"Lamb again!" Tenenbaum's brow is creased with anxiety as she peers through the glass at me. "She will stop at nothing to find you, now she knows that you seek her daughter. Please," she looks at me imploringly, "Hold the splicers off until we escape!"

I give a nod, exaggerated so that the woman will be able to see the helmet move, and turn away to make preparations for the battle to come. I turn back to the window when I hear a gentle tap on the glass, and see Tenenbaum force a plasmid syringe through the slim aperture beneath the pane.

"If you find any Little Ones, please- use this to cure them, then send them to me. I will make it worth your while if you do…"

I take the plasmid and give her a thumbs-up. She looks relieved, and her hand twitches as if she might return the gesture, but she turns away when one of the children tugs on her skirt, demanding her help in the vitally important business of telling Katy that that doll is Linda's, not hers. I smile behind my visor as Tenenbaum winds down the screen, and shoulder the rivet gun once again.

I stand at the gates to the platforms, listening intently for any sounds of activity. I don't have long to wait- a few seconds is all it takes for the feral snarls and growls of the splicers to make their way from "on the cusp of hearing" to "so loud they might as well be on top of you". I hastily shoot trap rivets across the entrance as the first splicer rushes around the corner, managing to strike me with his wrench before I retreat over the threshold. My luck being what it is, he of course somehow avoids all the traps I just placed and leaps into the centre of the room, darting close to me to batter his weapon against my suit. As more and more gush in through the gap I retreat further into the depths of the station, shooting snares as I go. Thankfully, the rage my presence inspires has distracted the creatures from the stench of ADAM emitting from the ticket booth, and they ignore its tantalising scent in favour of pursuing me down the hallway.

I hear squeals and roars behind me as several of the splicers stumble into my traps. By the time I turn around, there's only one left, and he looks distinctly uneasy at being all on his lonesome with a Big Daddy he's been attacking. I have no such worries, and riddle him with enough rivets to take him down and make him stay there. Unluckily for me, I can hear the sounds of his friends coming to join him, and I think there's no more trap rivets left in the corridor.

I find another way through to the platform, and circle back to take on the creatures from behind. There's a group of five here which will do nicely. I catch one of the females in the back with a rivet, causing her to let out a piercing screech which attracts the attention of her comrades. This gives me enough time to slip into the shadows and lurk there as they try and identify the source of the attack.

"Show your face, freakin' animal!"

Hmm. I'd say that was a bit rich, coming from someone who's drugged himself to the point where he doesn't mind if he has to slice a child's stomach open to get at his fix. Still, I do him a favour and show him my face, at the same time as bashing his skull in with the butt end of my firearm. I back up as the others turn on me, sinking rivet after rivet into their deformed hides.

When they're taken care of, I sprint onwards, towards the rest of the splicers, who have realised that the shots are coming from the opposite direction to the one they're running towards. I pick up some of the trap rivets which weren't triggered before, and ready my Electrobolt. The first one who dashes in is shocked right off the bat, but has to wait a bit while I deal with her companion in the rabbit mask, who's now slamming my helmet with a pipe. I don't have time to buckle on my drill, so instead I use more rivets to knock him back into firing range, alongside his lady friend. They both rush at me as a pair, shrieking curses and swiping wildly with their weapons, but I manage to get enough shots off to take care of them both before they get too close. I quickly scavenge some ammo from their bodies* and finish up just as another one runs round the corner at breakneck speed. Even after I shock him his momentum propels him forward, still juddering and shaking with the electricity. His twitching interferes with my aim slightly, but not so much that I don't manage to get him with a headshot. As his corpse crumples to the ground, I glance around for more of them, but that seems to be it for now.

My radio crackles to life once more: it's Tenenbaum, delivering her thanks to me and expressing her regret that she can no longer assist me in my quest. Instead, she tells me of another man I can look to for help, called Sinclair.

"Good luck, Herr Delta," she finishes. "And goodnight."

I don't know how much she can see out of the feed from my helmet, but I hold my thumbs-up signal right in front of me, so she hopefully can't miss it. She may have repeatedly stated the obvious as if it were breaking news, but anyone who's a friend to the Sisters is a friend to me.

Sinclair, Sinclair. The name goes round and round in my head as I rummage around in the debris for anything salvageable. I've heard it before, though I'd be hard-pressed to say exactly where. Unfortunately, although I now have free will, the boiling mess which I dignify with the title of "my mind" is still just as scrambled as it ever was, and I can't quite pick out the memories that would allow to me to ascertain whether I do remember the man or if I'm just imagining it.

I'm startled out of my thoughts by another burst of static as the radio signal switches, and my ears are suddenly filled with what must be the goshdarn smoothest voice I've ever heard. It's faintly amused, and so laid back that it wouldn't sound out of place in- where do people relax? At parties, I suppose- I don't have much experience of relaxation myself, and so I don't really know whereabouts this voice would sound at home. Wherever it is, it certainly isn't in this flooded-out graveyard.

Smooth as his voice may be, altruism isn't one of Sinclair's virtues, apparently- he's making it clear that he's not doing this out of the good of his heart. He's interested in the Fontaine Futuristics building, for whatever reason, and he hopes my assistance can get him it. He signs off with a request to meet me at Ryan Amusements, leaving me near consumed by envy for both his carefree swashbuckling attitude and his Southern syllables.
I've never had the luxury of that selfish outlook on life. My pairbond ensures that there's always someone I'll have to put first, even now my programming's been broken. Still, when I think of the kid, I know that even if I wasn't linked to her in such a lethal way, I'd tear the world apart for her.

I'm searching the area one last time for any useable items when I come across another audio diary from Tenenbaum. This one worries me considerably: apparently when the good doctor arrived, Lamb's splicers destroyed her submersible, leaving her and the Sisters she had rescued without any means of escape. Where is Tenenbaum now, then? Hiding out in another abandoned building, probably, trying to mask the scent of ADAM that still exudes from the children, even after the slugs have been removed from their stomachs. I don't like the idea of sending any Sisters I find into that mess, especially without the safeguard that their ADAM provides against injury, but I suppose it's better than abandoning them down here, risking their lives at Lamb's command without any hope of rescue.

The tape also tells me that Tenenbaum had her doubts about how trustworthy Sinclair really was. It's no skin off my nose, really; in my experience, most people shouldn't be trusted as far as you can throw them**, and the man's assurances that he was doing this for the Fontaine Futuristics building didn't exactly ease my qualms. Consequently, I'm prepared for him to sink a knife into my back at any moment. I'll survive. Heck, I've survived a bullet to the head- what more could anyone do to me?

I step into the train and examine the controls. I've never driven a train before, but how hard can it be? It has a track, so there's no need to steer. I should be fine, if I can work out which lever to pull to start the thing up. Unless it needs coal, or something- don't trains need coal? How would you get coal down here?

I shrug off my anxiety, and a few minutes of lever-pushing eventually gets the locomotive working. The carriage door slams shut, and the gate ahead of me sinks downwards, revealing a tunnel lit dimly by flickering lights. As the train begins its trek into the deep, I notice that most of the bulbs further ahead have blown themselves out, meaning that my journey is going to be in utter darkness. I give a drawn-out sigh, leaning against a wall as the train enters the pitch black. It's going to be a long ride.

Footnotes:

* Though I'm not sure why they were carrying rivets: she had a length of pipe and he a sledgehammer, and nothing else. Bit odd that they were carrying rounds for a Protector's weapon, but I won't look a gift horse in the mouth by questioning why.

** Given the amount of Sports Boost I've had forced into my blood, that would be inadvisable even if people were a bit more trustworthy, actually. I could throw the hammer in the Olympics, if they held the Olympics down here and let Big Daddies enter.