Fanfic: The Bioshock Trillogy

[kdn003]

Hello all. A strange thing happened to me this morning (or last night depending on how you want to look at it) I recalled some advice Invader had given me (at the time I had misunderstood it comepletely, though since then I've done what he proposed) involving rewriting the two Bioshock Fanfics I'd written. Anyway, I couldn't get back to sleep without starting, and then I couldn't stop writing until I was about half way through the second story. So now it's about 9 in the morning (thankfully I don't work Mondays anymore) and I have rewritten all of the first story and half the second. I'll be posting these as I go through and spell-and-error-check them. for those who've already read both of these, I hope you can see the improvements, and for those who haven't I hope you enjoy it!

Bioshock: Remnants

Part 1: Apollo Square

Half a mile below the ocean’s surface Apollo Square bustled with activity. The small block had always been one of the busiest in Rapture, a hub for the denizens of the underwater city. From the rich to the poor, the have to the have-nots, at the best of times Apollo Square would make anyone feel welcome.

However, 1958 was not the best of times. Though Rapture had been built to be a paradise, crime was a part of everyday life. People went missing, turned up dead, and, more frequently than not, were found to be involved with either Frank Fontaine or Andrew Ryan. The former was rumored to live within the square, or near enough that just being seen there would earn a person a permanent spot on Ryan’s black list.

Between the towering Olympus Heights and the square sat a small bar. Unlike Apollo square which was home to everyone under the waves, this bar was home to only two types of customers. There were the suits, men of power and fortune, who strutted about with their heads in the air. Amongst, and yet not actually with, the suits were the working stiffs, their eyes cast to the ground, their back hunched.

Trying his best to blend in with the other working class, David checked himself in a hanging mirror. His brown eyes went from the grease smeared across his face to the uneven, short, black bristles that covered his scalp. He tried to imitate the other working stiffs, with their heads down, and their shoulders slumped, despite the years of training that told him to stand straight. Repositioning the worker’s beret on his head, David went to the counter and nodded to the bar tender.

Nearby, he could spot the others. Five leaned against a wall, talking to a woman, his confident smirk playing into his disguise as a wealthy businessman. Only a few feet away, Six marched into the bar, looking exhausted in a fish-gutter’s outfit, his apron covered in blood and smelling of dead aquatic life. Only Eighteen looked truly out of place. Not because of his clothing, which made him look like a crime lord, but because he kept glancing over his shoulder and drumming his fingers on the counter.

As David casually glanced at the other suits in the bar, making sure he wasn’t doing so obviously, he noticed that none of them seemed nervous. Internally, the boy found himself berating Eighteen. Then he took a shallow breath and returned to his drink, hoping that no one would notice he’d yet to take so much as a single sip. The four of them were waiting for the sixth member of their party, Three.

Without warning, Eighteen crossed the bar, and leaned over David. His eyes widening in shock, David hoped he appeared to be a shocked working stiff and not of a man who was sure his colleague had just cost him his life. If anyone in the bar realized that it was just an act, the five of them would find themselves on the wrong end of about a dozen guns.

“What do we do?” Eighteen hissed. For a moment, David didn’t answer, not trusting himself not to simply throttle his teammate. “Thirteen, I said what the hell do we do now?”

“Stick to the ☺☺☺☺ing plan!” David responded, his voice little more than a grating whisper. “Now, slap me on the back and walk away laughing before you get us killed.” Eighteen followed David’s instructions, playing the part of an obnoxious kingpin, drunk on his own power. Even though his shattered nerves were working to improve his cover, David didn’t like the way his hands shook.

At last, as though he’d been waiting for one of them to make a mistake before arriving, Three strolled into the bar. Perhaps if he’d been there five minutes earlier, Eighteen wouldn’t have blown his cover. Maybe, one of Fontaine’s goons wouldn’t have gone running to his boss.

Five caught it first. The woman he’d been talking to, casually pulled a derringer from her purse, and fired a round into his chest. Despite the blood that spattered her face, the woman didn’t hesitate to put a second round into Three. Before he’d fallen to the ground, the woman was turning to aim at Eighteen, and the bartender was raising a shotgun from behind the counter.

Before the bartender could fire, David rolled over the counter and planted his palm into the other man’s nose. Using his momentum to carry him, the teenager then drove his elbow into the bartender’s chin. Relieving the already unconscious man of his firearm, David aimed the shotgun at the woman. Even as he pulled the trigger he could see the insane smile that had crossed her face as she fired at Eighteen.

With a thunderclap, the shotgun let loose a cluster of pellets that slammed into the woman’s chest and stomach. While her aim had been less precise, only winging Eighteen’s stomach, the man who charged into the bar, his Thompson Machinegun blazing with automatic gunfire, finished the boy off with a single burst.

As Six dove behind the counter, David pumped the shot gun and fired again, this time going wide. Three had all but disappeared, leaving only Six and David to complete the task at hand. The orders, handed down from Ryan himself, were to kill Fontaine, the most wanted and dangerous man in Rapture.

“Well, it’s hit the fan now,” Six shouted as David knelt behind the counter. As he said it, his hand became alive with electricity. Six was one of the few who had been permitted to use Plasmids, and he put the ability to practice as the bolt of electricity slammed into Fontaine’s goon. The force of the resulting blast sent the goon flying.

Using the short lull in the gun fight, David and Six fled the bar, slipping into Olympus Heights. According to the plan, this was supposed to have been the easy part. Getting past Fontaine’s guards, into his home, and then killing him would be the real challenge.

Ahead, the elevator that would have taken them to Fontaine’s penthouse sat, though it was open, there was no way they’d ride it to the top unharmed. Instead, David ran at the wall as though he hoped to plow through it. Before he slammed into the concrete he leapt, kicked off from the wall and vaulted over the second story banister.

With the understanding that their initial plan had relied on Fontaine’s men’s observation skills to be lax, David and the others had found an alternative route into Fontaine’s home. The third floor housed a small ventilation system that shared an opening with the fourth. Ideally they would have entered the penthouse quietly, without needing to shoot their way through Apollo Square. Of course, ideally they wouldn’t have lost Five, Eighteen and presumably Three in a gunfight.

Before someone could spot them, Six and David crawled into the third floor vent and silently made their way to Fontaine’s penthouse. Relying on haste more than silence, David kicked the grate from the vent and slid into the main entryway. He pulled the modified Colt from his belt and cocked the trigger.

Without warning, a horrible pain shocked David’s stomach. Falling to one knee, vainly holding his stomach as blood slipped through his fingers, the wounded assassin watched as Six stormed into the room only to be knocked back, a neat hole in his head.

“You think we didn’t know?” A deep voice thundered from the shadows. A hand suddenly appeared and wrapped itself around David’s throat. “We knew from the beginning.” Fontaine pushed David against the nearest wall, pinning the teenager with ease, while bringing his pistol to slam into the boy’s face with a nasty crack.

“About the slugs, Plasmids, even you little freaks,” Fontaine explained, his voice confident and cruel. His Colt missing, David grabbed his knife, hoping to at least wound the crime lord before he bled-out. His arm was pulled aside, and without warning a fresh agony in his shoulder told David that Fontaine had dislocated his arm from its socket.

“I’ve got plans for this city. Big ones.” Even as the man spoke, David could feel a strange, burning sensation in his stomach as though someone had poured boiling water down his throat.

David didn’t need a doctor or one of Ryan’s goons to tell him what was wrong. The sea slug in his stomach was revolting. It was trying to reject its host. In the process, it would kill him, leaching deadly poisons into his body.

“It’s a shame you won’t be around to see it.” Without another word, the crime boss of Rapture slid the edge of the blade across David’s throat. Initially it had felt horrible, the cutting edge opening his skin, sending a wave of panic and horror through his body. However, it was replaced by a foggy dreamlike state.

Letting the teenager fall to the carpeted floor, Fontaine turned to the other criminals who’d come in, possibly wondering what the noise had been. “Come on boys, Time to go out in a blaze of gunfire!”

Though he was dying, the sea slug in his stomach refused to let David go so easily. It was simultaneously keeping him alive and poisoning every cell in his body. Time seemed to become less constant, things would slow to a crawl, and then, in the blink of his eye, the room would change, like he’d been asleep for hours. People moved through the room, their voices nothing more than vague rumblings, shadows crawled across the floor and lights danced before his eyes. It wasn’t until a pair of luminous eyes came into view, that David’s mind could process what was happening around him.

“Uncle Ryan wants me to tell you something,” the Little Sister said in a singsong voice. “He says only he gets to decide when you become an Angel. No one else.” With that the Little Sister jammed her ADAM-gathering hypodermic needle into David’s heart.


Footnote: I don't know how often I'll be posting these. On the one hand, it's already been written, on the other, I tend to make a lot of errors after a night without sleep. Also yes, I intend to add to the series and make it a proper trillogy, though whether with a sequal or prequal, I'm undecided. Let me know if ya'll would be interested in reading this again/for the first time.

[kdn003]

I'm not sure if anyone is interested in this, but I thought I'd post one more chapter before abandoning it. Let me know if you're interested. Also, if you have any questions, comments or criticisms, feel free to post them

Part 2: Awakening

Death was not as long as David had expected it to be. As the last visages of life had left his body, the Little Sister burned into his retina, the world had gone dark. However, only a breath later he suffered from a horrendous jolt of electricity arcing through his being. Every cell suddenly screamed in agony, his muscles tightening to the point of tearing, his bones threatening to shatter, and his mind feeling as though it were being pulled from his skull.

Then his body went limp and David fell from the Vita-Chamber. He landed face first on a cold, steel floor, unable to lift his arms to cushion his fall. For several moments the assassin wondered if he’d been brought back only to lie there, suffocating under his own weight. For all intents and purposes, he was blind and deaf. What light there was, only reached his eyes as a distant blur. His hearing was little more than a constant roar, like he’d put his head under a waterfall. Gravity seemed like it was pushing him to the floor.

At first, the half dead teenager considered just lying there, letting his body succumb to the pain and weariness. Never one to shy away from a challenge or give in to pressure, David dismissed the idea and rose to his knees. He had to grit his teeth to keep from crying out as his muscles protested the motion.

As he sat there, swaying to and fro, he willed his eyes to focus, squinting at the world around him. Slowly, the room began to take focus. As the pain in his head began to fade, his senses began to function again. And for a brief moment, he wished they hadn’t.

For one, the room was on fire, a hole in the wall revealing a bit of piping that had burst and was alight in flames. For another the room was leaking. And, unless he was mistaken, it was buckling under the pressure of the ocean. None of these facts revealed any information in the slightest as to his location. Some of the aesthetics vaguely reminded David of his time under the employ of Ryan, but not anything to tell him where he was in Rapture.

At one point it may have been a lab, not so different from the labs where he had been inducted into Ryan’s service. However, it had suffered from several catastrophic failures. As though punctuating his thoughts, a piece of the ceiling slipped free to crash to the floor.

As the last remnants of pain and unease began to lift from his body, David felt a new sensation creep outward from his stomach. It was the same burning discomfort he’d felt only moments after Fontaine had shot him. It carried with it a quiet numbing that seemed to turn his insides into unfeeling, dead tissue.

“Number Thirteen,” a voice called over the noise of flames and water slapping against tile. “If you can hear me, pick up the radio.” Turning, David found the voice’s origin: a simple, handheld radio. It hung next to the vita chamber as though someone had put it there just for him. With more effort than it should have taken, the newly living teenager pulled himself to his feet. “Thirteen, are you there?”

With a ragged growl, he plucked the radio from the wall. When he tried to speak, David found that his voice box was all but ruined. Putting a hand to his throat, the teenager found a ragged scar that wound its way around his neck, a remnant of Fontaine slitting his trachea. Keeping his voice low, and his sentences short, he found that he could still talk, though the act itself was painful. “Here…”

“Good,” the voice responded in an almost cheerful tone. While David couldn’t recognize the speaker, she spoke with an unmistakable German accent. There was also a level of intelligence, a fluency to her words, something that came from a lengthy education.

“My name is Dr. Bridget Tenenbaum. I can get you out of here, but only if we hurry.” Without warning the floor pitched to one side, the room tilting violently. As David stumbled to the nearest glass door, he saw the reason for the room’s unstable condition.

“You are in a section of Fontaine Futuristics that is falling into the Trench,” Tenenbaum explained. The view through the bulkhead spoke volumes. Where the airlock should have continued to another portion of Fontaine’s building, it stopped abruptly, its edge jagged where the small room had broken away from the rest of the structure. The rest of Fontaine Futuristics was at least fifty feet above him, still resting on the edge of the trench. “As you are now, you cannot leave. The pressure is enough to kill you, and the sea slug in your chest is ending your life, yes?”

Though she’d said it like she would a question, David knew Tenenbaum wasn’t asking. It was a fact: the sea slug was killing him. It had been since Fontaine had shot him, and would continue to do so. And even if this Dr. Tenenbaum possessed the means to help him, there was no way for him to get to her. The ocean would crush him like a tin can.

“But there is a solution,” Tenenbaum continued. Even as she explained, David could feel his body dying. His fingers were going numb, the world was beginning to blur again, and even the air around him was taking a metallic tinge, as though each breath was poison. “Look for a display case near the door.”

Shaking his head in a vain attempt to clear his vision, the former assassin did as he was instructed. Near the door was a display case, as tall as him, and it contained what looked like a diving suit.

“This is what you are needing, Thirteen. It will combat the poisoning effects of the sea slug, and let you walk along the ocean floor.” Before she had finished, David began to don the heavily armored suit. He fumbled with the various components, struggling with the clasps and buckles, trying to force his numb and shaking body to function properly. As he locked the final components into place and reached for the helmet, Tenenbaum’s voice returned.

“I am sorry, but this will hurt.” Not sure if he’d heard her correctly, the dying teenager locked the helmet into place, and, almost in response, the suit gave an ominous hiss. Once it had become airtight, something drove its way into David’s left arm. He looked at the spun copper that composed the plating that covered his forearm. A clear tube ran from somewhere on his back, along his arm to the exact spot where the pain originated.

The tube instantly filled with a glowing blue liquid: Eve. As though it had gotten a taste for his flesh, the suit drove more hypodermic needles into his body. He felt pinpricks of white pain in his stomach, chest and along his spine. Finally a searing agony leapt into his chest, driving him to his knees, as a final needle buried itself in his heart.

Once the suit was on, however, David instantly felt better. His senses returned with sharp clarity, and the burning, numbing sensation receded. He took a deep breath, savoring the way the oxygen nourished his lungs rather than poisoned them. “You are feeling better now. Yes?”

“Much,” he responded, barely noticing that Tenenbaum’s voice now emanated from within his newly acquired helmet and not the discarded radio. It still hurt to talk, and his voice was still rougher than it used to be, but, as he stood, feeling the balance in his new suit, David felt life return to his tired limbs. “Now what?”

“Very soon, that room will collapse and follow Persephone into the trench.” The former assassin vaguely remembered Tenenbaum’s name from a list of those who worked with Frank Fontaine, but at the moment he could care less. By his count she had not only prevented a very painful and debilitating death from the sea slug, but may have also brought him back from the dead. “Even with that suit, you cannot survive those depths.”

Moving around, testing his flexibility in the diving suit, David found himself before a full length mirror. It had probably been placed there for the express purpose of showing the suit’s new inhabitant their appearance. The man who looked back, from the mirror, through a mask of copper and brass seemed alien. The boots gave him an extra few inches, their copper plated soles looking like medieval armor. Copper plates made hard points over his shins and knees, breaking the pattern of thick, insulating fabric that composed the body of the suit.

“That suit was designed specifically for Ryan’s… boys, like you,” Tenenbaum explained. Around his waist a belt, that supported his frame, held several diving tools, as well as an empty holster, though for what he couldn’t guess. Along his spine a series of ridges, made from copper plated steel, led to the heavy armor on his shoulders. While the teenager could feel the weight of the suit, it didn’t seem to actually push down on his shoulders, as though the suit somehow supported itself. While the suit added height and stature to David’s frame, it was nowhere near as bulky as the clumsy diving suits used to build and maintain Rapture. Rather, it fit his body like it had been custom tailored for him.

“It will amplify your abilities, as well as offer some protection.” David flexed his hands, looking at the heavy brass that capped each finger and backed his fists. His left arm held only the Eve tube, and a slotted plate of copper, as though something were missing. His right held what could only be a weapon. A hypodermic needle, at least six inches long, extended with a flick of his wrist. It reminded him of the same tools used by Little Sisters to gather ADAM, not only in its size, but because there was a clear vial behind the needle, empty, waiting to be filled.

“That is designed to harvest ADAM,” Tenenbaum described as though she could see David looking at the weapon attached to his forearm. “Sophia Lamb may have had notions for you to assist with the Little Sisters in their gathering, but now we will never know.”

The name Lamb sent a mild shock of recognition through David’s brain. While Sophia had been one of Ryan’s, she had been nothing like the hired goons the billionaire employed for protection and intimidation. She was something different, cold, calculating and manipulative. She had often twisted David’s thoughts, toying with his mind as well as the others.

Looking back at the mirror a final time, he put a hand to the spherical metal that shaped his helmet. The face plate, a circle framed by copper support, glowed faintly, turning the glass opaque. It was as though he were wearing a mask. He couldn’t see his own face. David fingered the mirror for a moment, and then slammed his fist into the glass. The newfound strength that coursed through his body felt like a loaded gun, ready to go off at any moment. As he moved away from the mirror Tenenbaum continued to describe his new suit of armor.

“The needle will drain the blood from a Splicer, but I do not know for what purpose.” Splicer. The word conjured a host of images and half whispered secrets. They were addicts, obsessed with altering their genetic makeup. Most people in Rapture would never mention them in polite society, like drunk, or socialist. “What effect it will have you, I also do not know. Now hurry Thirteen, we have work to be done.”

“David… My name… is David.” Without waiting for her to reply, the armored teen moved back to the clear bulkhead, wondering how he would get it open. Above him, the city of Rapture glowed like a beacon. Now, it offered none of its former glory. Structures that had once been created with only architectural artistry in mind were now ghostly skeletons, crumbing in the dark. Only a few, dim lights could be seen through the ocean haze. Between his derelict room and the city, a series of cables seemed to anchor the falling lab to Rapture, a thin lifeline back to the city.

[Invader]

Sorry I didn't see this earlier, I've been busy with real-life stuff and hanging around other parts of the forum. I can't read them right now but I'll come back later and tell you what I think. Glad you took my advice, stories only get better with each revision.