Chapter 4
"Pain and beauty. To an artist, they are parent and child."
Dewitt started, moving from his position at the window and grabbing the radio with a suspicious glare. "Cohen?" he cautioned.
"I'm sending you to find your...young one. No need to thank me. I'm not so sure you'll like what you find."
The other side of the glass reveals a building far below where the rest of the city is. They depicted tales and figures from sea mythology-mermaids, water nymphs, sea gods, and even the famed Poseidon's mighty trident, broken off from the god himself, a clenched fist still encircling the weapon though it was now a good fifty or so feet below the statue itself. Some statues had broken off heads, others hands, arms, or even tails-but all were in a state of decay that boasted of long periods of neglect. Seaweed hung from their legs and draped over their arms like cloth, fishes made their bubble nests atop the crowns of the women like crowns they never wore, and the few discarded advertisements and shop signs wedged firmly in between dunes of sand at the bottom of the abyss, growing barnacle mustaches and losing their neon glow.
Elizabeth looked around in astonishment, wondering what Cohen could possibly mean by sending them here, but then she noticed what one particular sign said. "Look," she pointed out to the others, motioning towards a sign than read in surprisingly still bright neon FONTAINE'S DEPARTMENT STORE.
"Fontaine's," Dewitt murmured. "Ryan sunk the whole thing to the bottom."
"But it's a prison now. Why would Cohen have sent Sally there?"
"Good question." Dante chipped in, this fact having always bothered him as he never found out why. Sure, it all worked out in the end, but if things had turned out differently...if she'd been sent somewhere else...
"Everyone has needs." Cohen replied. "I merely provide a service to those who have the means to pay. You'll find your little bird in the housewares department." And with that, the radio went dead.
"How many people do you suppose Ryan's got locked up in that place?" Elizabeth questioned, examining the building as they drew closer to it.
"Enough. Fontaine had amassed something near an army. Now they're down there, spliced up and wild." He then noticed that the bathysphere shifting into it's docking mode. "Alright, there's a dock up ahead.
"Takes a cold son of a bitch to do that to a living person."
"What's that?"
"Burial at sea." Dante answered, unholstering his gun and inspecting it.
"You read your residency contract with Ryan Industries?" DeWitt asked, shaking his head. ""In perpetuity." We're all buried at sea."
Their elevator landed at Fontaine's Station, the door swinging open as the smell of death and decomposition filled their noses. Out of all of them, Elizabeth was visibly repulsed by the scent as she pinched her nose and let out a sound of detestment. DeWitt pulled out his own revolver, although only putting in three bullets. Dante noticed and dug out an extra three from his pocket as he handed them to the PI. The smell aside, the building itself did not look like it held up. For starters, there was near ankle high water that soaked the trio's shoes as well as crabs skittering across the floor.
"Don't get too comfortable. Keep your eyes open." The older man advised, scanning the room with his gun pointed out. Dante followed suit, although keeping the gun in a standby position.
"Seem to be some supplies this way, Mr. DeWitt." Elizabeth pointed out, making her way forward.
"It's Booker," the older man grunted, clearly annoyed by this point.
"...What?" Elizabeth asked slowly, almost venomously.
"...Just call me Booker."
"If it's all the same to you, let's leave it at Mr. Dewitt." Elizabeth replied coldly, turning away and continuing on.
DeWitt grunted, putting a hand to his head and shaking it. Dante noted this as another one of his "spells" as he was beginning to remember.
Elizabeth stopped suddenly, pointing at the gate in front of them. "Look up there." She pointed at what seemed to be a lamp with a chain hanging off it. "Let's have another look around. Perhaps we'll be able to find something to get us up and over."
Another small detail of note was that a bit of the area and bodies that were littered all over were flash frozen. Dante suspected Winter Blast or perhaps a more advanced version of the Plasmid. He wondered if they would come across it during their venture. As the trio looked around, they came across three Air Grabber claw devices in the hands of frosty corpses, all bunched together with horrified expressions plastered on their faces.
"Could be handy," Dewitt nodded appreciatively as he wrestled the device out of the dead man's hand.
"A sky-hook." Elizabeth observed, as the device did resemble the Colombia device.
""Sky-hook"?" DeWitt raised an eyebrow. "You mean the "air-grabber"? Kids use 'em to ride around up on the pneumo lines."
'"Air-grabbers"? Huh." Dante commented before muttering. "Constants and variables indeed."
"Constants and what-?"
"Never mind." The duo quickly waved the question aside in unison before heading back to the gate, new tools in hand and ready to use them.
DeWitt tried out his new toy to get above the gate, only to get stuck halfway over. He groaned in frustration, trying to wrench the machine from its hook, but it wouldn't budge. "Goddamn Grabber's stuck…" He complained before new voices were suddenly heard, these not the friendly sounding kind.
"I want the frosty one! GET ME THE FROSTY ONE!" A crazed voiced yelled out from somewhere close by, but still unseen.
The duo behind the gate stayed silent (as did the PI) and they saw three splicers fighting over an ice-type vigor. The first splicer froze the second before running into an elevator that closed behind him. A third one pursued forward, beating on the door while the first broke from his frosty bindings.
"No! Come back! I want the frosty! Want it! Want it!"
DeWitt fiddled with his device for a moment before feeling it get loose. "Alright, I got the grabber unjammed." He whispered to the duo who gave him a thumbs up. Jumping down, he snuck up behind the second splicer before shooting him straight in the head. This gained the third one's attention as he turned around just to get a bullet to the brain, though not from the PI who turned to see Dante's gun smoking. Elizabeth followed suit, using her grabber to jump over the fence and land on the opposite side.
She walked up to the window before pointing outside to the tower for Housewares. "Housewares...that's where Cohen said we'd find Sally. The store ran trams between the three buildings. We'll need to avail ourselves to that."
"Assuming it still works," Dante said, somewhat unhelpfully.
Elizabeth barely held back a sigh. "Optimism, Mr. Price. It helps in situations like this."
They all made their way over to the elevator, and after pressing the button and waiting for the lift to arrive, they climbed in and began their descent in uncomfortable silence.
"When did you come to Rapture?" Dante decided to ask, knowing Elizabeth would've asked eventually if he didn't, but the silence was becoming unbearable.
DeWitt scratched the back of his head. "Oh, it was...jeez...I guess around '51. No...'48?"
"That's a rather large gap." Elizabeth commented, raising an eyebrow at the man's unsureness.
"Time...life I had before...sort of becomes a blur. '49. '49 for sure." He confirmed before noticing his nose was bleeding. "Damn."
"You look a mess, Mr. DeWitt."
"Just keep your eyes open for splicers. They can do us a whole lot worse."
The doors opened as the trio crouched down, sticking to the shadows so they wouldn't be noticed by the three splicers currently occupying the room. One was feeding dead birds that littered the ground, another was bumbling around with his head down, and the final one was pacing all the while wielding a billy club. The first splicer was talking to herself, trying desperately to get the "birds" to eat the birdseed.
"There, little birdies. Eat it up. It's good for you, you know! I never heard of birds that didn't like seeds! What's, what's the matter with you? Do you think it's poison?"
Elizabeth winced in sympathy for the poor woman, but shook herself out of it. She whispered to the others, "Careful. They don't look friendly."
The two nodded as the went to work. DeWitt snuck up behind the woman before snapping her neck, all the while Dante threw a Possession at the lumberer as he then began to beat the armed splicer till he was dead. After the Vigor wore off, he grabbed the billy club and bashed his head in. With the splicers dealt with, they continued on only to find the entry to the tram was blocked. A huge gap halting their progress with water spouting out of the broken pipes below the floor reaching the other side.
"Well, there's the tram." DeWitt commented bitterly, seeing no way to cross.
"That splicer had no problem freezing a path for himself before." Elizabeth pointed out, an idea forming in her mind-Dante could tell just by her look.
DeWitt scoffed. "I'm sure he'll be happy to do the same for us."
"I have no doubt you'll prove persuasive," she murmured sarcastically, mocking the man falling into step behind her before looking over to a sign that advertised something called Rapture on Ice. "An ice rink."
"It's a good place to look for our new friend," Dante nodded, adjusting his jacket to compensate for the chill of the area. As they neared the entrance, he could feel the chill settle into his bones, freezing his breath as it came out in puffy clouds and gifting Elizabeth with a rosy complexion.
Elizabeth stopped by the sign as they passed it, gave it a quick read, and noted, "Says it's on a top floor."
"So we go up." DeWitt surmised as he passed by the sign. Just as he stepped up to the door, he jiggled the lock and groaned. "Agh, damn thing's locked."
"Let me see that." She walked up to the door and examined the lock. "Ugh, have matters progressed so little...I could turn this with a rake pick." She leaned down, pulled a lockpick seemingly out of thin air, and after a few seconds passed she easily got the lock open. "Done."
"Where'd you learn that?" Dewitt had tried to peer over her shoulder to see what she was doing while she'd been lockpicking, but she hadn't permitted it.
"Oh, it's something I picked up a long time ago," was the nonchalant answer.
"Our frozen friend leaves one hell of a trail," Dante muttered as they pass by a couple more flash frozen corpses. These ones were more or less the same as the previous ones they'd seen. Entering the next room, they once again crouched down as four splicers were banging on a door that lead to a restaurant.
"Come on...just let me in ok? Fontaine said we're all equals down here now, all in the same boat. I just want a taste of some high-class food!" one of them cried out, banging on the door with a metal pipe.
"I don't think they see us. If you two keep quiet, maybe you could get the drop on 'em. Maybe even the odds," Elizabeth suggested, eyeing the room for bottles of EVE and spare ammunition.
DeWitt rubbed his chin, contemplating a course of action. He seemed to come up with an idea. "Yeah. Maybe even lay down a trap or two. What do you think kid?" He turned to Dante, who had already proceeded to silently move up the stairs, and swore. "Kid!"
Realizing he was just being ignored, the PI decided to put his plan into action as Dante went up to the next level. He planted a charged fire ball just close enough the group of four so that they wouldn't notice until it was too late. All he needed now was a good vantage point and a distraction which came in the sound of exchanged gunshots, and a splicer being flung from the rails right near the trap. A couple other of the four moved to investegate, only to be caught on fire and drop dead as their two compatriots suffered the former. DeWitt took advantage of this as he gunned down one before throwing fireball at the other, finishing the last of the four off. A guttural scream was heard as he turned to see a splicer aiming their gun at him, only to have a hole appear in the middle of their head and drop dead. Dante came down the stairs, holding his smoking gun as he downed a bottle of EVE before tossing DeWitt one.
"That the last of them?" Dewitt asked.
"Not sure, but pretty sure we can get through the door now."
They made their way to the door, and as soon as she saw the heavy metal lock on it, Elizabeth groaned in annoyance. She began to dig through her pockets for the lockpick as she muttered, "Okay. Give me a few minutes to crack this...this is getting annoying. Usually this is kinda fun, but…"
"Here," Dante dug through his jacket pocket before pulling out his sonic screwdriver and aimed it at the lock. "Next best thing to a lockpick, saves us the trouble of finding them." He held it out to Elizabeth who took and examined it. "All you need to do is point, think, and click."
"So I just think the lock away?"
"Think of it being unlocked."
"Er...okay…" She closed her eyes, pointed, clicked, and thought hard, and indeed, a few seconds later, they all heard a click. She opened her eyes, surprised, and noted that it was indeed unlocked now. She looked at the small device in her hands in wonder. "I have got to get me one of these."
Dante smirked. "I'll build you one after all is said and done."
"So what exactly is that thing?" DeWitt asked, still trying to wrap his mind around the fact that a small device like that was able to unlock a door. "Is it on the market? 'Cause I could use one."
"I'm sure you could," Elizabeth said icily, her momentary awe and joy at the small device forgotten at the remembrance of their companion.
"It's a sonic screwdriver." Before the PI could ask his next question, Dante added, "And no, it's a custom device."
"Damn shame."
They walked through the door to see more dead splicers, one having a tommy gun near it. Dante grabbed and inspected the weapons drum mag to see it was partially full. They headed near the stairs that lead lower into the restaurant before hearing bickering voices. Heading down the stairs and looking over the rails, they saw a group of splicers, two who were fixing up a turret and another two who were talking to each other. Most of what they said was either inaudible or incomprehensible, and as they chattered and babbled the three discussed a plan of attack. Just as they got their turret working, Dante silently tossed a Possession at it, causing it to go berserk and take out one of the splicers before being destroyed by the others. In the confusion, DeWitt followed suit by tossing one at another splicer as he turned on his ally, killing another of their number before being put down. Dante again threw a Possession at one of the remaining two as he gunned down his ally before both men gun downed the final splicer.
Once the damage was done and the enemy taken out, the three dug around the area for supplies and money that the splicers may have carried before making their way up another set of stairs, hearing another set of splicers. Opening the doors and taking cover, the trio noted that there were two upstairs and two on the level they were on. Upon further inspection, Dante noticed that the two upstairs were near a fuel drum which could be used to their advantage. He felt certain that he could take them out, and then the other two downstairs could be taken out by either hook dismount or plasmid. Silently, he pointed out the downstair pair to DeWitt before pointing at the vantage point he could get to via Air Grabber. The PI understood as he moved towards the pair on their level before Dante got up to the chain and took a shot at the drum. The duo caught on fire and died instantly as the other two took noticed but were gunned down by DeWitt. Once again, the trio searched through the place before coming across a wrecked set of stairs. They used their air grabbers to get across the gap via the magnetic ornamental scones hanging around the place, only to see even more splicers, these in the middle of a firefight.
They apparently were so self-absorbed in their own little feud that they didn't notice the trio landing behind them, hiding right around the corner. Possession seemed to work the last few times so Dante threw one out at a splicer who's back was turned as he killed the other splicer he was fighting with, only to get gunned down by a turret. Moving forward, DeWitt threw one at the turret which didn't attack them. They walked into the next room, finding two splicers alone as the two just gunned them down. A neutralized turret later and after scavenging for more money and ammo, they walked to a door that led to the pavilion.
"What's happened to these people...they don't even seem sane." For the first time since they started this mission, Elizabeth allowed the pity and sorrow to seep into her voice. Dewitt looked at her curiously, before shrugging.
"Nothing beats your first splice. From there, it's all downhill. The frozen frosties, the jockeys who will hand you a thousand volts as soon as look at you…"
Elizabeth threw the look back at him. "You sound sympathetic."
Booker shook his head, looking almost rueful. He didn't look at either of them as he answered. "They wouldn't be the first sons a bitches who found an answer at the bottom of a bottle. But once you seen them go all weak in the knees at the sight of a Little Sister and all her ADAM...well...then they cut a less sympathetic figure." HIs face and voice hardened at that last bit, and for a brief moment Elizabeth could almost sympathize with him.
Opening the doors, they see the pneumo tubes circling around and three stores: Ladies Wear, Fontaine Plasmids and Jack Frost's Ice Rink. But just straight ahead of them was the door leading to the elevator that led back to where the bursted pipe was. There only there was a small problem.
"Short-circuited. Probably be able to pop it open with a-"
"-a jolt of Shock Jockey." Elizabeth finished.
"You familiar with Shock Jockey?" DeWitt asked, a questioning look on his face.
"More than you could know," Elizabeth sighed, already thinking up some places where they might be able to find some.
"Allow me," Dante insisted, and threw his hand out to shoot out Shock Jockey, only for nothing to happen. "Crap, guess I'm out of EVE."
"Let's look around. Maybe there's a store ain't been ransacked by splicers yet," Dewitt suggested hopefully, looking around as if to make his point clearer.
"That plasmid department store's our best bet."
They air grabbed the tubes and got up to the Plasmid store, slowly walking in as they heard a group of splicers. DeWitt didn't know how much EVE he had left but he decided to take a shot as he threw two Possessions at the four splicers, causing the group to take themselves out. Once that was done, they scavenged around to find more bottles of EVE as well as the Shock Jockey which the PI drank.
Elizabeth decided to ask a question that was itching in her mind. "Why did Ryan lock up all of Fontaine's followers in a department store?
"He needed somewhere to put Fontaine's button men. Why not shut down the competition in the bargain?"
"But I thought Andrew Ryan was all about free markets and open competition?" Dante asked, knowing that there was more to it but wanted to know DeWitt's take.
"All those ideas lose their luster when the quarterly earnings come in and you find the other guy's eating your lunch." DeWitt explained, before sighing. "Either way, Fontaine's dead."
They left the store and made their way in to find it was unironically at sub-zero temperatures.
Elizabeth shivered and hugged herself in a vain attempt to bring some warmth back into her bones. "It's freezing in here."
"Something tells me all that cold isn't just comin' from the ice rink," Dewitt observed. His eye caught a frozen figure in the corner still gripping onto a carbine as he walked over and wrenched it away. Inspecting it, he saw it was still full one mag so he slung it over his shoulder and proceeded forward.
As soon as they walked in, they could hear someone shouting at a group of splicers. The voice sounded gruffer than the others, with an authoritative tone that told the trio without being told that he was undoubtedly the leader here. When he spoke, it was with the grating voice of nails on a chalkboard, and Elizabeth winced at the volume in the man's voice, amplified tenfold by the icy cavern he resided in. Even worse was the fact that the splicer seemed to be looking their way, and he growled.
"Nobody gets even a sip unless I say so! You got it? Anyone come nears that bottle without permission is a DEAD MAN!"
He then turned away, much to the trio's relief. Dante looked around for what he knew would be there-and yes, there it was, not ten feet away-a glass display case with the Old Man Winter logo on the front. It was closed, but they could see some sort of blue ooze trickling down the spine of the display case from inside. Dewitt turned, saw what he was looking at, and immediately tried to make his way to the case, but Dante stopped him.
"You trying to get yourself killed?" He asked ironically, obviously due to what would've occurred had he not showed up. "We need to strategize here. Whittle them down to just a couple of them and us."
"He's right, as usual," Elizabeth chipped in, looking sourly at DeWitt. "If you go over there now, you'll be frozen in a dry ice block in seconds. We need to take them out before we get to the case. There's only a few of them, I'm sure we can manage. But we need a plan."
"Right, right." DeWitt pondered, trying to come up with a way this could work. After a minute or two, it came to him. "Alright how about this: hit one with Possession, have him get bumped off, wait 'till two of them are in range then use Shock Jockey and finish the remaining two."
Dante looked at the older man with surprise. "Huh, that might just work... Alright, let's do it."
Their plan went into motion as the possessed splicer attacked his comrades until they killed him. Two of them (one of the normal splicers and the Frosty guy) started walking in the trio's direction before being stunlocked by a blast of Shock Jockey. As they were gunned down, the final two emerged only to be taken down by the PI. With all the spliers slain, they walk over to the display case. Elizabeth proceeded to use the screwdriver to unlock it, only to see all the bottles were opened and drunk from. She frowned, Dante sighed, and Dewitt cursed.
"Damn it. That son of a bitch drank every last bottle of Old Man Winter." DeWitt grimaced, not sure what do now that their plan had gone down the drain. "Where the hell else are we supposed to get this crap?"
"I think I can help," Elizabeth said after a moment. She closed her eyes, concentrated, and spread her hands apart, opening a tear where a bottle still existed in the display case. Dante knew what it was, and before she even closed her eyes, he had been expecting it. But Dewitt was completely perplexed, and a little amazed.
"Whoa. What was that?"
Elizabeth was clearly not expecting her miracle to be questioned. She fumbled around for a few moments, trying to come up with a plausible excuse. "It's a, uh, new plasmid. Lets me...lets me bring in things that might exist but...don't…" Her lie was a good one, but poorly delivered-either way, Dewitt was fool enough to buy it. He nodded, though he still looked confused.
"Not sure I understand. What's it called?"
"Tear."
"Where'd you find that?"
Elizabeth was silent for a moment as she tried to come up with a response. "It's a new Plasmid, but it's not out on the market yet. I volunteered to be one of the testers for it. It's...fairly useful, but it does have its side effects. They're not planning on releasing it for a while."
Booker nodded, because that made sense, right? "Fair enough. Just wish you'd said something sooner. That could come in handy. Or can you only...er...summon...munade things like that?" And here he pointed to the display case.
"Other things too. But...one of the side effects is that I can't summon things willy-nilly or whatever I want. They're...working on that." Okay, that last bit was a half-lie,, but how was he supposed to know? She couldn't think of any better way to explain it, either, so it would have to do for now.
"How do you mean?"
Elizabeth finally scoffed, turning away from Dewitt and heading towards the exit of the ice rink. "You don't expect a girl to share all her secrets, do you, Mr. DeWitt?"
DeWitt just shook his head, as he proceeded to drink the Plasmid. As they started back to the bursted pipe, DeWitt decided to try and pry more info out of the duo.
"Alright, I know you're the client and all, but I've gone about far enough without a few answers."
"Our purpose here is none of your concern. Consider us a means to an end." Dante answered, suddenly reminding himself of two particular redheads that would say the same thing.
"Then why do I get the feeling like I'm being set up?"
"I told you, we're in collections." Elizabeth interjected, tiring quickly of this topic. "An account is in arrears. Our clients simply want to see matters set to right. Why does it matter to you? You're getting what you want, we're getting what we want."
Booker made a face at that, but he was silent for a few moments more, until he grumbled under his breath, "Don't make any sense, that's all."
Elizabeth sighed, turning towards him impatiently. "If you don't like the arrangement, the bathysphere's back that way." She jabbed a thumb to where they had entered the establishment, and stared him down until he shook his head and pushed past the both of them.
They continue on, retracing their steps(dispatching a few splicers along the way and picking up a shotgun) from the ice rink to the central area, and then back to the burst pipe, where Dewitt used his new Plasmid to ice over the bridge so they could cross. As they made their way over the vast expanse of ice, Elizabeth asked, "If Sally's not your daughter, what's she to you? Why risk life and limb?"
DeWitt looked at her curiously. "Is this part of the job?"
Elizabeth shrugged. "You owe me no explanation."
Dewitt looked away. "She's just another orphan. After Fontaine went down, city was lousy with 'em."
"And…?" she prompted hopefully.
Dewitt suddenly got very defensive, spluttering for a moment or two before answering in a slightly higher pitched tone, "I don't know. You have a reason for every stupid thing you've ever done? She started showing up, looking peaked. More fool of me to feed the brat - shoulda known she would never leave."
Elizabeth, while taken aback at his sudden outburst, did not loosen up on her questioning. "How did you lose her?"
"It's none of you business."
The trio made their way into the bathysphere, pulling the lever so it got underway. It wasn't till they submerged that DeWitt decided to ask something that was nagging at him.
"Somethin' about you two doesn't sit right."
"What?" Dante inquired, curious on what he had to say.
"Wouldn't peg you two as the Rapture type. Not even a little."
Elizabeth glared at him. "If you mean I have no interest in joining the Andrew Ryan book club, you'd be right. Just another set of fanatics with a different set of books."
DeWitt was silent for a few moments, letting that sink in, and seemingly coming to a decision before saying, "I gamble."
"What?"
"You asked me how I lost Sally. I gamble. Took her somewhere a kid's got no business being. I was winning. In a place like that...you don't let a kid outta your sight."
Dante wanted to say something along the lines of "no shit", but decided not to, feeling that it would be inappropriate.
"But you did," Elizabeth noted carefully.
Dewitt laughed mirthlessly. "Yeah, and here we are. But the million-dollar question is: what's she to you?"
"We have an interest in reuniting you with her. Isn't that reason enough?" Dante questioned, eyes narrowing.
"Let's hope Cohen was on the level when he said this is where we'd find Sally."
Elizabeth shuddered as she looked around, lost in her own thoughts momentarily. "I can only imagine what they would do with a child in a place like this."
"Cohen's halfway to splice Town. Probably thought putting a child in prison would be "high art"."
Dante nodded in agreement. "The sooner we find her, the better."