Disclaimer: I only own this fic, my characters, etc. As much as I wish I owned the series, I, sadly, do not. We left Delta deep down in the remains of Fontaine Futuristics, battling it out with Big Daddies and Big Sisters in an attempt to free the last of the Little Sisters, and Eleanor and her rescued sisters topside in NYC with Jack, and Eleanor has just realized that Delta is still very much alive. As always, many thanks to my beta reader, Markal.

Eleanor sat up straight as a board, no easy feat with the cushy depths of the couch slowly sucking her in, her eyes. Jack stared at her, his brow furrowed with worry and deep thought.

"What do you mean?" he finally questioned.

Eleanor, pale-faced, turned her wide-eyed gaze to him.

"We . . . we were joined using a different kind of mechanism than future Big Daddies and Little Sisters. They called it the 'Pairbond', and . . . it was some sort of mental and physiological bond that joined a Daddy to a single Sister, forever.

She swallowed hard and took a deep breath before continuing.

"He . . . my Father . . . needed to protect me, to always remain beside me, or his body would shut down."

Guilt played across her face, but she carried on.

"For my part I could, to an extent, sense him and his feelings, sometimes even see through his eyes. While I was unconscious, I . . . saw things."

Her voice trailed off with a pained note. Jack looked at her intently.

"What did you see?" he asked gently. "You can tell me."

Eleanor was silent for a moment that stretched into a small eternity, the sounds of giggling little girls drifting in from other rooms nearby.

"Rapture," she finally whispered. Her voice was hoarse. "I saw Rapture. Saw it through a dirty glass porthole. Felt every shot he fired, every tear and swing of the drill, and all that . . . that bloody rage."

She shook her head, on the verge of tears.

"I had never known. I mean, I had felt him before, sensed him before, but it was never this . . ." she paused slightly, grasping for words, ". . . in depth." She gave a small, rueful smile.

"But, underneath all of that rage and hate, there was always this burning desire, this obsession to find me." The smile faded. "But whether it's love or just the Pairbond conditioning, I . . . I don't know."

Fat salty tears began to pour down her face as her eyes reddened. She began to sniffle through the teardrops.

"But I know it's him. I'm sure it's him. And I left him down there . . . Oh God . . ."

All coherent conversation broke down as the young woman was wracked by sobs. Jack knew what to do. One did not live with five teenage girls without having learned what to do at times like this. Calmly, the weathered man slowly leaned forward in his chair and took Eleanor into a tight hug.

Eleanor buried her tear-stained face and tangled hair into Jack's shoulder, sobbing loudly.

"It'll be alright," he assured her, voice soft. "It'll all be alright. It's not your fault. One of the Vita-Chambers must've revived him when he sank back down."

The girl brought up her head to speak, only to find coherent speech beyond her grief-addled ability.

Jack continued. "It hurts, I know it does. But it won't help you by feeling guilty over this. It's nothing you did or intended, it's just what happened. Now if he really is alive and kicking down there, then you can bet that if everything you told me is true, he's going to be looking for you, and come hell or high water he'll find ya'."

Jack loosened the girl from his shoulder and gently tilted up her chin so that her eyes met his.

"It's nothing you did, and there's nothing you can do now but keep yourself alive, and be ready for him. It hurts, but you can overcome it."

Eleanor gave a weak nod before heaving a mighty sniffle and collapsing back onto Jack's shoulder. The man patiently sighed and hunkered down for the wait.

Standing in the doorway, a slender teenage girl not unlike Eleanor watched silently as the man consoled Rapture's newest refugee. She smiled slightly. Her dad always knew just what to say to a person.

A heat-seeking rocket streaked up into the rafters before it erupted into a fireball. An unearthly screech rent the air as a lithe, smoldering form fell out from the shadows, tumbling downwards to the floor beneath. The tumbling figure landed atop a pile of crates with a thunderous crash, limbs splayed about wildly like a ragdoll. Delta gave a grunt of satisfaction. Only one Big Sister remained. He loaded in another rocket and scanned the darkness, finger twitching on the trigger. The mysterious opponent had yet to even show her helmet-clad face, but he knew she was there. Nothing could make as ungodly a wail as a Big Sister.

Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted a blur of movement, accompanied by the patter of light feet. With a roar, the hollow man whirled around to face its source, ready to unleash hell upon his unseen opponent. No shot was fired. Standing a short distance in front of him was the elusive fifth Sister, but that was all. She merely stood there, staring at him though a lit porthole. No crackling fireballs formed in her hands, no deadly needle was raised and poised to strike. Its blood-red glow was absent. In its place was a soft yellow, which then abruptly flickered to red. The light blinked back-and-forth between wrathful crimson and warm amber like a haywire traffic light, never certain as to what to settle upon. The two metal monsters were silent as the grave ; the only sounds in the warehouse disturbing it were the drip of leaking water and Delta's deep breathing. Finally the colored tug-of-war ended as the porthole glowed a buttery yellow.

His motions slow and deliberate, Delta carefully replaced his launcher with an old double-barreled shotgun, its wooden stock splintered, rusty steel barrels sawn off by a jagged cut, and an intricate revolving mechanism affixed to its loading chambers. The Big Sister seemed to tense at the sight of the weapon. Abruptly, a whimper pierced the silence, high pitched and metallic. Delta was disinclined to believe his ears. What came next gave the hollow man even greater pause.

"Daaaaaaaddy . . ."

It split the air, shrill as nails on a chalkboard, yet, in its own way, mournful and afraid. Delta's mind raced. Who beneath that helmet would call him by that name? Eleanor? Impossible. But could it be? He had to know.

Hands shaking, he tucked the shotgun away and slowly stepped forward. The Sister seemed to shudder, moving back ever so slightly. The Big Daddy paused, then resumed, slowly moving forward one agonizing step at a time. The Sister gradually ceased her fearful retreat, and soon he stood within reach of her. With unsteady hands, he reached forward, undoing the clasps that held the Big Sister's helmet in place. There was a hiss of releasing air pressure, and as he lifted up the metal sphere, the lights within it died. The helmet fell to the floor with a resounding thud, and Delta gazed at the face beneath.

The features of the teenage girl were gaunt and pale, the result of a harsh, nightmarish existence that had never seen the sun. Long brown wisps cascading down from a dirty rat's nest of hair swayed in front of her face, partially obscuring the long, thin scar that ran down her cheek. But nothing could hide her eyes. Two glowing yellow orbs stared back at him. They were the eyes of a Little Sister all grown up. This was not Eleanor Lamb, but it was a face he knew nonetheless. Broken, hazy memories came back in a flood.

Rapture was very much alive; its inhabitants parting like the Red Sea before him as he stomped down its streets. Eleanor led him on, her little hand barely wrapping around one of his gloved fingers. The glitz and glamour of Rapture was lost on his chained mind; there were only two emotions he could now feel, a vigilant contentment and murderous rage. He rumbled down the street, the fear and hate-filled glares of nearby pedestrians rolling off him like oil on water. He did not comprehend them, nor did he care.

Eleanor turned to him, her face alight with excitement.

"ADAM, Daddy! This way!"

Giddily, she tugged at his arm, taking them down a dim alley. Puddles and a few intrepid vermin, descendants of bathysphere stowaways, occupied the path before them. They continued onwards until the echoes of malicious laughter reached his ears. With one arm he hefted Eleanor atop his back, with the other he pulled out the drill. Redoubling his pace, Delta thundered down the alley, emerging in a dark, dank space between buildings, a gritty bit of Rapture never meant to be seen by its well-to-do upper class. A workman's corpse lay slumped against a fuel barrel, his coveralls stained with water, grease, and blood. In the dead center of the gloom was the crumpled form of a fellow Alpha-series, its Sister crouched atop it, tears streaming down her face as blood oozed from a gash on her cheek. Three men encircled her, grinning wolfishly, their crude weapons held high and threatening before them.

Eleanor screamed. The men turned, their smiles fading. The nearest Splicer pulled out a pistol, a single shot ringing out before pinging off Delta's armored suit. The Big Daddy roared and charged, the drill whirring to life. Moments later, the alley was splattered in blood, the corpses of the men scattered all around. Eleanor hugged him tightly, and he felt content. The other Little Sister, now bereft of her own guardian, looked up at him, and he hazarded a glance down at her. She stood and stared back, starry eyed and mournful.

"Daddy," she whimpered softly.

"Daddy . . ."

Shaken from his past, Delta gazed once more at the girl that now stood in front of him. For a certainty, the Little Sister from memory and the Big Sister at present were one and the same. The face, the hair color, and the scar from the cut . . . they had to be. Ghostly yellow eyes gazed back at him adoringly, and a small smile wreathed her pale face. The arrival of a new noise, however, wiped it away.

The distinctive click-clack of a Spider Splicer's hook-aided acrobatics from above turned her smile into an animal snarl, before her face contorted into a cruel, twisted visage and a bloodcurdling screech erupted from her mouth. Soft yellow eyes flashed crimson. Arms raised high; she launched a trio of fireballs into the gloom. They burnt their way through the darkness above until they reached their target, setting the mutated man alight and sending him crashing down to the ground nearby, screaming bloody murder as he continued to roast. The wretched creature landed face-first with a sickening crunch, before it struggled to its feet, shrieking with pain. The Sister wasted no time.

She dashed over to the downed Splicer, hair whipping behind her, red eyes glowing like fiery pits of Hell. A mighty leaping somersault through the air launched her over the pitiful creature and onto his far side. Grinning madly, she plunged her massive needle into the base of his neck, the gleaming syringe sticking out at a crazy angle as it slid into him. There was a slight squelch of suction and then a light gurgling noise as the ill-fated Splicer's insides were sucked out, but all other sounds were quickly drowned out as the Sister reared her head back, ratty brown hair whipping about her head. She let out a banshee scream. Even the Splicer's feeble death throes were obscured.

The scream faded as quickly as it came, and the Sister extracted the needle from the freshly-made corpse with a sickening pop as she stepped back and took a deep breath. She returned her glare to Delta, her eyes still blood red. She stepped forwards, needle poised and ready, and Delta quickly pulled out his drill in wary alarm. She took another step, grinning murderously, but then jerked to a stop. Her eyes widened, the wicked grin fading away as the crimson glowing orbs above it dimmed back to a mild yellow. A meek, blissful smile blossomed on her face.

"Daddy," she murmured happily.

The ONI Commander sat at his desk, rubbing at his temples as he found himself in need of a stiff drink for the umpteenth time as he reviewed the report brought to him by the gruff Captain Kombes.

"Christ," he spat, leaning back in his chair. "Damn FBI can't do anything right. They let whoever it was piloting that thing get away, they let themselves get wrapped up like Christmas presents, and to top it all off they let that warehouse go up in flames. Is there any salvageable evidence from it?"

The Captain shook his head.

"Firemen are still working on putting it out, but from the intensity of the blaze I doubt we'll be able to get anything conclusive from the ashes."

The Commander swore.

"What a disaster." He shook his head. "Alert the President as to the current situation, then get me Admiral Thompson and General Halkner." The man's face darkened. "If we can't find out where it went, we'll start looking at where it came from."

End Chapter. Thanks to all my reviewers, especially to one "Hexates" for a hefty dose of inspiration. Please, please, please keep up the feedback; hearing from you guys is what keeps me pumping out more chapters. That being said, I'm afraid that as the school year draws to a close, and academic hell breaks loose as teachers rush onwards to finals, I might need to take a quick break from spinning this tale of Rapture. Until next time, jschneids, signing off.