by John Shirley
Bill and Ryan sat alone in his office, Bill wishing someone were here to back him up. He had to say something Ryan wasn’t going to like.
Shifting in his chair, Bill rubbed his deeply bruised arm where the explosion had knocked the cart into him. His ears still rang a bit; Elaine was haunted by nightmares. “Mr. Ryan—this attack didn’t come out of the blue. It’s because you took out Fontaine. It’s a reaction to that, really. People are saying Rapture doesn’t mean what it used to—nationalizing a business … by force! It gave them the excuse to go a bit mad! That Atlas took the opportunity—lit the fuse of the whole bloody thing…”
Ryan snorted. “It’s not nationalization. I own most of Rapture anyway. I built it! I simply—acted for the best interests of the city! Atlas is just another babbling ‘Pravda,’ a tissue of lies he calls truth! If we let him take hold here, he’ll be another Stalin! The man wants to be dictator! If it’s war—why then so be it!”
“Mr. Ryan—I don’t think it’s a war we can win. It’s the math! Atlas just has too many of them rogue splicers. And too many rebels with him. We need to broker some kind of peace deal, guv—Rapture can’t take a revolution! This city is underwater, Mr. Ryan! It’s in the North Sea! It’s sitting on channels of hot lava! All of that is … oh, crikey, it’s volatile. We’re dying the death of a thousand cuts from leaks already—but one major leak in the wrong part of Hephaestus, and we could have a hell of an explosion. Suppose some of that icy water contacts the hot lava, in a pressurized area? The whole thing would go up! All this fighting risks exactly that kind of damage!”
Ryan looked at him, his gaze suddenly flat. His voice was flatter as he said, “And what do you suggest we offer them?” He closed his eyes and visibly shuddered. “Unions?”
“No, guv—a lot of these blokes worked for Fontaine. The others just want the ADAM. Crave it. Let’s hand over Fontaine Futuristics to Atlas’s lot. It’s not right to go against our principles—to nationalize, Mr. Ryan. We can take the high road, show ’em we stand for something! We can go back to the way we were and give up Fontaine Futuristics!”
“Give them…?” Ryan shook his head in disbelief. “Bill—men died to take over the plasmids industry! They will not have died in vain.”
Bill didn’t believe for a moment that Ryan was concerned about who’d died in vain. That was just an excuse. Andrew Ryan wanted the plasmids industry. It was in his nature. He was a tycoon. And the plasmids industry was the biggest prize in this toy store.
“Ryan Industries owns Fontaine Futuristics now,” Ryan went on. “For the good of the city. In due time, I’ll break it up. But I’m not going to give it to that murdering parasite Atlas!”
“Mr. Ryan—we’ve got to stop this war. It’ll destroy us all … there’s no place to retreat to! If we won’t make peace with them—well, if that’s the case, I’ll have to submit my resignation from the council.”
Ryan looked at him sadly. “So you’re walking out on me too. The one man I trusted … betraying me!”
“I’ve got to show you how strongly I feel about this—we’ve got to make peace! It’s not just Atlas—suppose he makes a deal with Sofia Lamb? Her people are fanatics. Now she’s broken out, she’s twice as dangerous! Her mad little cult’ll have a go at us too! We have to stop this war, Mr. Ryan!”
Ryan slammed a fist onto the desk so hard the room echoed with it. “The war can be stopped by winning it! It can be won with superior might, Bill! We can do more and better splicing, use pheromones, keep control of our splicers … and have an unstoppable army of superhuman beings! We have the labs—oh yes, we’re short on ADAM now, it’s true.” He cracked his knuckles. “The Little Sisters we have left can’t produce enough ADAM. But there’s ADAM out there—in all those bodies. It lives on after the splicer dies! It can be harvested, Bill! And the Little Sisters are ideal for harvesting it. We can make this war work for us! War can be opportunity as well as catastrophe!”
Bill stared at him.
Ryan flapped his hand in dismissal. “It’s written on your face, Bill. You’ve left me. You’ve always been loyal. But I’m afraid you will be a disappointment—like so many others. So many who’ve turned their backs on the grand vision. So many who’ve betrayed Rapture. Who’ve soiled the glorious thing I’ve built with my two hands.” He shook his head. “The future of the world … betrayed!”
Bill knew he’d better turn this around, fast, if he hoped to ever see Elaine again. He could see that in Andrew Ryan’s eyes. Ryan had only to call Karlosky or one of his other men and give the order, and he’d be in a cell. They might have lost control of Persephone, but there was always a lockup to be found, or an air lock to be thrown out of.
He let out a long, slow breath—and then nodded. “You’re right, Mr. Ryan. I reckon I did lose faith. I’ll…” He licked his lips. Hoped he was playing this right. “I’ll give it a lot of thought. We’ll find a way.” He almost believed it himself.
Ryan leaned back in his chair and frowned, looking at him closely. But Bill could see Ryan wanted to believe him. He was a lonely man. He trusted few people.
“Very well, Bill. I need you. But you need to understand— we’re here now, in Rapture, and we’re committed. And we’re going to do this my way. I built Rapture. I’ll do whatever I have to—but I will not let the parasites tear down what I have built.”
Banker’s Row, near Apollo Square
1959
Oh bloody hell, thought Bill McDonagh, seeing Anna Culpepper standing near the largest of Rapture’s banks, up ahead. Bill was walking along beside Andrew Ryan that frightened morning—and he knew what Mr. Ryan would think when he heard her singing. He’d heard her, once, himself, warbling in her new role as protest songstress—amazed that she’d gone from taking part in the council to condemning Ryan Enterprises for the new economic depression gnawing at Rapture’s soul …
Anna was standing on the street corner, singing to the frantic crowd, acoustic guitar in her hands. The overhead lamp flashed a golden glint from her earrings and played across her curly black hair.
“While Rome burns, she fiddles,” Ryan growled, as Bill followed him down the passageway to within a few yards of the crowd surging around the First Bank of Rapture. Karlosky and two other bodyguards, big men in long coats, carrying Thompsons, were walking a couple of paces in front of Ryan. Two others followed. The memory of the New Year’s Eve attack was still fresh.
Each wall along the passageway had its line of muttering, scowling customers, most of them men in work clothes or rumpled suits, clutching paperwork and shifting from foot to foot as if they were in a long line for a urinal. A wispy-haired man in frayed seersucker was peering over the shoulders of the people in front of him, trying to see into the bank, shouting past a cupped hand through the open door. “Come on, come on, we want our money; stop stalling in there!”
There were murmurs when Ryan walked up. A few glared his way and elbowed one another, but no one wanted to be the first to confront him.
“You could shut the bank down, just temporary-like, Mr. Ryan,” Bill suggested in a whispered aside. “I mean—just for now, for a few days, till the hysteria’s over, and we can reassure people…”
“No,” Ryan said firmly as the bodyguards encircled him, facing outward, guns pointed at the ceiling—but ready to drop their gun muzzles on the crowd should it rush Andrew Ryan. “No, Bill—that would be interfering with the market. The fools have the right to withdraw their money.”
“But a run on banks, guv—could be disastrous…”
“It already is. And they’ll pay the price. The resulting market correction will send them scuttling for cover like rats from a hailstorm. I just wanted to know if it was true—see it with my own eyes. I can’t interfere.”
“We could try and talk to them right here…”
Ryan snorted. “Useless. I’ll address them on radio, try and talk sense. But there’s no use reasoning with a mob.”
Karlosky turned and spoke in low tones with R
yan, out the side of his mouth. “Let’s get you out of here, Mr. Ryan…”
“Yes, yes, we’ll go…” But Ryan lingered, staring at the gathering crowd, people stalking from the banks counting fistfuls of Rapture dollars as they went, more men rushing up the street, eager to withdraw their money. Word had gotten out that the war with Atlas and the splicers was going to destroy the banks, somehow—that they’d be targeted by the subversives. Bill wondered if Atlas himself had spread that rumor, deliberately sparking the run on the banks. A depression gave him a propaganda victory.
Ryan’s presence had quieted the crowd a little—the shouting and muttering had dropped to a droning murmur, and Bill could hear Anna Culpepper singing now. Something about Cohen—how “Ryan’s songbird” was really “Ryan’s stableboy.”
“I’ve heard about this Communist versifying,” Ryan said to Bill, with acid quietness, glowering at Culpepper. “Union songs, organizers singing ‘folk music’ about the workingman. As if a Red had even a passing acquaintance with working!”
Anna had spotted Ryan now—and Bill could see she was nervous. Her voice faltered as she looked at the armed bodyguards. But she licked her lips and resumed singing. Bill had to admire her courage.
“So Anna’s turned against me,” Ryan said. “I’d heard something of the sort. But to go this far … singing a musical score for a run on the banks! I suppose she thought she’d find sheep for Atlas’s flock here. Or perhaps she’s gone over to the other sheep—the Lamb cult…” He shook his head in disgust. “I’ve seen enough. Let’s get out of here. I’ll see to it the little Red bird stops singing…”
Ryan Plasmids
1959
The little girl watched, big eyed, as the enormous metal man lumbered clankingly around the room, the sensors on its round metal head glowing. It was only a remote-controlled model, really—there was no man inside it. Brigid Tenenbaum puppeted the clanking caricature of a deep-sea diver around the room from a control panel overlooking the training area. She had to be careful not to misdirect the Big Daddy model—it could run over the little girl like a freight train.
Subject 13 was a small blond child in a pink pinafore, her large azure eyes fixed on the Big Daddy. It was all part of the conditioning process—the girl had been treated with a drug that made her more susceptible to bonding with the creature that would be her guardian in the dangerous urban wilderness Rapture had become.
“He’s big and strong,” the little girl chirped. “He’s funny too!”
“Yes,” Brigid said. “He is your big funny friend.”
“Can I play with him?” The child’s voice was a little fuzzy from the drug.
“Certainly…” Brigid made the Big Daddy model come to a sudden stop.
Then she moved a lever, causing its right arm to lift, its hand to outstretch—reaching out to the little girl.
There was something about the sight that stabbed Brigid Tenenbaum to the core …
18
Metro near Apollo Square
1959
Hurrying out of the passage from the Metro, Diane McClintock once more felt lost—though in fact she’d come here for a reason. She was here to find Atlas. Even so, she was overcome with a sensation of insubstantiality, of being a mere ghost wandering a palace.
And then, near the blockade at the entrance into Apollo Square, something caught her eye … a poster plastered to the metal wall.
It asked, Who is Atlas?
Just those three words, under a stylized, heroic image of a stoic, confident, clean-shaven man in rolled-up shirtsleeves and suspenders, fists on his hips, gazing with visionary intensity into the workingman’s future …
The one time she’d seen him, outside the café, he’d seemed like an ordinary man—good-looking, sturdy, but ordinary. And yet he was doing an extraordinary thing—risking Ryan’s constables by engaging in flagrant altruism.
At the very least, Atlas must be a charismatic man. Someone who could inspire her—end her feeling of aimlessness …
She turned to the bearded sentry cradling a shotgun at the blockade—a burly, unshaven man in a work shirt and oil-spotted blue jeans. “Listen—could you tell me … I saw him, once—in Pauper’s Drop. Atlas. He was passing out supplies. I’d … I’d like to talk to him. Maybe I could help. When I saw him in Pauper’s Drop, I just…” She shook her head. “I felt something.”
The sentry looked at her as if deciding whether or not she was sincere. Then he nodded. “I know what you mean. But I don’t know as I can trust you…”
Diane looked around to see if anyone was watching—then she took a wad of Rapture dollars out of her purse. “Please. This is all I could get hold of today. I’ll pay my way in. But I have to see him.”
He looked at the money, swallowed hard—then he reached out, grabbed it, and hid it in an inside coat pocket. “Hold up right here…”
The bearded sentry turned and called out to another, older sentry. They spoke in low tones; the bearded sentry turned and winked at her. The older guard hurried off. The sentry went back to his post, whistling to himself. With one hand he gestured to her: wait. Then he pretended not to see her.
Had she thrown away her bribe? Maybe she’d thrown away her life—spider splicers watched Apollo Square from high up on the walls. It was nippy, unevenly lit in Apollo Square tonight, and there were dead men rotting not so far away. The smell made her feel sick. She was still slightly drunk, the space around her whirling ever so slowly, and she thought she might throw up if she had to smell the dead bodies much longer.
But she wasn’t leaving. She was going to stick around till the splicers got her—or she got in to see Atlas.
If Ryan didn’t want her, she’d decided, maybe someone else would.
A woman hurried up to the barricade. “Atlas says okay, he’ll see you, McClintock,” said the woman. Diane tried not to stare at the woman’s scarred face—one of her eyesockets was covered over by scar tissue; her brown hair was matted. “Philo, you come on in with us.”
The shotgun-toting Philo nodded and gestured at Diane with the muzzle of the gun. “You go in ahead of me.”
Diane thought about backing out—but she stepped through the scrap-wood gate and followed them across Apollo Square to Artemis Suites. The one-eyed woman stepped over a low pile of trash in the doorway. Diane followed her into the reeking interior of the building.
Stomach lurching as she picked her way through moldy garbage, Diane entered a stairway that zigzagged up a graffiti-tagged concrete and steel shaft. They climbed four stories up, past drunks and groups of grubby children.
Her escorts took her through a doorway and down a carpeted, burn-scarred hall. The little bushy-haired woman never hesitated, and Philo clumped along behind Diane. The lights flickered again.
“Lights might go out,” Philo remarked, his voice a slow rumble. “Ryan’s turned the power off in the building. We got some jerry-rigged, but it ain’t reliable.”
“I got a flashlight,” the woman said. They came to another stairway, and, to Diane’s bafflement, this time they went down. This stairway was relatively clean, occupied only by the occasional bored sentry scratching himself and nodding as they passed.
Down and down they went, farther down than they’d gone up … down to a subbasement passageway.
Here, they passed under steam-shrouded pipes, their feet splashing through puddles, till they came to a small antechamber with a high, water-dripping ceiling. A Securis door was guarded by a grinning, shivering splicer in a ratty sweater and torn trousers, toes sticking out of his decaying shoes. He had the hard-core splicer’s red scrofula on his face, and he juggled three scythelike fish-gutting blades from hand to hand. The curved blades hissed close to the naked lightbulb on the ceiling, missing it by no more than a quarter inch. “Who’s the extra bitch, tittle-tattle tits?” the splicer asked in a scratchy voice, never pausing in juggling the blades.
“McClintock. Atlas says she can go in.”
“Says you, tittle
-tattle tits—we’ll fry your bits if that ain’t it! Ha! Go ahead on in!”
The splicer stepped aside, still juggling, and “tittle-tattle tits” opened the Securis door for them. Diane hurried through, eager to get past the splicer.
They were in a lamplit utility area. Pipes and heating ducts came up through the floor near the walls. The room was warm and smelled of cigarette smoke and mildew and brine.
The cigarette was being smoked by a muscular man seated casually behind a battered gray-metal desk. On the desk was a tumbler and a gold cigarette box.
It was he. The man she’d seen outside the café. He wore white, rolled-up shirtsleeves, just like in the poster. A good face, she thought, that seemed to emanate trustworthiness.
Two shaggy bodyguards stood behind him, near a ganglion of valves. Both bodyguards wore coveralls and carried tommy guns. One of them had an unlit pipe dangling from the corner of his mouth.
“I’d be Atlas,” said the man at the desk, with an Irish lilt, looking her over with an unsettling frankness. “And you’re one of Ryan’s birds?”
“I’m Diane McClintock. I work … I worked … for Mr. Ryan. I saw you helping people in Pauper’s Drop—and it touched me. I don’t feel good about the way things are going and … I just wanted to see if … to see if…” What was it she wanted, exactly?
He smiled impishly. “You don’t seem certain of what you’re wanting to see, Miss McClintock.”
She sighed and unconsciously brushed her hair into place with her hand. “I’m tired. Had a few drinks. But … I want to know more about you—I mean, you know, in a friendly way. I don’t work with the constables. I’ve seen things. Heard stories … I don’t know what to believe anymore … I just know—once I was passing by Apollo Square and I saw a woman come over the barricades and … one of the splicers working for Andrew…” She didn’t like to remember it. The woman hurrying along, full of life, one moment. The next, a splicer had sent a ball of fire into her—and she’d sizzled away into a blackened corpse, within steps of where Diane stood. “Well the splicer burned her. And the look on her face … like she was trying to tell me something. So tonight…” She sighed. “I don’t know. I’m just so tired right now…”
