MAY 25, 1959 — 10:43 PM

The Atlantic Express had seen better days. Though the advent of the sleek and versatile bathysphere hadn't quite been the railway's death knell, business had never been the same since the Rapture Metro had erected a station in every major port of the city. Shoe-shine and newspaper stands stood empty, the platforms devoid of passengers and thus all potential customers. But still the trains ran as reliably as ever, usually making their stops on time.

Jack couldn't tell what it was about that letter that had drawn him to the place, but there he was, wearing a shabby coat and dull-colored ascot cap just as its author had suggested. Dissidents were afoot in Rapture's darker streets, dissidents and parasites who sought to undermine Rapture's glory for their own gain...or so his father had always told him. He'd never before had any reason to doubt him, so why should he doubt him now? Nothing rang safe or true in a request for a meeting in a place like this, much less one under cover of darkness; only the promise of a trap could be found in a letter like the one he had received, no matter how kindly its summons had been made.

At least, this was what the rational part of Jack's mind told him, over and over and over again but all to little avail. There was something inexplicable in the words on that page, something he could hardly fathom or describe, save that it and it alone had finally quelled the dissonance in his mind. The doubt that had been plaguing him for so long finally abated. Someone wanted to meet him, him and no one else, and speak with him—about what? About Rapture? He had no way of knowing, no way of doing anything other than hazarding a guess or two, but that wasn't exactly the most important part of it all, was it? Somebody wanted to speak with him, as though he was the only one who mattered—not his father, not the scientists, not anyone else but him.

In this anonymous letter-sender's eyes, he was a man of worth. Perhaps that wasn't true, he reminded himself—perhaps the sender had some ulterior motive, perhaps they sought to ply him with pleasantries before revealing the dagger beneath their cloak—but it was something he desperately wanted to believe.

So he stood on the empty platform and waited, not without some wariness, but also not without some hope in his heart.

"Right on time, Mr. Ryan."

The voice came from somewhere to his side, in the dim shadows of the platform's furthest corner. Jack wondered for a moment how he could have missed the man's presence; in the next moment, he realized this must be whoever had sent him that letter.

It wasn't quite so dark that Jack couldn't make out the man's features, but the brim of his flat cap obscured enough of his face that he remained on his guard; in addition to the cap he wore a coat just as shabby as Jack's, with a faded scarf threaded loosely about its collar. He didn't stand quite as tall as Jack did himself, and the strength of his build didn't seem quite so much that Jack couldn't overpower him if necessary, but something in the man's carriage, in the lines drawn by his form as he stood before Jack with his shoulders back, chin high, and hands squarely in his pockets, rang with a peculiar familiarity in the back of his mind. He tried to feel further for that familiarity, but nothing more turned up no matter how deeply he searched.

It was nothing at all like anything Jack had expected.

"I'm sorry, but..." He had to at least ask to be sure. "Have we met before?"

"Met?" The man shrugged. "Can't say that we have. Then again, I can't say that you haven't seen me at my work, either. I've done a fair amount of odd jobs around this city, wherever the labor was needed."

The idea was a sound enough explanation, Jack thought. But it didn't explain why, although he stood just a few inches below Jack's line of sight, he couldn't shake the distinct feeling that this man was towering over him.

It was too strange for him to question aloud.

"You know, I have to admit..." The man took a step forward, though Jack couldn't tell if it was the train or his own self that he was approaching. "I was a little worried you might not show up."

He spoke with a thick accent that took Jack a few moments to place: Irish. That was his guess, at least. His knowledge in that area was purely peripheral.

"I had to think about it."

That was a lie. As soon as Jack had finished reading the letter, he knew with certainty that he would end up here.

"Well, I'm glad you did."

The man smiled, and the warmth of it seemed not an inch out of place. Jack could feel his earlier wariness beginning to fade.

"What's your name?"

"Atlas," he said simply, drawing one of his hands out of his pockets and extending it towards Jack. "Just call me Atlas, Mr. Ryan."

Jack shook his hand. The solidity of his grip seemed only to compound the confidence in his stance, which once again made Jack feel as though there was something he was missing. After a moment of searching, it occurred to him that perhaps this man's confidence was something he himself truly lacked—something he truly aspired to.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Atlas." Just Atlas. "Now, would you mind telling me what we're both doing here?"

"Easy," he said in reply, looking not to Jack but rather to a clock that sat above the station's timetables. "We're at a train station, aren't we? Let's go for a ride."

Atlas began to approach one of the trains, taking easy strides. Jack couldn't help but feel some confusion; despite how obvious Atlas had made it seem, he hadn't expected to actually be going anywhere else tonight. In fact, it might have been the last thing he expected.

"Don't we need tickets?"

Atlas stopped mid-step to look back at Jack, brow raised. Then he laughed.

"Trust me, boyo. We won't be needin' any tickets for where we're going."

He didn't understand. But he felt no urge to do anything but comply.

Jack followed him into the train car without another word. He took a seat while Atlas stood, one hand on the rung and the other in the pocket of his long coat. They were just in time: the doors soon sealed shut, the whistle sounded off, and the train lurched forward, down the waterway and into the sea.

Once the train was safely submerged and steadily on its way, Atlas fished a cigarette out of his coat, then patted himself down as it hung from his bottom lip.

"Shite..." His eyes flicked up from his pockets to Jack's. "Hate to be a beggar, but would you kindly get me a light?"

Jack didn't hesitate to find his lighter, tucked away inside his own coat pocket, and hand it across the aisle to him.

"Many thanks." Atlas lit up with care, taking a long, slow drag and breathing out with what might have been a sound of relief. The lighter shone silver in his hands, bright amid the wisps of smoke and the soft blue-green glow from the windows of the car. "You're not an Incinerate man?"

Jack shook his head as Atlas passed the lighter back to him. "I'm not any kind of plasmid man, to be completely honest with you. Too, er... Too many side effects."

It was at least part of the truth, he thought. It was as much of the truth as he could manage, at least. But he wondered what made him feel even the slightest bit of reluctance over lying to this man.

"Mm." Atlas nodded with that affirmative noise, turning his gaze downward as he took a seat across from Jack. "I'm the same way, meself. I could handle an extra lump or two in the face, but then people start goin' mad, and then they start seein' ghosts... The only place any ghosts should be is right in the ground, if you ask me."

Jack only nodded in reply. He had learned long ago what people really meant when they said they'd seen ghosts in Rapture: hallucinations of another life in moments previous, memories borne and shared by ADAM as it flowed from one set of veins to the next. It wasn't a process he fully understood, but then again, he was certain nobody but the scientists fully understood it either.

He considered it one of the grislier side effects of the gatherers' work. But that was a thought he would never dare to think aloud, and that thought was the most he would ever dare to dwell on the gatherers themselves.

"Have you ever taken the railway before, Mr. Ryan?"

The question was enough to shake Jack out of his thoughts, and he was grateful for it.

"I haven't," he said with a shake of his head. The only stops it made were places where Jack had no reason to be: a playground, a spa, seedy slums and the haven of his father's former nemesis. If there was ever a place in the city that Jack needed to visit, he could easily reach it by bathysphere.

"Mm." The sound was more thoughtful than affirmative this time. "I expected as much, to tell you the truth. The prince of Rapture doesn't seem the kind of man who's got much time to waste on the train...or in the places it goes to."

Atlas paused there to take another drag off his cigarette. The soft ember glow at its tip only intensified the quiet look in his eyes, eyes which didn't leave Jack for a second.

"But that's something I aim to change."

Before Jack could think to question what he meant, the train was cast into darkness as it entered another waterway, and then it began to shudder to a stop. Wherever Atlas was taking him, they'd just arrived.

"Hang on, boyo." Atlas stood first when the car doors opened, pulled the scarf free of his collar and handed it to Jack. "You'd best wear this. Wouldn't want people to recognize you down here."

Jack nodded and took the scarf without comment or complaint, wound it about his neck in such a way that he could pull it up to obscure his face, and tucked its loose ends into his coat. He wasn't certain why Atlas would bother with such a precaution, but he did have a vague inkling of an idea that told him not to question it.

"That's it," said Atlas, nodding his approval. "All right, come on. Just follow me and stay close; we'll have to walk a ways before we get somewhere safe to talk."

Jack followed him onto the platform and out of the station, just as he instructed. The walls here were grimier than the station they'd left behind, and the unevenly tiled floors were cracked and damp with seawater dripping from the ceiling. A crudely hand-painted sign soon greeted them: PAUPER'S DROP.

Perhaps Jack should have felt some more foreboding upon being led to such a place by a man who had until very recently been a perfect stranger. But he didn't, and while that in itself should have troubled him as well, he gave himself no quarter to question it. He tugged the scarf further up and took a deep breath. It smelled of cigarettes and ash, of gunpowder and steel, and of something else that he couldn't quite put his finger on or begin to describe, something that curled into the corners of his mind and settled into the darkest cracks of his memory, touching upon something too deep within himself to fathom.

He might have expected his earlier dissonance to return. But instead his mind felt calm—not at ease, not necessarily, but strangely still in a way he had never felt before as he followed Atlas into the Drop.