Ch. 8: A man with no face
A.N.:
Damn you college!
Sorry everyone. Forgive the long wait. Rest assured, I am working on my stories. I will finish this and the others. Have faith :)
Anyway, I hope the wait was worth it.
Read and review if you want.
As we made our way up the staircase that had streams of water flowing down its rubble-strewn steps, my honed senses detected the faintest traces of movement in the workshop above. I caught a faint scent of aged leather and corroding metal that was mixed with the once sweet aroma of a Little Sister that had turned bitter sweet. There was no mistaking that smell: a Big Sister. Sorrow flooded me as I remembered the one that I had unintentionally pursued earlier.
The city had gone and turned those sweet, innocent little girls into monsters. Yes, the cursed slugs inside of them made them look otherworldly but it was the cruelty of Suchong that conditioned them into blood-drinking gathers. However, any fool that bothered to take half a second to observe them could tell that they were still children. What kind of hell in their own minds could have turned them into these feral creatures?
The scent faded until it was gone. She must have retreated to continue keeping tabs on us for Sofia from a distance. Her presence was replaced by something even more mentally unbalanced. I could hear them scurrying about like rats in a maze as they set about getting ready to pounce on us like we were hapless prey that had been boxed into a corner. I growled slightly in irritation. Why would these fools not take a hint? We may not have been as physically imposing as the tin men but we were still Big Daddies.
As we neared the top of the staircase, I became aware of music being played from some source inside the workshop. "It's the dawn of a new day!" Upon reaching the landing, I saw a Splicer retreat to the far end of the area as she dragged her golf club's metal tip along the ground, giving off sparks as she did. Through the sheet of reinforced safety glass, I observed the barrel of a Thompson sticking up from behind the long worktable in the next area of the workshop. Along the top of the table in a line were a row of faded, weathered heads for the park's automatons and I noticed that one of them seemed a little too lifelike. I mentally sighed once again.
Taking point, I entered the workshop with Alpha following behind me far enough to be able to aim around me. As I did, the male security guard Leadhead Splicer wielding the Thompson stood up from where he had been crouching behind the worktable. Knowing better than to allow the deranged former park employee to fire his modified Thompson at me from such short range, where only the most incompetent individual could fail to score critical hits on the seven foot tall monster of metal and canvas stomping towards him, I willed a blast of Electro Bolt from my ported left hand into the man.
The electrical discharge left him sputtering convoluted profanities as he convulsed in agony. Capitalizing on his temporary vulnerability, I rushed forward and then thrust my industrial-grade mining drill's tip straight into the center of the Splicer's head. The sound of cracking bone filled the air as my blow easily compromised the man's skull. However, the man's body had no sooner crumpled to the ground in a heap before multiple small caliber rounds impacted my armored from.
I growled as one of the rounds scored a hit on the lightly armored canvas area beneath the armor plate of my chest and penetrated my hide to inflict internal damage. Luckily, the only vital organs located outside my area of protection were of my digestive track and I no longer needed them any more than I had needed my appendix when I was still a true human. The red liquid from the tank on my back would ensure that there was no internal hemorrhaging or bacterial poisoning of the surrounding tissue that would send me into shock.
Two revolver-wielding Leadhead Splicers rushed into the room. A third Splicer, the golf club-wielding former aristocratic woman that I had seen earlier, followed close behind them as she screamed, "Ridiculous!" Meanwhile, the music continued to play as if to add a rather unnerving aspect to this encounter with the denizens of Rapture. "Here we come one and all! There can be no resisting…" I revved my drill and thrust its whirling bit into the unarmored and disfigured chest of the nearest Leadhead Splicer as she attempted to pistol whip me with the cracked grip of her revolver.
She screamed in pure misery as my weaponized mining tool made short work of her torso. After powering down my drill, I flung the corpse into the second Leadhead Splicer. Meanwhile, Alpha had swiftly neutralized the Thuggish Splicer with two rivets to the woman's throat and then to the center of her face. "It's the dawn of a new day!" I flattened the skull of the downed Splicer with the bottom of my weighted right foot.
From the far end of the next room, two final Leadhead Splicers wielding Thompsons began to open up on us. As the storm of hot lead whizzed past my head, I forced my will into one of the Splicer corpses. As a miasma surrounded my gauntlet-encased left hand, I levitated the body into the air. Turning to face the two Splicers, I used the body as a shield momentarily before launching it at them.
The corpse hit home around their legs. As the two individuals collapsed face-first onto the hard floor, I charged towards them with my drill poised to deliver the final blow. The heavy weight of my diving boots cracked the floor beneath me as I moved with a speed that the lumbering tin men could only dream of achieving. They never had a chance. Having dealt with the Splicers, we both exited the workshop.
With the amount of fresh ADAM inside of my body, I would finally be able to purchase Incinerate. We needed to find a way out of the ride and back to the main area of the park. There, it would be a short trip to the Hall of the Future and its Gather's Garden Vending Machine. Obviously, we could have simply gone back to the entrance that we had used to enter the ride. My instincts warned me against that, however.
With that Big Sister now stalking us from the shadows, it was wiser to continue moving forward because, as a general rule, a stalking predator would opt to follow her target rather than to risk incorrectly predicting its path and thus losing the target. We were cat and mouse now. Question was: who was the cat and who was the mouse?
This whole situation was disgusting. Sofia had many things to answer for but the Big Sisters were number two on that list. Their conditioning had made them mentally fragile but it was the lack of a strong parental figure that had likely sent them over the edge until these broken creatures were all that were left of the original Little Sisters. The ones that had been bonded to the Tin Men were likely cast aside by their former guardians as they reached adolescence because the new hormones released during puberty had altered their chemical pheromone signature. The Tin Men responded only to the pheromone signature of Little Sisters.
It had not been personal. The Mass Production Models were essentially machines and the machines had failed to recognize the crying, confused teenagers as the little girls that they had once protected with their lives. The already fragile psyches of the blossoming teenage girls, compounded by the fact that their conditioning made them unable to understand what was happening to their bodies, was broken when "Mr. Bubbles" heartlessly pushed them aside, or worse, as they tried to interact with the lumbering giants as they had when they were little girls.
All they needed was a protector to hold them and tell them that what was happening to them was natural and that there was nothing to be afraid of. Knowing Sofia, the poor girls had probably been locked up like animals and made to feel like they were freaks. I felt an intense stab of fury enter my mind. How dare the city treat these girls like this?! They were the closest thing to royalty in this godforsaken place.
I could only imagine the pain that it would cause them to fight us. In their warped minds, we were probably still father figures to them. Not wanting to waste time, we continued past the third "scare", a scene with two parents having their child taken away by the hand of "big government" as they all watched television, while it played out. With the main path blocked by rubble, we had to go through the workshop just beyond the third "scare".
Upon entering the room, I saw a male Splicer attempting to vandalize a Power to the People machine that was against the far wall opposite the entrance. To my immediate left was a wooden shelf. A rather large circular flood lamp with a metal protective grate over it was mounted into the center of the ceiling. A worktable was located near the left wall. Beyond it, I saw the path that led to the next room.
I mentally sighed once again as I saw that the entire floor of the section of the room, including the rubble-strewn side room off to the right, was flooded. As a result, the Splicer was standing in ankle-high water. Protected by the concrete landing that I was standing on, I willed a blast of Electro Bolt into the water.
The man screamed in agony as blue electrical arcs danced around his body for a moment before he collapsed to the floor. I hesitated for a moment as I looked at the water before I forced myself onward. Doing my best to ignore the icy sting of the Atlantic, I pondered my next attachment to my drill. I had increased the damage capability of my drill to its mechanically maximum threshold. Unfortunately, the increased torque had increased my fuel consumption.
Thinking back to the gun mounts on the Fletcher-class destroyer that I had served on during the war, I remembered that we had encountered similar issues with the rotational wear on them. The mounts themselves were perfectly fine but the increased armor and weight of the guns following an upgrade while the ship had been dry-docked had caused more friction and, thus, an increase in wear. Perhaps, if I installed a lubrication system that would douse the section where the bit met the mount whenever I revved up the drill, it would offset the increase in torque by reducing the friction.
What would be the lubricant? It could not be anything petroleum based because the whirling bit and fossil fuel powered motor occasionally caused excessive heat. It would have to be synthetic and polymer-based to prevent turning my arm into a torch. Where the hell was I going to find something like that around this dump? For that matter, the design that I had in my head would require another tank on my person to work. I could not compromise my mobility; mobility was crucial for my kind to survive.
Was I over-thinking the idea? How did a city of geniuses end up having armored champions that were someone like me? Perhaps, I could use the same fuel that powered the motor. That would work as it neither required a new tank nor a specialized design. However, such a lubrication system would defeat its own purpose: reducing the fuel consumption of the drill. Moreover, I would still need a new fluid to dilute the fuel to prevent it from igniting if the drill bit became too hot.
Looking down at the icy sea water, I suddenly had an inspiration: water. My drill was a left-over tool from Rapture's construction that had been repurposed as a weapon. The metal was an alloy that allowed the drill to be exposed to sea water for extended periods of time. Given the deteriorated state of the city, I had little doubt that sea water was in plentiful supply. The only concern was that the mounts themselves, the ones that allowed me to attach or remove the drill over my right hand, were jerry-rigged by the engineers at Fontaine Futuristics during my construction and were not part of the original tool. The sea water could pool in the gaps between the mounts and could potentially fused them together, thus rendering it impossible for me to remove my drill from over my hand, if it reacted to the blood that would inevitably cover my drill.
However, seeing no other alternative that I could use in the short amount of time that I had to reach Eleanor before our bond sent me into irreversible madness, I detached my drill from my right hand and then used the vending machine to rig a series of nozzles in a ring around the edge of the point where the bit met the mount. The drill already had cut notches for such a system, the issue had been what substance to use as a lubricant. Like a chainsaw, the drill had a small reserve tank located on the side for lubricant. Typically, mineral oil would, and should have, been used to lubricate the bit but as mineral oil was now all but gone in Rapture, I would have to modify the tank and lines to use the icy waters of the Atlantic. I smirked slightly as I realized that, if nothing else, the new layer of salt coating the bit would make my strikes even more painful for the fool that had dared to attack me. Even better, it would be a delayed agonizing sensation that would afflict my target should it retreat.
My modifications were crude but I succeeded in rigging the lubrication system. I remounted my drill over my right hand and then opened the small hatch for the reserve tank with my left hand. After moving away from the vending machine so that Alpha could modify his Rivet Gun, I bent down and scooped up some of the water that was flooding the room. When I had a full tank, I resealed the hatch with my left hand. I then stood up and looked over to my brother.
After attaching a pressure line with a gauge on it to his tool, he retrieved his Prototype Rivet Gun from the machine. I smirked as I saw that he had not only increased his weapon's clip size, before it resembled a cylindrical container but now it was rectangular in shape, but that he had also modified his weapon to recycle the heat from firing the projectiles back into the weapon chamber to superheat the remaining rivets, hence the new pressure hose that wrapped around the exterior of the tool with a pressure gauge sticking up so that the wielder could see it. With each successive shot, the projectiles would get hotter and hotter.
The barrel of the rivet gun and the rivets themselves were both made of high quality steel alloys that were extremely tolerant of high temperatures, far more than what typical steel was capable of withstanding. All the tools used to construct Rapture were extremely durable because they were building a city at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. The Rivet Guns used by the Rosies were left-overs from the construction and the Prototype Rivet Guns were modified versions that had been repurposed as combat weapons.
I grunted, "Brilliant idea, brother. Subtle and brutal…I think that there is a sadistic side to you that you are keeping hidden from the rest of us."
He replied with a modest tone, "Survival of the most sadistic, sir. You taught us that. 'Give a man a fish, he eats for a day. Teach a man how to fish, he eats for a lifetime. Give your enemy a taste of pain, he leaves you alone for a day. Teach your enemy to fear the pain, he leaves you alone for a lifetime.'"
I smiled slightly beneath my face as I remembered demonstrating the concept of fear to my brothers over the course of three days in the Plasmid Theater in Fontaine Futuristics. The first day, I simply killed my opponents swiftly. The next day, I pointed out to my brothers, who would watch from backstage, how my new enemies did not fear me. During that match, I killed them all as slowly as possible to ensure that the others would hear their screams of agony. The next day, the new group of beggars, plasmid trial rejects, and criminals had to be forced onto the stage at gun point, conveniently out of sight of the crowd of course, and they cowered in the corners of the room literally paralyzed by their own fear of what I could do to them. It was brutal and disgusting, but so was our job. Those that would harm our daughters deserved no mercy from us.
As we continued on to the next room, I found a female Splicer dressed in tattered formal attire sitting in a peeling wooden chair in front of a wall safe. Upon noticing me, she jumped up, kicked the chair behind her, and yelled, "You can't take my furs! Never!" As she raised her golf club over her right shoulder, I revved up my drill. Sea water began to douse the whirling bit as the powerful motor roared. Ordinary mining drills had cause to fear the halite minerals in ocean water, but my drill had been purposely designed so simplistic that it was damn near indestructible.
As she jumped at me while swinging her melee weapon, I sent the whirling, razor sharp point of my drill straight into her right arm. In a matter of seconds, the surprised Thuggish Splicer's arm was ripped to shreds. Screaming and pressing the strings of bloodied flesh that were hanging from her now useless limb back against the remains of the arm with her left hand, she dropped her weapon and ran out of the room. I powered down my drill and stopped my brother as he attempted to pursue her.
He twisted his torso so that he was looking at me with his golden yellow segmented eye. I explained with a series of grunts, "Let her go. She will tell the rest of them about the pain we can cause."
He replied, "Yes, sir." After ripping the safe door off its hinges, I found that the Splicer's "furs" were one hundred dollars, some trap rivets, and two strange light bulb-looking objects that I ignored. I gave Alpha fifty dollars and the trap rivets before we continued forward. Upon exiting the workshop, we turned the corner to find a large shipping crate blocking most of the path. A lit burn barrel was in front of it casting shadows against the already morbid surroundings. To the left, inside the small side slot in the wall, were two bed mattresses.
Going around the shipping crate through the side slot, I found that there were small shipping crates that had been stacked to create a makeshift defensive line. More or less kicking the crates out of my way, I cleared the path and continued forward. To the right just beyond the barrier was a shop façade with the name "Disease" above the door. Red light bathed the façade to draw the attention of the long gone amusement park customers. The ceiling beyond the façade had partially collapsed and we had to squeeze past the debris.
As we turned the corner, a male Leadhead Splicer yelled at us from behind yet another shipping crate that was in the center of the path. To the left, sea water was pouring into the area through a large circular grate that was against the wall. Mounted high up on the right wall was a security camera, its red beam illuminating the left wall as the device passively scanned the area. Beside the Splicer to the left was a red metal barrel.
Before we could engage the Splicer, he screamed, "Sorry, doc. Salvation ain't worth towin' it with no Alpha Daddy!" He took off down the path like hell on wheels. I smirked at the sight. They were finally starting to remember their place. I let out a loud guttural roar after the fleeing Splicer, which succeeded in causing the panicked Splicer to cry out in terror and run even faster.
Laughing with repeated grunts, we continued forward, making sure to avoid the security camera's search beam. Around the next corner, we were met by the sight of a heavily vandalized Ryan automaton. The machine was ripped apart and dangling from the ceiling above the desk by a metal cable as if it had been "hanged". On the wall behind the desk, in white house paint, was the message, "Reject the tyranny of the Self." Below it was the message, "Rapture failed. We Will Not." On the wall to the left of the destroyed automaton were the messages, "Lamb will Lead The Way," and "The end of RYAN is the end of the SELF."
My brother let out a long grunt that sounded like a sigh. I waited patiently. After a moment, he said, "Lamb…came out the woodwork about two years after the New Year's Eve Riots. Ryan was killed by that fool that had infiltrated his clubhouse…Fontaine was killed by some Rosie Tin Daddy a few hours later up near Point Prometheus…there was no one left to run the city. It was awful, sir. I had to keep us in the shadows to protect Emily. The majority of the Little Sisters were suddenly gone for some reason. The few that were left…it was a nightmare…slaughter…they didn't have a chance."
He paused for a moment and then continued, "We both nearly starved to death so many times that I lost count…it just wasn't safe for her to gather…damned Splicers had turned corpses into traps. Ended up having to grab corpses and then run off to a secluded safehouse used by Fontaine's smugglers before the Civil War. I had found it and fixed the lockdown mechanism…the only way…the Splicers ran in huge packs like wolves...they would rush the Tin Men like hyena attacking an elephant. Worse, they would seal off the vent network but keep one open. Then, they would divert the scalding steam from the geothermic generators into the networks and drive the girls from the vent and pounce on them. I kept Emily with me after we saw them doing that. I wanted to help her sisters but I would have put Emily in danger so…I…made a choice…the Little Ones that survived long enough for Lamb to take control of the city weren't right in the head…how could they have been?"
I listened in silence as he continued, "Say what you want about Sofia, sir, but she did save Rapture from itself…not that it deserved to be saved. I nearly had a submersible fixed up when she set up that blasted torpedo system to prevent anyone from coming or going. By then, Emily was beginning to go through puberty. I assured her that nothing was wrong with her and that she wasn't a freak. She was just growing into an adult. Then…one day…Lamb's Splicers and Big Daddies assaulted the safehouse. I don't know how they found us. I fought back…so did Emily…but…there were too many…took her from me."
He paused for a moment, the pain clearly evident in his posture and tone, before he continued, "When I regained consciousness, I was in a holding cell up in Persephone. I broke out but it was too late. When I found Emily, she was a Big Sister…the first one. By then though, Lamb had nearly a dozen. That bitch Sofia ordered them to kill me. I don't know how, but I managed to escape and then found a way back into Rapture. I fought Lamb for years from the shadows…killing her followers…hacking security cameras…turrets…only so much I could do alone though."
The silence was nearly unbearable but I wanted him to get it off his chest so I continued to listen. Absentmindedly examining his Prototype Rivet Gun, he continued, "The fucking Tin Daddies were her slaves…she sent them after me…for nearly a year, they tried to hunt me down like a rat before they were given new Little Sisters to protect…plus I had to look out for the Big Sisters since Lamb had ordered them to kill me on sight. Emily would sneak rations of ADAM to me but I never saw her…just the teddy bears with the little boxes…she would leave notes with the vials of ADAM that said that she still thought of me as her knight and wanted to be with me again. It was her own ADAM…so our bond remained intact…but only just barely…they nearly severed it when they turned her into a Big Sister. Without my Protector Instincts, I could not fight my back to Persephone…the Fontaine building that you have to go through is the home of madmen…tried several times but never could get through it."
He finished, "A few months ago, Tenenbaum returned to the city. Found me one day…explained that she needed my help…explained that she and Eleanor could bring you back…all they needed was ADAM…lots of it…that and your body. I knew where your body was…I found it and informed the remaining Alpha Series that you were gone…those of us that had survived the riots…we created a kind of memorial…I told Tenenbaum where it was and started gathering ADAM with a Little Sister that Tenenbaum had reconditioned to see me as her father."
Knowing the rest of the story, I assured him, "We'll get them back…I promise." I turned to continue forward but then paused. I turned back to look at him and then said, "Thank you for that…I'm sorry that you and Emily went through that alone."
He laughed slightly before he replied, "No problem, sir. I am just glad that it worked. Now, we can put the bitch back in her straight jacket and let Emily and Eleanor see the Sun."
I smirked beneath my face before I said, "Come on, they're waiting for us." We continued onward. Past the vandalized Ryan automaton, we finally came to the end of the ride where the mockup of the Lighthouse was located. Two ride cars blocked the exit so we had to go through the employee access to the left of the Lighthouse. The door was long gone so we proceeded through the open passageway as we ignored the two crying Splicers that had fled from us as they cowered in the far corner. Two filing cabinets were against the left wall where they had fallen on top of each other. Turning right, we made our way through the winding side route and eventually came to a lever switch.
I could see the loading/unloading station for the ride cars below us through decorative glass panels. With the exit sealed, I lowered the master override lever that would open all of the remaining security gates. The automatic lockdown mechanism of the park must have sealed the bulkheads when the power had been cut years prior. As the sound of opening security bulkheads rumbled throughout the park, we exited the employee access area and finally found ourselves back at the entrance to the ride.
However, as we arrived at the entrance, I heard a man yell, "Come on choppers! Tear this place down!" It was the last of Sofia's Hit Squad. A female Leadhead Splicer appeared around the first corpse that we had gathered from. Before she could fire her modified submachine gun, my brother dropped her with a headshot. Meanwhile, a male Thuggish Splicer rushed through the entrance to the park. I caught his right wrist as he tried to swing his pipe wrench at me. Before he could react, I swung my drill's razor sharp point into his head. Dropping the bloodied mass onto a heap on the floor, I scanned the area for the rest of the assassins. However, to my surprise, only one final Leadhead Splicer appeared before us. Quickly, my brother neutralized her as well.
The entire main building was eerily quiet as we made our way upstairs. I could hear our heavy bootfalls echoing throughout the entire park, yet no movement replied back. Had all the Splicers fled? Granted, there were not that many Splicers within the park's walls to begin with but I had never encountered a section of Rapture this empty and hollow. Or, as I began to suspect, had the inhabitants fled from the park like rats from a sinking ship because they knew that the Big Sister was about to make her move?
We reached the second floor and made it to the entrance to the Hall of the Future before I finally heard a Splicer. As the decorative watertight bulkhead to the hall raised up to allow us to access the section beyond, I heard a man complain, "Rusted pile of junk! You broke it didn't you Edna?" The voice was coming from up ahead. With my drill at the ready and with blue electrical arcs dancing around my ported left hand, I pushed onward.
Upon reaching the top of the second flight of stairs, I heard a woman reply to the man, "Me? You're mean Roger! It was probably your fat hands that loused it up!"
The second bulkhead opened to reveal two Splicers in the room beyond. The man was attempting to repair a malfunctioning sentry turret while the woman was pacing around him with a revolver held in her right hand. Along the top of the walls on either side of them were television monitors that advertised various plasmids with the cartoon descriptions of them. I could not help but smile slightly as the man retorted, "Typical broad! Don't complain about things that you don't know nothing about!"
At times, it seemed like, despite their horrible mutations and mental instability, the Splicers could yet be saved from themselves. Truly, they often displayed signs of humanity in both their dialogue and actions. I had even seen what one might risk to suggest being pleas for help. That within itself suggested that there was still something to save in their ADAM ravaged shells. They were unstable, but they were still sane enough to know that they were not sane. As I had begun to suspect, the reason why the remaining inhabitants followed Lamb with cult-like fanaticism was that, in her, they saw a chance to be, as they put it: reborn.
Charging forward, I willed a blast of Electro Bolt in the woman. With his guard temporarily immobilized, I took aim at the man. As he reached for his Thompson, which was on the floor next to him along with a red toolbox, I thrust my drill's point straight into the side of his head. Brain matter and bits of bone flew out of his compromised skull as his body collapsed into a heap on top of the toolbox and weapon. Meanwhile, my brother had neutralized the female Splicer.
I heard a clicking noise and realized that the turret was actually functional except that the ammunition belt was jammed inside the housing. The result was an almost comical sight of a turret swiveling around to aim at me but only emitting a clicking sound as it attempted to fire its rounds at me. Leaving the turret, we continued towards the vending machine, which I could see on the other side of a large glass window in the left corner. Ahead of us, I saw what remained of the wall-sized advertisement for plasmids. Several sections of the "father's" left arm were burned, a section around the little girl's face looked like it had been ripped away from the wall, and near the bottom of the advertisement around the phrase "The Wondrous World of Rapture" were several more sections that had been burned.
As we proceeded passed the bulkhead to the right of the advertisement, we were met by the sight of a Big Sister glaring at us just outside the nearby glass panels as she was perched on a rocky outcropping. She continued to glare at us with her hellish red circular eye for a moment before she suddenly jumped up, floated upwards a few feet, and then swiftly swam down out of sight. I was certain that that was not the same Big Sister that had been stalking us inside the park because I could sense her presence somewhere behind us.
How many Big Sisters did Sofia have keeping tabs on us? What was she waiting for? In our present state, we would be outmatched if we encountered several of the lithe protectors. We would only be getting stronger. Now was the time to eliminate us. Why was she hesitating? Did she hope that we would "see the error of our ways" and become loyal to the Family? She was in for a rude surprise if she did indeed hope for such a thing. Our only loyalty was too our bonded masters and to the Little Sisters.
As we rounded the corner, my built-in radio activated. Sofia, surprisingly, addressed both of us, "So…you two would drain the people of their life's blood? Rapture is a body Delta…Alpha. I am the voice…and Big Sister is the hand. When Rapture speaks of you - it says only this: Sleep now. Your day is done."
When my radio deactivated, I grunted in disgust, "Your day is done? The Alpha Series are NOT DONE! Not as long as I have something to say about it!" I felt my anger rising dangerously. Your day is done?! Who the hell did Sofia think she was?!
My brother grunted in approval, "Right on, sir! Let's go burn that woman's little clubhouse to the ground!"
Pressing on past the bust of Andrew Ryan and the automatons that were set up to mimic a party scene and a romantic evening, we finally came to the Gather's Garden Vending Machine. I placed my gauntlet-encased left hand inside the little slot of the machine. Moments later, a needle was injected into my hand so the machine could calculate how much fresh ADAM was inside my body and therefore what I could afford to splice. The needle retracted from my hand and I examined the illuminated selections that the machine had allotted me from the amount of freshly gathered ADAM.
I could choose between Incinerate!, Health Upgrade, and EVE Link. Using the metal tipped index finger of my left hand, I selected Incinerate. A loud metal clanging sound came from the machine before a glowing red container of Incinerate emerged from the vending slot. Using telekinesis and an empty hypo needle, I collected a sample of the plasmid and then injected it through the IV Port on my left arm. This time, I only felt a sense of mild discomfort for a few seconds before jets of fire emerged from my ported fingertips and palm. I noticed that the metal ports were also now glowing red hot from the flame that was emitting from them.
I smirked with satisfaction before willing the flames to die down. When they had, I returned to the selections and pressed the Health Upgrade option. The container that was vended was neither glowing red nor blue. Instead, it was eggshell white, meaning it was neither a plasmid nor a gene tonic. Unlike the other two product lines, the products like Health Upgrade did not destabilize one's genetic sequence if he or she overindulged in them. As long as I had the ADAM and the vending machines had the upgrades, I could increase my health indefinitely without suffering genetic damage.
Not wanting to use the rest of my ADAM on EVE Link, I opted to conserve what I had left to put towards further upgrades. I turned towards my brother and motioned questioningly at the Gather's Garden. He replied, "No thank you, sir. I'm alright for now." With Incinerate! finally spliced, I turned and headed back towards the train station to melt the ice.
As I left the vending machine, a man's recorded voice announced, "Congratulations on your recent purchase of the Incinerate Plasmid. Say, Tom here is enjoying a romantic evening with a gal. What could impress her more than lighting the fireplace with a snap of your fingers?" Having tested prototypes for Incinerate!, I was easily able to will a fireball directly into the logs in the fireplace. After I did, I growled in discomfort as my EVE Tank refilled my body's reserve. The nauseating sound of suction filled the air as the new glowing collection of EVE entered my body through the IV line running along the interior of my left arm.
As the sensation passed, I noticed that an oil slick at the base of the fireplace had been ignited by my genetic flames. The trail of fire continued up to engulf "Tom" and his "gal" where they were on the couch. As the flames destroyed the two automatons, Eleanor taunted me through our bond, "Having trouble controlling your…ahem...fire, Topside? Did you get it all over the place you naughty boy?"
I retorted, "It's not my fault that whoever set up this thing used petroleum-soaked logs! By the way, highly inappropriate language young lady. Respect your elders."
She asked smugly, "What about Mother?"
I replied, "No, of course not. Sofia is a homicidal bitch."
She faked shock as she asked, "Did Papa just call Momma a bad word?"
I retorted, "Eleanor, your Mother has tried to kill me again several times in the past few hours…I'll call her whatever I want to."
I could feel her smirk darkly before my master said, "Yes…tried to kill you…but you are stronger than she could ever possibly imagine. You are the best mate a girl could want, Father."
Before I could reply, her presence left my mind. I mentally sighed. Mate? I had to get Eleanor out of Rapture before it claimed even more of her sanity. I turned to leave. As I neared the party scene, alarm bells erupted inside my mind. There was one too many automatons. Facing the new addition to the scene, I growled threateningly. Meanwhile, the male voice said, "Oh! A party! But this party just hit the skids. Carl needs a light for his cigar and no one can help him."
The Thuggish Splicer, realizing that his cover had been blown, swung his pipe wrench at us as he panicked. Before he even reached us, I ignited him with my genetic flames. The smell of burning flesh, hair, and clothing filled the air as the Splicer ran around while the flames consumed him. As he ran, he made contact with the automatons in the scene and they too became engulfed by flames. Moments later, the human candle collapsed into a burning heap on the floor. Though the repugnant smell did not bother me as much as it would bother a normal person, I quickly made my way towards the exit. However, this time, as I neared the exit, I noticed the ice-blocked entrance to another room just to the right of it. I melted the obstructive ice and entered the water soaked room.
In the far right corner was a mockup of a kitchen with a house wife stereotype ejecting freezing mist from a tube inside her outstretched right hand. The advertisement in front of the kitchen indicated that it was intended to demonstrate the Winter Blast Plasmid. To the left against the wall, I noticed the second Gather's Garden Vending Machine. Not wanting to waste any more time should the Big Sister decide to make her move while she had us trapped in this wing of the park, I exited the room and then proceeded back into the room with the wall-sized advertisement and the sentry turret.
However, as we reached the advertisement, an ear-shattering screech shot through the air. In a progressing line, the television monitors exploded and the room noticeably darkened. I cringed beneath my copper face. She had cornered us and now she was calling us out. Alpha grunted, "Got your back, sir." We moved towards the main room in the park cautiously.
As we did, I desperately tried to think of a way to calm the aggressive former gathers. They were former Little Sisters; I did not want to hurt them. Perhaps, the same ability that allowed me to kill the sea slugs inside the younger ones would allow me to somehow calm the older ones. The slug had probably fused to the post-pubescent girl's digestive track by now so I could not kill the cursed creatures without killing the sister. From what I had seen the Big Sisters do so far, it would not surprise me if it was raw ADAM coursing through their bodies instead of blood. Perhaps, with the ability that I had, I could draw off the excessive amount of ADAM from their bodies and stabilize them.
It was a long shot but I had to try something to help them. However, Eleanor was the only thing that mattered. If it came down to the Big Sister or my beautiful master, then I would have no choice but to use lethal force. I informed my brother with a series of grunts, "I have an idea. If I can draw off the excessive ADAM in her body with the Little Sister Exorcism Plasmid, it might calm her enough to stop her from attacking us."
He replied, "How do you plan to get your hand on her bare skin without her disemboweling you?"
I explained with a sarcastic tone, "By asking nicely."
He groaned before he commented, "You can't save them all, sir."
He was not being pessimistic. Alpha was always more optimistic than I was. However, in this situation, I understood his desire for caution against far-fetched ideas. I assured him, "It is worth a try. Besides, we can always do what we do best if it does not work."
He finally replied in agreement, "Very well, sir. Let's give it a try."
Upon reaching the bottom of the flight of stairs before the bulkhead door that led out into the main area, a loud metal bang rocked the air. Sparks appeared around the edges of the bulkhead as I felt myself being drawn towards the door. As we reached it, it was ripped out of its housing in pieces to reveal the hostile Big Sister standing on top of the red bench seat in the center of the upper walkway. Using her powerful version of Telekinesis, the lithe armored young woman formed the pieces of the door into a ball above her for a moment before sending the pieces flying in all directions. Luckily, the pieces failed to hit either one of us.
She then screeched in primal fury before doing a backflip through the air. Upon landing on the far side of the walkway, she stood upright and glared at us for a moment. It was then that I first noticed the odd proportions of her body. Her legs were unusually gangly even for a young woman. They were so thin and long that she appeared to be having difficulty with standing correctly. Her knees were bent forward at an excessive angle as they appeared to struggle to support the rail thin sections on either side of them. I noticed the metal supports on either side of her legs like the ones that a hospital might give a patient suffering from a muscular disease.
Meanwhile, her arms were just as rail thin as she wielded her needle-like weapon mounted to her left arm and the harpoon bolt mounted to her right arm. Her posture was unusual in that she was hunched over to the point that her red porthole was nearly parallel with her spine even though the porthole was mounted in the center of her bulbous diving helmet. There was something else that struck me about the way she was orienting her head: it was cocked slightly.
I mentally created an image of the skinny girl beneath her armor. I cringed as I pictured the girl hunched forward, arms extended out from her sides that were bent at the elbows, her unnaturally long legs bent excessively at the knees, her neck bent back to the point that her line of sight was nearly parallel with the top of her spine, and her head cocked to one side. ADAM had done this to her mind and body. I had to help her!
The Big Sister cartwheeled to the left and then used her Telekinesis to gather various items from the room above her head in a ball. A piece of concrete, a wooden advertisement stand, and a pillow collected above her. Motioning with her arms, she sent the items flying towards us. However, using our own Telekinesis, we caught the items, except for the pillow which harmlessly bounced off Alpha's chest, and then sent them back at her. She easily dodged them by cartwheeling to the right.
When she landed on her feet, she quickly turned and ran up the side of the nearby column. As she reached the top of the column, she turned towards us and then propelled herself forward at great speed. She landed on her feet just before us and then tried to strike us with a powerful thrust of her needle-like weapon. However, we sidestepped her in opposite directions.
Seeing an opening now that she had her back turned to me, I swung my drill at her. She managed to turn at the last second and my strike only succeeded in breaking off the basket-like contraption that was mounted to her oxygen tank. Seeing the metal contraption hit the ground, she gave off a deafening shriek. My senses had been overwhelmed by her cry and thus I was unable to dodge her as threw herself into my chest at full force.
The momentum of the collision sent us both over the side of the walkway. I let out an agonized roar as I handed hard slightly on my right side. The enraged Big Sister landed on me and began to straddle my waist with her long, gangly legs while she forced me completely back onto my two tanks by placing her gloved hands on my shoulders. She looked down at me with her cocked head for a moment. I tried to push her off of me but she simply relocated her hands to pin my arms down up near the shoulders. She then lowered her head down until the surfaces of our glowing eyes were mere inches apart.
Her strength was staggering. It seemed impossible that such a skinny frame could possess such strength. Despite the thick material between the surfaces of our true bodies, I was able to feel her abdominal muscles tighten and untighten as she shifted her posture. How was she so strong? Even with ADAM, there had to be body structure to match the increase in strength. I had to remind myself that her aggressive response was active and was thus allowing her to access strength that she would not normally be able to access. Her aggressive response combined with the ADAM in her body had made her capable of overpowering an unprovoked Big Daddy.
Suddenly, she shrieked as the report from Alpha's Prototype Rivet Gun sounded through the cavernous area. I also heard a sick, wet pop and when she had retracted from my body and then turned around to look up at where my brother was above us on the walkway, I saw that her right knee had a smoking rivet imbedded in its kneecap. Red and green blood slowly trickled from around the edges of the rivet as she attempted to put weight on it only for the damaged joint to give out.
She had turned to look up at him just in time to be struck by his second shot. I saw the molten rivet imbed itself into her left elbow. The grown Little Sister left out an agonized cry as she attempted to bend her left arm. Going through the numerous steps that were required for me to stand, I reflected that we would need more than our standard tactics to win against a being as strong as her. I heard the sister let out a grunt of exertion and realized that she had jumped up to the second floor to attack my brother. I mentally cursed as I realized what I had to do. However, in doing so, would Eleanor forgive me?
My bonded charge spoke into my mind with a shocked tone, "Father?"
With guilt heavy in my mind, I replied, "I'm sorry, kid. It's the only way. Please, I need you to say it." I felt her hesitate as she feared what I would do to the sister. I reminded her, "You can stop me from seriously hurting her. Eleanor, please…I need you to say it."
Trusting my judgment, Eleanor granted my request as she screamed, "Unzip 'em, Daddy!"
The burning maddening fury of my Protector Instincts stormed full strength into my mind like hellfire. My segmented eye began to emit hellish red light as I let out a deafening guttural roar that dwarfed the one that I had let out after I had killed the Bouncer. My entire body vibrated as I continued to shake the area with my furious war cry. Freed from the constraints of my conscience once more, I began to laugh in repeated grunts as the wonderful feeling of homicidal rage consumed my rational thoughts. Then, I suddenly stopped in the middle of a laugh and focused on the little fool that was the reason for the monster Subject Delta being let out of his cage.
My brother had been sidestepping her attacks and withering away at the pest's weak points with his Rivet Gun. Singe marks on her leather hide indicated where the rivets had been so hot that they had burned the section of the brat's suit. Looking down at the tiled floor, I noticed a large chunk of concrete about the size of a basketball to my left. I bent down and casually picked up the two hundred pound plus piece of concrete with my gloved left hand.
Calmly playing with the object in my hand, I called out, "Alpha, lure her to the edge of the walkway. I've got something for her." Seconds later, my brother appeared as he baited the former Little Sister to show herself to me. The undisciplined girl immediately took the bait and exposed herself to me. I took aim and then threw the chunk of concrete at her. My aim was true and the sister was knocked off her feet as the object hit her square in the side of her bulbous head.
My brother looked at me, but I motioned that I would take care of her. Seeing the red light emitting from my eye, he lowered his weapon down to his side and then took a few steps back. He knew better than to argue when I was under the influence of my aggressive response. Folding my left arm and drill across my armored chest, I waited for the girl to get up.
As I had expected, she was slow in getting to her feet. Getting hit by boulder in the side of one's head tended to be disorientating. Seeing Alpha passively standing off to the side, she looked down at me. The fear in her posture was evident as she saw my hellish red eye. I challenged her in a series of grunts, "So, you fancy yourself a killer do you little girl? Alright…I can allot a few minutes for you to indulge your fantasy before I go on my way. Come now, sweetie. Let's see what you can do against ol' obsolete Delta."
She shrieked loudly to try to intimidate me before she jumped down to my floor. Immediately, she lowered herself down to the ground and then charged towards me like a Bouncer. I mentally sighed in disappointment as I remained stationary with my arm and drill folded across my chest. As she neared me, I extended my right foot forward slightly.
The Big Sister, completely oblivious of her surroundings, had failed to see the oil slick on the floor in front of me. The second that the charging young woman's armored feet made contact with the slick, they shot out from beneath her. Falling forward, the girl hit the floor and began to tumble towards me. Her tumbling was finally stopped by the bottom of my extended right boot. Casually returning my right foot back to its normal position, I roughly grabbed the mortified young girl by her head with my left hand and then lifted her up off the ground.
I held her there in front of me for a second before letting out a thunderous roar. Charging forward, I slammed the sister against the EL Ammo Bandito Vending Machine hard enough to send her through the device. Over the sound of various calibers of firearms clattering individually onto the floor from the destroyed machine, I heard the distinctive sound of several of her ribs breaking. I released my grip on her head and then retreated away a few steps.
The injured Big Sister fell out of the remains of the vending machine and collapsed onto the ground in front of it in a heap. Seconds later however, she forced herself to get to her feet. Growling, she swung her needle at me. Amused by her stubbornness, I roughly caught her needle by its shaft with my left hand and then began to savagely pummel her head with my drill.
On the fourth strike, the glass of her eye cracked. She tried to break free from my grip but her strength was no match for mine now that my aggressive response was allowing me to access one hundred percent of my muscular potential. On the tenth strike, a crack appeared in the metal skin of her head. The sister's right knee gave out and she collapsed onto it. Her left foot remained on the ground however.
With more room to charge my strike, I turned my entire torso back to the right and then let out a loud grunt of exertion as I brought it back to strike the brat at full force in the cracked section of her head. A loud metallic thud sounded through the park as my heavy industrial-grade drill split open her helmet. As the two halves of her diving helmet fell to floor on opposite sides of her shaking form, her face was revealed to the world.
My anger faltered as I saw the innocent, frightened appearance of her true face. Releasing my grip on her needle, I stepped back a few steps as I studied her. Without me holding her, she collapsed onto her right side. I did not know what to expect, but the sight before me certainly was not what I had imagined.
Like my beautiful Eleanor, she had frost white flawless skin, thin cheeks, and a small nose. Her unruly short raven hair was slick with sweat. She gazed up at me with her once glowing eyes that had returned to their natural color of white with blue irises. Her pupils were dilated and her thin pale lips were quivering as she continued to look at me. Just below her eyes were black rings as if she had not slept in several days.
The girl's horrible state doused the anger of my Protector Instincts. My rational thoughts returned and my eye returned to emitting golden yellow light. The girl, seeing that my aggressive response had deactivated, slowly pushed herself up with her shaking right arm, letting out a soft hiss as she fought through the pain to do so. When she had finally managed to prop herself up, she said with a timid, frightened tone, "Pa…Papa Del…Delta…I'm sor…sorry…please..."
Dumbfounded, I continued to gaze at her in complete shock. They could talk. They must not have had the voice box modification surgery. Alpha appeared as he jumped down to our level. My brother moved to stand beside me and then we looked at the helmetless Big Sister. I bent down onto my right knee and assured her with my Alpha Series voice, "It's okay Little One. We just want to help."
Alpha handed me a First Aid Kit. I took it in my gloved left hand and then slowly slid it to the frightened girl. Keeping her eyes on us, she reached out and retrieved the kit with her right hand. I understood her confusion at our sudden display of kindness after I had been aggressively bludgeoning her moments prior. I was certain that kindness in general was something new for her as well.
As she applied the red liquid soaked bandages to her wounds, my brother asked her, "What's your name?"
She cocked her head to the left in confusion as she replied, "Name?" I realized that she was a survivor from the Mass Production line of Little Sisters. They did not receive names. Only the Alpha Series Little Sisters had names.
I asked her, "You remind me of my Eleanor…do you know her?"
I saw a slight, almost undetectable smile appear on her pale face before she replied, "Of course I do Papa Delta. Silly, we live in the same house…Perphony."
I smiled slightly beneath the emotionless face of Subject Delta before I corrected her, "I think you mean Persephone, sweetie."
She frowned slightly before she replied defensively, "Hey it is a big word alright! Just because I am not as smart as Eleanor doesn't mean that I am stupid!"
I assured her, "I did not say that you were. Besides, Eleanor is a genius. It is not fair to compare yourself to her."
The girl looked at me in silence for a moment as if she was studying me. Then, to my surprise, she asked me, "Are you going to hurt her like Mother said you are?"
I frowned beneath my face as I realized that Sofia was brainwashing the girls into thinking that I was going to hurt their sister in order to rile them up. I assured the misinformed young woman, "Of course not. I can't hurt my daughter…she is only reason that I have to live. Besides…she is my master…I am hers to do with however she pleases."
The Big Sister said sadly, "I miss my Mister Bubbles…Eleanor is lucky to have hers back. Mine is gone…he went with the angels."
I replied, "I'm sorry…I know that he would be proud of you though."
She smiled and then asked, "You think so? I charge at my targets to try to be like him…I guess that is stupid..."
My brother remarked, "That's not stupid." Seeing the two halves of her helmet, he walked over to the destroyed vending machine. After picking through the remains, he pulled a strip of metal free from the machine. The Big Sister watched him in curiosity as he put the two halves back together and then shaped the metal strip around them. When he was satisfied with the shape of the strip, he used his Rivet Gun to attach the strip to the helmet. The rivets were watertight so the helmet was once again a functional diving helmet.
Handing her repaired helmet to her, he informed her, "It will hold, but I would recommend that you find a replacement. The glass is cracked too so be extremely cautious if you need to get in a fight."
She dropped the empty kit and then took her helmet from him. After examining the repair that he had done, she smiled at him and said, "Thank you, Papa Alpha."
He replied, "Any time, Little One."
She looked at me and asked, "Can I come with you?"
I replied, "No, that would not be a good idea. If Sofia sees you with us, she will send your sisters after you. However, if you want to follow us and help from the shadows, we would be very grateful."
She smiled as she placed her helmet back down over her head and then resealed her suit. As she did, my built-in radio activated. Sinclair commented, "You're just makin' all sorts of new friends aren't you, son? Well, head on back to the station and melt the ice, an' we'll say goodbye to this two-bit carney ride."
My radio deactivated and I looked back at the Big Sister only to find that she had silently left. As I looked around for her, I heard a knocking sound coming from above us. When I looked up towards the glass and metal skeleton of the arched ceiling, I saw the Big Sister looking down at us from outside of the glass. Her eye had changed from hellish red to calm yellow. She waved at us before quickly darting out of sight. I could only hope that Sofia did not find out that the sister was now our ally.
As we made our way back to the entrance to the park, my brother commented, "Good thing we did not need to use that exorcism plasmid. She's such a little firecracker that I doubt that we would have been able to get her to be still long enough to use it."
I replied, "Indeed. Perhaps, our new friend can whisper at her sisters about how Sofia is a liar and get them on our side."
He said, "That would be nice. I'd hate to have to fight them individually all the way to Fontaine Futuristics. Some of the others are more sadistic when they fight."
I taunted him, "You're not afraid of them are you?"
He replied calmly, "No, sir. I promised Emily that if I had to kill them as a necessity, I would kill them quickly. The sadistic ones would complicate that."
By then, we had exited the park. As we reached the destroyed remains of the fallen clock in the ticket booth area, the intercom system activated. Sofia preached, "Ryan saw the individual as a hero…a noble survivor. And Rapture was his paradise…a shrine to the supremacy of the self. The result? Slavery. Genocide. Chaos. Now that the Tyrant is dead, we are a true collective…a single family."
I said darkly, "Noble survivor? I think she was talking about you, Alpha." My brother laughed darkly in return. We continued on to the train station. There, I used my genetic flames to melt the ice coating the watertight bulkhead. As the ice melted, my radio activated.
Sinclair said, "Outstandin' sport. You are provin' to be quite a windfall. Now just open the train tunnel from the security booth there, and I'll come an' jump on." My radio deactivated.
Alpha commented, "Hmm…I wonder how much we can milk this little scheme that you have cooking up for."
I smirked before I replied, "Let's not show our hand until we have to. Come with me, I want to see how trustworthy Sinclair is. Even if he takes the train, we can just walk to Fontaine's."
He said, "Right behind you, sir."
We entered the security booth and I pulled the override lever down. Looking through the glass panels of the booth, I saw Sinclair exit the locked room next to the bulkhead gate. He stopped in front of the tooth and turned to look at us. To my surprise, he said, "I like to look a man in the eyes when I give him my word. You and me kid, we're going places!" Then, he turned and waved behind him as he boarded the train car.
Perhaps, I had been a little harsh on Sinclair. The man was silver tongued but even he had a tell when he was lying. I had seen it when he had assured Sofia that there was nothing that he could do to stop Ryan from taking her followers as Test Candidates. His right eye would narrow ever so slightly and if you did not know to look for it, you would easily miss it. I had not seen his eye narrow just now. He truly was giving us his word.
'Don't get comfortable you weak old man! Focus! The second that it is profitable, he will betray you just like before.' I berated myself for weakening my stance on Sinclair. I had to get to Eleanor and Sinclair was a liability to her safety.
However, before I could leave the booth, my radio activated as Sofia contacted me. She sounded apologetic as she admitted, "I had thought you a golem of Sinclair's, brought here to hold Rapture's arms while…" Splicers appeared outside the booth as they headed towards the train car. "…riffles through her pockets." A Thuggish Splicer in bloodied security guard attire began to bang on the booth's reinforced glass with his left fist. "But no…you are aware of your plight. Who, I wonder, would be so cruel? To force a mirror on a man with no face…"
Immediately after she finished, Sinclair said, "Lamb was waitin' for us! Come out shootin' and start the train!"
With our weapons at the ready, we charged out of the booth. Three Thuggish Splicers were in the station. One was by the security door that led to the park. Alpha quickly neutralized him with a headshot. The security guard in bloodied attire rushed at me from where he had been banging against the glass. I blasted him with Electro Bolt and then bashed open his skull with a swing of my drill. The final Splicer, a woman in torn formal attire, was kicking the side of the train car. Getting her attention, I ignited her with a ball of genetic flame. As the nauseating smell filled the air, the woman screamed in agony before Alpha silenced her with a headshot.
We hastily boarded the train in case more Splicers were coming. I pulled the lever and the train began to depart. As we neared the water, both Alpha and I groaned as we prepared for the onrush of icy Atlantic water. I reminded myself that it was just one more time that I had to endure a long period of travel in the freezing ocean water. The next stop would be Fontaine Futuristics. With any luck, the rest of the trip would be uneventful.