With those words, the projection flew up and Rapture could be seen. Despite nearly a decade of war, decay and ocean pressure, the city was still looked as glorious as ever. Marie's eyes went wide as she moved closer to the window. She had seen the view once before, but she had only been a little girl- to her, this was the first she had ever seen such a spectable.
Behind her, Jack's eyes furrowed. He couldn't help but notice how many sections of the city had fallen to darkness. When last he had seen this, the city had been lit up like a Christmas tree, shining in all its glory. Now, it was nothing more than blackened shapes that lay on the ocean bed.
For Eleanor, she felt only intense dread. Here was the city that had ruined both Father and her own life. Here was the city that she wished to never return to. Here was the city that refused to let go of her life, that forever acted as her prison and cage. She was never going to escape was she?
Do not fear Eleanor, Delta whispered, pouring words of encouragement into her ear. Before you were weak and shackled. Now, you are strong and free. Before, we were separated and apart. Now we are together, working as one. I promise you that you will not be staying here for long.
Eleanor smiled, her fear decreased substantially. Thank you, Father.
"So Eleanor," Eleanor glanced up at Jack's voice, the porthole of her helmet shining brightly like a flashlight into Jack's face. Jack ignored it as he continued, "You said the last place you saw Tenebaum was at the Atlantic Train Station?"
It was actually Father who had seen Tenebaum, but that hardly mattered. Eleanor nodded.
"Well, I've never been there before. You're going to have to point out where I have to go."
"Oh!" Eleanor blinked, feeling slightly silly for assuming Jack would know where to go. She pointed out the window. "You see that area at the one o'clock position, with the two prongs? Take us there."
"I see it," Jack pushed forward with the bathysphere. "I'll just take us nice and ea-"
Jack was interrupted by loud beeping. For a second the inhabitants looked confused before Jack looked out the window and groaned- of course it couldn't be easy.
"Torpedo incoming!"
The girls were thrown off their feet as Jack immediately banked a hard right. The sphere shuddered as the torpedo exploded a few seconds later. The siren continued blaring- to the horror of the rescuers, dozens of torpedoes were speeding towards them.
"Take the wheel Marie!" Jack shouted, leaping to the window. A nearby torpedo was diverted as Jack pushed it away with his plasmids. "Eleanor, we need to use our Telekenisis! If any of those torpedoes hit, we're dead!"
Eleanor didn't need to be told twice, but she felt cold fear rush into her system. Stop countless torpedoes from hitting them with Telekenisis? She was extremely proficient with Telekenisis, but Jack was asking her to do the impossible! Still, it was better than doing nothing. Eleanor reached within herself and began grabbing the torpedoes and throwing them away. It was insanely difficult- not only were they moving at high speed, but in the dark ocean water, it was hard to see the missile until it was almost too late.
The results were clear as the torpedo explosions came closer and closer to the bathysphere. Sweat poured down Eleanor's brow and her head felt like it was going to split open from the intense concentration- she could feel a massive headache coming on.
BOOM!
The bathysphere rocked as a torpedo slipped past Eleanor's defense. It would have detonated on the ship hull if Jack hadn't managed to push it away in time. "Step your game up Eleanor!" He shouted. "I know you're stronger than this!"
"I'm trying!" Eleanor snapped. "Grabbing torpedoes isn't easy for all of us, Jack!"
For a moment Jack held a look of complete confusion. Then he realized Eleanor's error. "Don't grab the torpedoes themselves! Push the water around the torpedoes to redirect it!"
Oh. Eleanor's face turned red with embarrassment- God, she was such an idiot! No wonder Jack was superior to her. With those thoughts, she used her powerful telekinesis and began pushing the water. Instantly the number of close explosions began becoming less and less.
Jack gaped- he had forgotten how powerful Eleanor's plasmids were. Being a former Little Sister with excess ADAM certainly had its benefits.
He quickly snapped out of his awe. "Marie, take us down to the city! Eleanor, keep it up we're almost there!"
The torpedoes were knocked away with ease- they were going to make it! Eleanor felt empowered with the water- it was so much easier to push the liquid rather than the torpedoes themselves. She was-
-swimming through the dark ocean, deeper than any man had gone before. The pressure was intense- even with her new experimental diving suit, she felt as if there were walls around her, closing in, trying to crush her. The suit barely protected her from the freezing temperatures- she had never felt this cold before. But even her muscles locked up and her fragile eyeballs ready to explode, she felt only excitement. For she had gone further than any before her, where no man she have ever been before.
The clearly man-made buildings lighting the sea floor in front of her said otherwise.
It was beautiful. The lights from the city seemed to light up the entire ocean floor. Towers soared high into the ocean floor, like underwater skyscrapers- or perhaps seascrapers was the better word? Eleanor didn't know and didn't care- today was definitely her lucky day. She already had the unique opportunity to to try out a new experimental diving suit designed to allow any man to go deeper than any man before. Now, with that very diving suit, she had discovered an unknown underwater city! This HAD to be the most amazing discovery for mankind!
A beeping noise tore Eleanor's awed gaze away from this unknown site. She was running out of air! If she wanted to make it back to the surface, she had to leave now.
But Eleanor made no move to go back, her curiosity holding her back. Why was there a city on the bottom of the sea? Was it even man-made? Could it be aliens! Or perhaps some other sentient earth species that humanity had never encountered before? No, this was her day. She NEEDED to find out now!
She was so buried in her thoughts that Eleanor didn't notice the danger until it was too late. Suddenly, her entire body was illuminated in light from behind. She turned to see what looked like a large metal…sphere hurling at her at high speeds. She only had a second to see a woman behind a open glass window before the sphere smashed into her with a loud-
BOOM!
Eleanor was thrown off her feet as the bathysphere rocked from an explosion, a torpedo taking advantage of her inattention. Jack shouted in pain as her armor-covered body collided into Jack's fleshy skin, and the two were sent tumbling head over heels as the bathysphere shook violently. Only Marie remained standing, clinging onto the steering with all her might as the vessel spun out of control.
"Engines are blown!" Marie screamed, as Jack and Eleanor struggled to their feet. "I can't steer at all!"
Jack's eyes went wide as Rapture grew larger and larger, the window giving them a clear view of their collusion course. "Grab on to something!" Jack ordered, as he wrapped around Marie in a protective bear hug. "We're going in hard!"
CRASH!
The bathysphere slammed into the wall of a flamboyant gold building, sending vibrations to every building around it. The walls had no chance as the sphere hit the aging metal like a wrecking ball, breaking through with a loud crash. The sphere tumbled in a whirling ball of destruction, smashing everything in its way before finally come to a rumbling halt.
The Ryan family had returned to Rapture.
Eleanor was the first to regain consciousness, her Big Sister suit having protected her from the majority of damage received in the collision. She stirred sluggishly, blinking wearily inside her helmet. It was pitch black- she could barely make out vague shapes with her enhanced vision.
What happened? She thought sluggishly, still out of it. She could feel a massive headache coming on- something she hoped that was caused by the collision and not from...other sources.
One of the torpedoes slipped through your defense and hit our bathysphere. We have crashed landed in Rapture.
Where are we? Eleanor tried to shake the cobwebs out of her head with no success.
Before Delta could respond, there was a loud crack as Jack lit a flare. Eleanor flinched as the bathysphere was instantly flooded with light. Besides her, Marie laid sprawled on the ground. She had a dazed look on her face, but for someone without any gene tonic upgrades she was relatively untouched despite the magnitude of the crash.
Jack, on the other hand, was in far worse shape. His protective bear hug around Marie had caused multiple, deep gashes across his back and arms. A large purple bruise was already forming around his face, his armor shell tonics only doing so much to lessen the damage. His eyes were sharp though as he lifted the flare up and took in the situation.
"Is everyone alright?" Asked Jack. His focused gaze was completely at odds with his disheveled state.
"Jesus Dad!" Marie pulled herself to her feet, her face red with anger and...shame? "What were you thinking? You look like complete shit now!"
Jack ignored her as the teen pulled out a medi-kit and began to heal his wounds. "Eleanor, what is our supply situation?"
Eleanor quickly glanced at their storage. Everything in the bathysphere that wasn't nailed down had been thrown about in a chaotic mess. Surprisingly, almost all of their supplies were in good condition. "We may have lost some of our food, but we're good to go with our weapons and ammo."
Most of the cuts had been healed and the massive bruise had been reduced to small bump thanks the wonders of Rapture medicine. Jack gestured his thanks to Marie as he cast a critical eye on their bathysphere. It had absolutely shredded by the explosive force of the torpedoes, almost to the point that it looked like a split potato. Honestly, it was a miracle they had managed to land in Rapture alive and relatively unharmed at all.
"What happened?" Jack asked. "Why were all those torpedoes shot at us?"
Eleanor glanced at Jack, her fingers curling nervously. "Those were the automated defense systems of Rapture. The whole city must have gone on lockdown when Lamb was killed. Anything going inbound or outbound of the city will be shot down."
"What?" Marie cried, vocalizing the thoughts they were all thinking. "You mean we're stuck here?"
"Quiet!" Eleanor hissed. "There could be splicers nearby."
Jack sighed, taking command. "While this lockdown complicates things, it wasn't unexpected. We always knew it would be harder leaving Rapture than entering. This doesn't change our mission, understood?."
As the girls voiced there confirmation, Jack pulled out his Tommy Gun and loaded it. "Let's move out then. Keep your eyes peeled- we've made a lot of noise. That ought to attract any splicers in the area."
Marie nodded, her fingers curled tightly around her crossbow. Eleanor was curious to see a nervous look on the Hispanic girl's face that was completely at odds with her boisterous attitude. In fact, Eleanor realized it was the first time she had anything besides anger on her face since they had left the surface.
Not so superior now that you're actually here are you? Thought Eleanor as she smiled smugly behind her helmet.
The three rescuers stepped out of the bathysphere, taking the room around them. The place was pitch black but a combination of flares, flashlights, a Big Sister diving suit light and Eleanor's ignite plasmid chased the darkness away and revealed the area.
They were in a large room. At one point it must have been some kind of grand ball room or other fancy area. Fragments of faded red carpet lay scatter around the ground. Massive windows were placed along the walls, giving a beautiful view of the city. The ripped remains of regal purple drapes hanged like dirty laundry over the window frames. In the middle of the room was a magnificent gold statue. It was in pristine condition, with the exception that its head was missing. It looked someone had grabbed it and brutally ripped it off.
"Where are we?" Marie asked. Her voice was at a slightly higher pitch than normal.
At Jack's expectant glance, Eleanor spoke- images and maps flashed into her mind and she now recognized where they were. "I'm not completely sure, but I believe we are in the Guild homes of Rapture. These were the homes were where the skilled specialist lived together, often in guilds. Plumbers, cooks, welders- they weren't necessarily rich but they were the part of the "best of the best" that Ryan strived to bring to Rapture. Most of these guilds those were not part of Ryan's inner circle lived which is probably why he put them here. For the most part this area is cut off from the rest of Rapture, so we'll have to take a bathysphere back into Rapture. Luckily, almost all of these houses have private bathyspheres, so it will be a simple matter of finding one."
Jack frowned. "I thought that only Ryan's inner circle could use the bathyspheres. That's was one of the reasons why Fontaine needed me to kill Ryan."
Eleanor smiled, though Jack couldn't see it through her helmet. She liked when Jack asked her questions- for once, she was glad that Lamb had made her "study" (read: forced the knowledge into her brain) the relatively-short history of Rapture. "That was only after the civil war Jack. And when Lamb took power, she allowed only the Big Sisters access to the bathyspheres as well."
"So I wouldn't be able to use the bathysphere system at all anymore?"
Eleanor paused as a memory from Father flashed into her head, a young man's excited voice speaking into her ear.
All right, Diary - last entry! ... Lizzy and I ... we found a 'sphere and we're going home! Ain't that right, baby? Next stop, topside!
"Not anymore," Replied Eleanor shaking her head. "After some failed escape attempts from the relatives of Ryan's inner circle, Lamb closed off all bathysphere access except to those with Big Sister suits."
"So which way are the apartments?"
"That way." Eleanor pointed at an elevator on the east side of the room. "But it won't do us any good to go now. All apartments are sealed by a code. We're going to need to grab one before we can get out of here." She paused as she brought up what she could remember of the map schematics in her mind. "There should be interrogation rooms in that direction," She pointed at a long, dimly-lit hallway on the north side of the room. "There might be some kind of computer system we can hack there. If any place would have people's private information, why not the police force of this area?"
"Can we get a move on?" Marie interrupted, her eyes darting around as if expecting to get jumped at any second. "This place is giving me the creeps."
Jack said nothing as he gestured for Eleanor to take point. With her Big Sister armor and regeneration, she was the perfect vanguard. Marie quickly fell in step behind her with Jack coming in from the rear, ever watchful of their surroundings.
A/N: Thanks to all the reviews! Here are some answers to some common questions I've been getting (especially from anon reviews):
Q1. Will this be a Eleanor/Jack romance story?
A1: Eleanor certainly hopes so!
Q2: Why the long delay?
A2: As I said before, I was extremely dissatisfied with Chapter 25. With school going on, it was unfortunately very easy for me just to place the story on the back burner. I'll be even more busy in the next couple of weeks due to upcoming Finals but after that it'll be winter break!
Q3: Why don't you correct mistakes that have been pointed out?
A3: To be honest, I didn't realize there was an edit chapter feature in FFN- I had assumed to edit chapters, I would have to delete and re-up the chapter...And of course, I never bothered to ask =_=. Luckily, one of my reviewers pointed this feature out so I'll be editing my previous chapters for glaring errors. Please give me a headsup if you find one!
Q4: Why are your author notes long as [insert unpleasant descriptions]?
A4: Sorry, I like my A/N's :(
(Edited 7/19/12 for minor spelling errors)