Part 16: Mutual Bonds
"Hey Alice," David wheezed with a smile. Alice stared at him in disbelief. Her eyes, hazel once again, darted across every inch of his face, as though she were trying to make sure he was real. He most likely would have worn the same expression, but his head was swimming and the floor looked like it was rocking violently back and forth. "You grew up nicely." Sure he was leering, David climbed shakily to his feet. Alice giggled, like they were both back in Pauper's Drop, like they were both kids again.
"Shut up," she said, her smile fading. Her giggle turned from a natural expression of mirth, to a forced bark. "I could kill you, Davy." She took a step back, her smile gone, replaced by an agitated frown. "It would be so easy." The edges of Alice's irises began to glow, her hands balling into fists." I should… for the family."
"Come on," David responded, keeping his tone friendly. "What's the guy's name on first?" His voice was quiet, half strangled, but he managed to make himself heard. Alice giggled again, back to being human, not a psychopathic, ADAM fueled killer.
"What's the guy's name on second." She giggled again, smiling, and crossed the short space between them, wrapping both arms around his chest. Burying his head in her hair, he returned the embrace. After spending two years of his life, and one day after Tenenbaum revived him, fighting and scraping just to keep breathing, David had found something worth living for. He had died, committed and witnessed horrible acts. Rapture might be burning down around him. But none of that mattered, he had Alice again. For the first time, David was actually glad that the doctor had brought him back from the dead. Resting her head on his shoulder, Alice whispered softly, "I missed you Davy."
"Ah… another touching moment," Cassidy called out obnoxiously from the nearby speaker. David did everything in his power to ignore his former training instructor. "Well as much as it pains me to do it, I'm going to have to burst your little bubble. Alice… the family is burning."
While he couldn't see the change, he could feel it as Alice stiffened, pulling away slightly, and her muscles going tense. A suddenly bling pain pierced David's abdomen. When he looked down, he found that Alice had stabbed him, running the three feet of steel that was her ADAM gathering hypodermic into his stomach. She lifted him with the same arm, pinning the writhing teenager against the wall. As blood frothed up his throat, David bit down a scream, clutching the ADAM needle, futilely trying to dislodge it from his stomach.
With all the effort of flicking away a fly, the Big Sister threw him across the room, dislodging the ADAM needle in the same motion. David slammed into the floor, sliding to a stop inches from falling into the massive hole in Zeus's Crown. After coughing up a clump of blood, the former assassin, running more on adrenaline than anything else, slowly rose to his feet. The world around him had become a blur, his brain unable to cope with the repeated and devastating injuries his body had sustained.
As he swayed, his limbs going numb, David could make out a vague outline of something charging toward him. Instinct took over. Two years of training, implanted memories, and endless repetition turned his body against him. He grabbed at the nearest limb within reach, and pulled the attacker over his hip.
Some part of David's mind managed to fight off the fog of blood loss and concussions that clouded his vision and judgment. He held onto the arm as Alice slipped over the edge. Her weight dragging him down, the former assassin crashed to the floor, his right arm and shoulder dangling over the abyss. Desperately, knowing it was an act of futility, David tried to pull Alice back to solid ground, while his other hand gripped at the smooth tiles.
As she hung from one hand, Alice was hidden behind a mask of hatred, her eyes glowing with unchecked fury. They gazed at David with an unseeing, unquestioning malice. Even as he tried to pull her to safety, her hand glowed ominously. No! Fight it Alice! David screamed internally.
A moment later, the world shifted. One second he was half over the edge, still sliding closer to a fatal plunge, the next the world was white. Remembering the Little Sister's sojourn into his subconscious, David had a moment to wonder what Alice was trying to accomplish before the light faded, and he found himself outside of Rapture altogether.
Standing before him, in a ballroom lit by brilliant sunlight, Alice, dressed in a white evening gown, gently tugged him toward the dance floor. This wasn't Alice as a little girl, or the half mad killer who'd been tortured half her life. This was Alice as a young woman who'd never been inducted into the Little Sister program, an imagining of what her life could have been. Laughing, the light playing across her face, she spun, letting her dress swirl around her.
The ballroom melted away, revealing a moonlit park. Walking slowly, arm in arm, the two made their way past koi ponds and through swirling fireflies, until they reached a gentle, grassy slope. Lying there, watching the stars, Alice rested her head on David stomach.
Just as swiftly as the ballroom had disappeared, the sky turned dark with clouds and a gentle rain fell on the two. Laughing, they ran under the sheltering branches of a willow tree. Alice pressed close to David, her warmth spreading through his soaked clothing. She tilted her head up, and pressed her lips to his.
The warmth and comfort of the illusion was replaced by a blinding, white-hot pain in David's right arm. Convulsively his hand sprang open. For a moment that seemed to last an eternity, Alice seemed to hang in the air, her face framed by her short hair. In that moment David thought he could see her smile. Then, she was gone, swallowed by the darkness, falling down the abysmal hole that led to the bottom of Zeus's Crown.
"ALICE!" David screamed. Maybe if he shouted loud enough, maybe if he wished hard enough, if he could deny it, she might come back. Rolling away from the edge, David felt an indescribable yawning in his heart, a hole that had briefly been filled by the one thing that had made his life worth living. No, please God… no. David begged. Bring her back… Please… just bring her back. Curling into a ball, David gave a pained shout of loss and self-loathing. More than anything he wished Tenenbaum hadn't brought him back, that the Big Daddy or Big Sister had done their jobs and killed him. Anything, and everything to bring her back.
Without the helmet, David could feel his body dying, the long absence leaving a painful burning his lungs, like each breath was an inhalation of acid. Good, David raged at himself. Let me die. I deserve it. I killed her, I should die. For those few moments he was ready to lie there and accept the poison that was working its way through his veins. Then, he remembered why Alice had turned on him. No, David thought, a low growl escaping his clenched teeth. Cassidy.
Pulling his broken and bruised body up, David felt a new, vindictive energy fill his veins. Replacing the helmet on his head, feeling the suit go to work on his injuries, he glared at the massive, bronze doors. While his stomach sent one pulse of agony into his spine after another, David was sure it wouldn't kill him before he could get to his former training instructor.
"David I…" Though he was sure Tenenbaum had some comforting words to say, David interrupted her with a harsh growl.
"Quiet," he snapped, harsher than he intended. "Just… just let me do this." Pushing the massive doors to Ryan's home open, David found his Cassidy, pale, trying to suppress and hide the fear that was obviously bubbling its way to the surface.
"Okay kid, I'll grant your wish," Cassidy said, his voice shaking as he raised the Thompson. "I'll put you down myself." With hatred and blind rage fueling his every step, David flicked his wrist, using Telekinesis to send the machinegun flying away. With the same effort he slammed Cassidy into the wall, pinning the man, despite several yards separating the two of them. While his former training instructor writhed, struggling to free himself, David took sadistic pleasure in watching the fear creep into the man's every feature. When David was only a few inches away, Cassidy's resolve broke. "What do you want from me?"
Methodically, David removed his helmet and leaned close to whisper in Cassidy's ear. "I want to hear your heart stop." Punctuating his sentence, the former assassin slammed his ADAM hypodermic into Cassidy's chest. Quietly, David put his ear to his former training instructor chest and listened. Beat, beat. Cassidy let out a wet gurgle as blood shot up his throat. Beat, beat… The man pinned to the wall screamed, flecks of blood flying from his mouth. Beat… beat. David felt a cruel and merciless smile cross his face. Beat… silence.
Breathing deep, David detached the ADAM hypodermic from his arm, leaving the needle to pin Cassidy to the wall. Turning his back on the corpse, he replaced his helmet. "Tenenbaum… What do I… do now?"
After a short pause, the doctor walked David through the use of Ryan's emergency control panel. As he followed her instructions, he couldn't help but notice the emptiness that still plagued his chest. Cassidy was dead. So why didn't he feel any better? Why did his heart still hurt?
"Whoever controls this system controls Rapture. The Big Daddies, Big Sisters they will follow your command now." When David pulled the last lever, the room filled with a bright, purple light. One by one six Big Sisters appeared. Rapture was now firmly under David's control.