Beyond the Sea

Rapture - 1966

After picking up the second yellow bottle, Sarah knew she was on the right track. The tunnels had a familiarity now - she was close to the safe room.  Some of the walls had crayon drawings marking the way - what looked like a round egg with arms and legs was a Big Daddy, there were simple fish, and flowers, and someone had used a blue crayon to draw jellyfish. Sarah smiled, tracing the drawings with her finger. If she remembered correctly...yes, around this corner. There was a drawing of two little stick girls holding hands, one with brown curls and one with bright yellow. They’d written their names underneath in red. SARAH + HELENA. The letters were as bright as the day they’d drawn them. She thought about the matching drawings on her bedroom wall at home in England - that had been her only way of communicating for a while, as she tried to cope with the trauma of being separated from her beloved sister.

And now she was so close to being with her again. Sarah moved forward, passing another vent opening when she heard the scream. Her head snapped around at the sound, instantly recognizing it as a Little Sister. She shuffled backwards and put her face up to the vent, peering out into a paved area dotted with trees in low garden beds.

She could see a splicer dragging a length of pipe along the ground. He was laughing - not a crazed, monstrous laugh, but a good humoured chuckle - as he closed in on the Little Sister. The girl backed up, turning her head this way and that, her high, panicked voice reaching Sarah.

“Why can’t I go home! I wanna go home! Why can’t I go home!”

“Shit!” Sarah muttered. She shrugged off the backpack, took out the gun, and gently pushed the vent covering outwards. Lowering herself down to the floor quietly, she kept low and moved quickly to a wall between her and the splicer, peering around to make sure he still had his back to her. Double-checking the safety was off, Sarah took a few deep breaths. She’d never actually had to shoot a person before. Back when she and Helena had had a Big Daddy to protect then, they would shout encouragement at him when he took on splicers, and laugh when they were ripped apart by his giant drill. But now?

She squeezed her eyes shut briefly and tried to stop her leg from jittering. Then she stood up, swung around the wall and fired.

The shots rang out in the open space and hit the splicer in the back, three shots. Always shoot in threes, Maty had told her. More likely to hit, easier to keep count of your bullets. The chuckle turned into a roar as he spun around and lunged towards her jerkily.

Sarah kept the gun steady and pulled the trigger again, one two three. The splicer staggered, then leapt, swinging the pipe at her head. It hit - nothing. There was a flash of yellow and a cracking noise, and Sarah was still standing there. The splicer looked confused for a moment, swinging the pipe back again and again hitting the invisible shield.

Thank you Dr Lutece thought Sarah, and raised the gun again and shot the splicer in the face. At this close range, it did the job.

Sarah waved her hand back and forth curiously. She couldn’t feel anything, and yet -. She shrugged. Science. She’d never been that great at it.

The Little Sister clapped and skipped over to her. “You made an angel!” She raised her syringe, then plunged it into the dead splicers abdomen. Sarah looked down at her and frowned.

“Violet?” she asked.

The little girl giggled. “No! I’m Jasmine!”

“Oh.” The girl looked almost exactly like the other one. Sarah knelt down and looked closer at the girl’s face. Same golden eyes, of course, same dark hair...wait. Now that she was near the girl and under better lighting, she could see the fair roots at the scalp. Puzzled, she sat back on her heels. Someone had been dyeing their hair? Why?

“Are you all named after flowers?” she asked the girl, watching her face.

“I’m a flower?’ The little girls rapt expression added to Sarah’s nagging feeling of familiarity.

She laughed and said, “No, but there is a flower called Jasmine. It has a very pretty smell.”

“Oh.” The girl considered this. “I named myself after the pretty lady on the wall!”

Ah. Sarah remembered the posters - Jasmine Jolene. They’d seemed so glamorous to her younger eyes - but then, everything had. Now she had a better understanding of what the words ‘exotic dancer’ and “Andrew Ryan’s favourite gal” meant, and Jasmine was probably long dead, the poor thing. She patted the girl on the shoulder.

“She was very pretty,” she said comfortingly. The girl smiled back at her trustingly.  Sarah blinked. She reached out and cupped the girl's chin in her hand and lifted her face to the light. Violet’s face had been grubby and the tunnels dimly lit, but Sarah knew there had been something strangely familiar about her. She looked - they both looked -like Helena. Like Sarah too, she guessed.

What the hell… Her train of thought was arrested by a distant scream, reminding her to keep moving. She grabbed the Little Sister under the arms and hoisted the girl onto her hip, keeping her shooting hand free. “Time to go, Jasmine,” she whispered, jogging back to the vent. She lifted the girl up into the opening, then climbed up after her, pulling the cover closed after her. She paused, trying to think, but was distracted by the arrival of another splicer outside. She drew back, hearing Jasmine give a little whimper behind her. “It’s okay, little monkey,” Sarah whispered. “We’re safe in here.” This splicer wore a ragged dress and a bird mask with a pointed beak. She carried a pistol and when she saw the body of the first splicer, cried out- ‘Hey fella, dontcha wanna take a walk with me?” A lack of response on the corpses part made the splicer give it a kick, then walk off in a huff, muttering about no second chances, not anymore .

Sarah watched her as she passed right by the vent.

Craning her neck around to look at Jasmine, the resemblance to Helena struck her as obvious now, but...how? Surely...she was struck by an awful idea. Surely Helena hadn’t had children down here? She was only eighteen, and these girls were at least five or six years old. Sarah felt sick to her stomach. Was that what Suchong had taken her for? Some sort of disgusting breeding program? Sarah hadn’t thought she’d ever be able to hate Suchong more than she already did. But now she had to stop herself from punching the metal wall and pretending it was his face. She realised her fingernails were digging into her palms and she relaxed her hands.

“Jasmine, hey, we’re close to the safe-room, yeah? Do you know where I mean? Where your Big Sister lives?”

The girl's face lit up. “Yes! Big Sister keeps us safe! Sometimes I sing to her when she cries!” She looked proud of herself, and Sarah’s heart flipped over. Helena, crying. Her own eyes welled up, and she impulsively hugged the little girl.

“Thank you for looking after her,” she murmured. “Here.” She rummaged around and found a biscuit to give to the girl, who took it with a big smile and then shoved it into her mouth. Sarah shook her head. She’d have to teach them how to take bites of things.

The two of them crawled on, past more openings, past more drawings. The drawings had gotten more plentiful and covered all the inner surfaces of the tunnel now. It looked like Helena had taught all of them the stick figure school of art, and lines of little stick girls holding hands were everywhere. There were only a few Big Daddy drawings. Sarah patted Jasmine on the arm and asked, “Did you have Mr Bubbles looking after you, before?”

Jasmine shook her head, pressing her lips together tightly.

“Hmm.” Then she remembered how Violet had talked. “What was your name before you called yourself Jasmine? Do you remember?”

The girl stuck her bottom lip out and nodded. Then she mumbled something. Sarah made out “Leda’ and something about silver. Who is this damn silver lady? Were the girls her daughters? But then why do they look like Helena? What the hell happened down here?

They reached the end of the tunnel and here there was a different drawing - another stick figure but much taller than the others and topped with a red circle. Sarah tapped it.

“Hey, who’s this? Is this Big Sister?”

Jasmine nodded. “That means we’re home,” she announced, and disappeared around the corner. Sarah followed, and found a vent opening, the cover already pushed open. She stuck her head out and looked around.

The safe-room was almost exactly as she remembered it. Some of the bunks had been moved but otherwise… She slid down into the room and stood with her back to the wall for a moment, looking around. There were several Little Sisters, napping or playing or reading in various spots, and for a moment Sarah felt like she had stepped back through time. The girls closest to her looked up curiously and without fear. She smiled at them, gave a little wave. One jumped up, holding a piece of paper and came over to Sarah, taking her hand and waving the drawing at her.

“Look!” she said, “It’s a shark!” The drawing was indeed a shark, or at least a fish shape with a big triangle on top. Sarah took the paper in her hands and said “Wow! That's a good shark!” She handed it back. “You like sharks? My sister likes sharks.”

The little girl nodded. “They smile like this!” She bared her teeth in a grimace and moved her hands like she was swimming. “Rawrrr!” Sarah crouched down and grinned back. This girl, too, looked like Helena. And where was Helena?

Sarah got up again and wandered around the rooms. She found a plate in the kitchen and put what remained of the chocolate biscuits on it, placing it on a small table for the girls to help themselves. They all seemed remarkably nonplussed with a stranger walking in and making herself at home, she thought to herself, although - they do know my face, I guess. The desk in the corner was clean and there were fresh flowers in some old lab equipment. Mostly fresh. She picked up the Big Daddy doll and held it to her chest for a moment, thinking again about Mister Bubbles and hoping he was at peace.

Maty had explained so much about Rapture to Sarah before she died - how the Big Daddy’s were really men, mostly criminals or other ‘undesirables’, (such as people that Andrew Ryan needed out of the way), brainwashed, reprogrammed and grafted into diving suits with various mechanical parts and weapons added on. How the pair-bond was formed from a combination of mental programming, genetic manipulation, and liberal use of pheromones.

How she, Brigid Tenenbaum, had originally discovered the sea slugs containing what they had called ADAM, a wondrous substance that had so many scientific and medical applications, that could have done so much good in the world. How she had also been responsible for the Little Sister program beginning. How she, much like Suchong, had been more concerned with results than ethics. How she had been repulsed by the Little Sisters...until she realised she was actually truly repulsed by her own actions.  

When you and Helena came to me, my little sestras, I knew there was something special about you two. And once I would have exploited that, like Suchong wanted to. But instead, I decided to try to make amends...to seek викуп*

She had also spent hours theorising about what the long-term effects of ADAM on Helena’s body would be, how it could affect her physiology - Sarah was prepared to find her sister changed. She didn’t care, she just wanted her back.

Sarah sighed, replacing the doll on the desk, and picked up the photograph behind the accu-vox. It showed her, Helena, and Rachel - a copy of the one she had by her bed at home. She traced first her sister’s face with a finger, then Rachel’s. Where was she now?

Hidden just out of sight in the tunnel, a pair of glowing golden eyes watched Sarah hungrily. Helena wanted nothing more than to leap across the room and wrap herself around her sister, but… She had feared nothing for years now, she had no need to. But she was terribly afraid that Sarah would take one look at the monster she had become and run away from her. Helena pressed her lips together tightly and fiddled nervously with her helmet clasps.

Then she took a deep breath and slithered her way out of the vent.

Sarah heard the noise behind her and turned to see a figure squatting on the floor, long limbs folded. It appeared to be clad in some sort of diving suit that used to be white but was now dark with dirt and blood; there were leather straps along the arms and legs keeping the baggy suit streamlined. The helmet was round, with one panel at the front which shone with a green glow. There were black fishermans boots, which the figure was pulling off, wriggling their toes as they were freed.

Sarah was frozen where she stood, holding her breath as she waited for the helmet to be removed, one leg jumping slightly.

The figure stood up to it’s full height, and Sarah took an involuntary half-step backwards, immediately feeling guilty about it. The figure towered above everybody else in the room. Hands reached up and pulled the helmet off, revealing a mass of blonde curls and a pair of golden eyes that darted around nervously before coming to rest on Sarah. Helena bit her lip, then gave Sarah a tremulous smile.

Sarah’s heart gave a huge thump in her chest and her voice cracked as she said, “Helena?”

The girl nodded.

“Sarah….Sarah, you came back.” Her voice was unsteady also. Inside, Helena felt like she was going to burst, her heart was beating so fast and so loud, like it knew it’s other half was right there, across the room.

Helena moved carefully, hanging the helmet on a pipe, then took a small step towards Sarah, as if not to startle her. But Sarah crossed the space left between them in a heartbeat, throwing her arms around her sister, nestling her head under Helena’s chin. “‘lena, ‘lena, I found you. Oh god, ‘lena, I missed you so much,” she was crying now, “I’m so sorry we left you, ‘lena, it was all such a mess…”

Helena rested her cheek on her sister's hair, letting her tears fall and with them the last vestiges of fear that Sarah wouldn’t love her anymore. She smoothed her hands up and down her back, whispering shhh, Sarah, it’s okay, you’re here now, you’re here, you’re here… A sudden rush of euphoria filled her and she picked Sarah up and spun around, laughing through her tears.

Sarah was laughing too, squealing as her feet flew out. “Ahhh, you’re making me dizzy, ‘lena!”

The twirling twins slowed down and Helena let go. Sarah slid to the floor and they grabbed each other's hands and just grinned at each other for a moment.

They realised that the Little Sisters had gathered around with varying expressions of curiosity and excitement. Helena beamed at them, and said, “This is my sister, Sarah. She’s been up topside, and now we’re all going to go home with her! Just like I told you.”

There was a ragged chorus of ‘Hello Sarah’, one girl piping up with she gave me a biscuit! Another said bubbles and sunshine, bubbles and rain! in a sing-song voice. Another tugged at Helena’s hand and whispered in her ear when she bent down. Helena nodded at her, and she ran across the room and started up the record player. The slightly scratchy sound of ‘Beyond the Sea’ poured out of the flared trumpet speaker, and the twins twirled in a circle for a few minutes, giggling like they were nine years old again.

Then they all began chatting excitedly, and Sarah and Helena sat down on the floor in the middle, still holding hands tight, and started to talk.

After Sarah had filled Helena in on the basics of what had happened the day they were separated, told her about Maty’s illness and death, about Mrs S, who had proved to be a caring mother who ‘took no shit’, as Sarah put it, (Helena giggling at the rude word), about how she’d gone off the rails a bit after Maty died (Helena squeezing both her hands and blinking back tears), about life on the surface, how much light there was, what the sky was like.

After all of this, she looked around at the girls, and said softly, “Now, ‘lena, tell me about the girls. Where did they come from?”

Helena shrugged. “From DYAD. They started coming out into Rapture again...hmm...a while after I left there. Maybe a year?”

“But ‘lena...why do they all look like you? Like us? I mean - you can see it too, yeah?”

Golden eyes blinked owlishly at her.

“Y..es.” Helena answered. “I thought I was imagining it, at first. Because я сумував за тобою* so much. But then - I heard things. All the tunnels into DYAD are blocked up now,” she smirked, “but before, I could go in and listen.”

“Quiet like church mice.” Sarah said, matching Helena’s smirk. Helena nodded and squeezed Sarah’s hand.

Helena leant closer, and whispered, “They made copies of me. The- “ she waved her other hand dismissively, “...white-coats. Scientists. They needed to replace the Little Sisters that left with you and Maty. Everything they did needed ADAM. So…” she shrugged again.

Sarah looked at the girls around the room and shook her head. “Clones?” she said quietly. “I’d say it was unbelievable, but look at where we are!” She slapped herself in the forehead. “Ahh, I almost forgot. Who is this silver lady the girls have mentioned? They seem scared of her. Is she the one who made them?”

Helena looked at her, confused. “You...don’t know? Sarah, the silver lady is Rachel. She must know you’re here, she has eyes everywhere. Except here. This is still a safe place.”

Sarah gaped back at her, then with impeccable timing, there was a loud crash from the back area, where there used to be a door up into the Mercury Suites. Helena had blocked it up some time back, leaving the vent as the only entrance. Now it sounded like the door was open again.

All the Little Sisters jumped to their feet and turned their heads to Helena, who put a finger to her lips, then pointed at the vent. The girls moved swiftly, clambering up into the tunnel one by one, like a well-rehearsed fire drill.

There was silence, then Sarah and Helena heard the clicking of heels.

A figure in a fitted white dress with sleek blonde hair rounded the corner, followed by a small shape who Sarah recognised as Violet when she stepped into the light.

“Well.” said Rachel in a voice that balanced perfectly between polite and venomous. “Isn’t this nice. The twins are back together.” She ignored Helena, gazing at Sarah unblinkingly.

“Rachel?” Sarah said uncertainly. “It’s really you?” She was still trying to process the information that Rachel was the fearsome ‘silver lady’; that Rachel had been down here this entire time. That the girl who had been her closest friend, apart from her sister, had become something to be feared, was staring at her with a hungry look in her eyes. She shook her head, thoughts swirling like water down a drain. “Rachel, what happened down here? After I left?”

Rachel sniffed. “After you abandoned me? Abandoned us ?” She gestured at Helena, but still didn’t look at her. Sarah heard Helena scoff softly beside her, and she squeezed her hand comfortingly. Rachel’s eyes noted their joined hands, then flicked back up to Sarah’s face, looking noticeably silvery. Sarah got the feeling that there was a storm coming - she didn’t know how, considering they were at the bottom of the ocean, but it was like the wind changed and they were in a circle of deadly calm.

“Sarah.” Rachel’s voice was pleasant now, hands clasped loosely. She oozed sincerity as she continued. “After you...left, a lot of things changed in DYAD. I had to...take a larger role, assume responsibility. Ensure that -” She finally looked at Helena, glaring at her as she whispered something into Sarah’s ear. Sarah’s eyes widened, and she looked at Rachel with vague horror.

“You killed your parents? Bloody hell, Rachel!” Although , she added to herself, I kinda get your mother, she was a right bitch.

Rachel’s mouth tightened and she shot an icy look at Helena, who merely stared down at her. Then she stuck her tongue out, and Rachel rolled her eyes. Still a child, she thought.

She raised her hands, palms up, beseechingly. “My mother was intent on recapturing Helena, to continue experimenting on her, to carry on Dr Suchong’s work. They already had the genetic material for their project, their…” she waved at Violet, who had made a beeline for the plate of cookies and was happily munching away, oblivious to the tension in the room. “Their special gatherers, but they weren’t satisfied. They wanted to keep her locked away, Sarah, and I knew you wouldn’t have wanted that.”

Sarah could feel herself wavering. She wanted to believe that Rachel had had Helena’s best interests at heart, but she hadn’t forgotten how jealous she used to be either. She jerked her chin at Rachel and asked, “What about your dad?”

Rachel’s eyes lowered. When she raised them again, they shone with tears, and her voice held an undertone of sadness.

“My father...he told me that he and my mother had experimented on me since I was a child. That they’d been feeding ADAM into my body for years without my knowledge. That they’d kept it a secret to protect me. I left DYAD and nearly died because my father - both of them - had made me into an ADAM addict and I didn’t even know…” Her voice trailed off, and she dabbed at the corners of her eyes, still full of tears that somehow managed not to fall. She glanced at Sarah slyly, and saw that she was clearly struggling with what to believe.

“So, I...took extreme measures, I know. But I was confused and angry and everything had been terrible since you left, and I needed to set things right. To steer DYAD in a different direction. Sarah, I wanted to find a way to cure Helena, to fix her…”

Sarah felt Helena stiffen beside her. “I do not need fixing, ” she muttered. Sarah couldn’t help but wonder now about Helena on the surface - how would the world react to a woman six feet tall with glowing golden eyes and what amounted to superpowers? Maty probably could have formulated a cure, but…

“And did you?” Sarah asked point-blank. “Find a cure?”

Rachel nodded, eyes wide, and she took a step towards them. “I believe so. I found Dr Tenenbaums notes for the Little Sister Antidote, and worked from there.”

This much was true, although her reasons for curing Helena were much less altruistic than she wanted Sarah to believe. Rachel had spent the last four years researching and experimenting, using the remaining DYAD staff as test subjects. She believed she did have a Big Sister Antidote, something that should return Helena to a normal girl again….and no longer a threat to Rachel. She had also discovered - other things. Rachel arranged her face in an honest, open expression, with a hint of pleading.

Sarah sighed. “I want to believe you, Rachel. I really do. But you’ve got all these little girls acting like you’re the boogeyman, or somethin’ and you’ve been letting them wander about with no protection.”

“Oh, that.” Rachel thought fast. It was barely a lie anyway.  “I knew Helena would be looking over them, the Big Sister replacing the Big Daddy. The first few girls did have them, but once they were put down, we had no resources to make more.” She took another step closer. “Sarah. Please. Let me help.” Another step. “ I have missed you terribly, you know.”

Sarah’s shoulders slumped. She had missed Rachel too. In a less intense and different way than she’d missed Helena, but she had missed her. In a flash of embarrassment, she remembered the early teen crush she’d had on Grace Kelly - looking at Rachel now, she knew where that had come from. But could she trust her?

Helena whispered, I do not trust her, picking up Sarah’s thoughts.

Rachel took another step. “Helena, I know I said terrible things to you, hurtful things. I...I’m sorry. I was young and frightened and I lashed out at you. Can’t we put it behind us and be friends again?”

Helena tilted her head and stared at Rachel. “You’ve done something to your head, like you did with that little one. Made it so I can’t read you anymore.” Her eyes glowed like fire. “What are you hiding now, Rachel?”

Sarah snapped, “ What did you do to that little girl?” She started to step forward but Helena kept a grip on her hand, and pulled her back effortlessly. Careful she breathed.

Rachel looked at them, the sincere and honest expression fading, and she gave a small smile.

“Well. I had hoped we could come to terms, but it seems not. I’m terribly sorry, Sarah.” With that, she shot an arc of ice at Sarah’s feet, encasing her up to her knees.

“Oi!” shouted Sarah, “What the bloody hell, Rachel!”

Helena quickly knelt, bringing her fist down on the ice, turning her back on Rachel for a split second.

It was enough. Rachel grabbed Helena from behind, flicking her wrist and placing her palm on Helena’s temple. An intense golden light began to shine from her hand, spreading to Helena, and down her body, until the two of them were engulfed in a shining aura. Sarah had grabbed Helena’s hands again but they loosened their grip on Sarah’s, as if her muscles had lost their strength. Her mouth opened but no sound came out. Her eyes found Sarah’s, terrified and pleading.

“Helena!” Sarah shouted, “‘lena!” She struggled in the ice, feeling helpless and scared, like it was all happening again. It had started to crack around her feet where Helena had punched it, and she kept jerking her legs back and forth. If she could just reach the backpack...the gun.

Rachel’s voice cut through the light like a knife.

“Did you really think you could just waltz back through Rapture, and leave me behind again, Sarah? Now you’ll see how it feels .”

The golden light around them intensified, as the glow faded from Helena’s eyes. Her mouth opened and closed, but Sarah couldn’t hear her voice. Rachel’s eyes were solid silver, shining at her like terrible twin stars. She was grinning as the golden light traveled down her body as well.

Sarah desperately moved her feet in their ice casing, feeling the cold start to give and break up. Finally, she managed to get one leg free. Then pulled the other one after her, her boot still encased in a block of ice. She grabbed the backpack, unzipped it, and urgently dumped the contents on the floor, scrambling for the gun, checking the ammunition. She spun around and aimed at the light.

It took up an area roughly the size of a bunk bed, if you could spin a bunk bed on it’s axis. The golden glow was shot through with silver now, and a strange rushing sound, like wind and whispers, filled the room. She could still just see her sister and Rachel. Helena was lying in Rachel’s arms, conscious but seemingly unable to move.

“Let go of her!” Sarah screamed at the swirling light. “Let her go!” She pointed the gun at Rachel and released the safety.

Rachel’s grin grew wider. “You’re not going to shoot me, Sarah,” she said smugly, her voice clear, and she wrapped her other arm around the girl in her lap. The light shone brighter and brighter, and started to swallow the both of them up.

Sarah roared in frustration, and fired the gun in desperation into the glare. She could just make out the silver of Rachel’s left eye bloom into a red spiral before the light became blinding, and the two figures start to fade.

“No!” Sarah screamed and ran forward, leaping into the light. For a moment, she floated, and thought she heard Helena call her name, then she started to fall, hair rushing upwards past her face. She closed her eyes and waited for the crash.