In a hurry Jacob took the diary, grabbed his partner, and left the laboratory, almost breaking through the wall, and his shoulders, in his haste to leave. Even after such a short period of time the splicers had already piled up in the office. There were three Leadheads, two Thuggish, five Spider Splicers, and even a few Houdini Splicers.
Reaching into his pouch he noticed he only had about half of his supply of marbles left, so he grabbed a handful in his left and before they saw him, he started picking them off one by one by picking one marble at a time with his right hand and throwing them. His armour made the marbles a distraction tactic against him, the Splicers were not so lucky.
The Splicers were thrown around like rag dolls, limbs were blown off, and yet they still charged. they charged the group, they sprinted straight through the hole Brianna was making in their lines with Jacob right behind, and managed to make it back to the waiting room. Turning around his hand started glowing red while bits of fire sparked to life on his fingertips.
Hurling a ball of fire at the Splicers coming through the door he ended up missing the first three because they teleported at the last second. The last of the Spider Splicers managed to catch the ball of fire with their face though and ended up making one of the Spider Splicers behind him trip.
Too busy putting as much fire between themselves and the remaining Splicers as he could Jacob didn't notice a thuggish splicer sneaking up behind him until he felt a sharp pain in his left shoulder. Falling to the ground he rolled over just in time to dodge the next swing as the pipe wielding Thuggish Splicer tried to hit him again while he was down.
Prepared to block another swing "Get away from him!" Brianna yelled, electrocuting the splicer. They shook around wildly, Jacob couldn't see their faces due to the masks but that didn't matter because his head was smashed with a sledge hammer seconds later. Which frightened him more then he cared to admit, "get up Jacob, please. We need to go!" as she holds out her hand.
Grabbing her had she pulled him up, looking around the room was littered with corpses. There was nothing but an eerie silence in the room for several seconds before a loud screech echoed from everywhere at once followed by a relatively quiet explosion.
He knew it was stupid, but he ran to where the explosion came from and dragged Brianna with him.
Seeing a light up ahead he noticed he was standing on a balcony of some sort, looking down he saw two figures. One was an Elite Big Brother, but it looked different then herald. This one had a little bit less armour covering the arms, and his harvester was attached to his gauntlet as opposed to the forearm guard it was built into. The needle couldn't have been longer then six inches. On his left hand he had the same forearm mounted knife Herald did.
His legs from his knees to his ankles had no armour, his boots were a different colour metal as the rest of his armour. Possibly from a deceased Big Daddy. Jacob reasoned.
The big brother chuckled darkly, and the second figure ran away.
"You killed my brother... now I'm going to kill you, and little girlfriend too." Jacob hadn't even noticed the remaining Big Brother was looking at him.
"Harold?" Jacob asked. What he got for an answer was a handful of explosive marbles being thrown at him. Reacting just in time Jacob and Brianna jumped as far as they could, landing on what he could only guess was a chandelier. 'Perfect, if Harold wants to play rough then i'll give him a taste of his own medicine.' Jacob thought. Taking the remaining marbles he had left he threw them at the very top of the chain holding the chandelier up. Causing it to break and fall. Right onto Harold, if his scream of pain was anything to go by.
Hopping off of the ruined chandelier he looked at the damage. The ceiling wasn't damaged to bad, no risk of flooding them all, thankfully. And it looked like only Harold's legs were caught under the massive glass ornament
"I SWEAR IF I GET OUT OF HERE I'M GOING TO RIP YO-" Harold screams stoped when Brianna kicked him in his porthole. Jacob remembered what Gerald told him two days ago, he knew what to do.
"Harold, I know what happened. Your brother, your parents, everything. I'm sorry, but that gives you no excuse for stealing things from me. If you and your brother didn't have anything to eat you could have just asked for food. If you explained why you needed it and stopped bullying me I would have gladly shared." Jacob explained.
"Oh yeah? well I! ...wait what? Who told you that?" Harold asked, noticeably calmer than he was just a few seconds ago.
"Your brother told us." Bri replied, Noticing Harold getting mad again she quickly continued, "Gerald's fine! We met two days ago. True we fought, but Jacob and I didn't kill him. He gave Jacob this." Brianna finished as she showed Harold the, now empty, sack of explosives.
Harold nodded, recognizing the bag as the one his brother had been wearing since they had become Big Brothers. Jacob and Brianna helped Harold out from underneath the chandelier, the damage wasn't to bad. A few of the glass shards had pierced his legs, but they were quickly healing.
"Dude, I'm sorry for everything. Punching you, kicking you, calling you crazy." Harold said.
"Nah its okay." Jacob said, surprising even himself by actually meaning it. "No it is not, dunderhead" Bri clarified, flicking Jacob.
"No she is right, it's far from okay. Let me make it up to you." Harold said.
Stepping forward Harold refilled Jacob's bag of marbles and snapped off the blade on his left wrist before he welded it onto Brianna's left forearm. "I hope these will help you two."
"Thanks!" Jacob had to admit being forgiving was really paying off. "So who's your girlfriend?" Harold asked, "Harold, its me Brianna" she replied. "Oh." harold slipped out.
Examining the blade for a few seconds Brianna concluded it would come in handy in a close quarters fight where even her harvester would be to long, plus she could slash with it. Much easier than stabbing. The blade was on the bottom of her arm, pointed downwards. So if he were to shake someone's hand the blade would be right below her pinky finger pointing away from her hand. It was about a foot long so she could use it for blocking things as well.
Freezing, Jacob almost fumbled the words in an effort to ask the question that popped into his head. "Have you seen my Brother?" He asked almost to quickly to be understood.
Unfortunately for our hero, Harold shook his head. "I wish I could help you with that, but I haven't seen him since the crash."
"Oh, okay. Thanks anyway." Jacob muttered, crestfallen, and started walking away.
"But I know who has." Harold added quickly.
Pausing mid-step Jacob whirled around. "Who?"
"His name is Gear. He lives a dozen or so miles from here. You need to take a train to get there. Its the second stop, you'll need a pass though. Only Big Brothers and Sisters have them." Harold explained.
"I got mine when i finished my training" Brianna clarified.
"Where do I get one?" Jacob asked.
"You can have mine, I can just say mine broke or something, it happens." Harold gave a shrug and chuckled to himself. Bringing his hands up he took off his helmet. His mop of brown hair fell like water out of his helmet. He combed it back with his fingers away from his eyes after a few seconds of trying to see around it.
"You need a haircut." Brianna pointed out.
Harold chuckled. "You're not the first Big Sister that's told me that. I like it this way though." Harold admitted as he tinkered with his helmet. A minute later he took out a chip. "Here, this should allow you to use the train." He said, showing it to Jacob.
Taking off his helmet Jacob let Harold install the chip. Five minutes, and one comment about his helmet being weirdly advanced, later Harold gave it back and said his goodbye's before running off.
"Kid, your not thinking about going to save your Brother are you?" Lev asked. Jacob didn't answer, he just kept walking in the direction Harold pointed.
"Fine, its your funeral. Just don't get your friends killed too, I like living."
Jacob was quiet as he walked through the long hallways. He finally reached what looked like a train station. But the train was weird looking. It looked more like a monorail than a train. It was small, it could fit maybe about twenty adults, no more. Even though it was supposed to be old like everything else in rapture, possibly broken and malfunctioning, it looked high tech and surprisingly new.
Walking over the train doors he noticed there was a Big Daddy Doll sitting in the middle of them on the ground. Jacob stared and shuttered a bit.
That doll... it was stalking him.
"Jacob, why are you looking at the doll weird?" Bri asked
"I've seen this exact doll during the crash."
It sat on what looked like a letter. Picking up the doll with one hand Jacob reached for the letter with the other. Setting the doll back down he opened the letter and almost winced. Whoever wrote this looked like they either couldn't write, or hadn't written in so long they had forgotten how to properly make the letters.
Dear Jacob,
Thank you for sparing the Big Brother's lives. I will repay you for your kindness. For every four Big Brothers you save I will award you with exclusive plasmids, weapons, even a map for places you can get other useful things from. Special Big Brother weapon caches and the like. I can't tell you who I am yet. But rest assured, you have an ally on your side.
It wasn't signed, obviously. Who was this person? And how did they know who he was? Looking at the Big Daddy Doll Jacob noticed it looked over stuffed, and it was heavy too.
Ripping it open Jacob found an Adam jar inside. A nicely folded map too. It had something written on it crudely with what looked like red crayon at the bottom. "Beware of Gear" it said simply.
If this person was warning him to be careful then he should trust them. Deciding to look at the map later Jacob folded it up and stuffed it into his helmet so it would stay dry. He would have to look into getting some kind of watertight compartments built into his armour for the maps he would hopefully be getting.
Walking over to the train he noticed that on the door there was what looked like some sort of key hole. Inserting his harvester's needle into the hole, he waited for a few seconds before trying to twist the needle. That did it, the door opened instantly and almost soundlessly.
Entering the train the doors closed behind him and his partner and the train began to move forward. It was fast, as soon as it started moving the motion made Jacob fall over as it took him by surprise. He fell on onto Brianna, his helmeted head resting on her mid bust. Silently getting up and Regaining his balance Jacob sat on the nearest chair, face read and flustered... Brianna joined him on the bench.
"So why didn't you tell Harold you weren't my girlfriend?" "why didn't you tell him?"
"touché."
The train went on and on, the first stop was what looked like a small plaza, it was empty. It stayed for almost ten minutes before it moved on to the second stop. But just before the train reached the second stop the train itself stopped. "That's not good." Jacob muttered to himself. He had a bad feeling about this.
There was a loud *BZZZ* noise for a few seconds before the televisions in the front of the room turned on by themselves. A black and white picture appeared. It was a guy, about the same age as Jacob, Harold, and Gerald.
"Jacob Andrew and his volatile sidekick." he hissed.
The suit he wore looked more like a jumpsuit than armour. It was made out of a blue baggy jumper, his gloves, shoulder pads, knee pads, and boots were armoured. He had an old school Little Sister harvester in his left hand and a large wrench in his right.
He moved closer to the camera, "Yes, I know who you are. You think you can just come in here and do what you want just because you were right, because Rapture exists? I don't think so! You want a battle, I'll give ya war!" the jumpsuit wearing man yelled.
There was a beeping sound. From his dads stories he could wager the beeping meant everything was about to blow up. Not thinking twice, Brianna grabbed Jacob and used her new blade and jumped out the front window. Swimming as fast as they could in the direction of the blinking red light they saw the torpedo sail past him before a muffled explosion was heard.
Giving a sigh of relief he swam over to the second train stop. Jacob and Brianna entered the huge doorway to the train that was supposed to enter and up into the building. Rising from the water Jacob almost threw himself onto the floor of the train station. He was exhausted. He realised he hadn't slept in quite a while.
Stumbling around the station they managed to find a small room, it looked like a supply closet but it was big enough for him to lay down in if they cuddled together. Taking off their helmets, then collapsing onto his side Brianna laid her head on his arm and against his chest, they were asleep within seconds.
To Be Continued...