A/N: Hello, and welcome to the first chapter of BioShock: Destiny! After playing through the games again recently, I had the idea for this story, and although it's only short it's a story I'm very excited to tell. We have a trio of new characters (not including those featured in audio diaries) as well as a new plasmid (!) and a brand new setting. There will be familiar faces, but for the most part this is an original creation. I've tried to keep it faithful to the games and avoid any contradicting details, so hopefully you'll all enjoy it. As for the chronology, it takes place at some undisclosed time between BioShock 1 and 2. Anyway, on with the story and let me know what you think! :D
PART ONE: THE MALL OF RAPTURE (I)
Heavy booted footsteps echoed throughout the dank steel halls of Rapture, the great lumbering form of Subject Zeta continuing his single-minded trek towards Edgar Simpson-Fortier.
Edgar Simpson-Fortier.
Genius.
Madman.
Guardian of the Fountain of Youth.
Turning towards the window, Zeta saw his own reflection and his mind recoiled with disgust. There was no trace of the man he'd once been, now a shell trapped inside a suit of armour, his face nothing more than a dimly lit porthole. Whatever life he may have led, it had been thoroughly extinguished by the twisted science of this dystopia beneath the sea.
Giving a mournful groan, Zeta reluctantly turned his gaze back to the path, knowing that there was still work to be done.
Up ahead, a blast door slid open with a mechanical hiss and Zeta stepped through into darkness.
Summoning a ball of flame in his right palm, he cast a sickly orange glow over the surroundings. Rotten benches, withered plants and stained photographs of smiling families sagging on the walls. This place had not seen civilised life in a very long time.
Slowly reaching for the rivet gun slung across his back, Zeta levelled the mighty weapon ahead of him, finger tight over the trigger and ready to skewer any Splicer that may try to launch an ambush. Such a weapon would be almost impossible for an ordinary man to wield, but in the hands of an Alpha Series, with their super-enhanced strength, it was child's play.
Casting his vacant gaze across the dark space, Zeta's eyes quickly settled on the charred remains of a door, hanging limply from rusted hinges. Above the door, a dirty brass sign proclaimed MAINTENANCE.
Grumbling his approval, Zeta stomped over and entered the small room, its floor covered with water from a leaking pipe above. The walls were lined with screens, presumably from an ancient security system, now silent. A crackle and shower of sparks to his left caught Zeta's attention, and he found exactly what he needed.
Quelling the fire in his palm and letting the snapping currents of Electro Bolt form in its place, Zeta blasted the sparking circuit and all at once the lights flickered into existence. Even with illumination the maintenance office was a grim place, although for the first time Zeta could see the hapless Splicer pinned to the far wall with a metal spear. His bulbous, mutated face was contorted into a mask of surprise, beady eyes now devoid of any life. Scavenging some bullets from the dead monster's pocket, Zeta returned to the foyer.
A few corpses, mostly Splicers, littered the floor and blood splashed the furniture and walls. To his left another blast door sat closed, a name flashing above it in bright neon lettering.
THE MALL OF RAPTURE.
This is where he needed to be.
"Hello, can you hear me?"
The voice crackled weakly through his in-suit radio, Zeta startled by the sudden interruption.
"Zeta, this is Peter Blomkamp."
The voice was clearer now, and Zeta could discern a heavy accent, though he was unfamiliar with its source.
"I'm accessing your suit's camera," the man explained, before falling silent for a moment.
"There!" he proclaimed at last, a hint of satisfaction in his tired voice. "Now I can see everything that you see."
Zeta had many questions for this man in his head, and yet no voice to articulate them. Irritably, he settled for a vague grunt as a means of acknowledgement.
"Zeta," the man continued, his voice softening almost imperceptibly. "Doc Tenenbaum brought you to me, to help with a very important mission."
Doctor Brigid Tenenbaum.
The name conjured up an image in Zeta's head, of a frail woman with haunted eyes and a thick German accent. She'd been there, peering through the glass of his porthole, trying to see the man within. And yet Zeta could recall no further details, his mind drawing only darkness.
"Do you see that door to your left?" Blomkamp enquired, and Zeta slowly turned to face it, giving a single curt nod.
"Good. Head on through into the mall but be careful. The Splicers are everywhere."
Lightning snapped in his right palm and a gloved finger on his left hand squeezed the trigger ever more. Whatever Rapture was preparing to throw at him, Zeta was ready.
Jogging towards the door and passing through, he found himself in a grand atrium, a symbol of the ambition and decadence of Andrew Ryan's fallen dream. Above, a vast curved ceiling of glass covered the entire space, all manner of sea life passing by and eyeing the tragic city with nothing more than vague curiosity. Feeble light trickled down, distorted by the ocean, and cast deceptive shadows across the walls and floors. Moving to the edge of the balcony on which he stood, Zeta studied what lay ahead, knowing that he'd need to formulate a strategy for when the Splicers arrived.
Curving around to the left and right, the balcony ran the length of the great room and passed rows of abandoned, ransacked shops. Broken neon signs continued to feebly glow above their decrepit facades, as though determined to welcome their insane clientele.
There were more shops lining both sides of the floor below, probably once bustling with wealthy citizens brandishing their Rapture dollars, desperate for the latest display of success and power. Now, they were only silent, or home to the occasional rotting corpse.
"The Mall of Rapture," Blomkamp continued through the radio, disdain clear in his accented voice. "Once the pinnacle of Rapture's ideals, proof that our hard work had led to great affluence, and now it's... this."
A scraping sound from above drew Zeta's attention, and he whirled with the rivet gun ready to fire. Nothing emerged from the darkness, but he refused to lower his guard. Something was coming.
"Simpson-Fortier made this place his fortress during the Civil War, and no-one's been able to get in or out ever since," Blomkamp continued. "But there have been rumours of a new type of Splicer."
As if on cue, a slender figure dropped from the rafters, a glistening hook in each hand, and was met by a trio of well-placed rivets. They tore through clothing and flesh and the attacker hit the ground in a messy heap, wheezing painfully before falling silent.
Moving over the scavenge from the corpse, Zeta was taken aback by something he had not expected to find. The Spider Splicer's face was not an ugly mask of tumours and scars, but rather it was smooth and... human. His clear blue eyes were wide and soulful, and his scalp was covered with a luxurious mane of dark hair. His mouth, open in a silent scream of death, was filled with neat white teeth.
This man had moved like a Splicer, had brandished weapons like a Splicer, and yet he appeared human. Zeta staggered back a step, the lightning in his palm fading and his steadfast grip on the rivet gun wavering ever so slightly.
"Stay calm, Zeta," Blomkamp urged. "Don't let its face deceive you, my friend. That man was a Splicer. A new breed, born of Simpson-Fortier's Fountain of Youth."
Zeta shook his head in confusion and allowed the Electro Bolt to fade away completely.
"That is the legend," Blomkamp resumed, knowing that the Alpha Series demanded further explanation. "Splicers who enter the Fountain are cured of their physical deformities, but their minds cannot be restored. The flesh is renewed, but they are still Splicers, and it is still your role to kill them. Please, Zeta, you must keep moving."
The man within the suit heaved a weary sigh before turning towards the nearest shop.
Resting on a mouldy chair outside the store's main entrance was an audio diary, a recording device synonymous with Rapture.
Picking it up with a heavy gloved hand, Zeta's attention was drawn to the small photograph affixed to the device's surface. It was an unmistakeable face to any resident of the city beneath the sea.
That stern, driven expression, the meticulously oiled hair and the slender moustache were all trademarks of Rapture's founder.
Andrew Ryan.
Pressing Play, the device clicked and the tape started to run. Ryan's hypnotic voice rang out from the small in-built speaker as he began his narration.
"The Mall of Rapture. It is my great honour to unveil this new wonder of man's achievement, this newest link in the Great Chain.
Enterprise. Success.
This place has been built on the dreams of ordinary men and women, and through their hard work it will thrive. Now let me introduce a great man, a true visionary of Rapture. Augustus Sinclair."
Another voice played through the recording, slightly younger and more excitable, with an overbearing Texan accent.
"Thank you kindly, Andrew. And welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to Rapture's finest leisure complex. Eat, shop, take in a movie with friends. Let this place be your reward."
There was another brief pause before Ryan's voice returned.
"Well said, Augustus. And now, without further hesitation, I declare the Mall of Rapture open for business!"
The tape ended with a hiss of static and Zeta carefully set the device back down on the chair.
Entering the shop, cracked wooden floorboards creaking wearily beneath his weight, Zeta scanned for anything worth scavenging. It appeared the place had once been a jewellery shop, yet now only a few smashed display cases and scattered pearls remained. In the far corner was a desk and slumped across it was the corpse of a young woman, her lifeless face pale and sunken. She wore a tattered pink blouse and floral skirt, and beneath her withered hand lay a diamond-encrusted purse. Relieving the purse of its contents- a full 60 dollars- Zeta prepared to continue his search, only for a rustling sound behind to draw his attention.
With a warning bellow, Sonic Boom pulsed in his right hand and he brought the rivet gun to bear on the intruder. Yet before he could fire a shot, a white hot ball of flame struck his shoulder and he fell back across the desk with a pained roar.
"I knew Blomkamp would send you eventually!" his attacker snapped, a high-pitched English accent quivering with insanity. Ducking to one side as another fireball raced by his head, Zeta splayed his right palm and a deafening pop filled the room, a concentrated gust of wind launching the ambusher backwards, out of the shop and into the balcony railing. Rotten wood shattered beneath the impact and the man rolled painfully over the edge, falling to the floor below. Heaving himself to his feet, Zeta charged ahead to finish the job but as he peered over the balcony the man was gone. A red mist started to swirl around him, accompanied by a sucking sound, and the man materialised once more, standing to Zeta's left with a fireball cooking in his hand.
As he threw the attack Zeta countered with another blast of Sonic Boom, the fireball bouncing away and colliding with a nearby wall where it exploded, shoving the attacker to the ground. His head struck the balcony painfully, splinters of wood flying everywhere.
With indignant rage Zeta charged forward, ready to put a rivet directly into the Houdini Splicer's skull, but a fireball sent his weapon flying. The vile, deformed man before him flashed crooked yellow teeth in an ugly sneer as a red mist began to form around him.
"Don't think for a moment this is over, Zeta," he growled, blood trickling from a fresh wound on his forehead and covering mottled flesh. With an unnatural sucking sound, he disappeared in a cloud as flakes of red energy billowed softly to the ground. And yet even in his absence Zeta could hear the man's demented voice carrying through the stagnant air.
"It isn't over, chap. It hasn't even begun."
And then all fell silent in the vast hall before a tired, irritable sigh echoed through his radio and Blomkamp returned.
"You've just met Edgar Simpson-Fortier," he announced bitterly. "The man was a scientific genius, but splicing made him mad. Zeta, you must find him so we can complete the mission and leave Rapture."
The radio fell silent and Zeta was left alone to collect his weapon and explore the abandoned mall.
He passed a variety of high end shops, scouring the ruins for anything of value. A few dollars and some ammo, along with the occasional EVE hypo seemed to be the only items remaining, until he passed through a chipped marble archway into Aphrodite's Delight.
The neon sign with its elegant cursive font lay in a pile of rubble before the main entrance, no longer garishly illuminated.
Inside, Zeta uncovered a beauty salon, with faded portraits of conventionally attractive women lining the stained walls. Some of the portraits had been burnt or shredded, as if by claws, while others were obscured by crude graffiti.
The words ugly and fake marred the images, and grotesque modifications had been painted over some of them in red paint. Examining the dusty space, Zeta noted hairdryers and a nail salon, but it was the locked door at the room's far end which piqued his interest. Splaying his right hand, a blast of Sonic Boom shattered the wooden door, dust and splinters of wood erupting everywhere.
Zeta squeezed his massive frame through the gap and began to descend a creaking wooden staircase, the boards sagging painfully underfoot. When his feet met solid concrete, Zeta looked around and discovered more than he expected. In the centre of the room, beneath a naked yellow bulb, lay an operating table with a decomposed corpse slumped across its surface, all manner of long needles plunged into the corpse's ancient face. Zeta couldn't even determine what gender the person had been.
Ignoring the repulsive scene, he quickly moved over to a pile of storage crates in the corner, an upgraded rivet gun resting beside them. Discarding his existing gun, Zeta picked up the new, bulkier weapon and peered tentatively down the sights. Ultimately satisfied, he resumed his search, taking note of a hole in the concrete wall.
Looking through, he saw bare pipes and cables and beyond them, an elaborately styled jar filled with glistening red liquid. Straining, Zeta reached into the hole and felt his gloved fingers close around the jar, before pulling it back towards him.
There was no doubt in Zeta's mind as to the value of what he held. Plasmids were vital if one was to survive the horrors of Rapture, and there was no such thing as an over-stocked arsenal.
With no way to discern the plasmid's identity, Zeta opted to simply try it out. After all, any adverse effects would pale in comparison to the experiments conducted to make him into a Big Daddy. After being through hell, few things offered any fear and for that a small part of him was grateful. Small, because it was buried beneath confusion, self-loathing and barely-contained animal rage.
Shaking himself out of the dangerous reverie, Zeta removed the cap from the jar and tossed it aside, before drawing the noxious red liquid into an empty EVE hypo. Studying the viscous, shimmering substance with lust and caution, he opened the injection port on his right arm and plunged the needle into exposed flesh, forcing the ADAM into his bloodstream.
A moment passed with no reaction, and then Zeta's entire body convulsed, his back arching as power surged through every part of him. Vision flashing pink, he roared in pain and fell on shaking knees as his palm snapped outwards, beyond his control, and a dense red polyp shot forth and embedded itself in the far wall. A moment later and the polyp erupted with a flash and a thundering boom, showering him with dust and mortar. The Big Daddy fell on his side, struggling for breath as the world spun around him.
He wasn't sure how long he stayed like that, but once the fallen rivet gun beside him came back into focus and tangibility, he slowly and cautiously pushed himself to his feet. Whatever the plasmid was, it was new and it was powerful. And it was just what he needed to survive the Mall of Rapture.
"Zeta, are you okay?" Blomkamp's fretful voice emerged through his radio. "Take your time, my friend. The plasmid's effects have taken their toll, I can see."
Zeta grunted his irritated affirmation, well aware of the plasmid's effects without Blomkamp to remind him.
"Get to the nearest Gatherer's Garden, and you should be able to identify this new power of yours. The information will come in handy, no doubt."
With that, the radio fell silent again.
Picking up his rivet gun, Zeta slowly made his way back up the stairs to the main hall, alert in case his pained outburst had attracted any unwanted attention.
Stepping lightly through the marble archway, or as lightly as a Big Daddy could manage, Zeta peered left and right and confirmed that no Splicers were around.
Rivet gun in his left hand and explosive new plasmid in his right, the metal man advanced along the balcony, scavenging a few dollars from a mangled body in a torn pin-striped suit. Presumably he was once a businessman, Zeta surmised. In a time before chaos descended upon the mall.
Passing Worley's Choice, some sort of upscale wine shop, Zeta peered inside, finding only smashed and empty bottles littering the floor. Collecting some electric rivet ammo from a dust-laden wine rack, he headed back outside and continued his slow, relentless trek among the crumbling ruins of Rapture's brief success.
Eventually revealing itself on the left, between Cohen's Collection and Urquart Ceramics, Zeta found what he had been looking for. The towering pink machine was unmistakeable, beckoning him closer with its garish, fantastical appearance.
A Gatherer's Garden.
Stepping into its soft pink glow, he accessed the interface and immediately began scrolling through the available plasmids. After upgrading to Electro Bolt 2 and Incincerate! 3 Zeta's hollow gaze settled upon a product he did not recognise.
Kaboom!
Clicking on the promotional film, he began to watch as a sickly sweet, entirely insincere voice started to play over the flickering black-and-white images.
Tired of foes interrupting your day? it boldly asked, showing a caricature of a smiling man in a sharp suit, carrying a briefcase and walking with confident purpose. Ahead of him were three brutes wearing tattered overalls and brandishing lead pipes, angry scowls on their heavy faces.
Then try Kaboom! and clear the way.
The next few images showed the man tossing a polyp, which embedded itself in the nearest thug, before exploding and tossing all three skyward.
Kaboom! The practical choice.
The film ended and Zeta stepped back from the Gatherer's Garden, a smirk on his lips beneath the mighty helmet.
This new discovery would be helpful indeed.
Continuing along the balcony, his footsteps deep and rhythmic against the desolate silence, Zeta soon came to a crumbling staricase and made his way down to the ground floor. Up ahead was a fractured marble fountain, the water dark and stagant with a bloated corpse floating face-down in the murky pool.
Two grime-covered statues made up the fountain's centrepiece, one of the great Andrew Ryan with arms crossed tightly across his broad chest, eyes fixed on some unseen horizon.
Beside him with both hands pressed firmly to his hips, Augustus Sinclair stood with that same determined gaze, an assured smile on his lips.
The fountain was in the centre of a circular plaza, with old-fashioned streetlights lining its edge. The mozaic tiles beneath his feet were cracked and broken, with spent bullet casings and smears of dried blood everywhere. A single body lay to his right, the only evidence of the surrounding carnage.
Approaching slowly, Zeta knelt down to inspect the corpse for supplies, only for the dead woman's eyes to snap open and fix on Zeta's blank porthole, burning with a hateful insanity.
She leapt from the ground, cartwheeling away from Zeta before tossing a rusty metal hook which struck the side of his helmet, knocking the metal man off balance. Another hook connected with his right shoulder and Zeta spun around, landing on his back as the demented Splicer charged forward for the kill.
Struggling to raise his weapon, Zeta squeezed off an electric rivet that pierced the Splicer's chest cavity and sent lapping currents of electricity through her body.
Rising with a grunt, he rushed the stunned woman and brought the butt of his gun down on the side of her head. Skull crumbling under the impact, the woman plummeted to the ground, her lifeless corpse still twitching from the electric rivet.
Taking a step back Zeta knew there was no time to rest, as the insane babbling of more Splicers reached his ears.
Spinning around, a polyp of Kaboom! in his right hand, Zeta saw a trio of Leadheads rushing towards him, opening fire with modified pistols. He fell into cover behind the fountain, the bullets chipping away at its already ravaged marble surface, before tossing the polyp overhand in a careful arc, and feeling satisfaction as it embedded itself in the gut of the tallest Splicer.
With a scream he dropped the pistol and began clawing at the polyp, desperately trying to remove it but with no success. His two friends assisted, poking curiously at the red globule before it detonated, the targeted Splicer vanishing in a mist of blood as his comrades were thrown flaming across the room. They struck opposite walls with a pair of sickening crunches, before falling limply to the ground, bodies still roasting from the explosion.
"Zeta, thank goodness!" Blomkamp said over the radio. "God knows how many of those abominations are in the Mall; you'll have to push forward as quickly as possible. The sooner you reach Simpson-Fortier and the Fountain of Youth, the sooner we can both leave this damn place."
Before Blomkamp could say any more, a large, a heavy object struck Zeta from behind and sent him flying across the room, striking a bench and shattering it completely as he skidded across the tiled floor and into the front wall of a shop.
Wheezing in pain, he extricated himself from the gaping hole his impact had made in the brick frontage, before quickly administering a First Aid kit with shaking hands. As the healing fluids did their work, Zeta spun around for the source of the attack and saw the grotesquely muscular form of a Shocking Brute Splicer. The beast's entire body was glowing blue and snapping with electricity, and Zeta could only watch as he moved into a crouch before charging forward with a fearsome roar.
Finally getting his bearings, Zeta staggered away just in time to avoid the attack, and the Brute collided face-first with the wall, swearing viciously.
Hurrying past rows of shops, Zeta returned to the fountain and collected his rivet gun, hastily switching back to regular ammo- the electric rivets would have no effect- before turning to face his adversary.
The Brute was charging once again, and Zeta fired enough rivets into him to end the charge and send him tumbling across the floor.
Quickly topping up on EVE, he tossed another polyp into the muscled Splicer before backing away.
"What the fuck!?" the beast roared in a deep, basso voice, frantically reaching for the embedded polyp but quickly running out of time. It detonated with a flash and the sharp crackle of electricity in the air was all that remained of the Shocking Brute Splicer.
"Zeta, you need to push forward," Blomkamp urged. "Tell me, do you see the entrance to the Babylon Hotel?"
Turning, Zeta found the entrance on the right-hand side of the fountain plaza, its name spelled out in bold metallic letters above a pair of vast, gold-clad doors. He could see through the glass ceiling that the hotel towered far above the mall, and at its peak some of the internal lights still buzzed valiantly.
"Simpson-Fortier keeps the Fountain at the top of that hotel," Blomkamp explained. "Zeta, you must get up there."
Obeying, the Alpha Series hurried across the open plaza and ascended the few steps towards the grandiose hotel entrance.
Pressing his weight into the doors, he managed to force them open enough to slip inside into the tattered lobby.
Corpses lay everywhere, Splicers and civilians alike, and all the furniture had been smashed and tossed violently about the room. Up ahead a row of lifts caught Zeta's eye, but they were surrounded by a glass barrier and a closed Securis door.
"Damn it!" Blomkamp snapped, clearly seeing the same image as Zeta. "Can you get through?"
Stepping closer, Zeta fired a few rivets and swung his mighty fist at the glass, but it didn't so much as crack. As could only be expected in Rapture, the material was Ryan's special composite, and if it was resistant to the full weight of the Atlantic, then not even a Big Daddy could overcome it. Moving over to the door, Zeta inspected that as well.
Mag-locks held it tightly in place, and he could see the fuses beyond the glass. Unfortunately he had no means to remove them.
"Gravity Well," Blomkamp said. "What you need is Gravity Well." A frantic edge was creeping into his voice, and Zeta knew the man on the radio was struggling with the delay.
"Head on over to the Light Cinema, and see if you can't find a sample in there."
Zeta gave a single resolute nod- he knew Blomkamp could see it through the camera, before heading back towards the plaza. Along the way he caught sight of the bullet-ridden reception desk and thought it wise to inspect for supplies. Heading around the side he was pleased to find an EVE hypo and First Aid kit, but it was something else which drew the metal man's attention.
Tucked into a shelf beneath the main desk sat an audio diary, covered with the dust of time and abandonment. He knew Blomkamp was in a hurry, and he'd already vowed to help the fretting man, but Zeta simply couldn't resist the allure of an audio diary. Maybe it was not knowing his own history that compelled him to know the history of others. After all, each diary painted a small piece of the tragic portrait of Rapture.
With a gentle hand defying his bulk, the Big Daddy picked up the diary and studied the small photograph taped to its front.
A young girl, no older than eight or nine, with light-coloured hair in a short and messy bob. Her pale eyes flashed with excitement and she was smiling broadly, revealing a row of crooked teeth.
Almost reverently, Zeta pushed the Play button.
"Hello, and my name is Asha," the young girl proudly declared. "Mummy has brought to the mall to buy a new dress. You know, I'm going to be the best princess at the party."
The man inside Zeta's shell smiled warmly as he listened to the innocent words. Perhaps there was a fleck of light inside Rapture's shadowy depths after all.
"Hmm, I wonder where Mummy's gone now?"
A loud gunshot erupted through the small, crackling speaker and all of a sudden the little girl began to scream.
Mummy, where are you? Where have you gone?"
There was an agonising silence as the tape continued. Eventually the girl's voice returned, a terrified wail.
Mummy, please get up! Mummy! Please!"
The tape ended and Zeta stood in silence a moment, clutching the recorder gently in his powerful hand.
Slowly, he set it back on the shelf where he'd found it, and exited the lobby.