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jackjolene · 6 months

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BioShock/Sinking City/Vampyr - Ultimate Evil AU

I’ve had this one sitting in my drafts for a while now. I was hoping to finish my main story for BioShock/Sinking City/Vampyr first before posting this one, but this is too perfect for Halloween to wait.

In my BioShock/Sinking City/Vampyr multiverse, this is the worst possible world. Here, we’ve got Bad Ending Jack, Worst Ending Delta, Worst Ending Reid, and Abandonment Ending Charles. Of course, the worst ending in Sinking City is Annihilation, but that pretty much destroys the world long before the events of BioShock and BioShock 2 can take place, so here we go!

Subject Delta chose to harvest every Little Sister he came across, destroying not only his soul, but Eleanor’s conscience as well. After forcibly assimilating her father’s ADAM and taking his powers and knowledge for herself, Eleanor leaves in Sinclair’s craft.

Taking inspiration from Sinclair, she then sells Rapture’s technology to the highest bidder, raising much-needed cash. To her surprise, the winner of the auction is none other than Jack Ryan, and he’s not too happy about the amount of money he had to spend in order to maintain his monopoly on Rapturian technology.

In Rapture, Jack Wynand chose to harvest every Little Sister he came across, gaining power at the expense of the innocent and helpless. Tenenbaum took the Little Sisters she had saved and fled Rapture while Jack’s splicers, bribed with Fontaine’s ADAM, aided him in boarding and hijacking an American nuclear submarine.

After making it back to the States, Jack killed the splicers and then began rebuilding Ryan Industries with the money he gained from selling the submarine and its warheads. Jack had embraced both of his “fathers”, Andrew Ryan and Frank Fontaine, taking up the former’s surname and the latter’s ruthlessness and business strategy. Jack Ryan, the secret son of Andrew Ryan, rose to rebuild his father’s company after his untimely death with amazing new technologies, supplementing his income with crime, especially in the production and sale of a horrifying new drug, produced in the bellies of kidnapped little girls.

After the auction, Jack meets with Eleanor, learning that they are both children of Rapture. Eleanor is surprised and happy to learn that Jack is very similar to her; he was her inspiration for escaping Rapture, and he is just as ruthless and power hungry as she is. Seeing the other’s similarities to themselves, and also the potential benefits, Jack decides to mentor Eleanor and nurture her ambition and power.

Through Jack and his connections, Eleanor gains an introduction into the world of high society, business, and politics as his ward, “Eleanor Ryan”. With Eleanor, Jack gains good PR for adopting an orphan, a veritable genius to aid Ryan Industries’ R&D department, an agent to carry out the most dangerous and illegal of criminal assignments, and finally a protege to carry on after him.

And in private, the two of them find...comfort, with each other.

While at university, Eleanor meets a “Johannes Van Der Berg”, who she senses knows far more than he lets on. From him, she begins to learn about things far from the beaten path, old, mystical, and eldritch things. Through him, she learns of an isolated Massachusetts town, cut off from the world since the ‘20s, and of the secrets hidden within.

After piecing together the little puzzles that Van Der Berg gives her to solve, Eleanor learns of the greatest secret of all time - a way to gain ultimate power, to become a literal demigod. It would also involve unleashing a horror beyond comprehension upon the world and destroying Humanity, but that’s of small consequence when becoming a being of untold power.

Eleanor knows that Jack wouldn’t go for it, though. As power hungry as he is, he likes the life he has built well enough and wouldn’t be willing to destroy the world to become a near-god. Being a powerful CEO/crime lord is enough for him, but Eleanor believes in dreaming big, and she’ll need the resources of Ryan Industries to realize her dream. And all she has to do is kill Jack and two other men.

From Johannes, she learns that in order to unleash this “Hidden Daughter”, she needs to become the “Seed” - a person who was chosen to choose whether to awaken the Hidden Daughter or to restart the Cycle. However, the Seed of this Cycle, a man by the name of Charles Reed, chose to walk away. Because of him, there is a zone of unnatural flooding and reports of monsters extending from somewhere in Massachusetts.

In order to become the Seed, Eleanor will need to take the essence of the Seed from him. A man by the name of “Ebernote Blackwood” tried and failed to do so; however, Reed’s decision to walk away has made the forces that chose him willing to allow another to become the Seed. All Eleanor needs are the abilities of an “Ekon”, a vampire, and she will be able to become the Seed herself and finish what Charles refused to do.

Johannes knows of the perfect man-well, Ekon, for the job: Dr. Jonathan Reid, who terrorized the night shortly after the First World War in 1918. A heartless monster, he used his silver tongue and gifts of medicine to keep the citizens of London alive and healthy while he learned their secrets to maximize the purity of their blood for maximum power. Not even his own mother, butler, and best friend were safe from him. After losing his vampiric love, Reid returned to war-torn Europe to take out his rage and thirst on any unfortunate enough to cross his path.

All Eleanor needs is for him to turn her into an Ekon. The good news is that Dr. Reid doesn’t need to be willing; all she needs to do is to take his blood. And with her Big Sister needle, that’ll be as easy as pie should he refuse her.

Jack is the first to go. On the anniversary of the day they met, Eleanor and Jack, her hero, her inspiration, her ward, her mentor, , and her secret lover, have one last roll in the hay. After Jack falls asleep, Eleanor takes out her Big Sister needle and aims to kill Jack with one good jab and take his ADAM too. It turns out Jack wasn’t as deeply asleep as she thought, and the NYC penthouse where they reside becomes the site of their battle. Bullets riddle the walls, fire and electricity burn the furniture, and in the end, Eleanor stands triumphant over Jack’s body, his ADAM and mind joining Delta’s.

With Ryan Industries’ connections in the media, Eleanor is able to pass off Jack’s death as an assassination at the hands of Soviet agents, tears running down her face on live TV. Later, she is completely dry-eyed as she officially inherits Ryan Industries and all its assets, both legal and illegal.

With Ryan Industries’ resources at her fingertips, Eleanor is able to fully devote herself to the search for Dr. Jonathan Reid and Charles Reed. Finding Reed is easy enough; after Boston flooded, he’s stayed one step ahead of the strange events extending outwards from Massachusetts. As he’s useless without the bloodthirst of an Ekon, Eleanor orders her men to keep an eye on Reed, while the search for Dr. Reid continues.

Finally, after some hints from Van Der Berg, Dr. Jonathan Reid is found. Eleanor is able to set up a meeting between herself and the good doctor. Eleanor finds him charming, in the same way that she is charming: All polite words and gestures, with a tension like a coiled snake waiting to strike.

Dr. Reid listens politely to Eleanor as she outlines her offer to him: In exchange for turning her into a vampire, an Ekon, he will gain access to Ryan Industries’ connection with the Human trafficking business - they have to get their little girls for ADAM production from somewhere, after all. He’ll be eating well and easily for as long as Ryan Industries exists.

After giving her offer, Dr. Reid smiles and tells Eleanor that while her offer is generous, he prefers to hunt his prey rather than have it handed to him - and then he grabs at her. Putting his hand to her forehead, he begins to try and override her mind so that he may more easily feed on her. He is surprised when he is resisted and then thrown back - while she may have drained their ADAM against their will and imprisoned their minds within her subconscious, Jack and Delta aren’t going to let some bloodsucker kill their girl.

The fight between Eleanor and Dr. Reid is very different from her fight with Jack; Dr. Reid’s Ekon abilities are a far cry from the powers granted by plasmids and gene tonics, blood and shadow giving him advantages that no splicer could hope to have. Despite these advantages, however, the combination of Eleanor’s original Big Sister powers, Delta’s powers, and Jack’s powers, is more than enough to beat him.

After draining Dr. Reid of every ounce of his blood, Eleanor sets his body alight with Incinerate! She watches as one of the most powerful vampires of the modern age burns to ash before injecting the contents of her Big Sister needle into her veins. The rush is nothing like anything she’s ever experienced before. In fact, the last time she was as close to death was when Sofia Lamb smothered her.

Upon awakening, Eleanor feels like Hell itself. She is beyond thirsty, the only color she can see other than black and white is red from bloodstains, and other than the strange chanting, everything she hears is muted and distant.

Upon leaving the meeting room, a group of silhouettes approach her, each black with a cardiovascular system within. One of them moves to help her from falling, and that’s when she falls upon its neck, bites down, and drinks deeply. A few minutes later, the color comes back to the world and the horrified cries of her bodyguards reach her ears. Standing up from the bloodless body of one of her bodyguards, even as his final thoughts sound through her mind and his memories are archived in her mind, she orders them to have someone remove it.

A few things change. Eleanor can no longer go outside when the sun is out, so she conducts business from the safety of her office and board room with the blinds drawn. She only appears for social events if they take place while the sun is down. She no longer eats, now drinking blood from the poor souls that she orders from the Human traffickers they buy from and faking a lack of appetite during social dinners. With every new victim, her new powers grow and adapt.

She finds her final victim trying to ward off his hallucinations and memories with alcohol in a seedy bar. In his state, it’s easy to overwhelm Charles Reed’s mind and walk him out the door and into an alley. Despite the state of his mind and body, Reed’s blood gives her the most she’s ever had from a meal. The Seed dies in a dirty alleyway, and a new one stands over his cooling corpse, looking down at him as she reviews his memories.

When Charles Reed chose to abandon his destiny and leave Oakmont, he wasn’t alone. He took Joy Hayden with him and tried to build a life with her back in Boston, but the madness stayed with him, prompting him to take up drink to cope. His relationship with Joy soured and she left him, their unborn son going with her. That son, “Jonathan Hayden”, is none other than Johnny Topside, Subject Delta. Without a father in his life to teach him the value of justice, Jonathan Hayden never developed an instinct to protect the innocent, hence his ability to harvest Little Sisters. Eleanor looks down at her “grandfather” one last time before leaving him alone.

The next night, a fully empowered Eleanor Ryan leads Ryan Private Security as they penetrate the security measures set up around the “Massachusetts Quarantine and Disaster Zone”, making for the very center of it. Between her powers and the armaments her men possess, Eleanor has no doubt of accomplishing her mission.

Over the past 50 years, Oakmont has gone ever further into Hell. The floodwater have only deepened and the rain is now a permanent torrential downpour (or a blizzard during the winter). The Wylebeasts haunt the entire city now; few places are safe from them. Those originally trapped in the city are all dead, their surviving descendants now few in number and all members of the various cults that sprang up as social order finally dissolved. In the wake of Charles’ flight from Oakmont, stagnation, decay, and insanity now rule the day.

Eleanor Ryan and Ryan Private Security hit the city like a thunderclap, their boats and helicopters making landfall and complements of troops and drones swarming into the city. The Wylebeasts emerge from their hiding places, ready for a fresh meal, only to be slaughtered in droves by Eleanor’s powers and her men’s bullets. Crazed cultists attack in droves, only for Ryan Private Security Drones to swarm them. A few hapless men fall to the beasts, to the cultists, and to the tentacles that dwell in the water, but Eleanor calls for no retreat.

While her men and drones slaughter the beasts and the cultists, Eleanor retraces Charles steps, his memories guiding her all the way to Cthygonnaar. As she slips beneath the water in her new and improved Big Sister suit, Eleanor smiles at the irony of her returning to the waves once more.

It’s easy for Eleanor to avoid going mad from the strange, huge sea creatures that live beneath Oakmont; she’s got Delta, Jack, Dr. Reid, and Charles playing defense in her mind. As for the aggressive fish that patrols the waters, she does what Charles was unable to do and kills it. With that done, she proceeds into Cthygonnaar.

Despite all her preparations, Eleanor was not ready for the sheer horror of Cthygonnaar. She walks through a recollection of Rapture, London and Oakmont, memories of Delta, Sofia Lamb, Grace Holloway, Stanley Poole, Dr. Alexander Gilbert, Father Simon Wales, and even herself, accosting her mentally, saying things that she remembers perfectly, and things she has no memory of. Worse, the memories of Delta, Jack, Dr. Reid, and Charles Reed haunt her as well. Scenes of atrocities committed in London during the Skal Epidemic, in Oakmont when the Flood arrived, and in Rapture during the Civil War. Then, a long walk as citizens of London, Oakmont, and Rapture give into despair.

The last is a woman whose clothing changes from a young girl’s dress, to an Edwardian ensemble, then to a Rapturian outfit, and finally to the Rapturian outfit but torn and stained with dirt and blood.

“This world values children, not childhood,” the woman says, her eyes blank and cold. “There’s a profit to be made...and men who make it.”

After she disappears, Eleanor ventures into a pit of bones, of the Seeds who came before her. She looks up at the memory of one sacrificing himself to restart the cycle, this cosmic wheel of blood, shakes her head, and continues forward.

At the crossroads, she removes the Seal from the pedestal which Charles had chosen, allowing him to escape his destiny. The first Seed to choose not to sacrifice himself, and he chooses to run away? “Pathetic,” Eleanor says to herself.

She takes the Seal to the middle pedestal, the one in front of the cyclopean, eldritch door. Further on, she can see the pedestal that’s been chosen before again and again, the one that would restart the cycle.

Without a second thought, Eleanor places the Seal on the middle pedestal and the massive door slowly rises. Eleanor walks forward, ready to greet the Hidden Daughter. From the strange, ghostly shadows emerges dozens upon dozens of tentacles, surrounding a huge circular maw. Rising into the air, Eleanor screams as she feel her body being destroyed on a molecular level before being drawn into the Hidden Daughter’s mouth.

Back up in Oakmont, the personnel of Ryan Private Security look up at the huge incoming tidal wave and scream in fear. The cultists cheer with insane joy and triumph, and the wylebeasts give up one last roar just before the waves engulfs them all. First Oakmont, then Massachusetts, and finally the entire eastern coast of the continental United States is consumed by the monstrous wave.

From the waves now covering the completely sunken city, the Hidden Daughter, Cthylla, the greatest of all the children of Cthulhu the Dreamer, emerged from the depths. Johannes Van Der Berg appeared to greet her, casting off his suit, both the one of cloth and the one of false Humanity, revealing his true self: Hastur, the King in Yellow. For an eternity, he waited patiently for her to be allowed into the world, so that they could finally consummate their nuptials. The kiss they share is loving, and beyond disgusting.

Far off in the Pacific Ocean, the Dreamer Himself, Cthulhu awakens and rises to the surface, beginning his journey. After all, he is needed to give his daughter away to her new husband now. This wedding will be one to remember the world, and reality, over.

A little ways away from Hastur and Cthylla, Eleanor, or the Thing Who Was Eleanor, rises from the wave herself. The pain of destruction had quickly given way to the bliss of creation as the Daughter remade Eleanor in her own image.

Eleanor became a fusion of Human traits, and of the Great Old Ones. The upper half of her face could pass for Human, were it not so big and only had one pair of eyes. Her mouth, on the other hand, was now like a great leech’s, and could protrude out from her face like a butterfly’s proboscis. The form of her upper torso was still Human, but colored black and green and perpetually moist. Her legs were gone, replaced by a multitude of tentacles, almost like a living, squirming long skirt. More eyes and leech mouths dotted her body; when a mouth or eye closed, it would open to reveal that it had become the other. The palms of her hands now each had one such eye/mouth, and her nails were replaced with huge great claws. Two huge wings like a bat’s extended out from her back, perfect for flying through the air or swimming underwater.

Eleanor could feel her power, now increased beyond anything she could have ever imagined or comprehended before. Her senses, Human and Vampiric, are greater than ever, allowing her to see the entire electromagnetic spectrum and beyond, to hear sounds and thoughts from a continent away, to taste emotions and thoughts, to feel the Earth’s, Moon’s, and Sun’s gravitational and magnetic fields, to smell the decay of the atoms, and so much more.

She admires her new form in her reflection before looking back up. It’s exactly like the day she escaped from Rapture, the sun now hidden behind a dark bank of clouds, water pouring from the sky, lightning flashing, and now corpses rising from the ruins of a destroyed city to float on the water’s surface. The world had indeed changed, and they had never seen her coming.

Half an ocean away, as Brigid Tenenbaum, Charles Milton Porter, Subject Artemis, and Geoffrey McCullum battle Orrin Lutwidge and his Mutants, they are all struck by a realization that something horrible has happened. Rapture itself then shakes around them as a huge shape ascends from the chasm where Sinclair built Persephone, its bright glow dimming as it awakens. The four would-be saviors of a dying city, having spent years building a new Thinker to create the cure for ADAM, are almost overwhelmed by a single, huge thought.

Tonight, the Good Hunter joins the Hunt.

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