ryan, they would kill him as soon as they saw him. Thirty minutes passed, and his prayer wasn't answered.
No gods, or kings. Only man.
Not in Rapture.
Ryan felt more alone than he ever had. When he left his family on the surface to build his city, he had not felt this alone. When his son was taken from him by that son of a bitch, Fontaine, he had not felt this alone. He had never been this alone, nor this pitiful.
As the citizens of his city lay around him, he knew that never again would he return to the surface. He would pay for his sins. If one day, God were to grant him the grace of death, it would be in Rapture. He would never return to see the sun, or to feel peace, and calm. His city had fallen.
But he looked again at the corpses lying around him, and the blood still wet on the floor. They were all dead. Because of him. Every single one of them had died because he had chosen. And they had obeyed.
"A man chooses. A slave obeys". Andrew Ryan knew where he was on that part of the spectrum.