TIN DADDY.

“ Subject Delta's just a serial number ...They used to call you Johnny Topside — found the city all on your own in a divin' bell … real shame what they did to ya. But Ryan's  people locked you up … erased your damn name! Goodbye JOHNNY TOPSIDE -– hello SUBJECT DELTA. ”

delta is a big daddy - the terrifying creatures in diving suits that are iconic with the bioshock series. his main goal is literally just to protect all of his daughters!

he’s really lost without his bonded ‘little sister’ ( now a ‘big sister’ ) - but knows she’s safe and okay, now! still, he’s feeling depressed and confused regardless.

he can’t speak, but, hoo boy! he sure can communicate. ( loud/scary sound warning if you click on the link - it’s alpha series big daddy sound files ripped from the game )

the only good dad in bioshock, probably - even though the bond between him and eleanor was severed :C

delta has been through SO much. he’s been killed twice, and his body is still in it’s shutdown state from the events of the game. only, the powers that be in the city are keeping him alive for now- meaning he is constantly in a lot of pain.

“be nice, i’m dead”

delta is very much a father figure - and that doesn’t stop at little sisters. if you’re a kind-of lost child without supervision in spirale, congrats! he’s your dad now.

honestly very sweet and calm when he’s not being attacked by splicers! if you look closely at his armor you can probably make out some faint paint/chalk marks from where he let the girls draw on him, or places where stickers are still clinging to it.

The figure is hard to mistake, even after such a long time. Barry greets him with a smile, waving back, and patiently reads Delta’s signed letters. “Delta! Hey, it’s been a while. Didja make a stop back home?”

“How’s it goin’, bud?”

        while he understood others’ caution, it was nice to be greeted with genuine happiness and warmth. he gave a happy, climbing rumble upon seeing barry wave. at the question of whether he returned home, he paused for a moment, giving a thoughtful sound before ultimately shrugging. if he had returned home, he wouldn’t really know of it, he assumed. he was pretty sure that he’d died before coming to spirale - and unfortunately being revived by some unknown mechanism was not unfamiliar to the protector.

         when barry asked how he was, he gave an exaggerated sigh - the sound reverberating in his helmet, as if to say ‘i’ve had better days’. lifting his huge gloved hands, he motioned to his chest, before signing ‘pain’. old aches and pains were nothing new to him, but the pain of the severed bond of him and eleanor hurt in a way both emotional and physical. no one told him being dead would still be so exhausting.

He doesn’t talk much, huh? Kay tilts her head to the side. Like Link… she wonders if he can sign… she knows how, maybe she can teach him! In the meantime, though, she accepts the stickers with a quiet ‘thank you’, looking them over as they continue. She can talk enough for both of them, she thinks.

“The scary lady’s name is Lilith, and she’s really mean and strong. She hurt a lot of people.” Her face falls, and she leans forward a little, being sure to still hang on. “She really hurt my daddy ‘n me, and she still wants to hurt me I think. We might not even see her, I just wanted to warn you in case we did.” She peels a sticker off, carefully placing it so it doesn’t cover any of the ones left by others before her.

“I’ll keep my eye out for her, OK? I can see real good in the dark.” She pauses, eyes scanning the things written on his armor. The handwriting is messy, but…

“Do you have kids, Mister? There’s a lot of notes to ‘daddy’ written back here.” she gently traces over them with her hands. “And… some to ‘Mr. B’. Is that your name?”

       he smiled yet again as he felt her take the stickers from his hand, happy that he could provide even a small form of amusement. luxuries like this and other toys were hard to come by in rapture, and even though they seemed to be more common and accessible here, he still made a note to continue collecting in case he ran across any other stray children here. or...his own daughters, though he’d rather they be happy exploring the surface than being trapped in yet another city. 

       delta gave a pensive groan as he listened to her describe this ‘lilith’ even more, and he felt himself bristle at the mention that she likely wanted to harm kay, and had done so to her family before. with a disapproving rumble delta held his left hand in front of him and balled his right into a fist, driving his fist into the wall of his palm to indicate that he would defend her should she point out lilith to him. or any other hostile, for that matter. 

      upon kay revealing that there were previous notes written by his daughters, he gave a questioning rumble, immediately followed by a proud, happy intonation. he held up both of his hands for her to see, one by one indicating the number of daughters he had by extending a finger to count. one, two, three... he finished at ten, and he wished that he could somehow communicate their names to her. she would like them, he thought. it made him happy to picture them meeting and playing with other children ... and a bit sad that he wasn’t able to see it. 

Kay watches carefully– observant and cautious rather than scared. Dad says to stay away from strangers, but he can help her get home, right? And he seems to want to help. He doesn’t seem to talk much, but that’s OK. Maybe those noises are how he talks?

She actually laughs as she’s picked up– something in the way he does it is comforting, like he’s done it a million times before. And she finds the handholds and stairs easily, pausing before grabbing on. That’s strange… but maybe he has kids of his own, and that’s why his suit is made like that. She knows she likes to ride around on her dads’ shoulders.

“I don’t know where my house is from here,” she admits. “But if we can find some kinda landmark, maybe I’ll find the way?” Her sense of direction has always been kinda terrible…

“There’s a mean lady around here who’s looking for me, though,” she frowns. “If we see her, can we run away? That’s kinda how I got lost in the first place.”

       he felt a smile pull at the scarred, tattered corners of his mouth behind his helmet when she laughed as he lifted her into the air. repeatedly reminding himself that she was not a gatherer was a bit difficult, as was avoiding falling into the comforting trance-like mindset of a protector. still, the absence of having a child clinging to his armor felt a bit like missing a limb - and he was glad to have found a remedy, however temporary. she seemed like a polite child, anyway - and he listened as she spoke. 

      delta gave a thoughtful, gurgling hum to confirm that he was paying attention. he reached into one of his supplies satchels and removed a crumpled pack of stickers he’d found while wandering the city - wrinkled and clearly not handled delicately, but still bearing the happy, smiley-faced flower designs. he handed them to the girl over his shoulder.

       the mention of a ‘mean lady’ though caught his attention - and he wondered if there had been hostiles here, after all and he simply hadn’t been as observant as he would have liked. he gave a sound with an upward intonation to suggest a question as best as he was able; who? why? the protector frowned in frustration at his own lack of communication - even the odd tablet-like device he’d received here did little to assist when his clumsy fingers weren’t as precise as the “cell-phone” needed. 

       sentient data imprints: 

little sisters! these are little girls who delta has more or less adopted in the past and protected and he’s going to be doing so again. don’t be scared if you see one carrying a large syringe needle - they aren’t going to attack you...unless you happen to be dead and full of ADAM. in fact, if you get too close to one of the girls she’ll probably run to hide behind delta. little sisters are brainwashed to the point where they see regular people as either life-size dolls and tea party guests ( those who ignore her ) or monsters ( those who try to interact with her ). if the girl tends to fear you that will uh. not end great - even if you are trying to help. delta’s a big daddy - which means more than just being a large dad. that means he’ll probably get really, really mad if the little sister is scared in any way.

eleanor ! delta’s daughter. she may appear as her little sister self or her big sister self. in delta’s canon, she’s a kind and compassionate young woman who was put through hell. the mist versions of her might differ, though...

johnny topside - delta doesn’t remember being him, but he was. a long time ago, he used to be a regular human - a deep-sea explorer who unfortunately happened to find an underwater city he wasn’t supposed to. johnny was a charismatic albeit slightly arrogant & overly confident individual. delta caught glimpses of him before in spirale, and he’s going to be horrified to see him again - and johnny will be equally as horrified to see him. 

         residual data imprints:

   delta’s focus was almost entirely on the little sister gripping his hand - his mind slipped into a familiar haze from mere instinct, and he struggled to avoid allowing the trance to take over. this wasn’t rapture, this was something else - something far different, and he had to stay cautious. regardless, he felt his mouth reflexively form a smile as he looked down at the girl - who glanced up at him with a grin of her own. “ do you think we’ll find any angels? ” she asked, ADAM syringe at her side. he hadn’t seen any evidence of other splicers - or, subsequently, their corpses - when he was here last time. though he hadn’t seen any gatherers last time, either.

       he snapped back into the present as the little sister gripped his finger tightly to get his attention, pointing at a figure ahead of her in the mist.

      delta couldn’t help but welcome the horribly soothing nostalgia washing over him as the newest little sister in his charge took his hand in hers. he knew it wasn’t a real sense of peace; with his mind returned to him, he was more than aware it was a product of vicious torture at the hands of captors. but his awareness of it did not take away how his body ran on engineered instinct. he had to remind himself constantly remain aware instead of falling back into the mindset of an average protector - like fighting to stay awake when one hadn’t slept in so, so long. the sister momentarily brought him back to reality as she began to speak to him in a sing-song voice, informing him that ‘the angel’ was close.

       before his death ten years prior, he had never realized how truly brainwashed the little sisters had been - since he had been the same at the time. and here he was, still using them even with his mind intact ( more or less ). with the ability to save them, he shouldn’t have to assist them with ADAM gatherings anymore...but sinclair had been right about one thing. he did need the ADAM, regardless of how he restored their humanity after. he would do no good for these girls if he couldn’t live long enough to help them. and in this decrepit version of rapture, ADAM was synonymous with survival. 

       his remorseful thoughts came to a halt as his world briefly turned red. delta had to hold himself back from an instinctive snarl as he rounded the corner and saw a figure there; his hand moved in front of the little sister currently with him - protectively resting it on her shoulder. no one would touch this little one, his posture stated...though after a few long moments of silence, he seemed to relax just slightly and his vision became clearer. this stranger was not a splicer - if he were, he would have already attacked. that still didn’t mean that the stranger didn’t pose a threat, however - and delta gave a low, uneasy groan. it was a statement that he was unsure as much as it was a warning.